The Blurb (from Goodreads):
From the author of the New York Times and USA Today bestselling novel, The Alice Network, comes another fascinating historical novel about a battle-haunted English journalist and a Russian female bomber pilot who join forces to track the Huntress, a Nazi war criminal gone to ground in America.
In the aftermath of war, the hunter becomes the hunted…
Bold, reckless Nina Markova grows up on the icy edge of Soviet Russia, dreaming of flight and fearing nothing. When the tide of war sweeps over her homeland, she gambles everything to join the infamous Night Witches, an all-female night bomber regiment wreaking havoc on Hitler’s eastern front. But when she is downed behind enemy lines and thrown across the path of a lethal Nazi murderess known as the Huntress, Nina must use all her wits to survive.
British war correspondent Ian Graham has witnessed the horrors of war from Omaha Beach to the Nuremberg Trials. He abandons journalism after the war to become a Nazi hunter, yet one target eludes him: the Huntress. Fierce, disciplined Ian must join forces with brazen, cocksure Nina, the only witness to escape the Huntress alive. But a shared secret could derail their mission, unless Ian and Nina force themselves to confront it.
Seventeen-year-old Jordan McBride grows up in post WWII Boston, determined despite family opposition to become a photographer. At first delighted when her long-widowed father brings home a fiancée, Jordan grows increasingly disquieted by the soft-spoken German widow who seems to be hiding something. Armed only with her camera and her wits, Jordan delves into her new stepmother’s past and slowly realizes there are mysteries buried deep in her family. But Jordan’s search for the truth may threaten all she holds dear.
My Thoughts:
Some authors are must-buys, and Kate Quinn is now one of these for me. Her New York Times bestselling novel, The Alice Network, was one of my favourite books last year and I grabbed The Huntress the second I saw it. And it is just as good!
The book moves effortlessly backwards and forwards in time, between the points of view of Jordan McBride, a young woman in post-war American who dreams of being a photographer; Nina Markova, a reckless pilot from Siberia who join the infamous Night Witches, an all-female squadron of bombers who fly at night, undetectable by radar in their flimsy wooden planes, and wreak havoc on Hitler’s armies; and war-weary British journalist Ian Graham who has become a Nazi hunter with one particular target always in his sights: the Huntress, a cold-blooded German woman who murdered his brother.
I had heard of the Night Witches before, but knew very little about them; and I’ve always been interested in the men and women who hunted down Nazis on the run after the end of the war. So The Huntress was always going to appeal to me.
It’s the shining quality of Kate Quinn’s writing that lifts her books out of the ordinary, however. Razor-sharp characterisation, whip-smart dialogue, and her deft handling of a complex plot with three separate time periods makes this one of my favourite reads of the year so far.
If you love character-driven thrillers set in World War II, this is definitely for you!
For another character-driven novel set in WWI:
https://kateforsyth.com.au/what-katie-read/book-review-the-desert-nurse-by-pamela-hart
The Blurb (from Goodreads):
A hundred and seventy years ago many people would have chosen to die rather than undergo the ordeal of surgery. Today, even major operations are routine. Anaesthesia has made them possible.
But how much do we really know about what happens when we go under? Can we hear what’s going on around us? Is pain still pain if we are not awake to feel it, or don’t remember it afterwards? How does the unconscious mind deal with the body’s experience of being cut open and ransacked? And what happens to those rare patients who wake up under the knife?
Haunting, lyrical, sometimes shattering, Anaesthesia leavens science with personal experience – and brings an intensely human curiosity to the unknowable realm beyond consciousness.
My Thoughts:
After a childhood accident, I was in a coma for more than six weeks as a young child. I subsequently had quite a few operations under anaesthesia, and one awful experience of half-waking up while still on the operating table. My memories of the experience – the lights, the hooded faces, the flashing knives, the agony, the strange sensation of being out of my own body – have made me curious for many years about altered states of being.
So I bought this book on a whim at the Sydney Writers Festival last year. I dipped in and out of it over the following months, as I often do with non-fiction. Then I had the most strange and profound experience while undergoing a routine procedure in day-surgery (ok, ok, if you must know I was having a colonoscopy!)
