RIP III Challenge

It's time for another one of Carl V's fabulous challenges - this time it is the RIP Challenge:

From Carl's site

Mystery.
Suspense.
Thriller.
Dark Fantasy.
Gothic.
Horror.
Supernatural.

There is just something about this time of year, when the ghosts of past Autumns and the Autumn to come chase away the dog days of summer, that entices one to read books that fit into the above categories.

It was a desire share the love of eerie, creepy, things-that-go-bump-in-the-night literature that brought me into the online reading challenge game for the first time back in September of 2006. My goals today, in this its third iteration, are no different than the inaugural R.eaders I.mbibing P.eril Challenge:

1. Have fun reading.
2. Share that fun with others.

There are three different options availabe and I am choosing Peril the Second which is to read two books of any length, from any subgenre of scary stories that you choose.

I will be choosing from the following list:

Rises the Night by Colleen Gleason
Personal Demon by Kelley Armstrong
Before They are Hanged by Joe Abercrombie
The Blackstone Key by Rose Melikan

There's a chance I might substitute some other books as well but we will start with that list as a base.

Blast from the Past

One of the bloggers that I read posted about some of her favourite 80's music on her blog today. One of the songs that she posted was Howard Jones Like to Get to Know You Well which is a cool song, but my favourite Howard Jones song ever is No One is to Blame:




Of course when you start messing around on Youtube before you know it you are following one link to the next and then also thinking of other things to search for and so that brings up to Uncanny X-Men and 50 Years. Did I hear you say WHO? I don't know that their name has lasted twenty years in terms of people remembering them as one of the great Aussie 80's music bands, but I did love this song and I still do!

What's on Your Nightstand? and Teaser Tuesday (on Wednesday)

It's hard to believe but it is time for the monthly What's on Your Nightstand? post! The year is just flying by!

Unfortunately the pile by the side of my bed isn't descending, but rather it is nearly at cruising height! (I know....enough with the flying related terminology!). So here is the list of what I now have on my nightstand starting with the books that were there last month:

The Traitor's Wife by Susan Higginbotham
Archangel by Sharon Shinn
Rises the Night by Colleen Gleason
Mistletoe Kisses anthology
The Smoke Thief by Shana Abe
Dagger-Star by Elizabeth Vaughan
Visions of Heat by Nalini Singh

The new additions are:

Just One of the Guys by Kristan Higgins - It got rave reviews over at Dear Author so I thought I would give it a go even though I don't read a lot of contemporary romance.

Personal Demon by Kelley Armstrong - I really enjoy all the Women of the Otherworld books.

***********************

Teaser Tuesday is hosted by Should be Reading:

• Grab your current read.
• Let the book fall open to a random page.
• Share with us two (2) “teaser” sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12.
• You also need to share the title of the book that you’re getting your “teaser” from … that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you’ve given!
• Please avoid spoilers!

I completely forgot to do Teaser Tuesday last week, and it is now Wednesday, but I am going to do this anyway! Part of the problem is that by the time everyone starts posting their Tuesday Teaser posts it is already Wednesday here! We'll see how we go next week. My teaser is from Personal Demon by Kelley Armstrong:

From the thrill of the break-in, I presumed, but when he pulled back, there was trepidation in his eyes, lifting only when I leaned in for another kiss.

I am only in the very early stages of the book, but I have to say that I am eager to know exactly who HE is and what break-in. Damn! Looks like a teased myself!

New site!

Are you pining for HistoricalFiction.org? I have been I can tell you!

We are very excited to announce a new site which will feature the same friendly members and some of the same features, but at an all new site, and most importantly one where the moderators will be able to make changes when and where we need it!

If you haven't been part of the forum before, and you love to read Historical Fiction come check us out. The members are friendly and very knowledgeable and there are plenty of authors who hang out as well!

Come visit us at

Historical Fiction Online

Life...or something like it!

It's been a bit quiet here on my blog, but it's not because there's nothing happening. The Olympics are over and so tonight for the first time in a couple of weeks I had to actually think about what I wanted to watch on TV - and the choices weren't that inspiring!

Speaking of Olympics, I knew when I signed up for Annie's Olympic Reading Challenge I wasn't going to do all that well, because I only had one book by an Aussie author coming up to be read soon. I did end up reading the book (Sir Thursday by Garth Nix) but on the couple of occasions that I sat down to write the review the words just didn't come! They will eventually but for now, I have a few too many other things on my mind! If I was to look at the nationalities of authors that I read during the Olympics, then the US would dominate - 10 Americans, 1 Aussie and 1 Brit.

I got home from work on Friday night to find lots of messages about what is happening at HistoricalFiction.org. More on that in the next couple of days. I promise you all that there is something happening!

