Thought Corridor

I have just finished Fortune Favours the Grave. I love the grumpy/sunshine trope and this fits that very well. Along with a building friends to lovers plot too. I really enjoyed the first book in this series and was excited to read the next one. It’s just as good fun as the first. Highly recommend this. As a fan of Terry Pratchett this feels somewhat similar in style. The world building is excellent and it’s a very fun and enjoyable read. Thanks to the author, the publisher and Netgalley as always for this ARC. 

 Lastly for now is Founding Fathers by Meg Ellison  Must admit I didn't know much about this book before going in to if. It is a satire that plays around, it asks what if tech billionaires had access to cloning the founding fathers and just what would Franklin think of a smartphone. Much of the history of the founding fathers is lost on me as Brit but even though I liked it well enough. It is a fun but brief book, a novella that has an interesting premise but perhaps feels like it needs to be fleshed out more. The idea behind it is sound enough and it humorously looks at politics and updated time settings (with cloning of course). Its an enjoyable read but not quite a 5 star one for me. Thanks tot eh author, the publisher, and to Netgalley as always for this ARC.   

Next up is Nemesis Mine by Amy Archer  I really enjoyed this book, the writing is witty and the book is well paced. There is the classic villain with a heart of gold (somewhere deep in that lair of his) and Maximillian as his love interest. I felt like they had great chemistry and I really wanted them to get together.  The world building was good but maybe was a bit too superficial but still I enjoyed the characters so much that I'm willing to overlook it. This book fits well into the conventions of Romantasy, nothing groundbreaking as the romance hits the tropes and is unsurprising but that is not the point. It is an enjoyable read and I loved the characters.  Thanks to the author, the publisher, and as always to Netgalley for this ARC. 

 The next book is Common Decency by the brilliant Tom Allen, his debut novel. A cosy read with lots of Tom Allen's signature charm and wit. This is a peak behind the lace curtains and closed doors of suburbia and a look at what we find there. The characters who populate  Oak Drive feel very real, we've all heard of neighbors like these. There is more going on beneath the surface and this book explores those dramas. It is humorously written and nicely paced. Thanks to the author, the publishers and Netgalley as always for this ARC. 

 Next up is Upward Bound by Woody Brown.  Woody was the first non speaking autistic graduate of the UCLA and this book feels like a peak inside that world. Like many other reviewers here I loved this book. It is an engaging read from the start and the characters feels so real. As someone who is neurodivergent I could see myself in this book. It is uplifting, there is humour and there is heart and frustration too.   Charming and heartfelt, Upward Bound is a book that it will stay with you for a long time. Thanks to the author, the publishers, and Netgalley as always for this ARC,  

The next book is  The Library of Traumatic Memory  by   Neil Jordan. This was a difficult one for me as although it's helped by its short chapters it did feel a little complicated at times and it was tricky to keep track of the events unfolding. The language used is lovely but with the lack of punctuation and the lack of clear delineation of characters and the narrative voice with its two narrators with no clear way of saying which narrator is speaking it is hard to follow the threads through though the book. I almost did not finish this but persevered, unfortunately for me personally while the imagery and the language is at times beautifully and poetically written it was too complex for me to follow fully. If you're looking for an easy read then this is not it but if you take the time with it then I'm sure there are those who would love this book.  Thank you to the author, the publishers, and as always to Netgalley for this ARC. 

  Hello you! I'm back again with the first of several reviews, reading through my sprawling handwritten notes to make sense of them in order to write them up for this little blog of mine. Starting with T rip to the Moon:  Understanding the True Power Of Story by John Yorke. While this book does feel academical at times it is an enjoyable read and accessible. It  contains many useful passages and tips for aspiring writers of screenplays (and writers in general). It is an easy to understand look at how we are shaped by stories and how we ourselves can shape them. The author looks at various films and screenplays and examines the way they tell a narrative story. I was not familiar with Yorke's previous work and pick this up on a bit of a whim. It is very useful to anyone interested in the genre and is a book that I can see myself returning to. Thank you to the publishers, the author, and Netgalley as always for this ARC. 

The last book to review for the moment is A Great Act of Love  by   Heather Rose  and this one was a difficult one for me to review.  This book is a difficult one to review. Let's start with the summary from the publisher " Caroline examines a stolen map. And there she finds it, at the edge of the Western Hemisphere, a black mark at the 30th latitude smaller than a flea: Norfolk Island. Her Aunt thinks she's a fool for wanting to follow her father to the other side of the world. He is no longer the man who taught Caroline about philosophy, apothecary and dreamt of returning to the France of his childhood. He is a convicted murderer, mad, deported, condemned. But, when she understands that Caroline is determined, her Aunt has one piece of advice: she must leave her past behind and invent a new story. In 1839, Caroline lands in Van Dieman's Land, a young widow of means with a boy in her care. In this insular colony of exiles and opportunists, no-one talks too much abou...

