30 June 2022

Review: WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING, Delia Owens

  • This edition published by Little Brown 2019
  • ISBN 978-1-4721-5466-8
  • 368 pages  

Synopsis (Amazon)

For years, rumours of the "Marsh Girl" have haunted Barkley Cove, a quiet town on the North Carolina coast. She's barefoot and wild; unfit for polite society. So in late 1968, when handsome Chase Andrews is found dead, the locals immediately suspect Kya Clark.But Kya is not what they say.

Abandoned at age ten, she has survived on her own in the marsh that she calls home. A born naturalist with just one day of school, she takes life lessons from the land, learning from the false signals of fireflies the real way of this world. But while she could have lived in solitude forever, the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. Drawn to two young men from town, who are each intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new and startling world--until the unthinkable happens.

In Where the Crawdads Sing, Owens juxtaposes an exquisite ode to the natural world against a heartbreaking coming of age story and a surprising murder investigation. Thought-provoking, wise, and deeply moving, Owens's debut novel reminds us that we are forever shaped by the children we once were, and that we are all subject to the beautiful and violent secrets that nature keeps.

Wikipedia:
Where the Crawdads Sing is a 2018 novel by American author Delia Owens. The story follows two timelines that slowly intertwine. The first timeline describes the life and adventures of a young girl named Kya as she grows up isolated in the marsh of North Carolina between 1952 and 1969. The second timeline follows an investigation into the apparent murder of Chase Andrews, a local celebrity of Barkley Cove, a fictional coastal town of North Carolina.
By January 2022, the book had sold 12 million copies, making it one of the best-selling books of all time. 

My Take

A fascinating read on the edge of crime fiction. Kya Clark, the Marsh girl, is abandoned first by her mother, siblings, and eventually her father, and grows up alone in the North Carolina Marshes from the age of 8. She receives help from a local boy and a trader. Thrown back mainly on her own resources she becomes an acute observer of the wildlife around her and eventually becomes an author and a biologist of note, even though she spends only one day of her life at school.

Locals do not trust her and have little to do with her, but eventually one of the local boys who has befriended her is killed and she is brought to trial for his murder. A local lawyer defends her pro-bono.

So the first part of this book is about Kya growing up, and the second part is about the trial.

My rating: 4.6

About the author

Delia Owens (born ca. 1949) is an American author and zoologist. Her debut novel Where the Crawdads Sing topped The New York Times Fiction Best Sellers of 2019 and The New York Times Fiction Best Sellers of 2020 for 32 non-consecutive weeks and was on the list for 135 weeks in total. She has also written the memoirs Cry of the Kalahari, The Eye of the Elephant, and Secrets of the Savanna, with her then-husband, Mark, about their time studying animals in Africa 

26 June 2022

Review: HER PERFECT TWIN, Sarah Bonner

  • this edition from my local library
  • published 2022 by Hodder & Stoughton UK
  • ISBN 978-1-529-38271-6
  • 325 pages

Synopsis (Publisher)

THE MOST ADDICTIVE THRILLER YOU'LL READ IN 2022. HER PERFECT TWIN. YOUR NEW OBSESSION.

HER PERFECT TWIN. YOUR NEW OBSESSION.

When Megan discovers photographs of her estranged identical twin sister on her husband's phone, she wants answers.

Leah already has everything Megan has ever wanted. Fame, fortune, freedom to do what she wants. And when Megan confronts Leah, an argument turns to murder.

The only way Megan can get away with killing her twin is to become her.

But then lockdown hits. How can she continue living two lives? And what happens if someone else knows her secret too? 

My Take

Megan lives with her husband of three years, Chris. They spend a lot of time apart because of the nature of their individual jobs. Megan has never "strayed" although she suspects that Chris has. When Chris is home he likes things to go his way.

Megan's mother is in a nursing home with the early onset of dementia and Megan constantly looks for signs that her mother's memory loss is hereditary. Chris realises this, and plays on it.

