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.
American Devil, by Oliver Stark
Reviewed on June 22, 2010
Oliver Stark’s American Devil owes a lot to current American crime fiction. The setting, the hard-bitten detectives, and the duo of psychologist and detective will be familiar to all fans of the genre, but Stark holds his own in a debut that focuses on characterization and has a villain certainly creepy enough to keep the [...]
The Demon’s Covenant, by Sarah Rees Brennan
Reviewed on June 19, 2010
The Demon’s Convenant is Sarah Rees Brennan’s second novel and follows the same characters found in The Demon’s Lexicon. Mae, Alan, Jamie, and Nick are still fighting the forces of darkness and dealing with the fallout from Mae’s struggle to save her brother. Though they have gone their different ways, and are separated in the [...]
We Need To Talk About Kevin, by Lionel Shriver
Reviewed on June 15, 2010
Lionel Shriver’s We Need to Talk About Kevin is a conundrum. It is complicated; it is simple. It is the story of a victim; it is the story of a perpetrator. It is all of those things, complexity layered onto clarity, love mixed inextricably with hate, and, above all, blame and responsiblity, and where either, [...]
The Earth Hums in B Flat, by Mari Stranchan
Reviewed on June 13, 2010
Gwenni Morgan is surrounded by secrets. Secrets, and the stories they try to hide, twine around Gwenni’s life in a small Welsh town, making the space around her echo with everything that is not being said. Gwenni is an unusual little girl, though, and she lingers in those quiet spaces, eager to hear the stories [...]
Leviathan, by Scott Westerfield
Reviewed on June 11, 2010
Scott Westerfield’s Leviathan is wonderful. Clever, fascinating, fast-paced, and fun–and, luckily, the first in a series. A fact which makes coming to the end of the book slightly less distressing, at least we’ll get to see Deyrn, Alex, and their friends again and visit the fascinating world that Westerfield has created: a world that has [...]
Dark Secrets 2, by Elizabeth Chandler
Reviewed on June 4, 2010
Dark Secrets 2 returns its readers to Elizabeth Chandler’s Wisteria in an omnibus edition of No Time to Die and The Deep End of Fear. Wisteria is certainly one of the most dangerous towns for adolescent girls (and the boys with a crush on them) in all of the U.S., and these stories place their [...]
First Lord’s Fury, by Jim Butcher
Reviewed on May 19, 2010
Jim Butcher is more famous for his Dresden Files series–urban fantasy with a mysterious twist. Codex Alera, his second series, is also well worth a read, and shows the same deft touch with character and humour that makes Harry Dresden so much fun to follow. In the Codex Alera series, we follow Tavi, a common [...]
Dark Life, by Kat Falls
Reviewed on April 15, 2010
Kat Falls has done an astonishing job with her debut novel, Dark Life. From the fantastic and compelling setting, to the endearing and complete characters, to the vision of a future that manages to be both apocalyptic and hopeful, Dark Life is a fascinating combination of thriller, future-projection, and young adult coming of age story. [...]
Legend of a Suicide, by David Vann
Reviewed on April 13, 2010
David Vann’s Legend of a Suicide begins not with a death, but with those left behind: My mother and I survived. Not having taken off to any heights, we had nowhere to fall. We drank clear bouillon soup with a few peas in it after my uncle called and told us the news, and in [...]
The Affinity Bridge, by George Mann
Reviewed on April 8, 2010
The Affinity Bridge is George Mann’s first novel in the Newbury and Hobbes Investigations series. In it we are introduced to Sir Maurice Newbury, Gentleman Investigator for the Crown, Miss Veronica Hobbes, his intrepid assistant, and the fascinating and smokey version of London and life that Mann so cleverly creates. The rattling, smokey, and steam-powered [...]
Bound in Blood, by P.C. Hodgell
Reviewed on April 2, 2010
The Kencyrath are the three people forged into one weapon: Highborn, to lead; Kendar, to fight; Arrin-Ken, to judge. From the Kencyrath, from their ruling house, the Knorth, will come the Tyr-ridan, the three sides of their absent god: Torrigon, That-Which-Creates; Argentiel, That-Which-Preserves, and Regonereth, That-Which-Destroys. There are only three pure-bred Knorth left in Rathillien [...]
The Maid, by Yasutaka Tsutsui
Reviewed on March 31, 2010
Yasutaka Tsutsi’s The Maid takes the reader into the minds of the ordinary: the lacivious husband, the desperate to stay young wife, the family that despises cleaning. It follows the growth of a young girl who has always been able to hear the innermost longings and thoughts of those around her. It questions what it [...]
Hex Hall, by Rachel Hawkins
Reviewed on March 29, 2010
Rachel Hawkin’s Hex Hall stars Sophie Mercer, a girl who finds herself coming into the powers of her half-witch heritage and getting into enough trouble with a love-potion-gone-wrong that she is sent to the magical equivalent of reform school. Hecate Hall (or, as it is not so fondly known to its students, Hex Hall) is [...]
The Castle of Otranto, by Horace Walpole
Reviewed on March 24, 2010
The Castle of Otranto is gothic, romantic, terrifying, and unbelievably over the top. It is one of those books that seems to exist beyond its pages because of the influence it has had on the literature that followed. It is worth reading on its own merits, though, and it is possible to feel the thrill [...]
The Poison Throne, by Celine Kiernan
Reviewed on March 16, 2010
Wynter Moorehawke and her father have finally returned home. Called back after five years in the Northlands, they arrive exhausted and ill, desperate for healing and the sight of family and friends. But King Jonathon’s land is no longer the safe haven of Wynter’s memories, and the politics that ripple through the kingdom represent danger, [...]
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 [...]
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 [...]
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 follows [...]
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 [...]
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. Katsa’s [...]
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. [...]
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 [...]
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 [...]
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 Africa [...]
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 necromantic [...]
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 [...]
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The Bookgeeks Interview
Blaine Harden
Blaine Harden is an author and journalist who reports for PBS Frontline and contributes to The Economist. He worked for The Washington Post as a correspondent in Africa, Eastern Europe and Asia, as well as in New York and Seattle. He was also a national correspondent for The New York Times and writer for the Times Magazine.
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It’s a busy time for Irvine Welsh: not only has he got a new book out, Skagboys, a prequel to his famous and acclaimed Trainspotting, but his 1997 novel Ecstasy has been made in to a major new film, on general release from today. It’s a twisted tale that explores the euphoric highs and the [...]
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