Author: Rebecca Serle

This book came highly recommended by Kathryn with a warning that there might be a “trigger” for me in the story. I assured her that I could manage whatever came up.

As I read, and waited for the “trigger”, I was struck by this particular paragraph:

“Here is the thing no one tells you about cancer: they ease you into it. After the initial shock, after the diagnosis and the terror, they put you on the slow conveyor belt. They start you off nice and easy. You want some lemon water with that chemo? You got it. Radiation? No problem, everyone does it, it’s practically weed. We’ll serve you those chemicals with a smile. You’ll love them, you’ll see.”

Having come out on the other side of my diagnosis it seems a good way to describe the ordeal.

Author: Caradog Prichard

The suggestion for this book came from a Facebook group I’m part of. It is only the second suggestion I’ve followed up on but both have been excellent.

The narrator is telling us about his life as a young boy in Wales. It seems a fairly ordinary life but there are a few twists and turns. The story is mostly autobiographical but there is a small mystery at the end that moves the story into novel territory (at least I think it does).

If you are going to read it yourself you must read the Translator’s Note in order to make sense of some of the characters.

Goodreads Rating: * * * *

Author: Henning Mankell

Another Kurt Wallander mystery and they never disappoint.

A party of three young people disappear while celebrating Midsummer’s Eve. Are they really missing or are they travelling as their postcards home would indicate. When one of Kurt’s colleagues is found dead Kurt struggles to make sense of the two crimes and find a link between them.

Goodreads Rating: * * * * *

Author: Kate Mosse

This is a book I picked up at a yard sale this summer. The biggest draw to the book was the size – over 700 pages. I noticed that this is listed as a time-lapse book in that the story takes place during a couple of time frames.

Leonie Vernier is a 17-year old girl living in Paris in the late 1800s. When an aunt asks her and her brother to visit her on the family estate, Domaine de la Cade, they are happy to get out of the city. The brother is embroiled in “something” and Leonie is happy to have the company of her brother to herself.

Meredith Martin is writing a biography of Debussy who lived in the apartment below the Vernier’s. Her reason for visiting the Domaine de la Cade in 2007 has very little to do with Dubussy. It is her belief that somewhere in her past she has a link to the Vernier family.

The story takes you into the occult and a unique deck of tarot cards. A bit like an Anne Rice novel, but not quite as good. This is the second book in a trilogy but the other books are also time-lapses and a quick review didn’t seem to have much to do with this particular story.

Goodreads Rating: * * *