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.

Laura Anne Gilman: Free Fall

After the events of the last book in this series, Burning Bridges, the magical community is in disarray and the target of increasingly violent vigilante attacks. But that is the last thing on one woman’s mind. Her partner/lover has apparently been unable to let past loyalties go and has left her alone just when she needs him more than ever.
In order to take her mind off things she accepts what should be a simple retrieval job. She soon finds her mission wasn’t what she’d thought it to be and comes to the conclusion her people can no longer hide.
They are at war for their very survival and don’t stand a chance at open warfare. So she decides to fight back her own way-save those she can and inflict maximum damage to the enemy in the process. The battle is brutal and there are major losses on both sides and she is far from unscathed. But at the end of the day she knows who her real friends are and is relieved that her old partner/lover is amongst their number.
This is the second last book in this series and it reads very much as a continuation of the previous novel, so unlike earlier episodes it does not stand alone.
There is plenty of action and danger is ever present making for a fast paced read that is somehow less satisfying than it should be. There is a lot going on as the overarching plot reaches its zenith and I think perhaps character development suffers a little due to the rapid plot pace. A shame because the main character faces significant personal issues that I would have liked to have seen explored.
Overall this wasn’t a bad book but it was far from the best in the series. To be honest it felt a bit experimental, as if the author wanted to push the characters in a direction they didn’t want to go and their resistance shines through making the story feel false.
I can only hope that the final book in the series sees everyone back on track.-Lynn

Emma Holly: Prince of Ice

When a disgraced royal demon scheming to regain power by bearing the emperor a child, dies before her plans come to fruition, the daughter she leaves behind is raised alongside a young prince. That is until his affection for the girl starts to worry his parents who turn her out of their house.
Prospects are not good for the unwanted orphan, so when she is given the opportunity to make her fortune as a courtesan she takes the chance.
Her first protector is none other than her childhood friend. But he is no longer the sweet boy she remembers and she is no longer the carefree child she was all those years ago. Not only that, but their stations in life are greatly changed and their interaction is governed by a strict code of behaviour. The two fall in love and as a result face charges of treason and potential death sentences. But the girl’s family blackmail the emperor into accepting banishment rather than execution and the couple leave the isolated world they know to carve a future together in the human world.
I picked this book up because it was supposedly set in the same alternate Victorian universe as The Demon’s Daughter but while the story is set in the same universe, it takes place entirely in the isolated demon world. For all intents and purposes it may as well have been set in the Far East. Everything from the characters’ names and interests to the social structure scream eighteenth century Asia. The technology was entirely modern and while I knew this aspect of the demon world, I was disappointed that the steampunk elements that so attracted me to the first book were missing here.
There is plenty of Holly’s trademark erotica to be found within the pages which is technically well done but I feel wasn’t quite up to her usual standard. The ruling class genitalia and hormone cycles seemed both unnecessarily complicated and unbelievable (the royal males are physically different to common males but status is at the whim of the emperor-hmmm?).
Overall, not a bad book, particularly if you are a fan of the friends-to-lovers storyline, but certainly not what I had hoped for.-Lynn

Joe Hill: Heart Shaped Box

An aging rock star, with a collection of the macabre, buys a supposedly haunted suit from an internet auction. His purchase arrives in a black heart-shaped box and as advertised comes complete with a ghost. But unlike the gentle spectre he thought he’d bought, the entity he now owns is pure malevolence.
He soon discovers the ghost is the revenge seeking step-father of an old girlfriend who supposedly suicided in the wake of their break up. He’d been somehow tricked into accepting the haunting by his ex’s sister (the whys and wherefores of which are never satisfactorily explained). He immediately tries to return the spirit to her and so begins the ghost’s murderous rampage against him and those closest to him.
He runs with his current girlfriend but there is no place where they can hide and their efforts to exorcise the ghost uncover his ex’s perverted family history and its murderous secrets.
I can give no more detail without spoilers so suffice to say the guy comes out alive-though only just.
This story starts off well. I can’t say I particularly liked the main characters, who felt a little too clichéd at times, but I overlooked that since the writing has an appropriately dark feel to it and there is a definite creepiness present.
But as the story progressed the piling of trouble upon trouble for the main characters became quite repetitive and tiring. They never convincingly try to save themselves and the only defences they have against the spirit are discovered accidentally. By about two thirds of the way through, the story starts reading like the script of a second rate horror movie.
It does have a satisfactory ending with all the loose ends neatly tied in believable bows but somehow that doesn’t quite make up for the sagging middle.
Overall, a reasonably spooky book but lacking scare factor and substance.-Lynn

