#Bookreview ‘Hitler’s Secret’ by Rory Clements #thriller #WW2

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Fourth in the Tom Wilde World War Two spy mysteries, Hitler’s Secret by Rory Clements hits the ground running and keeps the pages turning. The secret in question is a ten-year old girl who may or may not be the love child of Hitler. Klara has a false identity and is hidden but is now in imminent danger of exposure and murder. Rory ClementsWilde travels to Berlin disguised as a German-American motorcycle manufacturer in search of a business deal. His cover enables him to meet allies and search for Klara. Unsure of his mission from the beginning, Wilde imagines that everyone can see through his false identity, everyone is planning to kill him. Clements tells the story at breakneck speed, flicking from viewpoint to viewpoint. Martin Bormann, Hitler’s gatekeeper wants Klara dead and despatches a henchman, Otto Kalt. But it seems everyone touched by Klara’s story is at risk of death. As Wilde closes in on Klara’s hiding place, so do her killers. What ensues is a tense chase north across Germany towards the promised sanctuary of Sweden. And at all times it is assumed Hitler is unaware of the girl’s existence. But who else knows the secret?
At the heart of this story is trust. Believing loyalty expressed at time of war can be a treacherous decision and at times Tom feels everyone has an agenda except him. Even his allies have their own motivations, their own friends and loyalties. Expecting to collect a ‘package’ in Berlin, he is horrified to find he is collecting a girl; he feels duped and used by his spy chiefs. And as Tom runs, it is impossible for him to identify his pursuers. His judgement is seriously challenged and he trusts no-one. What is on the surface a matter of shaming the perfect Adolf Hitler, so popular with his German female citizens, is at the same time a fight between the most elite of German officials.
Familiar characters from earlier books in the series recur: Tom’s partner Lydia, American diplomat Jim Vandenberg and Wilde’s contact at British intelligence, Philip Eaton. History professor Wilde is an affecting amateur spy, diligently learning the role he is assigned but relying on his instincts to get him out of trouble. Of course, the best laid plan can go wrong but this time the plan is not organised in advance and Tom is on his own. He will sink or swim and the few he trusts do not know if he is alive or dead.

Click the title to read my reviews of the other books in the Tom Wilde series:-
CORPUS #1TOMWILDE
NUCLEUS #2TOMWILDE
NEMESIS #3TOMWILDE
A PRINCE AND A SPY #5TOMWILDE
THE MAN IN THE BUNKER #6TOMWILDE
THE ENGLISH FUHRER #7TOMWILDE
A COLD WIND FROM MOSCOW #8TOMWILDE

And from the Sebastian Wolff series:-
MUNICH WOLF #1SEBASTIANWOLFF

If you like this, try:-
‘The Ways of the World’ by Robert Goddard
‘Munich’ by Robert Harris
‘Five Days of Fog’ by Anna Freeman

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview HITLER’S SECRET by Rory Clements https://wp.me/p5gEM4-47r via @SandraDanby

#BookReview ‘The Clergyman’s Wife’ by @MollyJGreeley #JaneAusten

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If like me you are fascinated and disturbed by the decision of Charlotte Lucas to marry Mr Collins in Pride and Prejudice, then you will enjoy The Clergyman’s Wife by Molly Greeley. I felt immediately immersed in Charlotte’s world at Hunsford. Molly GreeleyI won’t summarise the background to this novel on the assumption that all readers will be fans of Pride and Prejudice. Suffice to say, this could so easily have slipped into negative territory, negativity about William Collins and Lady Catherine de Bourgh, but Greeley handles Austen’s characters with respect, taking the heritage of Charlotte’s situation and adding a fresh perspective on her future. We see Mr Collins from a new, sympathetic angle, and are given an insight into Charlotte’s decision to marry him, her family’s position and the limited options available to her.
I liked Charlotte extremely, a considered, thoughtful woman, given an impossible choice to make and often put into uncomfortable situations by the crassness of people around her. Charlotte however is not negative, she works out the positive thing to do rather than assign blame.
This is a Regency family drama structured around the meaning of love; all kinds of love, for your spouse, your parents and siblings, as a mother, for the people who are your responsibility, and for yourself. Although Charlotte lives a life constrained by geography, convention and manners, that does not mean she lacks freedom. It is a freedom of imagination, a freedom of the mind. So when she faces a situation which she never believed would befall her, it is a life-changing experience.
A delightful light read, I read it in one sitting in holiday, you most definitely must have read Pride and Prejudice first to get the most from the undercurrent of references. I can’t help but wonder what Jane Austen would think of it.

