Category: Book Reviews

Book Reviews

The Housekeepers by Alex Hay Book Review

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Happy Friday bookish people! I hope you’re all having a good day today.

Today I am giving you my book review on The Housekeepers by Alex Hay.

Blurb/synopsis:

On the night of London’s grandest ball, a bold group of women launches a daring revenge heist against Mayfair society.

Mrs. King is no ordinary housekeeper. Born into a world of con artists and thieves, she’s made herself respectable, running the grandest home in Mayfair. The place is packed with treasures, a glittering symbol of wealth and power, but dark secrets lurk in the shadows. When Mrs. King is suddenly dismissed from her position, she recruits an eclectic group of women to join her in revenge: A black-market queen out to settle her scores; an actress desperate for a magnificent part; a seamstress dreaming of a better life; and Mrs. King’s predecessor, with her own desire for vengeance.

My review:

This was my first book of 2024, and it was gifted to me by my Parents for Christmas and I had been highly anticipating this book since it came out.
This book follows Mrs King, a housekeeper for a wealthy family, who is fired from her job by the daughter after the Father dies. She recruits a bunch of people with different skills to infiltrate the house and plan a heist for the night of the grand ball.
I love a heist, I really love that plot in pretty much all of the books I have read it in so far. This novel took a lot of time to set up each of the characters and get you to root for them individually and a s a group which is something that I liked because it gave each of them their time to shine. Mrs King was a stand out character for me, you never truly know her motives but you know that she is desperate for something and will do anything to get it. There was one character, I won’t name them, who I felt got built up and then one plot decision ruined all of their character development for me.
I did think that the actual heist could have been done better, no offense to the author here but they took the time to introduce the characters and that meant all of the culmination happened in a short amount of pages and it wasn’t explored enough for me.

Rating: 4 out of 5.
Book Reviews

Book Review: The Mistletoe Motive by Chloe Liese

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you are all having a good day today.

Today I am bringing you my book review for The Mistletoe Motive by Chloe Liese, a very short romance novel that I read at the beginning of December.

He loathes the holidays. She loves them. She’s full of festive cheer. He’s brimming with Bah, Humbugs. Besides unreasonably seasonable names, the only thing Jonathan Frost and Gabriella Di Natale have in common is a healthy dose of mutual contempt. Well, that and the same place of employment at the city’s most beloved independent bookstore, Bailey’s Bookshop. But when the store’s owners confess its dire financial state, Jonathan and Gabby discover another unfortunate commonality: the imminent threat of unemployment.

With the Baileys’ requests to minimize expenses, win new customers, and make record sales dancing in their heads, Jonathan and Gabby conclude—barring a financial Christmas miracle—one of them will soon be cut from the payroll. Neither are willing to step down from their position, so they strike a bargain: whoever has more sales in December gets to stay on in the new year; the loser will resign. With a lifetime’s worth of festive tricks up her sleeve, Gabby should easily outsell her nemesis, except the unreadable Mr. Frost’s every move seems purely designed to throw her off her game.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, Gabby’s deceptive ex won’t quit pursuing her, and her anonymous online friend suggests they take a break. Worst of all, as the pressure mounts to save the bookshop and her job, Gabby meets a new, tender side of Jonathan. Is this the same man she’s called her cold-hearted enemy?

Maybe he’s got a motive she just can’t figure out—or maybe Jonathan Frost isn’t as chilly as she once thought. Maybe Jonathan and Gabby already know—and love—each other in ways they never thought possible.

This is an #OwnVoices story for its portrayal of autism by an autistic author.

My Review

If you have seen most of the reviews on this blog you will know that I don’t usually pick up a romance by choice and if I do, it is unlikely I am going to enjoy it. Not because of any bad reason, just because I find them quite predictable and yes, you can say that about this book too. After all it follows the romance plot that they all do really, BUT I did enjoy this book. It was short which I think was a big help in making me enjoy it, it had a lot of plot but didn’t feel too drawn out because it was short.

