Book Reviews – Page 74 – Everything Is Better With Dragons

Review: ‘Porcelain Flesh of Innocents’, by Lee Cockburn

This is the first review I’m posting as part of the Clink Street Spring Reading Week Blog Tour. I was sent a copy of this book, in exchange for an honest review, by Rachel at Authoright as part of the Blog Tour.

Lee Cockburn Cover 4.2

Published By: Clink Street

Publication Date: 2017

I.S.B.N.; 9781911525318

Format: Paperback (Also available as an ebook)

See other posts for the blurb

MY REVIEW

Pros:

Good plot
Complex characters that drive the narrative forward
Nice plot twists.
Tackles a painful and complex issue – child abuse – with sympathy
The language used gives a flavour of the setting – Edinburgh – while being accessible
The author’s experience as a police officer shows through in the minutia of procedure and attitudes.

Cons:

For an experienced crime novel reader, the villain was obvious from fairly early on.
The book needed some serious editing for spelling and grammar.
The was a lot of telling and not much showing, especially with the characters personalities and relationships with each other.
The formatting left something to be desired. Changes in perspective weren’t signalled by any line breaks, causing confusion as to which character’s viewpoint I was reading.
There were times when I wanted to get my pen out and start deleting whole paragraphs for repetition and unnecessary exposition.
There’s only so much sex and violence I can read before I get bored, and while the violence had some purpose in the plot, the sexual encounters added nothing. In both cases, allusion is more effective that blow-by-blow description.
The victims of the crimes are evil people, but the author uses their bodies to show they are evil, and regularly equates fat with depravity, and thin athleticism with goodness. I’d prefer my novels to not strengthen prevailing fatphobia, thanks ever so.

Overall – 2/5

This book suffers from being published too soon. While the plot and characters were good, poor editing and heavy handedness let this novel down. With a bit more work it could be a damn good crime novel.

Warning, if I haven’t put you off, the book deals with, and there is explicit descriptions of child abuse and sexual assault. Honestly, read the first three chapters and thought ‘I’m going to need vodka to get through this’; unfortunately, I can’t drink on my medication.

Author Spotlight: Lee Cockburn

Lee Ann Cockburn has a new book out and has kindly agreed to tell us about herself.

What can I say, born in 1968, so I am not a spring chicken, although I still act like a giant child. I am six foot one inch, very tall for a woman, I have a strong frame, so when in my uniform, I am quite a formidable lady, and receive many comments about my height and build whilst out on duty.

I swam for 11 years when I was younger, reaching Scottish National times and represented Edinburgh in the youth Olympics in Denmark when I was 15 years old and thus my broad shoulders and swimmers gait when I walk. Towards the end of my swimming career, I swam 4 hours a day and 1 hour in the gym, 6 days a week, busy me, busy parents, but I met many, many lovely people, some of which I am still in contact with today, friends forever, great times, thank you for all the good times.

I then went into a career in Rugby, playing for 25 years, 15 of those for the National side, gaining 77 full caps for my country, playing the very first international on February the 14^th 1993, going on to win the first ever 5 nations championship in 1998, with a grand slam win, I have 4 British lionesses caps, all played in Bermuda, taking the field shoulder to shoulder with those competitors who you used to class as foes, but now proud to call my friends. Three nomads multi nationality caps, playing alongside some true greats, from other countries out with Britain, I played many games, attaining numerous National league and Cup wins with my clubs, Edinburgh Accies and Royal High, and finally we won the 2001 European championships. These were brilliant days, being part of a very special group of people. My international career ended in 2006, along with many other Scottish Rugby greats.

I was upset when my international playing days were over, but had this not been the case, I would never have embarked in the most remarkable achievement of my life, and that was having our two children.

Emily and I met when we joined the police in 2000, and it was then we felt the connection, but circumstance did not allow us to get together at this time. We eventually got together in 2005 and had our civil partnership in 2010, I was 6 months pregnant and Emily 3 months pregnant, and so Jamie and Harry were there at our wedding too.

I am a happy go lucky person, kind, caring, enjoy a laugh and will always stand up for what I think is right. I like fairness, respect, and good manners, there is never a reason to be rude in my books, and manners cost nothing.

Regarding my sexuality, I am glad things have moved on in Britain and people like myself and Emily and our precious children can live a life that is free from the stigmas of the past. Unfortunately though, there will always be the odd individual that feels they have the right to get in about your business in a negative way. I believe in live and let live, help one another, as there are so many other things to channel your emotions and attention into, and move away from negativity.

Follow Lee Cockburn on Twitter: https://twitter.com/lee_leecockburn

Porcelain: Flesh of Innocents

Detective Sergeant Taylor Nicks is back and in charge of tracking down a sadistic vigilante, with a penchant for torturing paedophiles, in this unsettling crime thriller by a real-life police sergeant.

