Watching what I’m reading . . .

HELP! I am completely lost with the changes to this site . . . Where has everyone gone? I can’t find the posts of everyone I follow. I miss you! This is not fun! Put it back to how it was, WordPress, please . . .

Meanwhile if you have managed to navigate the new system, please pass on some tips, ’cause I am just spinning around in circles going nowhere!

Currently I am reading The Birds and Other Stories by Daphne Du Maurier. The Hitchcock movie sure is different than Du Maurier’s story and sorry, Mr Hitchcock, but I greatly prefer the original story to your screenplay. It’s definitely creepier.

‘How long he fought with them in the darkness he could not tell, but at last the beating of the wings about him lessened and then withdrew . . . ‘

A classic of alienation and horror, ‘The Birds’ was immortalised by Hitchcock in his celebrated film. The five other chilling stories in this collection echo a sense of dislocation and mock man’s sense of dominance over the natural world. The mountain paradise of ‘Monte Verità’ promises immortality, but at a terrible price; a neglected wife haunts her husband in the form of an apple tree; a professional photographer steps out from behind the camera and into his subject’s life; a date with a cinema usherette leads to a walk in the cemetery; and a jealous father finds a remedy when three’s a crowd . . .

I am listening to a title from my 2019 backlist, We Hope for Better Things written by Erin Bartels and narrated by Steina Neilson. This is a powerful debut novel telling the story of three generations of Balsam women, told against the backdrop of racism and violence in America.

When Detroit Free Press reporter Elizabeth Balsam meets James Rich, his strange request–that she look up a relative she didn’t know she had in order to deliver an old camera and a box of photos–seems like it isn’t worth her time. But when she loses her job after a botched investigation, she suddenly finds herself with nothing but time.

At her great-aunt’s 150-year-old farmhouse north of Detroit, Elizabeth uncovers a series of mysterious items, locked doors, and hidden graves. As she searches for answers to the riddles around her, the remarkable stories of two women who lived in this very house emerge as testaments to love, resilience, and courage in the face of war, racism, and misunderstanding. And as Elizabeth soon discovers, the past is never as past as we might like to think.

And my pleasure read this week is Hannah Richell’s The Search Party. I have read and loved everything this author has written.

A spellbinding locked-room mystery about a glamping trip gone horribly wrong when a powerful storm leaves the participants stranded and forced to confront long-held secrets and a shocking disappearance.

Max and Annie Kingsley have left the London rat race with their twelve-year-old son to set up a glamping site in the wilds of Cornwall. Eager for a dry run ahead of their opening, they invite three old university friends and their families for a long-needed reunion. But the festivities soon go awry as tensions arise between the children (and subsequently their parents), explosive secrets come to light, and a sudden storm moves in, cutting them off from help as one in the group disappears.

Moving between the police investigation, a hospital room, and the catastrophic weekend, The Search Party is a propulsive and twisty destination thriller about the tenuous bonds of friendship and the lengths parents will go to protect their children.

I must admit to being a little creeped out by the birds appearing on the cover of two out of three books that I am currently reading. Don’t laugh, but even chickens terrify me. The only good place for them is in the oven.

This week I have a total of five ARCs to read for review. I am very much looking forward to getting into Behind a Closed Door by J.D. Barker.

Would you kill a total stranger to save someone you love?

Sugar & Spice is the latest app craze taking the world by storm, but for Abby and Brendan Hollander, downloading it leads to a dangerous game of life and death. When the app assigns them a series of increasingly taboo tasks, they soon find themselves caught up in a twisted web of seduction and violence.

Old Girls Behaving Badly by Kate Galley will, I believe, be the perfect antidote to J.D. Barker’s dark read.

Something old, something new, something stolen…?

Gina Knight is looking forward to the prospect of retirement with her husband of forty-three years. Until, to her surprise, said husband decides he needs to ‘find himself’ – alone – and disappears to Santa Fe, leaving a Dear John letter in his wake.

Now Gina needs a new role in life, not to mention somewhere to live, so she applies for the position of Companion to elderly Dorothy Reed. At eighty-nine, ‘Dot’ needs someone to help her around the house – or at least, her family seems to think so. Her companion’s first role would be to accompany Dot for a week-long extravagant wedding party.

But when Georgina arrives at the large Norfolk estate where the wedding will take place, she quickly discovers Dot has an ulterior motive for hiring her. While the other guests are busy sipping champagne and playing croquet, Dot needs Georgina to help her solve a mystery – about a missing painting, which she believes is hidden somewhere in the house.

Because, after all, who would suspect two old ladies of getting up to mischief?

We Were the Universe by Kimberley King Parsons will be my next read. I really enjoyed Black Light by this author.

The trip was supposed to be fun. When Kit’s best friend gets dumped by his boyfriend, he begs her to ditch her family responsibilities for an idyllic weekend in the Montana mountains. They’ll soak in hot springs, then sneak a vape into a dive bar and drink too much, like old times. Instead, their getaway only reminds Kit of everything she’s lost lately: her wildness, her independence, and—most heartbreaking of all—her sister, Julie, who died a few years ago.

When she returns home to the Dallas suburbs, Kit tries to settle in to her routine—long afternoons spent caring for her irrepressible daughter, going on therapist-advised dates with her concerned husband, and reluctantly taking her mother’s phone calls. But in the secret recesses of Kit’s mind, she’s reminiscing about the band she used to be in—and how they’d go out to the desert after shows and drop acid. She’s imagining an impossible threesome with her kid’s pretty gymnastics teacher and the cool playground mom. Keyed into everything that might distract from her surfacing pain, Kit spirals. As her already thin boundaries between reality and fantasy blur, she begins to wonder: Is Julie really gone?

