Watching what I’m reading . . .

It’s a winter day! We have the fire lit so the house is nice and cosy while the rain pelts down outside. I do enjoy the sound of the rain on the roof when I’m not having to go out in it!

We have been watching Formula 1 and Indy cars and reading. Such a nice way to spend a Sunday.

So what am I reading?

This is Why We Lied (Will Trent #12) by Karin Slaughter. I will finish it this afternoon. A very intense read. And I still have no idea who killed Mercy McAlpine . . .

One toxic family. Eight suspicious guests. Everyone is guilty. But who is a killer?

Welcome to the McAlpine Lodge: a secluded mountain getaway, it’s the height of escapist luxury living.

Except that everyone here is lying. Lying about their past. Lying to their family. Lying to themselves.

Then one night, Mercy McAlpine – until now the good daughter – threatens to expose everybody’s secrets. Just hours later, Mercy is dead.

In an area this remote, it’s easy to get away with murder. But Will Trent and Sara Linton – investigator and medical examiner for the GBI – are here on their honeymoon.

The Briar Club by Kate Quinn. I am loving this and will also finish it today. Enchanting. Captivating. Beautifully written.

Washington, D.C., 1950

Everyone keeps to themselves at Briarwood House, an all-female boarding house in the heart of the US capital, where secrets hide behind respectable facades.

But when the mysterious Grace March moves into the attic room, she draws her oddball collection of neighbours – a poised English beauty, a policeman’s daughter, a frustrated female baseball star, and a rabidly pro-McCarthy typist – into an unlikely friendship.

Grace’s weekly attic-room dinner parties and window-brewed sun tea become a healing balm on all their troubled lives, but she hides a terrible secret of her own. And when a shocking act of violence tears the house apart, the Briar Club must decide once and for all: who is the true enemy in their midst?

And I am listening to The Last Mrs Parrish by Liv Constantine and narrated by Suzanne Elise Freeman and Meghan Wolfe. I wanted to read this before I started The Next Mrs Parrish and I’m pleased to say I am not disappointed.

Amber Patterson is fed up. She’s tired of being a nobody: a plain, invisible woman who blends into the background. She deserves more—a life of money and power like the one blond-haired, blue-eyed goddess Daphne Parrish takes for granted.

To everyone in the exclusive town of Bishops Harbor, Connecticut, Daphne—a socialite and philanthropist—and her real-estate mogul husband, Jackson, are a couple straight out of a fairy tale.

Amber’s envy could eat her alive . . . if she didn’t have a plan. Amber uses Daphne’s compassion and caring to insinuate herself into the family’s life—the first step in a meticulous scheme to undermine her. Before long, Amber is Daphne’s closest confidante, traveling to Europe with the Parrishes and their lovely young daughters, and growing closer to Jackson. But a skeleton from her past may undermine everything that Amber has worked towards, and if it is discovered, her well-laid plan may fall to pieces.

I have five books to read for review in the coming week . . .

For Once in My Life by Sian O’Gorman. This is the second book I will have read by this Irish author and fills one of the criteria for my June Aussie Reader’s challenge. And isn’t that just a joyous cover!

A Tale of Love, Discovery, and Second Chances…

In the bustling world of Dublin’s advertising scene, Kitty O’Sullivan, a copywriter, feels an unexplainable void in her life that she can’t quite pinpoint. Her five-year relationship with Dave is stagnant, her creative juices have dried up and she’s even entertaining thoughts of marriage as a cure-all! Something’s missing from her life but she can’t work out exactly what it is…

When Dave decides to take time out from ‘them’, Kitty finds herself momentarily liberated to explore life and have some fun. She and best friend Shazza are corralled into joining a five-aside football team where she meets the intriguing Sweetman brothers, Tom and Rory.

As they sail around the enchanting coast of Dublin, engage in fierce football battles and stumble upon a magical secret drinking den, Kitty falls in love with her new life – and her new self – but is it only temporary until Dave returns?

