#BookReview ‘The Queen of Poisons’ by Robert Thorogood #cosycrime

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A poisoned coffee capsule. A blackmail letter. An anonymous tip-off. The Queen of Poisons by Robert Thorogood starts with a death at a council planning meeting. Hardly a probable setting for a murder, of course it must be an accidental death. But of course it isn’t. Robert ThorogoodThe Marlow Murder Club are amateur sleuths who help the police by digging the dirt in a town that is picturesque, community-minded and wealthy; but scratch the surface and things are not as pretty as they seem. In this, the third tale in Thorogood’s series, the trio of amateur detectives, Judith, Becks and Suzie, are now very familiar to readers. So when each of the behaves in an unusual way, it attracts attention. Becks seemingly doesn’t want to go home. Judith is drinking more whisky than usual and is throwing unopened letters on the fire. Suzie has suddenly got interested in the local planning process and it is Suzie who witnesses the dodgy death. Judith is at the heart of everything, as a crossword setter she has a suitably agile mind, and her home is the location for their incident room.
For what seems ages the women discover nothing resembling a proper clue, just bitty things all quite unrelated, until with some clever reasoning, brave flights of fancy and inspired questioning, the hidden connections begin to appear. Yes, I suspected the actual killer early on in the story but had forgotten this by Judith’s declaration in the last pages. The twisty plot is amplified by lots of red herrings, the visit of Becks’s difficult-to-handle mother-in-law and a romantic entanglement for Judith.
Next in the series is Murder on the Marlow Belle.

Here are my reviews of other books by Robert Thorogood:-
THE MARLOW MURDER CLUB #1MARLOWMURDERCLUB
DEATH COMES TO MARLOW #2MARLOWMURDERCLUB
THE KILLING OF POLLY CARTER #2DEATHINPARADISE

If you like this, try:-
‘Death on Deck’ by Verity Bright #13LADYELEANORSWIFT
‘The Killings at Kingfisher Hill’ by Sophie Hannah #4POIROT
‘The Silver Bone’ by Andrey Kurkov #1KYIVMYSTERIES

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COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Fiona Valpy

#BookReview ‘Love Lane’ by Patrick Gale @PNovelistGale #historical

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Love Lane by Patrick Gale is a family story across three generations, two continents and five viewpoints but is disarmingly small-scale in its focus on the truths of this group of relatives. Family legends, gossip and anecdotes are repeated and assumed true, but can look very different when seen from another person’s perspective. Patrick GaleThe five viewpoints we hear are Harry Cane, his daughter Betty, Betty’s husband Terry, Betty’s eldest daughter Pip and her husband Mike. Each person is hiding something that embarrasses or shames them, ignorant of how others in the family see them and the commonality that binds families together.
The story starts in Canada where Harry and Paul Slaymaker are neighbouring farmers, each living alone, growing wheat near the town of Winter on the empty Canadian prairie. For years they are secret lovers, their relationship easy to hide in the middle of nowhere. But when life moves on and Harry must sell his farm, he takes a ship to Liverpool to stay with the daughter he has never met. He is looking for a new home, a place to settle, but has no idea where this might be or indeed in which country. Betty, whose knowledge of her father is limited to family gossip passed on by her elderly aunts, and letters she has exchanged with Harry in recent years, frames him in her mind as the ‘Cowboy Grandpa.’ The bulk of the novel is set in England as Harry stays with one relative, and then another and Gale interleaves flashbacks to each person’s youth. Gradually a picture forms of each person, how they see themselves, how others see them, the things they think they hide, the things others guess. Everyone is uncomfortable with some part of their life, a sacrifice made, a compromise, a secret, a youthful adventure, a betrayal.
I admit to preferring the story when Harry is on the page, he lights up the story. There are large and small themes. Attitudes to male homosexuality throughout the first half of the 20th century are contrasted between the two countries. There is a case of sexual abuse by a doctor which is both surprising and casually brushed aside.
Only when I finished Love Lane did I discover that it is Gale’s second novel based loosely on his own family history, but I read it comfortably as a standalone without knowing A Place called Winter.
A gentle read about what it is to know yourself and finding a place to belong where you can be that person.

