Review of "The Miniaturist"

I find that great books are all about questioning your perspective, Whether it's developing ideas on race, culture, sex, relationships, or merely altering what you focus on in a novel, I love learning new ways to think about things and interpret our world. The Miniaturist questions what it is to be part of an arranged European marriage, and to lose faith in the idea of love within marriage when such a thing is forced upon you. Moreover, it tackles difficult issues facing puritanical society whilst keeping a realistic stance - i.e. whether or not one lives in a purtianical society, people always have and always will "sin", bucking against the norm.

Petronella is excited to finally become a wife to a wealthy merchant, and discover what it is to love and be loved by a man. Nervous about what a connubial bed might hold, at first Nella is relieved by the fact that Johannes, her husband, allows her to sleep alone. But soon she gets anxious: why is he so disinterested that he makes no attempt to seduce her? Does he not like her? Or is there a darker issue somewhere at the heart of their marriage?

In order to appease his new wife, Johannes buys her a dollhouse that is an exact replica of the house they live in. When Nella approaches a merchant in the city in order to gain furniture for the house as Johannes has asked her to do, she realises that the person behind the creation of the miniatures for the house knows a lot more than she should do. How else would she be able to make exact replicas of all the members of the household, and even predict the future? In the end, does it matter more than what is going on in the house itself. Perhaps Nella's insistence on looking into what the miniaturist is doing is simply deviating her attention away from the issues that are about to destroy her house entirely ....

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x

Review of "Dark Places"

If you've read my review of Gone Girl (here), you will know tat I've fallen a little bit in love with Gillian Flynn's writing, As soon as I finished Gone Girl I immediately downloaded this to my kindle. Although in the end I didn't like it quite as much as Gone Girl, I found the entire plot utterly alluring. I needed to know what happened that night, and why Libby survived the massacre which saw the end of the rest of her family. This was a book that I managed to whip through in a couple of days, and ended up making my boyfriend a tad irate with me on our holiday because I was simply so engrossed in it that I didn't want to do anything else! Finally, after I read it, I discovered that the film is currently in the process of being made, and so I cannot wait for that to come out!

Libby Day needs money, and fast, Having lived off of her survivor's fund since that night when she was seven, 30-something year-old Libby needs a new income. And when she's contacted by a member of a "Kill Club" who's offering her money in return for information about her family and mementos from them that she's kept, she sees a way out of her troubles.

On the night in question, Libby's mother and two sisters were brutally murdered, and her brother Ben has been in jail ever since for the crime. Libby's declaration of his guilt put him there. But when she meets the Day fanatics at the Kill Club, she realises that not everybody thinks that Ben is guilty, and the very people she's relying upon to secure her income want er to question everything she's ever believed in ...

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x

Review of "The Shock of the Fall"

This suspense novella from Nathan Filer ensures that you're kept at arm's length from the protagonist Matthew. At least, Matthew is what the protagonist calls himself. When Matthew's older brother Simon dies in his presence - something that causes a whole host of psychical traumas for young Matthew - Matthew blames himself. At nineteen he commences writing his story for us, something which is at times more confused than others, depending on his mental stability. This was a truly touching story about the implications of mental illness, specifically schizophrenia, on both an individual and the people surrounding him.

Matt just wants to have his brother back: pretty reasonable request, right? But why does everyone try to control his contact with him, and why will no one accept that he killed him? Simon is a happy, loving young boy, and his death leaves a gaping hole in the family life of Matthew and his parents. When Matthew begins to deteriorate, it is his Nanny Noo whom he confides in, and who is the only one he will see. The real question is: how do you move past the death of a sibling? Can you ever? And what if your reality still includes spending time with them?

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x

Review of "We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves"

A story about story-telling if done right is always going to be an interesting read, and this was done right. Karen Joy Fowler's novel, shortlisted for the 2014 Man Booker prize has been the subject of many book blogger reviews over the past few months. This had its benefits and drawbacks for me: on the one hand, it caused me to pick the book up, on the other a massive plot twist was alluded to in so many reviews that I missed the twist whilst looking for one (whoops). SO, from now on I am going to make sure I use reviews to guide my picks, but not alter my expectations. 

