tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53818999640347000622024-03-05T08:20:15.250-05:00Reads & KnitsBook reviews spanning science fiction, contemporary fiction, historical fiction, mystery/thriller, British fiction and the occasional YA title. Also the occasional mention of things I do with yarn.smittenkittenorighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00245109936279162868noreply@blogger.comBlogger926125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-80994542444079206222022-01-25T15:51:00.000-05:002022-01-25T15:51:17.902-05:00On Hiatus But Still Reviewing<p> This blog is currently on hiatus because I am just... tired. Alas, I am still reviewing but they're only being posted on Goodreads at the moment. Yes, I am finding I haven't the time I used to have to post them here with all the nice formatting. I lost my joy for it for now, but it may return in the future. My side bar showing my most recent Goodreads reads is to the right side of this page so if you're yearning for my thoughts on the books I'm reading... feel free. If not, I may regain my verve for this blog again & I'll see you then. </p><p>Until then, stay safe, wash your hands & smile (whether you're masked or not).</p><p>Mwah! ๐</p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-6278453739768289062021-06-11T08:30:00.001-04:002021-06-11T08:30:00.253-04:00Book Review: The Disappearing Act by Catherine Steadman<p> </p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqeTc2AKYJH1OU-f4vxzCdmr3u7fnatE8jKmurxT9c4Ee-T_s3CoQXhY6qnmvhDWcqkWlVtLNkFl1786I1Ai2WZRLF5ZIbMLGqhkEX7IjwePByS2yKDw-ej9utrsWN9t9LhpGmockp4d_4/s400/the_disappearing_act.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="263" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqeTc2AKYJH1OU-f4vxzCdmr3u7fnatE8jKmurxT9c4Ee-T_s3CoQXhY6qnmvhDWcqkWlVtLNkFl1786I1Ai2WZRLF5ZIbMLGqhkEX7IjwePByS2yKDw-ej9utrsWN9t9LhpGmockp4d_4/w263-h400/the_disappearing_act.jpg" width="263" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Disappearing Act<br />by<br />Catherine Steadman</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b><i>Title: The Disappearing Act </i></b>by <b><i>Catherine Steadman</i></b></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b><i>Rating:</i></b> ๐๐๐๐<b><i>(4 stars)</i></b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b><i>Publisher:</i></b> <i>Ballantine Books</i></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Quite the page-turner. It reminded me of Lynch's </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Mullholland Drive</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> and the tv show </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">The Arrangement</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">. Both for the "something's not quite right with this dreamy place" feels and also the feeling of falling down a seemingly bottomless pit of crazy.</span></span></p><p><span></span></p><a name='more'></a><p></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">It didn't take long for events to take an eerie turn upon Mia's arrival in LA for pilot season. I enjoyed reading about pilot season as a sole end user of entertainment and having only ever heard the term but clearly not having any idea of what is involved in that whirlwind. It was at times invigorating, dangerous and also absurd and it was easy to see how people could get pulled into the whirlpool of it all and in the case of this story, pulled under entirely. Rare was the moment I could see myself making the same decisions Mia chose to and sometimes I was a bit incredulous that she was 28, her naivete was somewhat unreal. But I still wanted her to figure things out and be safe. I was rooting for Mia to make it out on the other side (I was yelling at the book, "Girl, just get your passport & book a flight! Get out of there now! Don't call that woman back! Just leave it!").</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">As for other characters, I cared a lot about Emily and given the truth of what happens, I liked that Steadman made me feel so much for her and her fate. George, the oft-referenced ex-boyfriend didn't connect for me and I was a bit annoyed that he was talked about so much. I realized that the breakup was abrupt and difficult for Mia but George loomed far too large for a guy who isn't really present and also isn't described in such a way that he seems like a loss. Mia felt it but I didn't. Nick was fine and served his purpose well. For where the story ends, I'd have appreciated seeing a bit more about that journey but no complaints there. Marla, was quite a character and that's all I can say. The remainder were well done for their parts but I don't want to give away anything.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Finally, I very much enjoyed Steadman's descriptions of LA and its environs. As I read I imagined everything bathed in golden, peach and pink hues by day and the glow of the city by night with slashes of purple. The glass tower Mia stayed in was both sleek and creepy and not just because it was occupied by only twenty-odd residents (the remaining hundreds of units were held by off-shore people using them as investments & addresses) and built atop a fault line. Just a lot of well-done evocation of tone and feeling.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">In words I'll keep in mind for crosswords and puzzles this book gave me "air-con-chilled". It showed up twice in this book and I looked it up but didn't find a definition or any other word use so I can only assume this is the cool feeling from air conditioning. It was used to describe the coolness of skin and diamonds.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the Advanced Reader Copy.</i></span></p><p><br /></p><blockquote><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i><b>Summary:</b> Once a year, actors from across the globe descend on the smog and sunshine of Los Angeles for pilot season. Every cable network and studio looking to fill the rosters of their new shows enticing a fresh batch of young hopefuls, anxious, desperate and willing to do whatever it takes to make it. Careers will be made, dreams will be realized, stars will be born. And some will be snuffed out.<br />British star Mia Eliot has landed leading roles in costume dramas in her native country, but now it's time for Hollywood to take her to the next level. Mia flies across the Atlantic to join the hoard of talent scrambling for their big breaks. She's a fish out of water in the ruthlessly competitive and faceless world of back-to-back auditioning. Then one day she meets Emily, another actress from out of town and a kindred spirit. Emily is friendly and genuine and reassuringly doesn't seem to be taking any of it too seriously. She stands out in a conveyor-belt world of fellow auditionees. But a simple favor turns dark when Emily disappears and Mia realizes she was the last person to see her, and the woman who knocks on Mia's door the following day claiming to be her new friend isn't the woman Mia remembers at all.<br /><br />All Mia has to go on is the memory of a girl she met only once . . . and the suffocating feeling that something terrible has happened. Worse still, the police don't believe her when she claims the real Emily has gone missing. So Mia is forced to risk the role of a lifetime to try to uncover the truth about Emily, a gamble that will force her to question her own sanity as the truth goes beyond anything she could ever have imagined.<br /><br />Actress and author Catherine Steadman has written a gripping thriller set in a world close to home that asks the question: In a city where dreams really do come true, how far would you go to make the unreal real?</i></span><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div></blockquote><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqeTc2AKYJH1OU-f4vxzCdmr3u7fnatE8jKmurxT9c4Ee-T_s3CoQXhY6qnmvhDWcqkWlVtLNkFl1786I1Ai2WZRLF5ZIbMLGqhkEX7IjwePByS2yKDw-ej9utrsWN9t9LhpGmockp4d_4/s400/the_disappearing_act.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="263" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqeTc2AKYJH1OU-f4vxzCdmr3u7fnatE8jKmurxT9c4Ee-T_s3CoQXhY6qnmvhDWcqkWlVtLNkFl1786I1Ai2WZRLF5ZIbMLGqhkEX7IjwePByS2yKDw-ej9utrsWN9t9LhpGmockp4d_4/w420-h640/the_disappearing_act.jpg" width="420" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span><p></p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-10330056145878587662021-06-10T08:30:00.001-04:002021-06-10T08:30:00.236-04:00Book Review: The Husbands by Chandler Baker<p> </p><p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWwDjbeTr9D6q0gCMCdnSmsftce2GoYPBMPP9KUZSaEMKW1OTyKJC5vdV8sRBGexrU9JQ5MksoPao-CxzrgnseRZZb8cgONko7V4lIhIml9L5pzye84JI89EDbfL8Le75VUFDcNvzVNfB7/s400/the_husbands.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="263" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWwDjbeTr9D6q0gCMCdnSmsftce2GoYPBMPP9KUZSaEMKW1OTyKJC5vdV8sRBGexrU9JQ5MksoPao-CxzrgnseRZZb8cgONko7V4lIhIml9L5pzye84JI89EDbfL8Le75VUFDcNvzVNfB7/w263-h400/the_husbands.jpg" width="263" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Husbands<br />by<br />Chandler Baker</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b>Title: <i>The Husbands</i></b> by <b><i>Chandler Baker</i></b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b>Rating:</b> ๐๐๐๐<b><i>(4 stars)</i></b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i><b>Publisher: </b>Flatiron Books</i></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">This was a page-turner, mostly in the second half and the final quarter was amped up even higher. I enjoyed it as a bit of domestic noir. It was at times, creepy, witty, poignant and hilarious. My feelings were all over the place as I read which is unusual for me. </span></span></p><p><span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I loved the setting and the initial stressful setup. Parity and division of labour are very important when building a life with another and also trying to pursue professional fulfillment and success. It's a lot and I was sympathetic to Nora's plight initially. As I read on, I had an undercurrent of dread what with the murder mystery thread and Nora's willingness to even go along with the cabal's plan and held me back from investing in her fully. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">What made me hold back a bit is that I just didn't buy the idea that the only way to balance the scales is to take away the agency of the man you've married. I'm very much a woman who isn't interested in changing my husband. I control myself and I don't acknowledge any responsibility of controlling him. So if there's anything I don't like or don't want to do, I don't and I say so. I demand the same thing of him that he demands of me, to be a participating adult. I realized early on that I became to social keeper of the marriage. Invitations, Thank You notes, Christmas, birthday, christening, condolence correspondences etc (and appropriate gifts and/or flowers) and all current addresses are my provinces. Somehow, we successfully co-manage the calendar. During the pandemic, I renamed my desk and work area </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">The Office of Procurement</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> and handled "All The Things". I didn't mind doing any of it and it was chaotic at times wrangling everything into my system of order. I also haven't washed a dish, taken out trash or recycling or dusted the entire time as my husband does all of that (even pre-pandemic). </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I recognize everyone is different and has different expectations and thresholds so I felt for so many of the perspectives in the book (from "I'm tired" to "I can't just NOT do All The Things because they won't be done and then CALAMITY!!"). My advice, speak up, be honest, expect and demand more. I do think this speaks to a broad section of married and partnered women and is just perfect for beach and book club. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">But back to Nora and the story. I couldn't fully root for Nora for much of this and then when she finally turned a corner, half of me didn't want her to succeed against her foes (I really wanted her to pay!). I was completely fed up with Nora's boss to the point that I didn't even commit his name to memory but laughed in satisfaction when near the end, his demise is mentioned. He was completely ridiculous and I recognized the sort. I only wished Nora had found a solution to deal with him effectively beforehand. I SO wanted to know what was in that letter and there was so much tension spooled up that the way that thread tied off just drove me up the wall. I was very invested in the story so I have to give points for that. When all was said and done, I was satisfied with the ending. Apparently, I had a lot of thoughts and feelings about this story since this review is so long. Take it as a positive for the book.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I also appreciated the author's note at the end. Very good points were made. This is the second book of Chandler Baker's that I've read and I would happily read another.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Many thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an Advance Reader's Copy.<br /></i></span><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b></b></span></i></div><blockquote><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b>Summary: </b> Nora Spangler is a successful attorney but when it comes to domestic life, she packs the lunches, schedules the doctor appointments, knows where the extra paper towel rolls are, and designs and orders the holiday cards. Her husband works hard, too... but why does it seem like she is always working so much harder?</span></i></div><i><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: helvetica;">When the Spanglers go house hunting in Dynasty Ranch, an exclusive suburban neighborhood, Nora meets a group of high-powered women--a tech CEO, a neurosurgeon, an award-winning therapist, a bestselling author--with enviably supportive husbands. When she agrees to help with a resident's wrongful death case, she is pulled into the lives of the women there. She finds the air is different in Dynasty Ranch. The women aren't hanging on by a thread.</span></i></div><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: helvetica;">But as the case unravels, Nora uncovers a plot that may explain the secret to having-it-all. One that's worth killing for. Calling to mind a Stepford Wives gender-swap, The Husbands imagines a world where the burden of the "second shift" is equally shared--and what it may take to get there.</span></i></div></span></i><div style="text-align: center;"></div></blockquote><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIUpBQQGAYRlq2H7rWveqW2Utiau08zo1yl9eYi05a8_CAJiS04-WRUPIVCT0UUm0-LoYQ-_qBwNNrVHChpkNbnbheAI07VpiZDf7ekt02P74r9VyLEmVXn84SGs8T7pvFRhgx1i_0pAVh/s400/the_husbands.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="263" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIUpBQQGAYRlq2H7rWveqW2Utiau08zo1yl9eYi05a8_CAJiS04-WRUPIVCT0UUm0-LoYQ-_qBwNNrVHChpkNbnbheAI07VpiZDf7ekt02P74r9VyLEmVXn84SGs8T7pvFRhgx1i_0pAVh/w420-h640/the_husbands.jpg" width="420" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><span style="color: #181818; font-family: helvetica;"><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div></span><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #181818; font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span><span></span></p><!--more--><p></p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-39685742558612314312021-06-09T08:30:00.004-04:002021-06-09T08:30:00.253-04:00Book Review: Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse (Wastelands #1) by John Joseph Adams<p><br /></p><p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQXjTQ8LQ2g92Gy3YlJA4t7s1yvlNbjAIlh1G_kPBclu8kY44XZ_QF9RIHep7cA0UaTIbgXiEvhTPlc1I9DVok_iD8FqpTxOU-OqSLmURTAisvefgqdkU85yfAhE_QCTm8CFrkDUZSGwW5/s475/wastelands.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="317" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQXjTQ8LQ2g92Gy3YlJA4t7s1yvlNbjAIlh1G_kPBclu8kY44XZ_QF9RIHep7cA0UaTIbgXiEvhTPlc1I9DVok_iD8FqpTxOU-OqSLmURTAisvefgqdkU85yfAhE_QCTm8CFrkDUZSGwW5/w268-h400/wastelands.jpg" width="268" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse<br />by<br />John Joseph Adams</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b>Title: <i>Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse</i></b> by <b><i>John Joseph Adams</i></b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b>Rating:</b> ๐๐๐<b><i>(3 stars)</i></b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b>Publisher: </b><i>Night Shade</i></span></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px;">I</span><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">'ve had this on my shelf for years and finally pulled it from my bookshelf to read. There were 22 stories and as with all anthologies, some resonate more than others. 