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Today is my stop on the blogtour for Death at The Gates by Katie Gayle, thank you to Sarah Hardy from Bookouture for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.

Pages: 248

Synopsis: Hurlingham House school is a high-achiever’s heaven, full of happy, hard-working pupils. There’s just the small matter of the dead body on the field… Sounds like a case for Epiphany Bloom!

When Epiphany Bloom’s best friend’s sister Claire is accused of trading exam papers for money, Epiphany agrees to see Ms Peters, the headteacher of Claire’s fiercely competitive school, to provide moral support. Claire has always been a model student and is loudly protesting her innocence: surely it’s all just a misunderstanding.

But when Ms Peters hears about Epiphany’s previous sleuthing exploits, she enlists her help to track down the true culprit!

Taking a job as a PE teacher, Epiphany soon realises she has plenty of suspects for the exam scam mastermind. The broke young teacher with a shady past? The father willing to buy his daughter anything – including grades? The school governor desperate to keep Hurlingham House at the top of the ranks?

Then Epiphany finds one of them dead at the school fair, and it becomes clear someone is taking the cut-throat culture of the school too literally – and when mysterious accidents start happening around her too, it seems the killer knows she’s onto them.

Can Epiphany solve the murder as well as clearing Claire’s name, before she becomes the next victim? This is one test she can’t afford to fail…

A charming and totally addictive cozy mystery with a hilarious and warm-hearted heroine. A must-read for fans of M.C. Beaton, Lee Strauss and Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum series.

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧.5

My Thoughts: I absolutely love the Epiphany Bloom series, this is book 3 and was just such a delight.

This one didn’t feel as intense or action packed as the others but part of me appreciated that because although it was the same premise as the others it made this feel different, it was slower paced and more easy going but with a very serious undertone like the other two!

There are small issues like cheating in exams and expulsion from school but soon escalates to hostage taking and murder? – poor Pip just can’t do things by halves, does trouble just follow her around?

With all the old favourites returning this was heartwarming and felt like I was back with old friends ❤️

I loved the flirtatious banter between Pip and a couple of the other characters, I won’t mention who just incase you haven’t read them, but let me just say that I wish she would just make up her mind 😂

I adore the covers of these books too, they’re colourful and eye catching and definitely just make me want to pick them up!

I cannot wait to see where the 4th book in this series takes us ☺️

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Today is my stop on the blog tour for Dog Rose Dirt by Jen Williams, thank you to Anne at Random Things Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.

Pages: 400

Synopsis: A convicted murderer with a story to tell

Serial killer Michael Reave – known as The Red Wolf – has been locked in Belmarsh Prison for over 20 years for the brutal and ritualistic murders of countless women.

A grieving daughter with a secret to unearth

Ex-journalist Heather Evans returns to her childhood home after her mother’s inexplicable suicide and discovers something chilling – hundreds of letters between her mother and Reave, dating back decades.

A hunt for a killer ready to strike again

When the body of a woman is found decorated with flowers, just like his victims, Reave is the only person alive who could help. After years of silence, he will speak to Heather, and only Heather.

If she wants to unearth the truth and stop further bloodshed, she’ll have to confront a monster.

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts: This book completely took over my life whilst I was reading it, Everything about it just instantly drew me in and made it impossible to focus on anything else!

I really felt that the topic of suicide was dealt with with compassion thought towards the victim and the reader, as someone who has lost friends to suicide it was appreciated and made think that maybe this was something the author herself had dealt with in the past.

We’re following Heather, who following the tragic death of her mother had returned to the family home to clear up some of her things and also maybe try and get some answers as to why her mum would end her own life, after all she’s known her her whole life and although their relationship wasn’t ideal or perfect in any way, she had no idea that her mum was feeling so low.

It’s whilst getting her mother’s things together that she stumbles upon some letters from a very well known convicted serial killer, Michael Reave. The correspondence goes back years and it seems they knew each other quite well, could her mum have been hiding a double life?

Not long after Heather returns, dead bodies are being found in ways very similar to the way Michael’s victims were found all those years ago, so Heather takes her newly discovered letters to the police in the hopes that it will help then with their investigation and maybe even help her get the answers she needs at the same time!

