Category: reviews

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Blog Tour: Some Desperate Glory – Emily Tesh

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While we live, the enemy shall fear us. All her life Kyr has trained for the day she can avenge the destruction of planet Earth by an all-powerful, reality-shifting weapon known as the Wisdom. Raised in the bowels of Gaea Station alongside the last scraps of humanity, she is one of the best warriors of her generation, the sword of a dead planet. Then Command assigns her brother to certain death and relegates her to the nursery to bear sons until she dies trying and she knows she must take humanity’s revenge into her own hands. But she soon learns that not everything she’s been raised to believe is true and the Wisdom is far more complex and dangerous than she could ever have imagined. A thrillingly told space opera about the wreckage of war, the family you find and who you must become when every choice is stripped from you.

EMILY TESH is a World Fantasy award-winning author. She grew up in London and studied Classics at Trinity College, Cambridge, followed by a Master’s degree in Humanities at the University of Chicago. She now lives in Hertfordshire, where she passes her time teaching Latin and Ancient Greek to schoolchildren who have done nothing to deserve it. She has a husband and a cat. Neither of them knows any Latin yet, but it is not for lack of trying.

My thoughts: this was really good, set many years after a bitter war has destroyed Earth, where humans who believe they are the last of humanity left to face the Wisdom and it’s people wage a war only they are really fighting.

When Kyr starts to learn the truth and the messages she’s had drummed into her all her life break apart, at first she thinks she’s being tricked, but the more she learns, the new friends she makes, the more she realises that everything is wrong. The Wisdom and her commander are not correct either, something must change or they’re all doomed to repeat their mistakes over and over.

This is super clever, intelligent sci-fi but also highly enjoyable. It did get a bit meta at one point but I think I understood it! I like Kyr, she had so much to learn about the universe she lives in, and the people around her. And indeed about herself. Her relationship with her brother sustained her through all the complicated and dangerous things she had to do to make things right. Realising that Clara and the other Sparrows really could be her sisters, discovering that another species are just people, even her banter with Avi. She grew on me as she opened up and stepped into her birthright as the daughter of a heroic leader, who died trying to do what Kyr does – really help the humans of Gaea.

There are some funny moments, the most entertaining character being Yiso – a Prince of Wisdom who hates exercise and loves a spot of sarcasm. He and Kyr become close and she changes a lot because of their friendship. I loved Yiso too.

This was definitely one of those books you get to the end of and go “wait, no, there must be more!” as I can’t see how Kyr, Yiso and the rest of the gang won’t go on to have lots more adventures, foil a few more nefarious schemes and generally cause mayhem.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

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Blog Tour: Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers – Jesse Sutanto

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Tea-shop owner. Matchmaker. Detective?

Sixty-year-old self-proclaimed tea expert Vera Wong enjoys nothing more than sipping a good cup of Wulong and doing some healthy ‘detective’ work on the internet (AKA checking up on her son to see if he’s dating anybody yet).

But when Vera wakes up one morning to find a dead man in the middle of her tea shop, it’s going to take more than a strong Longjing to fix things. Knowing she’ll do a better job than the police possibly could – because nobody sniffs out a wrongdoing quite like a suspicious Chinese mother with time on her hands – Vera decides it’s down to her to catch the killer.

Nobody spills the tea like this amateur sleuth

My thoughts: this is very, very funny. Not exactly a surprise from the author of Dial A For Aunts and Four Aunties and a Wedding. Vera owns a small tea shop in San Francisco’s Chinatown and her life is pretty quiet until she finds a dead body in her shop one morning.

Gathering her suspects up, and building a found family along the way, she investigates the death, much to the irritation of Officer Grey at the local police station, who would rather she leave it alone.

Vera is delightful but you definitely don’t mess with her and she’s impossible to say no to. Everyone tries to, but somehow this Chinese Miss Marple bowls you along with her. It might be the mountains of food she keeps making, or just the way she carries on as though no one else spoke, but her determination to solve the mystery of the dead man in the tea shop is compelling.