If you like this, try:-
‘Lean Fall Stand’ by Jon McGregor
‘Dangerous Women’ by Hope Adams
‘The Women’ by Kristin Hannah

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#BookReview LOVE LANE by Patrick Gale @PNovelistGale https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8Yo via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Robert Thorogood

#BookReview ‘The Devil to Pay’ by Katie Daysh #historicalfiction #adventure #navalwarfare

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It’s 1802 and the Anglo-French war is over. I thoroughly enjoyed Leeward, first in the Nightingale & Courtney historical naval series by Katie Daysh, so was keen to read the next book. In The Devil to Pay, though the enamoured sailors set sail for the Mediterranean on the same ship they are soon separated. Katie DayshLeeward was Hiram Nightingale’s story, The Devil to Pay is told from the perspective of Lieutenant Arthur Courtney. The forbidden relationship of these two men, separated by social conventions, the law and nautical miles, is the skeleton of these books. Courtney is not like Nightingale; he was born into rural poverty and is still uncomfortable dining at the captain’s table. When HMS Loyal goes missing on route to Malta with two important diplomats aboard, Courtney and Nightingale are enlisted on the ship sent to find her. Their secret mission involves working closely with their one-time enemy, France. As the HMS Lysander sails south, accompanied by French frigate, the Fantôme, their journey is marred by the discovery of two Lysanders, crew members, having sex. An onboard punishment involving pain and humiliation turns into a naval tribunal in Gibraltar. With the Lysander stuck in dock, the Fantôme, with Nightingale on board, sets sail to continue the search for the Loyal. Shipwreck and piracy are suspected and Courtney, following on belatedly from Gibraltar, doesn’t know if Hiram is alive or dead, free or enslaved.
Can love survive separation, pirates, shipwreck, doubts and treachery? Daysh handles the emotions of the separated lovers with a light hand. Just when Courtney is distraught at Nightingale’s departure, he must once again take responsibility for a ship without a direct order to do so. Should he follow his instincts, or naval law? There are so many twists and turns in this plot that it’s impossible to forsee the ending, its a rollercoaster of emotions just as stormy as the waves that the sailors face.
Excellent. This is a series to read in order, so be sure to read Leeward first. The English and the French may not be enemies in this book, as they were in Leeward, but war between the two will be rekindled a year after The Devil to Pay ends.
Next in the series is A Merciful Sea.

Here’s my review of the first book in this series:-
LEEWARD #1NIGHTINGALE&COURTNEY

If you like this, try:-
‘The Blue Afternoon’ by William Boyd
‘A Rustle of Silk’ by Alys Clare #1GABRIELTAVERNER
‘Rush Oh!’ by Shirley Barrett

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COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Patrick Gale

#BookReview ‘Murder Under her Skin’ by Stephen Spotswood @playwrightSteve #crime

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New York 1946. Murder Under her Skin by Stephen Spotswood, second in the Pentecost and Parker post-WW2 private detective series, starts in the Big Apple and ends in rural Virginia. A completely different world that challenges expectations and attitudes. Stephen SpotswoodWhen Willowjean Parker receives a call for help from her old boss at the Hart & Halloway’s Travelling Circus and Sideshow, Will and her boss Lillian Pentecost catch a train to the small town of Stoppard. Before Will met Lillian and became a New York detective, she spent five years with the circus and her best friend was Ruby Donner the tattooed lady. Now Ruby is dead with a knife in her back.
Spotswood takes us into the circus world, the sleaze behind the magic and wonder, the tough life behind the make-up and sequins, the rivalries, the money problems, loyalty and friendship, the envy and spite. Ruby Donner ran away from Stoppard as a teenager and never went back until returning now with the circus. Who killed her? A circus colleague or someone from her hometown who has been harbouring resentments for years? Ms Pentecost’s most recent case has made the national papers and she’s famous, even in Stoppard, but not everyone welcomes the circus or the big city detectives. Will’s former mentor, the knife-throwing Russian Valentin Kalishenko, is already locked up in the town jail and the local police chief doesn’t welcome the arrival of strangers telling him how to do his job.
The focus on life in a small town in Virginia highlights the changing society as soldiers return from war and adapt to normal life again. Lillian and Will lodge with Ruby’s uncle Doc, who runs the local cinema, and he proves a useful guide to Stoppard’s people, their secrets, lawbreaking and lies. When the circus’s sideshow is firebombed, the detectives know they must be on the right track.
Murder Under her Skin develops the dynamic relationship between Will Parker and Lillian Pentecost that was introduced in the first book, Fortune Favours the Dead. Although Lillian is older and the boss, both women bring significant skills and strengths to their detecting partnership and Murder Under her Skin is told from Will’s point of view. The women are mutually supportive of each other. Lillian is Will’s mentor and teaches her the craft of detection, Will supports Lillian when her multiple sclerosis causes issues. It is too simplistic to say Lillian is the brains and Will the brawn; while Lillian proves to be nifty with a sword, Will knows when to take the initiative and ask difficult questions and when to say silent and listen.
Very enjoyable, full of snappy dialogue between Lillian and Will, plus plenty of offbeat characters who may or may not be as they seem. Next in the series is Secrets Typed in Blood.