I have loved every book by Jessica Redland that I have read – thank you Carla @CarlaLovestoRead for introducing me to her books. Her latest is A New Dawn at Owl’s Lodge.

Could one chance meeting change your life forever?

Zara is at a crossroads in life. While she adores her job as a producer’s assistant working on hit TV shows, travelling around the country means she doesn’t truly feel that she has a home. With a fractured relationship with her family and unrequited love weighing heavily on her heart, she is torn about what her next step in life should be…

Snowy is hiding from the world. He’s devoted his life to home schooling his young son and caring for sick owls at his home, Owl’s Lodge, deep in the Yorkshire Wolds countryside. While he’s passionate about both, it’s a lonely existence and he’s starting to question his decisions. But how do you step back into a world you’ve pushed away for years…?

When Zara brings an injured owl to Owl’s Lodge, its frosty, reclusive owner is far from welcoming. Despite hostilities, there’s a connection that neither could ever have prepared themselves for. As they discover a shared passion, a new friendship blossoms, but both Zara and Snowy are used to shutting people out.

Can they both find the courage to open up and the strength to move on from their pasts? And what could this mean for their future happiness?

And finally for the week is a collection of short stories by Amor Towles, Table for Two.

Millions of Amor Towles fans are in for a treat as he shares some of his shorter fiction: six stories based in New York City and a novella set in Golden Age Hollywood.

The New York stories, most of which take place around the year 2000, consider the fateful consequences that can spring from brief encounters and the delicate mechanics of compromise that operate at the heart of modern marriages.

In Towles’s novel Rules of Civility, the indomitable Evelyn Ross leaves New York City in September 1938 with the intention of returning home to Indiana. But as her train pulls into Chicago, where her parents are waiting, she instead extends her ticket to Los Angeles. Told from seven points of view, “Eve in Hollywood” describes how Eve crafts a new future for herself—and others—in a noirish tale that takes us through the movie sets, bungalows, and dive bars of Los Angeles.

Written with his signature wit, humor, and sophistication, Table for Two is another glittering addition to Towles’s canon of stylish and transporting fiction.

Does anything there interest you? Or perhaps there’s something that’s already on your shelf . . . let me know.

Happy reading! 💕📚

What’s new on my bedside table? . . .

Photo by cottonbro studio on Pexels.com

Do you have problems with deciding where contemporary fiction ends and historical begins? I certainly do. Is a book set in the 1960s or 70s historical fiction? It doesn’t feel like it to me, because I have lived through those times. But to someone in their 20s, it must seem so. Does anyone have any guidelines which may help iron out my confusion and indecision? I’d be grateful if you share them.

So here we are on hump day again. I have finally decided to stop fighting the greys in my hair and give in to them. My hair grows really fast, so two weeks after I have been to the hairdresser, I have a noticeable skunk stripe. It’s extremely frustrating, because I end up pulling my hair back into a ponytail all the time in an effort to make it less noticeable. Can you see Pete smirking? Because he says it doesn’t work. He’s probably right. I went to the hairdresser yesterday and Tracy put an ash blond through my hair to match my ‘skunk’ stripe as my husband so eloquently terms it, and I love it! I really don’t know why I was so anti going grey for so long!

So, what’s new on my bedside table this week?

I have had more book mail from Fremantle Press – just the one this time. Thank you, Clare and Adam. Right Way Down and Other Poems is an anthology of poems for children chosen by Rebecca M/ Newman and Sally Murphy, and illustrated by Briony Stewart. I have been dipping in and out at odd moments and am mostly loving what is offered. Expect my review soon.

Stand on your head with Sally Murphy.

Explode some dynamite with Cristy Burne.

Shoot some hoops with Cheryl Kickett-Tucker.

Grow a poettree with Meg McKinlay.

Curl up next to your cat with Amber Moffat.

Watch a bit of Stink-o-Vision with James Foley.

These and loads more poems by Australian poets are there to discover in Right Way Down. With striking illustrations by Briony Stewart, these poems will have you laughing, thinking, and playing with words – whichever way you read them.

And, oh dear! I have seven new ARC titles from NetGalley. How did that happen?

I’ll blame aliens . . . or computer hackers. Or alien computer hackers! (sorry, Luke and I have been working on a story together and I am very much still in stories-Luke-would-like mode.)

Death is No Excuse by David Baker jumped out at me because Pete and I are STILL procrastinating over our wills. I know, I know. But hopefully this book will have all the answers and get me motivated to finish everything.

What do Abraham Lincoln, Pablo Picasso, Aretha Franklin and Howard Hughes all have in common? They died without wills, left messy estates and tormented their surviving families who had to lawyer up and fight through the resulting nightmares for years.
Whether the reasons for this are death denial, penny-pinching or just too busy to be bothered, the majority of Americans will die in exactly the same predicament—no wills, no planning and nobody lined up to help their surviving families get what’s coming to them.
“Death Is No Excuse” is an insightful roadmap through the legal potholes of unplanned death and disability, offered by a veteran attorney who’s handled the worst of these cases for over forty years. It’s a plain-spoken, surprisingly entertaining guide to everything you need to know about planning for death or disability, as well as other calamities that can occur along the way, be they divorce, avoidable tax burdens or getting ripped off as you toddle into old age.
Told in twenty-three brisk chapters, each punctuated with a case history of life gone off the rails when people ignore the insights this book offers, “Death Is No Excuse” tells you how to avoid the pitfalls of un-planned death and disability.

Most of you will know by now that Stuart MacBride is one of my very favorite authors. His latest book is In a Place of Darkness and due for publication June 2024 (that’s so as all you other Stuart MacBride fans can preorder it.)

