Veronika Jordan's Blog, page 32

The Success Guidebook by Elizabeth Hamilton-Guarino Publication Day Party

An inspirational guide for visualizing and actualizing success on a personal and professional level.

Author Elizabeth Hamilton-Guarino, master life coach and founder of The Best Ever You Network has long espoused that we must redefine success for our authentic selves—a one-size fits-all-concept is not only outdated but unworkable. Success is so much more than data or the dollars in our bank account. True success is reflected in the smiles that brighten our faces and the peace that settles in our hearts. It’s the gratitude we seek in all things and the intention and actions being our very best in each moment.

Genre: Self-help
Pages: 224

In The Success Guidebook, readers will find inspiration, motivation, and a pathway to live their best, most fulfilling life. By implementing Elizabeth’s unique Ten Factors of Success—the behaviors consistently exhibited by people who stand out and behave with world-class excellence—readers will learn how to finally overcome the stubborn obstacles that have stood in their way and harness the power to move forward with clarity, a renewed purpose, and the personalized confidence to build a life of bold, brave, and infinite possibilities. Included are profiles of 20 people who exemplify these principles. Here’s the secret: You don’t need to be on a national or international platform to be world-class. You can have it right in your own home, to be and feel successful in each and every moment of your life. This book will help you learn how to tap into world-class behaviors and get the results you desire—at last.

About the Author

Elizabeth Hamilton-Guarino is the founder of The Best Ever You Network and co-founder of Compliance4. Through these companies, she has helped individuals and organizations around the world be their best and achieve world-class excellence with gratitude-based behavior and belief systems. She is one of America’s foremost personal and corporate development consultants specializing in mindset, strategy, leadership, and taking action.

Elizabeth is also the author of the award-winning personal development book PERCOLATE – Let Your Best Self Filter Through (Hay House) and multiple children’s books as a contributor and author. Elizabeth and her husband live in Maine with their four sons and three rescued cats.

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The Kitchen by Simone Buchholz (Chas Riley #2) translated by Rachel Ward

When neatly packed male body parts wash up by the River Elbe, Hamburg State Prosecutor Chastity Riley and her colleagues begin a perplexing investigation.

As the murdered men are identified, it becomes clear that they all had a history of abuse towards women, leading Riley to wonder if it would actually be in society’s best interests to catch the killers.

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But when her best friend Carla is attacked, and the police show little interest in tracking down the offender, Chastity takes matters into her own hands and as a link between the two cases emerges, horrifying revelations threaten Chastity’s own moral compass … and put everything at risk.

The award-winning, critically acclaimed Chastity Riley series returns with a slick, hard-boiled, darkly funny thriller that tackles issues of violence and the difference between law and justice with devastating insight, and an ending you will never see coming…

My Review

I can’t pretend that I didn’t find this a bit weird. I couldn’t work out when it was set, but I’m guessing maybe the nineties. Everyone smokes, even in pubs and restaurants, but it’s the way they concentrate on smoking, just enjoying a cigarette, rather than it being something they do while doing something else. And boy can Hamburg State Prosecutor Chastity Riley and her mates drink! I’d be hospitalised.

I was totally out of my comfort zone – I felt a bit like Margot in The Good Life asking what’s so funny when everyone else is in on the joke apart from me, except The Kitchen is no laughing matter. Though it has its moments of very dark humour.

So back to the story. Neatly packed male body parts have washed up by the River Elbe. But there’s no torso, just the head and limbs. Then there’s another, again just the head and limbs, and no torso, followed by the complete body of a young man. The victims didn’t know each other, and there appear to be no links. But the similarities between the first two at least, make it likely they have been killed by the same person or persons.

When the three men are eventually identified, it appears that the only link is a history of abuse towards women. In between chapters, we have small snippets of information given by a girl / woman who has suffered abuse from various quarters throughout her young life. Who is she and how is she connected to the murders?

