“Life is both fleeting and dangerous, and there is no point in denying yourself pleasure, or being anything other than what you are.”
New York, 1940. Young, glamorous and inseparable, Vivian and Celia are chasing trouble from one end of the city to the other. But there is risk in all this play – that’s what makes it so fun, and so dangerous. Sometimes, the world may feel like it’s ending, but for Vivian and Celia, life is just beginning.

City of Girls is about daring to break conventions and follow your desires: a celebration of glamour, resilience, growing up, and the joys of female friendship – and about the freedom that comes from finding a place you truly belong.

Published by Bloomsbury UK April 7th 2020 (PB)

Oh MY. This book was EVERYTHING. You know when you get that perfect book for the perfect moment? City of Girls was THAT book. Transporting me from the worry and concern of the moment right to the very heart of 1940’s New York

This is the epic story of Vivian, a naive young woman from a good family, thrust into the glamour and flamboyance of the New York theatre scene in its heyday and her life as a revolutionary, independent woman who learns to accept herself for who she is

It’s told in a conversational tone as Vivian, now an elderly lady, tells her story in a letter. I adored the way it’s written. I was captivated by the confessional and chatty style which feels as if she is talking directly to you. It’s fascinating and exciting, I never wanted to stop reading

Both New York itself and the era are vividly brought to life – with fashions described in breathtaking detail and characters brought to life in such a way they leap from the page. It’s incredibly fun and racy, but poignant and touching too.

Vivian will stay with me for a long time to come, and City of Girls has earned a place on my favourite ever shelf. I LOVED it so much and would recommend it over and over

Thank you @tandemcollectiveuk for inviting me to participate in this wonderful #readalong

Drawing on Maggie O’Farrell’s long-term fascination with the little-known story behind Shakespeare’s most enigmatic play, HAMNET is a luminous portrait of a marriage, at its heart the loss of a beloved child.

Warwickshire in the 1580s. Agnes is a woman as feared as she is sought after for her unusual gifts. She settles with her husband in Henley street, Stratford, and has three children: a daughter, Susanna, and then twins, Hamnet and Judith. The boy, Hamnet, dies in 1596, aged eleven. Four years or so later, the husband writes a play called Hamlet.

Award-winning author Maggie O’Farrell’s new novel breathes full-blooded life into the story of a loss usually consigned to literary footnotes, and provides an unforgettable vindication of Agnes, a woman intriguingly absent from history.

Published March 2020 by Tinder Press

It’s taken me a few days to compose my review of this stunning book and even now I’m certain I won’t be able to do it justice. This book is STUNNING

Telling the fictional story of the little known wife of Shakespeare, Agnes (Anne) Hathaway, it gives voice to the voiceless from a time where women were erased from history books in favour of men

I adored Agnes – ethereal, wise, spiritual and courageous. Her spirit shone though the pages as vividly as the rich and evocative descriptions of sixteenth century England. It’s harrowing at times, with themes of loss and grief and a coincidental parallel to the difficulties we currently face today. But it’s also inspiring and I adored every moment

My knowledge of Shakespeare is hazy at best, so if that’s you too don’t be put off. O’Farrell chooses not even to name him, making this uniquely Agnes’s story. Fans of The Familiars, The Doll Factory and The Binding are sure to find their next historical fiction fix here and love Hamnet as much as I did. It really is historical fiction at it’s very best

Thanks to the wonderful @tandemcollectiveuk for inviting me to be part of the fantastic #Hamnetreadalong

Eight classic murders.
A single crime obsessive.
Countless thrilling twists.

A series of unsolved murders with one thing in common: each of the deaths bears an eerie resemblance to the crimes depicted in classic mystery novels.

The deaths lead FBI Agent Gwen Mulvey to mystery bookshop Old Devils. Owner Malcolm Kershaw had once posted online an article titled ‘My Eight Favourite Murders,’ and there seems to be a deadly link between the deaths and his list – which includes Agatha Christie’s The ABC Murders, Patricia Highsmith’s Strangers on a Train and Donna Tartt’s The Secret History.

