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

Linking to: It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? at BookDate; Sunday Post @ Caffeinated Reviewer; and the Sunday Salon @ ReaderBuzz

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Life…

The past week has been uneventful, the next week is likely to be more of the same, though it’s my birthday midweek. My guess is no one will remember until they get hungry, it’s the one day of the year I refuse to cook. I have left them a clue – our menu board says SURPRISE ME! for Wednesday’s dinner 🙂

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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…

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How To Fake Being Tidy by Fenella Souter

Something to Hide by Fleur McDonald

Last Night by Mhairi McFarlane

You Need To Know by Nicola Moriarty

All We Have is Now by Kaneana May

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New Posts…

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Review: How To Fake Being Tidy by Fenella Souter ★★

Review: Something to Hide by Fleur McDonald ★★★★1/2

Review: Last Night by Mhairi McFarlane ★★★★★

Review: You Need To Know by Nicola Moriarty ★★★★

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What I’m Reading This Week…

 

From the bestselling Australian author of The Hating Game comes the clever, funny and unforgettable story of a muscular, tattooed man hired as an assistant to two elderly women – under the watchful eye of a beautiful retirement home manager

Distraction (n): Something that turns your attention away from something you want to concentrate on. See: Teddy Prescott.

Ruthie Midona is twenty-four (going on ninety-four) and fully committed to her job at a luxury retirement village. Keeping herself busy caring for the eccentric residents means that Ruthie can safely ignore her own life – what little there is of it.

Teddy Prescott is practically allergic to a hard day’s work. When he rocks up as the retirement village’s newest employee, Ruthie is less than impressed. The last thing she needs is a distraction as irritating (and handsome) as this selfish rich kid.

Lucky for Ruthie, her favourite pair of mischievous residents need a new assistant to torture . . . so she hands over Teddy, ready for them to send him running.

Except Teddy may be about to surprise her – not just by surviving the old women’s antics, but by charming Ruthie so much, she starts to remember that there’s more to life than work . . . Could Teddy be far more than simply an unwelcome distraction?

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As a medical detective of the modern world, forensic pathologist Ryan Blumenthal’s chief goal is to bring perpetrators to justice. He has performed thousands of autopsies, which have helped bring numerous criminals to book. In Autopsy he covers the hard lessons learnt as a rookie pathologist, as well as some of the most unusual cases he’s encountered.

During his career, for example, he has dealt with high-profile deaths, mass disasters, death by lightning and people killed by African wildlife. Blumenthal takes the reader behind the scenes at the mortuary, describing a typical autopsy and the instruments of the trade. He also shares a few trade secrets, like how to establish when a suicide is more likely to be a homicide.

Even though they cannot speak, the dead have a lot to say – and Blumenthal is there to listen.

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She never meant to be a hero…

In fact, Dreckly Jones has made a point her whole life to be exactly not that. The daughter of a forbidden union between an earth elemental and a selkie, her rare powers have meant she has always had a target on her back.

So Dreckly – a 40-something oyster shucker according to her fake documents, 140-something sprite if you’re going to get all nit-picky about it – has become an expert at many things. Chief amongst them: hiding.

When she meets a determined group of rebels who desperately need her help, she finds herself wanting to stick her neck out for the first time in a long while. Yet is she ready to be noticed? Is Dreckly willing to use her powers to stand up when it could cost her everything?

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Thanks for stopping by!

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

Linking to: It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? at BookDate; Sunday Post @ Caffeinated Reviewer; and the Sunday Salon @ ReaderBuzz

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Life…

I hope you’ve had a lovely weekend, whether you observed the Easter rituals, or simply spent it with with family and friends. We had a lovely lunch with family on Sunday, (I really should remember to take photos), but otherwise we’ve done very little.

Last Tuesday I zoomed into a virtual author event held by my library with Ali Sinclair, author of Codebreakers, and Meg Bignell, author of Welcome To Nowhere River, which I enjoyed.

The only other excitement this past week is that my eldest daughter finally took delivery of her (new-to-her) car. It’s nothing fancy, given she actually hasn’t even got her full licence yet, but it’s a step in the right direction to independence given she’ll be 25 next month.

School holidays have started so my boys will be home for the next two weeks. Just as they go back, my daughter will be able to come home from uni for a week. I can’t wait to see her!

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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…

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The Lady With the Gun Asks the Questions by Kerry Greenwood

The Best Things by Mel Giedroyc

The Plague Letters by V.L. Valentine

How To Fake Being Tidy by Fenella Souter

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New Posts…

Review: The Emporium of Imagination by Tabitha Bird

Review: The Last Reunion by Kayte Nunn

Review: The Lady With the Gun Asks the Questions by Kerry Greenwood

Review: The Best Things by Mel Giedroyc

2021 Nonfiction Reader Challenge Monthly Spotlight #3

Review: The Plague Letters by V.L. Valentine

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What I’m Reading This Week…

Eve, Justin, Susie, and Ed have been friends since they were teenagers. Now in their thirties, the four are as close as ever, Thursday night bar trivia is sacred, and Eve is still secretly in love with Ed. Maybe she should have moved on by now, but she can’t stop thinking about what could have been. And she knows Ed still thinks about it, too.

But then, in an instant, their lives are changed forever.

In the aftermath, Eve’s world is upended. As stunning secrets are revealed, she begins to wonder if she really knew her friends as well as she thought. And when someone from the past comes back into her life, Eve’s future veers in a surprising new direction…

They say every love story starts with a single moment. What if it was just last night?

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The holidays are here. The extended family has gathered. The cars are packed and the convoy sets off. The cottage is a few hours’ drive – but not everyone will live to see it …

For Jill, her three sons, their wives and children, a terrifying road crash will tear apart their family.

The crash will be an accident but the shattering that follows has been long coming.

Because at the heart of this family lies a secret – concealed, wrestled with, festering and harmful – and nothing now can stop it coming out.

But will any of them survive it?

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Healing others is their calling, but what happens if they can’t fix themselves? A richly nuanced and empathetic examination of life, loss and courage from a talented new Australian author.

Health and wellbeing brought Olive, Elsie and Bree together. After five years, their bustling wellness centre is demanding expansion. A beautiful federation house nestled among the picturesque backdrop of their small town is the perfect place to grow their business. But they don’t count on their personal lives getting in the way.

Practical and pragmatic, Olive keeps her past hidden from her friends. But when an old high-school flame shows up, the secrets she’s worked so hard to bury threaten to tear her carefully constructed world apart.

