#BookReview ‘The Housekeeper’ by Rose Tremain #historical

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1936 Cornwall. Lilianne Danowski is housekeeper at the coastal mansion Manderville Hall. The Housekeeper by Rose Tremain is the re-imagined story of Mrs Danvers in Daphne du Maurier’s classic Rebecca exploring a passionate forbidden relationship between housekeeper ‘Danni’ and local author. Rose TremainWhen Daphne meets Danni, the sexual tension is clear from the beginning. But this is socially-repressed 1930s England where anything other than traditional marriage is unforgiveable. Danni is a Jew who left Poland as a child with her father. Now she is alone in England, misses her homeland and is a lost soul who lives for her job. When the two women meet Danni is quickly seduced and falls deeply in love though they are only together briefly in the boathouse and at a friend’s house in London. The parallels with Rebecca are clear from the beginning – the location, the names, the infidelity – but the author/housekeeper relationship founders as propriety and expectations rule the day. du Maurier has committments to her husband and daughters and Danni is rejected. From the ruins of the love affair comes du Maurier’s masterful novel, but by the time it is published Danni has been sacked and is making a living as a seamstress. When the book is published, she is distraught to find she features as the fictional Mrs Danvers. This spiteful portrait written by the lover who spurned her is vicious and unforgiveable. This is a novel about class, wealth, power, social mores and forbidden love when Europe stood at the precipice of disaster.
According to the Author’s Note, The Housekeeper is based on a short story written some time ago by Tremain which is now in development as a film. This makes sense. This is a visual, sensual story of a love affair that goes wrong.
I hesitated about reading this novel as Rebecca is a long-time favourite of mine and I was wary of sullying that attachment. In the first few chapters I found myself continually referring back to Rebecca, looking for echoes. Two days after finishing it, I wondered if I would enjoy it more without having read Rebecca or watched the films. The description is luscious, some of the characters are wonderfully drawn [I’m thinking particularly of Lord Grenville-Withers] and scenes at Manderville Hall will be familiar to Rebecca lovers, particularly the Big Bash fancy dress ball. But accompanying my reading were the faces of Joan Fontaine, Laurence Olivier, Diana Rigg and Judith Anderson.
Definitely a novel that merits re-reading.

Read my reviews of these other novels by Rose Tremain:-
ISLANDS OF MERCY
LILY
THE GUSTAV SONATA

If you like this, try:-
‘The Vanishing of Audrey Wilde’ by Eve Chase
‘Little Deaths’ by Emma Flint
‘The Animals at Lockwood Manor’ by Jane Healey

And if you’d like to share this post:
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COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Alys Clare