The Melbourne Writers Festival started in Melbourne last weekend and I was very much looking forward to spending time at the Festival on Saturday, but it didn't end up being such a great day in the end. That's not because of anything at the Festival itself, but just that we had a bit of drama. You may remember that a couple of months ago I mentioned that my son had been diagnosed with a nut allergy and therefore we had to start carrying an epipen around with us just in case he had a severe allergic reaction. Saturday morning we got ready to go into the city, packed some lunch, a couple of books and his allergy medication into a backpack and caught a train into the city. Only problem is when we got off the train in the city, the backpack did not. By the time we realised it was too late and the train had left.

I took my son to the activity that he was participating in and explained what had happened and left him there, saying that I would be back with food a bit later and all seemed well. I then spent an hour at Flinders St train station waiting for the train to return to the city to see if the bag was still there, but it turned out not to be which was very disappointing. Not long after that I got a phone call from the program saying that my son couldn't stay there for the day unless someone stayed with him because he did not have his medication. I don't know why it took them an hour to decide this but it did. By this time I was very emotional and upset. It wasn't really the people at the program's problem or fault but it was just so frustrating, especially when it would have cost a fortune to buy a new one.

In the end I had to get a family member to come in to the city to stay with him so that I could go to the one session that I was already booked in for, which was to listen to Jennifer Kloesters talk about the life and times and Georgette Heyer, which was very interesting. I am definitely hoping to attend at least one more event, if not more, this weekend.

I was meant to be going to a flamenco club on Saturday night but that didn't happen either. Needless to say I didn't really enjoy my Saturday all that much.

Fortunately I got a phone call today to say that the bag had been found, and handed in and everything was still there, so we were very lucky! I guess part of the drama was that this was the first real impact we have felt in relation to the difficulties of living with allergies. Hopefully we won't have to go through this again.

Just because this is a very rambly post with not much point, I thought I would post the video that the session that I did get to go to on Saturday started with. I had seen it before but it is lots of fun. Enjoy!!

HistoricalFiction.org is down

For those people who read my blog and participate at HistoricalFiction.org, you may have noticed that the site is currently down.

We are currently trying to contact the owners to find out what is going on, and as soon as we know, then we will let you all know!

Thanks

My week

It's been a little quiet here this week because I have been a little busy. Today was the third of four days training in a new system that they are going to be installing at work soon. I have another four days of training again next week.

Today I don't feel too bad but every other day this week my eyes have been killing me and I have ended up having a shocking headache by the time I got home. This happens a lot when I attend training because I need glasses for looking at the screen in front of me and the books, but not to look up to the front and of course you spend all day doing both.

It is a bit strange that I don't have a headache tonight though, although I am sure the fact that I was in bed at 9pm last night and slept for a solid 8 hours or more probably helped a great deal. Another early night probably wouldn't hurt but I am off to watch the first episode of Cranford. I have no idea what time it finishes, but hopefully not so late that I will not get enough sleep tonight and therefore might avoid a headache again tomorrow!

In other news, Melbourne has been named the second City of Literature by UNESCO. Sounds as though there are some exciting things happening for both readers and writers.

Read more here.

Thanks to Kerrie for blogging about this!

The Drowning Tree by Carol Goodman

Augustus Penrose created the stained glass 'Lady Window' to adorn the chapel of the university he founded for the daughters of the women who worked in his factory, the Rose Glass Works. Depicting his wife, Eugenie, as the Lady of Shalott, it's a mesmerising portrait that has come to embody the spirit of the school itself.

But now, eighty years after it was created, the Lady Window is due for restoration. The task falls to former alumna Juno McKay. She's restoring it with the help of her friend, Christine Webb, an art historian who is researching the window for her thesis. Christine seems to have discovered some new evidence that suggests that Clare, not her sister Eugenie, was the subject for the Lady Window. But before Christine can discuss her findings with Juno, she's found dead in a boating accident that eerily echoes the fate of the Lady of Shalott. but did she drown or was it something more sinister?

As Juno starts to make her own investigations into just how Christine died, she learns more about Augustus Penrose and his family. The Lady Window was not the only thing the Penroses bequeathed to the world. Madness and deception also form part of their legacy...

Christine Webb is a glassmaker who specialises in restoring stained glass windows. Her company is currently working on a really big project - the restoration of The Lady Window from Penrose College. Christine had attended the college until she left because she was pregnant, and now as a single mum she is watching her teenage daughter become more independant meaning that she has more time to devote to herself. She had married but her husband, who was a successful artist, has been institutionalised in the local asylum after he tried to kill both her and their child years before in a moment of madness.

Christine's best friend Juno also studied at the College and was working on a thesis about the window, and about the founders of the college, Augustus Penrose and his wife Eugenie. After giving a speech at the college about her ideas about the origins and subject matter of the window, Juno goes missing, and is found drowned in the grounds of the Penrose's now deserted home, in an eerie echo of the fate of the Lady of Shallot, who is one of the many classical mythical figures that were used in the Penrose's art and decorations.