But when Chastity’s best friend Carla is attacked and raped, and the police are slow to act, Chastity begins to question her own belief in the law and justice, and her moral compass is tested to its limit.

It was all very exciting, what with Chastity’s friends, including an ex-police officer and her sketchy boyfriend whose flat is so cluttered, there is nowhere to sit on his balcony. We also get an insight into Hamburg’s nightlife at the time.

I was really enjoying it – it’s a fast-paced, snappy, short read – and then it suddenly turned so dark, it was actually quite comical, in a warped kind of way. The Kitchen is number two in the Chastity Riley series. It’s also an excellent translation from the original German – I would never have known it wasn’t the original.

And if you want to read the first book in the series, the synopsis states that: “A serial killer is on the loose in Hamburg, targeting dancers from The Acapulco, a club in the city’s red-light district, taking their scalps as gruesome trophies and replacing them with plastic wigs.” That’s not something you read every day.

Many thanks to @annecater for inviting me to be part of #RandomThingsTours

About the Author

Simone Buchholz was born in Hanau in 1972. At university, she studied Philosophy and Literature, worked as a waitress and a columnist, and trained to be a journalist at the prestigious Henri Nannen-School in Hamburg. In 2016, she was awarded the Crime Cologne Award as well as runner-up in the German Crime Fiction Prize for Blue Night, which was number one on the KrimiZEIT Best of Crime List for months. The critically acclaimed Beton Rouge, Mexico Street, Hotel Cartagena and River Clyde all followed in the Chastity Riley series. Hotel Cartagena won the CWA Crime in Translation Dagger in 2022. The Acapulco (2023) marked the beginning of the Chastity Reloaded series, with The Kitchen out in 2024. She lives in Sankt Pauli, in the heart of Hamburg, with her husband and son.

About Orenda Books

Orenda Books is a small independent publishing company specialising in literary fiction with a heavy emphasis on crime/thrillers, and approximately half the list in translation. They’ve been twice shortlisted for the Nick Robinson Best Newcomer Award at the IPG awards, and publisher and owner Karen Sullivan was a Bookseller Rising Star in 2016. In 2018, they were awarded a prestigious Creative Europe grant for their translated books programme. Three authors, including Agnes Ravatn, Matt Wesolowski and Amanda Jennings have been WHSmith Fresh Talent picks, and Ravatn’s The Bird Tribunal was shortlisted for the Dublin Literary Award, won an English PEN Translation Award, and adapted for BBC Radio Four ’s Book at Bedtime. Six titles have been short- or long-listed for the CWA Daggers. Launched in 2014 with a mission to bring more international literature to the UK market, Orenda Books publishes a host of debuts, many of which have gone on to sell millions worldwide, and looks for fresh, exciting new voices that push the genre in new directions. Bestselling authors include Ragnar Jonasson, Antti Tuomainen, Gunnar Staalesen, Michael J. Malone, Kjell Ola Dahl, Louise Beech, Johana Gustawsson, Lilja Sigurðardóttir and Sarah Stovell.

Back From The Dead by Heidi Amsinck (A Jensen Thriller #3)

A Missing person … a headless corpse … Jensen is on the case.

June, and as Copenhagen swelters under record temperatures, a headless corpse surfaces in the murky harbour, landing a new case on the desk of DI Henrik Jungersen, just as his holiday is about to start.

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Elsewhere in the city, Syrian refugee Aziz Almasi, driver to Esben Nørregaard MP has vanished. Fearing a link to shady contacts from his past, Nørregaard appeals to crime reporter Jensen to investigate.

Could the body in the harbour be Aziz? Jensen turns to former lover Henrik for help. As events spiral dangerously out of control, they are thrown together once more in the pursuit of evil, in a case more twisted and, more dangerous than they could ever have imagined.

