Category Archives: african american book

Book Review: Torn by Keisha Ervin for Triple Crown Publications

(Hover cursor over book cover to see the Amazon.com prices.)

Torn follows the bittersweet relationship between lovestruck Mo and eternal-playboy Quan. The line between right and wrong in their relationship is hazy because Mo and Quan have invested nearly a decade of love, time and money in each other. Although the fruits of Quan’s hustling is visible in the expensive house, cars and clothes, Mo would trade it all for a true bond of love from his heart to hers.

Mo’s father and her friends, Quan’s mother, and even Mo’s own intuition tell her to move on, but her desire for Quan controls her actions. Quan, on the other hand, knows he isn’t right, yet explodes at the very thought of Mo possibly being unfaithful. Their relationship is simultaneously passionate and pathetic, keeping you absorbed page after page. While they are saying “Yes, yes, yes!”, you will be cringing and saying, “No, no, no!” When you add baby-momma-drama, shady friends and other love interests, Mo and Quan are forced to make life-changing decisions that will test whether or not they are soul mates.

Keisha Ervin’s latest spin on love, life and lies is nothing less than incredible. Torn is street literature in its finest form. Keisha Ervin has written a story transcends its environment. Gunshots, crackheads and drug lords have been replaced with the sleepless nights, the phone calls that need to be taken in private and heart-to-heart advice that may hit home for some of the readers. There is even guest appearances by sisters Mina and Meesa, from Keisha Ervins’s National Best Selling Novels Mina’s Joint and Me & My Boyfriend respectively.

Keisha Ervin’s Torn has added on to her remarkable repertoire and is a yet another Best Seller in the making, following Chyna Black, Me & My Boyfriend, Mina’s Joint and Hold U Down. If you came across “After The Storm” in Triple Crown’s second anthology Street Love, Torn is the breathtaking expansion on that short story. This is not book for quick consumption like an item off the dollar menu. Instead, this book is full of substance, a tale that you will not mind taking time to read and digest.

Book Review: Queen by Cynthia White for Triple Crown Publications

Queen is the debut novel from one of Triple Crown Publications’ newest authors, Cynthia White. The namesake of this alluring novel is daddy’s little girl. Queen’s daddy just happens to be Hershey Aaron, the Boss of St. Louis’ most powerful organization, the Black Mafia.

The murder of her unfaithful mother sends Hershey to death row and Queen’s life on a tailspin full of lovers, killers and high-priced shopping sprees. Her striking beauty and intelligence are matched by her determination to keep alive the empire her father founded. But Queen is a teenager, exploring both her sexuality and her desire to love and be loved. The fine line that separates right from wrong is definitely blurred. What’s a teenage daughter of a boss to do?

Queen must deal with cops trying to shut down her father’s operation, various men vying for the opportunity to be her king, rival organizations on the come up, and her not wanting to turn into the deceased mother she despised. One thing is definitely true about this book. If you have to put it down for whatever reason, rest assured that something new and unexpected will develop when you start reading again.

Murder, sex and lies…these are the things that Queen must navigate through in order to survive. Love, life and liberty…these are the things that Queen slowly begins to realize are much more valuable. From manslaughter to motherhood, Queen struggles to make sense of the unyielding pace of her life.

Cynthia White has set the bar high for her future endeavors. This quality piece of street literature has aligned this new recruit with some of Triple Crown Publications’ veteran squad in terms of talent. Full of high fashion, expensive jewelry, unorthodox plot twists, arousing sexual encounters and quality characters, Queen may be seen as a street lit classic in the future.

Say Word! My review got banned by Amazon.com!

I knew it had to happen eventually. I mean, the realness I write is just too much for the mainstream to digest. Just kidding…

Well, I usually post the my reviews on Amazon.com within 48 hours of submitting them to the websites I review for. So I sat for a couple of days after I posted the review on Amazon.com and noticed that my review for Crave All Lose All never showed up.

So I emailed Amazon.com’s customer service like, “What’s up?!”

Actually, I wrote this:

I submitted a review for Crave All Lose All by Erick S
Gray that has yet to post. What do I need to do to make sure my review is posted?

Here’s what they told me:

Thank you for writing to Amazon.com.

Your review of “Crave All Lose All” was removed because your comments in large part focused on authors and their intentions, rather than reviewing the item itself.

Our guidelines do not allow discussions that criticize authors or their intentions. We encourage all voices to respond openly in our store, both positive and negative. However, we do exert some editorial control over our customer reviews.

As such, your review cannot be posted on Amazon.com in its current format. What I can suggest is that you resubmit your review, restricting your comments to critically analyzing the content of the item.

After that was a bunch of blah, blah, blah about reading guidelines, forum discussions and something about if I got an attitude then I could delete my reviews and take them elsewhere. Okay…it didn’t go that far, but I felt slighted.

The nerve!

Oh yeah, I changed some stuff around with the original review, condensed it and resubmitted it. Hopefully it will go through this time. I’ll keep you posted.

(While I’m on the subject, could just one person find one of my reviews on Amazon.com and click yes or no where it asks if the review was helpful or not? I mean, Crave All Lose All will be my 14th review on Amazon.com without anyone giving me any kind of flavor!)

UPDATE 05-14-08

I checked this morning just to be looking and the review I put together by reconfiguring the Crave All Lose All review I did for UrbanBookSource.com. That’s the original that got banned for talking more about the author’s intentions that the book itself. What?!