I’m not doing the best job of selling the story and for that I apologise but please trust me when I tell you that it was gripping, tense, haunting, full of twists and turns and something very different to any kind of thriller I have read before!

I didn’t see the ending coming at all, but once it’s revealed it all kind of falls into place and makes all the little niggles I had whilst reading make sense!

I can’t wait to see what Jen comes up with next, one thing is for sure, I will definitely be picking it up!

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Today is my stop on the blogtour for The Interview Chain by Lynn Farley-Rose, thank you to Zoé at Zooloos book tours for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy

Pages: 277

Synopsis: Everyone has something interesting to say if you take the time to listen.
The Interview Chain is a series of conversations—each interviewee was asked to nominate someone they admire as the next link.

Starting from a casual conversation on a boat on the Thames, the chain wended its way for over 23,000 miles, alighting on three continents and gathering up personal perspectives on issues that really matter in the world today.

The interviewees include a theatre director, a rabbi, a philanthropist, a sculptor, a New York Mayoral candidate, a pioneering documentary maker, and a man who rescues giant trees.
Some have worked in challenging places—Kabul in the time of the Taliban, a Romanian orphanage, immigration detention centres, remote Indian villages—while others have found themselves caught up in extraordinary situations such as the Rwandan genocide, the Ferguson uprising, and the UN Climate Change Negotiations.

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧🐧

My thoughts: this is going to be a really hard book to review because I can’t actually tell you anything about it without ruining the experience, but let me tell you that I loved it, I loved the idea of it, the way it was executed and the overall reading experience!

I was fascinated by the fact that everyone’s experience with life was totally different but somehow they were all linked, just by being recommended by the last person in the chain! – it opened my eyes to a lot of occupations that I never really give any thought to, you just know they exist but don’t really know what they do, they’re just always their, like priests or a nurse from the NHS.

It’s true what it says in the synopsis everyone has something interesting to say if you just take the time to listen or read!

I thoroughly enjoyed the book & actually read it in 2 sittings, it would have been one of work hadn’t got in the way!

I appreciate that this book isn’t for everyone and I won’t lie and say that all of the individual interviews interested me because they didn’t, but I still took the time to read them because they’d been kind enough to give their time and experiences for the book, and let’s be honest the chain would’ve been broken if I hadn’t!

I recommend this to all fans of non-fiction especially those who like to read about people’s life stories or experiences ☺️

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Today I’m on the blog tour for a invite me in by Emma Curtis, thank you to Anne at Random Things Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part & thank you to the author for my copy.

Pages: 410

Synopsis; To those who think they know her, Eliza Curran has it all: two healthy children, a stunning home and a wealthy, adoring husband. No one would guess the reality of her life: trapped in an unhappy marriage to a controlling man, she longs for a way out.

When she takes on a new tenant, her life changes unexpectedly. Dan Jones is charming and perceptive, and quickly becomes a close friend to the whole family.

But Dan’s arrival threatens to tip Eliza’s fragile world out of balance. And when someone has as many secrets as Eliza does, the smallest slip could destroy everything . . .

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts; I love a thriller that grips you straight away and just doesn’t let go and this book did exactly that, the twists and turns just didn’t stop!

We’re following Eliza who is currently renovating their latest house ready to put on the market, with just 2 weeks to go until it’s ready a stranger turns up at the door claiming he was looking for somewhere to rebuild and could he be cheeky and have a quick look before it gets put on the open market, reluctantly Eliza agrees, knowing it will make her late, knowing that Martin won’t be happy and that she will pay for it when she gets home.

Martin is in wheelchair after a horrific accident a few years ago, which sometimes makes him feel inadequate as a person and a father so has to assert his dominance in other ways normally using his words and his fists, he like Eliza to be the perfect little wife and he likes to know where she is at all times even going as far as putting a tracker on her phone…

Things start falling apart when Dan moves into the apartment and both he and Eliza start having feelings for each other, but the snag is that Dan is also seeing Eliza’s au pair to “keep up appearances”

The secret about Dan and Eliza comes out at a family party after Eliza who is a recovering alcoholic has far too many drinks, kisses Dan in one of the rooms and gets caught by the Au Pair!