Bree is the fun-loving one, although family tensions lurk behind her free-spirited facade. The reappearance of her troubled sister Winnie brings Bree’s priorities into sharp focus. Will she have to shelve her own happiness to save her sister?

Kind and maternal to all those around her, Elsie’s role as the practice’s counsellor comes naturally. But when tragedy strikes, her world tumbles down like a house of cards.

With everything they’ve built in disarray, their friendship is on the line.

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Eliza Bright was living the dream as an elite video game coder at Fancy Dog Games when her private life suddenly became public. But is Eliza Bright a brilliant, self-taught coder bravely calling out the toxic masculinity and chauvinism that pervades her workplace and industry? Or, is Eliza Bright a woman who needs to be destroyed to protect “the sanctity of gaming culture”? It depends on who you ask…

When Eliza reports an incident of workplace harassment that is quickly dismissed, she’s forced to take her frustrations to a journalist who blasts her story across the Internet. She’s fired and doxed, and becomes a rallying figure for women across America. But she’s also enraged the beast that is male gamers on 4Chan and Reddit, whose collective, unreliable voice narrates our story. Soon Eliza is in the cross-hairs of the gaming community, threatened and stalked as they monitor her every move online and across New York City.

As the violent power of an angry male collective descends upon everyone in Eliza’s life, it becomes increasingly difficult to know who to trust, even when she’s eventually taken in and protected by an under-the-radar Collective known as the Sixsterhood. The violence moves from cyberspace to the real world, as a vicious male super-fan known only as The Ghost is determined to exact his revenge on behalf of men everywhere. We watch alongside the Sixsterhood and subreddit incels as this dramatic cat-and-mouse game plays out to reach its violent and inevitable conclusion.

This is an extraordinary, unputdownable novel that explores the dark recesses of the Internet and male rage, and the fragile line between the online world and real life. It’s a thrilling story of female resilience and survival, packed with a powerful feminist message.

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Thanks for stopping by!

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

Linking to: It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? at BookDate; Sunday Post @ Caffeinated Reviewer; and the Sunday Salon @ ReaderBuzz

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Life…

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It’s extraordinary how quickly the flood waters can recede, but it really leaves a lot of mess behind. The Australian Defence Force has joined the SES in my town helping clean up the mud and debris. There has been quite a lot of property damage and loss, livestock and crops too since we are surrounded by farm land. It was Wednesday before supermarket food trucks etc could gain access to town, however the main access is still closed as they assess damage to the bridge, so we are left with just one way in and out, which means a lot of traffic congestion during peak hours. My husband is back at work and the kids are back at school but due to the traffic issues, about a third of the students don’t make it til mid morning. Luckily this is the last week of term with two weeks of Easter school holidays to follow.
The two top pictures below are of the restaurant my son works out – the water reached about 1/2 a metre inside – about half a metre above the dark blue paint.

Of course it wasn’t just my area that were affected, flooding extended north into Queensland, and south to Sydney. In all over 18,000 people were evacuated, more than 1000 rescues were performed, and sadly there were 5 deaths. There are still areas covered by floodwater, and some remain cut off because roads and bridges have been washed away or affected by land slips.

We’ve had four days of sun but it started raining again today, and is expected to do so for most of the week.

It’s the last Monday of the month so time for a challenge update!

Given recent events I’m behind again, which is annoying because I’d just caught up before all this palaver.

Nonfiction Reader Challenge 4/12

Australian Women Writers Challenge 25/50

Aussie Author Challenge 6/20

Historical Fiction Challenge 7/25

Books In Translation Challenge 0/4

What’s in a Name Challenge 4/6

Cloak and Dagger Challenge 8/25

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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…

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Nowhere River by Meg Bignell

The Last Reunion by Kayte Nunn

The Emporium of Imagination by Tabitha Bird

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New Posts…

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Review: One Last Dance by Emma Jane Holmes

Review: Wonderworks by Angus Fletcher

Review: Nowhere River by Meg Bignell 

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What I’m Reading This Week…

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Warm, funny, life-affirming and true, The Best Things is the joyous debut novel from much-loved comedian, writer, actor and presenter Mel Giedroyc.

It’s the story of a family who lose everything, only to find themselves, and each other, along the way.

Sally and Frank Parker have it all. Then one day, because of Frank, they don’t.

As the bailiffs move in and the money runs out, Sally realises that she and her children don’t have a clue about how to survive. Or do they?

The Parkers are about to discover that the best things in life aren’t things at all.

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My mother wasn’t much of a housekeeper. She wasn’t much of a cook either, although she tried. She longed to live a more unconventional life. Admirably high-minded, but it meant I never learnt to fold a towel.

In these funny, sometimes poignant, stories, award-winning feature writer Fenella Souter celebrates the highs and lows of domestic life – from her attempts to run the house like a grown-up, to lessons in good cooking; from accidentally killing her wisteria, divorcing the cat and shirt-fronting bossy tradies, to wondering if the ‘hostess gift’ is still a thing or why some people have impeccable taste.

With their distinctive wit, they will leave you smiling with recognition at the everyday dramas and dilemmas that can make or break friendships and marriages, turn a house into a home, or let chaos get the upper hand.

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With the sickening realisation that his cover has been blown, Detective Dave Burrows knows his family is in serious danger from the vicious stock thieves and murderers, Bulldust and his brother Scotty.

Devastating news brings Dave back to Barrabine, where circumstances force him to question his determination to stay in the police force. How could he live with himself if anything happened to Mel and the kids?

Mel, understandably frightened, must decide who she’ll listen to. Can she trust Dave to handle this threat hanging over their family, or is her father right to argue that she should leave her marriage immediately?

With her acclaimed skill for tension and drama, Fleur McDonald has delivered another richly compelling story in Something to Hide.

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WHAT IS ONE MORE CORPSE, WHEN ALL AROUND YOU ARE DYING…

London, 1665. Hidden within a growing pile of corpses, one victim of the pestilence stands out: a young woman with a shorn head and pieces of twine delicately tied around each ankle.

Symon Patrick, rector of St. Paul’s Covent Garden, cannot say exactly why this corpse amongst the many in his churchyard should give him pause. Longing to do good, he joins a group of medical men who have gathered to find a cure for the plague, each man more peculiar and splenetic than the next. But there is another – unknown to The Society for the Prevention and Cure of Plague – who is performing his own terrible experiments upon unwilling plague-ridden subjects.

It is Penelope – Symon’s unwanted yet unremovable addition to his household – who may yet shed light on the matter. Far more than what she appears, she is already on the hunt. But the dark presence that enters the houses of the sick will not stop, and has no mercy…

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Thanks for stopping by!

