Ransom Riggs: Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children

From the blurb-
...a horrific family tragedy sets sixteen-year-old Jacob journeying to a remote island off the coast of Wales, where he discovers the crumbling ruins of Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. As Jacob explores its abandoned bedrooms and hallways, it becomes clear that Miss Peregrine's children were more than just peculiar. They may have been dangerous. They may have been quarantined on a deserted island for good reason. And somehow-impossible though it seems-they may still be alive.
This book is illustrated with a collection of vintage photographs that were the inspiration for the children's various talents. While the said talents would be remarkable I didn't feel it was explained why that would make them dangerous and feel the author could have made more of the for-their-own-protection angle and increased the believability of the work. The story also throws up a number of logistical questions that I don't feel were adequately addressed, though it was good that the author at least acknowledged the difficulty of the situation (and I can't be less criptic without spoilers) and attempted to address it.
But perhaps I am being too picky. This is, after all, aimed at the young adult market and is the author's debut novel.
The story itself is well written and engaging. The hero is a little bland but the author captures the selfishness/thoughtlessness of his age well. The world building is a bit perfunctory but good enough as far as it goes.
After reading a lot of glowing reviews for this work in the mainstream press my expectations were quite high so maybe it was inevitable that I would come away a bit disappointed. And I am a little let down even though I did enjoy the story.-Lynn

Karina Machado: Spirit Sisters

From the back of the book-
Spirit Sisters illuminates the very personal ghost stories of ordinary Australian women. Journalist Karina Machado has listened to many of these stories and within these pages captures the sorrow, fear, comfort and hope that go along with them. Here she passes on their secrets and shares those incrediable moments when someone leans in to whisper their tale and the hairs on the back of your neck stand up.
Whether you believe in the afterlife or not, reading this book will lead you to question your reality and wonder...maybe?
I sought out this book after reading its follow up Where Spirits Dwell  and just as expected Spirit Sisters offers more of the same. Reading them out of order didn't seem to make any difference both being simple collections of retold experiences.
The strengths and weaknesses of the book remain unchanged. The stories themselves are again related in a mundane language that requires quite a bit of imagination if the reader is to get a sense of the emotions claimed in the blurb but is no less interesting for that. Perhaps sometimes you really do need to be their if you are to truly understand.
Not bad but don't expect scary-Lynn.

Karen Machado: Where Spirits Dwell

From the back of the book-
There are houses that are as seductive as lovers. There are houses that draw us close and never let us go, there are houses that haunt us. And then there are houses that are truly haunted, houses where spirits dwell. Are you ready to step inside?
Where Spirits Dwell unearths the creaking, spine-chilling moments when ghosts appear in suburbia. Alongside infamous Australian haunted houses, like Sydney's historic The Abbey, Karina Machado takes us away from stereotypical rundown mansions and into everyday homes-from far north Queensland to Sydney's north shore, from Tasmania's desolate coast to Melbourne's outer suburbs.
There are stories in this book that will chill you, shock you and break your heart. Meet the beautiful girl with honey-blonde hair, the stern old lady in a high-necked gown and the malignant poltergiest who lurks in a red-brick bungalow. Spirits dwell everywhere: inside restaurants, hospitals, shoping centres and even our hearts. If you dare, lose yourself in these true-life encounters of ghosts that terrorise, comfort, torment and console.
This collection of ghost stories is told in the words of those who experienced the events. While this gives the reports a ring of authenticity, it does mean they lack narrative flair. Undoubtedly the experiences were terrifying for those on the scene but the retelling, for the main part, doesn't convey a strong sense of atmophere to the reader.
The author does have a tendency to self reference an earlier work that I was not familiar with, something that would normally put me off but in this case has made me curious.
I quite like the fact that the stories were local and the settings mundane. In that respect the author has validated my own experience of growing up in a haunted house and hilighted the fact that not only grand old buildings are home to the unexplained.
An interesting collection of stories but not 'spooky'in the traditional sense.-Lynn

