28.07.26
It's set in 1976, you know. 1976! Yes, 1976! Can you tell? Can you tell? Are there enough irrelevant pop culture details and political references and endless updates on the heatwave (which actually sounds quite mild compared with 2026's brutal summer) to hint at it being, you'd never guess, 1976? And let's add so much background description that readers might not notice the flimsy, predictable plot.
52%
25.06.26I liked the bold feminism (and having a nice and not entirely useless husband seemed like a subversive move) but the main character was so unlikable and unrelatable both before and after her 'transformation', and the situations so exaggerated, that it didn't please me very much.
(Apparently, I read a book with the same title last year, which I have absolutely no memory of. I doubt I'll remember this one either.)
56%
15.06.26It's not a bad book (it's in fact well written, well characterised, quite well plotted) but it's so unrelentingly depressing that I simply didn't want to read it. But, after many attempts, I forced my way to the end, but that was somehow even more depressing (spoiler! But this is Liz Nugent, after all: evidence #1; evidence #2).
08.06.26
This wasn't as tragic as some of Joyce's other books but it was still pretty dark. But it was frustrating, too. Beautifully written, of course, but it didn't finish where it should have done and I was hoping that karma would get the utterly unlikable and entitled adult siblings, too dependent on their manipulative father, and it sort of did, but then... it didn't. Because having siblings is apparently always preferable to not, even if they're horrible.
23.05.26
My verdict on Grisham's novels is either great or guilty of being poor - the best thing about this one is the marketing strapline on the cover. The interesting idea was badly paced and even more badly written, with cardboard characters and details that have horribly (and fascinatingly) dated over the thirty years since it was written.
63%
26.04.26This was well researched and compelling with a great two-word hook - Jesus's wife! - but I wondered at the choice of exiling her while he was doing all the messiah stuff. Then I realised that it was really about the first-century female experience and the biblical Easter eggs (ha!) were just for decoration.
15.04.26
I didn't hate this but it didn't work for me. The podcast-transcript format can work well but here it seemed like a gimmick instead of the standard third-person narrative it should have been. Factual errors spoilt the immersion (when it is 9am in the UK, it is not, and never has been, 5pm in LA). The '90s setting was not convincing. The romance was hard to take seriously. The 'twist' was obvious from early on but was still never properly explained. All these things, as I say too often, could have been solved with a proper edit.
11.04.26
Promoting this as a fairytale retelling does it a disservice. There are no fairies or romance - it's in fact a dark tale of a flawed woman fighting for survival. But it's well written (if very American in tone and language) and unpredictable enough to keep one reading until midnight.
48%
06.04.26A very silly story that depended too much on coincidences, miscommunications and misunderstandings, with only its Irish setting to lend it some interest.
47%
03.04.26I like TJR's vivid stories from the world of Evelyn, Carrie and Daisy but her contemporary relationship novels (see also this and this) might as well be by a different author. Everyone was just a cipher and, despite each person presenting a different aspect of long-term relationships versus independence, the ending was deeply conservative, with everyone ending up (spoiler) traditionally coupled up.
It also made America seem very foreign, highlighting their strange food (sweet potato at Christmas? Pigs in blankets with pastry at a baby shower?) and traditions and approaches to life.
25.03.26
The last book I read by Sally Hepworth I reviewed as 'ridiculous in every way', and this was no different. It was very silly in a way I didn't hate - but it could have been so much better and so much more memorable.
08.03.26
This was charming and well characterised, although Austen did most of the hard work. As it's basically fan fiction, it suffers where it departs from Austen's example - being bogged down in endless exposition (so much telling, not much showing) and the occasional distracting head hopping away from the protagonist's point of view. And as for the completely contrived misunderstandings near the end... if even the characters admit they should have just spoken to each other, then the plot simply isn't strong enough.
25.02.26
This is archetypal lit fic, in all senses. It's introspectively character driven with very little actual plot, and the New York setting almost a character in itself. It's vividly and wittily written, just on the edge of pretentiousness. It can be read at surface level or appreciated for its clever narrative device in which the omniscient narrator is a subtly critical friend of the protagonist. And the feminist message is fascinatingly complex. It's a book that can be admired and enjoyed but, while both are true for me, I don't think I'll remember much about it in a month.
28.01.26
I could say exactly what I said about Back Trouble but this was slightly more memorable, with more vivid characters. I didn't like the anti-only-child rhetoric though!
45%
26.12.25I can sort of see what Devlin was going for here - but it didn't really work. Trying to add nuances to perceived nepotism - and actual privilege is fine if we care about the characters. But everyone was either awful (the main character and her friends) or unrelatable (her aunt and mother) so the stakes would have been higher if they'd all tried to go into accountancy instead of the family business of acting.
10.12.25
Although the style and much of the subject matter is dated, you could bump into many of the characters today. Everyone was eccentric in their own way - sometimes charmingly and sometimes obnoxiously but always vividly. And the message of women's sacrificing their individuality for men and family is still, sadly, relevant.
14.11.25
This had an unusual and intriguing premise that was unfortunately fumbled in the execution. Readable enough but too many 'but whats?', 'but whys?' and 'but hows?' to feel like a final draft.
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.
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.
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.