The Book, The Film, The T-Shirt - Matt Beaumont

An ad director keen to create something spectacular and original, a tyre manufacturer keep to add his own imprint, a pregnant wife who talks with her unborn child (who talks back), a PA worth her weight in gold, two MIA creative geniuses who hold an ad company's future int heir hands, a respected US soap starlet with a hidden past, an actor transitioning from day time drama to Hollywood stardom, two entourages of ever-increasing size, and a production steadily moving out of control...
Told sequentially from the points of view of all these players (and another half dozen or so), The Book, The Film... combines several plots (is Joe really that small, and who told the press? Where are Paul and Shaun? What's Veronica's last name? Will Carrie catch Greg out? How stupid is Tish, really?) with the steady conversion of an original ad into dross through the simple process of too many cooks.
I liked the premise of the book, and really liked the original ad script. But the delivery was too bitty, the number of small world coincidences strained credulity, few of the characters were pleasant or easy to relate to (one of the risks of such a large cast and small snippets), and it just wasn't that interesting or sparkling - quite possibly because I've read too much of the great Brookmyre recently. - Alex

Witch Way to Murder – Shirley Damsgaard

Small town librarian Ophelia is happy with an unobtrusive life, though she does keep herself to herself – after the events of four years ago she’s careful not to allow herself to get too close. In fact, aside from her ‘herbalist’ grandmother, Ophelia’s closest human relationship is probably with ditzy Darci, who also works at the library. That is, until a travelling chemical salesman named Rick Davis starts asking questions about a recent spate of thefts of chemicals that are the precursors to meth and, against her wishes, Ophelia becomes drawn into a murder enquiry – a mystery that will force her to confront the magickal heritage passed down her maternal line for generations.
I found Witch Way to Murder profoundly annoying, and the only reason I didn’t put it down at page three was because I was at the hairdresser’s and the only alternative way hair design magazines. Where to start with why? How about the hyperbolic writing style – the novel opens with the lines:

Rising panic clenched my stomach. Clammy sweat made me itch beneath my arms. The high heels of my boots beat a staccato rhythm on the empty sidewalk as I rushed to the door.

It’s in this prelude that we first learn that someone died four years before the main action, a man who Ophelia should somehow have saved, though who Brian was, how and why he died, don’t emerge until the final third of the book. All we learn initially is that “on that dreary November night four years ago, the first stone in the wall around my heart clicked into place.”
There are the odd unsubtle lumps of exposition, designed to impart knowledge to outsider Rick, all tell and no show. Rick elicits information, too, asking questions of everyone in a significantly unsubtle way, particularly considering he’s an undercover reporter. Sorry if this revelation has ruined the novel for you.
Another thing that irritated me both times it occurred was technology based - Witch Way is copyrighted 2005, yet Rick is surprised the library has a computer, let alone one with internet access, and Darci (who’s in her twenties) says “You must teach me how to use one of these. This is fascinating.” What’s she doing? Using the mouse to swirl a cursor around the screen. My mother’s in her late sixties and uses email, my father banks online… I have a suspicion this first ‘Ophelia and Abby’ novel was published quite some time after it was first written. Even if it were not for this tip off, this is clearly intended as a series - the last line in Witch Way? “My hackles stood up and my skin tingled. She couldn’t possibly mean… Oh no, here we go again.” Yeah, off you go alone, Ophelia – I’m staying right here. - Alex