Carol Goodman: The Ghost Orchid

From the back of the book-

For more than one hundred years, creative souls have traveled to upstate New York to work under the captivating spell of the Bosco estate. Cradled in silence, inspired by the rough beauty of overgrown gardens and crumbling statuary, these chosen few fashion masterworks-and further Bosco's reputation as a premier artists' colony. This season, five talented artists-in-residence find themselves drawn to the history of Bosco, from the extensive network of fountains that were once its centerpiece but have long since run dry to the story of its enigmatic founder, Aurora Latham, and the series of tragic events that occurred more than a century ago.
Ellis Brooks, a first-time novelist, has come to Bosco to write a book based on Aurora and the infamous summer of 1893, when wealthy, powerful Milo Latham brought the notorious medium Corinth Blackwell to the estate to help his wife contact three of the couple's children, lost the winter before in a diphtheria epidemic. But when a seance turned deadly, Corinth and her alleged accomplice, Tom Quinn, disappeared, taking with them the Lathams' only surviving child.
The more time she spends at Bosco the more Ellis become convinced that there is an even darker, more sinister twist to the story. And she's not alone: biographer Bethesda Graham uncovers stunning revelations about Milo and Corinth; landscape architect David Fox discovers a series of hidden tunnels underneath the gardens; poet Zalman Bronsky hears the long-dry fountains' waters beckoning him; and novelist Nat Loomis feels something lingering just out of reach.
After a bizarre series of accidents befalls them, the group cannot deny the connections between the long ago and now, the living and the dead... as Ellis realized that the tangled truth may ensnare them all in its cool embrace.
I write this review some considerable time after having read the book in question, yet still the story haunts me. A well developed central plot with unexpected twists is peopled by fascinating characters in a beautifully described setting.
This writer has the knack of leading the reader up the garden path (in this instance quite literally) in such a way as to make us follow willingly and be delighted when the expected doesn't eventuate.
Great mystery, with a touch of romance and a sprinkling of chills, this is a good modern gothic.-Lynn

Sarah Waters: Affinity

An upperclass woman recovering from a suicide attempt becomes a volunteer visitor at Millbank women's prison. It is 1874, spiritualism is at its height, and one of the inmates is a genteel medium convicted of fraud. This woman stands out amongst the murderers and thieves who surround her.
The visitor develops a special bond with the medium and after a sceptical start becomes convinced that her abilities are real. Eventually she falls in love with the woman and helps her plan her escape. She is to arrange the mundane aspects of their getaway, while the woman insists that the spirits will help her with the actual prison break.
But will, the desperate plan work?
I have mixed feelings about this work. I have quite enjoyed stories by Waters in the past but I don't feel that this one lived up to its potential.
The pace was very slow and at times I felt I was reading a tract on the conditions and workings of ninteenth century prisons.
Having said that, the story had a feeling of truth to it, the characters were quite believable, if somewhat unsympathetic. The ending is good in that it brings everything to light but somehow it still felt loose to me.
I think there was a lot that might have been done here that wasn't, a shame because the author's voice is strong and capable.-Lynn

Kaye Fallick: Get a New Life

From the back of the book-
Forget the quick-fix approach of extreme makeovers shown on reality TV. Real change is about finding out what's right for YOU-planning, researching options, discovering your own intrinsic qualities and matching them to the people, the places and the activities which sing to your soul.
What's stopping you from changing the way you live?
If you crave a more balanced life, are suffering from MTL syndrome (there's got to be More To Life than this), or have had change dumped upon you through bereavement, retrenchment, retirement or illness, taking control is the first step towards successfully managing this change.
Packed with checklists to help you determine your change-readiness, practical advice about managing your finances and inspiring profiles of those who have done it, this is the essential road map for the life you really want to live.
I must disclose straight up that I didn't read this book in its entirety but dipped in and out of the sections that I found most interesting or relevant. So while I did get through most of it, I did not read it all and my comments should be considered accordingly.
The book is divided into four parts. The first section discussed the nature of change and highlights some of the things that need to be taken into consideration before committing to any course of action. Quite frankly I found this part a bit dull and skimmed it for the most part.
The other three sections each focus on a different aspect of life and the possible choices a person might be faced with therein. They present a more practical guide for instigating change offering various checklists, goal planning advice and noting some of the resources available at the time of publishing (in the form of web sites, books and organizations that might be worth following up).
I am indebted to this book for introducing me to the concept of portfolio or modular work, an idea that has very strong appeal to me and one that I will investigate further.
The real value though, I feel, is to be found in trying to answer the oft repeated question "What's stopping you?". Are you being held back by excuses or do you have genuine reasons for not following your dream? Either way this book offers methods to help you adapt to, or overcome, obstacles.
Certainly a book worth a look if you are wanting to change but don't know quite where or how to start.-Lynn

Erin Morgenstern: The Night Circus

From the back of the book-

In 1886, a mysterious travelling circus becomes an international sensation. Open only at night, constructed entirely in black and white, Le Cirque des Reves delights all who wander its circular paths and warm themselves at its bonfire.

Although there are acrobats, fortune-tellers and contortionists, the Circus of Dreams is no conventional spectacle. Some tents contain clouds, some ice. The circus seems almost to cast a spell over its aficionados, who call themselves the reveurs-the dreamers. At the heart of the story is the tangled relationship between two young magicians, Celia, the enchanter's daughter, and Marco, the sorcerer's apprentice. At the behest of their shadowy masters, they find themselves locked in a deadly contest, forced to test the very limits of the imagination, and of their love...