Click here to read my review of THE HEIRESS, also by Molly Greeley.

If you like this, try:-
‘Miss Austen’ by Gill Hornby
‘The Ballroom’ by Anna Hope
‘The Clockmaker’s Daughter’ by Kate Morton

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE CLERGYMAN’S WIFE by @MollyJGreeley https://wp.me/p5gEM4-4sX via @SandraDanby

Great Opening Paragraph 124… ‘The Camomile Lawn’ #amreading #FirstPara

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“Helena Cuthbertson picked up the crumpled Times by her sleeping husband and went to the flower room to iron it.”
Mary WesleyFrom ‘The Camomile Lawn’ by Mary Wesley

Read my reviews of these novels by Mary Wesley:-
JUMPING THE QUEUE
THE CAMOMILE LAWN

Try one of these #FirstParas & discover a new author:-
‘For Whom the Bell Tolls’ by Ernest Hemingway 
‘A Month in the Country’ by JL Carr
‘Back When We Were Grown-Ups’ by Anne Tyler 

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#Books #FirstPara THE CAMOMILE LAWN by Mary Wesley https://wp.me/p5gEM4-48b via @SandraDanby

#BookReview ‘The Ninth Child’ by Sally Magnusson @sallymag1 #historical #Scotland

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The Ninth Child by Sally Magnusson is a Scottish historical mystery featuring a doctor’s wife, Queen Victoria, an infrastructure project to bring clean water to Glasgow from the wild and beautiful lochs, and the sithichean (fairies). Sally MagnussonIt is a story of water and the fate of two different women, both expecting their ninth child, and their husbands; one who is ignorant until the end, the other who looks the threat in the eye and shivers. The pregnant women, who have never met, are the Queen and Isabel, wife of Dr Alexander Aird, physician to the water construction project. The Airds live on the remote and basic construction site in a stone cottage called Fairy Knoll, alongside the drilling and tunnelling of the water project. There are two stories here – a historical saga about health and living conditions for the families which struggle both in Glasgow tenements and of the navvies that work on the water project; and a mystical story of a preacher stolen by the fairies in 1692 who returns 167 years later to talk and walk with Isabel Aird. His purpose is not clear but he is egged on by a fairy voice with whom he has made an unearthly deal. The link with Queen Victoria is tenuous and, after a strong introduction, this strand goes silent for a long time.
The tale is told by the Aird’s neighbour and servant Kirsty McEchern, alternating with Robert Kirke the preacher and, briefly, Prince Albert. At times the transition between viewpoints is sudden and confusing and I admit to skipping over some of the Robert Kirke passages. Sometimes his dialect merged into a following section by Kirsty and this took me away from the story. But I did like the character of Isabel Aird and the portrayal of her journey through the grief for her eight miscarriages. Inspired by contemporary women such as Florence Nightingale and Anne Lister, Isabel fights against her husband’s expectations that she pursue a gentlewoman’s traditional life. The juxtaposition of the Queen, Isabel and Kirsty demonstrates that women, whatever their class and education, face many of the same trials in life and have the similar mental and physical fortitude when called upon.
Magnusson is a confident writer in this period and I believed in the construction site she describes near Loch Chon and Loch Katrine. Many characters and incidents are based on real people and events including many places in the Trossachs national park which to this day bear fairy names. The Queen Victoria strand promised much but was under-used. I wished the story had more pace and for this reason the first three-quarters of the book was a 3* for me, rising to 4* for the last quarter which races along. A special mention goes to the glorious purple thistle cover.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ABOUT THIS BOOK AT AMAZON

