This week has been hectic and because of my eye I have been finding that by about 4.00pm my good eye is getting tired too and it is all getting blurry!  I have still got my cold and cough that started the second day after the eye Op and then Fiancée got it and also Little Lady too!  It has also been very hectic with work both ours and Eldest’s and then to top the week off our dishwasher decided to stop working!  The engineer came on Thursday and ordered the parts we need and coming back this  Thursday to fix it!  Out of all the machines we have my dishwasher is not a problem but a machine I cannot cope without is my washing machine!  That decided to have a conniption fit last night and not drain but DH managed to get it working again!!!! 

Anyway it is Book Club Friday, on Tuesday, sorry!  Because of my eye Op and not being able to read or do anything for five days except have my head down resting on my arm I did untilise my audio book app alot and got through eight books.  Some were great, some were good and a few were awful!

***** – My Five Star Reards

“Murder at Maple Grange” By Jane Bettany – Another book in the Violet Brewster Mysteries.  A Murder takes place at the very exclusive retirement home near Violet’s village and the residents ask her to help them find out who did it.  These books are really easy to read and very much in the cosy mystery section. So far there are five in the series but I believe there is a new one being published later this year.

“The Curfew” By T.M. Logan – This author is new to me and Jayne picked one of his books for our Book Club and it was good.  Mr Logan actually lives in my home town of Nottingham and sets quite a few of his stories there and I know the areas his characters are talking about in the stories.  This book starts out with Connor who goes out with friends to celebrate the end of his exams but his parents, Andy & Laura say he needs to be home by Midnight!  Andy checks at 2.00am and sees his son asleep in his bed and all is right with the World.  In the morning he gets a call from his brother that his son is missing and this starts a train of events which lead to five teenagers going into the local woods that night but only four came back out!  Curfews are fine until they are missed.  

It is a twisty thriller with the parents of the teenagers involved trying to support their children but find out what happened in the woods that night.  There is no blood, guts and gore in this it just shows how parents have to navigate parenting almost adult children who really do need their parents, even if they think they do not.

“The Soul Killer” By Ross Greenwood – I came across one of Ross Greenwood’s books on BookBeat and it was a D.I. Barton novel.  D.I. Barton has been on the force for a long time and in charge of the serious crimes squad.  He likes the people who work under him and also likes training the new Detectives assigned to his squad.  He has a happy home life with a wife, Holly, who is always trying to get him fit. 

The latest case is not a murder but a suicide but there is something about it that Barton is just not sure about. Another case which appears like an accident but Barton’s intuition tells him that it is not an accident but these two things affect one family then some remains are found and Barton and the team move in to to make an arrest thinking they have solved it, but things begin to happen and one of the team becomes the next Soul to be targeted by the killer.  

“The Dream Home” By T.M. Logan – Mr Logan again!  Adam & Jess move from their small home in the suburbs to a wonderful Victorian villa in the exclusive area of Nottingham called The Park.  It has three floors as well as a cellar and a wonderful garden right in the middle of the city which they wanted for themselves and their three children.  However the home needs renovating and whilst doing so Adam finds a hidden room and in that room are some unusal items which make no sense.  Adam loves a puzzle and starts to find out about the items, however somone has been watching and waiting to see if these items were ever found and now that they have been they will do anything to keep them from seeing the light of day.

Another good twisty thriller from Mr Logan and with a twist in the tail you do not see coming!

“The Astral Library” By Kate Quinn – My final five star read.  I love a book about books and this one did not disappoint.  Alexandria Watson, Alix for short, has spent her life surviving after her mother abandoned her as a young girl to the foster system.  She is living on the sofa at a friends apartment, has a job at the local coffee shop which she hates and the job she loves as a helper at the Boston Library she only gets a few shifts at.  Reading is her escape from her life and when she is fired from her coffee shop job and then asked to leave her friend’s apartment she escapes to the Boston Library where she also finds trouble!  To escape and give her a little peace and quiet Alix goes through a door which she thinks is to a reading room but finds herself in another Library, one where the books are moving in and out of their slots.  She meets the Librarian who is like no other and is offered the chance to live in a book and be in the story however which book will she choose?