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

Linking to: It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? at BookDate; Sunday Post @ Caffeinated Reviewer; and the Sunday Salon @ ReaderBuzz

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Life…

I’m afraid I’ve been terribly distracted since the latter half of the week. Last year it was fire, this year it is flood. We are currently surrounded by floodwaters with access to and from cut, essentially rendering us an island. Thankfully my house is above the flood line, though we did have an indoor waterfall feature for a few days because the guttering couldn’t cope with the sheer amount of rain, and it found its way inside to run down the glass sliding doors that lead out from our lounge room. We’ve had to drill holes in the roof of our verandah which seems to have solved the issue for now. Electricity and internet services have also been a little erratic, and we are expecting more rain for the next two-three days. Schools have been closed, and my husband can’t get to work.

The images below shows part of my town, Taree in NSW, and the tiny red dot in the larger photo shows approximately where my house is. Though we are less than 100m from the river edge, we are on the high side. The first photo in the collage shows my son’s workplace, the others around the main town streets, the last two show the bridge into town that usually sits around 4m above the river, it went under at the floods peak which was 5.85m. That mightn’t sound high but Taree sits in a valley, but a minor flood warning is issued at 1.5m, a moderate warning at 2.4m and a major flood warning at 3.7m.

In addition to all of that, the area where my in-laws and daughter are living in the Hawkesbury region of NSW are also experiencing record flood levels. My sister in law and her family have had to evacuate tonight, my mother-in-law and other SIL and her family are on a warning, as are my nephews and their family’s. My daughter is safe on campus so far, and we are hoping evacuation won’t be necessary for her, but no one is sure yet how bad it will get…. they have used that terrifying word -unprecedented.

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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…

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The Iron Raven by Julie Kagawa

One Last Dance by Emma Jane Holmes

Wonderworks by Angus Fletcher

Nowhere River by Meg Bignell

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New Posts…

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Review: The Codebreakers by Alli Sinclair

Review: Tipping by Anna George

Review: The Iron Raven by Julie Kagawa

Bookshelf Bounty

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What I’m Reading This Week…

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Warm, funny, life-affirming and true, The Best Things is the joyous debut novel from much-loved comedian, writer, actor and presenter Mel Giedroyc.

It’s the story of a family who lose everything, only to find themselves, and each other, along the way.

Sally and Frank Parker have it all. Then one day, because of Frank, they don’t.

As the bailiffs move in and the money runs out, Sally realises that she and her children don’t have a clue about how to survive. Or do they?

The Parkers are about to discover that the best things in life aren’t things at all.

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Five women come together at a New Year’s Eve’s party after decades apart, in this thrilling story of desire, revenge and courage, based on a brave group of Australian and British WWII servicewomen

Burma, 1945. Bea, Plum, Bubbles, Joy and Lucy: five young women in search of adventure, attached to the Fourteenth Army, fighting a forgotten war in the jungle. Assigned to run a mobile canteen, navigating treacherous roads and dodging hostile gunfire, they become embroiled in life-threatening battles of their own. Battles that will haunt the women for the rest of their lives.

Oxford, 1976. At the height of an impossibly hot English summer, a woman slips into a museum and steals several rare Japanese netsuke, including the famed fox-girl. Despite the offer of a considerable reward, these tiny, exquisitely detailed carvings are never seen again.

London and Galway, 1999. On the eve of the new millennium, Olivia, assistant to an art dealer, meets Beatrix, an elderly widow who wishes to sell her late husband’s collection of Japanese art. Concealing her own motives, Olivia travels with Beatrix to a New Year’s Eve party, deep in the Irish countryside, where friendships will be tested as secrets kept for more than fifty years are spilled.

Inspired by the heroic women who served in the ‘forgotten war’ in Burma, The Last Reunion is a heartbreaking love story and mystery by the international bestselling author of The Botanist’s Daughter and The Silk House. It is also a tribute to the enduring power of female friendship.

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They’ll kill to get more time. She’ll die to stop them.

In a world where each person’s life span is limited by law, time is a lucrative commodity that some people will do anything to get more of.

Fourth-dimension physicist, Dr Varya Galanos, invented the technology that time thieves used to murder children by stealing their remaining years of life. Although it was destroyed 10 years ago, and the thieves brought to justice, she still suffers from the burden of guilt.

Masquerading as a lowly lab technician at the Minor Miracles Foundation, Varya finds a certain peace searching for cures for rare childhood diseases, like the one which took her 4-year-old son, Kir, away from her.

The Foundation is secretly funded by Varya and her employee and confidante, Marisa Volkov, by selling illicit time tabs to wealthy patrons. When dissolved on the tongue, a single time tab grants a person four extra hours in their day.

The time tab technology is highly valued – and highly illegal – in a society where Time Chips are inserted into each child’s brain stem at birth. Lives are limited to just sixty-five years to conserve the planet’s ever-dwindling resources.

Varya’s tenuous peace is shattered when children start disappearing again. She fears the worst – that the time thieves have returned and have somehow resurrected the technology to steal precious years from children.

Varya is the only one who can find a way to reverse the time drains and save the returned children. But doing so could cost the lives of those she holds dearest.

When her best friend’s son becomes a victim, returned with just hours to live, she is faced with an impossible choice.

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Welcome to The Emporium of Imagination, a most unusual shop that travels the world offering vintage gifts to repair broken dreams and extraordinary phones to contact lost loved ones.

But, on arrival in the tiny township of Boonah, the store’s long-time custodian, Earlatidge Hubert Umbray, makes a shocking realisation. He is dying . . .

The clock is now ticking to find his replacement, because the people of Boonah are clearly in need of some restorative magic.

Like Enoch Rayne – a heartbroken ten-year-old boy mourning the loss of his father, while nurturing a guilty secret.

Like Ann Harlow, who has come to the town to be close to her dying grandmother. Though it’s Enoch’s father who dominates her thoughts – and regrets . . .

Even Earlatidge in his final days will experience the store as never before – and have the chance to face up to his own tragedy . . .

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Thanks for stopping by!

