#BookReview ‘The French for Murder’ by @BrightVerity #cosymystery #crime

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A glamorous movie set and an even more glamorous it-crowd are not what Lady Eleanor Swift expects to find in the South of France. But from day one of their holiday at an exclusive rented villa, amateur detective Ellie and her butler sidekick find themselves embroiled in murder once again. The French for Murder by Verity Bright includes a new cast of glamorous Americans, mysterious Frenchmen and the gorgeous Mediterranean coast. Verity BrightThe tenth book in the 1920s cosy mystery series revolves around a film about Napoleon being shot at a nearby chateau, a dead body in Ellie’s wine cellar, a deliciously flamboyant police detective and a variety of arrogant, talented, partying movie stars, artists and hangers-on. But although the villas – and the casino at Monte Carlo – are top notch luxury, there is something rotten beneath the beauty.
The murder is hushed up by the local mayor who fears damage done to the reputation of the Côte d’Azur as a budding movie location. If the truth about murder gets out, the new American tourists will holiday elsewhere. So Ellie agrees to gather clues. But after successive all-night parties involving over-the-top extravagance, alcohol and illegal substances, and beachfront sunbathing soirees with the briefest of swimwear, she is at a loss. Love, jealousy, betrayal, blackmail, money; can Ellie discover the real reason for the death of the leading man before the murderer kills again. Does the answer lay with the cast of Napoleon or is that too obvious. The two most suspicious people clearly have something to hide but lack an obvious motivation for murder and everyone else, being actors, are talented dissemblers.
The French for Murder is another delicious helping of the talented detecting duo. Ellie and Clifford are as indefatigable, brave and curious as ever, Ellie’s gowns and beach attire are impressively glamorous and the descriptions of Mrs Trottman’s pastries made me feel hungry. And as always, in each book in the series we learn more information about the backgrounds of Eleanor and Clifford.
Excellent, again.

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

If you like this, try:-
‘The Marlow Murder Club’ by Robert Thorogood #1MARLOWMURDERCLUB 
‘A Cornish Seaside Murder’ by Fiona Leitch #6NOSEYPARKER 
‘The Secret Detective Agency’ by Helena Dixon #1SECRETDETECTIVEAGENCY

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE FRENCH FOR MURDER by @BrightVerity https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8pL via @SandraDanby

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

#BookReview ‘The Stranger’s Companion’ by Mary Horlock #mystery #suspense

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A fascinating premise. A small, isolated island, the abandoned clothes of a man and a women found on a beach, no missing people. The Stranger’s Companion by Mary Horlock, set on the island of Sark, starts with a mystery based on true fact but merges into a blend of Mary Stewart and Agatha Christie. Mary HorlockThe Stranger’s Companion is a ghost story set in a place where folklore is just below the surface, a story of two teenagers who meet again as adults and the history that lies between them, a disappearance story that spreads from regional to national newspapers. The story is unveiled in two timelines, 1923 and 1933, that uneasy inter-war period occupied by ghosts of the Great War and premonitions of 1939. Sark’s bleak geography adds to this; towering cliffs that fall to the sea, stark weather, empty space, the island almost divided in two by La Coupée, a thin isthmus of rock connecting Big Sark and Little Sark, a dangerously exposed footpath.
The start is slow, confusing because the two timelines involve the same two teenagers, Phyll and Everard, and it all swirls into one so 1923 and 1933 merge. The voice switches back and forth between different people, adding to the feeling of disorientation and the uncertainty about what is real. There is an undisputed oddness to the tale, things sensed, people glimpsed, strange noises, unexplained happenings. There are rumours of witches. And then there is the tale of the Stranger Woman, a female ghost always dressed in white.
It took a while to separate out the omniscient narrator from the various 1923 and 1933 voices. Phyll is an observer, at the edge of things, as a teenager she loves stories, true stories, ghost stories, her own inventions. As an adult she writes stories, news and fictional. I was less clear about Everard, a visitor rather than resident, but who clearly has secrets to hide. At times the disappearance of the unidentified couple, the owners of the clothes, is lost in the spooky atmosphere, vanishings, unexplained appearances, old stories. As the narrator says, ‘Doesn’t everyone love a ghost story? It means the ending is never that, because life continues, just in a new shape or form. We could argue that every story is a ghost story, because once a tale is told, it is over, it is past. All we can do is keep going back over it, to for from the end back to the start.’
I found the mystery more intriguing than the characters and remained slightly confused to the end about the historical connections and who was who. Perhaps too difficult themes are tackled in too many sub-plots, but at its heart is a most surprising secret. Sark is probably the most important presence in the book. A great promotion of the island. Despite its ghostly history, this novel made me want to visit the real place.

