+ family, fiction, Greece, grief, holiday, lies, loss, love, marriage, motherhood, murder, obsession, relationships, review, secrets, thriller
The Other Guest by Heidi Perks
Laila and her husband arrive for a week’s luxury holiday at the exclusive White Sands resort on a stunning but tiny Greek island.
They’re in desperate need of a reset on their relationship. As Laila sits by the pool, she finds herself inexplicably drawn to another family staying in the resort.
#TheOtherGuest @HeidiPerksBooks @centurybooksuk #RandomThingsTours @annecater @RandomTTours #blogtour
Em has no idea who Laila is, or that she has been watching her and her teenage sons and husband so intently.
Five days later Em’s world is blown apart by a horrifying event. Laila thinks she knows the truth of what happened. But in telling Em what she’s seen, she stands to lose everything she holds dear. And what if she’s got it wrong?
My Review
I am sorry to say that I really didn’t like Laila. I have two children and four grandchildren, so I can’t possibly understand how she feels about not being able to have any, but her fixation is blowing her marriage apart. Her husband James wants to stop after five failed IVF attempts, her family and friends also think she should give it a break for a while. The devastation following each failure is taking its toll on them and their relationship.
So James decides to use their savings to take Laila on a five star holiday to the Greek island of Ixos. The hotel is unimaginable luxury, everything should be perfect. Laila is angry that he spent the money reserved for the next round of IVF on the trip, but James felt they needed the reset.
Then Laila becomes obsessed with a family staying at the resort – mum Em, husband Rob, and two teenage boys Isaac and Theo. Laila calls it ‘people watching’ – some (me included) would call it stalking. Is it because they have children? Or because they are rich? Or is it something else? I found Laila’s behaviour rather odd and a bit creepy.
Then tragedy strikes and a body is found floating in the pool. At this point, I would have thought that the hotel would be totally evacuated, and the guests found alternative accommodation. But maybe it’s because there could be a killer amongst them that they have to stay put – if the death was suspicious that is. Not much of a happy holiday. I hope they got a refund.
Poor Em. I really liked her, and Rob is such a supportive person. Even if he is a bit uptight and boring – he’s better than James, who’s starting to look like he’s not all Laila thinks he is. What secrets does he have, secrets that never came out before they married ten years ago. She never spends time with his family – he keeps them apart. What could they tell her?
Because she has spent time hanging around Em’s villa, Laila has information that might tell the police what happened. If she’s got it right that is. And how can she tell Em without being accused of stalking her, which she is.
‘Oh what a tangled web we weave
‘When first we practice to deceive,’ (It sounds very Shakespearean, however it actually comes from Scottish author, Sir Walter Scott, writer of novels, plays, and poems.)
But I digress. I think this quote most definitely applies to Laila. In fact the more everyone lies – and she is not the only one – the deeper the hole they dig themselves into.
The Other Guest is a story full of murder, secrets, lies, misunderstandings, twists, obsession and stalking. Of marriages falling apart, and insurmountable grief. It’s a fabulous holiday read – honestly!
Many thanks to @annecater for inviting me to be part of #RandomThingsTours
About the Author
Multiple Sunday Times bestselling growing brand author for Century, with over 580K copies of her books – Now You See Her, Come Back For Me, Three Perfect Liars, The Whispers – sold to date.
Heidi’s debut novel Now You See Her was selected for the 2019 Richard and Judy Book Club and was optioned for TV from the production company behind BBC One’s ‘The Miniaturist’. She is a graduate of the inaugural Curtis Brown Creative Online Novel Writing Course and lives with her family in Bournemouth.
Follow Heidi on Twitter @HeidiPerksBooks and join in the conversation
with #THEOTHERGUEST
+ feel-good, female friendship, fiction, forgiveness, friendship, grief, List, literature, loneliness, loss, love, motherhood, music hall, obsession, psychiatric hospital, relationships, review, secrets, strongman, strongwoman, suffragette movement, whimsical
My Top 8 Books of 2023 – Part Two
Here are my favourite eight books of the second quarter of 2023. One or two of these might make it into my top four books of 2023. Still a long way to go. While I read a lot of crime novels all of these books are other genres, as a crime novel needs to be totally unique and exceptional to make it into my favourites. So here we go.
Lyrics For The Loved Ones by Anne Goodwin
Having just finished it, I am still reeling from the sheer brilliance of this book. I have previously read Matilda Windsor is Coming Home, which I thoroughly enjoyed (though parts were difficult for me to read – you can see my review for the reasons) and Stolen Summers, but Lyrics for the Loved Ones is in a league of its own.
I confess it did take me awhile to work out who was who and the relationships between eg Gloria, Tim and Brendan, Wesley and Oh My Darling (Clementine), Denise aka Mrs Jefferson and Goodnight Irene and Scarlett, who Matty calls Bluebell etc. Then there are the Loved Ones ie the rezzies (residents), their rellies (relatives) and all the other names for the various characters. I loved the names. I tried to work out the connections with Matilda Windsor, but could only remember Irene and her relationship with Matty’s brother Henry.
For my full review click here
Chai Time At Cinnamon Gardens by Shankari Chandran
If you were looking for a light-hearted, funny read, you might be surprised. This is not The Good Karma Hospital. I am devastated. Not because it’s not Good Karma, but because there are images I will never get out of my head. Why are people so cruel to each other? I don’t understand. We could all live together in peace so easily.
Chai Time at Cinnamon Gardens is a masterpiece and everyone should read it. Because it’s not just about the predicament of the Tamils or outright racism. (Imagine being asked a question and giving your answer in Tamil. Having petrol poured over you and being set alight. Answer in Sinhalese and they let you go.)
For my full review click here
The Forgotten Garden by Sharon Gosling
I’m not normally a sentimental old romantic but this book left me an emotional wreck. I cried buckets, but then I did have Covid when I read it, so that’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it.
Luisa MacGregor is in a rut. After her husband Reuben died in an accident, she hasn’t been able to move on. Never having worked as a landscape designer, the degree in which she mastered, she works for a dreadful boss, lives with her sister Jo and has put her love life on hold forever. That is until she is gifted a piece of land in the rundown seaside town of Collaton on the north-west coast of Cumbria. She can turn it into a beautiful community garden – it was Reuben’s dream to do something like this – but can she make it work?
For my full review click here
Preloved by Lauren Bravo
I love browsing charity shops, especially in places like Wimbledon or Oxford where the quality of the donated items is really good. I don’t dwell on the history of the items though – most are not really interesting enough – but I may do so now.
But what’s so special about Preloved is the staff. Most of the people who volunteer in our local charity shops are over 75, think Next is a designer brand, and wear polyester that looks like a hairdresser’s overall. I jest and I apologise.