THE CLOCK IS TICKING…

Detective Constable Angus MacVicar has just landed his dream job – transferred out of uniform and assigned to Oldcastle’s biggest ongoing murder investigation: Operation Telegram, hunting the ‘Fortnight Killer’.

Every two weeks another couple is targeted. One victim is left at the scene, their corpse used as a twisted message board. The second body is never seen again.

This should be the perfect chance for Angus to prove himself, but instead of working on the investigation’s front line, he’s lumbered with the forensic psychologist from hell. A sarcastic know-it-all American, on loan from the FBI, who seems determined to alienate everyone while dragging Angus into a shadowy world of conspiracies, lies, and violence.

It’s been twelve days since the Fortnight Killer last struck, and the investigation’s running out of time. Angus’s shiny new job might just be the death of him…

I was excited to be approved for Amor Towles collection of short stories, Table For Two. That cover makes me think of Sean Connery as James Bond and his martini, ‘shaken not stirred’. Yes, I know it’s a wine glass and Sean Connery would probably have assassinated the bartender for such a transgression, but it’s the vibes the cover gives off.

Amor Towles

shares some of his shorter fiction: six stories based in New York City and a novella set in Golden Age Hollywood.

The New York stories, most of which take place around the year 2000, consider the fateful consequences that can spring from brief encounters and the delicate mechanics of compromise that operate at the heart of modern marriages.

In Towles’s novel Rules of Civility, the indomitable Evelyn Ross leaves New York City in September 1938 with the intention of returning home to Indiana. But as her train pulls into Chicago, where her parents are waiting, she instead extends her ticket to Los Angeles. Told from seven points of view, “Eve in Hollywood” describes how Eve crafts a new future for herself—and others—in a noirish tale that takes us through the movie sets, bungalows, and dive bars of Los Angeles.

Both this title and the next were a case of cover love! As winter is rapidly closing in (we had a frost last night and another expected tonight) I am drawn to anything summery. The End of Summer is by new-to-me author Charlotte Philby.

Your mother is not who you think she is…

When the phone rings in Judy McVee’s Languedoc farmhouse, she knows her past has finally caught up with her. It’s her daughter, frantically asking why there are journalists on her London doorstep making terrible accusations.

Decades earlier, Judy was a girl with big plans – to ensnare a rich husband, to make something of herself, to rise above her upbringing and leave behind past tragedies. Wealthy young widower Rory Harrington seemed the perfect target – but Judy hadn’t reckoned on actually falling in love with him.

Now her daughter Francesca, who has secrets of her own, must come to terms with the realisation that the mother she thought she knew wasn’t real. Where has Judy gone – and was anything she told her family true?

The Next Mrs Parrish by Liv Constantine is a sequel to The Last Mrs Parrish, which I am going to have to get from the library or pick up from a secondhand shop.

Amber Patterson Parrish has come a long way. Hard work and immaculate planning turned her from invisible wallflower to prominent socialite, but there have been bumps along the way. Less than a year after her husband Jackson’s tax-evasion scandal, Amber reigns supreme over the Bishops Harbor community. But with Jackson being released from prison, Amber’s free time – and money – is vanishing.

Meanwhile, Daphne Parrish left Bishops Harbor after her divorce from Jackson, swearing she would never go back. But when one of her daughters runs away from home, desperate to see her father, Daphne agrees to return for the summer. Jackson swears he’s a changed man, but Daphne knows all too well that he can’t be trusted.

When a ghost from Amber’s past emerges looking for revenge, these three find unlikely allies in one another. But who is playing who? When all is said and done, they’ll have to fight tooth and nail for everything they have left in this zero-sum game.

I have read several of Kate Quinns books with varying degrees of success, but after reading a few rave reviews of The Briar Club I knew I just had to have it and, what do you know, it was ‘read now’ for me! It was meant to be. 😉

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 last but not least is the audiobook of The Other Year by Rea Frey, and narrated by Brittany Pressley.

Can the entire course of a life be traced back to a single moment?

On a coveted two-week beach vacation, working mom Kate Baker’s nine-year-old daughter, Olivia, vanishes suddenly among the waves—a heart-dropping incident that threatens to uproot her entire reality. But in the next moment, Olivia resurfaces, joyously splashing.

What would I do if she didn’t come up? Kate wonders. How would I live without her?

In another set of circumstances that hold a different fate, Kate doesn’t have to wonder. Because in that “other” world, in the pulse-pounding seconds after Olivia goes under, she doesn’t come back up.

Told in parallel timelines, Kate begins to live two lives—one in which Olivia resurfaces and one in which she doesn’t. In the reality that follows her daughter’s death, she maneuvers through every mother’s worst nightmare, facing grief, rage, and the ques­tion of purpose in the aftermath of such profound loss. She endures, day by day, in a world without her daughter.

In her alternate timeline, while she explores a tremulous romance with her best friend, Jason, she finds herself grappling with the ex-husband who abandoned Kate and Olivia years prior. Even as Kate scrambles to hold her daughter close, Olivia pulls further away. The line between joy and loss seems to get thinner with each passing day.

Woven into a single story, both Kates discover a breathtaking fragility and resilience in their respective journeys. Bringing to light the drastic polarities dire circumstances often create, The Other Year explores truths about love, loss, and the sharp turns any life can take in the blink of an eye.

Well I hope you see something there that gets your requesting finger twitching!

I had a lovely afternoon with Luke yesterday, picking him up from school (i had trouble finding his new classroom and was late!😬) then taking him to swimming class. He is swimming like a little fish now. We played in the playground at the pool complex for a while then headed home to inspect the new cattle, as yet unnamed, and the chicken coop. After hockey Saturday morning Luke is going to pick up the eight chickens he has bought. The breeder has said that they should start laying in the next 2 – 3 weeks, then he will have eggs for sale at the gate. He is a very enterprising seven-year-old!