I love an enemies to lovers, if I am going to read a book with romance in it then that is what I want. Give me some tension. This book had a ton of that, which I very much enjoyed. Plus it was set in a bookstore and I can relate to both the characters being desperate to keep their jobs working in the bookshop. I really can’t say much about this book without spoiling anything but if you are looking for a short, festive romance then I would recommend this book.

Rating: 4 out of 5.
Book Reviews

Book Review: The Anne Boleyn Bible by Mickey Mayhew

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you’re all having a good day today.

Today I am bringing you my review for The Anne Boleyn Bible by Mickey Mayhew. As with all reviews from now on I will not be splitting the review into categories anymore, I will be giving my overall thoughts in a few paragraphs and then I will be giving one final star ratings.

Anne Boleyn sells, but she sells in segments; a biography here, a study over there on her guilt and something else yonder concerned with where she lived or what she liked to wear. This book, covering not just her life but her life onscreen, in theater, on TV and also the impact of the first black actress to play her, is the definitive, all-encompassing story of Anne Boleyn from 1501 (or thereabouts) to 2023. Having examined the ardent fandom of Anne Boleyn for his doctorate, Dr Mickey Mayhew is in a unique position to offer something new to say on this much-discussed ‘tragic’ Tudor queen and is not afraid to tackle some of the less palatable aspects of her life.

Also, this book is the first to examine with authenticity the reality of Anne’s relationship with the most important man in her life, the man whose name she repeated in comfort while facing the Swordsman of Calais on the scaffold, having spent her life promulgating his doctrine; Jesus Christ himself. As for the aforementioned executioner, Dr Mayhew’s research in Calais and Saint-Omer can now lift a lid on a few of the particulars of this elusive and yet essential figure of Anne Boleyn mythos; and yes, now he even has a name as well.

The Anne Boleyn Bible also offers a straightforward retelling of Anne’s actual historical life, albeit one that outlines an entirely fresh and empowering perspective on her rise to prominence; this is followed by a series of considered arguments on the ‘for’ and ‘against’ in regard to her guilt & execution; then her entry into popular culture, firstly in plays and masques, before she went on to headline movies, TV series, cosplay, and now, with the first black woman to portray her, model and actress Jodie Turner-Smith. This book is simply what it says on the cover – The Anne Boleyn Bible – leaving no depiction, no religious aspect, no appearance in popular culture, from The Simpsons to the West End musical ‘Six’, overlooked; likewise, Dr Mayhew also turns his trademark brand of rather wry commentary toward the vast plethora of Anne Boleyn merchandising, tourist spots, rubber ducks, beanies and the wrangling question of who was the ultimate onscreen Anne; Geneviève Bujold or Natalie Dormer?!

My Review:

Okay, where to start with this one. I have wanted this book for so long, months, and I couldn’t get my hands on it where I live until finally I got it for Christmas from my Parents. Of course, I forgot everything else I was doing and I read this book straightaway. My overall thoughts after reading was that I was disappointed. I don’t know if it was because I had hyped it up in my mind or just because I have read a lot around Anne Boleyn already, I don’t know but it was not as engaging or interesting as I thought it would be.

I found the biographical chapters, such as information about Anne’s childhood and particularly the chapters about religion and the ways she engaged with it, quite good. I thought they were interesting, there wasn’t anything really new in the chapters which was the start of the disappointment for me. Everything about the book was sold as having this new information, about her life, about her relationship with Jesus and particularly about the swordsman of Calais. I saw a lot of tweets by the author about this topic and how he had this information about the identity of the swordsman of Calais and had travelled and seen the actual sword. This is described in the book, his visit to see the sword and it details how he felt in that moment and all of that, but it covers about two pages of the book and that was it. He doesn’t go into detail about any of it.

If you are interested in reading an overview of Anne Boleyn’s life and death and you haven’t read around the subject much then you may enjoy this but as a book to add something new to the subject, I don’t think this book does that.