The people she draws into her orbit, her suspects, slowly come to love her and bond with each other as they’re all lonely. Vera gives them advice and encouragement as well as keeping them very well fed (I was so hungry by the end of this book) so they become less alone and closed off. But does she solve the case? Well, you’ll have to read the book to find out!

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

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Blog Tour: Oblivion’s River – Shoshana Rain

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OblivionsRiver copy

Welcome to the book tour for Oblivion’s River by Shoshana Rain! If you enjoy spicy romance and Greek myths, you will love this!

22-295 Shoshana Rain Oblivion’s River

Oblivion’s River (The New Olympus #2)

Publication Date: February 28th

Genre: Romantic Fantasy/ HEA/ Greek Mythology

Oblivion’s River is a full-length, medium-burn, standalone fantasy romance with a guaranteed HEA. It contains steamy scenes and is an opposites attract romance. It is book two in The New Olympus series. While it is a standalone, reading the first book will provide the best reading experience.

Hephaestus:

I wanted to forget Lethe, to stop seeing her every time I closed my eyes. The goddess hunted me, tormented me, took away everything I am. She should rot away in Tartarus like she deserves.

But we need her. She’s the only one who can tell us where the rift knife is—and our very survival depends on it. I’m the only one who can get answers from her, so I’ll punish her, bend her, use her.

Until she gives me everything.

Lethe:

There are so many things I can’t remember. Who I hurt. Who hurt me. The location of the knife, the one I can trade for my freedom. I don’t want to remember. I’m happy in the darkness and silence, forgotten.

They don’t believe me, and when they drag me out of my prison, I find myself faced with a god I shouldn’t remember. But I do.

He wants to play a game, but I don’t play games. That’s why I’ll win.

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Strife’s Apple (The New Olympus #1)

Apollo:

As the God of Prophecy, it’s my duty to keep my fellow gods safe. And to do that, I need Eris. Which means retrieving the Goddess of Discord from the pits of Tartarus—where I left her, seven hundred years ago.

The now-freed goddess may think she can beat me, but I intend to tame her wildness before she destroys us all. I’ll do anything to save my family, including seducing her. And I’ll love every second of it. I’ll have the little goddess on her back, hands, knees, any and every way I can get her.

No matter what, I’ll bring her to heel.

Eris:
For seven hundred years, they kept me chained in darkness. For seven hundred years, I never saw sunlight, never knew joy, never spoke to another mortal—or god. Until Apollo came, and with the wave of one imperious hand, freed me.

I know he needs my help. The gods are fading, and only I can save them. Too bad I have no interest in anything beyond revenge.

Especially against him

Strife’s Apple is a full-length, medium-burn, standalone fantasy romance with a guaranteed HEA. It contains steamy scenes and is an opposites attract, enemies to lovers romance.

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About the Author

Shoshana Rain (1)

A lover of mythology, sexy romances, and heroines who give as good as they get, Shoshana knew she wanted to write fantasy romance since reading Kushiel’s Dart. When she’s not writing, she’s hanging out with her cat and trying to keep her garden alive in the harsh desert summer.

Shoshana Rain

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My thoughts: the current trend for retellings of Greek myths has thrown up some really interesting takes on old stories. In this series Shoshana Rain has looked at the various romances between gods and mortals. Hephasteus is the god of the forge, a son of Zeus and tormented by his love for Lethe (later one of the rivers that seperate the Underworld from the living) the goddess of forgetfulness.

Tormented by his love for a murderer, desperate to forget her, yet he’s needed to extract a secret she insists she can’t remember.

This is a really interesting take on the myth, and full of repressed emotions, manipulation and lust. As Lethe and Hepasteus try to resist their desire, tension builds. You’ll have to read it to find out how this ends!