For me, this book was flat from beginning to end. The characters never really engaged me, in particular Juno who I never really cared too much for. If there was one thing I did like, it was the treatment that Goodman gave to Neil, Iris's ex husband, although the climactic events of the book that involved him felt extremely contrived and very handy so that we could have the ending that occurred.

Once again Goodman tried to show how clever she was by trying to fit as many classical mythical figures into the narrative as well as lots information about the making and restoration of glass. I do normally like it when an author tries to incorporate new things into the narrative, but when the narrative was already ponderously slow, this just tended to slow the action down even further.

When I first started reading this book I was pleasantly surprised to discover that there was a link to the previous book that I had read, which I posted about here. It was basically the only pleasant surprise I had. After having declared how much I enjoyed the last Goodman book that I read, this one was a real disappointment for me. I have requested The Sonnet Lover from the library so I guess we will see where that book fits for me in the enjoyment scale.

Golden Girls

So the Olympic swimming program is over. The story is of course Michael Phelp's extraordinary achievement, but from an Australian perspective, one of the major things to come out of this meet is the form of the Australian Women's Swimming team. The Aussies won 6 gold medals at the pool, and all of them were won by women, either individually or as part of relay teams.

So all hail the golden girls of Australian swimming!




Liesel Jones - Gold 100m Breaststroke, Gold 4x100m Relay, Silver 200m Breastroke,







Stephanie Rice - Gold 4x200m Freestyle, Gold 200m Individual Medley, Gold Individual 400m








Libby Trickett - Gold 100m Butterfly, 4x100m Medley Relay, Silver 100m Freestyle









4x100m Medley Relay team












4x200m Freestyle Relay team

Book Blogger Appreciation Week

Amy from My Friend Amy has come up with an awesome idea!



Book Bloggers: You work hard. You read books, you write reviews, you maintain relationships with your readers, publicists, and authors. You are constantly running to the post office to mail your giveaways and participating in carnivals to help boost traffic. You sometimes want to faint when you see the size of your TBR pile, but faithfully you read. And you do it because you love it. Book blogging is for most a hobby. But it's a hobby that takes a lot of work and time. It's a labor of love.


I've been blogging for three years but only really got into book blogging in the last year. I have found, without a doubt, that book bloggers are the kindest, most open minded, and supportive group of bloggers on the internet. With book blogging, it's about community and a love for the written word.

The Readers: We love you! You don't have a blog, but you read our reviews and share your thoughts with us. You enter our giveaways and click on our Amazon associates link. We do this for you and appreciate your readership. We hope you'll join in the fun and festivities of BBAW! (we'll have a special contest just for you!)

Book Blogger Appreciation Week: Acknowledging the hard work of book bloggers and their growing impact on book marketing and their essential contribution to book buzz in general, I am excited to announce the first Book Blogger Appreciation Week. Think of it as a retreat for book bloggers and a chance for us to totally nerd out over books together. And of course, shower each other with love and appreciation.

Register: In order to experience the maximum impact of the week, I invite you to register your participation (just like a retreat)!
To register, just send an email to bookbloggerappreciationweekATgmailDOTcom with your blog url and what you consider your niche...i.e, general book blog, classics blog, personal blog with a healthy dose of books, YA books blog, etc. Then, add one of the two buttons at the bottom of this post to your sidebar. If you are a reader (no blog) just send an email announcing your plans to follow along.
Why bother? If you register, you will be added to a book blog directory which will exist long after this week is over. Additionally, you will receive one raffle entry into the daily giveaways during BBAW here at My Friend Amy.

Awards: Oh yes, there will be awards. The Oscars of Book Blogging. :) Nominations start next week.

Spread the Word: If you are excited about this idea like I am and the other book bloggers who are helping, please consider writing a post on your blog announcing this event and inviting other book bloggers and readers to join.

Help Wanted: If you have a talent for designing buttons (like those below) and would like to donate some of your time and skill to me, please email me personally at mypalamyATgmailDOTcom

The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer

It's 1946, and as Juliet Ashton sits at her desk in her Chelsea flat, she is stumped. A writer of witty newspaper columns during the war, she can't think of what to write next. Out of the blue, she receives a letter from one Dawsey Adams of Guernsey - by chance he's acquired a book Juliet once owned - and, emboldened by their mutual love of books, they begin a correspondence. Dawsey is a member of the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society, and it's not long before the rest of the members write to Juliet - including the gawky Isola, who makes home-made potions, Eben, the fisherman who loves Shakespeare, and Will Thisbee, rag-and-bone man and chef of the famous potato peel pie. As letters fly back and forth, Juliet comes to know the extraordinary personalities of the Society and their lives under the German occupation of the island. Entranced by their stories, Juliet decides to visit the island to meet them properly - and unwittingly turns her life upside down.

