Good morning everyone I’m very happy to hand over the reigns to Kirsty again for her spot on the Absolute Darkness blog tour.  As well as sharing her review she has details of how to enter a giveaway to win a copy of the book.

Absolute Darkness is available now in ebook and paperback.  You can purchase a copy of both here.

Before I share Kirsty’s review with you here is a little bit about the book.

Book Synopsis:

A thrill ride through time that will make you hold your breath.

Sitting by the campfire, Brandy admitted a secret to her friends. She swore she saw a ghost when exiting a cave earlier that day. Was she seeing things? Did they believe her? The next day, breaking a cardinal rule, she snuck back to the cave alone. No one knew where she was. What if she fell or was trapped? There would be no rescue.

For ten thousand years Alexander had kept the time streams of this universe safe from an eternal destructive force that continually threatened to tamper and destroy all. Locked in an unremitting battle, the two foes become sidetracked by an unexpected visitor. An entangled journey begins with chilling twists and turns until becoming locked into an inescapable death in a submerged cave.

Who will come out of the watery depths alive?

Kirsty’s Review:

Absolute Darkness

Inescapable death and love await…
….in the timeless depths.

Sitting by the campfire, Brandy admitted a secret to her friends. She swore she saw a ghost when exiting a cave earlier that day. Was she seeing things? Did they believe her? The next day, breaking a cardinal rule, she snuck back to the cave alone. No one knew where she was. What if she fell or was trapped? There would be no rescue.

For ten thousand years Alexander had kept the time streams of this universe safe from an eternal destructive force that continually threatened to tamper and destroy all. Locked in an unremitting battle, the two foes become sidetracked by an unexpected visitor. An entangled journey begins with chilling twists and turns until becoming locked into an inescapable death in a submerged cave.
Who will come out of the watery depths alive?

This was a really interesting concept of a book, the whole idea of someone (a being) able to experience time in a different way and can manipulate it to their own ends, changing the linears (people who travel through time in a straight line) past to influence the future and keep the universe on track.
Brandy and Susan are best friends who like to spend their free time caving. I know nothing about caving, however I found these scenes really well written and I felt immersed in the experience of the hobby – almost claustrophobic in some instants – especially the cave diving scenes, having had a diving accident, I do know first hand how dangerous that can be.

I really warmed to the characters of Brandy and Susan, they have flaws like any person but their friendship endures and helps them through the events to come.  It took me a lot longer to warm to the character of Alexander, I initially felt he was very selfish but his character evolves as the book goes on and you realise his motivation for doing what he does. I did enjoy the descriptions of Alexanders home, it reminded me very much of the plane that DEATH lives on in the Disc World books.

Tina has borrowed bits of myth and made characters and a world that is truly her own – this book is really fast paced for the most part which kept me engaged and reading. The pace slows a little in the middle of the book where everything is explained and plans are formed but it soon picked up again. I got a little confused in places when the timeline gets altered but you soon get back on track. Throughout the book you feel like something is coming, something big – it just keeps building and building to its ultimate crescendo.

For fans of the genre I would recommend picking up this book and giving it a whirl you won’t be disappointed.

Excerpt:

Alexander shivered. Cold air, cold skin, cold stone floor. The sun had set in their time. He considered. It was her time now. Not theirs.
“Main time,” he thought. Not theirs, not hers, just main. He concentrated and willed his body to pull energy from the earth. It felt cold and lifeless. It could sustain him, but not for long.
“What if I just stay here?” Alexander thought. He pictured his naked body flat against the ground. Here where time stood still, no dust would settle on his still form. Slowly he would lose the ability to move but he would live. His body would breathe energy from the earth and continue to keep the cells of his body tuned to this frozen time. Without sustenance, physical food, he would lack the energy to drive his muscles. Alexander pictured himself trapped in a frozen existence with only the company of his thoughts. Perhaps he would lack the ability to even close his eyes. A waking death. With leaden limbs he rolled then drug himself to a seated position and brushed the sand from his chest. The rubble flitted away from him randomly through time and landed on the ground.
A sharp, needy pain gripped him. This pain sharper than the ache he had felt before, the ache caused by a universe moving towards chaos. He dropped his head forward, rubbed a hand over his hair. He should cut it all off, save that nuisance. It would only grown when he was in main time, her time. A grunt. He felt forward for Yindi. Nothing. “Patience is not one of your virtues. What are you up to?”

Alexander walked slowly and with effort through time and towards the entrance of his cave. He walked by the vision of himself at the pit, without glancing its way, and came to stand near the ghostly vision where she had turned to look at him. He stared into her transparent grey eyes. Defeated, hungry and weak he walked on.
The full moon hung heavy in the sky when Alexander slipped into main time. A cool breeze brushed delicately on his skin. It felt like silk. Away from his time and the earth of his cave the sharp pangs of hunger hit again. He slipped back to his cold, frozen time to conserve his energy as much as he could. In that future full moon he could see the comings and goings of his love and her friend. She had come back to the cave today. He had been so preoccupied with leaving that he hadn’t noticed the new vision of her there. He followed their ghostly trail through the grass and woods. Alexander studied the frozen transparent women for a moment. They had stood by a small truck, talking, examining something in her hands. Eventually they had driven away, east. Alexander stood still and tried to pull energy from the earth. This far from his cave, his dirt, the energy was barely enough to aid him.

Giveaway:

#FORLINEARS puzzle: Please check out the virtual blog tour and you might find some embedded fun in the imagery.
(https://www.rachelsrandomresources.com/absolute-darkness) In fact, I dare you. Can you find the hidden puzzles that lead to an autographed book give away? First one to figure it out wins an autographed book.

Please note Over The Rainbow Book Blog is not responsible for this giveaway.

About The Author:

Tina O’Hailey (author of animation text books “Rig it Right” and “Hybrid Animation”, professor in animation, visual effects and game programming, caver and occasional mapper of grim, wet, twisty caves—if she owes a friend a favor or loses a bet—whose passion is to be secluded on a mountain and to write whilst surrounded by small, furry dogs and hot coffee) was struck by lightning as a baby.