Keeper of the Winds - Jenna Solitaire

When Jenna Solitaire, nineteen year old college student and author of this allegedly autobiographical novel, returns home after burying her beloved grandfather, her last surviving relative, she knows her life has changed forever. She's not, however, prepared for quite how different her life will become. While going through the belongings of her maternal grandmother, who died when Jenna was a child, she discovers a strange triangular wooden board, etched with cryptic runes and stored in a leather carrying case. It is the Board of the Wind, one of several Boards handed down from Solitaire woman to Solitaire woman since time immemorial, and Jenna is the last of the line. She has a sacred duty that she knew nothing about and, hunted by one branch of the Knights Templar and protected by another, she doesn't know who she can trust - not even herself.
Reading as a blend of The DaVinci Code, and a Charmed/Buffy/Weather Warden hybrid, Keeper of the Winds is the first in what could be a thirteen part series (three sets of three Boards, each set of which can apparently be combined into a single mega Board plus, presumably an über Board), Daughter of Destiny. I'm pretty sure my destiny is to skip on the rest of the series.
Where to start? There are some significant plot holes, like - if only women can be Keepers of the Boards, and Jenna's grandmother died years earlier, why did it take the death of her grandfather to set her Keeperdom in motion? Okay, that's the first time she went poking around int he attic, but the mysterious men only started tracking Jenna once he'd died. If the Boards were so safe all those years without a Keeper, do they even need a Keeper to begin with?
The novel's structured as a first person narration, in near real time - there's no reflection from Jenna, the insight of looking back at events from the end of a journey. Instead the approach is more like diary installments, with the disadvantage of leaving the audience knowing as little as the protagonist. The series creator clearly has an ambitious Big Picture, and we get glimpses of it through what Jenna's told and her nightmares (?memories of past lives) - magic that predates Christianity, created by a woman in peril, mastery of the elements, Vatican opposition. Unfortunately this is about all the information we have, at least by the end of the first book, making the going very murky.
Although the series is supposed to be penned by the protagonist, chapters open with snatches of real time dialogue between shady men who may be with or agin her, to whit:
"My Lord, there is a small problem."
"I am aware - the heir has woken the first Board."
"What are your wishes, my Lord?"
"For now, just watch her. Mark all who visit her and find out everything you can about them. We will not be the only ones interested in young Jenna Solitaire."
Forget 'who are these men and what are their intentions?' - how did transcripts of their conversations get into the text of Jenna's autobiographical, mysteriously published accounts of her eventful life?
Of course, my lack of engagement with the novel didn't help with my appreciation of it. As I think I've made clear, I found the whole thing murky and somewhat preposterous (and I enjoyed Charmed, loved Buffy, and passed on The DaVinci Code) . The characters are sketchily developed the plot inarticulate, and I found Jenna herself quite annoying. One thing in particular grated on me - on at least two occasions Jenna rings her best friend, Tom, and is annoyed that he knows it's her because he 'cheats' by using caller ID. She doesn't seem to object to the existence of caller ID itself, and I don't really know what it is she wants him to do - pretend he doesn't know it's her calling? Maybe she should shield her number.
And when I get this narky with a fictional character it's time to call it a day. - Alex

Dexter in the Dark - Jeff Lindsay

Blood spatter analyst Dexter Morgan is used to his life the way it is - incapable of experiencing emotion, he goes to great efforts to pass for human, and he has a strict moral code. Okay, he didn't mean to get engaged to single mother of two Rita, but it seems to be working out, especially if he has a few drinks first. But when Dexter's called out to a murder site and discovers the ritualistically-slaughtered, headless bodies of two young college students, something unexpected happens - his Dark Passenger flees. Dexter faces the horrifying possibility of... being normal.
The third in a series, the writing of Dexter in the Dark is a marked departure from its predecessors. Instead of being solely narrated by Dexter, section of Dexter in the Dark are from the point of view of IT, a supernatural evil that predates the dawn of life on earth, and others are told by the Watcher, a cult member observing Dexter.
What really sets this installment apart, though, is the somewhat disappointing effect that explaining Dexter's Dark Passenger has. No longer the result (or perhaps not solely the result) of his childhood trauma, the Passenger is now an entity from outside Dexter. While this raises some potentially intriguing questions (like who is Dexter on his own?), this really isn't that kind of novel. There was excellent potential for a better novel here - the changes in Deborah's relationship with her boyfriend, mutilated in Dearly Devoted Dexter, the relentlessness of Sergeant Doakes, whose hatred of Dexter is undiminished by his own maiming, and the evolving relationship Dexter has with Rita's damaged children are all elements that could have been more deeply and interestingly explored, instead of the unnecessary complicating aspects of real evil entities. We usually write our reviews independent of other sources, but I was so disappointed and surprised with Dexter in the Dark that I googled it before writing this, and am relieved to find it's not just me who disliked this new direction. Unlike some Amazon reviewers, I didn't have a problem with the coincidence of Rita's children being similarly traumatised, and I think this adds a nice dimension to Dexter's character, within the confines of the series' universe. But if this supernatural, non rational element continues in the fourth Dexter book I'm going to have to reluctantly give up. - Alex