High-powered businessmen are turning up tortured around the city of Edinburgh with one specific thing in common — a sinister double life involving pedophilia. Leaving his ‘victims’ in a disturbing state, the individual responsible calls the police and lays bare the evidence of their targets’ twisted misdemeanours to discover, along with a special memento of their own troubled past — a chilling calling card. Once again heading the investigation team is Detective Sergeant Taylor Nicks, along with her partner Detective Constable Marcus Black, who are tasked not only with tracking the perpetrator down but also dealing with the unusual scenario of having to arrest the victims for their own barbarous crimes. But with the wounded piling up the predator’s thirst for revenge intensifies and soon Nicks discovers that she is no longer chasing down a sinister attacker but a deadly serial killer.

Vivid, dark and deeply unsettling Porcelain: Flesh of Innocents is the perfect next read for serious crime and police thriller fans.

Purchase from Amazon UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Porcelain-Flesh-Innocents-Lee-Cockburn-ebook/dp/B01MR8004F/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1486590103&sr=1-1&keywords=porcelain+flesh+of+innocents

Purchase from Barnes & Noble – http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/porcelain-lee-cockburn/1125500067?ean=9781911525318

Review: ‘Dunstan’. by Conn Iggulden

Published by: Penguin

Publication Date: 4th May 2017

Format: Hardback

I.S.B.N.: 9780718181444

Price: £18.99

Blurb

The year is 937. England is a nation divided, ruled by minor kings and Viking lords. Each vies for land and power. The Wessex king Æthelstan, grandson of Alfred the Great, readies himself to throw a spear into the north.

As would-be kings line up to claim the throne, one man stands in their way.

Dunstan, a fatherless child raised by monks on the moors of Glastonbury Tor, has learned that real power comes not from God, but from discovering one’s true place on Earth. Fearless in pursuit of his own interests, his ambition will take him from the courts of princes to the fields of battle, from exile to exaltation.

For if you cannot be born a king, or made a king, you can still anoint a king.

Under Dunstan’s hand, England may come together as one country – or fall apart in anarchy . . .

From Conn Iggulden, one of our finest historical writers, Dunstan is an intimate portrait of a priest and murderer, liar and visionary, traitor and kingmaker – the man who changed the fate of England.

Continue reading “Review: ‘Dunstan’. by Conn Iggulden”

Review: ‘Who’s to blame?’, by Jane Marlow

Published by: River Grove Books

Publication date: 18th October 2016

I.S.B.N.: 9781632991041

Blurb

Set during the mid-1800s in the vast grain fields of Russian, Who Is to Blame? follows the lives of two star-crossed serfs, Elizaveta and Feodor, torn apart by their own families and the Church while simultaneously trapped in the inhumane life of poverty to which they were born.

At the other end of the spectrum, Count Maximov and his family struggle to maintain harmony amidst a tapestry of deception and debauchery woven by the Count’s son. The plot twists further when the Tsar emancipates twenty million serfs from bondage while the rural gentry’s life of privilege and carelessness has taken its final bow and much of Russia’s nobility faces possible financial ruin.

Continue reading “Review: ‘Who’s to blame?’, by Jane Marlow”

Review: ‘Let The Dead Speak’, by Jane Casey

Published by: Harper Collins UK

Publication Date: 9th March 2017

Format: Ebook

I.S.B.N.: 9780008149000

Price: £9.99

Available here

When an 18-year-old girl returns home to find her house covered in blood and her mother missing, Detective Maeve Kerrigan and the murder squad must navigate a web of lies to discover the truth… When eighteen-year-old Chloe Emery returns to her West London home she finds Kate, her mother, missing and the house covered in blood. There may not be a body, but everything else points to murder. Maeve Kerrigan is young, ambitious and determined to prove she’s up to her new role as detective sergeant. In the absence of a body, she and maverick detective Josh Derwent turn their attention to the neighbours. The ultra-religious Norrises are acting suspiciously; their teenage
daughter definitely has something to hide. Then there’s William Turner, once accused of stabbing a schoolmate and the neighbourhood’s favourite criminal. Is he merely a scapegoat or is there more behind the charismatic façade? As the accusations fly, Maeve must piece together a patchwork of conflicting testimonies, none of which quite add up. Who is lying, who is not? The answer could lead them to the truth about Kate Emery, and save the life of someone else.

My Review

I read this novel in one seven-hour sitting. Despite being exhausted I couldn’t put it down, because I had to find out what happened next. This is a tightly written crime thriller, packed with suspense and an unexpected twist. The characters are rounded and well written, although I found the evangelicals a little stereotypical. The relationship between Maeve Kerrigan and Josh Derwent, at once confrontational and affectionate really draws the reader in as they discover the secrets of Kate Emery and her neighbours.

