Tag: review

blog tours, Book Reviews

As Good As Dead by Holly Jackson Book Look and Top 5 Reasons to read.

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Happy Wednesday bookish people! I am so excited to be part of the book tour for As Good As Dead by Holly Jackson, the third book in the Good Girl’s Guide to Murder Series. I absolutely love this series and I am excited today to be bringing you a ‘book look’ and my Top 5 Reasons for you to read As Good As Dead!

Thank you to TbrBeyond tours for having me on this tour and sending me an e-copy of this book.

So, first let me show you my book look! I looked at the colours on the cover, black, grey and red, and I chose a red top and a pair of grey jeans.

(This photo was taken in my hallway by the way, it’s the place that had the best light)

Onto my Top 5 Reasons To Read As Good As Dead…

Top 5 Reasons To Read As Good As Dead by Holly Jackson:

  1. If you have read the first book, or the first and second book in this series you’ll already know how good it is and can’t wait to pick up the third book – I felt like this and I was not disappointed, I thought As Good As Dead was brilliant.
  2. If you like school based murder mystery books like Truly Devious by Maureen Johnson then this book series would definitely be for you!
  3. The characters have you on their side before you even know you’re on their side. It’s really that quick and the characters are some of my favourites in YA books.
  4. The book has a large focus on family and friendship which is something I particularly enjoyed, if you’re like me and you enjoy seeing this in books there is plenty of it in this series.
  5. There is mixed media – like emails and transcripts of interviews which is a unique element that adds to the story.

Blurb/Synopsis of As Good As Dead:

The highly anticipated, edge-of-your-seat conclusion to the addictive A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder series that reads like your favorite true crime podcast or show. By the end, you’ll never think the same of good girls again.

Pip’s good girl days are long behind her. After solving two murder cases and garnering internet fame from her crime podcast, she’s seen a lot.

But she’s still blindsided when it starts to feel like someone is watching her. It’s small things at first. A USB stick with footage recording her and the same anonymous source always asking her: who will look for you when you’re the one who disappears? It could be a harmless fan, but her gut is telling her danger is lurking.

When Pip starts to find connections between her possible stalker and a local serial killer, Pip knows that there is only one choice: find the person threatening her town including herself–or be as good as dead. Because maybe someone has been watching her all along…

You can find the rest of the tour schedule here: https://tbrandbeyondtours.com/2021/08/27/tour-schedule-as-good-as-dead-a-good-girls-guide-to-murder-3-by-holly-jackson/

Author Holly Jackson:

You can buy the book here:https://www.waterstones.com/book/as-good-as-dead/holly-jackson/9781405298605

And here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/As-Good-Dead-thriller-everyone-ebook/dp/B08T6YS245

That’s it for my post today, I hope you all enjoyed it!

Book Reviews

Book Review: Caraval by Stephanie Garber

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Happy Monday bookish people! Today I am bringing you the book review for one of my favorite books that I have read – Caraval by Stephanie Garber! I can’t wait to share my thoughts with you all.

In this book review I will give star ratings to four categories and I will write a little bit about each one. I will try to keep it as spoiler free as possible. I hope you enjoy my book review.

Caraval Plot:

Rating: 5 out of 5.

I happened to pick this book up in a WhSmith in one of those service stations on the motorway while on a long car journey because I liked the sound of a circus-y themed competition story. I didn’t know then that this book would start an obsession with all things circus, particularly books with that setting. I love the plot of this book, it is filled to the brim with magic and escapism and one of the things I always love in books – not knowing who or what you can trust. This book completely messes with your head while at the same time being joyously beautiful and whimsical, dashed with danger. I could not put this book down.

Caraval Characters:

Rating: 5 out of 5.

Scarlett Dragna is one of two sisters, Scarlett and Tella, and in Caraval we follow Scarlett after Tella goes missing and Scarlett must compete in Caraval to find her. She is headstrong and fierce, especially in her loyalty to her sister. Scarlett is the character that I wish I could be (and who I will be dressing up as for YALC next year). The other character who features heavily in this book is Julian de Santos, he’s a cheeky, charming, mysterious man often described as looking like a rogue/pirate. As soon as I read that I knew I was going to love him, he’s definitely in my top five male book characters.

Caraval Writing and Dialogue:

Rating: 5 out of 5.

Stephanie Garber is an exceptionally good writer who has such talent that she drew me in from the very first sentence of the book and has captured my interest ever since. I have read the first and second book in the series so far and I find myself thinking on it all the time.

Caraval Overall:

Rating: 5 out of 5.

