Top Five Tuesday – Books With Less Than 300 Pages

A new Top Five Tuesday, the prompts are created by Bionic Book Worm. A lot of my potential picks for this week were aimed at children but I’ve tried to pick a mixture!

1. Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll

I love this book, it’s so bonkers! Alice’s adventures are so much fun to read, my favourite bit is probably at the beginning when she shrinks then grows huge. And the Hatter’s tea party!

2. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K Rowling

This book still gives me chills, I’m surprised it’s this short, this book used to terrify me, I used to think a basalisk would come out of my sink and eat me (one of the toilets in my house has a green door, I think that set me off!) I still love the bit towards the end when Harry and Ron (with the help of a petrified Hermione) figure out what the beast is and how to get into the Chamber of Secrets.

3. Mort by Terry Pratchett

This is one of my favourite Discworld novels as it’s centred around Death. Death decides to hire and apprentice, Mort, a very alive human! As always from Terry Pratchett the book is filled with imagination and wit.

4. Persuasion by Jane Austen

I really enjoy reading this classic maybe because it isn’t ridiculously long! Some classics feel like you’re never going to be able to finish them, but not Persuasion. It’s about getting a second chance at love and if you’re meant to be with a person, eventually you’ll find each other again. It’s also just really cute and filled with olden days kind of sexual tension!

5. Solar by Ian McEwan

I really enjoyed the science angle of this book, it’s about Michael, a prize-winning physicist who travels to New Mexico and tries to save the world from environmental disaster. In his private life Michael is a mess, he’s facing his fifth divorce as his wife wants to leave him for another man.

Quotes of the Week

I started watching the OA on Netflix this week, it is so incredible, really clever and beautiful. Here are my favourite quotes from this week:

“It is an uncanny feeling, that rare occasion when one catches a glimpse of oneself in repose. An unguarded moment, stripped to artifice, when one forgets to fool even oneself.” – Grace, The House At Riverton

I would love to be able to see myself from the outside, we’re so tough on ourselves these days but we would never be that mean to one of our friends, it would be nice to see all our own little quirks and our genuine smile, not posing for a picture but in our natural state.

“Remember the pain, pain is good, it means you’re out of the cave.” – Jim Hopper, Stranger Things season 3 episode 8

This whole episode broke my heart but this quote really got to me, it’s so true! When you’re out there living you can feel!

“My biggest mistake was thinking if I cast a beautiful net then I would only catch beautiful things.” – Prairie, The OA season 1 episode 2

Such a powerful quote and a very powerful show. There are so many layers of genius to unravel!

I hope you all have a great weekend.

Top Five Tuesday – Alphabet

A new Top Five Tuesday, the prompts are created by Bionic Book Worm. The end of the alphabet! I couldn’t find any books for X and Z so I’ve added different ones. I’ve really enjoyed this month’s prompts, it’s been a good challenge.

U – The Underground Railroad by Colby Whitehead

This book is an important read, tough but important. It’s set in America when slavery was still happening. We meet Cora, a young slave whose own mother escaped years ago and now Cora wants to try too. The book is superbly written, it’s tense and just heartbreaking to think about what all those people went through.

V – The Virgin’s Lover by Philippa Gregory

I’ve mentioned a lot of Philippa Gregory books this month and this might be my favourite. It’s set during Elizabeth I’s reign about her relationship with Robert Dudley and her struggles as a new queen. As much as I love Elizabeth’s fierce independence, it does make me sad that she didn’t get to be with the man she loved despite being the most powerful woman in the country.

V – A Vision of Fire by Gillian Anderson

This is in my TBR list, Gillian is one of my favourite humans so of course anything she does, I’m there! It’s a sci-fi novel, Caitlin, a child psychologist is called to attend Maanik, the daughter of India’s ambassador to the UN. There was an attempt on Maanik’s father’s life and she is having violent visions and fits. But it’s not just Maanik, all around the world young people are experiencing the same thing. I can’t wait to read it!

W – Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel

Another book set in Tudor times what are the chances?! This one is set during Henry VIII’s reign, he still hasn’t produced a male heir and now wants to divorce Katherine to marry Anne Boleyn. Thomas Cromwell helps him do it while the Pope and most of Europe appose the plans. I really enjoyed seeing this from Crowell’s point of view, in the second book I really start to dislike him though!

W – When Will There Be Good News? by Kate Atkinson

This was the first book I read by Kate Atkinson, the first chapter is so shocking, it draws you straight into the mystery and drama. Jackson Brodie is once again caught up in a shocking event, he seems to attract trouble. This is definitely my favourite of the whole series.