Here’s my review of THE BOOK OF LIES, also by Mary Horlock.

If you like this, try:-
‘The Lamplighters’ by Emma Stonex
‘Foxlowe’ by Eleanor Wasserberg
‘Thornyhold’ by Mary Stewart

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE STRANGER’S COMPANION by Mary Horlock https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8rQ via @SandraDanby

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

#BookReview ‘The Secret History of Audrey James’ by Heather Marshall #WW2

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The Secret History of Audrey James by Heather Marshall sat for some time on my Kindle before I read it. It’s a World War Two story, a period which fascinates me, so why did I delay? On reflection I think it was because the story of Audrey James is inspired by historical fact. I’ve been disappointed in the past by novels where a fictional story is unexplored because the author sticks too close to the truth. I needn’t have worried. Heather MarshallAudrey James is based on a real woman but Audrey herself is fictional. Marshall uses the truth as inspiration to creative a novel that’s impossible to put down. I read this, at times harrowing, novel quickly. It is told in two timelines, Germany in 1938-1945 and Alnwick, England 2010. In 1945 at the end of the war, a troop of Canadian soldiers have just liberated a Dutch village. As they play cards, they notice a bedraggled woman walking towards them, her dress is torn, she is missing a shoe. This is Audrey James and this is the story of her war and her role in the German resistance which fought against Hitler.
In pre-war Berlin, British teenage pianist Audrey is living with her German friend Ilse Kaplan while she studies at the conservatory. On one day, their world changes. Ilse’s family are arrested and the house is requisitioned by two Nazi officers. Without anywhere else to go and no money, the two girls must react quickly. Ilse, who is Jewish, hides in the attic while Audrey becomes housekeeper for the two men. As war approaches, Audrey’s father in England writes telling her to come home. But Audrey is unable to leave Ilse despite being in danger herself.
In London in 2010, Kate Mercer is packing up her possessions. She and her husband are divorcing and, after the recent loss of her parents, Kate is seeking a new start. Drawn to a hotel in the North of England where her parents went on honeymoon, Kate puts the dog in the car and drives to Alnwick. She has a new job, as assistant administrator at the Oakwood Hotel. Very quickly Kate knows she’s made a mistake. The elderly owner of the hotel is grumpy, unwelcoming and very old. The two women are alone in the house during winter, both are secretive and defensive. Why does Kate feel guilty? And who is her elderly employer?
The twists and turns of this story are unpredictable and that’s what kept me reading. Audrey is prepared to do anything to keep Ilse safe. When she has the opportunity to join the Red Orchestra, a resistance group, she doesn’t hesitate. Her bravery is breathtaking. Audrey’s story is told in two phases, woven into Kate’s modern-day life. There are universal themes of love and loss, forgiveness and survival, both during wartime and many decades after.
This is a fascinating portrayal of the role of women in wartime, their bravery, ingenuity and determination. Canadian writer Marshall also writes about the strength of women in her previous novel Looking for Jane, which is now added to my To-Read list.
Excellent.

If you like this, try:-
‘The Collaborator’s Daughter’ by Eva Glyn
‘Homeland’ by Clare Francis
‘The Last Lifeboat’ by Hazel Gaynor

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE SECRET HISTORY OF AUDREY JAMES by Heather Marshall https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8pv via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Mary Horlock