Pete should be home soon with his new (well new to us) Toyota Hilux ute! Me thinks he has watched too many Barry Crump ads over the years 😂🤣If you have never seen them, do a search for Barry Crump Toyota advert. It is classic kiwiana!

Well, the temperature is dropping so I need to get the clothes off the line, shut all the windows and doors which have been wide open through the middle of the day, and light the fire. I also need to think about what to have for dinner tonight because, right now, I have no ideas!

Have a wonderful week.

With Winter Comes Darkness by Robbi Neal

EXCERPT: Wednesday, 4 June 1975 – The Darkest Day

The Peugeot doesn’t stand a chance when the Mercedes livestock truck carrying 150 unhappy sheep ploughs into it on the back road to Creswick. It is the fourth day of June 1975, the fourth day of winter and darkness falls by 5.30. Pippa, who is just six years old and loves nothing more than her Ballerina Barbie (though Deluxe Curl Barbie comes a close second), has chosen to perch on the edge of the back seat, right in the middle so she has a better view out the front windscreen because she isn’t quite tall enough to see out the side windows. But her brother Max, who is seven, just won’t stop the rib-digging and the hair-pulling, and when she complains her dad, Liam, says, ‘Don’t tease your sister, Max,’ and Max just keeps going, so finally she turns to punch him. She clenches her fist hard and she swings her arm out and right at that moment, before her fist even has the chance to connect with Max’s cheek, the truck lands on them.

ABOUT ‘WITH WINTER COMES DARKNESS’: A terrible accident burns down a family’s life on the same day a murder is committed. From the ashes of these acts comes revelation, darkness, and the truth. Psychological suspense and profound family drama meet in this heartrending and original Australian novel.

1975, Ballarat Alice is happy in her world and in return for her happiness the world is good to her. She has everything she needs – a lovely house and children, and a devoted husband. Even though her journalism job doesn’t pay much, she doesn’t have to worry about the bills. All is well with her world until a terrible accident rips a child from her, a profound betrayal is uncovered, and things fall apart.

On the same day Alice’s world collapses, a man is found brutally murdered on respected teacher Ellery’s farm. Ellery can’t remember what happened but there is blood on his clothes, and he is arrested.

Neither Alice nor Ellery realise that their paths in life are about to intertwine and a desperate bargain is about to be made. A bargain that could save or destroy them in their quest to draw some light and fathom the darkness that surrounds them.

MY THOUGHTS: With Winter Comes Darkness is not a book to be rushed through. The writing is intricate, richly detailed, quietly powerful and almost poetic at times. There were instances I had to close the covers and walk away just to breathe, to get away from the anguish that oozes from the pages. At times I felt my heart was breaking for Max, who stops talking, and for Alice, whose whole world has imploded, and yes, even (maybe especially) for Ellery, awaiting trial for murder.

Lena, Alice’s mother, and Maggie, Liam’s mother, are wonderful supplementary characters; each of whom expresses their love in different ways and each of whom has hidden depths. Bruce would have to get the award for the world’s most supportive and understanding boss. I fell in, then out, of love with Claudia very rapidly, and the less said about Liam the better. Detective Rush is another character with hidden depths. Every character in this book is so well drawn that they could walk off the page and into real life.

This is a book filled with drama, tragedy and love; a mother’s love for her child (several times over); the tragedy of losing a child; the drama of a marriage going down the drain. And then there is Ellery. Enigmatic, mysterious Ellery on remand for murder, who fascinates Alice and gives her life focus. Ellery is the character who really stood out for me. Ellery and Max, each of whom is carrying a massive burden, a secret that is crippling them.

This is a subtly written story, one that will tear at your heartstrings. I defy anyone to read this without shedding a tear or two. It is beautiful and tragic. It is a classic in the making.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

#WithWinterComesDarkness #NetGalley

THE AUTHOR: She has lived in country Victoria, Australia, for most of her life. When Robbi isn’t writing, she is painting, or reading or hanging out with her family and friends, all of whom she adores. She loves procrasti-cooking, especially when thinking about the next chapter in her writing. She also loves cheese, any cheese, all cheese and lemon gin or dirty martinis, the blues, and more cheese.

DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Harlequin Australia, HQ & MIRA, via NetGalley for providing a digital ARC of With Winter Comes Darkness by Robbi Neal for review. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own personal opinions.

Red River Road written by Anna Downes and narrated by Maddy Withington

EXCERPT: ‘Hi everyone! I’m Phoebe and I’m a travel addict and van-lifer. I’m about to take me, myself and I off on the adventure of a lifetime – the big lap of Australia. Only two more sleeps to go. And before you ask, no I’m not scared. The first thing people say when I tell them I’m travelling alone is “Be careful”. Don’t even get me started on my parents’ response. But the world is full of magic, and solo travel offers way more rewards than risks. It’s just that the bad stories get told way more often than the good. . . .’

ABOUT ‘RED RIVER ROAD’: Katy Sweeney is determined to find her sister. A year earlier, just three weeks into a solo vanlife trip, free-spirited Phoebe vanished without a trace on Western Australia’s remote and achingly beautiful Coral Coast. With no witnesses, no leads, and no DNA evidence, the case has gone cold. But Katy refuses to give up.

Using Phoebe’s social media accounts as a map, Katy starts to retrace her steps, searching for the clues that the police have missed. Was Phoebe being followed? Who had she met along the way, and what danger did they pose? Was she as happy as her sun-bleached, lens-flared photos seem to suggest?