For my full review click here
Vita And The Birds by Polly Crosby
The Unravelling was one of my four favourite books of 2022 (and probably all time). Therefore I had great hopes and expectations for Vita And The Birds. I was not disappointed. I love the cover to start with.
In 1997, Eve Blakeney returns to the place where she spent her summers with her four brothers and her Bohemian mother Angela. During these holidays they hung out with the local teenagers and her brothers’ friends who came to stay, having picnics on the beach and drinking. Angela was not exactly a traditional mum. On one of these nights, Eve and Henry’s friend Elliott, both intoxicated, accept a dare and go off to explore the disused Cathedral of the Marshes. It’s dangerous and scary and lots of myths surround it. Then an accident and the discovery of a painting change Eve’s life forever.
For my full review click here
The Dictionary Of Lost Words by Pip Williams
Absolutely fantastic! Who knew that a book about compiling a dictionary could be so emotional and beautiful.
It’s a combination of fictitious characters like Esme and her father ‘Da’, and others like Dr Murray, his daughters Elsie and Rosfrith and Ditte who really existed. The author gives some of the real people more importance and personality in the story than we know as real – Ditte for instance is very central to the book, but in reality we know little about her in real life.
For my full review click here
Vulcana by Rebecca F. John
Seeing as my son is a novice strongman, how could I not want to read this book. The feats of strength they perform today would no doubt make Atlas and Vulcana look tame in comparison, but while Atlas – William Roberts – may not have been all he purported to be, Kate was undoubtedly exceptionally strong for a woman.
Kate ran away from home when she was sixteen to be with William, who she had met when she was fifteen. He was twelve years her senior and already had a wife Alice, who was a number of years older than him (old enough to easily be Kate’s mother), and they already had five children (reportedly). While Kate remained passionately in love with William until the day she died in 1946 at the age of 72, his relationship with Alice was very different. Kate and William had at least four children together, or maybe six – accounts vary – though they never married. Alice looked after them as well as her own, while Atlas and Vulcana toured, often for months at a time. It all seems a bit strange to us, but Alice was happy with the arrangement and she and Kate became good friends.
For my full review click here
The Fascination by Essie Fox
This is one of my favourite books of the year so far. I simply adored it. I don’t read that much historical fiction, but when I do it has to be unique and something special and this is. It’s the third book I’ve read this year which involves music halls, entertainers and ‘freak shows’, and The Fascination did not disappoint.
It’s mainly the characters – Theo Seabrook, disowned grandson of Lord Seabrook, the twins Keziah and Tilly, sold by their quack medicine-man father to the mysterious ‘Captain’, Aleski Turgenev based on real-life Fedor Jeftichew, better known as the Dog-Faced Boy, a sideshow performer in Barnum’s circus, Martha who hid her face because of a disfiguring harelip and Dr Eugene Summerwell, owner of the Museum of Anatomy in London, who becomes Theo’s employer.
For my full review click here
Norman was born to write, but doesn’t know his destiny is written in his DNA, inherited from generations of earlier Normans who yearned to put pen to paper – once those items had been invented!
Yet with nothing to show for all his literary endeavours and struggling to pay the rent, he tells himself there must be easier ways of making a living. It’s only when Norman discovers his descent from a long line of wordsmiths who’d experienced many of the same setbacks as himself yet had found the resolve to keep on going, that he wants to know: ‘What was their secret?’
#TheWritersGuideToObscurity @SteinbergStory @Zooloo’s Book Tours @zooloo2008 #ZooloosBookTours #blogtour
The Writer’s Guide to Obscurity is an illustrated record of Norman’s research into his vast family tree, sharing with us his predecessors’ trials, triumphs and absolute catastrophes through the centuries, before bringing us back to Norman today – and the twist in his own tale.
My Review
A very short book which follows different ‘Normans’ through the ages, from seeking materials and making your own ink, to the invention of the printing press. A ‘Norman’ is always there, but rather than publishing his own work, he is helping someone else, even Shakespeare at one point.
We start with Ancient Norman in 4500 BCE. Norman needed something to write on, which meant parchment, but he ‘immediately found himself out of his comfort zone when faced with an animal carcass’. I’m with you on that one Norm. He required his neighbours to lend a hand.
In Ancient Greece 700 BCE, Norman had to go though the same ‘stringent, character-building physical regime that was part and parcel of the development of the ordinary Athenian male’. Those who like Norman were ‘built more for comfort than for speed’ had to find ways to survive. But it wasn’t all bad news. Norman was able to perform his comedies and poetry, which were very popular, but he needed a patron so he could pay for food and lodgings.
In Ancient Rome c.700 BCE, Roman Norman was involved in ‘writing statements and other commissions for paying clients’. Basically, Norman was being paid to improve on his patrons’ writing, but he had to give up any rights to his work. So no progress yet as an author in his own right.
Dark-Aged Norman 410 – 1066 CE. Now we are heading into more modern times. Norman had to give up Latin and learn Anglo-Saxon, but this was all for the good as he liked the stories that went with it, such as the tales of Beowulf.
Norman Norman 1066 CE and we see our intrepid writer assisting on the Doomsday Book, but much of his income came from writing boring religious scripts rather than narrative epics and romantic literature.
In the Middle-Ages, 1066 to c.1600, sponsors were rare but Norman being literate was always able to find work as a clerk. And luckily for Norman, he retained all the education of his forbears, which he was able to put to good use. With his knowledge, he could have written a play and put his money into producing it. Simpler though to chuck in his lot with a playwright and actor called – you guessed it – Will Shakespeare.
Early Modern Norman 1600-1900 and things are changing rapidly. Along came the printing press. Unfortunately, this new-fangled contraption saw the end for those employed in the laborious production of hand-written manuscripts, so it was ‘adapt or get laid off’. And never let it be said that Norman wasn’t adaptable! Literature was becoming available to the masses and more advanced presses meant a wider range of books was being published.
Finally, Modern-Day Norman from the 19th century to today and education for everyone means literacy was at an ‘all-time high’. Pen and paper had been replaced by the typewriter, and eventually word processing and computers, but still Norman hadn’t had any success with his own writing.
But things didn’t change until Norman found himself able to share his experiences with his writer community, and the rest, as they say, is history.
This was a lot of fun – I sat and read it in one go – it’s witty, cynical, has hilarious illustrations, and gives us a historical insight into the development of writing and being an author. In fact I read it again in order to pen this review.
Many thanks to @zooloo2008 for inviting me to be part of this blog tour.
About the Author
Born and raised in North London in 1952, John still lives in the city with his wife and three children. Privately educated, John left school after ‘A’ levels and completed a business diploma in what is now the University of Westminster, before entering banking.
