The Good Son by You-jeong Jeong

The Good Son by You-jeong Jeong
First published in South Korea by Eun Haeng NaMu as Jongui Giwon in 2016. English language translation by Chi-Young Kim published in the UK by Little, Brown on the 3rd May 2018.

Featured in Cover Characteristics: Blood and WorldReads: South Korea

How I got this book:
Received a review copy from the publisher via NetGalley

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository
	Wordery
	Waterstones
	Amazon US / Amazon UK

YOU WAKE UP COVERED IN BLOOD
THERE'S A BODY DOWNSTAIRS
YOUR MOTHER'S BODY

YOU DIDN'T DO IT. DID YOU?
HOW COULD YOU, YOU'VE ALWAYS BEEN THE GOOD SON

THE INTERNATIONAL SENSATION FROM KOREA'S MILLION-COPY BESTSELLING AUTHOR YOU-JEONG JEONG.

When Yu-jin wakes up covered in blood, and finds the body of his mother downstairs, he decides to hide the evidence and pursue the killer himself. 

Then young women start disappearing in his South Korean town. Who is he hunting? And why does the answer take him back to his brother and father who lost their lives many years ago.

The Good Son is inspired by a true story. 

I recently spotted Ova's The Good Son review on her blog Excuse My Reading which encouraged me to get to reading my ARC of this book sooner rather than later. It's narrated in the first person by Yu-jin who is a brilliantly unreliable narrator. A chilling character, he fascinated me (much like watching a snake) and loved the uncertainty of never knowing whether what I was discovering was The truth, his truth or whether he was spinning me a tale! The novel isn't particularly fast-paced, but it was always so tense that, for me, it felt like it flew by. I had to keep putting the book aside from time to time to make sure I had absorbed everything that was happening.

The story spirals around key moments for Yu-jin and his family, each revisited with the reader having a little more information to help them gauge the real story. I was convinced I had sussed it out quite early on, but was very wrong. Twice! Thinking back over the story now, I would say potential readers might need to be wary of The Good Son for it's blood level. I'm often squeamish and there were a few scenes here that I slightly skim-read to avoid the strongest imagery. This is a psychological thriller that, for me at least, leant more towards horror than crime fiction. If you don't mind blood splatter though, it's one I would highly recommend.


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Butterfly by Yusra Mardini

Butterfly: From Refugee to Olympian, My Story of Rescue, Hope and Triumph by Yusra Mardini with Josie Le Blond
First published in the UK by Pan Macmillan on the 3rd May 2018.

Featured in Cover Characteristics: Swimming and WorldReads: Syria

How I got this book:
Received a review copy from the publisher via NetGalley

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Yusra Mardini fled her native Syria to the Turkish coast in 2015 and boarded a small dinghy full of refugees bound for Greece. When the small and overcrowded boat's engine cut out, it began to sink. Yusra, her sister and two others took to the water, pushing the boat for three and a half hours in open water until they eventually landed on Lesbos, saving the lives of the passengers aboard.

Butterfly is the story of that remarkable woman, whose journey started in a war-torn suburb of Damascus and took her through Europe to Berlin and from there to the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.

Yusra Mardini is an athlete, one of People magazine’s twenty-five women changing the world, a UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador and one of Time Magazine’s thirty most influential teens of 2016.

I was almost in tears at the culmination of this inspirational memoir! Mardini's story of determination, survival, and the kindness of strangers is one that certainly does need to be shared widely around the world. I found the contrast between the cheering crowds for the Refugee Olympic Team in Rio and the hate-filled rhetoric for refugees generally in Britain to be a sad indictment of my country. Two years after the Rio Olympics, there is still plenty money available to send yet more bombs to Syria, but apparently very little to support and assist the resulting flood of refugees.

Butterfly is a very engaging and readable biography. Mardini and Le Blond make a great writing team and I found myself caught up this story from the first few pages. From living a relatively affluent life in Syria, promising young athlete Yusra Mardini slowly sees her opportunities and dreams eroded by the ever-approaching civil war in Syria. Her family is forced to repeatedly move house to escape the fighting until, eventually, there really isn't anywhere left to go. Simple actions like swimming in a pool or walking to the shops are potentially fatal. Mardini puts across well the stress of living under such conditions. It is intolerable and terrifying, but yet becomes 'normal' frighteningly swiftly. I wondered how traumatised people must be in order to deal so calmly with such intense danger on a daily basis.

I was amazed by the perceptions of Syrian life that Mardini encounters and the assumptions a proportion of Europeans have of refugees and their lives prior to war in their homelands. Like Clemantine Wamariya in The Girl Who Smiled Beads, Mardini discusses the charity she receives and how difficult it is for her to reconcile the life she had before with now needing to rely on the kindness of strangers for absolutely everything. She is aware that knowledge of her athletic prowess enables her to be fast tracked through administrative hoops with which most refugees must struggle and this is an interesting point to consider too. Many refugees are highly skilled and have talents which would benefit European society - they couldn't financially afford to make the journey otherwise - so, by veiling their potential behind that 'refugee' catch-all, are we Westerners actually setting ourselves up to lose out in the long term?

As in The Baghdad Clock by Shadad Al Rawi, Butterfly gives readers an excellent insight into why these refugees have left everything in order to start again elsewhere. It is sobering to understand just how much the Mardini family endured before they felt they must flee, and also how easily a nation can fracture into all-consuming war especially when the rest of the world simply stands by and watches.

Etsy Find!
	Yusra Mardini  coloring page by The Nirbhao in Michigan, USA Click pic to visit Etsy Shop

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Moonlight And Midtown by Christina Bauer + Giveaway + Excerpt

Moonlight And Midtown by Christina Bauer
Published in America by Monster House Books on the 27th May 2018.