I had been working on a new poem about labyrinths for a few days and had decided to write it as a Fibonacci sequence (i.e. syllables of 1,1,2,3,5,8). A I lay in my hospital gown on the trolley, waiting in the chill, bare hall, I thought about my poem. Reciting poetry to myself has always been one way I deal with the rising whine of anxiety I feel once I smell that awful hospital smell and hear those awful hospital sounds.
When I drifted into wakefulness some time later, I had the poem in the palm of my hand, a perfect marvellous spiral. I wrote it down when I got home, and needed to change barely a word.
This experience was so eerie I spent my convalescence reading Kate Cole-Adams’s book, Anaesthesia: The Gift of Oblivion & The Mystery of Consciousness. On the one hand it's an examination of the history of anaesthetics, and some of the mysteries and problems associated with it. To my relief, it was written in such clear, limpid and often lyrical language that I had no problem understanding it. The other aspect of the book was personal histories of those who have suffered and survived and been saved because of anaesthetics, including that of Kate Cole-Adams herself. These stories lifted the book out of the ordinary, along with her utterly beautiful prose:
‘Anaesthesia … Most of us can barely pronounce it. Yet it has allowed the body’s defences to be breached in ways previously unimaginable except during warfare or other catastrophe. Through the use of powerful poisons, it has enabled entry into the secret cavities of the chest and the belly and the brain. It has freed surgeons to saw like carpenters through the bony fortress of the ribs. It has made it possible for a doctor to hold in her hand a steadily beating heart. It is a powerful gift. But what exactly is it?’
An astonishingly intense and personal book about a science we now all take for granted.
BUY ANAESTHESIA: THE GIFT OF OBLIVION NOWHere's another great book that I reviewed recently:
BOOK REVIEW: The Orchid Thief: A True Story of Beauty and Obsession by Susan Orlean
The Blurb (from Goodreads):
“I seen a kid killed…He strangled it, up by the horse.”
When Billy, a troubled young man, comes to private eye Cormoran Strike’s office to ask for his help investigating a crime he thinks he witnessed as a child, Strike is left deeply unsettled. While Billy is obviously mentally distressed, and cannot remember many concrete details, there is something sincere about him and his story. But before Strike can question him further, Billy bolts from his office in a panic.
Trying to get to the bottom of Billy’s story, Strike and Robin Ellacott—once his assistant, now a partner in the agency—set off on a twisting trail that leads them through the backstreets of London, into a secretive inner sanctum within Parliament, and to a beautiful but sinister manor house deep in the countryside.
And during this labyrinthine investigation, Strike’s own life is far from straightforward: his newfound fame as a private eye means he can no longer operate behind the scenes as he once did. Plus, his relationship with his former assistant is more fraught than it ever has been—Robin is now invaluable to Strike in the business, but their personal relationship is much, much trickier than that.
My Thoughts:
Robert Galbraith is, of course, J.K. Rowling’s not-so-secret non-de-plume, and this is the fourth book in her utterly brilliant contemporary crime series. The last book ended with a cliff-hanger of sorts, with Robin – her smart, kind, red-headed heroine – marrying the wrong man. Everyone knows that Robin is destined to get together with Cormorant Strike, the one-legged chain-smoking detective she works for … everyone but Robin and Cormorant themselves. But in the very best tradition of long-running TV murder investigation shows, d.s.g. (delayed sexual gratification) rules the day, and life throws every possible obstacle in the way of this slow simmering romance.
Rowling’s great strength is her depth of characterisation. Robin and Cormorant are rich, complex and believable characters who make mistakes, regret them, try and do better, only to stumble again. The London setting is as lovingly and vividly created, and I feel sure that someone will one day set up a Cormorant Strike walking tour and make a fortune. Minor characters are deftly drawn too and, despite the hefty weight of the book, the pace does not flag for an instant.