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

Linking to: It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? at BookDate; Sunday Post @ Caffeinated Reviewer; and the Sunday Salon @ ReaderBuzz

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Life…

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I’m late posting this week, and I’m about to head out to join my local #WomenMarch4Justice

Graphic by Rae Mitchell @morraessey

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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…

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The Husband Poisoner by Tanya Bretherton

Grace Under Pressure by Tori Haschka

The Ministry of Bodies by Seamus O’Mahony

The Codebreakers by Alli Sinclair

Tipping by Anna George

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New Posts…

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International Women’s Day & Southern Cross Crime Month

Review: You’ve Got To Be Kidding by Todd Alexander

Review: The Husband Poisoner by Tanya Bretherton

Review & Giveaway: Grace Under Pressure by Tori Haschka

Review: The Ministry of Bodies by Seamus O’Mahony

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What I’m Reading This Week…

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A sassy, heart-breaking and jaw-dropping memoir of life behind the scenes in a funeral home and strip club, written with all the panache, honesty and sensitivity of Rosie Waterland’s The Anti-Cool Girl and Sarah Krasnostein’s The Trauma Cleaner.

Emma Jane Holmes had her dream job, working in the funeral industry, caring for those who could no longer care for themselves. But when the bills mounted after her marriage breakdown, she turned to her other dream – dancing on stage as a showgirl – and her glittering alter ego Madison was born. Emma Jane kept Madison a secret. Madison kept Emma Jane an even bigger one.

But what happens when death touches the neon world of the strip club? And sex – in the form of a cute co-worker – encroaches on the funeral home? Could the answer be life, lived in the day, because that’s the only day you have?

Emma Jane Holmes’ debut will take you into the mortuary, cemetery and crematorium – and behind the scenes in night clubs – and answer all the questions you never wanted to ask ..

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Long past its heyday and deep in drought, the riverside hamlet of Nowhere River is slowly fading into a ghost town. It’s a place populated by those who are beholden to it, those who were born to it and those who took a wrong turn while trying to go somewhere else.

City-born Carra married into Nowhere River, Lucie was brought to it by tragedy, Josie is root-bound and Florence knows nowhere else. All of them, though familiar with every inch of their tiny hometown, are as lost as the place itself.

The town’s social cornerstone — St Margery’s Ladies’ Club — launches a rescue plan that turns everything around and upside down, then shakes it until all sorts of things come floating to the surface. And none of its inhabitants will ever be the same again.

This is the highly original and heartfelt story of a place where everybody knows everything, but no one really knows anyone at all. Brimming with heart and humour, this is a delightful novel that celebrates the country people and towns of Australia.

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The elegant Miss Phryne Fisher returns in this scintillating collection, featuring four brand-new stories.

The Honourable Phryne Fisher – she of the Lulu bob, Cupid’s Bow lips, diamante garters and pearl-handled pistol – is the 1920s’ most elegant and irrepressible sleuth.

Miss Phryne Fisher is up to her stunning green eyes in intriguing crime in each of these entertaining, fun and compulsively readable stories. With the ever-loyal Dot, the ingenious Mr Butler and all of Phryne’s friends and household, the action is as fast as Phryne’s wit and logic.

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A brilliant examination of literary inventions through the ages, from ancient Mesopotamia to Elena Ferrante, that shows how writers have created technical breakthroughs—rivaling any scientific inventions—and engineering enhancements to the human heart and mind.

Literature is a technology like any other. And the writers we revere—from Homer, Shakespeare, Austen, and others—each made a unique technical breakthrough that can be viewed as both a narrative and neuroscientific advancement. Literature’s great invention was to address problems we could not solve: not how to start a fire or build a boat, but how to live and love; how to maintain courage in the face of death; how to account for the fact that we exist at all.

Wonderworks reviews the blueprints for twenty-five of the most powerful developments in the history of literature. These inventions can be scientifically shown to alleviate grief, trauma, loneliness, anxiety, numbness, depression, pessimism, and ennui—all while sparking creativity, courage, love, empathy, hope, joy, and positive change. They can be found all throughout literature—from ancient Chinese lyrics to Shakespeare’s plays, poetry to nursery rhymes and fairy tales, and crime novels to slave narratives.

An easy-to-understand exploration of the new literary field of story science, Wonderworks teaches you everything you wish you learned in your English class. Based on author Angus Fletcher’s own research, it is an eye-opening and thought-provoking work that offers us a new understanding of the power of literature.

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Thanks for stopping by!

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

Linking to: It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? at BookDate; Sunday Post @ Caffeinated Reviewer; and the Sunday Salon @ ReaderBuzz

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Life…

Uneventful

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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…

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Men Who Hate Women by Laura Bates

A Home Like Ours by Fiona Lowe

The Girl Explorers by Jayne Zanglein

Other People’s Houses by Kelli Hawkins

You’ve Got To Be Kidding by Todd Alexander

{Just started}

The Husband Poisoner by Tanya Bretherton

Shocking real-life stories of murderous women who used rat poison to rid themselves of husbands and other inconvenient family members. For readers of compelling history and true crime, from critically acclaimed, award-winning author Tanya Bretherton.

After World War II, Sydney experienced a crime wave that was chillingly calculated. Discontent mixed with despair, greed with callous disregard. Women who had lost their wartime freedoms headed back into the kitchen with sinister intent and the household poison thallium, normally used to kill rats, was repurposed to kill husbands and other inconvenient family members.

Yvonne Fletcher disposed of two husbands. Caroline Grills cheerfully poisoned her stepmother, a family friend, her brother and his wife. Unlike arsenic or cyanide, thallium is colourless, odourless and tasteless; victims were misdiagnosed as insane malingerers or ill due to other reasons. And once one death was attributed to natural causes, it was all too easy for an aggrieved woman to kill again.

This is the story of a series of murders that struck at the very heart of domestic life. It’s the tale of women who looked for deadly solutions to what they saw as impossible situations. The Husband Poisoner documents the reasons behind the choices these women made – and their terrible outcomes.

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New Posts…

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Review: Everything is Beautiful by Eleanor Ray ★★★★1/2

Review: Men Who Hate Women by Laura Bates ★★★★

Review: A Home Like Ours by Fiona Lowe ★★★★1/2

Review: The Girl Explorers by Jayne Zanglein ★★★1/2

2021 Nonfiction Reader Challenge Monthly Spotlight #2

Review: Other People’s Houses by Kelli Hawkins ★★★★

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What I’m Reading This Week…

Grace Harkness looks like she has it all – two beautiful children, four cookbooks under her belt and an idyllic beachside home #blessed. But add another baby on the way (oops), a spouse that is nowhere to be seen and a relentless list of things she ‘should’ be doing, and Grace is starting to unravel.

When the madness of modern-day motherhood finally pushes her to the brink, Grace and her friends decide to ditch the men in their lives, move in together and create a ‘mummune’ – sharing the load of chores, school pick-ups/drop-offs and endless Life Admin. The new set-up seems like a dream, but is life in this utopian village all it’s cracked up to be?