My Review

This is my third Jensen novel and it’s just as good as the first two. In my review of My Name Is Jensen, I said I wasn’t that keen on her. I quite like her now, she’s grown on me, though her choice of men is still debatable. Her ex-lover DI Henrik Jungersen who I described as “…uncouth, uneducated, untidy, rough and bald. What’s not to like? Ha! What is to like? Not a lot it would appear,” I haven’t changed my mind one bit.

Jensen’s current boyfriend is Kristoffer Bro. Tall, muscled, handsome and very rich, he sounds far more attractive, but while with Henrik, what you see is what you get (probably his best or worst feature, depending how you look at it), with Bro you get a secretive man with a lot to hide. He won’t talk about his childhood or his family, which Jensen doesn’t question, but Henrik has a lot to say about it. But then he would, wouldn’t he.

The book opens with a headless corpse that has been fished out of the harbour. Henrik is called to investigate, just as he is about to go on holiday with his wife and family, with whom he has now been reunited. It’s not a good time, but he needs to be at work. Without a head or fingerprints (I won’t say why), it’s impossible to identify the body.

In the meantime, MP Esben Nørregaard’s driver, Syrian refugee Aziz Almasi has gone missing. Has he been kidnapped? Is it something to do with his escape from Syria? Esben and Jensen have been friends since the beginning, but while she wants to call the police, Esben is adamant he doesn’t want anyone else to know and asks Jensen to investigate.

Of course, we immediately think the headless body must be that of Aziz. There are many similar characteristics. So Jensen must turn to Henrik for help, and that inevitably throws them back working together. But Jensen has a boyfriend now, whom Henrik is not enamoured with, and let’s face it, if he appears too good to be true, he probably is.

It’s a great third instalment and we still have most of the characters from the first two books – Jensen’s boss at Dagbladet, editor-in-chief Margrethe Skov, her teenage nephew and Jensen’s apprentice Gustav, coffee kiosk owner Liron, hacker Fie, and elderly features writer Henning, amongst others. It’s once again set in Copenhagen, it’s June, and the temperature is stifling. It all adds to the menace and feelings of claustrophobia.

Many thanks to @annecater for inviting me to be part of #RandomThingsTours

About the Author

Heidi Amsinck won the Danish Criminal Academy’s Debut Award for My Name is Jensen (2021), the first book in a new series featuring Copenhagen reporter sleuth Jensen and her motley crew of helpers. She published her second Jensen novel, The Girl in The Photo, in July 2022, with the third due out in February 2024. A journalist by background, Heidi spent many years covering Britain for the Danish press, including a spell as London Correspondent for the broadsheet daily Jyllands-Posten. She has written numerous short stories for BBC Radio 4, such as the three-story sets Danish Noir, Copenhagen Confidential and Copenhagen Curios, all produced by Sweet Talk and featuring in her collection Last Train to Helsingør (2018). Heidi’s work has been translated from the original English into Danish, German and Czech.

The Shadow Key by Susan Stokes-Chapman

There’s something mysterious about the village of Penhelyg. Will unlocking its truth bring light or darkness?

Meirionydd, 1783. Henry Talbot has been dismissed from his post at a prestigious London hospital. The only job he can find is as a physician in the backwaters of Wales where he can’t speak the language, belief in myth and magic is rife, and the villagers treat him with bewildering suspicion. When Henry discovers his predecessor died under mysterious circumstances, he is determined to find answers.

Linette Tresilian, the unconventional mistress of Plas Helyg, lives a lonely life. Her father is long dead, her mother haunted by demons which keep her locked away in her room, and her cousin treats her with cool disdain – she has had no choice but to become fiercely self-reliant.

Linette has always suspected something is not quite right in the village, but it is only through Henry’s investigations that the truth about those closest to her will come to light…a truth that will bind hers and Henry’s destinies together in ways neither thought possible.

