Spy stories aren’t usually my thing, but a middle-aged, single-mum spy? In 1960s London? With humour and sass and secrets? Yes, I’m sold!
Thanks to Aria and NetGalley for my review copy. Opinions are entirely my own.
Continue reading Book Review: ‘Mrs Spy’ by M J RobothamThis isn’t my usual genre, but having recently discovered Bridgerton (yes, I know I’m so late to the party that I nearly missed it!) I was intrigued by a Regency romance told through a trans lens. Thanks to HQ and NetGalley for my review copy.
Lord Christopher Eden lives as a recluse – having lost his parents, he’s been able to bury himself in life at his country estate with only a couple of trusted staff for company, keeping away from the gossip of the ton. Unfortunately, his comfortable existence it put in jeopardy when he’s told the future of his estate rests on him finding a wife by the end of the Season, which might just cause a few issues… One of his first hurdles is to appear as a respectable and eligible young bachelor in the eyes of high society – and for that, he’ll need a valet. Of course, the valet that arrives – James Harding – is problematically gorgeous and may prove to be quite the distraction from Christopher’s main goal.
Continue reading Book Review: ‘The Earl Meets His Match’ by T J AlexanderClassic crime fiction fans, this one is for you! If you can imagine a modern ‘And Then There Were None’ (Agatha Christie in fine form) and mix it with all the crime tropes you can think of, plus throw in some classic horror elements…you might be part of the way to imagining this book.
Thanks to NetGalley for my review copy. As always, opinions are entirely my own.
Continue reading Book Review: ‘You Are Fatally Invited’ by Ande PliegoThis is such a hard book to review – it’s so dark and gruesome, disturbing and odd, Gothic and horrific, yet also strangely compelling. I found that I couldn’t put it down, even as I was being pulled into the twisted workings of the protagonist’s mind.
The novel follows Winifred Notty as she arrives at Ensor House, the home of the fairly odious Pounds family. Her role is to be governess to the children, Andrew and Drusilla, although her unconventional bedtime stories and tendency towards brutality are at first dismissed as merely eccentricities compared to their previous governesses. As she begins to draw the attention of the master of the house, strange things begin to happen – someone defaces the family portraits and even the staff start to go missing… When guests begin to arrive for Christmas celebrations, it becomes obvious that Winifred is going to continue on the path of destruction that led her to Ensor House in the first place.
Wow, this book is so dark – we are literally taken inside the mind of a killer whose twisted way of looking at the world means that no-one around her is safe. Her thoughts and actions are presented in graphic detail and her total lack of remorse or empathy is chilling for the reader – although her voice is also often humorous and knowing and so not totally alienating for the reader. The book often focused on the macabre and grotesque – this is a book where description is frequently visceral and repellent. There’s lots of blood, bodily function, gorging on stomach-churning things, decay and rot, filth and death. Yes, it’s disgusting, but also shocking and interesting and unlike much I’ve read before.
As is evident from the above, Winifred isn’t a character we grow to love – this isn’t a book for anyone who needs to like the characters in what they read. In fact, every one of the characters is awful in their own way. Indeed, we are shown a procession of greed and lust and any of the other deadly sins you can name – and it’s probably best you don’t get attached to any of the characters anyway as they don’t have long life expectancies!
The writing is clever, although references to ‘fall’ for autumn jarred a little within a story set within Victorian England – in an otherwise immersive book, I found this tricky to skim over.
So, if you’re of a strong disposition then there’s much to get caught up in within the world of ‘Victorian Psycho’ – I’m not sure it is a wholly enjoyable experience, but it’s one you won’t forget!
Photo by Aimee Vogelsang on Unsplash
I haven’t been great at keeping on top of my blogging recently. Sometimes life just takes over! However, I didn’t want to miss the opportunity to highlight some crime fiction and thriller gems that I’ve enjoyed in the past few months.
‘The Dark Hours’ by Amy Jordan
I loved the premise of this novel – seeing a police officer at the very start of her career in 1994, then when she’s called back as a retired detective in 2024 to pick up a case that has echoes of that traumatic first one.
Continue reading Book Reviews: New Crime FictionThis is the seventh book in the engaging DS George Cross series – thanks to NetGalley for my review copy.
