Category Archives: book reviews

#BookReview ‘A Spool of Blue Thread’ by Anne Tyler #contemporary

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What do you think of when you think of novelist Anne Tyler? For me, it is The Accidental Tourist, Breathing Lessons, Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant. It is quite a list. So I enjoyed the anticipation of reading her latest, A Spool of Blue Thread. What do I expect? Family, no-one writes about family like she does. Anne Tyler I became wrapped in the story of Abby and Red Whitshank and their four children Denny, Stem, Jeanie and Amanda. Abby was the character that fascinated me, we see her first as a mother in 1994 when Red takes a strange phone call from Denny who is living who knows where. They don’t know whether to believe Denny, whether to worry about him, Abby tries to empathize, Red says there is such a thing as being ‘too understanding’. And so the Whitshank story slowly unfolds like a dropped spool of blue thread running across the floor. We hear the story of Red’s father, Junior, a carpenter, who built the house Abby and Red now live in, we hear about Linnie Mae, Red’s mother and her love affair with Junie. The history of this family is in their bones, and in the bones of the house where they live. But Abby and Red are getting old now, and managing in this large house is becoming fraught with incident.
Anne Tyler dissects the structure of the family, how they become who they are, how the memories and misunderstandings from childhood and adolescence filter through to adulthood and shape mature viewpoints. And how all of this affects the Whitshanks’ relationships with each other, and the outside world.

Read my reviews of these other books by Anne Tyler:-
CLOCK DANCE
FRENCH BRAID
LADDER OF YEARS
REDHEAD BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD
VINEGAR GIRL

And read the first paragraphs of:-
DINNER AT THE HOMESICK RESTAURANT 
BACK WHEN WE WERE GROWN UPS 

If you like this, try:-
‘A Thousand Acres’ by Jane Smiley
‘Housekeeping’ by Marilynne Robinson
‘My Name is Lucy Barton’ by Elizabeth Strout

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview A SPOOL OF BLUE THREAD by Anne Tyler via @SandraDanby http://wp.me/p5gEM4-1xH

#BookReview ‘The Lightning Tree’ by Emily Woof #contemporary

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The Lightning Tree by Emily Woof is the twin story of Ursula and Jerry. Emily WoofUrsula grows up in a house of mirrors and though she tries to avoid looking at her reflection, she cannot. So it is apt that she is the chameleon of this story, changing her appearance, her style, her clothing, so that as the years pass she seems a different person.
Ursula lives in Jesmond, a nicer area of Newcastle, and through her childhood she passes close to Jerry, who grows up in a flat at the rougher Byker Wall. When they do meet, there is a connection. Their lives run in parallel, twisting and turning, sometimes together, other times far apart.
It is a love story, and an un-love story. How it is to fall in love as an adolescent and then see that love challenged into maturity, changing priorities, changing values, changing circumstances. Jerry, his nose always in a book, goes to Oxford and seems destined for politics. Ursula, less academic, goes to India where she undergoes something of a ‘Marabar Caves’ experience which is not really explained and which I still didn’t understand at the end of the book.
Interwoven with Ursula and Jerry’s stories is that of Ursula’s Ganny Mary, her rural Lancashire upbringing, and how her life was affected by the death of her father and the change in her mother Annie who had her own ‘Marabar Caves’ experience, up Pendle Hill in Lancashire.
There’s no doubting the energy in this book, but I did find the storyline confusing, there are so many surplus characters who we never really engage with, and Ganny Mary never ages. It is an enigmatic book, but one which I struggled to really grasp.

If you like this, try:-
‘Himself’ by Jess Kidd
‘Foxlowe’ by Eleanor Wasserberg
‘The Lost Girl’ by Sandu Manganna

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE LIGHTNING TREE by Emily Woof via @SandraDanby http://wp.me/p5gEM4-1wL

#BookReview ‘An Uncertain Place’ by Fred Vargas #crime

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If you ever hear anyone say ‘plog’, then you know they have read An Uncertain Place. Totally different to any other crime novel I have read, this is my first by Fred Vargas and will not be my last. Fred VargasIt is the tale of fear, passed on from one generation to the next. Inevitably the tale is embroidered a little along the way, misinterpreted, but still half-believed. Believed enough to act on it, to prevent the fabled terror from continuing.
The trail starts in London: shoes are found outside Highgate Cemetery, with the feel still inside them. Next, two gruesome murders. Many unrelated strands come together and finally the pieces fall into place in a tiny wooded village in Serbia.
This is my first Commissaire Adamsberg book. I love discovering a new author, knowing there are many books just waiting to be read. Fred Vargas has created a quirky policeman – I particularly liked Adamsberg’s relationship with his one-armed Spanish neighbour Lucio.
Plog.