My Review

I’m beginning to think that Gothic Horror is rapidly becoming my new favourite genre. Maybe it’s because I was obsessed with Dennis Wheatley when I was a teenager, particularly The Devil Rides Out (not technically Gothic) and I kept getting those vibes while reading The Shadow Key. Nothing like a bit of devil worship and ritual sacrifice. I was waiting for Henry to recite the words of the ‘Sussamma Ritual’ or shine his headlights on the rising goat-like figure in his midst (ooops no headlights yet). But in the case of the Tresilian family and Plas Helyg, it’s just folklore and superstition. As a man of science Dr Henry Talbot doesn’t believe in any of that nonsense.

Having been dismissed from his job at a prestigious London Hospital, and unable to find another position, he is surprised to be offered a post in the mining village of Penhelyg in rural Wales, where myth and magic are rife. He is hired by Julian Tresilian, who is looking for a local doctor, but also someone to take care of his wayward cousin Linette (she wears men’s clothes and is very outspoken – this is 1783 after all), and her mother Gwen, who is suffering from what the Victorians later on would call ‘hysterical madness’ following the death of her husband.

Henry soon discovers that the locals hate the English, especially the ones who don’t speak Welsh (which is basically all of them), and treat him with suspicion and often downright rudeness. But Henry gets on well with Linette, her dog Merlin likes him (a sure sign), and he feels certain he can turn them around eventually. They urgently need a doctor as his predecessor died ‘under mysterious circumstances’ and the nearest one is miles away.

On his arrival, Henry’s accommodation has been ransacked, and he is shot at in the woods. Hopefully, it’s only because he’s the interloper – not that I’ve ever been shot at when moving to a new house – and they’ll soon get to accept him. But things start to turn even more sinister, and Henry and Linette must join forces to outwit the power of darkness. This book is so my cup of tea, I absolutely loved it, and while wanting to know the outcome, I didn’t want it to finish.

Many thanks to The Pigeonhole, the author, and my fellow Pigeons for making this such an enjoyable read.

About the Author

Susan Stokes-Chapman was born in 1985 and grew up in the historic Georgian city of Lichfield, Staffordshire. She studied for four years at Aberystwyth University, graduating with a BA in Education & English Literature and an MA in Creative Writing. Her debut novel, Pandora, was shortlisted for the Lucy Cavendish Fiction prize 2020 as well as longlisted for the Bath Novel Award that same year. You can find Susan on Instagram and Twitter under the handle @SStokesChapman. Her website is www.susanstokeschapman.com.

Dark Road Home by Sheila Bugler

In a small town, it’s impossible to hide…

Two decades after she left Ireland, Leah Ryan is back. She knows she won’t get a welcome reception in her hometown of Dungarry, but she’s finally ready to face up to the events that forced her to leave as a teenager.

As she arrives home, another tragedy is waiting for Leah – her first love, Eamon Lonergan, has been found brutally murdered.

At first, Eamon’s murder appears unrelated to Leah’s past. But in a small town like Dungarry, everything is connected and everyone has secrets. Sometimes there’s only one way to ensure the truth stays buried.

A tense and emotional thriller set in Ireland. Perfect for fans of Claire McGowan and Patricia Gibney.

My Review

I love that I was able to read this with my online book club The Pigeonhole, in ten staves, one stave each day for ten days. It meant that my fellow pigeons (as we call ourselves) and I could try and work out whodunnit.

Basically, Leah Ryan (a successful lawyer in Australia) returns home to Ireland after 18 years, just at the time – coincidentally – when her ex-boyfriend and twin brother of her best friend Aisling is brutally murdered. Aisling is pregnant with partner Jim’s baby. So far so good.

However, Leah’s mum Mary was knocked down by an unknown hit-and-run driver and left with severe disabilities, and while Leah ran away, her older brother Frank had to remain in Dungarry to look after her. That was basically the end of his life’s ambition.

But peddle back a bit and 15-year-old Leah has ditched Aisling to be ‘besties’ with Coco, a jealous, manipulative witch, who has just moved from Dublin with her mother Isabelle (another jealous, manipulative witch). So when Leah ditches Coco for Eamon, Coco gets very annoyed. Isabelle’s boyfriend Seamus is a sleazebag, with a penchant for groping teenage girls, but he disappears one day. Was it him who knocked down Mary Ryan?