This historical fantasy presents an unusual love story. For the bulk of the novel the protagonists are unaware of each others identity, knowing only that they are in competition with each other to prove their superiority. Their main means of communication is through challenging each other to greater and greater feats of magic within the arena of the circus.

The idea of practitioners of different disciplines within the same field challenging each other for superiority isn't new. Neither is the enemies to friends to lovers concept. This book stands out because both of these aspects have been done so well. The characters are all larger than life but somehow fit easily in the story. Secondary characters are as well developed as primary ones. The plot manages to unfold gently without losing pace.

There is an unmistakable literary inclination here with layers of meaning and subtlties to be seen if the reader is so inclined (the symbolism of a black and white world being the most obvious) but the story can be enjoyed without contemplating those deeper levels.

Quite unlike anything I've read in a long while. Delightful-Lynn

Carol Goodman: The Drowning Tree

From the back of the book-
Juno McKay intended to avoid her fifteenth-year college reunion, but she can't resist the chance to see her longime friend Christine Webb. Though Juno cringes at the inevitable talk of her troubled personal life-and the husband who ended up in a mental hopsital only two years after their wedding-she endures the gossip for her friend's sake.
While lecturing at the Penrose College library, Christine shocks the rapt crowd by reavling little-known details about the lives of two sisters-memebers of the influential family whose name the college bears. Christine's revelations throw shadows of betrayal, lust, and insanity over the family's distinguished facade.
After her speech, Christine seems distant, uneasy, and sad. The next day, she disappears. Juno is alarmed and begins to peel away the layer of secrets and madness that surround the Penrose dynasty. She fears that Christine discovered somethig damning about them, perhaps even something worth killing for. And Juno is derermined to find it-for her friend and for herself.
This tangled combination of historical and modern mystery tales has a strong literary flavour. The pace is slow, the characters complex and the story deceptively straight forward.
My last foray into this author's work didn't leave me partiuclarly impressed but I'm pleased to say this effort was much more enjoyable. There were enough red herrings thrown in to cloud the antagonist's identity without it coming as a complete surprise at the end of the story or worse, being telegraphed loudly throughout the book. A complicated romantic subplot fits in well.
I would class this as a mild modern gothic worth a look for those with an interest in the genre and comfortable with a less sensational approach.-Lynn

Richard Ellis:Imagining Atlantis

From the back of the book-
The idea of Atlantis, the lost continent, has tantalized the human imagination since the fourth centuery B.C. when the brilliant civilization and its mysterious destruction were first mentioned by Plato. Is it only a myth, or did a real Atlantis exist? Over the centuries this question has inspired countless theories, from the scientifically challenging to the undeniably crackpot.

Richard Ellis takes us on a fascinating journey through the rich and exotic history of the search for Atlantis, during which we meet characters as diverse as Francis Bacon, Jules Verne, Edgar Cayce, Jaques Cousteau, Charles Berlitz, and even Indiana Jones. Both scholarly and diverting, Imagining Altantis has been hailed as the most important book ever written about the Atlantis legend and its perennial appeal.
This book certainly does give a comprehensive overview of the many faces of Atlantis. Using archeology, seismology, volcanology and mythology, it examines theories and possibilities as to where Atlantis was and how it met its fate. A large portion of the discussion is dedicated to the ancient Minoan culture and the debate over exactly where the Pillars of Hercules were in Plato's time (apparently it isn't accepted that the current Pillars of Hercules are the ones being referred to in the original Atlantis legend). There is also a brief look at modern films about Atlantis included.
This is a good and accessible scholarly work, that while fascinating in places, I found a little dry overall to maintain my full interest.-Lynn