Links:
Absolute Darkness: Virtual Blog Tour: June 28 – July 4
https://www.rachelsrandomresources.com/absolute-darkness

On Amazon:

Preorder from the publisher. Use code: PREORDER2018 to receive a 10% discount!
http://www.blackrosewriting.com/sci-fifantasy/absolutedarkness

Author Blog:
https://coffeediem.wordpress.com/

Absolute Darkness Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/AbsoluteDarknessBook

I’m excited to be on the blog tour for this fantastic sounding book today.  Thanks so much to the lovely Kelly for being so understanding when I got the date of the book tour wrong.

Corrupted is available in ebook and paperback now.  The ebook is currently only 99p and you can purchase a copy of both here.

Before I share my extract with you here is a little about the book.

Extract:

chapter 1

friday, 26 june 1964

10.00 hours
Charles Holborne pushes open the double doors of the Old Bailey robing room, heavy slabs of oak darkened and made shiny by years of barristers’ sweaty palms. At ten o’clock this is usually the busiest time of the day, but the end of the Trinity court term approaches and the robing room is only half full, as barristers whose cases have finished and whose children have already returned from their boarding schools slip away early for summer holidays before the hordes of state school kids and their families.
Charles Holborne looks like an Italian truck driver. His forearms are enormous hams that complement tree-trunk legs. His shoulders are of a width that requires bespoke tai- loring and he possesses black eyes, dark curly hair and an olive complexion. He currently sports a healing cut to his left eyebrow and faint evidence of a black eye, and a careful observer might note that his nose is no longer quite straight. First impressions are of a swarthy bruiser not averse to a fight. However, Charles Holborne, né Charlie Horowitz, is supposedly a cultured and successful criminal barrister, and one at the top of his game. It is only weeks since his highest profile case yet, a dock brief still being referred to in the newspapers as The Thames Murder Case. Despite all the odds, most of the evidence and several corrupt police officers ranged against him, Charles secured an acquittal and saved the lives of both his client and himself. Since then he has been deluged with work. Today’s speech in Court 1 of the Central Criminal Court, the Old Bailey, will conclude the second back-to-back murder trial in which he has been instructed – both, importantly, for the Crown – and two more await his attention in Chambers. It’s being said, once again, that he’s the up-and-coming junior destined for great things.

Charles elbows his way gently past counsel jockeying for position in front of the mirrors to tie their bands and adjust their wigs. He is amused to note how many make the effort to greet him and smile – a sharp contrast to the year before when he was persona non grata with his professional colleagues. Being charged with murdering your wife, the daughter of the viscount who was also once your head of Chambers will do that, he thinks wryly. Being an East End Jew with a bit of a past doesn’t help either. Now, however, the public face of his profession professes him fully rehabili- tated: cleared of murder and of proven integrity – despite all rumours to the contrary. Now, he is tipped for silk: promo- tion to one of ‘Her Majesty’s Counsel learned in the law’, next April. Having spent all his life as an outsider, Charles finds himself inexplicably popular. He has even reached a form of uncomfortable truce with the Twins, whose lives he cannot disentangle from his, however he tries; those community- spirited sociopaths who refuse to remain in his past, the gangland rulers of London, Ronnie and Reggie Kray.
So Charles smiles, without for a second trusting this new-found popularity. It’s an illusion, he reminds himself as he reaches his locker at the end of the row; painted smiles on whoreson faces. Whatever they say to my face, I’ll still be outside the circle. His mother is wont to express it in blunter terms: ‘Scratch any Englishman, and beneath the surface you’ll find an anti-Semite.’ Millie Horowitz, lately of Mile End and now of Golders Green, milliner and devoutly inward-looking Jewess, could never feel comfort- able in English society and will never understand why her elder son wanted to join the ranks of a profession that would despise him. Charles is prone to remark that his mother acts like a first-generation frightened immigrant, not someone whose family has in fact lived in London for four centuries. But in the Jewish East End, surrounded by kosher butchers, bakers and candlestick-makers, living a few hundred yards from her synagogue in one direction and the family business in the other, she never needed to venture outside her own community. ‘Outside’ was unknown and daunting, and her son’s choices, to anglicise his name, to marry out – in short, to be part of a wider world – are incomprehensible to her; they constitute an unforgiveable rejection of everything she holds dear.

Charles stands in front of his locker, which bears a card
in an elegant copperplate hand proclaiming that it belongs to Charles Holborne, Esq.. He places his wig tin on the enormous oval table where it joins a shoal of other identical shiny black tins, and opens it to take out his wig. He smells the yellow and grey horsehair tentatively, and reluctantly acknowledges that the last weeks of high-stress sweat-inducing murder trials will require the wig to be professionally cleaned again during the vacation. He hates the seventeenth-century anachronism represented by his court dress and refuses to wear the wig until the last possible moment before the judge enters court. It’s an idiosyncrasy by which he has become well known, and for which he has been berated on a couple of occasions when caught out by judges returning unexpect- edly to their benches.

Charles finishes changing, closes his locker and collects his papers. He leaves the chatter of the robing room behind him and descends the staircase to Court 1. He pushes open the doors and walks down the aisle. The dock towers above him, but it is vacant, as are the barristers’ benches and the jury box. Higher still, in the public gallery, the first specta- tors are filing in, folding umbrellas and shaking rain from wet raincoats. Charles slides into the junior barristers’ bench, wondering if this time next year he’ll be occupying the bench in front as a QC, and pulls the bow on the white ribbon on his brief. The white ribbon is also new: red for defence briefs, white for prosecution.
Twenty minutes later the court is packed with barris- ters, solicitors, members of the public and the jury. At a nod from the judge Charles rises to deliver his closing speech. The accused, a thirty-year-old woman, is supposed to have murdered her abusive husband by hitting him over the head with a rolling pin after one complaint too many concern- ing the quality of her cooking. Her defence – self-defence
– had appeared almost hopeless when Charles first read the depositions. The police found plenty of evidence that the deceased had thrown his supper at the accused – on their arrival she’d been sobbing on the kitchen floor next to her husband’s body, gravy and shards of crockery in her hair and a cut to her forehead – but Charles hadn’t thought it possible to elevate a thrown plate into such a fear of attack that it became reasonable to bash the late gourmet several times over the head with a rolling pin. Nonetheless, defence counsel had made the most of a thin case and had the advan- tage of a jury composed, unusually, of eight women and four men.

