Month: July 2019

Recent Reads: Our Stop by Laura Jane Williams

Posted on by Pam

My review: ?????

Our Stop by Laura Jane Williams is a book that I was following the author on Instagram for about a year, and really enjoyed her take on things.

Our Stop is about Nadia and Daniel, who both take the same train (she tries, anyway) to work.  Daniel decides that a good way to meet a woman on a train is to put something in Missed Connections in the paper that everyone reads on the train.  

This is the story of their near misses as they nearly meet in a lot of different ways, and was one that I really enjoyed!  

If you liked The Flatshare by Beth O’Leary, then you’ll enjoy this!  I personally loved both!

Laura Jane Williams has written two non-fiction books, and this is her debut novel!  She’s currently working on her next book, but is finding the time to promote Our Stop, and tickets for these events have been going quickly!

Our Stop was published on Kindle on 6th June, and is coming out in paperback on 8th August,  and is available to buy or preorder on Amazon  and on Waterstones.  I’ve found a link to where you can search for local bookshops, including independent!


I was given this book for free in return for an unbiased review, so my thanks to NetGalley and to Avon Books UK (the publishers) for this book.

Check out my GoodReads profile to see more reviews!

Recent Reads: Season of Darkness by Cora Harrison

Posted on by Pam

My review: ???

Season of Darkness by Cora Harrison is a murder mystery, with Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins as the investigators.

These two authors get sucked into the crime as Dickens recognises the woman who is murdered as one of the young women who went to Urania Cottage, which was a home where women could improve themselves, and then emigrate to Australia, America, or South Africa, to make better lives for themselves.

I found the characters to be quite good, but I found them to be a little obsessive over the one idea of who committed the crime, which annoyed me, but being flawed is human.

Cora Harrison has written quite a few historical crime and historical romance novels, so if you like Season of Darkness you should probably have a look at her other books.

Season of Darkness was published on 1st July 2019,  and is available to buy on Amazon  and on Waterstones.  I’ve found a link to where you can search for local bookshops, including independent!

I was given this book for free in return for an unbiased review, so my thanks to NetGalley and to Severn House Publishers (the publishers) for this book.

Check out my GoodReads profile to see more reviews!

Recent Reads: I’ll Be Gone In The Dark by Michelle McNamara

Posted on by Pam

My rating: ?????

I’ll be gone in the dark is Michelle McNamara’s recounting of the Golden State Killer, which is the name she gave the East Area Rapist, who moved out of the East area, and started to kill people.  McNamara felt that he wasn’t being talked about as he didn’t have a catchy name.

As the book states, it is an obsessive search, and she does talk about that, but she also talks about the crimes, and the evidence.  All in all, it was a very well researched book, if you like true crime!


This was finished by friends of McNamara’s (Billy Jensen (investigative reporter) and Paul Haynes (researcher)), as she died writing the book.  Some credit her popularising the Golden State Killer leading to the arrest of Joseph DeAngelo in April 2018, who is going to stand trial for these crimes.

I found My Favorite Murder (MFM) podcast last year, and gobbled up over 200 episodes (they’re just coming up for 300 in total), and loved Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark’s frankness over their anxiety, mental health struggles, addiction, and how talking about true crime helps them!

Their book Stay Sexy and Don’t Get Murdered was out on 28th May this year, and they have live shows in London on 27th and 28th November this year! 

MFM have introduced me to so many true crimes I didn’t know existed, and then they mentioned “I’ll be gone in the Dark”, and hosted an event for it, and I knew that I had to read it!  Luckily for me, my library had a copy!

Billy Jensen (who helped to finish the book), and Paul Holes (criminalist, who was involved in the Golden State Killer case) have their own podcast now, called The Murder Squad, where they talk about true crimes that haven’t been solved, and ask for help from armchair investigators in solving them!  Episode 3 is about the Golden State Killer, if you’d like to listen to that!

I’ll be Gone in the Dark is available to buy on Amazon  and on Waterstones.  I’ve found a link to where you can search for local bookshops, including independent!