Grace Under Pressure is a deliciously hilarious, honest and heartfelt portrayal of modern-day motherhood and the saving grace of female friendship.

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You may have heard of me…

Robin Goodfellow. Puck. Prankster, joker, raven, fool… King Oberon’s right-hand jester from A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The legends are many, but the truth will now be known as never before, as Puck finally tells his own story and faces a threat to the lands of Faery and the human world unlike any before.

With the Iron Queen Meghan Chase and her prince consort, Puck’s longtime rival Ash, and allies old and new by his side, Puck begins a fantastical and dangerous adventure not to be missed or forgotten.

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In The Ministry of Bodies, Seamus O’Mahony charts the realities of life in a modern hospital over the course of a year. From difficult births and unexpected deaths to moral quandaries and bureaucratic disasters, O’Mahony documents life in the halls that all of us will visit at some point in our lives with his characteristic wit and dry and unsentimental intelligence. As the Coronavirus crisis demands more and more of the medical profession and the people who support it, Seamus O’Mahony describes his work on the front lines of a pandemic in a harrowing final chapter. This is not a conventional medical memoir: it’s the collective biography of one of our great modern institutions, the general hospital, through the eyes of a brilliant writer who happens to be a gifted doctor.

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They will dedicate their lives to their country, but no one will ever know…

A compelling story about tenacity and friendship, inspired by the real codebreaking women of Australia’s top-secret Central Bureau in WWII. For readers who love Judy Nunn and Kate Quinn.

1943, Brisbane: The war continues to devastate and the battle for the Pacific threatens Australian shores. For Ellie O’Sullivan, helping the war effort means utilising her engineering skills for Qantas as they evacuate civilians and deliver supplies to armed forces overseas. Her exceptional logic and integrity attract the attention of the Central Bureau-an intelligence organisation working with England’s Bletchley Park codebreakers. But joining the Central Bureau means signing a lifetime secrecy contract. Breaking it is treason.

With her country’s freedom at risk, Ellie works with a group of elite women who enter a world of volatile secrets; deciphering enemy communications to change the course of the war. Working under immense pressure, they form a close bond-yet there could be a traitor in their midst. Can the women uncover the culprit before it’s too late?

As Ellie struggles with the magnitude of the promise she’s made to her country, a wedge grows between her and those she holds dear. When the man she loves asks questions she’s forbidden to answer, how will she prevent the double life she’s leading from unravelling?

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An Instagram scandal at a grammar school sparks outrage in an exclusive bayside suburb and upends the lives of the families involved. However, it might also prove to be the tipping point required to change the school, and the wider community, for the better.

Liv Winsome, working mother of three sons, wife to decent if distracted Duncan, is overwhelmed. And losing her hair. Her doctor has told her she needs to slow down, do less. Focus on what’s important.

After Jai, one of her fourteen-year-old twins, is involved in a sexting scandal, Liv realises things need to change, and fast. Inspired by the pop-psychology books she devours, she writes a nine-page list of everything she does to keep the family afloat, and she delegates. She lets her boys’ conservative school know it has some work to do, too – partly, Liv suspects, because its leadership has a ‘woman problem’ (or, rather, a too-many-men problem).

Jai’s girlfriend, Grace, is at the heart of the sexting scandal and her mum, Jess Charters, up in arms as well, goes to the media. The women’s combined focus forces Carmichael Grammar to take action. To everyone’s surprise, and Liv’s delight, things actually start to improve.

Inspired by his wife’s efforts, Duncan rethinks the way he lives and works, too, despite the workaholic culture of his law firm and its scary managing partner, who’s also Duncan’s older brother. In unexpected ways, Liv and Duncan’s marriage and family life undergo their own transformations. Some new developments, though, aren’t entirely welcome.

Light-hearted and optimistic, Tipping is a novel for our times. It’s a story of domestic activism. Mum and dad activism. Because real change is possible. Sometimes all it takes is a tweak. And the will. And a bit of fun.

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Thanks for stopping by!

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

Linking to: It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? at BookDate; Sunday Post @ Caffeinated Reviewer; and the Sunday Salon @ ReaderBuzz

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Life…

I need to read faster, I thought I’d have a good chance to catch up this past week but somehow the days slipped away. Due in part to a free trial period of a new streaming service which has seen me binging on Grand Designs UK and Grand Designs NZ. I’ve redesigned my house, and my dream house, repeatedly over the past week or two.

I also spent an entire day remotely helping my daughter hunt up sources from her ‘essential’ reading lists, a total of about 80 books, and articles. Her first semester includes Forensic Science, Biodiversity, Introductory Chemistry, and Scientific Literacy. Classes start tomorrow!

Thankfully Book’d Out’s Facebook page has now been reinstated with Zuckerberg and our government reaching some sort of agreement. I’m still trying to figure out Instagram though. How many hashtags are too many? What sort of hashtags should I be using? What’s the follow etiquette? Is it enough to just ‘heart’ a post? Leave your Insta handle in the comments, and I’ll follow you, that part I’ve mastered!

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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…

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The Paris Affair by Pip Drysdale

The Cold Millions by Jess Walter

Florence Adler Swims Forever by Rachel Beanland

Everything is Beautiful by Eleanor Ray

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New Posts…

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Review: The Silent Listener by Lyn Yeowart

Review: The Paris Affair by Pip Drysdale

Review: The Cold Millions by Jess Walter

Review: Florence Adler Swims Forever by Rachel Beanland

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What I’m Reading This Week…

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An explosive book examining the rise of secretive, extremist communities who despise women. In this ground-breaking investigation, Laura Bates traces the roots of misogyny across a complex spider’s web of groups extending from Men’s Rights Activists and Pick up Artists to “Men Going their Own Way” trolls and the Incel movement, in the name of which some men have committed terrorist acts. Drawing parallels with other extremist movements around the world, Bates seeks to understand what attracts men to the movement, how it grooms and radicalizes boys, how it operates, and what can be done to stop it. Most urgently of all, she traces the pathways this extreme ideology has taken from the darkest corners of the internet to emerge covertly in our mainstream media, our playgrounds, and our parliament. Going undercover online and off, Bates provides the first, comprehensive look at this hitherto under-the-radar phenomenon, including fascinating interviews with trolls, former incels, the academics studying this movement, and the men fighting back.

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As a small town turns on itself, three women discover true friends aren’t always the ones you think you know… A compulsive page-turner from bestselling Australian author Fiona Lowe.