Finally we have Tom Lonergan, father of Aisling and Eamon, who is in love with Isabelle. Everyone has secrets and they are all lying (well almost all).

So who killed Eamon? It was great fun trying to work it out! I really loved it, even though most of the characters are quite horrible, including Leah, though we forgave her behaviour as being typical of a selfish teenager. Not sure the same could be said of Coco.

Many thanks to The Pigeonhole, the author, and my fellow Pigeons for making this such an enjoyable read.

About the Author

Sheila Bugler is the author of the Ellen Kelly and Dee Doran crime novels. Her first stand alone novel, The Lucky Eight, was published in July 2021.

She grew up in a small town in the west of Ireland. After studying Psychology at University College Galway, she left Ireland and worked in Italy, Spain, Germany, Holland, Argentina and London before finally settling in Eastbourne, where she now lives with her husband, Sean, and their two children.

The Night In Question by Susan Fletcher

Florence Butterfield has lived an extraordinary life full of travel, passion and adventure. But, at eighty-seven, she suspects there are no more surprises to come her way.

Then, one midsummer’s night, something terrible happens – so strange and unexpected that Florrie is suspicious. Was this really an accident, or is she living alongside a would-be murderer?

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The only clue is a magenta envelope, discarded earlier that day.

And Florrie – cheerfully independent but often overlooked – is the only person determined to uncover the truth.

As she does, Florrie finds herself looking back on her own life . . . and a long-buried secret, traced in faded scars across her knuckles, becomes ever harder to ignore.

Readers of Elizabeth is Missing, Small Pleasures or Dear Mrs Bird will love prize-winning author Susan Fletcher’s The Night in Question – an absorbing and uplifting novel with a uniquely loveable protagonist at its heart.

My Review

It’s not often that the main protagonist in a novel is old enough to be my mother, and still alive. But in The Night In Question, we have Florence Butterfield (Florrie), 87 years old (soon to be 88), one leg and a wheelchair user. So don’t expect any fast car chases or wrestling to the ground, because while there is a death and a possible attempted murder, it’s more about Florrie reflecting on her life. And what a life it has been, a life ‘full of travel, passion and adventure.’

Florrie lives in an assisted living facility, her ‘apartment’ being an old apple store, while the others include an old pig sty, converted into four dwellings! Those less able live in the main house like Tabitha Brimble and Nancy Tapp. Renata is the manager, a tiny forty-something woman with pale skin and platinum hair.

The residents are described in such perfect and humorous detail, particularly the Ellwood twins, who are not actually sisters, or in fact twins. They are the gossips and know everything that’s going on, not that they pry or snoop, heaven forbid.

There were six loves in Florrie’s life – from Gaston Duplantier, who without Paris they would never have met, Jack Luckett (Florrie can still see his musculature and the colouring of his forearms) in Africa, and her husband of 30 years diplomat Victor Plumley. What fun they had! Then there was Hassan abu Zahra, Dougal Henderson and finally (though in fact first if we were doing this in chronological order) Teddy Silversmith, the latter involved in that Hackney business, which we desperately want to know about.

Florrie lived with her eccentric mother Prudence, father Henry, a policeman who was killed on duty when she was quite young, Aunt Pip who fled an abusive marriage to take care of them all, and poor Bobs, her older brother, devastatingly injured during the 2nd World War. There is also Gulliver the cat, always there throughout Florrie’s childhood. We had a dog named Gulliver – he was huge like Gulliver in Lilliput. The cat was more like Gulliver in Brobdingnag.

And I wish I had a friend like Pinky. Always loyal, always there.