Will Kitty find the answers to life’s mysteries and take charge of her future?

Join Kitty on this journey of love, self-discovery, and the pursuit of a life truly worth living.

Just About Coping by Natalie Cawley, a memoir.

At the psychologist’s clinic of an NHS hospital, Noah needs help with procrastination, Bill compulsively lies, Steph is coping with rejection and their therapist, Dr Natalie Cawley, is dealing with her own emotional crisis, breathing into a paper bag between patient sessions.

In this honest, often poignant and frequently funny memoir about training to be a psychotherapist, we meet the patients grappling with mental health issues, from OCD and addiction to self-deception and toxic relationships, and see how Dr Natalie helps them understand and change these attempts to self-soothe.

Storm Child by Michael Robotham, an Australian author I love and the final book I need to read for my June Aussie Readers Challenge.

The most painful of Evie Cormac’s memories have been locked away, ever since she was held prisoner as a child – a child whose rescue captured hearts and headlines.

Forensic psychologist Cyrus Haven’s mission is to guide her to something near normality. But today, on a British beach, seventeen bodies wash up in front of them. There is only one survivor, with two women still missing. And Evie’s nightmares come roaring back . . .

Whatever happened all those years ago lies at the core of this new tragedy. Because these deaths are no accident. The same dark forces are reaching out, dragging her back into the storm.

Evie must now call upon Cyrus’s unique skills, and her own, in their search for the missing pieces of this complex and haunting puzzle. But will that be enough to save them? And who will pay for the past?

Silent Ritual by Andrew James Greig, a new-to-me-author.

 An ear-shattering scream pierces the quiet Glasgow street as a mother stands frozen in her doorway, groceries strewn at her feet. Her son holds a bloodied knife while his father lies dead before him.

As Logan Martin begins his prison sentence for the brutal murder of his father, the eighteen-year-old’s aunt hires private investigator Teàrlach Paterson. She believes Logan is innocent and wants Teàrlach to uncover the truth.

Teàrlach’s visit to the Martin family home yields two disturbing discoveries: a pentagram etched under the carpet in Logan’s sister’s bedroom, and a link to the sinister deaths of their elderly neighbours—a journal with the same ominous symbol lies in the couple’s home. 

While ritualistic murders plague the city, bodies placed precisely on an occult pentagram, bound in intricate knots, Teàrlach and his team unearth the sinister inspiration behind the killings in a mysterious ancient map.

Then, two young women are reported missing, and Teàrlach fears the worst. He’s inching closer to a killer who is weaving a complex web of murder rooted in Glasgow’s pagan past. But can Teàrlach stop the twisted soul from carrying out another cruel ritual? This time, one of his own is about to be in grave danger.

And, finally, Vengeance is Mine by Michale Wood. This is a stand-alone novel.

A GRUESOME MURDER

Twenty years ago, a young girl vanished from a quiet street in Northumberland. When her body was found in an attic close to her home, the whole neighbourhood was shocked.

A DEVASTATING SECRET

For her entire life, Dawn Shephard has never known her father. But when news breaks that a murderer is about to be released from prison, her mother has no choice but to reveal his identity.

THE ORIGINS OF EVIL

As Dawn digs into her father’s history, she lands on a chilling connection. And the closer she gets to the truth, the more dangerous it becomes. Just how far will she go to discover if a killer’s blood runs through her veins?

Is there anything there that tempts your reading buds?

I think dinner tonight will be something easy like scrambled eggs on toast or mushrooms on toast. It’s definitely a toast sort of day!

I am heading to Hamilton on Tuesday so will pick Luke up from school and take him to his swimming lesson. I have a bagful of books to drop off to the hospice shop and, no doubt, will lighten their shelves of a few titles while I am there.

But right now, I am going to make a pot of tea and settle back in with my book (The Briar Club by Kate Quinn) – it’s one of those books that I find myself thinking about even when I’m not reading. The characterisations are superb.

Happy reading!