Victoria Laurie: Demons are a Ghoul's Best Friend

When a ghost hunter is called in to rid an exclusive boarding school of a nasty spirit, she gets more than she bargained for. The ghost is that of a particularly nasty serial killer and it is terrorizing the ghosts of its victims, as well as the current student body and her business partner.
In the process of setting the victims’ spirits free and sending their tormentor to hell for good she uncovers a thirty year old secret that changes the lives of those concerned for ever.
I feel compelled to admit upfront that this great premise was let down, for me, by the author’s voice and character choice.
Let’s start with the gay best-friend/business partner. (Yes, Helen Fielding has a lot to answer for on this front.) I really don’t believe that this particular relationship dynamic exists widely outside of chic lit. I can speak only from my own experience of course but the gay people I know, both male and female, generally don’t have opposite sex ‘best friends’. Friends yes, but best-friends in the sense that most women understand it, no. So, for me, this wasn’t working from the start but add in the fact that he was the embodiment of all the worst clichés of the gay man (flirted with everyone with a penis, felt free to comment on women’s clothes, hair, make-up, anatomy, was an out and out coward, minced rather than walked) and this was more of a caricature than a character
The ‘love interest’ (and I use the term advisedly) was multi-lingual with English being his fifth language. The author chose to demonstrate his language difficulties, and possibly tried to add a little humour, by having him constantly get colloquialisms wrong by a word or two. It got old very quickly. Thankfully he disappears for about a third of the novel.
The main character herself seemed to have a bit of a chip upon her shoulder about her abilities. In fact, to me, she had a boarder line victim mentality about them. Nobody understood what she did (not surprising given that rather than use a simple phrase they would understand she insisted on going the whole pseudo scientific jargon explanation first) and once they did they immediately thought she was some sort of charlatan. She would then wow them with her amazing abilities and they would go from die hard sceptic to believer in a matter of moments. I’ve no doubt a professional psychic will come across more than their share of sceptics but surely that wouldn’t be everyone they meet and from my understanding it is a gift that can’t be turned on and off like a tap when needed. In any case most sceptics require a lot more convincing than she had to offer.
Apart from this she didn’t behave in a way that I thought logical for someone hunting ghosts. For example at no point does she attempt to discover the full legend behind the ghost, surely that would be a place to start when she had no other leads as to who it might be.
In spite of my perceived flaws, the storyline was good enough to have me persevere on to the end and I can quite understand how others might enjoy this series but it is not for me.-Lynn

Fork it Over - Alan Richman

This collection on GQ articles, subtitled "The Intrepid Adventures of a Professional Eater" is divided like a meal, from courses "Amuse-Bouche" to "Cheese", a "Wine" section and "Gratuity" with a couple of "Palate Cleansers" thrown in. For the most part I found the categorising arbitrary (the exceptions being cheese and wine), the tone unduly dismissive of almost everything, and though I completed the book (intermittently, over the course of almost a week), I do in no way agree with Emeril Lagasse's front cover blurb that Richman is even remotely funny. The article of veganism was aggressive and rude (and I'm not a vegetarian, let alone a vegan), and I doubt I'd like the man if I met him in person. If you want to read a collection of amusing, interesting, appetising essays about food, I strongly recommend you read Jeffrey Steingarten instead. - Alex