A moving tale of post-war friendship, love and books, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society is gloriously honest, sweet and funny - a book to fall in love with.

This little book is the subject of quite a lot of attention at the moment, and I am going to join the chorus and say that it definitely deserves it!

I must confess that the first few times I saw this mentioned on blogs I completely skipped over it simply because, to me, the title suggested something very different from what it is actually is.

Julia Lambert has spent most of WWII writing witty newspaper columns under the name Izzy Bickerstaff, doing her part in keeping the spirits of Londoners up during the dark days of the Blitz. Now that the war is over, Julia wants to do something different. She doesn't want to be Izzy anymore but she doesn't know what she does want to write.

One day she receives a letter from one Dawsey Adams, who lives in Guernsey. He has found a book by Charles Lamb that used to be owned by Julia and he has written to her in the hope that she may be able to assist him in finding more books by that author. In his letter, Dawsey mentions that he is a member of the Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Pie Society, and Julia's interest is captured. What is the Society? Where did the name come from and how did it start?

What starts as a simple correspondence about an author grows into a series of letters between not only Dawsey and Julia, but also several of the other islanders (some are members of the Society but others are not) and Julia, and soon she begins to feel as though these people are her friends. They also begin to tell her of how life was on the island during the German occupation which no other part of the British Isles experienced.

Soon Julia finds herself wanting to go to Guernsey to meet the people she has come to know. It doesn't take long before she is caught up in island life, and her life is further woven into the lives of her friends than she could ever have imagined she would be at the beginning of the book.

The characters are fun with lots of quirkiness, but there is a depth that is captured as well - the losses that they suffered, the separation from the children that were sent to the UK for their on safety, the hunger, the fear left from living under oppression.

The whole book is told in the format of letters, telegrams and notes between the characters.
when I started I really wasn't sure if that format would work for me, or if it would become a bit annoying by the end of the book, but the author(s) really did well at making the story flow within the limitations that this format necessarily gives to the structure of the novel .

I have been trying to think of a book to compare to this one, but I am really struggling. It is funny and charming, poignant, informative and there are probably numerous other descriptions I could use, but at its heart it is a really lovely story. The fact that I too wanted to go to Guernsey after finishing the book means that the characters not only captured Julia's heart, but also mine as a reader!

Just a couple of other thoughts on the cover and author. The covers for the Australian book is just so plain that if I had not heard of this book already I would never have even picked it up. It is interesting that in other places around the world, the author is given is Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows, but here it is just Mary Ann Shaffer. There is a note in the back that explains that after submitting the original manuscript, Mary Ann Shaffer became ill, and so her niece Annie Barrows completed the book. Unfortunately Mary Ann Shaffer died before seeing her book published, which is both a shame for her, and for us as readers because her book is a lovely read and it would have been interesting to see if she could have followed it up with another great read.

I totally recommend this book to anyone, and ending up giving it the highest possible grade - 5/5 for this one!



Cross posted at Historical Tapestry.

If you have reviewed this book, leave a comment and I will add a link to your review.

A Garden Carried in the Pocket
Thoughts of Joy
B&B Ex Libris
Fresh Ink
Hey Lady! Watcha Reading?
Sincerely Stacie
Word Lily

Well that was a little embarrasing!

I was feeling very pleased with myself this morning because we had what was going to be a great day planned. My son and I got up and going relatively early and caught the train into the city so that we would be there by 10am, and then wandered off to the event site...only to find that the event wasn't today but it is actually next week! Whoops!

I am blaming my brain not working on the fact that I am still recovering from when I was sick last week!

So instead of what I thought we were going to be doing we hung around in the city. We spent some time at the National Gallery of Victoria where they had two new to us exhibits that were really great. My nine year old boy likes going to the Art Gallery, but usually only likes to do one room before he starts getting a bit bored, but we actually went through one of the exhibits twice.

The one that we went through twice was called Klippel/Klippel: Opus 2008. What you can't tell from the link is how the exhibit space was set out. The first two rooms were these tiny, intricate little sculptures, but the first room was very dark with display boxes scattered throughout with just lighting within the boxes so that you could see the contents. The next room was completely white with the only thing breaking the whiteness/brightness the display boxes that were scattered around the room at different levels and more tiny and intricate modern sculptures. The third room was just a single piece, but it was 3 metres tall. The whole exhibit was very cool!

The second exhibit was called Look! New Perspectives on the Contemporary Collection and there were some great pieces there as well. One of my favourites was the second picture on the above link, but there were lots of others good pieces as well.