The story begins with Megan's discovery on her husband's phone of a picture of herself in underwear that she has never seen. That's how she knows that he is seeing her identical twin Leah. She and Leah have a very fractured relationship and rarely see each other. 

Her knowledge that Chris is having an affair with Leah gives Megan "permission" to find someone new for herself. She also decides to confront Leah, with dreadful consequences.

From that point, you are hooked. The story becomes compulsive with sections narrated by Megan, Chris, and Leah, cleverly following on from each other. Until an incredible finale. Megan told you what was going to happen, but did you take her at her word?

The lockdown caused by the global pandemic adds another element to the whole scenario.

My rating: 4.9

About the author

Sarah Bonner grew up in Salisbury, dreaming of a career as a writer and performer. Instead, she became an accountant! After a fifteen-year career, she decided to answer her original calling and completed her first novel, Her Perfect Twin. She lives in West Sussex with her husband and very spoiled rescue dog.

24 June 2022

Review: TWELVE SECRETS, Robert Gold

Synopsis (publisher)

A SMALL TOWN. A SHOCKING CRIME.
YOU'LL SUSPECT EVERY CHARACTER. BUT YOU'LL NEVER GUESS THE ENDING.

Ben Harper's life changed for ever the day his older brother Nick was murdered by two classmates. It was a crime that shocked the nation and catapulted Ben's family and their idyllic hometown, Haddley, into the spotlight.

Twenty years on, Ben is one of the best investigative journalists in the country and settled back in Haddley, thanks to the support of its close-knit community. But then a fresh murder case shines new light on his brother's death and throws suspicion on those closest to him.

Ben is about to discover that in Haddley no one is as they seem. Everyone has something to hide.

And someone will do anything to keep the truth buried . . . 

My Take

Ten years ago Ben's mother died and now his chief editor wants to use the anniversary with an article that rakes over the details of of the murder of his brother and a friend just ten years before that. Madeleine wants Ben to write the story. She thinks the story will attract new readers to their paper but Ben says he does not want to re-live the past. He believes that nobody gains anything by looking back.

But then he changes his mind. A young woman is murdered, the same way his brother was murdered. An accidental coincidence or is it the murderer himself? Ben decides that his mother would want him to investigate, to follow the threads, to find out what is really happening.

The main narrator of the book is Ben, but we often hear the voices of others, and we gradually learn what happened twenty years ago, through a multi-layered, multi-stranded tale. The plot is clever, devious, and it is not until the last few pages that all is revealed.

My rating: 4.8

About the author

Originally from Harrogate in North Yorkshire, Robert Gold began his career as an intern at the American broadcaster CNN, based in Washington DC. He returned to Yorkshire to work for the retailer ASDA, becoming the chain's nationwide book buyer. He now works in sales for a UK publishing company. Robert now lives in Putney and his new hometown served as the inspiration for the fictional town of Haddley in Twelve Secrets. In 2016, he co-authored three titles in James Patterson's Bookshots series.

21 June 2022

Review: THE WAY FROM HERE, Jane Cockram

  • this edition made available as an e-book on Libby by my local library
  • ISBN: 9780062939326
  • ISBN 10: 0062939327
  • Imprint: Harper Collins
  • On Sale: March 1, 2022
  • Pages: 320 pages 

Synopsis (publisher)

Three generations of women. Three generations worth of secrets. Will a cache of letters from beyond the grave hold the key to unravelling them all? The answer to that question lies at the heart of this addictive and atmospheric novel from the author of THE HOUSE OF BRIDES

Growing up, the Anderson sisters could not have been more different. Susie, the wild one, had an adventurous life while Camilla —Mills— followed a safer path. When Susie suddenly dies, Mills falls apart. Until she receives a bundle of mysterious letters from her estranged sister to be read in the case of her death. Each letter instructs her to visit a place special to Susie, both to spread her ashes but also to uncover some truths Susie has long kept hidden from her family.

Their mother Margaret has secrets of her own. When living in Swinging Sixties London, she too made a decision about her life that not only haunts her, but will reverberate through the generations.