#BookReview ‘The Briar Club’ by @Kate_Quinn #thriller #mystery

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Oh what a tangle this story is, in a good way. The Briar Club by Kate Quinn is about the women renting rooms at Briarwood House, a down-at-heel all-female boarding house in Washington DC. Starting off as a group of individuals, they slowly bond at their Thursday supper night. Kate QuinnThe story starts on the night Thanksgiving in 1954 with a prologue in the voice of the house. There’s a dead body in the attic and there is blood everywhere. Police are questioning witnesses. The narrative then backtracks four years. Set in the post-war McCarthy era when communists are reported by friends, family, neighbours and colleagues, at the time of this story no one feels immune from threat of denunciation. Not Bea, the former baseball player with a dodgy knee. Not Fliss, mother of baby Angela, both waiting for Fliss’s doctor husband Dan to come home from the Korean war. Not Nora, secretary at the National Archives, whose police officer brother steals her rent money.
At first The Briar Club seems long and languorous, taking its time to tell the background story of each female lodger one at a time. This is a clever device that first shows each woman as the others see them, the assumptions made, prejudices assumed, judgements taken; then the real person is revealed in their own viewpoint, the experiences that made them who they are today, the twists and turns of life that made them behave and speak as they do. But then there is a dead body in the attic apartment and the tangles become twisted, knotted and dangerous to everyone. Is it a lover’s tiff or something more sinister? Is it the reds? This is the time of the HUAC [House Un-American Activities Committee] investigations, set against a rough Washington background of gangsters, sleaze, knife crime and wife-beating. The Thursday night Briar Club get-together gives the women a safe place to be themselves.
The first voice we hear in 1950 doesn’t belong to one of the lodgers but to Pete Nilsson, son of the landlady. When Pete is on the front stoop mending the screen door, he is interrupted by a tall woman wearing a red beret. She enquires about a room to rent and 13-year old Pete instantly falls in love. Grace March takes the dingy room, as big as a shoebox with dull green walls. Grace is the sun around which the lodgers and the story revolve. She is both at the centre of everything, seemingly all-knowing, all-seeing, but remaining an enigma. It is Grace who suggests a Thursday night supper club, it is Grace who encourages the other ladies to club together to buy spectacles for Pete’s younger sister Lina, and it is Grace who first encourages Lina’s attempts at baking despite the frequent burnt offerings. She is the bringer of light and flowers into a grubby house, the one who notices everything and knows how to keep a secret.
The stately telling of a complicated story, slow for the first 60% until the strands become entwined, character connections are made and deeply-held secrets and opinions are unveiled. From the beginning this is a consummate picture of the lives of women in 1950s Washington DC at the time of the communist witch hunts. Opportunities for women are changing post-war though many are still trapped by marriage, racism, expectations and low wages. The story starts with a mystery that becomes consuming as the paths of the fictional women cross with real-life historical people and events. And I loved that the house is given its own voice, because Briarwood House too seems a member of the Briar Club.
Very good. Slower in parts than the other Quinn novels I’ve read. All are different and I’ve enjoyed every one of them. The Briar Club morphed from a 4* to a 5* towards the end as I realised I wanted to go back to the beginning and start all over again.

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

If you like this, try:-
‘Shrines of Gaiety’ by Kate Atkinson
‘Before the Fall’ by Noah Hawley
‘The Chase’ by Ava Glass #1ALIASEMMA

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE BRIAR CLUB by @Kate_Quinn https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8mt via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Heather Marshall

#BookReview ‘The Midnight Feast’ by Lucy Foley #mystery #suspense

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I’m at a loss how to describe the plot of The Midnight Feast, the latest mystery suspense story by Lucy Foley, without giving away anything critical. It is dark, it is gothic, there is West Country paganism, teenage friendship, spite and a bit of romance set at an ultra-glamorous cliff-top hotel in Dorset which opens at midsummer. Lucy FoleyTold in three timelines. In 2025 as The Manor, described as ‘Soho Farmhouse meets Daylesford Organics,’ opens its doors to guests. At the same location fifteen years earlier when the house was occupied by a retired Government chief whip and his wife. And again in 2025, the day after the opening night party, billed as a midnight feast with mystery musical guests, art in the gardens and a Midsommar theme inspired by the folk horror film.
This is a clever thriller juggling timelines and character arcs, at the heart of which is a them v us dynamic between the house and the locals. People are not who they claim to be, the fun is working out who is who. Untangling the true identities of Francesca Meadows, hotel owner, her guest, staff and villagers is a continuing puzzle as I tried to connect the 2025 and 2010 storylines together. There are a lot of characters to keep track of.
During the summer solstice of 2010, a teenage girl on holiday with her family at a caravan park in Dorset meets a rich girl who is cooler and more confident than her and wants to be her friend. The events of that summer, romance, manipulation, bullying, drugs and death have repercussions on everyone there. The bird theme is a creepy folklore thing attributed to the local villagers, a kind of vigilante group who dress up in black bird costumes to impose justice on wrongdoers. On midsummer night, the birds come into their own.
Francesca the hotelier is a control-freak Goop-influenced woman who sells a lie; locally grown organic produce, for example, that is bought-in from London not grown locally or on the hotel’s organic veg plot. Her husband Owen is a fitness-obsessed architect responsible for developing the woodland retreat lodges, set in the hotel grounds. She doesn’t know he’s installed a tracker on her mobile phone, he doesn’t know she commissioned hidden cameras throughout the hotel. There are loads of secrets, over-the-top opulence, silliness and eerie things happening in the woods. And there is murder.
The hotel’s setting next to ancient woodland adds a gothic darkness to this thriller that is a welcome relief from the champagne, meditation and crystals. I found it a little slow at the beginning but once the guests arrive and the midnight feast approaches, the pace takes off.
An entertaining thriller which kept me guessing, it’s not just a whodunnit but who-was-it-done-to.