Having invited the jury to convict the unfortunate house- wife, Charles resumes his seat and allows his opponent to rise. Charles listens with interest and approval to the speech for the defence. Michael Levy QC, a recently appointed silk with a soft Glaswegian accent and a deviated septum (the result, variously, of a fight in an Edinburgh pub, a car crash or a cricket ball, depending on which story Levy is telling at the time) is an old friend of Charles’s. They met during pupillage, recognised each other as kindred spirits, and shared their respective horror stories and examples of anti- Semitism over the cheapest glasses of red wine sold by El Vino’s on Fleet Street. Although the two men are less close now than during their pupillage year, Charles is still very fond of Levy, his inexhaustible supply of almost-believable stories and his tendency to irrepressible giggling, even when in court. On one memorable occasion he and Charles had been co-defending before the Recorder of London, and had reduced one another to tearful near-hysteria with laughter over something that occurred in court. With the jury still in court, they’d been made to stand like naughty schoolboys while berated by the Recorder.
The Glaswegian makes the most of a bad job and a difficult case, on several occasions making the members of the jury laugh as he attempts to fan a smouldering ember into the steady flame of ‘reasonable doubt’. However, within ten minutes of the judge starting his summing up of the evidence, the judicial boot has been so firmly put into the defence case that Charles knows the faint hope of acquittal has been extinguished. And so it proves. Little more than an hour later, the jury having convicted the accused and she having been tearfully remanded into custody for social reports, Charles makes his way back to the robing room.

‘Well done,’ say a number of colleagues as he passes. ‘Another good win.’
It doesn’t feel merited.
As he is about to push open the door of the robing room, Charles hears a young voice behind him.
‘Sir?’
Charles turns to see a bright and spotty-faced youth, the most recent addition to Chambers’ clerking team, his arm outstretched.
‘Afternoon, Clive. What’re you doing here?’
‘I went on my first tea party, sir,’ replies the lad with pride, referring to the High Court listing appointment at which clerks attempt to get their guvnors’ trials listed at a time when they are available, thereby avoiding having to return their best cases. ‘And Barbara asked me to pop along and give you this.’
He proffers a folded slip of paper which Charles takes. ‘Thanks,’ says Charles, and the clerk turns and skips back down the steps.
Charles opens the piece of paper and reads: Prospect tomorrow19.00? It is signed The other one-armed bandit. Charles smiles with pleasure, and pockets the note.

About The Author:

Simon Michael is the author of the best-selling London 1960s noir gangster series featuring his antihero barrister, Charles Holborne. Simon writes from personal experience: a barrister for 37 years, he worked in the Old Bailey and other criminal courts defending and prosecuting a wide selection of murderers, armed robbers, con artists and other assorted villainy. The 1960s was the “Wild West” of British justice, a time when the Krays, Richardsons and other violent gangs fought for control of London’s organised crime, and the corrupt Metropolitan Police beat up suspects, twisted evidence and took a share of the criminal proceeds. Simon weaves into his thrillers genuine court documents from cases on which he worked on the big stories of the 1960s.

Simon was published in the UK and the USA in the 1980s and returned to writing when he retired from the law in 2016. The Charles Holborne series, The Brief, An Honest Man and The Lighterman, have all garnered strong reviews for their authenticity and excitement. Simon’s theme is alienation; Holborne, who dabbled in crime and in serious violence before becoming a barrister, is an outsider both in the East End where he grew up and in the Temples of the Law where he faces daily class and religious prejudice. He has been compared to Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe and Dashiell Hammett’s Sam Spade, honourable men surrounded by corruption and violence, trying to steer an honest course.

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If you liked the sound of this book from my extract please follow the blog tour and find out what these other fabulous bloggers are saying.

Book Synopsis:

From the author of bestselling phenomenon Daughter comes a thrilling exploration of a marriage consumed by ambition and revenge . .
The perfect couple

Meeting Albie gave Beth a fresh start – a chance to leave her past behind. Now she has her new husband; an ambitious, talented young neurosurgeon.

The perfect marriage

Their marriage gives Beth the safe haven she’s always wanted – with just one catch. Albie has no idea of the secrets she’s keeping. He doesn’t know that years ago, Beth had an affair with Ted, the boss helping Albie’s star ascend. Nor that the affair’s devastating ending will have consequences for their own future.

The perfect storm

So when Ted’s generous patronage begins to sour, Beth senses everything she’s built could crumble. And she sees an opportunity. To satisfy Albie’s ambitions, and her own obsessive desire for revenge . . .

She’ll keep her marriage and her secret safe.

But how far will the fall take them?

My Review:

How Far We Fall is an intriguing, dark and twisty thriller that I thoroughly enjoyed.  I always like a revenge story, particularly when I feel it’s justified, so I found this book to be very entertaining.

It is a bit of a slow burner but after the first couple of pages soon picks up.  The author slowly increases the tension and intrigue which along with a few surprise twists in the plot make this a hard book to put down.

There is a bit of information about neurological procedures which I found quite fascinating, as I’ve always been intrigued by the subject.  Some of it might not be to everyone’s taste though as it is quite detailed in places.  There is also a mention of animal testing which was a bit of an eye opener for me and which I can see leading to a lot of discussions.  For this reason it might be quite a good book club book as there would definitely be a lot to discuss.

I wasn’t really sure what to make of Beth, the main character.  On one hand I felt quite sirso for her as I felt she deserved her new start with Albie and I can imagine her horror at discovering Albie’s new boss was her ex.  However on the other hand she seemed quite cold, calculating and emotionless which sent a shiver down my spine.

This is Jane’s third book and I definetly look forward to reading more from her in the future.  If you like intriguing, dark thrillers with some great twists then you’ll love this book.

Huge thanks to Jenny Platt and Michael St Joseph for my copy of this book and for inviting me onto the blog tour.