One family, three very different women. What choices and secrets connect them? In this novel of truth and lies, concealment and regret, Jane Cockram flips the looking glass to expose our true face, revealing the deep lines of deception that can run through families and how the people we love the most often have the most to hide.

My Take

This novel is a mystery rather than crime fiction. 

The story is told by 3 main characters but also in several time frames - Susie, Camilla and their mother Margaret over a period of 30 years. The story begins with letters that Susie has left for her sister Camilla, in the form of a request that Camilla will go overseas, deliver the letters, and scatter Susie's ashes in various places.

Susie originally went overseas twenty years earlier, in 1998, on a gap year after she had finished school. Her grandmother Nellie had given her various places to visit. She herself had come to Australia as "ten-pound" Pom nearly 40 years earlier. When Susie returned to Australia she had changed, but she seemed unable to talk about what had happened to her. Susie died falling off a ladder just before her 40th birthday, so the year is 2018.

The novel tells us the history of the 3 generations of women and the secrets they have kept between them for almost 60 years.

The weaving of the story is very cleverly done, with several interlinked and twisted strands of mystery. Highly recommended and memorable.

My rating: 4.6

About the author

Jane Cockram was born and educated in Australia, where she studied Journalism at RMIT, majoring in Literature. After earning a post-graduate diploma in Publishing and Communication at Melbourne University, she worked in sales for Pan Macmillan Publishers and then as fiction buyer at Borders, fulfilling a childhood dream of reading for a living. Cockram spent a year living in the West Country of England, where The House of Brides is set, and still daydreams about returning.  In the meantime, she resides in Melbourne with her husband and two children. The House of Brides is her debut novel.  

18 June 2022

Review: THE LIAR'S GIRL, Catherine Ryan Howard

  • this edition made available by my local library as an e-book on Libby
  • Published: 1st March 2018
  • ISBN: 9781782398974
  • Number Of Pages: 336

Synopsis (publisher)

Her first love confessed to five murders. But the truth was so much worse.

Dublin's notorious Canal Killer is ten years into his life sentence when the body of a young woman is fished out of the Grand Canal. Though detectives suspect a copy-cat is emulating the crimes Will Hurley confessed to as a teen, they must turn to Ireland's most prolific serial killer for help. Will admits he has the information the cops need, but will only give it to one person - the girl he was dating when he committed his horrific crimes.

Alison Smith has spent a decade building a new life. Having changed her name and moved abroad, she's confident that her shattered life in Ireland is finally behind her. But when she gets a request from Dublin imploring her to help prevent another senseless murder, she is pulled back to face the past, and the man, she's worked so hard to forget. 

My Take

Alison has had 10 years in Amsterdam trying to forget the man who was her first boyfriend, who confessed to five murders of first year college girls, including her best friend. Because Will confessed to the murders, there was never a trial. Alison has spent 10 years trying to forget him, and to forget her role in giving evidence.

But now there is someone murdering girls again: the same methods, a copycat or the real murderer? And Will has told the Gardai that he can help but he will only tell what he knows to Alison. So they turn up on her doorstep in Amsterdam, the same Gardai as 10 years ago, asking her to come back to Dublin to talk to Will. And that will mean talking to her parents too.

Despite her conviction that Will is the murderer Alison finds herself trying to find proof. And then she notices someone watching her, someone from the past. What will happen if she proves his innocence? How do you give back 10 years?

An excellent read.

My rating: 4.7

I've also read

4.4, DISTRESS SIGNALS

16 June 2022

Review: MALICE IN MINIATURE, Jeanne M. Dams

  •  this edition an e-book on Kindle (Amazon)
  • Dorothy Martin Mystery Book 4
  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B08M6FKTTP
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Joffe Books crime, thriller and cozy mystery (28 October 2020)
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 276 pages 

Synopsis  (Amazon)

IN THE WORLD OF MINIATURES, SOMETIMES THE CRIMES ARE MAJOR

Dorothy and her new husband are interrupted one cold November afternoon by Ada Finch. Ada’s son Bob is Dorothy’s gardener.

