I’ve been reading a lot of Lisa Jewell books lately and they have made me realize that the reasons that I loved Lisa Jewell twenty years ago are different to why I enjoy her today. Upon reflection, I think that she has grown with me, with my own sensibilities. As I’ve aged and matured, so […]
Like finding a good man, you sometimes need to meet the right book at the right time. In retrospect and due to a misunderstanding with my good friend Mrs P, I found this book at the wrong time. The House We Grew Up In isn’t really the kind of book that you read when you […]
I’ve said it before and will no doubt say it again, but I don’t believe in persevering with books that you are not enjoying. If a book doesn’t grab me in the first sixty or seventy pages, sometimes sooner, I can be pretty damn sure that things aren’t going to change. Why then, did I […]
It would be impossible to write about Young Jane Young by Gabrielle Zevin, without referencing Monica Lewinsky because that’s the kind of story that this is and sadly, when you think about political sex scandals in the US, even twenty-something years later, that’s still where our minds go. That said, Zevin knows this and uses […]
Years and years and years ago, a book was published called Ralph’s Party. It was chick lit and I just loved it. The writer was Lisa Jewell and in very quick succession I demolished whatever she wrote. I remember my old boss and friend, Mrs N, who always seemed to be invited to the best […]
Looking back, I’m pretty sure that over the years I have read umpteen Jojo Moyes novels, most enjoyably The Last Letter from Your Lover and Me Before You, which unquestionably took the her career into the stratosphere and really is a book that you should read if you haven’t already. Her rise as the doyenne […]
On a recent trip to Chicago, I arrived at the airport far too early with my son. This is a genetic failing on my part. I always need to be at the airport hours before my plane takes off, ‘just to be safe’. The Husband who feels just the opposite and would leave it until […]
Would you go to a hen night/bachelorette party of a woman that you hadn’t seen since school? Nora does. Would you go even if you knew that you weren’t being invited to the wedding? Nora does. Yes it sounds implausible, but in the masterful hands of Ruth Ware, this horrendous social scenario becomes utterly plausible […]
Anthony Horowitz’s Magpie Murders, makes no pretense about what it is, namely a rollicking good read. For those Netflix fans amongst you, Horowitz was the brains behind Midsomer Murders and as you read this book, it’s hard to forget this legacy. No one would ever accuse Midsommer Murders of being highbrow, but it is hard […]
When I was young I lived in London. All over London. Moving, as young renters do, approximately every twelve or eighteen months. What initially seemed like a fun way to live soon became a drag as flatmates moved in with boyfriends or went travelling. As I read JP Delaney’s novel, The Girl Before, I was […]
Nutshell Book Reviews 