Rating: 2.5 out of 5.
Book Reviews

Book Review: The Vanished Bride by Bella Ellis

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you’re all having a good day today. Today I am bringing you my book review for The Vanished Bride by Bella Ellis, the first in her Bronte mystery series.

It’s a new year and that means I am changing up the way I write my book reviews, let me down below what you think of this new style.

I will not be splitting my reviews up into sections anymore. I will be writing a few paragraphs of my overall thoughts about the book instead and then I will be giving an overall star rating at the end. I hope you enjoy my book review!

Before they became legendary writers, Charlotte Brontë, Emily Brontë, and Anne Brontë were detectors in this charming historical mystery…

Yorkshire, 1845. A young wife and mother has gone missing from her home, leaving behind two small children and a large pool of blood. Just a few miles away, a humble parson’s daughters–the Brontë sisters–learn of the crime. Charlotte, Emily, and Anne Brontë are horrified and intrigued by the mysterious disappearance.

These three creative, energetic, and resourceful women quickly realize that they have all the skills required to make for excellent “lady detectors.” Not yet published novelists, they have well-honed imaginations and are expert readers. And, as Charlotte remarks, “detecting is reading between the lines–it’s seeing what is not there.”

As they investigate, Charlotte, Emily, and Anne are confronted with a society that believes a woman’s place is in the home, not scouring the countryside looking for clues. But nothing will stop the sisters from discovering what happened to the vanished bride, even as they find their own lives are in great peril…

My Review:

I have had this book sitting on my shelves for a long, long time. It has only been in the past year as I have started reading more historical mysteries that I realised how much I enjoyed them. So, finally as my last book of 2023 I read The Vanished Bride by Bella Ellis.

This book captures the personalities of the three Bronte sisters extremely well, you can see the wildness of Emily and the quiet nature of Anne and the sensible longing Charlotte. I personally enjoyed the chapters written in Charlotte’s perspective the most but that makes sense considering Jane Eyre is my favourite Classic novel. I did like how the book mixed the perspectives of the sisters together, it gave each of them space to investigate on their own and discover integral information and develop their own identities within the novel.

One of the things I loved the most about this novel was the way that the mystery worked. It was a tangled web of secrets and darkness that started unfolding more and more with each turn of the page. Throughout I had my own suspicion as to who the murderer was going to be, and this was the most clever part of the novel because I was completely wrong. I could have given 100 guesses and not a single one of them would have come close to the actual ending. Normally, this kind of thing annoys me a bit, I can feel cheated as a reader sometimes if the mystery doesn’t leave you enough hints, but for this novel it really worked.

If you love historical mysteries I would highly recommend this book.

Rating: 5 out of 5.
Book Reviews

Book Review: Gideon Green in Black and White by Katie Henry

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you are all doing well today. Today I am bringing you my book review of Gideon Green in Black and White by Katie Henry. I was kindly sent a copy of this book by Harper Voyager quite a while ago I’m embarrassed to say but I kept putting off reading it because I was interested in the plot but it leans more Young Adult to me than Adult and I haven’t been enjoying YA mysteries as much anymore. So, I kept putting it off but finally in November I read this book and I regret putting off reading it because I enjoyed it a lot.

As usual I will be giving star ratings to four categories and I will write a little bit about each one. I will try to keep this review as spoiler free as possible.

Gideon Green in Black and White Plot:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Gideon Green in Black and White by Katie Henry follows a boy named Gideon, he is a high school student (right now I can’t remember what exact age he is) who before the novel begins you realise something happened where he and his best friend, Lily, are no longer speaking. Gideon has an interest in everything Noir, films, books, Detectives, everything in that genre is his passion. He even wears his trench coat to school. Then suddenly Lily turns up on his doorstep and tells him she needs his help with a mystery. That’s all I am going to tell you about the plot because I highly reccomend any mystery lovers read it and I don’t want to ruin the experience for you.

