Slags by Emma Jane Unsworth - Review

I actually saw this book in a motorway service station when I was travelling to Birmingham in February, and I was really tempted to buy it, but resisted temptation of buying this and something else. But then I looked later and it was only 99p on Kindle so I bought it. I read it while I was in Rome! And flying there and back. I loved Rome and highly recommend it, and this was a good book to read while I was travelling. 

The book is about sisters Sarah and Juliette and has a dual narrative - one in the 90s, and one in the now, when Sarah is 42 and Juliette is just turning forty. I am forty-two and am enjoying reading about women my age - especially when there was a dual narrative which was so reminiscent of my own life in the 90s. 

Sarah is single, and lives in London. She's from Manchester originally where Juliette still lives with her mediocre husband and two children. Their mother was pretty neglectful and I don't remember much said about their dad at all, but I did read this over a month ago so maybe I've just forgotten by now. (I am kind of sorry that my reviews are so far behind, but I'll get caught up.... eventually). Sarah's life is pretty empty but she knows she doesn't want Juliette's life either. 

Anyway, she rents a campervan for the two of them to go on a trip to the Scottish Highlands for Juliette's birthday. It's a bit run down and causes them no end of problem but that's half the fun of it. There's no mobile signal at the campsites so Juliette can't speak to her children. Neither of the women like going over to the showers and loos, either, which I found very relatable and hilarious. They've had a bit of a tempestuous relationship over the years and things do flare up but it's obvious there's a lot of love between the two of them even if they don't always understand each other.

In the dual narrative, it's the late 90s and Sarah is fifteen. She is obsessed with boy bands, sex, underage drinking, and her teacher, Mr Keaveney. She is convinced that they are in love and that once she leaves school and turns sixteen, they will go to Gretna Green and get married and everyone will accept this. I knew girls who were obsessed with teachers in the 90s and I think Emma Jane got this so perfect, just bang on for what it was like back then when you FEEL so deeply. When bands do mean EVERYTHING and when a crush feels like it will kill you. 

It's obvious that something happened in the 90s that has repercussions on today, and I thought I guessed it, but I was a bit wrong. I do think the ending didn't quite live up to the rest of the book. I wish it had been a bit different. 

But I did really like the book; I liked Sarah a lot and really felt a lot of her life. I will definitely read something else by Emma Jane Unsworth and I am giving this four out of five. 

Not A Happy Family by Shari Lapena - Review

I can't remember where I heard about this book but I was intrigued by it so bought it on Kindle. I read it at the end of April and it's the first of June as I'm writing this, so forgive me if I've forgotten some of the ins and outs of the plot. However, I know I didn't particularly like the book and wouldn't reach quickly for something else by the same author. 

The family in question is the Merton family. They are parents Fred and Sheila and their children, Catherine, Dan, and Jenna, and Catherine's husband Ted and Dan's wife Lisa. They are all getting together for Easter dinner, but tensions are already running high. The family is rich as anything after Fred sold his company. However, Dan assumed that he would inherit the company so he's angry with his dad that he didn't. He and Lisa have very little money and he is stressed about it. Fred is selfish and cruel. Sheila is neglectful and critical of all her children. They were brought up by a nanny, Irene, who lived in the house and who still lives close. 

Catherine has a high flying career as does Ted, but they've been having problems having a baby so their lives aren't perfect either. Jenna is the wild, third child, a bit flighty, blah blah. Her boyfriend attends the dinner too but I don't remember his name. Everyone falls out with Fred and Sheila and leaves, although Jenna and her boyfriend stay a little bit longer than the others. 

The next day the housekeeper or someone arrives at the house and finds Fred and Sheila brutally murdered. At first the policce think it's a robbery gone wrong, but then they realise it's been set up to look that way. Suspicion falls on the three children, of course, but there are just so many people and so many red herrings that it's hard to keep up. Fred's sister (Angela?) says that Fred had promised to leave half his money to her, but there's no proof of this - although it would have given her a good motive, of course. It's easy to think it's Dan, as he's been screwed over most by his father, but honestly, all the kids are acting weird. 

The book is like 100 pages too long in my opinion, and a crucial piece of information comes way too late in the book for me to care. I found it hard to read and can only give it two and a half out of three. 

The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter - Review

I first read The Bloody Chamber years and years ago when I was a teenager. I didn't do English Lit at 6th form but tons of my friends did, and a lot of them did this book and we were all obsessed with it. I'm pretty sure I read a library copy way back when, and I'm not entirely sure where this copy came from, but I've had it forever and not picked it up. When we moved last summer I was reminded of its existence, but then didn't pick it up until just before Christmas. 

However, I read the first few stories and then put the book down and didn't pick it up again until April, by which time I was determined to finish it. However, I didn't really like it as much as I remember liking it. Maybe it was just because I was seventeen and it was all new to me, so maybe stories just don't hit the same now I'm in my forties. 

I did still really like the story The Bloody Chamber, which is a retelling of the fairy tale Bluebeard. It's exactly as creepy and gothic as I remember, which I liked. I also really liked the story of Puss in Boots, about a cat who spends his days with a rakish young man. Some of the others were so graphic - something that the collection is controversial for - that they left me cold. 

In all I am glad I reread this, but it wasn't quite my jam anymore. Still, I would recommend it to young adults who haven't read anything similar before. I'm giving it three out of five. 

Frozen by Ann Cleeves - Review

This is a really short story that I must have got on Kindle at some point and when I was scrolling my way through what I wanted to read I came upon it. So I'm reviewing it even though it is really short! I loved being back with Vera and will have to pick up another of her books soon. 

Vera is having a day off and heads to a bookshop in Corbridge. She's interested in a book about Hadrian and the wall, but she ends up walking into a crime instead. The bookshop is in an old church, and the owner and her teenaged son are working on opening up the old baptismal underneath the floor of their shop. To their surprise, there is a dead body in there. 

A skeleton, to be more precise. And what's more, Vera recognises who it is from the bracelet on the skeleton's wrist. It is a girl who went missing years and years ago, a case that Vera has never forgotten. And of course, she's involved now and she wants to solve it. 

I'm giving this four out of five, I liked it a lot for such a short story. 

Athelstan by Tom Holland - Review

This was the May choice for my book club and I read it way back in mid April, so I was in plenty of time before book club. As I write this, we haven't yet met, so I don't know what everyone else thought, but I really enjoyed the book. It's non fiction, it's about the King called Athelstan who I had never heard of, although I'd heard of some of his relatives for sure. But that period of England is not something I know a lot about at all, so it was good to learn more. 