Anonymums

From the back of the book-
Once upon a time, there were three mums-Mum A, Mum B and Mum C.
Bored with their suburban existence, they decided to add some spice to their lives. For three months, they would dare each other to do things.
Mum B would find herself wearing firecracker red lipstick for a whole week (yes, even to swimming lessons); Mum C would tell her atheist husband she'd found religion; and Mum A would have a secret tryst with Santa in a shopping centre.
They also dared each other to tell the truth... The truth about motherhood. The truth about their lives. The truth about who they'd become compared to who they wanted to be.'
This book basically says what all parents, if they're being honest, know-motherhood is hard. It is exhausting, unrelenting, mind-numbing, dull, repetative work. Sure we love our children and wouldn't swap them for the world etc, etc but that doesn't mean we don't pine for the women we were Before Children or mourn the Woman We Could Have Been.
I could relate to a lot of what these women were saying about their mothering experience and sitting surrounded in the mummy-zombie suburbs even be a little jealous that they found each other.
The dares and their responses to them were fun. The truths were open, honest and at times confronting. Both are presented in an engaging, easy to read way. However the book left me with mixed feelings.
For all I knew where these women were coming from part of me (a judgemental, contemptuous part) couldn't help but want to give them a good shake and tell them to wake up to themselves. In the grand scheme of things they have it good. Their problems are most definitely first-world, middle-class ones and not even difficult first world ones. They weren't faced with the death or disability of their partners or children, poverty or abuse.
In all fairness they never claim that their lives are particularly difficult in any way other than motherhood and the book is about loss of identity and regaining self not social justice. I find it interesting that it provoked such a response in me and it has made me examine my world view.
A deceptively light read that will have many nodding in agreement and some wondering why.-Lynn

Cooking the Books - Kerry Greenwood

Corinna Chapman, baker par excellence and proprietor of Earthly Delights, is doing nothing during her holidays. Her trainee Jason has taken off to learn how to surf, her partner Daniel is busy tracking down corporate fiscal shenanigans, and her waif-like assistants Kylie and Goss are auditioning as extras on a new soap. Without care or responsibility, Corinna should be enjoying the down time, but she's bored.
Which is what allows her to succumb to the emotional blackmail of a former school mate, assisting her on the set of "Kiss the Bride" - coincidentally the same soap Kylie and Goss have got parts on.

There are so many delightful things about this series, from the oddments I flag for follow up (Kipling's Puck of Pook's Hill, the not safe for work song 'The Sexual Life of the Camel') and the meticulously seamless plot to the way traditionally-build Greenwood describes life as a fat woman

"But I haven't got long - I have a dinner date."
"You?" she asked with that touch of incredulity which flicks a fat woman on the raw. I resolved that I would try to do the Christian thing and forgive my enemoes, but that did not require me to turn the other cheek...
She had aged badly, looked haggard and lined. One advantage of being fat is that one does not wrinkly like the slim and gorgeous.

There's bullying, intrigue, a lion, high drama, a tiny bit of Doctor Who, a literary scavenger hunt, the tyranny of the thin-is-healthy obsessed, and bullying of all sorts. There's also the deep satisfaction of just desserts and righteous comeuppances, and the city of Melbourne as integral to the soul of the novel as a character:

The weather was temperate, which is a signal that it is about to change. In Melbourne, a city whose climate can only be called 'unstable'. If by unstable you mean that it is blowing a hot gale before lunch and raining like the Flood after lunch. This makes Melburnians flexible and agile. You have to be, to dodge he hailstones. Some of them are as big as tennis balls, I swear.

Not a breath of a lie! Greenwood's best book, and this is one of that predominant number, are so beautifully constructed, intricate and masterfully crafted that it is impossible to do them justice. It is a mystery greater than any Corinna or her 'twenties counterpart Phrynne have ever solved that she is not more greatly lauded and renown. - Alex the Fan Girl

The Corinna Chapman series:
Earthly Delights; Heavenly Pleasures; Devil's Food; Trick or Treat; Forbidden Fruit; Cooking the Books

Before I Go to Sleep - SJ Watson

Christine wakes one morning in an unfamiliar bed next to a stranger with grey hair and a wedding ring. Though they're usually younger and single, the experience isn't a new one, but Christine has no recollection of the night before. she tiptoes to the bathroom, and that's when things start to become strange - her hands are wrong, old, and she's got a band on her left ring finger. Startled, she looks in the mirror and sees the face of a stranger - an old woman.
According to the man, Ben, eighteen years earlier Chris was in an accident that caused a rare form of amnesia - she can retain information for a day, but as soon as you gos to sleep for more than a nap it all goes. Sometimes she can remember parts of her twenties, and sometimes she thinks she's a girl, but she never remembers anything leading up to the accident or following it.
That premise is what lead me to pick up Before I Go to Sleep, and the idea of an exploration of identity reconstruction is fascinating. However, Watson's added a tense element - Chris discovers a journal, kept for weeks, where her previous selves details fragments they remember of their old life and secret therapy sessions with Dr Nash, a psychologist Ben refused to let see her. She learns about things Ben has kept from her, apparently to reduce distress, including the existence and death of their son. And on the cover of the journal, underlined, is the warning "Don't trust Ben!"
As the journal progresses Chris learns more about herself and her life, and becomes increasingly distrustful - about Ben, her therapist, and the reliability of the journal entries she wrote but can't remember. She also discovers that the act of writing things down has, as Dr Nash hoped, has allowed the waking her to retain some of that information. It also let her build up a more coherent picture of her post-accident life, including a lengthy stay is a psychiatric unit.
Perhaps my favourite aspect of Before I Go to Sleep is the beautifully executed unreliable narrator - like the very different but equally compelling We Need to Talk About Kevin, the single voice illuminates and clouds, creating a nivel that is both literary and genuinely gripping. As Anita Shreve says on the jacket, Before I Go to Sleep is "Brilliant in its pacing, profound in its central question, suspenseful on very page." I absolutely couldn't say it better myself. - Alex