About The Author:

While working as a GP, Jane Shemilt completed a postgraduate diploma in Creative Writing at Bristol University and went on to study for the MA in Creative Writing at Bath Spa, gaining both with distinction. Her first novel, Daughter, was selected for the Richard & Judy Book Club, shortlisted for the Edgar Award and the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize, and went on to become the bestselling debut novel of 2014. She and her husband, a professor of neurosurgery, have five children and live in Bristol.

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If you liked the sound of this book please follow the blog tour and find out what these other fabulous bloggers are saying.

Book Synopsis:

YOU DON’T FIND HIM… HE FINDS YOU.

‘THE MUST-READ SUMMER CHILLER’ – Daily Express

‘GENUINELY SCARY’ – Observer

‘IF YOU READ JUST ONE PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLER THIS YEAR – MAKE IT THE TALL MAN’ – CultureFly

The Tall Man is an ADDICTIVE and UNFORGETTABLE blend of psychological suspense and spine-tingling chills that will be perfect for fans of Stephen King, Ruth Ware, Sarah Pinborough’s BEHIND HER EYES. If you love STRANGER THINGS, prepare to be haunted by THE TALL MAN.

A SENSELESS MURDER. A TERRIFYING LEGEND. A FAMILY HAUNTED.

1990: In the darkest woods, three girls devote themselves to a sinister figure.

2000: A young mother disappears, leaving behind her husband and baby daughter.

2018: A teenage girl is charged with murder, and her trial will shock the world.

Three chilling events, connected by the shadow he casts.

He is the Tall Man. He can make you special…

My Review:

The Tall Man is a chilling, eerie and intelligent thriller that kept me guessing.  This is definitely not a book to read at night as it gets inside your head making you think you can see and hear things.  I jumped at quite a few shadows at night, turning on a light to check everything was ok.

The story goes back and forth between a few time lines as it covers Sadie and her families experiences of The Tall Man.  I thought this was very cleverly done as not only does it help increase the suspense and tension in the book, it also helps the reader to understand the characters more as you are aware of what has happened in their pasts.

Despite some of her dubious actions in the book I felt quite sorry for Sadie.  I don’t think she really understood what she was getting herself into and she seems pretty terrified when things start to happen. My favourite character was Miles who seems to be a lovely husband and father who clearly adores both of them.  His fear and concern over Sadie’s erratic behaviour was quite heartbreaking to read about.

This was a very fast paced read for me which I couldn’t put down.  I raced through the pages wanting to find out what happened and how it all gets resolved.  If you want a gripping read for your holidays I really recommend this one.

Huge thanks to Anne Cater and Wildfire books for my copy of this book and for inviting me onto the blog tour.

About The Author:

PHOEBE LOCKE is the pseudonym of full-time writer Nicci Cloke. She previously
worked at the Faber Academy, and hosted London literary salon Speakeasy.
Nicci has had two literary novels published by Fourth Estate and Cape, and also writes YA for Hot Key Books. She lives and writes in London. THE TALL MAN is Phoebe Locke’s debut thriller.

Find Phoebe on Twitter on @phoebe_locke

Follow The Blog Tour:

If you liked the sound of this book from my review please follow the blog tour and find out what these other fabulous bloggers are saying.

Im excited to be on the blog tour for After He’s Gone by Jane Isaac today and to have a fantastic extract to share with you.  Huge thanks to Jane for giving me an extract to post when I’ll children and sleep deprivation meant I wasn’t able to read the book in time.  I’ve been hearing lots of great things about this book though and look forward to reading it in the near future.

After He’s Gone is available in ebook now at the fab price of £1.99.  You can purchase your copy here.

Before I share my extract with you here is a little bit about the book.

Book Synopsis:

You think you know him. Until he’s dead.

When Cameron Swift is gunned down outside his family home, DC Beth Chamberlain is appointed Family Liaison Officer: a dual role that requires her to support the family, and also investigate them.

As the case unfolds and the body count climbs, Beth discovers that nothing is quite as it appears and everyone, it seems, has secrets.

Even the dead…

Prologue Extract:

The moments before death were not at all how she imagined them to be. No images, carved from the recesses of her memory, flashed before her. No celebrated successes or missed opportunities. Instead, an overwhelming fear beat a tune beneath her skin, faster and faster, picking up momentum, immobilising her organs, one by one.
Were they out there? She risked a fleeting glance at the window. She couldn’t see them, hadn’t heard the soft thrum of their engines in the distance, felt their clandestine footfalls as they crept around the perimeter of the house. But there were children inside, they would be discreet.
She willed them to be out there. Trussed up in bullet-proof vests. Semi-automatics clutched to their chests. Hell, they should have evacuated the neighbouring houses by now. Cordoned off the whole estate.
‘Eeny, meeny, miny, mo.’
She turned back to the room, just in time to stare down the barrel of the Glock. And froze.
A tremor ran through the sofa as a knee juddered a staccato beat beside her.
Their captor repeated the rhyme, moving the gun down the line, from child to adult, child to adult. A cat playing with his prey. A pernicious smile tickling his lips.
Please be out there. Eventually they’d make some contact, attempt to negotiate a deal. Wouldn’t they?
The knocking knee squirmed beside her, sending a trail of urine down its calf. She swallowed, the heat of the bodies squeezed beside her on the sofa failing to suppress the chill of raw ice in her chest. Two adults, two children. To kill an adult was gruesome enough. But a child? That was pure unadulterated evil.
The urine crept forwards, a languid line on the polished flooring.
Wasn’t this where self-preservation was supposed to kick in? That animal instinct, sewn into living genes from the dawn of time. They’d tried screaming, reasoning, pleading, even begging. To no avail. The face opposite was calm and still. And now the fight was fading from her bones, numbing the fear biting at every sensory receptor.
The breeze picked up, a sudden gust whistling through the trees out front. The sound cut her breaths. Even if the surrounding pavements weren’t deserted, the house was set so far back from the road that nobody would have heard their screams, their pleading. This wasn’t the movies. No one was out there. There would be no heroic rescue.
The safety catch on the Glock snapped as it was released. Her stomach curdled as she watched the face of death stretch and curve. Listened to the words drip from his mouth, ‘Right. Let’s begin, shall we?’

