March ends this week. Clocks changed yesterday. Spring is (allegedly) here and I had a lovely visit to a cat cafe on Friday … How are we a quarter of the way through the year? Crazy. Passing by in a blur. Not all bad, but still… Can’t quite get the ageing noddle around it. At least I have some slightly more interesting pictures to share with you this week . Well, I think they are anyway.
How was your week? Mine was slow on a bookish front. No reflection on the books in question, but I have been so tired after work that I’m surprised I even stayed awake to feed myself, let alone read. Far fewer books read, bought or received. The latter two are no great issue given the back log of books I already have, but meh.
One bit of book post – the paperback of The Guilty Couple by CL Taylor (27 April). I can honestly say I was not expecting this as I’d told the publicist I was reading the HB so could review from that ahead of publication day, but it’s here now. May do a giveaway closer to review time. We’ll see. One Netgalley book – The Silence by Katerina Diamond (08 June), courtesy of Avon Books. Sounds delightfully creepy so looking forward to reading it. Two book buys – both Agatha Christie Special Edition hardbacks – Dead Man’s Folly and Five Little Pigs (22 June). Love these pretty books. One day I may even read them …
And that is it. I know, right? Go me being all restrained and sensible. Not that restrained when you think I have about 800 unread books on the kindle and probably a few hundred in book format, but who is counting? That and I’ve sunk a couple of hundred quid into buying tickets for The Wizard of Oz this summer. It’s got Ashley Banjo, Jason Manford and Gary Wilmot in it. How could I resist? Not been to the theatre in what feels like a lifetime. I’m very excited.
Books I have read
The Vanishing of Class 3B by Jackie Kabler
One spring morning, a bus full of children and their teachers from a Cotswolds primary school head off on a much-anticipated day trip.
But as night falls and the well-heeled parents – one or two of them famous, as well as wealthy – wait at the school to collect their weary offspring, it soon becomes clear that something has gone very wrong.
The children and their teachers simply do not come back.
What’s happened doesn’t seem possible.
How can an entire class of children simply vanish?
The Last Passenger by Will Dean
A luxury cruise liner, abandoned with no crew, steaming into the mid-Atlantic.
And you are the only passenger left on board.
Caz Ripley, a cafe owner from a small, ordinary town, boards the RMS Atlantica with her boyfriend Pete and a thousand fellow passengers destined for New York.
The next morning, she wakes to discover that everyone else on board has disappeared.
And that’s just the beginning. Caz must prepare for a crossing that will be anything but plain sailing …
The End Of The Game by Holly Watt
Where the police can’t go, she can….
Casey Benedict is the globe-trotting star reporter at London paper the Post. Casey is tenacious, fearless, inventive and still in recovery after her last major story jeopardised her life, and all of those she held most dear.
Invited to spend the day at the races at the invitation of a former colleague, it is meant to be a chance to relax and recover. But when she sees a man being hunted across the racecourse, a horrified Casey intervenes to save his life – and in doing so finds herself face to face with her next major investigation. Match fixing. Gambling. And murder.
From London to Budapest, from snowy mountain retreats to glitzy Mediterranean coastal resorts, Casey is on a desperate hunt to find the person behind the shadowy organisations responsible and expose them to the public before anyone else’s lives are lost.
Not too shabby considering I hadn’t even finished one book by Thursday! I do love long weekends … Busy enough week on the old blog last week – recap below:
#Review – The Real Prime Suspect – Jackie Malton & Hélène Mulholland
#Review – The Last Supper – Rosemary Shrager
#Review – Beautiful Shining People – Michael Grothaus
#Review – Force of Hate – Graham Bartlett
#Review – Midnight at Malabar House – Vaseem Khan
No blog tours this coming week just five lovely reviews of five wonderful books. Aside from that it will be work, work, work, although hopefully a bit less than last week where I did my equivalent of a five day week in just four days … I earned that day off.
Hoping to read at least another couple of books by Friday. If I can pull that off it will be my biggest reading total in a month in a very long time, helped considerably by snow days earlier in the month. Watch this space.
Have a lovely week all. Hope it’s full of lots of reading and very little stress.
Jen x
Jen Med's Book Reviews 
I love that spring is really trying to get here. Your pics are cute, love the cats and swans. Too bad you have been so tired after work, I hope things settle enough that you don’t fall asleep eating dinner. 😁 Enjoy your new books, even if it is just a few new additions.
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It’s definitely nice to see the seasons finally changing. My magnolia tree has flowered so always a good sign.
I am hopeful of a better week this week work wise. Failing that I do have a day and a half off 😂
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Time off is always welcome.
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