I’ve had a mixed reading week but a great week for finding new books to escape into.
Here’s what I’ve read and bought this week and what’s up next.
This was a mixed week for reading. I set two good thrillers aside, binged on a collection of twenty-four Alfred Hitchcock-inspired short stories, and was greatly amused by a Jane Austen novel I’d never read before.
On the Yorkshire moors, celebrated author Faye Mathis is coming to terms with her early-onset dementia. She has begun writing her memoir, committing her past to paper before her memory betrays her. But her family history is full of gaps, bloodlines cut short, family ties all ending in knots…
When a picture of Faye – dirty and dishevelled, stumbling alone on the moors – goes viral, her life is thrown into chaos. Faye is convinced she is not that person in the photograph. But how can she be sure?
Faye sets out to find the true identity of the woman in the photograph. But the more questions she asks, the more confounding the truth becomes. As her darkest suspicions begin to bear true, Faye is forced to question all that she knows and everything she doesn’t.
Because every family has secrets, and there’s always someone who wants them to remain that way.
Joanne Haynes has a secret: that is not her real name.
And there’s more. Her flat isn’t hers. Her cats aren’t hers. Even her hair isn’t really hers.
Nor is she any of the other women she pretends to be. Not the bestselling romance novelist who gets her morning snack from the doughnut van on the seafront. Nor the pregnant woman in the dental surgery. Nor the chemo patient in the supermarket for whom the cashier feels ever so sorry. They’re all just alibis.
In fact, the only thing that’s real about Joanne is that nobody can know who she really is.
But someone has got too close. It looks like her alibis have begun to run out…
This week, I began to think that psychological thrillers might not be for me. ‘Secret Sister‘ and ‘The Alibi Girl’ are both well-written, deeply engaging psychological thrillers. I set both of them aside partway through.
I set ‘Secret Sister’ aside when it reached a point where I felt the main character had nothing but misery ahead of her that I didn’t have the stomach for. I set ‘The Alibi Girl‘ aside because I didn’t want to spend any more time in the head of the paranoid but vulnerable main character.
My review of both books is HERE
Birds, Strangers and Psychos is a thrilling anthology that brings together the biggest names in mystery and crime fiction to pay homage to Alfred Hitchcock, the legendary filmmaker whose name is synonymous with suspense. Acclaimed editor Maxim Jakubowski curates 24 original short stories, each inspired by the mood, tension, and style that defined Hitchcock’s groundbreaking work. This anthology invites both emerging and established voices to reimagine the chilling atmospheres, twisted plots, and unforgettable characters of Hitchcock’s films, from Psycho and Vertigo to North by Northwest and The Birds.
Each author takes on the challenge of evoking the quintessentially ‘Hitchcockian’ elements that have captivated audiences for decades: ordinary lives interrupted by peril, psychological duels, and unexpected encounters that spiral into nightmares
Maxim Jakubowski has done a great job of recruiting talented writers to generate brand new inspired by Alfed Hitchcock. The twenty-four stories in this collection vary greatly in style and content, but they each do their part to evoke the spirit of Hitchcock’s movies and TV shows. Not all of them matched my taste, but I’m sure other readers will have different favourites.
These stories kept calling to me throughout the week. I consumed all twenty-four of them in five days.
My review, including coments on and a rating of each story, is HERE
There was a lot more to ‘Northanger Abbey‘ than I’d expected. It was more than a satire of the Gothic novels popular in Jane Austen’s youth. It was also a realistic look at the challenges faced by a seventeen-year-old girl, who has always been loved and dealt with honestly by her parents, when she enters Society and meets people who say things that don’t mean, are motivated by desires that they hide and conceal calculation of self-interest behind a mask of civility, hospitality and friendship
It’s often funny and sometimes acerbic or arch, especially when Jane Austen is describing the behaviour and attitudes of men towards women..
It was surprisingly modern both in how the author directly addressed the reader and in the behaviours of the young people in the story. Update the clothes and some of the language, throw in modern technology, and you could have a modern RomCom movie script.
This was the first of six Jane Austin novels that I’m reading in celebration of her 250th anniversary. It took a little longer than I’d planned, mostly because I was having fun writing my thoughts on each chapter as I read it. I’m behind schedule, but I’m going to try to stay with the format because it’s enhancing my enjoyment of the book.
