Showing posts with label Graham Norton. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Graham Norton. Show all posts

Monday, January 13, 2025

Tuesday Tomorrow

Witchcraft for Wayward Girls by Grady Hendrix
Published by: Berkley Books
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 496 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"There's power in a book...

They call them wayward girls. Loose girls. Girls who grew up too fast. And they're sent to Wellwood House in St. Augustine, Florida, where unwed mothers are hidden by their families to have their babies in secret, to give them up for adoption, and most important of all, to forget any of it ever happened.

Fifteen-year-old Fern arrives at the home in the sweltering summer of 1970, pregnant, terrified and alone. Under the watchful eye of the stern Miss Wellwood, she meets a dozen other girls in the same predicament. There's Rose, a hippie who insists she's going to find a way to keep her baby and escape to a commune. And Zinnia, a budding musician who plans to marry her baby's father. And Holly, a wisp of a girl, barely fourteen, mute and pregnant by no-one-knows-who.

Everything the girls eat, every moment of their waking day, and everything they're allowed to talk about is strictly controlled by adults who claim they know what's best for them. Then Fern meets a librarian who gives her an occult book about witchcraft, and power is in the hands of the girls for the first time in their lives. But power can destroy as easily as it creates, and it's never given freely. There's always a price to be paid...and it's usually paid in blood."

Hopefully the blood of their oppressors! 

Clever Little Thing by Helena Echlin
Published by: Pamela Dorman Books
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 352 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A taut, powerful psychological thriller following a mother who must confront a sudden and terrifying change in her daughter after the abrupt death of their babysitter.

Charlotte's daughter Stella is sensitive and brilliant, perhaps even a genius, but a recent change in her behavior has alarmed her mother. Following the sudden death of Stella's babysitter, Blanka, the once disruptive and anti-social child has become docile and agreeable. But what's unsettling is that she has begun to mirror Blanka's personality, from Blanka's repetitive phrases to her accent, to fierce cravings for Armenian meat stew after being raised a vegetarian.

Charlotte is pregnant with her second child, and depleted and sick with the pregnancy. She is convinced that Blanka herself is somehow responsible for Stella's transformation. But how could Blanka, dead, still be entwined in their lives? Has Blanka somehow possessed Stella? Has Stella become Blanka? As Charlotte becomes increasingly obsessed, she is sure that only she can save her daughter...even though it's soon clear that her husband believes this is all in Charlotte's head.

Helena Echlin's singular, chilling voice holds light to the blurred lines of diagnosis in children and to the vital power of maternal instinct. Kaleidoscopic and tense, pulse-pounding and genuinely creepy, and infused with shades of the supernatural, Clever Little Thing is an ode to motherhood and a nuanced critique of the caretaking industry, a page-turner that will haunt readers long after its epic, surprising finale."

Seriously, when a kid's behavior changes, be suspicious. Be very suspicious. 

Honeysuckle and Bone by Trisha Tobias
Published by: Zando - Sweet July Books
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"On the run from her own dark secrets, a teen girl becomes the nanny for a prestigious family on their Jamaican estate, where she quickly discovers even paradise may be haunted.

Carina Marshall is looking to reinvent herself, and what better place to do it than Jamaica, her mother's alluring homeland where she conveniently has access to an au pair gig for the wealthy and powerful Hall family. After months of being the target of vicious rumors and hate online, Carina might have found everything she wants at the luxurious Blackbead House: a world of mango trees, tropical breezes, and glamorous parties - and a place to disappear.

Once there, Carina finds herself settling right into her busy, but comfortable, new life. Yes, the family runs a tight ship, and yes, there is some tension between the Halls, but Carina is content flying under the radar and hanging out with her new friends - not least, the handsome and charming Aaron. But when inexplicable things start happening to her in the house, only getting worse each night, Carina realizes that someone, or something, is out to get her. Is it the Halls? The house itself? Or is her own past catching up with her? With Aaron's help, she must figure out what is haunting her, and fast, before she's forced out of Blackbead House for good.

Honeysuckle and Bone is a deliciously atmospheric and utterly spooky young adult novel following an imperfect yet courageous teen as she seeks to remake herself in the homeland she always idealized, discovering that new beginnings don't always come easy."

A Wide Sargasso Sea vibe that's even more Gothic.

Death of the Author by Nnedi Okorafor
Published by: William Morrow and Company
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 448 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"In this exhilarating tale by New York Times bestselling and award-winning author Nnedi Okorafor, a disabled Nigerian American woman pens a wildly successful Sci-Fi novel, but as her fame rises, she loses control of the narrative - a surprisingly cutting, yet heartfelt drama about art and love, identity and connection, and, ultimately, what makes us human. This is a story unlike anything you've read before.

The future of storytelling is here.

Disabled, disinclined to marry, and more interested in writing than a lucrative career in medicine or law, Zelu has always felt like the outcast of her large Nigerian family. Then her life is upended when, in the middle of her sister's lavish Caribbean wedding, she's unceremoniously fired from her university job and, to add insult to injury, her novel is rejected by yet another publisher. With her career and dreams crushed in one fell swoop, she decides to write something just for herself. What comes out is nothing like the quiet, literary novels that have so far peppered her unremarkable career. It's a far-future epic where androids and AI wage war in the grown-over ruins of human civilization. She calls it Rusted Robots.

When Zelu finds the courage to share her strange novel, she does not realize she is about to embark on a life-altering journey - one that will catapult her into literary stardom, but also perhaps obliterate everything her book was meant to be. From Chicago to Lagos to the far reaches of space, Zelu's novel will change the future not only for humanity, but for the robots who come next.

A book-within-a-book that blends the line between writing and being written, Death of the Author is a masterpiece of metafiction that manages to combine the razor-sharp commentary of Yellowface with the heartfelt humanity of Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. Surprisingly funny, deeply poignant, and endlessly discussable, this is at once the tale of a woman on the margins risking everything to be heard and a testament to the power of storytelling to shape the world as we know it."

And how once out in the world, an author's words are no longer theirs to control.

Water Moon by Samantha Sotto Yambao
Published by: Del Rey Books
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 384 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A woman inherits a pawnshop where you can sell your regrets, and then embarks on a magical quest when a charming young physicist wanders into the shop, in this dreamlike and enchanting fantasy novel.

On a backstreet in Tokyo lies a pawnshop, but not everyone can find it. Most will see a cozy ramen restaurant. And only the chosen ones - those who are lost - will find a place to pawn their life choices and deepest regrets.

Hana Ishikawa wakes on her first morning as the pawnshop's new owner to find it ransacked, the shop's most precious acquisition stolen, and her father missing. And then into the shop stumbles a charming stranger, quite unlike its other customers, for he offers help instead of seeking it.

Together, they must journey through a mystical world to find Hana's father and the stolen choice - by way of rain puddles, rides on paper cranes, the bridge between midnight and morning, and a night market in the clouds. But as they get closer to the truth, Hana must reveal a secret of her own - and risk making a choice that she will never be able to take back."

Why can't I ever inherit a mystical shop or for that matter just stumble upon one...