If you like this, try:-
‘The Good People’ by Hannah Kent
‘The Threshold’ by Anna Kovacevic
‘The Crows of Beara’ by Julie Christine Johnson

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE NINTH CHILD by @sallymag1 https://wp.me/p5gEM4-4sR via @SandraDanby

A poem to read in the bath… ‘A Shropshire Lad II’ by AE Housman #poetry

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Alfred Edward Housman published two books in his lifetime, A Shropshire Lad in 1896 and Last Poems in 1922, followed after his death by More Poems. His part-patriotic, part-nostalgic poetry appealed to a population at war, his words of nature, sorrow and the brevity of life striking a chord during the Great War.

AE Housman

[photo – EO Hoppé]

This is the second poem in A Shropshire Lad. Please search out the poem in an anthology or at your local library.

‘A Shropshire Lad II’

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide

Listen to Alan Brownjohn read ‘A Shropshire Lad II’ at The Poetry Archive.
AE HousmanBUY THE BOOK

Read these other excerpts, and perhaps find a new poet to love:-
‘The Road Not Taken’ by Robert Frost
‘Japanese Maple’ by Clive James
‘The Cinnamon Peeler’ by Michael Ondaatje

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A #poem to read in the bath: ‘A Shropshire Lad II’ by AE Housman https://wp.me/p5gEM4-4bG via @SandraDanby

#BookReview ‘The Inheritance of Solomon Farthing’ by @mspaulsonellis #WW1

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A group of Great War soldiers is waiting for orders. During the last skirmishes of the war, men are still dying. Will the men receive orders to retreat or advance? Who will live or who will die? There are two strands to The Inheritance of Solomon Farthing by Mary Paulson-Ellis and the title refers to the second. A contemporary man in Edinburgh, an heir hunter, finds a pawn ticket amongst the possessions of Thomas Methven, an old soldier who died alone. Mary Paulson-Ellis This is a detailed story with many layers and many characters introduced as the two strands are told and hesitantly connected. At times the detail became confusing with so many descriptive repetitions I found myself skipping forwards. Paulson-Ellis writes scenes so well – the soldier’s gambling scene with the chicken is totally believable, and her portrayal of the foundling school in NE England is heart breaking. As Solomon tracks the life story of the deceased soldier, we see flashes of his own story, orphaned at seven and sent to live with his grandfather. Though interesting I found this distracting, it took me away from the story of the soldiers and added even more characters and family trees to remember.
The message is that the debts of the past do not disappear. Captain Godfrey Farthing is waiting, always waiting; to live to die, to advance, to retreat. He is simply trying to keep his men safe to the end of the war, which they suspect may come at any time. But Farthing’s intentions may be wrecked by enemy attack, by orders to attack, or by his own men themselves who are confined and bored. ‘A strange peace was coursing through his veins; that terrible calm that comes when a man knows the end is coming, but not in the way he had imagined when he began.’
Gambling is a continuous theme throughout the WW1 strand, and I lost track of the treasures gambled, won and lost, coveted, stolen and hidden. There are 11 soldiers involved, surely too many. Like The Lord of the Flies, the boredom of the men, their jealousies, petty rivalries and guns come to dominate their world, as if the war is already over. The treasures they gamble can be the smallest thing which to us may seem irrelevant but in war is crucial. Not monetary value as known at home, but representing an emotional or practical value.
Different rules apply during wartime and items that are significant then are cast into the spotlight when they survive across the generations to be found by modern day relatives. I admit to confusion about who was related to who and perhaps the cutting of a few peripheral characters would help. Given my interest in family history and WW1, I expected to love this book but longed for a firmer editing hand.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ABOUT THIS BOOK AT AMAZON

If you like this, try:-
‘Life Class’ by Pat Barker
‘A Long Long Way’ by Sebastian Barry
‘Half of the Human Race’ by Anthony Quinn

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE INHERITANCE OF SOLOMON FARTHING by @mspaulsonellis https://wp.me/p5gEM4-4tz via @SandraDanby

First Edition ‘It’ by @StephenKing #oldbooks #bookcovers

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Published in 1986, It was Stephen King’s 22nd book and the 17th written under his name. His first published novel, Carrie, appeared in 1973 though it was actually the fourth he wrote, on a a portable typewriter belonging to his wife. It tells of seven children as they are terrorized by an evil entity that exploits the fears of its victims to disguise itself while hunting its prey. I have read it once, in my twenties, and it terrified me. I was unable to sleep for days afterwards and have not seen the films, though I still own the paperback.

