The Monuments Men: Really enjoyed by a couple of people, but everyone else finding it utterly tedious and completely overwhelmed by minutiae, though picking up towards the end – which is a shame as quite a few people (myself included!) had given up by then. The main problem seemed to be that although billed as… Read more »Read more

Laidlaw, as a classic of Scottish Noir literature, did suffer from being somewhat dated, particularly in relation to its attitudes to gay men, and it was littered with stereotypes of The Gay Man, The Big Man and the people trying to be Big Men; the women came off rather badly, being scanty at best, somewhat… Read more »Read more

Noah and Jude are twins, linked in that ineffable way that twins so often seem to be. Inseparable for their childhood, things start to change as they get older and I’ll Give You The Sun tells their story from two points in time and alternating perspectives: Noah at thirteen and Jude at sixteen. Hugely talented… Read more »Read more

Edmund Mallory, one of the first and keenest adventurers on Mount Everest was once asked why he wanted to climb it. He famously answered, “Because it’s there”. And people have been climbing it, because it is there, ever since. Not all with success. Mallory himself was killed before ever reaching the summit and his body… Read more »Read more

Instructions for a Heatwave was again predicated on the mystery of a missing family member – this time the husband of Gretta Riordan, which serves to bring her children back from their unhappy lives so that they can all eventually go on a jolly jaunt to Ireland and resolve all their issues. As characters, the… Read more »Read more

This compilation of the first 3 Inspector Montalbano novels is a great way to immerse yourself in the world of Salvo Montalbano. The characters, the plots, the locations and most importantly (for Salvo) the food are all wonderfully and entertainingly brought to life. These are crime novels and while well plotted, Sicily is the star.Read more

Part of the problem with Gone Girl was that it was so hyped up as a shocking thriller crammed with twists, that the only shocking thing about it was that the twists were easily guessed virtually from page one. Another thing that played against it was that not one of the characters were likeable, and… Read more »Read more

In Fates and Furies, Lauren Groff has written a story with a powerful plot reminiscent of a Greek myth with a Shakespearean pair of lovers at its heart. The flamboyantly named Lancelot Slatterwhite and Mathilde Yoder meet one night at university and two weeks later they are married: this is the story of their lives together… Read more »Read more

The 1st in the lost fleet series. We start as our hero John “Black Jack” Geary wakes up after 100 years in a cryogenic sleep to find a never ending war and himself a national hero and propaganda tool. Due to a military disaster Captain Geary finds himself in charge of a fleet of spaceships… Read more »Read more

Before I go to Sleep had some interesting ideas, despite them all being pinched from the film Memento, and having absolutely no factual basis in the medical literature. But then it’s fiction! Why should it? It should, according the pedants (mostly me) because if the premise holds no credibility then neither does the plot. Also,… Read more »Read more