If I could give this book six stars I would. I cried (no surprise there) for Florrie when the truth of that Hackney business is finally revealed. In fact I cried for a good half hour at the end. I cried for a life well lived, but never fully realised, for second chances and for love, of course. Beautifully written and observed, a true masterpiece.

Many thanks to @annecater for inviting me to be part of #RandomThingsTours

About the Author

Susan Fletcher was born in Birmingham and studied English Literature at the University of York. Whilst taking the MA in Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia, she began her first novel, Eve Green, which won the Whitbread First Novel Award (2004) and Betty Trask Prize (2005). Since then, Susan has written seven novels – whilst also supplementing her writing through various roles, including as a bar person, a cheesemonger and a warden for an archaeological excavation site near Hadrian’s Wall. Most recently, she has been a Royal Literary Fund Fellow at the University of
Worcester. She lives in Warwickshire.

How Soon Is Now? by Paul Carnahan Cover Reveal

Troubled ex-journalist Luke Seymour discovers an untapped talent for time travel after being recruited to rescue the stricken leader of The Nostalgia Club, an eccentric band of time travellers who meet in the back room of an Edinburgh pub.

As he hones his skills and learns the stories of the Club’s members, Luke delves deeper and deeper into his own past – where the terrible mistake which scarred his life is waiting…

About The Author

Paul Carnahan is a former national newspaper journalist-turned-writer who lives and works in Central Scotland. How Soon Is Now? is his first novel – a second, End of a Century will follow later this year.
Author’s Website: www.paulcarnahan.com 

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And Of Course, There Was The Girl by Brandon Barrow Publication Party

Gabriella’s name meant love and lies…

When Sam Harrigan agreed to find runaway bride Gabriella Cole, he expected to be looking for a marriage-scammer, not a lovely phantom with a trail of devastation in her wake whose victims include washed-up celebrities, politicians, and even mobsters.

Now everyone wants to get their hands on Gabriella, but with each step Sam takes, she seems further away as danger races closer and romance, lust, and murder are never far behind!

Read the first full-length mystery starring Sam Harrigan, the private investigator featured in the pages of Guilty Crime Story Magazine!

Author bio

Brandon Barrows is the author of several crime and mystery novels. His most recent, The Last Request, was published September, 2023 by Bloodhound Books. He has also published over one hundred short stories and is a three-time Mustang Award finalist, as well as a 2022 Derringer Award nominee. Find more online at https://www.brandonbarrowscomics.com/

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Little Red Driving Hood And The Three Repairs by Stacey Rayz and Nenad Taskov (illustrator)

Think you know the story of Little Red? Think again! This time Little Red is under the hood. What challenges will she encounter on her way to grandma’s this time?

Would you dare take a risk if your life depended on it? Especially on a day when everything seems to go wrong? Little Red dares to be different and takes bold risks as she ventures into a field that is out of the norm for girls.

Genre: Children’s Fiction
Age: 5-10
Publisher: Two Season Press

Perfect for girls and boys ages 5 to 10 who love cars, fixing things, and fairy tales, this empowering story is a modern mashup between Little Red Riding Hood and Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Little Red Driving Hood and the Three Repairs is a treat for little mechanics-in-the-making and girls who will grow up into empowered women with the choice to challenge gender roles for a better society.

My Review

How appropriate that I read this on International Women’s Day. Little Red is a great example of a girl who will let nothing stand in her way of doing what she wants. And what she wants is to be a mechanic like her mum, who owns an auto repair shop.

But this day not everything goes to plan. It looks like it could be a disaster, especially when she encounters big, bad Papa Wolf and he’s seriously scary. Little Red had tried to fix Baby Wolf’s car, but it still wouldn’t go. Then she tried to help Mama Wolf fix her car, but it went up in smoke. So when Papa Wolf says she has to fix his car or he’ll eat her up, she has to try.

Poor Little Red. What should she do? She needs to find out and quickly.

Children aged 5-10 years old will enjoy this. It teaches us that being a car mechanic isn’t just for boys. It’s for girls who believe in themselves and ‘will grow up into empowered women with the choice to challenge gender roles for a better society‘. Hooray!