I had to give this book five stars because as I said, it is one of my favourite books I have ever read.

Blurb/Synopsis:

A legendary competition.
A mesmerizing romance.
An unbreakable bond
between two sisters.

Scarlett Dragna has never left the tiny island where she and her sister, Tella, live with their powerful, and cruel, father. Now Scarlett’s father has arranged a marriage for her, and Scarlett thinks her dreams of seeing Caraval—the faraway, once-a-year performance where the audience participates in the show—are over.

But this year, Scarlett’s long-dreamt-of invitation finally arrives. With the help of a mysterious sailor, Tella whisks Scarlett away to the show. Only, as soon as they arrive, Tella is kidnapped by Caraval’s mastermind organizer, Legend. It turns out that this season’s Caraval revolves around Tella, and whoever finds her first is the winner.

Scarlett has been told that everything that happens during Caraval is only an elaborate performance. Nevertheless she becomes enmeshed in a game of love, heartbreak, and magic. And whether Caraval is real or not, Scarlett must find Tella before the five nights of the game are over or a dangerous domino effect of consequences will be set off, and her beloved sister will disappear forever.

Welcome, welcome to Caraval . . . beware of getting swept too far away.

That’s it for this book review, I hope you all enjoyed it!

blog tours, Book Reviews

Book Review: The Curry Compendium by Richard Sayce

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Happy Friday bookish people! Today is my spot on the book tour for The Curry Compendium by Richard Sayce. Thank you to Literally PR for sending me a copy of this book to review.

This review will be different to my usual ones as a Curry Compendium doesn’t have a plot or characters to rate but I will give the book an overall rating and tell you some of my thoughts about it.

Curry Compendium: My thoughts:

So, I myself am not a lover of curries. Okay, admittedly I’ve only ever tried one and I think pepper (as in salt and pepper) is too spicy. That tells you a little something about my culinary palette. It barely exists. However, my partner loves curries and spicy food. He was very happy I received this book.

This book contains many recipes split down into clear and organised sections, each one is easy to find and easy to read through. We haven’t had the chance to make any of the recipes yet, although I’m pretty sure he is eyeing up a few of them to try and get me to taste them. The book itself is very well presented, I think the cover stands out and all the pictures are enticing.

I’d give this book a rating of

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Four stars because I know my partner is going to get a lot of enjoyment out of experimenting with the recipes and making them for his family who also enjoy eating curries.

Blurb/Synopsis:

Introducing the definitive guide to recreating British Indian Restaurant favourites from the comfort of your own home!

Lockdown saw a surge in people trying to recreate restaurant flavours at home – and now Brits want more inspiration as they get bolder in the kitchen.

In Curry Compendium, Richard Sayce expertly combines both volumes of his best-selling, Gourmand award-winning Indian Restaurant Curry at Home books, with a sprinkling of new recipes, to create the ultimate guide to cooking excellent British Indian Restaurant food in your own kitchen.

Richard Sayce, the man behind Misty Ricardo’s Curry Kitchen, is renowned by his many fans for quality recipes, attention to detail and his affable style. Having sold more than 50,000 copies of his first books, and amassing over six million views of his recipes on YouTube, there is a huge appetite for this new magnus opus packed with mouth-watering, easy-to-follow recipes.

Curry Compendium includes starters, side dishes, curries, rice and bread, along with a generous portion of vegetarian, traditional and street food style recipes. Readers benefit from supporting YouTube tutorials for the majority of recipes, each with a QR code to scan with a smartphone/tablet to watch online instantly.

Research from Bray Leino points to lockdown leading to an overwhelming rise in home cooking: 55% said they are ‘cooking more from scratch as I’m spending more time at home.’ Interestingly, the group most likely to agree with this statement was 18-34 year olds. Their 2019 report identified this group as most likely to eat fast food and use ready meals, so we’re seeing a huge behaviour shift that will impact for years to come.

That’s it for this book review, I hope you all enjoyed it!

blog tours, Book Reviews

Book Review: The Dinner Party by Sarah Gilmartin

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Happy Friday bookish people! Today is my stop on the book tour for The Dinner Party by Sarah Gilmartin. Thank you to Tara McEvoy for sending me a physical copy of this book to read and review.

In this book review I will give star ratings to four categories and I will write a little about each one. I will try to keep it as spoiler free as possible. I hope you enjoy my book review.

The Dinner Party Plot:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

For most of this book I wasn’t sure there was much of a plot, but I realised this was because the author was showing us glimpses of the past intertwined with events of the present and the relationships of the characters. I liked that this book didn’t shy away from difficult topics and instead presented them in the right way.