This next review is for The Pie & Mash Detective Agency  by  J.D. Brinkworth Jane and Simon are a millennial couple and on a whim, Jane enrolls herself and Simon in a local private detective night class. Their instructor assigns them a "cold case" he assumes they'll never solve: the disappearance of Nellie Thorne . Now Nellie is not the first person with that name to go missing and its up to Jane and Simon to solve the case and pass their course.  This book has a bit of a slow start for me  but that's largely due to the scene setting. Its very cosy so don't expect any high stakes here. It's entertaining but it does feel a bit too slow for me personally.  Thanks to the publishers and to Netgalley as always for this ARC. 

 The next book for me to write my review of is The Book of Blood and Roses by Annie Summerlee. This is a classic  enemies to lovers plot with the added bonus of vampires. This was a surprising read for me as its not usually my go to genre but the world building really pulled me in and the main character is well written and she has flaws that we can relate to. Its the first sapphic book I have read but it will not be the last  Its a slowburn that sets up the plot to be continued in the next book.    Thanks to the publishers and to Netgalley as always for this ARC. 

 Back to my list of books read and this time it's The Night Hag by Hester Musson, This was the first time I'd read anything by this author and it take me a little while to get into the book but once I did then I enjoyed it. It has its roots in folklore in Scotland in the age of Victorian spiritualism. The writing is very descriptive and beautiful but at times it feels as if this drags the plot down with it. It is a dark, gothic historical mystery with a logical archeologist as our protagonist. Lili is the daughter of a famous (and probably fraudulent) medium, she has rejected the supernatural in favor of the dirt and hard facts of archaeology and we follow her as she uncovers her past.  Thanks to the publishers and to Netgalley as always for this ARC. 

The next book read was  Tea You at the Altar  by   Rebecca Thorne This book series is so much fun It's described as  The Princess Bride  meets Travis Baldree,  Tea You at the Altar is  the third  cosy fantasy in Rebecca Thorne's bestselling Tomes & Tea series. This time our sapphic adventurers must navigate the ultimate maelstrom – their own wedding! Kianthe and Reyna are finally ready to walk down the aisle, but like most best laid plans their plans are going all wrong. Pirates, baby dragons and more are causing mayhem, This book continues in the footsteps of the earlier works, it blends cozy vibes with a political edge as t he wedding ceremony is being used as a trap to lure out the tyrannical Queen and overthrow her. This book deepens the characters and adds more weight to them as we learn more about their inner conflicts. This book is perfect for those who love the found family trope, it is a cosy read with an edge. This is a book that you...

 Onto the next book review. Checking my notes I can see that it is  A Case of Life and Limb  by  Sally Smith.  This is a great follow up to A Case of Mice and Murder, it is another  murder mystery set in Gabriel Ward's world of the Inner Temple .   The Victorian era has just ended, and the Edwardian age is beginning and Gabriel Ward our  protagonist, an  idealistic barrister, is struggling to make a name for himself in the stuffy, tradition-bound world of the London Inner Temple its a typical Old Boys Club.  This book, like Smith's other has an  authenticity to the dialogue used in the courtroom. Despite what people might expect with stuffy courtroom dramas of the past here the pacing is remarkably fast. If you have read the first book then you';ll enjoy seeing more of Gabriel but it can equally work without prior knowledge of the first book.  Thanks to the publishers and to Netgalley as always for this ARC. 

   Hello You! I hope you had a great Christmas and I wish you a Happy New Year.  Today will see me catching up this blog of mine with all the books I read over the festive period.  To begin lets start with  Traitors Legacy, Traitors Legacy is the first in a new series by S. J. Parish. It is a highly engaging, gripping tale of political espionage. Here t he stakes are deeply personal and politically explosive. The book mixes real historical characters and events with the fictional world and its highly engaging. Parish excels at making 16th-century England feel vivid and alive from the London stage to the halls of power. The chapters feel fast paced and for a big book it is easy to get lost in its pages. I highly recommend this book even though its outside of the genre I usually read I really enjoyed it and will seek out more works from S. J . Parish.  Thanks to the publishers and to Netgalley as always for this ARC.