Jennie Blake
Jennie Blake is a native Californian who moved to Manchester in 2008 after getting married. The biggest part of the move was bringing over 1,000 books across the pond with her – luckily, she doesn’t own much else! Jennie will read just about anything, although she gravitates most towards fantasy and sci-fi. If Jennie’s not reading, or writing about books, she can usually be found horseback riding or outside running about. She can be found on LibraryThing.com, and blogging at unabridgedopinions.com.
The Osiris Ritual, by George Mann
Reviewed on March 9, 2010
George Mann’s The Osiris Ritual is the second book in the Newbury and Hobbes series. We return once again to Victoria’s England, well Victoria’s England with a steampunk twist and a distinct possibility of zombie invasion. Mann’s 1901 England is filled with steam powered cars, robot servants, and a distinct sense of more being possible [...]
Dark Secrets, by Elizabeth Chandler
Reviewed on March 1, 2010
Elizabeth Chandler’s Dark Secrets is an omnibus of two of her Wisteria novels, young adult novels full of suspense and a healthy dollop of the supernatural. The two novels, Legacy of Lies and Don’t Tell, both take place in the sleepy (well, in appearance) town of Wisteria, Maryland. Wisteria is a small town, and the [...]
Vampirates 5: Empire of Night, by Justin Somper
Reviewed on February 26, 2010
WARNING: this book begins with a significant development! Do not read further if you are worried about being spoiled! Short review: The book is fun and worth a read.
Now, with that out of the way, Vampirates: Empire of Night is the fifth book in the carnival ride that is Justin Somper’s Vampirates series. This book [...]
Jasmyn, by Alex Bell
Reviewed on February 18, 2010
Alex Bell’s Jasmyn is one of those novels with a backstory as compelling as the action it chronicles. It begins with Jasmyn, despairing in her grief over the sudden death of her husband. She abandons herself to her sadness and barely manages to interact with anyone at the funeral. Jasmyn’s grief may not be the [...]
Truth or Fiction, by Jennifer Johnston
Reviewed on February 11, 2010
Jennifer Johnston’s Truth or Fiction is a slight, upright novel, and the physical presence of the book echoes the ethereal nature of the story within it. This isn’t to imply that the story is lacking power, emotion, or heft, but that it, and the memories and stories it contains, spin a thread that feels slippery, [...]
The Victorians, by Jeremy Paxman
Reviewed on February 9, 2010
Jeremy Paxman’s The Victorians uses the paintings of the Victorian Age to paint a picture of the lives of the men and women who lived through a time filled with upheaval and investigation, darkness and discovery, a vibrant sense of purpose and a new perception of the purpose of art itself. Paxman deftly weaves the [...]
Lex Trent versus The Gods, by Alex Bell
Reviewed on February 5, 2010
Lex Trent versus The Gods contains one of fiction’s most entrancing character types: the scoundrel. This scoundrel, the Lex Trent of the title, lives the quiet, and seemingly blameless, life of a law clerk by day, only to spend his nights as “The Shadowman”, a cat burglar who has eluded capture for long enough to [...]
Naamah’s Kiss, by Jacqueline Carey
Reviewed on January 11, 2010
Jacqueline Carey’s Naamah’s Kiss lives in the same world as her well known “Kushiel” series, but the focus has shifted from the pain as pleasure in the previous series to the worship of the pleasure of the transitory, the fragile, and the new. For the first few chapters, we have also left D’Ange and travelled [...]
The Thirteen Curses, by Michelle Harrison
Reviewed on January 8, 2010
Michelle Harrison’s debut novel, The Thirteen Treasures, won the Waterstone’s Children’s Book Prize in 2009, and its sequel, The Thirteen Curses, is another story of a young girl struggling to deal with a gothic and dangerous world populated by fairies and other creatures out of myth and legend.
The Thirteen Curses follows Red, a young girl [...]
The Shadow Dragons, by James A. Owen
Reviewed on January 6, 2010
It is always dangerous to insert well known figures into a story not their own. James Owen’s Imaginarium Geographica series is full to bursting with literary and historical figures living out lives just a shade different from those recorded in the history books. The Shadow Dragons is the fourth book in this series and [...]
Hunger, by Michael Grant
Reviewed on January 4, 2010
Sometimes people are locked away to keep others safe from them; sometimes people are locked away to keep themselves safe from others. Michael Grant’s Hunger tells the story of a group of kids locked away for their own safety, but locked in their prison, hidden away from prying eyes, is a danger greater than any [...]
Princeps’ Fury, by Jim Butcher
Reviewed on January 1, 2010
Jim Butcher’s Codex Alera series is a fantasy series with a hero who is interesting not because of any power he possesses, or mystical armour or weapons he finds, but because, even with the absence of powers considered commonplace in his land and a distinct lack of magical or otherwise unique weapons he succeeds and [...]