#BookReview ‘The Newer World’ by Sebastian Barry #historicalfiction

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If you’ve read and loved Days Without End and A Thousand Moons, Sebastian Barry’s loosely-connected novels set during the American Civil war, don’t miss The Newer World. What is it like to live in the aftermath of war in the vacuum between survival, death, atrocities, hatred and returning home? Where does the poison of war linger? Sebastian Barry Beautifully, and at times hauntingly-written, The Newer World is the story of Tennessee man Tennyson Bouguereau, freed man, farmer, singer, brother and soldier. Tennyson has always sung, the songs of the field, the songs of his mother, the songs of the slaves. Sponsored by a local lawyer he is given the chance for a new life and goes to Nashville to join a choir of freed men. This is about more than singing, it is about learning to live free in the world. The college helps him to leave behind the ways of a farmhand and teaches him to read, write, sing, to keep himself and his clothes clean. And there he meets a woman to love, Minnie, and a best friend, George.
This is a story that skips across continents and American states but also has the time to watch time pass slowly, to see the sun rise and set again. After the choir’s trip to England where they sing for the great, the good and the common people, and are welcomed by all, they return to Nashville. In love with Minnie, Tennyson is faced with an impossible to decision; to choose between his love, and his friend.
When Tennyson follows George into the army they are sent to New Mexico to fight the Apache, a people Tennyson knows are trying to hold onto their own lands against the might of Washington. Another suppsedly free people still hobbled and constrained as his people are. The leader of the army’s Seminole scouts is an two-armed Indian called One-Arm Charlie who ‘had a strong look of the Bouguereaus.’ Despite Tennyson’s attempts to engage Charlie in conversation, he fails. ‘Funny how the slant of a body, just even a way of standing, how a person walked, beckoned me to friendship. But it was no go without a bit of language.’
Universal themes are explored and Tennyson’s first person narrative is addictive as he faces some of life’s biggest problems. The pages turn easily even when Tennyson is considering nothing more than the blowing of the wind or the hooves of his horse Balius. Having studied Greek in Nashville, he considers the parallels between his own journey and that of Odysseus returning home, and vows he will also ‘strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.’ Tennyson is a freed slave, but is he truly a free man? As he travels to Nashville at the urging of Lawyer Briscoe, crosses the ocean with the choir and joins the army with George, he carries with him the weighty hopes, debts and expectations of others; but what of his own wishes and dreams?
America after the Civil War is not a new world, it is a world newer than the pre-war one but ridden with many of the same divisions, prejudices and hatred and a few new ones. The newly freed men and women must find their way to live in this uncertain country and find love, comradeship, opportunity and forgiveness.
These three novels are a wonder, a must-read, and Tennyson is a character to fall in love with. Barry’s writing is exquisite, his plotting light-handed, the emotions tense.
Please note that although The Newer World can be read as a standalone novel, its setting, themes and characters – including Thomas McNulty, John Cole and Winona – are intertwined with Days Without End and A Thousand Moons.

Read my reviews of these other novels by Sebastian Barry:-
A LONG LONG WAY
DAYS WITHOUT END #1DAYSWITHOUTEND
A THOUSAND MOONS #2DAYSWITHOUTEND
OLD GOD’S TIME
THE WHEREABOUTS OF ENEAS MCNULTY … and try the #FirstPara of THE WHEREABOUTS OF ENEAS MCNULTY

If you like this, try:-
‘Life Class’ by Pat Barker #1LIFECLASS
‘Life after Life’ by Kate Atkinson
‘Love is Blind’ by William Boyd

And if you’d like to share a link:
#BookReview THE NEWER WORLD by Sebastian Barry https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-abm via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Rose Tremain

#BookReview ‘Cold Sunset’ by William Boyd #spy #thriller

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Cold Sunset is the third Gabriel Dax spy thriller by William Boyd. I was hooked from the first, Gabriel’s Moon, and so turned to page one of Cold Sunset with high anticipation. It is the Sixties, the Cold War and Gabriel, a travel writer cum reluctant spy, is in Los Angeles waiting to meet a poet. William BoydThe meat of Gabriel’s assignment in Cold Sunset is to go to Moscow to bring in MI6’s man in Russia, triple agent Kit Caldwell who is desperate to return to London. Gabriel’s visit to LA, and another to Indianapolis, may seem superfluous but read them carefully, there are hints at the deeper story. His Institute of Development Studies handler and occasional lover from the previous two books, Faith Green, is still giving him orders. Faith’s job is to root out traitors and when the dying poet tells Gabriel that a former colleague from Bletchley Park is a Soviet spy, Faith sends Gabriel to Indianapolis to check it out. It is a road that leads to Moscow, St Petersburg and the northernmost Finnish-Soviet border. The betrayal, Faith fears, could be a threat as serious as the Cambridge Five and she is under pressure to identify the new traitor, the ‘terminte.’
Gabriel is a patriot, a freelance writer trying to make a living, a single man with romantic entanglements, he leads a double-life and is unable to say no to Faith whenever she gives him a mission. The difference is that now he is not a novice at killing men. He knows enough tradecraft to lay false clues, spot a tail and speak in spook language. Yes Boyd’s Gabriel Dax books are spy thrillers but the action is not full-on, they are also studies in human nature, in relationships, in the detail of daily life in the Sixties. The finding of a cleaner for his Sussex cottage, leaving out food to tempt Cat his occasionally visiting feline neighbour to be a permanent resident, forgetting to change the sheets on his bed at his London crashpad, his inability to say no to a night with an old girlfriend. Gabriel feels real. People smoked and drunk alcohol more than they do now, it was possible to appear and disappear without leaving a trace, postcards written with short messages were delivered quickly by post.
Reading a William Boyd thriller is like reading no other. A combination of dry wit and literary references, stomach-clenching tension and the ordinary everyday of buying fish and wine for lunch, nervous suspicion and outright fear, Cold Sunset is so Boydian. I had a fondness for his Sussex neighbour Royston Mitchell-Moore in his cherry red corduroy trousers, and old roué Norman Helenhill who reminded me of Olivia Manning’s Prince Yakimov in Fortunes of War.
I do hope there will be another Gabriel Dax book, the enigmatic ending suggests there will be. If you think you don’t like thrillers, try Boyd.