Y – You Let Me In by Lucy Clarke

This is also on my TBR list, it’s a psychological thriller and it looks so good. Nothing feels right since Elle rented out her house, it’s colder and she feels as if someone is watching her. Or could she be imagining it?

The Clockmaker’s Daughter by Kate Morton Review

“All past is present.”

I absolutely adored reading this book, especially reading it in the middle of summer, it just made it feel more magical and I felt more connected to the events as most of the book takes part in the summer (many different years but all at the same house). The book starts with our main narrator, a ghost of Birchwood Manor, she tells us parts of her life and the ‘visitors’ who she connects with over the decades that have passed since her death. The clever language used during these chapters kept me guessing B’s story and even her name (which I won’t reveal)!

In 2017 we meet Elodie, an archivist who is about to get married. She lost her mother when she was six, she has few memories of her but she remembers a fairy story, about a house on a river, a safe space for those who needed it. At work Elodie sees a sketch of a house that brings those memories flooding back to her, along with a photograph of a beautiful young woman. She can’t stop thinking about how they are connected and why she feels such a pull towards them.

There is a lot of time jumping throughout the book, Birchwood Manor is home to a broken soldier in the 1920s, a family from London during the Blitz in the 1940s and it was a school for girls in the late 1800s. And our ghost sees all of this, meets all of them. A special few can see her and talk to her, I too connected with them, Elodie, Ada, Leonard and Tip are all quiet and clever. B’s story gripped me the most, I wanted to know what happened to her, how she died and before.

The whole book is so beautiful how all these people throughout are connected, their stories are woven flawlessly together. It’s a story about time and how precious stories are. How houses can hold memories forever but not always in a bad way, Birchwood Manor is a place of safety and comfort.

I’m just so glad I got to read this book, I have cried tears of joy and sorrow and right until the end I was surprised at how perfectly everything was tied together.

“I am the stars in the dark when you feel yourself alone.”

Top Five Tuesday – Alphabet

A new Top Five Tuesday, the prompts are created by Bionic Book Worm. This week it’s books that start with P-T, again I’ve gone for books that I haven’t talked about much before.

P – Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

My favourite classic and one of the few I can actually follow without getting really confused! I so want to live in this book, the Bennett family sound like so much fun and the way the countryside is described makes me want to go and live in the middle of nowhere!

Q – The Queen’s Fool by Philippa Gregory

This is set during Mary I’s reign. Hannah is 14 when she has to flee her home in Spain, she makes it to England with her father. Hannah has the gift of sight. Robert Dudley takes an interest in Hannah and brings her to court as a ‘holy fool’ for Queen Mary. But really she is his spy. It’s a really interesting take on life at Tudor Court, the secrets and manipulation, the tension. I really enjoyed it.

R – The Rapture by Liz Jenson

The apocalypse is here, global warming has reached alarming levels. Natural disasters are happening more and more frequently. The worlds population is in panic, their are religious cults preaching about the rapture, the innocent and the good will be saved. Gabrielle Fox has other concerns, she’s trying to rebuild her life after the car accident she had, she takes a job out of London at a psychiatric hospital which is home to one hundred of the most dangerous children in the country. Bethany Krall killed her mother and still shows no remorse after two years of therapy and she is convinced that electric shock therapy allows her to predict the disasters that are taking over the planet. I read this years ago but I still remember it so well, it’s dark, dramatic and shows humanity at the end of our reign.

S – Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan

Set in England during the Cold War, we follow Serena on her mission from MI5 to infiltrate the literary circle of a promising young writer called Tom Haley. MI5 are looking to fund writers whose politics align with that of the government (not Communism). It’s a story full of intrigue but also a story of love.

T – The Trees by Ali Shaw

The trees arrived in the night, wrenching through the ground and thundering up into the air. Adrien wakes to find his entire street taken over by trees, buildings are destroyed. It is soon apparent that no help is coming and the trees extend far beyond this town. Adrien meets Hannah who sees the strange occurrence as a blessing in disguise, her son however has grown up with technology all around him and is stunned when he has to fend for himself. Together they pack up what is left of their lives and go to find Hannah’s forester brother and Adrien’s wife who was on a work trip in Ireland. It’s a very dark and powerful book. The characters are really relatable and I love an apocalyptic theme!

Quotes of the Week

I’ve had a good week, I’m close to finishing The Clockmaker’s Daughter (and all my quotes are from it) this book is so beautiful, I don’t want it to end!

“He’d lost his way, but hope still fluttered in and out of focus like a bird, singing that if he kept putting one foot in front of the other, he might just make it home.” – Leonard, The Clockmaker’s Daughter

This is so beautiful and I reminded me of Emily Dickinson’s poem “Hope is the thing with feathers, That perches in the soul, And sings the tune without the words, And never stops at all.” Leonard was a soilder in WWI and has PTSD, he found hope in a heartbroken artist and the house he loved so much.