Can the killer be stopped before all eight of these perfect murders have been re-enacted? 

Published March 3rd 2020 by Faber Books  

I talk often about my relationship with my Grandmother and how she instilled a love of books in me. She adored crime, Murder and Mystery and if she was here today this is absolutely a book I’d be pressing into her hands. I know she’d love it!

While I have to admit to not reading an awful lot of classic crime, I know enough to have got this book, and I definitely think that fans of the genre would really enjoy it. With reference to all the big classics, it has all the ingredients of an old fashioned who done it.

I loved how the eight classic murder mysteries formed the basis for this book, it was such a unique story and has definitely inspired me to pick some of them up. I thought the many twists and turns were very clever, and I was kept constantly on my toes.

Rules For Perfect Murders is a gripping, fast paced read which I really, really enjoyed. It’s clever, twisty and despite me not being familiar with the classic murder mysteries featured, I got it. I loved the tension, the characters, the clever twists and yes, the sense of nostalgia even, which it evoked. Thoroughly entertaining and well worth a read.

Thanks to the publisher my my gifted copy

The river can take you home. But the river can also drag you under…

‘It’s something she learned years ago – the hard way – and that she knows she will never forget: even the sweetest fruit will fall and rot into the earth, eventually. No matter how deep you bury the pain, the bones of it will rise up to haunt you … like the echoes of a summer’s night, like the river flowing relentlessly on its course.’

Margot Sorrell didn’t want to go home. She had spent all her adult life trying not to look behind. But a text from her sister Lucy brought her back to Somerset. ‘I need you.’

As Margot, Lucy and their eldest sister, Eve, reunite in the house they grew up in beside the river, the secrets they keep from each other, and from themselves, refuse to stay hidden. A wedding brings them together but long-simmering resentments threaten to tear the family apart. No one could imagine the way this gathering would change them all forever. And through the sorrow they are forced to confront, there is a chance that healing will also come. But only if the truth is told. 

Published 19th March 2019 by Orion (UK)

~ Review ~ 

As soon as I heard about The River Home, I wanted to read it. I’d read Secrets Of The Tides by Hannah Richell a few years ago and really enjoyed it, and stories that involve a large family home and dark secrets are absolutely my thing. I was most definitely in!

The River Home delivers on all counts for me. It’s got that wonderful, quintessentially English country home, a cast of interesting characters and a series of dark, deeply hidden secrets bubbling beneath the surface and ready to explode.

Hannah Richell’s writing is captivating and compelling. Very early on I was transported into this novel and the pages turned effortlessly. The three sisters, Eve, Lucy and Margot have distinct and individual personalities which made them very easy to relate to and become invested in, while their larger than life mother, Kit brims with eccentricity.

The book switches between the present, where Lucy is getting married in incredible haste and bringing the estranged family back together for the first time in years, and the past which reveals the events that lead to the fractures between them. I wasn’t expecting the turn it took, and felt incredibly moved at times by this story.

I flew through this book, finding large chunks of time passed easily while I was absorbed in this emotional and moving story. It’s a complex story of the betrayals and miscommunication that can tear a family apart, with the inspiring message that it’s never too late to put the pieces back together.

Many thanks to the publisher for my gifted copy

Three extraordinary lives intertwine across oceans and centuries.

On the banks of the River Seine in 1899, a heartbroken young woman takes her final breath before plunging into the icy water. Although she does not know it, her decision will set in motion an astonishing chain of events. It will lead to 1950s Norway, where a grieving toymaker is on the cusp of a transformative invention, all the way to present-day Canada, where a journalist battling a terrible disease, drowning in her own lungs, risks everything for one last chance to live.