Athelstan is arguably the first King of England because he managed to unify the country more than anyone had done previously. There is apparently little documentary evidence about Athelstan himself, but what there is Tom Holland manages to pull together in a very readable and dramatic fashion. This is a short book so I raced through it, but it is also compelling. Also, presumably he's not THAT Tom Holland, haha. 

I also found it really interesting how Athelstan became king of all of England. When a different king died, others would rush in and fill the gap - what an absolutely mad way to do anything. So Athelstan managed to get a couple of places before anyone else, including some Irish kings, did. Wild. 

I really enjoyed this and would recommend it to anyone who would like to learn more about this period of history. I'm giving this four out of five. 

The Eternal Return of Clara Hart - Review and Blog Tour

Hello and welcome to my blog for my stop on the tour for The Eternal Return of Clara Hart by Louise Finch. It is a pleasure to welcome you here! Please do click around and have a look at my other posts. I love contemporary YA and don't feel like I've read one in ages, so I was eager to sign up to this blog tour and to read the book!

The main character of the book is James Spencer, and he is in his last year at 6th form so he's already eighteen. His dad calls him James but everyone else calls him Spence. He has a car, an MG Midget which I've got major envy for, and on this particular Friday just before exam leave, he wakes up in his car. 

It is the year anniversary of his mum's death and he and his dad haven't been getting on very well, so James has chosen to sleep in his car to stay out of his dad's way. He is woken up by a car hitting his. A small red Micra, driven by Clara Hart. They have a bit of an altercation about it and then James goes into school and sits with his friends Anthony and Worm. They have forgotten the significance of the day and are their usual selves - mocking girls, catcalling, and giving all the girls ratings out of five. They are also planning a party for that evening. James doesn't really want to go, but he does. He and Anthony pick up alcohol and get ready.

At the party Worm strips naked and jumps into the pool. James ends up asleep. A girl called Mia gets incredibly drunk. Clara's friend Genni gets off with a guy called Jay and Clara ends up upstairs with Anthony. James rescues her, covering up her naked body, but she's drunk and upset and runs out of the house. She is then killed by a car coming past. The party ends with everyone at the police station giving a statement about what happened. James is obviously distraught and ends up asleep in his own bed, taken home by his dad. 

But then he wakes up again in his car, and Clara is again close by in her red car. James is obviously confused, and moreso when the day repeats itself. Can he save Clara this time, though?

Through more than a week of Fridays James tries and tries again to save Clara, to make a better hash of the day than he did the first time around. He's sure there must be some kind of key - but what is it?

I loved the book, I liked James a lot and loved the setting he found himself in. I liked the mystery of how he was going to get out of the mess he was in and I liked the ending. In all I'm giving this four out of five. 

Star by Star by Sheena Wilkinson - Review and Blog Tour

Hello and welcome to my blog for my stop on the tour for Star By Star by Sheena Wilkinson! It is a pleasure to welcome you here. Please do click around and have a look at my other reviews. 

I was really intrigued by the premise of this book and signed up for it without realising that I have already read something by Sheena Wilkinson. I finished the book and when I was adding it to Goodreads I realised I read Name Upon Name by Sheena, which is actually related to this book! That book's main character is Helen, and she has a cousin Sandy, and in this book the main character Stella meets Helen in the first chapter, and she ends up living with Sandy! So that was delightful to learn and I'm glad I did learn it. 

So yes, Stella is fifteen and the year is 1918. The Spanish flu is endemic across Europe and the Great War is roaring. Stella has grown up in Manchester with her Mam after her mam had to leave Ireland when she was pregnant with Stella. Her mam has been a suffragette, fighting for women's rights to vote, and eventually, women who are over thirty and are householders are entitled to vote. It's a great victory! But Stella's Mam catches flu and Stella has to nurse her as she dies. 

Stella is left alone in the world and has to travel back to Ireland to live with her mother's sister Nancy. Nancy runs a kind of boarding house and Stella is to go and help her. She meets Helen on the train from Belfast; Helen is trying to visit Sandy but it doesn't go well. He is a wounded soldier, wounded in the trenches of the war, and has some kind of PTSD that means he rarely leaves his room. Also in the house are two elderly women and a young nurse, Kit, who nurses at the local convalescent home for soldiers.

Things are changing in Ireland - after the Easter Rising of 1916 the spirit of independence from British rule is in the air. Reading this as someone in 2026 who knows what happened in Ireland it was interesting to get into the head of someone living in Ireland at the time. Stella is an independent forthright young woman who wants to sort everything out. She has no malice in her and people's best interests at heart, but the way she goes about things sometimes rubs people up the wrong way! 

I loved the book, I am so glad I joined in this tour. I loved Stella and I liked the setting and her aunt and all the other inhabitants of the house. I liked Sandy and thought he was very compassionately portrayed. He is only 22 and has been an officer and has been permanently wounded by the war. I'm giving this four out of five and thoroughly enjoyed it. 

Sugar & Other Stories by A S Byatt - Review

I have never read anything by A S Byatt but have always wanted to, so when I saw this in a charity shop in York for just a couple of quid I picked it up. 

I really enjoyed the selection of stories, but it's a few weeks since I read it so I don't remember specifics of many. I think generally the theme was people, and relationship, and quite a lot about middle class people. The book was published in 1987 so all of the stories were dated before that, but some felt quite a bit older - more like Agatha Christie type of time period. But some really felt set in the 1980s, too. 

This definitely has inspired me to read something else by A S Byatt, so I'll keep an eye out for something else by her! I'm giving this four out of five. 

Shorelines by Ruth Ennis - Blog Tour and Review

Hello and welcome to my blog for my stop on the tour for Shorelines by Ruth Ennis! It is a pleasure to welcome you here today. Please do have a click around and read some of my other reviews. 

I love novels told in verse and I love mermaids, so when I saw this book come up on the blog tour I signed up immediately! This book really did not disappoint. I loved the artwork on the front and inside; I would recommend it on artwork alone. But the writing is beautiful too. I raced through this and loved it. It is somewhat a retelling of The Little Mermaid, but in a modern setting. I loved the glimpses of the original story peeking through. 