Catherine Barry – Skin Deep

Finn O’Farrell’s never been happy with herself – flat-chested, tubby, uninteresting hair, it’s no wonder her boyfriend left her. Well, she arranged a spectacular fight that allowed her to kick him, but only to avoid being dumped. Lurching between chocolate and alcohol, besieged by flashbacks of her miserable and somewhat neglected childhood, Finn has a revelation in a lingerie shop and finally realises what she needs to turn her life around. So, after taking out a £3,500 loan from the Credit Union she works at in Dublin, Finn checks into hospital over Christmas and has breast augmentation and readies herself to change her world.
I was pleased that the post-op scenes were realistically crafted, with unexpected pain and unsightly bruising etc. Unfortunately, that’s about the only thing I was pleased with. I so want to read a chick lit novel that doesn’t obsessively focus on size dissatisfaction (though at least there’s no shoe obsession). Finn’s tormented by pretty much everything, including the unfolding childhood misery we’re hammered over the head with in slabs of italicised flashbacks that stylistically mirror the heavily tell-don’t-show style of the novel in general. If I didn’t know from the blurb that this is Barry’s third published novel I’d think it was her first, so laden with angst is it.
Finn herself is unsympathetic – so self-obsessed, short-sighted and filled with self-loathing that it’s hard to see how she has friends, let alone the obligatory crossed-wire romantic lead. And the frequent referencing to the millennium, which undoubtedly made Skin Deep topical when it was published, serve now to only reinforce how dated it is. The family reconciliation is tacked on at the end, and I found the whole thing profoundly irritating. But I finished which, in light of my recent increase in unfinished books, is something. – Alex

The Chocolate Lovers' Diet - Carole Matthews

Lucy's happily engaged, Autumn has a new boyfriend, Chantal's hoping to save her marriage, and Nadia's husband's stopped gambling. So all's well with the Chocolate Lovers' Club? Well, no - Aidan's in Australia and when Lucy activates the web cam a woman answers - a woman in lingerie with a man in a rumpled bed behind her. Autumn's new boyfriend is perfect, but not for her parents, and her drug-abusing brother's turning to her for help. Chantal's made a distressing discovery, and her husband's had enough of her philandering ways (plus he wants a baby). And Nadia's husband hasn't completely quit gambling.
The solution? Chocolate.
I'm quite the chocolate lover myself, but I almost acquired diabetes reading this - the constant, indiscriminate, mindless chocolate consumption (primarily by the narrating Lucy) made me queasy. I really, really hate chick lit heroines who do stupid things for no good reason (except to advance the plot), and there are no shortage of stupid things here. I did finish it, so that's something, but I think I'll take a break from chick lit in general, Carole Matthews in particular, and chocolate, for now. - Alex

Peepshow - Leigh Redhead

Simone Kirsch always wanted to be a cop, but her three years as a stripper made that impossible. Instead she takes the second best option and begins training as a PI, a new career that comes in handy when her best friend (and fellow stripper) Chloe is accused of murder. Simone returns to the seamy underworld of illicit sex to uncover the truth. In the process she falls in lust, gets caught up with a rockabilly band, and set up by a corrupt cop.
I really should have written my review before reading Lynn's, because I find I have nothing substantial to add! Like her I found the battering over the head of the fact that we're in Melbourne extraordinarily painful and almost always unnecessary: "We drove down Hoddle Street past the housing commission flats then down CityLink and the Monash Freeway...", "I took him down Broadway towards Glenhuntley Road and turned left at the Elwood canal," "The gym was up Glenhuntley Road, across the Nepean Highway where Elwood turned into Elsternwick," and my favourite, "As I passed the [Queen] Vic markets on Peel Street...". If you don't know Melbourne, the street name means nothing, and if you do then you already know where the Queen Vic market is. And I could really have done without the detail, every single time, of which tram she was getting on and off.
I have to disagree with Lynn on one point - the references weren't always completely spot on. At one point Leigh (the character) talks about the stress of doing a hook turn (where you turn right from the left hand lane) and says she always worries about a tram going up her arse if she's not fast enough - the point of the hook turn is to avoid delaying trams within the city, which is why you have to turn from the lane they're not in. The only way to come to tram-related grief is to turn directly in front of one in motion (seen that more than once), or get hit by a tram that's jumped the tracks, and in that case we've all got bigger worries!
I have to admit that's a lot of moaning for a tiny plot error, but that's how easily I found myself brought out of the novel. The plot was interesting enough, but the writing was not quite accomplished enough. I wouldn't recommend it to any innocent punter who thinks the women stripping are doing it for any reason other than money - as a DJ says at one club, "You gotta hand over the cash if you wanna see some gash, yeah."
I was unconvinced by how readily and frequently the character's knickers dampen, and agree with Lynn that we all already know the sex industry contains women who have kids, degrees and lives, as well as women with drug issues, abusive childhoods and pimps.That said, I didn't hate it, and if the next Redhead novel crosses my path I'll probably give it a burl - but if there's no improvement, that's it. - Alex
To read Lynn's review of this book, click here