Here are my reviews of other Gabriel Dax books:-
GABRIEL’S MOON #1GABRIELDAX
THE PREDICAMENT #2GABRIELDAX

… and my reviews of other books by William Boyd:-
ANY HUMAN HEART
LOVE IS BLIND
NAT TATE: AN AMERICAN ARTIST 1928-1960
ORDINARY THUNDERSTORMS
SWEET CARESS
THE BLUE AFTERNOON
THE DREAMS OF BETHANY MELLMOTH
TRIO
WAITING FOR SUNRISE

… and try the first paragraph of ARMADILLO.

If you like this, try these:-
‘Exposure’ by Helen Dunmore
‘Midnight in Europe’ by Alan Furst
‘The Partisan’ by Patrick Worrall

And if you’d like to share a link:
#BookReview COLD SUNSET by William Boyd https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-adF via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Sebastian Barry

#BookReview ‘Our Noble Selves’ by Kate Atkinson #FestivalofBritain #historicalfiction

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London 1951. The war is over and the Festival of Britain is soon to open. Our Noble Selves by Kate Atkinson immerses you into this grey time of shortages when on the streets the spies are still busy.Kate AtkinsonJournalist Harry Flynn had a bad war on the Burma railway. Unable to settle on his return to London he finds himself part of the organising team for the soon-to-open Festival of Britain. Charged with locating, ordering and delivering various sundry items required by the site’s designers, he tries to make a new life. Following an impulsive proposal and a quick ceremony, Flynn has a failed marriage behind him and continues to be unsuccessful in love.
Surprisingly for a novel by Atkinson, it takes a while to get into the story proper. At the halfway point, the pace changes. When not one woman but a second and then a third, go missing – a girl Flynn took out for a drink, a work colleague and his neighbour in the upstairs flat – he is the common denominator in the three police investigations. He doesn’t tell anyone about the missing hour on the night after his date with the missing girl or about a blood-stained scarf he doesn’t remember finding. Not understanding what is going on, Flynn feels helpless, ‘was he just a pawn in a larger game? A game where it felt like there were no rules at all.’
The Festival office is populated by a hotpotch of people, recruited for various nefarious reason, because of who they know, because they’re sexy, because they’re important or know someone who is, because of what they did in the war. The Festival is intended to shine a bright light on London and dismiss this daily greyness with fairground rides, dancing and food. But it is an event of smoke and mirrors, like the wartime double and triple agents still operating in London. Nothing is as it seems. The sumptuous Festival Cake is uncookable. One roomset is home to hundreds of rats. Someone is using an assumed name. And Flynn is being blackmailed.
There is so much to like in this book. The Shakespeare and poetry references, the Boy’s tutoring in grammar and pronunciation – awnithollojist, tiepogrifi – and Carswell Orange Blossom, the Festival cow. Atkinson has especial fun with the eccentric catalogue items requested by designers; a ‘Pyrex heat-resisting pudding dish (James A. Jobling and Co. Ltd, Sunderland)’ and ‘model animal, toad (Peggy Tearle, 202 London Road, Leicester).’
I have two favourite characters. Fourteen-year-old Boy, whose name Terence is rarely used, is the general dogsbody, fetching and carrying, soothing the frayed atmosphere with wise sayings learned from his mother. Veronica, Flynn’s thirteen-year old step-daughter, is a gem. Whisky-drinking, pulp fiction-reading Veronica turns out to be unafraid, independent and curious. While Flynn hesitates, she uses her initiative and says the unsayable.
A book of two halves. Reading a Kate Atkinson novel means to read on a number of layers, her wry wit combines with historical detail and the wartime stories of those involved in the Festival. Can a festival make everyone feel better about the greyness of their lives, will celebrating historical landmarks and achievements make people feel proud and empower them to make a better life going forwards?
Imperfect, full of laughs and wit, it left me feeling this is two books woven into one. See Atkinson’s Author’s Note at the end for an explanation of how this novel evolved.