Moving effortlessly across time and space and taking inspiration from an incredible true story, Coming Up for Air is a bold, richly imagined novel about love, loss, and the immeasurable impact of every human life.

Published 19th March 2020 by Doubleday/Transworld UK

Coming Up For Air is a book that I hadn’t heard of until just over a week ago. I’m surprised, because after reading it I genuinely think it’s a book that deserves more attention and needs shouting about more. I know some of my fellow book pals would adore it too.

Telling three different stories in three different time frames, they appear at first unconnected although water and drowning soon become an apparent theme. In 1899 Paris, an unknown and unidentified young woman – L’Inconnue – is pulled lifeless from the Seine. In 1950’s Norway, a grieving toy maker is on the verge of a lifesaving invention and in the present day Canada, forty year old Cystic Fibrosis sufferer, Anouk, awaits a life changing lung transplant.

I adored this book, the writing is lyrical and richly descriptive – particularly L’inconnue’s story which was my favourite. The individual stories are told in alternating chapters, and despite the apparent lack of connection, each one was easy enough to fall back into and there was no disjointedness to the book at all.

It’s towards the end where the connection is revealed and it both took me by surprise and moved me intensely. With some fact woven into the fictitious story, it was a revelation and incredibly interesting. I genuinely don’t think I will do a certain aspect of my jobs training again without thinking of this book. I often say that a book will stay with me, but this one absolutely will.

I feel I’ve had to be vague, because I really don’t want to ruin the book for anyone who reads it. I would urge anyone who enjoys entangled timelines, moving and poetic writing with a literary feel that will both engage, challenge and move you, to give this book a go. A unique, fascinating story – I recommend it highly

Thanks to the publisher for my gifted copy

Where do you see yourself in five years?

Type-A Manhattan lawyer Dannie Kohan has been in possession of her meticulously crafted answer since she understood the question. On the day that she nails the most important job interview of her career and gets engaged to the perfect man, she’s well on her way to fulfilling her life goals.

That night Dannie falls asleep only to wake up in a different apartment with a different ring on her finger, and in the company of a very different man. The TV is on in the background, and she can just make out the date. It’s the same night – December 15th – but 2025, five years in the future.

It was just a dream, she tells herself when she wakes, but it felt so real… Determined to ignore the odd experience, she files it away in the back of her mind.
That is, until four and a half years later, when Dannie turns down a street and there, standing on the corner, is the man from her dream…

In Five Years is a love story, brimming with joy and heartbreak. But it is definitely not the love story you’re expecting.

Published March 10th 2020 by Quercus

~ Review ~

This is one of those books that I’d seen everywhere. It was making waves across book twitter and bookstagram and everyone was raving about it. Yes, I was completely sucked in by the hype and FOMO, desperately trying to get my hands on a copy by entering every competition going but it wasn’t until it popped up on Amazon Vine a couple of weeks ago that I finally got my mitts on it.

* The hype was 100% Justified *

I started this book almost immediately, and within seconds was completely and utterly captivated. Rebecca Serle’s writing is just stunning and with a magical little twist early on, where main protagonist Dannie catches a brief glimpse of a surprising future, I was caught – Hook, Line and sinker – and devoured this story in two wonderful sittings.

In Five Years is exactly the type of love story I adore. It’s smart, surprising, tender, emotional, flawed and raw. I thought I had this book weighed up right from the start. Nope. While it might not have been the love story I expected, I utterly adored it and my heart both soared and shattered in tiny pieces through the duration of this book. Dannie is written with such clarity that, despite being the very antithesis of myself, I understood her wholeheartedly.

Love isn’t all hearts and rainbows, and isn’t always about the epic romance – and In Five Years reflects this beautifully. I know in five years, I’ll still remember this book and feel gratitude. Because that’s what this book is ultimately all about. Being grateful for the people who love you and living every moment.

I read a free proof copy courtesy of the publisher & the Amazon Vine program

Two Lives. Two Loves. One Impossible Choice.

