Tag: reviews

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: The Pawnshop of Stolen Dreams – Victoria Williamson, illustrated by James Brown

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In a strange little village called Witchetty Hollow, eleven-year-old Florizel is the first to run into the curious visitors who’ve come to open a brand new Daydream Delicatessen and sack-baby factory.

At first, it seems the daydream confection and cheap sack children are the best things that could have happened to the poor folk of the Hollow – after all, who has the money to rent their child from Storkhouse Services these days? But after a few weeks, Florizel starts to notice something odd happening to the adults of the town. First, they seem dreamy, then they lose all interest in their jobs and families. Soon they’re trading all their worldly goods in the newly-opened Pawnshop for money to buy daydreams. With no money for rent payments, the children of Witchetty Hollow are being reclaimed by Storkhouse Services at an alarming rate. Florizel needs to act.

A magical tale of intrigue and adventure from award-winning children’s author Victoria Williamson

About the Author

Victoria Williamson grew up in Glasgow, Scotland, and has worked as an educator in a number of different countries, including as an English teacher in China, a secondary science teacher in Cameroon, and a teacher trainer in Malawi.

As well as degrees in Physics and Mandarin Chinese, she has completed a Masters degree in Special Needs in Education. In the UK she works as a primary school special needs teacher, working with children with a range of additional support needs including Autistic Spectrum Disorder, Down Syndrome, physical disabilities and behavioural problems.

She is currently working as a full time writer of Middle Grade and YA contemporary fiction, science fiction and fantasy, with a focus on creating diverse characters reflecting the many cultural backgrounds and special needs of the children she has worked with, and building inclusive worlds where all children can see a reflection of themselves in heroic roles.

Victoria’s experiences teaching young children in a school with many families seeking asylum inspired her debut novel, The Fox Girl and the White Gazelle, an uplifting tale of redemption and unlikely friendship between Glaswegian bully Caylin and Syrian refugee Reema.

Twenty percent of her author royalties for The Fox Girl and the White Gazelle are donated to the Scottish Refugee Council.

You can find out more about Victoria’s books, school visits and upcoming events on her website: http://www.strangelymagical.com

My thoughts: this was a fun, magical story for independent readers, known as Middle Grade in publishing terms (which makes little sense in the UK, I know). I think a 9-10 year old would enjoy this as Florizel and Burble are about that age.

It’s a story about finding your place, your family, and defeating the evil Gobbelinos who turn all the adults into idiots and risk the children being taken away from them forever. Thankfully Florizel is clever and resourceful and Burble, helps. Their relationship is sweet, he’s a bit like a talking dog – he eats everything and is a bit clueless but loveable. Gently entertaining.

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: Seat 97 – Tony Bassett

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SEAT 97: wrong place, wrong time: the mystery of a very public murder
A man who had it coming, or mistaken identity?
People are finding their seats for a soul concert when a shot rings out. David Barron crumples to the floor. Next to him, journalist Nick Colton and his wife, Greta, step in to help.
The assassin quickly escapes from the building. Realising this might be the scoop of his life, Nick rushes after him.
Although the man evades him – perhaps a good thing, seeing as he is holding a gun – Nick is determined to find the killer. Despite the misgivings of the police.
So who was David Barron and why was he shot? Why was he holding the lethal ticket for Seat 97?
Can you work out the mystery?
This is a totally gripping standalone crime mystery set in London that will keep you guessing.

