Opening in 1807, Rachel grows up on the island of St Thomas, a child beloved by her father, who makes sure that she's well educated, and a mother who is cold and bitter. In her family there is also Adele, who is their servant, and her daughter, Jestine, who is like a sister to Rachel. …
This book of short stories by the author of Chocolat is a nice little collection of tales which personify the authors usual humour, pathos and sense of whimsy and the magical. The title comes from her answer to the question, if you were to be stranded on a desert island, what things would you take …
Continue reading A Cat, A Hat & A Piece of String by Joanne Harris.
In this coming of age story, Miriam, a young Jewish girl, discovers her love of painting, and follows her heart, from Romania to Israel to the US. Starting in the 1950's, in a politically hostile Romania, the story is as much about finding our place in the world, especially as an immigrant, as it is …
Continue reading No Portrait In The Gilded Frame by Tudor Alexander
Lacey Becnel is still recovering from the death of her beloved husband Fox, and the subsequent revelations of his infidelity, when she wakes one morning to find her self under an overpass in New Orleans, naked, with an unconscious and injured stranger lying next to her. As she starts to piece together what happened, she starts …
Continue reading The Incident Under The Overpass: Book One Of The Traiteur Trilogy by Anne McClane
I loved this book, and read it almost in one sitting! It's atmospheric, creepy and actually really fun, in a spooky way. It tells the story of a small town called Warboys, nestled in Britain, and the way that the entry of one beautiful woman tears the town apart. That woman is Agnes Samuel. If …
A more fun book this week than usual, a Victorian mystery/thriller about a girl who has inherited a criminal empire from her grandmother and must learn how to use her new power wisely. But as she is coming into her own, her long lost brother asks her to shelter a child, and she soon finds …
Continue reading Kitty Peck & The Child Of Ill Fortune by Kate Griffin
This is a hard review to write, because being sent the book by the author, I have to say that at the core there was something that I didn't quite get about this book. Former.ly is the story of a guy who is recruited to work at a mysterious social media start up for a …
Continue reading Former.ly: The Rise And Fall Of A Social Network by Dane Cobain
Perhaps Grisham's best novels were the early ones, like The Firm or The Client, but his more recent ones still make the best seller lists, and hold their own. In this volume, rather than being about a good lawyer in bad circumstances, it's about the type of lawyer we love to hate. The kind that defends …
There is nothing quite like an Allende story. I feel like her books read as though she's right there narrating them to you, like you're hearing someone's family history or life story, and yet her description is so evocative and insightful, it's something more than mere storytelling too. In this, her latest book, she writes …
Shardlake, that kind-hearted, hunch backed lawyer in Henry VIII's England is at it again, this time involved in a plot to incriminate the Queen Catherine Parr. This series of books is so evocative and immersive, I love sinking into them and being in the dark streets of London or whatever town Shardlake finds himself sent …
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