The Dinner Party Characters:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

To me this book was very character centred. Most of the tension and the mystery was because of the relationships between the characters and I liked getting to know each of them on a deeper level than books sometimes show their characters.

The Dinner Party Writing and Dialogue:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

The writing in this book is lovely, clear and smooth. It also has this ominous tone to it throughout which I think added a whole other level to the story.

The Dinner Party Overall:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

I gave this book three stars overall because although it was an enjoyable read, I didn’t feel all the tension in my self, I wasn’t that connected to any of the characters.

Blurb/Synopsis:

To mark the anniversary of a death in the family, Kate meticulously plans a dinner party – from the fancy table setting to the perfect baked alaska waiting in the freezer. But by the end of the night, old tensions have flared, the guests are gone, and Kate is spinning out of control.

Set between from the 1990s and the present day, from Carlow to Dublin, the family farmhouse to Trinity College, Dinner Party is a beautifully observed, dark and twisty novel that thrillingly unravels into family secrets and tragedy.

Haunting and unforgettable, it explores how the past informs the present, the inevitability of childhood damage resurfacing in later life – and yet how, despite everything, we can’t help returning home.

That’s it for this book review, I hope you all enjoyed it!

blog tours, Book Reviews

Book Review: Stalking Shadows by Cyla Panin

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Happy Friday bookish people! Today I’m excited to be bringing you a book review of Stalking Shadows by Cyla Panin as my stop on the book tour. Thank you to TBR Tours and Beyond and Cyla Panin for sending me an ecopy of this book to read and review.

In this book review I will give star ratings to four categories and I will write a little about each one. I will try to keep it as spoiler free as possible. I hope you enjoy my book review.

Stalking Shadows Plot:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

I had heard that this book is a different take on the Beauty and the Beast retelling so I knew instantly that I wanted to read it. Anything that is even slightly reminiscent of Beauty and the Beast interests me. I loved the eerie Gothic feel to this book, it was most prominent in the settings but the whole book was filled with mystery and tension. I enjoyed the mystery and the slight creepyness of it, one thing I wanted more of was the action, I felt the story was too slow-paced for my liking and I would have liked some more intriguing events.

Stalking Shadows Characters:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I really enjoyed the personality of the main character, Marie, she is very caring and brave and loyal to her sister. One of my favourite things about this book is the connection between the sisters, in this book they are the Beauty and the Beast rather than a love interest which was a nice change, there aren’t too many books with such a focus on the sibling relationship and having a sister myself I really felt I could put myself in Marie’s shoes.

Stalking Shadows Writing and Dialogue:

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

The writing in this book is very detailed and atmospheric, it helped to build up the plot layer by layer. I personally felt there was a tiny bit too much foreshadowing which sort of gave away the ending before it happened.

Stalking Shadows Overall:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

I gave this book three stars overall because, although it is a very enjoyable YA debut read, I felt like I wanted a little more from the book than what it gave me.

Blurb/Synopsis:

A gothic YA fantasy debut about a young woman striving to break her sister’s curse and stop the killing in her small French town

Seventeen-year-old Marie mixes perfumes to sell on market day in her small eighteenth-century French town. She wants to make enough to save a dowry for her sister, Ama, in hopes of Ama marrying well and Marie living in the level of freedom afforded only to spinster aunts. But her perfumes are more than sweet scents in cheap, cut-glass bottles: A certain few are laced with death. Marie laces the perfume delicately—not with poison but with a hint of honeysuckle she’s trained her sister to respond to. Marie marks her victim, and Ama attacks. But she doesn’t attack as a girl. She kills as a beast.

Marking Ama’s victims controls the damage to keep suspicion at bay. But when a young boy turns up dead one morning, Marie is forced to acknowledge she might be losing control of Ama. And if she can’t control her, she’ll have to cure her. Marie knows the only place she’ll find the cure is in the mansion where Ama was cursed in the first place, home of Lord Sebastien LeClaire. But once she gets into the mansion, she discovers dark secrets hidden away—secrets of the curse, of Lord Sebastien . . . and of herself.

About the Author:

Cyla Panin is an MG, YA and Adult author who prefers to look at the world through a dusting of magic. After spending most of her childhood wanting to escape into the wonderful worlds her favourite author’s created, she’s now using her own words to craft magical places. When not writing, Cyla can be found playing dinosaurs with her two young boys, watching swashbuckling and/or period TV shows with her husband and, of course, reading.