About The Author:

Book Synopsis:

Song is just a boy when he sets out from Lishui village in China. Brimming with courage and ambition, he leaves behind his impoverished broken family, hoping he’ll make his fortune and return home. Chasing tales of sugarcane, rubber and gold, Song embarks upon a perilous voyage across the globe to the British colony of Guiana, but once there he discovers riches are not so easy to come by and he is forced into labouring as an indentured plantation worker.

This is only the beginning of Song’s remarkable life, but as he finds himself between places and between peoples, and increasingly aware that the circumstances of birth carry more weight than accomplishments or good deeds, Song fears he may live as an outsider forever.

This beautifully written and evocative story spans nearly half a century and half the globe, and though it is set in another century, Song’s story of emigration and the quest for an opportunity to improve his life is timeless.

Song is published on the 28th June in paperback and ebook, you can pre-order your copy here.

My Review:

Firstly I have to say how much I love that cover, the bold colours and unusual picture really works.  I know you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover but I think there is no denying that a great cover definetly helps.

This was a surprising emotional read for me.  The hardships that Songs family endure at the start of the novel was just heartbreaking and I have no idea how I’d cope in a similar situation.  The strength and resilience the children show in this situation made me cry and i just wanted to give them a hug.  I ran upstairs to hug my kids after reading some parts of this book.

Song was a character it’s hard not to fall in love with.  He’s so brave setting off to try and help his family, even more so when you realise he’s only 9.  All the hardships and awful things he experiences on the way was very sad and I kept hoping he’d find someone to take him under his wing.

This isn’t a particularly fast moving book but what makes it is the beautiful descriptions and attention to detail that is included.  The author has clearly done her research and I found it fascinating to learn more about the history of this part of the world.  The reader wants to continue reading to find out what happens to Song and if he makes his fortune to help his family.  The story is ultimately uplifting and it was wonderful to see how far Song had come.

This is the author’s debut novel and I look forward to reading more from her in the future.

Huge thanks to Anne Cater and Unbound publishers for inviting me onto the blog tour and for my copy of this book.

About The Author:

Michelle Jana Chan is an award-winning journalist and travel editor of Vanity Fair. She is also contributing editor at Condé Nast Traveller, presenter of the BBC’s ‘Global Guide’ and a writer for The Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times and Travel & Leisure. Michelle has been named the Travel Media Awards’ Travel Writer of the Year. She was a Morehead-Cain scholar at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Follow The Blog Tour:

If you liked the sound of this book from my review please follow the blog tour and find out what these other fabulous bloggers are saying.

Book Synopsis:

Australia 1945. Until now Kate Dowd has led a sheltered life on her family’s sprawling sheep station but, with her father’s health in decline, the management of the farm is increasingly falling to her.

Kate is rising to the challenge when the arrival of two Italian POW labourers disrupts everything – especially when Kate finds herself drawn to the enigmatic Luca Canali.

Then she receives devastating news. The farm is near bankrupt and the bank is set to repossess. Given just eight weeks to pay the debt, Kate is now in a race to save everything she holds dear.

The Woolgrower’s Companion is available in ebook and hardback now.  You can purchase a copy of both here.

My Review:

I’m on a roll for reading fantastic historical fiction and The Woolgrower’s Companion was no exception! It’s a fabulous read, full of history detail, heartbreak, endurance and love.

I loved the beautiful descriptions of Australia, in particular the wonderful sunsets.  The author so vividly described the rugged landscape that I felt I could feel the heat on my face and the dust in my mouth.  It was fascinating to learn more about Australian history during the war and to discover they also had rationing and had a shortage of workers due to men away fighting.  I’ve always thought they were largely uneffected like America so it was interesting to learn otherwise.

My favourite character was Kate.  I thought she was so strong and determined trying to keep the farm going and keep everything together.  She obviously loves her father and her home which is very touching to see.  When she falls in love I was so happy for her as I felt she deserved it after everything she’d been through.

The love affair was wonderful to read about as it felt so real.  It was so tender and sweet which was even more touching when contrasted against such a rugged harsh landscape. It was a great to see Kate let her hair down a bit and get a break from the stress of her life.  I was on tenderhooks throughout the book wondering what would happen and hoping for a happy ending.

The Woolgrower’s Companion is a fairly easy read which I mean as a compliment.  Joy’s writing just draws you into the story and makes you care about the characters you meet there.  I wanted to keep reading to find out more about them and to discover what would happen to them.  I was quite sad to finish the book and leave them behind but I understand that the author is currently working on a sequel so I’ll look forward to reading that!

Huge thanks to Sian Devine and Vintage books for inviting me onto the blog tour and for my copy of this book.  If you like beautifully written, heartbreaking historical fiction with a wonderful romance at its centre you’ll love this book!

About The Author:

I’d love to hear from you! Please follow me on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.

About me? I grew up in a small town in the bush in Queensland, Australia. I spent my time with my head in a book, or outdoors – climbing trees, playing in dry creek beds, or fishing for yabbies in the railway dam under the big sky. Some of my favourite memories were visiting my grandmother’s sheep farm in rural New South Wales where my father had grown up. She was a fifth generation grazier, a lover of history, and a great and gentle teller of stories. My childhood gave me two passions: a love of the Australian landscape and a fascination with words and stories.

I left the bush at 13 when I went to boarding school in Brisbane. I stayed on there to study law and literature at the University of Queensland. After, my work as a lawyer took me first to Sydney and then all over the world, to London, Hong Kong, Singapore, Tokyo and New York. But I always carried in my head a strong sense of my childhood: the people, the history, the light and the landscape. Those images have never left me and they would eventually become The Woolgrower’s Companion. It’s a story I’ve felt I had to tell.

I currently live in London with my husband and our two young children. But I miss the Australian sky.

Follow The Blog Tour:

If you liked the sound of this book from my review please follow the blog tour and find out what these other fabulous bloggers are saying.

Book Synopsis:

Virginia Wrathmell has always known she will meet her death on the marsh.

One snowy New Year’s Eve, at the age of eighty-six, Virginia feels the time has finally come.