The Vanishing of Josephine Reynolds by Jennifer Moorman
Published by: Harper Muse
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Paperback, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Can one thoughtless wish erase a life?

Widowed at thirty-five, Josephine Reynolds wishes she could disappear, but her concerned sister convinces her to buy their ancestral home, a Craftsman bungalow in disrepair and foreclosure. It's a welcome distraction, and Josephine can't believe her luck when she finds the home's original door in a salvage yard.

When she installs the door and steps through it, Josephine is transported into 1927, where she meets her great-grandmother Alma, a vivacious and daring woman running an illegal speakeasy in the bungalow's basement. Immersed in the vibrant Jazz Age, Josephine forms a profound bond with Alma, only to discover upon her return to the present that history has been altered. Alma's life was tragically cut short in a speakeasy raid just a week after their fateful meeting.

Josephine has a chilling revelation - her own existence is unraveling/vanishing - and she must race against time to rewrite history. Josephine is desperate to not only save Alma but save her own future in a time-bending journey where past and present intertwine in a desperate battle for survival."

Always be careful to not Marty McFly yourself!

The Lost House by Melissa Larsen
Published by: Minotaur Books
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 352 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"In Melissa Larsen's The Lost House comes the mesmerizing story of a young woman with a haunting past who returns to her ancestral home in Iceland to investigate a gruesome murder in her family.

Forty years ago, a young woman and her infant daughter were found buried in the cold Icelandic snow, lying together as peacefully as though sleeping. Except the mother's throat had been slashed and the infant drowned. The case was never solved. There were no arrests, no conviction. Just a suspicion turned into a certainty: the husband did it. When he took his son and fled halfway across the world to California, it was proof enough of his guilt.

Now, nearly half a century later and a year after his death, his granddaughter, Agnes, is ready to clear her grandfather's name once and for all. Still recovering from his death and a devastating injury, Agnes wants nothing more than an excuse to escape the shambles of her once-stable life - which is why she so readily accepts true crime expert Nora Carver's invitation to be interviewed for her popular podcast. Agnes packs a bag and hops on a last-minute flight to the remote town of Bifröst, Iceland, where Nora is staying, where Agnes's father grew up, and where, supposedly, her grandfather slaughtered his wife and infant daughter.

Is it merely coincidence that a local girl goes missing the very same weekend Agnes arrives? Suddenly, Agnes and Nora's investigation is turned upside down, and everyone in the small Icelandic town is once again a suspect. Seeking to unearth old and new truths alike, Agnes finds herself drawn into a web of secrets that threaten the redemption she is hell-bent on delivering, and even her life - discovering how far a person will go to protect their family, their safety, and their secrets.

Set against an unforgiving Icelandic winter landscape, The Lost House is a chilling and razor-sharp mystery packed with jaw-dropping twists that will leave you breathless."

A true crime podcast, a family mystery, and Iceland? Sold!

The Last Room on the Left by Leah Konen
Published by: G.P. Putnam's Sons
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 336 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Kerry's life is in shambles: Her husband has left her, her drinking habit has officially become a problem, and though the deadline for her big book deal - the one that was supposed to change everything - is looming, she can't write a word. When she sees an ad for a caretaker position at a revitalized roadside motel in the Catskills, she jumps at the chance. It's the perfect getaway to finish her book and start fresh.

But as she hunkers down in a blizzard, she spots something through the window: a pale arm peeking out from a heap of snow. Trapped in the mountains and alone with a dead, frozen body, Kerry must keep her head and make it out before the killer comes for her too. But is the deadly game of cat-and-mouse all in her mind? The body count begs to differ..."

I mean, everyone wants a nice read alike to The Shining right? It can't JUST be me.

Vantage Point by Sara Sligar
Published by: MCD
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 400 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Succession meets Megan Abbott in this seductive, technological suspense about the dramatic downfall of one of America's most affluent families.

The old-money Wieland family has it all - wealth, status, power. They're also famously cursed.

Clara and her brother, Teddy, grew up on a small island in Maine in the shadow of their parents' tragic deaths, haunted by rumors and paparazzi. Fourteen years later, they've mostly put their turbulent past to rest. Teddy has married Clara's best friend, Jess, and the three of them have moved back home to take over the sprawling, remote family mansion known as Vantage Point.

Then Teddy decides to run for the Senate - an unnerving prospect made much worse when intimate videos of Clara are leaked online. The most frightening part is that she doesn't remember filming any of them. Are the videos real? Or are they deepfakes? Is someone trying to take down the Wielands once and for all?

Everyone thinks Clara is losing her grasp on reality. But she knows the truth: the videos are only the beginning. Years ago, the curse destroyed her parents. Now, it's coming for her.

Sara Sligar, the critically acclaimed author of Take Me Apart, returns with a shocking family drama full of suspense. Brimming with palpable tension, Vantage Point carefully unravels a twisted web of family secrets and political ambition that raises questions about the nature of "truth" in our digital age."

First mistake, trying to run for office. That right there will activate a curse every time.

The New Rector by Rebecca Shaw
Published by: George Weidenfeld and Nicholson
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Paperback, 272 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"When Peter Harris arrives in Turnham Malpas as the new rector, he finds the village people welcoming but set in their ways. Yet despite his own weaknesses, and a deeply felt sadness his wife keeps hidden, he comforts and advises his new parishioners, growing more and more involved with the rural way of life.

Then the whole village is rocked by spiteful trick that goes terribly wrong, and a gruesome murder that points to a killer in its midst. Now, more than ever, Peter's pastoral role is crucial - and yet he is wrestling with his own private hell that may still wreck his own life."

Is his own private hell the secret that he's a killer? Because that could be a fun twist...

Frankie by Graham Norton
Published by: Harpervia
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Paperback, 304 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"From the internationally bestselling author and host of The Graham Norton Show, a dazzling and decades-sweeping story about love, bravery, and what it means to live a significant life.

Always on the periphery, looking on, young Frankie Howe was never quite sure enough of herself to take center stage - after all, life had already judged her harshly. Now old, Frankie finds it easier to forget the life that came before.

Then Damian, a young Irish caretaker, arrives at her London flat, there to keep an eye on her as she recovers from a fall. A memory is sparked, and the past crackles into life as Damian listens to the story Frankie has kept stored away all these years.

Traveling from post-war Ireland to 1960s New York - a city full of art, larger-than-life characters and turmoil - Frankie shares a world in which friendship and chance encounters collide. A place where, for a while, life blazes with an intensity that can't last but will perhaps live on in other ways and in other people."

As someone in entertainment I find it odd that Graham named his character Frankie Howe which is so close to Frankie Howerd... 

Unromance by Erin Connor
Published by: Forever
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Paperback, 352 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A recently dumped TV heartthrob enlists a jaded romance novelist to ruin romance for him - one rom-com trope at a time - so he never gets swept off his feet again...

Sawyer Greene knows romance. She's a bestselling author of the genre - or she was, until her ex left her with nothing but writer's block and a broken heart. But when she gets stuck in the elevator with a handsome stranger, she sees their meet cute for what it is: just a one-night stand. It might have worked, too, if they could stop running into each other.

