Book review – Page 44 – Everything Is Better With Dragons

Review: ‘Mrs Bates of Highbury’, by Allie Cresswell

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Blurb

The new novel from Readers’ Favourite silver medalist Allie Cresswell.

Thirty years before the beginning of ‘Emma’ Mrs Bates is entirely different from the elderly, silent figure familiar to fans of Jane Austen’s fourth novel. She is comparatively young and beautiful, widowed – but ready to love again. She is the lynch-pin of Highbury society until the appalling Mrs Winwood arrives, very determined to hold sway over that ordered little town.

Miss Bates is as talkative aged twenty nine as she is in her later iteration, with a ghoulish fancy, seeing disaster in every cloud. When young Mr Woodhouse arrives looking for a plot for his new house, the two strike up a relationship characterised by their shared hypochondria, personal chariness and horror of draughts.

Jane, the other Miss Bates, is just seventeen and eager to leave the parochialism of Highbury behind her until handsome Lieutenant Weston comes home on furlough from the militia and sweeps her – quite literally – off her feet.

Mrs Bates of Highbury is the first of three novels by the Amazon #1 best-selling Allie Cresswell, which trace the pre-history of Emma and then run in parallel to it.

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Bonus Review #2: ‘Kitchen Witchcraft: Spells & Charms’, by Rachel Patterson

Kitchen Witchcraft: Spells & Charms Published By: Moon Books

Publication Date: 27th July 2018

I.S.B.N.: 978-1-78535-768-8

Format: Paperback

Price: £6.99

Available here

Blurb

There are a lot of things in the universe that we don’t understand. When something is meant to happen, it will whether you cast a spell or not. But you can help it on its way by guiding and encouraging it and maybe even tweaking events a little too. A spell can be worked in many ways, from a simple pointing of the finger to a complicated ritual involving lots of herbs and crystals and, of course, any variation in between. What will happen for sure is the boost of confidence and happy buzz you will receive as you cast the spell, as well as the positive vibe you get from putting something into action.
Kitchen Witchcraft: Spells & Charms is a the first in a series of books which delves into the world of the Kitchen Witch. Each book breaks down the whys and wherefores of the subject and includes practical guides and exercises. Other titles include Garden Magic, Altars & Rituals and The Elements.

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Review: ‘Balloonomania Belles’, By Sharon Wright

Published By: Pen & Sword

Publication Date: 26th February 2018

I.S.B.N.: 9781526708342

Format: Hardback

Price: £19.99

Blurb

Balloonomania Belles reveals the astonishing stories of the fabulous female pioneers of balloon flight. More than a century before the first aeroplane women were heading for the heavens in crazy, inspired contraptions that could bring death or glory and all too often, both. Award-winning journalist Sharon Wright reveals their hair-raising adventures in a book that brings the stories of the feisty female ballooning heroines together for the first time.

Women were in the vanguard of the “Balloonomania” craze that took hold in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and swept across Europe then the world. Their exploits were a vital element of our first voyages into the sky. When women’s options were often severely limited by law and convention they managed to join the exhilarating quest for spectacle, adventure and danger among the clouds.

Many of the brightest stars of this extraordinary era of human flight were women. From the perilous ascent in 1784 by feisty French teenager Elisabeth Thible, female aeronauts have never looked back… or down. Who were these brave women who took to the air when it was such an incredibly dangerous and scandalous thing to do? Sharon Wright brings together in one book the show-stopping stories of the very first flying women.

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Review: ‘Implant’, by #Ray Clark, #UrbanePublications, #LoveBooksGroupTours

Thanks to Kelly at Love Books Group for organising this blog tour. I’ve reviewed this book honestly in return for a review copy of the novel.

Implant - Ray Clark

Published By: Urbane Publications

Publication Date: 9th August

Format: Paperback

I.S.B.N.: 9781911583981

Price: £8.99

Blurb

Bramfield, near Leeds, a sleepy little market town nestled on the borders of West and North Yorkshire. Detectives Stewart Gardener and Sean Reilly discover the naked corpse of Alex Wilson, nailed to the wall of a cellar in his uncle’s hardware store. His lips are sewn together and his body bears only one mark, a fresh scar near his abdomen.

Within forty-eight hours, their investigation results in dead ends, more victims, no suspects and very little in the way of solid evidence. Gardener and Reilly have a problem and a question on their hands: are the residents of Bramfield prepared for one of history’s most sadistic killers, The Tooth Fairy?

Implant is the perfect read for fans of Peter May, Mark Billingham and Peter James.

Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/2HzlTAL
Amazon US: https://amzn.to/2jceVY2
Foyles: http://bit.ly/2JDHFnQ
Waterstones: http://bit.ly/2FpKPJ6

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Review: ‘The Cheesemaker’s House’, by Jane Cable

The Cheesemaker's House front cover

Published By: Matador

Publication Date: 1st August 2013

I.S.B.N.: 9781783061242

Format: Paperback

Price: £7.99

Blurb

Just think, Alice, right now Owen could be putting a hex on you!

When Alice Hart’s husband runs off with his secretary, she runs off with his dog to lick her wounds in a North Yorkshire village. Battling with loneliness but trying to make the best of her new start, she soon meets her neighbours, including the drop-dead gorgeous builder Richard Wainwright and the kindly yet reticent cafe´ owner, Owen Maltby.

As Alice employs Richard to start renovating the barn next to her house, all is not what it seems. Why does she start seeing Owen when he clearly isn’t there? Where – or when – does the strange crying come from? And if Owen is the village charmer, what exactly does that mean?

The Cheesemaker’s House is a gripping read, inspired by a framed will found in the dining room of the author’s dream Yorkshire house. The previous owners explained that the house had been built at the request of the village cheesemaker in 1726 – and that the cheesemaker was a woman. And so the historical aspect of the story was born.