I thought this plot was very intriguing, the mystery is weaved in with a lot of other things like the backstory of the characters, high school drama and a few other themes that to be honest I wasn’t expecting to appear in this book. Overall, I liked the mystery part of it more than the inclusion of the other themes but that is my personal opinion.

Gideon Green in Black and White Characters:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Gideon is the main character in this book and as I said above, his character is mainly defined by his love of old mysteries and black and white films but what I really liked about his character is the growth you see. As a character Gideon has a few flaws and the author does not shy away from the reader seeing them, the person who doesn’t see them is Gideon and that’s what I mean when I say growth, if you read this book you will see what I mean.

The other main character is Lily, Gideon’s ex-best friend. To me I think she could have had more character development, it’s there but it’s not as punchy as it is for Gideon and sometimes I actually forgot you were meant to be feeling things for Lily too.

Gideon Green in Black and White Writing and Dialogue:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Gideon Green in Black and White Overall:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I gave this book four stars overall because I enjoyed my reading experience. I couldn’t give it five stars because there were a few things I would change, like I said, Lily wasn’t developed as much as I would have liked her to be and there were some themes that distracted from the mystery for me in a negative way. They made sense for the plot but weren’t to my taste.

Blurb/Synopsis:

Gideon’s short-lived run as a locally-famous boy detective ended when middle school started, and everyone else–including his best friend, Lily–moved on while Gideon kept holding on to his trench coat, fedora, and his treasured film noir collection. Now, he’s sixteen and officially retired. That is, until Lily shows up suddenly at Gideon’s door, needing his help.

He might be mad at her for cutting him off with no explanation, but Gideon can’t turn down a case. As a cover, Gideon joins Lily on the school paper. Surprisingly, he finds himself warming up to the welcoming, close-knit staff . . . especially Tess, the cute, witty editor-in-chief.

But as the case gets bigger than Gideon or Lily could have anticipated, Gideon must balance his black-and-white quest for the truth with the full colours of real-life–or risk a permanent fade to black.

Book Reviews, Uncategorized

Book Review: Last Girl Breathing by Court Stevens

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you are all having a good day today.

Today I am bringing you my book review for Last Girl Breathing by Court Stevens. A big thank you to Harper Collins for sending me an ARC copy of this book.

As usual I will give star ratings to four categories and I will write a little bit about each one. I will do my best to not include any spoilers but there may be parts that come across that way, if you prefer to read a book with no idea before going I would highly recommend reading this review after you have read the book instead.

Last Girl Breathing Plot: 4 stars

In Last Girl Breathing by Court Stevens you follow the people of a small town who are still reeling from a tragedy that happened eight years prior to the novel beginning. When a murder is committed Lucy Michaels starts investigating.

my first thought when I started reading this book was “wow, this is darker and more intense than I thought it would be” and usually that type of book doesn’t appeal to me, I prefer the cosier mystery. However, I was surprised by this book. Yes, it is dark and yes it’s got incredible twists and a very fast pace but also it felt real and I felt completely immersed in the story.
It sounds cliche to say I couldn’t put this book down but I honestly couldn’t, I read it on a car trip to wales and when I had to stop reading I couldn’t stop thinking about the book and what was happening in it. I also have to say, I did not guess the identity of the killer.

Last Girl Breathing Characters: 4 stars

The main character in this novel is Lucy Michaels, she is a young girl still struggling with the grief of losing her brother during a dam break 8 years ago. She us at the centre of this book, she knows everyone in the town and has deep connections with many of the people connected with both events. Sweat I liked most about her character was the rawness and realness behind her. She wasn’t perfect, and she didn’t pretend to be. Court Stevens wrote her as a believably flawed character and I liked that. There are many other characters in this book but I don’t want to go into discussing them here because it would definitely reveal some spoilers.

Last Girl Breathing Writing and Dialogue: 4 stars

As I said before this book fully immersed me in its story and I believe that is a testament to an excellent writer. This is the first Court Stevens book I have read but I enjoyed her balance between tension and mystery combined with building strong community connections and separating their good features from the mystery.