What follows is tense, gripping and a story that leaves you not knowing which way to turn but staying strapped in for the ride because you just need to know where it’s going!

There was so many layers to the story that every time we peel one away there’s another one to decipher!

This is the second book by Emma that I’ve read and the second 5 star read!

Well worth a read to any fans of a psychological thriller that is near impossible to put down!

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Today is my stop on the blog tour for Hope Nicely’s Lessons for life, thank you to Tracy at Compulsive Readers for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.

Pages: 464

Synopsis: I don’t have any friends, only dog ones, because they don’t make you do bad things. I don’t want any human friends, actually. It’s for the best.’

Hope Nicely hasn’t had an easy life.

But she’s happy enough living at 23 Station Close with her mum, Jenny Nicely, and she loves her job, walking other people’s dogs. She’s a bit different, but as Jenny always tells her, she’s a rainbow person, a special drop of light.

It’s just . . . there’s something she needs to know. Why did her birth mother abandon her in a cardboard box on a church step twenty-five years ago? And did she know that drinking while pregnant could lead to Hope being born with Foetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder?

In a bid to find her birth mother and the answers to these questions, Hope decides to write her autobiography. Despite having been bullied throughout school, Hope bravely joins an evening class where Hope will not only learn the lessons of writing, but will also begin to discover more about the world around her, about herself and even make some (human) friends.

But when Jenny suddenly falls ill, Hope realises there are many more lessons to come . . .

Hope Nicely’s Lessons for Life is a heartwarming, coming-of-age novel about loneliness, friendship, acceptance and, above all, hope.

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts: well, this book was an absolute joy to read, it made me laugh, it made me cry, it made me cringe and it made me want to hold Hope right and never let her go.

When it comes to the writing style and Hopes voice although I totally understood why it was written the way it was, it did take a lot of getting used to, but once I was there it made the story feel more real and genuine.

The story deals with a lot of hard hitting topics, and there were times when I thought I’d have to put it down, but I kept on going and I am SO GLAD I did,

How do you deal with the worst days of your life when you take things literally and struggle to process your emotions in the way that everyone else is telling you too? – stick with Hope and she will show you how.

This has to be one of my favourite reads of the year and gave me serious Eleanor Oliphant vibes and I will be recommending it to anyone possible.

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Today I’m on the blog tour for Marrying The Heiress by Autumn Miller, thank you to Kelly at Love Books Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you to the author for my copy.

Pages: 267

Synopsis: Marrying The Heiress is a standalone, enemies-to-lovers romance featuring a smoking hot guy, steamy bedroom-scenes, and a happily ever after.

Kate
I didn’t expect to inherit a multi-million pound estate – especially under dubious circumstances – but I’ve only ever wanted to be financially secure.
For years I’ve been cast out from my family, desperately scraping together a living, trying to find some self-worth in the process.
But the rightful heir – Will Dawlish – hates my guts.
He wants his inheritance back.
A-Daw-rable Dawlish, the papers call him. Dee-Lish Dawlish.
But even though he’s distractingly handsome and adored by the country as a cricketing legend, he’s emotionally bankrupt.
The prenup demands that I sleep with him, and I just know that there will be sparks. That born from his hate will be a sizzling chemistry that will be impossible to ignore.

Will
I just want my grandfather’s inheritance back. I’ve got big plans to realise, and Kate Parsons has utterly derailed them.
After pursuing her through my lawyers, I’m left with one brazen plan.
Marrying her is the only option.
It makes good business sense; the divorce will be clean and tidy, my finances restored.
There will be nothing romantic between us because there’s absolutely nothing to like about Kate Parsons.
Not her lies, her mysteries, nor her blatant thievery.
And when she walks down the aisle towards me, I refuse to be moved by her graceful beauty.
I don’t want to notice her dazzling smile.
All I need to focus on is the next twelve months. Except, I also have to meet a stipulation of the prenup: consummating this marriage.

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts: I absolutely adored this book, the writing style flowed easily but drew you in straight away, before I knew it I was 100 pages in!