Stephen King

My copy, the New English Library 1987 edition

My paperback [above] is the 1987 New English Library edition with the cover line ‘The Terrifying New Bestseller’.

The first edition [above left] was first published in the USA by Viking on September 15, 1986. King first thought of the story in 1978 and began writing it in 1981. His original concept was that the title character would live in the local sewer system, inspired by the Norwegian folk tale Three Billy Goats Gruff, who lived beneath a bridge.

Stephen King

It by Stephen King – the current edition by Hodder

The current UK edition [above] is published by Hodder.
BUY THE BOOK

The story
During a heavy rainstorm, six-year-old Georgie Denbrough sails a paper boat – made for him by his brother – along the rainy streets before it washed into a storm drain. Peering into the drain, George sees a pair of glowing yellow eyes. It is an eccentric clown who introduces himself as Mr Bob Gray, or Pennywise the Dancing Clown. Georgie declines a balloon but is enticed by Pennywise to reach into the drain and retrieve his boat,. The clown rips off the child’s arm and leaves Georgie to die.

Other editions

Films

Stephen King

It, the DVD 2017

Watch the trailers for the 1990 two-part mini-television series and the 2017 film [above]
BUY THE DVD

If you like old books, check out these:-
‘Couples’ by John Updike
‘The Moonstone’ by Wilkie Collins
‘Lord of the Flies’ by William Golding

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First Edition IT by @StephenKing #oldbooks #bookcovers https://wp.me/p5gEM4-4ak via @SandraDanby

My Porridge & Cream read… Jessie Cahalin @BooksInHandbag #books

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Today I’m delighted to welcome romance novelist Jessie Cahalin. Her ‘Porridge & Cream’ read is Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte.

“Wuthering Heights appeared in my life when I was eleven years old in 1983.  Following my English teacher’s recommendation, I saved pocket money to buy the novel.

‘The air made me shiver through every limb’ as I entered Heathcliff’s kitchen and lost myself in the language. This was my first taste of one of ‘the important authors’ and she was a Yorkshire lass to boot. I still remember the picture of the withering tree on the front cover and the delicious new smell of the fine pages.

Jessie Cahalin

Jessie’s vintage copy

“The tiny writing meant I had to concentrate and there were delicious new words to savour. Even then, the rhythms of the language and the powerful setting captured me, and I read them aloud. I stood on t’top of t’world with my new book.

Bronte inspired me to enjoy the power of words, and I would spend hours painting my own scenes with language. I marked pages in Wuthering Heights and would re-read them constantly. My parents took me to Howarth to visit the parsonage, and I knew Jessie had gone home.

Wuthering Heights was my trusty companion on the train when I departed from Yorkshire to commence my first teaching job down south. Can you imagine my delight when I was asked to teach Wuthering Heights to my first A Level class? I passed on my joy of Bronte to some of the students who read English in Leeds and York.

I have not managed to return to live in Yorkshire, so I still read Bronte to get my fix of the rugged landscape. Alas, my original copy gave up the ghost a long time ago. I have the book on my kindle, which is always at hand in my handbag.”

Jessie Cahalin

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte – Penguin Clothbound Classics

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Jessie’s Bio
Jessie is a Yorkshire author living in Cardiff, Wales. Wales and words have a special place in her heart. She loves to entertain and challenge readers with her contemporary fiction and wants everyone to meet the characters who’ve been hassling her for years. Set in Wales, You Can’t Go It Alone is ‘a novel with a warm heart’ and is the first book in a family saga. Jessie is also the innovator of the popular ‘Books in Handbag’ Blog. Besides writing, Jessie adores walking, talking, cooking and procrastinating. Walking helps her to sort out tangles in her narratives or articles. She searches for happy endings, where possible, and needs great coffee, food and music to give her inspiration.