The Nurse's Christmas Wish - Sarah Morgan

Mac (or, on p. 11 of my copy, Matt) Sullivan adores Cornwall, enjoys working with his brother Josh, and is dedicated to his work as an Accident and Emergency consultant - particularly since the death of his wife two years earlier. He has no interest in relationships but his brother has other plans.
Enter Louisa Young - not just a nurse, Josh has hired her to act as Mac's housekeeper, something Louisa only discovers after breaking in to the house. With nowhere else to stay the pair are trapped, at least for a while. Will it be long enough for them to find love?
Yes, of course it will be. This is my second experience of Morgan's medical romances (I reviewed the first a couple of weeks ago), and I have to confess I was disappointed. In comparison with the similarly Yule-themed the Midwife's Christmas Miracle the writing is less nuanced, the characters less subtle, the plot more shallow and the medical scenes are marked by clumsy exposition.
Louisa is a paragon of efficiency and good humour - she cleans, she cooks, she bubbles like an adult Pollyanna, trailing happiness behind her. She takes in strays, charms the hardest hearted, and invites patients into her (or rather, Jake's home) for a Christmas feast he doesn't want, complete with tree and boughs of greenery.
And not only is Louisa untouched, Jake is able to detect this once he takes her virginity in a glorious cascade of simultaneous orgasm. It must be because of the greater sensitivity of the unclad penis and the emotional integrity of our hero.
This is my least favourite romance novel trope, hands down. I can handle a virgin heroine if there's context - the era, her age, a protected upbringing, a strong religious conviction, the reckless sexual behaviour she witnessed as a child, uncomfortable with her own attractiveness or sexuality, whatever. Here there's none of that - she's attractive, straight, able to orgasm with penetration and precious little foreplay, and though she had a deprived childhood there's no mention of abuse of any kind.
I liked the other Morgan novel as much as I disliked this, and so I'll give both the author and the genre another run, though perhaps not for a wee while. In the interim I have no shortage of other novels to be making my way through. - Alex

The Midwife's Christmas Miracle - Sarah Morgan

Miranda Harding only meant to go for a walk in the beautiful Lake District; with much to think about, it seemed an appropriate place to ponder in peace. She'd never liked Christmas, and recent events had nothing to change that. Unfortunately, while deep in thought she failed to notice the change in weather and, unfamiliar with the area, was unequipped for the sudden knee-high snow that not only bit to the bone but obliterated any sign of the way she'd come.
Jake Blackwell was pleased his closest friends had patched up their marriage, but seeing them so happy only brought home his own single state, and his longing for Christy, despite all the practice he'd had putting her out of his mind. Walks in sunshine were fine, but he preferred the tempestuous, unpredictable winter weather, and a gentle hike was just the thing to distract him. Until he was distracted by a wan, shivering girl almost hidden in the snow.
A recent review on Smart Bitches lead me to check what Morgan romances my library held, and though I'm not usually a fan of medical romances - all that longing gazes over full bedpans thing strikes me as highly unlikely, and in my experience doctors are far more prone to hooking up with other doctors now women comprise over half of graduates - I'm open to persuasion. The SBTB review was for a non-medical category romance that sounded intriguing enough that I forwent my usual aversion, and I have to admit I was pleasantly surprised.
Jake is an obstetric consultant, Miranda is a new midwife on his unit - and she's pregnant, which he doesn't realise until after he's rescued, chastised, recovered and soundly kissed her. In fact, it's not until he sees her at work the following day that the penny drops - and it's to Morgan's credit that this seems plausible.
What I particularly liked was the intelligence of both characters - both in general and clinically. Jake is, of course, a brilliant clinician, but Miranda holds her own, and if Morgan wasn't a clinician herself then she's done research that's incorporated in to the novel without any head-hitting signage.
She also avoids the too-common romance trope of equating conflict with passion - practitioner conflict is restricted to other clinicians, and though there are obstacles to their HEA (chief of which, unsurprisingly, is Miranda's pregnancy) they don't read as contrived or ludicrous.
I so enjoyed the Midwife's Christmas Miracle that I've borrowed another of Morgan's medical romances. - Alex