Last Girl Breathing Overall: 4 stars

I gave this book four stars overall because I really enjoyed this novel and it surprised me how much I enjoyed it.

Blurb/Synopsis:

When the answers to a present-day murder lie in the past, one teen girl must examine a tragic event to prevent more lives from being lost. No one expected it to rain that much. But the rain kept coming, the dam broke, and lives were lost. One was Lucy Michaels’s little brother. She was there and while she saved the lives of many young boy scouts, despite being a child herself, she couldn’t save him.

Now eight years later, Lucy is preparing to graduate from high school and compete in the air rifle competition at the Olympics when her stepbrother goes missing right before his most important football game. The search is focused on the same plot of land where her younger brother died, and she can’t help but draw parallels.

When the search for a missing person becomes a murder investigation, Lucy knows the secrets she holds about what her stepbrother was up to that day could help find the murderer. The clues quickly connect Lucy’s ex-boyfriend to the murders, but he couldn’t be guilty… could he?

Everyone involved has their own secrets and revealing hers to the wrong person could put her life—and her whole town—at risk. Last Girl Breathing is a page-turning hunt for the truth as Court Stevens once again creates nonstop suspense with characters who will break your heart.

Book Reviews

Book Review: Murder Most Royal by S J Bennett

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you are all having a wonderful day today.

I am bringing you my book review for Murder Most Royal by S J Bennett, the third in the Queen Investigates series.

In this book review I will give star ratings to four categories and I will write a little bit about each one. I will do my best to keep this review as spoiler free as possible.

I hope you all enjoy! Let me know in the comments if you have read this book and what you thought of it.

Murder Most Royal Plot:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Murder Most Royal is the third book in the Queen Investigates series of murder mystery books. In this one Queen Elizabeth II gets involved in a murder investigation after the hand of a wealthy man, known to the Queen, is found washed up on a beach.

I have read all of the books in this series so far, and I absolutely plan to continue with it, but this was probably my least favourite of them so far. The second one, A Three Dog Problem, is my favourite. I enjoy the series because of it’s unique premise but for me this one, although it threw you straight into the action with the discovery of the hand, was the most complicated and confusing. This was good in the fact that it was fun trying to work out all the threads and I’m not ashamed to admit I didn’t manage to guess what happened before it was revealed.

I liked that this book took a different route than the first two, in the first two of the series it is revealed very early on who was murdered and how but this book was more complicated because you had the who but there was no actual body.

Murder Most Royal Characters:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

There are two main characters in this series, the first being Queen Elizabeth II and the other being her assistant Rozie.

In the first and second books Rozie is the one who the narration focuses on, she is the main investigator with some input from the Queen. However, what I liked about this third book in the series was that Rozie took a backseat on the investigation while the Queen was more actively investigating. It made the book stand out and feel fresh while still keeping the overall cosy feel of the series.

Murder Most Royal Writing and Dialogue

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Murder Most Royal Overall:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I gave this book four stars overall because it was a very enjoyable read in a very quirky series that fits very well in the cosy crime genre.

Blurb/Synopsis:

December 2016 – A severed hand is found washed up on a beach next to the Queen’s estate at Sandringham. Elizabeth has become quite accustomed to solving even the most complex of murders. And though she quickly identifies the 70-year-old victim, Edward St Cyr, from his signet ring, the search for his killer is not so straightforward. St Cyr led an unconventional, often controversial life, making many enemies along the way in the quiet, rural world of North Norfolk, where everyone knows each other’s business.

But when a second man is found dead, and a prominent local woman is nearly killed in a hit-and-run, the mystery takes an even darker turn. With the Christmas break coming to an end, the Queen and her trusted assistant Rozie must race to discover how the pieces of the puzzle fit together. Or the next victim may be found even closer to home.

