Latest Reviews on Amazon
Heart Stopper: 
5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful first novel by a thinking author. November 27, 2013
By Fred Bakenhus
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
It was great story with great characters with twists and turns to keep my interest. R J Samuel’s style is delightful.
5.0 out of 5 stars Nice Surprise! November 16, 2013
By Liz Caruso
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
I loved the uniquely regional feel to this book! I learned new things, was surprised along the way, and really liked the characters. Great introduction to this author. I look forward to reading more from RJ Samuel!
5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant Read April 21, 2013
By caryn elias sherman
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I just happened upon this book and thought it looked intriguing, so I purchased it. And I’m really glad I did!! It’s beautifully written and has an exciting, fast-paced plot. You’re immediately pulled into the story and the characters. Honestly, I couldn’t put it down! Just purchased RJ Samuel’s other 2 books and can’t wait to read them. CES Boca Raton, FL.
5.0 out of 5 stars Read this book!!! July 17, 2013
By Chetefon
Format:Kindle Edition
I want to read lesbian fiction that dares to be different. Searching through the lesbian fiction lists on the Internet my quest was rewarded when I came upon Heart Stopper by RJ Samuel. Samuel is an Irish based author from Galway.
Heart Stopper ticks all the right boxes for me.
If you love mystery then read this book. If you love twists and turns that keep you guessing to the end read this book. If you are not already passionate about the Irish landscape you will be when you read this book. If you are a romantic read this book. If you yearn for strong characters and dialogue that leaps off the page, read this book!
There are already many excellent reviews about Heart Stopper on Amazon and Goodreads. There is little more I can add to the eloquent, well-expressed reviews except to say buy the book! You won’t regret it..
Falling Colours:
4.0 out of 5 stars Mind stretching., November 27, 2013
By
Fred Bakenhus – See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What’s this?)
This review is from: Falling Colours: The Misadventures of a Vision Painter (Paperback)
It is well written. Beautiful sentence structures. Fresh and new concept. A pleasant experience. Interesting characters who were well developed..
CASTING SHADOWS REVIEWS
Terry Baker
When Kiran gets a call from her father that her mother is, or could be seriously ill, Kiran must immediately return to India. The result of this phone call could well change the lives of everyone forever.
This is RJ Samuel’s third book. With each book, I grow to love her writing more. Her stories are well written page turners. This series is spellbinding and magical and although the series has an element of fantasy, I found myself almost believing the impossible.
This story is completely enthralling and absorbing. Once I’d started this book, I couldn’t put it down. The story had me feverishly turning the pages until I’d finished it. No matter how hard I tried to slow up, I couldn’t. I simply had to know what happened and how the book ended. In doing this, I did this wonderful book an injustice. But no worries. I knew I would be reviewing it, so I simply re-read it more slowly the second time to savour the story without the pressures of not knowing how it ended. My second reading was just as pleasurable and intense as the first.
This story is actually written in the past and the present and is so intricately woven that it’s seamless. It was a great idea to give the reader the background on vision painters. Also it cleared up a lot of things I’d been wondering about Kiran’s past.
RJ takes the reader back into the past and tells of how Kiran’s parents met, married and their struggles and traumas along the way. We also learn of how Kiran became a vision painter against all odds.
The myriad of emotions this book evoked went far beyond any I’ve experienced for quite sometime when reading a book. In the span of minutes I went from a calm and serene feeling, to a laugh out loud humour and intense anger and back again to calm and serene.
The scenic descriptions are so vivid I could feel myself amongst the characters. I’ve never visited Kerala, India, so I took a look online after finishing this book. The photographs I found matched exactly the way I’d imagined Kerala to be. The Irish scenes are equally as well described.
There is actually two romances in this book. The romance between Kiran’s parents and the romance between Kiran and Ashley. But this book isn’t actually just a romance, it’s a story wrapped around a fantasy, which appears to be very real. A story full of love and hate with so many twists and turns I didn’t have a clue as to how it was going to end.
Each and every one of these well formed and multidimensional characters played an essential part in progressing the story forward to its climatic conclusion. Although this book ended, I feel these characters have a lot more to offer us. I would love to see at least one more book added to make a trilogy, more if possible. Although this book is a sequel, it can also be read as a standalone. But I would urge you to read Falling Colours first. You will be sorely missing out on a great read if you don’t. Plus it will give you the chance to get to know some of the characters better.