Crime novels are always about the mystery, however. And Rowling does not disappoint. The story begins with a twitchy young man named Billy coming to the office and telling Cormorant about a murder he thinks he witnessed as a child. Billy is clearly mentally unstable. He looks as if he is living on the streets. His account is incoherent, his manner disquieting. He does not stay long or say much before bolting in a panic. But Cormorant cannot get the story out of his mind. He begins to investigate, following the faintest possible trail of clues and red herrings through the seamy back streets of London to the halls of the powerful and mighty. Robin goes undercover, despite suffering post-traumatic stress from the last dangerous case she and Cormorant solved, while her marriage slowly cracks under the strain.
I came close to guessing some of the secrets and lies, but was still taken by surprise by the end (all while cursing myself for my lack of cleverness). This is top-notch crime fiction, lifted out of the ordinary by its depth, clarity and complexity. I can’t wait for the next in the series!
The Blurb (from Goodreads):
Miryem is the daughter and granddaughter of moneylenders... but her father isn't a very good one. Free to lend and reluctant to collect, he has loaned out most of his wife's dowry and left the family on the edge of poverty--until Miryem steps in. Hardening her heart against her fellow villagers' pleas, she sets out to collect what is owed--and finds herself more than up to the task. When her grandfather loans her a pouch of silver pennies, she brings it back full of gold.
But having the reputation of being able to change silver to gold can be more trouble than it's worth--especially when her fate becomes tangled with the cold creatures that haunt the wood, and whose king has learned of her reputation and wants to exploit it for reasons Miryem cannot understand.
My Thoughts:
My eldest son put a pile of Naomi Novik’s books on my bedside table years ago and said, ‘you must read these, Mum, you’d love them.’ But I didn’t read them (I was busy, so many books, so little time, you know how it goes.) Her books got pushed to the back of the shelf, and spun over with cobwebs, and furred over with dust, and sank away out of sight under the weight of all the other books.
Then a writer-friend of mine, Anna Campbell, asked me on Twitter if I’d read Spinning Silver yet, and I had to admit no, I hadn’t, nor any of her books. Should I? I asked.
I think you’d love it, Anna tweeted back, and so I ordered it straightaway.
Anna was right. I loved it!
In fact, I think that needs a stronger verb and more exclamation marks.
I adored it!!!
My favourite type of fantasy is silver-tongued.
By ‘silver-tongued’, I mean imaginative, poetic, and intense.
I mean wondrous, lyrical, and eerie.
Spinning Silver is all of these things, and more. Naomi Novik has taken the well-known ‘Rumpelstiltskin’ fairy-tale and made it into something new and surprising, and yet filled with archetypal power.
The story has a Slavic setting. The heroine Miryem is the daughter and granddaughter of Jewish moneylenders... but her father is too humble and kind-hearted to be very good at it. Miryem sets herself to do what he cannot do, before the whole family starves. Turning silver into gold, she draws the attention of the cold faery ice-king … and finds herself bound to an impossible bargain.
Reducing the story down to this bare-bones outline cannot give you any sense of the compulsively powerful plot, the extraordinarily well-wrought atmosphere, or the boldness of Naomi Novik’s storytelling choices (multiple first-person point-of-view is fiendishly difficult to pull off, and yet she does it with such skill and bravado I never once lost sight of who was telling the story). Needless to say, I have dug out her other books, blown the dust and cobwebs away, and intend to read them all very, very soon.
Another great book with a magical story you'd love to read is:
https://kateforsyth.com.au/what-katie-read/book-review-the-hazel-wood-by-melissa-albert
The Blurb (from Goodreads):
The world's most beloved detective, Hercule Poirot--the legendary star of Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Expressand most recently The Monogram Murders and Closed Casket--returns in a stylish, diabolically clever mystery set in the London of 1930.
Hercule Poirot returns home after an agreeable luncheon to find an angry woman waiting to berate him outside his front door. Her name is Sylvia Rule, and she demands to know why Poirot has accused her of the murder of Barnabas Pandy, a man she has neither heard of nor ever met. She is furious to be so accused, and deeply shocked. Poirot is equally shocked, because he too has never heard of any Barnabas Pandy, and he certainly did not send the letter in question. He cannot convince Sylvia Rule of his innocence, however, and she marches away in a rage.