3.5 stars overall.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Thoughts on my favourites:</span></span></p><p><span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b>The End of The Whole Mess</b> </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">by </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Stephen King</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">- A very sad story in which a brother relates how his brilliant sibling ruined humanity with an unintended eco-catastrophe with biological fallout. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b>The People of Sand & Slag</b> </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">by </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Paolo Baciagalupi</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">- Actually more disturbing than enjoyable. This is a hellscape with post-humans and one of the more other-worldly stories in the book. Unsettling.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b>Bread and Bombs</b> </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">by </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">M. Rickert</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">- A very good story about a world where fear of "the other" is the catalyst for a surprising end.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b>How We Got In Town and Out Again</b> </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">by </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Jonathan Lethem</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">- Bleak story of a sort of travelling VR carnival of the carnal that arrives in a town and how the two main characters get in and ultimately away from it.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b>Waiting for the Zephyr</b> </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> by </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Tobias S. Buckell</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> - I really enjoyed this one and felt it was just too short. After the collapse, rural towns are mere outposts and one character has been awaiting the return of the airship Zephyr to make her escape. This is a great beginning to a story. I need more!</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b>When Sysadmins Ruled the Earth</b> </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">by </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Cory Doctorow</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">- I very much enjoyed this one. A bio-attack destroys the world but systems admin Felix still forges on. The broken Toronto landscape was vivid. I also liked the willingness to forge on and keep trying a civilized society. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b>Artie's Angels</b> </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">by </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Catherine Wells</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">- Here's to Artie D'Angelo, a king among couriers of B9. Great short.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I have the other two books in this series and will continue.</span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><i></i></span></span></p><blockquote><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b>Summary:</b> </span>Famine, Death, War, and Pestilence - the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, the harbingers of Armageddon - these are our guides through the Wastelands.<br />From the Book of Revelation to The Road Warrior, from A Canticle for Leibowitz to The Road, storytellers have long imagined the end of the world, weaving eschatological tales of catastrophe, chaos, and calamity. In doing so, these visionary authors have addressed one of the most challenging and enduring themes of imaginative fiction: The nature of life in the aftermath of total societal collapse.<br /><br />Gathering together the best post-apocalyptic literature of the last two decades from many of today's most renowned authors of speculative fiction - including George R. R. Martin, Gene Wolfe, Orson Scott Card, Carol Emshwiller, Jonathan Lethem, Octavia E. Butler, and Stephen King - Wastelands explores the scientific, psychological, and philosophical questions of what it means to remain human in the wake of Armageddon. Whether the end of the world comes through nuclear war, ecological disaster, or cosmological cataclysm, these are tales of survivors, in some cases struggling to rebuild the society that was, in others, merely surviving, scrounging for food in depopulated ruins and defending themselves against monsters, mutants, and marauders.<br /><br />Wastelands delves into this bleak landscape, uncovering the raw human emotion and heart-pounding thrills at the genre's core.</i></span></blockquote><p></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCkiQt1bbLiHNTp8lJtMQP4lToj5d2GYx4g4cUOHcYnOEP1FXVq1h8SfE9evy3EcKWAd1fpd3oHyLCb0G6JN6gvTqbBkpYDVeXkH2mnapcn90VlJpfELTEpWrWe1rJxk6b0P8gezLDHTJ9/s475/wastelands.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="317" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCkiQt1bbLiHNTp8lJtMQP4lToj5d2GYx4g4cUOHcYnOEP1FXVq1h8SfE9evy3EcKWAd1fpd3oHyLCb0G6JN6gvTqbBkpYDVeXkH2mnapcn90VlJpfELTEpWrWe1rJxk6b0P8gezLDHTJ9/w428-h640/wastelands.jpg" width="428" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span><p></p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-42988191085471110282021-06-08T08:30:00.001-04:002021-06-08T08:30:00.247-04:00Book Review: The Murder of My Aunt by Richard Hull<p><br /></p><p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju8IUdlz0zgnF8eMdeGbVoi7NlSz9qK-z4nhin7BqlbXMG2HcQFyr3-v9KcHmIZwZNsWZZdANUHAfOmdMjUyG4QTiGv1wWWyBke4k5l5iIOhELj9byE7DQg1aSS_02n_oZvpuDbg20AxIN/s465/murder_of_my_aunt.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="465" data-original-width="318" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju8IUdlz0zgnF8eMdeGbVoi7NlSz9qK-z4nhin7BqlbXMG2HcQFyr3-v9KcHmIZwZNsWZZdANUHAfOmdMjUyG4QTiGv1wWWyBke4k5l5iIOhELj9byE7DQg1aSS_02n_oZvpuDbg20AxIN/w274-h400/murder_of_my_aunt.jpg" width="274" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Murder of My Aunt<br />by<br />Richard Hull</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b>Title:</b> <b><i>The Murder of My Aunt</i></b> by <b><i>Richard Hull</i></b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b>Rating: </b>๐๐๐๐<b><i>(4 stars)</i></b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b>Publisher: </b><i>The British Library</i></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">This was a great story! Edward and his Aunt Mildred Powell are two of the most disagreeable and quarrelsome relatives I've ever read trapped together. It almost becomes too much but there's ample opportunity to laugh along the way in this macabre tale of pettiness.</span></span></p><p><span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Edward narrates most of this but he's not the only unreliable narrator (Aunt Mildred) so while I could see points for both to have just annoyance, they both took this to levels that of course ensured this would end badly. Quite often I wished Edward would just leave or Mildred would just send him off but this was a battle royale of wills and control that just wasn't an option. It goes on just long enough not to be tiresome but you need a high tolerance for the absurd. The house staff and various town residents play minor parts in this War of the Powells but none shine in comparison. There's a great twist at the end that worked terrifically and I would definitely read another by Hull.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">A great addition to the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">British Library Crime Classics</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> reissues.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><b style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Favourite quote:</b><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"></span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">"My aunt has been in a strange mood, and I never have known a woman who is so capable of conveying a sense of disquiet without saying anything."</i><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Recommended.<br /></span></span><br /><blockquote><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i><b>Summary:</b> Edward Powell lives with his Aunt Mildred in the Welsh town of Llwll.<br />His aunt thinks Llwll an idyllic place to live, but Edward loathes the countryside โ and thinks the company even worse. In fact, Edward has decided to murder his aunt.<br /><br />A darkly humorous depiction of fraught family ties, The Murder of My Aunt was first published in 1934.</i></span></blockquote><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBKCcY3PAzlzclYm2fg7yKnY2ENgo6K6lKXT4uHWA6eLtyhQnRjd3-c0ZSOh2vG67np_GIXIFEWbTrcFaZq5GzSNa9IVfI7PTLi_Xi93aul9oFGZETFLbUbiQWvxRkvqfee-C6xB21EoO3/s465/murder_of_my_aunt.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="465" data-original-width="318" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBKCcY3PAzlzclYm2fg7yKnY2ENgo6K6lKXT4uHWA6eLtyhQnRjd3-c0ZSOh2vG67np_GIXIFEWbTrcFaZq5GzSNa9IVfI7PTLi_Xi93aul9oFGZETFLbUbiQWvxRkvqfee-C6xB21EoO3/w438-h640/murder_of_my_aunt.jpg" width="438" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-21109683466265938372021-06-07T08:30:00.015-04:002021-06-07T08:30:00.254-04:00Book Review: The Sussex Downs Murder by John Bude<p><br /></p><p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgveESICV1A6JgyVcEaFkkSHhwJuD-HiSrRbxkmylEkCLcAMmdpP8ellHi-0VZ_v3gt9lEO7BM15kwiwYAVq6-Eb7wCAyCMLD-AyXPp7BcK-c3ftYtIdRBNUEGAYXhqzCTaD-3k352OIXar/s369/sussex_downs_murder.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="369" data-original-width="255" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgveESICV1A6JgyVcEaFkkSHhwJuD-HiSrRbxkmylEkCLcAMmdpP8ellHi-0VZ_v3gt9lEO7BM15kwiwYAVq6-Eb7wCAyCMLD-AyXPp7BcK-c3ftYtIdRBNUEGAYXhqzCTaD-3k352OIXar/w276-h400/sussex_downs_murder.jpg" width="276" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Sussex Downs Murder<br />by<br />John Bude</td></tr></tbody></table></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b>Title:</b> <i><b>The Sussex Downs Murder</b></i> by <i><b>John Bude</b></i></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b>Rating:</b> ๐๐๐ <b><i>(3 stars)</i></b></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b>Publisher: </b><i>The British Library </i></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Three stars because I figured out who did it early on and didn't find the How-dunnit to be as compelling as I'd hoped. </span></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span></span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I did like the characterizations very much and enjoyed getting to know Meredith a bit better. Major Forest along with Mrs. Meredith and Meredith's son, were good additions to the story. The son had interesting perspectives that added to his father's investigation. The strongest disappointment and complaint I had came at the very end with Meredith pretty much shrugging off one of the parties of the murder plot absconding and saying they were simply misguided.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">This is the third Superintendent Meredith book I've read and while it's my least favourite, I'm glad I've read it. This, along with </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">The Cheltenham Square Murder</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> and </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Death on the Riviera</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> are included in the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">British Library Crime Classics</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> reissues and there are two more Meredith books I still need to read. I recommend this but I'd say read another before this one.</span></span></p><br /><blockquote><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i><b>Summary:</b> 'Already it looked as if the police were up against a carefully planned and cleverly executed murder, and, what was more, a murder without a corpse!'<br />Two brothers, John and William Rother, live together at Chalklands Farm in the beautiful Sussex Downs. Their peaceful rural life is shattered when John Rother disappears and his abandoned car is found. Has he been kidnapped? Or is his disappearance more sinister - connected, perhaps, to his growing rather too friendly with his brother's wife?<br /><br />Superintendent Meredith is called to investigate - and begins to suspect the worst when human bones are discovered on Chalklands farmland. His patient, careful detective method begins slowly to untangle the clues as suspicion shifts from one character to the next.<br /><br />This classic detective novel from the 1930s is now republished for the first time, with an introduction by the award-winning crime writer Martin Edwards.</i></span></blockquote><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeB45A2pEtQHz_8y0los7qx7FAFFRVgIvrCymUpTp2RhA2ODDYQnB7TFDbV-RYYCZRc-OiQsDobzf2ks3dIfcpyXParHDKZUJvBgFqqg0K0uyF7Au08WysIzY9vhI0mPGB2D5T9E9kNAE4/s369/sussex_downs_murder.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="369" data-original-width="255" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeB45A2pEtQHz_8y0los7qx7FAFFRVgIvrCymUpTp2RhA2ODDYQnB7TFDbV-RYYCZRc-OiQsDobzf2ks3dIfcpyXParHDKZUJvBgFqqg0K0uyF7Au08WysIzY9vhI0mPGB2D5T9E9kNAE4/w442-h640/sussex_downs_murder.jpg" width="442" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></p><p></p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-58131731841488617232021-05-13T08:30:00.001-04:002021-05-13T08:30:00.230-04:00Book Review: Body on the Island (Smart Women's Mystery #2) by Victoria Dowd<p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMDo-PI3l92XACVYtUI9Z_7ETCumSB441OSh4J3NTrEaYQgfmZ8DE4lXBV-Nge_b1K7GtMRp2xEfYiuE5kI73ek9cxIlOK8YS742Uq64Ey1LIA_WmlsNnKofSAQ2aWffxPAW__02GdKSlb/s475/body_on_the_island.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="297" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMDo-PI3l92XACVYtUI9Z_7ETCumSB441OSh4J3NTrEaYQgfmZ8DE4lXBV-Nge_b1K7GtMRp2xEfYiuE5kI73ek9cxIlOK8YS742Uq64Ey1LIA_WmlsNnKofSAQ2aWffxPAW__02GdKSlb/w250-h400/body_on_the_island.jpg" width="250" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Body on the Island<br />by<br />Victoria Dowd</td></tr></tbody></table><b>Title: Body on the Island</b> by <b>Victoria Dowd</b></p><p><b>Rating: 3 stars</b> (๐๐๐)</p><p><b>Publisher: Joffee Books</b></p><p><br /> <span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">I'm torn between two and three stars. This is the second in this series and while I enjoyed parts, I was also rather tired of some of Ursula's quirks. Like seriously, I stopped caring about the green eyes she kept seeing (it turns out to be important to the solution but the repetition of it was too much), along with her dearly departed father fixation (which I was really over in the first book), whatever is going on with those possibly supernatural visions and hints or whatever and even her acerbic wit wore thin.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span></span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span><p></p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">The mystery itself was fine enough even if it did feel a bit lost and weighed down under all the other stuff (the group dynamics, Ursula being herself and the "there be ghosts!" segues). I did like that the description of the island and environs was well done. Very atmospheric. The murderer and their motive was well done and tied together well. And I'll even give that Ursula and Pandora reached a sort of pax as a welcome development.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I don't know if I'll jump into another trek with the Smart women plus Mirabelle, Bridget and the dog. Charlotte remains my favourite but she's not enough to do all this lifting.</span></span><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><i><div style="text-align: center;"><i><b>Summary:</b> An uninhabited island.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Ten stranded strangers.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>No way to escape.