Muireann is a mermaid. She has lots of sisters, including her twin sister Mairead. One day, they are searching for pearls as gifts for their mother. The twins are obsessed with the world above the surface and want to go one day. Mairead goes missing and the whole family has to look for her. When they find her, she is dead - killed by a mass fishing net. Muireann's mother sinks into a deep depression and Muireann feels totally alone.

She is a fat, strong, powerful mermaid. She knows her place within the ocean, but she really wants to see the surface. She and Mairead had spotted a ship in trouble and saw a man there - obviously the handsome prince. 

But when Muireann does go ashore, the real world isn't like she imagined it to be. She has to become someone else in order to be safe. And she wants more than anything to return to the sea.

I loved the book and would definitely read something else by Ruth Ennis in the future! I will keep a look out for them for sure. I'm giving this a high four out of five. 

What Does It Feel Like? by Sophie Kinsella - Review

My friend Stacey read this book and recommended it, but she had a library copy so she couldn't lend it to me, so I requested it from my library because it sounded really interesting. It is a tiny little novella, but it's really good and really packs a punch and I would definitely recommend it. 

It's a semi-autobiographical novel about Sophie's own life. She was a massively popular author whose Shopaholic books got made into a film (maybe more, I don't know, I didn't read much of her stuff) and she died of a brain tumour in 2024 I think. This book is about an author called Eve who buys a dress to wear on the red carpet for the premiere of her film. She's successful, she's happily married, and she has five gorgeous children.

Then she wakes up in hospital with no memory of how she got there. It turns out she has a malignant brain tumour that has grown huge. She has to learn how to walk, talk, and write again. She has to work out how to tell her beautiful children that their mum will die. She has to be reminded about what has happened by her husband, who is faithfully by her side. 

This is a tiny book, a novella really, and it's told in little vignettes which tell Eve's story. There's a few pages which have text messages from Eve's family and friends, which I liked the inclusion of. It's a powerful little book and I'm giving it five out of five. 

The Secret Room by Jane Casey - Review

I can't remember where or when I heard of this book but I obviously had, as I requested it at the library and it arrived so I read it. I didn't love it, though, I don't think it really stood up to what I thought it was going to be. Oh well, I live and learn! 

This is the twelfth book in a series about a detective called Maeve Kerrigan and her boss, Josh Derwent. I didn't realise that but as with most series you mostly can start here and catch up on some of the back story. In this case, it is obvious that Maeve and Josh have had a bit of a dalliance, and later there's more on their relationship. I did mostly like this aspect but Josh is a bit of a dickhead so it was hard to care as much about him as Maeve clearly does. They were nearly together but then Josh's girlfriend Melissa's son got unwell, and Josh felt guilty and stayed. From further reading I see that this book is set six months after Maeve and Josh didn't get together, which makes sense. 

The main murder in the book is of a wealthy woman called Ilaria Cavendish. She has a long standing meeting on a Wednesday afternoon with her lover, who I think is called Sam? They meet in a hotel every week for sex. She arrives one week, makes her way up to the room which is the room she always has, and waits for Sam. A hotel employee arrives with a bottle of champagne; on the CCTV later the police can see that he was in and out of the room in only a few minutes. When Sam arrives he says he finds her submerged in a scalding hot bath - he tries to pull her out but she is already dead. He is the prime suspect, of course, but he didn't really have enough time to kill her. 

It's a classic locked room mystery and Maeve and Josh are confused. Ilaria was married to a man who had a lot of money and who seemed to trade in wives for a younger model every few years, so he is a suspect too. Sam, meanwhile, has a pregnant girlfriend who he's trying to keep all this from. 

Maeve's parents are Irish immigrants to London and she seems like she avoids them a lot, but they were close with Josh's stepson and still miss him; they end up looking after him at times. Then Melissa is found attacked at home, badly beaten at the bottom of the stairs, and Josh is of course prime suspect. Maeve is sure that he couldn't have done it so she ends trying to investigate it herself, which brings her up against some fellow cops, of course, but she obviously has to meddle which did actually annoy me. Some unsavoury things about Josh come out which I feel was meant to put the reader off him, but he had already come across as a dick anyway so. 

I did like the outcome of both mysteries but something in the way this was written just didn't work for me. It meandered a lot in the middle and I didn't care about Maeve's dating life - she's trying to see this other fella - enough to put up with it. In all I'm giving this three and a half out of five. 

Spring by Michael Morpurgo - Review

After I read Winter by Val McDermid I knew I wanted to read the rest of the series. This one is the only one to have come out so far - Summer is expected this summer and I can't wait! I requested this one at the library and read it at the beginning of April when it really did feel like Spring had sprung but the weather was still a bit wild, as it ought to be. 

Michael's description of his Springs has a lot to do with his farm, which is in Devon, and from where he and his wife set up Farms for City Children, a charity where children come from the cities to work on farms to explore the living, etc. This still happens at Michael's home, apparently, and I liked the descriptions of the children with the pigs, mucking out the horses, and so on. I could imagine the farm well, including the birds that he and his wife Claire spend a lot of time looking at. Michael appreciates that he is no longer in the spring of his life, but he appreciates each new spring with the new life that comes and what that brings on a farm. 

He also talks a bit about how sometimes nature is cruel and things don't live, which I liked. In all this is a cute little book - not quite as punchy and immediate as Winter, but I liked it all the same. I'm giving it five out of five. 

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke - Review

This was the April choice for my book club, chosen by Helena. I was a little uncertain about it when I read the blurb, and for the first few chapters of the book. But then I just decided to lean into it, into the weirdness, and then I ended up really liking it. It is odd and it did split the group a bit, but I think more people liked it than not. 

Piranesi is the main character and he lives in the House. It has big halls and vestibules, is made of marble, and has three levels. Below, there are tides that wash through the halls, and above as clouds. Piranesi has spent years journalling and mapping the halls where he finds himself. He lives a simple life; he passes through the halls, he visits the skeletons of the thirteen other people he knows to have lived, he fishes and keeps note of the tides, and on Tuesdays and Fridays he meets with The Other.

The Other is the only other person that Piranesi knows to be alive currently. Piranesi doesn't know where he goes when they're not meeting, but assumes he is in the vast House somewhere. The halls are filled with marble statues depicting any number of things; Piranesi knows them all intimately. He also has reverance for the skeletons even though he doesn't know who the bodies were. As far as he knows, only fifteen people - includimg himself and The Other - have ever lived. 

