Blog Tour Review: Provex City + Giveaway

Provex City (The Lorne Family Vault Series, 1) by Michael Pierce, April 14, 2012. 324 pages. Source: CBB's Book Promotions/author.

Fifteen-year-old Oliver Grain begins his school year fighting off bullies, learning about the boy who committed suicide in his room, and trying to understand why his history teacher, Mr. Gordon, has taken such a personal interest in him.
Do you believe in ghosts? Do you believe you can make bullies simply disappear? Do you believe you can walk through walls?
Mr. Gordon tells Oliver: "When you truly believe anything is possible, you will be able to open doors where there were only walls." And one of those doors leads Oliver to Provex City, which puts him in far greater danger than he can possibly fathom.

First Sentence:

Helen leaned against the kitchen counter with a pocket sized wooden box in her hand.

I'm always a little nervous when I start reading self published books. Not because I've read a lot of bad ones, but sometimes they could use a lot more editing and just general cleaning up, but thankfully that was not a big problem with Provex City.

The prologue is what really caught my attention when I started reading Provex City.Why, because the beginning was a little weird and thus had me wanting to delve deeper into the story so that I could see why Oliver's gave her children, and took one herself, a pill to forget all that they knew so they could have a fresh start. It was strange yet fascinating because you had no idea what she/they were trying to forget and how it was going to play into the story line later on in the book.
  While it may have taken a little longer than expected for the twist in the prologue to be explained away, I still really enjoyed the way it tied into the story and that there was this little piece of knowledge to tease you as you read.

It took me some time to warm up to the main character, Oliver. Not because he was a boring character, but because I felt that while he had all these questions regarding his family he did not seem all that pressed to find out the answers...quickly. What I did like about him was that he was skeptical and did not immediately believe all the things his teacher was trying to teach him in their private lessons. I enjoyed the fact that he did not buy into what the teacher was trying to get him to right away because it was a more real reaction then if he had been all for it out the gate.

What I ended up enjoying most about Provex City would have to be the writing-even though the beginning was slow. The reason I liked the author's writing is that I felt that he did a great job on building the two worlds that of ours and Provex City. While Provex City itself reminded slightly of another city in something else I've read before, I really liked that vast contrast between the world that we know and the one that held the answers to all of Oliver's questions regarding his past. It was definitely interesting to see the differences between the two and how it changed things for the characters,

Even though Provex City was a good read I felt that it took a little long to get to the big plot point that was hinted at in the prologue. While the story did take time to take off and get down to business, I really liked the actual story and even the characters...even if they did have a tendency to make poor decisions. What kept me from giving this one a full five pineapples is the mysterious past of Oliver and his family was not revealed till like the last four chapters. I was in a constant state of waiting for things to start to come together and for Oliver to find out what I had already guessed.

Final Verdict: Provex City was a an intriguing read with two well thought out worlds.

Provex City earns 4 out of 5 pineapples.

About the author:

I spent the early years of my life bouncing around the East Coast and moved to Southern California in high school. I graduated from Cal State Fullerton with a bachelor's degree in Management, but continually took creative writing classes. It was the classic struggle between passion and practical.
I stopped writing for a while and focused on building a career through serving people Starbucks coffee. I loved coffee and I still do. It just wasn't my true calling.
Writing beckoned me back to a magical world of possibility, and I could only resist for so long. As Mr. Gordon would say, "Believe anything is possible." In the routine and obligations of everyday life, it's sometimes hard to believe. But lost in a story, I feel absolutely free. And my furthest exploration into that freedom has become my first novel, Provex City, which is Book One in the Lorne Family Vault Series.

You can stay up to date on all things concerning the Provex City.

Giveaway:

 Three winners will receive a paperback of Provex City and a $15 Amazon Gift Card (INT)
 Five additional winners will win paperback copies of Provex City. (INT)

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