The Invention of Air, by Steven Johnson
Reviewed on December 23, 2009
It is rare, I think, for a popular science novel to feel charming as well as informative, but Steven Johnson’s The Invention of Air reads less like a strict biography than a fireside chat with someone who knows an enormous assortment of fascinating facts on the history of science and has the wit to draw [...]
Gone, by Michael Grant
Reviewed on December 11, 2009
Michael Grant’s Gone begins with a familiar teenage fantasy, a world where the adults have just disappeared:
For a moment he thought he had imagined it, the teacher disappearing. For a moment he thought he’d slipped into a daydream.
Sam turned to Mary Terrafino, who sat just to his left. “You saw that, right?”
Mary was staring hard [...]
To Ride a Rathorn, by P.C. Hodgell
Reviewed on November 17, 2009
Those lucky enough to have already found P.C. Hodgell’s books have followed Jame through fire, flood, earthquake, and collapse. They have watched as she struggled to find her place in her people, the Kencyrath, and felt every bruise as she fell down (yet another) flight of stairs. Now, in To Ride a Rathorn, we follow [...]
Graceling, by Kristin Cashore
Reviewed on November 13, 2009
Krisitin Cashore’s novel, Graceling, takes place in the world she wrote of in Fire. The seven kingdoms are existing in a precariously balanced peace, one that owes more to the fact that any action could be fatal than any really commitment to peace, and Katsa has a Grace that is both formidable and frightening. [...]
Wake, by Lisa McMann
Reviewed on November 3, 2009
People often look their most peaceful when asleep. Whatever the dream that is going on within them, outwardly peace and contentment often reign. What, though, if you could see what they were dreaming? What if you experienced the dreams, nightmares, and kaleidoscopes of desires and fears along with the dreamer? And what if there was [...]
Seeker’s Mask, by P.C. Hodgell
Reviewed on October 29, 2009
Sometimes, an author’s skill at world-building is such that even the forests, flowers, rivers, and streams seem to breathe, to have a life of their own. P.C. Hodgell is one of those authors, and Seeker’s Mask, the third book in her series about the Kencyr Jame, is one of those books where each character, and [...]
Ice, by Sarah Beth Durst
Reviewed on October 27, 2009
Sarah Beth Durst’s Ice is an unlikely combination of myth and science, modern times and ancient lore. It begins at a scientific station in the Arctic, where Cassandra Dusent lives a less-than-normal teenage life with her father and the other scientists at the station. We first meet her as a very young girl, listening to [...]
The True Deceiver, by Tove Jansson
Reviewed on October 23, 2009
Tove Jansson’s The True Deceiver is a chilling book. It is not a thriller in the typical sense of that word. There is no breathless chase with certain death waiting at the finish. There are few weapons, none of them made of steel. Still, there is a mounting sense of dread, a stretching of the [...]
Hush, Hush, by Becca Fitzpatrick
Reviewed on October 19, 2009
Hush, Hush is Becca Fitzpatrick’s debut novel, and it’s joining a swathe of young adult literature that focuses on the “other”: be it vampire, werewolf, or fallen angel. Luckily, Fitzgerald delivers a suspenseful and fun roller-coaster ride of a book that ends in the sweet spot that makes a sequel something to look forward to.
First, [...]
Edgar Allan Poe’s Tales of Death and Dementia, by Edgar Allen Poe
Reviewed on October 9, 2009
This year is the 200th anniversary of the birth of Edgar Allan Poe, one of the most celebrated writers of horror, mystery, and the macabre. His stories have always lent themselves to illustration and dramatization, and the newest offering, Edgar Allan Poe’s Tales of Death and Dementia, takes some of Poe’s shorter stories and tales [...]
The Pocket Book of Boosh, by Noel Fielding and Julian Barratt (and cast)
Reviewed on October 7, 2009
First, of course, when reviewing a tome such as The Pocket Book of Boosh some important questions must be answered. To set everyone’s minds at rest, it does, indeed, come in its own pocket: a snazzy, jean (and jazz, it is assumed) inspired pocket. That query aside, Bollo, Vince, and Howard have put together a [...]
Fire, by Kristin Cashore
Reviewed on September 21, 2009
Fire is an element, a saviour of lives, and a destroyer of them. Fire is a weapon, a protector, and a force of nature. In Krisitin Cashore’s book, Fire is all of those things contained in an astonishingly beautiful and, in the language of the kingdom where she was born, monstrous young woman.
Cashore treads a [...]