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Ursula Smart (not her real name), realising therapy alone cannot teach her how to survive this life, is determined to make some changes. She signs herself up for a survival course โ along with her mother, aunts Charlotte and Mirabelle and Bridget.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>But the promised gentle weekend of foraging and camping in the Outer Hebrides swiftly turns into a desperate battle for survival.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Their boat capsizes. Washed up on an uninhabited island, the Smart women face starvation, freezing conditions and โ worse โ no Wi-Fi.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Then the murders begin.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Someone is killing off them one by one. Will the Smarts escape or will they be next?</i></div></i><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpCLeNOeVGf9xSRdJd0C9Jk2P1n8QIh-mKhwYQkcvb99SvTpo7KIH9C8UBvkl02sF-Erso4Pv5cf842C715EuL30LV_wuNdy6vsR4mAgetCMzi-sDWNxeoiP0Jc2TQqIV54YhwW3AgEsJe/s475/body_on_the_island.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="297" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpCLeNOeVGf9xSRdJd0C9Jk2P1n8QIh-mKhwYQkcvb99SvTpo7KIH9C8UBvkl02sF-Erso4Pv5cf842C715EuL30LV_wuNdy6vsR4mAgetCMzi-sDWNxeoiP0Jc2TQqIV54YhwW3AgEsJe/w400-h640/body_on_the_island.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Body on the Island<br />by<br />Victoria Dowd</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><span><!--more--></span>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-66433973347462918652021-05-12T08:30:00.019-04:002021-05-12T08:30:01.536-04:00Book Review: Oracle by Julie J. Anderson<p></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_b79s_L_KNKL3WT2pnzVCnxUUhFNNq3lRRTJEDUBEPnDxZAd4aTGun5oY_qprMXShJFbQ7fYYzzlesV8ItIhvtmZGCE3LSQMEvlJOjLIdR2iEW_zvitd3xcP6gPxAQKUnlpqg30In889d/s475/oracle.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="311" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_b79s_L_KNKL3WT2pnzVCnxUUhFNNq3lRRTJEDUBEPnDxZAd4aTGun5oY_qprMXShJFbQ7fYYzzlesV8ItIhvtmZGCE3LSQMEvlJOjLIdR2iEW_zvitd3xcP6gPxAQKUnlpqg30In889d/w263-h400/oracle.jpg" width="263" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Oracle<br />by<br />Julie J. Anderson</td></tr></tbody></table><b>Title: Oracle</b> by <b>Julie J. Anderson</b><p></p><p><b>Rating: 4 stars</b> (๐๐๐๐)</p><p><b>Publisher: Claret Press</b></p><p><br /> <span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Cassandra "Cassie" Fortune is only a few weeks removed from her traumatic experiences that took place in </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Plague</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">. She's dispatched by the Prime Minister to a conference in Delphi to give a presentation on tax policy but most importantly to secure a connection with a high-level official on the PM's behalf. That would be stressful enough but Cassie has some additional challenges, her stalker may be closing in and there's the murder she's roped into investigating as well.</span></span></p><span><a name='more'></a></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">After a bit of a slow start in the first quarter, this really took off and was very much a page-turner. Cassie still suffers from some personality traits that tended to grate on my nerves but she did display growth and that was welcome. Even when she annoyed me, I still wanted to see her succeed in her duties and overcome her trials. The other characters were well done, especially Helena (I very much liked her). The main mystery itself was a good one with quite a few turns and a completely tragic culmination. I liked that facets of this story were threaded through decades and also enjoyed the ties to Hellenism (even when some of them seemed a bit on the nose). By the end, I was sure I'd happily read another and look forward to checking in on Cassie Fortune again.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Many thanks to the author for an Advanced Reader's Copy.</i></span><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></i></span></div><i><div style="text-align: center;"><i><b>Summary:</b> Blood calls for blood.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Near the ancient Temple of Apollo, environmentalists protest outside an international conference. Inside, business lobbyists mingle with politicians, seeking profit and influence. Then the charismatic leader of the protest goes missing.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>The next day a body is discovered, placed like an offering to the gods. One day later a broken corpse is found at the foot of the cliffs from which blasphemers were once tossed to their deaths.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>As a storm closes in and strange lights are seen on the mountain, the conference centre is cut off. Is a killer stalking its corridors? Or are primal forces reaching out from the past? Like the cryptic Oracle of Delphi, Cassandra Fortune must supply the answers before the conference is over. And before more die.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Justice will be done, but what kind of justice?</i></div></i><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnlMqRuP_ZGz7jDAZuqbCLGr7IePumJIvrFLCTMt6g1w7l-972du_8XVtTsz00fSGQd5WVDI02nJkEqSuN1HcE2nwXW5Vl70WAy3OVMsn4X4EZpWE8KUDWwG7YCtvC_50wduSYudzQMyOL/s475/oracle.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="311" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnlMqRuP_ZGz7jDAZuqbCLGr7IePumJIvrFLCTMt6g1w7l-972du_8XVtTsz00fSGQd5WVDI02nJkEqSuN1HcE2nwXW5Vl70WAy3OVMsn4X4EZpWE8KUDWwG7YCtvC_50wduSYudzQMyOL/w420-h640/oracle.jpg" width="420" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Oracle<br />by<br />Julie Anderson</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-17732658873339944532021-05-11T08:30:00.015-04:002021-05-11T08:30:00.241-04:00Book Review: The Kensington Kidnap by Katie Gayle<p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjph1vxcpEAd0k1wp1h5EIPeMhuwVMqJclULSCzCs226GBjcpfeKalzzo_4RjbV2jqAsouLogZL4cXyjGVwwW6O1oCreFXHmnXR8lFeR0a-xayXDoZVq7GLAYeOs9NJgkwmoUwy1fJt7pm6/s475/kensington_kidnap.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="313" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjph1vxcpEAd0k1wp1h5EIPeMhuwVMqJclULSCzCs226GBjcpfeKalzzo_4RjbV2jqAsouLogZL4cXyjGVwwW6O1oCreFXHmnXR8lFeR0a-xayXDoZVq7GLAYeOs9NJgkwmoUwy1fJt7pm6/w264-h400/kensington_kidnap.jpg" width="264" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Kensington Kidnap<br />by<br />Katie Gayle</td></tr></tbody></table><b>Title: The Kensington Kidnap</b> by <b>Katie Gayle</b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><b>Rating: 4 stars</b> (๐๐๐๐)</span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><b>Publisher: Bookouture</b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">This was a fun cozy mystery that kept me reading past midnight.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span></span></span></p><a name='more'></a><p></p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Epiphany "Pip" Bloom is pretty much a disaster with a passport. She's had jobs all over the world but that any country is still willing to grant her a visa is stunning. She's left a fair amount of damage to her employers and others in her wake. While she seems nice enough, she isn't reliably employable or terribly responsible and it's taken a toll on her being able to do things like pay rent and live without financial worry. Her mother's stopped helping her out with cash so when we enter the story, Pip is worried she's on the cusp of eviction by her kind, hot and helpful flatmate, Tim. She finagles a job under an assumed identity and hijinks and hilarity ensue along with a decent mystery of where a missing teen has gone.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Also along for the fun were a boxer that offers Pip lessons and possibly more, her sister Felicity/ Flis who has the best malapropism habit I've ever had the pleasure to read. Pip remarks that speaking with Flis is often like doing crosswords for the vocabulary workout. And last, there's Most, Pip's three-legged rescue (or stolen depending upon who you ask) cat. As an aside, I don't know why the adorable kitty on the cover has four legs. All these characters added to the story and were well-drawn in their own right. I would have liked more on Tim but that's probably because he was my favourite guy. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">There's a murder but it's not the focal point of the story and it isn't revealed until rather late in the book. As the main issue for this cozy is the kidnap, which has happened before we enter the story and propels the plot effectively, I felt the mystery and the tension held up well. Some aspects of the villainy were easy to figure but I was surprised with some turns also and that was enjoyable. The conclusion was well done and Pip not only had success but learned some things along the way.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">The only downside for me was that Pip had an instance where she seemed to dismiss & devalue a character for his speech impediment. It struck me as rude, and I was delighted when it's revealed he's top in his field of zoology. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Overall, I enjoyed this and look forward to the next book to go along with Pip and her people on another adventure.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Recommended.</span></span><div><span style="color: #181818; font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></div><i><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><b></b></span></i><blockquote><i><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><b>Summary:</b> A missing teenager, a mysterious cult and a case of mistaken identity โ just another dayโs work for Epiphany Bloom.<br />Epiphany โPipโ Bloom is down on her luck. She can barely afford cat food, and just because Most has three legs doesnโt mean he eats any less. So she absolutely canโt afford to mess up her latest temp job. But when she walks through the door of the private investigation firm, her new boss mistakes her for a missing persons expert. He then charges her with finding Matty Price โ the teenage son of two A-list celebrities โ who has mysteriously disappeared from his home in Kensington.<br /><br />It ought to be a disaster, but Pip reckons itโs actually an opportunity. Sheโs always been curious (nosy, her mother calls it) and has an uncanny knack for being at the wrong place at the right time (she doesnโt want to know what her mother thinks of that). After years of trying to find something sheโs good at, has Pip managed to walk straight into the job she was born to do?<br /><br />She owes it to herself and poor missing Matty to find out.<br /><br />But searching for Matty takes Pip into the strange, intimidating world of the rich and famous. And it soon becomes clear that some of these peopleโs love for themselves doesnโt extend to their fellow humans.<br /><br />As Pip investigates further, she realises the question isnโt whether Matty ran away โ itโs whether she will find him alive and make it home safely herself...<br /><br />An absolutely brilliant, light-hearted cozy mystery for fans of M.C. Beaton, T E Kinsey, Lauren Elliott and Joanne Fluke, featuring an irresistible new heroine.<br /></span></i><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg44h3um5ToWwj-N057nwsBq0Ci20AxAoetD57Jsu26jRYvLdkRf7TMlds4-Ry3Z0TY9MtmJ8a8UJavF59ikJP2yfDFdo5gyLnLcToVuQWfVQ0HiPzyacLL9TXhCRS9_UtX6EfXD3svIdEh/s475/kensington_kidnap.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="313" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg44h3um5ToWwj-N057nwsBq0Ci20AxAoetD57Jsu26jRYvLdkRf7TMlds4-Ry3Z0TY9MtmJ8a8UJavF59ikJP2yfDFdo5gyLnLcToVuQWfVQ0HiPzyacLL9TXhCRS9_UtX6EfXD3svIdEh/w422-h640/kensington_kidnap.jpg" width="422" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Kensington Kidnap<br />by<br />Katie Gayle</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><span style="color: #181818; font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="color: #181818; font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="color: #181818; font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div><div></div></div></blockquote><div><div><br /></div></div>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-27079791594574501282021-05-10T08:30:00.009-04:002021-05-10T08:30:09.263-04:00Book Review: Nemesis Games (The Expanse #5) by James S.A. Corey<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNkjdSPUsa2iRUGsiVvOExO7J4RCj1jcfBhQB-RIuyL-1VKxtD3kQHjPC26lmWDJQgOHmgjeF_mY_jbNdXHrMR9hIGw0ohn8NdIGkhgkV6RjlKoWPV-vgi0baK95IMC7BfdSVmr-rEcYnV/s475/nemesis_games.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="312" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNkjdSPUsa2iRUGsiVvOExO7J4RCj1jcfBhQB-RIuyL-1VKxtD3kQHjPC26lmWDJQgOHmgjeF_mY_jbNdXHrMR9hIGw0ohn8NdIGkhgkV6RjlKoWPV-vgi0baK95IMC7BfdSVmr-rEcYnV/w263-h400/nemesis_games.jpg" width="263" /></a></div><br /><b>Title: Nemesis Games (The Expanse #5)</b> by <b>James S.A. Corey</b><p></p><p><b>Rating: 4 stars </b>(๐๐๐๐)</p><p><b>Publisher: Orbit</b></p><p><br /></p><p> <span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">This was what I enjoy about </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">The Expanse</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">! After a bit of a disappointment in reading </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Cibola Burn</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">, I was a little reticent to jump right into another. My husband decided he wanted to get back to watching the show so I figured I'd read the book for the season before we did.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span></span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span><p></p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">This book delves into the backgrounds of the main characters and also gives an in-depth perspective to current goings-on on Earth, Mars, Tycho station and what's become an OPA faction ship. Holden, Naomi, Alex and Amos shone brightly and I loved reading about their trials, setbacks and successes. The bonus of course was having Bobbie and Avasarala reemerge as major players again. Honourable mention to Fred and Clarissa. The action was great, the quips fun and the tragedy on epic scale. This was the culmination of the high stakes humanity has been on the brink of for years and that's not even including the protomolecule sample that's still out there or who knows what else will happen with the many planets through the Ring Gate. I really look forward to the next book!</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I will of course continue with the series. Recommended.</span></span><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></div><i><div style="text-align: center;"><i><b>Summary:</b> The fifth novel in Corey's New York Times bestselling Expanse series--now being produced for television by the SyFy Channel!</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>A thousand worlds have opened, and the greatest land rush in human history has begun. As wave after wave of colonists leave, the power structures of the old solar system begin to buckle.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Ships are disappearing without a trace. Private armies are being secretly formed. The sole remaining protomolecule sample is stolen. Terrorist attacks previously considered impossible bring the inner planets to their knees. The sins of the past are returning to exact a terrible price.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>And as a new human order is struggling to be born in blood and fire, James Holden and the crew of the Rocinante must struggle to survive and get back to the only home they have left.</i></div></i><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy9emQksVPRZeGARZ-6Hl-X9SsLh8GuDCbA3QJkCUxjroFUR_G5UjjjLERfXMCZbo4jVRvW8AXwCBzTbo493mxGlUgLFye8wlYyFdN6RmdJN2APc7GGm_KhtbXW6UWVSqy8UkiHpYeUVDj/s475/nemesis_games.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="312" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy9emQksVPRZeGARZ-6Hl-X9SsLh8GuDCbA3QJkCUxjroFUR_G5UjjjLERfXMCZbo4jVRvW8AXwCBzTbo493mxGlUgLFye8wlYyFdN6RmdJN2APc7GGm_KhtbXW6UWVSqy8UkiHpYeUVDj/w420-h640/nemesis_games.jpg" width="420" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Nemesis Games (The Expanse #5)<br />by<br />James S.A. Corey</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></div>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-71688121607016782572021-05-07T08:30:00.002-04:002021-05-07T08:30:00.257-04:00Book Review: Shiver by Allie Reynolds<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgO0gAAnxhxcw9VqaMtWhn1VbFSlGXHw3ZZTot_g2t7NP6Vkkkrzr0Hjtk8xGICD52z9YR-QWmrSUskuVGAOQWmBFZApNfSDL2i2Ab6_-NezNWNkrSzkXio0US9YRAk0GuNMJc7vzQq-2mK/s475/shiver.