Shaken, Poirot goes inside, only to find that he has a visitor waiting for him -- a man called John McCrodden who also claims also to have received a letter from Poirot that morning, accusing him of the murder of Barnabas Pandy...
Poirot wonders how many more letters of this sort have been sent in his name. Who sent them, and why? More importantly, who is Barnabas Pandy, is he dead, and, if so, was he murdered? And can Poirot find out the answers without putting more lives in danger?
My Thoughts:
Sophie Hannah is a British writer of psychological thrillers who in 2014 was chosen to bring Hercule Poirot, Agatha Christie’s most beloved creation, back to life. The Christie estate is notoriously protective of the brand, but The Monogram Murders, Sophie Hannah’s first foray into recreating her style, was met with almost universal acclaim and was a top five bestseller in more than fifteen countries. I haven’t read that yet, but was eager to give this Poirot pastiche a go, being a huge Christie fan. Seeing The Mystery of Three Quarters in the airport bookshop, I grabbed it and devoured it in a single sitting.
The mystery has an intriguing premise. Hercule Poirot finds an angry woman waiting on the doorstep of his apartment building. She wants to know why Poirot has accused her of the murder of a man named Barnabas Pandy. Poirot cannot convince her that he did not send the letter of accusation, or that he has never heard of the man. At last she leaves, and Poirot can go inside, only to discover a man is waiting for him within. He too has received a letter accusing him of the murder of Barnabas Pandy, and he too will not believe Poirot did not send it.
Poirot sets out to unravel the puzzle, with his usual passion for order and belief in the exercise of the little grey cells. The resulting obligatory unmasking of the villain is done with great aplomb. I enjoyed it all hugely.
The Blurb (from Goodreads):
Imagine you could erase grief.
Imagine you could remove pain.
Imagine you could hide the darkest, most horrifying secret.
Forever.
Young Emmett Farmer is working in the fields when a strange letter arrives summoning him away from his family. He is to begin an apprenticeship as a Bookbinder—a vocation that arouses fear, superstition, and prejudice among their small community but one neither he nor his parents can afford to refuse.
For as long as he can recall, Emmett has been drawn to books, even though they are strictly forbidden. Bookbinding is a sacred calling, Seredith informs her new apprentice, and he is a binder born. Under the old woman’s watchful eye, Emmett learns to hand-craft the elegant leather-bound volumes. Within each one they will capture something unique and extraordinary: a memory. If there’s something you want to forget, a binder can help. If there’s something you need to erase, they can assist. Within the pages of the books they create, secrets are concealed and the past is locked away. In a vault under his mentor’s workshop, rows upon rows of books are meticulously stored.
But while Seredith is an artisan, there are others of their kind, avaricious and amoral tradesman who use their talents for dark ends—and just as Emmett begins to settle into his new circumstances, he makes an astonishing discovery: one of the books has his name on it. Soon, everything he thought he understood about his life will be dramatically rewritten.
My Thoughts:
I bought this book because of the cover, and because Tracy Chevalier had called it ‘spellbinding’, and because quite a few people I follow on social media had been raving about it.
Well, now it’s my turn to rave.
The Binding is one of those books that transcend genres. It should most probably be defined as historical fantasy, but the magic is so close to our own reality that its really only a couple of turns of the dial away from magic realism. It’s a love story, but so delicately developed it’s unlike most romances I’ve ever read. And it's a book about the power of books, something that always draws me irresistibly.
The setting is very much like Victorian Britain, with hansom cabs and top hats. The story begins as a first-person narrative, from the point of view of a young man named Emmet Farmer. He’s been deliriously ill, and is having trouble recovering. A summons come: he has been chosen to be apprenticed to a Bookbinder.
Emmett doesn’t want to go. Bookbinders are regarded with superstitious distrust and suspicion. There is something unnatural about their craft, something uncanny. Emmett has no choice, however. He has a vocation, he’s been told.