Here is my review of the first in this series:-
FORTUNE FAVOURS THE DEAD #1PENTECOST&PARKER
…and read the #FirstPara of FORTUNE FAVOURS THE DEAD.

If you like this, try:-
‘Death at the Sign of the Rook’ by Kate Atkinson #6JACKSONBRODIE
‘Darktown’ by Thomas Mullen
‘The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle’ by Stuart Turton

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#BookReview MURDER UNDER HER SKIN by Stephen Spotswood @playwrightSteve https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8Vx via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Katie Daysh

#BookReview ‘Divided Souls’ by Toby Clements #historicalfiction #WarsoftheRoses

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England 1469. For five years, Thomas and Katherine Everingham have lived in peace until the divisions of the Wars of the Roses envelop them again. Divided Souls by Toby Clements is third in the Kingmaker series set during this deadly and complex time of on-off war between the houses of York and Lancaster. Toby ClementsAt the heart of Divided Souls is the rebellion by the Duke of Warwick against King Edward IV. Thomas and Katherine, now with a five-year-old son Rufus, never look for trouble. But when Thomas is asked by his former commander Lord William Hastings to travel to Yorkshire to monitor enemy troop movements, the Everinghams cannot refuse. And then Hastings admits his real reason for sending them north from their Lincolnshire home. He wants them to find a ledger, find it before Warwick’s supporters do. The value of the ledger is unexplained but Thomas and Katherine already know because it is buried beneath their hearth, hidden because of the deadly information it contains. And they are the only people who know where it is.
So the three Everinghams, with faithful retainers one-armed John Stump, Jack and his pregnant wife Nettie, set out for York. Old friends and familiar foes are encountered once again in Yorkshire and on a new battlefield. Old fears and nightmares that return are deepened as Thomas and Katherine, with Rufus to protect, feel vulnerable in a way they never have before. Their five years of domestic peace at Marton Hall seem a fleeting moment as the couple are separated again, Thomas must fight and Katherine faces battlefield surgery. And all the time they know that the enemy and other agents working for Hastings are searching for the ledger. Terrified of being caught, they discuss the consequences of burning it, burying it or simply giving it to Hastings.
Clements negotiates his way through a complex and confusing time in history, placing his fictional characters into an imagined setting within the facts known of the times. The result is quick-reading tale that races from one difficult decision to another as Thomas and Katherine journey into the unknown, no sooner escaping from one danger before facing another. Loved ones must be left behind, home must be abandoned and once safe familiar places are now dangerous. As King Edward’s loyal lords rebel, it isn’t only Thomas and Katherine who don’t know who to trust.
Excellent.
This is the third in the series. Please start reading with Winter Pilgrims in order to enjoy Kingmaker at its best and to fully appreciate the long-standing loyalties, fear and hatred that runs throughout Clements’ telling of two innocent people caught up in the Wars of the Roses.

