First a quick explanation!
Due to some severe health issues over the last few years, and a lingering chronic condition, my planned review schedule went right out of the window and I have been scrabbling ever since to get it back on track.
In an attempt to try to regain some lost ground, I have been scrunching some of my (overdue) NetGalley reviews together into one or two posts each week: shorter reviews, but still covering all of the points I intended to.
That's the plan anyway, so let's get back to school and have a look at what I've been studying recently!
Title: Starling House
Author: Alix E. Harrow
Publisher: Pan Macmillan | Tor
Blurb: Step into Starling House – if you dare. Alix E. Harrow reimagines Beauty and the Beast in this gorgeously modern Gothic fantasy, perfect for fans of V. E. Schwab and Naomi Novik.
No one in Eden remembers when Starling House was built. But everyone agrees that it's best to let the house – and its last, lonely heir – go to rot.
Starling House is uncanny and ugly and fully of secrets, just like its heir. Opal knows better than to mess with haunted houses or brooding men, but it might be a chance to get her brother out of Eden. It feels dangerously like something she's never had: a home.
But Opal isn't the only one interested in the house, or the horrors and wonders that lie beneath it. If Opal wants a home, she'll have to fight for it. She'll have to dig up her family's ugly history and let herself dream of a better future. She'll have to go down, down into Underland, and claw her way back to the light . . .
This is a romantic and spellbinding Gothic fairytale from Hugo, Nebula and Locus Award-shortlisted Alix E. Harrow.
Review: Starling House is a fantastic blend of dark horror, fantasy, mystery and romance that I just could not stop reading.
I fell in love with Opal and Arthur, and with Starling House itself, and was hooked on the myriad of mysteries and family/town secrets to be uncovered, pieced together and (hopefully!) resolved.
The story structure also offers a tale within a tale, as stories of Eleanor Starling, the Beasts and the Underworld run through and under the main plot, winding in and out between lies and truth. And throughout also runs a message about trust and reaching out for help, and not going it alone out of stubbornness, pride or fear when people are trying to reach out to you.
I absolutely recommend this haunting ghost-and-monster story, about a bad-luck small town and those that would die to protect it from itself. This is a keeper!
Title: The Turnglass
Author: Gareth Rubin
Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK
Blurb: Imagine you're holding a book in your hands. It's not just any book though. It's a tĂȘte-bĂȘche novel, beloved of nineteenth-century bookmakers. It's a book that is two books: two intertwined stories printed back-to-back.
Open the book and the first novella begins. It ends at the middle of the book. Then flip the book over, head to tail, and read the second story in the opposite direction.
Both covers are front covers; and it can be read in either direction, or in both directions at once, alternating chapters, to fully immerse the reader in it.
1880s England. On the bleak island of Ray, off the Essex coast, an idealistic young doctor, Simeon Lee, is called from London to treat his cousin, Parson Oliver Hawes, who is dying. Parson Hawes, who lives in the only house on the island – Turnglass House – believes he is being poisoned. And he points the finger at his sister-in-law, Florence. Florence was declared insane after killing Oliver's brother in a jealous rage and is now kept in a glass-walled apartment in Oliver's library. And the secret to how she came to be there is found in Oliver's tĂȘte-bĂȘche journal, where one side tells a very different story from the other.
1930s California. Celebrated author Oliver Tooke, the son of the state governor, is found dead in his writing hut off the coast of the family residence, Turnglass House. His friend Ken Kourian doesn't believe that Oliver would take his own life. His investigations lead him to the mysterious kidnapping of Oliver's brother when they were children, and the subsequent secret incarceration of his mother, Florence, in an asylum. But to discover the truth, Ken must decipher clues hidden in Oliver's final book, a tĂȘte-bĂȘche novel – which is about a young doctor called Simeon Lee . . .