Read my reviews of these other books by Kate Atkinson:-
A GOD IN RUINS
LIFE AFTER LIFE
NORMAL RULES DON’T APPLY
SHRINES OF GAIETY
TRANSCRIPTION
BIG SKY #5JACKSONBRODIE
DEATH AT THE SIGN OF THE ROOK #6JACKSONBRODIE
… and try the #FirstPara of EMOTIONALLY WEIRD

If you like this, try:-
‘When the Germans Come’ by David Hewson
‘The Light Years’ by Elizabeth Jane Howard #1CAZALET
‘The Rescue Man’ by Anthony Quinn

And if you’d like to share a link:
#BookReview OUR NOBLE SELVES by Kate Atkinson https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-a8R via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- William Boyd

#BookReview ‘Murder at the Grand Alpine Hotel’ by Lucy Foley #mystery #crime #AgathaChristie #Marple

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Switzerland 1950. Stunning mountain scenery, a single track railway. A snow storm forecast. Murder at the Grand Alpine Hotel by Lucy Foley is the first Miss Marple novel to be published for 50 years since Agatha Christie’s Sleeping Murder in 1976. Lucy Foley Miss Marple appears at first sight as the familiar elderly lady with her knitting, her dislike of the cold, her piercing eyes and acute observation. She is visiting with her friend Mrs Bantry (who appears in 4.30 from Paddington) and Mrs Bantry’s ultra-efficient personal assistant Diana Glass.
One morning the railway arrives at the hotel from the village below and inside is only one passenger who is dead. There are a number of suspects each with a strong motive, the guilt of each of which seems totally convincing until disproven by the French detective who happens to be among the guests. The setting starts off as a not-quite closed room location, a luxurious mountain hotel isolated by altitude with limited access to the village below. When the snow arrives everyone is trapped.
The list of potential villains is familiar from Christie. A film star. An ambitious politician and his timid wife. The politician’s wartime friend who seems completely out of place. Even nuns who ski and enjoy spa sessions. Some guests are strangers, some already know each other, many have secrets. Trapped inside by the blizzard, cracks begin to appear and tempers are tested. There are a variety of motives. Betrayal, jealousy, money, love, and revenge, perhaps connected to the Second World War.
One of the main viewpoints is that of Diana Glass, as an outsider she presents a first impressions overview of the hotel guests, staff and action. Of her cool efficiency she says, ‘We learned this during the war. You can’t be in a state of full-blown panic at all times. Normality, humanity – even boredom – creep back in at the most fraught of times.’ But can she be trusted? Can anyone be trusted?
A mixture of two writers. The first half, a Christie-like careful build-up of context and characters. The second half, a typical Foley rollercoaster rush to the end where everyone present seems guilty and the next victim could be anyone.
I missed the dominant presence of Miss Marple and wanted more. Murder at the Grand Alpine Hotel is a Lucy Foley novel with a sprinkling of Marple but like all Foley’s novels, it is an entertaining pageturner.