Bob has been arrested for stealing a seventeenth-century tea set created for a doll's house at grand English country house, Brockelsby Hall. The Hall is the home of the Museum of Miniatures, a spectacular collection of doll’s houses assembled by eccentric aristocrat Sir Mordred Brocklesby.

DARK DOINGS IN A GOTHIC ENGLISH COUNTRY HOUSE

Then the old housekeeper is found poisoned. Can Dorothy unmask a murderer without putting herself in mortal danger?

DOROTHY’S NEWLY MARRIED BUT THAT WON’T STOP HER SOLVING CRIMES!

My Take

So here I am at #4 in Dorothy Martin's adventures in amateur sleuthing. Dorothy and Chief Constable Alan Nesbitt are recently married and Alan, apparently on the verge of retirement, is away exploring what may well be his final administrative job. Dorothy is not sure how he feels about her continuing her sleuthing activities but that doesn't stop her from going to the aid of Ada Finch when her son Bob is arrested for theft. 

As readers we are now well familiar with the main characters of the story: Dorothy and Alan, Dorothy's London friends, her neighbour Jane, and Ada and Bob Finch. Bob has been accused of stealing a valuable item from the nearby Museum of Miniatures, Brockelsby Hall, where he has a part time job as a gardener. Theft is so out of character for Bob that Dorothy takes no persuading to come to his defence.

Dorothy makes new friends at the Museum and then a very nasty and dangerous enemey indeed.

I am enjoying the series and have one book to go in the ones that I have purchased. After that I will probably consign them to "occasional read" when I am looking for something to read on my Kindle.

My rating: 4.4

I've already read 

11 June 2022

Review: HOLY TERROR IN THE HEBRIDES, Jeanne M. Dams

  • this edition an e-book on Kindle (Amazon
  • Dorothy Martin Mystery Book 3
  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B08LHDXC9Y
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Joffe Books crime, thriller and cozy mystery (19 October 2020)
  • Originally published 1997
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 276 pages

Synopsis (Amazon

ALONE ON A REMOTE SCOTTISH ISLAND WITH A MURDERER ON THE LOOSE

A peaceful stay on the charming Scottish island of Iona sounds perfect to sometime sleuth Dorothy Martin.

But trouble always follows Dorothy. Thrown in with a bickering American church tour, she tries to keep her distance.

Then one of the group, a man everyone disliked, falls to his death from a cliff at the legendary Fingal’s Cave.

Dorothy is the only witness. She notices a small clue that the police dismiss, one that makes her believe the death was murder. 

My Take

Dorothy is offered the opportunity to holiday in a cottage on Iona with friends from London, but at the last minute they are unable to join her and she goes alone. She meets up with a most unusual group of Americans who end up staying at the same hotel as her (after she has discovered that she has left the key to the holiday cottage at home). And then she witnesses the most unpopular of them falling to his death at Fingal's Cave.

And then Iona is hit with a monster storm and they are all stranded.

Dorothy becomes convinced that somehow the death that she witnessed was a murder, and that all the factors point to a Jewish Rabbi as the perpetrator. The problem is that she has become very friendly with him and cannot believe that her judgement can be so wrong. 

This story is largely without the presence of Chief Constable Alan Nesbitt who has gone off to a police conference in Brussels. She is desperate to talk to him.

Unfortunately this plot feels a bit pedestrian. It is a bit of a travelogue. It also focuses on Dorothy's tendency to see murder everywhere.

My rating: 4.2

I've also read

8 June 2022

Review: TROUBLE IN THE TOWN HALL, Jeanne M. Dams

  • this edition an e-book on Kindle (Amazon
  • Dorothy Martin Mystery Book 2
  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B08KSCY1P5
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Joffe Books cozy mysteries (5 October 2020)
  • originally published: HarperPaperbacks (7 January 1998) 
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 260 pages

Synopsis (Amazon)

A DEAD BODY IN THE CLOSET AND A LEAKING ROOF KEEP DOROTHY BUSY.

Dorothy Martin is still learning her way around the charming English cathedral town which she moved to a year ago from America.