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository : unavailable
	Wordery : unavailable
	Waterstones : unavailable
	Amazon : from $3.81 / £2.84 (ebook)
Prices and availability may have changed since this post was written

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After battling werewolves and evil aunties, Bryar Rose is ready to enjoy her new life. No more crazy aunties. Her curse is toast. And Bry’s new man, Knox, is literally a dream come true. Best of all, Bry will soon attend a regular high school. Forget those sketchy tutors! To get ready, Bry is dedicating the rest of her summer to some serious back-to-school shopping with her best friend, Elle. It’s a blast, except for one thing:

Mysterious strangers are following Bry across Manhattan.

All these stalkers have oddly familiar scents and an uncanny ability to slip into the shadows whenever Bry tries to confront them. Even worse, their presence is making Knox act crazy with a capital C.

But Bry’s having none of it. Enough of her life has already been ruined by secrets. With Elle’s help, Bry plans to confront these strangers, find out what they want, and send them packing. Trouble is, the truth about their identity won’t be so easy to manage, especially when Bry finds out how these stalkers could change her future with Knox…and not for the better.

***An interim novella between WOLVES AND ROSES and SHIFTERS AND GLYPHS*** --About The Series The Fairy Tales of the Magicorum series includes WOLVES AND ROSES (Book 1), MOONLIGHT AND MIDTOWN (Novella 1.5) and SHIFTERS AND GLYPHS (Book 2, Fall 2018). Eight full novels are planned in total.

Excerpt

MOONLIGHT AND MIDTOWN
Fairy Tales of the Magicorum, Book 1.5
Chapter One
Bryar Rose

7 p.m. Time to get dressed. In other words, time to change from “seventeen-year-old slob” into “cool Manhattan socialite.” Crossing my bedroom, I open my closet door and wince. A few holiday-themed sweaters line the top shelf. Clusters of bare wooden hangers knock against one another, wind-chime style. Out of my once-awesome collection of footwear, only two lonely flip-flips now collect dust on the floor. They don’t even match.
No question about it. Being a werewolf is a murder on your wardrobe.

And I have an art opening to attend tonight. Bummer.
On reflex, I turn around, ready to sift through the contents of my dresser. Then I remember I don’t have a dresser anymore. Whenever I shift, I lock myself in my bedroom. My wolf smashed all the furniture in here weeks ago. In fact, she really destroyed my dresser, gnawing the wood into chips. These days, my bedroom’s decorated with a single mattress and tons of claw marks on the walls. I’ve taken to keeping my underthings in a drawer in the bathroom.

A sad weight settles onto my shoulders. My aunties kept me locked in a penthouse so they could hide my true magical nature from me. With the help of my bf Knox and my bff Elle, I broke free from their plans and tricks. There’s no hiding the truth from me any more. I can wield all three types of magic: fairy, shifters, and witch. Even so, I’m still trapped in my apartment because who wants to spontaneously shift into a werewolf on Fifth Avenue and then end up naked on the sidewalk?
Not me.

But tonight’s art opening is with other Magicorum kids like me, so shifting shouldn’t be a big deal. Plus, my boyfriend Knox will be there with me, and he’s a were Alpha, so he can help me control when I change forms.
All of which leads to the fact that I need something to wear tonight.
Back to the closet I go.
For a full minute, I stare at the empty hangers as if my old wardrobe will somehow magically reappear. Not happening.

Every time I shift, I shred another outfit. And lately, I’ve been shifting a ton. Some mornings, my wolf tears out six times before I down my bagel, and it’s all because I first took my werewolf form only a month ago on my seventeenth birthday. Most weres spend a lifetime mastering their wolf. I’ve had four weeks.

At least I have a master plan to fix my wardrobe issue: a shopping spree in Manhattan’s secret network of stores run by the fae. My best friend Elle is taking me because she’s both fae and an awesome shopping partner. With any luck, Elle and I will find me some unshreddable magic outfits. That is, if I survive the trip. Fairies are crazy. Plus, most carry a major grudge against weres. About a million years ago, some weres lost their cool and tried to massacre some fae. They didn’t succeed, but fairies have a long memory, and shifters are definitely on their hate list.

Meet the Author

Christina Bauer knows how to tell stories about kick-ass women. In her best selling Angelbound series, the heroine is a part-demon girl who loves to fight in Purgatory’s Arena and falls in love with a part-angel prince. This young adult best seller has driven more than 500,000 ebook downloads and 9,000 reviews on Goodreads and retailers. The first three books in the series are now available as audiobooks on Audible and iTunes.

Bauer has also told the story of the Women’s March on Washington by leading PR efforts for the Massachusetts Chapter. Her pre-event press release—the only one sent out on a major wire service—resulted in more than 19,000 global impressions and redistribution by over 350 different media entities including the Associated Press.

Christina graduated from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School with BA’s in English along with Television, Radio, and Film Production. She lives in Newton, MA with her husband, son, and semi-insane golden retriever, Ruby.

Stalk Christina On Social Media – She Loves It!

Author links:
Website ~ Facebook ~ Twitter ~ Instagram ~ LinkedIn ~ Blog

And now for the giveaway!
Open internationally until the 30th May, the prize pack is a decal sticker for the launch of MOONLIGHT AND MIDTOWN, a charm bracelet to celebrate the cover reveal of THE SIGN OF THE SERPENT, earrings to celebrate the cover reveal of ZINNIA, a speaker to celebrate the release of the THRAX audiobook, and an electronic copy of MOONLIGHT AND MIDTOWN.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Giveaway listed @ Stephanie Jane!