Click the title to read my reviews of these other novels by Lucy Foley:-
THE GUEST LIST
THE INVITATION
THE PARIS APARTMENT

If you like this, try:-
‘The Last of Us’ by Rob Ewing
‘The Snakes’ by Sadie Jones
‘Summer House with Swimming Pool’ by Herman Koch

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE MIDNIGHT FEAST by Lucy Foley https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8o0 via @SandraDanby

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

#BookReview ‘The Heretic’s Mark’ by SW Perry @swperry_history #historical #crime

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The Jackdaw Mysteries by SW Perry are fantastic stories and The Heretic’s Mark, fourth in the series, is a twisty unpredictable story full of suspense. When the Queen’s physician is executed for treason, Nicholas Shelby is accused anonymously of being part of the plot. Nicholas and new wife Bianca flee abroad, unsure if they can ever return to England. SW PerryTheir first destination is Den Bosch in the Low Countries where, helped by Jan van der Molen, skipper of the herring boat which is their means of escape from England, they have time to draw breath. But it seems nowhere is far enough from forces wanting to lock them up. While Bianca says confession to a priest in the cathedral, Nicholas wanders into a side chapel he comes across a triptych, a three-panelled painting which presents a scene of horror. This is ‘The Last Judgement’ by Hieronymus Bosch. Though a practical man of science, the religious horror portrayed in the painting turns Nicholas to ice. Then a woman screams and two men are dead.
This is the trigger for Nicholas and Bianca to flee from Den Bosch, south along the Via Francigena, a pilgrim trail which ends in Rome. They take with them the young woman who screamed in the cathedral, a serious, proselytizing Hella Maas. Nicholas feels sympathy for her, her hard life, the death of her family. Bianca is impatient with her doom-laden words, her prophecies of doom, and questions her motivations. And so the odd trio make the road trip south, across the Alps. Once in Italy they part ways, Hella Maas to continue to Rome, the Shelbys to Padua, Bianca’s birthplace. The road journey takes up a lot of the story and, for my taste, could be more concise but it includes important foreshadowing of the eventual mystery; who is pursuing Nicholas and why. The answer is something I suspected but was unable to explain why.
Arriving in Padua, Bianca is reunited with her cousin Bruno Barrani, so introducing the sub-plot featuring Bruno and his attempts to make an armillary sphere for the city of Venice. He has raised the money and found the craftsmen, but scorns the accusations of heresy. At first this storyline seems so disconnected from the main plot to be superfluous, but in the last chapters the stories entwine. I found the third sub-plot, of Bianca’s servants Rose and Ned Monkton who stay in London to run the Jackdaw inn, riveting. Ned, determined to discover who wrongly condemned his master of treason, investigates a vague lead which brings him to the College of Physicians. Rose, pregnant with their first baby, wills him to be peaceful. Unfortunately the gentle giant is arrested for murder and sent to the Marshalsea prison.
Another good book from SW Perry who has quickly become a favourite. The next Jackdaw mystery is The Rebel’s Mark.
Note: I enjoyed the passing references to Giordano Bruno, the former Italian monk turned heretic and philosopher who features in the historical series by SJ Parris. If you haven’t read it yet, the first book is Heresy [there’s a link to my review below].

