Rural noir is a thing at the moment, which means some stellar entries in the category, and some not so good ones. Makes opening each new novel and settling in for the experience a bit of rollercoaster ride. So did 55 live up to the hype? Well yes, yes it did. It’s an intriguing premise…
I’m slowly acquainting myself with Angela Carter’s writing, and when I saw The Magic Toyshop in a Sydney bookshop, I had to have it. This is the blurb: One night Melanie walks through the garden in her mother’s wedding dress. The next morning her world is shattered. Forced to leave the comfortable home of her…
Lady Bird and the Fox by Kim Kelly is one of the best historical fiction titles I’ve read in a long time, a claim boosted by the familiarity I felt with the setting (not far from where I grew up). This is the blurb: It’s 1868 and the gold rush is spreading across the wild…
The Girl on the Page by John Purcell is a pacy page-turner that raises interesting questions regarding the divide between commercial and literary fiction. Through the characters of Amy, a commitment-resistant book editor, and Helen, a literary great who is struggling with the manuscript she’s been paid a whopping advance for, this novel gets to…
The British Special Operations Executive (SOE) conducted espionage, sabotage and reconnaissance in occupied Europe during WWII. The Juliet Code focuses on the actions of the operations of the SOE to greater extent through the eyes of British agent and wireless operator Juliet (her story is told in real-time and reflection) as she is asked to…
Isabel Allende’s In the Midst of Winter is a quiet, emotive read about friendships built out of unlikely circumstances – a freak snowstorm, a car accident and a dead body. Here’s the blurb: Amid the biggest Brooklyn snowstorm in living memory, an unexpected friendship blossoms between three people thrown together by circumstance. Richard Bowmaster, a…
It’s not altogether surprising that Good Charlotte’s song “Lifestyles of the rich and the famous” is in my head as I type this review. Harrison Young’s novel Nantucket describes a lifestyle most of us can only imagine – private jet planes, unlimited money, beautiful holiday houses on exclusive beaches … It’s a world where the stakes are…