He started training as an accountant but did not complete the course, choosing a position in his family’s furniture manufacturing business instead. John started his own mergers and acquisitions business in 1987, which he ran for almost 20 years before quitting to become a full time writer in 2007.
John has co-written and produced comedies for the stage and has created a series of books for children. “Previously, I had only been interested in comedy and finally started to write down the things I said or thought of. That led me to co-write and produce a play, In the Balance, and then W for Banker – which appeared at the New End Theatre, Hampstead. It was then I decided to quit the world of business in favour of writing full-time, and move toward more serious subjects. My first novel has taken two years to write and is the first in a series of books I am calling the ‘Steinberg Stories’.”
Links
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/steinbergstories/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/steinbergstories/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SteinbergStory/
Website: https://steinbergstories.com/
Goodreads – https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/124864581-the-writer-s-guide-
to-obscurity
Buy Links – https://geni.us/riLMlA7
+ abuse, child abduction, child abuse, childhood, crime fiction, fiction, grief, loss, love, murder, revenge, review, thriller
Girls Don’t Cry by Peter Kesterton
A decade after his young daughter’s murder, a grief-stricken father’s need for justice puts his own life in danger as events spiral out of control . . .
Ever since Caitlin Grady was released from prison, Darren has been tormented by rage and injustice. He finds himself venting online, where a stranger befriends him—and encourages him to seek revenge.
#GirlsDontCry @Peter_Kesterton #RandomThingsTours @annecater @RandomTTours #BlogTour
But Caitlin no longer goes by that name. She has been given a new identity and is living quietly, dreading exposure as the tabloids—with help from her publicity-hungry mother—try to hunt her down. And having committed the crime at age eleven, Caitlin struggles as an adult on her own, out in the world beyond prison walls.
Will Darren manage to track Caitlin down, and if he does, will he be able to carry out his plans?
My Review
What can you say about a story with two such unlikeable protagonists? The one a child killer who was only a child herself when she killed a little girl – the other the victim’s father, who should be a sympathetic character, but in actual fact is horrible.
Caitlin Grady has been released from prison after ten years and has been given a totally new identity. Darren is the grieving father, so filled with hate and rage that he drives his wife away and seeks support online. He finds himself befriended by a stranger, whose lust for revenge appears greater than his own. But what is his motive?
He also goes to the press to talk about the injustice – they should have thrown away the key etc – starts a campaign to reveal the identity of the ‘killer nextdoor’, and even appears on TV to talk about it. Unfortunately he has no idea what is going to happen next and finds himself in a situation beyond his control.
It’s hard to imagine feeling sympathy for Caitlin, but we do. My generation will be reminded of 11-year-old Mary Bell who choked two little boys to death in 1968. She was cleared of murder, found guilty of manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility, and served a ‘life’ sentence amounting to 12 years. She is living under a secret identity, and is purported to have a daughter and a granddaughter.
However, we are also reminded of the horrific murder of James Bulger in more recent years, and how while Robert Thompson is living under a new identity with a man who knows who he is, the other, Jon Venables, was released, sent back to prison in 2010 and 2017 for possessing indecent images of children, and was refused parole in 2020. It’s Venables that we remember. Released to do it again, though thankfully he hasn’t killed anyone else.
Thanks to Darren’s campaign, a lynch mob mentality is created and Riley’s Law attracts thousands of supporters.
Initially I struggled with the subject matter – how could I sympathise more with Caitlin than with Darren? I felt bad for giving her a second chance, but stick with it. And how could there be any humour in the story? I admit I cried buckets at one stage but I also laughed – not a laugh out loud laugh – but amusement at a very clever twist. A brilliant book. Highly recommended.
Many thanks to @annecater for inviting me to be part of #RandomThingsTours
About the Author
“I was born in Manchester to Irish parents who gifted me the tradition of storytelling and a love of words. Unusually for an Irish family I was an only child and found company in books and stories. I moved to Bristol to go to university, and loved the city so much I stayed on after graduating. I landed a job as a technician at the BBC and worked on radio dramas. Not content with simply doing the sound effects, I decided to write my own radio play. Many years and drawers full of rejections later, I had my radio drama Heads You Win, Tales I Lose, broadcast on BBC Radio 4. I went on to write stage plays, notably Air Guitar for the Bristol Old Vic Theatre and Playing with Snails which won the Croydon Warehouse International Playwriting competition 2011. In 2019, I went to Bath Spa University as a mature student, undertaking an MA in creative writing. I graduated with distinction. Girls Don’t Cry was partially written on the course. For more information visit: http://www.peterkesterton.com.”
From Award-winning actor, filmmaker, and founder, Jaret Martino, comes Single Parents Rock! (Based On a True Story and Feature Film, DONNA: Stronger Than Pretty). Streaming everywhere you buy and rent movies.
A story about a creative, caring, and strong young girl who has the most caring heart and sees the world in ways we can all learn from. Shay knows just how special single parents are, and is excited to introduce you to the strong females in her family. When Shay turned five, her Mom and Grandma got to work on making her party extra special. Shay is exuberant to invite her friends from school and just met a new friend Nala. Through Shay’s heart we see her embrace the world’s differences with love. When her Grandma makes her a cape and a crown, she feels the magic and power of the long line of strong women that surround her.
#SingleParentsRock #JaretMartino @Zooloo’s Book Tours @zooloo2008 #ZooloosBookTours #blogtour
To our Shay-Shine, as Grandma loved to call you. Continue to light up the world with your heart and smile. Love, Uncle Jaret.
To my loving Mother, Donna, who handled the role of Mom and Dad with such grace. Your untimely passing only amplified your accomplishments as a teacher and parent and I will continue to spread, unwaveringly, all your lessons and your every expression of love. Shay Marie, your beautiful granddaughter, will always be reminded of the long line of Strong Women in her family, and of the bravery it takes every woman to make a life for herself and her children.
“Women have to be Stronger Than Pretty. We have to be warriors…you look like a warrior to me.” – from feature film DONNA: Stronger Than Pretty.
Stronger Than Pretty LLC. Love Wins Productions, Distribution and Film Festival. Creating awareness for subjects deserving attention.
Book design by Mery Pelecine.
My Review
Shay is about to turn five and her mum is organising her birthday party with the help of her Grandma (who looks incredibly young). Shay has invited her friends from school, including her new friend Nala, who has two mums.
Shay’s mum is a single parent, and has to play the role of mum and dad and she does an amazing job. Her Grandma has made her a cape and a crown, so she can feel the magic and power of the long line of strong women in her family.
This is a picture book story about love, diversity and being ‘stronger than pretty’. It has beautiful illustrations to enhance the magic of the book.
Many thanks to @zooloo2008 for inviting me to be part of this blog tour.