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="315" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgO0gAAnxhxcw9VqaMtWhn1VbFSlGXHw3ZZTot_g2t7NP6Vkkkrzr0Hjtk8xGICD52z9YR-QWmrSUskuVGAOQWmBFZApNfSDL2i2Ab6_-NezNWNkrSzkXio0US9YRAk0GuNMJc7vzQq-2mK/w265-h400/shiver.jpg" width="265" /></a></div><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><b>Title: Shiver</b> by <b>Allie Reynolds</b></span></span><p></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><b>Rating: 4 stars</b> (๐๐๐๐)</span></span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><b>Publisher: G.P. Putnam & Sons</b></span></span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">This was the perfect read for a snowy weekend (especially when the Superbowl is... not as good or competitive a game as you had anticipated). This totally saved my Sunday night with a taut conclusion.</span></span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span></span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span><p></p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">There's quite the cast of characters and none of them are loveable but they were interesting. Each kept me engaged wondering what were their motivations, secrets, lies and prospects of being the murderous one of the group. The answers came slowly as the story is told from one POV (Milla's) and it's clear that Milla isn't the most forthcoming narrator either. The interpersonal relationships were sliding scales and Venn diagrams that kept me on my toes with each revelation. This also rose the tension to a crescendo when the Big Showdown happens on the sheer depths of the mountain.. I loved the surprises & was not sure who would make it off the mountain alive or in what condition. There's an epilogue that ties things up tidily for the survivor(s).</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">As ever, accepting invitations to remote destinations with complicated acquaintances is a poor and dangerous choice. And I still can't pass up one of these tales.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Recommended. </span></span><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><i></i><blockquote><i><b>Summary:</b> When Milla accepts an off-season invitation to Le Rocher, a cozy ski resort in the French Alps, she's expecting an intimate weekend of catching up with four old friends. It might have been a decade since she saw them last, but she's never forgotten the bond they forged on this very mountain during a winter spent fiercely training for an elite snowboarding competition.<br />Yet no sooner do Milla and the others arrive for the reunion than they realize something is horribly wrong. The resort is deserted. The cable cars that delivered them to the mountaintop have stopped working. Their cell phones--missing. And inside the hotel, detailed instructions await them: an icebreaker game, designed to draw out their secrets. A game meant to remind them of Saskia, the enigmatic sixth member of their group, who vanished the morning of the competition years before and has long been presumed dead.<br /><br />Stranded in the resort, Milla's not sure what's worse: the increasingly sinister things happening around her or the looming snowstorm that's making escape even more impossible. All she knows is that there's no one on the mountain she can trust. Because someone has gathered them there to find out the truth about Saskia...someone who will stop at nothing to get answers. And if Milla's not careful, she could be the next to disappear...</i><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3BbPoQuXXwWU6SHZuHlRmlqadsZYwfIqUzWEeFhzxkDFJZcQUU_Wl6eepzCnwRmrH2C2R176zXaZB3YN9EraPSiRFjchu_G7ciDJoeeTLrMVpXeiKVkcm0qdY0qoQZNvKBH_bkdLNzJbP/s475/shiver.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="315" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3BbPoQuXXwWU6SHZuHlRmlqadsZYwfIqUzWEeFhzxkDFJZcQUU_Wl6eepzCnwRmrH2C2R176zXaZB3YN9EraPSiRFjchu_G7ciDJoeeTLrMVpXeiKVkcm0qdY0qoQZNvKBH_bkdLNzJbP/w424-h640/shiver.jpg" width="424" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Shiver<br />by<br />Allie Reynolds</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><div></div></blockquote><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-36719534896503403282021-05-06T08:30:00.004-04:002021-05-06T08:30:00.245-04:00Book Review: Midnight at Malabar House by Vaseem Khan<p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgl7FHD8zrBorW7r9ipimB_PibToZJb-QWiiq1Tg5hFgo_BoLMg2HB-qTrlpUHk80OsPXfdiJ6-eCJMBUqtt2MB9rW3iRQdw6r3pmWFfAK3Jkt4IY7vSTwgLW4owLHnhz3nVrepHqLtApS/s475/midnight_malabar_house.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="309" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgl7FHD8zrBorW7r9ipimB_PibToZJb-QWiiq1Tg5hFgo_BoLMg2HB-qTrlpUHk80OsPXfdiJ6-eCJMBUqtt2MB9rW3iRQdw6r3pmWFfAK3Jkt4IY7vSTwgLW4owLHnhz3nVrepHqLtApS/w260-h400/midnight_malabar_house.jpg" width="260" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /><b>Title: Midnight at Malabar House</b> by <b>Vaseem Khan</b></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><b>Rating: 4 stars</b> (๐๐๐๐)</span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><b>Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton</b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">This was a very enjoyable historical mystery/police procedural. Set in the first days of 1950 with the consequences of Partition still churning, Persis, the first woman police officer in her country is tasked with a complicated and politically sensitive murder investigation. Her being the first woman is a major theme here and she's inundated with obstacles along the way but of course, she persists. Her colleagues, all male, were an interesting bunch and had surprises to the very end. I liked Persis and also the insight into her personal relationships with her family. She was determined and cared to find the truth, not just any answer served up to her for expedience. I adored the family bookstore her father maintained and her deep love for him. Even her Aunt Nussie was a good character with her overbearing ways.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span></span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span><p></p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">The mystery of who killed Sir James Herriot was a tangled one for many reasons. He's found alone in a room with his throat slit and sans trousers. There were burned remnants in the fireplace and his safe is empty. The files of an investigation he was carrying out are missing and it's clear very quickly that he's not the good and honourable man he presents. There were many leads and threads of the investigation and I appreciated the turns it took. I enjoyed the final solution and how Persis arrived at it. I do have to admit that there was a lot of historical information on Partition and that sometimes felt like it slowed down the narrative. I can't imagine how else to have included the information than the way it was done and it was important but at times it did feel a bit like a history lesson, even in a historical novel. Still, I did feel the tension from the characters and understood the depth of it because of those details.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I'd read another by Khan and given that I realized when I reached the end of this that it's the beginning of a series, I suppose I will do.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Recommended. </span></span><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><i><b>Summary:</b> As India celebrates the arrival of a momentous new decade, Inspector Persis Wadia stands vigil in the basement of Malabar House, home to the city's most unwanted unit of police officers. Six months after joining the force she remains India's first female police detective, mistrusted, sidelined and now consigned to the midnight shift.<br /><br />And so, when the phone rings to report the murder of prominent English diplomat Sir James Herriot, the country's most sensational case falls into her lap.<br /><br />As 1950 dawns and India prepares to become the world's largest republic, Persis, accompanied by Scotland Yard criminalist Archie Blackfinch, finds herself investigating a case that is becoming more political by the second. Navigating a country and society in turmoil, Persis, smart, stubborn and untested in the crucible of male hostility that surrounds her, must find a way to solve the murder - whatever the cost.</i></span><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcMf462mLPgi73d7cQ7n40pYreCtLgyTtaOp8QDYudwABNgBEVmzhSbl26n4efCOFH6xRtbITplAqgZ4pqxrbS4-6SmZUFMb_GMne3iFcF9cvs8eAgd9L3Ini0x9dJBtbt_gzYpTVigRFs/s475/midnight_malabar_house.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="309" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcMf462mLPgi73d7cQ7n40pYreCtLgyTtaOp8QDYudwABNgBEVmzhSbl26n4efCOFH6xRtbITplAqgZ4pqxrbS4-6SmZUFMb_GMne3iFcF9cvs8eAgd9L3Ini0x9dJBtbt_gzYpTVigRFs/w416-h640/midnight_malabar_house.jpg" width="416" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Midnight at Malabar House<br />by<br />Vaseem Khan</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-31635782972618013352021-05-05T08:30:00.014-04:002021-05-05T08:30:00.459-04:00Book Review: Death on the Cherwell by Mavis Doriel Hay<p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"></span></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi59A00YIHuf7aoQbuv3NLBTWa9yVed4jetSPzMwoPsVvOoOfnqtvf-z8Ioz7y9bJ9QjHZ_af2BzTEoBrqe5smHxtNUO8GDj53J9SfaBSciFnqx_LqoRGc81ML-WCEEZDWJ-taNgwc_WEoR/s443/death_on_the_cherwell.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="443" data-original-width="318" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi59A00YIHuf7aoQbuv3NLBTWa9yVed4jetSPzMwoPsVvOoOfnqtvf-z8Ioz7y9bJ9QjHZ_af2BzTEoBrqe5smHxtNUO8GDj53J9SfaBSciFnqx_LqoRGc81ML-WCEEZDWJ-taNgwc_WEoR/w288-h400/death_on_the_cherwell.jpg" width="288" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Death on the Cherwell<br />by<br />Mavis Doriel Hay</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /> <b>Title: Death on the Cherwell</b> by <b>Mavis Doriel Hay</b></span><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> <b>Rating: 3 stars</b> (๐๐๐)</span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> <b>Publisher: British Library Crime Classics</b></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">The body of Miss Denning, the bursar of Persephone College has been found dead in her canoe floating down a river and this sets off an inquiry into how that happened. She has a head injury and her clothes are wet, though the interior of the canoe is dry. It's sussed quickly that there's friction between her and the students of the college and also two nearby landowners as she was tasked with the acquisition of a tract of land to expand the college. The question of course is if that was what really led to her death.</span></span><div><span><a name='more'></a></span><span style="color: #181818; font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span><p></p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Inspector Wythe is initially investigating and mostly deals with sorting out the alibis and general minutiae of the women of the college who themselves are investigating the death. Detective Inspector Braydon of Scotland Yard arrives by Chapter 8 and that's really where I felt the book really took off. The group of collegiate investigators recede quite a lot and the police suss out the culprit and to a tidy if slightly disappointing resolution. Given all the characters here, I most enjoyed Draga (very distinct & memorable) and Inspectors Whythe and Braydon. I also liked what was learnt about the deceased Bursar Denning. I think when the focus was on her and the police were involved, the story was stronger. I wasn't much into the lives of Sally and her circle of friends and there wasn't much distinction between them.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I liked this. I have tried more than once to get through </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Murder Underground </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">by Mavis Doriel Hay (book & audiobook) and have found it didn't engage me so I've relegated it to the rear of my </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">BLCC</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> pile. That book was referenced here as one of the characters is the sister of the character who solves the mystery in that book. I kind of hoped this book would spoil </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Murder Underground</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> to save me the read but alas, no luck there. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I will of course, continue with the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">British Library Crime Classics</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">.</span></span><div><br /></div><div><i><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b></b></span></span></i></div><blockquote><div><i><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b>Summary:</b> </span></span> For Miss Cordell, principal of Persephone College, there are two great evils to be feared: unladylike behavior among her students, and bad publicity for the college. So her prim and cozy world is turned upside down when a secret society of undergraduates meets by the river on a gloomy January afternoon, only to find the drowned body of the college bursar floating in her canoe.<br /><br />The police assume that a student prank got out of hand, but the resourceful Persephone girls suspect foul play, and take the investigation into their own hands. Soon they uncover the tangled secrets that led to the bursar's deathโand the clues that point to a fellow student.<br /><br />This classic mystery novel, with its evocative setting in an Oxford women's college, is now republished for the first time since the 1930s, with an introduction by the award-winning crime writer Stephen Booth.</i></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqNjjXKqYSd3bDc4fHkDffVum3djhxDVw52rvX-m0CzrPKaylicISn_mimTnPmzDc1Q2TTCMaCasp4VMD-955dcvni56V4KMR_cBdSKjzGLLY03jsxINAcVX5BcF1dwnKiqANBVQ8WAFol/s443/death_on_the_cherwell.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="443" data-original-width="318" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqNjjXKqYSd3bDc4fHkDffVum3djhxDVw52rvX-m0CzrPKaylicISn_mimTnPmzDc1Q2TTCMaCasp4VMD-955dcvni56V4KMR_cBdSKjzGLLY03jsxINAcVX5BcF1dwnKiqANBVQ8WAFol/w460-h640/death_on_the_cherwell.jpg" width="460" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Death on the Cherwell<br />by<br />Mavis Doriel Hay</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></div><div></div></blockquote><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></div></div></div>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-7975182692877938132021-05-04T08:30:00.019-04:002021-05-04T08:30:00.287-04:00Book Review: Cibola Burn (The Expanse #4) by James S.A. Corey<p></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSisEtkF4BX8r1842fDyI-hm72YG5NpY2VKLtLfUJXuqyXzB3aQ33fbicH3Q7Zcp9swsO40bqSBRTjcIzAzciBRKVAanPBNJ_XZNLln86h0IR3MPDsrey8b04MUmrYaXowxLqlW5U4s1rW/s475/cibola_burn.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="313" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSisEtkF4BX8r1842fDyI-hm72YG5NpY2VKLtLfUJXuqyXzB3aQ33fbicH3Q7Zcp9swsO40bqSBRTjcIzAzciBRKVAanPBNJ_XZNLln86h0IR3MPDsrey8b04MUmrYaXowxLqlW5U4s1rW/w264-h400/cibola_burn.jpg" width="264" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cibola Burn (The Expanse #4)<br />by<br />James S.A. Corey</td></tr></tbody></table><br /> <b>Title: Cibola Burn (The Expanse #4)</b> by <b>James S.A. Corey</b><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> <b>Rating: 3 stars</b> (๐๐๐)</span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> <b>Publisher: Orbit</b></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I fell off on my </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Expanse</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> reading but I feel like this is a bit of a detour in the series and it's one I could have skipped. I had been excited to see what the first adventure after the Ring gate opened would be so I was primed to love this. Alas, I didn't.