One day The Other mentions something about an unknown sixteenth person. He warns that if Piranesi was to talk to them, he would go quite mad, so he must not talk to them. Piranesi trusts The Other so believes him. He sees evidence of the sixteenth person a little time later, in the form of arrows through the confusing labyrinth of halls and vestibules. Then Sixteen leaves a note for Piranesi but he, mindful of The Other, erases the words. But little by little things start to unravel. Piranesi discovers gaps in his journals, and the names of some other people. He can't trust himself and he has no idea who, what, or where he is. 

I thought at first Piranesi might be in heaven, because of the many rooms. Then I realised it has shades of Plato's Allegory of the Cave which I know about but can't explain in good enough detail to explain why I thought of it, but I really did. I liked how the story unravelled and I thought it was a satisfactory ending. I just leaned into the weirdness and got involved in Piranesi's life and thoughts. I'm giving it four out of five. 

The Vipers by Katy Hays - Review

I read The Cloisters by Katy Hays and didn't hate it, but I didn't love it either, so I don't know that I would have given her another chance but then someone chose this for an online book club that I'm in so I bought it on eBay for a few quid and picked it up. And I ended up liking it a lot more! So that's good.

The book is set on the island of Capri so it has the summer gothic feel that I love, where everything is so bright and sunny but there's an undercurrent of threat and something sinister. I loved the setting and could picture it perfectly. 

The main characters are Helen and Lorna. Helen is the daughter of the Lingate family. Her dad and uncle, Richard and Marcus, have a lot of money and are very rich and influential. Thirty years ago, on Capri at the villa they always stay at, Helen's mother Sarah, a famous playwright, fell over a cliff and was killed. The family maintains that it was an accident, but Helen, who was a small child at the time, has always had her doubts. Her father and uncle - and Marcus' wife, Naomi, who drinks too much and takes a lot of prescription drugs - keep her on a really tight leash. She went to college but had a driver and so on; she's  never been free. 

She's determined to make things happen, so she's looped in Lorna, who is Marcus' assistant, to help. Pretty soon in the book the reader knows that Lorna has disappeared, but not exactly why. But as soon as the family arrive on Capri they run into an old friend, who was on the island the day Sarah died, and there's something for Helen too - a present. It turns out to be the necklace that Sarah was wearing when she died. 

A ton of things happen and it did get slightly confusing in places, and there are quite a lot of people involved, but I liked the story and the setting. I thought it had a good ending, too. I'm giving it four out of five. 

The Frozen People by Elly Griffiths - Review

 

So you know I'm a huge fan of Elly Griffiths and have read everything she's written for adults, and a couple of her books for children, but when I first heard of this book I wasn't thrilled about it. It involves time travel and I was like ....sure. So I didn't buy it. But then when I was at Stockport Noir in January Elly was there and the way she talked about this book was enough to pique my interest. So I bought a copy of it for Elly to sign. Then when I mentioned it to my mum and to my friend Sarah, who both also really like Elly, they both said that it's really good and I should give it a go. Sarah said that you just accept the time travel premise and how it's done, and that the book carries you along with it. 

So I picked it up in March and I have to say my mum and Sarah were right - I really liked it and the story is good enough to forget my misgivings about time travel. I will definitely read the second and more in the series! 

The protagonist is Ali, she's in her forties and has a son called Finn who is about twenty five. She had him pretty young and was married to his father (Declan? Duncan? One of those) but they have divorced and don't particularly get on. Ali's job is for the police, ostensibly in 'cold cases', but in actuality, a scientist in the department has cracked time travel. Ali has been back in time just once, when she and a colleague went to the 1960s to witness a crime to bring back to the present day for relatives to get closure. There's just six people in the department and it's obviously on a need to know basis. 

Finn works for a Tory MP called Isaac Templeton. Ali is disappointed if he believes in Tory politics, which I thought was very funny, but she appreciates that he has a good job and is learning his way in politics, etc. Then Isaac gets in touch with Ali's department and she has to go see him. 

He explains that his great grandfather, Cain Templeton, was a bit of a wrong 'un, that he might have belonged to this group called The Collectors - and rumour has it that to join the group, you had to kill a woman. There are details in his diary of a murder in a house he kept, and Isaac wants to be sure that Cain didn't kill this woman so Ali has to go back in time to see. Cain certainly did collect some weird things, like people's brains and so on, so it seems like he really might have murdered this woman. I liked the similarities here to Jack the Ripper and to other groups like The Collectors. 

Ali is helped in her transformation into a Victorian lady by several people, including the scientist in the department, whose name I've forgotten but I liked her a lot too. The time travel goes well and Ali arrives in the 1860s and goes to Cain Templeton's house. It isn't where he lives - he's posh so he has a manor house in Sussex or something - but he keeps the house for artists he's patronising and other waifs and strays. Ali sees the murdered girl and isn't sure who has murdered her, so does some enquiries. She is supposed to return home at the same time the next day, when the 'portal' will be open again, but when she gets there, it doesn't work. 

She's stuck. She rents a room in Cain's house and starts trying to unravel what has happened there. She poses as a widowed lady and tries to get herself back home. Victorian London is not a fun place to be...

Meanwhile Finn is in legal trouble back in the present day but with his mum 'away' for work he's having trouble too. 

I liked Ali a lot and can't wait to read more about her. I liked Finn too. The set up was just good, and it was a good story for the first in a series. I'm giving it four out of five. 

2 Mysteries by Enid Blyton - Review

The Secret of Moon Castle was one of my favourite Enid Blyton books when I was a kid. I had it in a compendium of three stories, and it was the first story in that book. The book is probably still in my mother's attic, but a few years ago when I wanted to reread it I bought this book, which has two stories in it. I am entirely sure that I've never read the first story in this book, so maybe I just read The Secret of Moon Castle when I bought this several years ago. 

I was looking for something short to read so picked this off the shelf. I decided to read the first story, even though I didn't know the characters. It's cute, I quite liked it. The main character is Nicky and he has a dog called Punch. In the book, it's the first day of the Easter holidays and Nicky is exciting to be rushing around with the dog and his best friend, Ken, who lives next door. 