31 Hours, by Masha Hamilton
Reviewed on September 18, 2009
Sometimes, even after the last word is read and the final page turned, a book is so full of unique and deftly drawn characters that they seem to continue living, free of the pages, ink, and binding that contained them. Masha Hamilton’s 31 Hours is such a book, and each character, no matter how brief [...]
The Country Formerly Known as Great Britain, by Ian Jack
Reviewed on September 3, 2009
Ian Jack’s latest collection, The Country Formerly Known as Great Britain, gathers together a series of articles and essays that range far and wide, both emotionally and geographically. From a light question on the reason young girls love dolphins so much to a deep and emotional response to the Hatfield Rail crash, each of the [...]
The Death of Bunny Munro, by Nick Cave
Reviewed on August 31, 2009
You can read en extract from The Death of Bunny Munro at our sister site, Bookhugger.co.uk.
There is a fluffy stuffed bunny on the front cover of Nick Cave’s The Death of Bunny Munro. That first glance of fuzzy, friendly bunny, before you read any of the text, is certainly the lone warm and fuzzy point [...]
The Captain’s Table, by Brian Thompson
Reviewed on August 24, 2009
The Captain’s Table is Brian Thompson’s second foray into Bella Wallis’ life and loves. The first, The Widow’s Secret, is both a portrait of the danger and adventure to be found in Victorian England and a representation of the struggles a writer faces when confronted with real life and a need to create.
Thompson’s focus [...]
The Poison Garden, by Sarah Singleton
Reviewed on August 19, 2009
Sarah Singleton’s The Poison Garden has something that, occasionally, feels rare in young adult literature: children who behave much like children really do. Thomas, and, to a lesser extent, Maud, both seem to be first and foremost children. They get frightened and want help. They are curious but also distractable. They love playing games of [...]
The People’s Train, by Thomas Keneally
Reviewed on August 14, 2009
Thomas Keneally has visited the past for inspiration before with his award-winning (and best-selling) take on the complex Oskar Schindler in Schindler’s Ark. Here, in The People’s Train, Keneally goes a step further: he has taken the story of Artem Sergeiev, a Bolshevik Russian immigrant to Australian in the early 20th century, and turned into [...]
Skin Trade, by Laurell K. Hamilton
Reviewed on June 28, 2009
Laurell K. Hamilton’s Anita Blake has left St. Louis for a short trip to Vegas. But Blake is not heading to Sin City for the bright lights, she’s chasing a vampire serial killer, one who has already escaped her once. He’s responsible for a trail of destruction and death that stretches across the country, and [...]
A Deadly Trade, by Michael Stanley
Reviewed on June 26, 2009
Detective “Kubu” Bengu returns in A Deadly Trade to solve a complex and compelling mystery. This book is the Botswanan detective’s second outing, and he, and the rest of the characters that populate the novel, are well established and engaging. The authors (Michael Stanley is a combination of Michael Sears and Stanley Trollip) treat [...]
Johannes Cabal: the Necromancer, by Jonathan L. Howard
Reviewed on June 21, 2009
Johannes Cabal is a necromancer, as the title of the first book by Jonathan L. Howard, (and the character himself) proudly proclaim. He is also arrogant, intelligent, sporadically empathetic, a master of a variety of modern and ancient languages, socially inept, and, oh yes, missing his soul (after trading it to Satan for further [...]
Kill & Cure, by Stephen Davison
Reviewed on May 30, 2009
Stephen Davison’s Kill & Cure ticks all of the medical thriller boxes. There is an “evil” company out to protect its research at all costs, a group of scientists putting themselves in harms way to outwit the company, and the man of the hour, in this case named David Stichell (called Stich), who rises up [...]
The Adamantine Palace, by Stephen Deas
Reviewed on May 23, 2009
Stephen Deas’ The Adamantine Palace drops the reader directly into the action. In fact, flings or tumbles may be a better word considering that, within the first ten pages, a woman falls to her death from the back of a dragon. That ride is only the beginning of a wild journey that stretches across an [...]
The Death Maze, by Ariana Franklin
Reviewed on May 20, 2009
Ariana Franklin’s The Death Maze is the excellent second novel in the “Adelia Aguilar” historical detective series. The first, The Mistress of the Art of Death, was an exciting and fascinating journey into the medieval world of Henry II, and its sequel continues in the same vein. Adelia Aguilar is still Henry II’s secret weapon, [...]
Inside Straight, edited by George R.R. Martin
Reviewed on May 12, 2009
Reality television has come to the world of George R.R. Martin’s Wild Card series. Inside Straight, the first of the “new” releases from Tor, uses the Big Brother-esque reality show “American Hero” as a vehicle for introducing the next generation of aces, jokers, and characters, and it works superbly. There are certainly some familiar faces [...]