Then Katy’s path collides with that of Beth, a young woman on the run from her own dark past—and very recent present. And as Katy realizes that Beth might be her best and only chance of finding the truth, the two women form an uneasy alliance to venture forth into increasingly wild territory to find out what really happened to Phoebe in this breathtaking but maybe deadly place, and how her fate connects them all.

MY THOUGHTS: Red River Road, brilliantly written by Anna Downes and superbly narrated by Maddy Withington, blew me away. Tense, twisty, atmospheric and addictive are just a few of the superlatives I could use to describe this. I held my breath so often during the narrative, it’s a wonder I didn’t black out!

When I started, my first thoughts were ‘FFS! Not another alcoholic, unreliable narrator!’ But I’m pleased to report that’s not how it panned out.

The narrative is related from three POV: Katy, Beth and a 15-year-old boy, Wyatt, whose mother is also missing. All three of these main characters come across as slightly flaky and unreliable at times. Not constantly, just at times. The tension starts pretty much straight away and never completely disappears. If Anna Downes aim is to stop women travelling on their own, she has definitely succeeded with me.

There are a lot of threads to this plot which are slowly woven together to present the full picture, which turned out to be something I had never envisaged. Not even remotely imagined. There is some pretty heavy subject matter, but very little of it graphically described, including sexual assault, mental health issues, and stalking – both physically and on social media. There are some excellent and diverting red herrings, and lots of lies and secrets.

There is a general air of creepiness – who to trust? Anyone? No one? That man with the soulful eyes, reading a book? Those two women? The person I’m travelling with? Damn, I felt unsafe just reading this and I am no shrinking violet. Much is made of local legends, myths and reports of missing women. Just how can someone and their van just disappear off the face of the earth? Well, it turns out it’s quite easy . . .

What sealed the five-star rating for me was that final line in the book. Superbly chilling!

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

#RedRiverRoad #NetGalley

THE AUTHOR: ANNA DOWNES was born and raised in Sheffield, UK, but now lives just north of Sydney, Australia with her husband and two children. She worked as an actress before turning her attention to writing.

DISCLOSURE: Thank you to W.F. Howes via NetGalley for providing an audio ARC of Red River Road written by Anna Downes and narrated by Maddy Withington for review. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own personal opinions.

In Her Place by Edel Coffey

I just discovered I hadn’t posted my review of this rather wonderful book, which I read earlier in April. So here it is . . .

EXCERPT: Sometimes the membrane between the knowledge that her mother was dead and the idea that she might somehow find a way back to Ann was very thin. In quieter moments, meditating or just before fully waking up in the morning, Ann swore she could feel a sense of her mother.
She tried to imagine what her mother might say to her now about the nightmare she was in.
Told you so?
Get the hell out of there?
Ann was so deeply in love with Justin and the life she imagined they were going to have when their baby arrived that she found it impossible to reverse out of this situation. She was dug in, up to her waist in it. And why should she be the one who had to graciously bow out? Didn’t she have as much right to Justin, their home, this life, as Deborah did? She should have known. Everything was too perfect, too good to be true.
She should have listened to her sisters.

ABOUT ‘IN HER PLACE’: Who is the other woman? That’s for you to decide. Ann devoted years to her mother’s care – and now she’s gone, Ann feels lost. Justin is also grieving, but his wife is still alive. Deborah is in a coma and she doesn’t have long left. When the two meet, they are instantly drawn to one another and, before long, they’ve fallen deeply in love. Ann quickly moves in with Justin and his little girl, making them the perfect family. But just as Ann settles into her new life, Justin’s is turned upside down. Unexpectedly, his wife has survived. Deborah is coming home. Neither knows what to do. But one thing is Ann has earned the life Deborah left behind, and she plans to keep it . . .’

MY THOUGHTS: I have said this before, and I’ll say it again: I love a good moral dilemma. In Her Place is certainly that. Marian Keyes nailed it when she said: “It’s propulsive, thought-provoking and unputdownable.” I certainly couldn’t put it down. I didn’t always like the characters, but I couldn’t put it down. I didn’t always like what the characters were doing, but I couldn’t put it down.

I don’t think I have ever read a book quite like it. Quite often I found myself shouting at Ann; always a good sign. She is a very complex character; scarred, flawed, proud, grieving – but she had standards. HAD being the operative word. Justin is just so . . . perfect. And how does a woman resist perfect? She doesn’t. Ann can’t. Ann is suddenly in possession of everything she has ever wanted – she belongs.

But then things start to go wrong. Just minor things initially. Nothing that can’t be fixed, worked around. But then there’s THE BIG THING. You know the story about the boy and the leaky dyke? Keep that in mind.

The ending surprised me – in a good way. I certainly didn’t see it coming although I may have hoped for something like it.

A very clever and addictive read. I’m now going to go find Ms Coffey’s first book and devour that.

⭐⭐⭐⭐.5

#InHerPlace #NetGalley

THE AUTHOR: Edel Coffey is an Irish journalist and broadcaster. She lives in Galway with her husband and children.

DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Little Brown Book Group UK, Sphere via NetGalley for providing a digital ARC of In Her Place by Edel Coffey for review. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own personal opinions.

