Lamp Black, Wolf Grey by Paula Brackston is like a lot of movies you watch on Netflix where you think: "This movie is alright but I wouldn't have wanted to pay full price for it." The book is about a young woman, Laura, who is devastated by her inability to have a child. For some reason, she thinks uprooting her husband and moving to Wales is the answer. She becomes intrigued by her neighbor, with disastrous results, and discovers she can see the wizard, Merlin, who briefly lived in the area. The success of the book hinges on the reader finding Laura to be "special" as she was often described in the book but I found her whiny and self-indulgent, which made it hard to fathom why she was able to see into another time and why Merlin would reach out across the ages to her. In a more interesting side story, alternating chapters set in Merlin's lifetime and revolving around his true love, Meghan, were much more engaging because Meghan was a believable heroine. The strength of Meghan really underscored the weakness of Laura. This was a decent read. It started very slowly for me but the interest level definitely picked up. I wouldn't recommend it highly but I wouldn't warn anyone away from reading it either.

This was a fast-paced thriller that really hit the ground running. The heroine, Reeve, was abducted at age 12 and held captive for 4 years. Nine years later, she seems remarkably well adjusted and is living a typical college student life. When her abductor escapes from the mental facility where he is incarcerated, she becomes the key to his recapture, because of her intimate knowledge of him. The bad guy is satisfyingly evil, and the detailed and patient plan leading to his escape is chilling.

As with many thrillers, the final confrontation seems a little anticlimactic, but the haunting twist at the end closes out the book nicely. Looking forward to reading other books by this author.

The Witch of Painted Sorrows is about a young woman, on the run from a bad marriage, who is drawn to her family's ancestral home and is ultimately possessed by the spirit of an ancestor, who was a courtesan and a witch. The plot is interesting enough, but I found the "faux Victorian" writing style annoying. Also, the primary character, Sandrine, made one puzzling, impetuous, and ultimately disastrous decision after another--without which there would be no story I guess.

This is a book that will probably appeal to many readers, but it did not appeal to me.

Whispering Shadows is not a quick read. Even though I am normally a fast reader, the patient, deliberate pace of this book made it impossible for me to speed through. And that was fine with me. I know little about life in China and Hong Kong so I found the glimpse into the lives of ordinary people fascinating. The main characters were dealing with personal tragedies that shaped their entire lives and made their efforts to find the murderer of a perfect stranger quite heroic. This was definitely a book worth the time.

The Life I Left Behind is about two women who have lost their lives--one to death and one to fear. The book is divided into two sections and alternates, in first person, between two protagonists: Melanie who survived an attempted murder but now lives as a virtual recluse and Eve, speaking posthumously, who investigated the attack on Melanie six years later to try and exonerate the man accused of the crime. I found the first part of the book a little slow when the speaker was Melanie because I found her timidity annoying. However, the book picked up considerably in the second part as Melanie finally started fighting to get her life back.

Bitter Greens is a fascinating historical novel set in the 14th century that uses the classic fairy tale, Rapunzel, as it's framework. The book is divided into three strands. The first is the story of French noblewoman, Charlotte-Rose, who is credited as the author of Rapunzel. The second strand is the story of Selena, the Venetian courtesan/witch who imprisons Rapunzel. The third is the story of Rapunzel herself: Margherita, the daughter of an impoverished Venetian mask-maker and his wife. The strands are interwoven as tightly as Rapunzel's braid and the reader is drawn into the lives of these three women.

Bitter Greens is clever, original, and well-written. I hope Kare Forsyth plans to re-imagine other classic fairy tales.

I wasn't sure I would even finish this book. I found the beginning slow and frustratingly disjointed. I persevered, however, and the story did pick up. Did I like this book? I am still not entirely sure.

Small wonder "Where the Monsters Are" is already an international best seller. It is fascinating, fast-paced, and downright creepy. It is fitting that the book starts with a macabre murder at the Edgar Allen Poe Museum because this book is an homage to Poe.

Author Brekke does a masterful job of maintaining three separate story lines while still managing to give his central characters well-developed back stories and personalities. You would think Brekke would need an 800-page opus to properly develop his story and characters but he manages to wrap everything up quite satisfactorily in under 400 pages.

The pacing was so quick, in fact, that it wasn't until I finished the book that I realized how macabre and tragic it really is. I also did not expect the wealth of fascinating historical information on the controversy surrounding Poe's death as well as on the early practice of autopsies for medical knowledge.