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The Unit by Ninni Holmqvist

The Unit by Ninni Holmqvist
First published in Swedish as Enhet in August 2006. English language translation by Marlaine Delargy published by Trade Paper in August 2009. Republished by OneWorld in April 2018.

How I got this book:
Received a review copy from the publisher via NetGalley

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository : from £8.46 (PB)
	Wordery : from £6.61 (PB)
	Waterstones : from £8.99 (HB)
	Amazon : from $2.62 / £3.42 (used PB)
Prices and availability may have changed since this post was written

One day in early spring, Dorrit Weger is checked into the Second Reserve Bank Unit for biological material. She is promised a nicely furnished apartment inside the Unit, where she will make new friends, enjoy the state of the art recreation facilities, and live the few remaining days of her life in comfort with people who are just like her. Here, women over the age of fifty and men over sixty - single, childless, and without jobs in progressive industries - are sequestered for their final few years; they are considered outsiders.

In the Unit they are expected to contribute themselves for drug and psychological testing, and ultimately donate their organs, little by little, until the final donation. Despite the ruthless nature of this practice, the ethos of this near-future society and the Unit is to take care of others, and Dorrit finds herself living under very pleasant conditions: well-housed, well-fed, and well-attended. She is resigned to her fate and discovers her days there to be rather consoling and peaceful.

But when she meets a man inside the Unit and falls in love, the extraordinary becomes a reality and life suddenly turns unbearable. Dorrit is faced with compliance or escape, and...well, then what? 

The Unit is a dystopian novel set almost entirely within the confines of the Second Reserve Bank Unit which is a complete living facility for older people that society at large has deemed dispensible. As readers, we don't know how this legal situation came about or what drove their country to create these facilities, but we can see from the people who end up there how society's priorities lie. The novel is Swedish authored and set in Sweden so it was interesting for me to see how much of The Unit's philosophy meshed with what I know of lifestyle choices in that country.

If it wasn't for what has to be given in return, life in The Unit sounds like bliss. There are excellent leisure facilities, empathetic staff, it never rains and the library can swiftly get any book requested! However, the price is to repeatedly volunteer for potentially dangerous clinical trials and experiments, and to donate increasingly more vital organs to more deserving people on the outside. I was fascinated by how these 'dispensible people' cope with this situation. The criteria by which they are chosen would almost certainly make me one of them in just a few years so to say I was unsettled by this book is a massive understatement!

I was completely convinced by Holmqvist's creation and from thinking about how drug trials are actually carried out in poor African towns and villages, it's not a huge leap of faith to get to Units. I thought the intensity of friendships and relationships was very real and poignant and I was gripped by this story from start to finish. Holmqvist's writing style suits her subject perfectly. A scary prospect!


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The Forever Night Stand by Bena Roberts

The Forever Night Stand by Bena Roberts
Self published in the UK in March 2018.

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository : unavailable
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	Amazon : from $2.98 / £2.24 (ebook)
Prices and availability may have changed since this post was written

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A two hour romance which starts with drama and mayhem!

Sara has her back up against the wall. She is recovering from the side effects of chemotherapy and at her own "cancer free" party, she makes a decision that will change her life forever.

The adventure begins when she leaves her posh lifestyle in Scotland and moves in with her Bollywood loving parents, in West London. Her parents are tragically ashamed of Sara's actions and her electronic monitor. She decides to make them happy again and considers re-marrying. 

Enter Raj, a possible hero who comes with the promise of a huge Indian wedding in Goa!

George, the childhood love of her life who seems to be hanging around every corner. Or should she just go back to her husband? Sara faces the biggest dilemma of her life, after making the colossal mistake of her life. What will she do and whom will she choose?

The Forever Night Stand is a humorous novella that starts from a serious place, but aims more for an entertaining read than a deep exploration of Issues. Sara is a fun character and I enjoyed spending a few hours in her company. She is at a major crossroads in her life and I was interested to discover how she would cope with essentially having been thrown back to a teenage situation, despite being in her forties.

Roberts has a great descriptive turn of phrase and can put across a visual image very effectively in just a few words. I loved the humour in this novella too and induged in several giggles as the story progressed. I didn't, however, really understand George. We see about a third of the story from his point of view and I didn't like how I felt I was being persuaded to think of him. George and Sara haven't seen each other for the best part of two decades. During this time, George has still been in love with Sara so 'obviously' Sara must fall straight in insta-love with him? A scene where George attempts to kiss an unconscious Sara without her consent and without her even knowing he was there just made me feel distinctly uncomfortable. This isn't highly romantic, it's assault!

So, overall, I enjoyed reading about Sara and her attempts to get herself back together. Most of the story is fun and funny if I could just have avoided weirdo stalker George!

Meet the author:

Bena Roberts was a journalist and analyst. Now she prefers the title novelist and romance adventurist. She graduated in England 1994 and then with a Masters in 1997.

Born in 1973, Bena lived in West London until she was 24. Then she lived and worked in Budapest, Bruges, Prague, Amsterdam, Vienna, Hamburg and Munich. She currently resides in Germany, between Heidelberg and Frankfurt. Although she still refers to London as 'home.'

Bena successfully created a technology blog which gained funding, had lunch with Steve Ballmer and was 'top 50 most influential woman in mobile.' Her blog also won several awards including Metro Best Blog.

Bena has two children, loves small dogs and always writes books with a cup of Earl Grey.

Bena's favorite literary style is black humor, and she hopes to offer a unique voice in this area. Her books aim to confront the darkest of life experiences, with levity. Most of her writing is heavy hitting yet also entertaining.