Tara Hooper is at breaking point. With two young children, a business in a town struggling under an unexpected crime wave, and her husband more interested in his cricket team than their marriage, life is a juggling act. Then, when new neighbours arrive and they are exactly the sort of people the town doesn’t want or need, things get worse.

Life has taught Helen Demetriou two things: being homeless is terrifying and survival means keeping your cards close to your chest. Having clawed back some stability through her involvement in the community garden, she dares to relax. But as she uncovers some shady goings-on in the council, that stability turns to quicksand.

For teenage mother Jade Innes, life can be lonely among the judgement of the town and the frequent absences of her boyfriend. A chance encounter draws her into the endangered community garden where she makes friends for the first time. Glimpsing a different way of life is enticing but its demands are terrifying. Does she even deserve to try?

Can these women with such differing loyalties unite to save the garden and ultimately stop the town from tearing itself apart?

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Never tell a woman where she doesn’t belong.

In 1932, Roy Chapman Andrews, president of the men-only Explorers Club, boldly stated to hundreds of female students at Barnard College that “women are not adapted to exploration,” and that women and exploration do not mix. He obviously didn’t know a thing about either…

The Girl Explorers is the inspirational and untold story of the founding of the Society of Women Geographers―an organization of adventurous female world explorers―and how key members served as early advocates for human rights and paved the way for today’s women scientists by scaling mountains, exploring the high seas, flying across the Atlantic, and recording the world through film, sculpture, and literature.

Follow in the footsteps of these rebellious women as they travel the globe in search of new species, widen the understanding of hidden cultures, and break records in spades. For these women dared to go where no woman―or man―had gone before, achieving the unthinkable and breaking through barriers to allow future generations to carry on their important and inspiring work.

The Girl Explorers is an inspiring examination of forgotten women from history, perfect for fans of bestselling narrative history books like The Radium Girls, The Woman Who Smashed Codes, and Rise of the Rocket Girls.

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A stunningly tense, page-turning debut for all fans of The Woman in the Window and The Girl on the Train The perfect house. The perfect family. Too good to be true.

Kate Webb still grieves for her young son, ten years after his loss. She spends her weekends hungover, attending open houses on Sydney’s wealthy north shore and imagining the lives of the people who live there.

Then Kate visits the Harding house – the perfect house with, it seems, the perfect family. A photograph captures a kind-looking man, a beautiful woman she once knew from university days, and a boy – a boy that for one heartbreaking moment she believes is her own son.

When her curiosity turns to obsession, she uncovers the cracks that lie beneath a glossy facade of perfection, sordid truths she could never have imagined.

But is it her imagination? As events start to spiral dangerously out of control, could the real threat come from Kate herself?

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The steep-climb highs and free-fall lows of my rollercoaster rural life

They say it takes 10,000 hours to master a new skill. Well, seven years (60,000 hours) since former city boys Todd and Jeff moved to the country they should have nailed this whole farming gig, right? Yes, they make lovely wine and have built beautiful accommodation, and they’ve even learnt how to look after their rescued farm animals. But they didn’t really count on Mother Nature getting involved.

Drought, bushfires, sick animals, failed crops, heatwaves, enormous changes in the two industries they rely on to make a living, snakes, the unstoppable breeding of peafowl, insurmountable debts and broken machinery …

Just when they think they’re on top of things, the land throws another few hurdles their way. But with fierce determination to succeed, willingness to evolve and their ever-present senses of humour, these boys might be down for the count but they aren’t quite ready to throw in the towel just yet.

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Thanks for stopping by!

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

Linking to: It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? at BookDate; Sunday Post @ Caffeinated Reviewer; and the Sunday Salon @ ReaderBuzz

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Life…

The past week was a black hole where reading, and the blog, was concerned. I barely managed to finish one book, and wrote not a single review, putting me badly behind.

I was completely distracted by the lead up to moving our youngest daughter into university. She’s now safely ensconced in her campus accomodation as of the weekend. I managed not to cry in front of her when we left. We won’t see her again until Easter when she can come home for a week.

The stress of the whole thing also had some health implications for my chronic condition so it’s been a tough week, physically and emotionally (and don’t even get me started on the havoc causing peri-menopause).

Additionally there is also the Facebook vs the Australian Government ‘media code’ stand off, which means my Book’d Out Facebook page is currently blocked, because apparently it counts as ‘media’ thanks to Murdoch’s nefarious influence on our legislation. I happen to support Facebook in this particular battle, and I imagine my page will be reinstated eventually, but it in the meantime if you were wondering what happened to it, now you know! Of course you can follow my posts a dozen other ways instead… subscribe to my blog via email or your preferred feed reader, follow me on Twitter, Instagram, Goodreads, LibraryThing or Pintrest.

It’s the last Monday of the month so time for a challenge update!

Nonfiction Reader Challenge 2/12

Australian Women Writers Challenge 14/50

Aussie Author Challenge 4/20

Historical Fiction Challenge 4/25

Books In Translation Challenge 0/4

What’s in a Name Challenge 3/6

Cloak and Dagger Challenge 6/25

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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…

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The Silent Listener by Lyn Yeowart

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New Posts…

Review: Sargasso by Kathy George

Bookshelf Bounty

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What I’m Reading This Week…

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Atlantic City, 1934. Every summer, Esther and Joseph Adler rent their house out to vacationers escaping to “America’s Playground” and move into the small apartment above their bakery. Despite the cramped quarters, this is the apartment where they raised their two daughters, Fannie and Florence, and it always feels like home.

Now Florence has returned from college, determined to spend the summer training to swim the English Channel, and Fannie, pregnant again after recently losing a baby, is on bedrest for the duration of her pregnancy. After Joseph insists they take in a mysterious young woman whom he recently helped emigrate from Nazi Germany, the apartment is bursting at the seams.

Esther only wants to keep her daughters close and safe but some matters are beyond her control: there’s Fannie’s risky pregnancy—not to mention her always-scheming husband, Isaac—and the fact that the handsome heir of a hotel notorious for its anti-Semitic policies, seems to be in love with Florence.

When tragedy strikes, Esther makes the shocking decision to hide the truth—at least until Fannie’s baby is born—and pulls the family into an elaborate web of secret-keeping and lies, bringing long-buried tensions to the surface that reveal how quickly the act of protecting those we love can turn into betrayal.

Based on a true story and told in the vein of J. Courtney Sullivan’s Saints for All Occasions and Anita Diamant’s The Boston Girl, Beanland’s family saga is a breathtaking portrait of just how far we will go to in order to protect our loved ones and an uplifting portrayal of how the human spirit can endure—and even thrive—after tragedy.

xxxxxx

She thinks love can kill you. It turns out she might be right.