Review: The ARC I received for this book was only for Book 1 - the 1880s story - so I can confirm that this does technically stand alone as a fully mystery novella in its own right. However, (full disclosure!) I couldn't stop there and was desperately curious to experience the full tĂȘte-bĂȘche experience, so purchased a full copy for myself... and I am glad that I did because it made such a big difference to see BOTH sides of the story.
The idea of a tĂȘte-bĂȘche is two books printed back-to-back in the same volume. In The Turnglass, Book 1 is set in 1880s England and is a Gothic mystery featuring a poisoned parson, an investigating doctor and a murderess trapped in a glass prison. And within the story is another tĂȘte-bĂȘche, as Dr Simeon Lee reads the story of The Gold Field about a man in 1930s California searching for his mother. So, as you can already see, there are stories within stories, layers within layers, and the whole book is complex, unexpected and very, very clever.
Book 2 then tells the story of the mysterious death of author Oliver Tooke in 1930s California, investigated by his new friend, aspiring actor Ken Kourian. And the book that Oliver was just about to release on his death: The Turnglass... Dr Simeon Lee's story from Book 1!
Both stories are cleverly constructed mysteries and the whole novel is definitely worth reading for the concept, and to get two inter-related murder mysteries in one book. The only problem was that I was constantly aware of the hook and how clever it all was while I was reading, so could never quite lose myself in the story the way I would have liked to.
Title: Mrs Winterbottom Takes a Gap Year
Author: Joanna Nell
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
Blurb: It's never too late for the adventure of a lifetime . . .
Heather Winterbottom has worked side by side with her husband as GPs in their idyllic rural practice for over forty years. But as the time comes to hang up their stethoscopes, the Winterbottoms discover that they have rather different visions of retirement . . .
Heather dreams of exploring the Greek Islands, of escaping the shackles of her routine life and embracing an exciting new adventure. Alan dreams of growing his own vegetables.
When things come to a head at a family lunch, Heather announces that she has decided to take a year off. From her old life, from her marriage - from Alan.
Alone in beautiful Greece, Heather embarks on her very own odyssey - complete with peak experiences, pitfalls and temptations. But what if coming home is the biggest adventure yet?
Full of wisdom and warmth, this is a gorgeously poignant, hilarious story about how it is never too late to forge a new path. Fans of Judy Leigh, Jill Mansell and Sally Page will be hooked from the very first page.
Review: Usually I love a Joanna Nell book - she perfectly captures the joys, fears and sadness of growing older in modern society, with a warmth and humour that always makes me smile and often cry.
That said, this isn't one of my favourites. We follow Dr Heather Winterbottom as her and her husband, also Dr Winterbottom, retire from their GP surgery and find they have very different visions for the future. While her husband is making new friends and busying himself re-landscaping their garden Heather feels lost without her familiar role and purpose and eventually sets off to fulfil her dream of exploring Greece (more-or-less) solo.
After something of a slow start to her later-life crisis, she has a few adventures along the way, flirts with a little romance, enjoys the glorious food, drinks and landscape that Greece has to offer, and rediscovers that she is a whole person and that life continues after work, marriage and children.
I found the ending a bit too sweetly convenient, wrapping everything up with a neat bow when real life tends to be messier and more complex. Still, this is a fun, light summer read for those longing to experience a taste of Greece vicariously, and Heather's sunny escape may help to warm you up as the chilly, darker evenings start drawing in.
Title: The Olympian Affair
Author: Jim Butcher
Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group UK | Orbit
Blurb: The fate of the Cinder Spires may be decided by crossed swords in the next exhilarating fantasy adventure in the New York Times bestselling series of noble families, swordplay, and airships.
For centuries the Cinder Spires have safeguarded humanity, rising far above the deadly surface world. Within their halls, aristocratic houses rule, developing scientific marvels and building fleets of airships for defence and trade.Now, the Spires hover on the brink of open war.
Everyone knows it's coming. The guns of the great airship fleets that control the skies between the last bastions of humanity will soon speak in anger, and Spire Albion stands alone against the overwhelming might of Spire Aurora's Armada and its new secret weapon--one capable of destroying the populations of entire Spires.