“All past is present.” – The Clockmaker’s Daughter by Kate Morton

When I first read this I thought about how old memories are present wherever we are, like ghosts, all the people that have come before us left their emotions floating in the air.

“One generation passes to the next a suitcase filled with jumbled jigsaw pieces from countless puzzles collected over time and says, ‘See what you can make out of these.’” – Birdie, The Clockmaker’s Daughter by Kate Morton

Adults don’t know what they’re doing either, a chilling realisation! As a child we think everyone has it all sorted out we trust the adults in our lives to guide us but it doesn’t always end well as Birdie will tell you! This also reminded me of ASOIAF quote “It all goes back and back,” Tyrion thought, “to our mothers and fathers and theirs before them. We are puppets dancing on the strings of those who came before us, and one day our own children will take up our strings and dance in our steads.”

Have a lovely weekend everyone!

Top Ten Tuesday – Auto-Buy Authors

I do have a collection of authors that I have to read everything they’ve ever written!

1. George R.R. Martin

This man though….he’s honestly a genius. I’ve read all of A Song of Ice and Fire and the first part of Fire and Blood which is about the Targaryen kings and queens. I’ve got Nightflyers waiting on my bookshelf which is a completely different genre from ASOIAF. It’s set in space in the future and I’m really looking forward to reading it.

2. Kate Morton

All of her books are stand alone but they all have a similar style. Set in different times but centred around the same place, usually an old house. The characters are so well written and I always form a strong connection to them. I love Kate’s descriptions of the houses and the different time periods feel real. I’m reading the Clockmaker’s Daughter at the moment which goes from 1862-2017 and lots in between but every time we switch there’s a different feel to the chapter, I don’t know how she does it. I’m always eagerly awaiting her next book!

3. Kate Atkinson

I first discovered Kate Atkinson when I read When Will There Be Good News? which is part of her Jackson Brodie series, he’s a private detective but the books aren’t so much focused on the crimes in them, more about the characters and how they’re affected. I read the rest of the series and when Life After Life came out I was bowled over with the incredible writing and depth of this book, it’s so beautiful and covers the theory of parallel worlds but not in a super sci-fi way. I recently read Transcription which was again historical fiction and I loved it.

4. Nicci French

Nicci French is actually a husband and wife duo! Their books are crime/psychological thrillers and some of them are super scary. I can’t stand scary films but these are different they’re full of suspense. The Frieda Klein series is really good, Frieda is a psychologist who consults with the police and seems to attract trouble. I’ve still got two books left to read from that series and then I’m going to tackle all the ones I haven’t yet read.

5. Laura Andersen

I’ve read her first trilogy The Boleyn Trilogy which is written as if Anne Boleyn had given birth to a son, she survived Henry and her son and daughter are heirs to England. It’s great historical fiction with a twist, the new characters who are friends of the Prince and Princess are Minuette and Dominic all four of them are true friends and have to try and navigate court life together. I’ve started the second trilogy which is set twenty years after the first, I can’t wait to read the rest. I really like Andersen’s style and choice of genre!

6. Lucinda Riley

I am loving her series of The Seven Sisters, every book tells the story of one of the D’Apliese sisters on the journey to discover where they were born. They also flashback to characters in history of each place, so far we’ve discovered Brazil and Norway! I really enjoy reading about the sister’s dynamics, I only have two sisters but they still reminded me of us a little bit! I’m really excited to read the rest of the series.

7. Ian McEwan

I read Atonement for the first time years ago and fell in love with it, since then I’ve read Sweet Tooth which is set in England during the Cold War, Solar and The Children Act. I love how all his novels are completely different, I’ve got all of his older ones on my TBR list and the newest one about robots!

8. Katherine Webb

Webb’s style is similar to Kate Morton, based in the past with ties to the present. The Legacy was the first book I read by Katherine Webb and I was completely hooked. Her others look just as intriguing, The Unseen is next on my list, it’s set in the early 1900s in a small village in England, when two strangers show up and change the town forever.

9. Stephen Fry

I’ve been reading Stephen’s books about Greek Mythology, the way he ties them all together is so clever. Mythos was great, I used to love learning about the many Greek Gods and Goddesses at school but I had forgotten how funny they were. I’ve started Heroes and there’s a third book still to come!

10. J K Rowling

Although we haven’t had anything from Rowling for a while and despite the epic disappointment the was Harry Potter and the Cursed Child (which wasn’t written by Rowling), I would probably still read anything she writes. After Harry Potter we had the Casual Vacancy about a small town, it’s residents and their complicated relationships and biases, I really enjoyed the book, I might re-read it soon.