But she recognizes a dead body when she sees one. The historic town hall is closed with its future hanging in the balance. Dorothy is visiting when the cleaner finds the dead body of a young man in a closet.

Her passion for mysteries is as hot as ever, of course. Despite warnings from her dear friend Chief Constable Alan Nesbitt not to get in the way of the official investigation, Dorothy simply can't resist taking a look around.

There are plenty more skeletons in local closets, enough to keep an amateur sleuth on her toes — unless the hands of a murderer reach her first. And not to mention her lovely house has water coming in through the roof!

Can she find a murderer and a decent builder?

My take

Over 6 months has passed since the events in #1 in this series, THE BODY IN THE TRANSEPT

Dorothy is thrust into world of building by the state of the roof of her cottage, and also by the local controversy over what will be happening to the town hall now that the Town Council has moved to new premises on the outskirts of the town. 

Since the last book Dorothy has acquired another cat and has been developing her friendship with the Chief Constable Alan Nesbitt. Despite Alan's warnings to take things carefully and circumspectly, Dorothy attends a town meeting when discussion about turning the old Town Hall into a shopping mall becomes very heated. 

Dorothy discovers the body of a young man in a cupboard in the Town Hall, and then becomes curious about why a work colleague becomes faint every time the incident is mentioned.

Eventually Dorothy predictably outs herself in danger yet again, and another work colleague is murdered.

If you enjoy cozies you will probably enjoy this series, but make sure you read them from the beginning.

My rating: 4.4

I've already read  THE BODY IN THE TRANSEPT

5 June 2022

Review: DISTRESS SIGNALS, Catherine Ryan Howard

  • this edition made available as an e-book on Libby through my local library
  • First published 2016
  • Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 368 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1504757521
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1504757522
  • An Amazon Rising Star Best Debut Novel 2016 (UK edition) and Shortlisted for the IBA Crime Novel of the Year Award 2016
  • Amazon listing

Synopsis (Amazon)

The day Adam Dunne's girlfriend, Sarah, fails to return from a Barcelona business trip, his perfect life begins to fall apart. Days later, the arrival of her passport and a note that reads "I'm sorry--S" sets off real alarm bells. He vows to do whatever it takes to find her.

Adam is puzzled when he connects Sarah to a cruise ship called the Celebrate --and to a woman, Estelle, who disappeared from the same ship in eerily similar circumstances almost exactly a year before.

To get answers, Adam must confront some difficult truths about his relationship with Sarah. He must do things of which he never thought himself capable. And he must try to outwit a predator who seems to have found the perfect hunting ground.

My Take

Before the global pandemic, thousands, hundreds of thousands, of people took cruises all over the world, and I was amongst them.  And every year, dozens, perhaps hundreds, of those passengers went missing. In some cases the disappearances were never solved. Some cases have made headlines in Australian and international newspapers.  But my guess is that very few of the missing were meant to be somewhere else.

When Sarah goes off to Barcelona for a conference Adam Dunne accepts that she will be away for just 4 days. When she doesn't answer his phone messages he puts it down to technology failure. It is only when he finds out that he is the only one who thinks she has gone to a conference that he becomes alarmed. Work says she has called in sick, and her parents are unaware that she is away. When she is not on her scheduled return flight then Adam becomes really alarmed.

What has happened to Sarah, and the reasons behind it, takes a bit of untangling. Adam finds himself on a cruise ship in the Mediterranean with another man whose wife went missing from the same ship a year earlier. There is yet another story running in the background of this book and it is not until nearly the end of the book that the reason for it being there is revealed.

I ended the book feeling that while I thought I knew everything, there were some t's not crossed and some i's not dotted. Maybe I just wasn't reading carefully enough at that stage. Nevertheless it was an engaging read. It is a debut novel, and the praise heaped on the novels that follow it encourage me to read this author again.

