How Not to Marry a Lord - Emma Orchard

47%

06.07.26

Passable Heyer / Austen / Quinn fanfic that would have worked better if it hadn't tried so hard to shove in irrelevant historical events and 21st-century sensibilities. 

People Pleaser - Bryony Gordon

52%

25.06.26

I 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.) 

The Woman on the Ledge - Ruth Mancini

56%

06.05.26

This was a fun read but so confusing, with its unnecessarily complicated 'explanation' for 'what really happened' and its interchangeable female characters. I wouldn't even say it was twisty - more that its unreliably unreliable narrator revealed unpredictable information as the story progressed.

A Slipping Down Life - Anne Tyler

61%

01.05.26

This Tyler is so early that the distinctive small-town 1960s setting was contemporary. It's stranger and sadder than her later work - and it's not set in Baltimore! - but it's as intriguing and beautifully captured as ever. 

Lady Tremaine - Rachel Hochhauser

60%

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.

The Other Bennet Sister - Janice Hadlow

58%

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.

Fleishman is in Trouble - Taffy Brodesser-Akner

 61%

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.

A Glass of Blessings - Barbara Pym

72%

18.12.25

I hadn't heard of this but it was by far the best Pym novel I've read. The snobbish, judgemental narrator was, oddly, especially engaging and relatable - in fact, it's surprising how much of a 1950s, middle-class, religious housewife's life is still relatable through Pym's witty and perceptive writing. Her relationships with her mother-in-law and, later, her gay friends, were surprisingly positive. Overall: delightful.

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. 

Death and the Harlot - Georgina Clarke

64%

24.06.25

I want to describe this as a Regency romp, but it's set too late to be Regency and is too serious in places to be a romp. But it's a fun read with well-drawn characters, good world-building and no embarrassing attempts at realistic period dialogue. Yes, the identity of the villain quickly becomes obvious but it's an entertaining journey to their unveiling.

Young Jane Young - Gabrielle Zevin

61%

15.06.25

This was clever, engaging and well written, and the strongly drawn female characters were all fighting the patriarchy in their own refreshing ways (compared with the depressing victimhood of the women in Birding, for example)... but a book making such a clear feminist point perhaps shouldn't seem quite so light - it needs more anger, more bite, more raw emotional veracity. Good but not as good as Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow (but not much is). 

Birding - Rose Ruane

43%

08.06.25

This was longlisted for The Women's Prize for Fiction but read like a collection of writing exercises that tried to cram in as many metaphors as possible about pathetic women, horrible men and depressing seaside towns. It started out pretentious and ended up trite, thus losing any insights into (some specific) female experiences.

Susan, You're the Chosen One - Lauretta Hignett

48%

27.04.25

The idea was promising but the whole book just read like an introduction to the series rather than anything worth reading by itself.

Foils and Fury (series) - Lauretta Hignett

63%

13.04.25

Four books comprising:

• Oops I Ate a Vengeance Demon
• Dancing with the Vengeance Demon
• Dating with the Vengeance Demon
• Dying for My Vengeance Demon

A fun, feisty, feminist fantasy series that I read n about 5 days. A pretty biting political commentary too, marred only by a few jarring typos. 

A Civil Contract - Georgette Heyer

51%

18.03.25

Some reviewers enjoy the more serious approach to relationships (and class and politics) that make this a rather untypical Heyer but it bored me and lacked the light touch of the better Heyers. The male lead was totally unsympathetic, and the female lead remained as dull as she first appeared. The class clashes were handled awkwardly - although the vulgar new-money father was one of the few vivid (if overdone) characterisations.

Tipping the Velvet - Sarah Waters

67%

06.03.25

Sarah Waters hasn't published a novel for more than 10 years so I was pleased to remember there was one I hadn't read. In her anniversary afterword, she's pretty critical of this, her debut novel,  but I think she's too harsh on herself. From the start, the reader is clearly in the hands of a confident and sophisticated storyteller, a late-20th-century Dickens. Yes, it was a bit messy, and the main character is self-serving to the end - and it wasn't quite as good as The Little Stranger, for example - but it's certainly a good read.

The Book of Eve - Meg Clothier

71%

12.01.25

Was this fantasy? Magical realism? Speculative historical fiction? Whatever it was, it was oddly compelling, beautiful, intriguing. The characters and worldbuilding were strong, and the complex layers of meaning and plot and power dynamics were handled with confidence. I could have done with a little more humour, but at least it had a happy ending (spoiler!) and it's already better than anything I read last year.

Friday's Child - Georgette Heyer

60%

06.01.25

New year, old favourites. This was a middling-to-good Heyer. The dialogue in particular was a masterclass - every character had a distinct way of speaking that reflected their personality and the effect was reliably entertaining. Yet the novel was overlong and portrayed gender-based behaviours that are discomforting to a modern reader (the hero occasionally resorts to what we'd regard as domestic violence) - although, as usual, the hints at gay characters were sympathetic.

The Trouble With Mrs Montgomery Hurst - Katie Lumsden

 58%

02.12.24

The trouble with this novel was the uneasy mix of paying homage to Austen/Gaskell and the 21st-century turns of phrase and sensibilities of the characters. It worked best when it interrogated class assumptions, using a light yet skewering humour, and not always taking the easy way out. But the main character was unlikable (and not in the 'Emma' sense) and many conversations and actions were just unconvincing.