About the Author
Jaret Martino began his acting career at age six in theatre and has gone on to appear in TV / Film productions, including The Middle, Law and Order SVU, 30 Rock, One Life To Live, Modern Family, Teen Wolf, and national commercial campaigns for Mastercard, Usher & Lady Gaga’s Tour Promo, Sonic, and T-mobile. Jaret studied at Fordham University, as well as The Lee Strasberg Institute. Always placing an importance on education he continues to study with top industry professionals, such as Larry Moss. In loving memory of Gary Austin (Founder of The Groundlings), and Elizabeth Kemp.
Today his journey as an artist includes writing and producing Films in an effort to bring awareness to subject matters deserving attention. Jaret formed a Production company, and some credits include Driven The Documentary, an empowering film created to inspire women, artists and anyone with a dream that feels impossible. Driven has played at film festivals worldwide, receiving support from companies such as Microsoft and Step Up!
Jaret Martino and Love Wins Productions is an original content and third party production company, designed for the 21st century’s changed media landscape. Focused on raising awareness for subjects deserving attention. With a focus on women’s empowerment, diversity and inclusion and LGBTQIA messages. Specializes in the development, production, marketing and distribution of talent- driven films, television, and digital media content. Jaret’s award winning films have been seen throughout the world in festivals and streaming platforms. From Love Wins Productions and Distribution and Gravitas Ventures, Feature Film,
DONNA: Stronger Than Pretty is now available worldwide, everywhere you buy and rent movies! http://www.DonnaTheMovie.com His latest release is Children’s Book, SINGLE PARENTS ROCK! celebrates the toughest job in the world and is available now on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Walmart and Target.
Book Links – GoodReads – https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/123154447-single-parents-
rock
Buy Links – https://bit.ly/3q8ixQF
In my Toaster is the second book in the series and follows on from What’s in my Fridge. This inspirational story deals with loneliness of Tracey the younger sister of Terry. In this adventure Tracey has become lonely because her father has become stuck in New Zealand due to the pandemic and the travel restrictions.
Her brother Terry is older now and is always playing out with his friends or up in his bedroom on his PlayStation. Her mother’s time is taken up by running the home and she has little or no time for her daughter, like she used to.
On this morning following a missed FaceTime call from her father the evening before. Tracey goes to put her bread into the toaster for her breakfast. Tracey is pulled into the toaster before been shot out of it. The ceiling crumbles away and Tracey lands on the tip of a tree with birds flying around.
#InMyToaster #PaulGuyHurrell @BlossomSpring3 @Zooloo’s Book Tours @zooloo2008 #ZooloosBookTours #blogtour
On her magical adventure she meets Sam a Titfur bird who carries a Needed Bag which will produce items they need on their journey. On Tracey’s journey to get back home she will have to be rescued by Sam from the moving pavement, cross through the up river only with an umbrella and cross over the bridge to nowhere.
Avoid the Chatterings who will keep you talking for hours, by hiding under a picnic blanket. She will have to find and get to Peter Smith the wizard who can help her get back home, but not before she has to go down the longest and fastest slide. This slide descends into the creator where the wizard lives in his wood stack where magic happens. The slide has loop de loop, corkscrews and parts missing but this is the only way down to the wizards house.
Tracey must avoid the purple rings which will send her into the cannon that will shoot her back out of the creator. All this in her Unicorn slippers.
My Review
Tracey is lonely. Brother Terry is always out with his friends or playing computer games with them online. But the main reason for Tracey’s unhappiness is that her father was working in New Zealand when Covid struck and he couldn’t get home. They FaceTime and speak on the phone, but she hasn’t seen him for months and she misses the hugs and him tucking her in at bedtime.
Then one morning when her mum asks her if she can make her own toast, she is sucked into the toaster and thrown out again, landing on top of a tree in a strange land. Here she meets Sam the Titfur bird who helps her to find Peter Smith aka Wimpole the Wizard, who lives in a shack at the bottom of a slide and can help her to get home.
She must however avoid being seen by the Chatterings, who will keep her and Sam talking for hours, be rescued from a moving pavement, traverse a river with just an umbrella and cross over the bridge to nowhere. She must definitely not step on the purple rings.
Poor Tracey is still in her Unicorn slippers which are getting very wet, and though she is having fun on the slide, it’s not the same as being home with her dad. Will she get a surprise when she finally gets back? This is another lovely story from Paul Guy Hurrell, this time dealing with loneliness.
Many thanks to @zooloo2008 for inviting me to be part of this blog tour.
About the Author
“I was born in Leeds, Yorkshire, England in 1960 to a single parent family. I am the youngest of five siblings – four boys and a girl. I was brought up on a council estate and my family had very little, just like many other families on the estate at the time. I attended two schools as I grew up Bentley Lane Infants/Junior School and then onto Stainbeck High School. For me school was always hard, mainly because of my absenteeism. I wasn’t ill, it was just my mum didn’t send me (empty nest syndrome). Looking back at my school years there is a good chance I spent more times at home, than I did in school.
“I officially left school in 1976 and my first full time job was making special mirrors, the ones you see in pubs. I didn’t last long there before I got bored. I had a number of other jobs after that, but I didn’t stay long in any of them. One job I stayed a full day before not going back, but my record for the shortest stay was 4 hours, I walked away from this job after the hourly rate was cut from 90p an hour, down to 70p an hour.
“The following year I was forced to take a job, back at Stainbeck High School repairing school desks. While here I met my wife, Beverley. We are still together and have two wonderful grown- up children and three grandchildren. I worked for Leeds City Council, in the Housing section for 22 years, before retirement. Since retiring I have the time to carry out one of my first loves, writing stories.”
Follow Paul at:
Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/paul.hurrell.35GoodReads – https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/123195160-in-my-toaster
Buy Links – https://mybook.to/inmytoaster-zbt
+ adventure, child abuse, devil worship, family, fiction, gothic, Historical fiction, literature, London, loss, love, obsession, sisters, twins
The Fascination by Essie Fox
Twin sisters Keziah and Tilly Lovell are identical in every way, except that Tilly hasn’t grown a single inch since she was five. Coerced into promoting their father’s quack elixir as they tour the country fairgrounds, at the age of fifteen the girls are sold to a mysterious Italian known as ‘Captain’.
#TheFascination @essiefox @OrendaBooks #RandomThingsTours @annecater @RandomTTours #blogtour
Theo is an orphan, raised by his grandfather, Lord Seabrook, a man who has a dark interest in anatomical freaks and other curiosities … particularly the human kind. Resenting his grandson for his mother’s death in childbirth, when Seabrook remarries and a new heir is produced, Theo is forced to leave home without a penny to his name. Theo finds employment in Dr Summerwell’s Museum of Anatomy in London, and here he meets Captain and his theatrical ‘family’ of performers, freaks and outcasts.