Actor Mason West sees Sawyer's reappearance in his life as a sign. Obviously, they're meant to cure each other. Him of the hopeless romanticism that only ends in heartbreak - and tabloid trainwrecks - and Sawyer of her writer's block. Their agreement is simple: 1. No (more) sex, and 2. No matter how swoony the circumstances, absolutely no falling in love.

It's a foolproof plan - until Sawyer and Mason find that, once set in motion, some plots can't be stopped - and that they might be hurtling towards a happy ending..."

I mean, how can you NOT fall for all the rom-com tropes? They're tropes for a reason.

1986: Stories by Will Stepp
Published by: Bookbaby
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Paperback, 164 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Ten interconnected stories about a boy growing up in a small town in Georgia, set against the backdrop of the 1980s. From a secret pond nestled in the woods to the fog-shrouded rooftop of an interstate truck stop, to the shadowy corridors of a YMCA basement, familiar landscapes transform into realms of childhood wonder and discovery. Together, these dreamlike and often surreal tales weave a nostalgic meditation on family, home, memory, and time."

You can't get more 80s than a YMCA basement. 

Everything Is Poison by Joy McCullough
Published by: Dutton Books for Young Readers
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 304 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A Blood Water Paint-style historical YA in prose and verse from New York Times bestselling author Joy McCullough.

Early Seventeenth-Century Rome.

For as long as she can remember, Carmela Tofana has desperately wanted one thing: to be a part of La Tofana's, her mother's apothecary in Campo Marzio, Rome. When she finally turns sixteen, she's allowed into the inner sanctum: the workroom where her mother and two assistants craft renowned remedies for their customers. But for every sweet-smelling flower extract in the workroom, there's another potion requiring darker ingredients. And then there's Aqua Tofana, the apothecary's remedy of last resort. In all Carmela's years of wishing to follow in her mother's footsteps, she never realized one tiny vial could be the death of them all.

Everything Is Poison is a story of a deadly secret hiding in plain sight and of the women who risk everything to provide care for those with nowhere else to turn."

Oh, feminist and deadly!

Queen of Diamonds by Beezy Marsh
Published by: William Morrow and Company
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Paperback, 304 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Peaky Blinders - but with women! In the thrilling final installment of Beezy Marsh's riveting crime trilogy about a real-life London gang that began with Queen of Thieves, we go back to crime queen Alice Diamond's bold beginnings in 1920s Soho.

London, 1922. Orphan girl Alice dreams of more than toiling long hours in Pink's jam factory. Inspired by stories about the legendary Queen of Thieves, Mary Carr, who terrorized the streets of Victorian London, Alice decides to set up her own gang: the Forty Thieves. She has an accomplice too: sly seamstress Kate Felix from Whitechapel persuades Alice they'd make the perfect team. Before long, the pair are making headlines in the glitzy world of 1920s Soho, known for their daring heists and for the row of heavy diamond rings that Alice uses like brass knuckles in her frequent brawls.

What Alice soon discovers is that a life of crime makes her powerful enemies, including some who are closer to home than they'd like. Alice must sacrifice more than she ever imagined - but the toughest and most beautiful diamonds are formed under pressure.

From squalid slums and the grim confines of Holloway Prison to the glittering nightclubs of London in the roaring twenties, Queen of Diamonds is a fast-paced, gritty story of love, loss, and loyalty to the gang. Women's fiction with brass knuckles on!"

You know how a few years back now Ada Lovelace was everywhere? Well, replace Ada with Alice Diamond. She's the star of the moment.

A Treasury of XXth Century Murder Compendium II by Rick Geary
Published by: Nantier Beall Minoustchine Publishing
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Paperback, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"400 pages of real murder cases from the 20th century! From the famous Sacco and Vanzetti story through the ever-intriguing renowned Black Dahlia murder of a striking aspiring actress in Los Angeles, the mysterious murder of silent movie director William Desmond Taylor in early Hollywood to that of a preacher and his lover found murdered in a park, here is a collection of scandalous murders which were never solved or marked the century. Meticulously researched, they are presented in Geary's inimitable tongue-in-cheek style."

As someone who's read everything that Rick Geary has written in the true crime genre I have to say this reissued collection contains easily his best work. Especially Lovers' Lane!

Marvel Studios' She-Hulk: Attorney at Law - The Art of the Series by Jess Harrold
Published by: Marvel Universe
Publication Date: January 14th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 224 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Jennifer Walters is a talented, ambitious lawyer trying to balance her work life and personal life just like anyone else...except hers is complicated by Hulk-like super-powers that she never asked for, gained from her cousin Bruce Banner! Now six feet tall, super-strong and emerald green, Jen has just landed her dream job at a prestigious law firm...but her first big case is representing Emil Blonsky, better known as Bruce's archnemesis the Abomination! Continuing their popular Art Of series of tie-in books, Marvel Studios presents another blockbuster achievement! Featuring exclusive concept artwork and in-depth interviews with the creative team, this deluxe volume provides insider details about the making of the highly anticipated series!"

And maybe we'll get a second season? Pretty please!

Friday, October 20, 2023

Holding

Holding is Ireland's answer to a procedural show that is Broadchurch meets Ballykissangel. It's nice and pastoral with crimes that are comfortably in the past even if their shadows are now finally being felt in the present. Everyone is on a spectrum of "hot mess" from secretly binge eating in their car to drunkenly heckling bad karaoke singers to shagging in an abandoned ambulance. Yet somehow everyone is OK with just plodding along. The show is based on Graham Norton's first fiction book and while the show does keep you engaged over it's four episodes you could tell by the very structure that he is a first time author. How you might ask? Well, the ending is just too convenient. When you set up a decades old crime and then in the present have one of the characters dying of Cancer, well, to make the killer the Cancer patient, that's too pat isn't it? Life isn't that simple. Life can't be tied up in a nice little bow that quickly heals the community. Nature being the bringer of justice not to mention the whole "maybe guilt brought on the Cancer" is just lazy. Just because you have quirky characters and a pastoral setting doesn't make this charming. In fact, there's one aspect that skeeved me out so bad that it tainted the entire show. Evelyn Ross is in her thirties and has never gotten over her true loving abandoning her after he beat her to a pulp and she miscarried on the night of his wedding to another woman. Of course his is the body that was discovered. Evelyn, to numb herself, is having an affair with Stephen Chen. Stephen is seventeen and the son of Evelyn's sister's partner. At least they kind of call out the "incest" but they never really call out the whole pedophile aspect of this relationship. So yes, he's technically of the age of consent. But that's a technicality that doesn't get ride of the whole creepiness of it. Plus they are having sex in an abandoned ambulance. How is this sanitary!?! I mean, I just can't on so many levels. And here's the thing, consent is more important than ever and how we talk about power dynamics in a relationship, and if there's anywhere in the world more associated with pedophiles than Ireland, strictly because of the Catholic Church, I don't know where that would be. Therefore to be telling this story in Ireland at this time, I think it needed to be done more sensitively. Just by having the woman being the older of the two doesn't make this OK, just look to Mary Kay Letourneau, may she be singed for an entirety. But what adds insult to injury is when Evelyn apologizes at her sister's wake to Stephen saying that what she did was wrong and him then saying to basically forget about it because he loved every minute of it... Excuse me? He's a child, he might think this way now, but what about when he gets older and realizes that their relationship was actually abuse? It's not cool or sexy or anything to be in this kind of relationship and Holding didn't real emphatically say otherwise. Therefore I can do nothing but look back on this series with a kind of creepy regret. It could have been something, but it was out of touch and unoriginal.        

