by Louise Jensen ‘That was when she saw a glint of silver. A sharp point pressed against her neck. Instantly the bottom fell out of her world, her body slackened. She had to stay alive for her sisters.’The Stolen Sisters (2020) is the sixth of Louise Jensen’s psychological thrillers. It follows the same structure that …
Category: Thrillers
Jane Eyre meets Wuthering Heights
Mrs England by Stacey Halls A Review '.... Mr England was in high spirits. He'd played two songs on the upright piano and now sat on the stool smoking. Cigar cuttings littered the carpet. His mood was infectious; the children cheered and ran about, and Charley clapped on the rug.' Stacey Halls's first novel The …
Little Bones
by N.V. Peacock Cherrie Forrester seems a normal young woman. She lives in Northamptonshire with her partner Leo and eight-year-old son Robin. She works in a supermarket, has some good friends and enjoys watching back episodes of Greys Anatomy. But Cherrie has a past, one she doesn't want Leo or her friends to know about. …
Saintly Con in Santa Cruz
Revisiting the favourite literature of our childhood and youth can often bring disappointment. There may be several reasons why this is so. For one thing, reading tastes change as we grow older. The world changes too; ideas about what is acceptable, amusing, moral, and so on, do not remain fixed. That is not to say …
Westwind
by Ian Rankin First published in 1990, this novel was judged by the author himself to be a flop. Now that Ian Rankin has made his name, principally as a writer of classic detective stories, he has judged it suitable for reissue (or his publishers have). Westwind is essentially a what-if spy story. Although the …
The Family
by Louise Jensen A Review 'I am still wrestling to be free as I am dragged, my feet scraping the ground, but I'm losing the fight ..... I know they'll never let us leave here now. Not alive anyway.' Not to be confused with Mario Puzo's splendid novel with the same title, Louise Jensen's fifth …
Millennium No.6
The Girl Who Lived Twice by David Lagercrantz (trans. George Goulding) 'She laid a hand on the Beretta in its holster and felt herself pitched into the same icy cold as when she threw the petrol-filled milk carton at her father.' This is David Lagercrantz's third excursion into the world of Larsson's zany heroine, Lisbeth …
Comatose?
If I Die Before I Wake by Emily Koch Review 'My life as I knew it was stopped shortly after I turned twenty-seven.' Alex is in a coma as the result of a climbing accident. At least, that is what his family and doctors believe. Because Alex can hear every word they speak and …
Farewell to Barcelona
The Labyrinth of the Spirits by Carlos Ruiz Zafon translation by Lucia Graves 'Isaac sighed. “Alicia,” he said at last. “Welcome to the Cemetery of Forgotten Books.” ' I [and I suspect many other readers too] have waited a long time for this book. Conceived sometime around 1998, the project Mr Zafon is pleased to …
Anaesthesia
The Way of All Flesh by Ambrose Parry Occasionally, a walk through a bookshop will throw up unexpected delights. Browsing the new and bestseller shelves in my local shop recently, I was surprised to see a book entitled The Way of All Flesh. I immediately thought of Samuel Butler, and wondered why on earth his …
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