Agatha Christie meets The Crown in MURDER MOST ROYAL, the much-anticipated third book in the ‘Her Majesty The Queen Investigates’ mystery series by SJ Bennett – for fans of The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman, Agatha Christie and M.C. Beaton’s Agatha Raisin.

Book Reviews

Book Review: A Very Lively Murder by Katy Watson

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you are all having a good day today.

Today I am bringing you my book review for A Very Lively Murder by Katy Watson.

I will be giving star ratings to four categories and I will write a little bit about each one. I will do my best to not include any spoilers.

I hope you enjoy my book review!

A Very Lively Murder Plot:

Rating: 5 out of 5.

A Very Lively Murder is the second book in the Three Dahlias series by Katy Watson. This book follows Posy Starling, Caro Hooper and Rosalind King as they once again must team up to solve a murder mystery. In this book they are on the set of the new Dahlia Lively film, of which Posy is playing the leading lady, when it becomes clear that Rosalind is receiving death threats and then someone gets murdered.

I loved this book. I enjoyed the first one, The Three Dahlias, but I liked the second one more because I already felt as though I knew the characters and also their relationships with each other were already established too. We, as readers, were able to get stuck straight in to the murder itself. It is hard to say a lot about this book’s plot without revealing any spoilers but what I can say is that there are so many twists even I didn’t solve the mystery before the end, and that is unusual.

A Very Lively Murder Characters:

Rating: 5 out of 5.

As in the first book, the main character we follow is Posy Starling. She is an actress who wants to get the press back on her side after a difficult time as a child star. I like Posy, she is young and vibrant and it is fun to follow a character as they are finding out who they are themselves and we get to go on that journey with them. In this first book Posy felt like a leader but for me, in this second book Rosalind felt like a stronger character. More of the plot was focused around her and her backstory and I loved that we got to see more of her life.

A Very Lively Murder Writing and Dialogue:

Rating: 5 out of 5.

A Very Lively Murder Overall:

Rating: 5 out of 5.

This book was definitely a five star read for me, I am already excited for any future books from this author.

Blurb/Synopsis:

One murder mystery movie. Three Dahlias. And a whole cast of suspects…

Ex-child star Posy Starling is finally filming her dream role – Dahlia Lively in The Lady Detective movie. But things take a nightmare turn when a prop weapon is replaced with the real thing – with almost fatal consequences for her fellow Dahlia, Rosalind King. There’s something very wrong on the set of The Lady Detective – which means it’s time to call in Caro Hooper, so the three Dahlias can investigate.

In between filming scenes, signing autographs for locals, photoshoots in London, talk show appearances and jetting off to France for an impromptu party, the three Dahlias do what they do best – surrupticiously sleuth. And very soon the evidence starts to point towards one particular co-star…

But before they can prove it, another murder rocks the production. And this time, with a storm raging, the river flooded and the bridge washed out, there are no police to rely on so it’s up to the three Dahlias to stop a murderer in their tracks… before another victim is claimed.

Book Reviews

Book Review: The Good Thieves by Katherine Rundell

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you are all having a good day today! I am bringing you my thoughts on the book The Good Thieves by Katherine Rundell, which I read in August.

For this book review I will be giving a star rating to four different categories and writing a little bit about each one. I will do my best to not include any spoilers in this book review.

The Good Thieves Plot:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

The Good Thieves follows Vita, a young girl who sets out to reclaim her Grandfather’s property that has been stolen, to do this she recruits three others to join her heist.

I was very excited to read this novel, after enjoying some of Katherine Rundell’s other books earlier in the year, and ‘heists’ are a favourite topic of mine to read about. I enjoyed how this book focused on the build up with a much energy as it had for the actual heist part. This novel wraps you in it’s atmosphere from the very first chapter, with the sensory descriptions and well researched setting.

I didn’t enjoy this book as much as I did her other book, Rooftoppers, but I still enjoyed it and I would recommend it as a nice, light read.