Jennifer Crusie: Maybe This Time

From the back of the book-
Andie Miller is ready to move on with her life. She wants to marry her fiance and leave behind everything in her past, especially her ex-husband, North Archer. But when Andie tries to gain closure with him, he asks one final favor of her. A distant cousin has died and left North the guardian of two orphans who have driven away three nannies already, and things are getting worse. He needs someone to take care of the situation, and he knows Andie can handle anything...
When Andie meets the two children, she realizes the situation is much worse than she feared. Carter and Alice aren't your average delinquents, and the creepy old house where they live is being run by the worst housekeeper since Mrs. Danvers. Complicating matters is Andie's fiance's suspicion that this is all a plan by North to get Andie back. He may be right because Andie's dreams have been haunted by North since she arrived at the old house. And that's not the only haunting...
Then her ex-brother-in-law arrives with a duplicitous journalist and a self-doubting parapsychologist, closely followed by an annoyed medium, Andie's tatot card-reading mother, her avenging ex-mother-in-law, and her jealous fiance. Just when Andie's sure things couln't get more complicated, North arrives to make her wonder if maybe this time things could just turn out differently.
This unusual mash up of The Turn of the Screw and Dharma and Greg could have been ridiculous but it works quite well. I think the success is due to the very well developed and believable characters (with perhaps the exception of Alice who felt like a bit of a caricature to me).
The setting was acceptably creepy but I can't understand why the author felt the need to have the haunted mansion imported from England and rebuilt on American soil. It seems completely unnecessary, especially since the ghosts are connected to objects rather than the house itself. This is something I've come across a couple of times (with different authors) and I suppose I'll never understand. If the English mansion is essential then why not set the story in England rather than drag England to the U S.
I really enjoyed this book with the exception of one scene. It was pure Henry James. It didn't add to this story in any way other than possibly as a tribute to the original and for some reason its presence here particularly annoyed me.
In spite of the few quibbles I've mentioned I did find this a fun and easy read. Another hit from Ms Crusie.-Lynn

The Bone Yard – Jefferson Bass

Bill Brockton is called away from his home under the University of Tennessee’s bleachers to Florida in the height of summer, at the request of forensic analyst Angie St. Claire – she’s convinced that her sister’s death, attributed by the coroner to suicide, was really a murder committed by the dead woman’s husband.
What promises to be a relatively quick trip is lengthened when an adolescent skull is found in the panhandle – decades old and damaged by time and predation, it bears the unmistakable signs of violent death. When a second skull, of similar age, vintage and trauma, appears Bill has to investigate. What he discovers reopens a dark and disturbing chapter in Florida’s history – and reveals a cycle of abuse that persists to this day.
I found this the most powerful in this six-part (to date) series. This is in part because it’s stepped away from the family aspect of Bill Brockton, which I was finding distracting, but mostly because of the subject matter. The heart of The Bone Yard is institutional child abuse, and the novel is a strong argument for change to a system that, particularly for young back men, compounds misfortune, poverty, youthful indiscretion and poor parenting, creating a perfect breeding ground for abuse, escalating crime, diminishing options, and a growing prison population. For anyone inclined to dismiss this as a problem of the past, disturbing contemporary cases are also discussed.
This is a novel, and the key message, along with a plea for better financing of forensic technology, is interwoven with a strong novel. There are also some light notes; I particularly liked the scene, clearly influenced by experience of police phone lines, when a press release about the first skull asks for anyone with information about a missing child (white, aged ten to twelve, and missing for months or even years) to call:
“We’ve had a few calls, including one from a guy who says that he’s the missing child.”
I laughed. “Did he say how he manages without his skull?”
“No,” Vickery deadpanned, “but I’m guessing the lack of a skull makes it a lot easier to go through life with his head up his ass.”
I was a little disappointed with the fifth novel in this series, and was relieved to find that my return was worth it - The Bone Yard combines an interesting mystery with a strong social message, including enough forensic detail to be genuine without becoming overly technical. The discomfort I had in Brockton's personality last time is not in evidence this time around, and the slightly more soapy aspects of the character arc (father/son issues and a pregnant ex-girlfriend fleeing from the law) are mercifully backgrounded. It is with relief and genuine excitement that I look forward to the release of book seven. - Alex

The Bill Brockton series:
Carved in Bone
Flesh and Bone
The Devil’s Bones
Bones of Betrayal
The Bone Yard
The Bone Thief

Makita Brottman: The Solitary Vice-Against Reading

From the back of the book

Mikita Brottman wonders, Just why is reading so great? It's a solitary practice, one that takes away from time that could be spent developing important social networking skills. Reading is not required for health, happiness, or a loving family. And, if reading is so important, why are catch and juvenile slogans like "Reading Changes Lives" and "Champions Read" needed to hammer the point home?
Fearlessly tackling the notion that non-readers are doomed to lives of despair and mental decay, Brottman makes the case that the value of reading lies not in its ability to ward of Alzheimer's or that it's a pleasant hobby. Rather, she argues that like that other well-known solitary vice, masturbation, reading is ultimately not an act of pleasure but a tool for self-exploration, one that allows people to see the world through the eyes of others and lets them travel deep into the darkness of the human condition.