Read my reviews of the other books in this series:-
WINTER PILGRIMS #1KINGMAKER
BROKEN FAITH #2KINGMAKER

And also by Toby Clements:-
A GOOD DELIVERANCE

If you like this, try:-
‘Cecily’ by Annie Garthwaite
‘The Other Gwyn Girl’ by Nicola Cornick
‘The Lady of the Rivers’ by Philippa Gregory

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COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Stephen Spotswood

#BookReview ‘The Alice Network’ by Kate Quinn @Kate_Quinn #WW1 #WW2

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Oh what anticipation, to pick up an unread Kate Quinn book. In The Alice Network, Quinn’s first wartime novel, two strangers are hunting ghosts from the past. A story reaching across both world wars into that other-worldly strange post-war time when music plays, wildflowers bloom and children laugh but the violent truths of war are hidden amongst the weeds. Kate Quinn Southampton 1947. Charlotte St. Clair, a nineteen-year-old American-French girl, arrives with her mother on a boat from America. They are en route to Switzerland where Charlie’s ‘little problem’ will be dealt with and no-one at home need know. But Charlie is desperate to track down her French cousin Rose who has been missing since the end of the war. So she runs away to London to find Evelyn Gardiner, a woman she’s been told may be able to help her. What follows is a road trip to France with Eve and Finn, Eve’s chauffeur and ‘man of all works.’ Eve is a violent drunk. Finn, a taciturn Scot, drives a blue Lagonda and deals with Eve’s nightmares when she waves around a loaded gun. Each one of this unlikely trio is hiding secrets and guilt. If Charlie is to find Rose, Eve must revisit the territory she worked as a wartime spy which means reliving her nightmares. As the trio drive through France, we learn of Eve’s life as a spy in the Great War and why she hates a restaurant owner called René Bordelon.
London 1915. Eve, a twenty-two year old orphan, is desperate to do something to help the war effort, something more than typing and filing. Growing up in Lorraine on France’s border with Germany, she is fluent in French, English and German. She is also resourceful, calm, able to lie under pressure and has a stutter that makes people think she is simple-minded. All useful attributes for a spy. After rapid recruitment and training, she arrives in occupied northern France where she meets her new boss. The first piece of advice she receives from Lili, who runs the Alice Network, is, ‘there is no time for fear. It is an indulgence. Turn your ears on and your mind off.’
Excellent. The Alice Network is unputdownable.

Here are my reviews of three other novels by Kate Quinn:-
THE BRIAR CLUB
THE DIAMOND EYE
THE ROSE CODE

If you like this, try:-
‘A Hero in France’ by Alan Furst
‘V2’ by Robert Harris
‘The Ways of the World’ by Robert Goddard #1WIDEWORLD

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#BookReview THE ALICE NETWORK by Kate Quinn @Kate_Quinn https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8Td via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Toby Clements

#BookReview ‘The House of Seymour’ by Joanna Hickson @joannahickson #historicalfiction  

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A preface featuring the best known Seymour of them all, Jane, sets the background to The House of Seymour by Joanna Hickson. It is 1537 and a new coat of arms has been created for Queen Jane as she awaits the birth of her first child. It features six crests: King Henry VIII’s personal symbols, the badge of the Seymour family plus four that are unfamiliar to the queen. They belong to her four grandmothers. Joanna HicksonThe House of Seymour starts in 1424 and concentrates on the life of sixteen-year-old Isabel Williams who is promised to a boy she loves. It is a love match, her betrothed Thomas Stamford is of a good family and a friend to Isabel’s younger brother and Williams heir Robert. But when Rob dies of a fever, Isabel’s parents seek a more advantageous match for their remaining child. And so she marries into the Seymour family. John Seymour is a good customer of Isabel’s father, a vintner, and Mark Williams has discovered John is also heir to a rich grandfather. He is set to inherit a Wiltshire manor, Wolf Hall, and the wardenship of Savernake, a royal hunting forest. And so Isabel’s life changes forever.
Running parallel to Isabel’s story is that of Jess Henge, unusually a shepherdess, whose family live at Henge Farm beside the standing stones at Avebury. This is an area of superstition and the family are regarded as different, especially when one of the ewes cared for by Jess gives birth to two lambs. When her cousin Addy disappears in odd circumstances from the Long Barrow at Silbury Down, villagers say Addy was stolen by the devil. Whisperers and gossips blame Jess. In search of a church where she may give confession to a priest who does not know her, she flees to Easton Priory.
This is a story of godliness and superstition, of cruelty and kindness, of naked ambition fuelled by the gains to be made by moving in royal circles. It is a story of loyalty and support among women and friends, sometimes from unexpected places, and the arrogance and sense of superiority of a male-dominated society that sees women as objects. Foreshadowing of King Henry VIII, perhaps, though not all the male characters in the book are thoughtless or rough in their treatment of women.
I read The House of Seymour easily over a weekend and enjoyed this glimpse into society on the edge of royal circles when King Henry VI is a young child. Isabel Seymour and Jessica Henge are two very different women, both compelling characters who face pain and abuse by holding their heads up high. The pace drops at times but my curiosity about the women kept me reading.
An intriguing insight into a family I know little about. The two major settings, Wolf Hall and Avebury, are wonderfully depicted. I anticipate further Seymour novels telling the life stories of Jane’s other female relatives.