But it is Theo’s fascination with Tilly and Keziah that will lead all of them into a dark web of deceits, exposing unthinkable secrets and threatening everything they know…
My Review
This is one of my favourite books of the year so far. I simply adored it. I don’t read that much historical fiction, but when I do it has to be unique and something special and this is. It’s the third book I’ve read this year which involves music halls, entertainers and ‘freak shows’, and The Fascination did not disappoint.
It’s mainly the characters – Theo Seabrook, disowned grandson of Lord Seabrook, the twins Keziah and Tilly, sold by their quack medicine-man father to the mysterious ‘Captain’, Aleski Turgenev based on real-life Fedor Jeftichew, better known as the Dog-Faced Boy, a sideshow performer in Barnum’s circus, Martha who hid her face because of a disfiguring harelip and Dr Eugene Summerwell, owner of the Museum of Anatomy in London, who becomes Theo’s employer.
But it’s not just the characters. The setting is just as important. Dorney Hall is the seat of Lord Seabrook, with its freakish exhibits, its dark secret corridors and the ‘satanic gatherings ‘where ‘persons of quality’ would meet to engage in sordid practices akin to the real stories of the Hellfire Clubs of the eighteenth century. Linden House is where the twins, Captain, Aleski and Martha reside, while the aforementioned museum contains strange items like swan’s wings for sale and displays so-called freaks of nature. The music halls and theatres such as the famed Royal in Drury Lane is where Tilly performs.
For those still inclined to witness the bizarre, Victor Wynd’s Museum of Curiosities, Fine Art and Unnatural History can be found in East London, while equally macabre displays are to be found in the Hunterian Museum, currently owned by the Royal College of Surgeons. With thanks to the author for these and many more historical details.
The story follows Keziah (the first person narrator) and her twin sister Tilly from when they were assisting their father in selling his ‘elixir’ said to cure all ills. Their mother has died and Pa has found himself another woman. The girls are displayed with claims that Keziah, who took the elixir was grown to a ‘normal’ height, while Tilly refused and was now the size of a small child. In fact it was the other way round and Tilly was hooked on the medicine (probably a mixture of laudanum and other substances).
When one night the twins decide to escape, Pa catches them, thrashes them and finally sells them to the ‘Captain’. In the meantime, Theo (he is narrated from the third person point of view) has been thrown out of his home, because his grandfather has taken a new wife, who has produced a legitimate heir. Theo is the bastard son of Lord Seabrook’s dead daughter, Theodora.
Theo goes to live with his governess Miss Agnes Miller, but after a few years finds employment with Dr Summerwell at the museum. And so the links between Theo and the twins begin to reveal themselves, together with all manner of dreadful secrets and terrible goings-on at Dorney Hall.
The story is interwoven with the tale of Snow-White and Rose-Red as Keziah remembers her Ma saying that it was ‘a mirror of their own lives’.
Many thanks to @annecater for inviting me to be part of #RandomThingsTours
About the Author
Essie Fox was born and raised in rural Herefordshire, which inspires much of her writing. After studying English Literature at Sheffield University, she moved to London where she worked for the Telegraph Sunday Magazine, and then book publishers George Allen & Unwin, before becoming self-employed in the world of art and design. Essie now spends her time writing historical gothic novels. Her debut, The Somnambulist, was shortlisted for the National Book Awards, and featured on Channel 4’s TV Book Club. The Last Days of Leda Grey, set in the early years of silent film, was selected as The Times Historical Book of the Month. Essie is also the creator of the popular blog: The Virtual Victorian. She has lectured on this era at the V&A, and the National Gallery in London.
Orenda Books is a small independent publishing company specialising in literary fiction with a heavy emphasis on crime/thrillers, and approximately half the list in translation. They’ve been twice shortlisted for the Nick Robinson Best Newcomer Award at the IPG awards, and publisher and owner Karen Sullivan was a Bookseller Rising Star in 2016. In 2018, they were awarded a prestigious Creative Europe grant for their translated books programme. Three authors, including Agnes Ravatn, Matt Wesolowski and Amanda Jennings have been WHSmith Fresh Talent picks, and Ravatn’s The Bird Tribunal was shortlisted for the Dublin Literary Award, won an English PEN Translation Award, and adapted for BBC Radio Four ’s Book at Bedtime. Six titles have been short- or long-listed for the CWA Daggers. Launched in 2014 with a mission to bring more international literature to the UK market, Orenda Books publishes a host of debuts, many of which have gone on to sell millions worldwide, and looks for fresh, exciting new voices that push the genre in new directions. Bestselling authors include Ragnar Jonasson, Antti Tuomainen, Gunnar Staalesen, Michael J. Malone, Kjell Ola Dahl, Louise Beech, Johana Gustawsson, Lilja Sigurðardóttir and Sarah Stovell.
+ adventure, child abuse, childhood, coming-of-age, fiction, friendship, healing, Historical fiction, kidnapping, literature, loss, love, Native American, review, slavery, superstition
The East Indian by Brinda Charry
Inspired by a historical figure, an exhilarating debut novel about the first native of the Indian subcontinent to arrive in Colonial America—for readers of Esi Edugyan and Yaa Gyasi.
Meet Tony: insatiably curious, deeply compassionate, with a unique perspective on every scene he encounters. Kidnapped and transported to the New World after traveling from the British East India Company’s outpost on the Coromandel Coast to the teeming streets of London, young Tony finds himself in Jamestown, Virginia, where he and his fellow indentured servants—boys like himself, men from Africa, a mad woman from London—must work the tobacco plantations. Orphaned and afraid, Tony initially longs for home. But as he adjusts to his new environment, finding companionship and even love, he can envision a life for himself after servitude. His dream: to become a medicine man, or a physician’s assistant, an expert on roots and herbs, a dispenser of healing compounds.
Like the play that captivates him—Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream—Tony’s life is rich with oddities and hijinks, humor and tragedy. Set during the early days of English colonization in Jamestown, before servitude calcified into racialized slavery, The East Indian gives authentic voice to an otherwise unknown historic figure and brings the world he would have encountered to vivid life. In this coming-of-age tale, narrated by a most memorable literary rascal, Charry conjures a young character sure to be beloved by readers for years to come.
My Review
This was a wonderfully written story, but hardly a laugh a minute. Life was very hard in the 1600s and it was especially hard for ‘Tony’, the first East Indian to arrive in Jamestown, Virginia.