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Blog Tour: Gin Palace – Tracy Whitwell

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Ever since Tanz discovered she could speak with the dead, life has become a whole lot more interesting. But after putting herself in grave danger helping to solve a grisly murder, she’s now determined to ignore the voices and put all that nasty business behind her. So when she’s offered another acting gig in her hometown of Newcastle, it feels like a perfect opportunity to spend some time with family and have a laugh with old friends. But the dead won’t stay quiet for long. Soon Tanz is being drawn back into their world, and this time, the danger is much closer to home . . .

Tracy Whitwell was born, brought up and educated in the north-east of England. She wrote plays and short stories from an early age, then in the nineties moved to London where she became a busy actress on stage and screen. After having her son, she wound down the acting to concentrate on writing full time. Many projects followed until she finally found the courage to write her first novel – The Accidental Medium, a work of fiction based on a whole heap of crazy truth and now a trilogy, with more to come. Today, Tracy lives in north London with her son, surrounded by a neverending supply or Aperol Spritzes and a coven of friends as spooky as she is. Tracy is nothing like her lead character Tanz. (This is a lie.)

My thoughts: I love Tanz, The Accidental Medium was great so I was really pleased to read Gin Palace. I love her friends, I love her little mam. It’s just a really fun book. Even with the scary ghost.

Tanz is in Newcastle to play a supporting role in a TV show, although she’s not thrilled about it. I think it’s the mini skirt and bad hair. While she’s there, she encounters the ghost of a small boy and then a really horrible one that possesses her pal Milo and gives her nightmares. With Sheila out of action in London, it’s up to Tanz to exorcise this mean spirit.

Luckily she meets Gladys, a fierce old lady healer who gives her the boost she needs to sort out the spook. She’s also got enough time to befriend and help the lead actress in the show and have a Sunday roast with her parents.

Tanz packs a lot in, from ghost walks and a few G&Ts with Milo, to learning how to channel her powers better. And while she enjoys being back home, she misses her flat and of course her cat, Inka (who’s being spoiled with cheese by the nice neighbour).

She’s a great protagonist, down to earth, very funny and her relationship with Frank from beyond the grave, as a sort of spirit guide, is entertaining. I like quirky, eccentric people and Tanz definitely is one, talking to the dead in her no nonsense way and racing around sorting everyone else out. I hope in her next adventure, she takes a bit of time for herself too.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

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Blog Tour: Murder at Waldenmere Lake – Michelle Salter

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A murder shocks the small town of Walden. And it’s only the beginning…
Walden, 1921. Local reporter Iris Woodmore is determined to save her beloved lake, Waldenmere, from destruction.
After a bloody and expensive war, the British Army can’t afford to keep the lake and build a convalescent home on its shores yet they still battle with Walden Council and a railway company for
ownership. But an old mansion used as an officer training academy stands where the railway company plans to build a lakeside hotel. It belongs to General Cheverton – and he won’t leave his home.
When the General is found murdered, it appears someone will stop at nothing to win the fight for Waldenmere. Iris thinks she can take on the might of the railway company and find the killer. But nothing prepares her for the devastation that’s to come…
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Michelle Salter is a historical crime fiction writer based in northeast Hampshire. Many local locations appear in her mystery novels. She’s also a copywriter and has written features for national
magazines. When she’s not writing, Michelle can be found knee-deep in mud at her local nature reserve. She enjoys working with a team of volunteers undertaking conservation activities.

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My thoughts: Iris is back in Walden and trying to help preserve the local mere, a beautiful nature spot and not something the locals want to see turned into a hotel or railway line. But they’re up against it, if the army sells their part of the land they can build a convalescent home, which is more popular.

Thankfully the owner of one section of land, General Cheverton, isn’t budging and he’s messing up the unpopular plans. Then he’s murdered. Iris thinks it must be linked to the proposed development but would the railway boss get his own hands dirty?

While all this is going on, she’s also having a great time with her pals, wandering the local lanes and enjoying the summer weather. But the case keeps nagging at her, so with the support of her boss at the paper, she starts digging. What she finds will be heartbreaking.