After all that culture we wandered around the city for a while and then went and watched our beloved Adelaide Crows play Aussie Rules Football. The only problem was that because I hadn't actually planned to go to the footy we weren't exactly dressed for sitting around in the cold, but it was a good win by the Crows, so we managed.

All in all, it was still a great day, just a different great day than I had planned!

Note to self: Melbourne Writer's Festival begins next week!

The Seduction of Water by Carol Goodman

Iris Greenfeder, ABD (All But Dissertation), feels the “buts” are taking over her life: all but published, all but a professor, all but married. Yet the sudden impulse to write a story about her mother, Katherine Morrissey, leads to a shot at literary success. The piece recounts an eerie Irish fairy tale her mother used to tell her at bedtime—and nestled inside it is the sad story of her death. It captures the attention of her mother’s former literary agent, who is convinced that Katherine wrote one final manuscript before her strange, untimely end in a fire thirty years ago. So Iris goes back to the remote Hotel Equinox in the Catskills, the place where she grew up, to write her mother’s biography and search for the missing manuscript—and there she unravels a haunting mystery, one that holds more secrets than she ever expected. . . .

Of the three Carol Goodman books I have read, this is my favourite! Iris Greenfeder is a writer. The reality is that she is more a writing teacher who is constantly looking for the story that is going to give her success so that she can step out from the shadows of her mother. Her mother, Kay Morrissey, wrote two hugely successful fantasy novels, and is rumoured to have written the third and final book in the trilogy but she was killed in a terrible hotel fire, and no one knows exactly where that third book may be hidden.

When she is writes a story about her mother she achieves a degree of success, and she is contacted by her mother's former agent and asked to write a book about her mother. The best place to do this is at her childhood home, the Equinox Hotel in the Catskills. Where the hotel used to be a family vacation destination, nowadays the hotel is struggling and is in danger of being closed for good. Fortunately, a new owner has been found, and so Iris is employed to manage the hotel when it reopens, which should allow her to save her home but also the time she needs to write, and access to documents about her mother and memories from the few guests who do continue to return year after year.

What follows is a story that is laced through with myths and legends - Celtic myths of selkies and fairies, but when she sets her students a writing project to write about myths we are also introduced to the myths of other countries, most memorably from Japan. As part of her teaching at a community college, we meet several other diverse characters who play minor but key roles in the book. Iris also teaches at a prison, and it is here that she meets Aidan Barry who is just about to be released on parole.

With her new role as manager, she offers Aidan a job at the hotel - a chance for the ex-con to start again. The question is can you ever truly leave the past behind? Is the new owner of the hotel only interested in the hotel as a business or is there more too it than that? Who exactly was her mother and was Kay Morrissey's death an accident, and why are all these questions arising after all these years? As Iris learns more, the evidence takes her in completely unexpected directions and threatens to reveal the truth about a lot of people who don't necessarily want the truth revealed after all these years.

As the book heads towards its climax, the body count grows, the plot twists and turns, and Iris is forced to evaluate her relationship with her artist boyfriend and fight for what it is that she really wants out of life. If there is one criticism it may be that the characters had to go through one too many trials at the end of the book, but it's a small thing.

I loved the mythology and the imagery that permeated this book. Of the three books by this author I have read so far, this is the one book that I would be happy to reread. If Goodman's future novels are like this one then I will be a very happy reader indeed.


Have you reviewed this books? Leave a comment and I will link to your review.

Aussiecon 4

Just saw over at Matilda that Melbourne will be hosting the World Science Fiction Conference from September 2-6 in 2010 and that the event will be known as Aussiecon 4.

Obviously there aren't many details available yet, but one of the guests has already been named - Shaun Tan. I just love his books so I will definitely be trying to go along to at least some events!

Teaser Tuesday

Teaser Tuesday is hosted by Should be Reading:

• Grab your current read.
• Let the book fall open to a random page.
• Share with us two (2) “teaser” sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12.
• You also need to share the title of the book that you’re getting your “teaser” from … that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you’ve given!
• Please avoid spoilers!

He and Mrs Maugery went with me to the Commandant's Office, and we all swore that I was Lord Tobias Penn-Piers

From The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer

Desperate Duchesses by Eloisa James

Welcome to a world of reckless sensuality and glittering sophistication . . . of dangerously handsome gentlemen and young ladies longing to gain a title . . . of games played for high stakes, including—on occasion—a lady's virtue. A marquess's sheltered only daughter, Lady Roberta St. Giles falls in love with a man she glimpses across a crowded ballroom: a duke, a game player of consummate skill, a notorious rakehell who shows no interest in marriage—until he lays eyes on Roberta. Yet the Earl of Gryffyn knows too well that the price required to gain a coronet is often too high. Damon Reeve, the earl, is determined to protect the exquisite Roberta from chasing after the wrong destiny. Can Damon entice her into a high-stakes game of his own, even if his heart is likely to be lost in the venture?