This book captured my attention right from the introduction with the combination of fascinating material and an easy going style. Sadly it was unable to hold my interest past chapter three.
The first third of the book contains a spookily familiar childhood reminiscence (and coincidentally reading list). Here the author also manages to articulate feelings about reading, specifically Literature, that I would never be able to express so succinctly. But sadly after this the book runs off at a tangent that I was unwilling to follow.
Chapter 4 sings the merits of celebrity tell-alls, and while I am uninterested in the subject (a situation the author believes impossible) I persevered in the hope of a return to the delight of the earlier pages. It wasn't to be. The beginning of chapter 5 offered little of interest. Skimming the rest of the book I simply found more of the same. Chapter after chapter devoted to various incarnations of 'gossip' pages. I would allow that the subject has a place in a book of this nature but I put it that it is unworthy of a book in its own right (which is what this book, to all intents and purposes, becomes). At the end of each chapter an attempt is made to relate the contents back to the original theme of the book. I believe these attempts to be singularly unsuccessful.
This is not a book I would recommend but if the opportunity arose to read the first three chapters I would say go ahead and have a look but be willing to do as the author suggests and put it aside as soon as you find yourself no longer engaged. I think you can guess where that point was for me.- Lynn

All Clear – Connie Willis

Post-graduate Oxford historians Michael, Merope and Polly have travelled to 1940 to complete their research. They were prepared for contingencies, and were given a lot of background prior to their journeys, but being stuck wasn’t a possibility and of them had contemplated. As window after window fails to open the likelihood of them getting home becomes ever more remote, particularly as the dates of previous trips to the past approach – nobody can be in the same time twice. And Polly has a greater concern – even though it should be impossible, their presence seems to be altering events, potentially changing the outcome of the War and history itself.
Far less a sequel than the second part of an enormous story (the novels combines total almost 1,200 pages), All Clear picks up directly where Blackout left off. This is an ambitious and complex return to the universe first encountered in The Doomsday Book, and is characterised by many of the same trademarks, most notably a breathless, pervasive sense of urgency. In The Doomsday Book and To Say Nothing of the Dog, the previous novels set in this universe, I found myself swept up in the emotion – Willis has an amazing ability to recreate that feeling so often encountered in dreams of being in a tearing hurry but beset on all sides by people and events seemingly intent on delay and derailment.
This time, however, perhaps because of the length of time over which it has to be sustained, I found myself becoming impatient with it. And instead had a far stronger feeling of irritation. That said, Willis does this time include a reason for it, though this itself opens the door to some interesting questions about inevitability, free will, self-correction, randomness and sentience.
There are several interwoven narratives, and the setting jumps from year to year, so the opening chapter set in “London – 26 October 1940” is followed by “London – 7 May 1945” and is then interspersed between “Bethnal Green – June 1944”, “Kent – April 1944” and “Golders Green – June 1944” among others. Combining this darting timeline with a host of character, including the historians adopting different personas, meant that I eventually gave up on trying to keep track and decided to be swept along by the story. I don’t think that this is necessarily a bad thing, but it did mean I ended up missing some of the nuances and detail.
While I enjoyed Willis’ homage to Jerome K Jerome’s classic Three Men in a Boat in To Say Nothing of the Dog, I found the unexplained references to Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest in the 1944 scenes set in Kent irritating – as well as Earnest there’s an Algernon, a Chasuble, Gwendolyn, Moncrieff, Cess, Prism, Merriman and Lady Bracknell; though I originally enjoyed the allusion, after several encounters it was just irritating.
It may well be that this was explained in Blackout, but I read that perhaps the better part of a year ago, and though I was able to pick up enough of it for All Clear to make sense, there’s a lot of information to carry over. It would, perhaps, have been better for me to read the two parts back to back, or at least in close chronological proximity, but that didn’t happen. I appreciate that Willis wanted to include a myriad of detail about this clearly well researched era, as well as the several individual stories, and for the most part this paid off. But there were certainly times where I wanted some heavier editing.
There are several touches I very much enjoyed, primarily to do with the evacuated children – from Alf and Binnie Hodbin tearaways to a quote from a letter in 1940:

There are six evacuated children in our house. My wife and I hate them so much that we’ve decided to take away something for Christmas.

