Silent Kill

Based in Sydney after the Second World War, PI Cliff Hardy’s work has slowed down a bit. Then he is hired by the owner of a speakers’ agency as bodyguard to his client Rory O’Hara, a whistle-blower with a lot of enemies. There is also the suggestion of an inside leak in the entourage of the reformer who is doing a lecture tour by bus in numerous important cities in NSW. O’Hara is ready to spill even more beans on the corruption prevalent in the building industry and those, including several politicians, who profit from it
It sounds like an easy job, but things start to go wrong almost immediately: a woman on the tour is found dead and Cliff is out of a job. Her brother approaches him and offers him a good deal of money to find out who killed her and why. o with no other offers forthcoming, Cliff, of course, accepts.
He starts with the group of people on the tour and soon discovers there’s much more here than meets the eye. His constant searching puts both he and a woman he’s fallen for, in danger. As he moves across the country, he also realizes that someone is pulling a lot of strings — but exactly who and why is what he must find out.
Silent Kill is not a difficult book to read due to the author’s very simple writing style. The story takes a convoluted path but is easy to follow, and plausible, and it becomes a hybrid mystery/thriller that kept me turning pages. Although the murderer is identified before the end of part one, and that piece of the mystery is solved, there remains Hardy’s other problem; who was so worried about what O’Hara might do with his recent information that they set a killer in his midst to silence him?
I recommend Silent Kill and all of Peter Corris’ other Cliff Hardy books – note this is No. 39.






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Blood Trail

I read this book 12 months ago but it still haunts me. I had read of the poachers in and around game reserves in South Africa. Tony Park an Australian who has property close to a reserve, brings the problems of poaching close to us.

Mia Greenaway is a tracker and a safari host in the Sabi Sand Game Reserve in South Africa. Since COVID-19 has taken over the world, Mia and the company she works for take their safaris online. While broadcasting to the world, a rhino is killed which exposes how bad the rhino poaching has become. But while chasing him the poacher disappears without a trace. But how? Are they using traditional African magic?
Policewoman, Captain Sannie van Rensburg is mourning the recent loss of her husband, but she keeps on working through her grief. Sannie is sent out on a police investigation to find two girls missing from a nearby village. It is feared that these two girls have been abducted for the use of traditional medicine practices.
When another girl goes missing, Mia and Sannie’s missions become linked. They must work together to find the missing girls and also to understand how these poachers disappear into thin air.
The plot had plenty of twists and turns, set in the time of Covid. And as Covid is still ongoing, I think back to the start of 2020 when no one knew what was happening and businesses had to adapt to survive. I hadn’t thought of how the African safaris were affected with borders closed in many places around the world.
The description of the scenes makes one think you could be there, and the sprinkling of local phrases makes it seem more authentic. And the inclusion of traditional African magic added a whole new side to the plot. There’s plenty to think about in this and all of Tony Park’s books. I thoroughly recommend it.

The Dictionary of Lost Words

This is a book I read several months ago, even possibly a year, but for some reason I didn’t write a review

This is the perfect book for anyone who enjoys historical fiction and loves words. That describes me perfectly.

A fictional story based on fact, it tells how the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary was compiled. A team of lexicographers sat day after day in a garden shed, the Scriptorium, gathering, discussing and interpreting words. Hundreds of people responded to Professor James Murray’s call asking interested members of the reading public to scour published literature for quotations to illustrate the use of English words.

In this book, we are told the words were stored on slips of paper in wooden pigeon holes. As they worked on each letter of the alphabet the word was taken out and the meaning of it was discussed and disputed endlessly until there was agreement on its definition(s).

We are introduced to the fictional Esme. Esme’s father is one of Dr. Murray’s most trusted lexicographers, working on the dictionary. She grew up while sitting under a table in the Scriptorium, listening to her father and the others talking about words and understanding the power of words.  As a word on a piece of paper slips off the end of the table, she catches it and saves it. When she questions what happens to the words that are left out, she is told, “If there isn’t enough information about them, they’re discarded.”