Her YA debut, Stalking Shadows will be out with Amulet, Abrams Fall 2021. She is represented by Chloe Seager of the Madelaine Milburn Literary, TV and Film agency.

Barnes and Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/stalking-shadows-cyla-panin/1138773828

Amazon: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Stalking-Shadows-Cyla-Panin/dp/1419752650

Blackwells: https://blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/product/Stalking-Shadows-by-Cyla-Panin/9781419752650

Tour schedule: https://tbrandbeyondtours.com/2021/08/19/tour-schedule-stalking-shadows-by-cyla-panin/

That’s it for this book review, I hope you all enjoyed it!

blog tours, Book Reviews

Book Review: The Chateau by Catherine Cooper

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Happy Monday bookish people! Today is my spot on the book tour for The Chateau by Catherine Cooper, an intriguing murder mystery set in a castle (Chateau). Thank you to Anne Cater, Random T Tours and Harper Collins for sending me a copy of this book to read and review.

In this book review I will give star ratings to four categories and I will write a little about each one. I will try to keep it as spoiler free as possible. I hope you enjoy my book review.

The Chateau Plot:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

I found this plot to be very intriguing, the first chapter throws you straight into the scene of the party and the finding of the body but it doesn’t tell you who the body is and then the first chapter goes back to before the party, sets the scene and introduces the characters. I love a murder mystery where it is set in a party, hotel or castle type place and then you have a limited amount of suspects so this was an enjoyable element of this story for me. This story got dark pretty quickly and that’s when I found myself enjoying it a little less because it was feeling like a thriller instead of a mystery that it started out like. It is described as being a thriller but the beginning felt a lot lighter and that was better for me than the end.

The Chateau Characters:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

The only character that I particularly liked throughout this novel was Aura with her down to earth, seemingly sweet nature she was just trying to turn her Chateau into a lovely hotel but as I went through the book my opinion on her changed a little. I wasn’t drawn to any of the other characters, I found they were very well-written but none of them captured my attention.

The Chateau Writing and dialogue:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

In the first few chapters the writing was a little clunky but it soon found it’s feet and got smoother to read.

The Chateau Overall:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

I gave this book three stars because I enjoyed the mystery for the most part, other than how dark it quickly got but I just wasn’t feeling the characters the way I like to when I’m reading books.

Blurb/Synopsis:

The twisty new thriller from the Sunday Times bestselling author of The Chalet

They thought it was perfect. They were wrong…

A glamorous chateau

Aura and Nick don’t talk about what happened in England. They’ve bought a chateau in France to make a fresh start, and their kids need them to stay together – whatever it costs.

A couple on the brink

The expat community is welcoming, but when a neighbour is murdered at a lavish party, Aura and Nick don’t know who to trust.

A secret that is bound to come out…

Someone knows exactly why they really came to the chateau. And someone is going to give them what they deserve.

The Sunday Times bestseller is back with a rollercoaster read, perfect for fans of Lucy Foley and Ruth Ware.

That’s it for this review, I hope you all enjoyed it!

blog tours, Book Reviews

Book Review: The Hawthorne Legacy by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

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Happy Wednesday bookish people! Today is my spot on the book tour for The Hawthorne Legacy, sequel to the Inheritance Games, by Jennifer Lynn Barnes. I was so excited to receive a copy of this book to read and review, it was one of my most anticipated releases for 2021. I loved The Inheritance Games, I will be posting my review of the first book in the series later today.

In this book review I will give star ratings to four categories and I will write a little about each one. I will try to keep it as spoiler free as possible. I hope you enjoy my book review.

The Hawthorne Legacy Plot:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

This book picks up almost immediately after where the inheritance Games finishes, and you as the reader are chucked right into the middle of another mystery. And what a mystery it is, I love how intricate and complex the mystery itself is, there’s so many tricks and codes and puzzles. I adore puzzles, any type so I think I would definitely be a little like the Hawthorne brothers with their competitive natures and love of solving puzzles. I really loved that I couldn’t predict where the story was going to take me, it was filled with new and exciting scenarios but also had a balance by constantly referring to things that happened in the first book.

The Hawthorne Legacy Characters:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Avery is a wonderful character to follow, I felt like I was learning about her along with her and this made the book very interesting for me. I like that she can stand up for herself against the family that keep throwing negative things her way. Her sister Libby, there’s something about her that I just always feel like something bad is going to happen. Then there’s the Hawthorne brothers, all charming and enigmatic but also slightly dangerous it feels like. Of course, I have a favourite brother but I’m not going to say which one it is.

