Summary
A collection of short poems, without an overarching theme.

Review
The collection uses an informal tone throughout, and poems include many contemporary references, such as the “Amazon wish list” in ‘Fried Chicken One Rainbow and 24 Grams of Beef’ and a plethora of designer labels in ‘A Midnight Caper into Someone’s Mind Insomnia Part 0’. There are also older references such Marlene Dietrich and Duke Ellington, as well as Byron and Baudelaire. It is difficult to state what many of the poems are ‘about’, as most eschew narrative for a series of images.
Some of the poems use regular rhyme schemes and meter, although this is often a little heavy-handed. Most of the poems are also divided into regular stanzas, but the divisions sometimes feel a little arbitrary and there are no attempts at traditional forms, such as sonnets, or villanelles. This is, by no means, essential, but some of the poetry would gain from a more formal structure.
There are no chapter divisions, so it is impossible to quickly select individual poems. This also leads to distracting problems with presentation. Poetry publishers need to consider the effect of the reader’s choice of font size: what looks great in one size won’t work in another. Here, inconsistent spacing often leads to the end of one poem and the beginning of the next being found on the same page, or the title being found on a different page to poem itself. There are frequent errors with punctuation: full stops are missing from most of the poems, which may be deliberate; commas often appear with spaces on either side; and apostrophes are occasionally printed the wrong way round.

★★★☆☆

Why you’ll like it
The stream of images often produces startling juxtapositions.
Why you won’t
It is difficult to take much more than a vague series of impressions from some poems.

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Age:

40 ish

Nationality:

British

Day job:

Tax Collector

I’m into:

I don’t really think about genre that much.  I like books that use language to challenge and create new worlds.

Motivation:

I love the English language (I never quite got the hang of other languages when I was at school, but I still think I might give Gaelic a go).  I enjoy being immersed in language, whether this is reading, writing or writing about reading.

Favourite writers:

Thomas Hardy, Jonathan Coe, Jim Crace, AS Byatt, Zadie Smith.

Perspective:

I enjoy getting hold of a book and letting the book get hold of me.  I want to read books that inextricably combine plot, character and language.

Twitter: @jasondj

Summary
When Betsy Butter’s parents are killed in a car crash, her cousin – and guardian, ships her off to boarding school in Switzerland, citing Betsy’s love of French as an excuse. Coping with grief, being in a new country, a new school and another language, Betsy soon finds comfort in the warmth and friendship of the girls around her and in the delicious food. But not all is as it seems at the Château Mont Blanc. When one girl disappears, raising talk of sex slave trafficking, and Betsy realises there is art at the school stolen by the Nazi’s with a connection to her best friend, our innocent protagonist sets a rescue plan in motion, all while trying to keep her grades up and the headmistress happy.

Review
This is a sweet tale of a girl coping with a new life. The opening chapters are poignant, with Betsy dealing with the loss of her parents. But the adventures that ensue are certainly not those of your average schoolgirl. Her new boarding school is classic in its portrayal, and the aroma of chocolate from the nearby factory allows a level of fantasy. It’s fun and you get involved, but the language and writing is overly simplified and often clumsy, even for a young adult readership. Although this may be a reflection of the fact she is supposed to be talking in limited French, it doesn’t always flow any better when she is talking to English speakers.

★★★☆☆

Why you’ll like it
It’s a girls own adventure, with the innocent Betsy as the unlikely hero, in what looks to be the first of many.

Why you won’t
It’s a little simplistic, and you’ll need to suspend a lot of belief. The least being that every single pupil of the school is exceptionally nice.

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Summary:

A fresh and carefully crafted love story set in the run up to the Nazi invasion of Budapest.

Review: 

This is a beautifully written story that manages to add to the prolific cannon of Second World War literature. The descriptions are vivid and crisp building the moods for the different settings effortlessly. The lakeside hotel manages to suggest both the surface cool serenity experienced by the guests and the frenetic activity of the over-heated hotel employees. These juxtapositions set up the cross class romance between Zeno and Catherine.

The story moves to the big house in the Hungarian capital referencing well understood models of upperclass and servant characters without resorting to cliche. The appreciative relationship that servant Zeno has with the master of the house, husband of his lover, furnishes a misleading element of safety to the novel. Somehow in all of the distraction of individual character relationships the immediacy of the well known facts of war appear as a surprise: as if these people were somehow safe from irreversible historical events.