I have to saw William Dawlish Senior was my favourite, as much as I knew he was going to die I was absolutely devastated when I’d happened, I don’t know if it’s because we’ve had a couple of bereavements in our family but it actually made me shed a tear!

Enemies to lovers is one of my favourite tropes within romance so I devoured this and loved every second of it!

I loved Will and Kate as separate characters, Will was cocky, entitled and selfish and as much as I wanted to hate him there was just something about him that made it impossible to hate him, so when he started showing his softer side, I knew I’d need right not to write him off straight away!

Kate was warm-hearted, caring and always put others before herself, so when we found out about her life and living arrangements my heart broke for her and I couldn’t help but feel that she deserved the inheritance 😂

I couldn’t help but feel that although they acted like they hated each other the attraction had been there for both of them from the start! I felt that Will was too embarrassed to admit, more worried about what his friends would think instead of what his words and actions were doing to Kate, whereas Kate felt that she wasn’t beautiful or deserving enough to be loved by someone like Will!

Experiencing them getting closer was frustrating in the best way possible, I just wanted to shake them both & sort them out, you could cut the tension with a knife.

The length of this book was perfect for me too, I prefer my romances to be short and snappy, although that being said I wouldn’t be opposed to a second book from their perspective 🤷🏻‍♀️😂

I would highly recommend this to all fans of a steamy romance.

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I’m on the blog tour today for The Lucky Eight by Shelia Bugler, for those eagle eyed among you, the poster isn’t wrong I’m posting a day late! – thank you to Kelly at Love Books Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part & thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.

Pages: 277

Synopsis: When the plane crashed, 160 people perished. Now someone is killing off the survivors.
Five years ago, a horrific airline disaster made headlines around the world. On the anniversary of the fatal crash, a number of those who were spared gather to mark the occasion. By morning, Nick Gilbert, a celebrity chef and one of the party, lies dead. Detective Rachel Lewis leads the investigation and within days another survivor is stabbed to death. It seems certain that a killer is targeting the lucky eight.

Clodagh Kinsella recovered from the injuries she sustained in the crash, but lost her sister that day. The bereavement shared by Clodagh and her sister’s husband led them to a romance of their own. Yet lately, Clodagh knows something isn’t right. As the noose tightens on the group and Rachel comes across more questions than answers, it’s only a matter of time before Clodagh will have to face the consequences of a mistake she made before the plane went down…

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts; the synopsis of this book drew me in straight away, it just really intrigued me!

The 8 survivors of a plane crash that killed 160 others meet up once a year on the anniversary of the plane crash to remember the ones who didn’t survive but also celebrate their survival – normally these get togethers go without a hitch, but this time one of them is found dead on the beach, did he fall off the edge, or was he murdered?

The story is told from 2 different perspectives, one from Clodagh who is one of the survivors and the one who found the victim and the other from Rachel who is the lead detective in the investigation, although I appreciated both sides, I did find myself getting lost in the story more within Clodaghs chapters!

I loved that Clodagh was convinced that she held the answer to what had happened that night and why, if only she could remember! She had problems with her memory which were caused by the crash, but she starts getting flashbacks of not only that night but of the day of the crash too, can she piece them all together before someone else gets hurt?

None of the survivors knew who they could trust or where to turn, they’re left constantly doubting eachother and the guests that some of the survivors brought with them – is the killer among them or is it someone else entirely?

At times I did find myself getting a little muddled with all the different characters, but I think that was more my issue than anything the author did wrong.

This was a good solid thriller, with short snappy chapters which are my fave, it’s one that I highly recommend although it may make you think twice about getting on a plane for a while 😂

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Today is my stop on the blog tour for Cyprus Kiss by Murray Bailey, The amazing prequel to the Ash Carter series, thank you to Murray for organising it and inviting me to take part.

Synopsis: Help Me!
Those were the words on the back of a woman’s photograph. And she vanished six months ago.
It’s 1948 and military investigator Ash Carter has arrived in Cyprus.
A gang has been operating for two years, leaving a mark known to police as the kiss of death. Is this something to do with them? And why ask him for help?
After a murder, Carter begins to realise this is personal. In a race against time, Carter must work out the connection between the gang, the missing woman and the murder before it’s too late.