Wednesday, December 28, 2022

Book Review - Richard Osman's The Thursday Murder Club

The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman
Published by: Penguin
Publication Date: September 3rd, 2020
Format: Kindle, 382 Pages
Rating: ★★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

Coopers Chase might seem like your regular upscale retirement community, but there's a group that meets every Thursday in the Jigsaw Room to discuss murder. Cold cases to be specific. One of the founding members, Penny, was a cop. Any case where they never caught the culprit or she wasn't sure whodunit, she bent the rules and made copies of the files and brought them with her into retirement. Her dear friend Elizabeth though is the de facto leader. Not just because Penny's dementia has taken over and she was transported to the hospital on site, but because Elizabeth has "connections" and was involved in the security services. The other two members are Ron, AKA Red Ron the union organizer, and Ibrahim, a therapist, who may or may not still be seeing patients. Now that Penny has left the group they are down a member and a certain kind of expertise, which leads Elizabeth one day to approach Joyce. Joyce used to be a nurse so can answer questions about wounds inflicted on a body and therefore becomes indispensable to The Thursday Murder Club. Whereas Joyce is just excited to be included. It's all so thrilling getting to be a part of the cool gang. She doesn't dwell on how alone she is and how her daughter never comes to visit. But the club never thought in a million years that they'd get to be on the scene and investigate a real live case! Tony Curran is the property developer behind Coopers Chase. He and his business partner Ian Ventham are planning on expanding the retirement community. Coopers Chase used to be a convent and the expansion would require the razing of the cemetery where the nuns are buried. Needless to say this plan isn't met by the community with open arms. In fact Tony Curran is murdered. Which means it's time for The Thursday Murder Club to swing into action and inveigle themselves with the police. A job that is perfect for Joyce. She's so nice and unobtrusive and always there with a tasty treat and something to drink. Elizabeth sees that Joyce really was the perfect addition to the club at this exact moment. Especially when more bodies start turning up. Will the group be able to solve the crimes being committed at Coopers Chase or will the police beat them to the finish line?

When The Thursday Murder Club was released and jumped immediately onto ever bookstore's "best of" lists I was instantly gun-shy. Me and popular books don't go hand in hand. At all. But then I was watching an episode of The Graham Norton Show and Richard Osman was on. I never connected the British comedian whose appearances on Graham Norton's show whom I've always enjoyed with the author of The Thursday Murder Club. I seriously don't know how that piece of information, which is clearly printed on the front of the book, didn't sink in. I claim distraction by fox as the only logical explanation. Therefore I got myself on the wait list at my library for a digital copy and it eventually came in and I slogged my way through to the bleak and bitter end. Here's the thing, I should have stuck with my gut and not been lured in by Graham Norton. Yes, this book has witty dialogue, so "shocking" because it's written by a comedian. But what people love about it is that it evokes Agatha Christie and Midsomer Murders. I wonder why that is? Could it be because the title (and concept) is literally two days off from an Agatha Christie book!?! The Tuesday Club Murders is a set of thirteen short stories, six of which are told at the Tuesday Night Club. This club is a group of people meeting at Miss Marple's house to discuss mysteries. Does that sound familiar Mr. Osman? Secondly the Midsomer Murders angle. Am I the ONLY person to remember the episode "Blue Herrings?" DCI Tom Barnaby's aunt goes into a nursing home where death and missing property soon follow. Now this wouldn't be the first time an author builds on greater authors to acclaim. As I've lamented several times The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo just filched the ending from two different Val McDemid books and smashed them together and everyone loved it. No, what really got me was that for a book that started out so jovial it ended up so bleak. I mean, how many suicides and assisted suicides can one book have? A lot would be Richard Osman's answer. It's not just a sloppy way to end a book but a damn depressing one given everything that came before. Though the pièce de résistance for me is just how unrealistic this retirement facility is. After how much money went into the care of my mother in a nursing facility I know what things cost, and it's dear. The whole of Coopers Chase pissed me off with it's wealth and luxury. This isn't what health care is! Who are these people? How can they afford this life? This isn't cozy, this is infuriating! I want to speak to the manager! Oh he's dead? A likely excuse.

Wednesday, September 30, 2020

The Stranger

I'll be honest, The Stranger almost slipped right under my radar. I saw it on the front page of Netflix and was like, is that Dutch from Killjoys? And once I figured out that yes, it was Hannah John-Kamen, my interest disappeared until an episode of The Graham Norton Show. I literally watch every episode of Graham's show even if I hate the guests because he somehow makes everyone come alive, though the one big exception was Laura Linney's recent appearance. Laura was working her ass off and the other guests, Saoirse Ronan, Timothée Chalamet, and Stephen Mangan, fell painfully flat. Shame on you three! Yet it gave me a new respect for Laura, so good on her. Anyway, Jennifer Saunders was on with Patrick Stewart, Jamie Foxx, and Michael B. Jordan, so a typical Graham couch, tons of A-listers and a comedian at the end of the couch. Only Jennifer was there to promote her first dramatic outing, The Stranger. I was all, what!?! Huh!?! Tell me more about walking across this car park!?! So I looked into the show more and saw it stared Richard Armitage!?! Be still my heart! So yes, thanks to Graham I didn't miss this show about a stranger played by Hannah John-Kamen arriving in a small yet tony British town and upsetting everyone's lives with a little helping of the truth and a whole lot of blackmail. There's a LOT of Broadchurch thrown in when they decided to move Harlan Coben's story from America to the British Isles, but that's part of the charm. It's nothing too original and many of the plot twists I saw coming from a long way off, but the acting and the cast made it enjoyable. Could I always have Antony Stewart Head play Richard Armitage's father? Because that would be a joy I would love to repeat. Seriously, when Rupert Giles appeared in the credits I squeed. This is very much a mystery I would have been sad to have missed.

Monday, August 12, 2019

Tuesday Tomorrow

The Swallows by Lisa Lutz
Published by: Ballantine Books
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 416 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A teacher at a New England prep school ignites a gender war - with deadly consequences - in this dark and provocative novel by the bestselling author of The Passenger.

When Alexandra Witt joins the faculty at Stonebridge Academy, she’s hoping to put a painful past behind her. Then one of her creative writing assignments generates some disturbing responses from students. Before long, Alex is immersed in an investigation of the students atop the school’s social hierarchy - and their connection to something called the Darkroom. She soon inspires the girls who’ve started to question the school’s “boys will be boys” attitude and incites a resistance. But just as the movement is gaining momentum, Alex attracts the attention of an unknown enemy who knows a little too much about her - and what brought her to Stonebridge in the first place.