Meet Harper Brown …

Occupation: Arts journalist

Dream job: Hard-hitting news reporter

Location: Paris

Loves: True crime podcasts, art galleries, coffee, whiskey

Does not love: fake people, toxic positivity, being told how to live her life by smug workmates who have no life (that’s you, Stan), her narcissistic ex

Favourite book: 1984

Favourite artist: Noah X. Sometimes.

Favourite painting: Klimt’s Schubert at the Piano

Special skills: breaking out of car boots, picking locks and escaping relationships.

Superpower: She can lose any guy in three minutes flat. Ask her how.

Secret: She’s hot on the trail of a murderer – and the scoop of a lifetime.

That’s if the killer doesn’t catch her first.

xxxxxxx

It is 1909 in Spokane, Washington. The Dolan brothers live by their wits, jumping freight trains and lining up for day work at crooked job agencies. While sixteen-year-old Rye yearns for a steady job and a home, his dashing older brother Gig dreams of a better world, fighting alongside other union men for fair pay and decent treatment. When Rye finds himself drawn to suffragette Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, her passion sweeps him into the world of protest and dirty business. But a storm is coming, threatening to overwhelm them all . . .

The Cold Millions is an intimate story of brotherhood, love, sacrifice and betrayal set against the panoramic backdrop of an early 20th century America. Jess Walter offers a stunning, kaleidoscopic portrait of a nation grappling with the chasm between rich and poor, dreams and reality, in a sensational tale that resonates powerfully with our own time.

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Sometimes it’s impossible to part with the things we love the most…

When Amy Ashton’s world came crashing down eleven years ago, she started a collection. Just a little collection, just a few keepsakes of happier times: some honeysuckle to remind herself of the boy she loved, a chipped china bird, an old terracotta pot . . . Things that others might throw away, but to Amy, represent a life that could have been.

Now her house is overflowing with the objects she loves – soon there’ll be no room for Amy at all. But when a family move in next door, a chance discovery unearths a mystery long buried, and Amy’s carefully curated life begins to unravel. If she can find the courage to face her past, might the future she thought she’d lost still be hers for the taking?

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Glamorous, beautiful Mummy has everything a woman could want… except for a daughter of her very own. So when she sees Kim – heavily pregnant, glued to her phone and ignoring her eldest child in a busy shop – she does what anyone would do. She takes her. But little foul-mouthed Tonya is not the daughter that Mummy was hoping for.

Meanwhile Kim is demonised by the media as a ‘scummy mummy’, who deserved to lose Tonya and ought to have her other children taken too. Haunted by memories of her own childhood and refusing to play by the media’s rules, she begins to spiral, turning on those who love her.

Though they are worlds apart, Mummy and Kim have more in common than they could possibly imagine. But it is five-year-old Tonya who is caught in the middle…

CALL ME MUMMY. IT’LL BE BETTER IF YOU DO.

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Thanks for stopping by!

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

 

Linking to: It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? at BookDate; Sunday Post @ Caffeinated Reviewer; and the Sunday Salon @ ReaderBuzz

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Life…

Happy Valentines Day!

It’s a week until my daughter leaves for her first year of University so we’ve been busy gathering all the things she’ll need – a more time intensive, and expensive process than I expected!

Otherwise it’s generally been a rather ordinary week. I read, I cooked, I cleaned, I shopped, I wrote reviews, I binge watched Traces and season 2 of Discovery of Witches, and The Great British Sewing Bee.

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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…

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Crackenback by Lee Christine

The Second Son by Loraine Peck

Space Hopper by Helen Fisher

The Moroccan Daughter by Deborah Rodriguez

Sargasso by Kathy George

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New Posts…

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Review: With My Little Eye by Sandra Hogan ★★★★

Giveaway: ENTER TO WIN With My Little Eye by Sandra Hogan

Review: Crackenback by Lee Christine ★★★★1/2

Review: The Second Son by Loraine Peck ★★★★1/2

Review: Space Hopper by Helen Fisher ★★

Blog Tour Review: The Moroccan Daughter by Deborah Rodriguez ★★★

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What I’m Reading This Week…

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Propelling the reader back and forth between the 1940s, 1960s and 1980s, The Silent Listener is an unforgettable literary suspense novel set in the dark, gothic heart of rural Australia.

Deep red scars. Cold dark secrets . . .

In the cold, wet summer of 1960, 11-year-old Joy Henderson lives in constant fear of her father. She tries to make him happy but, as he keeps reminding her, she is nothing but a filthy sinner destined for Hell . . .Yet, decades later, she returns to the family’s farm to nurse him on his death bed. To her surprise, her ‘perfect’ sister Ruth is also there, whispering dark words, urging revenge.

Then the day after their father finally confesses to a despicable crime, Joy finds him dead – with a belt pulled tight around his neck . . .

For Senior Constable Alex Shepherd, investigating George’s murder revives memories of an unsolved case still haunting him since that strange summer of 1960: the disappearance of nine-year-old Wendy Boscombe.

As seemingly impossible facts surface about the Hendersons – from the past and the present – Shepherd suspects that Joy is pulling him into an intricate web of lies and that Wendy’s disappearance is the key to the bizarre truth.

xxxxxx

 

Atlantic City, 1934. Every summer, Esther and Joseph Adler rent their house out to vacationers escaping to “America’s Playground” and move into the small apartment above their bakery. Despite the cramped quarters, this is the apartment where they raised their two daughters, Fannie and Florence, and it always feels like home.

Now Florence has returned from college, determined to spend the summer training to swim the English Channel, and Fannie, pregnant again after recently losing a baby, is on bedrest for the duration of her pregnancy. After Joseph insists they take in a mysterious young woman whom he recently helped emigrate from Nazi Germany, the apartment is bursting at the seams.

Esther only wants to keep her daughters close and safe but some matters are beyond her control: there’s Fannie’s risky pregnancy—not to mention her always-scheming husband, Isaac—and the fact that the handsome heir of a hotel notorious for its anti-Semitic policies, seems to be in love with Florence.

When tragedy strikes, Esther makes the shocking decision to hide the truth—at least until Fannie’s baby is born—and pulls the family into an elaborate web of secret-keeping and lies, bringing long-buried tensions to the surface that reveal how quickly the act of protecting those we love can turn into betrayal.