New Year’s Eve, 1939. Virginia is ten, an orphan arriving to meet her new parents at their mysterious house, Salt Winds. Her new home sits on the edge of a vast marsh, a beautiful but dangerous place. War feels far away out here amongst the birds and shifting sands – until the day a German fighter plane crashes into the marsh. The people at Salt Winds are the only ones to see it.

What happens next is something Virginia will regret for the next seventy-five years, and which will change the whole course of her life.

Call Of The Curlew is published in ebook and hardback on the 28th June 2018 and you can pre-order your copy of bothhere.

My Review:

There’s nothing I like better than a dual timeline mystery and Call Of The Curlew is definitely one of the best I have read.

The book is very atmospheric with the descriptions of the bleak, eerie marshes adding to the feeling that anything could happen. The bleakness seems to creep in side the house and affect the people living there, making them act very strangely at times.

The reader is aware almost from the start that something is not quite right with the house and the situation but is largely kept in the dark about what it might be.  The facts are slowly and tantalisingly revealed as the story unfolds in a way that is very well done by the author.  I was very intrigued and wanted to keep reading to find out what was going to happen.

The characters are very well created and developed well throughout the book.  I’m not sure if I particularly warmed to any of them though I did feel sorry for them and the situation they find themselves in.  Virginia was an interesting character very astute and capable one moment but very childlike at other times, even when she’s an 85 year old.  She obviously adored Clem which was very touching to see and her pain over what happened is very palpable, I did really feel for her then.  Max Deering is a great characters as he is very unlikeable and smarmy at times.  I wanted him to get his comeuppance and not get the ending he obviously wanted.

This is Elizabeth  Brooks’s debut book and I really can’t wait to read more from her in the future. If you like atmospheric, dual timeline mysteries with some great characters you’ll love this book. I felt this book was similar in style to The Taxidermist by Kate Mosse so if you liked that book I think you’ll enjoy this one.

Huge thanks to Anne Cater for inviting me onto the blog tour and to Hannah Bright for my copy this book.  This is definitely going on my keep forever shelf!

About The Author:

ELIZABETH BROOKS grew up in Chester, and read Classics at Cambridge. She lives on the Isle of Man with
her husband and children. Elizabeth describes herself as a “Brontë nerd”; Call of the Curlew is her homage to the
immersive and evocative writing of Charlotte Brontë.

Follow The Blog Tour:

If you liked the sound of this book from my review please follow the blog tour and find out what these other fabulous bloggers are saying.

Happy weekend everyone! I’m on the blog tour for Oliver Twist And The Mystery Of Throate Manner today and have a great interview with the author to share with you.

Oliver Twist And The Mystery Of Throate Manner is available now in ebook and paperback, the ebook is currently only 99p.  You can purchase a copy of both here.

Before I share my interview with you here is a little bit about the book.

Book Synopsis:

Oliver Twist is a young man in his late twenties and employed as a solicitor. He has taken his old associate Jack Dawkins, aka the Artful Dodger, on as his clerk in attempt to civilise him and keep him out of trouble. Together they become embroiled in a dark and dangerous murder mystery.
Throate Manor is the ancestral home of the Throate Family in Surrey. The latest incumbent of the line, the aged Sir Ebenezer, trapped in a loveless marriage to Lady Amelia, is being terrified by a night visitor, a sheeted apparition who appears in his bedroom, and warns him to remember his son. This does not refer to his legitimate offspring Jeremiah Throate, a reckless gambler and libertine, who is deeply in debt to Eugene Trench, a sinister figure in the Victorian underworld. The son to whom the apparition refers is an illegitimate child Sir Ebenezer fathered with a maidservant some twenty five years previously. Fear mixed with guilt prompts Sir Ebenezer to try and locate the son he has never known. He plans to alter his will to favour him. He contacts his solicitors, the firm of Gripewind and Biddle, for this purpose and they despatch Oliver Twist and Jack Dawkins to Throate Manor to attend to this business. Sir Ebenezer charges Oliver with the task of finding his lost son.

The task is a perilous one leading to violence and murder before shocking revelations threaten to destroy them all.

Bestselling crime author David Stuart Davies delivers a unique Victorian set mystery, reimagining some of Charles Dickens best loved characters in new and thrilling roles. Ideal for fans of Kim Newman, Mark Frost and the author’s acclaimed Luther Darke series.

Interiew with David Stuart Davies:

1. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself?

I live in Huddersfield in Yorkshire and started out as an English teacher. I was able to jump ship over twenty years ago and do what I’d always wanted to – to write.
I work best on my new creative writing in the mornings from around six o’clock, before having a shower or getting caught up in real life. My mind is really clear then and I leave editing until later in the day.
My most recent series of novels (Blood Rites was the final one in the trilogy, published by Urbane in 2017) was actually the first I’d set in my home town of Huddersfield. The DI Paul Snow series is very dark Yorkshire noir – he’s gay, facing prejudice in the police force of the 1980s
I’ve written a lot about Sherlock Holmes: eight novels, two plays and three non-fiction books as well as numerous articles and introductions about the character.
I am happily married to a wonderful and tolerant woman who reads and checks everything I write – even my shopping lists.
I am on the national committee of the Crime Writers’ Association and edit Red Herrings, their magazine. I am proud to be a member of the Detection Club formed in the 1930s by Dorothy L. Sayers and G. K. Chesterton – a dining club for crime writers.

2. What do you do when you are not writing?

When I’m not writing I do pretty boring, essential stuff – working from home I end up cleaning the loo, doing the ironing and defrosting the fridge while my wife is out at work. I’m much better at it than she is!
I love eating out and meeting friends for a good conversation. I enjoy reading, which is probably a fairly obvious thing for a writer to do – though I find it hard to read: if I’m blown away by a novel I fall into despair, thinking that I’ll never achieve anything a tenth as wonderful in my own writing. And if the book I’m reading isn’t engaging me as I’d hoped, I get distracted thinking about how I’d have written it more effectively. It’s hard to leave your own insecurities behind sometimes and just enjoy the ride. I read best between books and on holiday, and I read a lot of non-fiction to prevent myself from falling into the malaise mentioned above.
I also adore watching old films. I’m very fond of horror movies from the golden age of Universal and Hammer. The kinds of friends I hang around with also tend to be classic film geeks and you can often find us nattering away about the oeuvre of Peter Cushing or Boris Karloff.