Click the title to read my reviews of these other novels by Lucy Foley:-
THE GUEST LIST
THE HUNTING PARTY
THE INVITATION
THE MIDNIGHT FEAST
THE PARIS APARTMENT

If you like this, try:-
‘The Doll’s House’ by MJ Arlidge #3HELENGRACE
‘The Monogram Murders’ by Sophie Hannah #1POIROT
‘The Pure in Heart’ by Susan Hill #2SIMONSERRAILLER

And if you’d like to share a link:
#BookReview MURDER AT THE GRAND ALPINE HOTEL by Lucy Foley https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-a5E via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Kate Atkinson

#BookReview ‘The Mouthless Dead’ by Anthony Quinn #crime

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Mid-Atlantic 1947. Inspired by the real life case of William Herbert Wallace who was convicted of murdering his wife, The Mouthless Dead by Anthony Quinn moves in time between the Great War, 1931 when the crime is committed and post-Second World War when we hear the account of Detective Inspector Key. Anthony Quinn Wallace, a convicted murderer who was found guilty of murdering his wife Julia in 1931, is freed on appeal leaving the murder officially unsolved. The backstory is told by the fictional Key, who worked on the fringes of the case and knew Wallace simply by belonging to the same chess club. Key believes the evidence presented at trial did not prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt. In 1947, fifteen years after the trial Key, now retired, is bound for New York on a transatlantic cruise. He is writing his memoir of the Wallace trial and reconsiders the evidence.
This is a novel of two halves for me. Novels based on true-life stories are by necessity a blending of fact and fiction by the author, particularly critical for real-crime cases. In the first half, The Mouthless Dead switches between descriptions of the crime, trial and subsequent appeal using dry factual language close to that of police reports and trial documents, plus the third person viewpoint of Key. This makes for a slow, often impersonal story interleaved with wonderful moments of painfully acute observation familiar in Quinn novels. After a bloody time in the trenches, Key struggles to return to the mundanity of everyday life. Police work helps him. ‘A vital flame had been doused in him, never to be relit’ until eventually ‘the colour seemed to return to the trees, food tasted of something again.’
The story takes off in the second half when Quinn throws off fact and lets his imagination free. On board, Key makes the acquaintance of two fellow passengers, both younger than him. Lydia Tarrant is travelling with her controlling mother, and Teddy Absolom, who is a budding film producer. Both are captivated by the fact he is writing his memoir about such a famous case and Teddy hits upon the idea of the trio writing a screenplay. Initially flattered, their questions become more troubling for Key to answer without divulging confidential information from the investigation. Key is an interesting man but we never get to the bottom of what makes him tick, his viewpoint is all third person and he can be opaque.
The mystery of the Wallace case, at the time it was called ‘the perfect murder,’ is fascinating. As Raymond Chandler said ‘Wallace couldn’t have done it, and neither could anyone else.’ This is an atmospheric novel, particularly in 1930s Liverpool and aboard the Cunard liner; Quinn is always so good at writing the Thirties, especially set in his hometown Liverpool.
Not among my favourite Quinn novels, that’s Curtain Call and Freya.