Jessie’s links
Website
Facebook 
Twitter 

Jessie’s latest book
Jessie CahalinCan’t Go It Alone… Love, music and secrets are woven together in this poignant, heart-warming narrative. Set in a Welsh village, the story explores the contrast in attitudes and opportunities between different generations of women. As the characters confront their secrets and fears, they discover truths about themselves and their relationships. The reader is invited to laugh and cry, with the characters, and find joy in the simple things in life. Listen to the music and enjoy the food, as you peek inside the world of the inhabitants of Delfryn. Let Sophie show you that no one can go it alone. Who knows, you may find some friends with big hearts
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What is a ‘Porridge & Cream’ book? It’s the book you turn to when you need a familiar read, when you are tired, ill, or out-of-sorts, where you know the story and love it. Where reading it is like slipping on your oldest, scruffiest slippers after walking for miles. Where does the name ‘Porridge & Cream’ come from? Cat Deerborn is a character in Susan Hill’s ‘Simon Serrailler’ detective series. Cat is a hard-worked GP, a widow with two children and she struggles from day-to-day. One night, after a particularly difficult day, she needs something familiar to read. From her bookshelf she selects ‘Love in A Cold Climate’ by Nancy Mitford. Do you have a favourite read which you return to again and again? If so, please send me a message.

Discover the ‘Porridge & Cream’ books of these authors:-
Rhoda Baxter’s choice is ‘The Night Watch’ by Terry Pratchett
Chantelle Atkins chooses ‘The Catcher in the Rye’ by JD Salinger
‘Camellia’ by Lesley Pearse is chosen by Helen J Christmas

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Why does Jessie Cahalin @BooksInHandbag re-read WUTHERING HEIGHTS by Emily Bronte #books https://wp.me/p5gEM4-4t7 via @SandraDanby

A poem to read in the bath… ‘Out Chasing Boys’ by Amanda Huggins #poetry

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Recently published is this small poetry chapbook, The Collective Nouns for Birds by Amanda Huggins, with 24 poems. Huggins is an award-winning writer of flash fiction and short stories, so knowing her skill with the short form I looked forward to this first poetry chapbook with anticipation. And I wasn’t disappointed. I’ve chosen the first poem in the book as it struck a chord from my own childhood. I can smell the salt in the breeze, hear the lapping of the summer waves on the shore and taste the tang of vinegar as I lick my fingers after eating haddock and chips. Amanda HugginsThis poem is subject to copyright restrictions. Please search for the full poem in an anthology or at your local library. A ‘poetry chapbook’ is a slim pamphlet of poems, usually no more than 40 pages.

‘Out Chasing Boys’
We spent summer on the seafront,
two stranded mermaids
killing time.
We rolled up our jeans,
carried our shoes,
blew kisses at the camera
in the photo booth.
Always out, chasing boys,
as if we had forever.

Read my reviews of other work by Amanda Huggins:-
Novellas
ALL OUR SQUANDERED BEAUTY
CROSSING THE LINES
THE BLUE OF YOU
Short stories
AN UNFAMILIAR LANDSCAPE
BRIGHTLY COLOURED HORSES
EACH OF US A PETAL
SCRATCHED ENAMEL HEART
SEPARATED FROM THE SEA

Read these other excerpts and find a new poet to love:-
‘A Thousand Years You Said’ by Lady Heguri
‘The Cinnamon Peeler’ by Michael Ondaatje
‘After a Row’ by Tom Pickard

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#Poetry ‘Out Chasing Boys’ by Amanda Huggins @troutiemcfish https://wp.me/p5gEM4-4v6 via @SandraDanby

