Based on real characters, this book fictionalises the lives of Sarah Grimke, daughter of a plantation owner, and a slave in her household called Handful. Both women refuse to be put into the box prescribed them, and fight for the lives they believe they can and should live, in the process challenging society and finding …
Dombey and Son by Charles Dickens
I set myself the task this year of reading the remaining Charles Dickens novels that I hadn't already read before. I love a Victorian serialised novel, and Dickens rarely fails to disappoint. One of his less famous works, Dombey and Sons follows the life of Paul Dombey, a wealthy merchant whose sole aspiration in life …
Ticker by Lisa Mantchev
This book was so much fun. It's only short, I ripped through it in a day, and when I bought it I didn't realise that it was meant perhaps for a young adult readership. I just liked the premise for the book: a girl with a clockwork heart must race against time to rescue her …
If you go down to the woods today… A Local Ghost Story.
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.
The Misbegotten by Katherine Webb
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 …
The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton
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 …
Paper Towns by John Green
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 …
The Valley of Amazement, by Amy Tan
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 …
New House, New Bookshelves.
Every time I move house, I have that moment that all book-lovers have where you have to admit to yourself that you own a lot of books. Do you really need to own that many? Yes you do. Can you get rid of any so that there's less to move? No, you really can't. I …
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