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 Ten Tuesday – Summer TBR

Today’s Top Ten Tuesday topic by thatartsyreadergirl is the top books on my Summer TBR list. It’s the summer! Although it really doesn’t feel like it at the moment, the weather is rubbish!

1. Transcription by Kate Atkinson

I’m reading it at the moment and absolutely loving it! We follow Juliet’s story through WWII when she joins MI5 and then through the Cold War.

2. Guards! Guards! By Terry Pratchett

A dragon has taken over Ankh-Morpork, and is burning or eating everything in sight. The City Watch are in disarray and even the Wizards haven’t got a clue what to do. I’m really looking forward to this one, the City Watch are my favourites also dragons!

3. The Clockmaker’s Daughter by Kate Morton

Kate Morton’s books are always great summer reads. This book is set in the summer of 1862 in London, a group of artists spend the summer in a beautiful manor on the Thames. But by the end of their time there one woman has been shot dead and a family heirloom is missing. In the present day, a young archivist finds drawings of the manor with a photograph of a beautiful woman, will she be able to uncover the truth?

4. The Shadow Sister by Lucinda Riley

This is the third book in the series and I’m really looking forward to finding out more about Star and her roots. These books are so well written, they really take you on the sisters journeys with them.

5. The House At Riverton by Kate Morton

This will be a re-read and a wonderful pick for the summer. This is Kate Morton’s first book it’s set in the 1920s/30s and it’s been a while since I read it so I’ve forgotten what happ, it’ll be nice to fall back in love with the book.

6. Sunday Morning Coming Down by Nicci French

The seventh Frieda Klein novel this leads straight from the end of Saturday Requiem which ended dramatically with Frieda finding the dead body of a policeman under her floorboards. Frieda is sure her stalker Dean Reeve is behind it but he’s been (supposedly) dead for seven years.

7. Nightflyers by George R.R Martin

I saw this book in a shop a little while ago and I didn’t know George had written any space books, I’m so excited to read it.

8. The Virgin’s Spy by Laura Andersen

I really enjoyed the first book in this series and meeting some of the knew characters. The Tudors are so fascinating, Elizabeth I is on the throne and her daughter has finally been allowed to join the court in London.

9. One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson

Another re-read, I’ve started reading the Jackson Brodie series again and this is the second book. Jackson is a private investigator and former police officer. This time he’s in Edinburgh and witnesses a brutal attack on a man stuck in a traffic jam.

10. The Day of the Dead by Nicci French

I think this is the last Frieda Klein novel which makes me sad! I didn’t want to read the blurb because it might have spoilers from the seventh book! But I know however they decide to end it it’ll be a brilliant read.

So there are my Summer TBRs, I don’t think I’ll make it through all of them but we’ll see!

Top Five Tuesday – Debut Novels

A new Top Five Tuesday, the prompts are created by Bionic Book Worm. I’ve realised that I don’t read enough debut novels as I struggled to make this list! I do tend to stick with what I know so I might need to branch out and find different authors more. Anyway here are my top five debut novels:

1. The House at Riverton by Kate Morton, Published in 2007

This is such a good book and already Kate’s style is clear, the theme of past mysteries, old houses and brilliant written characters that stay with you. It’s set in England between WWI and WWII, a story about an aristocratic family their house and a mysterious death, told in flashbacks by a woman who witnessed it all.

2. The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins, Published 2015

It is hard to believe this is a debut novel, it’s full of suspense and really clever. It follows three women and their involvement in each others lives. Rachel gets the same train into London every day and it stops opposite some lovely town houses, every morning she sees a couple on their balcony having breakfast together, she makes up a story about them. But one day the woman goes missing.

3. The Boleyn King by Laura Andersen, Published 2013

I absolutely love this book and the rest of the trilogy. What if Anne Boleyn had given Henry a son? Would she have been executed? In this story Anne gives birth to a baby boy and survives to raise her children. Henry IX becomes King at age seventeen. He’s known to his friends as William and there are only three people in the world that he truly trusts, his older sister Elizabeth, his best friend Dominic and Minuette a young orphan raised as a royal ward by Anne. It has all the drama of a Tudor court, a really brilliant read.

4. The Colour of Magic by Terry Pratchett, Published 1985

The whole Discworld series is quirky, funny and genius and the Colour of Magic is no exception. Our introduction to the Discworld and the wizards is led by Rincewind, a former wizard who was thrown out of the University for reading one of the spells that could end the world.

5. The Lifeboat by Charlotte Rogan, Published 2012

This book is set in the early 1900s, a ship to the USA goes down, the passengers are huried on to lifeboats and have to watch as the ship goes down. Now they are stuck in the middle of the ocean not knowing if help is on its way. The survivors on one lifeboat soon realise they are over capacity. Their supplies are dwindling and the weather is worsening. If they are going to survive they will have to make sacrifices. This book is chilling and thought provoking, as the reader I was constantly wondering what I would have done in the same situation. A fascinating take on humanity’s determination to survive at any cost.

What are some of your favourite debut novels?