I struggle with Eloisa James. I know that I should love her books but a lot of the time I just don't. I have commented on this before so I guess the question that needs to be asked is just why do I keep reading her books. The short answer is that there are lots of things I do like about her writing, but then there are times that she just overcomplicates matters and loses me. As a result I hadn't read one of her books for nearly 18 months, but then I was sitting here the other day I was thinking why haven't I read any of the Desperate Duchesses books. Now I remember why!

In this book, the main couple are almost bit players as opposed to the main focus. There seems to be more focus on Jemma, Duchess of Beaumont. She has just returned from a self-imposed exile in France, much to the apprehension of her husband - a hard working politician who cannot afford a whif of scandal. He knows that Jemma lives a life filled with scandal. Also problematic is the fact that Jemma's brother has come to stay, bringing with him his illegitimate child.

With a house filling up rapidly with all sorts of barely acceptable characters, when Roberta turns up to stay uninvited because she wants to come out into society, the Duke warns his wife that there must be no more scandal. Roberta is a cousin to the Duchess and her brother (although somewhat distant! If my cousin five times removed (or seven...whichever it was) turned up and wanted to stay for a while I am not sure that I would be quite so pleased as Jemma appeared to be.

Roberta has decided that she wants to marry, and luckily she already know exactly who she wants to marry - the notorious Duke of Villiers. Much is made about the Duke's detachment so it is likely that Roberta may have chosen a very difficult target indeed. Jemma is though, a master at manipulating, so with her help perhaps it is not unattainable.

What gives this book a point of difference is the use of parlour games like chess and dominoes to help heighten the tension (sexual and otherwise) between our characters. It seems surprising today but in the Georgian era, playing chess was one of few ways for males and females to be together in an intimate setting without causing a scandal. Jemma loves chess and soon finds herself playing games with both her husband and Villiers.

It is obvious that the story of Jemma and her husband is going to be a story that arcs throughout the series in the same way as the story of Sebastian and Esme did in the Duchess Quartet. In that series, Sebastian and Esme's story was the one that I wanted most and the main couples in the books were there, but not as compelling, and so I do wonder though if James will manage to manage the balance between the individual romances in each book and the overarcing storyline.

I guess that part of the reason that this book didn't work as well as I would have liked for me was in the fact that I never felt like I understood exactly when Roberta fell in love with Damon. His attraction was more obvious than hers, but even whilst she is fooling around with Damon, she is still determined that she is in love with Villiers - goodness only knows why, but she had declared this on having spied the man across a crowded room once!

There are definitely some good things about this book - it is funny and there are some great individual scenes, but once again I put down the book thinking that I am not clever enough to GET this author.

Urn Burial by Kerry Greenwood

Super-sleuth Phryne Fisher is sojourning at Cave House, a Gothic mansion in the heart of Gippsland mountain country. But she soon discovers that her host is receiving death threats, someone is setting lethal traps and the parlourmaid has been strangled to death. It seems Phryne is up to her neck in danger.

How does this connect with a pair of young lovers, an extremely eccentric swagman and an angry outcast heir? Just who is responsible for the mysterious funerary urns which keep appearing around the house? And how can she make time for the luscious Lin Chung?

Phryne's search draws her deep into the darkest dungeons of the house and of the limestone Buchan cavers. Who knows what she will unearth this time.

When Phryne is invited to a house party at Cave House in the Gippsland area outside of Melbourne, she takes along her current beau, Lin Chung, and their servants, the ever faithful Dot and the ever resourceful Li Pen who is Lin Chung's bodyguard. The fact that Lin is Chinese is something of a shock to the guests who are all from the upper echelon's of Melbourne society, and Phryne and Lin have to deal with the not so hidden racism of the time.

Even before the Fisher party arrive at the gothic Cave House there is drama when Phryne hears a gun shot and then they see a young woman emerge from the bush screaming. What Phryne doesn't realise is that she has been invited for a specific reason. The host is being threatened with letters, and it isn't long before Phryne finds that matters are escalating with a number of more lethal traps being set within the grounds. Like Phryne, many of the guests are at the house for a reason, and it is only as the book progresses that everyones agendas are unveiled piece by piece and layer by layer. The group dynamics are affected by a couple of major events. The first is that the river that is near the property is on the rise, and the house guests are all trapped together until the rains cease and the river goes down. There are also the small matters of the mysterious urns that keep on being moved from one place to another, the people who seem to want to get into Phryne's room at night, and the housemaid who has gone missing. Of the guests, Phryne is the only one who knows that the girl is already dead because she saw the body, but when she went to get the hosts the body had been moved and there is no sign of where it might be.