Meanwhile, Gemma, a defiant senior, has been plotting her attack for years, waiting for the right moment. Shy loner Norman hates his role in the Darkroom, but can’t find the courage to fight back until he makes an unlikely alliance. And then there’s Finn Ford, an English teacher with a shady reputation, who keeps one eye on his literary ambitions and one on Ms. Witt. As the school’s secrets begin to trickle out, a boys-versus-girls skirmish turns into an all-out war, with deeply personal - and potentially fatal - consequences for everyone involved.

Lisa Lutz’s blistering, timely tale of revenge and disruption shows us what can happen when silence wins out over decency for too long - and why the scariest threat of all might be the idea that sooner or later, girls will be girls."

Lisa Lutz is literally a favorite author of mine and to have my birthday share a birthday with her new book is beyond exciting. 

Pride, Prejudice, and Poison by Elizabeth Blake
Published by: Crooked Lane Books
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 336 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Perfect for fans of Laura Levine and Stephanie Barron, Elizabeth Blake’s Jane Austen Society mystery debut is a mirthfully morbid merger of manners and murder.

In this Austen-tatious debut, antiquarian bookstore proprietor Erin Coleridge uses her sense and sensibility to deduce who killed the president of the local Jane Austen Society.

Erin Coleridge’s used bookstore in Kirkbymoorside, North Yorkshire, England is a meeting place for the villagers and, in particular, for the local Jane Austen Society. At the Society’s monthly meeting, matters come to a head between the old guard and its young turks. After the meeting breaks for tea, persuasion gives way to murder - with extreme prejudice - when president Sylvia Pemberthy falls dead to the floor. Poisoned? Presumably…but by whom? And was Sylvia the only target?

Handsome - but shy - Detective Inspector Peter Hadley and charismatic Sergeant Rashid Jarral arrive at the scene. The long suspect list includes Sylvia’s lover Kurt Becker and his tightly wound wife Suzanne. Or, perhaps, the killer was Sylvia’s own cuckolded husband, Jerome. Among the many Society members who may have had her in their sights is dashing Jonathan Alder, who was heard having a royal battle of words with the late president the night before.

Then, when Jonathan Alder narrowly avoids becoming the next victim, Farnsworth (the town’s “cat lady”) persuades a seriously time-crunched Erin to help DI Hadley. But the killer is more devious than anyone imagines."

Any book that starts with killing a pompous member of the Jane Austen Society gets two thumbs up from me.

And Then They Were Doomed by Elizabeth Kane Buzzelli
Published by: Crooked Lane Books
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 276 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Zoe Zola is one of ten invitees to an Agatha Christie symposium. Tempers flare...and then there are nine. Can Jenny Weston save Zoe from murder on the Upper Peninsula?

Little Person author Zoe Zola believes that one of the unluckiest things in life is to receive an invitation - in the form of a letter edged in black - to an Agatha Christie symposium at an old Upper Peninsula hunting lodge. Her reluctance dissipates when she learns that the organizer is named Emily Brent - the name of a character poisoned by cyanide in Christie’s And Then There Were None.

As a dreary rain soaks the U.P., Zoe and nine other Christie scholars - each of whom bears a vague resemblance to one of the classic mystery novel’s characters - arrive at the lodge. At the opening night dinner, arguments flare over the experts’ discordant theories about Christie. Next morning, the guests find one particularly odious man has gone - whereabouts and reasons unknown. Such a coincidental resemblance to a work of fiction is surely impossible; therefore, it appears to be possible.

As the guests disappear, one by one, Zoe resolves to beat a hasty retreat - but her car won't start. She calls her friend, amateur sleuth/little librarian Jenny Weston, but Jenny will have to wait out a storm off Lake Superior before she can come to the rescue. If Zoe’s to stay alive to greet Jenny when she eventually arrives, she’ll have to draw on everything she knows about Agatha Christie’s devilish plots in Elizabeth Kane Buzzelli’s fourth tantalizing Little Library mystery."

How did I not know about this cozy series? Seriously, HOW!?! 

The Case of Miss Elliott by Baroness Orczy
Published by: Pushkin Vertigo
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Paperback, 224 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A classic collection of mysteries from the Golden Age of British crime writing, by the author of The Scarlet Pimpernel.

Mysteries! There is no such thing as a mystery in connection with any crime, provided intelligence is brought to bear upon its investigation.

So says a rather down-at-heel elderly gentleman to young Polly Burton of the Evening Observer, in the corner of the ABC teashop on Norfolk Street one afternoon. Once she has forgiven him for distracting her from her newspaper and luncheon, Miss Burton discovers that her interlocutor is as brilliantly gifted as he is eccentric - able to solve mysteries that have made headlines and baffled the finest minds of the police without once leaving his seat in the teahouse.

The Old Man in the Corner is a classic collection of mysteries featuring the Teahouse Detective - a contemporary of Sherlock Holmes, with a brilliant mind and waspish temperament to match that of Conan Doyle's creation."

I am IN LOVE with these Baroness Orczy re-issues from the Golden Age of detective fiction!

Death Comes to Dartmoor by Vivian Conroy
Published by: Crooked Lane Books
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The mist-shrouded moors of Devon proffer a trove of delights for two vacationing zoologists - but also conceal a hoard of dark secrets reaching down to the fathomless depths of the ocean.

Miss Merula Merriweather barely saved her uncle from the gallows after he was wrongly accused of murder - and now, she’s left the bustle of Victorian London to recuperate in the fresh air of Dartmoor with her fellow zoologist, Lord Raven Royston. The trip offers a unique treat, as they’ll be staying with a friend of Raven’s, who owns a collection of rare zoological specimens - including a kraken, a sea monster of myth and legend.

But all is not right in the land of tors, heaths, and mist. Their host’s maid has vanished without a trace, and the townspeople hold him responsible, claiming that his specimens are alive and roam the moors at night, bringing death to anyone who crosses their path. Merula and Raven are skeptical - but the accusations become more ominous when they find several specimen jars empty.

As the two hunt for clues across a desolate and beautiful landscape, a stranger appears bearing a shadowy secret from Merula’s past. Could there be a connection between her family history, the missing girl, and a fearsome monster that could be on the loose? The race is on to find the truth."

A fearsome monster on the loose in Dartmoor? My Sherlockian heart beats for joy! 

The Doll Factory by Elizabeth Macneal
Published by: Atria/Emily Bestler Books
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 368 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The #1 International Bestseller.

Obsession is an art.

In this “sharp, scary, gorgeously evocative tale of love, art, and obsession” (Paula Hawkins, bestselling author of The Girl on the Train), a beautiful young woman aspires to be an artist, while a man’s dark obsession may destroy her world forever.

In 1850s London, the Great Exhibition is being erected in Hyde Park and, among the crowd watching the dazzling spectacle, two people meet by happenstance. For Iris, an arrestingly attractive aspiring artist, it is a brief and forgettable moment but for Silas, a curiosity collector enchanted by all things strange and beautiful, the meeting marks a new beginning.