We start the story in the British East India Company’s outpost on the Coromandel Coast. Tony (that wasn’t his real name – it was given to him later) lives with his mother and uncle. His mother is a courtesan (that’s a high class prostitute to you and me) and exceptionally beautiful (though this may be seen through a child’s eyes). When she dies, Tony travels to London where he wants to become a medicine man. But he is kidnapped and transported to America, where he ends up an indentured servant. On the journey he befriends two other boys, Dick and Sammy, and also ‘Mad Marge’, a ‘lunatic’ as she was referred to in those days.
Once he begins his work on the tobacco plantation, he meets other servants like Bristol and Cuffee from Africa, and Flynn who wants to learn to speak the language of the Native American ‘Indians’ as they were known – many of his fellow workers believe Tony must be one of them – so he can go and live with them. In fact no-one knows where Tony comes from – he’s not dark enough to be African, he’s not a Turk, though he is often referred to as a ‘moor’, and East India was so far unheard of.
The boys’ master initially is a man called Ganter, whose treatment of nine-year-old Sammy is so awful, I won’t describe it here – in fact we never get the details, we just know.
Tony is a likeable character, who sympathises with the plight of the underdog, and is saddened by the ill-treatment of his fellow servants, this is ‘before servitude calcified into racialized slavery‘. His dream is still to become a medicine man and he slowly begins to learn as a physician’s assistant, but we know that he will never be fully accepted unless he is working alongside his mentor. It was interesting to note that sick people were often given ‘Jimson Weed’ to cure their ills. Otherwise known as Datura, it is highly toxic, addictive and kills in large quantities. It grows here in the UK – don’t touch or ingest it!
This is an amazing, well-researched tale of love, hope and coming-of-age. I adore the references to Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream – Tony talks constantly about the Fairy King and Queen’s feud over the Indian boy, saying that he never discovers what becomes of him. But he actually likens himself more to Puck, getting up to mischief and playing tricks.
Many thanks to The Pigeonhole, the author and my fellow Pigeons for making this such an enjoyable read.
About the Author
BRINDA CHARRY is an academic who specialises in the work of Shakespeare and his contemporaries. She has a special interest in race and intercultural encounters in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and has published several books and articles in the field. Her novels and short stories, published in India, have won several awards. Born and raised in Bangalore, Brinda now lives in New Hampshire, USA.
+ female friendship, feminism, fiction, friendship, Historical fiction, love, marriage, motherhood, music hall, review, sisterhood, sisters, strongman, strongwoman, suffragette movement, Victorian Britain
Vulcana by Rebecca F John
An inspirational fictional telling of Welsh Victorian Strongwoman Kate Williams
Vulcana is a fictional telling of the real story of Victorian ‘strongwoman’ Kate Williams (born 1874), starting when she runs away from home at 16 to travel with the love of her life, William Roberts.
They perform in music halls as Atlas and Vulcana – the climax of their act is that Kate can lift William over her head.
#Vulcana @Rebecca_Writer @honno #RandomThingsTours @annecater @RandomTTours #blogtour
She and William present themselves to the public as brother and sister as they travel the world because William is already married, and William’s wife brings up Kate’s children with her own.
Kate is driven by love: for William, for her children, for performing, and for life, and Rebecca’s gorgeous, immersive writing fits perfectly this brave, unconventional woman and her amazing story.
My Review
Seeing as my son is a novice strongman, how could I not want to read this book. The feats of strength they perform today would no doubt make Atlas and Vulcana look tame in comparison, but while Atlas – William Roberts – may not have been all he purported to be, Kate was undoubtedly exceptionally strong for a woman.
Kate ran away from home when she was sixteen to be with William, who she had met when she was fifteen. He was twelve years her senior and already had a wife Alice, who was a number of years older than him (old enough to easily be Kate’s mother), and they already had five children (reportedly). While Kate remained passionately in love with William until the day she died in 1946 at the age of 72, his relationship with Alice was very different. Kate and William had at least four children together, or maybe six – accounts vary – though they never married. Alice looked after them as well as her own, while Atlas and Vulcana toured, often for months at a time. It all seems a bit strange to us, but Alice was happy with the arrangement and she and Kate became good friends.
Much of the story is based in fact – Vulcana did stop a runaway horse with her bare hands when she was thirteen, she really saved two boys from drowning in the River Usk, she led the police to the arrest and hanging of Dr Crippen for murdering his wife, and rescued four horses from a fire in a burning theatre. In fact Kate loved animals, and any suffering really upset her.
A lot of the story, however, is fictionalised. We wouldn’t have insight into her relationship with Williams, their sex life (how could we know), the lives of the children when they were with Alice and the history of the other members of the troupe like Mabel, Abe and ‘Hatty’ Hatfield.
Kate was friends with the renowned music hall artist Marie Lloyd, whose tragic death in her early fifties is well documented, and also briefly followed the suffragette movement. But Kate’s real passion was that women should be strong, they should cast off the stays and corsets that actually damaged their insides, and take regular exercise to remain healthy. It’s something that we believe to be so important today – she was ahead of her time by decades.
I loved this book. It’s so beautifully written. The ‘future’ in 1939 when Kate is hit by a taxi and believed to be dead and seven years later when she is remembering her life brought tears to my eyes. What an amazing woman she was. She will be burned in my memory forever.
Many thanks to @annecater for inviting me to be part of #RandomThingsTours
As an aside, my husband is related by marriage to another music hall ‘legend’ named Lydia Thompson – she was briefly married to riding-master John Tilbury, who was killed in a steeplechase race in 1864. Thompson was a professional actress, comedienne and burlesque dancer, who left home at fourteen (even younger than Vulcana), to go on the stage. This was fifty years earlier. Her performances were considered ‘to transgress the boundaries of propriety’. Described as an ‘idiotic parody of masculinity’, and ‘monstrously incongruous and unnatural,’ in America she was both hated and adored. Like Kate’s daughter Nora, Lydia’s daughter Zeffie Tilbury appeared in a number of Hollywood films. There is far more documented about Lydia Thompson, than there is about Kate Williams, such is the pity.
About the Author
Rebecca F. John was born in Llanelli. Her first novel, The Haunting of Henry Twist (Serpent’s Tail, 2017) was shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award. She won the PEN International New Voices Award 2015. In 2017 she was on the Hay Festival’s ‘The Hay 30’ list. Her stories have been broadcast on Radio 4. She lives in Swansea with her dogs. Her previous book for Honno, Fannie, was published in January 2022 and was Waterstones Book of the Month for Wales and the BCW Book of the Month.
+ anthology, crime fiction, female friendship, fiction, friendship, murder, murder mystery, obsession, review, secrets, short stories, short story
Marple by Various
A brand-new collection of short stories featuring the Queen of Mystery’s legendary detective Jane Marple, penned by twelve remarkable bestselling and acclaimed authors.