So there they are, who are your must buy authors?

Top Five Tuesday – Alphabet

A new Top Five Tuesday, the prompts are created by Bionic Book Worm. This week it’s letters K-O, again I’ve tried to pick books that I don’t talk about often.

K – Katherine of Aragon: The True Queen by Alison Weir

The book starts from when Katherine first comes to England from her home in Spain. She’s been betrothed to Arthur Tudor for years but they’ve never met. She is nervous and doesn’t warm to England or Arthur at first. But when she marries the sickly prince she does fall for him. They only have a short time together before Arthur gets gravely ill and dies. The book feels so real, there’s so much detail it’s almost as if Alison Weir were there at the time.

L – Lock In by John Scalzi

In the future a virus strikes humankind that causes paralysis in its victims but they are still mentally conscious and functioning but they’re trapped. Technology evolved to help the people affected by the virus, they can enter a computer generated world and enter robot type beings and move around as they used to. Chris Shane is a rookie FBI agent and one of the ‘locked in’. He has been paired up with Leslie Vann on a murder case which proves more complicated than it first appears.

M – Me Before You by Jojo Moyes

A rare romantic read for me, I actually loved this book. Louisa’s quirky and optimistic nature really drew me in, I loved reading her and Will’s relationship grow. Louisa gets a job working for Will who is now wheelchair bound after a skiing accident. Will hates that he can’t be independent anymore. It’s a heartbreaking story and I haven’t read any of the other books in the series because I don’t want to be sad!!

N – Nation by Terry Pratchett

On a deserted island Mau is all alone, everyone and everything he loves has been washed away in a storm. He’s all alone, until he meets Daphne, a survivor of a shipwreck. Together they discover remarkable things, more survivors turn up and they start to build a new nation. A really clever and enlightening book.

O – The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory

This is probably my favourite Philippa Gregory book. When I first learnt about the Tudors and Henry VIII’s many wives I was fascinated by the six women. This book tells the story of Mary Boleyn who had an affair with Henry and of course Anne and her marriage to Henry. It is fictional but it feels very real.

Top Five Tuesday – Alphabet

A new Top Five Tuesday, the prompts are created by Bionic Book Worm. This week it’s the second part of the alphabet! I’ve tried to go for books that I don’t usually talk about.

F – A Feast for Crows by George R.R. Martin

This is definitely a book I’ve never spoke about (not)! I couldn’t resist having at least one ASOIAF book in the month. Westeros is in absolute tatters by this book and Kings Landing is about to get hit by a group of militant religious fanatics, great. This book has the first POV chapters for Cersei and Brienne which is probably why it’s my favourite because they are the best!

G – A God in Ruins by Kate Atkinson

This book is the follow up to Life After Life, it follows Ursula’s younger brother Teddy as he joins the RAF in WWII and his life after the war. He becomes a husband and father but he struggles with all the changes in the decades that follow the war. It’s really poignant and heartbreaking.

H – The Help by Kathryn Stockett

The Help is set in Mississippi, USA, 1962. The story follows Minny and Aibileen as they go through their lives as maids until Skeeter approaches them about the maid who used to look after her, she can’t find her. Skeeter decides to use her privilege to tell the women’s stories. This time in US history makes me shudder, I cannot understand how they could treat other people the way they did just because of the colour of their skin. And people still have that backwards view now, it madness. The book shows us what it was like for the women of colour in that time and how they kept going.

I – The Illustrated Mum by Jacqueline Wilson

I read this book forever ago, it’s about Dolphin, Star and their mother Marigold. Marigold has loads of tattoos, bright hair and a quick temper. Star is the eldest and worries what her Mum will do next.

J – Jingo by Terry Pratchett

This is on my TBR list, I just read the blurb, it sounds amazing. It’s about war over land that people consider their own and bearing arms in defence of their ‘own’ land. I can’t wait to read Pratchett make a fool of humanity once again!

Quotes of the Week

This week has been super hot, I’ve tried to sit out in the garden with a book as much as possible! Here are my favourite quotes of the week:

“She was clearly intended to be the pawn in this game. But I am a queen, she thought. Able to move in any direction.” – Juliet Armstrong, Transcription by Kate Atkinson

This quote is so empowering, definitely going to add it to my mantra for when I start spiralling.

“She always left a gathering, no matter how intimate, feeling depleted as if she’d accidentally left behind some vital layers of herself she’d never get back.” – Elodie Winslow, The Clockmakers Daughter

This summed up being an introvert so perfectly. I love having meaningful and deep conversations with people but big groups or dull conversations are like hell, I just feel awkward.

Hope you have a lovely summer weekend!