Pages: 321

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts: I adored this, I’ve loved the Ash Carter series so the thought of a series about how he became the Ash Carter we all know and loved was so exciting!

This had all the best bits of the Ash Carter series with added element of his youth and his inexperience which made him seem naive but almost cocky at times!

As always this book gripped me instantly and I was almost turning the pages quicker than I could read the words, I just needed to get to the bottom of the mystery, does the woman in the photo need help or so someone trying to test Ash?

He shows how clever and cunning he is, whilst trying his best to stick to the rules he’s been given, but when it looks like his girlfriend is being framed for the murder all the rules go out of the window!

I cannot wait to see where the story takes us next!

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Today I have a cover reveal for you and it’s adorable! – but before I show you, let me tell you a little about the book and the author!

Synopsis: What would you do if you found the world’s smallest dog?

When Ernie and his family leave the countryside to move to the city. Ernie feels like he’ll never settle into their new home.

Yet on his very first night, a surprising new friend introduces himself – Swop is a very tiny dog. A dog that just happens to be the size of a satsuma.

Ernie vows to keep Swop a secret, but Swop has other ideas and he’s determined to make Ernie’s first day at his new school a memorable one!

About The Author: An ex-primary school teacher and Teacher of the Deaf. I now run a small educational company, specialising in arranging book projects and theatre events for schools and families. I live with my husband, our three children and our three dogs in Ealing, London. Yet the one in charge is our little ex-street dog, even though he has no eyes and three legs. He also happens to be called Swop!

Are you ready to see the cover?!

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Isn’t it cute?! – I don’t have children myself but I do think all the children I have in my life would love this!

If you like the look of the cover and the sound of the book it can be bought here… don’t forget to come back and tell me what you and your little ones thought!

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Today is my stop on the audio blog tour for Mimic by Daniel Cole, thank you to Tracy at Compulsive readers for organising it and inviting me to take part & thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy

Before I start, let me just say that after experiencing 2 family bereavements in a very short space of time, one still less than 2 weeks ago I am still struggling to get my thoughts in order, so please forgive me if this review seems ranty or falls flat in any way.

Synopsis:

1989
DS Benjamin Chambers and DC Adam Winter are on the trail of a twisted serial killer with a passion for recreating the world’s greatest works of art through the bodies of his victims. But after Chambers almost loses his life, the case goes cold – their killer lying dormant, his collection unfinished.

1996
Jordan Marshall has excelled within the Metropolitan Police Service, fuelled by a loss that defined her teenage years. Obsessed, she manages to obtain new evidence, convincing both Chambers and Winter to revisit the case. However, their resurrected investigation brings about a fresh reign of terror, the team treading a fine line between police officers and vigilantes in their pursuit of a monster far more dangerous and intelligent than any of them had anticipated…

Pages: 311

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts: I really enjoyed this story, it drew me in quite quickly, the writing flowed easily and I really enjoyed the humour of the story with the very serious undertone!

I’ve never read a book with a story line quite like this, murders are being committed and the bodies are being left looking like famous sculptures, so death has become art, it gave me the creeps and fascinated me at the same time.

It seems like DS Chambers and DC Winters just keep hitting brick walls when it comes to trying to solve the case, they’re both getting frustrated and give it one last ditch attempt which ends up with dire consequences for one of them?

The case is ‘forgotten’ for 7 years before being picked up by new blood Jordan who manages to convince both Chambers and Winters to help her solve the case despite them both having new jobs! – they’re reluctant at first out soon the pull of the new evidence and the possibility of finally getting to the bottom of it proves too much!

Unfortunately in reopening the case they seem to have reawakened the murderer, can they get to the bottom of who started this awful new collection of art before it’s too late?

I thoroughly enjoyed the story and felt the audiobook added a whole new level too it making it feel more real, or had me laughing in places, whilst cringing and on the edge of my seat in others, this is my first dive into Daniels work and it’s left me eager to discover his previous books!

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