Reviewed by Rod McLary It is always exciting to read the first published book of a new author. Sam Coley is the author of this book describing a road trip undertaken by Alex and his twin sister Amy following the sudden death of their parents. The circumstances which lead to the road trip and the
Reviewed by Wendy Lipke ‘Lost in slumber, all the scents, the sounds, the colours of her past rise up, all that she has buried – the secrets, the darkness – return to her.’ What have you done? What on earth have you done? (Prologue) The main storyline of The River Home, by Hannah Richell, takes
Reviewed by Wendy Lipke For many readers, it is a mystery how individual writers can continue to come up with their many and varied storylines. Some writers believe that the stories find them. Kayte Nunn was a magazine and book editor, then freelance feature writer and project editor, before she had her first book published
Reviewed by Wendy Lipke Bond Springs Station, north of Alice Springs, was first settled in the 1870s by a Mr Willoughby and Mr Youl, after a daunting twelve-month wagon trek through central Australia. Australia’s Cattle King, Sydney Kidman, became the property owner in 1910, from whom Grant Heaslip purchased it in 1964. The original houses,
Reviewed by Wendy Lipke Finding Eadie is the third historical novel by Caroline Beecham. This author provides a well-researched backdrop for her stories. In this case, it is World War Two in London and focusses on how many of those left behind struggled to carry on their normal lives. This is not a story about
Reviewed by Wendy Lipke This novel is another interesting read from the pen of Kerry McGinnis. Using her vast experience of the outback, she has opened up this part of Australia to her readers. Kerry McGinnis is the oldest sister in a family who run a vast station out near Lawn Hill, in North-west Queensland
Reviewed by Patricia Simms-Reeve Sex as a consolation and substitute for fame, and a young woman behaving with the confidence and lack of commitment of the male, is the driving force of Jena Li – a brilliant child prodigy who once played her Stradivarius violin to international audiences. Being a young, now 23, beautiful Asian,
Reviewed by Ian Lipke Tony Park’s novels are well known to most readers of general fiction. His books are usually fast moving narratives that tell an exciting story and introduce characters as efficiently as some of the highly visible, top line writers. His Scent of Fear and Ghosts of the Past were exciting and worthwhile.
Reviewed by Antonella Townsend In her latest novel, Better Luck Next Time, Kate Hilton introduces readers to a cast of angst-ridden characters; a chaotic mix that includes: a famous feminist icon, five capable professional women,husbands and fathers, two unattached wise men, an angry teenage boy, and, crashing through the sound barrier, four-year-old twin sisters. Manipulating
Reviewed by Patricia Simms-Reeve The earlier chapters of On a Barbarous Coast might strike the reader to be an imagined survival story set near what is now Cooktown. The exploits of the crew of Cook’s Endeavour are graphically related. It is, in fact, much much more. In order to conclude as it does, the authors
Reviewed by E.B. Heath … Mum came down from the tallest greengage tree … “This whole thing is not at all as I’d thought” … Life is precisely that which she and others were prodigiously killing – the moment itself. Should an award ever exist for the category ‘Lightness of Touch when Writing about Brutality’
Reviewed by Patricia Simms-Reeve The impressive title, A Universe of Sufficient Size, promises themes that are far from trivial. The reader is not disappointed with this brilliant novel. It gives a fine portrait of genius in the character Pali Kalmar who is based on the mathematician Paul Erdos – a Hungarian. Pali is unprepossessing in
Reviewed by Rod McLary Lanny is a book of the imagination and the reader who most enjoys it will have an imagination to match. Lanny – the eponymous hero – is a young boy living with his parents in a village outside London. His mother, Jolie, is an emerging crime writer and his father, Robert,
Reviewed by Wendy Lipke When I first read the title of this book, I imagined the storyline would be something that highlighted the dedication of this group of people who provide us with the sustenance to survive. I was wrong in my assumption. This story does have a farmer at its centre. Mitch Bishop is
Reviewed by Patricia Simms-Reeve As a charming distraction from the Covid19 world, The Switch has all the winning ingredients, especially for the female reader. There is a clever, beautiful thirty-something heroine; a feisty adventurous seventy-year-old, her grandmother; a handsome, near perfect hero and a host of diverse minor characters. There is even a lively Labrador