As she gets older, she also starts working on the dictionary. First running errands, but eventually being given more responsibilities.

Through Esme, we follow the day to day work of the lexicographers, spend time with the Suffragettes and Women’s Suffrage Movement, and eventually experience some of the horrors of the First World War. Esme is a fictional character but I am sure many women who lived through that time lived a life such as hers.

I really enjoyed the book and as usual with this author, I am amazed at the depth of her research. The writing was smooth, the characters charming and the story was intriguing

I recommend this book if you love words and historical fiction.

The Keeper of Hidden Books

I have recently been reading novels set during the Second World War, particularly about librarians and their involvement.

I talked about some of the historical novels I have enjoyed and about The Librarian Spy by Madeline Martin in an earlier blogpost. And I have read her next book, published in August this year and called The Keeper of Hidden Books.  I am still reeling from this book weeks after I finished reading it.

It is set in Warsaw during WWII.   Early in the war Poland and its people were sure that help would come from either the Soviets or the Allies convincing them that the war for their country would be quickly over.  Unfortunately, no help arrived and the war dragged on.

The book is set in Warsaw, and we meet Zofia and her best friend Janina a young Jew.  They have been friends since early childhood and are inseparable.  They both work in the main library while still attending the final term at school.  With a few close friends, the girls start a book group with the plan to read the books that Hitler had banned.

Soon after the Nazis arrive antisemitism begins to flourish.  Many Jews are loaded up into vans and deported to who knows where.  Janina and her family are moved into the ghetto where living becomes more and more difficult for the Jews and eventually, the ghetto is locked up with nobody allowed in or out. Zofia and a good friend, devise a plan to contact Janina and then get the family out of the ghetto.

The Nazis instal their own people in the libraries and they set about banning books that did not align with Hitler’s viewpoint deeming them “inappropriate” and destroying them. Librarians and their assistants are given a list of books to be destroyed. Under the watchful eyes of the Nazis, they derive a plan to keep and hide as many books as possible.

In the author’s notes, we learn Ms Martin relied on Polish archives to write her credible account of those tragic years under German Occupation and the two girls among others who worked to salvage as many books as possible at the risk of their lives. She explains that the main characters are based on real people and that the major events depicted in the story are true. 

Clearly, this book was meticulously researched, and I felt as if I was in Warsaw amid it all. 

I really loved the author’s book The Librarian Spy, but as I tell anybody who will listen, I am completely blown away by this book.

I started to read this book on a wet Sunday morning in Wellington, New Zealand and finished it by midnight, having stopped only for food and bathroom breaks.  I loved this book and heartily recommend it to all who are interested in historical novels. I still haven’t laid hands on the first of Ms Martin’s books but have reserved a copy in the local library and eagerly await my turn to read it.  So, watch for my review later.

 Incidentally, in reading this book and writing my review I found I had to look up where books are banned today.  Here in New Zealand, we have New Zealand’s Office of Film and Literature Classification from where we learn:

“These days books are rarely blacklisted, except if they’re considered to promote either extreme violence or certain sexual acts involving coercion, exploitation of children, bestiality, necrophilia, use of urine, or use of excrement.”

