Nicki's book blog

ASK ME NO QUESTIONS - Louisa de Lange -Thriller Suspense A mother and father are murdered by their neighbour who was convinced that the father was having an affair with his wife. The children of both families have always been close being more like siblings. Fifteen years later, one of the dead parents twin girls is brutally attacked. DS Kate Munro is on the case and wonders if the past has some meaning as there is a distinct lack of suspects. The twins are identical and hence easily cause confusion, however each leads a very different life and they haven’t spoken for over fifteen years when their parents were shot. The three children, Harry, Theo and Gabi have differing relationships to each other and things have changed since they were children, something they never wanted to happen. Secrets and lies, pasts that come back to haunt and threaten to tell the truth. Louisa give brilliant characters- some you like, others I was not quite sure about. They

Cover Reveal ********* Blurb: The Vagabond Mother Tracey Scott-Townsend Not every Vagabond is a Castaway... Maya Galen’s oldest son, Jamie, left home eight years ago after a massive row with his parents and now Joe, her youngest child and apple of her eye, has cut off all contact with them too. Called to Australia to identify the body of a young man, Maya is given her son’s journal. After a sleepless night she decides that the only thing she can do is follow in Joe’s footsteps and try to discover her most basic human self. Eschewing a monetary lifestyle, from now on she must rely on her physical and emotional strength to survive. Following Joe’s hand-drawn maps and journal entries, she travels from Australia to Denmark and beyond, meeting many other travellers along the way and learning valuable lessons. Eventually a crisis forces her to return home and confront the end of her marriage, but also a new understanding of what family, in the widest sense, really means. E

Severed- Stewart Giles- Crime   A body is found of a young female student in her flat behind a locked door.  Rather a loner , no one has missed her until there was rather a noxious smell emanating from her room. It appears that she died of exsanguination. When a second body is found in the street a short while later, DS Smith has rather an odd case on his hands. Why are they being killed and what on earth is going on with the blood? I like this series, there is not only a brilliant plot but substories about the characters which really brings them to life. Smith and his partner Whitton. Partners in crime fighting and at home too. A little humour here and there and a plot to keep the grey matter active. This is a fairly quick read at around 200 pages (which meant I devoured it rather quickly). I had to smile at the line “this investigation is rather draining”. A clever plot and a very unusual premise- something I wasn’t previously aware of. I won’t give a

Four Christmases and a Secret- Zara Stoneley- Holiday fiction Daisy has just been dropped by her boyfriend. It’s almost Christmas and he’s shown his true colours by putting everyone before her. She is currently working at the local rag- or at least she is until she gets a text advising her that she has to reapply for her job as three papers are merging. The love of her life is Stanley the dog she is fostering and her Uncle who runs a bookshop.Uncle Terence holds a party every year and flashing jumpers are a pre- requisite. When she was younger she had  a thing for Ollie. Ollie is now a successful doctor and at the party with his girlfriend and almost fiancee from what Daisy can tell. A book about life and its ups and downs with a smile along the way. I loved Stanley and almost cried at one point (I won;t give anything away). Although Christmas features in this, much is about other times of the year so is not really just a seasonal book. A main character

LAKE CHILD. -Isobel Ashdown- Psychological thriller Eva is a seventeen year old girl who lives remotely with her parents. She wakes up to find herself not in her bedroom but in the attic room and the door locked. What on earth is going on? She aches all over and has scars. She discovers that she was in a road traffic accident but she can’t remember anything about it. Her parents have been over and over it with her and she is retaining nothing. She doesn’t know who she was in the vehicle with- just that the police are trying to trace him- or anything about that evening. Eva knows her parents are hiding things from her- about the accident and maybe even more. She has to get away from her attic prison and find out what is happening. Her best friends are being turned away without even being allowed to  see her. She keeps hearing the call of a fox and she has a feeling that a fox was there that night. I took to Eva and her predicament of confusion and not

Hidden- Lisa Sell -psycholigical thriller Jen works in a counselling office and is training to be a counsellor. She has had a rough ride and all credit to her has pulled herself back in line and on the up. However Jen has a secret- when she was a child she killed another girl and no one found out, her death was put down to either suicide or misadventure. When she meets  with the girls mother she explains that she now only has a few months to live and believes that Kelly was murdered and would Jen help with some of her old friends to try and find out what went on. Jen understandably is quaking in her shoes. Did she really kill her or was there more to that day? We are taken back in alternate chapters to the 1980’s when the story began and I loved some of the references to that era (being of a certain age!) There are quite a few characters to discover and who fits where but this is well done without overdoing the detail. A clever plot, an interesting read a

ASK ME NO QUESTIONS - Louisa de Lange- psycholigical thriller A mother and father are murdered by their neighbour who was convinced that the father was having an affair with his wife. The children of both families have always been close being more like siblings. Fifteen years later, one of the dead parents twin girls is brutally attacked. DS Kate Munro is on the case and wonders if the past has some meaning as there is a distinct lack of suspects. The twins are identical and hence easily cause confusion, however each leads a very different life and they haven’t spoken for over fifteen years when their parents were shot. The three children, Harry, Theo and Gabi have differing relationships to each other and things have changed since they were children, something they never wanted to happen. Secrets and lies, pasts that come back to haunt and threaten to tell the truth. Louisa give brilliant characters- some you like, others I was not quite sure about. The