Rosemary is a pretty normal college student - apart from the fact that she hardly ever speaks. And never about her family (something which she finds is difficult to do when she moves to college). However, Rosemary hasn't always been like this: as a child no one could get her to stop talking. So what happened? Her twin sister Fern disappeared at the age of five, and Rosemary has never understood why. When her older brother leaves home to find Fern, you realise that this family may have even darker secrets than you had ever considered ...

*Don't read if you're trying to avoid any spoilers*

I'm pretty much a fan of every Planet of the Apes movie ever, so when I found out quite early on that Fern was actually a chimpanzee my interest was spiked. Plus, as someone who is really interested in animal rights, the effort that Fowler put into researching the subject matter she is writing about made it quite an educational read!

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x

Review of "The Jade Lioness"*

I feel so privileged to be able to read Christina Courtenay's newest release! The Jade Lioness is the third installment to her Japanese trilogy, the Kumashiro series, and despite not having read the first two, I was able to pick this up and get through it with ease. Plus, now I want to go back and read the others! I love love love reading books set in exotic locations - as someone who hasn't travelled much but would like to, the beautiful descriptions of places I've never been to really inspires the nomad in me. 

The quotation I chose for this review felt so potent for me because a book set in the 1600s should not see women faced with some of the same problems as those of our current day. Women are still sold into marriages, or sexual relationships all over the world, and it is something that we really ought to challenge, especially where it is accepted. 

During the throes of civil war in England, Temperance has joined her cousin Nico, an important Dutch trader, and his half Japanese wife Midori, on an incredible trip to Japan. There's only one problem: foreigners are hated, and the traders are confined to a tiny island called Dejima. Foreign women aren't even allowed there, and Midori must pose as a concubine to Nico, whilst Temperance adorns herself in male clothing. 

However, Temperance is soon forced into an impossible situation. Haag, one of Nico's traders, realises she is a woman, and attempts to coerce her hand in marriage. With only two weeks to try and work her way out of this dilemma, the claustrophobia of the island becomes too much for Temperance, and she steals a boat to get to a nearby much larger island. What she expects is to get away from her troubles - she doesn't plan on meeting Kazuo, a rugged outcast seeking to restore his father's name.

Returning to the island a week later, Temperance expects to meet him again, though her Puritan conscience wants her to remain away from the temptation he poses. However, she meets a group of outcasts who kidnap her and drag her through the island until she is sold is a concubine. From there, Temperance must make her own fate. 

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x

Review of "Shifting Colours" + Summer Reading Goal

I've been looking for books with a little more depth behind them than the generic chick flick I always come back to (hey, everyone has their own guilty pleasures right?). As I'm almost at the end of my English lit degree, I'm no longer forced to read things I wouldn't necessarily pick up, and what's more, I don't have the time to read ones I've missed because of the impending doom that is finals. So, over summer I'm going to try and read one that I didn't get around to every couple of weeks so that I make sure I keep my reaching schedule varied! Plus, it'll be great to read without a deadline.

Celia, mother of three, must work as a maid in South Africa in order to sustain herself and her children, two of which live with their grandmother. Miriam, her youngest child, lives with her in the white family's house and Celia must care for this young girl whilst performing all of the duties expected of her. 

However, once Michael and Rita, Celia's employers, have a stillborn baby and realise that child bearing may not be a thing in their future, they begin to look at Miriam in a new light. Informed that they will take Miriam to England, and bring her up in an economically stable environment, or she be forced to find a new job and care for Miriam, Celia does what she feels is best for her child. Breaking her own heart, she hopes that Miriam will be happy. But, living in a predominantly white area and being outcast as an outsider at school in England, Miriam longs for home. As she grows older, Miriam realises she needs to find out more about her real identity, and begins a journey back to Africa. But, will there be more surprises than anticipated in Miriam's journey to self-awareness?

