‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’ by Holly Seddon #TuesdayBookBlog #BookReview

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I really enjoyed ‘Don’t Close your Eyes’ by this author and I also love ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’ by Joy Division so I had to read this!

This is a very different novel to ‘Don’t Close Your Eyes’ in terms of story and ‘feel’, but the characterisation, attention to detail, storytelling skill and ability to capture a mood, a scene, a nuance of character, are all there.

Childhood friends Kate and Paul (two children from very different backgrounds) make a pact that they’ll marry each other when they’re thirty if they’re still single – and they do, the story moving back and forth between their tenth wedding anniversary and their childhood and teenage years.

They grow up in the eighties and I was transported back to my own teenage years by the references to music and TV and clothes shops. The detail is spot on and very well done.

The chapters focussing on the past were the highlight of the novel – and I thought these were very much stronger than the chapters dealing with their marriage. It felt as though the author really enjoyed writing the earlier years too, more so than the later years.

And I did feel as though the ending was a little flat.

That said, this is a really enjoyable book, and the author is a great writer. I didn’t enjoy this as much as ‘Don’t Close Your Eyes’ but I’ll certainly read more by Holly Seddon.

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Rosie’s #Bookreview Team #RBRT #Mystery Novella An Empty Vessel by @JJMarsh1 #TuesdayBookBlog

My review of ‘An Empty Vessel’ for #RBRT

‘Snap’ by Belinda Bauer #TuesdayBookBlog #BookReview

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SNAP DECISIONS CAN BE DANGEROUS . . . 

On a stifling summer’s day, eleven-year-old Jack and his two sisters sit in their broken-down car, waiting for their mother to come back and rescue them. Jack’s in charge, she’d said. I won’t be long.

But she doesn’t come back. She never comes back. And life as the children know it is changed for ever.

Three years later, Jack is still in charge – of his sisters, of supporting them all, of making sure nobody knows they’re alone in the house, and – quite suddenly – of finding out the truth about what happened to his mother. . .

This novel has a fantastically gripping opening scene – a brilliant example of a real hook. Three children are left alone in their broken down car while their heavily pregnant mother goes off to get help. Jack, left in charge, immediately gets to you, and is a wonderfully drawn, fully realised character. You can really feel his growing fear and frustration as time ticks on.

Jump forward a few years and Catherine, heavily pregnant, alone in bed one night investigates a noise downstairs, and a series of creepy events lead the two strands of the story together.

This is where things began to fall apart for me. I didn’t believe that Catherine would keep what had happened to herself, for a start. And once the police got involved, their incompetence seemed to be more a way to keep the plot going for longer than genuine.

There were places where I was completely involved and couldn’t wait to read what happened next, and places where I was so frustrated with the plot. It’s disappointing to be so invested in characters and a story and then to feel let down like that.

So it was difficult to give a star rating – some of the writing was brilliant and the story galloped along. And some of the characters really got to you. This could have been so much more.

‘Her Name Was Rose’ by Claire Allan #TuesdayBookBlog #BookReview

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Her name was Rose. You watched her die. And her death has created a vacancy. 

When Emily lets a stranger step out in front of her, she never imagines that split second will change her life. But after Emily watches a car plough into the young mother – killing her instantly – she finds herself unable to move on.

And then she makes a decision she can never take back.

Because Rose had everything Emily had ever dreamed of. A beautiful, loving family, a great job and a stunning home. And now Rose’s husband misses his wife, and their son needs a mother. Why couldn’t Emily fill that space?

But as Emily is about to discover, no one’s life is perfect … and not everything is as it seems.

I really liked the premise of this novel and the opening was really gripping and raised my hopes for a great read. But, unfortunately, the book didn’t keep up its momentum and, while I appreciated the quality of the writing, there were a few things about the novel that I really didn’t enjoy.

While I did sympathise to an extent with Emily, I also found her very frustrating and very self-absorbed. I didn’t feel her back story was developed fully enough for me to really care about her, and, in the end, I didn’t really like her.

And I found too that the eventual ‘reveal’ about Rose’s life was a bit too obvious, while the ending just wasn’t believable at all.

That said, the writing is sound, and the author certainly has talent. But it’s a shame that, despite there being a great deal of potential here for a really thrilling and nail-biting story, it really didn’t fulfil its promise.

‘An Empty Vessel’ by @JJMarsh1 #Fridayreads #BookReview #RBRT

I read ‘An Empty Vessel’ for Rosie Amber’s Book Review Team.

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Today’s the day Nancy Maidstone is going to hang.

In her time, she’s been a wartime evacuee, land-girl, slaughterhouse worker, supermarket assistant, Master Butcher and defendant accused of first degree murder. Now she’s a prisoner condemned to death. A first time for everything.
The case has made all the front pages. Speculation dominates every conversation from bar to barbershop to bakery. Why did she do it? How did she do it? Did she actually do it at all? Her physical appearance and demeanour in court has sparked the British public’s imagination, so everyone has an opinion on Nancy Maidstone.
The story of a life and a death, of a post-war world which never had it so good, of a society intent on a bright, shiny future, and of a woman with blood on her hands.
This is the story of Nancy Maidstone.

This is such a captivating novella. The author clearly and without sentimentality tells the story of poor Nancy, misunderstood and downtrodden, overlooked by almost everyone in her life. Unattractive and ungainly, Nancy’s options in life are limited, but she pulls herself up, and is successful at what she does. Now she finds herself in a cell, about to be executed for murder.

The book looks back, from Nancy’s point of view and those around her, to the events that have led up to this moment. And you’re kept guessing all the way through. I’m not going to give anything away, but this is a real page turner, and you’ll be desperate to get to the end to find out the truth while all the time not really wanting to leave Nancy, alone in her cell.

So well-written, this story captures your imagination. There is nothing overwrought here, or overdone, and that adds to the emotions you feel – the writing is honest, and your reactions are genuine.

The other characters are fully drawn and believable too with enough detail that you really feel you know them, without unnecessary information dragging the narrative down. It’s a lesson in restraint and shows the skill of a competent and talented writer.

I feel that Nancy could almost warrant a novel by herself, but as the heart of this novella, she is a compelling character, in a powerful narrative that is a pleasure to read.