A delightful book of adult fairy tales, from the author of Johnathan Strange & Mr Norrell, and set mostly in the same world, though involing different characters and timescales. I would suggest, for book lovers, to get it in hardback, because it is an illustrated book, and the paperback version does not do it justice. …
Continue reading The Ladies of Grace Adieu by Susanna Clarke
I like Alice Hoffman books, with their subtle magic, darkness and everyday lives. I had forgotten that she also wrote young adult fiction, so when I ordered this one, it looked more like a novella. It's a sad book, the story of a 15 year old girl, whose parents and sister head into the city …
Everything is covered in cold, white snow in this novel of family trauma and intrigue in 1908 Wisconsin. Goolrick was inspired to write this book after coming across Michael Lesy's Wisconsin Death Trip, a photographic collection of residents of this area in the early 1900's with stories from records and newspapers of the subject's stories. …
Written by blogger The Virtual Victorian, this book tells the story of a 17 year old girl, Phoebe, coming of age caught between her strictly religious mother and beloved opera performer aunt. When her aunt kills herself after seeing a man from her past at a performance, family secrets start to emerge. Based in the …
Traffic is slow, and we're chatting about nothing as we round the curve and see the police tape and tired looking cops standing around in the rain. I've seen enough crime shows to know what a crime scene looks like. Whatever happened, it was really close to the road, and the tape everywhere means that …
Continue reading If you go down to the woods today… A Local Ghost Story.
In early 1800's Bath, a neglected, beaten child wanders in out of the cold and finds shelter and family with a young, kind hearted woman called Alice. Twenty years later, a newlywed bride is drawn into the mystery of Alice's disappearance when she finds that she resembles the missing girl. It's a novel of social …
I was really excited about this book when I read the premise for it, and in a lot of ways, it is a good read, but the ending is kind of... meh. Set in the late 1600's in Amsterdam, the story revolves around Nella, an eighteen year old country girl who is married off to …
As I was reading this book, something about it just didn't feel right. I guess that high school was long enough ago for me that I think back on it with the rose coloured glasses of nostalgia, so from time to time, I kind of like a coming of age story. But what drew me …
After growing up in a famous house of courtesans, run by her mother, a young American-Chinese girl is kidnapped and her virginity put up for sale, changing the course of her life forever. This book by Amy Tan is about the life of the Shanghai courtesan at the turn of the century, about the nature …
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