Wikipedia has a lot to say about banning books –

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The Librarian Spy

I have been reading some World War II books recently and one that I’ve just finished is The Librarian Spy by Madeline Martin.
This story set in 1941 is around 2 women, two courageous women one in Lisbon and one in Lyon. At the time, Lisbon was of course in neutral Portugal while Lyon was in occupied France.
First, we are introduced to Ava who is a librarian at the Library of Congress in Washington DC. Her life revolves around caring for treasured books, and she is content. Then she is approached to join a special government group and goes to Lisbon to work for a covert operation whose aim is to gain intelligence on the Nazis from newspapers and other publications. Her task is to uplift these publications as and where she can microfilm them and send them back to Washington for analysis and decision-making.
Life is pleasant for Ava. She has a good social life and meets up with James a British officer whom she assumes is doing the same work as her. 
Life for Elaine in Lyon is not so comfortable. Elaine (real name Hélène) joined the French Resistance after her husband was arrested for being a member. Until his arrest Elaine was unaware of his involvement with the Resistance more so because he was adamant that she should not get involved, citing the dangers. Elaine has to change her name as she gave her papers to a fleeing Jewish woman and her new papers show her as Elaine Rousseau. Elaine later learns that Joseph her husband, is an expert forger making papers for many of those with whom she worked, and others who needed new papers and identities. Elaine’s role is working at a printing press for the Resistance, right under the noses of the Nazis. Elaine becomes adept at typesetting and after meeting another Jewish woman and her son, she decides to assist her in getting a visa to travel to the US. She cleverly includes a coded message in the newspaper Combat, and eventually, Ava sees the paper and understands the message. The women eventually connect and begin working together.
I love how this book shines a light on the women who worked and sacrificed to put an end to the war. While the focus is on the women (and those they work with) and their efforts in the war, there’s also an angle that explores the refugees fleeing the war. Another angle that is often overlooked when talking about the war efforts.
The Librarian Spy is a fantastic, suspenseful, well-researched novel of love, courage, and sacrifice. This novel is based on real people and true events.
I strongly recommend this book.. 

Homecoming by Kate Morton

I have been a follower of Kate Morton since I first discovered her book, The Secret Keeper way back in about 2012.  Now, I eagerly await each new novel. And her latest, Homecoming met all my expectations.

Christmas Eve 1959 and the Turner family is having a picnic by a waterhole in the garden of their fabulous property, Halcyon up in the hills of South Australia.  Mrs Turner is there with her three children and newly born babe.  Mr Turner is absent overseas on business. There is some tension in the family, and we only find out what has caused it much later in the story. 

A local man comes across the family and at first, he says he thought they were all sleeping.  The police, coroner and the local population decide the mother committed suicide and took her children along with her.

The story then jumps to London in 2018 where Jess a journalist is wondering what to do with her life having lived in London for the past 20 years.  She has now lost her latest job and there’s nothing on the horizon. She is awakened from her musings by a telephone call from her grandmother’s housekeeper in Sydney. Nora, Jesse’s grandmother has had a fall and is in hospital. Jess decides to take the next flight back to Sydney to be with her grandmother who has raised her since early childhood and in fact has become more of a mother to her than a grandmother. While filling in the hours between hospital visits in the large old house in which she was brought up Jess discovers a long-buried family secret.

This fascinating story easily moves the writer between these two periods.  

I was totally immersed in all the many characters – Jess, her mother Polly, Nora, Percy Summers the man who found the dead bodies and his family, and the author of the novel As If They Were Asleep.  It is in reading this novel that Jess begins to understand the family of whom she had no indications until now. 

I have never been to South Australia but the descriptions of the land, the flowers and the fauna make it a place to visit.

This is a fascinating story so well researched and written by the author, that one doesn’t want it to end.  In fact, the end was completely unexpected. Lives lost, and lives changed by a happening one afternoon in 1959.

The audiobook version that I borrowed from our local library is fantastic!

I enjoyed the voice of the narrator and the way in which she changed voices between characters. I listened for many hours, so much so that my hearing aids ran out of power one evening.

This is historical fiction and indeed fiction at its best.  I thoroughly recommend this book and this author.

The School House

This is a triple-story line novel.  We know Isabel through her diary writing as a child and her time spent at The Schoolhouse, things that happen to her in the current day, and the police investigation into the disappearance of a young girl.

In the first storyline, we meet Isabel a 10-year-old girl attending an unconventional school in London. Something terrible happens and she leaves the school abruptly.

Then 15 years later, we meet Isabel again. Now, an introverted librarian living her life between a university library and her small, safe flat in Islington, London. Some of the things with which she struggles now are caused by childhood experiences, which we only find out about later.

And the third storyline is that of the police procedure in looking for a missing young girl.