I would like to thank BookBrowse for giving me the opportunity to read this exceptional novel. It tells the story of some of the unsung heroines of World War 1: the volunteer nurses. Through the lives of the Durance sisters and the other members of their Australian nurses corps, Keneally does a terrific job of conveying their courage and fortitude in the face of unimaginable horror and privation. The book was absorbing from start to finish, but I have to confess the ending took me completely by surprise and I am still thinking about it--a week after finishing the book. Put this book on your must read list.

Alan Brenert used the stories of the people who worked at Palisades Park to tell both its history and offer a working-class perspective of important events in American history ranging from the Great Depression, through the Second World War, to the Civil Rights movement and Korea. Seeing history unfold through the lives of the Stopka family was an absorbing and enjoyable experience.

"The Hour of Peril" reminded me a lot of Erik Larson's "Devil in the White City". It takes an interesting subject and tells it is such a didactic manner as to make it difficult to slog your way through. I persevered and learned a lot about Allan Pinkerton and the early science of investigation. The reviewer quoted on the front of the book called it a "riveting" book and a "race-against-the-clock thriller." I don't think he actually read the book.

Live By Night is the rare sequel that is actually better than its predecessor--in this case The Given Day. Not only is this a fascinating look at the Prohibition era, but the characters are utterly intriguing. I was very conflicted about who were the good guys and who were the bad. Lehane says in the book that people are not good or bad, they are just trying to get by. I think that moral flexibility is what sets Lehane's books apart.

Niceville is one of the oddest books I have ever read--and I loved it! There are two concurrent plotlines. One reminds me of Cormac McCarthy's "No Country for Old Men." The other reminds me of a Dean Koontz novel. Both are set in Niceville with overlapping characters, and the plots dip into one another throughout the book. There is an awful lot going on in this book, but I didn't have too much trouble keeping track. I did feel, however, that one of the plots was not satisfactorily resolved. Nonetheless, I would highly recommend this book.

Hard to believe this is a debut novel. The storytelling is very assured with a terrific blend of historical fiction woven into the mystery. The characters are developed and interesting. The familial relationship between some key characters did become somewhat confusing, but the author recognized that fact and smartly summed up the family tree before the conclusion so that the reader had a realistic chance of "solving" the mystery.

I will look forward to other books featuring these characters.

I am a huge fan of Christopher Moore so I was excited to be selected to review his latest book, Sacre Bleu. While not as laugh out loud funny as some of his other works, Sacre Bleu is still highly original and entertaining. It is probably the quirkiest art history you will ever read.

Tides of War may have been Stella Tillyard's first foray into fiction writing, but I pray it will not be her last. That a biographer of her repute would be able to write a historically accurate novel was not in question. That she would be able to develop her characters-both real and fictional, so expertly was the delightful surprise. Tides of War is an absorbing and satisfying read on every level.

When I signed up to review A Bitter Truth, by Charles Todd, I was looking forward to being introduced to an author I hadn’t read before. After reading the book, I was glad it was free. For a team of writers (Charles Todd is a mother-son writing duo) with 15 books to their credit, this book was surprisingly clumsy and amateurish.

This book was the third in a mystery series featuring a World War One military nurse, Bess Crawford, as the protagonist. It opened with Bess arriving home from the front for holiday leave. Her bus was delayed while police searched for a deserter. Much was made of this deserter in the first few pages so the reader was led to believe this was a significant element of the plot. It turned out to be no more than an oblique clue to the denouement which, by the way, had nothing to do with this particular deserter.

Bess then encounters a woman, Lydia Ellis, wandering around in the rain and decides she should take this stranger home and get involved in her affairs to a ridiculous degree. Despite having only a short leave, Bess is persuaded to accompany Lydia to her home and thus is conveniently on-site to become involved in the murder of another house guest who, of course, chooses to confide in Bess just before he is killed.

I did like the character of Bess. She is strong, capable, and intelligent. However, for some reason she capitulates every time selfish, manipulative Lydia or any member of the odious Ellis family ask her to do something—no matter how great the imposition. The chapters set in France, at the front, are the most believable for me, aside from Bess’ search for a French orphan which, of course, she was persuaded to undertake for the egocentric Lydia. Most of the characters in the book are actually likable. The faithful family friend Simon and the charming and eccentric Australian soldier Sergeant Larimore are strong characters. Even the brief interaction she has with her parents showed them to be engaging. It is too bad that so much of the book is centered on people who are self-important and condescending.

When I finally reached the unsportsmanlike conclusion, I was relieved that my acquaintance with the works of Charles Todd was mercifully at an end.