‘The Bookseller’ takes us into the (who knew?!) murky world of antiquarian bookshops. When a bookseller is discovered dead in his store, it seems unlikely that brutal murder would strike at the heart of the sleepy, bookish community in Bristol. However, DS George Cross soon discovers that the book world is packed with shifting allegiances, hidden secrets and bitter rivalries – all he has to do is work out who has the motive to kill, picking from a pretty packed field. Add in the multi-generational nature of the family-run bookstores and there’s plenty of simmering resentments for him to examine…
Continue reading Book Review: ‘The Bookseller’ by Tim SullivanWelcome to my stop on the blog tour for the latest in Bonnie MacBird’s brilliant Sherlock Holmes series. ‘The Serpent Under’ is the 6th book in the series and is a great addition.
With thanks to Random Things Tours and Collins Crime Club for my place on the tour and my copy for review. Opinions, as always, are entirely my own.
Continue reading Blog Tour: ‘The Serpent Under’ by Bonnie MacBirdCara Hunter is one of my favourite crime writers and a new DCI Adam Fawley book is always exciting! This is the seventh book in a brilliant series – although I think it would work as a standalone. It actually picks up the characters from a previous book in the series, although I didn’t know this until after I’d finished reading as I think it’s the only one of the series I haven’t read!
Continue reading Book Review: ‘Making a Killing’ by Cara HunterThanks to Random Things Tours and Laurence King Publishing for my invitation to join the blog tour for this puzzle book based on the Queen of Crime’s best-loved novels.
Opinions, as always, are entirely my own.
From the Publisher:
Can you work out whodunnit, with what and why like Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot? Put your armchair detective abilities to the ultimate test…
Do you have the flair, order and method of Poirot,
or the unassuming, shrewd intelligence of Miss Marple?
You’re going to need it…
A mystery is afoot. With a missing librarian and 100 perplexing clues left behind, can you solve the mystery and follow the trail of the crime?
Brush off your moustache, collect your knitting needles and put your little grey cells to good use with this puzzling series of events.
Immerse yourself in the world of Agatha Christie.
My Review:
What’s not to like? Agatha Christie and puzzles? Sounds like a match made in heaven to me, especially when the book is produced by the brilliant Laurence King Publishing who are also responsible for some beautiful literary jigsaw puzzles (including an Agatha Christie collection).
I was intrigued by how the book would hang together, but it actually works well – there’s little bits of narrative and a selection of puzzles arranged around a number of the most famous and popular of Christie’s books. It’s a book that you can easily dip into whether you know everything about Christie’s writing or whether you know absolutely nothing.
The puzzles themselves are varied and engaging – some (the word searches and gridwords) are quite easy, but there’s some really tricky ones in there too. I love logic puzzles and I was well served with some fiendish tests of reasoning. I liked the fact that the puzzles were themed too, e.g. lots of train-related puzzled for the ‘4.50 from Paddington’ chapter, word puzzles for ‘The ABC Murders’, hieroglyphics and pyramid-puzzles for ‘Death on the Nile’. The puzzles were varied and generally well explained (I only found one where the instructions baffled me!)
There is a final puzzle that brings together a solution to the over-arching story by asking you to revisit some of the puzzles. I love this idea, but haven’t managed to solve it yet because the puzzles themselves are keeping me very busy. There’s certainly plenty to do in this book!
This would make a great Christmas present for the puzzle fans in your life. Obviously, the core audience will be Agatha Christie fans who also like puzzles, but I did a few of these with my teen daughter and they were accessible to her, especially the crosswords, word searches and word grids. There’s so much variety that everyone will find something to enjoy. It’s a nice, gift-able book (and the answers are in the back for those moments when you’re completely stumped!)
Highly recommended!
About the Author:
Born in Torquay in 1890, Agatha Christie became, and remains, the bestselling novelist of all time. She is best known for her sixty-six detective novels and fourteen short story collections, as well as the world’s longest-running play, The Mousetrap. Her books have sold over a billion copies in the English language and a billion in translation too. Agatha Christie Limited (ACL) has been managing the literary and media rights to Agatha Christie’s works around the world since 1955, when the company was set up by Christie herself. The company is managed by Christie’s great-grandson, James Prichard. Follow Facebook @OfficialAgathaChristie, Instagram @officialagathachristie and X @agathachristie to keep up to date.
M W Craven’s writing is always a cut above, as anyone who has discovered the brilliant crime series featuring Washington Poe and Tilly Bradshaw knows. This series (of which this book is the second) takes a different genre – the thriller – and proves that Craven can turn his hand to this genre just as well.
Continue reading Book Review: ‘Nobody’s Hero’ by M W Craven