Based on a true story and told in the vein of J. Courtney Sullivan’s Saints for All Occasions and Anita Diamant’s The Boston Girl, Beanland’s family saga is a breathtaking portrait of just how far we will go to in order to protect our loved ones and an uplifting portrayal of how the human spirit can endure—and even thrive—after tragedy.

xxxxxx

 

She thinks love can kill you. It turns out she might be right.

Meet Harper Brown …

Occupation: Arts journalist

Dream job: Hard-hitting news reporter

Location: Paris

Loves: True crime podcasts, art galleries, coffee, whiskey

Does not love: fake people, toxic positivity, being told how to live her life by smug workmates who have no life (that’s you, Stan), her narcissistic ex

Favourite book: 1984

Favourite artist: Noah X. Sometimes.

Favourite painting: Klimt’s Schubert at the Piano

Special skills: breaking out of car boots, picking locks and escaping relationships.

Superpower: She can lose any guy in three minutes flat. Ask her how.

Secret: She’s hot on the trail of a murderer – and the scoop of a lifetime.

That’s if the killer doesn’t catch her first.

xxxxxxx

It is 1909 in Spokane, Washington. The Dolan brothers live by their wits, jumping freight trains and lining up for day work at crooked job agencies. While sixteen-year-old Rye yearns for a steady job and a home, his dashing older brother Gig dreams of a better world, fighting alongside other union men for fair pay and decent treatment. When Rye finds himself drawn to suffragette Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, her passion sweeps him into the world of protest and dirty business. But a storm is coming, threatening to overwhelm them all . . .

The Cold Millions is an intimate story of brotherhood, love, sacrifice and betrayal set against the panoramic backdrop of an early 20th century America. Jess Walter offers a stunning, kaleidoscopic portrait of a nation grappling with the chasm between rich and poor, dreams and reality, in a sensational tale that resonates powerfully with our own time.

———————————————

Thanks for stopping by!

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

Linking to: It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? at BookDate; Sunday Post @ Caffeinated Reviewer; and the Sunday Salon @ ReaderBuzz

………………………………

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Life…

Ughh I got sick, not Covid sick, just ordinary cold sick (germs shared by my lovely daughter who works in retail). I spent most of the week with a sore throat/cough/ achy eyeballs/headache and did very little other than feel sorry for myself.

But I did start an Instagram account. To be honest I’m not really a fan, but I figure I should give it a try for a few months. If you want to follow me I’m @shelleyrae_bookd_out I’ll be sure to follow back. I’d also welcome any tips, if you have some to share.

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What I’ve Read Since I last Posted…

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Exit by Belinda Bauer

Before I Saw You by Emily Houghton

With My Little Eye by Sandra Hogan

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New Posts…

Review: Girls With Bright Futures by Tracey Dobmeier & Wendy Katzman

Review: Exit by Belinda Bauer

Review: The Shape of Darkness by Laura Purcell

2021 Nonfiction Reader Challenge Monthly Spotlight #1

Review: Before I Saw You by Emily Houghton

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What I’m Reading This Week…

Duty always has a price.

When Ivan Novak is shot dead putting out his garbage bins in Sydney’s west, his family wants revenge, especially his father Milan, a notorious crime boss. It’s a job for the second son, Ivan’s younger brother Johnny.

But Johnny loves his wife Amy and their son Sasha. And she’s about to deliver her ultimatum: either the three of them escape this wave of killing or she’ll leave, taking Sasha.

Torn between loyalty to his family and love for his wife, Johnny plans the heist of a lifetime and takes a huge risk. Is he prepared to pay the price? And what choice will Amy make?

The Second Son is a brilliant action-packed crime debut that creates a world where honour is everything, violence is its own language, and love means breaking all the rules.

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This is a story about taking a leap of faith

And believing the unbelievable

They say those we love never truly leave us, and I’ve found that to be true. But not in the way you might expect. In fact, none of this is what you’d expect.

I’ve been visiting my mother who died when I was eight.

And I’m talking about flesh and blood, tea-and-biscuits-on-the-table visiting here.

Right now, you probably think I’m going mad.

Let me explain…

Although Faye is happy with her life, the loss of her mother as a child weighs on her mind even more now that she is a mother herself. So she is amazed when, in an extraordinary turn of events, she finds herself back in her childhood home in the 1970s. Faced with the chance to finally seek answers to her questions – but away from her own family – how much is she willing to give up for another moment with her mother?

Space Hopper is an original and poignant story about mothers, memories and moments that shape life.

Thanks to Simon & Schuster 

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An empty house, a lonely shore, an enigmatic, brooding man-child waiting for her return … a trip to the dark lands of Australian Gothic, for readers of Kate Morton and Hannah Richell.

Last night I dreamt I went to Sargasso again …

As a child, Hannah lived at Sargasso, the isolated beachside home designed by her father, a brilliant architect. A lonely, introverted child, she wanted no company but that of Flint, the enigmatic boy who no one else ever saw … and who promised he would always look after her.

Hannah’s idyllic childhood at Sargasso ended in tragedy, but now as an adult she is back to renovate the house, which she has inherited from her grandmother. Her boyfriend Tristan visits regularly but then, amid a series of uncanny incidents, Flint reappears … and as his possessiveness grows, Hannah’s hold on the world begins to lapse. What is real and what is imaginary, or from beyond the grave?

A mesmerising Australian novel that echoes the great Gothic stories of love and hate: Wuthering Heights, Jane Eyre, and especially Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca.

Thanks To HQ

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Morocco: a captivating country of honor and tradition. And, for these four women, a land of secrets and revelations.

From the twisted alleyways of the ancient medina of Fès to a marriage festival high in the Atlas Mountains, Deborah Rodriguez’s entrancing new bestseller is a modern story of forbidden love set in the sensual landscape of North Africa. Author of The Little Coffee Shop of Kabul and The Zanzibar Wife.Amina Bennis has come back to her childhood home in Morocco to attend her sister’s wedding. The time has come for her to confront her strict, traditionalist father with the secret she has kept for more than a year – her American husband, Max.

Amina’s best friend, Charlie, and Charlie’s feisty grandmother, Bea, have come along for moral support, staying with Amina and her family in their palatial riad in Fès and enjoying all that the city has to offer. But Charlie is also hiding someone from her past – a mystery man from Casablanca.

And then there’s Samira, the Bennises’ devoted housekeeper for many decades. Hers is the biggest secret of all – one that strikes at the very heart of the family.

As things begin to unravel behind the ancient walls of the medina, the four women are soon caught in a web of lies, clandestine deals and shocking confessions . . .

Thanks to PenguinRandomHouse Australia

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Thanks for stopping by!