The Good Thieves Characters:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Vita is the main character in this novel. Although she is young she is motivated by family loyalty, it is obvious from early in the story that Vita would do anything for her family. Driven with a sense of justice and her headstrong personality she shows her intelligence, creativity and bravery by creating a plan to steal back what was taken from her family.

The Good Thieves Writing and Dialogue:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I knew already that I liked Katherine Rundell’s writing style but I especially like how the writing doesn’t feel young, it is just as complex a plot as it would be in an older age bracket.

The Good Thieves Overall:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I gave this book four stars.

Blurb/Synopsis:

From award-winning author Katherine Rundell comes a fast-paced and utterly thrilling adventure driven by the loyalty and love between a grandfather and his granddaughter.

When Vita’s grandfather’s mansion is taken from him by a powerful real estate tycoon, Vita knows it’s up to her to make things right.

With the help of a pickpocket and her new circus friends, Vita creates the plan : Break into the mansion. Steal back what’s rightfully her grandfather’s. Expose the real estate tycoon for the crook he truly is.

But 1920s Manhattan is ever-changing and full of secrets. It might take more than Vita’s ragtag gang of misfits to outsmart the city that never sleeps.

Award-winning author Katherine Rundell has created an utterly gripping tour de-force about loyalty, trust, and the lengths to which we’ll go for the ones we love.

Book Reviews

Book Review: Anatomy a Love Story by Dana Schwartz

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Happy Monday bookish people! Today I am bringing you my review for Anatomy by Dana Schwartz.

In this book review I will give star ratings to four categories and I will write a little bit about each one. I will do my best to not give any spoilers.

Anatomy Plot:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

In this novel we follow Hazel Sinnett, a wealthy woman who wants more than anything to become a physician, but she doesn’t just want to help with healing, instead she wants to do the operations. In the process of infiltrating the all male lecture classes she meets Jack Currer, a resurrection man but there is much more going on then either of them know.

I enjoyed this novel a lot more than I thought I would do, I was gripped for most of the novel. The atmosphere was very intense and dark and as a reader I was waiting for each new thing to be discovered. However, towards the end I did find the story a bit dragging, very satisfying but a little slow.

Anatomy Characters:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Hazel Sinnett is a lady, she has lived in a castle her whole life but her life isn’t exactly happy. She is a headstrong woman who will stop at nothing to become the physician she wants to be, no matter what society thinks of it. I liked how her character knew what was right and wrong and even though there was a lot of conflict because of ti she always followed her heart.

Jack currer is a ressurection man, he steals corpses in the night and sells them, but he only does this because he has no other choice. I liked how his character developed throughout this novel, I want to say so much more but I can’t without giving away too many spoilers so you’ll have to read the book to find out what Jack is like.

Anatomy Writing and Dialogue:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Anatomy Overall:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I gave this book four stars overall because although the ending was a little slow I really enjoyed this novel and I bought the second one to read soon.

Blurb/Synopsis:

Edinburgh, 1817. Hazel Sinnett is a lady who wants to be a surgeon more than she wants to marry.

Jack Currer is a resurrection man who’s just trying to survive in a city where it’s too easy to die.

When the two of them have a chance encounter outside the Edinburgh Anatomist’s Society, Hazel thinks nothing of it at first. But after she gets kicked out of renowned surgeon Dr. Beecham’s lectures for being the wrong gender, she realizes that her new acquaintance might be more helpful than she first thought. Because Hazel has made a deal with Dr. Beecham: if she can pass the medical examination on her own, the university will allow her to enroll. Without official lessons, though, Hazel will need more than just her books – she’ll need bodies to study, corpses to dissect.

Lucky that she’s made the acquaintance of someone who digs them up for a living, then.

But Jack has his own problems: strange men have been seen skulking around cemeteries, his friends are disappearing off the streets. Hazel and Jack work together to uncover the secrets buried not just in unmarked graves, but in the very heart of Edinburgh society.

A gothic tale full of mystery and romance about a willful female surgeon, a resurrection man who sells bodies for a living, and the buried secrets they must uncover together.