I really like this series, and Iris, although maybe her next case could hit a little further from home as so far it hasn’t been very happy for her.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

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Blog Tour: Bellevue – Alison Booth

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New South Wales, 1972. Following the death of her beloved Aunt Hilda, widow Clare Barclay inherits Bellevue, an historic property in the Blue Mountains township of Numballa, Australia. Giving up her teaching job to move to the mountains, Clare plans to restore the house to its original glory. She also hopes to track down a box of missing documents that may shed light on why husband Jack secretly second-mortgaged their former home.
Clare makes friends with the locals, including a young boy, Joe, and soon hears of plans to redevelop Numbulla and to exploit the land bordering the protected wilderness area. As she joins the protest against the rezoning, it’s clear someone doesn’t want her there and they’ll do anything to stop her…

Written from Clare’s and Joe’s perspectives, Bellevue highlights cross-generational bonds that grow between them as they struggle, individually and together, towards an acceptance of the losses each has sustained.

Born in Australia, Alison Booth gained a degree in architecture before transferring to economics. She is Professor Emeritus of Economics with a PhD from the London School of Economics and spent over two decades living and working in the UK before returning to Australia. She wrote her first novel at the age of nine, before other distractions set in.

Alison’s seventh published novel, Bellevue, will be out in March 2023. Her previous novels were published by Penguin and RedDoor. Her fiction has been translated into French and her short stories have appeared in international publications including Antipodes and New Writing. Awards include a Varuna Longlines Fellowship from the Eleanor Dark Foundation and the Highly Commended Award in the 2011 ACT Book of the Year Award. Her novels are: Stillwater Creek, The Indigo Sky, A Distant Land, A Perfect Marriage, The Philosopher’s Daughters and The Painting. For more information visit: https://www.alisonbooth.net/home

My thoughts: this was a really interesting book about community, friendship, outsiders and the environment. Clare inherits her late husband’s aunt’s house Bellevue in the small New South Wales town of Numballa. Hoping to build a new life and a permanent home for herself there, she finds that all is not well. Silent phone calls, vague threats, a car accident that probably isn’t an accident. Someone is trying to drive her away.

As the battle for the wilderness at the edge of her land heats up, she finds that she’s not alone. Other members of the local conservation group are also being harassed and frightened but Clare won’t give up.

She also meets Joe, a young boy with a love of birds, who draws beautiful pictures of them. Befriending him and offering him a safe space to work on his art, Clare expands her new world again.

Joe is struggling, after his mother’s death, left with an often absent older brother and a father who drinks too much, he’s a sensitive, artistic soul. Afraid to tell anyone except the local librarian of his passion, he’s sneaking into Clare’s hayloft to draw. Their unlikely friendship is a delight to read about. As Joe comes out of his shell, things seem to look up for his family too.

There’s a lot of heart in this book, and as Clare finds her place in Numballa, making friends and campaigning to save the wilderness, she slowly comes back to life after years in survival mode.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

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Blog Tour: His Fatal Legacy – Heather Atkinson

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Edinburgh 1896
Amy Alardyce’s once-perfect life is in tatters. Her eldest son, Robert, has come of age, become the master of his own home, and married his childhood love Jane. But with maturity has come a terrible legacy, and the dark desires Robert inherited from his evil father Matthew, are fighting to get loose.
Whilst Jane is working hard to get her and Robert accepted into fashionable society, poor women are being hunted on the streets of Edinburgh, and Amy fears her son is to blame. And once the infamous Inspector Murphy takes up the case, Amy has to face a stark choice – denounce her son as a monster or risk her own safety to protect him from the consequences of his lethal actions.
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Heather Atkinson is the author of over fifty books – predominantly in the crime
fiction genre. Although Lancashire born and bred she now lives with her family,
including twin teenage daughters, on the beautiful west coast of Scotland. Her
gangland series for Boldwood, set on the fictional Gallowburn estate in Glasgow
begins with the title Blood Brothers.