I found the book gripping and at times, challenging, but through it all I loved it.  The characters were totally believable: the settings had been well researched and so too were believable.

The book particularly interested me because I knew all the places, Holloway Road where the library is, Victoria Park, Whittington Hospital etc   It was where I grew up though I wouldn’t recognize many of the places today.

I thoroughly recommend this book.  I haven’t read the author’s previous book “Love and Other Thought Experiments” but I intend to do so.

Death Warning

A new novel by Andrew Barrett featuring our favourite CSI operator is always a delight.  And particularly as I am on Andrew’s ARC team and get the book to read before it is published.

This time, while Eddie is his usual churlish, unfriendly soul, he does step out of character to allow a grieving mother one last hug of her dead daughter.

On a miserable rainy night, Eddie is called out to a murder scene in a particularly dirty old, neglected yard.  At the rear of several shops, the body of a young man is found brutally stabbed to death. Because of the wind and heavy rain, the crime scene is impossible to search and eventually it is decided that they will come back tomorrow.  But before Eddie leaves the scene, he has a call from another area in the city to attend a probable suicide. At the first scene, he is confronted by an onlooker who introduces himself as the dead boy’s father. 

Arriving at the second scene, Eddie is unconvinced it is a suicide.  Too many things appear to lead him to the thought that it is murder, even though it has been written off as suicide by the investigating officers.

Meanwhile, a film crew is shadowing him, Benson, his police colleague, appears to be having a midlife crisis and his father Charles is behaving very strangely. 

By now we are familiar with the cast of characters with whom Eddie interacts, or doesn’t, and in this book, we are introduced to DS Regan Parker, the two murder victims and members of their families.

Barrett manages to keep all the balls in the air – so many characters to weave in – and we are never confused as to who is who.

Another great book from Barrett.  As I have said, I am lucky enough to be on his ARC team and so read this book before publication.  I highly recommend this author.  Each book can be standalone, but I suggest if you read one, you’ll want to know more about Collins.  Barrett is an active CSI, so all scenes are true to life, but as I have never been to a murder scene, I can’t swear to that.

Martha Hall Kelly

I have just reread the three books by Martha Hall Kelly. She writes about the strong and determined women in the Ferriday-Wolsey family. I have already posted on Lilac Girls which is the first one I read. Click here to read that post.

I don’t know why I waited almost three years to review the other two books in this series. So here they are:-

This novel is a prequel to  Lilac Girls and features the real-life heroine, Caroline Ferriday. The world is in turmoil and edging towards World War One. We learn about Caroline’s mother, Eliza and two other women who are thrown into the intense situations they faced in 1914. Eliza is the connection between the two novels – Lilac Girls and Lost Roses, but this one could easily be read as a stand-alone.

The story follows the lives of three women. Eliza is a socialite and lives in Manhattan. Her friend Sofya Streshnayva,  is a cousin of the Romanovs, the reigning dynasty in Russia. While visiting her in St. Petersburg, Eliza becomes aware that war is imminent and fears for her friend Sofya, who seems unaware of the danger that could come. When war is declared, Eliza heads back home to America.

Varinka Kozlov is a Russian girl, who the Romanov family hire to help in their household. She is the daughter of a well-known fortune-teller, and her situation is dire.  I tried to imagine the helplessness that she felt when she had to make some dangerous decisions. Varinka and her mother are under the thumb of some dangerous men who are involved in the local uprisings. Let’s just say, she has a lot going on. and makes some decisions that will impact all of these women. A story of three strong, determined women and their quest for survival.

While this story is not as fast-paced as Lilac Girls, the characters are compelling, and the author’s research of the period was evident. There is a lot that happens in this novel, and it took some concentration to keep it all straight. There are some “hold your breath” moments towards the end, and I feared for what was to come. I was very much invested to find out how each of their stories would play out.