The Baby by A.J. McDine

EXCERPT: I flick the kettle on and gaze out of the window while I wait for it to boil. Even though I can see Percy stretched out in the sun by the greenhouse, I could swear I’m not alone. I get that feeling every so often. It’s almost as if Grandad’s spirit is sandwiched between the plasterboard and the brickwork, like insulation. Sometimes I feel his presence so keenly it’s as if her is standing beside me, just out of sight.
But today it’s more than that. I can hear something. A rustling noise, coming from the living room. Not rustling. More like snuffling. I stiffen, my hand gripping the worktop, my head cocked to one side. Hoping to God Percy hasn’t brought in a rabbit – I can’t deal with that, not today – I make my way along the hallway to the front of the house.
At the door to the living room I stop in my tracks. The bottom drawer of Grandad’s old oak bureau, the one with the barley twit legs, has been tipped onto the floor. Diaries and birthday cards, envelopes and notebooks, old seed packets and pens, sticky tape and gardening twine have all been upended on the carpet in a jumble.
But this is incidental. Because it’s what’s lying in the upturned drawer that’s holding my attention.
Tiny fists waving in the air. Chubby legs encased in a white sleepsuit. A fuzz of dark hair.
A baby.
And this makes no sense at all. Because I, Lucy Quinn, might have a husband called Miles and a cat called Percy and a cottage that once belonged to my grandad.
But the one thing I don’t have, the one thing I have never had, is a baby.

ABOUT ‘THE BABY’: There’s a baby in your house. It isn’t yours…

The day I was told I’d never be able to have a child, my world came crashing down. My husband says he still loves me but I lie awake at night, wishing we could have a family.

One morning, my husband’s side of the bed is cold and empty. I hear a noise and head downstairs.

In the middle of the rug in my living room is a wooden drawer. Swaddled inside, with perfect rosy cheeks and beautiful round blue eyes, a baby gazes up at me.

I shiver. It’s all I’ve ever wanted, but this baby is not mine…

MY THOUGHTS: I liked The Baby, but didn’t love it. Lucy is a character who is hard to like or to empathise with. She is emotionally immature and mercurial. She is an alcoholic, although she would vehemently deny this. Her husband Miles is a manipulative abuser, also thoroughly unlikeable. He more than enables, he actually encourages her drinking then punishes her for it.

There’s a lot of repetition as Lucy endlessly agonises over things and questions herself. Some of it is just downright dumb. Like “maybe this baby is mine and I’ve just forgotten I have it”. The baby is sleeping in a drawer. Other than a bag of baby clothes and some formula in the same bag, there are none of the usual accoutrements that seem to come with babies. There are no nappies, no formula, no bottles, no clothes, no crib, no buggy, no toys . . . . Authors – please credit your readers with some brains.

On the plus side – the story of where the baby actually comes from is quite inventive and plausible. I have to admit to enjoying the second half of the story much more than the first, especially the ending, although I do have problems with some of the forensic details.

Narrator Tamsin Kennard was a pleasure to listen to.

⭐⭐.5

#TheBaby #NetGalley

THE AUTHOR: A. J. McDine lives in Kent in the UK with her husband and fellow thriller writer A. J. Wills, their two sons and two VERY demanding cats.

She worked as a journalist and police press officer before becoming a full-time author in 2019.

Endlessly fascinated by people and their fears and foibles, she loves to discover what makes them tick.

She writes dark, domestic thrillers about ordinary people in extraordinary situations.

When she’s not writing, playing tennis or attempting to run a 5k, she can usually be found people-watching in her favourite café.

DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Bookouture Audio via NetGalley for providing an audio ARC of The Baby written by A.J. McDine and narrated by Tamsin Kennard. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own personal opinions.

A Marriage of Lies by Amanda McKinney

EXCERPT: ‘Mrs Velky,’ Agent Briggs says, ‘as I’m sure you’re aware, this is pretty much a slam dunk case. By denying legal counsel, and by your continued silence on the matter, you are basically admitting guilt. Do you understand that?’
‘Yes.’
‘So, you are admitting guilt?’ Zeal asks. ‘Did you kill Cora Granger? Would you like to make a confession right now?’
‘Yes.’
A moment of shocked silence fills the room.
I look up, my teary eyes as cold as ice.
‘I killed Cora Granger.’

ABOUT ‘A MARRIAGE OF LIES’: Beneath the surface of every marriage there are secrets. This one is deadly.

My husband is lying. The minute he came home with alcohol on his breath and unable to look me in the eyes I knew it.

We used to be in love – the intense ‘I can’t be without you for a second’ kind. Where it hurts deep to be apart.

But now, we’re the couple that keep secrets from each other.

We hide the truth.

He thought I wouldn’t find out. I’m a detective – it’s literally my job to uncover clues and solve mysteries. I know what he did.

And now I’m sitting here, in a police interview, being asked the question ‘did you kill her?’ to which I utter one life-shattering ‘yes.’

MY THOUGHTS: This is my third book by this author and, while I loved the other two I have read, A Marriage of Lies fell short for me. I didn’t feel clever solving this mystery early on; I felt disappointed that between the book blurb and the first few chapters, the solution jumped out at me. The clues are all there in flashing neon. The only thing that kept me reading was the ‘why?’ and trying to figure out how all these people were connected.

The author doles out that information very sparingly initially, kind of like giving someone on a diet a little chocolate to keep them invested. It works.

The story is told mainly from the POV of Detective Rowan Velky and her therapist, Amber. There are occasional chapters presented by various other people. Rowan is a complicated character – she has had a bleak upbringing, one which brought her into contact with her husband, Shep. She cares for her aunt Jenny who has Alzheimers. Her marriage isn’t great, yet Rowan feels indebted to Shep and is reluctant to end it despite her suspicions that Shep is playing away. This is only one of the reason’s she is seeing a therapist.

The story moves along at a good pace, there is a great sense of place, and the mutilation of the bodies adds a certain frisson of tension. I really liked the why of it all, but the ending lets the whole book down. It was all too easy, too quick and quite deflated my balloon. There’s also quite a bit of ‘telling’ rather than experiencing at the end.