When Iris is asked to model for Pre-Raphaelite artist Louis Frost, she agrees on the condition that he will also teach her to paint. Suddenly, her world begins to expand beyond her wildest dreams - but she has no idea that evil is waiting in the shadows. Silas has only thought of one thing since that chance meeting, and his obsession is darkening by the day."

The Great Exhibition, the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, what other of my obsessions does this book hold? You must read to find out!

Petra's Ghost by C.S. O'Cinneide
Published by: Dundurns
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Paperback, 288 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A man's pilgrimage becomes something from his darkest nightmares when secrets arise and ghosts haunt his path.

A woman has vanished on the Camino de Santiago, the ancient five-hundred-mile pilgrimage that crosses northern Spain. Daniel, an Irish expat, walks the lonely trail carrying his wife, Petra’s, ashes, along with the damning secret of how she really died.

When he teams up to walk with sporty California girl Ginny, she seems like the perfect antidote for his grieving heart. But a nightmare figure begins to stalk them, and his mind starts to unravel from the horror of things he cannot explain.

Unexpected twists and turns echo the path of the ancient trail they walk upon. The lines start to blur between reality and madness, between truth and the lies we tell ourselves."

YAS! Just so much yas! It's a book that you read the description and instantly want to drop all other books to read. 

A Keeper by Graham Norton
Published by: Atria Books
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"When Elizabeth Keane returns to Ireland after her mother’s death, she’s focused only on saying goodbye to that dark and dismal part of her life. Her childhood home is packed solid with useless junk, her mother’s presence already fading. But within this mess, she discovers a small stash of letters - and ultimately, the truth.

Forty years earlier, a young woman stumbles from a remote stone house, the night quiet except for the constant wind that encircles her as she hurries deeper into the darkness away from the cliffs and the sea. She has no sense of where she is going, only that she must keep on.

A Keeper confirms Graham Norton’s status as a fresh and evocative literary voice, and illustrates his clear-eyed understanding of human nature and its darkest flaws."

A love Graham SO MUCH! What I wouldn't give for a US signing tour, just saying...

The Night is Short, Walk on Girl by Tomihiko Morimi
Published by: Yen On
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 272 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A college student spends an evening out, unwittingly attracting the attention of various men whose paths she crosses. One in particular, an upperclassman who has been nursing a crush on her for some time, has chosen this night to make his true feelings known.

Will the two come together, or will this girl just keep on walking...?"

That cover is just too cute for words! 

Voyages in the Underworld of Orpheus Black by Marcus Sedgwick
Published by: Walker Books US
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Harry Black is lost between the world of war and the land of myth in this illustrated novel that transports the tale of Orpheus to World War II–era London.

Brothers Marcus and Julian Sedgwick team up to pen this haunting tale of another pair of brothers, caught between life and death in World War II. Harry Black, a conscientious objector, artist, and firefighter battling the blazes of German bombing in London in 1944, wakes in the hospital to news that his soldier brother, Ellis, has been killed. In the delirium of his wounded state, Harry’s mind begins to blur the distinctions between the reality of war-torn London, the fiction of his unpublished sci-fi novel, and the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. Driven by visions of Ellis still alive and a sense of poetic inevitability, Harry sets off on a search for his brother that will lead him deep into the city’s Underworld. With otherworldly paintings by Alexis Deacon depicting Harry’s surreal descent further into the depths of hell, this eerily beautiful blend of prose, verse, and illustration delves into love, loyalty, and the unbreakable bonds of brotherhood as it builds to a fierce indictment of mechanized warfare."

I couldn't think of a better pairing than WWII and Orpheus, it just seems so right. 

Monday, August 28, 2017

Tuesday Tomorrow

The Alchemy of Masques and Mirrors by Curtis Craddock
Published by: Tor Books
Publication Date: August 29th, 2017
Format: Hardcover, 416 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A delightful and engrossing fantasy debut featuring an intelligent heroine and her guardian, a royal musketeer.

In a world of soaring continents and bottomless skies, where a burgeoning new science lifts skyships into the cloud-strewn heights, and ancient blood-borne sorceries cling to a fading glory, Princess Isabelle des Zephyrs is about to be married to a man she has barely heard of, the second son of a dying king in an empire collapsing into civil war.

Born without the sorcery that is her birthright but with a perspicacious intellect, Isabelle believes her marriage will stave off disastrous conflict and bring her opportunity and influence. But the last two women betrothed to this prince were murdered, and a sorcerer-assassin is bent on making Isabelle the third. Aided and defended by her loyal musketeer, Jean-Claude, Isabelle plunges into a great maze of prophecy, intrigue, and betrayal, where everyone wears masks of glamour and lies. Step by dangerous step, she unravels the lies of her enemies and discovers a truth more perilous than any deception."

Anyone else thinking this sounds so weird it has to be awesome?

Wonder Woman: Warbringer by Leigh Bardugo
Published by: Random House Books for Young Readers
Publication Date: August 29th, 2017
Format: Hardcover, 384 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The highly anticipated, entirely new coming-of-age story for the world's greatest super hero: WONDER WOMAN by the # 1 New York Times bestselling author LEIGH BARDUGO.

She will become one of the world's greatest heroes: WONDER WOMAN. But first she is Diana, Princess of the Amazons. And her fight is just beginning...

Diana longs to prove herself to her legendary warrior sisters. But when the opportunity finally comes, she throws away her chance at glory and breaks Amazon law—risking exile—to save a mere mortal. Even worse, Alia Keralis is no ordinary girl and with this single brave act, Diana may have doomed the world.

Alia just wanted to escape her overprotective brother with a semester at sea. She doesn't know she is being hunted. When a bomb detonates aboard her ship, Alia is rescued by a mysterious girl of extraordinary strength and forced to confront a horrible truth: Alia is a Warbringer—a direct descendant of the infamous Helen of Troy, fated to bring about an age of bloodshed and misery.

Together, Diana and Alia will face an army of enemies—mortal and divine—determined to either destroy or possess the Warbringer. If they have any hope of saving both their worlds, they will have to stand side by side against the tide of war."

I don't know which aspect I'm more excited about, that this book is about Wonder Woman or that it's written by Leigh Bardugo...

The Dazzling Heights by Katherine McGee
Published by: HarperCollins
Publication Date: August 29th, 2017
Format: Hardcover, 432 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The sequel to the New York Times bestselling novel The Thousandth Floor.

New York, 2118. Manhattan is home to a thousand-story supertower, a breathtaking marvel that touches the sky. But amidst high-tech luxury and futuristic glamour, five teenagers are keeping dangerous secrets…

LEDA is haunted by memories of what happened on the worst night of her life. She’ll do anything to make sure the truth stays hidden—even if it means trusting her enemy.

WATT just wants to put everything behind him…until Leda forces him to start hacking again. Will he do what it takes to be free of her for good?

When RYLIN wins a scholarship to an upper-floor school, her life transforms overnight. But being there means seeing the boy whose heart she broke, and who broke hers in return.