This collection of a dozen original short stories, all featuring Jane Marple, will introduce the character to a whole new generation. Each author reimagines Agatha Christie’s Marple through their own unique perspective while staying true to the hallmarks of a traditional mystery.
Naomi Alderman
Leigh Bardugo
Alyssa Cole
Lucy Foley
Elly Griffiths
Natalie Haynes
Jean Kwok
Val McDermid
Karen M. McManus
Dreda Say Mitchell
Kate Mosse
Ruth Ware
Miss Marple was first introduced to readers in a story Agatha Christie wrote for The Royal Magazine in 1927 and made her first appearance in a full-length novel in 1930’s The Murder at the Vicarage. It has been 45 years since Agatha Christie’s last Marple novel, Sleeping Murder, was published posthumously in 1976, and this collection of ingenious new stories by twelve Christie devotees will be a timely reminder why Jane Marple remains the most famous fictional female detective of all time.
My Review
I’m not going to attempt to review all 12 stories so I’ll pick out the ones that ‘spoke’ to me in Miss Marple’s ‘voice’. Plus one that was totally different.
Starting with The Second Murder At The Vicarage by Scottish crime writer Val McDermid. I could hear Joan Hickson (my favourite) speaking and see her as Jane Marple in the 1980s TV series. Of course we all know that Agatha Christie wrote a novel called Murder At The Vicarage in 1930, which was later adapted into a play. In McDermid’s version, there is a degree of humour which makes it all the more entertaining.
‘To have one murder in one’s vicarage is unfortunate; to have a second looks like carelessness…’ Where have I heard that before? Must be none other than Oscar Wilde himself!
The story is narrated by the vicar in this instance. The dead maid is called Mary, but she is not ‘our maid’. She was, but not any more. Anyone who had dined at the vicarage, ‘could bear testament to the literally diabolical nature of Mary’s cooking.’ I doubt that was sufficient motive for her murder though.
The Unravelling by Natalie Haynes is definitely near the top of my list. When pigman Martin arrives in town and gets a job with Mr Syme, all hell breaks loose outside Weavers the haberdashers, when the pigs get loose. An argument between Weaver and Martin breaks out and then Martin is found dead with an arrow sticking out of his back. A mystery to everyone, except of course to Miss Marple who explains it’s about unravelling the wool, not the other way round.
Miss Marple’s Christmas by Ruth Ware is much gentler than the first four stories. In other words, there is no murder, just a complicated tale of fraud and deception. Miss Marple has to stay overnight with friends on Christmas Day, when they are snowed in. It’s a motley bunch with a couple named the Dashwoods that Colonel Bantry doesn’t actually remember inviting, together with their nephew Ronald, sent down from Oxford for gambling and such like.
Nothing gets past Jane Marple, especially a mystery that involves pins, mistletoe and Dorothy L Sayers. An ‘absolutely damnable business’ and it’s all terribly Agatha Christie.
Murder At The Villa Rosa by Elly Griffiths takes place on the Amalfi Coast and begins with the narrator, author Felix Jeffries, telling us that he is going to kill Ricky Barber. Feeling he cannot do this successfully at home, surrounded by his wife and children, he travels to Italy to stay at the awe-inspiring Hotel Villa Rosa. But all is not as it seems. He meets the other guests, including Miss Marple of course, in her tweed suit, but no knitting – it’s a winter pastime she says.
There are all sorts of strange goings on and while not very typical Marple, this was definitely one of my favourites, maybe because I loved Felix’s narration.
The Murdering Sort by Karen M. McManus introduces us to yet another narrator. This time it’s seventeen-year-old Nic, the great-great-niece of Jane Marple. Her best friend is American heiress Diana Westover. They are inseparable. This is one of those intricate plots with lots of potential suspects. Who would be prepared to kill someone for the inheritance? Because surely these people are not the murdering sort. ‘The problem with that, you see,’ muses Miss Marple, ‘is that no one is ever the murdering sort until they are.’
I loved this. Even though it is more modern that most of the others, I really felt the Marple vibe, though I know some of my fellow readers didn’t.
The Mystery Of The Acid Soil by Kate Mosse. Even if this wasn’t one of my favourites – which it is – how could I not include a story by Kate Mosse. I have read so many of her books. She is one of the most accomplished authors of historical fiction today.
It’s very typical Miss Marple, sticking closely to Agatha Christie’s voice – I have this on good authority from my fellow readers as I don’t have enough experience to judge. It all takes place in Sussex, where Miss Marple is staying with her friend Emmeline for three weeks. Two deaths and a disappearance in a short space of time. Has there been foul play? That’s for Miss Marple to work out.
Many thanks to The Pigeonhole and my fellow Pigeons for making this such an enjoyable read. The interaction with my fellow readers was a big part of the enjoyment.
+ cosy mystery, crime fiction, family, female friendship, fiction, friendship, marriage, motherhood, murder, murder mystery, review, secrets
The Expectant Detectives by Kat Ailes
For Alice and her partner Joe, moving to the sleepy Cotswold village of Penton is a chance to embrace country life and prepare for the birth of their unexpected first child.
He can take up woodwork; maybe she’ll learn to make jam. But the rural idyll they’d hoped for doesn’t quite pan out when a dead body is discovered at their local antenatal class and they find themselves suspects in a murder investigation.
#TheExpectantDetectives @Kat_Ailes @bonnierbooks_uk @Tr4cyF3nt0n #CompulsiveReaders #blogtour
With a cloud of suspicion hanging over the heads of the whole group, Alice sets out to solve the mystery and clear her name, with the help of her troublesome dog, Helen. However, there are more secrets and tensions in the heart of Penton than first meet the eye. Between the discovery of a shady commune up in the woods, the unearthing of a mysterious death years earlier and the near-tragic poisoning of Helen, Alice is soon in way over her head.
My Review
It’s been decades since I had my two sons. Born in the mid-eighties, it was the beginning of the whole natural labour, water birthing, NCT bonding (it was really cheap to join back then) and ‘breast is best’ movement. Except it stuck around. Had we done our pelvic floor exercises every day? Were we prepared for the breathing during contractions? We talked openly about constipation, piles and heartburn. Husbands would be there on the labour ward, helping us choose the right mood music when the time came. I was so disappointed when after 14 hours of natural labour I gave in and had an epidural.
We never talked about what to do with the baby afterwards. At least not until the midwife showed us how to fold a towelling nappy and gave us a free Guiness for the iron content. I lasted three months before I gave in yet again and resorted to Pampers. Same with breastfeeding. I lasted about three months. What a failure I was made to feel (by the books and magazines I read).
