It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? #SundayPost #SundaySalon

 

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…

I’m still in self isolation because I haven’t yet managed to entirely shake off this cold, and now my oldest daughter, and oldest son are also sick with it. I did venture out to the supermarket late Friday night right before closing but by desperately trying to smother a cough I pulled a muscle in my back, so I’m not doing that again any time soon. Honestly I had a bit of a freak out mid week because I am vulnerable health wise  if I get Covid-19, and the numbers are steadily climbing here, but I have it better than many so I’m choosing to suck it up.

Otherwise though we are all managing. Hubby still goes to work everyday. The kids’ school has formally begun online education, and they are working out their own ways of socialising, for example my eldest sons weekly Dungeon & Dragons games have moved online. One side of my family have started a regular zoom conference call every Sunday evening for about a dozen of us which is fun. I’m hoping I can get a regular routine happening this week because I am behind on my review commitments, which I really dislike.

I hope you and yours are safe and well.

It’s the last Monday of the month so time to check in with my challenge progress. I’m not where I should be … but hey… pandemic 🤷🏻‍♀️

Nonfiction Reader Challenge: 5/12

Australian Women Writers Challenge: 17/50

Aussie Author Challenge: 10/24

Nerd Reading Challenge: 16/52

Historical Fiction Reading Challenge: 11/25

Social Justice Challenge: 1/5

SwordsnStars Challenge: 3/10

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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…

The Origin of Me by Bernard Gallate

Sheerwater by Leah Swann

The Salt Madonna by Catherine Noske

Code Name Helene by Ariel Lawson

 

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New Posts…

 

Review: Our House Is On Fire by Marlena Ernman, Svante Thunberg, Greta Thunberg and Beata Ernman

Review: The Origin of Me by Bernard Gallate

Review: Sheerwater by Leah Swann

Review: The Salt Madonna by Catherine Noske

 

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What I’m Reading Now…

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What I’m Reading This Week…

Why would someone bury a bucket of precious jewels and gemstones and never return?

Present Day. When respected American jewelry historian, Kate Kirby, receives a call about the Cheapside jewels, she knows she’s on the brink of the experience of a lifetime.

But the trip to London forces Kate to explore secrets that have long been buried by her own family. Back in Boston, Kate has uncovered a series of sketches in her great-grandmother’s papers linking her suffragette great-grandmother Essie to the Cheapside collection. Could these sketches hold the key to Essie’s secret life in Edwardian London?

In the summer of 1912, impoverished Irish immigrant Essie Murphy happens to be visiting her brother when a workman’s pickaxe strikes through the floor of an old tenement house in Cheapside, near St. Paul’s Cathedral in London. The workmen uncover a stash of treasure—from Ottoman pendants to Elizabethan and Jacobean gems—and then the finds disappear again! Could these jewels—one in particular—change the fortunes of Essie and her sisters?

Together with photographer Marcus Holt, Kate Kirby chases the history of the Cheapside gems and jewels, especially the story of a small diamond champlevé enamel ring. Soon, everything Kate believes about her family, gemology, and herself will be threatened.

Based on a fascinating true story, The Lost Jewels is a riveting historical fiction novel that will captivate readers from the beginning to the unforgettable, surprising end.

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When top-flight journalists Hadley Callahan and Mitch Samuals married two years ago, theirs had been declared the celebrity wedding of the year. But, now, Hadley unexpectedly returns to Stringybark Creek alone to tell her parents one major piece of news while determinedly hiding another even more explosive secret.

Hadley’s big society wedding had killed any hopes that Oliver Dawson, the Callahans’ neighbour and Griff Callahan’s best friend, had nurtured since his teenage years when Hadley was his best friend’s little sister and thus out-of-bounds.

While Hadley’s in town, the shocking suicide of one of their old school friends brings them together as they mourn their loss. Hadley and Ollie begin a campaign to raise awareness of rural mental health, both wanting to make a difference.

With Mitch putting pressure on Hadley to keep quiet, and the secret she’s keeping causing her great anguish, Hadley’s feelings for Ollie take her by surprise. But her life is so messed up at the moment – what future could they possibly have together?

Return to Stringybark Creek concludes the Callahan family trilogy with a delightfully irresistible story of loyalty, hope and the importance of staying true to yourself.

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Birth. Death. Wonder … One woman’s journey to the edge of love and loyalty from the bestselling author of The Lace Weaver

London, 1702. When her husband is lost at sea, Mary Burton Gulliver, midwife and herbalist, is forced to rebuild her life without him. But three years later when Lemuel Gulliver is brought home, fevered and communicating only in riddles, her ordered world is turned upside down.

In a climate of desperate poverty and violence, Mary is caught in a crossfire of suspicion and fear driven by her husband’s outlandish claims, and it is up to her to navigate a passage to safety for herself and her daughter, and the vulnerable women in her care.

When a fellow sailor, a dangerous man with nothing to lose, appears to hold sway over her husband, Mary’s world descends deeper into chaos, and she must set out on her own journey to discover the truth of Gulliver’s travels . . . and the landscape of her own heart.

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It all began when I met you, Lily.

Beautiful, dangerous, precious you.

At first Katherine dismisses her early-twenties intern as a millennial ‘snowflake’: entitled, moralistic, soft. Yet as Lily’s youth and beauty increasingly remind Katherine of everything she once had, she begins to develop a dark fascination with her new colleague.

But is Lily as perfect as she seems, or does she have a sinister hidden agenda? As Katherine is drawn into an obsessive power struggle with the intern, a disturbing picture emerges of two women hiding dark secrets – and who are desperate enough to do anything to come out on top…

With shocking twists at every turn, Precious You is a powerfully gripping story of obsession, revenge and deceit.

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Thanks for stopping by!