AVERY is tormented by her love for the one person in the world she can never have. She’s desperate to be with him… no matter the cost.

And then there’s CALLIOPE, the mysterious, bohemian beauty who arrives in New York, determined to cause a stir. And she knows exactly where to begin.

But unbeknownst to them all, someone is watching their every move, someone with revenge in mind. And in a world of such dazzling heights, just one wrong step can mean a devastating fall.

The sumptuous second book in the bestselling Thousandth Floor series has all the drama, romance and hidden secrets that landed the first book in this series at #2 on the New York Times bestseller list."

The masochist in me says bring this on. Why masochist? Because I am SO afraid of heights! 

Glass Houses by Louise Penny
Published by: Minotaur Books
Publication Date: August 29th, 2017
Format: Hardcover, 400 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"When a mysterious figure appears in Three Pines one cold November day, Armand Gamache and the rest of the villagers are at first curious. Then wary. Through rain and sleet, the figure stands unmoving, staring ahead.

From the moment its shadow falls over the village, Gamache, now Chief Superintendent of the Sûreté du Québec, suspects the creature has deep roots and a dark purpose. Yet he does nothing. What can he do? Only watch and wait. And hope his mounting fears are not realized.

But when the figure vanishes overnight and a body is discovered, it falls to Gamache to discover if a debt has been paid or levied.

Months later, on a steamy July day as the trial for the accused begins in Montréal, Chief Superintendent Gamache continues to struggle with actions he set in motion that bitter November, from which there is no going back. More than the accused is on trial. Gamache’s own conscience is standing in judgment.

In her latest utterly gripping book, number-one New York Times bestselling author Louise Penny shatters the conventions of the crime novel to explore what Gandhi called the court of conscience. A court that supersedes all others."

Anyone else thinking that Tree Pines is starting to rival Midsomer County as a haven for criminals and death? 

Further Associates of Sherlock Holmes edited by George Mann
Published by: Titan Books
Publication Date: August 29th, 2017
Format: Paperback, 304 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Once again, famous associates of the Great Detective – clients, colleagues and, of course, villains – tell their own stories in this collection of brand-new adventures. Meet Lucy Hebron years after Holmes’s only ever failed deduction; follow your nose down the streets of London with Toby the Dog; join Mrs Hudson on her first ever case; greet an ambassador from Mars alongside Lord Holdhurst; and confess your sins to your cellmate, Professor James Moriarty…"

Yeah George! Also yeah to Stuart Douglas, and all other writers I love in this collection!

Victoria and Abdul by Shrabni Basu
Published by: Vintage
Publication Date: August 29th, 2017
Format: Paperback, 352 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Soon to be a Major Motion Picture starring Dame Judi Dench from director Stephen Frears, releasing September 22, 2017.

Tall and handsome Abdul was just twenty-four years old when he arrived in England from Agra to wait at tables for Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee. Within a year, Abdul had grown to become a powerful figure at court, the Queen's teacher, or Munshi, her counsel on Urdu and Indian affairs, and a friend close to the Queen's heart. "I am so very fond of him.," Queen Victoria would write in 1888, "He is so good and gentle and understanding....a real comfort to me."

This marked the beginning of the most scandalous decade in Queen Victoria's long reign. Devastated first by the death of Prince Albert in 1861 and then her personal servant John Brown in 1883, Queen Victoria quickly found joy in an intense and controversial relationship with her Munshi, who traveled everywhere with her, cooked her curries and cultivated her understanding of the Indian sub-continent—a region, as Empress of India, she was long intrigued by but could never visit. The royal household roiled with resentment, but their devotion grew in defiance of all expectation and the societal pressures of their time and class and lasted until the Queen's death on January 22, 1901.

Drawn from never-before-seen first-hand documents that had been closely guarded secrets for a century, Shrabani Basu's Victoria and Abdul is a remarkable history of the last years of the 19th century in English court, an unforgettable view onto the passions of an aging Queen, and a fascinating portrayal of how a young Indian Muslim came to play a central role at the heart of the British Empire."

Firstly I was clued into this by Judi Dench on Graham Norton, then I saw the preview with Eddie Izzard, now I can't wait for the movie OR the book!

Monday, July 31, 2017

Tuesday Tomorrow

The Cottingley Secret by Hazel Gaynor
Published by: William Morrow
Publication Date: August 1st, 2017
Format: Hardcover, 416 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"One of BookBub's Most-Anticipated Books of Summer 2017!

The New York Times bestselling author of The Girl Who Came Home turns the clock back one hundred years to a time when two young girls from Cottingley, Yorkshire, convinced the world that they had done the impossible and photographed fairies in their garden. Now, in her newest novel, international bestseller Hazel Gaynor reimagines their story.

1917… It was inexplicable, impossible, but it had to be true—didn’t it? When two young cousins, Frances Griffiths and Elsie Wright from Cottingley, England, claim to have photographed fairies at the bottom of the garden, their parents are astonished. But when one of the great novelists of the time, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, becomes convinced of the photographs’ authenticity, the girls become a national sensation, their discovery offering hope to those longing for something to believe in amid a world ravaged by war. Frances and Elsie will hide their secret for many decades. But Frances longs for the truth to be told.

One hundred years later… When Olivia Kavanagh finds an old manuscript in her late grandfather’s bookshop she becomes fascinated by the story it tells of two young girls who mystified the world. But it is the discovery of an old photograph that leads her to realize how the fairy girls’ lives intertwine with hers, connecting past to present, and blurring her understanding of what is real and what is imagined. As she begins to understand why a nation once believed in fairies, can Olivia find a way to believe in herself?"

Even if I didn't love Hazel Gaynor's writing, it's about the Cottingley Fairies! MUST BUY!

The Bedlam Stacks by Natasha Pulley
Published by: Bloomsbury USA
Publication Date: August 1st, 2017
Format: Hardcover, 352 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The eagerly anticipated new novel from the author of THE WATCHMAKER OF FILIGREE STREET--a treacherous quest in the magical landscape of nineteenth-century Peru.

In 1859, ex-East India Company smuggler Merrick Tremayne is trapped at home in Cornwall after sustaining an injury that almost cost him his leg. On the sprawling, crumbling grounds of the old house, something is wrong; a statue moves, his grandfather's pines explode, and his brother accuses him of madness.

When the India Office recruits Merrick for an expedition to fetch quinine--essential for the treatment of malaria--from deep within Peru, he knows it's a terrible idea. Nearly every able-bodied expeditionary who's made the attempt has died, and he can barely walk. But Merrick is desperate to escape everything at home, so he sets off, against his better judgment, for a tiny mission colony on the edge of the Amazon where a salt line on the ground separates town from forest. Anyone who crosses is killed by something that watches from the trees, but somewhere beyond the salt are the quinine woods, and the way around is blocked.

Surrounded by local stories of lost time, cursed woods, and living rock, Merrick must separate truth from fairytale and find out what befell the last expeditions; why the villagers are forbidden to go into the forest; and what is happening to Raphael, the young priest who seems to have known Merrick's grandfather, who visited Peru many decades before. The Bedlam Stacks is the story of a profound friendship that grows in a place that seems just this side of magical."