If you like this, try:-
‘Snow White Must Die’ by Nele Neuhaus
‘The Killing Lessons’ by Saul Black
‘Wilderness’ by Campbell Hart #1Arbogast

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview AN UNCERTAIN PLACE by Fred Vargas http://wp.me/p5gEM4-1sC via @SandraDanby 

#BookReview ‘Midnight in Europe’ by Alan Furst #thriller #WW2

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1938. Spain at war, Europe on the brink of war. Midnight in Europe by Alan Furst is the first World War Two novel I have read about the overlap of the two wars, the impact of one on the other, and the approaching shadow of fascism. Nothing happens in isolation. The Spanish Civil War is notoriously difficult to understand: so many factions, changing names etc. Sensibly, Furst concentrates on one aspect: the supply of weapons to the Republicans fighting the fascist army of Franco. Alan FurstA secret Spanish agency in Paris sources arms and ammunition for the Republicans. Cristián Ferrar, a Spanish lawyer living in Paris and working for a French law firm, is asked to help. Unsure what he is getting into, but resigned to help his mother country, he is soon looking over his shoulder to see if he is being followed – he doesn’t know who by, it could be the Spanish fascists, the Gestapo, the Russians. Inter-cut with Ferrar’s story are excerpts from the front line in Spain where preparations are being made to fight the Battle of the Ebro. The need for the weapons is desperate, as bullets are counted out for each soldier.
Working with an odd mixture of diplomats, gangsters and generally shady characters, Ferrar first travels to Berlin where there is a glimpse of the pre-war country which with hindsight gives us a chill. The Gestapo follows them at every step. Then there is a nail-biting train journey to Gdansk, as an arms shipment goes missing. The climax is a thrilling boat journey from Odessa to Valencia. Ferrar, is a lawyer not a spy, he is simply an ordinary man doing what he can to help. An ordinary man who is, meanwhile, having a sprinkling of love affairs which may or may not be authentic.
If you have been put off before at reading novels about the Spanish Civil War because the politics is confusing, you will enjoy this novel. The shadow of war in Europe is cast over every page, the sense of approaching doom however does not seem to affect the nightclubs of Paris, or the shops of New York where the cheerful atmosphere seems unreal. Ferrar faces moving his family from Louveciennes on the outskirts of Paris, the picturesque country west of the capital which was painted by the Impressionists, to the safety of New York.
This is the first novel by Alan Furst I have read, picked up at random in an airport bookshop. I will read many more.

Read my review of A HERO IN FRANCE, also by Alan Furst.

If you like this, try:-
‘Citadel’ by Kate Mosse
‘A Hero in France’ by Alan Furst
‘Dominion’ by CJ Sansom

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview MIDNIGHT IN EUROPE by Alan Furst http://wp.me/p5gEM4-1ct via @SandraDanby

#BookReview ‘Etta and Otto and Russell and James’ by Emma Hooper #contemporary

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This was a ‘sort of’ book for me. I ‘sort of’ enjoyed it but… I was ‘sort of’ irritated with it too. The story premise for Etta and Otto and Russell and James by Emma Hooper grabbed me straightaway, and the excellent first paragraph. Emma Hooper

“Otto,
The letter began, in blue ink.
I’ve gone. I’ve never seen the water, so I’ve gone there. Don’t worry…”

Etta and Otto are in their eighties. The setting is Canada. Etta sets out one day to walk towards the water, which means either east to the Atlantic or west to the Pacific. She goes east. Otto stays at home, working his way through Etta’s index cards, trying hard to make cinnamon buns like hers. Gradually we learn their back stories: Otto’s childhood on the farm then as a soldier in France during the Second World War; of Etta’s teaching days and then a munitions worker. The Russell in the title is their childhood neighbour and friend. The James of the title is a coyote.
I was unclear why Etta was walking, unclear why Otto seemed philosophical and Russell concerned by her adventure. The relationships are enigmatic, the memories are fluid, which I found confusing. And what precisely happened at the end, I re-read and still do not understand. Enigmatic again, perhaps too much smoke and mirrors. Partly, also I think the problem was insufficient editing combined with the layout of the text [in the Kindle edition]. The viewpoint shifts from paragraph to paragraph, something I hate as it means a minute mental re-adjustment each time which interrupts the flow of the story. Also there is no punctuation to show dialogue, another pet hate of mine, and it is often difficult to know who is talking when. Anything which takes you ‘out’ of the story has to be a bad thing.
Some of the writing is beautiful though. My favourite passages were when Etta is walking with James; their relationship, their dialogue, and the description of the places they walk through are wonderful. When they come to their final river to cross, she takes the bridge and he swims, and we never see James again. I was sorry for that loss.