Having been hooked all the way through I wasn’t convinced by the ending which stops it just short of being a perfect read but I’d highly recommend it.

★★★★☆

Why you’ll like it: Compelling historical literature from an interesting collection of perspectives.

Why you won’t: Another second world war story isn’t of interest to everybody.

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Summary
The only family Cody Marsh had ever known was her domineering, and embittered mother. That was until her paternal grandfather showed up. For the briefest time he introduced Cody to love, warmth, and another side of herself. When he dies, she makes it her mission to visit his childhood town in an effort to hold onto any memories of a man she barely knew. But her quest leads her to the heart of a double murder, and a place where the past is not buried deep enough.

Review
In Cody Marsh the author has created a shy, awkward, overweight 23 year old red-head, who has never known how to stand up for herself or against her very unpleasant mother. The journey Cody takes is of course about finding herself, not just the memories of her recently discovered grandfather. And despite wanting to shout at her every now and again, you mostly want to cheer her on, and become as attached as she does to the great characters that she meets along the way. The murder mystery and small town goings on that Cody gets drawn into are also engaging, and while extreme, often reflect issues with which we can all identify.

★★★☆☆

Why you’ll like it
There’s murder, mystery, politics, family secrets, dark motivations and a girl just trying to research her past.

Why you won’t
Cody’s internal dialogue gets a bit repetitive, and the mother sometimes came across as a caricature.

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Summary

Five survivors set out to avoid the undead while searching for remaining civilisation.

Review

Firstly this book deserves praise for presentation, editing and overall writing skill. It’s a professional book. The novel begins with the protagonist Julie writing a diary entry into her laptop; it creates an effective feeling of constricted fear. She’s writing about the events so far, not sure who (if anyone) will read this. You get a real sense of her as a person and the situation around her. This was a great introduction however as the story continues this format becomes a little claustrophobic- attempts are made to tell small stories of the day which does open the scene up a bit but I found the whole journal system a little hard going. I began to think of this novel as a series of small boxes and not really wanting to continue opening each. I know it sounds harsh but as a fan of the genre I recognise that this is well written but lacked some real flow and pace. It didn’t do it for me.

★★★☆☆

+ Why you’ll like it

Technically well written with good characters.

- Why you won’t

The diary element of the novel.

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Summary

Dana Quinn travels to the family cabin in New Hampshire to take some time out and write a dissertation. This novel has a mystical theme; a priestess reveals a family secret to Dana which will have a big role in her future…

Review

The author has a good style, I enjoyed the writing which painted a wonderful picture of New Hampshire. Characters were well imagined and delivered. Plot wise I felt things was too little early on. Obviously you’d purchase this book knowing of the Witch theme but during the first quarter I was waiting for something of note to happen- as I mentioned the writing is good enough to carry you along but the set-up just went on too long for me. I’m not expecting an all action occult fest from page one but having read the summary as any punter would I felt I was waiting too long. Once it did I didn’t feel a real edge to the novel. Obviously this is a personal opinion and I can’t really fault the writing.

★★★☆☆

+ Why you’ll like it

Lovely descriptive style, developed characters, slow and easy style.

- Why you won’t

If you don’t like the slow and easy style! I’d imagine if you enjoy this niche you wouldn’t be too disappointed but it lacked an edge for me.

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Summary

High school dating story with a Christian edge. Cole is dating Emily but sends sex texts to another girl causing Emily to break off their relationshp.

Review

A did not finish for me. The word sexting was repeated far too many times and the story was told in a breathless, and-then-this-happened kind of way. However, while writing this I wanted to check something and used the look inside feature on the Amazon page and found an entirely different version of this book to the one on my kindle. There is a backlog at bookstack and perhaps the author has updated the book since sending it for review. The writing style appears to have improved and I’d be interested in reading the new version. However, the review has to be written on the version submitted.

DNF

+ Why you’ll like it
Issue filled modern teen story with Christian values.

- Why you won’t
The above won’t appeal to a huge range of readers. The writing isn’t polished and there are errors. But perhaps an updated version has since been made available?

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