</span></span><p></p><span><a name='more'></a></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Ilus/New Terra is the site of a land war between a group of Belters who make a colony in basically a land rush and a mining corporation. This is an interesting enough set up but not for an entire book. Holden and the crew of the Roci are pretty much on a mission to mediate between the two parties and it's pretty dicey. Behind the scenes is Fred Thompson of the re-branded OPA and Avasarala of Earth who needs things to be quelled but also to try to gain leverage for their respective factions. All in all, I'd have preferred for the land dispute to be the side story here. The characters were okay but didn't captivate my interest like the ones in </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Abbadon's Gate</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">. Like, I'm not even going to bother listing and explaining by character but suffice it to say, Havelock is the only one I'll retain because I remember him from way back with Miller. By the end, I thought the best parts were the brief Bobbie sections and the Investigator interlude sections.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I'll definitely keep going with the series because overall it's awesome. It's completely usual to read a series and come across a book one feels they could skip and be just fine. I'm hoping for more Avasarala and Bobbie in the next book and just more enjoyment all around.</span></span><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></span></div><i><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><b>Summary:</b> The gates have opened the way to thousands of habitable planets, and the land rush has begun. Settlers stream out from humanity's home planets in a vast, poorly controlled flood, landing on a new world. Among them, the Rocinante, haunted by the vast, posthuman network of the protomolecule as they investigate what destroyed the great intergalactic society that built the gates and the protomolecule.</span></i></div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">But Holden and his crew must also contend with the growing tensions between the settlers and the company which owns the official claim to the planet. Both sides will stop at nothing to defend what's theirs, but soon a terrible disease strikes and only Holden - with help from the ghostly Detective Miller - can find the cure.</span></i></div></span></i><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQwzZpNTXdS8QXRoc_UPVFyx_FvbeKAsCBo3IwrTuQfItqyStJdrQWM0Ybex-aFjD2W0XPq6Ij-bzu6SeiDK4CZCDicNqvlun5tq2MrQTiw0JxBAoCeKlPeaWI-W_KdayMpRhXSV89KPhn/s475/cibola_burn.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="313" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQwzZpNTXdS8QXRoc_UPVFyx_FvbeKAsCBo3IwrTuQfItqyStJdrQWM0Ybex-aFjD2W0XPq6Ij-bzu6SeiDK4CZCDicNqvlun5tq2MrQTiw0JxBAoCeKlPeaWI-W_KdayMpRhXSV89KPhn/w422-h640/cibola_burn.jpg" width="422" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cibola Burn (The Expanse #4)<br />by<br />James S.A. Corey</td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div></span><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div></div></div>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-50132842828575056902021-05-03T08:30:00.021-04:002021-05-03T08:30:00.307-04:00Book Review: Logan's Run by William F. Nolan<p></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHUkuL8wfZt9EcrTLy-7_rFkX0v401qLVOjn0Vg1zVzESiu9Jrc7a89x2r1hye8jPzLbHi31h3VD5iIMWvKcjiTKRGoc-gH0SrFuUbn-cRT51CuhmPVx9nznrzyTxYshnJ98ibVx16EA-5/s475/logans_run.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="308" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHUkuL8wfZt9EcrTLy-7_rFkX0v401qLVOjn0Vg1zVzESiu9Jrc7a89x2r1hye8jPzLbHi31h3VD5iIMWvKcjiTKRGoc-gH0SrFuUbn-cRT51CuhmPVx9nznrzyTxYshnJ98ibVx16EA-5/w259-h400/logans_run.jpg" width="259" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Logan's Run<br />by <br />William F. Nolan</td></tr></tbody></table><br /> <span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><b>Title:</b> <b>Logan's Run</b> by <b>William F. Nolan</b></span><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"> <b>Rating: 3 stars</b> (๐๐๐)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"> <b>Publisher:</b> <b>Vintage</b></span><b><br /></b><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">Over the last several years I've watched a number of 70s science fiction movies: ( </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">Logan's Run, Soylent Green, Westworld, etc.</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">) and read the books when I could. I finally got a copy of </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">Logan's Run</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"> and gave it a read.</span><div><br /></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">I liked this but I have to admit that I think the movie is more engaging. Perhaps that's simply because it was my introduction to the story. I'll just mention here what I most liked and didn't in the book. The characters beyond Logan and Jessica (and maybe Francis to an extent) were mere sketches and not memorable at all. I didn't much mind that because the settings were pretty detailed and interesting. Logan and Jessica see many places in this world that were not at all in the movie so that kept things fairly exciting. The story does linger overlong in a few places and it became surprisingly tedious. It's a short volume and feeling like something could have been edited down is somewhat a disappointment.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">My favourite part of the book was in the last third where many things come together but most importantly for me, the reader finds out how and why the United States turned into this place. It was fascinating, sad and somewhat disturbingly imaginable given the current real world. There's a climate crisis, over-population, government over-reach, civil uprising and what I can only describe as a complete breakdown of a society that ultimately trades one handful of horrors for a basket of other horrors. The use of propaganda was also a scary feature here and there's a whole section surrounding a Civil War re-enactment in Virginia that just boggled the mind. The book was worth reading for these parts alone. The ending was great, and I think I may have liked it more than the movie's ending. There's a great twist and the back third of this book had me up late reading.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">In the end, both the book and the movie had things to recommend them and I am glad that I read this. I have noticed that there are subsequent books in </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">Logan</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">, so perhaps I'll find and read those at some point also.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">Recommended.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><b style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><i>A couple of favourite passages:</i></b><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">"Logan paused to survey the vast mural which gave the structure its nameโa climbing mosaic composed of tiny bits of fireglass brilliantly arranged to commemorate the Burning of Washington. Orange, purple and raw red flames jeweled halfway up the faรงade; bodies flamed; buildings smoked and tumbled. Yet the awesome masterwork was flawed, incomplete. Stark, gaping areas broke the pattern. Only the famed muralist Roebler 7 could handle the corrosive fireglass, and when he had accepted Sleep his secret died with him. The project would never be finished."</i><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">"In his State of the Union address President Curtain had stressed the severity of the food shortage, as world population spiraled toward six billion. He called upon the young to exercise self-control in this crisis. But the sight of the fat, overfed President standing in living units across the country, talking of duty and restraint, had a negative effect on his audience. And the well-known fact that Curtain had fathered nine children made a showdown inevitable."</i><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">"The Little War had begun. By morning, half of Washington was in flames. Senators and congressmen were dragged in terror from their homes and hanged like criminals from trees and lampposts. The police and National Guard units were swept away in the first major wave of rioting. Buildings were set afire and explosives used. During the confusion an attendant at the Washington Zoo released the animals to save them from flames. The beasts were never recaptured."</i><p></p><br /><b><i>Summary:</i></b> <i>The bestselling dystopian novel that inspired the 1970s science-fiction classic starring Michael York, Jenny Agutter, and Richard Jordan.<br />In 2116, it is against the law to live beyond the age of twenty-one years. When the crystal flower in the palm of your hand turns from red to black, you have reached your Lastday and you must report to a Sleepshop for processing. But the human will to survive is strongโstronger than any mere law.<br /> <br />Logan 3 is a Sandman, an enforcer who hunts down those Runners who refuse to accept Deep Sleep. The day before Loganโs palmflower shifts to black, a Runner accidentally reveals that he was racing toward a goal: Sanctuary. With this information driving him forward, Logan 3 assumes the role of the hunted and becomes a Runner.</i><br /><br /><p><span style="color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><i><br /></i></span></p><p><span style="color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><i><br /></i></span></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW7jMJA10oDEo1TCjsV4Yp3VXU9KQI5vlIJ9Ic3aGxsBtzcrEc0q5jdQrTZdb7n7qfnxSYY5RIv4pkVUJVfBSC5ae3mjLa9qstmyUxe5ei975-qcBnrh08Mobl7wX-FXbUPnHs9FnWYjBk/s475/logans_run.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="308" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW7jMJA10oDEo1TCjsV4Yp3VXU9KQI5vlIJ9Ic3aGxsBtzcrEc0q5jdQrTZdb7n7qfnxSYY5RIv4pkVUJVfBSC5ae3mjLa9qstmyUxe5ei975-qcBnrh08Mobl7wX-FXbUPnHs9FnWYjBk/w414-h640/logans_run.jpg" width="414" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Logan's Run<br />by<br />William F. Nolan</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p></p></div></div></div>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-72497289087828181202021-02-17T08:30:00.001-05:002021-02-17T08:30:05.000-05:00Book Review: The Pint of No Return (Sloane Krause #2) by Ellie Alexander<p> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV4kek3yibQUOxx37ORz_0I-cCRAQ7WJABVzOoRMldYTvxSfvAA601-1oF2fmSMmBKqMRPMM6w0o1ZRTDh_uKpmDwCkj3N7BWWYTNY63GVb6pSvo-xw-4w6RB6DC0kNL5xcHx2HhfaKFh4/s475/pint_of_no_return.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="314" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV4kek3yibQUOxx37ORz_0I-cCRAQ7WJABVzOoRMldYTvxSfvAA601-1oF2fmSMmBKqMRPMM6w0o1ZRTDh_uKpmDwCkj3N7BWWYTNY63GVb6pSvo-xw-4w6RB6DC0kNL5xcHx2HhfaKFh4/w265-h400/pint_of_no_return.jpg" width="265" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Pint of No Return<br />by <br />Ellie Alexander</td></tr></tbody></table><b>Title: <i>The Pint of No Return</i></b> by <b><i>Ellie Alexander</i></b></p><p><b>Rating: <i>4 stars</i></b><i> </i>(๐๐๐๐)</p><p><b>Publisher: <i>Minotaur Books</i></b></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">The autumn fairs and Oktoberfests that I usually headed off to in autumn with my family weren't happening in 2020. That doesn't at all change the fact that I was in that mode and so I went on a hunt for some thematic cozy mysteries. I found Sloan Krause in a short novella </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Trouble Is Brewing </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">where she's introduced to readers while helping baker, Jules Capshaw, solve a keg theft. I have some of the baker books on my TBR but Sloan living in Leavenworth WA really captured my attention so I bought this to read immediately.</span></span></p><span><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><a name='more'></a></span></span><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Leavenworth is a whole Bavarian-themed town and in this installment, Oktoberfest is just beginning. The hamlet of 2000, is about to be inundated with tourists to enjoy all the brats, beer and as many reels of the Chicken Dance they can stand. Add in a blaze of foliage, strings of twinkling lights, pastries, schnitzel and murder and this was an engaging and enjoyable read. Sloan Krause is a likeable sleuth. She's trying to get her life back on track while being a mother in the midst of a divorce from a cheating husband, working at Nitro, a small brewer (the first job she's had outside of her husband's family brewery </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Der Keller</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> in about 20 years) and of course, is having some feelings that aren't strictly professional, for her boss, Garrett. There's also the not so small matter of her ongoing search for her birth parents which, as the story progresses, is getting more mysterious. If she's found to be a secret Contessa or hidden heiress to some storied family's fortune (related to beer or perfume because she's got a Nose), I wouldn't be surprised.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Also descending onto the town is a film crew making a documentary on beer and brewers. They're a somewhat interesting bunch but the most obnoxious is the host, Mitchell. The murder takes place at the end of Chapter 6 so there was a good amount of story to go in which to puzzle out the clues and solution, which was great. Sloan didn't talk with the people I most wanted to hear from until the end so that put up a bit of a red flag for me as to the culprit but it didn't diminish the story. I liked all of the characters as they fit their parts well. April was a real standout and while she was not likable, she was a necessary character to have around. I liked Sloan's moment of charitable thought about April also. I liked Chief Myers. I wanted to see more of her and liked that she didn't have an adversarial relationship with Sloan. Garrett is perfectly anodyne and just what I expect of would-be love interests in cozies. I liked that he's a scientist and has neat tee shirts. I do hope Sloan's son, Alex gets to be around more in future books. He's a sweet kid. And Kat is just a ball of bouncing positive energy so I was glad that she's staying on at Nitro. I hope to see more of Lisa and her real estate ventures, since it seems they will cross with April's.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I should say that I'm not a beer drinker but I did find all the brewer information interesting (and there was a lot of it). It showed that the writer and the main character cared about the craft. I was able to appreciate that and had fun reading some of the beer descriptions to my husband (the in house beer drinker). I was more drawn to the food and there's a vegetable soup Sloan makes that I highlit and will be riffing because it sounded delightful for an autumn meal.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I'll likely read the next </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">(Beyond a Reasonable Stout)</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> soon. It's still autumn in Leavenworth and set during election season and obviously, thematically perfect for the moment. Recommended.</span></span></p><p><br /></p><p><i><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b></b></span></i></p><blockquote><p><i><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b>Summary:</b> </span> <span style="font-family: helvetica;">No other festival compares to Oktoberfest in Leavenworth, Washington. The whole town is buzzing with excitement over this yearโs activities and eagerly awaiting Nitroโs latest offering Cherrywizen, made with locally sourced cherries. But local brewmaster Sloan Krause is tapped out. Between trying to manage the pub, her pending divorce with Mac, and her mounting feelings for Garrett, sheโs fermenting in internal turmoil.<br /><br />To complicate matters, dreamy movie star Mitchell Morgan and his production crew have arrived in the village to film during the authentic Bavarian brewfest. Mitchell has his eye on Sloan and a taste for Nitroโs Cherrywizen. Sloan escapes his advances for good when she finds Mitchell slumped over the bar. Is this a case of one pint too many, or has Mitchell been murdered by microbrew?</span></i></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxbuMAn0jBxmS4QEkxlszwdC7vEbq95htIJZvZDVgmrgOyHEsko1IK3sCAkPcLFN1aCrQZf9vHBBvqGoF_sft_CtJ6vN5qa3IMYaZbFAInAJUjKhwCbzQZff25W18KkBMdNU69IZXN2VdN/s475/pint_of_no_return.