Oh how this novel took me back! Yes, things have changed. Terry nappies to disposables and now it’s all reusable TotBots. I attended antenatal classes at the hospital as well as the NCT. When they showed us a cesarean section I suddenly needed to pop out to the toilet, because it wasn’t going to happen to me. My first would be born in under an hour (like I was), ha ha. Actually, my second was, but that’s another story and I’m supposed to be reviewing the book – not reliving those forceps.
I found this book absolutely hilarious. I felt for Alice, I sympathised, I emphasised, I could relate to the naivety, the denial, the mess….the snacks. Especially the snacks. Though not to investigating a murder. Luckily that wasn’t part of the dynamic of our friendship group. We talked about knitting booties for baby (not really), would baby be late or early, what was involved in being induced – no-one planned to give birth naked in a yurt – they hadn’t become trendy yet – under a full moon.
Heavily pregnant Alice and her boyfriend Joe have moved from London to a Cotswold village – not a real one I don’t think – I live in the Cotswolds and I don’t recognise a Penton. They don’t want the baby brought up amongst the traffic and the smog of the city. They want a healthy life in the country, somewhere they can also walk their unruly dog, Helen. In my head I imagined Helen to be a crazy, short-legged, stumpy-tailed Jack Russell, probably because we lost our crazy, short-legged, stumpy-tailed Jack Russell eighteen months ago and I still miss her. But Helen is very different, all blond fur and long legs.
Alice doesn’t know anyone, but following Hen’s sudden delivery at the antenatal class, while a murder is going on downstairs (by that I mean the actual floor below, not Hen’s downstairs if you get my drift), she soon becomes friends with Poppy and her wife Lin, Ailsa from the commune (sort of) and of course Hen, plus hitherto unnamed baby.
Together, they try to solve the murder, much to the annoyance of Detective Jane Harris, who thinks they should stay out of it. But they won’t be deterred and Alice’s musings made me laugh out loud at times.
Many thanks to @Tr4cyF3nt0n for inviting me to be part of the #CompulsiveReaders #blogtour
About the Author
Kat Ailes’ debut novel, The Expectant Detectives, was runner-up for the Comedy Women in Print Unpublished Prize 2021. She works as an editor and freelanced for several years to allow her to take a couple of belated gap years, including hiking the Pacific Crest Trail from Mexico to Canada. She now lives in the Cotswolds with her lovely husband and son and her beautiful but foolish dog.
+ abuse, female friendship, fiction, friendship, holiday, lies, love, marriage, obsession, rape, relationships, review, secrets
The Girls of Summer by Katie Bishop
‘That place has been my whole life. Everything I thought I knew about myself was constructed in those few months I spent within touching distance of the sea. Everything I am is because Alistair loved me.’
Rachel has been in love with Alistair since she was seventeen. Even though she hasn’t seen him for sixteen years and she’s now married to someone else.
Even though she was a teenager when they met.
Even though he is twenty years older than her.
She’s found it impossible to let go of their summer together on a remote, sun-trapped Greek island.…until now.
#TheGirlsOfSummer @WhatKatieBWrote @TransworldBooks #RandomThingsTours @annecater @RandomTTours #blogtour #metoo
When Rachel unexpectedly reconnects with a girl that she knew back then, she is forced to re examine her memories of that golden summer and confront the truth about her relationship with Alistair and about her time working for an enigmatic and wealthy man on the island. And when Alistair returns, the pull of the past could prove impossible to resist…
My Review
What started off as a fun read about a holiday on an idyllic Greek island slowly turned into something more sinister.
Seventeen-year-old Rachel arrives with her best friend Caroline to simply enjoy the sunshine, make friends and get drunk. But when the money starts to run short, they join another group of teenage girls which includes Helena, Keira and Priya, who share a house and work at a beach bar. Rachel is the last to join them and it’s here that she meets the charismatic Alistair, handsome, charming and twenty years older than her.
She is attracted to him to the point of obsession (at 17 I’m afraid I’d have seen him as creepy – hindsight is a wonderful thing though), so when Caroline goes home to return to college and finish her A levels and go to university, Rachel decides to stay. On a number of occasions, the girls, plus Agnes who is a few years older, are asked to attend parties and entertain Alistair’s boss’s wealthy friends – the alarm bells are ringing so loudly you could have heard them from the mainland. But Rachel and her friends are too happy and drunk to see it.
When Alistair says to Rachel, ‘God, you’re so young,’ that for me was the trigger warning. Of course she is. And so are the others.
That was ‘Then’. In the ‘Now’ sixteen years later, she is married to Tom, but she can’t let go of the past. When they holiday on the same Greek Island, she bumps into one of the girls she met back then and everything changes.
Was life really so idyllic on the island? Was Alistair in love with her or is that what she still wants to believe? At 17, Rachel was naive, but 16 years later she must face the reality of their ‘relationship’ whatever the outcome. Some of the revelations are unexpected, earth-shattering and twisted. This is a book about how we perceive things, until we are made to accept the truth. An important book for today.
Many thanks to @annecater for inviting me to be part of #RandomThingsTours
About the Author
KATIE BISHOP is a writer and journalist based in Birmingham, UK. She grew up in the Midlands before moving to Oxford to work in publishing in her early twenties. Whilst working as an assistant editor she started writing articles in her spare time, going on to be published in the New York Times, Guardian, Independent and Vogue. Katie started writing The Girls of Summer during the first UK COVID lockdown, after becoming increasingly interested in stories emerging from the #MeToo movement. The novel is inspired by her own experiences of backpacking, and by her interest in how personal narratives can be reshaped and understood in light of cultural and social changes. In 2020, Katie moved back to the Midlands, and now lives in Birmingham with her partner. She is a full-time writer.
Katie says: “My novel explores themes of consent, power, and memory through the story of a woman reliving a memorable summer in her late teens. Through her emerging memories the novel explores abuse and victimhood, and how victims can rewrite narratives of trauma.
I was initially thinking about writing a book that encapsulated some of the nostalgia and excitement of ‘the one that got away’, but at a time when the #MeToo movement was evolving quite rapidly I started to reflect on my own past relationships differently.
Myself (and a lot of women that I spoke to) were starting to understand their formative relationships and sexual experiences in a different light. I started to think about how I could use the idea of ‘the one that got away’ to explore this reckoning, and how it feels to realise that a relationship that profoundly impacted you could be interpreted in a different light.
The Girls of Summer is a book for every woman. One of the things that I have found most interesting about bringing The Girls of Summer into the world has been the conversations that I’ve had along the way. Almost every woman that I talk to about the book has their own story, their own personal reckoning. An experience they are reminded of that, as an adult, they have had to make peace with.
The #MeToo movement bought about solidarity and empowerment, but it also opened up vast wells of trauma, shame and pain. We have all seen women coming together to shoulder this burden, and to help each other through this. I hope that The Girls of Summer reflects both the horror and the hope of this collective experience.”
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