Author links: 
Amazon ~ Twitter ~ Goodreads

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Books by Bena Roberts / Women's fiction / Books from England

The Baghdad Clock by Shahad Al Rawi

The Baghdad Clock by Shahad Al Rawi
First published in Arabic by Dar al-Hikma in 2016. English language translation by Luke Leafgren published by OneWorld in May 2018.

Featured in WorldReads: Iraq

How I got this book:
Received a review copy from the publisher via NetGalley

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository (PB)
	Wordery (PB)
	Waterstones (HB)
	Amazon (used PB)

Baghdad, 1991. In the midst of the first Gulf War, a young Iraqi girl huddles with her neighbours in an air raid shelter. There, she meets Nadia. The two girls quickly become best friends and together they imagine a world not torn apart by civil war, sharing their dreams, their hopes and their desires, and their first loves. But as they grow older and the bombs continue to fall, the international sanctions bite and friends begin to flee the country, the girls must face the fact that their lives will never be the same again.

This poignant debut novel will spirit readers away to a world they know only from the television, revealing just what it is like to grow up in a city that is slowly disappearing in front of your eyes, and showing how in the toughest times, children can build up the greatest resilience.

The Baghdad Clock is a beautifully magical novel of a girl coming of age in a war-torn city. Through the eyes of our never-named narrator, we see the effects of bombings, a decade of sanctions, and more bombings on a thriving Baghdad neighbourhood as its community slowly splinters and evaporates. I was strongly reminded of South American magical realism at several points so was happy to spot the classic novel One Hundred Years Of Solitude being given a role. The Baghdad Clock is a considerably faster read, but I think readers who enjoy Marquez will appreciate Al Rawi too. Concepts such as the neighbourhood being a ship allow for truly effective imaginings and I gave a wry smile at the irony of the emigrating families all leaving in a black Chevrolet - an American car.

I did feel as the story continued that our narrator often felt younger than her years would suggest, but that may be because I am used to reading about protagonists who are overly worldly wise. I can't remember exactly how childish I was in my early teens! The friendship with Nadia is utterly believable and provides such a strong thread for these lives. Al Rawi gives touching details so I felt as though I genuinely saw Baghdad through a child's eyes, which makes her occasional drawing back to reveal the full extent of the suffering caused - especially by the drawn-out years of sanctions - particularly poignant. Neighbourhood characters such Uncle Shawkat and his Kurdish wife, Baji Nadira, are memorable and I was moved by the image of Shawkat continuing to tend the houses of the departed, not knowing whether they would ever return. Seeing the impetus here for what has become a global 'immigration problem' reveals its other side - that of an emigration disaster leaving communities and neighbourhoods destroyed not so much from the physical damage caused by war, but by the gradual exodus of friends, relations and neighbours.

The only part of this book that didn't work for me was the short Future which is kind of an epilogue. Its style felt too different to what had gone before so, while I was interested to see some of what would happen to these characters and how their lives might pan out, I wouldn't have felt anything lost if The Baghdad Clock had ended prior to this final section. I preferred being in the earlier atmosphere and the sudden change felt almost like starting a new book without having taken enough time to reflect on the previous one.


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A Reason For Living by Julian Jingles + Giveaway

A Reason for Living by Julian Jingles
Category: Adult Fiction, 382 pages
Genre: Historical fiction
Publisher: iUniverse
Release date: January 17, 2018
Tour dates: May 21 to June 8, 2018
Content Rating: R

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository : from £17.95 (PB)
	Wordery : from £13.23 (PB)
	Waterstones : from £17.95 (PB)
	Amazon : from $8.80 / £6.49 (ebook)
Prices and availability may have changed since this post was written

Add A Reason For Living to your Goodreads

It is the mid-1960s in Kingston, Jamaica, and the country is steeped in social, political, and economic inequities. Howard Baxter, the heir to a real estate empire, has no interest in seeking or managing wealth. Painting and deflowering Jamaican maidens are his passions. As he combs the streets looking for greater meaning in his pathetic life, it soon becomes apparent that Howard's journey will not be easy.

Bernaldo Lloyd, a member of the Baxter clan, is a medical student who is sensitive to the hopelessness of the Jamaican masses. Inspired by his close friend and Howard's cousin, Ras Robin Pone, and their ties with the Rastafari movement that calls for social and economic equity, Bernaldo is determined to overthrow the corrupt government. As Howard, Bernaldo and Robin become influenced by America's Black Power and Civil Rights movements demanding equal rights for African Americans, the women in their lives both love and criticize them. But when revolution breaks out, Howard finally discovers a purpose for his twisted life that leads him in a direction he never anticipated.

In this tale of love, passion, and self-discovery, two Jamaican men become caught up in a 1960s revolution that reveals injustices, oppression, and a purpose for one of them.

Praise for A Reason for Living:

“Riveting, touching on micro and macro relationships of love, sex and politics, and the search of Jamaicans for the essence of their existence, with many compelling scenes and very touching, sensitive dialogues.”
- Dr. Basil Wilson, New York Carib News
​
"A Reason for Living is a highly complex work that pits sense against sensibility. Emotions surge, transforming men in unfathomable ways. And as love and revolution march in lock-step, Jingles might well have earned a place among the region’s more interesting writers."
- Glenville Ashby, Kaieteur News

“The author, filmmaker, entrepreneur did not wile away five decades as a bystander but may have calculatedly used the hiatus to toil in order to reveal a compelling novel about the creative and volatile ‘60s in Jamaica.”
- Vinette K. Pryce, Caribbean Life

About the Author:

Julian Jingles has had a professional career spanning 52 years writing for publications such as the Jamaica Gleaner, the New York Amsterdam News, JET magazine, the New York Daily News, and the New York Carib News. He began work on his novel A Reason For Living in 1966, a teenager just graduating from high school in Jamaica. In 1967 he went to work as a journalist at the Gleaner Company, the oldest published newspaper in Jamaica, and the Caribbean. He has written, produced, and co-directed three documentary films, production managed several music videos featuring Kool and the Gang, Steel Pulse, the Main Ingredient, promoted several music concerts, and a stage play, along with investing in several entrepreneurial projects in America, and Jamaica.