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="314" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxbuMAn0jBxmS4QEkxlszwdC7vEbq95htIJZvZDVgmrgOyHEsko1IK3sCAkPcLFN1aCrQZf9vHBBvqGoF_sft_CtJ6vN5qa3IMYaZbFAInAJUjKhwCbzQZff25W18KkBMdNU69IZXN2VdN/w424-h640/pint_of_no_return.jpg" width="424" /></a></div><br /><p></p></blockquote><p><br /></p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-67230191952417633132021-02-16T08:30:00.001-05:002021-02-16T08:30:10.480-05:00Book Review: Eight Perfect Murders (Malcolm Kershaw #1) by Peter Swanson<p> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggEC95tMz4yjU_e56iaAdmhMRSxNeNiwze14f5G2lho-JEOBobEcqdV77tP15yWUBVXSSTR1CcPxlwFjW9qH7v1rkLMdYVxwraBk37ACDKXPYb6u50wdZhuAtyknMK8ixT41XRXwleHvun/s475/eight_perfect_murders.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="317" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggEC95tMz4yjU_e56iaAdmhMRSxNeNiwze14f5G2lho-JEOBobEcqdV77tP15yWUBVXSSTR1CcPxlwFjW9qH7v1rkLMdYVxwraBk37ACDKXPYb6u50wdZhuAtyknMK8ixT41XRXwleHvun/w268-h400/eight_perfect_murders.jpg" width="268" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Eight Perfect Murders<br />by<br />Peter Swanson</td></tr></tbody></table><b>Title: <i>Eight Perfect Murders</i></b><i> </i>by <b><i>Peter Swanson</i></b></p><p><b>Rating: <i>4 stars</i></b> (๐๐๐๐)</p><p><b>Publisher: <i>William Morrow</i></b></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;">This is a love letter to lovers of Classic Crime & mystery fiends so right up my lane.</span></span></p><span><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><a name='more'></a></span></span><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Narrator Malcolm Kershaw is our guide through quite the twisty tale of disparate murders that may well not be and I thought it was a very enjoyable tour. There were plenty of clues to puzzle over and there were, of course, the eight perfect mysteries that come into play (seven books and one movie). I don't know if it's better to be familiar with all the referenced works but as I'd read some of them I did enjoy how they came into play. There were even a couple works I'd not heard of that I want to read and also one book in particular that I was planning on reading. And this brings me to the one thing that I didn't like about the book (but, admittedly there's also no getting around it to tell this story).</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">My gripe is about spoilers for other books (I last ran into this in Loreth Anne White's </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">In the Dark </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">). ๐ For the books I'd yet to read, the solutions are already known to me so it takes a lot of the thrill out of reading them (at least any time soon). I suppose it's a bit crazy to cry foul when works are widely known and/or decades-old but fine, I'll be crazy on this one. Funnily enough, it was the Tartt book that I was most put out with regard to spoilers. I have that on my TBR and now will give it a bit more time so I can let the answer recede in my mind. For anyone who hasn't read Highsmith's </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Strangers on a Train </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">or especially Christie's </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">And Then There Were None</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">, good luck on dodging spoilers. I can't quite believe I've read two books this year that just told All The Things.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">But overall, this was very enjoyable and while I figured correctly on some things, I didn't on others. Most especially at the end so I had surprise, a bit of disbelief and sheer delight when I found there will be another book. Given where Malcolm ends, how does that happen?!</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I can't believe there'll be another but I'm here for it! ๐๐ต๏ธโโ๏ธ Recommended (if you're a reader of classic crime and mysteries, if you're not, maybe read some of those first & then enjoy this one).</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"></span></span></p><blockquote><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b>Summary: </b> </span>A chilling tale of psychological suspense and an homage to the thriller genre tailor-made for fans: the story of a bookseller who finds himself at the center of an FBI investigation because a very clever killer has started using his list of fictionโs most ingenious murders.</i></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i><br />Years ago, bookseller and mystery aficionado Malcolm Kershaw compiled a list of the genreโs most unsolvable murders, those that are almost impossible to crackโwhich he titled โEight Perfect Murdersโโchosen from among the best of the best including Agatha Christieโs A. B. C. Murders, Patricia Highsmithโs Strangers on a Train, Ira Levinโs Death Trap, A. A. Milne's Red House Mystery, Anthony Berkeley Cox's Malice Aforethought, James M. Cain's Double Indemnity, John D. Macdonald's The Drowner, and Donna Tartt's A Secret History.<br /><br />But no one is more surprised than Mal, now the owner of the Old Devils Bookstore in Boston, when an FBI agent comes knocking on his door one snowy day in February. Sheโs looking for information about a series of unsolved murders that look eerily similar to the killings on Malโs old list. And the FBI agent isnโt the only one interested in this bookseller who spends almost every night at home reading. The killer is out there, watching his every moveโa diabolical threat who knows way too much about Malโs personal history, especially the secrets heโs never told anyone, even his recently deceased wife.<br /><br />To protect himself, Mal begins looking into possible suspects . . . and sees a killer in everyone around him. But Mal doesnโt count on the investigation leaving a trail of death in its wake. Suddenly, a series of shocking twists leaves more victims deadโand the noose around Malโs neck grows so tight he might never escape.</i></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"></span></p></blockquote><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvjEhJCQNwrZCN09q0BNPGTUKf7pzEXET745usP9XouKe3flkCajYXrb6fEGzGiKKeb_P5H1nMR9VGaTbY8Itl607pLslr0muDwHcvhDPazOHva7CddMmDNh0Z1eSrON02QhP9bE2B3d5X/s475/eight_perfect_murders.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="317" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvjEhJCQNwrZCN09q0BNPGTUKf7pzEXET745usP9XouKe3flkCajYXrb6fEGzGiKKeb_P5H1nMR9VGaTbY8Itl607pLslr0muDwHcvhDPazOHva7CddMmDNh0Z1eSrON02QhP9bE2B3d5X/w428-h640/eight_perfect_murders.jpg" width="428" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span><p></p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-52186618319129237832021-02-15T08:30:00.002-05:002021-02-15T08:30:14.556-05:00Book Review: The Case of the Famished Parson by George Bellairs<p> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZtD7Z_ywRU3F-OOyP0O2qBTvIWwR6F0VTHEuVqtNuQ7kAkJwYUhFGxKgtRmsDkEhw1uz6rvkBeKJ-rQYcJPxgDehSOvQ0LtylsYvp7fmtZowNhmiGqBda5o3AqCD_8ACUd1XhG7TP9AOZ/s475/case_of_famished_parson.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="310" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZtD7Z_ywRU3F-OOyP0O2qBTvIWwR6F0VTHEuVqtNuQ7kAkJwYUhFGxKgtRmsDkEhw1uz6rvkBeKJ-rQYcJPxgDehSOvQ0LtylsYvp7fmtZowNhmiGqBda5o3AqCD_8ACUd1XhG7TP9AOZ/w261-h400/case_of_famished_parson.jpg" width="261" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Case of the Famished Parson<br />by<br />George Bellairs</td></tr></tbody></table><b>Title: <i>The Case of the Famished Parson</i></b> by <b><i>George Bellairs</i></b></p><p><b>Rating: <i>3 stars</i></b> (๐๐๐)</p><p><b>Publisher: <i>Ipso Books</i></b></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I read this several days ago and held off writing a review because I couldn't think of what I wanted to say. While that can be a good thing when I finish a book, it wasn't in this case. This was left me decidedly neutral.</span></span></p><p><span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">This isn't going to be listed as my favourite Inspector Littlejohn story. It was a bit better than just ok and I did like a lot of the story but the solution left me disappointed. It wasn't that the back third wasn't done well it's just that it hinged on the part of the story I was least interested in. I was least interested in that thread because I was bored. On the positive side, we meet Mrs. Littlejohn and there's a good bit of action in the beginning of the Inspector's investigation. I also enjoyed a good many of the possible suspects through most of the story.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">If you skip this period in Littlejohn's life, you'll be just fine.</span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b></b></span></i></span></p><blockquote><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b>Summary:</b> </span>Dr. James Macintosh, the Bishop of Greyle, was a mysterious man; for a long time, nobody even knew his last name. But things take a turn for the bizarre when his body is found emaciated and battered having being pushed face-first off the edge of a cliffโฆ<br />Inspector Littlejohn faces an incredibly peculiar case. How to explain the savage murder of a gentle Bishop? Did he know too much about the secretive citizens of Cape Marvin, the seaside resort of his murder? Or did the reason have something to do with the strange family he had left behind in Medhope?<br /><br />Above all, why was the Bishopโs body so undernourished that death by violence won out by only a few days over death by starvation?</i><br /><br /></span><br /></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><p></p></blockquote><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="310" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA8DgSHB6rvR63rXfH6n7KhpOUPtBin9qwXDZB9nj-lzI97LeMh-1D02YAoV14WnyFclaVkR_yLetA_yoAh2snxjMr4xohxRLOPIsKALWjfheHxSBYnsqImt0tIFn0fAPfVrT3u3zXlCNh/w418-h640/case_of_famished_parson.jpg" width="418" /></span></div><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span><p></p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-10964812546227734512021-02-12T08:30:00.001-05:002021-02-12T08:30:06.804-05:00Book Review: The Pact by Dawn Goodwin<p> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7HGQsMfjvYAbXNu-JMCveAosdcVuvZILRnMHAw7Xi-waBaBrD03epmCXHH7TQOaXGrCzEkJWaKT6M_zwLHzW7HJ_ArcgJy1egHK5XpOVTPHZk3mjcpkR8ONiN-1U0uuf3eXSkMmMYCkoU/s475/the_pact.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="309" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7HGQsMfjvYAbXNu-JMCveAosdcVuvZILRnMHAw7Xi-waBaBrD03epmCXHH7TQOaXGrCzEkJWaKT6M_zwLHzW7HJ_ArcgJy1egHK5XpOVTPHZk3mjcpkR8ONiN-1U0uuf3eXSkMmMYCkoU/w260-h400/the_pact.jpg" width="260" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Pact<br />by <br />Dawn Goodwin</td></tr></tbody></table>Title: The Pact by Dawn Goodwin</p><p>Rating: 4 stars</p><p>Publisher: Aria</p><p><br /></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">The cover of this caught my eye on Netgalley and after reading the blurb, I had to request it. It definitely sounds like </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Strangers On a Train</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> (without the train). Two women with man troubles and one muses after too many glasses of wine that killing hers would improve her life. Unfortunately, the other is a lunatic and takes this as a "Game on!" moment and that can't end well.</span></span></p><p><span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">But the way this played out wasn't exactly what I was expecting. There is indeed a murder but it doesn't take place until around the 75% mark. As a rule, I'm not a fan of that and like most stories where this happens, there's no good reason for it. Honestly, there was too much time spent on laying out the marriage of Maddie and Greg (from their meeting to the present). Maddie suffers through infertility and the breakdown of her marriage and when we enter the story, she is being moved into a nearby flat by her husband. Greg's now living in the home he and Maddie shared, with his formerly-his-really-bad-at-her-job-PA-girlfriend and their baby. Maddie, is really fine with all this and so accommodating to Greg to the point that upon accepting a lunch invitation to what used to be her home, she goes to the trouble of making him his favourite dessert (sticky toffee pudding) because he asked and gosh darn it all, he's just such a great guy (I never liked or felt for that guy but I think readers are supposed to). And that's not the most banana-pants thing this story has to roll out on the reader.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">This was like a <i>Lifetime</i> movie and I had many moments of "What did I just read?!" That's not a bad thing because I just went with it and had fun but that's not the serious toned, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Strangers On a Train</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> vibe I'd been seeking when I requested this. The back 25% of this was full of twists and I was surprised at some of the revelations. The very end is too cute and wrapped in a bow for me but it was completely in line with that Lifetime movie feel, so not unexpected. There were a couple things that felt like continuity issues: Maddie is 38 but refers to herself as a Boomer (so... definitely not). She talks abt her fave shows with Greg & having watched them as newlyweds in the 90s. So perhaps she's supposed to be a Gen Xer & 38 was a typo, idk). May be worked out in the final edition for release.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I'd recommend this as a weekend or beach read. If you're the sort to talk to the characters as you read, you should settle in with a beverage. Wine, perhaps.</span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"></span></p><blockquote><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><b><i>Summary:</i></b> <i>I'LL KILL YOURS, IF YOU KILL MINE.Maddie's life has come crashing down around her. Her husband has left her and moved on with a new woman and baby. No longer can she run from the past that's been haunting her. The past has destroyed her future.<br /><br />In a new flat, trying to start a new life, Maddie meets Jade and her young son, Ben. All too swiftly Maddie finds the dark thoughts whirring through her brain. But Jade's different, she loves Ben, doesn't she?<br /><br />As the two women begin to open up about their exes over a few glasses of wine, Jade conjures a plan, a pact. She'll kill Maddie's if Maddie kills hers. Laughing it off, Maddie returns to her normal life. But what if it wasn't a joke at all...</i></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggx0rcYr9azcLPmtDSouUwyfFpBNav3d1aUBuYK1x8-8hHQmtzwbmnv5nuqvzcYIkUKx0ELzazGypt-TpSk0HIb51FYwkaE3qzMq2vh2a8vVQ3o45zuWE9Ogx9Fr7arXS3VsrjaVU9Lwsz/s475/the_pact.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div><p></p></blockquote><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggx0rcYr9azcLPmtDSouUwyfFpBNav3d1aUBuYK1x8-8hHQmtzwbmnv5nuqvzcYIkUKx0ELzazGypt-TpSk0HIb51FYwkaE3qzMq2vh2a8vVQ3o45zuWE9Ogx9Fr7arXS3VsrjaVU9Lwsz/s475/the_pact.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="309" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggx0rcYr9azcLPmtDSouUwyfFpBNav3d1aUBuYK1x8-8hHQmtzwbmnv5nuqvzcYIkUKx0ELzazGypt-TpSk0HIb51FYwkaE3qzMq2vh2a8vVQ3o45zuWE9Ogx9Fr7arXS3VsrjaVU9Lwsz/w416-h640/the_pact.jpg" width="416" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br style="background-color: white;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Many thanks to Netgalley & the publisher for the Advance Reader's Copy.</i></span><p></p><p><br /></p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-49357409003561390242021-02-11T08:30:00.001-05:002021-02-11T08:30:00.400-05:00Book Review: Death of a Busybody by George Bellairs<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbiUKvPTCUvVjapqCO74usiPc_mKAw9Om0Wytc4kokrgTBW54C0w2yF4P6bDr_rKoB3L3DEUFHzoVXKTgyv7an9cekDnr5qErLBhhnLUmw1zpm26Lwo-PPnP4g2hinlAxt-MmvJDZCZOY0/s465/death_of_busybody.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="465" data-original-width="318" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbiUKvPTCUvVjapqCO74usiPc_mKAw9Om0Wytc4kokrgTBW54C0w2yF4P6bDr_rKoB3L3DEUFHzoVXKTgyv7an9cekDnr5qErLBhhnLUmw1zpm26Lwo-PPnP4g2hinlAxt-MmvJDZCZOY0/w274-h400/death_of_busybody.jpg" width="274" /></a></div><b>Title: <i>Death of a Busybody</i></b> by <b><i>George Bellairs</i></b><p></p><p><b>Rating: <i>4 stars</i></b> (๐๐๐๐)</p><p><b>Publisher: <i>British Library Classics</i></b></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">This was a great village mystery and I'm so glad for the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">British Library Crime Classics</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> including it in their reissues because I can't imagine I'd have come across it any other way!