Back Trouble - Clare Chambers

59%

23.10.25

Wry humour, sharp observation and a strong sense of place and time - yes, it's a Clare Chambers novel. I have a few to read and this was engaging and interestingly structured, if not ultimately memorable or profound.

Grave Birds - Dana Elmendorf

43%

19.10.25

There was an atmospheric Southern Gothic thriller fighting to free itself from this poorly paced, poorly edited book. I'm all for genre fluidity but it didn't know what it was (Romance? Apocalyptic horror? Murder mystery? Not enough of any of those) and so ended up as an unfocused muddle.

Queen of Fives - Alex Hay

44%

14.10.25

This story made no sense.

The Examiner - Janice Hallett

57%

13.10.25

Hallett rehashes her trademark 'murder by email' style, and then rehashes it all over again halfway through, for added WTF flavour. It's probably meant to be a critique of the inherent dishonesty of e-communications but mostly it's just plain crazy.

Behind Her Eyes - Sarah Pinborough

60%

09.10.25

All talk of this book is about the twist - or rather, twists - the first of which I guessed and the second I didn't, because it was, frankly, crazy (if not, on reflection, particularly surprising or original). But maybe I should have, as it was a crazy story in general, with so much booze consumed that it's no wonder it ends up like a fever dream. Although some of the weirdness never quite works, and characters are frustratingly inconsistent, the genre-bending approach worked for me and it was, in the end, simply entertaining.

Mary Jane - Jessica Anya Blau

67%

05.10.25

This was such a lovely story: pleasing turns of phrase, funny in the right places, sweet without being cloying yet secretly quite complex - and surprisingly wholesome, given the sex 'n' drugs 'n' rock 'n' roll at its heart.

Carmilla - Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

52%

01.10.25

Predating (ha!) Dracula by 25 years, this is celebrated as the original queer vampire story. But that's misleading - the lesbian implications seem mainly a metaphor for power imbalance and a blunt condemnation of 'unnatural' behaviour. The story, atmospheric as it was, didn't make much sense and rushed the ending.

We Begin at the End - Chris Whitaker

41%

26.09.25

I wish this really did begin at the end, so I wouldn't have had to force my way through this overlong, overblown, overwritten and under-edited melodrama.

Hot for Slayer - Ali Hazelwood

n/a

25.09.25

Fun, and sneakily clever, short story/novella, in which much symbolic use is made of penetration by stakes and steel.

Every Last Suspect - Nicola Moriarty

61%

24.09.25

I've read all of Liane Moriarty's books but luckily her sister writes in a very similar, entertaining style. It uses the same formula of bubbling domestic and social resentments, leading to an unlikely but somehow satisfying conclusion. The Moriartys make suburban Australia sound much more interesting that it probably is.

What You Did - Claire McGowan

45%

21.09.25

I read this because the author went to the same college as me, and a sort-of unnamed version of it did feature - but it was nothing like my experience. She seems to have hated it as much as she hated her protagonist, who has so few redeeming features that I hoped she sank under the increasingly heavy pile of increasingly ridiculous Bad Things that happened to her. It was hardly the gritty realism I suspect it was intended to be.

(I didn't realise this was by the same author - it was both similar and quite different.)

Death at Fakenham Races - Ross Greenwood

45%

17.09.25

I'm not much of a Greenwood fan but how could I resist a story set in my oft-ignored home town? Unfortunately, the town didn't feature at all and so the very occasional mention of local businesses - plus the use of the actual names of many racecourse staff - were the only high points in this poorly written and deadly boring (ha!) police procedural, where there were more police officers than suspects.

The Perfect Guest - Ruth Irons

47%

13.09.25

I think I was supposed to root for the very flawed protagonist in this domestic thriller but she was so unlikable and her actions so inexplicable that the best I can say is at least she did protag, unlike all those passive lit fic main characters. Almost as annoying were the endless detailed descriptions of every room and every outfit that kept stalling the plot. Just sum it up in a pithy sentence and move on.

Ordinary Saints - Niamh Ni Mhaoileoin

 54%

11.09.25

Subtle and many-layered as this book aimed to be, the stubborn and childish protagonist prevented any emotional connection and therefore it became just a long examination on all the different ways that families and the (Irish) Catholic church can fail you. And, this being lit fic, nothing much happened except random jumps to and from other times when nothing much happened.

The View from the Top - Rachel Lacey

53%

07.09.25

An unexceptional queer romance with rather annoying protagonists who need to get over themselves. Never leaving town and/or taking 40 years to notice your privilege don't gain my empathy. I did like how they were a bit older than typical romantic leads, and that nearly everyone was LGBTQ+. 

The Female Persuasion - Meg Wolitzer

54%
01.09.25

The problem with literary fiction is that the characters all feel very strongly about stuff without actually doing anything about it, and making bad decisions if they do. There were some nice turns of phrase but this was rather untethered, with an odd choice of emphasis ("Oh yeah, that computer game I spent 20 pages describing? It failed." "By the way, the main characters got married and had a baby two years ago, didn't I say?"). I'm all for a character-driven plot but I can't help thinking that they might as well be feeling very strongly about stuff in a fantasy world or a murder mystery, because at least then there's something tangible to focus on. 

Scuttler's Cove - David Barnett

64%

27.08.25

Hugely clichéd, hugely predictable and yet somehow hugely entertaining. I must like a folk horror that's leavened with humour - the light tone at times seemed to battle with the dark atmosphere but that's probably what made it so engaging, despite the uneven pacing.

(Interestingly, this very different but in some ways quite similar book is by the same author, particularly in terms of portraying the female experience.)

Crying in H Mart - Michelle Zauner

56%

22.08.25

I was 15% of the way through and wondering when the plot was going to kick in before I realised this was non-fiction. Even having experienced my own version of what the author describes, it did nothing to change my mind about the point of memoirs beyond therapy for the writer. It was well written but, oh, the endless descriptions of bonding over food - yes, I get it.

Behind Every Good Man - Sara Goodman Confino

54%

20.08.25

This was well researched but I suspect the misogyny of the time was exaggerated for effect. It was hard to warm to the main character - or, indeed, any of the characters - and it was all a bit predictable, making the story rather lacklustre.

 

Greta and Valdin - Rebecca K Reilly

51% 

13.08.25

The only engaging and empathetic character in this mildly amusing but entirely plotless novel was New Zealand. I wanted less of the twentysomethings behaving like tiresome children and more of the secretly complex country.