The Hawthorne Legacy Writing and Dialogue:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I like that the writing style matches the mystery, it never reveals more than it should and this meant that I was constantly guessing and looking for clues.

The Hawthorne Legacy Overall:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I gave this book four stars overall because I loved getting back into the world of Avery and the Hawthorne’s.

Blurb/Synopsis:

Intrigue, riches, and romance abound in this thrilling sequel to the New York Times bestselling The Inheritance Games perfect for fans of Karen McManus and Holly Jackson.

The Inheritance Games ended with a bombshell, and now heiress Avery Grambs has to pick up the pieces and find the man who might hold the answers to all of her questions – including why Tobias Hawthorne left his entire fortune to Avery, a virtual stranger, rather than to his own daughters or grandsons.

Thanks to a DNA test, Avery knows that she’s not a Hawthorne by blood, but clues pile up hinting at a deeper connection to the family than she had ever imagined. As the mystery grows and the plot thickens, Grayson and Jameson, the enigmatic and magnetic Hawthorne grandsons, continue to pull Avery in different directions. And there are threats lurking around every corner, as adversaries emerge who will stop at nothing to see Avery out of the picture – by any means necessary.

With nonstop action, aspirational jet-setting, family intrigue, swoonworthy romance, and billions of dollars hanging in the balance, The Hawthorne Legacy will thrill Jennifer Lynn Barnes fans and new readers alike.

That’s it for this book review, I hope you all enjoyed it!

Book Reviews

Book Review: A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you’re all having a good day. Here is my third and final book review for today – A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson.

In this book review I will give star ratings to four categories and I will write a little about each one. I will try to keep it as spoiler free as possible. I hope you enjoy my book review.

A Good Girl’s Guide To Murder Plot:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I’ll start by saying, I loved this book. It got the right balance between light and dark for most of the book and the mystery in it was so engaging I couldn’t go to bed last night until I had finished reading it. I loved the school project element to the story and I particularly loved the brother of the boy everyone thought was the murderer teaming up with Pip. I would have liked a little bit more resistance from Ravi before he started teaming up with pip though.

A Good Girl’s Guide To Murder Characters:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

As I was saying, I really liked following Pip and Ravi as the two main characters in this story, they had their own quirks which gave the story another layer. I felt that all of the characters were well created and although I would have liked to have seen more of some of them I could see why I didn’t and how each character fit within the story.

A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder Writing and Dialogue:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I liked Holly Jackson’s writing style a lot, it allowed for the serious moments and the light hearted ones very well and it helped me enjoy reading it even more.

A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder Overall:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I gave this book four stars overall and I am really excited about getting to the sequel soon.

Blurb/Synopsis:

The case is closed. Five years ago, schoolgirl Andie Bell was murdered by Sal Singh. The police know he did it. Everyone in town knows he did it.

But having grown up in the same small town that was consumed by the murder, Pippa Fitz-Amobi isn’t so sure. When she chooses the case as the topic for her final year project, she starts to uncover secrets that someone in town desperately wants to stay hidden. And if the real killer is still out there, how far will they go to keep Pip from the truth?

That’s it for this book review, I hope you all enjoyed it!

Book Reviews

Book Review: Moonflower Murders by Anthony Horowitz

theblindscribe

Happy Monday bookish people! Today I am posting three book reviews, of which this is the second. This book review is for Moonflower Murders by Anthony Horowitz.

In this book review I will give star ratings to four categories and I will write a little about each of them. I will try to keep it as spoiler free as possible. I hope you enjoy my book review.

Moonflower Murders Plot:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

This is the kind of mystery that I really enjoy, someone gets murdered and another goes missing and it all relates back to the hotel they both have a connection to and because of this hotel there’s only a certain number of suspects. It reminds me of Agatha Christie style murder mysteries and they are just my favourite.The plot itself is really engaging, although the book is about 600 pages long I flew through it because it is so complex and so well created that the mystery surrounds you and you can’t stop reading until it is solved.

Moonflower Murders Characters:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

There’s too many characters to talk about them here individually but each and every one of them I went through thinking they were a suspect, except for the detective of course, and they are so well created that any one of them could have been the killer. I enjoyed getting to know each of the characters better because they each had their own part to play in the story which meant I got to see a lot of each of them.

Moonflower Murders Writing and Dialogue:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I really enjoyed Anthony Horowitz’s writing style, it lended itself well to the mystery. One thing that I didn’t like as much was the inclusion of the entire Atticus Pund takes the case story, I felt it was a bit unnecessary.