This book felt like a tribute to classic Agatha Christie. There is the house party, the guests who all have hidden links to other guests, the body that Phryne knows is there but that goes missing and it has to be said that Kerry Greenwood really manages to make these really classic mystery ideas feel fresh. The unveiling of the culprits is really very creepy and takes place in a very interesting place.

If there was one thing that did bother me it relates to Phryne's relationship with Lin Chung. She has always been a lover of beautiful young men, but in this book she also has relations with one of the other characters. Lin Chung obviously isn't pleased but it happens anyway. I suspect that the relationship is growing, but I don't really want to see this kind of thing continue. It is probably worth mentioning that the sex is a bit more obvious in this book than I remember it being in the earlier books. Not explicit by any stretch of the imagination just more there.

After being just a little disappointed in the last Phryne Fisher book this was a welcome return to form and I am totally looking forward to getting to the next book. As an added bonus, my interest has been piqued about the Gippsland area in which the book was set, including the Buchan Caves. I can't remember the last time I went into a cave - must be more than 20 years.

Once again, this isn't the cover that I had on the library book I read, but I do so love this new series of covers, and they do fit the series so well that I am just going to go ahead and post with this cover instead of looking for the one I have!

Legacy by Jeanette Baker

When a distant relative bequeaths a Scottish castle to Christina Murray, the beautiful college professor is off to a distant land to claim her inheritance. It is there that she meets Ian Douglas, a breathtakingly handsome man who may hold the key to the secrets of Traquair House...and to her heart. As Christina enters the elusive passageway to love, her all-too-lifelike dreams reveal that she is tied to three ghostly ancestors: Katrine, a spirited Jacobite in love with an Englishman...Jeanne, a Renaissance wife accused of witchcraft...and Mairi, the medieval maid who shares a forbidden passion with England's king.

Destined to become the curse's next victim, Christina travels through time to unveil the mystery of her family. But she soon discovers that her assumptions about Ian and their newly found love, as well as her own life, may have put her in grave danger...

I would never have chosen to pick up this book but when Jeanette Baker was chosen as Author of the Month over at Historical Romance Chat for May. When I say I would have have chosen to pick it up, it is not for any other reason than I had never ever heard of her before. When I checked the library catalogue under either name that she wrote under (Jeanette Baker and Jeanette Ramirez) this was the only one they had, so this is the book I chose to read.

The book opens with Christina Murray arriving at Traquair House in Scotland. She has no idea why she is there, and so she is totally surprised when it turns out that the historic house has been bequeathed to her by a complete stranger. Christina has just gone through a divorce from her husband of 15 years where one of the bigger issues is that she doesn't seem to be able to have children. So when the handsome neighbour, Ian Douglas, starts paying attention she is somewhat surprised, and very flattered by the attention.

Not long after arriving at Traquair, Christina starts to suffer strange headaches, and very strange dream where she finds herself in the past. At first she thinks that it might be something to do with her diabetes, but gradually it becomes that there is something more to it than that. Where first it feels like they are dreams gradually the intensity of the experiences increases until Christina is actually there feeling what the other three women who are her ancestors are feeling, seeing what they are seeing and hearing what they are hearing and with whom she shares several characteristics, including their looks and the fact that they all suffer from diabetes.

The first story to be told is that of Katrine Murray who lives in the mid 1700's. She is a spirited young lass (as are all of the ancestors). When she meets a handsome English soldier and fall in love it is impossible for her to know what the consequences will be. With the Jacobite rebellion gaining momentum, Katrine finds herself on the wrong side of the conflict. She is a Scottish woman living in England but when she returns to Scotland her heart is with her husband who is fighting for the English.

The second story is of Jeanne, who despite a rocky start, falls desperately in love with John Douglas. John has spent time in the English court, but he has now returned to the court of King James, known to his friend as Jamie. With a confrontation looming against the English, Jeanne has a vision of what is to come and tries to stop it with tragic consequences for her and her family.

The third story, and the one where the curse against the Douglas women started, goes back to the late 1200s when Mairi of Shields falls passionately in love with a man who turns up asking for hospitality at her home, and who she ends up nursing back to health. The man does not reveal his true identity, but when she goes to the English court, the truth is revealed. Her love is none other than King Edward I. As yet another conflict looms with the English, Mairi does what needs to be done and removes the Stone of Scone, used for centuries in the coronation ceremonies of Scottish kings and queens. When she marries against his wishes, their feelings change to hostility, once again with tragic consequences.

In effect there are four different love stories in this book. The fact three of them are doomed adds a level of poignancy. This is a really clever book in many ways. The only problem I had was with the contemporary sections. For the most part it is good, but just at the end, the resolution didn't quite work for me, both in terms of how Christina was going to get a happily ever after and break the curse, and also in how that HEA came about. Having said that, this is one of the more unusual books that I have read and I really did enjoy it.