3. Do you have a day job as well?

No day job but, like most writers, I have several strings to my bow in order to keep the wolf from the door – and writing in clichés probably doesn’t count as a job! As well as editing the Crime Writers Association’s monthly magazine Red Herrings, I’m the general editor for Wordsworth Editions Mystery and Supernatural series.

4. When did you first start writing and when did you finish your first book?

I started writing before I was ten. I used to write little stories for my mother. But in a serious way it was in my mid-teens that I attempted to create new Sherlock Holmes stories. My first published book was written when I was at university. See the response to question 10.

5. How did you choose the genre you write in?

I’ve always loved crime fiction – ever since I encountered The Hound of the Baskervilles in the school library when I was about twelve. The book had as much of an impact on my life as if the hound itself had jumped howling from the library shelves. I fell in love with the character of Sherlock Holmes and when I’d exhausted Conan Doyle’s originals I started writing my own Holmes stories for fun – what today would be called fan fiction. Holmes eventually led me to other detectives and crime writers.
Similarly ghost and horror stories have always been a favourite. It’s a simple case of tending to write about what I enjoy reading. If I don’t enjoy it, I feel that the reader would somehow see through me and they wouldn’t be convinced by the fictional world I’d created either.

6. Where do you get your ideas?

Mainly they just appear – out of thin air, as the saying goes, or in my case out of a wall of fog and black and white cinematography. I am lucky to have a vivid and visual imagination. But obviously I’m also influenced by everything around me – whether it’s other books, overheard conversations, news stories, drama or films. For me, it’s films particularly – when I visualise a scene in a novel, I see it cinematically in my head. But my ideas come from anything and anywhere really – writers are like hoovering vultures with an eye on the recycling bin.

7. Do you ever experience writer’s block?

Yes, from time to time I do! Rarely when I’m actually writing a book but usually when one project is finished and it’s time to start a new one. That peculiar gap between ending one fictional world and leaping into another: what do I want to do next? What should I do next? What can I do next? A writer should always think of the reader. I may love what I’ve created, and it would be great to write for the sheer joy of it, but will anyone else develop a love affair with my words? It would be nice to think that one person, one reader somewhere, really loved what I’d done – that it made them laugh or cry or be afraid to sleep at night and in some way allowed them to escape from reality for a little while. Art, literature and culture is so important right now in these uncertain times to give people a little boost.
However, in the end, when I’m wrestling with a new project at the back of my mind is always the question, will that big hairy wolf be kept from the door? It is a profession, which means that more often than not you write what you have to write rather than what you want to write. Most of the time I’m excited by what I’m doing and even if it wasn’t the route I intended originally I’ll try to find something in it to get me through. You have to discover ways to wriggle around and shape a project you may not be that keen on so that you can do what you love, do your best within that context, and surround yourself with other people who have the same passion.

8. Do you work with an outline, or just write?

I start with an idea, a notion and a very vague sense of where it will lead – then I just write. There are some authors who plan everything carefully before actually writing their novel and do a lot of research. I use broad brush strokes and I couldn’t plan. I enjoy the journey too much, never quite sure where the road will lead. I’ve never thought, I’m going to write a novel about X which will appeal to market Y and be particularly relevant to current trend Z – that way lies the scary formulaic untruth. It is exciting and frustrating at times. New plot developments appear unbidden, as do some new characters. This can make it all the more exhilarating and I hope that if I’m excited by the process maybe some of that will translate itself into the completed work – and excite the reader.

9. Is there any particular author or book that influenced you in any way either
growing up or as an adult?

Well, it has to be Arthur Conan Doyle. Sherlock Holmes not only led me to a writing career, he has been a constant in my life and has made me many friends around the world. I think it is fair to say that I am well known in the international Sherlockian community having written fiction, non-fiction and two one man plays about the character as well as giving dramatised presentations at festivals and in libraries. And, indirectly, I met my wife through Sherlock Holmes!

10. Can you tell us about your challenges in getting your first book published?

This will really annoy people, I’m afraid. I was incredibly lucky and the first book I wrote, as a student, was accepted by the first publisher I sent it to! After that it was all downhill and it took me another 15 years to have another one published.
What happened was I was considering options for my final dissertation at university. I wanted to write about Conan Doyle but was told that he wasn’t a significant enough author. He’s on the National Curriculum now, but not then! As an antidote to this and for my own amusement I began to write an article about the films of Sherlock Holmes, which grew until I had a book length manuscript. I sent it off to New English Library and when I returned from my early morning milk round, which was earning me a student beer or two, there was a letter accepting the book.
When I went into teaching, I’d naively thought that I’d have loads of free time to write but the work was draining and nothing happened. In the meantime, I began writing for pieces for a commercial Sherlock Holmes magazine. This, helped me build a network and a profile in quite a niche area and helped me to get the next book out. Eventually I was offered the post of Editor of the magazine and so recklessly I jumped ship from teaching and became a full time writer.

11. Is anything in your book based on real life experiences or purely all
imagination?

Predominantly imagination. Particularly with this novel, which is set in the mid-Victorian period. The nineteenth century is well beyond living memory but it’s an era I’m immersed in and which is incredibly well documented, through increasing literacy, novels, newspapers and social documentary, as well as the thrilling new medium of photography.
I’ve always loved Dickens and A Christmas Carol is one of my favourite books. Maybe something of Oliver’s experiences – and Dickens’s own, as shown most explicitly in David Copperfield – as someone starting out in life and experiencing problems resonates with me. I came from a loving but very ordinary background with few educational opportunities early in life and it took a long time to be able to make writing my career.
I had great fun in working in a slightly different style in this book. I have not in any way tried to write like Dickens – I would not be so arrogant – but I hope I’ve captured the spirit and essence of his style. It is a crime and mystery novel – but then so were a number of Dickens’ tales. I have been able to include moments of drama, horror and humour and people the narrative with a wide range of characters, some of them comic, some grotesque and some engaging.