Many thanks to @lovebookstours for inviting me to be part of the #LittleRed blog tour

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Whitechapel Autumn of Error by Ian Porter

Whitechapel 1888; a killer is on the loose and the newspapers are ensuring the nation knows all about not just the crimes but the terrible living conditions in which they are being perpetrated.

Nashey, a tough, scary yet charismatic man of the night, whose mother had to prostitute herself when he was a boy, knows the identity of the killer but keeps it a secret. He believes the publicity generated by the murders is forcing the authorities to address the poverty and degradation in the area. He allows the killer to remain free (whilst ensuring no more women are attacked) so the unsolved murders continue to dominate the headlines.

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He meets Sookey, an eccentric middle-class slummer and civilising influence. The two of them share a mutual friend, Mary Kelly, a fiery young prostitute whose back-story tells of how she was reduced to such a life.

To fund his surveillance of the killer, Nashey agrees, against his better judgement, to assist an old adversary to commit a daring night robbery under the noses of the huge police presence in the area.

Is it too late for Nashey and Mary to correct their mistakes?

My Review

A somewhat different approach to the usual Jack The Ripper stories – Whitechapel doesn’t centre on the killer himself or the police who are tracking him down. His identity here is almost irrelevant. Out main protagonists are Alexander ‘Nashey’ Nash, who lives in Whitechapel, his friend and prostitute Mary Kelly, who has come to London following a sad start in life, and the eccentric, middle class Sookey, who struggles to be accepted as a ‘slummer’.

Now as I know the story pretty well, there were no surprises about certain outcomes. Some characters are real like Mary Kelly, Lloyd-George and George Lusk, while others are totally fictitious. There were times when the story read like non-fiction, giving us an insight into life in a slum in the late 1900s, while at others, it was a novel like any other.

The relationships between Nash, Mary and Sookey were well handled, but there is nothing romantic or soppy. Life was hard and people had to do what they did in order to survive. Prostitution for many women (and no doubt boys and young men) was better than the workhouse, though I can’t imagine anything worse. The danger and the degradation led many to spend a large part of their earnings on gin to overcome the disgust.

Nash is a big, scary, hard man. He’s actually intelligent and self-educated like Mary. He often wears a Peaky Blinders cap when he goes out, and uses it, but only in defence of others. Sookey had a privileged background, but admits she is not very clever or knowledgeable. Nash believes that leaving the killer on the streets will finally bring the terrible squalor and poverty to the attention of the politicians, a plan which ultimately works, but with horrendous consequences. Can the end ever justify the means? Easy for us to say never (personally I believe it never can), but life was very different then.

The book is written in what is often an unemotional and non-judgemental way (also making it seem like non-fiction at times), but I think that’s the intention. We are observers – it’s not for us to judge the behaviour of these people – we can’t possibly understand their plight. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it.

Many thanks to @annecater for inviting me to be part of #RandomThingsTours

As a PS I love rhyming slang so the inclusion of a few examples really made my day. Even though I’m nowhere near London, I often ask someone if they are a bit ‘mutton’ or whether their whatever has been ‘half-hinched’. A friend of my son’s from Birmingham just looked at me like I’d gone nuts.

About the Author

Ian Porter is a historian, lecturer, public speaker and walks guide. He has a particular interest in women’s history and social history. His novels are renowned for being extremely well researched and historically accurate. Whitechapel Autumn of Error is a typically feminist, social history novel that brings the dark streets of the East End 1888 to life. He has written several other novels including the highly acclaimed Suffragette Autumn Women’s Spring, set during the fight for the vote for women, and A Plague On Both Your Houses, set in both London & Berlin in 1918/19 during the final months of The Great War and the Spanish Flu. Ian is getting on a bit (well, aged 69). His grandparents were young adults living in East London at the time of the Whitechapel Murders.