Back to a bit of the same old, same old this week I’m afraid. Because of the heat at the weekend (and I am a terribly pale person not suited to prolonged sun exposure) I spent most of the weekend indoors, and pretty much as soon as I got back from Bute it was all work work work. I do have some pics from our final day on the island, plus one of the (alleged) Supermoon from Thursday. I say alleged as it didn’t seem any bigger than normal, at least from where I was seeing it. But hey ho. It’s a cool moon picture anyway.
On the plus side – doing nothing constructive with my time other than sitting around, has allowed me to read/finish four books, as well as making good headway into another. Go me. Means I am more or less back on track with planned reading. Possibly still slightly less than more as my reviewing has nose dived and I have to catch up with that, but it’s better than it was. Books were fabulous which helped.
I had three new Netgalley titles in the week – Marple: 12 New Stories by various authors, Women Like Us by Amanda Prowse and Private Beijing by James Patterson and Adam Hamdy. Four new orders in the week too – a hard copy of Marple as it looks stunning; Cemetery Lake by Paul Cleave (as his upcoming new book is part of the same series so it has to be done); Run Time by Catherine Ryan Howard and The Bleeding by Johana Gustawsson, special edition hardback from Goldsboro Books.
And that’s the lot. A really slow week book wise this week. By recent standards anyway.
Books I have read
The Blood Tide by Neil Lancaster
You get away with murder.
In a remote sea loch on the west coast of Scotland, a fisherman vanishes without trace. His remains are never found.
You make people disappear.
A young man jumps from a bridge in Glasgow and falls to his death in the water below. DS Max Craigie uncovers evidence that links both victims. But if he can’t find out what cost them their lives, it won’t be long before more bodies turn up at the morgue…
You come back for revenge.
Soon cracks start to appear in the investigation, and Max’s past hurtles back to haunt him. When his loved ones are threatened, he faces a terrifying choice: let the only man he ever feared walk free, or watch his closest friend die…
LONGLISTED FOR THE 2022 McILVANNEY PRIZE FOR SCOTTISH CRIME BOOK OF THE YEAR! Max, Janie and Ross return in the second gripping novel in this explosive Scottish crime series.
Murder In The Library by Katie Gayle
Julia Bird’s picturesque Cotswolds life is everything she’d dreamed of. Until, that is, she discovers a dead body in the library…
Julia Bird had imagined the quiet of rural life would be soothing after years in the city, but she finds she can’t just sit still.Determined to throw herself into village activities, she joins the library just in time to attend a talk by celebrated local author Vincent Andrews.
Charming, devilishly handsome and talented, Vincent teases the crowd with a reading from his forthcoming novel. Set in a village bearing strange similarities to Berrywick, with characters the audience start to recognise, Vincent hints of dark secrets to be revealed, to gasps of outrage from the room. The meeting ends in uproar, and, just hours later, Vincent’s dead body is discovered behind the bookshelves…
As one of the last people to see him alive, Julia feels morally bound to help the police investigate. With her trusty Labrador, Jake, at her side, she decides to do her own sleuthing and quickly discovers that Vincent’s personal life is messy, his finances are in disarray and his book sales are declining. But most of all, remembering her neighbours’ faces at the book reading, Julia wonders if one of them could have lost the plot enough to kill…
As Julia interrogates the suspects, she walks straight into another scene of murder and mayhem, and realises Vincent’s manuscript is now missing. There’s someone out there who’s deadly serious about keeping their secrets unpublished. Will Julia be able to stop them, before anyone else gets hurt?
Black Hearts by Doug Johnstone
A faked death, an obsessive stalker, an old man claiming he’s being abused by the ghost of his late wife, and a devastating spectre from the past. The Skelfs are back in another explosive thriller, and this time things are more than personal…
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Death is just the beginning…
The Skelf women live in the shadow of death every day, running the family funeral directors and private investigator business in Edinburgh. But now their own grief intertwines with that of their clients, as they are left reeling by shocking past events.
A fist-fight by an open grave leads Dorothy to investigate the possibility of a faked death, while a young woman’s obsession with Hannah threatens her relationship with Indy and puts them both in mortal danger. An elderly man claims he’s being abused by the ghost of his late wife, while ghosts of another kind come back to haunt Jenny from the grave … pushing her to breaking point.
As the Skelfs struggle with increasingly unnerving cases and chilling danger lurks close to home, it becomes clear that grief, in all its forms, can be deadly…
The Butcher and the Wren by Alaina Urquhart
WREN WAS NEVER AFRAID OF THE DARK.
UNTIL SHE LEARNT THAT SOME MONSTERS ARE REAL. . .
In deep Louisiana, a serial killer with a taste for medical experimentation is completing his most ambitious project yet. The media call him ‘The Butcher’ – and, so far, he’s proved impossible to catch.
With her encyclopedic knowledge of humanity’s darkest minds, and years of experience examining their victims, forensic pathologist Dr Wren Muller is the best there is. The longer the Butcher’s killing spree continues, the more determined she is to bring him to justice. And yet, he continues to elude her.
As body after body pile up on Wren’s examination table, her obsession grows. Pressure to put an end to the slaughter mounts. And her enemy becomes more brazen.
How far is Wren willing to go to draw the Butcher into the light. . .?
An addictive read with straight-from-the-morgue details only an autopsy technician could provide, The Butcher and the Wren promises to ensnare all who enter.
So that was my week – all highly recommended reads. Last week on the blog was a little quieter but still a good number of reviews. Recap below:
#Review – You Can Stay – Elle Connel
#Review – Something In The Air / A Pain In The Neck – Rachel Amphlett
#Review – The 6:20 Man – David Baldacci
#Review – Extraordinary People – Peter May
#Review – Dead Man’s Grave – Neil Lancaster
You will notice that the next couple of weeks are a little slower paced than normal. We did promise ourselves an easier time this year and August seems to be where we hit our peak. One blog tour this week – Whisper of the Seals by Roxanne Bouchard tomorrow and that’s it. What we lack in quantity we make up for in style though as Roxanne’s book is stunning. Only one tour next week too, plus we’re taking a couple of Mondays off from reviewing. At least that’s the plan …
That’s me done. Off to continue moaning about the heat (currently Sunday as I write this – Monday will be an entirely different matter). Have a lovely week. Catch you on the other side.
Jen xx
Jen Med's Book Reviews 