Read my reviews of these other novels by Anthony Quinn:-
CURTAIN CALL
FREYA
HALF OF THE HUMAN RACE
MOLLY & THE CAPTAIN
OUR FRIENDS IN BERLIN
THE MILLIONAIRE WALTZ
THE RESCUE MAN
THE STREETS

If you like this, try:-
‘Munich Wolf’ by Rory Clements #1SEBASTIANWOLFF
‘The Pure in Heart’ by Susan Hill #2SIMONSERRAILLER
‘A Fatal Crossing’ by Tom Hindle

And if you’d like to share a link:
#BookReview THE MOUTHLESS DEAD by Anthony Quinn https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-a6r via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Lucy Foley

#BookReview ‘Murder on the Marlow Belle’ by Robert Thorogood #cosycrime

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A party on a river boat. A film star. A dead body. An amateur dramatics production of The Importance of Being Earnest. The plot of Murder on the Marlow Belle by Robert Thorogood, fourth of the Marlow Murder Club mysteries, is as twisty and clever as the preceding three novels. Robert ThorogoodWhen the body of Oliver Beresford, co-founder of the Marlow Amateur Dramatic Society (MADS), is washed ashore with two bullet holes in it, there is no shortage of possible murderers. He was last seen on board the Thames pleasure cruiser Marlow Belle with other MADS committee members celebrating the return to Marlow of local-born film star Lizzie Jenkins. But it seems everyone on the boat that night has an alibi. Detective Sergeant Tanika Malik tells the amateur detective trio of Judith, Becks and Suzie that she is facing an investigation at work so they must not help her solve the crime or she will lose her job. Undeterred, the crossword setter, vicar’s wife and dog walker decide to investigate but not tell Tanika what they are doing. It seems everyone – from the murdered man’s wife, the MADS technician, the skipper of the boat, MADS’ leading man and Lizzie Jenkins herself – has a reason to hate Oliver. But is the hatred enough to commit murder. In order to get closer to the suspects, Judith joins the cast.
Murder on the Marlow Belle is a closed room mystery that doesn’t disappoint. And what a cliffhanger ending! Next in the series is The Mysterious Affair of Judith Potts. Please read these books in order, otherwise you’ll miss important character arcs and story threads.

Here are my reviews of the other books in this series:-
THE MARLOW MURDER CLUB #1MARLOWMURDERCLUB
DEATH COMES TO MARLOW #2MARLOWMURDERCLUB
THE QUEEN OF POISONS #3MARLOWMURDERCLUB

… and from the Death in Paradise series:-
A MEDITATION ON MURDER #1DEATHINPARADISE
THE KILLING OF POLLY CARTER #2DEATHINPARADISE

If you like this, try:-
‘The Art of the Imperfect’ by Kate Evans #1SCARBOROUGHMYSTERIES
‘Magpie Murders’ by Anthony Horowitz #1SUSANRYELAND
‘Dissolution’ by CJ Sansom #1SHARDLAKE

And if you’d like to share a link, try:
#BookReview MURDER ON THE MARLOW BELLE by Robert Thorogood https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-a9J via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Anthony Quinn

#BookReview ‘The Valley of Ravens’ by Barbara Erskine @Barbaraerskine #historical

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Two healers, one in the 21st century the other in the thirteenth, are unjustly harrassed. The Valley of Ravens by Barbara Erskine is the third book by this author that I’ve read. All are timeslip novels, all a completely different blending of contemporary and history. Erskine is quickly becoming addictive. Barbara Erskine The two women, who live in the same house centuries apart, are victims of persecution. Eve, desperate to escape from a stalker in Suffolk, a retired GP who doesn’t believe in natural healing, has moved secretly to a lonely Welsh valley. How does her stalker find out her address in the Valley of the Ravens? Little does Eve know that her rundown cottage, T ŷ’r Wrach, is known locally as the Witch’s House and carries an ancient curse. As she gets to know her neighbours and begins the renovations, strange things begin to happen. Small gifts. Noises in the night. Is it her stalker, or does the house have a ghost? And why are local men reluctant to visit the cottage?
Alys, who lived in the house in 1260, attends the wounded in the aftermath of a battle where she treats the last Prince of Wales, Llewellyn. A lasting friendship grows and, when he is near the Valley of the Ravens, Llewellyn visits Brother Afan, a holy man living in a nearby cave, and Alys at T ŷ’r Wrach where he eats her bread and honey. When he is killed, Alys is wrongly blamed by her neighbours for betraying Llewellyn, Prince of Gwynedd, Lord of Snowdon and of Aberffraw, to the English king Edward I. It is rumoured the prince paid her for witchcraft. Llewellyn’s death is grisly and Alys has a critical role to play in what happens next. As the story of each woman unfolds, trying to understand their persecutors and struggling to survive, it becomes clearer why Alys is still present at Eve’s house. She made a vow to the prince which she attempted to fulfill.
The Valley of Ravens is a masterful blending of ancient and modern, romance, superstition, witchcraft and Welsh history. Atmospheric, spooky, rooted in Welsh nature and tradition.
This is a long book but I didn’t want to put it down. Prince Llewellyn’s story is true, but Eve, Alys, T ŷ’r Wrach and the Valley of the Ravens are fictional.