My rating: 4.4 

About the Author
Catherine Ryan Howard is an internationally bestselling crime writer from Cork, Ireland. Her most recent novel, 56 Days, was an Irish no. 1 bestseller, won Crime Fiction Novel of the Year at the Irish Book Awards and was named a best thriller of 2021 by the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Irish Times. Her previous work has been shortlisted for the Edgar Award for Best Novel, the CWA’s John Creasey New Blood and Ian Fleming Steel Daggers and Irish Crime Novel of the Year multiple times. She lives in Dublin.

Books by Catherine Ryan Howard- all stand alone novels
2016 DISTRESS SIGNALS
2018 THE LIAR'S GIRL
2019 REWIND
2020 THE NOTHING MAN
2021 56 DAYS

2 June 2022

Review: THE BODY IN THE TRANSEPT, Jeanne M. Dams

  • this edition an e-book on Kindle (Amazon
  • Dorothy Martin Mystery Book 1
  • Winner of the Agatha Award for Best First Novel.
  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B08JVKFM1W
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Joffe Books cozy crime and mystery (September 22, 2020) 
  • Book originally published by Harper Torch in 1996
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 228 pages 

Synopsis (Amazon

It's Christmas Eve in the small town of Sherebury. Dorothy Martin, a recently widowed American, is having her first Christmas in England.

But as she leaves the cathedral's midnight mass, she literally stumbles over a dead body — and it’s one of the priests, Canon Billings.

He wasn’t very popular and the list of suspects includes most of the town. But Dorothy doesn’t give up easily when it comes to finding out the truth.

Of course, she does get to meet Chief Constable Alan Nesbitt, and a good mystery on a chilly English night does have some appeal.


THE DETECTIVE
Dorothy Martin, sixtyish widow from Indiana and retired schoolteacher, moves to England shortly after her husband dies. A move they had planned to make together. Like the author, she has a taste for fabulous hats. 

SETTING
The fictitious cathedral city of Sherebury, located somewhere in the southeast of England. A small and beautiful town, it is a mix of many real cities and towns in the England so loved by the author. She guarantees that no American fast-food chains will ever crop up on the High Street of Sherebury, where pubs, tea shops, and Indian restaurants thrive.

My Take 

I have bought a Kindle edition of Books 1-5 of this series and I see that there are are 17 books in the series. (see the list of titles below)

Dorothy Martin's sleuthing idols are Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot. Once she has the scent of a mystery she can't let go. Leaving the cathedral near her home on Christmas Eve she comes across what she initially thinks is a heap of clothing, and then discovers it is a very unpopular canon. 

Despite the fact that there are finally 3 murders, this is a light cozy read, and I feel that I will probably enjoy reading further into the series. The characters in this title are interesting and there seems to be a good basis for further development. The structure of the plot is Christie like with various characters being held up for scrutiny as suspects and then discounted. The strands of the plot hang together reasonably well, but the whole thing is not too demanding. I suspect it is another series that you need to read in order.

DOROTHY MARTIN MYSTERY SERIES
Book 1: THE BODY IN THE TRANSEPT
Book 2: TROUBLE IN THE TOWN HALL
Book 3: HOLY TERROR IN THE HEBRIDES
Book 4: MALICE IN MINIATURE
Book 5: THE VICTIM IN VICTORIA STATION
Book 6: KILLING CASSIDY
Book 7: TO PERISH IN PENZANCE
Book 8: SINS OUT OF SCHOOL
Book 9: WINTER OF DISCONTENT
Book 10: A DARK AND STORMY NIGHT
Book 11: THE EVIL THAT MEN DO
Book 12: THE CORPSE OF ST JAMES’S
Book 13: MURDER AT THE CASTLE
Book 14: SHADOWS OF DEATH
Book 15: DAY OF VENGEANCE
Book 16: THE GENTLE ART OF MURDER
Book 17: BLOOD WILL TELL 

My rating: 4.3

About the author

Jeanne M. Dams has lived in South Bend, Indiana, all her life. Her love of England was born of almost obsessive reading of English mysteries from an early age, and was cemented by a brief visit to London after her graduation from Purdue University. Many years and many visits later, she continues to love the British Isles and especially their people. She is also interested in history, has written one historical series, and is beginning another.

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