As you can probably see from the books I’ve bought this week, I’m in the mood to use my reading to escape from the insanity of our current reality to realities that I will enjoy more. This week’s tunnels to escapist fiction include a cosy mystery (with a dog on the cover), two Urban Fantasies (one of which has a dog on the cover), a revenge thriller and a Wild West Vampire story.
Meet Sergeant Ali Wren and her trusty companion Officer Police Dog Wilson, a springer spaniel with a nose for trouble. Together they serve the small Yorkshire town of Heft, where everyone knows everyone else’s business. And if they don’t, that’s a cause for concern…
Ali, who has just returned home to Heft, needs all her diplomatic skills, not to mention a huge sense of humour, to navigate the requirements of her job. Drama lurks around every corner, from rogue parking in the disabled bays to a feud between the long-established Hooley bakery and a fancy new ‘cakery-bakery’. When Brian Bright reports his wife Melody missing, at first Ali thinks it’s just another routine case. The evidence overwhelmingly suggests that Melody has simply left, tired of playing a supporting role to Brian’s obsession with classic cars and his first (dead) wife.
But something niggles. When Ali and Wilson doggedly continue their investigation, they find there was more to Melody than anyone realised – and more to her disappearance too…
Well, the cover’s cute. The story has a dog as a main character. It’s set in the prettiness of the Yorkshire Dales. Nothing really nasty is going to happen. Hopefully, there will be mystery worth solving and people worth meeting. It’s also the first book in a new series so it could feed my need for cosy for some time.
Agent Cara Cruz is sworn to protect society from beings of myth and magic. She goes after her targets with relentless determination and a heavy dose of snark. Despite her unconventional methods, the results are among the best in her agency.
A supernatural event forces Cara to return home to Las Vegas, where she must deal with her dark and painful past.
Can she survive when faced with the enemy she harbors deep inside herself?
On vacation from their peaceful lives in rural Minnesota, Spencer Mack and his best friend arrive in Sin City, excited to compete in a national escape room competition. Their lives are upended when a rogue sorcerer’s terrifying magic nearly destroys them. Under Cara’s protection, the two men find themselves as targets of paranormal creatures and deadly spells.
Unknown to Spencer, his blood is worth more than its weight in gold. The vampires, sorcerers, and other beings who thrive off blood magic will do anything to get it, including murder.
I’m hoping that the book is better than it’s cover (Why do so many Urban Fantasy books have such awful covers?). If it’s fast, fun and action-packed, I’ll be happy.
Most people come to Destiny Park for entertainment. They come to have their cards read to tell them a bit about their future. They come to walk through a beautiful park and to eat at the hotel’s restaurant. They come in the hope of catching a glimpse of the Arcana, the paranormal beings who rule the Isle of Wyrd.
But some people come to make a bargain with the Arcana—to change their fate. And some people come for dark purposes.
When Detective Beth Fahey is sent to Destiny Park to inquire about a “ghost gun,” she will begin a strange journey on which she must learn to navigate the Arcana’s unforgiving laws and dangerous attractions. Her search will draw her into seemingly impossible cases and the secrets of her own past as tensions rise between the Arcana and their human neighbors across the river.
For the Isle of Wyrd is a place where the dead ride trains to their final destinations, predators literally become prey, and seekers’ true natures are revealed in the ripples of destiny unknowingly stirred in their wakes.
Who will live? Who will die? And who will be lost in between?
THE FIRST BOOK IN A NEW ANNE BISHOP URBAN FANTASY SERIES!
I don’t think I need to add anything to that. OF COURSE I bought it.
Esmie is meant to be invisible.
Just a cleaner with a foreign accent that no one quite has time to place, and a uniform of leggings and a duster that allows her to explore the homes of the wealthy Woodlands gated community, unnoticed.
Which is exactly what she wants. Because Esmie isn’t really a cleaner.
One of the residents of Woodlands has ruined her life. And when she finds out who, she’s going to make them pay . . .
The darkest book that I’ve bought this week but I think the focus is mainly on a woman working to take justifiable revenge on people who I’m not going to like, so it should still meet my escapist aspirations. Plus, it was £0.99 on Amazon, so what’s to lose?
Welcome to LonePine, Wyoming, population 438, where the best of the west faces off against the rise of the undead. It’s a love story for the ages when a broke cowboy and a glamorous big city reporter fall lipstick over boot heels in love. But she carries a 2000-year-old secret in her veins that will test their unusual romance to the very edge of death, and beyond.
Saddle up for a hilarious, sexy, existential gallop through the dying American west with an army of ancient bloodsuckers in hot pursuit.