If you like this, try:-
‘In Another Life’ by Julie Christine Johnson
‘The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessey’ by Rachel Joyce
‘Ferney’ by James Long

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview ETTA + OTTO + RUSSELL + JAMES by Emma Hooper http://wp.me/p5gEM4-1wo via @SandraDanby

#BookReview ‘The Vows of Silence’ by @susanhillwriter #crime

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Young women are being shot, but by the same person? In The Vows of Silence by Susan Hill, the first killer uses a rifle and shoots from distance, the other shoots face-to-face. Different modus operandi, different killer? Susan HillOne serial killer in a small town is rare, two serial killers in a small town at the same time is beyond apprehension. The thing that sets Susan Hill’s crime novels apart from the rest, for me, is the way she deals with the violence. It is there in the storyline but not on the page, we feel it through the reaction of Detective Chief Superintendent Simon Serrailler. Susan Hill writes page-turning crime novels about ordinary people, people we can identify with, but people that extraordinary things happen to.
Cathedral town Lafferton is the setting, and Prince Charles and Camilla are due to attend the wedding of the Lord Lieutenant’s daughter, not a great idea when a shooter is on the loose. A shooter who no-one sees, who plans meticulously, and who leaves no clues behind. As women keep being killed, Serrailler’s brother-in-law is diagnosed with cancer and his widowed father suddenly has a girlfriend. Elsewhere in Lafferton, widow Helen meets widower Phil, but her newly-religious son Tom disapproves. Quite how much he disapproves, Helen doesn’t appreciate. As the murders continue, the police focus on the forthcoming high profile wedding and the town’s Jug Fair. Both are ideal settings for another shooting.
This was the first of the Simon Serrailler books that I read, and I was immediately hooked in the way that finding a new detective series hooks you. I re-read it recently in one sitting.

Read my reviews of the other novels in the series:-
THE VARIOUS HAUNTS OF MEN #1SIMONSERRAILLER
THE PURE IN HEART #2SIMONSERRAILLER
THE RISK OF DARKNESS #3SIMONSERRAILLER
THE SHADOWS IN THE STREET #5SIMONSERRAILLER
THE BETRAYAL OF TRUST #6SIMONSERRAILLER
A QUESTION OF IDENTITY #7SIMONSERRAILLER
THE SOUL OF DISCRETION #8SIMONSERRAILLER
THE COMFORTS OF HOME #9SIMONSERRAILLER
THE BENEFIT OF HINDSIGHT #10SIMONSERRAILLER
A CHANGE OF CIRCUMSTANCE #11SIMONSERRAILLER

And also by Susan Hill, HOWARD’S END IS ON THE LANDING

If you like this, try:-
‘Death at the Sign of the Rook’ by Kate Atkinson #6JACKSONBRODIE
‘Magpie Murders’ by Anthony Horowitz #1SUSANRYELAND
‘Dead Simple’ by Peter James

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE VOWS OF SILENCE by @susanhillwriter http://wp.me/p5gEM4-1dJ via @SandraDanby 

#BookReview ‘Mobile Library’ by @d_whitehouse #contemporary

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Stuffed with book and movie references – from The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe to The Terminator – if Mobile Library by David Whitehouse was a film it would be described as a ‘road movie’. Really, it’s a book about running away to find yourself. David WhitehouseChapter One, titled ‘The End’ is reminiscent of Thelma and Louise and The Italian Job. A mobile library van stands at the edge of cliffs, surrounded by police. Inside are Bobby, Rosa and Val. We don’t know who they are or why they are there: such an incentive to keep reading.
Twelve year-old Bobby lives with his father and his father’s girlfriend Cindy, a mobile hairdresser who paints a look of suspicion onto her face every morning with her foundation. Bobby misses his mother and saves anything of hers he can find: hairs from her hairbrush, scraps of paper.
When his schoolfriend, Sunny, offers to protect Bobby from the bullies by turning into a cyborg like The Terminator, neither of them realize what that really entails. Bones are broken, blood is spilled, until Phase Three when Sunny ends up in hospital and disappears. Bobby, alone, passes the time by peeling wallpaper off his bedroom walls. When he meets Rosa and her mother, he finds a place that feels more like a home should be.
When things go wrong, the trio run away in the library van and have adventures along the way [as is the way of road movies]. Lessons are learned about love, life and family. They have an objective: to find Sonny. Bobby reads books from the library – Tom Sawyer, Of Mice and Men – takes a lesson from the story and applies it to his situation. This is a funny, touching story, its message is that family is where you make it. Anyone who loves books will love this story, it is a book with heart.