This wasn't the quickest page-turner for me, but as I said, it was good to read something with a little more depth to it. However, I'm someone who is oddly affected by the mood of a book, and so much of this was an endless depressing battering of any hope. This personally made it harder for me to want to come back to. And yes, I do get that books can't always be happy-go-lucky, but when the 17th thing in a row went wrong and smacked Celia or Miriam in the face I felt like flinging my kindle across the room. But, that's a miniscule percentage of the frustration that being in Celia or Miriam's position would have produced!

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x

Review of "Elephant Moon"

(image taken from www.johnsweeney.co.uk)

This book examined the direct negative side of Empire in Burma in the early 1940s. The quotation I've chosen expresses what is finally beginning to change about how people consider various Western Empires. Attitudes are slowly but surely beginning to change in opposition to the very notion of Empire, and this is the only way we can move forward away from the heinous crimes which occurred under this hierarchical system.

Grace, schoolteacher to 62 half-caste orphans in Burma, realises that things are getting more dangerous as invasion strikes and she, alongside the children, need to leave. However, the schoolmistress refuses, and Grace must acquiesce to her decision. Moreover, these half caste orphans, the result of lusty imperialist soldiers enacting their desires, are outcast from society, and refused help because of their race on a seemingly never-ending basis.

Finally, Grace gets her way, and the entire school packs provisions and attempts to leave, but is it too late? Gone are traditional methods of getting away from Burma and there is no choice but to commence a long bus journey on a decrepit old vehicle which is never going to last the entire journey. When Grace meets Jem, it seems as though things may just work out, and her and the children will survive, but when tragedy strikes Grace is going to be forced to question everything she's previously believed. Especially when they are rescued by a group of elephant herders and begin to understand these beautiful but potentially deadly creatures.

This was a truly touching novel. This expressed for me in a better way than anything I've ever read just how debilitating it is for someone who is prejudiced against by people even during times of emergency. It speaks out about the blind inhumanity people can be reduced to. The fact that John Sweeney spent 12 years with this novel in the process of being written really highlights just how much thought is put into every step of the journey Grace and her orphans took. Moreover, it is inspired by a true story; if you want to learn more about this, check out Sweeney's explanation here.

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x

Review of "The Turn of the Screw"

This is pretty much the most psychological gothic novel I've ever read. If you want to read something that will really make you question what's real and what's not, then you need to check this out. In comparison, other gothic novels like Dracula and Frankenstein are CSI and this is more Goosebumps (who didn't read about 50 of those when they were younger?!). Anyway, I've recently written on this for a university paper comparing it to The Yellow Wallpaper, so if you've read both it might be interesting to think about ways in which they're similar as they were both written by American authors in the same period.

A group of friends gather around a fire to hear ghost stories - but one participant claims he has a true one, taken from the diary of the governess at the heart of it. When the governess arrives at her new job, she is charmed by the distant uncle of the two children she is to care for. Meeting the unbelievably beautiful children Miles and Flora, she is shocked to discover that Miles has been expelled from his school for an unnamed reason. However, as the novel progresses and the governess begins to see the spectres of two socially transgressive deceased servants, she begins to wonder whether the children are as innocent as they seem. 

Never knowing exactly what is going on makes everyone anxious, and the amount of critical debate over whether the spectres actually exist or not highlights just how much James leaves to the imagine in this text. 

The critique of American family values and strictures comes through evidently in the discussion of the role of both the governess and Miles' social transgression. Queer discourse is snuck into the heart of the story, which is always enlightening to witness. This is what is the great unspoken crime of the novella, and bathos is used when it is finally exposed. In this way, James indicates that by not using queer discourse, we don't avoid it, but create anxiety around it.