I can't remember the last time I read a time travel book. It's been a while, but this one certainly has renewed my interest in the subgenre.

Coincidentally this morning I stumbled over a link to the Traquair House website over at Classical Bookworm, where you can read the history of the house, and see some pictures. It was really interesting to look at since I only finished this book in the early hours of this morning.

Woe is me!

I am so sick of being sick. In addition to still feeling the effects of the virus that I had last week, I now also have an infected finger, and inner ear infections in not one but both ears.

I haven't managed to read a lot whilst I have been sick, but I have managed to write quite a few reviews, so that is an added bonus.

I have a doctors certificate for Monday, so assuming that I go back to work on Tuesday I will have been off for more than a week. I am going to need instructions on how to find my desk!

Lady Macbeth by Susan Fraser King

I am granddaughter to a king and daughter to a prince, a wife twice over, a queen as well. I have fought with sword and bow, and
struggled fierce to bear my babes into this world.
I have loved deeply and hated deeply, too.


Lady Gruadh, called Rue, is the last female descendent of Scotland’s most royal line. Married to a powerful northern lord, she is widowed while still carrying his child and forced to marry her husband’s murderer: a rising war-lord named Macbeth. Encountering danger from Vikings, Saxons, and treacherous Scottish lords, Rue begins to respect the man she once despised–and then realizes that Macbeth’s complex ambitions extend beyond the borders of the vast northern region. Among the powerful warlords and their steel-games, only Macbeth can unite Scotland–and his wife’s royal blood is the key to his ultimate success.

Determined to protect her small son and a proud legacy of warrior kings and strong women, Rue invokes the ancient wisdom and secret practices of her female ancestors as she strives to hold her own in a warrior society. Finally, side by side as the last Celtic king and queen of Scotland, she and Macbeth must face the gathering storm brought on by their combined destiny.

From towering crags to misted moors and formidable fortresses, Lady Macbeth transports readers to the heart of eleventh-century Scotland, painting a bold, vivid portrait of a woman much maligned by history.

For most people, the main thing that would be associated with the name Lady Macbeth are the following words from Shakespeare:

Out, damn'd spot! out, I say!—One; two: why, then'tis time to do't.—Hell is

murky.—Fie, my lord, fie, a soldier, andafeard? What need we fear who knows it,
when none can call ourpow'r to accompt?—Yet who would have thought the old man
tohave had so much blood in him?

If you pick up this book expecting to see anything like this, you are bound to be disappointed, but if you are interested in finding out some of the historical background to this particular character then this could be the book for you.

Lady Gruad is born into the Royal family of Scotland making her a very desirable marriage match due to her pure bloodlines. After being kidnapped twice, once when she is very nearly of marriagable age, her father decides that it is time to marry her off, and she is married to Gilcomgan of Moray against her wishes. A relatively short time after, Rue is heavily pregnant when she is widowed. Her husband has been killed by Macbeth in one of the many power struggles that dominated the Scottish political scene in the late 11th century, and particularly in revenge for the murder of Macbeth's father by Gilcomgan. Macbeth himself is descended from King Duncan, and so when he forces Rue to marry him immediately following her first husband's death (all spoils to the victor!) he bolsters his own claim to the throne of Scotland even though his grandfather the King has named another as his successor in a break from the traditional way that the kings of Scotland have been chosen.

By marrying Rue, Macbeth becomes Mormaer of Moray, a powerful and rich lord, but it is through his efforts to be a fair and generous ruler to his people that he gains their loyalty. For a long time he is prepared to not make any challenges to the throne, but when his life and those of his young family are threatened things change, and Macbeth becomes King of Scotland and Rue his queen.

There are many details of life in Scotland in 11th century within the book: the struggle for peace with both the Vikings and the English, the struggle between the Church in Rome and the Celtic church as well as weaving in many superstitions, omens and spells.

It was interesting to read the life of a Queen who involved herself in her husband's life to such an extent as Rue did, including in policy making, and it is inferred within the novel that the two came to value and respect each other, and yes perhaps love each other. There were however still plenty of examples where she was left behind and it is in those times that we begin to see how much Rue is affected by the portents and omens that she can see, and how it effects the decisions that she makes for the future, and in particular how determined she becomes to protect the old ways of life.

Whilst I enjoyed this book, it didn't quite make it to the status of a great read for me. I never felt truly immersed in the book. Part of the reason for this may be the first person narrative, but I don't think that it was the only factor. For much of the time I was outside of the book. In my favourite HF novels, I would be there with the characters, wrapped in furs trying to keep warm in the middle of a harsh Scottish winter, but with this book I was still firmly in the 21st century looking back through a window of time.

Cross posted at Historical Tapestry