books Archives - Page 2 of 16 - The Quick and the Read

Book Review: ‘A Curtain Twitcher’s Book of Murder’ by Gay Marris

This was one of the most bizarre books I’ve read in a while – and I mean it entirely as a compliment!

The novel is set on Atbara Avenue in 1968. It’s a seemingly close-knit community where people know each other’s business and routines, especially the vicar and his interfering wife who watch and discuss the goings-on on the street in often humorous detail. Each chapter has a different focus – a quirky resident, a house, usually a death – and it’s a structure that works brilliantly as we move between distinctly odd vignettes about what goes on behind the closed doors of the road. There’s also tonnes of clever plot points, as bits from earlier stories prove key later on.

When I initially picked this up, I assumed it would be cosy crime. There’s actually not much cosy about Atbara Avenue – but there is a dark humour that runs throughout and some really compelling observations about human nature, whether it’s sibling rivalry, the concealment of secrets or the domestic situations people normalise (such as the bullying parent/adult daughter relationship that opens the novel). Underneath the slightly shabby but genteel surface, Atbara Avenue is an absolute hotbed of crime! It might not be completely believable that all this happens in such close proximity, but each story is engaging and lively in its own right.

I also loved the setting – the 1960s time period allows us to see the contrast in the staid and conservative older generation and the younger characters. It also allows for some gripping murders that probably now would be solved in a trice with CSI and forensics and so on. Instead, there’s a good chunk of the Atbara Avenue murderers who get away with – yup – murder! At least seemingly…

This is an unusual and highly engaging book – there were plenty of twists that surprised me, but I also think I need to read it again to go over some of the more subtle points and links between the stories. If dark humour and a clever narrative is your thing, this is for you!

I received a copy of this book for review from NetGalley – opinions, as always, are my own.

Photo by Simon Berger on Unsplash

(Audio)Book Review: ‘A Haunting in the Arctic’ by C. J. Cooke

I was in two minds about reading this book – on the one hand, I’m obsessed with anything set in the Arctic. What a fascinating, inhospitable, fabulous place with plenty of scope for peril, adventure, tragedy, isolation, creepiness…it has it all! On the other hand, I’m often less convinced by ghost stories as I often find them just too silly. Regardless, the Arctic won me over and so I picked up this book.

The story is essentially in three parts, with the focus skipping between the three timelines quite regularly. One of the strands is set in 1901 and features Nicky Duthie, daughter of a shipping company owner, being kidnapped and taken on board the whaling ship, the Ormen. Then there’s a 1973 strand (not featuring heavily) where the Ormen (now in use as a scientific research ship) is found drifting with a missing crew and just one mutilated body on board. Finally, there’s a modern strand in which Dominique, an urban explorer, travels to the ship just before the wreck is due to be sunk forever off the coast of Iceland. Here, in the almost perpetual darkness and freezing cold, she is determined to uncover the secrets of the ship.

I did worry initially that I’d fail to engage with a narrative that moved so frequently between time periods. However, I found that Dominique and Nicky’s stories were so different that it was easy to follow. I thought I’d probably like the historical story the best (as I love historical fiction), but I did find Nicky’s story really very grim. I’m not one for trigger warnings, but there’s a lot of casual rape and abuse which I found quite hard to process. Instead, I found myself much more interested in Dominique’s story, although baffled as to why anyone – no matter how intrepid – might want to explore/live in/broadcast on social media such a dangerous location!

The Arctic was – as I expected – magnificent. I loved the description of the people surviving in the inhospitable terrain, the darkness, the bitter cold, the maritime details of life in the North Sea (less keen on the actual whaling!) I thought the setting was great and gave the sense of claustrophobia even within the massive open spaces of Iceland.

And as for the ghost story – I did find it engaging and relatively credible. There were definite twists that I didn’t see coming and Cooke skilfully manipulates the reader’s sense of dread in seeing the mysterious female figure in the barren Arctic landscape. I did appreciate that the ghostly elements weren’t there for all-out horror, but something more subtle to do with shadows of the past. Indeed, the plotting was clever and the revelations kept me reading.

I should also mention that I listened to the audiobook which is narrated excellently by Lucy Goldie. I loved the fact that she has quite a strong Scottish accent which was perfect for the Scottish origins of the story and the associated mythology around selkies that feature in the novel.

This is an intriguing novel and one that kept me interested throughout. Some of it I found uncomfortable, but I loved the sense of setting and the fact that it kept me guessing to the end.

I received a free copy of the ebook from NetGalley for review. As always, opinions are entirely my own.

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

Blog Tour: ‘Whole Life Sentence’ by Lynda La Plante

It’s out now! The last book in the brilliant Tennison series – this is Book 10 and it’s another great mystery.

Thanks to Compulsive Readers for inviting me to join #TeamTennison and to Zaffre Books for my review copy. Opinions, as always, are my own.

I’ve loved this series and it has been a treat to read it from the start with other bloggers as part of #TeamTennison. It’s been great to see Jane Tennison develop from a new recruit in the Metropolitan Police to a DCI in the prestigious AMIT unit. Along the way, she’s investigated IRA bombings, serial killings, cold cases, armed robberies and a fair dose of police corruption – it’s been a varied career and an enjoyable one to follow.

Blog Tour: ‘Forget Me Not’ by M. J. Arlidge

Thanks to Compulsive Readers for inviting me on the blog tour for this – the latest in the brilliant DI Helen Grace series. Thanks also to Orion Books for my copy of the book – as always, opinions are entirely my own.