I think it was the cover and Cornwall that sold me on this book...

On Her Majesty's Frightfully Secret Service by Rhys Bowen
Published by: Berkley
Publication Date: August 1st, 2017
Format: Hardcover, 304 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"In the new Royal Spyness Mystery from the New York Times bestselling author of Crowned and Dangerous, Lady Georgiana Rannoch juggles secret missions from the Queen, Darcy, and her mother. But it’s all in a day’s work when you’re thirty-fifth in line to the British Crown.

When Darcy runs off on another secret assignment, I am left to figure out how to travel to Italy sans maid and chaperone to help my dear friend Belinda, as she awaits the birth of her baby alone. An opportunity presents itself in a most unexpected way—my cousin the queen is in need of a spy to attend a house party in the Italian lake country. The Prince of Wales and the dreadful Mrs. Simpson have been invited, and Her Majesty is anxious to thwart a possible secret wedding.

What luck! A chance to see Belinda and please the queen as I seek her permission to relinquish my claim to the throne so I can marry Darcy. Only that’s as far as my good fortune takes me. I soon discover that Mummy is attending the villa party and she has her own secret task for me. Then, Darcy shows up and tells me that the fate of a world on the brink of war could very well depend on what I overhear at dinner! I shouldn’t be all that surprised when one of my fellow guests is murdered and my Italian holiday becomes a nightmare..."

Is it bothering anyone else how shitty the cover art has gotten in this series? 

Holding by Graham Norton
Published by: Berkley
Publication Date: August 1st, 2017
Format: Atria Books, 272 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"From Graham Norton, the BAFTA-award-winning Irish television host and author of the “sparkling and impish” (Daily Mail) memoirs The Life and Loves of a He Devil and So Me, comes a charming debut novel set in an idyllic Irish village where a bumbling investigator has to sort through decades of gossip and secrets to solve a mysterious crime.

The remote Irish village of Duneen has known little drama but when human remains are discovered on an old farm, suspected to be that of Tommy Burke—a former lover of two different inhabitants—the village’s dark past begins to unravel. As the frustrated sergeant PJ Collins struggles to solve a genuine case for the first time in his life, he unearths a community’s worth of anger and resentments, secrets and regret.

In this darkly comic, touching, and at times heartbreaking novel, perfect for fans of J.K. Rowling’s The Casual Vacancy, Graham Norton employs his acerbic wit to breathe life into a host of loveable characters, and explore—with searing honesty—the complexities and contradictions that make us human."

I love Graham. Hence any opportunity to promote his writing yes? 

The Address by Fiona Davis
Published by: Atria Books
Publication Date: August 1st, 2017
Format: Hardcover, 368 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Fiona Davis, author of The Dollhouse, returns with a compelling novel about the thin lines between love and loss, success and ruin, passion and madness, all hidden behind the walls of The Dakota—New York City’s most famous residence.

After a failed apprenticeship, working her way up to head housekeeper of a posh London hotel is more than Sara Smythe ever thought she’d make of herself. But when a chance encounter with Theodore Camden, one of the architects of the grand New York apartment house The Dakota, leads to a job offer, her world is suddenly awash in possibility—no mean feat for a servant in 1884. The opportunity to move to America, where a person can rise above one’s station. The opportunity to be the female manager of The Dakota, which promises to be the greatest apartment house in the world. And the opportunity to see more of Theo, who understands Sara like no one else...and is living in The Dakota with his wife and three young children.

In 1985, Bailey Camden is desperate for new opportunities. Fresh out of rehab, the former party girl and interior designer is homeless, jobless, and penniless. Two generations ago, Bailey’s grandfather was the ward of famed architect Theodore Camden. But the absence of a genetic connection means Bailey won’t see a dime of the Camden family’s substantial estate. Instead, her “cousin” Melinda—Camden’s biological great-granddaughter—will inherit almost everything. So when Melinda offers to let Bailey oversee the renovation of her lavish Dakota apartment, Bailey jumps at the chance, despite her dislike of Melinda’s vision. The renovation will take away all the character and history of the apartment Theodore Camden himself lived in...and died in, after suffering multiple stab wounds by a madwoman named Sara Smythe, a former Dakota employee who had previously spent seven months in an insane asylum on Blackwell’s Island.

One hundred years apart, Sara and Bailey are both tempted by and struggle against the golden excess of their respective ages—for Sara, the opulence of a world ruled by the Astors and Vanderbilts; for Bailey, the free-flowing drinks and cocaine in the nightclubs of New York City—and take refuge and solace in the Upper West Side’s gilded fortress. But a building with a history as rich—and often tragic—as The Dakota’s can’t hold its secrets forever, and what Bailey discovers in its basement could turn everything she thought she knew about Theodore Camden—and the woman who killed him—on its head.

With rich historical detail, nuanced characters, and gorgeous prose, Fiona Davis once again delivers a compulsively readable novel that peels back the layers of not only a famed institution, but the lives—and lies—of the beating hearts within."

Something about The Dakota has always fascinated me, beyond Rosemary's Baby and John Lennon, those big gas lights outside? Spooky. 

Hoodoo Harry by Joe R. Lansdale
Published by: MysteriousPress.com/Open Road
Publication Date: August 1st, 2017
Format: Kindle, 72 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A long-lost bookmobile opens a wild new chapter in the lives of dysfunctional Texas detectives Hap and Leonard—stars of the hit Sundance TV series.

Hap Collins is a straight, white, liberal, blue-collar tough guy. Leonard Pine is a gay, black, Republican combat veteran. Together, they’re the truest Lone Stars living in America’s most independently minded state. Best friends who’ve shared a succession of low-wage odd jobs that have gotten them into even odder situations dealing with lowlifes, now the duo delivers their own brand of ass-kicking justice as private investigators.

In this brand-new story, a day’s fishing lands Hap and Leonard their biggest catch ever: the Rolling Literature bookmobile. A pillar of rural African American communities in East Texas, the renovated school bus vanished fifteen years ago—along with its driver, Harriet Hoodalay, aka Hoodoo Harry—reappearing just in time to crash Leonard’s pickup into a creek. Behind the wheel was a twelve-year-old boy who didn’t survive the accident.

The kid was clearly running scared, but who was he running from and how did he end up in the driver’s seat of the missing bookmobile? The first solid lead in a case that started more than a decade earlier with Hoodoo Harry, this mystery of a small town’s dark and disturbing past will take all of Hap and Leonard’s wits—and fists—to solve.

Known for his “zest for storytelling and a gimlet eye for detail,” multiple award–winning author Joe R. Lansdale brings his rapid-fire dialogue, no-holds-barred action, and gut-busting humor to this original Hap and Leonard novella (Entertainment Weekly).

The Bibliomysteries are a series of short tales about deadly books, by top mystery authors."

Being a addict of the TV show, this is a nice way to ease myself from that to the book series. Which I REALLY must read NOW. Why? Because I can't wait for season three!

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