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Author Bio – Tony Bassett, a former Fleet Street journalist, has had seven crime novels published so far.
This latest book, Seat 97, introduces Nick Colton, a journalist who is swept up into a murder investigation. It is a standalone novel which may possibly lead to a series. The book is published by London-based independent publishers The Book Folks, who specialise in crime fiction.
Tony is best known for his Midlands series of crime novels featuring DCI Gavin Roscoe and DS Sunita Roy (Murder On Oxford Lane, The Crossbow Stalker, Murder Of A Doctor and Out For Revenge, all published by the Book Folks).
He first developed a love of writing at the age of nine when he and a friend produced a magazine called the Globe at their junior school in Sevenoaks, Kent. When he reached his teenage years, growing up in Tunbridge Wells, his local vicar staged one of his plays, about Naboth’s Vineyard.
At Hull University, Tony was named student journalist of the year in 1971 in a competition run by Time-Life magazine and went onto become a national newspaper journalist, mainly working for the Sunday People in both its newsroom and investigations department.
His very first book to be published, the crime novel Smile Of The Stowaway, was released in December 2018. It concerns a Kent couple who harbour a stowaway and then battle to clear his name when he is charged with murder.
Then, in March 2020, the spy novel The Lazarus Charter, was released. It involves foreign agents operating in the UK. The book has kindly been endorsed by Marina Litvinenko, widow of the murdered Russian dissident Alexander Litvinenko, and by Stan and Caroline Sturgess, parents of the innocent mother-of-three poisoned with novichok in Salisbury in 2018.
Tony has five grown-up children. He is a Life Member of the National Union of Journalists. He lives in South-East London with his partner Lin.

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My thoughts: this was a really interesting, fast paced and clever crime read. When the man next to him at the Royal Albert Hall is shot dead, chaos erupts, but smart thinking journalist Nick gives chase to the gunman. He ever gets a snap of the getaway car.

The story of a lifetime, or so it seems, as Nick carries out his own investigation, despite the police disapproval. He seems to be able to get a lot more information out of people – even though he’s a journalist, his proximity to the victim seems to make people willing to open up. He gets a lot more than the police do.

A second murder muddies the waters, the victim was also at the fateful concert, but Nick carefully untangles that one too. The police come across as a little bit slow, Nick’s finding the clues and answers on his own, and their whole team aren’t getting anywhere as fast. Luckily he’s a nice guy and shares his findings.

I really enjoyed this book, and could see it easily becoming a series. Nick’s a great protagonist, and clearly has a nose for investigating knotty cases.

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: A Dead Herring – Helen Golden

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BREAKING NEWS Urshall United FC Owner Dies at Drew Castle.
Details are sketchy at this stage, but it is believed businessman Ben Rhodes (38) was found dead in his bathroom at the king’s Scottish home by his twin brother Max, where the pair were guests at a
shooting party hosted by Lord Frederick Astley (39), brother of Lady Beatrice (36). The cause of Mr Rhodes’ death is not known, but he started receiving death threats from football fans after his
controversial takeover of the club and had recently employed his own personal security.
How unlucky can a girl get? Is fate playing a cruel trick on her for boorish Detective Chief Inspector Richard Fitzwilliam to be the only person who can get to the snowed-in castle to investigate Ben Rhodes’s death? And with no other external resources available to him, he now needs her, her smart dog, and her best friends’ help to catch the killer. Can they put their issues behind them and
work together to find the murderer before the weather improves and the perpetrator is free to leave?
Another page-turning cozy British whodunnit with a hint of humour from author Helen Golden.
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Hello. I’m Helen Golden. I write British contemporary cozy whodunnits with a hint of humour. I live in a small village in Lincolnshire in the UK with my husband, my step-daughter, her two cats, our two
dogs, sometimes my step-son, and our tortoise.
I used to work in senior management, but after my recent job came to a natural end I had the opportunity to follow my dreams and start writing. It’s very early in my life as an author, but so far I’m loving it.
It’s crazy busy at our house, so when I’m writing I retreat to our caravan (an impulsive lockdown purchase) which is mostly parked on our drive. When I really need total peace and quiet, I take it to a
lovely site about 15 minutes away and hide there until my family runs out of food or clean clothes.

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My thoughts: another fun royal romp as a millionaire drowns in the bath at the family’s Scottish Castle and Lady Bea, Perry and Simon are needed to help DCI Fitzwilliam out once more.

Cut off by snow, the killer can’t leave, and neither can anyone else. So they have a perfect country house murder mystery to unravel. Who killed Ben Rhodes and why?