​Connect with the Author: Website ~ Facebook ~ LinkedIn

Enter the Giveaway!

Win a $15 Amazon.com gift card (open internationally, 1 winner) or a copy of A Reason for Living by Julian Jingles (print for USA, ebook for int'l, 1 winner)
Ends June 16, 2018

​

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Giveaway listed @ Stephanie Jane!

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The Farm by Hector Abad

The Farm by Hector Abad
First published in Spanish 2014. English language translation by Anne McLean published by Archipelago in April 2018.

Featured in WorldReads: Columbia

How I got this book:
Received a review copy from the publisher via NetGalley

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Where to buy this book:


When the Angel family's beloved home in the Antioquian wilderness falls into danger, they manage to defend it against the guerrillas and, later, the paramilitaries - but at a high price. After their parents' death, Pilar, Eva and Tono have to decide the fate of their father's legacy. While Pilar and Tono want to keep La Oculta, Eva, who experienced something terrible at the old farm house, is determined to sell. As the siblings each struggle with their own problems, their inner conflicts threaten to tear apart not only their home but also their family.

The Farm is, first and foremost, a novel about the concept of home: how we identify home and how the idea of it means different things to different people. In this book three siblings, Pilar, Eva and Tono, take it in turns to narrate their stories of their family home. The farm itself, La Oculta, was hewn from pristine Colombian rock and forest some 150 years earlier by their ancestor and has experienced changing fortunes in a tumultuous country since then.

I liked how each sibling has a very distinct character and voice. Pilar is happily married to her childhood sweetheart and cannot imagine ever being without La Oculta as her home. Eva has been through a number of marriages and relationships and, for her, home is fleeting. Wherever she lives at that moment is home, but she could move elsewhere  next week and live just as happily. Tono has settled down and married his artist boyfriend in New York but returns regularly to La Oculta. For him, the history of the place is what defines it and he is happier delving into La Oculta's past than in dealing with it's present problems.

The Farm feels like an epic read in that it has a large scope of characters and time periods. I enjoyed discovering the old history through Tono's chapters and the recent history from Eva's. The Colombian landscape and Antioquian people are brought vividly to life and I appreciated seeing how the relatively remote township came to exist and then to thrive. At times, particularly earlier on in the book, The Farm felt a little repetitive. I thought this more the case when the characters were establishing themselves and we were sometimes told things about them more than once, but this turned out to be good grounding for later on. This novel explores home and family in a way that I found familiar even though I think this is only the second Colombian-authored novel I have read. The experience of generation gaps and differing expectations is illustrated through Tono's and Eva's American lives while Pilar is more rooted in the mountain community traditions. This is a lovely novel to immerse oneself in and I think would make a good Book Club choice as it raises deep issues to think over and discuss.


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Books by Hector Abad / Contemporary fiction / Books from Colombia

Shadows Of Asphodel by Karen Kincy

Shadows of Asphodel by Karen Kincy
First published in America in September 2013.

One of my Top Ten Books for IndiePrideDay 2016

How I got this book:
Purchased during the Indie Steampunk Book Extravaganza 2 event on Facebook

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository : unavailable
	Wordery : unavailable
	Waterstones : unavailable
	Amazon : from $2.97 / £2.21 (ebook)
Prices and availability may have changed since this post was written

She never asked for the undying loyalty of a necromancer.

1913. Austria-Hungary. Wendel may be devilishly handsome, a charming bastard with the manners of disinherited royalty, but he's an abomination. His skin shivers with the icy fire of necromancy. With one touch, he can raise the dead. Worse still, he's being hunted by assassins from Constantinople, and he would rather die than confess why.

Ardis escaped her own dark past, fleeing from America as a fugitive to become a mercenary for the Archmages of Vienna. When she discovers Wendel bleeding out on the battlefield, she saves his life with a ransom in mind. She never asked for him to fall to one knee and declare his undying loyalty, or for tension to smolder hot between them. Especially once she discovers his scars run much deeper than his skin.

I mentioned this book as one of my Series To Continue for 50/50 Friday last week at which point I realised its review was one which hadn't yet been transferred from my Stephanie Jane blog to Literary Flits.
Apparently, Shadows Of Asphodel isn't truly steampunk, but dieselpunk, as the setting is just ahead of The Great War when diesel engines existed in the real world. However, the novel contains the same blend of strong characters, especially female characters, that I have come to expect, interwoven with magical elements, incredible inventions and dastardly deeds!

I loved the characters in Shadows Of Asphodel. Our heroine, Ardis, is strong and independent, making her own decisions and dealing with their aftermath. Along the way, she picks up an emotionally damaged necromancer, Wendel, who is a great creation. I admit to being just a little in lust with Wendel! Despite and because of each other, Ardis and Wendel find their paths link together and their witty sparring dialogue is fun to read. I presume the people on the book's cover are meant to be Ardis and Wendel though. If so, I'm not sure that Ardis does look half-Chinese?