I had another major niggle – the medical aspects of Connor’s condition. Authors, please, if you are going to throw in a complicated medical condition – do your research. You need to get these things right.

I didn’t think the sexually explicit scene between Rowan and Shep was necessary – in fact I found it quite gross. I don’t normally mind sexually explicit scenes, but this felt like it had been inserted just to provide the obligatory sex scene.

Although this is a decent read (except for that one scene – pun intended), quick and easy, it could have been better.

⭐⭐.5

#AMarriageofLies #NetGalley

THE AUTHOR: Set in small, Southern towns, Amanda’s books are page-turning murder mysteries peppered with steamy romance She lives in Arkansas with her handsome husband, two beautiful boys, and three obnoxious dogs.

DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Storm Publishing via NetGalley for providing a digital ARC of A Marriage of Lies by Amanda McKinney for review. All opinions expressed in his review are entirely my own personal opinions.

What’s new on my bedside table ? . . .

Photo by cottonbro studio on Pexels.com

Ten! Yes, ten new titles arrived to review this week. What was I thinking? But so many of my favorite authors have put books up on NetGalley this week, that I just couldn’t resist!

So, what are these titles?

If Something Happens to Me by Alex Finlay. I have enjoyed every book I have read by this author; he sure knows how to write a tense and absorbing read!

The crushing blow to the head. Hands yanking him from the vehicle. His girlfriend’s piercing scream…

For the past five years, Ryan Richardson has relived that terrible night. With no trace of Ali after she is abducted, a cloud of suspicion hangs over him, though he is never charged. Trying to put his past behind him, Ryan changes his name and enters law school.

It’s on a summer trip to Italy that he gets the call: his missing car has finally been found, submerged in a lake in his hometown. But inside the car are two dead men. The only trace of Ali is a cryptic note, the envelope in her handwriting stating If something happens to me…

Reeling from the news, Ryan sees the man who has haunted his nightmares since the night Ali was taken. But how could that be possible, so far from home? His search for answers leads him to England and France, but the truth may lie in the shape of two very different people back in the USA.

Dog Days by Wendy Corsi Straub is the next instalment of the Lily Dale mysteries. I have come to feel a great affection for these characters.

After attending a family wedding in Chicago, young widow Bella Jordan is returning to the guesthouse she runs in Lily Dale – the quirky upstate New York lakeside village famous for its spiritual mediums – when she catches a glimpse of the impossible at the airport: her late husband Sam.

A former science teacher, Bella is grounded in facts and logic. She doesn’t believe in ghosts. But even when she’s back home with the competing distractions of her quirky guests, small son Max, resident pet cats and a very unexpected litter of puppies, Bella can’t find a good explanation for what she’s seen.

The situation gets even stranger when her psychic friend Odelia tells her that she made contact with Sam’s spirit and he shared a significant name: Kevin . . . Bacon!

Bella doesn’t know what to think, but when she glimpses Sam again and things start to vanish around her, she knows she has to get to the bottom of the strange happenings – even if that means letting go for good . . .

Fiona Walker is an author whose books I can never wait to get my hands on! Her latest is The Art of Murder.

Welcome to the beautiful English village of Inkbury. Tucked deep in the North Wessex Downs, its only claim to fame is the picturesque riverside that once appeared in a Richard Curtis movie. That is, until the murder…

Former stand-up comic Juno Mulligan has been suffering a serious sense-of-humour failure. Not only has she lost the love of her life, but she’s having to relocate to the (admittedly idyllic) village of Inkbury to watch out for her elderly mother, who she’s genuinely worried might be marrying a wife-killer.

She hopes that her old friend, disgraced-journalist-turned-novelist Phoebe Fredericks can help her crack the case of whether her mother’s perma-tanned, iceberg-smiled, three-times-a-widower fiancé is hiding a murderous past.

But before they have a chance, the local art dealer washes up distinctly dead in the village’s famous river. His lover is in the frame, but Juno and Phoebe suspect that there is a deeper secret… One that relates to Phoebe’s own past and Juno’s present.

Will the unofficial Village Detective Agency solve the mystery before the killer strikes again? In sleepy Inkbury, as they soon discover, living one’s best midlife can be murder.

Beth Moran is an author who always gives me all the feels with her heartwarming novels. It Had To Be You is one I just had to read.

Growing up, sisters Libby and Nicky never knew who they’d find at breakfast.

Their parents fostered children of all ages, and although the girls loved playing their part in providing a safe haven, it meant that life was rarely peaceful.

Now as a single mother of two, Libby’s life is still anything but peaceful. In her work as an antenatal coach, as well as for the charity she and Nicky run for teenage mothers, Libby uses all the skills she learnt growing up surrounded by children. Her days are full, caring for her family, the mothers-to-be and the latest strays she has welcomed into her home. But in the dark of the lonely nights, Libby worries she’s falling apart at the seams.

One troubled boy and a reckless decision she made thirteen years ago still haunts her.

Two hearts that were broken, still not mended.

The time has come for Libby to look out for herself. As her family, friends and her community have known forever, Libby is one of a kind, and if she can just learn to love herself, she may be able to welcome back the love she let slip through her fingers.

I have heard a lot about, but whom I have never read until now. The Blood Promise is the first installment in a new Scottish crime series.

A deadly gift

Imogen Clark wakes up on her 16th birthday to find her parents dead at the breakfast table, along with a message from their killer.

A twist of fate

Detectives Jazzy Solanki and Annie McQueen join the investigation, but the more they discover, the more Jazzy suspects that the killing is a twisted message for her. Jazzy shares the same birthday as Imogen, and believes that this is more than a coincidence.