Aided by Daisy’s sharp canine nose (vital clues are always her wheelhouse) and with Bea’s ability to get people to open up, it shouldn’t take too long for them to find their killer. But it’s a lot more complicated when there’s so many possible suspects and they’re trying to keep the Queen Mother (Bea’s grandmother) in the dark too.

Lots of fun, at times very silly, and clever. This series just gets better and better.

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: Blackjack – Gail Meath

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A lifetime game of solitaire turns into a vicious family feud.

New York City 1923

Back in the city after a nightmare vacation, PI Jax Diamond and his courageous canine partner, Ace, just can’t catch a break when three quick and easy cases explode into a massive mess of unrelated major crimes with victims, dead and alive, piling up.

Laura Graystone’s career soars as she rehearses for her new Broadway musical. Yet, she senses something’s amiss when Jax spends more time with a new buddy aboard a steamboat than solving crimes. With the help of their friends and a mysterious stranger, Laura and Ace set out to get to the bottom of it.

It’s a whirlwind of twists and turns as Jax discovers there is far more to a family than just blood relatives. And who knows? They may just solve the biggest case of his life.

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Award-winning author Gail Meath writes historical romance novels that will whisk you away to another time and place in history where you will meet fascinating characters, both fictional and real, who will capture your heart and soul. Meath loves writing about little or unknown people, places and events in history, rather than relying on the typical stories and settings.

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My thoughts: Jax has so many different cases on the go in this book, and gets distracted by the charismatic cruise ship owner Nick, so Laura and Ace do a fair bit of investigating with the help of Carla and Jeanie. They’re trying to help Jax out and they’re worried about him.

Some of the cases seem very tightly connected to Jax, and the orphanage where he grew up. Who is the mysterious woman Laura keeps running into? Will Jax finally get some answers about his parents and who he really is?

Obviously Ace does a lot of the heavy lifting again, emotional support, catching bad guys, finding evidence. He’s the hardest working dog in crime fiction. But Laura comes a close second, she should be the detective really, Jax completely fails to get much done.

I really enjoy this series, it’s a lot of fun and clearly well researched, you get a real feel for the 20s, and the friends Jax has made come to life. Really enjoyable and entertaining. With a cute dog, what more do you need!

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: Tales From Beyond the Rainbow – Pete Jordi Wood

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Ten captivating stories of adventure and resilience celebrating LGBTQ+ characters, published as an illustrated collection of queer classics for the first time.

These are the fairy tales that history forgot – or concealed. Tales in which gender is fluid and where queer stories can have a happy ending.

From the humble sailor who finds his handsome prince to the transgender market girl who becomes queen, from Europe to Asia via the African savannah, LGBTQ+ folklore researcher Pete Jordi Wood has combed through generations of history and adapted ten unforgettable stories, each illustrated by an artist who shares heritage with the culture from which the stories were born.

Pete Jordi Wood (he/him) is a British author, illustrator and screenwriter from Cornwall, U.K. Pete has written original drama for Channel 4 and the BBC and was a recipient of The John Brabourne Award from the Film and Television Charity. He describes himself as a ‘fairy tale detective’ who has dedicated himself to the academic study of queer folk tales, myths and legends.

My thoughts: what a great book to start Pride Month off with, ten stories from around the world collected here in this beautiful book. Each story has an LGBTQ+ protagonist and they’re illustrated too.

From modern day Benin (then the Kingdom of Dahomey) to Russia, China, India and beyond, these are traditional tales featuring characters that are either explicitly Queer or could be read as such.

Modernising the language but not altering the content, making them more accessible for younger readers as well as folklorists means this is a collection that could sit easily alongside a collection of Grimm tales on either a child’s shelf or a researchers. Or just someone like me, who loves fairy tales and folklore (and ok, I do have an academic background in this) but any reader would find these enchanting.

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

blog tour, books, reviews

Blog Tour: Fractal Noise – Christopher Paolini

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Fractal Noise is the thrilling prequel to the masterful space opera To Sleep in a Sea of Stars by internationally bestselling author of Eragon, Christopher Paolini.