12. What was your hardest scene to write?

The first scene in a novel is usually the hardest to write for me. You have to produce prose where every word counts, capturing the flavour of the novel to come so that the reader is engaged and wants to continue the adventure. It’s really hard! With this book, I tried to set the tone of the narrative, demonstrating the stylein which the story will be told. Hopefully in describing Throate Manor and its occupants, the reader will sense the wit and colour of the prose.

13. How did you come up with the title?

I wanted ‘mystery’ and ‘manor’ in there to suggest the dark gothic elements of the novel, signaling to the potential reader that it might be something they’d enjoy. I also had my tongue in cheek – or maybe part way down my throat – when I added ‘Throate’ to the title. It suggested a sense of peculiar eccentricity and also a frivolous nod to the weird names Dickens includes in his novels.
I hope people don’t take this as a serious attempt to emulate Dickens’s style and depth – there’s no way any sensible author would even contemplate that. It’s my homage, aiming purely to entertain, a nod to his brilliance and a blatant theft of his characters – one of which I hope Fagin would have been proud. I’m hoping that Dickens doesn’t notice that he’s been dipped…

14. What project are you working on now?

At the moment I’m working on a detective series featuring Harry Black. He’s a private investigator working in 1950s London. I’m only at the early stages with this first novel but the character and the period, with its post-Windrush racial tensions is really exciting me. As a man of colour operating in that era, the issues Harry faces seem very alien sixty years on, but unfortunately many of them still resonate in today’s society.

15. What has been the toughest criticism given to you as an author?

Well, rejection is always tough to take but it is part of being a freelance in any profession – you create your stuff lovingly, you put it out there, you audition or tout your wares, but if it’s the right stuff in the wrong place at the wrong time you’ll get nowhere. Hard work and talent are not always enough – you need to create some luck as well.
The majority of writers experience rejection at some time, even the most successful, and you have to try not to take it personally and just keep plugging away, hoping to encounter a decision maker in the future who ‘clicks’. The phrase that hurt me the most because of its subtlety was when a novel was returned with the comment, ‘this is not for me.’

What has been the best compliment?

The best compliment came from respected crime writer Peter James who said to me, ‘David, you can really write!’ That’s all I’ve ever wanted to have said of me. For a long time I really doubted my ability to write and whether I actually merited the term ‘writer’ at all, so to hear it from an author of Peter’s calibre was lovely – maybe he was just surprised!

16. Is there anything that you would like to say to your readers and fans?

Well, thank you for clicking on the link which took you to this Q&A – that’s lovely. And thank you for reading this far – I really appreciate it. Maybe you are that one reader out there who’ll love my work!
Now here comes the hard sell – please buy the novel! Writers are privileged to be able to spend their time creating characters and entertaining scenarios but in the end we need readers – and we need to sell books in order to live. While we write because we can’t stop ourselves, we also write because we need to – telling stories is a job, not a hobby.
Of course I hope that readers will enjoy Oliver Twist and the Mystery of Throate Manor. I feel that it’s one of my best attempts at creating a quality story. It’s a rich and multi-faceted narrative with enigma, humour and pace. I really enjoyed orchestrating my backdrop of pseudo-Dickensian types to people its pages, and taking Oliver and Dodger into an alternate adult life.
So, please buy the book, or if you don’t fancy it yourself, think of a friend who would. Thanks so much for reading 

About The Author:

David Stuart Davies is an author, playwright and editor. His fiction includes six novels featuring his wartime detective Johnny Hawke, Victorian puzzle solver artist Luther Darke, and seven Sherlock Holmes novels the latest being Sherlock Holmes and the Ripper Legacy (2016). His non-fiction work includes Starring Sherlock Holmes, detailing the film career of the Baker Street sleuth. David is regarded as an authority on Sherlock Holmes and is the author of two Holmes plays, Sherlock Holmes: The Last Act and Sherlock Holmes: The Death and Life, which are available on audio CD. He has written the Afterwords for all the Collector’s Library Holmes volumes, as well as those for many of their other titles. David has also penned three dark, gritty crime novels set in Yorkshire in the 1980s: Brothers in Blood, Innocent Blood and Blood Rites. He is a committee member of the Crime Writers Association and edits their monthly publication Red Herrings. His collection of ghost and horror stories appeared in 2015, championed by Mark Gatiss who said they were pleasingly nasty. David is General Editor of Wordsworth’s Mystery & Supernatural series and a past Fellow of the Royal Literary Fund. He has appeared at many literary festivals and the Edinburgh Fringe performing his one man presentation The Game’s Afoot an evening with Sherlock Holmes & Arthur Conan Doyle. He was recently made a member of The Detection Club.

I’m happily handing over the reigns to Kirsty again today for her spot on the blog blitz for The Note by Andrew Barrett today.

The Note is currently free in ebook and you can download your copy here.

Before I share Kirsty’s review with you here is a little bit about the book.

Book Synopsis:

A thrilling novella introducing Eddie Collins, CSI

Have you ever had that feeling of being watched but when you turn around no ones there?

I have.

It was raining, and I was working a murder scene around midnight when that prickle ran up my spine. If I’d listened to that feeling, if I’d thought back to my past, maybe I could have prevented the terror that was to come.

Back at the office, I found a death threat on my desk.

I had no idea who sent it or why they wanted to kill me.

But I was about to find out.

I’m Eddie Collins, a CSI, and this is my story.

Kirsty’s Review:

I do love a short story so was looking forward to giving this a read. Eddie Collins is featured in other books by Andrew Barrett, I haven’t read any before and can say with confidence that this can be read as a true stand alone.

This book had an excellent opening paragraph that pulls you right in, so important in a book that’s only going to take you a short while to read. I haven’t read a book that’s been told from the point of view of a CSI before and I loved all the added detail of the crime scene that this afforded. I also enjoyed the well-placed CSI Vegas references which did make me smile.

Barrett has a lovely way of phrasing things, the way he describes the current feelings of the characters really gives you a sense of what they are going through. There was also a little dark humor which appeals to me and a great twist, there is a lot packed into a relatively short book.

I shall certainly be looking up other books with Eddie Collins as I would love to know more about him. Many thanks to Sarah Hardy at Bloodhound books for giving me a copy to review.

About The Author: