Tag: Rating: 4 stars

Review: My Sister, the Serial Killer

Posted 12 September, 2019 by Lianne in Books / 0 Comments

My Sister, the Serial Killer
By: Okiyan Braithwaite
Format/Source: Paperback; my purchase

My Sister, the Serial Killer is a blackly comic novel about how blood is thicker – and more difficult to get out of the carpet – than water…

When Korede’s dinner is interrupted one night by a distress call from her sister, Ayoola, she knows what’s expected of her: bleach, rubber gloves, nerves of steel and a strong stomach. This’ll be the third boyfriend Ayoola’s dispatched in, quote, self-defence and the third mess that her lethal little sibling has left Korede to clear away. She should probably go to the police for the good of the menfolk of Nigeria, but she loves her sister and, as they say, family always comes first. Until, that is, Ayoola starts dating the doctor where Korede works as a nurse. Korede’s long been in love with him, and isn’t prepared to see him wind up with a knife in his back: but to save one would mean sacrificing the other…

I had started hearing and seeing this book around quite a bit over the later half of the summertime, hearing positive things about the book as well as the fact that the book is quite a quick read. I was in desperate need of some distraction at the time (that would be…early August when I read it) so I decided to pick up this book.

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Review: A Desperate Fortune

Posted 7 August, 2019 by Lianne in Books / 2 Comments

A Desperate Fortune
By: Susanna Kearsley
Format/Source: eBook; my purchase

For nearly 300 years, the mysterious journal of Jacobite exile Mary Dundas has lain unread-its secrets safe from prying eyes. Now, amateur codebreaker Sara Thomas has been hired by a once-famous historian to crack the journal’s cipher. But when she arrives in Paris, Sara finds herself besieged by complications from all sides: the journal’s reclusive owner, her charming Parisian neighbor, and Mary, whose journal doesn’t hold the secrets Sara expects.

It turns out that Mary Dundas wasn’t keeping a record of everyday life, but a first-hand account of her part in a dangerous intrigue. In the first wintry months of 1732, with a scandal gaining steam in London, driving many into bankruptcy and ruin, the man accused of being at its center is concealed among the Jacobites in Paris, with Mary posing as his sister to aid his disguise. When their location is betrayed, they’re forced to put a desperate plan in action, heading south along the road to Rome, protected by the enigmatic Highlander Hugh MacPherson.

As Mary’s tale grows more and more dire, Sara, too, must carefully choose which turning to take…to find the road that will lead her safely home.

Oh man, I’ve had this book on my TBR pile for ages. I guess I put off reading this book because it was focusing on the Jacobites, which I guess I studied to deat at uni so I wasn’t so inclined to read it lol. But it is a Susanna Kearsley book and she writes wonderfully so slowly but surely I finally got around to reading it.

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Review: The Collapsing Empire

Posted 19 July, 2019 by Lianne in Books / 1 Comment

The Collapsing Empire (The Interdependency #1)
By: John Scalzi
Format/Source: eBook courtesy of the Tor.com book club

Our universe is ruled by physics and faster than light travel is not possible — until the discovery of The Flow, an extra-dimensional field we can access at certain points in space-time that transport us to other worlds, around other stars.

Humanity flows away from Earth, into space, and in time forgets our home world and creates a new empire, the Interdependency, whose ethos requires that no one human outpost can survive without the others. It’s a hedge against interstellar war — and a system of control for the rulers of the empire.

The Flow is eternal — but it is not static. Just as a river changes course, The Flow changes as well, cutting off worlds from the rest of humanity. When it’s discovered that The Flow is moving, possibly cutting off all human worlds from faster than light travel forever, three individuals — a scientist, a starship captain and the Empress of the Interdependency — are in a race against time to discover what, if anything, can be salvaged from an interstellar empire on the brink of collapse.

I don’t read nearly as much Scalzi as I should lol. Then this book popped up in Tor.com’s First-In-a-Series book club (or whatever it’s called…it’s something along those lines) so I decided to check it out 🙂

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Review: Provenance

Posted 15 July, 2019 by Lianne in Books / 0 Comments

Provenance
By: Ann Leckie
Format/Source: Hardback; my purchase

Following her record-breaking debut trilogy, Ann Leckie, winner of the Hugo, Nebula, Arthur C. Clarke, and Locus Awards, returns with an enthralling new novel of power, theft, privilege, and birthright.

A power-driven young woman has just one chance to secure the status she craves and regain priceless lost artifacts prized by her people. She must free their thief from a prison planet from which no one has ever returned.

Ingray and her charge will return to her home world to find their planet in political turmoil, at the heart of an escalating interstellar conflict. Together, they must make a new plan to salvage Ingray’s future, her family, and her world before they are lost to her for good.

The premise of this book intrigued me, as well as the fact that the book is a standalone. Ann Leckie’s work so far as been great–even though the last book in her Imperial Radch trilogy didn’t grip me as much as the first volume–so naturally I kept a lookout for this title 🙂

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Review: A Darker Shade of Magic

Posted 3 July, 2019 by Lianne in Books / 2 Comments

A Darker Shade of Magic (Shades of Magic #1)
By: V.E. Schwab
Format/Source: eBook; my purchase

Kell is one of the last Travelers: magicians with a rare, coveted ability to travel between parallel universesóas such, he can choose where he lands. There’s Grey London, dirty and boring, without any magic, ruled by a mad King George. Then there’s Red London, where life and magic are revered, and the Maresh Dynasty presides over a flourishing empire. White London, ruled by whoever has murdered their way to the throne–a place where people fight to control magic, and the magic fights back, draining the city to its very bones. And once upon a time, there was Black London…but no one speaks of that now. Officially, Kell is the Red Traveler, personal ambassador and adopted Prince of Red London, carrying the monthly correspondences between the royals of each London. Unofficially, Kell is a smuggler, servicing people willing to pay for even the smallest glimpses of a world they’ll never see–a dangerous hobby, and one that has set him up for accidental treason. Fleeing into Grey London, Kell runs afoul of Delilah Bard, a cut-purse with lofty aspirations, first robs him, then saves him from a dangerous enemy, and then forces him to spirit her to another world for a proper adventure.

But perilous magic is afoot, and treachery lurks at every turn. To save all of the worlds, Kell and Lila will first need to stay alive–and that is proving trickier than they hoped.

At long last, I am reading this book. For years I’ve heard seen this book around, heard great things about it, and wanted to read it myself. I guess I stalled on it because I was worried that it was just overhyped or something. But anyway…

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