Here are my reviews of Hickson’s two Queens of the Tower books:-
THE LADY OF THE RAVENS #1QUEENSOFTHETOWER
THE QUEEN’S LADY #2QUEENSOFTHETOWER

If you like this, try:-
‘The Royal Rebel’ by Elizabeth Chadwick #1JEANETTEOFKENT
‘Days Without End’ by Sebastian Barry #1DAYSWITHOUTEND
‘Orphans of the Carnival’ by Carol Birch

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE HOUSE OF SEYMOUR by Joanna Hickson @joannahickson https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8U6 via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Kate Quinn

#BookReview ‘Death on Deck’ by Verity Bright @BrightVerity #cosymystery #crime

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It’s not normal to start a book review by describing the end but Death on Deck by Verity Bright ends in such a thrilling chase on an ocean liner that I had to mention it first. It is thrilling, in more ways than one. Verity BrightIn Death on Deck, thirteenth in the 1920s Lady Eleanor Swift cosy mystery series, Eleanor is at last able to spend some time, her birthday, with her handsome beau Detective Chief Inspector Hugh Seldon. Except yet again, Hugh has to work instead. So Eleanor, offered a free ticket on the maiden transatlantic of the luxurious Celestiana ocean liner, takes Clifford and her staff with her across the Atlantic to New York. With echoes of Titanic, which sank ten years earlier, the descriptions of the accommodations, décor, furnishings, food and guests are beyond anything we have seen before in this series. Everything is going swimmingly until on a bitterly cold March night, Eleanor goes out onto deck to clear her thoughts. She thinks she is alone until she shivers and the hairs on her neck stand up. There are two dark shadows wrestling, a gunshot, then one of the shadows falls overboard. Racing to the scene, she stumbles on the murder weapon. It is a revolver, one she knows well.
Seldon, not knowing Eleanor is a guest onboard, is working undercover on the Celestiana. His gun is the murder weapon. Clifford and Ellie’s staff – housekeeper, cook and two maids are travelling too – identify Hugh’s cabin where he is valiantly trying to work despite suffering from extreme sea sickness. Of course the captain engages Seldon and Eleanor to investigate the murder, hoping they will solve the crime with discretion and the planned triumphant arrival of the liner into New York will not be wrecked. Ellie knows she has broken the law by not disclosing the murder weapon, but she will do anything to save Hugh.
Nothing goes to plan. Seldon is so ill he can hardly think straight, Eleanor’s usual slick questioning doesn’t seem to work on her fellow first class passengers, and every hour New York draws nearer. When another first class guest is murdered, Ellie fears Hugh will hang. This plot is full of twists and tumbles, false clues, over-the-top opulence and a cast of shady characters who all look very guilty. There is room for an attractive captain, who doesn’t appear in enough scenes, and a stowaway who proves critical at the end. Plus a dancefloor lothario, a card shark, an insufferable hotelier, a jobsworth master-at-arms and a femme fatale. Ellie’s staff, the ladies, travelling in second class, are under-used and some of the language slips into modern tones, but I loved it. The plot is pulled onwards by the thread of Ellie and Hugh’s growing recognition of their love.
Highly recommended. Read with delight over a weekend.

Read my review of other books in the Lady Eleanor Swift series:-
A VERY ENGLISH MURDER #1LADYELEANORSWIFT
DEATH AT THE DANCE #2LADYELEANORSWIFT
A WITNESS TO MURDER #3LADYELEANORSWIFT
MURDER IN THE SNOW #4LADYELEANORSWIFT
MYSTERY BY THE SEA #5LADYELEANORSWIFT
MURDER AT THE FAIR #6LADYELEANORSWIFT
A LESSON IN MURDER #7LADYELEANORSWIFT
DEATH ON A WINTER’S DAY #8LADYELEANORSWIFT
A ROYAL MURDER #9LADYELEANORSWIFT
THE FRENCH FOR MURDER #10LADYELEANORSWIFT
DEATH DOWN THE AISLE #11LADYELEANORSWIFT
MURDER IN AN IRISH CASTLE #12LADYELEANORSWIFT