I also liked the ending, which was a little messier and organic than most fiction completions, and I look forward to the release of another novel set in this universe, which I very much enjoy. I just hope that, should Willis continue the series, she returns to the slightly more straightforward plots of the first novels. - Alex

Hell to Heaven – Kylie Chan

Australian Emma Donahoe, nanny turned wife of Xuan Wu, absent god of the Northern Heavens, would have her hands full with any of her many tasks – managing the training academy, running John’s empire while waiting his return, raising his teenage daughter Simone, and fending off the advances (personal and political) of the Demon King and his competitive progeny. She has to juggle not only all these demands but also her own demon nature – as if discovering she was part snake were not enough, contamination with demon essence presents the very really danger that Emma may become wholly demon.
Her quests to uncover the reasons for this, undo it, and discover who (or what) she really is, form the driving narrative of the second in Chan’s Journey to Wudang trilogy, Hell to Heaven. It continues the story started in the Dark Heavens novels, and like the previous four novels blends a combination of contemporary sensibilities with ancient lore – in both cases primarily Eastern but with a little Western flavour (primarily Australian) added to the mix.
Though engaging and intelligent, this is not a light or easily accessible series, and if the books are read out of order or elements forgotten the plot could easily become unintelligible. This is certainly not to say that Chan’s writing is oblique, just that the subject matter and the plot are layered and complex.
As I read I noted several passages I wanted to include in my review – the role of ‘calling’ in preventing consanguinity; the lure of Emma’s other nature; Emma’s Archivist experiences looking at indigenous Australian records; the concept of Celestial High school; the unexpected results when the uninformed but well-intentioned (and determined) act – but they all turned out to be too difficult to include without having to explain half the book, because it is so much of a piece. Instead I give you this snippet:

It sounded too much like a Druidic sacrifice ritual, which was very disturbing. Druids had been nature-loving tree-huggers, yes; but they’d also disemboweled people and used their own intestines to tie them still alive, as sacrifices to the trees they worshipped.

I look forward to the final part of the Journey to Wudang trilogy but hope it will conclude the story, rather than being a springboard for a third trilogy. Thus far Chan has managed to keep the central plot, of Xuan Wu’s return and Emma’s growth, at the heart of the narrative. I would hate to see that diluted. – Alex

The Dark Heavens Trilogy:
1. White Tiger
2. Red Phoenix
3. Blue Dragon
The Journey to Wudang trilogy:
1. Earth to Hell
2. Hell to Heaven
3. Heaven to Earth

Dead Reckoning – Charlaine Harris

We last left mind-reading waitress/vampire sheriff’s wife Sookie Stackhouse recovering from the fae war that saw most of her fairy relatives either dead or separated from the mortal realm, with trouble brewing on two fronts - an internal vampire power struggle, and the consequences of the two-natured 'coming out' to humanity.
This may have been problematic enough, but Sookie has other issues to juggle – two of her fairy kin are staying with her, and though she delights in their presence she can also feel herself becoming more fae, which concerns her. Former housemate and witch Amelia may have a way to dissolve the bond between Sookie and Eric, which would allow her to decide how she real feels about her husband, but it’s not a decision without cost. She’s also concerned about whatever t is Eric’s hiding from her – something she can tell his 2IC Pam knows about. Her first lover, Bill, has relationship issues, and Sookie’s not at all sure that her shifter boss (and dearest friend) Sam’s girlriend Jannalynn’s good for him. But first up is a Molotov cocktail attack on Merlott’s, the bar Sam owns and at which Sookie works – is it aimed at Sam and the two-natured, or is it something closer to home?
As I've mentioned several times before, each instalment in this series is more convoluted than the last, and though Harris does a good job of keeping the various strands coherent and intelligible I find myself increasingly weary of the plot devices, massive cast and ever-tenser drama.
I did very much enjoy the reappearance of Hunter, the mind-reading son of Sookie’s deceased cousin, and though he had only a brief guest spot I was also glad to see werewolf Alcide again, and Bubba’s one of Harris’s most tender characters, who was used with care. In fact, for the most part I do enjoy spending time in Harris’s world, but I find myself paying less attention with each book to tracking the character arcs and the numerous persons who threaten Sookie and her entourage. Otherwise spending time here diminishes in escapist quality and becomes more like work. This is definitely a series to read in order, and with a little time between adventures. - Alex