Kincy has cleverly woven her tale around the real momentous events of 1913 and I appreciated how magical fictions, such as the Hex, seemed to easily slot in alongside the truth. Making it feel so natural to the reader must take a lot of rewrites and research! Most settings are atmospherically described and I am now particularly drawn to visiting Vienna. The descriptive passages rarely slow the pace of the novel and I liked the inclusion of little details such as all the books in the way on Konstantin's bed.


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Books by Karen Kincy / Steampunk fiction / Books from America

Seraphita by Honore de Balzac + Free Book

Seraphita by Honoré de Balzac
First published in French in the Revue De Paris in France in 1834. English language translation by Katharine Prescott Wormeley.

How I got this book:
Downloaded the eBook from ForgottenBooks

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository : from £7.99 (PB)
	Wordery : from £4.35 (PB)
	Waterstones : from £5.90 (PB)
	Amazon : from $Free / £Free (ebook)
Prices and availability may have changed since this post was written

The ForgottenBooks edition of this classic begins with a lengthy introduction which discusses and explains the religious significance of Seraphita at great length. This was so in depth and dull that I nearly didn't get through its eighty-odd pages in order to start the novel itself!

Seraphita is set in Norway and Balzac does a fantastic job of describing the country, its landscape, seasons and the people of the isolated rural village where his story is set. I loved reading these passages which actually advanced the story and would love to someday visit a similar remote fjord as it was so romantically presented. However, two long sections of the book are simply Seraphita expounding (over many pages of monologue) various religious doctrines and dogmas and I found these bits incredibly difficult to understand and to remain focused on. The beliefs range across Christianity, Hinduism and Buddhism amongst others, and also include mentions the beliefs of races of people on other planets such as Mars and Venus. It is all probably fabulously imagined but felt like sitting through a long harangue. Perhaps it would all make more sense to someone of the time as much of the science has now advanced far beyond that denounced by Seraphita as her proofs.

All in all, this is an odd book for me to have read and it is pretty much two books mashed together - one a lovely story and one a intensely detailed lesson!


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Awu's Story by Justine Mintsa

Awu's Story by Justine Mintsa
First published in French as Histoire d'Awu in France by Gallimard in 2000. English language translation by Cheryl Toman published in America by University of Nebraska Press in May 2018.

How I got this book:
Received a review copy from the publisher via NetGalley

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository : from £13.99 (PB)
	Wordery : from £11.24 (PB)
	Waterstones : from £13.99 (PB)
	Amazon : from $8.98 / £10.99 (used PB)
Prices and availability may have changed since this post was written

At the dawn of the twenty-first century, villages in the Fang region of northern Gabon must grapple with the clash of tradition and the evolution of customs throughout modern Africa. With this tension in the background, the passionate, deft, and creative seamstress Awu marries Obame, after he and his beloved wife, Bella, have been unable to conceive. Because all three are reluctant participants in this arrangement, theirs is an emotionally fraught existence. Through heartbreaking and disastrous events, Awu grapples with long-standing Fang customs that counter her desire to take full control of her life and home.

Supplemented with a foreword and critical introduction highlighting Justine Mintsa’s importance in African literature, Awu’s Story is an essential work of African women’s writing and the only published work to meditate this deeply on some of the Fang’s most cherished legends and oral history.

Awu's Story, in this edition, begins with informative introductions by Therese Kuoh-Moukhoury and Cheryl Toman. While I did appreciate these immensely - they give a lot of additional background to the novella and to Gabonese literature in general - I would recommend not tackling them until after reading the book itself. In their explanations of incidents in Awu's Story I thought they gave away too much of what was to come.

Awu's Story explores the changing roles of women in Fang society and how the pioneers of these changes struggle against their society's expectations and the conservative traditions with which they have been raised. We view a series of events over several years affecting primarily Awu, her sister-in-law and her niece. Through these we see Awu grow in confidence and maturity. She chooses her battles wisely though and I found it interesting to learn which traditions she chose to uphold. Not everything is cast aside in the name of progress and, as a former French colony, Gabon has its share of post-colonial disasters such as the state of its maternity hospital.

I liked Mintsa's writing very much. She has created strong and memorable female characters, both ones with which I could empathise and ones who irritated or angered me. However my problem with Awu's Story and the reason it didn't hit a full five star rating is its brevity. A short volume overall, once the introductions were out the way it didn't feel to me that I really had enough time to get fully immersed in the tale before it was over. I could have happily have read many more pages about Awu's life.


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The White Sultana by Pierre Christin and Annie Goetzinger

The White Sultana by Pierre Christin and Annie Goetzinger
First published in French as La Sultane Blanche by Dargaud in France 1996. English language translation by Montana Kane published by Europe Comics in April 2016.

How I got this book:
Received a review copy from the publisher via NetGalley

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository : unavailable
	Wordery : unavailable
	Waterstones : unavailable
	Amazon : from $9.53 / £6.79 (ebook)
Prices and availability may have changed since this post was written

This is the story of two women. One of those women is Lady Sheringham, interviewed in her manor house, the other is Emma Piggott, who has just passed away in her London apartment, alone. 

To the former, life has been kind. She's gone from Shanghai to Hong Kong to Kuala Lumpar, from governess to sultana. She lives in the lap of luxury, engaged in an endless cycle of drinks parties, outings on horseback and the delicious little scandals of the British colonial community. This is a woman destined never to know hardship, other than the loss of loved ones. 

Emma Piggott, a teacher at St. John's, has lived a gray and stagnant life, experiencing Asia only through newspaper articles that she carefully cuts out and collects, but never leaving the Whitechapel neighborhood where her parents kept a grocery store.