Here are my reviews of the first three books in the series:-
THE ANGEL’S MARK #1JACKDAWMYSTERIES
THE SERPENT’S MARK #2JACKDAWMYSTERIES
THE SARACEN’S MARK #3JACKDAWMYSTERIES 

If you like this, try:-
‘Heresy’ by SJ Parris #1GIORDANOBRUNO
‘Dark Aemilia’ by Sally O’Reilly
‘The Whispering Muse’ by Laura Purcell

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE HERETIC’S MARK by SW Perry @swperry_history https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8jp via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Lucy Foley

#BookReview ‘Murder at the Wedding’ by Helena Dixon @NellDixon #cosymystery #crime

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Murder at the Wedding is seventh in the Kitty Underhay cosy mystery series by Helena Dixon and the series is definitely reaching that familiar point where it is necessary to read from book one to appreciate everything. There are so many familiar characters from previous books, the nuances of things said and not said, the promise of romance, that this novel is definitely not a standalone read. Helena DixonThis time Kitty and her beau, private detective Captain Matthew Bryant, face a ghost, a shocking shooting, a domineering old lady and a fascist who supports Oswald Moseley. Kitty is in Yorkshire at Thurscomb Castle for the wedding of her cousin Lucy to her fiancé Rupert, now Lord, Woodcomb. This is ripe territory for mysteries. Rupert has only just assumed his title and ownership of the estate after the death of his uncle. The estate is rundown and in need of repair. There is a derelict wing burned in a horrible fire, the electrics have a mind of their own and there are rumours of a ghost. Kitty and her maid Alice arrive to find Lucy in the midst of pre-wedding jitters. The guests are gathering, the house is being spring cleaned and the flowers are arriving by the cartload.
There are some familiar faces – Lucy’s parents Lord and Lady Medford of Enderley Hall, Lord Medford’s cousin Hattie, Rupert’s sister Daisy and her new husband Aubrey. Newcomers include Aubrey’s cantankerous mother Adalia Watts, Rupert’s best man Sandy Galsworthy and his wife Moira, Moira’s father Ralston Barnes, Rupert’s old schoolfriend Sinclair Davies and his wife Calliope. It is quite a cast of characters to get your head around and they all appear by the second chapter.
When Ralston’s butler Evans is shot dead, the local inspector soon arrests a man staying at the local inn. But Kitty and Matt are not so sure this is the guilty man. Inspector Lewis is however cut from different cloth to the policemen Kitty and Matt are used to working with in Devon and on no account will he allow amateurs to interfere with police investigations. Then on the evening of the wedding there is a second death.
Murder at the Wedding takes a while to get going but once it does the shocks, the suspicions and the clues continue to arrive. There is a concern about poisoning, the electrics frequently fail plunging the house into darkness, and items of furniture and decorative items seem to be moving around. Then just when I’d forgotten about it, the ghost appears again.
This is a cosy mystery in that the gruesome details of murder are not described, but the action is fast and the threat to the vulnerable is great. Kitty as usual heads into danger without hesitation and by now Matt realises he can’t stop her. Is she simply too headstrong and independent for him, does he want and need a wife he can protect and care for. Their tentative courtship adds romance while the 1934 setting brings a dark political element, something which I’m sure will be developed in further books.
Great fun and tricky to predict.
Next in line is Murder in First Class.

Here are my reviews of other books in the series:-
MURDER AT THE DOLPHIN HOTEL #1MISSUNDERHAY
MURDER AT ENDERLEY HALL #2MISSUNDERHAY
MURDER AT THE PLAYHOUSE #3MISSUNDERHAY
MURDER ON THE DANCE FLOOR #4MISSUNDERHAY
MURDER IN THE BELLTOWER #5MISSUNDERHAY
MURDER AT ELM HOUSE #6MISSUNDERHAY

If you like this, try:-
‘A Deadly Discovery’ by JC Kenney #4AllieCobb
‘The Silver Bone’ by Andrey Kurkov #1KyivMysteries
‘A Necessary Evil’ by Abir Mukherjee #2Wyndham&Banerjee

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview MURDER AT THE WEDDING by Helena Dixon @NellDixon https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-82p via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- SW Perry