</span></span></p><p><span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">The village of Hilary Magna has a grisly murder on its hands. The titular busybody is Miss Tither and a more disagreeable woman would likely be difficult to find. She's made everyone else's business hers and also was on a one-woman crusade to rid the village of any ills she rooted out. At long last, she's found concussed and drowned in a cesspit. A grisly end. So it falls to Scotland Yard's Inspector Thomas Littlejohn, Sergeant Cromwell and P.C. Harriwinckle to investigate and find out the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Why</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> and </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Who</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> did the deed. There is no shortage of suspects and that made for a good read.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I won't spoil the solution but it came together so well and provided a fun puzzle to try and solve along with the investigators as the story went along. Additionally, I very much cared about how things resolved for some of the villagers and was glad there's a bit at the end sharing that. Points also for some very memorable names used: Ethelred Claplady and Athelstan Wynard. And honourable mention to all the meals recounted, from the cringeworthy chitterlings P.C. Harriwinkle favours to roast beef, roast pork, various dumplings, suet and Yorkshire pudding, a fine repast was had by many.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I so enjoyed this and at the end of the book, there's a little biography of George Bellairs and a mention of his website. I signed up for a newsletter & even got a free book download of his </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Corpses in Enderby </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">(book 22 in the series featuring Inspector Littlejohn), so I'll definitely be reading that.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Recommended.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b>Favourite passages</b>:</i><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">"Miss Tither was a campaigner as well. Her weapon was her tongue, which she used like a pair of bellows, fanning a spark of a whisper into a consuming fire of chatter, a holocaust of pursuing flame."<br /><br />"Carradine, the Coroner, is in a rare temper about another inquest in Hilary Magna. He detests the place for some reason and seems to think the natives are doing it on purpose to spite him."<br /><br />"Mr. Crabtree's father, an ex-member of the Trentshire Yeomanry, had desired for his son a high army rank which his means were inadequate to procure. He, therefore, gave him Major as a Christian name, by which he had been known all his life, except during a spell as a conscript in the army, when he ordered to assume the name of Wilfred by an outraged sergeant-major."</i></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></i></span></p><p><span style="color: #181818; font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white;"></span></span></p><blockquote><p><i><span style="color: #181818; font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white;"><b>Summary:</b> </span></span><span style="font-family: helvetica;">The eponymous nosy parker in Death of a Busybody is Miss Ethel Tither. She has made herself deeply unpopular in the quintessentially English village of Hilary Magna, since she goes out of her way to snoop on people, and interfere with their lives. On being introduced to her, the seasoned reader of detective stories will spot a murder victim in the making. Sure enough, by the end of chapter one, this unpleasant lady has met an extremely unpleasant fate. She is found floating in a cesspool, having been bludgeoned prior to drowning in the drainage water.This is, in every way, a murky business; realising that they are out of their depth, the local police quickly call in the Yard. Inspector Thomas Littlejohn, George Bellairs' series detective, arrives on the train, and in casting around for suspects, he finds that he is spoiled for choice. The amiable vicar supplies him with a map showing the scene of the crime; maps were a popular feature of traditional whodunnits for many years, and Bellairs occasionally included them in his books, as he does here.</span></i></p><p><span style="color: #181818; font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="color: #181818; font-family: helvetica;"></span></p></blockquote><p><span style="color: #181818; font-family: helvetica;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #181818; font-family: helvetica;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9tU1y6gg_ePJdHUahxDjbt7BpzY_z8ogKkK9m4aRnAxy2Hxtm7JUrvQL92ITpB60zPgjJqvkh28BQwR7oxgUgb9NFxel4ex1lQdeq7bd1yrtty9KQSKP7iv3YrA2ZjB3Lmx03RGdHFZ3-/s465/death_of_busybody.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="465" data-original-width="318" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9tU1y6gg_ePJdHUahxDjbt7BpzY_z8ogKkK9m4aRnAxy2Hxtm7JUrvQL92ITpB60zPgjJqvkh28BQwR7oxgUgb9NFxel4ex1lQdeq7bd1yrtty9KQSKP7iv3YrA2ZjB3Lmx03RGdHFZ3-/w438-h640/death_of_busybody.jpg" width="438" /></a></span></div><span style="color: #181818; font-family: helvetica;"><br /><span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span></span><p></p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-59149509385321220872021-02-10T08:30:00.003-05:002021-02-10T08:30:02.350-05:00Book Review: Magpie Murders (Susan Ryeland #1) by Anthony Horowitz<p> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj76bBZOaaIigDaBi5zegElNFybrvl-5FJh8WVMnATa-mvCFo3re3WbD2vwruzWJ0F4Um_uu8AJXA3y1NWDrc_tnzOFeCWYJnubUxWhCX6ytu5UM_BwUjzGinI6DlNkymaJBYPQCawT2KM8/s475/magpie_murders.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="314" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj76bBZOaaIigDaBi5zegElNFybrvl-5FJh8WVMnATa-mvCFo3re3WbD2vwruzWJ0F4Um_uu8AJXA3y1NWDrc_tnzOFeCWYJnubUxWhCX6ytu5UM_BwUjzGinI6DlNkymaJBYPQCawT2KM8/w265-h400/magpie_murders.jpg" width="265" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Magpie Murders<br />by<br />Anthony Horowitz</td></tr></tbody></table><b>Title: <i>Magpie Murders</i></b> by <b><i>Anthony Horowitz</i></b></p><p><b>Rating: <i>3 stars </i></b>(๐๐๐)</p><p><b>Publisher:<i> Harper</i></b></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Well, I don't really know what to say. I liked parts of this but I have to admit to being overall non-plussed. I gave it three stars but mostly because I can't bring myself to give in two.</span></span></p><p><span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">The book within a book idea was initially intriguing and I initially enjoyed it but it got to feel overlong and I lost a bit of interest. It took me ten days to get through it and I read another book at that time. When the discovery is made that the end of the novel is missing and the reader is thrust back into the world with Susan to take on a real murder mystery, I was again excited. But that thrill eventually fizzled for me. I take no joy in saying this. I love cozy mysteries and mysteries in general (I'm a Midsomer Murders and Foyle's War fangirl, so know I very much enjoy Horowitz's storytelling). This is something that should be right up my lane but it just didn't capture and captivate me in all.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I would read the next in the series (and I already own it) but I think I'll give it a bit. Now, I'm off to find some science fiction to get into.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Neutral on recommend.</span></span><span><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"></span></span></p><blockquote><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><b>Summary:</b> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">When editor Susan Ryeland is given the manuscript of Alan Conwayโs latest novel, she has no reason to think it will be much different from any of his others. After working with the bestselling crime writer for years, she's intimately familiar with his detective, Atticus Pรผnd, who solves mysteries disturbing sleepy English villages. An homage to queens of classic British crime such as Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers, Alanโs traditional formula has proved hugely successful. So successful that Susan must continue to put up with his troubling behavior if she wants to keep her job.</span></i></span></p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Conwayโs latest tale has Atticus Pรผnd investigating a murder at Pye Hall, a local manor house. Yes, there are dead bodies and a host of intriguing suspects, but the more Susan reads, the more sheโs convinced that there is another story hidden in the pages of the manuscript: one of real-life jealousy, greed, ruthless ambition, and murder.</span></i></span><div><span style="color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></span><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div><div></div></div></blockquote><div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIqf-8DdUb-rMw94FwWFysAz7kIlL-NEoxyCt93Qew_I6xkTgapr-u3oUHabi6q1Y330CTK6NoBgSLGDedrtMuiLvV3JFvQortDbczWjFRQP1tT-eHAkfQ2P_bwM5RA7R5Sa87Y6nkkZI6/s475/magpie_murders.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="314" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIqf-8DdUb-rMw94FwWFysAz7kIlL-NEoxyCt93Qew_I6xkTgapr-u3oUHabi6q1Y330CTK6NoBgSLGDedrtMuiLvV3JFvQortDbczWjFRQP1tT-eHAkfQ2P_bwM5RA7R5Sa87Y6nkkZI6/w424-h640/magpie_murders.jpg" width="424" /></a></div><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div></div>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-75666382650194395482021-02-09T08:30:00.029-05:002021-02-09T08:30:03.638-05:00Book Review: Crossed Skis: An Alpine Mystery by Carol Carnac<div class="separator"><br /></div><p> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij4rjuBSZc1p-ucTTYSEV2St39NDrIN7XLvxsCTnw2bkbR1Quxovfh8Lj1klQN8_tMiyxQi8rlQMMq_CnKgZwElPAZDiCZoqqPE3UukaLDnn3BgQ0pnISNNjIOH2NvTRC_n2jmo7QsCP_a/s465/crossed_skis.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="465" data-original-width="318" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij4rjuBSZc1p-ucTTYSEV2St39NDrIN7XLvxsCTnw2bkbR1Quxovfh8Lj1klQN8_tMiyxQi8rlQMMq_CnKgZwElPAZDiCZoqqPE3UukaLDnn3BgQ0pnISNNjIOH2NvTRC_n2jmo7QsCP_a/w274-h400/crossed_skis.jpg" width="274" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Crossed Skis: An Alpine Mystery<br />by<br />Carol Carnac</td></tr></tbody></table><b>Title: <i>Crossed Skis: An Alpine Mystery</i></b> by <b><i>Carol Carnac</i></b></p><p><b>Rating: <i>4 stars</i></b><i> </i>(๐๐๐๐)</p><p><b>Publisher:</b> <b><i>British Library Publishing</i></b></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I loved this! The setting was fantastic (piles of snowy awesome, mountains, chalets and skiing!) & the mystery is more a London police procedural with a concurrent thread running with an Alps vacationing party of 16 in which the sought after killer is embedded under an assumed identity.</span></span></p><p><span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">The detectives are presented with a grisly situation upon happening onto a house fire with a horribly burned corpse. It's soon clear that there's been a murder and the notice of the impression of a ski pole in the mud is the first clue. The vacationing group was a chaotic and jovial bunch with varying knowledge of each other (siblings, friends, friends and acquaintances of friends).</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Kate is the main organizer and one of the main characters of the story. She was inquisitive and interested in people so when she senses something amiss with missing money, she wonders what is going on and who is the mystery centred on. When it comes to her notice that the CID is asking questions at her boarding house and arrive in the Alps, she's sure it's to do with the travelling group somehow. She was a good character and I found her quite a good investigator in her own right. I'd read another book with her as the sleuth. The story culminates with the two threads merging, the killer outed and an exciting scene on the slopes. I'd thought it was going to zig but the story zagged and I loved every minute of it. When the title popped up I had the "A-ha!" moment and that was cool as well.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I chose to read this because it's the time of year I want my mysteries wintry and this more than satisfied. This is a great addition to the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">British Library Crime Classics</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> and I recommend it. I'd read another by Carnac (aka E.C.R. Lorac). This is the eighth book in the Julian Rivers series but she has many books under her other name in the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">BLCC</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"> reissue series.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><b style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Favourite passages (surprise, mostly related to the atmosphere & setting):</b><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">"Snow and mountains are the only reality and in spite of their beauty thereโs an element of terror in them."<br /><br />"They had emerged from the pine woods now, and were in bright sunlight again, travelling up a wide valley shut in by snowy crests, the intense whiteness confusing distances, so that the valley seemed a vastness of immeasurable untrodden snow, stretching from the track to the mountain tops, the horse and sleigh dwarfed to insignificance."<br /><br />"A blue dusk seemed to caress the snow: stars were beginning to gleam above the mountains and the valley shone with golden specks from lighted windows. The sound of sleigh bells and the soft thud of horsesโ hooves on the beaten snow tracks combined to make enchantment of the Austrian village."<br /><br />"Kate Reid took one good look at what she could see of Lech and was well satisfied. It was an Austrian village, set in a wide Alpine valley, with a stream racing in torrents between snowy banks. Cradled on all sides by the embracing snow slopes, dominated by mountain peaks, Lech yet retained the charm of a village. It had the comely wide-eaved wooden houses familiar to travellers in Switzerland, which clustered round an enchanting little stone church, whose tall rather gaunt tower was crowned by an onion-shaped cupola, glowing golden in the lucid light. Neither the hotels, nor the polyglot crowds in ski-ing kit, destroyed the impression that Lech was an Austrian mountain village, which had its own way of life, its own character, developed and bred in the mountains: something picturesque and yet sturdy, colourful and independent, to which the winter sports crowd was but an incident in a life of sturdy independence, whose ways and traditions had developed in its mountain environment."<br /><br /><b>And one because detectives in detective novels reading detective novels is awesome:</b><br /><br /><i>"Lancing had bought six Penguin detective novels, from which he derived much entertainment: he left them all in the train at Langenโโas propagandaโ, he said to Rivers."</i></i></span><p></p><p><br /></p><br /><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i><b></b></i></span><blockquote><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><i><b>Summary:</b> An atmospheric holiday novel from one of the most consistently popular authors in the series, Carol Carnac (also known as E.C.R. Lorac).<br />โCrossed skis means danger aheadโฆโ<br /><br />In Londonโs Bloomsbury, Inspector Julian Rivers of Scotland Yard looks down at a dismal scene. Here is the victim, burnt to a crisp. Here are the clues โ clues which point to a good climber and expert skier, and which lead Rivers to the piercing sunshine and sparkling snow of the Austrian Alps.<br /><br />Here there is something sinister beneath the heady joys of the slopes, and Rivers is soon confronted by a merry group of suspects, and a long list of reasons not to trust each of them. For the mountains can be a dangerous, changeable place, and it can be lonely out between the pines of the slopes...