On the planet Talos VII, twenty-three years before the events of To Sleep in a Sea of Stars, an anomaly is detected: a vast circular pit, with dimensions so perfect that it could only have been the result of conscious design. So a small team is assembled to learn more – perhaps even who built the hole and why. Their mission will take them on a hazardous trek to the very edge of existence.

For one explorer, this is the opportunity of a lifetime. For another, a risk not worth taking. And for xenobiologist Alex Crichton, it’s a desperate attempt to find meaning in an uncaring universe. But every step they take towards that mysterious abyss is more punishing than the last. Ultimately, no one is prepared for what they will encounter.

My thoughts: I loved TSiaSoS, but while this is set in the same universe, twenty three years earlier, it is a very different book, and not just because of its lengths.

In a way it is a desperately sad book, these four humans more or less alone on an alien world, a hostile environment, making it hard for them to sleep, to walk, to do anything. Alex, the protagonist, is mourning his wife, the other members of the team have their own traumas and damage. As they trudge endlessly across an uncaring planet, towards an unknown goal, their exhaustion and isolation make them spiral.

They’re convinced someone made the mysterious, loud, EMP emitting hole, it’s too perfect to be accidental, but the only creatures they encounter are somewhat hostile and make no attempt to communicate, they are so strange that no one knows what to make of them. They don’t seem to be doing anything recognisable, we always try to equate things back to what we understand from human experience – but these creatures or machines, follow no patterns the team can discern.

As they get closer, a series of accidents make it harder and harder for them to accomplish their work and their mental states start to struggle. The desperate straits they find themselves in are worsened by not being able to contact the rest of the crew, isolation pushing them to breaking point. None of them are particularly easy people to be with, and there’s a distinct lack of team spirit. Alex withdraws into himself and his memories, and the rest of the team aren’t any better.

What their mission achieves is minimal and for a moment, all seems lost. There’s a Pandora’s Box effect for Alex, suddenly looking up, the ship passes overhead. And hope sparks. Perhaps we aren’t alone – we have each other.

*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: A Vintage Vacation – Maddie Please

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Clover Harrington might be sixty-one, but she’s still bossing it in the corporate world and can still run rings around her younger colleagues. And then she is made redundant….
Devastated and now suddenly the wrong side of sixty Clover doesn’t know what to do with her life or her corporate wardrobe! What does she wear if not red lippy and a power suit?! Rather than offer
her any support, her partner, Jack announces he’s off on a golfing weekend, leaving Clover completely adrift.
Desperate to get away from it all, Clover decides to visit her cousin Zoe at her small taverna in the gorgeous Italian Lakes. There she can rest and recuperate and plan the next stage of her life.
Until Clover’s eighty-year-old mother, Eleanor decides to turn up for the holiday too! Instead of gentle ambles around the lake, Eleanor seems more interested in late night poker and swigging Prosecco and Clover can’t quite believe her mum is having more fun than she is. But as the saying goes – if you can’t beat em, join em!
But is Clover brave enough to live La Dolce Vita?
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Maddie Please is the #1 bestselling author of novels including The Old Ducks’ Club and Sisters Behaving Badly. Having had a career as a dentist and now lives in rural Devon where she enjoys box sets, red wine and Christmas. She will be taking a new direction in her writing for Boldwood with
joyous tales of older women.

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My thoughts: this was a lot of fun to read and a good reminder that you’re never too old to start again! Or to have fun.

Clover is sixty-one, redundant, and done with partner Jack, who doesn’t seem to see that she needs his support – he’s more interested in playing golf. So she tells him to get out and hopes on a plane to Italy, where her cousin runs a trattoria with her husband. And a hunky local painter, Gio, picks her up from the airport.

Before she knows it, she’s helping in the kitchen, getting messy and finally learning to let go and enjoy herself. Then her hilarious mother rolls into town (I found her antics so funny), getting drunk and cheating at poker, having a little romance with Uncle Franco and generally having a merry old time.