The Bookbinder is an old woman who lives on the edge of the marsh. Local villagers think her a witch. Slowly Emmett comes to understand theat the craft of a Bookbinder is to take away people’s memories, to free them from the pain of the past. It’s a sacred calling, but one that can be dangerously misused. Emmett comes to realise that there is something he has forgotten, something vital, and that the Bookbinder has hidden away a book with its name on it.
I cannot tell you any more about the plot without spoiling it, but this is a beautifully crafted novel of love and loss, magic and memory, hatred and hope – I loved it.
Another great book review full of mystery, magic and myth I think you'd love is:
https://kateforsyth.com.au/what-katie-read/book-review-the-girl-in-the-tower-by-katherine-arden
The Blurb (from Goodreads):
After the shocking murder of a high-profile celebrity, Gemma Woodstock must pull back the layers of a gilded cage to discover who among the victim's friends and family can be trusted--and who may be the killer.
Troubled and brilliant, Detective Sergeant Gemma Woodstock finds herself lost and alone after a recent move to Melbourne, brokenhearted by the decisions she's had to make. Her new workplace is a minefield and Detective Sergeant Nick Fleet, the partner she has been assigned, is uncommunicative and often hostile. When a homeless man is murdered and Gemma is put on the case, she can't help feeling a connection with the victim and his lonely, isolated existence.
Then Sterling Wade, an up-and-coming actor filming his breakout performance in a closed-off city street, is murdered in the middle of an action-packed shot, and Gemma and Nick have to put aside their differences to unravel the mysteries surrounding the actor's life and death. Who could commit such a brazen crime? Who stands to profit from it? Far too many people, and none of them can be trusted. Gemma can't imagine a pair of victims with less in common--and yet as Gemma and Fleet soon learn, both men were keeping secrets that may have led to their deaths.
With riveting suspense, razor-sharp writing, and a fascinating cast of characters, INTO THE NIGHT proves Sarah Bailey is a major new talent to watch in the world of literary crime fiction.
My Thoughts:
I really enjoyed Sarah Bailey’s first crime novel, the atmospheric and brilliantly clever Dark Lake. So I was really looking forward to seeing what Sarah Bailey would come up with next.
Detective Sergeant Gemma Woodstock has moved to Melbourne to pursue her career, leaving her son Ben with her ex-partner in the small Victorian town where she grew up. She is lonely, but determined. Being a homicide cop is what she’s good at, and she’s determined to make a go of it.
Then a homeless man is brutally murdered in a dark and lonely alleyway. The crime is odd, but nobody sees to care much. It’s a quite different matter when a famous young actor is killed, in daylight, in front of hundreds of witnesses. Amid a media storm, with dozens of potential suspects, Gemma and her partner are feeling the heat. But Gemma can’t get the dead homeless man out of her mind. The two murders could not be more different … and yet …
Although not quite as brilliant as Dark Lake (which, to be honest, would be almost impossible!), Into the Night is a really adroit and intelligent crime thriller that relies on acute psychological insight for its twists and turns. Gemma Woodstock is a great protagonist – tough but still vulnerable, troubled but still believable – and I really hope there will be a lot more books about her in the years to come. Sizzling hot Australian crime!
I also loved The Lost Man by Jane Harper:
https://kateforsyth.com.au/what-katie-read/book-review-the-lost-man-jane-harper
The Blurb (from Goodreads):
A moving, funny, heartwarming tale of love and friendship, for anyone who loved The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, The Keeper of Lost Things and Three Things about Elsie.
It's never too late to grow old disgracefully ...
The life of 79-year-old pensioner Peggy Smart is as beige as the décor in her retirement village. Her week revolves around aqua aerobics and appointments with her doctor. The highlight of Peggy's day is watching her neighbour Brian head out for his morning swim.
Peggy dreams of inviting the handsome widower - treasurer of the Residents' Committee and one of the few eligible men in the village - to an intimate dinner. But why would an educated man like Brian, a chartered accountant no less, look twice at Peggy? As a woman of a certain age, she fears she has become invisible, even to men in their eighties.