Then they get the good news that Nicky's Uncle Bob is coming to stay! He is a private detective and Nicky is thrilled, and wants to set up some mysteries for Uncle Bob to unravel, even though he is supposed to be coming to rest and recuperate. Nicky and Ken start flashing lights at night - but then someone flashes back! Nicky and Ken set up a note for Uncle Bob to find, thinking they are clever, but Bob is on to them. But then they end up embroiled in a real mystery, including Ken's sister Penny and her friend Winnie. The boys can't stand them but they end up having to work together. I thought this was a cute mystery. 

The Secret of Moon Castle stars Jack, Peggy, Mike, Nora, and Paul. Peggy, Mike and Nora are biological siblings. Jack is their adopted brother - I can't remember if this is explained in earlier books, as I know I read a couple of them. And Paul is Prince Paul of Baronia, because of course he is. He has his manservant, Ranni, with him. There is some racism in how these two characters are portrayed, which did make me roll my eyes. 

Anyway Paul's parents, the King and Queen of Baronia, obvs, want to come and stay in England and rent a castle. Of course. So the childrens' mother, Mrs Arnold, requests the particulars for castles, and starts looking through them. The children pick up one of the ones she's discared, about Moon Castle. They don't understand why she has discarded it so ask her; she thinks it is far away from anything. But they decide to go visit anyway and set off on a two hundred mile round trip in Ranni's huge car. Of course. 

When they stop for lunch they mention to the castle to the waitress, who says that strange things happen there, that the place is haunted. The children and Mrs Arnold ignore her and go anyway. They meet a hostile welcome, though. The caretakers are Mrs Brimming and her sisters, and they do not want to show everyone around the castle. They keep saying that Mrs Brimming's son, Guy, who is a scientist, will be fuming that they let the visitors in. Mrs Arnold insists on it, though. 

She decides the castle will be fine for Paul's family so rents it, but before the Baronians can come over, two of Paul's brothers get the measles or something, so their visit in postponed. No matter, the children can go visit instead, supervised by their nanny? type of woman, Miss Dimity (who they called Dimmy). They go, assured that Guy has cleared out of the Tower, which they are desperate to visit. 

But as the children settle in, strange things do start to happen! Stringed instruments start to play themselves, and vases jump off shelves! The children start to investigate and visit the nearby ruined village of Moon. 

I still loved this mystery, it's really cute and kept my interest. In all I'm giving both books four out of five. Nostalgia reasons, I'm sure, but I liked my reread. 

 

Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver - Review

Demon Copperhead was the February choice for my book club, and I started listening to it way back in January. I had finished Cuddy in good time before our meeting, so I decided to start this. It is LONG, it's like 23 hours of audiobook time. So I was getting a good start, I thought!

But then, it's just SO depressing. I didn't realise that it's meant to be a modern retelling of David Copperfield, set in the 90s in the opiate addiction crisis in the south of the USA. Maybe if I had known that to begin with I would know what I was getting into, but I didn't, so. Not that I am particularly familiar with the plot of David Copperfield, but I do know it's depressing, so that might have helped. 

Demon is the protagonist of the novel and it's all told from his point of view. His real name is Damon, but most kids call him Demon. He lives with his mom in a trailer on land belonging to the Peggots. She is a teen mother and an addict. Demon gets close to the Peggots' grandson, Matt, whose mom is in prison. He is better known as Maggot and he becomes a goth teenager which was quite funny. 

Demon's dad died before he was born, and there's little other family around. Life is hard. Then his mother takes up with a guy called Stoner who is incredibly abusive towards Demon. His mom overdoses and goes to rehab and Demon enters foster care for the first time. He is with an old farmer nicknamed Creaky, who has four boys in his care and who is abusive towards each of them. The eldest one, Fast Forward, is popular and the others dote on him. He introduces them to drugs. 

Demon's mother overdoses again and dies, and Stoner takes off so Demon ends up in foster care with a family only in it for the money. He is forced to sleep in the dog room and is starved by the family. He works for a man called Ghali and manages to save up some money. Just before his foster family move a way away, Demon takes off, determined to hitchhike to Tennessee to find his dad's mother. He considers Knoxville, where Maggot's aunt and cousin live, but ends up in Tennessee. He finds his grandma and spends a few happy weeks with her and her disabled brother, but ultimately they can't keep him. But they find better foster care for him, in the shape of Coach and his daughter Angus, who are vaguely family. 

Demon is good at football and Coach starts to whip him in to shape as a star player. As he moves into high school he is quite popular because he plays for the team, and he meets a girl called Dori. He injures his knee playing football and thus begins an addiction to opioids himself. I know that he ends up with Dori for a while, but unfortunately I don't know the end of the book because I had to give up on it. It is SO depressing. I liked Demon a lot and felt for him, but everything just kept going wrong and even when it went mostly right - like when he's living with Coach and Angus - he sabotages it and then life shits on him some more. I just couldn't listen to more than just over half. I'm counting it though because I listened to over half of it, so there. Three out of five. 

 

The Chemist by A A Dhand - Review

I bought this book at the crime book festival that I went to at the end of January. A A Dhand was there, and I didn't realise he was the author of the TV series Virdee, which is set in Bradford and which I watched a few episodes of. He was talking about this, his new book, and I liked the sound of it so I bought it and got him to sign it for me. He is a really lovely person, but I didn't enjoy the book that much.

It's about a pharmacist, Idris, who has a pharmacy in Headingley in Leeds. He is married to Maryam, a GP, but he has an ex wife, Rebecca, who he is still in touch with and who he's still fond of. He deals a lot with methadone users - who come to the pharmacy daily to take their methadone under supervision - and he has a lot to do with the local sex workers of Beeston. Rebecca does too as part of her job, so when a sex worker called Amy calls on her, Rebecca goes to help. 

Amy's punter was a man called Patrick, who is part of a big crime family, and he's just got out of prison. He tries to pull a fast one on Amy, she calls Rebecca, and Rebecca kills him. Then she phones Idris for help. He does indeed try to cover it up, with the help of a local called Al, a Syrian refugee, who is a drug runner inside a notorious load of high rise flats called The Moorings. Idris has been blackmailed into providing drugs for the estate, because his money is in short supply and he is scared of the kingpins there. 

It's a very complicated and convoluted plot and it was just so confusing for me. Then there's a few people whose names are really similar - for example two men called Daniel and Damon - which made it hard to keep them straight in my head. Every time I thought the plot surely had to be over now, something else would pop up and someone else would come along and threaten Idris and he would have to make even stupider decisions. 