And yet, something unites these two women--a little detail, nothing at all really, mere chance, or perhaps just a nightmare that troubles Lady Sheringham's sleep from time to time...

I chose this graphic novel because I liked the idea of its historical fiction aspect and because its illustrator, Annie Goetzinger, was reputed to be brilliant. Overall I did enjoy this story. It is set in the Far East just after the Second World War and in the decade that followed as the British Empire disintegrated. The rags to riches fairytale follows young Emma Piggott from governess to nobility and finally sultana, but we are never quite sure what is reality and what is truth. Does London-based Emma dream of Asia, or is it Asia-based Emma who has nightmares of being trapped in drab London?

I would have liked a deeper, more emotional story and felt that The White Sultana was too superficial for my tastes. However I did appreciate Goetzinger's illustrations especially the various beautifully fashionable dresses worn by the British socialites in Hong Kong. I spotted fashions changing from slim 1940s silhouettes to Dior-style New Look skirts and beyond. The contrast between colourful Asia and monochrome London was particularly effective as well. I am not sure I would seek out more Christin stories, but I would choose more graphic novels with Goetzinger artwork.


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Place Of The Heart by Steinunn Sigurdardottir

Place Of The Heart by Steinunn Sigurdardottir
First published in Icelandic as Hjartastadur in Iceland by Mal og menning in 1995. English language translation by Philip Roughton published in America by AmazonCrossing in 2014.

One of my WorldReads from Iceland and my Book Of The Month for May 2018

How I got this book:
Bought the ebook from Amazon

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository : from £8.53 (audio CD)
	Wordery : from £8.99 (PB)
	Waterstones : unavailable
	Amazon : from $1.36 / £1.00 (ebook)
Prices and availability may have changed since this post was written

Single mother Harpa has always been a misfit. Her physical appearance is unique among Icelanders: so small she self-deprecatingly refers to herself as a dwarf, so dark-skinned she doubts her genetic link to her father, so strange she nearly believed the children who mistook her for a mythical creature of the forest. Even as an adult, she struggles to make sense of her place in the world.

So when she sees how her teenage daughter, Edda, has suffered since the death of her best friend, Harpa sees no choice but to tear her away from her dangerous social scene in the city. She enlists the help of a friend and loads her reprobate daughter and their belongings into a pickup truck, setting out on a road trip to Iceland’s bucolic eastern fjords.

As they drive through the starkly beautiful landscape, winding around volcanic peaks, battling fierce windstorms, and forging ahead to a verdant valley, their personal vulnerabilities feel somehow less dangerous. The natural world, with all its contrasts, offers Harpa solace and the chance to reflect on her past in order to open her heart.

The second contender so far for May's Book of the Month, Place Of The Heart is a very different novel to A Spoke In The Wheel, and I loved its gorgeous descriptions of Icelandic landscapes. Harpa, her daughter Edda and their friend, Heidur, drive across the south of Iceland on a route that Dave and I partially took during our Icelandic holiday several years ago now. Having seen the astounding countryside up close myself, I was captivated by Sigurdardottir's descriptions and explanations of what I had seen. I was also captivated by her story of these three women trying to get themselves to Harpa's homeland without practically murdering each other on the way.

Place Of The Heart is the third of a trio of dysfunctional mother-daughter relationship books I have recently read (after Craving and Ponti) and it is my favourite of the three. Harpa narrates her own story and I appreciated her sense of humour. As a mother, she is consumed with worry over her teenage daughter's delinquency, but she takes a wry view of how they have come to this situation. Self-depreciating and occasionally whimsical, Harpa imagines conversations with her own now-deceased mother and agonises over having left her father in Reykjavik in order to rescue her daughter. She also has to come to terms with a family secret that has always been in the background.

This review is starting to make Place Of The Heart sound a depressing novel, but I didn't find that to be the case at all. Edda's outbursts are shocking, but amusing just the same. Heidur and the Aunts are wonderful creations too. I don't think this novel will appeal to everyone, but if you like lots of description and intriguing characters then this might be a good fit.


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A Spoke In The Wheel by Kathleen Jowitt

A Spoke In The Wheel by Kathleen Jowitt
Self published in the UK on the 5th February 2018.

How I got this book:
Received a review copy from the author

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository : from £8.99 (PB)
	Wordery : from £8.99 (PB)
	Waterstones : from £8.99 (PB)
	Amazon : from $5.80 / £4.31 (ebook)
Prices and availability may have changed since this post was written

Add A Spoke In The Wheel to your Goodreads

The first thing I saw was the wheelchair.

The first thing she saw was the doper.

Ben Goddard is an embarrassment – as a cyclist, as an athlete, as a human being. And he knows it.

Now that he's been exposed by a positive drugs test, his race wins and his work with disabled children mean nothing. He quits professional cycling in a hurry, sticks a pin in a map, and sets out to build a new life in a town where nobody knows who he is or what he's done.

But when the first person he meets turns out to be a cycling fan, he finds out that it's not going to be quite as easy as that.

Besides, Polly's not just a cycling fan, she's a former medical student with a chronic illness and strong opinions. Particularly when it comes to Ben Goddard...

I chose to read A Spoke In The Wheel based on its eyecatching cover and one of the characters being identified in the synopsis as a wheelchair user. I see disabled people around me pretty much every day, but they still seem to rarely warrant inclusion in novels. I thought Kathleen Jowitt has created a wonderful character in Polly. She's abrasive and outspoken which initially comes across as rudeness, but once I began to understand exactly what Polly has to deal with just to get through the challenges of daily life, her frustration is more than justified.