#BookReview ‘Home’ by Marilynne Robinson #classic #Americanwriters

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Home by Marilynne Robinson is the story of two adult children who return home, coincidentally at the same time, who feel the shame of not living up to the standards set by their minister father, Reverend Robert Boughton. It is a profoundly sad book; the slow winding tale towards the inevitable ending is curiously addictive. It is a three-hander, concentrating on father, son and daughter. Marilynne RobinsonGlory and Jack Boughton grew up in a clerical family home in Gilead, Iowa. We learn of their country childhoods, quite different as siblings go, from their conversations and the memories prompted by visits from neighbours Reverend John Ames, his wife Lila and son. The story is told from Glory’s viewpoint. Jack takes lots of ‘dark nights of the soul’, long solitary walks in the dark to which we are not privy, and his true thoughts remain a mystery to the end. Just when you think you have worked him out, he confounds you.
Robinson draws a picture of rural America at a time of great change. There are demonstrations in Montgomery, but Gilead seems insulated from the outside apart from occasional telephone calls to their father by Glory and Jack’s siblings, and news reports of violence. Jack is drawn to the news coverage; his father dismissive. Jack is a contradiction; he struggles to believe yet knows his Bible backwards, plays hymns on the piano, and quotes scripture at Ames.
Slowly, piece by piece, we find out the details of Glory’s shame. Why she really came home, why she is no longer teaching. But Jack is more opaque, hiding his past, unable to share, he is spiky when offered help and understanding. Does he feel unworthy? He is spiritually isolated from his family, unable to connect though at times he longs to, other times he kicks out. A to-and-fro battle proceeds as Jack opens up a little to Glory, then slamming shut again when faced with his father’s well meaning but blunt questions. There are parallels between the siblings; Glory is recovering from a failed relationship with an unscrupulous man who sounds rather like Jack, while Jack mourns the loss of a good woman who sounds rather like Glory. This book tells the story of how the brother and sister come to understand themselves, and each other, more clearly, but based on fractured pieces of the truth.
As the book progresses, Boughton grows weaker as death approaches. He is one moment gentle towards Jack; the next, angry. Does he think that in striving for achievement for his children he also failed them, by channelling them towards a path they might not otherwise have followed, by not allowing them to develop naturally. I’m not sure Boughton sees it like that. They all live within the constraints of a family entwined in the strait-jacket of belief.
Robinson is best at the detail of ordinary life, the garden, the fruit and vegetables, the weather, the faded house, drawing pictures as clearly as Leonardo da Vinci drew pencil sketches of hands. “Glory made up a batch of bread dough. Brown bread was her father’s preference. Something to lift the spirits of the household, she thought. The grocer brought her a roasting hen. She opened the windows to cool the kitchen and air out the dining room a little, and the breezes that came in were mild, earthy, grassy, with a feel of sunlight about them.”
How many adults can return to visit their parents in the family home in which they grew up and find that home unchanged? “It was in fact a relief to have someone else in the house. And it was interesting to watch how this man, gone so long, noticed one thing and another, as if mildly startled, even a little affronted, by all the utter sameness. She saw him put his hand on the shoulder of their other’s chair, touch the fringe on a lampshade, as if to confirm for himself that the uncanny persistence of half-forgotten objects, all in their old places, was not some trick of the mind. Nothing about that house ever did change, except to fade or scar or wear.” The unchanging nature of the family house mirrors the unchanging nature of the family that lives in it; the patriarch with his rules and expectations, the children trying to please him but falling short and feeling guilty. Each not wanting to worry the other, protective of the myth of their family, sensitive to their father’s opinion, fearful of striking out on their own again away from Gilead and what they know. Wanting to leave, wanting to stay.
Home will stay with you a long time after reading, whether you have faith or none. It is a companion to Gilead which won the Pulitzer Prize.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ABOUT THIS BOOK

Read my reviews of Robinson’s other novels:-
GILEAD
HOUSEKEEPING
JACK

Try the #FirstPara of GILEAD here.

If you like this, try:-
‘A Little Life’ by Hanya Yanagihara
‘The Witchfinder’s Sister’ by Beth Underdown
‘Skin Deep’ by Laura Wilkinson

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview HOME by Marilynne Robinson https://wp.me/p5gEM4-3gf via @SandraDanby