It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

 

The It’s Monday! What Are You Reading meme is hosted at BookDate

I’m also linking to The Sunday Post @ Caffeinated Reviewer

And the Sunday Salon @ ReaderBuzz

Life…

Whether you celebrate Easter or not, I hope you are enjoying a relaxed weekend. My family is not religious so for us the holiday is an excuse to eat chocolate for breakfast and spend time with family and friends.

So I’ve been working hard this week to catch up. I was shocked to log in to Netgalley and find I had 37 titles awaiting feedback, I really didn’t think the total would be so high. During the last two weeks, I’ve reduced that to under half, which is why you are seeing multiple posts a day right now, and will for a while.

And of course, since I was logged in already, I couldn’t help browsing and I added a few more titles to my schedule.

On a positive note, I discovered Netgalley has introduced some new badges, so I now have all these pretties to show off.

Unfortunately the tower of unsolicited print ARCs is still, well, towering. And there are still a couple of dozen or so titles in a pile which again, I read during my hiatus, for which I feel I still owe a review.

At the moment the task still feels insurmountable, but I’m going to keep working at it.

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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…

 

The Sparkle Pages by Meg Bignell

Most Wanted by Lisa Scottoline

The Complete Guide to Contemporary World Fiction by MA Orthofer

Those Other Women by Nicole Moriarty

Devil’s Bargain {Red Letter Days #1} by Rachel Caine

Devil’s Due {Red Letter Days #2} by Rachel Caine

Blood River by Tony Cavanaugh

Last Call at the Nightshade Lounge by Paul Krueger

 

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New Posts

 

Review: The Sparkle Pages by Meg Bignell ★★★★★

Review: The Year of the Farmer by Rosalie Ham ★★★

Review: Breakdown by Jonathan Kellerman ★★★

Review: Outback Sisters by Rachael Johns ★★★★

Review: Viral by Helen Fitzgerald ★★★

Review: Making it Up As I Go Along by Marian Keyes ★★★

Review: The Complete Guide to Contemporary World Fiction by MA Orthofer ★★★★

Review: Dastardly Deeds by Isla Evans ★★★★

Review: Review: Fall {Archer & Bennett #3} by Candice Fox ★★★★★

Bookshelf Bounty

Review: The Weight of Him by Ethel Rohan ★★★

(a better late than never) Review: The Near Miss by Fran Cusworth ★★

(a better late than never) Review: Smoke and Mirrors {Stephens and Mephisto #2} ★★★1/2

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What I’m Reading This Week

(book covers link to Goodreads)

 

Wilbrook in Western Australia is a sleepy, remote town that sits on the edge of miles and miles of unexplored wilderness. It is home to Police Sergeant Chandler Jenkins, who is proud to run the town’s small police station, a place used to dealing with domestic disputes and noise complaints.

All that changes on a scorching day when an injured man stumbles into Chandler’s station. He’s covered in dried blood. His name is Gabriel. He tells Chandler what he remembers.

He was drugged and driven to a cabin in the mountains and tied up in iron chains. The man who took him was called Heath. Heath told Gabriel he was going to be number 55. His 55th victim.

Heath is a serial killer.

As a manhunt is launched, a man who says he is Heath walks into the same station. He tells Chandler he was taken by a man named Gabriel. Gabriel told Heath he was going to be victim 55.

Gabriel is the serial killer.

Two suspects. Two identical stories. Which one is the truth?

++++++++

You live on a picturesque communal garden square, an oasis in urban London where your children run free, in and out of other people’s houses.

You’ve known your neighbours for years and you trust them. Implicitly.

You think your children are safe.

But are they really?

Midsummer night: a thirteen-year-old girl is found unconscious in a dark corner of the garden square. What really happened to her? And who is responsible?

++++++++

May 1904. Coney Island’s newest amusement park, Dreamland, has just opened. Its many spectacles are expected to attract crowds by the thousands, paying back investors many times over.
Kitty Hayward and her mother arrive by steamer from South Africa. When Kitty’s mother takes ill, the hotel doctor sends Kitty to Manhattan to fetch some special medicine. But when she returns, Kitty’s mother has vanished. The desk clerk tells Kitty she is at the wrong hotel. The doctor says he’s never seen her although, she notices, he is unable to look her in the eye.
Alone in a strange country, Kitty meets the denizens of Magruder’s Curiosity Cabinet. A relic of a darker, dirtier era, Magruder’s is home to a forlorn flea circus, a handful of disgruntled Unusuals, and a mad Uzbek scientist. Magruder’s Unusuals take Kitty under their wing and resolve to find out what happened to her mother.
But as a plague spreads, Coney Island is placed under quarantine. The gang at Magruder’s finds that a missing mother is the least of their problems, as the once-glamorous resort town is abandoned to the freaks, anarchists, and madmen.

++++++++

Rowland Sinclair is an artist and a gentleman. In Australia’s 1930s the Sinclair name is respectable and influential, yet Rowland has a talent for scandal.

Even with thousands of unemployed lining the streets, Rowland’s sheltered world is one of exorbitant wealth, culture and impeccable tailoring. He relies on the Sinclair fortune to indulge his artistic passions and friends … a poet, a painter and a brazen sculptress.

Mounting tensions fuelled by the Great Depression take Australia to the brink of revolution.

++++++++

‘The right people turn up in your life at the right time if you let them.’

Sienna Wilson is living her dream in the city – a rewarding obstetrics job in a leading hospital, an apartment with a view, and handsome Sergeant McCabe on call whenever she needs him. The last thing she wants is a posting to investigate a medical mystery in a remote outback town.

But on arrival in Spinifex, Sienna is brought to life in new and exciting ways. In a community riddled with secrets, she meets troubled young barmaid Maddy, and tough publican Alma, both with their secrets to hide.

As they draw strength from each other, new friendships, new loves and new babies are born, proving that when strong women join forces, they can overcome even the greatest odds.

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Thanks for stopping by!