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x

Review of "The Wedding Cake Tree"*

(image taken from Goodreads)

A couple of days ago I came across the phrase "book hangover" on Instagram and that is the best way I've ever heard the idea being described. You know when you finish a book and can't pick up a new one for a day or two because you're still contemplating the world of the old one? Well that's what I had with this. There were so many important messages in it about love and identity, but I think the most important one was that expressed in the quotation I picked out above.

Grace Buchanan is hit hard by her mother's seemingly sudden death, but she isn't exactly prepared for the conditions of her will either. Rosamund, Grace's late mother, has insisted she take ten days off of work to go on a mysterious trip with hunky military man Alasdair. Despite Grace's extreme reluctance to go, her mother's desire to have her ashes spread in the places she will travel to means that she can't exactly say no. However, was this Rosamund's only intention for the journey? And how will Grace deal with having to put her life in the hands of a man she's never met before?

I pretty much figured nothing could ever make me want to travel to Scotland as much as this did. As someone who lives in the south of England, concepts about the environment of Scotland are usually filled with "HOW much snow?!", so it's never seemed too appealing. However, the descriptions of the beautiful landscape here make me want to pick up a camera and go travelling up there myself. There was so much chemistry between Alasdair and Grace that I was practically begging for them to get together the entire time. I don't think I've ever rooted for a couple as much as this since Dexter and Lumen!

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x

Review of "Dracula"

(image taken from Oxford University Press)

Dracula has been on by TBR pile for about seven years. As a fan of the Gothic I should have got round to reading this yonks ago, but I finally managed it a few weeks ago. And wow, do I regret not having done so before. This is most definitely sat in my top ten books of all time, possibly top five. If you haven't read it, I would highly suggest you got out and do so. There's everything you could ever want in there: love interests, underlying sex scandals, gore, the uncanny, well developed characters and incredible writing. 

Jonathon Harker travels from London to Transylvania to conduct a deal with a man living in a mysterious home. When he arrives, he realises it isn't just the fact the man's home which is a little odd. Count Dracula, Harker's host, soon displays worrying behaviour, particularly when he refuses Jonathon's entreaties to leave the castle. Having arranged for the Count to move to London, Harker soon begins to question what he has done when he encounters the count sleeping in a coffin ...

Thus begins a whirlwind of a hunt against time to save the woman of London from this vile predator. Who will win this ultimate battle?

There are so many issues raised about normative gender roles, the idea of a 'foreigner' and sexual orientation in this wonderfully deep novel. The image of blood runs throughout the text, and gets particularly interesting if you think about its relation to both menstrual blood and semen. Moreover,the corruption of sexually innocent women by this life-sucking European exposes a number of fears held by the British population during this period about immigration. The contamination of blood leading to disease also links to the concern about STIs (though not necessarily ones we would immediately think about). 

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x

Review of "Fat Chance"

(image taken from www.nickspalding.com)

There were a whole mound of hilarious quotations that I had saved up from this book to share with you all through this blog post, but I really think the one above is incredibly important. It concerns an issue which I greatly believe in, in that, we're now being fed food-like substances rather than food by major corporations. Many illnesses are on the rise and we pretty much all have an addiction to sugar in some form. Attitudes within governments and major companies (don't even get me started on Monsanto) really need a paradigm shift so that we aren't being fuelled by reams of nasty chemicals everyday. *Rant over*, this book is not actually entirely about creating a new world in which there's a fat chance of being fat, but is actually incredibly funny and heartwarming. 

Greg and Zoe are simply no longer happy. Despite being childhood sweethearts, and voraciously in love with each other now, their inability to produce a child, and one too many takeaways over the years has resulted in a stagnation in their marriage. When an opportunity comes up to star in a reality show produced by the radio channel Zoe works for, she is less than impressed that her best friend puts the couple's names into the running to star. However, when they realise they've been chosen to star in show, will it be the kick in the teeth they need to organise their lives, or will it destroy their marriage?

Filled with moments that literally made me laugh out loud, as well as ones that made me want to tear up, Nick Spalding effectively manages to navigate a difficult subject to handle with empathy.