I eagerly await RJ Samuel’s next book. This one will join Heart Stopper and Falling Colours on my re-read pile.
FALLING COLOURS REVIEWS
Terry Baker
Kiran is a vision painter, the only one in the whole of Ireland. She works part time as a waitress in a restaurant in Connemara to supplement her income. When Kiran is asked by a client to do an unusual vision painting, she is very apprehensive. It goes against everything she believes to be ethical. Unfortunately Kiran makes a serious error of judgment, which results in chaos and Kiran’s life being changed forever.
Added in to the mystery and intrigue is a woman. A woman Kiran finds irresistible, a woman Kiran feels she will never be able to have. But the path of true love rarely runs smoothly, or according to the best laid plans, is there a chance Kiran is wrong in her assumptions?
This is R. J Samuel’s second book. It is very well written and the dialogue flows. The story is most unusual and unlike like any I’ve ever read before. This is more than just a run of the mill mystery, intrigue, romance book. It has a touch of supernatural elements and is humorous in parts too. It’s fast paced and a page turner from the first page through to the last. The story kept me on a knife edge throughout, it is full of twists and turns, ups and downs, and had the effect on me of being on a rollercoaster. Totally delightful, mesmerizing and impressive.
The main characters are well developed and have a strong supporting cast of minor characters who all interact well together, (even the not so nice to know characters) to progress the story forward. The scenic descriptions are wonderful, and it’s easy to visualize the different places.
R.J has the gift for making the reader feel as though they are an actual part of the story, it is easy to get totally immersed in this book. The thrill and suspense with a romantic feel to the story, ensured that I had to stay up most of the night to find out how the story ended. In fact, I have read this book twice now. Once was not enough. I had to re-read it without the pressure of not knowing how the book ended. The second time was to savor the richness of the story and the wonderful way with words R.J has.
R.J Samuel is an up and coming exciting new voice in lesbian fiction. An author to watch out for and to add to my list of favorite authors. I am greatly looking forward to reading more from R.J soon.
Amazon Reviews
Falling Colours is R.J. Samuel’s second book. It is a story of a Vision Painter, who shares her gift with others to fulfill their dreams by painting their requests. A vision someone has for their own happiness may not necessarily be the best idea, however. There are repercussions to be dealt with when the vision involves other people. And what if the vision painter has a dream that is contrary to the vision someone asks her to paint?
Kiran left her professional life behind to concentrate on her painting gift, inherited from her Indian father. There are strict guidelines that are to be followed to the letter. She waits tables in Delilah’s restaurant to pay the bills, and the hours allow her to focus on her painting.
Kiran finds Ron distraught outside the restaurant. Ron’s request for his vision requires Kiran to bend the rules. She knows that she should not bend the rules, but his request is motivated by anguish rather than greed. Enter a beautiful daughter and missing money and the situation gets really complicated, but not without humor and an opportunity to make amends.
There are many twists and turns in Falling Colours by R. J. Samuel. The characters are well illustrated, and her writing style complements an unusual situation. The setting is in Galway, Ireland and includes Ireland’s colourful scenery. I give this book five stars not just because I like it, but because I find the premise to be unique. Samuel’s writing suits the unique perspective and makes the book really fun to read. It is fun, funny, serious, mysterious and touching with inner connections that are not all apparent. Even though this book was just released yesterday, I anxiously await another from R. J. Samuel.
HEART STOPPER REVIEWS
GALWAY ADVERTISER, MAY 03, 2012.
The heart stopping sentences of Rejini Samuel
By Kevin Higgins
I FIRST became aware of Rejini Samuel’s work a couple of years ago when she began attending creative writing classes at GTI and, as a result, came along and read some poems and extracts from stories at an Over The Edge open-mic.
Even in those early efforts, it was obvious that she understood that good writing is not defined so much by the story that is being told as it is by the linguistic nuts and bolts of how it is told: the new metaphors and similes that surprise us along the way and make any story or poem its own new thing, rather than a derivative rehash of something that went before.
We all know people who could make a trip to the planet Neptune sound duller than a bus to Ballinasloe on a damp Saturday in October. Equally, there are those incapable of writing a shopping list without making it, in its own way, a work of art. Rejini Samuel is definitely one of the latter.
