Gateway Reviews

  Best                      First Place:             Every Time You Hear That Song Jenna Voris                                         ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ In this dual-timeline historical fiction, Darren Purchase spots her ticket out of town in the scavenger hunt left in country star Decklee Cassel's will, but there's a lot more to Decklee Cassel's legacy than the tabloids ever knew. A historical love story with strong women at the core, Jenna Voris presents a story of ambition, desperation, and the regret of a one-way ticket out of town. Though the payoff of the contemporary leg of this dual-timeline story feels a little lackluster, this piece of historical fiction is worth escaping into a world where small town girls dare to dream. Runner...

THE RULES OF ROYALTY Jamie Johnson's summer plans include hanging out with friends, getting late night milkshakes, and promoting his best friend Max's new single with every bit of energy he can muster. But when he finds out on his birthday that his adoptive mom's been harboring a secret all seventeen years of his life, those plans go out the window. Suddenly a prince to the sunny southern European country of Mitanor and definitely in the direct line of succession, Jamie gets whisked away to spend the summer at the king of Mitanor's palace. The king who also happens to be his birth father. Meeting the royal family is nerve-wracking enough. Add his identity getting leaked and new royal appearances he has to make, and Jamie Johnson is in over his head. Luckily, Erik von Rosenborg is here to help. The spare prince to a cold and stoic northern European country, Erik knows a thing or two about royal life. Plus, he's gay--someth...

DUST There was a flood. And the rent went up. And her father had a dream. Now Thea and her family are here, trying to make a life for themselves in southern Colorado's Bloodless Valley. It's a return to tradition, to the way things should be: just a man and his family and the land that he owns, the land that will provide. Except the land isn't providing. The river is dried up. There's no water in the well. The crops are shriveling. And the dust... The dust just won't let up. It's in the fields. It's between the floorboards. It's in their hair, in their clothes, in their lungs. Thea's parents are afraid of the outside world's dangerous influence on their daughters, but sometimes there's no choice. To make ends meet, Thea is allowed to leave the homestead to work at the only café in town. Work and home: that's all Thea knows. But as hot and barren as this valley is, the residents are friendly. An...

THE LOSTING FOUNTAIN There's something calling to Ember, Miles, and Sam. Calling across decades. Calling through dark waters, watery graves. Something claiming to be their home, though none of them have ever been there before. The Fountain wants them to come. The Fountain houses all the losting things, the things lost and dearly missed. The things that people want back. If they're lucky, seekers will find the Fountain and be reunited with what they've lost... if they can resist the temptation of the treasures that it holds. And if they can't, well, the Fountain is home to all manner of losting souls, those it won't ever let go. There's a delicate balance between the Fountain's treasures and its justice, a balance upheld by the Jury. But the Jury has gone missing, and her days are dwindling anyhow. A new Jury must be sought, before the balance is upended. Before the Fountain and its consequences leak out of its idy...

WHAT THE WOODS TOOK When Devin Green wakes up to find two strange men in her bedroom, her first instinct is to fight. But nobody is coming to her rescue. Her foster parents just stand by as these men drag her from the house and toss her into the back of their van. That's what they've been paid to do. Released from the van deep in the Idaho woods, Devin finds herself the unwilling participant in a "wilderness therapy" camp meant to rescue her from her "self-destructive" ways. Along with a group of troubled teens and two counselors, Devin sets off on a hike through the woods that will take just under two months to complete. By the time Devin reaches the end, she'll be a legal adult, and she'll be able to put it all behind her. She's here to survive, nothing more. But these hikers aren't alone in the woods. And it isn't just bears and coyotes they have to look out for. When the campers wake to fin...

THE LOVE INTEREST Jenna Ray is prepared for the end of the world. She would have to be. There's an apocalyptic prophecy foretelling doom for her seaside town, after all. Everybody's prepared for something bad to happen this year. There's even a souvenir shop where Jenna works selling apocalyptic merch to tourists before it's too late. What Jenna isn't prepared for is being saved from that deadly electrical storm by the world's newest hero, Blaze. Not just being saved. Being his very first rescue, which in the eyes of the public means only one thing: Jenna Ray is his brand new Love Interest. Jenna doesn't want anything to do with Blaze or the HPA, the organization in charge of heroics across an environmentally unstable planet. She doesn't want anything to do with the Villains who keep threatening her life, either. But with paparazzi swarming and something more cataclysmic than an electrical storm brewing on the...