Iron Canuck Reviews & More: Review Tour: Next Stop, Boston by Iris Dorbian with an excerpt, a giveaway, and my review

Next Stop, Boston

by Iris Dorbian

GENRE: Contemporary Fiction

BLURB:

Sixteen-year-old Geri Randall's life is turned upside down when her late sister's fiance, Dez Deacon, a washed-up rock star, is named her guardian. Whisked away from the only life she knew and taken on a rock and roll tour, Geri is initially desperate to win Dez's approval. That desire hits a sour note when Dez's treatment of her becomes too much to bear. What ensues is a battle of wills between her and her temperamental guardian, a collision course that will push Geri to do the unthinkable to get what she wants.

EXCERPT:

If there was one thing she’d learned with this tour, it was that time operated on a whole other scale. It wasn’t weird to go out and have a burger at two in the morning, or stay up until five, eat an early breakfast, and then crash until noon.

At first, she’d felt like a vampire, but after a month of this nocturnal schedule, she’d gotten so acclimated to the lifestyle, she wondered how she would ever be able to go back to a daily schedule that consisted of her going to sleep at ten o’clock at night, waking up at seven o’clock so she could arrive at school by 8:30, and be in classes until 2:30 in the afternoon. Then do it all over again the next day. Lather, rinse, and repeat.

“It’s a soulless existence,” Dez said to her a week into her attempt to adjust to life on the road. He was opining about the nine to five normies. “Absolutely brain-atrophying. These poor people are like ants. Hamsters on a wheel, doing the same thing over and over again. That’s why what we do is so important to these people. For two hours, Ger, we bring them the excitement and adventure that’s missing in their dull, defeated lives. We’re like saviors to them.”

Geri clicked on her personal photo gallery. She pored through an unending succession of shots of Dez, as well as shots she never would post on her account: various hotel rooms, desk clerks on phones or dealing with customers, piles of suitcases gathered in a mound in lobbies, regular people sharing drinks at a bar, working on their laptops. She loved the simplicity of these images, which captured life in hotels with an organic detail and vibrancy. She stopped at the bar shots, then zoomed in to snag a clearer view at the people in them. The barflies seemed to be swigging whiskey or scotch, she wasn’t sure—an alcohol connoisseur, she was not; however, she’d seen so many adults in her young lifetime down gallons of liquor, she might as well be.

She studied their features to see if Dez was right about these normies. No, he wasn’t. They didn’t look defeated at all, only tired.

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Iris Dorbian is an arts and business journalist whose bylines have appeared in a wide array of outlets that include Forbes, Wall Street Journal, Reuters, Crain's New York Business, Business Insider, Buyouts, Venture Capital Journal, Investopedia, Playbill, Backstage, Dance Magazine, Theatermania and Stage Directions, where she served as editor-in-chief for eight years. Her personal essays have been featured in HBO's Inspiration Room, Boomer Magazine, Jewish Literary Journal, Diverse Voices Quarterly, and Gothesque Magazine. Having previously published "Great Producers: Visionaries of the American Theater" (Allworth/Skyhorse) "An Epiphany in Lilacs: In the Aftermath of the Camps" (original publisher: Mazo Publishers) and "Sentenced to Shakespeare" (Sunbury/Milford House Prss), "Next Stop, Boston" is her fourth book.

Links:

Book links:

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Next-Stop-Boston-Iris-Dorbian/dp/1949802353

B&N: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/next-stop-boston-iris-dorbian/1144160777

Social Media Links:

Linkedin Site: http://www.linkedin.com/pub/iris-dorbian/1/759/358

Twitter site: https://twitter.com/IrisDorbian

Facebook site: https://www.facebook.com/iris.dorbian

Instagram site: https://www.instagram.com/irisdorbian/

Muckrack.com: http://www.muckrack.com/irisdorbian

Personal website: www.irisdorbian.com

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GIVEAWAY

Iris Dorbian will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/28e4345f4801/

My Review - 4 of 5 stars -

This was a complex read. Geri was a young orphan who lost her sister and was made the ward of her sister's fiance. Most of the story revolved her mistreatment in the world of rock stardom. Near the end of the story, Geri found a new life but more secrets, and once again, set out on her own. Geri was a scared, lonely, minor who did what she felt necessary to survive and be safe. By the end, she developed into a more confident and independent young woman. There were some very dark scenes throughout the book.