I did like Idris and I liked Rebecca as well. I couldn't tell you if I liked Maryam (I'm not even certain on the spelling of her name) because she's in it for like two scenes. I understand that this book is the first part of a series and I would like to read more for Idris, but I am just not putting myself through it again. It's way too complicated for me. 

Two out of five. 

Winter by Val McDermid - Review

I got this book with one of my Waterstones vouchers, I bought it not long after Christmas in my haul then, and I knew I wanted to read it before this winter was over. I kept meaning to pick it up and finally got round to it at the beginning of March. I don't know about you, but winter returned with a vengeance at the beginning of March - we had sleet, hail, and tons of wind! So it was perfect to read this book then. 

This is only a short book and apparently it's one of a series on each of the seasons, by different authors. I would really like to read the other ones so maybe I'll seek them out. My review won't be very long because it really is a short book, but I really enjoyed it, and recommend it. 

Apparently Val settles down each winter to write a new novel, so it's a time of creativity for her, a time to hunker down and work. I really liked knowing that about her writing structure, it was interesting as I've read a lot of her novels. She also writes a lot about her Scottish childhood and the brutality and beauty of a Scottish winter. I found her writing really evocative of the time and space and learnt a lot about Scotland in the 1950s and 60s. Did you know for example that the puritanical church didn't celebrate Christmas so it wasn't a bank holiday in Scotland until the mid 1960s, which explains why they celebrated New Year/Hogmanay so much more! So interesting. 

I lent the book to my friend Morag, who I go to craft club with, and who is only a couple of years old than Val. She is Scottish herself - obviously, with a name like Morag - and I thought she would find it really interesting and evocative of her own childhood too. 

I'm giving it five out of five and will definitely read it again!

Murder Before Evensong by Richard Coles - Review

I of course have heard of Richard Coles' books and I even caught one episode of the TV show and quite liked it, but I wouldn't have picked up the book ever I don't think. But someone chose it for our book club choice in March, so I got it to read. And I didn't rate it at all and definitely won't bother reading any more of his books! Hey, at least I know that now. By the time you read this I will have been to book club and I am interested to see what other people thought of it, because I just didn't like it much.

I know Richard is a Church of England vicar of course and some of the stuff about the inner workings of the church was both interesting and funny, but I felt there was too much of it that it bogged down the book. The main character is Canon Daniel Clement. His parish is semi rural and has a typical parish church. There are the flower ladies and the local archivist and the local teachers etc, and there's also the Lord of the manor up at the big house, who is the patron of the church. Daniel is considering putting a toilet into the church - which was a whole thing in the C of E like thirty five years ago - and the flower ladies are outraged because they want a bigger room and because the pews - oh god, the pews - are historic, blah blah blah. Daniel thinks this will be his biggest problem but then Anthony, cousin to his lordship, is found murdered in the pews (oh god, the pews!!!). 

Daniel lives with his mother, Audrey, who is a gossipy woman who worries about his far too much, and they're also joined by his brother Theo, who is an actor. He's about to be a vicar in a TV show so he's keen to shadow Daniel but he's kind of just in the way. There is a lot about the gossipy old women of the village which I did enjoy; they're very true to life and I loved how they tried to get one up on each other. The manor house was a convalescence home during World War Two, so there's a lot of history there which becomes pertinent to the plot. 

I was confused by the sheer number of characters, some of whom have very similar names, so I think there could have been some cut out there. I was confused about the time period too, I found it very hard to decide when the book was set. I decided on around 1990, but I'm really not sure. I would have liked something concrete about that. 

I'm giving this three out of five ish in general. I didn't hate it but it needed a better edit and the story got bogged down in places. 

The Sleepwalkers by Scarlett Thomas - Review

 

I bought this recently when I was browsing in Waterstones with a voucher. The blurb appealed to me so I thought I'd give it a go. I've never heard of Scarlett Thomas and was intrigued; I love to discover new authors so it was worth a shot. 

However, I didn't like the book very much. I thought it was confusing and trying too hard to be better than it was, to have like a twist in the tale to make the reader rethink the whole book. But this didn't happen, so it didn't work. 

The book is told in a few different media, which adds to the confusion. The first, longest part, is a letter from Evelyn to her new husband, Richard. They are on their honeymoon on a Greek island and have arrived at a villa owned by Isabella. Something happened at their wedding that neither of them want to talk about. They spent the first week of their honeymoon with Richard's best friend Paul, and his latest girlfriend, Becky. The four of them had fun together in their cheap hotel, sunbathing all day and then eating at the local taverna all night. But Paul and Becky have left and Evelyn and Richard have gone to the villa. The stay was a wedding present from Richard's parents and Evelyn is not thrilled. 

Isabella is odd, and the honeymoon suite is odd too. Evelyn would like another room but is told only that one is available. One day she leaves a not for Richard which then disappears; things like this keep happening. Isabella gives her the cold shoulder while showering affection on Richard. He gets a full English breakfast and when Evelyn asks for fruit she gets just unripe melon. She's uncomfortable and wants to leave but Richard makes out like she's just overreacting. 

Then there is the story of the sleepwalkers. The year previously, at the end of the summer season, just before the annual storm rolled in, an older couple were staying in the villa. James, the husband, who was experiencing some kind of religious delusion, went for a walk and ended up in the sea, and Claire (I think that was her name) followed him, and they both ended up drowned. Evelyn is disturbed by the story. She's also obsessed with some young people who she keeps seeing around the place; she thinks they're some kind of Turkish pop band. This part of the story just seemed totally irrelevant and although it was resolved at the end I don't think it was done to justice.

The second part of the book is Richard's letter to Evelyn, which reveals what happened at the wedding, which is a massive secret; I liked this part of the book a lot. Richard is unlikeable but his part reveals that Evelyn isn't the innocent she pays herself as either. She used to be the housekeeper for his parents, which adds a different spin on their relationship.

The next bits of the book are some transcripts and some half scribbled notes. I didn't feel like this worked a lot, it just left me a bit cold. The last part is another letter, but how it ended just really annoyed me. I'm giving this two and a half out of five. 

A Spot of Folly by Ruth Rendell - Review

After I enjoyed the Ruth Rendell book Shake Hands For Ever back in October, I thought I would like to read something else by her so I reserved three books by her from the library. I then renewed those loans a bunch of times, but never mind, that's what libraries are for! I did however pick this book up eventually at the end of February. 