Her new novel Heart Stopper, published under the name RJ Samuel, by Create Space, defies categorisation. It is self-published, having first been published as an e-book, but is in a different universe, in terms of its absolute literary quality, from most self-published books, which tend to be rather shaky offerings.
The story is a murder mystery/medical drama with a lesbian love interest set at a recently opened and, it is important to say, entirely fictional pacemaker clinic here in Galway. It appears someone has been tampering with the pacemakers. Not a good situation, obviously.
The main protagonists are Priya, who works at the pacemaker clinic, and Reyna, the sister of the first person murdered as the mystery begins. The book is subdivided into 34 chapters of varying length – some no more than a page long – in addition to a prologue and epilogue.
Priya is dragged into the investigation into ‘what went wrong’ and uncovers secrets that could bring the whole house crashing down. She is, you get the feeling, one of those characters destined to end up at the centre of unexpected mysteries.
In the end, a love interest develops between the two main women characters, but this is only at the end of the longest and windiest of roads. This novel breaks barriers between genres. It is a medical drama, a murder mystery, and a love story, but it is so much more than any one of those. It is, more than anything else, a book of beautiful sentences.
Chapter Eight closes fantastically with “The night passed without any further sighting of the dark car and in silence apart from a restless sleep feathered with dreams of cats crying.”
Later, Samuel finishes Chapter 33 with elegant harshness “She thought she’d have three minutes before her brain stopped functioning but time flew when you were dying.”
The only place where this book lapses into cliché in on the back cover, where Heart Stopper is described as, you guessed it, “a real page turner”. It is so much more than that.
Heart Stopper will be launched at the May Over The Edge Writers’ Gathering at The Kitchen in The Galway City Museum on Wednesday May 9 at 8pm.
Terry Baker
This is R. J Samuel’s debut book. It is different from any of the other medical themed books I’ve ever read. It is well written, fast paced, intriguing, mysterious, exciting, thrilling, dramatic and a real page turner.
R. J has written in great detail of the workings and technology of a pacemaker, all seamless integrated into the story. She has obviously carried out extensive research with all the technical details in this book. I’m afraid some of this went over my head, but I could get the gist of it all. So, I did learn a few things along the way too.
This book is far more than a medical drama, thriller, murder mystery or a romance. It is a unique combination of all these things. R.J writes about race, sexual orientation and also about being an outsider in a new country. The characters are all written so that the reader can feel a part of the group.
I loved the book, settings, characters and the story. Although this book is a book I couldn’t wait to finish, at the same time when I did, I felt as though I hadn’t had enough.
I am looking forward to R.J Samuel’s next book very much.
Amazon Reviews
An excellent thriller, mystery and romance rolled into one. The author skillfully combines sizzling and angsty lead and secondary characters, refreshing imagery of Irish settings, well-researched technical details (but not boring enough to make you skip sections), timely cultural conflicts, Irish economic woes and a very plausible and believable premise resulting in an intense, exciting page-turner culminating in an explosive climax.
Priced very reasonably, it compares quite favorably with the best in lesbian romance/thriller genre.
Other Reviews
Evelyn Parsons (Writer – Kujowriters)
An exciting medical thriller perfectly set in Galway, West of Ireland . I’m familiar with the writings of RJ Samuels ,-an ability to intelligently tackle issues of race ,gender ,romance,sexual orientation,outsider and cultural aspects while delivering a rollicking fast paced story, mark this debut novelist’s work.
After reading this novel , you have to ask- why has it not been done before? The ingredients have always been there, but in this novel there is a fresh approach to combining them in a manner which traverses genres, refusing to be narrowly pigeonholed.
There’s plenty nitty detail here too for tech fans giving a fascinating insight into the medical pacemaker device world.Glimpses of Indian culture and a changing Ireland enrich the backdrop to this thoroughly enjoyable, unputdownable novel.
It is to be hoped it is the first of many to come.
Yvonne McEvaddy (Author – Kujowriters)
RJ’s descriptions bring the reader into the novel so that you feel every bump in the road and your heart races along with the fears of the main character. This is a wonderful debut novel and I can’t wait to read RJ’s next one. I have read a number of short stories by this author and know there’s lots more thrilling rides to come.