If you like this, try:-
‘Paper Cup’ by Karen Campbell
‘The Funny Thing About Norman Foreman’ by Julietta Henderson
‘Etta and Otto and Russell and James’ by Emma Hooper

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview MOBILE LIBRARY by @d_whitehouse http://wp.me/p5gEM4-1sF via @SandraDanby

#BookReview ‘The Magician’s Land’ by Lev Grossman @leverus #fantasy #magic

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Thrown out of Fillory and back in the non-magical world, Quentin Coldwater retreats to his former magical university in Brooklyn. Brakebills. He becomes a professor where he teaches his discipline, described as ‘mending small things.’ Remember this, it will be important later. The Magician’s Land is the final book of the magical trilogy by Lev Grossman and like book two, The Magician King, this final instalment is action-packed. Lev Grossman The story moves between present and past, Fillory and earth, above ground, in the air and underground. Seeking adventure, and money, Quentin meets a new group of underground magicians and accepts a task for payment of $2m. On the team is Plum, who admits she once attended Brakebills too.
In parallel we get the stories of Quentin, Eliot [still in Fillory] and Plum. In order to understand the threat in the present, we have to go back in time to fill in the real story of what happened to the Chatwin children [whose true adventures inspired the novels of Fillory]. And it becomes plain that the Fillory known by Quentin from his childhood love of those novels, is incorrect. The novels were fictional and Fillory is not what it seems.
Depending on them all, is the very existence of Fillory.
A cracking finale.

Click the title below to read my reviews of the first two novels in the trilogy:-
THE MAGICIANS #1THEMAGICIANS
THE MAGICIAN KING #2THEMAGICIANS

If you like this, try:-
‘The Queen of the Tearling’ by Erika Johansen #1TEARLING
‘The Invasion of the Tearling’ by Erika Johansen #2TEARLING
‘The Lost Girl’ by Sangu Mandanna

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE MAGICIAN’S LAND by Lev Grossman @leverus http://wp.me/p5gEM4-1rD via @SandraDanby

#BookReview ‘Summertime’ by Vanessa Lafaye #Florida #historical

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From the first chapter, Summertime by Vanessa Lafaye is steeped in its setting. Florida, 1935. Racial divides, love [extra-marital and long lost], the US mistreatment of its Great War veterans, and the threat of the elements dominate this tale of Heron Key. Vanessa LafayeLafaye is a debut novelist but she handles her explosive material with assurance, taking time to build the story as the town prepares for the annual beach barbeque on Independence Day. With the weather reports showing a hurricane approaching, tensions build between the townsfolk and the war veterans camped nearby in cockroach-infested mouldy conditions.
Lafaye took her inspiration from two real events, the Labor Day Hurricane in 1935, and the appalling way the US Government treated its war veterans. Heron Key is fictional as are the characters, but some of the things which happen during the hurricane are based on real-life reports. This is a wonderful meld of fiction and fact, handled by skilled storyteller. Lafaye handles the suspense as if she has been telling stories like this all her life.

And here’s my review of AT FIRST LIGHT, also by Vanessa Lafaye.

If you like this, try:-
‘The Knife with the Ivory Handle’ by Cynthia Bruchman
‘The Last Runaway’ by Tracy Chevalier
‘The Other Eden’ by Sarah Bryant

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview SUMMERTIME by ‪Vanessa Lafaye‪ via @SandraDanby http://wp.me/p5gEM4-1v2

#BookReview ‘The Girl on the Train’ by Paula Hawkins #mystery #suspense

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This book has been hyped much in the pre-publicity and I can understand why. After a slowish start, I finished it at a sprint and rarely put it down. The girl on the train in The Girl on the Train, by Paula Hawkins, is a voyeur, she watches people in their houses. On her morning commute, her train regularly stops at a red light and she looks at a house and ponders the perfect life of the people who live there. She is fantasising, you think, and then you realise she isn’t. She knows the people. Or does she? Paula HawkinsYou never know where you are with Rachel’s account of what happens, she is the ultimate unreliable narrator. The problem is she is a drunk, a falling-over, hungover woman who swigs alcohol on the train and suffers memory blackouts. At no point do you know whether to believe her version of the truth. She says, “I wonder where it started, my decline; I wonder at what point I could have halted it.”
In contrast to Rachel, there is Megan, the woman who lives in the house by the railway. She seems a more reliable source of information, or is she? She is unhappy too and we are uncertain why. Dissatisfied – with her marriage, her life? – she goes to see a counsellor. She hints about ‘betrayals’.
For the first half of the book I got the two women slightly confused, not their current life but their back stories. Then a third female voice is added, Anna. Anna was clear to me from the beginning, and her viewpoint adds clarity to the wider picture.
This is a thriller about men, as seen by women; about relationships, as seen by women; about truth and lies, and our ability to recognise one from the other.
A great debut.

If you like this, try:-
‘The Girls’ by Lisa Jewell
‘Foxlowe’ by Eleanor Wasserberg
‘All the Birds, Singing’ by Evie Wyld

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE GIRL ON THE TRAIN by Paula Hawkins http://wp.me/p5gEM4-1rA via @SandraDanby