The story goes on from there and is good.  The characters are complex but likeable and although you think the story is going one way it does go in another.  I would like to say that I am hoping for a second book and follow the story from the end but who knows.

*** – My Three Star Reads

“Beautiful Ugly” By Alice Feeney – Author Grady Green’s new book is going to be a New York Times best seller and is waiting for the call. His wife Abby is on her way home to celebrate and on a call to Grady when she sees an accident and stops to help.  Abby never gets back in to her car and in fact disappears never to be seen again!  Grady goes into a tail spin and one year later decides to move to a Scottish island to try and get his career back on track but when he arrives he sees a woman who looks just like his wife.  Is it Abby or someone who  just looks like her?

The story was okay but similar to her other book I read.  The characters were weird which then made the story weird and the ending was, well weird!!  I don’t think I will be reading any further Alice Feeney books!

“Amnesia” By L.J. Ross- Two women are in a coma both of whom are special to Dr. Alexander Gregory.   He wants to help both women survive but there is a manhunt for notorious felon Carl Deere who is suspected in both womens conditions.  However what Dr. Gregory does not know is that one of the women is a killer, in retribution for a murder which happened years before, but who is it and can Gregory help?

It was okay, hence the three starrs, but I was not invested in the characters and there is a long of “talking” between the characters without moving the story forward.  I did finish the book but I was not impressed with it.

* – My One Star Read

“What Happened At No. 13” By Saskia Sarginson – I did finish this book but then wished I had DNF’d it because it really was not good!  Rosie inherits No. 13 from her Grandmother but the house is a wreck as it has not been maintained.  This house is also where her parents died and because of the Trust the house cannot be sold.  Rosie moves in but to make ends meet and try and repair the house she needs to take in lodgers.  The two people who rent the rooms have an agenda each and it is to get Rosie out of the house by any means possible.

This book was over-hyped and recommended by everyone and his dog it seems and yet the story was boring and the characters not likeable at all.  I did get to the end of it but it was more out of how is this going to end but not in an excited way.  The ending was also flat.  I will not be reading any more of her books!

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Having my Audio Book subscription saved me during the head down section of my recovery from my eye Op and although some people say that listening to an Audio Book is not reading I beg to differ, especially for someone who is blind and although may be able to use Braille I am sure the joy of just sitting back and listening to a story is priceless.  Of course it also reminds us of childhood when we had stories read to us before we could read!

I hope you find a book here that you would like to try and I will be back later in the month with some other book related posts.  I also, tomorrow, have some quilting to show you!  I know don’t faint!  I have gifted the two quilts now so can show you what I have been working on for the last six to eight months!  They are not small quilts I hasten to add; one was a King size quilt and the other was a double bed quilt so definitely large!!!

Happy Tuesday you lovely lot.  Hugs & Love, Susie & Coco xx

Who doesn’t love an excuse to buy more books?  Today is World Book Day and our Boys always loved it at Primary School dressing up as their favourite characters from books.  A lot of the time it was Harry Potter, who dominated their early reading.  Eldest thoroughly enjoyed “The Famous Five” books by Enid Blyton and went once as “Julian” and Youngest did go as Indiana Jones once, although a film character they did bring out some books too!

Chatsworth House put out a post today, for World Book Day, about what they call their curation works during the closure of the house.   One big job is to take every book off the library shelf one at a time and dust it thoroughly and put it back in its place.  That doesn’t sound too bad until you realise that there are 17,000 books in the Library itself!  We have 1240 in our sitting room and we do take them all off the shelves and dust them and the shelves when I am doing the Spring Cleaning and it always takes longer than we expect! However you can tell when it has been done.  

I am still listening to my audio books as my eye is not working yet and the right eye is getting tired because of my working so I am not able to read yet, which is why I am so glad I have my subscription to BookBeat.  

Tomorrow I am at Eldest’s to catch up on his work and then Saturday evening DH and I are at a swimming event and then Sunday we have some home jobs to do.  The weather today has been very Spring like and it feels like Spring itself may not be far behind!  At the moment March is coming in like a Lamb so it will be going out like a Lion!  Happy Thursday you lovely lot. 

Hugs & Love, Susie & Coco xx