But a chance encounter with an old school friend she hasn't seen in five decades - the glamorous fashionista Angie Valentine - sets Peggy on an unexpected journey of self-discovery. Can she channel her 'inner Helen Mirren' and find love and friendship in her twilight years?
My Thoughts:
Tired, over-worked, and under-appreciated, I was facing a pre-dawn flight down to Melbourne and wanted something to read that would help brighten my day. I reached for The Single Ladies of Jacaranda Retirement Village by Joanna Nell, which has the tagline ‘a moving, funny, heart-warming tale of love and community.’ It sounded perfect. And it was perfect! I was chuckling to myself even before the plane’s wheels had left the tarmac.
Peggy Smart is 79½. She lives at the Jacaranda Retirement Village. Her biggest fear is being moved to a nursing home by her over-protective children. Her greatest pleasure is watching Brian, the cute widower from across the street, head out for his daily swim, his towel draped across his gently sloping shoulders, a tangle of white hair on his bony chest. Then one day she encounters an old friend from her past. Angie Valentine is skinny and glamorous, has had four husbands and a jetsetter life. Peggy can’t help being a little jealous. And worried that Brian will fall for her charms. And afraid that Angie will find her as boring as her wardrobe of comfortable beige elastic-waisted pants.
She could not have imagined what changes meeting Angie again would bring …
I loved this book. It’s as warm and funny as it promised, but also deals with real issues of ageing such as loneliness, fear, and vulnerability. Peggy’s voice is a delight. I particularly loved her malapropisms (the mistaken use of a word in place of a similar sounding one).
Here is one that made me laugh out loud:
‘I’m sure we didn’t have all these allergies in our day,’ said Brian, pulling out onto the main road. ‘I blame the disinfectants. The ones that kill 99.9% of all germs.’
‘I couldn’t agree more. People these days are so careful, I never minded about having a few harmless orgasms on the kitchen workshop, even when the kids were still living at home…’
An utter delight!
The Blurb (from Goodreads):
Half the Perfect World is an account of the expatriate artist community on the Greek island of Hydra from 1955 to 1964. Fostered by celebrated Australian literary couple Charmian Clift and George Johnston, this fabled 'colony' came to include Leonard Cohen and numerous other writers and artists. What brought this group to Hydra? What does their story reveal about the post-war world? Looking at the Hydra expatriates through their writing, letters, diaries, and photographs, Genoni and Dalziell identify a deep restlessness within a rapidly changing time of emerging social movements and counter-cultures, shifting geo-political realities, incipient pop-cultures, new technologies of communication and entertainment, and altered understandings of what it meant to live as an expatriate artist.
My Thoughts:
I have been interested in the life of Charmain Clift ever since my aunt gave me her memoir, Mermaid Singing, for my birthday in 1994.
Charmain Clift and her writer-husband, George Johnston, took their young family to live on the Greek island of Hydra in the ‘50s, and became the epicentre of a group of other writers, artists and musicians whose lives and loves ebbed and flowed like the tides of the wine-dark sea. George Johnston wrote My Brother Jack on Hydra, and returned to Australia after it was published to much acclaim in 1964. It won the Miles Franklin award the following year.
I’ve read numerous books about their lives on Hydra since, but this is one of the most interesting.
Firstly, because it does not focus only on the tumultuous marriage and literary careers of Charmain Clift and George Johnston, but also looks at the lives of many of the other creative artists who ended up in Hydra, including singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen and his partner Marianne Ihlen. I was not familiar with their story and found it fascinating and illuminating. It also has a lot of fresh material like letters and diaries which I found really added to the book’s depth.
Secondly, the book is beautifully illustrated with photographs taken by LIFE magazine photo-journalist James Burke. These images gave me such an intimate and revealing look into every-day life on Hydra. Loved it!
Leave me a comment and let me know what you think.
Another fabulous book I've recently read is:
https://kateforsyth.com.au/what-katie-read/book-review-a-letter-from-paris-a-true-story-of-hidden-art-lost-romance-and-family-reclaimed-by-louisa-deasey