Clover doesn’t want her old life anymore, it doesn’t fit with who she is in Italy, possibly who she’s always been, deep down, and it’s time for a different life. A better, happier one. A lesson for us all there.

*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: Seahurst – S A Harris

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‘Seahurst is set on the Suffolk coast. The area is famous for its folklore. I was born in the county and spent my childhood on the beaches, running along narrow, sandy paths that thread through the dunes. The vast empty skies, mudflats and whispering reed beds have inspired writers over centuries. What better setting could there be for a contemporary haunted house ghost story?’ – S.A. HARRIS

S.A. Harris returns with a gripping contemporary ghost story set on the Suffolk coast.

Evie Meyer and her son Alfie flee from her abusive partner Seth in Toronto to spend New Year with her half-brother Luke at their late father’s summer home on the Suffolk Coast, only to find Seahurst abandoned and Luke missing.

As Evie searches for her brother, she is filled with a deepening dread that something is very wrong at Seahurst and that their father’s death may not have been suicide after all. Can Evie uncover Seahurst’s sinister secrets and keep Alfie safe before the souls of the dead claim yet another terrible revenge?

‘Seahurst is a suspenseful spine-tingling ghost story I absolutely loved! One moment I was holding my breath, and the next my heart was aching for Evie and her son Alfie. Harris has once again held me with her spell-binding prose’ – RUBY SPEECHLEY

Sally Harris writes ghost stories and gothic fiction as S. A. Harris. Her first novel, Haverscroft was long listed for Not The Booker Prize, was one of Den Of Geek’s best books of 2019, a semi-finalist in the Book Bloggers Novel of the Year Award 2020, and a Halloween recommended read in Prima Magazine. Sally is a family law solicitor living with her husband and children in Norwich.

For more information visit https://saharrisauthor.com/ Follow Sally on Twitter @salharris1

My thoughts: Seahurst is on a crumbling cliff, parts of which have already fallen away. It may also be haunted. Perhaps using parts of the old Abbey in its walls was a bad idea. Evie’s father lived there alone, and committed suicide off those cliffs, and now her brother seems to have vanished in the same way.

During a fraught time in her life, attempting to get away from her abusive partner and protect her son., she’s returned to Suffolk to see her brother and old friends but the past lingers. Her father’s room is the same as when he died, her brother’s things are everywhere, as though he just left the room. There’s strange noises and smells, the house seems sinister, which it didn’t before.

There’s a lot of tension in the book, the characters are all carrying it and maybe are more affected by the house and the winter, cut off at times from anyone else, than they’d like to admit. Suffolk is famous for its ghosts and monsters, something about all that land that belongs more to the sea than anything else.

Evie is on edge and her son, Alfie, picks up on that. It’s only them that sense the sinister in the house, Evie’s friends seem unaffected, certainly her horrible ex, when he shows up, doesn’t feel it.

While this isn’t a happy book, and the ending, while one of escape and resolution, doesn’t feel enormously cheering, there is hope for Evie and Alfie, and for their found family.

*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: Troy Story – Carla Luna

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The friendship that launched a thousand adventures is about to embark on the greatest one of all…
Ever since Stuart Carlson and Dusty Danforth met as kids on a dig in Egypt, they’ve been best friends, supporting each other through heartaches, triumphs, and countless archaeological expeditions. So
when Stuart gets hired to help run the American excavations at Troy, he asks Dusty to join him as the site illustrator.
For Dusty, the Troy project isn’t just another adventure. It’s the chance to tell Stuart how she really feels. After years of pining for him, she’s ready for more than friendship.
But soon after they arrive at the site in Turkey, they’re caught up in a feud with a group of German archaeologists. While both teams are eager to make a major find, Stuart’s boss is so determined to beat his rivals that he’s willing to break a few rules. Or laws.
As Stuart and Dusty work together to keep the dig on track, they give in to the passion that’s been simmering under the surface. But will their romance survive when their boss’s scheme puts the entire project in jeopardy?