I really enjoyed it. It's a book of short stories and they all kept my interest and were amusing. They all seemed typical of the type of people that she would write novels about - posh middle Englanders in somewhat boring marriages in a lot of cases. A lot of the stories had a twist in the tale with unexpected endings, or endings that make the reader go Ohhhh. I love short stories like that. 

There's also a ghost story which I really liked. There's a long story about a woman who steals things from people who have annoyed her. That comes back to bite her in the bum in a really unusual way; I thought it was well done. One of the stories was written under Rendell's pen name, Barbara Vine, which was interesting to read too. 

In general this was a good read, just the kind of thing I needed. I'm giving it four out of five. 

Girls to the Front by Lucy Nichol - Review

I got this book from my Secret Santa at Christmas, but I know who that was! For the past couple of years, Lee's family has done a secret Santa where each adult just buys presents for one other adult, up to the value of £60. It makes things a lot cheaper, and it means each adult can choose things they'd really like. in 2025 Lee and I chose a new toaster and kettle that we wanted for our kitchen, but they were only £30 so we could choose other things we wanted too. I said I would  like champagne because I love champagne. My Santa was Libby, one of my sisters in law, who knows I love books. She got me the kettle, a bottle of champagne that I have not yet drunk, and this book. It's set in the north east where Lee's family is from, and where Libby lives, and I really appreciated that! 

The beginning of the book sees a woman called Roma in police custody. She is lying about what happened with the body she has been found with, but is obviously covering for someone. We then go back to a few weeks ago in Roma's story. She works at a place called Electric Dreams which sells old video games and DVDs and stuff. Roma had some kind of breakdown previously and had to leave her graduate job, so she works there instead of something more stressful. She enjoys the work and her colleagues though. She lives with her two best friends, Jonny and Leila, and they definitely care for each other and all of that. 

At work they often get given boxes of house clearance stuff. In one such box, Roma discovers a home video accompanied by a menacing note. She is intrigued and goes to some trouble to watch the video (which is like thirty years old by the time she finds it). On it, there is a video of a young woman passed out on a sofa in a hotel room, and some men talking about how they're going to assault her. The accompanying note identifies these men as members of the band The Razor Heads, who often played in a local venue. Roma is disturbed by what she has seen and is determined to take the video to the police. She begins to get a bit obsessed with discovering what happened to the woman on the video, and her flatmates are concerned about her. 

In a parallel narrative, Kat is a mature student in 1995. She is friends with a younger student called Alison. They go to see the Razor Heads and while there, Alison decides to crowd surf. As she is doing it, she is assaulted by random hands in the crowd, including sexually assaulted. She is obviously upset and shaken up. Kat realises that there is a problem with the band and with the venue. She starts to investigate, as she's a writer on the student newspaper, and discovers loads of girls with similar complaints. She is a bit of a loner and is a bit witchy and fierce too. 

I liked both narratives and loved how they came together. This book is described as feminist and thrilling with a 90s nostalgia thing, and it definitely did all that for me. I liked it a lot and am giving it four out of five. 

Bog Queen by Anna North - Review

I can't remember where I heard of this book but I think someone I follow on Instagram was reading it. I asked Lee for it for Christmas, and picked it up in February. It's a really lovely novel, it felt like good literature and really interesting to read. 

There are two strands to the narrative. Firstly, in 2018, there is a post graduate student called Agnes who is called to help identify a body that has been found in a peat bog in Ludlow. She is American, and she's kind of a loner, and a bit strange? I liked her a lot, but she is odd. She has left behind her dad and her (ex?) fiance in America; her dad really wants her to go home but she's enjoying her life in Britain, even if she finds the English a bit baffling. She's very clever. 

The body is supposedly that of a woman who was murdered by her husband in the 1960s. He has confessed to the murder and says he buried her in the bog. Her relative (niece I think?) travels from Spain for her, etc. Only when Agnes starts her examination, she realised the body is much older than the 1960s. She is a perfectly preserved bog woman. Agnes realises that she has several injuries to her body, but that she survived most of them - she died from just one of them. Someone cared for her while she was ill.

Some environmentalists are interested in the bog and want to stop the police and archaeologists from digging there, because of the moss (which is kind of a strand in the book too, but I found that bit quite weird so didn't altogether read those little excerpts). Agnes tries to get them on side while also trying to work out who the bog woman is, and what her story is. 

The second narrative strand is of course of the bog woman herself, who remains unnamed which I liked, because she is unnamed in 2018 too. She is an Iron Age woman who is only around seventeen or eighteen. She is the local druid in her village and has been for a couple of years since she took over from her mother. She has a fight going on with her brother and his clan. At the very beginning of the book she leaves her village to travel to one of the Roman settlements in the south east of Britain - I think it's supposed to be Chelmsford - with her brother and a friend, Aesu and Crab. They run into trouble and I really liked their story. 

I loved the book and am giving it five out of five. It was just a really good read. I would definitely read something else by Anna North! 

We Fell Apart by E Lockhart - Review

We're back in the same universe as Family of Liars and We Were Liars! I didn't even know this was a thing! Then I spotted this book in The Works in Ripon just before Christmas, and got Lee to buy me it as a Christmas gift. I picked it up in mid February, still on my mission to read all my Christmas gifts before too long! I loved this, it was so nice to be back in that universe. As a reminder, in We Were Liars we meet the Sinclair family, who are super rich and own an island - of course! - and there has been a devastating fire. I won't spoil We Were Liars but read it, oh my god. I wanted to throw my tablet out of the window when I read it. I can remember so specifically where I was, too, away for the weekend in North Yorkshire and I was lying in bed one morning reading the end of the book. I love it when books stay with you so much. 

This book starts just a week after the fire on Beechwood Island. Matilda is eighteen years old and about to go to college. She is living in LA with her kind of stepdad, Saar, who is an actor. Her mother, Isabela, is living in Mexico with her new boyfriend, having basically abandoned Matilda. Matilda has never known who her father is, but then she gets an email from him. 

He is Kingsley Cello, the reclusive artist. His paintings sell for millions, and in her research Matilda learns very little about him. He changes his back story a lot and is never truthful, so Matilda is just basically confused. Still, he sends her the money for a plane ticket, so Matilda heads out to Massachussetts (I'm not sure I've spelt that right, hey ho). In the airport she meets Holland and Winnie, who come back into the story later, which I won't spoil. She meets a rude taxi driver and follows confusing instructions, but eventually she's at Kingsley's property in Hidden Beach. 