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My thoughts: Amy and Henry Alardyce are just too nice, they keep trying to save Robert from himself, from the darkness he’s inherited from his monstrous father, and in this installment of the Alardyces’ story, he’s actually trying as well. Married to the lovely Jane, father to a new baby daughter, he wants to change, to not bring the cruelty and violence within him home. But it keeps breaking out, and people are getting hurt.

I kept waiting for his Mr Hyde side to pop out and it did, learning to box leads him to almost kill a man, and his attacks on women continue. Now that the police, in the form of Inspector Murphy are on his tail, he’s running out of places to hide and his parents must decide what to do. Can Amy and Henry protect him anymore? And should they? I feel sorry for Jane, the Robert she knows isn’t all of him, and the part she doesn’t see is terrible. The village witch Magda (I love Magda) warns him that he will have to leave his family to protect it. Staying will have terrible consequences. More please!

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

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Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize Longlist Review: I’m a Fan – Sheena Patel

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Celebrating the international world of fiction in all its forms including poetry, novels, short stories and drama, the annual Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize is one of the most important awards for young writers, aimed at encouraging raw creative talent worldwide. The prize is named after the Swansea-born writer, Dylan Thomas, one of the most influential, internationally renowned writers of the mid-twentieth century, and invokes his memory to support the writers of today and nurture the talents of tomorrow.

The full longlist for 2023 is:

–               Limberlost byRobbie Arnott (Atlantic Books) – novel (Australia)

–               Seven Steeples by Sara Baume (Tramp Press) – novel (Ireland)

–               God’s Children Are Little Broken Things by Arinze Ifeakandu (Orion, Weidenfeld & Nicolson) – short story collection (Nigeria)

–               Maps Of Our Spectacular Bodies by Maddie Mortimer (Picador, Pan Macmillan) – novel (UK)

–               Phantom Gang by Ciarán O’Rourke (The Irish Pages Press) – poetry collection (Ireland)

–               Things They Lost by Okwiri Oduor (Oneworld) – novel (Kenya)

–               Losing the Plot by Derek Owusu (Canongate Books) – novel (UK)

–               I’m a Fan by Sheena Patel (Rough Trade Books) – novel (UK)

–               Send Nudes by Saba Sams (Bloomsbury Publishing) – short story collection (UK)

–               Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in Her Head by Warsan Shire (Chatto & Windus) – poetry collection (Somalia-UK)

–               Briefly, A Delicious Life by Nell Stevens (Picador, Pan Macmillan) – novel (UK)

–               No Land to Light On by Yara Zgheib (Atlantic Books, Allen & Unwin) – novel (Lebanon)

Worth £20,000, the Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize is one of the UK’s most prestigious literary prizes as well as the world’s largest literary prize for young writers. Awarded for the best published literary work in the English language, written by an author aged 39 or under, the Prize celebrates the international world of fiction in all its forms including poetry, novels, short stories and drama.

American poet, novelist and essayist Patricia Lockwood received the award in 2022 for her inventive debut novel, No One Is Talking About This (Bloomsbury Publishing). Chair of the 2022 Judges, Namita Gokhale, said: “No One Is Talking About This is a vital reflection on online culture today. A deeply timely winner, Patricia Lockwood is the voice of a generation of new writers who grew up under the constant pressures of real-time news and social media.”

The Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize shortlist will be announced on Thursday 23 March followed by the Winner’s Ceremony held in Swansea on Thursday 11 May, prior to International Dylan Thomas Day on Sunday 14 May.

In I’m A Fan a single speaker uses the story of their experience in a seemingly unequal, unfaithful relationship as a prism through which to examine the complicated hold we each have on one another. With a clear and unforgiving eye, the narrator unpicks the behaviour of all involved, herself included, and makes startling connections between the power struggles at the heart of human relationships and those of the wider world, in turn offering a devastating critique of access, social media, patriarchal heteronormative relationships, and our cultural obsession with status and how that status is conveyed. In this incredible debut, Sheena Patel announces herself as a vital new voice in literature, capable of rendering a range of emotions and visceral experiences on the page. Sex, violence, politics, tenderness, humour—Patel handles them all with both originality and dexterity of voice.