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Carla Luna writes contemporary romance with a dollop of humor and a pinch of spice. A former archaeologist, she still dreams of traveling to far-off places and channels that wanderlust into the settings of her stories. When she’s not writing, she works in a spice emporium where she gets paid to discuss food and share her favorite recipes. Her passions include Broadway musicals, baking, whimsical office supplies, and pop culture podcasts. Though she has roots in Los Angeles and Vancouver Island, she currently resides in Wisconsin with her family and her feisty Siberian cat.

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My thoughts: my friend’s mum is a doctor of archaeology and wherever I went to their house as a kid, she’d be cleaning up trays of potsherds, little broken pieces of ancient pottery. I love history but archaeology didn’t appeal a huge amount as some of it seemed really boring – mostly the cleaning of bits of pots!

In this book however, an archaeological dig in modern Turkey, at the site of Troy, is full of incidents, arguments, a bully for a boss, thefts of artifacts and love.

It’s also great fun to read, and highly entertaining as Dusty and Stuart finally admit they’re in love amid the goings on at the dig site and at the German site across town. Most academics are obsessive about their subject (I’m an academic, I know this all too well) and these archaeologists are no different. What they don’t tend to do is what ghe ghastly Dr Hughes does – steal from another dig, threaten his employees, sexually harass his grad students and any other women, bully his way through life and basically be a turd of a human being.

Thankfully Dusty has a strong backbone and the support of her academic parents, the rest of the dig team and the person funding the trip, Mort, when she faces off against the unpleasant man.

I really enjoyed this book, the history stuff, the romance, the scumbag getting his comeuppance, the whole thing really. And I think you will too. Plus it’s made me want a holiday in Turkey even more than I already did!

*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: An Unsuitable Heiress – Jane Dunn

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‘Do you realise, Corinna, just how hard it is for a young woman of irregular birth, without family, fortune or friends in the world? Marriage is the only way to get any chance of a life.’
Following the death of her mother, Corinna Ormesby has lived a quiet life in the countryside with her cantankerous Cousin Agnes. Her father’s identity has been a tantalising mystery, but now at nineteen Corinna knows that finding him may be her only way to avoid marriage to the odious Mr Beech.
Deciding to head to London, Corinna dons a male disguise. Travelling alone as a young woman risks scandal and danger, but when, masquerading as a youth, she is befriended by three dashing blades,
handsome and capable Alick Wolfe, dandy Ferdinand Shilton and the incorrigible Lord Purfoy, Corinna now has access to the male-only world of Regency England. And when she meets Alick’s turbulent brother Darius, a betrayal of trust leads to deadly combat which only one of the brothers
may survive.
From gambling in gentleman’s clubs to meeting the courtesans of Covent Garden, Corinna’s country naivety soon falls away. But when she finds her father at last, learns the truth about her parentage
and discovers her fortunes transformed, she must quickly decide how to reveal her true identity, while hoping that one young man in particular can see her for the beauty and Lady she really is.
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Jane Dunn is an historian and biographer and the author of seven acclaimed biographies, including Daphne du Maurier and her Sisters and the Sunday Times and NYT bestseller, Elizabeth & Mary: Cousins, Rivals, Queens. She comes to Boldwood with her first fiction outing – a trilogy of novels set in the Regency period, the first of which was published in January 2023. She lives in Berkshire with her husband, the linguist Nicholas Ostler.

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My thoughts: I loved this, Corinna (or Cory) is a wonderful protagonist and the friends she makes in London (and Will from back home) are a fun and charming bunch. The author has great fun with the Georgian slang these young bucks speak, and the various slightly outrageous things they get up to.

Cory is incredibly brave, and very lucky as things could have gone very wrong when she runs away dressed as a boy.

If you like Bridgerton or Georgette Heyer or any of the more recent Regency books (there’s so many around) then you need to get stuck into Jane Dunn’s books, there’s two out so far, and they’re both great. I loved this one and didn’t want it to end. With a fabulous cast of characters and real heart, it’s very much worth a read.

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