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x

Review of "The Woman Who Did"

It really is very disturbing how little progress we've made in the face of feminism when you read a text like this that was produced over 100 years ago (published in 1895). The quotation above reflects a number of issues women are getting increasingly concerned about, in that they are having to now be recognised in an academic manner, but often have their behaviour proscribed to them in a moral and social sense. One only has to think about recent anti-rape campaigns, which focus on women changing their behaviour rather than changing the behaviour of potential rapists, to see that we still have a long way to go.

Herminia, son of a prestigious religious father, has rather radical ideas about her future. Rather than marry for love, money, or social status, she wants to join a man of an intellectual equal with her in a perfect union which is not bound by the law. When she manages to do so, and convinces him that this relationship is the way forward, they conceive a child, which they hope will be the advent of a new type of woman and class, in which marriage is disdained and women are man's equal. However, when fever strikes and her man dies, Herminia realises that there were quite a number of flaws to her plan ....

Although it starts off rather optimistic about Herminia's ideals, this text soon becomes tragic and very dark. Herminia was way ahead of her time, and her ideals simply cannot cohere with the world she lives in. With the death of her partner comes financial independence, and as a heavily pregnant woman there is little she can do. A life of poverty is begun, in which she is treated as a tainted woman. Moreover, she casts a dark shadow onto the future of her daughter with the dubious state of the relationship she was conceived in.

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x 

Review of "The Two of Us"

(taken from Simon and Schuster)

Nowadays there's pretty much two camps of young couple, and they're separated by their reaction to a little positive sign on a certain test. There's the "eeeek we're having a baby" and the "oh god WHY? What are we gonna do now?!". So, what happens when nineteen days into a sexathon of a relationship your 40-ish year old girlfriend gets pregnant ... a bit of both?

Fisher and Ivy just want a simple relationship filled with lots of fun. Fisher's almost certain that Ivy's the one. That is, until she starts acting cold towards him. Thinking he's committed some kind of horrendous faux pas, Fisher wants to do anything he can to win her back. However, when she announces her pregnancy, will their budding relationship be able to last?

*SPOILER ALERT*

This one was a bit of a tear-jerker I have to say. As Ivy's pregnancy progresses, us readers are witness to all the highs and lows of the upcoming birth of Ivy and Fisher's twins, as well as their relationship in itself. However, when they lose one of the babies a couple of weeks before the due date, and have to say goodbye to one stillborn twin whilst learning to love the other we really get to see just how far human emotional pain and the ability to recover from it can be stretched.

If you like whirlwind romances, and are looking for something with a little more depth in, I would highly recommend The Two of Us.

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x

Review of 'The Soft Whisper of Dreams'*

This has definitely been my favourite book of 2015 so far. I am a big fan of Christina Courtenay, and all of her books which I've been lucky enough to read so far have been pretty fab (Monsoon Mists was one of my top reads of the summer, and you can check out the review for it here). Also, I don't think I've seen London so accurately described in one sentence before as it was in the above quotation.

Maddie's parents die suddenly, and now the only family she has left is her bitch of a sister. That is, until the will tells them that Maddie was adopted, and so, unless her sister displays some heart (highly unlikely) she's now inheritance-less. Needing to get away from the city and the shock of all that's happened, Maddie takes a break in the country at her best friend Kayla's. She expects peace, quiet and a chance to see Kayla's kids. What she doesn't expect is Kayla's hunk of a brother-in-law to be staying there, nor to recognise a resident from the nearby town. When things start to get scary, Maddie is forced to question everything she thought she knew.

This plot had so many strands coming into it that there was never really a dull moment in the book. Courtenay once again creates realistic, believable and over-all humanity-affirming love interests. There's no ridiculous sex scenes (hello one I read where a tampon was whipped out by a guy ... on the first time?!), and the characters all have a great deal of depth to them. Moreover, if you like a bit of a thriller, The Soft Whisper of Dreams has that for you too!

Have you read it? What did you think?

Steph x