I have a weakness for Weird West novels. I like the idea of one fantasy world (the imaginary Wild West that has overwritten a history of genocide, misogyny, the violence of the rich towards the poor and the wilful destruction of an ecosystem) being subverted by other fantasy worlds, in this case, one where vampires exist.
If ‘A Very Unusual Romance’ lives up to this piece of marketing by the publisher, I’ll be happy:
First published in 1999 and now re-released in its third printing, the definitive “author’s cut,” The Cowboy and the Vampire: A Very Unusual Romance is the first book of The Cowboy and the Vampire Collection. A cult-classic genre mash-up that deftly navigates the darkest sides of human nature while celebrating the power of love and lust.
This week, I’m reading an historical mystery that I’ve had on reserve from my local library for months and now have two weeks to read, the newly published sequel to ‘Legends & Lattes’ and the next book in my Jane Austen Binge Read Challenge.
Maisie Dobbs is back and this time she has been hired to find a wealthy grocery magnate’s daughter who has fled from home. What seems a simple case at first becomes complicated when Maisie learns of the recent violent deaths of three of the heiress’s old friends. Is there a connection between her mysterious disappearance and the murders? Who would kill such charming young women? As Maisie investigates, she discovers that the answers to all her questions lie in the unforgettable agony of The Great War.
I read ‘Maisie Dobbs‘ (2003) three years ago and was impressed at how Jacquline Winspear tackled the impact of the slaughter of World War I on the people who survived it. I’ve been meaning to get back to the series ever since. I thought I’d read this series through my local library. It’s a sign of the popularity of the books that I’ve been waiting for this for three months now. I’m hoping that it will demonstrate that the Maisie Dobbs series is a must-read one.
Fern has weathered the stillness and storms of a bookseller’s life for decades, but now, in the face of crippling ennui, transplants herself to the city of Thune to hang out her shingle beside a long-absent friend’s coffee shop. What could be a better pairing? Surely a charming renovation montage will cure what ails her!
If only things were so simple . . .
It turns out that fixing your life isn’t a one-time prospect, nor as easy as a change of scenery and a lick of paint.
A drunken and desperate night sees the rattkin waking far from home in the company of a legendary warrior surviving on inertia, an imprisoned chaos-goblin with a fondness for silverware, and an absolutely thumping hangover.
As together they fend off a rogue’s gallery of ne’er-do-wells trying to claim the bounty the goblin represents, Fern may finally reconnect with the person she actually is when anything is possible . . .
I started this series with the prequel ‘Bookshops & Bonedust‘ (2023), which persuaded me that maybe I should believe some of the hype and read ‘Legends & Lattes‘ (2022). I enjoyed them both, so when I heard that there was going to be a third book, featuring one of the characters from the sequel, I pre-ordered it. It arrived this week and I’ve already started it. So far, I’m enjoying that Travis Baldree has avoided easy answers to ennui and has declined to write a second version of ‘Legend & Lattes’ with a bookshop replacing the coffeeshop. I’ve also settled into Travis Baldree’s narration, which I’d had my doubts about.
Pride and Prejudice is an 1813 novel of manners by Jane Austen. The novel follows the character development of Elizabeth Bennet, the dynamic protagonist of the book who learns about the repercussions of hasty judgments and comes to appreciate the difference between superficial goodness and actual goodness. Mr. Bennet, owner of the Longbourn estate in Hertfordshire, has five daughters, but his property is entailed and can only be passed to a male heir. His wife also lacks an inheritance, so his family faces becoming poor upon his death. Thus, it is imperative that at least one of the daughters marries well to support the others,
‘Pride and Prejudice‘ (1813) is the second book in my JANE AUSTEN 250TH ANNIVERSARY BINGE READ.
My introduction to Jane Austen’s work came via M. Macnamara’s ‘I Have Five Daughters‘, a stage play based on ‘Pride and Prejudice’. I was fourteen and taking part in a joint production by my (at the time) single-sex boys’ Comprehensive school and the local all-girls Grammar school (there’s a whole play’s worth of material about class and gender differences and awkwardness right there). I was completely miscast as Bingley ( I’d have been a better fit for Collins). Fortunately, the girl playing Jane Bennett helped me stumble through the role.
Anyway, in preparation for the play, I read the book and was stunned at how good it was. I’ve re-read it a few times in the past fifty-plus years and always enjoyed it. This time, I’m going to listen to the audiobook narrated by Rosamund Pike.
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