Check out my GoodReads profile to see more reviews!

Recent Reads: City of Girls by Elizabeth Gilbert

Posted on by Pam

My review: ?????

City of Girls by Elizabeth Gilbert is mostly set in 1940s New York, from the point of view of Vivian Morris, then a 19 year old, good at sewing, but we are told her story by 95 year old Vivian, set in the present day.

Vivian has had a boring upbringing, and is ready for adventure, so when she can go and live with her Aunt Peg, who owns a rundown theatre, in a run down part of New York, she is thrilled.  When they discover that she can sew, they make her the seamstress, and she is surrounded by the glamorous people of the theatre, and is soon going out on the town with them.

This was a very evocative story, with the characters enjoyable, and flawed.  I really enjoyed reading Vivian’s life story, even if there were moments when you wanted to reach into the book and shake her.

This was the first fiction book that I’ve read by Elizabeth Gilbert, but I have previously really enjoyed a couple of her non-fiction books; Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear, and the famous Eat, Pray, Love (I also really liked the film with Julia Roberts!).

City of Girls was published on 4th June 2019,  and is available to buy on Amazon  and on Waterstones.  I’ve found a link to where you can search for local bookshops, including independent!


I was given this book for free in return for an unbiased review, so my thanks to NetGalley and to Bloomsbury Publishing (the publishers) for this book.

Check out my GoodReads profile to see more reviews!

Recent Reads: This Brutal House by Niven Govinden

Posted on by Pam

My review: ???

This Brutal House by Niven Govinden is set in New York in 1980s/1990s, with a look at the balls drag queens would hold, think RuPaul’s Drag Race for the commentary as they each walk the floor, showing off their looks.

We also see a silent protest held outside City Hall, where drag mothers are sitting, waiting for someone to care enough to look into the disappearances of their drag children that has been going on for years.

I did find this an unusual read.  The story flows around the protest, and telling us about how life was, and I don’t think there was ever a conclusion, which is probably a telling fact that some things are still the same.

This book did make me think about the challenges of people being ‘other’, whether that is intelligent, gay, drag queen, or unhappy with their lives.  It was immersive, and I felt like there should be a play list to go with each chapter.


This Brutal House was published on 6th June 2019,  and is available to buy on Amazon  and on Waterstones.  I’ve found a link to where you can search for local bookshops, including independent!


I was given this book for free in return for an unbiased review, so my thanks to NetGalley and to Little, Brown Book Group (the publishers) for this book.

Check out my GoodReads profile to see more reviews!

Recent Reads: Swan Song by Kelleigh Greenberg-Jephcott

Posted on by Pam

My review: ????

Swan Song by Kelleigh Greenberg-Jephcott is about Truman Capote, and the glamorous high society women he called his Swans, and his betrayal of them.

Truman Capote loved gossip, and his Swans all told him secrets – theirs, and their friends, all of which they believed he would keep.  But, he used these women’s lives as grist for the writing mill, changing names but little else, and told some of their deepest darkest secrets in an extract for a book he was writing call Answered Prayers.  


Swan Song is a fictional re-telling, with some of the secrets, from the point of view of the women he betrayed, as a fictional chorus of ‘we’.  It has details about Truman Capote’s life, friendships and love.

I really enjoyed Swan Song as it had a good mix of shock, the sadness of betrayal, and the attempt to live after.  


I’ve not read anything by Truman Capote (don’t worry he’s on the list now!), and it’s funny that I’ve read a book about Harper Lee (Furious Hours, which I reviewed in May), and now about Capote as I never knew they were childhood friends, even if they did drift apart later in life.

This is Kelleigh Greenbery-Jephcott’s debut novel, and what a start as it was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2019!


Swan Song was published on 9th July 2019,  and is available to buy on Amazon  and on Waterstones.  I’ve found a link to where you can search for local bookshops, including independent!


I was given this book for free in return for an unbiased review, so my thanks to NetGalley and to Random House UK (the publishers) for this book.
Check out my GoodReads profile to see more reviews!