Lydia and Freddie. Freddie and Lydia. They’ve been together for almost a decade, and Lydia thinks their love is indestructible.

But she’s wrong. Because on her 27th birthday, Freddie dies in a car accident.

So now it’s just Lydia, and all she wants to do is hide indoors and sob ’til her eyes fall out. But Lydia knows that Freddie would want her to live her life well. So, enlisting the help of his best friend and her sister Elle, she takes her first tentative steps into the world and starts to live – perhaps even to love – again.

But then something inexplicable happens, which gives her another chance at her old life with Freddie. A life where none of the tragic events of the past few months have happened. But what if there’s someone in in her new life who wants her to stay?

Published March 5th 2020 by Viking – Penguin Uk

I read One Day In December a couple of years ago and knew Josie Silver was a master at beautiful love stories, hope and heartache and The Two Lives Of Lydia Bird didn’t disappoint in any way. I spent this book either sloppy smiling or bawling my eyes out, every page bursting with emotion that is impossible not to become completely involved in.

Lydia Bird is planning her wedding to her childhood sweetheart, Freddie, when he is tragically killed. Stricken with grief, Lydia looks for a way to ease her pain but instead finds a gateway to another life. One where the accident never happened and Freddie is very much alive and well – where Lydia finds herself torn between two lives.

The love story between Lydia and Freddie is epic. True childhood sweethearts, it’s tender and honest. Lydia’s grief at loosing him is profound – honestly, I physically felt her pain, it is so well written. Yet I also felt genuine hope and joy while reading this book, the relationships are exquisite – far from perfect but filled with warmth and depth. I loved the support system around Lydia, as her friends and family battle their own grief, concern and at times frustration with sometimes awkward but always sincere and heartwarming care and love.

I adored the ‘two lives’ element, which adds a little unexplainable magic to the story. I felt this was a beautiful way to allow the reader to really understand the dynamics of the relationship between Lydia, Freddie and also some of their close friends. This is a gorgeous book, I was completely engrossed in Lydia’s world (s) and felt like I travelled an emotional rollercoaster with her. It’s so damn romantic and genuinely heartwarming without being sickly sweet. I loved it and recommend it highly.

Thanks to the publisher for sending me a gifted copy for review.

An era-defining novel about the relationship between a fifteen-year-old girl and her teacher

ALL HE DID WAS FALL IN LOVE WITH ME AND THE WORLD TURNED HIM INTO A MONSTER

Vanessa Wye was fifteen-years-old when she first had sex with her English teacher. She is now thirty-two and in the storm of allegations against powerful men in 2017, the teacher, Jacob Strane, has just been accused of sexual abuse by another former student. Vanessa is horrified by this news, because she is quite certain that the relationship she had with Strane wasn’t abuse. It was love. She’s sure of that.

Forced to rethink her past, to revisit everything that happened, Vanessa has to redefine the great love story of her life – her great sexual awakening – as rape. Now she must deal with the possibility that she might be a victim, and just one of many. Nuanced, uncomfortable, bold and powerful, My Dark Vanessa goes straight to the heart of some of the most complex issues our age.

Published 31 March 2020 by @4thestatebooks

My Dark Vanessa has attracted a lot of interest around the book community, and the likelihood is you’ve heard about it. It’s right that it’s received so much exposure as this is absolutely a book that should be read.

Telling the story of Vanessa, who at fifteen is groomed by her teacher and struggles to come to terms later in life that this was not in fact a love story, but sexual abuse and she is a victim . It’s one of the most uncomfortable books I’ve read, yet the writing is so utterly compelling that it is hard to look away.

My Dark Vanessa will certainly push your boundaries as a reader. As the mother of a fifteen year old, it horrified me. . It’s a difficult book to find the words to review. It’s excellent, but it’s also harrowing. The depths of Vanessa’s vulnerability are shattering and the anger and disgust it provokes are intense. This is a book that needs to be read. It will challenge you, unnerve you and will have you thinking about it long after you finish the last word

Thanks to the publisher and netgalley for my #gifted e-arc

Shocking, tense and sharply written, The Poison Garden is the gripping new novel from the international bestseller and Edgar award-winning Alex Marwood.