Read my reviews of other novels by Barbara Erskine:-
THE DREAM WEAVERS
THE STORY SPINNER

If you like this, try:-
‘The Royal Rebel’ by Elizabeth Chadwick #1JEANETTEOFKENT
‘Days Without End’ by Sebastian Barry #1DAYSWITHOUTEND
‘Disobedient’ by Elizabeth Fremantle

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE VALLEY OF RAVENS by Barbara Erskine @Barbaraerskine https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-a4v via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Robert Thorogood

#BookReview ‘Murder by Invitation’ by Verity Bright @BrightVerity #cosymystery #crime

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After lots of foreign travel Murder by Invitation, the fifteenth Lady Eleanor Swift cosy mystery by Verity Bright, returns to Little Buckford. As preparations are made to celebrate the King’s birthday, is it really possible that there is a nest of anti-monarchists plotting in the village? Verity BrightWhen the chairman of The King’s Birthday Celebrations Committee is found dead, Eleanor joins her new fiancé Chief Inspector Hugh Seldon in his investigation. At every step, they receive congratulations on their recent engagement. More awkwardly, the victim seems to have made enemies of just about everyone in the small community. As Henley Hall’s staff are working hard with their contributions to the celebrations – food, bunting, flags, costumes for the children, floral displays – news comes in of the death of a missing man, Clanger, Jimmie Dawkins the blacksmith. Frustrated with the lack of progress they are making given the unusually large number of suspects, Eleanor is horrified when a member of her staff is accused.
This is a wide-ranging investigation taking place in a small geographical area encompassing anti-monarchism, trading standards, secrecy, local rivalries and infidelity. As one of the villagers says, ‘you need to know a man’s past before you can judge him in the present.’
After a slowish start, the second half of the novel races towards the end with a manhunt across the countryside. Hugh searches the Chipstone area accompanied by Constable Fry while Ellie and butler Clifford search around Little Buckford. As their pursuit turns into terror, Ellie must once again find the courage that propelled her out of tricky situations in her years cycling solo in China, Persia, Peru and Africa.
The perfect read for a rainy day, this is a perfect combination of a senior policeman reduced to a blushing, bashful beau, and his intrepid, never-say-die, totally unconventional fiancé. The characters are still fresh and the action doesn’t disappoint. A nice addition to the animal family at Henley Hall is Tomkins the cat, a companion for Gladstone.
Next in the series is ‘Murder on the Cornish Cliffs.’

