Rhoda Baxter's Blog, page 10

Book review: Last Victim of the Monsoon Express by Vaseem Khan

This book is described as ‘charming’ and it really is!
Inspector Chopra is on a revived steam train and his ward, the baby elephant Ganesha is travelling with him. An Indian politician is murdered and Chopra has to solve the mystery before the train stops or risk there being a major international incident.
I liked how the history of partition was woven into the story (only where it was relevant). I really appreciated the Poirot-esque murder mystery.
This was a fun short read. I liked the gentle...

Book review: The Forgotten House on The Moors by Jane Lovering

Another corker!
Alice is woken up by the police coming to tell her that her ex husband, Grant, has died in an explosion. When she goes up to the site where it happened, she meets his current girlfriend, Jenna and her brother Max. She ends up seeing more of them because Jenna needs someone to talk to about Grant, Alice is curious as to why Grant was out there in a deserted house in the first place and well, seeing Max again wouldn’t be all that terrible either.

It’s nice to see a heroine who...

Plot your Novel In One Morning

It’s back!

Doing NanoWriMo in November but don’t have a plot yet?
Need a bit of time dedicated to thinking about your book with helpful advice on hand?
Going to the RNA York Tea and want to make a day of it?
We have just the thing for you.

The Plot Your Novel in a Morning workshop is happening 9.30am – 12 noon, on the 3rd of September at Miller’s Yard in York.

Date: Saturday 3rd September 2022
Cost: £35 (£30 if you book before the end of July).
Venue: The Loft, Miller’s Yard, Gillygate, Y...

Book Review: You had me at Halloumi by Ginger Jones

Flora Butterly is competing for the Golden Spoon – a Masterchef/ Bake off style competition featuring only Cypriot food. This is such a fun beach read. I felt like I was in sunshine myself. I also felt very, very hungry. I had to keep stopping to have a snack.

I liked that Flora was so relatable. I also liked that the story touched on kids who have been carers and what it’s like to look after someone who has schizophrenia. These elements were touched on only lightly, but it was good that ...

Love At First by Kate ClayBorn

This book is so lovely!
Having enjoyed Love Lettering, I was pretty sure I’d enjoy Love At First too. And I did!

Will fell in love with Nora when he first saw (well, heard) her as a teenager. When he meets her again as an adult, he falls in love with her all over again. Nora meets Will as the guy who is about to destroy the peace in the beautiful old building that she lives in. What starts as a battle of wits, ends in friendship and love.

It’s hard to say more without giving too much away. It’s...

The Change by Kirsten Miller

When I spotted The Change on Netgalley, I requested it straight away.
Three women in a Long Island seaside community realise that they have powers. Nessa, who sees the dead; Harriet who is the punishment that fits the crime and Jo who will destroy it all at the end.
Nessa sees dead girls (not women, teenaged girls) who have been murdered by men. She knows there’s a serial killer on the loose, but it’s hard to prove it when the bodies haven’t actually been found. As the three women seek to get ...

Book Review: Lessons in Chemistry

A friend of mine sent me a copy of this book because she was so sure I’d love it. She was right.
Elizabeth Zott is a scientist – a chemist- and a good one. But sexism in the science community and general nastiness towards her because of her beauty force her out of science and she ends up bringing up her daughter alone. Then she is offered a job as host for a TV cooking show…

Zott is awesome! She’s clever and practical and strong. Her life isn’t easy, but she handles it in her own unique wa...

Book review: My Sweet Girl by Amanda Jayatissa

I picked this up because it was written by a Sri Lankan author and I was told had a lot about Sri Lanka in it. What I was not expecting the Sri Lankan parts to be set in what Ratmalana, which is an area I know well. And I wasn’t expecting there to be the little references which felt like a little zing of recognition each time I saw one. I really enjoyed that.

It’s been a long time since I read a thriller. And this is an excellent thriller. It has a properly unreliable narrator, where n...

Book review: The Buy-In by Emma St Clair

I had never read anything by Emma St Clair before. I grabbed this book on Netgalley because I saw that it was a sweet or low heat romcom and it sounded like fun. I’m so glad I did.
The Buy In is sweet in every sense of the word. It has a whole lot of heart. The story centres around Lindy who has abandonment issues, and Pat who is a ex pro football player with a tendency to be impulsive (he has ADHD, which is discussed in the context of being part of who he is). It’s a second chance romance be...

The Grooms Wore White by Charlie Lyndhurst

This story is women’s fiction/ general fiction rather than romance and it centres around Jason who is a wedding planner, nearing his 40s and who has a long term partner in Pete; Mel who is in her 40s, suddenly single and grappling with being a single mum after all these years; and Harriet, who is another wedding planner, slightly younger than Jason, who is actively homophobic at the start of the book. Harriet is definitely not the most likeable, but she does go through a huge character chang...