Now this third book that takes place during the civil war. It’s historical fiction but is based on this true-life family and the contributions they made over the generations. It’s impeccably researched, and the author makes it clear in her “Notes on Sources” what is real, and what is fictional and that the bulk of the story is based on the letters of the Woolsey family and that is what makes it so meaningful.

The story is told from the point of view of three women in first person narrative. Georgy Woolsey, great aunt of Caroline Ferriday, whose story is told in the first book of this trilogy, is from an affluent, abolitionist family in New York. She trains as a nurse with the famed Dr Elizabeth Blackwell and with one of her sisters serves as a nurse attending the wounded. With a desire to stake a foothold for women in the nursing profession while up against the male-dominated medical profession. Jemma is a young slave girl who can read and write. She lives on a plantation in Maryland where the abuse is horrific yet she holds the hope of freedom. There are lashings, so much abuse, fear of rape, and for some young women slaves, the fear of having your child taken from you at birth so the baby could be sold. Anne-May, Jemma’s mistress at her plantation, is vile, not just to the slaves, but even to her own family and she gets more abhorrent with each chapter. 

The novel is reflective of the time, the war, and slavery, taking us from Maryland to Washington to New York City to Gettysburg, from plantation to society dinners to the shacks where the slaves lived, to the battlefields and hospitals. A depiction of the country and what it might have been like to live during this time. My only reservation is that at times it felt a little slow and drawn out, especially in the earlier part of the novel. It’s a lengthy book and could have used some editing to move the story forward.

Overall, I enjoyed all three books, but my favourite of the three is Lilac Girls.

The Retreat

An island off the coast of Devon has been transformed into a wellness retreat.  

The island has a dark and sinister past. There is a history of murder – four teens murdered by a deranged caretaker; sexual and child abuse, that occurred when it was a boy’s boarding school that mysteriously burned down, violence and superstition and many years before all that, a Leper colony. It is known locally as Reapers Rock.

However, it is now known as Lumen and we are introduced to Jo, a media influencer and her sisters Hana and Bea.   Jo has booked a weekend for the sisters, their close cousin Maya and their partners, to reconnect with each other on Lumen.   But it’s not the island’s geography — or its past — that has Hana reluctantly agreeing to her social media influencer sister Jo’s plans for a getaway at Lumen.  Instead, she’s hesitant because she’s still mourning the death of her boyfriend, Liam, in a mountain biking accident. Spending a few days with her extroverted (and exhausting) sister and their cousin, Maya, isn’t her idea of a good time. To make things even more awkward, Jo’s privileged boyfriend, Seth, is part of the group. So is the more reserved Caleb, who is dating Jo and Bea (unknown of course to each woman). All is going well; they are enjoying themselves until Bea, the eldest is found dead below the yoga pavilion. But Bea is at a conference in California so why was she even on the island?

DS Elin Warner and her partner are sent to the island to investigate.  Elin’s fiancé designed the Resort, and his sister Farah runs it. Soon another body is found having apparently drowned in a diving incident and Elin begins to suspect that these deaths are not accidents but cannot find a link between the two victims.

Elin formerly investigated MAJOR CRIMES, but now she has been assigned lesser duties. She suffered from a breakdown after being unable to catch the guy who killed two young girls in the last book – The Sanatorium. 
Then more deaths. Are the deaths related? Is the island repeating its cursed dark past? There is a storm raging in more ways than the weather. It appears someone is targeting a family gathered at the resort for a vacation of bonding. 
The guests want to leave. There is no relaxing or recharging here. They fear for their lives. Someone is out for REVENGE. As the bodies pile up, it’s clear that someone has a murderous agenda. And there is a killer among them?

Soon, the secrets and connections to the island are unravelled.There are twists, turns, suspense, tension, sibling rivalry, and family dynamics. The setting is creepy, atmospheric, and claustrophobic. The history of the past adds mystery and intrigue. Also, the impending storm adds to the guests’ anxieties. The emotions are high in the dysfunctional family with jealousy, greed, betrayal, lies, friendship, grief, complex relationships, and murder. 

A classic whodunnit with a killer final twist.