Read my review of other books in the Lady Eleanor Swift series:-
A VERY ENGLISH MURDER #1LADYELEANORSWIFT
DEATH AT THE DANCE #2LADYELEANORSWIFT
A WITNESS TO MURDER #3LADYELEANORSWIFT
MURDER IN THE SNOW #4LADYELEANORSWIFT
MYSTERY BY THE SEA #5LADYELEANORSWIFT
MURDER AT THE FAIR #6LADYELEANORSWIFT
A LESSON IN MURDER #7LADYELEANORSWIFT
DEATH ON A WINTER’S DAY #8LADYELEANORSWIFT
A ROYAL MURDER #9LADYELEANORSWIFT
THE FRENCH FOR MURDER #10LADYELEANORSWIFT 
DEATH DOWN THE AISLE #11LADYELEANORSWIFT
MURDER IN AN IRISH CASTLE #12LADYELEANORSWIFT
DEATH ON DECK #13LADYELEANORSWIFT
MURDER IN MANHATTAN #14LADYELEANORSWIFT

If you like this, try:-
‘Agatha Raisin and the Walkers of Dembley’ by MC Beaton #4AGATHARAISIN
‘Death and the Brewery Queen’ by Frances Brody #12KATESHACKLETON
‘Murder in the Belltower’ by Helena Dixon #5MISSUNDERHAY

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview MURDER BY INVITATION by Verity Bright @BrightVerity https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8vY via SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Barbara Erskine

#BookReview ‘What We Can Know’ by Ian McEwan #dystopianfiction

6 Replies

What We Can Know by Ian McEwan asks what is truth and is it important? Can an unpublished poem recited once at a dinner party 100 years ago be worthy of fame and adulation? Ian McEwanIn an ambitious novel encompassing a century and a planet affected by climate change and war, McEwan explores the overlapping of facts and lies, secrets never revealed and truth casually brushed aside. In 2119, a literature scholar sets out to find the lost manuscript of famous 21st century poet Francis Blundy. Tom Metcalfe takes dangerous and tedious journeys across Britain’s new archipelago landscape to find Blundy’s ‘Corona for Vivien’ and considers how historians and academics make assumptions about truth based on the hard evidence in front of them.
McEwan’s 22nd century world has some similarities to today and many differences. The global population is tiny and young people question the efforts of older historians to discover what happened in the past. How can events that occurred 100 years ago, they ask, have relevance for us? Today, say student protestors, is what matters.
In two timelines, Tom in 2119 and Blundy and Vivien in 2014, McEwan tells us the truth of the missing poem. Hand-written on one copy of vellum, a gift from the poet to his wife Vivien, the poem achieves fame way beyond expectations. Convinced there must be a hard copy of the poem somewhere, Tom compiles a timeline using texts, emails and journals of everyone present at that 2014 dinner party. But digital communications can be deleted, diary entries rewritten, journals edited for publication.
In 2014, Vivien is not taken with her husband’s tribute though his editor says it is ‘a monument to a threatened biological civilization’ with echoes of Wordsworth and Eliot. Vivien remembers the love her first husband, violin-maker Percy, had for the natural world, watching a passing butterfly, identifying wildflowers. Francis is a quiet climate change sceptic.
The lack of a clear timeline and the distortion of fact and fiction can be disorientating. McEwan asks us to consider the modern relationship with news, fact and truth and applies it to the past. How much of the truth is on show, how much hidden? The first quarter is slow and rather dense, mirroring the lies the characters are telling themselves and others, lots of smoke and mirrors, personas assumed, roles played. At times it is unclear whose point of view is being expressed but as the characters become clearer, as secrets and shames are revealed, the story becomes more transparent and the pace picks up. I raced through the final third to a clever, unexpected ending.
Complex, thought-provoking, challenging, What We Can Know is a must-read novel in today’s world of fake news.

Read these reviews of other McEwan novels:-
MACHINES LIKE ME 
NUTSHELL
THE CHILDREN ACT

Read the #FirstPara of:-
ENDURING LOVE
THE CEMENT GARDEN
THE CHILDREN ACT

If you like this, try these:-
‘The Ship’ by Antonia Honeywell
‘The Choice’ by Claire Wade
‘The Last of Us’ by Rob Ewing

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview WHAT WE CAN KNOW by Ian McEwan https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8TY via @Sandra Danby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Verity Bright