A new M. J. Arlidge book is always a treat – fans of the series will know exactly what I mean and what to expect. There’s always the fabulous but maverick DI Helen Grace at the book’s heart, usually immersed in a tense, dangerous and high-stakes investigation as part of Southampton Police’s Major Incident Team.

This book starts on Day One with the abduction of a young girl, a case that DI Grace wants the team to prioritise. However, she is put under strict instructions to put her team to work instead on the gang crime that is taking over Southampton’s streets. As DI Grace is never one to follow orders, she begins work on the case of the missing girl – and uncovers some disturbing and dark secrets that are a little too close to home…

Blog Tour: ‘Taste of Blood’ by Lynda La Plante

Here we are – the 9th and most recently published of the Tennison series! This marks the last of my regular #TeamTennison reviews…until the publication of Book 10 in July!

Thanks to Compulsive Readers for inviting me on the tour and Zaffre Books for my review copy. As always, opinions are my own.

Book Review: ‘You Don’t Have To Be Mad To Work Here’ by Benji Waterhouse

I’m really intrigued by people’s jobs and always enjoy a sneaky behind-the-scenes look at other people’s careers. Especially jobs I could never do in a million years – and NHS psychiatrist can definitely be added to this list if this book is anything to go by!

Benji Waterhouse takes us on a journey through his psychiatric career – right from when he chose to specialise in psychiatry through to his various placements as he grapples with the state of mental healthcare in the NHS. Through this, we also learn a bit about Waterhouse’s family, his own mental health problems (it’s totally normal and actually recommended for psychiatrists to be in therapy themselves) and his feelings about the challenges of the job.

The easy comparison here is Adam Kay – like Kay, Waterhouse is funny and self-deprecating, but also doesn’t shy away from the more shocking elements. It’s always engaging and eye-opening, but often sad and frustrating too, as a lot of Waterhouse’s initial learning seems to be how to discharge patients who he has serious concerns about but for whom there is no available hospital bed. We meet a range of these patients – some ‘frequent fliers’ who play the system, some tragic and suicidal cases, and some whose mental health challenges have comic elements (although much of the humour is really levelled at Waterhouse himself). It’s important to say that Waterhouse doesn’t undermine the dignity of the patients – obviously, they are given pseudonyms or are amalgams of cases he’s encountered, and their difficulties are presented as (sometimes temporary) ailments or through unusual situations rather than being who they are as people.

I really enjoyed this book, if ‘enjoyed’ can be the right word for something that raised so many concerns about the broken NHS system of mental healthcare. This is a system stretched to its limits, peopled by those who are doing their best in impossible circumstances and receiving little recognition for their considerable efforts. However, it’s also often a warm portrait of patients who Waterhouse clearly cares about deeply. In fact, he comes across well himself too – a caring, if stressed and hardworking doctor with a bit of imposter syndrome and going through an incredibly steep learning curve.

This will make you very glad you’re not an NHS psychiatrist, but very grateful for the fact that some people do sign up for it as they’re clearly needed. It will definitely make you want mental health services funded properly. It will also raise a few smiles too – there are some lovely comic touches, with the table tennis story being my favourite!

Thanks to NetGalley for my review copy – opinions are entirely my own.

Header photo by rivage on Unsplash

Book Review: ‘Divine Might’ by Natalie Haynes

I absolutely love Natalie Haynes – her writing is excellent and her podcasts (‘Natalie Haynes Stands Up For The Classics’) are both enlightening and witty. She can take some impossibly complex ideas and make them engaging, accessible and entertaining – this is exactly how I like my Classics and I just wish that my lecturers at university back in the mists of time had been half as funny when we looked at Homer!

Book Review: ‘Hunted’ by Abir Mukherjee

Wow! The pace of this book is incredible – this is one you’ll pick up, read at every opportunity and it will have to be prised out of your hands!

I really loved Abir Mukherjee’s Wyndham and Banerjee historical crime series, but I didn’t know whether I’d feel quite the same about a modern thriller as they aren’t my usual fayre. I’m quite happy to report that I loved this too.

Book Review: ‘The Ministry of Time’ by Kaliane Bradley

This was such an odd book! I think mostly in a good way, but it really wasn’t what I was expecting.

The story focused on a top-secret project where selected figures from the past have been ‘rescued’ from death in their own time periods and transported to the future. In this future, each of the ‘expats’ from history are assigned a ‘bridge’, a civil servant to help them acclimatise to their new existence. One of these visitors from the past is Commander Gore, an explorer who – as far as the history books are concerned- died on a failed expedition to the Arctic in the Victorian era. He is assigned to a female ‘bridge’ and so begins the process of learning about the modern age. However, nothing (and especially secret time travel, it seems) is simple and the project soon proves to be more dangerous than was envisaged for all involved.

Book Review: ‘The Midnight Feast’ by Lucy Foley

I’ve enjoyed previous books by Lucy Foley, so was pleased to be granted a review copy of ‘The Midnight Feast’. Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley – opinions, as always, are entirely my own.

This book centres on the opening of an exclusive resort, The Manor, on the beautiful Dorset coast. Guests flock to the high-end luxury and anticipate a fabulous solstice feast, all overseen by the owner of the great house, Francesca. However, the site has a dark past and some of the guests are perhaps not welcome. When a body is discovered at the base of the cliffs the day after the solstice party, the police have a task on their hands to unravel the events of the past that have brought The Manor and its guests to its latest tragedy.