The doper of the synopsis, Ben, narrates A Spoke In The Wheel and I liked how we get to see his life intertwine with that of Polly and her friend/carer Vicki. Ben was a professional cyclist, but this is definitely not a sports novel. Cycling does feature, but in a more practical way. Readers aren't ever bogged down in technical details or expected to know anything about the sport - fortunately for me!

Instead this is, I suppose, best described as a slice of life portrait. I loved how I got drawn into Ben, Polly and Vicki's lives. Jowitt explores British attitudes to disability, to homosexuality and to cheating, showing how ignorance or spite can have a huge impact on someone's life. Yet I never thought I was being lectured or preached to which is a sign of great writing. I read the whole book in a couple of days and actually felt quite bereft at the end when I closed the cover on these friends. They had come to feel like my friends too! I'm really pleased to have found A Spoke In The Wheel and this might well be my Book of the Month.

Meet The Author

Kathleen Jowitt was born in Winchester, UK, and grew up deep in the Welsh Marches and, subsequently, on the Isle of Wight. After completing her undergraduate degree in English Literature at the University of Exeter she moved to Guildford and found herself working for a major trade union. She now lives in Cambridge, works in London, and writes on the train.
Her first novel, Speak Its Name, was the first self-published book ever to be shortlisted for the Betty Trask Prize.

Author links:
Website ~ Goodreads ~ Facebook ~ Twitter ~ Instagram ~ Amazon Author Page


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Silent Victim by Caroline Mitchell

Silent Victim by Caroline Mitchell
Published in the UK by Thomas And Mercer in March 2018.

How I got this book:
Won in a Dorset Book Detective giveaway

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository : from £8.44 (PB)
	Wordery : from £14.53 (HB)
	Waterstones : from £8.99 (PB)
	Amazon : from $5.34 / £3.98 (ebook)
Prices and availability may have changed since this post was written

Emma’s darkest secrets are buried in the past. But the truth can’t stay hidden for long.

Emma is a loving wife, a devoted mother…and an involuntary killer. For years she’s been hiding the dead body of the teacher who seduced her as a teen.

It’s a secret that might have stayed buried if only her life had been less perfect. A promotion for Emma’s husband, Alex, means they can finally move to a bigger home with their young son. But with a buyer lined up for their old house, Emma can’t leave without destroying every last trace of her final revenge…

Returning to the shallow grave in the garden, she finds it empty. The body is gone.

Panicked, Emma confesses to her husband. But this is only the beginning. Soon, Alex will discover things about her he’ll wish he’d learned sooner. And others he’ll long to forget.

I think I am going to be in a minority of Silent Victim readers who aren't raving about how amazing this crime novel is! Don't get me wrong. I think it is resoundingly OK, hence my three star rating, but seeing gushing praise elsewhere I wondered if I had perhaps mistakenly read a different book? Silent Victim is a fast-read thriller which nicely passed a couple of sunny afternoons. I didn't especially like its storyline being passed between three narrators because they all spoke with the same voice so I kept forgetting whose point of view I was supposed to be following at that time. Also the characters' actions were frequently abrupt and without adequate motivations so I didn't understand why they chose to follow their particular course. These kinds of issues irritate me, particularly in a novel which has such a serious subject as child abuse at its centre. As an entertaining read, it does its job, but I felt uncomfortable with this subject being just 'entertainment'.


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Norse Stories Retold From The Eddas by Hamilton Wright Mabie

Norse Stories Retold From The Eddas by Hamilton Wright Mabie
First published in America by Roberts Brothers in 1882. ForgottenBooks edition published in the UK in 2013.

How I got this book:
Downloaded from ForgottenBooks

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Where to buy this book:

	The Book Depository : from £6.31 (PB)
	Wordery : from £5.47 (PB)
	Waterstones : from £4.99 (PB)
	Amazon : from $2.05 / £0.99 (ebook)
Prices and availability may have changed since this post was written

Norse Stories Retold from the Eddas by Hamilton Wright Mabie is a refreshing read for the young and old alike. The author presents the original Scandinavian poetry in riveting prose and has succeeded in retaining the flavour of the Norse tales without losing anything to translation. 

Hamilton Wright Mabie has made an excellent selection of myths that fill the 16 chapters in Norse Stories Retold from the Eddas and taken great care to sustain the chronology of events as they unfolded, starting with the creation of the world, moving on to the adventure and warfare with giants and culminating in the regeneration of the new world under the All-Father. While the valour of Thor and engrossing descriptions of battle and victory may tingle the imagination of younger readers, Norse Stories Retold from the Eddas is by no means a book meant only for children. It has hidden within it some moving messages of hope, peace and prosperity, which can only be truly appreciated by a more mature reader. 

Mabie has kept the tone friendly and engaging. More importantly, he has resisted the all-consuming need to allegorize these beautiful stories and stuck to pure narrative which does absolute justice to the work. Readers can take a trip down memory lane by awakening the child within them with or read it as an adult to absorb the finer nuances of life, happiness and peace.

After recently reading Margaret Atwood's The Penelopiad I wanted to read more mythological stories and remembered this ebook which had been lying dormant on my Kindle for about two and a half years. Oops!

Written for older children, this short story collection is a fast read that gives a good flavour of the world of the ancient Norse gods. Female gods are beautiful, male ones are violent, frost-giants are ever threatening and Loke is out to cause mischief at every turn. (He reminded me of Anansi who I first encountered in Neil Gaiman's Anansi Boys.) As an introduction to Norse mythology, I think this is a good place to start. The main gods and monsters are introduced as well as the different world strata they inhabit. I am now tempted to get a more in depth volume of stories though to give me a greater understanding.


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