#BookReview ‘The Predicament’ by William Boyd #thriller

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In The Predicament by William Boyd, Gabriel Dax, writer and occasional British spy, gets involved in more suspect shenanigans, this time involving the CIA and the Americans. This book takes up his story in 1963, two years after the end of the first Dax book, Gabriel’s Moon. William BoydIn Guatemala, an election is looming. After a brief lesson in how to kill using the contents of his pockets [a notebook, wallet and keys], Gabriel is sent to South America by his MI6-handler and occasional lover Faith Green. An interview is arranged with Padre Tiago the secretive, charismatic left-wing leader who is predicted to win the forthcoming election. Tiago’s views are not universally popular. When his meeting is disappointing, Gabriel fears the trip is a waste of time. Then Padre Tiago is assassinated and Gabriel flees the ensuing riots. With his journalist’s sixth sense for the dodgy, Gabriel knows the real story is being hidden. The people he meets in Guatemala City and what happens there are important to the developing plot which later leads him to Berlin and the visit of President John F Kennedy.
Gabriel’s spy adventures are alternated with sessions with his psychoanalyst Dr Haas, meetings with his Russian handler Varvara [Dax is still posing as the secretive London contact of an English traitor now in Moscow], and scenes as he settles into his new life in a country cottage in Sussex. These storylines are continued from Gabriel’s Moon so it is helpful to read that book first. Boyd wastes nothing, all of these slower sub-plots add to the narrative. They bring new perspective on Gabriel’s personality, his past spy missions, his longing to return full-time to travel writing, and his feelings for Faith.
When Faith sends him to Berlin to shadow a suspect, Gabriel wants to refuse but knows he can’t. Dean Furlan is one of the men he met in Guatemala, who he instinctively knew was up to no good. The second half of the book is a page-turning race through the Berlin streets, working with the CIA and Berlin police to prepare for Kennedy’s arrival, identify a possible assassin and stop an attack. Gabriel is growing in confidence, his spycraft is improving and he has an instinct for trouble. He is at the centre of the action.
Boyd writes an addictive spy novel set at a time of global insecurity. Gabriel is a likeable character with his complicated love life. He attempts to live a normal life as a writer, planning and researching chapters for his next book, but is unwittingly pulled into more spying by the women who has bewitched him. All told in Boyd’s masterful style, combining simple details with lush descriptions and gentle humour.
Excellent.

Here’s my review of GABRIEL’S MOON, first in the Gabriel Dax trilogy.

And my reviews of other books by William Boyd:-
ANY HUMAN HEART
LOVE IS BLIND
NAT TATE: AN AMERICAN ARTIST 1928-1960
ORDINARY THUNDERSTORMS
SWEET CARESS
THE BLUE AFTERNOON
THE DREAMS OF BETHANY MELLMOTH
TRIO
WAITING FOR SUNRISE

… and try the first paragraph of ARMADILLO.

If you like this, try these:-
‘Munich Wolf’ by Rory Clements #1SEBASTIANWOLFF
‘The Ways of the World’ by Robert Goddard #1WIDEWORLD
‘The Second Midnight’ by Andrew Taylor

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE PREDICAMENT by William Boyd https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8oZ via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Helena Dixon

#BookReview ‘Gabriel’s Moon’ by William Boyd #spy #thriller

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Gabriel’s Moon by William Boyd could actually be titled ‘The Accidental Spy’ because that’s what Gabriel Dax is. What a wonderful spy novel this is, it plays with the idea of mistaken memory, mistaken perceptions and dangerous obsession. A Sixties Cold War thriller wrapped up in stellar writing. I raced through it. William BoydTravel writer Gabriel Dax has a dream singleton’s life. A flat in Chelsea, journalistic assignments taking him around the world, he is the author of three books and has an occasional girlfriend, Lorraine, who provides fun without committment. On location in the Congo, Dax is sent by his editor to do a political interview with the country’s new prime minister. This is unfamiliar territory for Gabriel but he takes the opportunity, hoping it may lead to more work. On the flight home he is surprised, and delighted, to see a fellow passenger reading one of his books. What follows next are a series of events he later realises are not coincidences.
In London he is surprised to see the woman from the plane near his house, but she disappears before he can speak to her. Then on a cold January day he is eating a lonely plate of spaghetti in the Café Matisse when the same woman approaches his table. She introduces herself as Faith Green and says she recognises him as the author of the book she was reading on the plane from Léopoldville. Then she drops two bombshells, that Patrice Lumumba, the prime minister who Gabriel interviewed, is dead. And that she would like him to do ‘us’ a ‘small favour’ as he has done in the past for his brother Sefton, mostly delivering packages. But when Faith says ‘us,’ she means MI6.
The favours that Gabriel undertakes for Faith are always mysterious, taking him to Spain and Poland. Operating on sparse information and cryptic instructions, Gabriel quickly learns to look over his shoulder and to trust his instincts. After each job he pockets the cash and vows never to work for Faith Green again, until the next time she asks. He becomes unable to say no to her, his attraction evolves into obsession.
Woven through Gabriel’s adventures as a reluctant spy are matters closer to home. The death of his mother when he was six in a house fire, from which he escaped, has left him with insomnia and nightmares. So Gabriel starts to see Dr Katerina Haas who recommends anamnesis, the search of facts that aid the return of memory. The family strand of the story encompasses Gabriel’s relationship with his two remaining relatives. His uncle Aldous Dax, who raised Gabriel when he was orphaned, is an art dealer. Older brother Sefton does something unspecified in the Foreign Office. Boyd handles his intricate plotting with a light hand, Gabriel never really knows what is happening and neither does the reader; but it is fun guessing.
William Boyd never disappoints, from cradle to the grave stories such as Any Human Heart, the story of a young pianist in Love is Blind, and a mix of sex and spies in Waiting for Sunrise, he reliably takes you away from the modern world as you sink into the world of his story.
Excellent.