Moonflower Murders Overall:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I gave this book four stars because it was a great read and a very enjoyable mystery.

Blurb/Synopsis:

Featuring his famous literary detective Atticus Pund and Susan Ryeland, hero of the worldwide bestseller Magpie Murders, a brilliantly complex literary thriller with echoes of Agatha Christie from New York Times bestselling author Anthony Horowitz.

Retired publisher Susan Ryeland is living the good life. She is running a small hotel on a Greek island with her long-term boyfriend Andreas. It should be everything she’s always wanted. But is it? She’s exhausted with the responsibilities of making everything work on an island where nothing ever does, and truth be told she’s beginning to miss London.

And then the Trehearnes come to stay. The strange and mysterious story they tell, about an unfortunate murder that took place on the same day and in the same hotel in which their daughter was married—a picturesque inn on the Suffolk coast named Farlingaye Halle—fascinates Susan and piques her editor’s instincts. 

One of her former writers, the late Alan Conway, author of the fictional Magpie Murders, knew the murder victim—an advertising executive named Frank Parris—and once visited Farlingaye Hall. Conway based the third book in his detective series, Atticus Pund Takes the Cake, on that very crime. 

The Trehearne’s, daughter, Cecily, read Conway’s mystery and believed the book proves that the man convicted of Parris’s murder—a Romanian immigrant who was the hotel’s handyman—is innocent. When the Trehearnes reveal that Cecily is now missing, Susan knows that she must return to England and find out what really happened.

Brilliantly clever, relentlessly suspenseful, full of twists that will keep readers guessing with each revelation and clue, Moonflower Murders is a deviously dark take on vintage English crime fiction from one of its greatest masterminds, Anthony Horowitz.

That’s it for this book review, I hope you all enjoyed it!

Book Reviews

Book Review: The Way Of All Flesh by Ambrose Parry

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you’re all having a good day today. So today is Monday which means I’ll be posting book reviews, three of them actually. But I also would like your opinion, I haven’t shared any of my art on here but I do paint and use pens and things like that. I’m thinking of creating some things and maybe opening a shop like on Etsy or something – I just wanted to get some opinions on that. So let me know what you think in the comments and if you have any suggestions for things you might like to see.

In this book review I will give star ratings to four categories and I will write a little about each one. I will try to keep it as spoiler free as possible. I hope you enjoy my book review.

The Way of All Flesh Plot:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

This novel throws you into the plot as soon as it begins, the first chapter is an intriguing hook that propelled me through the reading of this book. There were so many tiny details that were thread throughout the text which tied together and made sense when the mystery, and the killer, was finally revealed. I did end up guessing who the killer was before the end but with this book it didn’t matter too much because the story was so engaging anyway.

The Way of All Flesh Characters:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

With this book I had the feeling that I wasn’t going to like the two main characters, and at the start I really didn’t. I thought the male character was obnoxious and very unlikeable and the main female character was the same. She did not like that the male character was judging her because she was a servant and a woman, yet she automatically judged him just because he was richer than her and a man. It took a while to get past my feelings on this but by the end of the book I liked the characters more.

The Way of All Flesh Writing and Dialogue:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

This book is set in the Victorian Era and thankfully the writing reflects this very well. It was clear and matched both the setting and the characters in the way that it should.

The Way of All Flesh Overall:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I gave this book four stars overall because I enjoyed reading it and I am looking forward to reading the next two in the series.

Blurb/Synopsis:

A vivid and gripping historical crime novel set in 19th century Edinburgh, from husband-and-wife writing team Chris Brookmyre and Marisa Haetzman.

Edinburgh, 1847. City of Medicine, Money, Murder.

Young women are being discovered dead across the Old Town, all having suffered similarly gruesome ends. In the New Town, medical student Will Raven is about to start his apprenticeship with the brilliant and renowned Dr Simpson.

Simpson’s patients range from the richest to the poorest of this divided city. His house is like no other, full of visiting luminaries and daring experiments in the new medical frontier of anaesthesia. It is here that Raven meets housemaid Sarah Fisher, who recognises trouble when she sees it and takes an immediate dislike to him. She has all of his intelligence but none of his privileges, in particular his medical education.

With each having their own motive to look deeper into these deaths, Raven and Sarah find themselves propelled headlong into the darkest shadows of Edinburgh’s underworld, where they will have to overcome their differences if they are to make it out alive.

That’s it for this book review, I hope you all enjoyed it!