Liv’s Book Corner

  Synopsis: Amber and Toby and Barney and Kitty. The four Alton children spend every day of the hot Cornish summer playing games on sun-baked lawns or building dens in the dark woods. Endless days of laughter and fun, without an adult in sight. But no one can foresee the storm that will bring it all to a tragic end. Afterwards, Black Rabbit Hall, their home, with its endless corridors and ancient creaking clocks, is a twisted and changed place, set to steal the last vestiges of their childhood and innocence. A home that not all of the Altons will be strong enough to survive. Now, thirty years later, a message from one of the Alton children is discovered carved into an old oak tree. Could the tangled truth of that terrible summer finally creep into the light? Or should some secrets be left in the past for good? My Review: An emotional, twisty tale of family, love and grief set in the atmospheric grounds of Black Rabbit Hall. Two narratives, one past and one present, entwine througho...

  Synopsis: There was a woman at the heart of the Trojan War whose voice has been silent - until now. Discover the greatest Greek myth of all - retold by the witness that history forgot . . . Briseis was a queen until her city was destroyed. Now she is a slave to the man who butchered her husband and brothers. Trapped in a world defined by men, can she survive to become the author of her own story? My Review: A brutal and honest retelling of the Trojan War from Briseis’ perspective, as well as occasional chapters from Patroclus and Achilles’ points of view. This book is brilliantly written and I especially enjoyed the speech, written as common British dialect (‘piss’, ‘bloody’, ‘bugger’), which made the characters all the more human and all the more relatable. This novel does not hold back from including every gory and disturbing detail of the horrors of war, creating a bleak picture of the Trojan War, far from the colourful displays of glory that feature in other retellings. The S...

  Synopsis: Owen Pick’s life is falling apart. In his thirties, a virgin, and living in his aunt’s spare bedroom, he has just been suspended from his job as a geography teacher after accusations of sexual misconduct, which he strongly denies. Searching for professional advice online, he is inadvertently sucked into the dark world of incel—involuntary celibate—forums, where he meets the charismatic, mysterious, and sinister Bryn. Across the street from Owen lives the Fours family, headed by mom Cate, a physiotherapist, and dad Roan, a child psychologist. But the Fours family have a bad feeling about their neighbor Owen. He’s a bit creepy and their teenaged daughter swears he followed her home from the train station one night. Meanwhile, young Saffyre Maddox spent three years as a patient of Roan Fours. Feeling abandoned when their therapy ends, she searches for other ways to maintain her connection with him, following him in the shadows and learning more than she wanted to know abou...

  Synopsis: The remote Antarctic island of South Georgia is about to send off its last boat of the summer – which signifies safety to resident glaciologist Felicity Lloyd.   Felicity lives in fear – fear that her ex-husband Freddie will find her, even out here. She took a job on this isolated island to hide from him, but now that he's out of prison, having served a term for murder, she knows he won’t give up until he finds her.   But a doctor delving into the background of Felicity and Freddie's relationship, back in Cambridge, learns that Felicity has been on the edge for a long time. Heading to South Georgia himself to try and get to her first is the only way he can think of to help her. My Review: A good thriller with some great twists that I didn’t seen coming, and others that were blindingly obvious, set in the isolated polar island of South Georgia, as well as the picturesque city of Cambridge I enjoyed how the plot was separated into 4 parts, the first in present d...

  Synopsis: In the middle of the night, a woman wakes to find her beloved city engulfed in flames. Ten seemingly endless years of conflict between the Greeks and the Trojans are over. Troy has fallen. From the Trojan women whose fates now lie in the hands of the Greeks, to the Amazon princess who fought Achilles on their behalf, to Penelope awaiting the return of Odysseus, to the three goddesses whose feud started it all, these are the stories of the women embroiled in the legendary war. Powerfully told from an all-female perspective, in  A Thousand Ships  Natalie Haynes puts the women, girls and goddesses at the centre of the story. Review: “A war does not ignore half of the people whose lives it touches. So why do we?” A brilliant retelling of the Trojan War from the unique perspectives of all the women involved, some which you will have heard of and others which you will not. Compelling written from many different narratives that are all equally as interesting, to full...

  Synopsis: For fans of Karen McManus' One of Us is Lying and films like I Know What You Did Last Summer, comes a gripping thriller about murder, mystery, and deception. Blackmail lures Ava to the abandoned amusement park on Portgrave Pier. She is one of ten teenagers, all with secrets they intend to protect whatever the cost. When fog and magic swallow the pier, the group find themselves cut off from the real world. As the teenagers turn on each other, Ava will have to face up to the secret that brought her to the pier and decide how far she's willing to go to survive. The teenagers have only their secrets to protect and each other to betray. Review: A fast paced, twisty thriller that had me hooked, so much so that I devoured it in one day when I should be revising for my A Levels. I was expecting a murder mystery sort of book but the supernatural elements of this novel were something that I actually enjoyed, because the author managed to pull them off very well. The setting o...

  Synopsis: In  Traces , Professor Patricia Wiltshire will take you on a journey through the fascinating edgeland where nature and crime are intertwined.  She'll take you searching for bodies of loved ones - through woodlands, along hedgerows, field-edges, and through plantations - solving time since death, and disposal of remains, from ditches to living rooms. She will give you glimpses of her own history: her loves, her losses, and the narrow little valley in Wales where she first woke up to the wonders of the natural world. Pat will show you how her work with a microscope reveals tell-tale traces of the world around us, and how these have taken suspects of the darkest criminal activities to court. From flowers, fungi, tree trunks to car pedals, walking boots, carpets, and corpses' hair,  Traces  is a fascinating, unique, and utterly compelling book on life, death, and one's indelible link with nature. Review: Unfortunately I found this book incredibly boring ...

  Synopsis: This time the gossip columnists have it wrong. London’s most elusive bachelor Anthony Bridgerton hasn’t just decided to marry—he’s even chosen a wife! The only obstacle is his intended’s older sister, Kate Sheffield—the most meddlesome woman ever to grace a London ballroom. The spirited schemer is driving Anthony mad with her determination to stop the betrothal, but when he closes his eyes at night, Kate’s the woman haunting his increasingly erotic dreams... Contrary to popular belief, Kate is quite sure that reformed rakes do not make the best husbands—and Anthony Bridgerton is the most wicked rogue of them all. Kate’s determined to protect her sister—but she fears her own heart is vulnerable. And when Anthony’s lips touch hers, she’s suddenly afraid she might not be able to resist the reprehensible rake herself... Review: I loved this book so much. It was so much more passionate and emotional than the first novel and the characters were much more likeable as well. Ant...

  Synopsis: By all accounts,   Simon Basset is on the verge of proposing to his best friend’s sister, the lovely—and almost-on-the-shelf—   Daphne Bridgerton. But the two of them know the truth—it’s all an elaborate plan to keep Simon free from marriage-minded society mothers. And as for Daphne, surely she will attract some worthy suitors now that it seems a duke has declared her desirable. But as Daphne waltzes across ballroom after ballroom with Simon, it’s hard to remember that their courtship is a complete sham. Maybe it’s his devilish smile,  certainly  it’s the way his eyes seem to burn every time he looks at her… but somehow Daphne is falling for the dashing duke… for real! And now she must do the impossible and convince the handsome rogue that their clever little scheme deserves a slight alteration, and that nothing makes quite as much sense as falling in love… My Review: I decided to pick up the first two books after watching the second series of B...