A trading summit at Spire Olympia provides an opportunity for the Spirearch, Lord Albion, to secure alliances that will shape the outcomes of the war, and to that end he dispatches privateer Captain Francis Madison Grimm and the crew of the AMS Predator to bolster the Spirearch's diplomatic agents.
It will take daring, skill, and no small amount of showmanship to convince the world to stand with Spire Albion--assuming that it is not already too late.
Review: This is the second novel in Jim Butcher's Cinder Spires series, and I think you really do need to read The Aeronaut's Windlass first to get the full understanding of the worldbuilding and characters, as this book starts with the characters dealing with the aftermath of the previous book's finale.
I am aware that there are a few continuity errors between books 1 and 2, but it honestly didn't affect my enjoyment of the story, as I was utterly gripped from beginning to end and thoroughly rooting for my favourite characters (most of them!) to succeed.
Expect betrayals, epic duels, ambushes, weird crystal-zombies, an airborne monster, terrible injuries, inevitable looming war... basically plenty of action and excitement to keep you turning the pages. And I am desperate to know more about the Archangels and the Tyranima now, after the intriguing hints seeded towards the ending!
Basically, I was already hooked into this series from the first by the interesting worldbuilding, and the overall charm and thrills of the story and its characters, and this instalment builds on those aspects, so I am happy to ignore minor flaws and just enjoy the solid fantasy read.
Title: A Swarm of Butterflies
Author: Sarah Yarwood-Lovett
Publisher: Embla Books
Blurb: When Finchmere's first summer fete turns fatal, Nell has more than just a killer to net...
Since their YouTube channel, Following Finchmere, has taken flight, showcasing Dr Nell Ward's sustainability transformation at her family's Finchmere estate, it's her partner and colleague, Rav, who's become the star.
Amongst Rav's fan mail and gifts, Nell makes the chilling discovery that one person's obsession with him has metamorphosed into a deadly threat.
Just as Finchmere flings open its gates to welcome swarms of visitors to their idyllic summer fete - celebrating rewilding, artisan produce and local crafts - Nell realises the disguised peril has already wormed its way into the heart of Finchmere itself, and the path of destruction soon leads to murder.
DI James Clark's and Nell's powers of observation are put to the test to detect the camouflaged predator.
With everyone as a suspect, who can Nell really trust when those she loves are in danger?
Review: This is Book 6 in Sarah Yarwood-Lovett's series of eco-mysteries, featuring main character Dr Nell Ward and her friends and family as they preserve wildlife and cultivate the natural environment while also solving the occasional murder mystery.
I've really grown to love this series, mainly due to the character, but the environmental aspect is also a unique hook and always provides some fascinating bonus facts about the natural world. This instalment is something of a cosier, cottagecore version of Nell's adventures, as the focus is on the small businesses being established as part of the rewilding of Nell's ancestral estate - beekeeping and honey production; artisanal food and drinks and woodworking.
This also neatly gives a natural suspect pool when Nell finds out that someone is stalking Ravi and is willing to go to great lengths to remove any obstacles between them... namely Nell herself!
I definitely recommend reading these books in order, as the characters develop and grow throughout the series and there is a lot of backstory that might not affect the current mystery plot but would be a real shame to miss out on.
As always from this author, this is a solid mystery with plenty of motive and opportunity among the core suspect pool and a lot of fun investigating alongside Ravi, Nell and James, each in their distinctive ways.
Another great addition to this nature-friendly cosy mystery series and I genuinely can't wait for the next one!
Some really big-name books here and some very different styles - which one takes your fancy? Are you here for the Gothic fairy tale, the clever literary twister, the warm-hearted post-retirement adventure, the epic steampunk fantasy or the cosy environmental murder mystery...
... or, like me, are you here for all of the above!
Keep shining and happy reading! đ
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