Sheena Patel is a writer and assistant director for film and TV who was born and raised in North West London. She is part of the 4 BROWN GIRLS WHO WRITE collective, has been published in 4 BROWN GIRLS WHO WRITE (Rough Trade Books) and a poetry collection of the same name (FEM Press). In 2022 she was chosen as one of the Observer’s Top 10 best debut novelists. I’m a Fan is her first book.Follow her on Twitter @Sheena_Patel_

My thoughts: I’m from the same part of North West London as the author and the narrator of this book, so every now and then as a place was mentioned I’d get a little surprise jolt of nostalgia. But otherwise the narrator and I are nothing alike. I couldn’t tell if this was purely fictional, autofiction or a mix of the two.

The obsession with “the man I want to be with” and his many girlfriends, especially the one she’s stalking on Instagram, the fact that he’s serially unfaithful to his wife, the way he toys with the narrator’s feelings and she never seems willing to just get away from him, the boyfriend she clearly doesn’t love anymore. All of it left me cold, we would not be friends.

The stream of consciousness style was interesting, the way it felt like the inner monologue of a young woman’s mind, her constant sense of being unbalanced, she knows none of this behaviour is healthy but yet can’t seem to break out of the cycle.

We all use social media to look at lives we want to live – the comparison, the shameless “where is that from?” and the copycatting of bits of other lives we can afford and hope will somehow make us more like them. This I could totally relate to. But her stalking of the other other woman, that I found a bit much.

As a story of obsession, emotional self harm this totally hits the mark. You’re not a fan, you’re obsessed and it needs to stop. Though I am now a fan of Sheena Patel, can’t wait to see what she writes next.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

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Blog Tour: Reservoir – Livi Michael

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Acclaimed novelist Livi Michael returns with a tense novel about memory, guilt and reinvention, and the dangerous power games played by children and adults.

At the International Conference Centre in Geneva, Hannah Rossier, formerly Annie Price, comes face to face with Neville Weir, someone from her childhood whom she never expected, or wanted, to meet again. As Neville’s reasons for attending the conference become clear, the dark waters of Hannah’s past start to rise. Hannah is a psychotherapist, with a specialist interest in memory and how connections are made between past and present. She has reinvented herself successfully, moving from a small northern town in England to Lucerne, Switzerland, with her husband, Thibaut.

Nobody, not even Hannah, knows the full truth about herself. Her ‘memories’ consist of glimpses of the place where she played in childhood, known simply as ‘The Wild’. Over the three days of the conference, she has to decide whether she can avoid Neville, or whether she should submit to an encounter with him and with her past. And in her keynote lecture about the neuroscience of memory, how much to conceal or reveal. But can her specialism save her from drowning?

LIVI MICHAEL has published seven previous novels for adults: Rebellion; Succession; Accession; Under a Thin Moon which won the Arthur Welton award; Their Angel Reach which won the Faber Prize; All the Dark Air which was shortlisted for the Mind Award; and Inheritance, which won a Society of Authors Award.

She has also published several novels for young adults and children and her short stories have been published in several magazines and anthologies. Livi has two sons and lives in Greater Manchester. She teaches creative writing at Manchester Metropolitan University and has been a senior lecturer in Creative Writing at Sheffield Hallam University.

My thoughts: a terrible incident from her childhood haunts Professor Hannah Rossier but she has been able to bury it deep enough to work, marry, build a reputation, until now when an unfriendly face from the past tries to bring her world down.

Neville was a slightly strange little boy who followed Hannah (then known as Annie) and her friend Joanna around, spying on them in the way of lonely, socially awkward kids. He was caught up in the incident and blames Hannah for the shape his life took. Although she was also a child at the time.