<br /><br />As with each of the novels published under E C R Lorac in the Crime Classics series, the authorโs sense of place is beautifully realised in all its breathtaking freshness, and she does not miss opportunities; there may be at least one high-stakes ski-chase before this chilling mystery can be put to rest.<br /></i></span><br /><br /><br /><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW6DSzmqWSPWmThgZGBU8qS-nBfGmQc4jLPBm1XUluTFbd6TfKG-HQbRo9TMt7oI6OrbQ7cUX1ka2QeJcOKWtXSoLscRicy_DLSd2eXw7Ym2STeTHl_QTJd76uGn9ae6aSFVkLi_CO6bwr/s465/crossed_skis.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div></blockquote><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW6DSzmqWSPWmThgZGBU8qS-nBfGmQc4jLPBm1XUluTFbd6TfKG-HQbRo9TMt7oI6OrbQ7cUX1ka2QeJcOKWtXSoLscRicy_DLSd2eXw7Ym2STeTHl_QTJd76uGn9ae6aSFVkLi_CO6bwr/s465/crossed_skis.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="465" data-original-width="318" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW6DSzmqWSPWmThgZGBU8qS-nBfGmQc4jLPBm1XUluTFbd6TfKG-HQbRo9TMt7oI6OrbQ7cUX1ka2QeJcOKWtXSoLscRicy_DLSd2eXw7Ym2STeTHl_QTJd76uGn9ae6aSFVkLi_CO6bwr/w438-h640/crossed_skis.jpg" width="438" /></a></div><br />Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-42932959662930328382021-02-08T08:30:00.002-05:002021-02-08T08:30:00.358-05:00Book Review: Who Is Maud Dixon by Alexandra Andrews<p> </p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYqs0B4dvxJ8440XuRQ-4ZafSQAG1Xo8LYuDBS5-hGLxeInOYJEGkawlcAt-PkGvYxxAlGAgHyEAuOUgp9VDFdgEUzqslDnoln6G1KbL25_1F6IEhDsg91BkMODiCzlaVq4a5eFcT_eJEk/s475/who_is_maud_dixon.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="309" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYqs0B4dvxJ8440XuRQ-4ZafSQAG1Xo8LYuDBS5-hGLxeInOYJEGkawlcAt-PkGvYxxAlGAgHyEAuOUgp9VDFdgEUzqslDnoln6G1KbL25_1F6IEhDsg91BkMODiCzlaVq4a5eFcT_eJEk/w260-h400/who_is_maud_dixon.jpg" width="260" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Who Is Maud Dixon<br />by <br />Alexandra Andrews</td></tr></tbody></table><b>Title: <i>Who Is Maud Dixon</i></b> by <b><i>Alexandra Andrews</i></b><p></p><p><b>Rating:</b> <i><b>4 stars</b></i> (๐๐๐๐)</p><p><b>Publisher:</b> <i>Little Brown & Company</i></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;">This was fun! This was a fresh twist on the Imposter trope & I couldn't stop tapping my screen for the next page. I don't want to give away spoilers because that's the real fun here but do know that it is a little slow at some points. </span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span></span></span></p><a name='more'></a><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><br /></span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Honestly, the parts when Florence had any sort of hookup liaison felt like it lingered aimlessly for a bit. They both reached purposeful ends but I felt they could have arrived there sooner. The first especially has a good payoff that propelled her trajectory worthily. Helen proved a good character and by about the midway point of the book, things take an interesting turn between the women and things get even wilder in the final quarter of the book.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">I highlit a fair amount and Andrews definitely has a wonderful turn of phrase on display here. I can't do a favourite quote for an ARC review because something may change in the final version but there are many I hope make it to the final cut because they're gems.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">As I've mentioned in past reviews, I enjoy a good ingratiator book as such types both fascinate and repel me so I was likely just the audience for this one. In book likes this reminded me of Anna Pitoniak's </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Necessary People</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">, Tara Elizabeth Burton's </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Social Creature</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">, Stephanie Clifford's </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Everybody Rise </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">and of course Highsmith's </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Ripley</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">. I can't stress enough though that I haven't come across a book before that had this particular twist but I surely hope I run into it again. I look forward to more from Andrews.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Great debut. Recommended.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818;">Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for an Advanced Reader Copy.</i></span></p><br /><blockquote><b><i>Summary:</i></b> <i>For readers of The Silent Patient - a taut, twisty, character-driven suspense novel about a famous novelist and a small-town striver locked in a struggle for fortune and fame.</i></blockquote><blockquote><i>Florence Darrow is a small-town striver who believes that she's destined to become a celebrated writer. When she stumbles into the opportunity to become the assistant to "Maud Dixon," a celebrated-but anonymous-novelist (think: Elena Ferrante), she believes that the universe is finally providing her big chance. The arrangement feels idyllic; Helen can be prickly, but she is full of pointed wisdom on both writing and living. She even invites Florence along on a research trip to Morocco, where her new novel is set. Florence has never been out of the country before; maybe, she imagines, she'll finally have something exciting to write about herself. But when Florence wakes up in the hospital after a terrible car crash, and Helen is dead, she begins to imagine what it might be like to 'upgrade' into not only Helen's life, but also that of Helen's bestselling pseudonym, Maud Dixon... </i></blockquote><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgcuLnGldLCOwG_FxIJikLqzgqn8xZyRyYt70hZZofoEHqj9bHr85Vmf_3JBUClpJfCvNuflJW3d8PNNMQmBmZS2qnNumgAwhIecaSE6OMz5vKYu_13hvZNu1t-SWR_2PP0JiM74hKQuzS/s475/who_is_maud_dixon.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="309" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgcuLnGldLCOwG_FxIJikLqzgqn8xZyRyYt70hZZofoEHqj9bHr85Vmf_3JBUClpJfCvNuflJW3d8PNNMQmBmZS2qnNumgAwhIecaSE6OMz5vKYu_13hvZNu1t-SWR_2PP0JiM74hKQuzS/w416-h640/who_is_maud_dixon.jpg" width="416" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span><p></p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-26150410430174987362021-01-29T08:30:00.007-05:002021-01-29T08:30:07.647-05:00Book Review: Refuge by J.J. Blacklocke<p> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLP3II4kWrDnzrYTjz9LSvyDiusJRiw-_EOCIjGQPqeakZHa_F0DdO2n5RVwP3X0pplCY5mxrprQsw7vhuZ3_2NkG0irSwdxkSHl4T1CJsJv0_C86WtTX5njhnQ2Tnt6fYPjALDY3oudlH/s466/refuge.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="466" data-original-width="318" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLP3II4kWrDnzrYTjz9LSvyDiusJRiw-_EOCIjGQPqeakZHa_F0DdO2n5RVwP3X0pplCY5mxrprQsw7vhuZ3_2NkG0irSwdxkSHl4T1CJsJv0_C86WtTX5njhnQ2Tnt6fYPjALDY3oudlH/w273-h400/refuge.jpg" width="273" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Refuge<br />by<br />J.J. Blacklocke</td></tr></tbody></table></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b>Title: <i>Refuge</i></b> by <b><i>J.J. Blacklocke</i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b>Rating: <i>4 stars</i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b>Publisher:</b> <i>Aethon Books</i></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">I'm a sucker for stories set on space stations and this also had trade, politics and diplomacy so I had to request this on Netgalley. Add in some planetary destruction and I was completely intrigued.</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div style="text-align: left;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">There's a huge convocation going on at Tradepoint with many beings from an array of planets and the Vennan has arrived with a delegation of just under a thousand people to participate. The diplomatic arm of the delegation includes Gredin a translator, on her first assignment fresh off her honeymoon. Tetrelanna, known as The Voice is who she is subordinate to and fairly quickly it's clear this is not a good working relationship. Tetrelanna has barely concealed contempt for her translator and also seems temperamentally not to be suited to diplomatic endeavours. The rest of their direct party includes Cirin and Burlon, both Travelers (Burlon is also a Trader for his House), Keegan, a historian and Sill, a Memory. The rest of the delegation are made up of many artisans, crafters, musicians, culinary experts and others with cultural expertise.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">There's a lot covered here and many beings to meet. My favourites were the Prett because how could I not really be interested in the runners of the space station? Wyve is the Director of Tradepoint and had a good amount of characterization, so I was very pleased. Also, the Beng, Shodekekeen and the rest were fairly fascinating. While reading I was reminded of </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">The Retrieval Artist</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"> series by Kristine Katherine Rusch because the non-humanoid beings were so well rendered and so varied. Also, there's a bit of a trial that highlights the deft dance of rules, laws and rendering of justice can come about when so many come together in order to maintain peace and trade ties. A small thing to one can be a catastrophe for another and just like reading KKR's series, it gave this reader a lot to think about. I loved that!</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">There's so much that happens but I'm not going to spoil because it was enjoyable to discover. That's not to say there were not a disappointment or two along the way. The Venna have a bit of fantasy woo-woo going on and while I don't need an explanation for it, I was a bit let down when Gredin is basically transformed overnight by this woo-woo thing from a grief-stricken person unable to do anything to help herself to a collected and steady person grasping the mantle of leader because Chosen One reasons. I wanted to see her grow into that role or at least marshal herself to the task. She lost a bit of that whole formidable bona fides with the woo-woo. To be fair, as this story takes place over about three days, she spends several chapters an inert crying mess after a calamitous situation and it was grating on my nerves. What can you do with compressed time? I certainly wouldn't have wanted to exist with her like that any longer than the story allowed but still. I did like that other characters voiced skepticism given the rapidity of the shift. But everything that followed the woo-woo was excellent.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">This is the first book in either a duo or series (I'm not sure which) but I am inclined to read the next. There's enough given and this ends at such a pivotal point that I want to know more. Who did it? Why? What did Palomar have to do with whatever to suffer its fate? What will become of the Vennan when their rotations on Tradepoint have elapsed? What will the Beng do next? I mean, I have many questions so... this is good.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">I should also mention there are a lot of in-universe words and there's no glossary but with context, a reader can likely work out what things and meanings are. Honestly, the names and such felt so much like </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">SFF Random Name Generator</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"> outputs, and made only more noticeable when one of the characters has such a normal human name, Keegan. I wondered why he was so different (great character, btw).</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">Recommended. I'll be on the outlook for the next book and would read another by Blacklocke, no question.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the Advance Readers Copy.</i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><br /></i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><br /></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPiGDHFq6fTJSrjJk-w67I_V49EWkMMTRZFq-xspNszZiVgK1KiboGM6JYzga3a9JXbBWGwUqnlIHMLe6msCefC14fnFozH6LMdGPI-7zlYh0hA3GYx9QVEkeEjRfItAru3vQzG3Dyh1AF/s466/refuge.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="466" data-original-width="318" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPiGDHFq6fTJSrjJk-w67I_V49EWkMMTRZFq-xspNszZiVgK1KiboGM6JYzga3a9JXbBWGwUqnlIHMLe6msCefC14fnFozH6LMdGPI-7zlYh0hA3GYx9QVEkeEjRfItAru3vQzG3Dyh1AF/w436-h640/refuge.jpg" width="436" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><p></p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5381899964034700062.post-20642448067746916032021-01-28T08:30:00.036-05:002021-01-28T08:30:01.649-05:00Book Review: The Little Cafรฉ in Copenhagen (Romantic Escapes, #1) by Julie Caplin<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtAjhM8BPIHvt1y702sSwwaB5vAXj-CXWzBLH6OtljF00ByNVgOWIJof9mhVZK6ifF7BGzzxqjo2n_zO4xBivSWvD-_j09bgheDp7-ScIw4FRVBDENJq21b8-BLXnUwGxCNZ0rWqwEf9YB/s475/little_cafe_copenhagen.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="310" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtAjhM8BPIHvt1y702sSwwaB5vAXj-CXWzBLH6OtljF00ByNVgOWIJof9mhVZK6ifF7BGzzxqjo2n_zO4xBivSWvD-_j09bgheDp7-ScIw4FRVBDENJq21b8-BLXnUwGxCNZ0rWqwEf9YB/w261-h400/little_cafe_copenhagen.jpg" width="261" /></a></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b>Title:</b> <b><i>The Little Cafe in Copenhagen</i></b> by <b><i>Julie Caplin</i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b>Rating:</b> <b><i>4 stars</i></b> (๐๐๐๐)</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b>Publisher:</b> <i>HarperImpulse</i></span></div><p></p><p></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">It's 2020 and I just needed a comfort read so what better way than to take a dip into hygge by way of some chick-lit.</span></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div style="text-align: left;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">There's food, candlelight, a group of characters who all seem to need a soft place to land and a happy end. It's a winning formula when one is in the mood for it and I let myself be swept away into the story. The misunderstandings between Kate and Ben were fairly silly so that detracted a little but it was exactly on-brand for these type of stories so no stars taken off for me. Copenhagen came alive in a wonderful way and by perusing the titles of the other books in the series, it's quite the tour. I have another in this series </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">The Little Teashop in Tokyo </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">so I'll likely get to that one soon.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;">Recommended, if you need a soft place to land.</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"></span></i></div><blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><b>Summary: </b> </span></i><span style="font-family: georgia;">Welcome to the little cafe in Copenhagen where the smell of cinnamon fills the air and the hot chocolate is as smooth as silk.</span></div><span style="font-family: georgia;">Publicist Kate Sinclairโs life in London is everything she thought she wanted: success, glamour and a charming boyfriend. Until that boyfriend goes behind her back and snatches a much sought-after promotion from her.Heartbroken and questioning everything, Kate needs to escape.<br /><br />Leaving behind rush hour and late nights in the office for a city break in beautiful Copenhagen, Kate discovers how to live life โthe Danish wayโ. From candles and cosy nights in to the easy smiles of tall, gorgeous Vikings and eating your body weight in pastries (ok, thatโs just her), the city offers her a new perspective.<br /><br />Can the secrets of hygge and happiness lead her to her own happily-ever-after?</span></blockquote><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"></span></i><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEv9J0IoMbSTbBfnz3dCSJrm5bkTv_3BOgbMEev10BmZDOt8y_VWJuJVzXchwD3PKm8Cb9UiiWp-X9p9_f1myDNan0U5qY2w_xE5J3oN0KLYk7-s7RKoc8iDEc77vwkXYuaTj_7B5djGc2/s475/little_cafe_copenhagen.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="310" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEv9J0IoMbSTbBfnz3dCSJrm5bkTv_3BOgbMEev10BmZDOt8y_VWJuJVzXchwD3PKm8Cb9UiiWp-X9p9_f1myDNan0U5qY2w_xE5J3oN0KLYk7-s7RKoc8iDEc77vwkXYuaTj_7B5djGc2/w418-h640/little_cafe_copenhagen.jpg" width="418" /></a></div><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div><p></p>Anissa Annalisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17585751365032357436noreply@blogger.com0