4/5

Review: Arrowood, by Mick Finlay

Published by: HQ

Publication Date: 23rd March 2017

I.S.B.N.: 9780008203207

Format: Ebook

Price: £7.99

Author Spotlight: Michelle Conner

A local YA author is releasing her new book on 21st March, which will be free via Kindle Unlimited. Michelle Conner is a published poet and painter, as well as a writer of YA fantasy and she designs e-book covers for other authors. She is married with three children and a dog, and writes around her family life.

Her author Facebook page is: www.facebook.com/Authormichelleconnor.

Her website is: michelleconnorauthor.co.uk

Her cover design page is: www.facebook.com/michelle.ebookcoversonline/

The website for this is: http://ebookcovers.online/

She is also a personal friend; the first time we met, in December 2015, we talked for four hours almost constantly about books. I read some of the early drafts, so naturally I am biased.

Continue reading “Author Spotlight: Michelle Conner”

Review: ‘Written in Bones’ by James Oswald

Publication Date: 23rd February 2017

Published by: Penguin UK

I.S.B.N.: 9780718183677

Price: £12.99

Format: Hardback

Blurb

The roots of murder run deep . . .

When a body is found in a tree in The Meadows, Edinburgh’s scenic parkland, the forensics suggest the corpse has fallen from a great height.

Detective Inspector Tony McLean wonders whether it was an accident, or a murder designed to send a chilling message?

The dead man had led quite a life: a disgraced ex-cop turned criminal kingpin who reinvented himself as a celebrated philanthropist.

As McLean traces the victim’s journey, it takes him back to Edinburgh’s past, and through its underworld – crossing paths with some of its most dangerous and most vulnerable people.And waiting at the end of it all, is the truth behind a crime that cuts to the very heart of the city . . .

Inspector McLean is back in the next gripping instalment in James Oswald’s bestselling crime series.

Continue reading “Review: ‘Written in Bones’ by James Oswald”

Review: ‘Thin Ice’, by Quentin Bates

If you read my blog post from last week, you’ll know we had the pleasure of a visit from journalist, translator and crime writer Quentin Bates. Quentin has written four novels (in paperback and ebook format) and three novellas (available as ebooks only) featuring the character Officer Gunnhildur. Details are available on his website: http://graskeggur.com/

I have, and recommend the novella Winterlude. Last week Quentin kindly gave out copies of his books, and of books by Ragnar Jonasson that he had translated; I got my hands on a copy of his most recent book, Thin Ice, published by Constable (an imprit of Little, Brown Book Group) in March 2016.

Continue reading “Review: ‘Thin Ice’, by Quentin Bates”

Review: ‘Victoria’, by Daisy Goodwin

Published By: St. Martins Press

Publication Date: 22nd November 2016

I.S.B.N.: 9781250045461

Blurb

“They think I am still a little girl who is not capable of being a Queen.”

Lord Melbourne turned to look at Victoria. “They are mistaken. I have not known you long, but I observe in you a natural dignity that cannot be learnt. To me, ma’am, you are every inch a Queen.”

In 1837, less than a month after her eighteenth birthday, Alexandrina Victoria – sheltered, small in stature, and female – became Queen of Great Britain and Ireland. Many thought it was preposterous: Alexandrina — Drina to her family — had always been tightly controlled by her mother and her household, and was surely too unprepossessing to hold the throne. Yet from the moment William IV died, the young Queen startled everyone: abandoning her hated first name in favor of Victoria; insisting, for the first time in her life, on sleeping in a room apart from her mother; resolute about meeting with her ministers alone.

One of those ministers, Lord Melbourne, became Victoria’s private secretary. Perhaps he might have become more than that, except everyone argued she was destined to marry her cousin, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. But Victoria had met Albert as a child and found him stiff and critical: surely the last man she would want for a husband….

Drawing on Victoria’s diaries as well as her own brilliant gifts for history and drama, Daisy Goodwin, author of the bestselling novels The American Heiress and The Fortune Hunter as well as creator and writer of the new PBS/Masterpiece drama Victoria, brings the young queen even more richly to life in this magnificent novel.

My Review

Biography in novel form. Not half bad either. The development of Victoria during her first few years as queen is developed and explored in a sympathetic manner and with skillful storytelling. Occasionally the biography breaks through the novelisation and it becomes very obvious that the author is dumping information rather than telling the story, but it only happens three or four times and barely detracts from the flow at all.

Definitely one for fans of Victorian history and Queen Vicky herself.

3/5