Singing to the Dead, by Caro Ramsay
Reviewed on May 7, 2009
There is something about a Scottish detective. Something about the often cold and rainy city of Glasgow that lends itself to determined and forthright policing. In Caro Ramsay’s second novel, Singing to the Dead, the Partickhill squad is facing severe staff shortages at Christmas because of the holidays and a particularly vicious form of the [...]
The Poison That Fascinates, by Jennifer Clement
Reviewed on April 23, 2009
It will surprise no one who reads The Poison That Fascinates that Jennifer Clement is also a published poet. Her prose is saturated with a poet’s awareness of language: its flexibility, its sounds, its resonance. This does not mean that the book is filled with page after page of hyperbolic description. Each word is placed [...]
The Brightest Moon of the Century, by Christopher Meeks
Reviewed on April 10, 2009
In The Brightest Moon of the Century, Christopher Meeks captures the embarrassments, flashes of joy, and moments of panic that make up everyday life. His central character, Edward, is reassuringly normal. As a teenager, he worries about girls. As a university student, he worries about his future. As as adult, he worries about his [...]
The Black Monastery, by Stav Sherez
Reviewed on April 2, 2009
The tag for Stav Sherez’s The Black Monastery is “paradise can be murder”, but the island of Palassos has never been a utopian paradise of sun and sand. Littered with the remnants of a past that included a cult and the uprising against and slaughter of a Turkish navy, its present is drug riddled and [...]
The Night Sessions, by Ken MacLeod
Reviewed on March 30, 2009
Jennie reviews the fourth and final book from the BSFA Best Novel Award 2009 shortlist:
I feel as if I should begin this review with a confession. It’s fairly tame, as confessions go, but it does have direct bearing on how very much I enjoyed The Night Sessions by Ken MacLeod. So, I just [...]
The Big Sleep, by Raymond Chandler
Reviewed on March 26, 2009
To commemorate the 50th anniversary of the death of Raymond Chandler today, Hamish Hamilton have reissued five of his key novels with their original early-edition hardback covers. Jennie checked out The Big Sleep for Bookgeeks.
Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep traffics in shades of grey. Women are wicked but reformable; men are lethal but protective; [...]
The Case of the Imaginary Detective, by Karen Joy Fowler
Reviewed on March 15, 2009
The Case of the Imaginary Detective is not really a mystery. Well, no more a mystery than any other work of fiction that deals with the secrets at the heart of a family. There is a central question, a heroine looking for clues, and, in the distant past, a murder, but the story itself shunts [...]
The Hidden, by Tobias Hill
Reviewed on March 3, 2009
When you read voraciously, sometimes you fall into the habit of assuming that you’ve seen it all. Every plot twist. Every surprise reveal. Everything. You may enjoy a book, but are rarely surprised by it. Luckily, every once in awhile, a book comes along to remind you that this is hubris, [...]
Lowboy, by John Wray
Reviewed on February 15, 2009
John Wray’s Lowboy is a thriller, a coming of age novel, and an immersion into the head of a schizophrenic boy. It is a mystery, a race that pits a detective above ground against the boy below. Its setting, New York City, is a character in itself, a world that vibrates and mutates under the [...]
Shadow Gate, by Kate Elliott
Reviewed on February 3, 2009
Kate Eliot’s Shadow Gate suffers, a bit, by standing in the unenviable position of the second book in a series. Much of the character and world building is out of the way, but enough grand action must be left for the books that follow to give them a reason to exist. Luckily, Shadow Gate is [...]
Tokyo Year Zero, by David Peace
Reviewed on January 22, 2009
David Peace’s Tokyo Year Zero is awash with death and retribution, honour and compromise, despair and occupation, degradation and chaos. Set in the day after and the year after MacArthur’s conquest of Japan, the survivors of the war are attempting to force the strictures and structure of a now-defunct hierarchy onto the unstable world that [...]
The Tales of Beedle the Bard, by J.K. Rowling
Reviewed on January 16, 2009
It would be difficult to miss J.K. Rowling’s newest addition to the world of Harry Potter. With a handwritten, hand-illustrated copy bought by Amazon for almost two million pounds, and the more accessible public edition still in the Amazon top ten, the book certainly made a media, and charitable, splash. Although only one of the [...]
The God Stalker Chronicles, by P.C. Hodgell
Reviewed on January 10, 2009
Today we welcome a new geek! We are very pleased that Jennie will be sharing her thoughts with our readers, starting with an intriguing fantasy re-issue. Now read on…
P.C. Hodgell is not a well-known author, and her books have until quite recently been difficult to find. Luckily, Baen Books has re-issued her first two [...]
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