A race to catch a killer

When Jazzy discovers the connection between the killer and the stalker who has been following her for years, she is forced to confront the dark past she was desperate to keep hidden. She must stop at nothing to solve the case, before she becomes the next victim…

The first of two Australian titles this week is Down the Track by Stella Quinn, also a new-to-me author.

Dr Joanne Tan is an expert in a lot of things. Love isn’t one of them.

Being thirty-something, broke, divorced and in a cold war with her ten-year-old son is a lot, but Jo’s handling it. Just. At least she is until her job at the Natural History Museum is put in jeopardy. An invitation to dig up dinosaur bones on a remote Queensland sheep station arrives at just the right time.

It’s not her first trip to Yindi Creek, but it’s not as though anyone will remember her from fifteen years ago … And by anyone, of course, she means the pilot she had that fling with. The fling that taught her she’s far safer sticking to science …

Gavin ‘Hux’ Huxtable, helicopter pilot and reluctant sheep-shearer, has turned his broken heart into a secret (and successful) writing career. But running into Jo again, all these years down the track, stirs up a lot more than outback country dust.

A missing person, a fossilised legbone and a nosy country cop force Jo and Hux together and the sparks that start flying don’t go unnoticed by the locals …

Digging up the past isn’t easy. Digging up the truth can be even harder.

Susan Loves Books is to blame for this title! I saw it on her post and had to have it! The Irish Key by Daisy O’Shea is the first in The Emerald Isles series.

‘Take the key, my pet. I can’t ever go back. The last letter I had from Ireland was clear about that. But one day you may need a safe haven, and it’s the one thing I can give you. Ireland is in your blood, it will keep you safe.’

When Grace arrives tired, tearful and rain-soaked in Roone Bay, the little Irish village where her grandmother Caitlin grew up, she is overwhelmed with longing for Caitlin’s safe, warm arms. The crumbling wreck of Caitlin’s once-beautiful childhood cottage – whose key Grace was given on her wedding day as a secret refuge if she ever needed it – is not the fresh start she’d hoped for. But with her young daughter Olivia to look after and a painful past to hide from, Grace has to stay strong.

Plucking up the courage to ask for help from her kind new neighbours – including quietly rugged carpenter Sean Murphy – Grace gets to work making the house habitable. Soon the view of the deep emerald sea has her captivated, Olivia is blossoming, and Sean makes her laugh in a way she’d forgotten she could…

As she learns more about her family history, with Sean by her side, Grace’s curiosity unearths only further mystery. What drove Caitlin away from Ireland, never to return? But when Grace uncovers a long-lost letter to Caitlin that reveals the heartbreaking truth, she is suddenly threatened by her own devastating secrets.

Grace may have finally found a home for her little family. But when faced with everything she ran from, will the past tear her apart once more? Or will Grace find the strength to stand up for her daughter, her love for Sean, and her new life in Ireland?

David Mark is an author I read religiously. When the Bough Breaks is his latest offering and also the start of a new series.

Traffic cop Sal Delaney’s past is catching up with her . . .

North of England. Cumbria. Salome Delaney didn’t have a great start in life. But her abusive childhood came to a tragic conclusion with the killing of her tyrant mother, Trina, by a jealous ex-boyfriend. At least, that’s what the police say. Sal has never believed kind Wulf, who tried to protect her from her mother’s dark side, could have committed such a crime, but the evidence was irrefutable . . . and who else could have done it?

Now an adult, with a good job as a Collison Investigation Officer, Sal’s done her best to put the past behind her. But one snowy morning she’s called to an accident scene, and she recognizes the body – Barry Ford, the man her mother left Wulf for, all those years ago.

It soon becomes clear this wasn’t just an accident – it was murder. And Wulf, now out of prison, lives very close by . . .

The question of who really killed her mother has haunted Sal her whole life, but as she launches a complex investigation, which gets darker by the hour, she starts to wonder if she really wants to know the answer after all.

Two of this weeks new ARCs are audiobooks – the first is The Intruders, written by Louise Jensen and narrated by Helen Keeley.

They were told to leave. They should have listened.

The perfect opportunity…

A manor house available rent-free to house-sitters is an offer too good to miss for Cass and James, who have been saving for a deposit on their own home for so long.

Although it had been abandoned for almost thirty years, after a home invasion left almost all the inhabitants dead, it is an amazing chance for them to build their future.

But is it worth the price?

Shortly after moving in things take a sinister turn. Objects disappear and turn up in odd places, the clock always stops at the same time, the house is strangely oppressive and sometimes it feels like Cass and James are not alone.

Newington House may have bad energy, and a dark reputation. But surely there’s no reason for history to repeat itself, is there?

The second audiobook is also my second Australian title this week – Red River Road is written by Anna Downes, a new-to-me author, and narrated by Maddy Withington.

Katy Sweeney is looking for her sister. A year earlier, just three weeks into a solo vanlife trip, her free-spirited younger sister, Phoebe, vanished without a trace on the remote, achingly beautiful coastal highway in Western Australia. With no witnesses, no leads, and no DNA evidence, the case has gone cold. But Katy refuses to give up on her.

Using Phoebe’s social media accounts as a map, Katy retraces her sister’s steps, searching for any clues the police may have missed. Was Phoebe being followed? Who had she met along the way, and how dangerous were they?

And then Katy’s path collides with that of Beth, who is on the run from her own dark past. Katy realizes that Beth might be her best—and only—chance of finding the truth, and the two women form an uneasy alliance to find out what really happened to Phoebe in this wild, beautiful, and perilous place.

I think I need to ban myself from NetGalley for a while! What do you think?

Enjoy the remainder of your week, and happy reading!💕📚