If you like this, try:-
‘The Marlow Murder Club’ by Robert Thorogood #1MARLOWMURDERCLUB
‘A Rising Man’ by Abir Mukherjee #1WYNDHAM&BANERJEE
‘Fortune Favours the Dead’ by Stephen Spotswood #1PENTECOST&PARKER

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview DEATH ON DECK by Verity Bright @BrightVerity https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8sn via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Joanna Hickson

#BookReview ‘Confessions’ by Catherine Airey @catherineairey #contemporaryfiction

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An emotional story of three generations of women moving back and forth between New York and the west of Ireland from 1970s to 2018. Confessions by Catherine Airey is an accomplished debut examining the changing freedoms of women fifty years apart, and the social mores and variations between two countries that speak the same language but are oh so different. Catherine AireyConfessions is a book about stories, secrets and confessions; the telling of stories and the keeping of secrets and about whether confessing your secrets is the right or wrong thing to do. The story starts in New York 2001 as the Twin Towers fall. Sixteen-year-old Cora Brady’s accountant father never comes home. She is left alone – her artist mother Máire having died years earlier – and disorientated, until a letter arrives from her Aunt Ró in Ireland. Before she leaves the city, Cora hangs posters of her father ‘Missing. Cantor Fitzgerald. 104th Floor, North Tower. Father’ in places she will miss.
Airey takes time to establish the character of Cora but as soon as the teeneager arrives in Ireland, the story switches to 1974 to tell the story of two sisters, Róisín and Máire. This is 1970s Ireland, strictly Catholic, setting up stark contrasts between Ireland and New York city at that time: the illegality of abortion, alcohol, sexual freedom, drugs and the coming of AIDS. Occasional references throughout are made to a ‘game’ which make no sense to me until three-quarters of the way through the novel.
Airey is particularly good at juxtaposing the expectations placed on her female characters, in different decades; by the women themselves, on each other and by society, to suffer, to put up with things, to make do, to stay silent. And conversely to let it all out, to scream, to admit the truth even when painful and uncomfortable to oneself or others.
By the end, for me the women merge into one homogenous character. Though the writing is beautiful – ‘I was too wired to even close my eyes, my thoughts wound up like swirls inside a marble’ – the loose plotting is at times disorientating and at times I forgot which woman was speaking. The anchoring point of time in this family’s story is the fall of the Twin Towers in 2001, the events leading to it and what happened afterwards. Airey takes us on a meander through the decades, showing events and their consequences. Stories are the things you present to other people, secrets are the things you never confess to another soul. Viewpoints switch around until the final quarter which is told largely in letter-form when uncomfortable truths are finally addressed. ‘We’re only as sick as our secrets,’ writes one to another.
I finished Confessions not sure if I enjoyed it or not; at times it focusses on distressing subjects, death, addiction, rape, abortion, betrayal, grief. At times it is beautiful. Sometimes I wanted to read on to know what happened next, but then I delayed picking it up again. Challenging. Unflinching.

If you like this, try:-
‘A Little Life’ by Hanya Yanagihara
‘Brooklyn’ by Colm Tóibín
‘Nora Webster’ by Colm Tóibín

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview CONFESSIONS by Catherine Airey @catherineairey https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8SU via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Verity Bright

Great Opening Paragraph 144… ‘The Gift of Rain’ by Tan Twan Eng #amreading #FirstPara

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“I was born with the gift of rain, an ancient soothsayer in an even more ancient temple told me.”
Tan Twan EngFrom ‘The Gift of Rain’ by Tan Twan Eng

Here’s my review of THE GIFT OF RAIN …and two other books by the same author:-
THE GARDEN OF EVENING MISTS …read the first paragraph HERE
THE HOUSE OF DOORS

Try one of these #FirstParas & discover a new author:-
‘Anna Karenina’ by Leo Tolstoy 
‘The Paying Guests’ by Sarah Waters
‘Queen Camilla’ by Sue Townsend

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#Books #FirstPara THE GIFT OF RAIN by Tan Twan Eng https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8Lr via @SandraDanby