Gabriel’s Moon is first in the Gabriel Dax trilogy. Here’s my review of THE PREDICAMENT, second in the Gabriel Dax trilogy.

Here are my reviews of other books by William Boyd:-
ANY HUMAN HEART
LOVE IS BLIND
NAT TATE: AN AMERICAN ARTIST 1928-1960
ORDINARY THUNDERSTORMS
SWEET CARESS
THE BLUE AFTERNOON
THE DREAMS OF BETHANY MELLMOTH
TRIO
WAITING FOR SUNRISE

… and try the first paragraph of ARMADILLO.

If you like this, try these:-
‘Nucleus’ by Rory Clements #2TOMWILDE
‘Wolf Winter’ by Cecilia Ekback
‘The Traitor’ by Ava Glass #2ALIASEMMA

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview GABRIEL’S MOON by William Boyd https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8n5 via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- William Boyd

#BookReview ‘Tyrant’ by Conn Iggulden #historicalfiction #RomanEmpire

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Wow. Tyrant, book two of the Nero trilogy by Conn Iggulden, doesn’t disappoint. An ageing emperor who appeases his younger wife. A fatherless son, wild and untameable. His ruthless mother, single-minded, unscrupulous, determined her son should rule. This is the story of Nero’s ascent to the most powerful seat of all. Conn IgguldenIn his portrayal of Roman history, Iggulden’s writing bears his research lightly. Never once did I sense a fact included superfluously, everything was there for a reason. Where historical accounts are thin, Iggulden adds his own fictional interpretation. The result is a gripping story of political machinations not unfamiliar to today’s global governments, where ambition and dominion drive everything; loyalty is fragile, words have double meanings, while at the heart of it all are money and power.
Where Nero was the story of Agrippina, Tyrant is the story of her son Lucius, now re-named Nero. A headstrong teenager, Nero is out of control. His mother persuades her husband Emperor Claudius, and now Nero’s adoptive father, to name Nero as his heir in place of his natural son Britannicus who is the butt of Nero’s ridicule. An education is arranged at the hands of statesman and dramatist Seneca and praetorian Burrus.
A combination of political power struggles, subterfuge, a spot of teenage shoplifting and reckless charioteering, Tyrant shows Rome at its bloodiest and most dangerous. Plenty of plot twists, betrayals and plotting set against excessive wealth. I particularly enjoyed the portrayal of the naumachia, a naval battle in a flooded amphitheatre between ships crewed by prisoners of war. I was willing on Caractacus; first seen in Nero, as king of the Catuvellauni in Britain he fought the Romans many times but was captured and taken to Rome as a prisoner. He provides an interesting comparison on the nature of leadership, responsibility and power.
Conn Iggulden’s portrayal of Nero is compelling, despite the darkness, brutality and often insanity of the story. It’s a tribute to his storytelling that the writing does not descend into hyperbole. Tyrant is the story of Nero from boy to man, as he breaks free of the influence of his mother. A really entertaining read.
The final book of the trilogy is Inferno.

Read my review of NERO, first instalment of Conn Iggulden’s ‘Nero’ trilogy

If you like this, try:-
‘The Beasts of Paris’ by Stef Penney
‘The Last Hours’ by Minette Walters #1BlackDeath
‘The Lost Lights of St Kilda’ by Elisabeth Gifford

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COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- William Boyd