This was incredibly fascinating, I used to play in the woods with my friend at about the same age, and we were forever coming home soaking wet or coated in mud, famously once without a shoe (left in the sinking mud that took it) but luckily nothing serious ever happened. Children’s memories are often terrible and since we know that the part of the brain that understands consequences doesn’t develop till later, they can’t always explain their actions.

To place so much blame, although Neville insists it’s not about blame, on another child, is very wrong. It was the adults (his parents, teachers, social workers, police) who let him down, who punished him wrongly, who didn’t see that he was innocent, not Hannah. Indeed they hadn’t seen each other for 40 years and she had no idea what had happened to him. Her own experience was difficult enough.

The events at the conference, the confrontation, when it comes, is shocking. Neville carries so much anger, despite overcoming it all, despite his career and life now. It would be like carrying resentment of our childhood slights or bullies all our lives – it’s not healthy.

Hannah is confused and hurt by his accusations, by his genuine anger. He can’t even really say what it is he wants from her. He insists it’s not an apology he wants, but can’t articulate it. Jopi, the conference host, attempts to resolve things, but I don’t know if it actually makes it worse. There’s still a lot unresolved at the end and I found it unsettling not knowing how any of the characters were going to move ahead.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

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Blog Tour: The Space Between Us – Doug Johnstone

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Lennox is a troubled teenager with no family. Ava is eight months pregnant and fleeing her abusive husband. Heather is a grieving mother and cancer sufferer. They don’t know each other, but when a meteor streaks over Edinburgh, all three suffer instant, catastrophic strokes … …only to wake up the following day in hospital, miraculously recovered.

When news reaches them of an octopus-like creature washed up on the shore near where the meteor came to earth, Lennox senses that some extra-terrestrial force is at play. With the help of Ava, Heather and a journalist, Ewan, he rescues the creature they call ‘Sandy’ and goes on the run. But they aren’t the only ones with an interest in the alien … close behind are Ava’s husband, the police and a government unit who wants to capture the creature, at all costs. And Sandy’s arrival may have implications beyond anything anyone could imagine…

Doug Johnstone is the author of fourteen previous novels, most recently Black Hearts (2022). The Big Chill (2020) was longlisted for the Theakston Crime Novel of the Year and three of his books, A Dark Matter (2020), Breakers (2019) and The Jump (2015), have been shortlisted for the McIlvanney Prize for Scottish Crime Novel of the Year.

He’s taught creative writing and been writer in residence at various institutions over the last decade, and has been an arts journalist for over twenty years. Doug is a songwriter and musician with six albums and three EPs released, and he plays drums for the Fun Lovin’ Crime Writers, a band of writers. He’s also co-founder of the Scotland Writers Football Club, and has a PhD in nuclear physics.

My thoughts: at first I was disappointed it wasn’t a new Skelfs book but then I read it and now I want more Sandy & the Gang (as I am calling them). I loved Sandy the cephalopod from space. There’s several incredibly touching moments between them and the humans they’ve bonded with, Lennox, Ava and Heather, especially when Sandy can help check on Ava’s unborn baby for her. That was so lovely. All Sandy wants is to be reunited with the rest of their kind, fleeing from an invasion of their home. They’ve picked Earth even though it might not be super friendly because presumably the waters here are suitable and have the right environment for them.

Unfortunately a government organisation, possibly MI7, also wants Sandy and not for friendly reasons. Why are we so hostile to the idea of other people? It feels very timely with the current carry on in Westminster about refugees. Sandy and their kind are fleeing danger too, and they just want to be safe here on Earth in the sea loch off Ullapool. Which I’m sure the fish have no issues with, just the humans.

Funny, warm, with a huge heart and lots of brains (octopus have mini brains in each of their tentacles, so maybe Sandy does too!) and a real sense of the ridiculous (the ancient camper van, Sandy in a rucksack, waving), this is lovely and I hope there’s more. As Lennox says “now what, Sandy?”

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.