He had built a castle, with four turrets and everything. There's a map in the book which I love, I always love to see things in pictures! There's a pool house and steps down to the beach, and the whole place is basically falling apart. At the house Matilda finds Meer, her half brother, and his mother, June, who is Kingsley's partner. She is thrilled to have a brother, but still wants to meet her dad, of course. June doesn't want her there and makes this very clear.

Also living in the castle is Brock. He is a former child star who went off the rails and who came to Hidden Beach to sober up, to recuperate and relax. He is barely older than Matilda and Meer, who are only a month apart. Then there is Tatum - who is the taxi driver from earlier! He wants rid of Matilda immediately, but as the weeks pass romance builds between them. I loved the romance actually and thought it was very sweetly done. 

Meer is nice to Matilda and wants them to bond, but everyone else wants rid of her and won't answer her questions about Kingsley. They keep fobibng her off and saying he's in Italy and that he'll be back any time, but as time goes on it's obvious that there are so many things going on that Matilda has no idea about. She doesn't know who she can trust or how to make things right in Hidden Beach.

I love the atmosphere of the book, it's hazy and dreamy and very reminiscent of We Were Liars. It feels like the heat of the summer is setting in and everyone is going a bit crazy in the place. I'm giving this five out of five, it's E Lockhart at her absolute best! 

Stockport Noir Crime Festival

On the 31st of January I headed over to Stockport to go to a crime fiction festival. I saw it advertised absolutely forever ago and bought myself a ticket. I would have been better if Lee had been there with me to carry books and so on, but I didn't want to spend the money on two tickets, so I sucked it up and went by myself. I took my things in a backpack, which did help. I took my lunch and drinks and snacks etc with me too so that I didn't have to leave the venue. I set off really early which meant I did get a space in the car park. Such is life with a disability! 

Even though I was there early I still had to queue a bit to get in. It was fun though, everyone was just really excited to be there. Once I got in I picked up a lanyard and a goodie bag. Inside was a proof copy of a book that I haven't even heard of, so I'll look forward to reading that! 

There was tea and coffee and then everyone went in to the main hall for the first panel. The first panel was debut authors and I think they all did brilliantly. Immediately after each panel were signing lines. I have to say that these could have been better organised. Plus when I've been to other lit festivals, I - as someone who uses a walking stick - have been pressed to go to the front of the lines so that I didn't have to queue. That didn't happen here so I ended up in some pain, which was a shame. After the second panel I even asked one of the organisers if I could go to the front of the queue, and while he did help me he did it with some bad grace which made me feel even worse. If I could give feedback on this to the authors I absolutely would, but I haven't seen how to do that (yet?). It left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth. 

The panels were all great though. The moderators asked some really amazing questions and everything was funny and insightful. I really liked the sound of a LOT of the books, so I bought four from the bookstall that was in the venue. I do think their prices were very high, but I had some Christmas money to use so that's okay. 

I ate my lunch in the break out room, which was also where the signings were, so it made space a bit squeezed. I would prefer if they could do that differently next year too! I got talking to a woman I was sitting next to in the main hall, so that was nice. 

The final panel of the afternoon had Elly Griffiths on it. I have read most of her books and have met her twice before, but I hadn't bought any of her new series which features time travel, mostly because it sounds a bit weird. But it sounded interesting so I did buy it so that I could get her to sign it. I wore my Bruce Sprinsteen t shirt especially for her as she's a big fan (which is why Ruth Galloway is also a fan!) so we talked about him and how much we love him, haha. 

I didn't stick around too long after the last panel, and managed to get home in good time so that I could rest for a bit. I had ended up carrying a lot of books and other stuff, by myself, which I'm proud of, but I was tired! 

My freebie tote bag

All the panels, these are backwards in time but not to worry! 

Proof I was with Elly! 

And here's what I came home with! Bad Deeds was the book I got for free. The top right is a chapter sampler but Rebecca was really interesting and her book sounds really good so I got her to sign this sampler for me and will probably buy it when it's out. Everything else just sounded really interesting so I bought them and got them signed!

What You Are Looking For Is In the Library by Michiko Aoyama - Review

This was one of the books that I got in the swap I did at Christmas, where the person I was swapping with was actually my friend Sarah Beth, which was really nice because it meant we knew each other and it was nice to choose books for Sarah Beth and really lovely to receive books that they really rate. I wasn't sure about this one at all, but was obviously willing to give it a go. My friend Stacey had also read this one and said I should get to it, so I did. As a reminder, I was trying to read all the books I got as gifts for Xmas in February, and I managed it! I'm thrilled that I did this, but it's not even the end of February and I have finished all five books! 

Anyway, this book. It is a book in translation which I always really like to read, although I don't get to many. This one is translated really beautifully which I think added to my enjoyment of the book. 

The book has five different protagonists, all of whom are struggling with something in their lives. They each end up in this one community library, either accidentally or because they're encouraged to go. There, this mysterious librarian called Ms Komachi, who sits needle felting in a little cubby by herself, will find for them several books. Among them will be a curve ball, something they weren't expecting, but which gives them exactly what they need in life. 

The first person is a young woman who works as a sales assistant who needs a push to educate herself a little better. She also makes some kind of rice ball things and maybe ends up starting a relationship with someone she works with. The second person is an accountant - a boring, safe life, but he really wishes to open an antiques store. He has his reasons for that, from his past. Some of his story ends up being reflected in someone else's story further on, too. I liked how all five people's lives were interwoven in this way for the reader to know even if the protagonists themselves don't realise it. 

The third person in the book had my favourite story. She used to be a magazine editor but then got pregnant, and was replaced while she was on maternity leave. She is struggling with life now - it's busy, she has to think about her daughter and deal with all the admin, etc. Her husband is trying, but she feels very alone. She's forty, and I just really liked her story arc. I like how her little section ended up, too. It felt very real for a lot of forty year olds. 

The fourth person is a manga artist, a young man who needs the library to help him learn new things. He's not in education or employment and he's flailing a bit. I liked him, and the fifth person, who is newly retired and isn't sure what to do with himself. 

As I say, all the stories do interweave a bit, in a really clever way. I did mostly like this book, but found it drifted a little bit. I'm giving it three and a half out of five - it didn't quite get to four stars but it was close.