Jane Cable’s novel won the Suspense & Crime category of The Alan Titchmarsh Show People’s Novelist competition, reaching the last four out of over a thousand entries. The Cheesemaker’s House can be enjoyed by anyone who has become bored of today’s predictable boy-meets-girl romance novels.

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Review: ‘Duck Egg Blues’, by Martin Ungless

Published By: Independently Published

Publication Date: 25th May 2017

Format: Paperback

I.S.B.N.: 978-1521495919

Price: £8.99

Blurb

This perfect slice of ‘cozy crime’ is narrated in the voice of a pre-war English butler and concerns a rich and powerful businesswoman whose daughter goes missing from their country house estate. That the story- teller is a robot belonging to an impoverished detective brings a fresh and original take on ‘cozy’, and as for ‘crime’… well, it does begin to escalate, what with MI6, criminal gangs, corrupt police, and that’s not to mention international cybercrime!

As the plot strands weave together, we discover that behind one mystery lurks a greater threat. No one is safe, not even PArdew…

This is without doubt the robot-butler-detective thriller you have been waiting for!

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Review: ‘Whiskey Tango Foxtrot’, by Gina Kirkham #LoveBooksGroupTours

Publication Day: 19th July 2018

Publisher: Urbane Publications

ISBN: 9781911583813

Price: £8.99

Blurb

The laughter continues to flow in Gina Kirkham’s brilliant sequel to the wonderful Handcuffs, Truncheon and a Polyester Thong.

Our hapless heroine Constable Mavis Upton is preparing to step down the aisle with her fiancé Joe, but has to deal with her temperamental teen daughter, as well as investigate a serial flasher on a push bike. Throw a diva drag queen into the mix and readers can expect the usual hilarious Mavis mishaps that made the first book such a hit.

Revel in Gina Kirkham’s humorous, poignant and moving stories of an everyday girl who one day followed a dream.

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Review: ‘Tubing’, by K.A.McKeagney

tubing cover

Published By: Red Door Books

Publication Date: 31st May 2018

I.S.B.N.: 9781910453568

Format: Paperback

Price: £8.99

Blurb

Polly, 28, lives in London with her ‘perfect-on-paper’ boyfriend. She works a dead-end job on a free London paper. . . life as she knows it is dull. But her banal existence is turned upside down late one drunken night on her way home, after a chance encounter with a man on a packed tube train. The chemistry between them is electric and on impulse, they kiss, giving in to their carnal desires. But it’s over in an instant, and Polly is left shell-shocked as he walks away without even telling her his name.

Now obsessed with this beautiful stranger, Polly begins a frantic online search, and finally discovers more about tubing, an underground phenomenon in which total strangers set up illicit, silent, sexual meetings on busy commuter tube trains. In the process, she manages to track him down and he slowly lures her into his murky world, setting up encounters with different men via Twitter.

At first she thinks she can keep it separate from the rest of her life, but things soon spiral out of control.

By chance she spots him on a packed tube train with a young, pretty blonde. Seething with jealousy, she watches them together. But something isn’t right and a horrific turn of events makes Polly realise not only how foolish she has been, but how much danger she is in…

Can she get out before it’s too late?

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June Bonus Review #2: ‘The Gaslight Stalker’, by David Field

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Published By: Sapere Books

Publication Date: 16th February 2018

I.S.B.N.: 9781912546039

Format: Paperback

Price: £6.50

Blurb

Jack the Ripper is stalking the streets of London. Can anyone stop the serial killer before more women are murdered?

London, 1888

Whitechapel is full of the noise of August Bank Holiday celebrations. Everyone is in high spirits until a woman – Martha Turner – is discovered brutally murdered.

Her friend, Esther, a lowly seamstress turned female sleuth, is determined to find the killer.

A young police officer, Jack Enright, takes the lead on the case, and he and Esther soon embark on a professional – and personal – relationship.

When another murder is committed and whispers of a slasher calling himself Jack the Ripper start flowing through the London streets, the search becomes even more desperate.

The police are on the wrong track and the young couple take matters into their own hands, and soon find themselves navigating through London’s dark underbelly.

Can they find the murderer before he kills again? Will anyone listen to their suspicions?

Or will this dark presence continue to haunt Whitechapel…?

THE GASLIGHT STALKER is the first crime thriller in an exciting new historical series, the Esther and Jack Enright Mysteries, a traditional British detective series set in Victorian London and packed full of suspense

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Bonus Review: ‘Testosterone Rex’, by Cordelia Fine

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Published by: ICON

Publication Date: 24th January 2017

ISBN: 9781785783180

Format: Paperback

Price: £8.99

Blurb

Many people believe that, at its core, biological sex is a fundamental, diverging force in human development. According to this overly familiar story, differences between the sexes are shaped by past evolutionary pressures: Women are more cautious and parenting-focused, while men seek status to attract more mates. In each succeeding generation, sex hormones and male and female brains are thought to continue to reinforce these unbreachable distinctions, making for entrenched inequalities in modern society.

In Testosterone Rex, psychologist Cordelia Fine wittily explains why past and present sex roles are only serving suggestions for the future, revealing a much more dynamic situation through an entertaining and well-documented exploration of the latest research that draws on evolutionary science, psychology, neuroscience, endocrinology, and philosophy. She uses stories from daily life, scientific research, and common sense to break through the din of cultural assumptions. Testosterone, for instance, is not the potent hormonal essence of masculinity; the presumed, built-in preferences of each sex, from toys to financial risk taking, are turned on their heads.

Moving beyond the old “nature versus nurture” debates, Testosterone Rex disproves ingrained myths and calls for a more equal society based on both sexes’ full, human potential.

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