Where Romy grew up, if someone died you never spoke of them again.

Now 22, she has recently escaped the toxic confines of the cult she was raised in. But Romy is young, pregnant and completely alone – and if she is to keep herself safe in this new world, she has some important lessons to learn.

Like how there are some people you can trust, and some you must fear. And about who her family really is, and why her mother ran away from them all those years ago.

And that you can’t walk away from a dark past without expecting it to catch up with you…

Published July 2019 by Alex Marwood

~ Review ~

I’ve just been lucky enough to take part in my first read along over on Instagram and what a great book to start with! There was lots of discussion material and some great questions posed by my fellow readalongers. You can check out some of my thoughts in my Instagram story highlights

I’m not really sure what I was expecting with this book and it certainly kept me guessing from beginning to end. Even 3/4 way through, I had no idea where it was going to go. It made for gripping reading!

I’m going to be vague about the plot, because part of the thrill of this book was the unexpected. I found the Cult aspect fascinating and at the same time sinister and uneasy. The characters are flawed and messy and their actions and responses gave me a lot to think about

The Poison Garden, despite appearances, isn’t your run of the mill thriller. In fact it’s more of a character study and exploration of manipulation, conditioning, vulnerability, power and obsession. It’s dark and at times harrowing but always compelling. It does leave some unanswered question and the ending was a little abrupt, however it’s certainly a book that I’ll remember with a chill. I recommend!

Thanks to Tandem Collective and Sphere/Little Brown UK for my gifted copy

Twenty-five years ago, a sixteen-year-old schoolgirl and her charismatic teacher disappeared without trace…

In an elite Catholic girls’ boarding-school the pupils live under the repressive, watchful gaze of the nuns. Seeking to break from the cloistered atmosphere two of the students – Louisa and Victoria – quickly become infatuated with their young, bohemian art teacher, and act out passionately as a result. That is, until he and Louisa suddenly disappear.

Years later, a journalist uncovers the troubled past of the school and determines to resolve the mystery of the missing pair. The search for the truth will uncover a tragic, mercurial tale of suppressed desire and long-buried secrets. It will shatter lives and lay a lost soul to rest.

The Temple House Vanishing is a stunning, intensely atmospheric novel of unrequited longing, dark obsession and uneasy consequences

Published 20th February 2020 by Atlantic Books

A dark and brooding building, deep obsessions and a chilling mystery – The Temple House Vanishing was ticking all my boxes from the moment I unwrapped it and took in that gorgeous cover. Settling down to read it on a wild and stormy night, I was swiftly consumed by this deeply atmospheric and intense story.

The book is told in dual time line of alternating chapters. In the present, an unnamed journalist is on a quest to detangle and solve the mysterious disappearance of sixteen year old Louisa, who vanished 25 years ago along with her young, handsome and charismatic teacher while the past is revealed tantalisingly slowly, burning with emotional intensity and nothing is quite how it seems.

The writing is just breathtaking, evoking the heightened emotions of the teenage girls living in a rural boarding school run by nuns. Jealousy, infatuation, secrets and insecurity crackle through the pages, while the brooding and wild setting is vividly atmospheric, cloaking the reader in heavy tension. The present is just as chilling, with the journalist narrator remaining almost as mysterious and obsessive as the case itself.

I loved this book. Haunting and chilling, it both unnerved and unsettled me and tore my heart apart just a little. It’s one of those books that become all-consuming when you read them, leaving you slightly dazed and needing a moment to adjust to reality when you put it down. Beautifully written, this is a story I’ll remember for a long time to come.

Thank you to the publishers for my beautiful gifted copy