Seduction: A Novel of Suspense by M.J. Rose

From the author of The Book of Lost Fragrances comes a haunting novel about a grieving woman who discovers the lost letters of novelist Victor Hugo, awakening a mystery that spans centuries.

In 1843, novelist Victor Hugo’s beloved nineteen-year-old daughter drowned. Ten years later, Hugo began participating in hundreds of séances to reestablish contact with her. In the process, he claimed to have communed with the likes of Plato, Galileo, Shakespeare, Dante, Jesus—and even the Devil himself. Hugo’s transcriptions of these conversations have all been published. Or so it was believed.

Recovering from her own losses, mythologist Jac L’Etoile arrives on the Isle of Jersey—where Hugo conducted the séances—hoping to uncover a secret about the island’s Celtic roots. But the man who’s invited her there, a troubled soul named Theo Gaspard, has hopes she’ll help him discover something quite different—Hugo’s lost conversations with someone called the Shadow of the Sepulcher.

What follows is an intricately plotted and atmospheric tale of suspense with a spellbinding ghost story at its heart, by one of America’s most gifted and imaginative novelists.

Fictional books about reincarnation are difficult to pull off. It’s hard to make them feel anything but corny when it comes to the characters’ reliving past lives. Unfortunately, as much as I enjoyed the first half of this novel, it has these same faults.

The whole novel’s setup is done nicely. It’s very atmospheric, making the reader feel quite cozy despite the mysterious circumstances Jac is living through. The British setting is perfect, with the ocean providing an almost sinister backdrop.

Jac herself is interesting, though not as complex as I would have liked. We don’t get too much about her personality, getting more flashbacks of past lives than anything else. We also get to meet a fictional Victor Hugo through his journals, which provides a nice contrast to Jac’s story. I wish I could say that the Owain and Gwenore plot was as interestingly composed as the rest, but it feels overdone and not nearly original enough to warrant an entire novel devoted to it. We don’t see much of it, even though it is truly crucial plot line, so it feels extraneous, when it really shouldn’t.

Apart from that, the supposedly climactic scene was a disappointment. Considering all the pages devoted to descriptions, as lovely as they were, I expected a bit more of the big “fight” scene at the end.

All in all, not one of my favorites, although I did enjoy the first half quite a lot. You can find better novels of this genre out there.

Follow Friday

Q: Tell us about the most emotional scene you’ve ever read in a book – and how did you react?

I think I've written about this scene before. It's from Immortal Bird by Doron Weber, a book about the author's real experience of living through his son's death. There is one scene towards the end of the book, when the boy is in the hospital for the last time that is heart breaking. I don't cry with books often, but I did with this one.

Teaser Tuesdays

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

Grab your current read
Open to a random page
Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

From Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

"I spin around like I've been caught stealing food again. That only happened once and my parents didn't believe me when I said it wasn't for me."

pg. 13

Musing Mondays

Musing Mondays asks you to muse about one of the following each week…
• Describe one of your reading habits.
• Tell us what book(s) you recently bought for yourself or someone else, and why you chose that/those book(s).
• Tell us what you’re reading right now — what you think of it, so far; why you chose it; what you are (or, aren’t) enjoying it.


I'm reading Seduction: A Novel of Suspense by M. J. Rose. Really fun read so far, with lots of Gothic ambience and lovely storytelling. I didn't know this was a book in a series, so I'll be looking for the rest of the books, though each one can be read as a stand-alone. I'm having fun with this one!

Cobweb Bride by Vera Nazarian

Many are called...
She alone can save the world and become Death's bride.

COBWEB BRIDE (Cobweb Bride Trilogy, Book One) is a history-flavored fantasy novel with romantic elements of the Persephone myth, about Death's ultimatum to the world.

What if you killed someone and then fell in love with them?

In an alternate Renaissance world, somewhere in an imaginary "pocket" of Europe called the Kingdom of Lethe, Death comes, in the form of a grim Spaniard, to claim his Bride. Until she is found, in a single time-stopping moment all dying stops. There is no relief for the mortally wounded and the terminally ill....

Covered in white cobwebs of a thousand snow spiders she lies in the darkness... Her skin is cold as snow... Her eyes frozen... Her gaze, fiercely alive...

While kings and emperors send expeditions to search for a suitable Bride for Death, armies of the undead wage an endless war... A black knight roams the forest at the command of his undead father… Spies and political treacheries abound at the imperial Silver Court.... Murdered lovers find themselves locked in the realm of the living...

Look closer — through the cobweb filaments of her hair and along each strand shine stars...

And one small village girl, Percy—an unwanted, ungainly middle daughter—is faced with the responsibility of granting her dying grandmother the desperate release she needs.

As a result, Percy joins the crowds of other young women of the land in a desperate quest to Death's own mysterious holding in the deepest forests of the North...

And everyone is trying to stop her.

 

I don’t often read fantasy books, but this one had such a promising premise that I had to pick it up. And I really wasn’t disappointed.

This was a lovely first part to a trilogy which promises to have an epic span. We are introduced to a large group of characters, but, unlike other fantasy books, it is not difficult to keep them straight. They are written so vividly and introduced so carefully, that it is easy to cement them in our minds without problem. Percy, short for Persephone, is the protagonist, a “plain” young woman who immediately catches the reader’s attention by her strong personality. Definitely a good character to follow around for three books.

The story itself is pretty quick paced, with only one or two moments where the pace dragged just a bit. There are a few storylines that seem like they can never converge but which the author does a careful job of joining by the end of the book, bringing most of the characters together and setting up the next book without leaving us without some kind of closure. This, I think, is a good move on her part.

Even if you don’t necessarily read fantasy books, I do recommend you give this one a chance. It is a fun story that does not disappoint.

Follow Friday

Q: What is your guilty pleasure as far as reading? Is it a genre, or is it a certain type of book?


Hmm. I suppose I have to say some of the young adult books are guilty pleasures for me. Since I tend to read pretty much adult books, the odd YA story feels like a special treat, something fun and light to read in a day or two. I mean books like Monument 14 or The Goddess Test. Books that aren't all that deep but which are still fun.

The Hobbyist by Darryl Shelly

The Hobbyist is a coming-of-age story masked as a sex addict's roller coaster. Based upon true events, the author authentically chronicles sexual awakening from a man's perspective as he pulls back the curtain, and with staggering honesty, invites you into his private world of decadence. Not to be confused with a book on recovery, this raucous account is a cautionary tale of heartbreak and hilarity as a young man rises to manhood and into the throes of full-blown, sexual addiction in New York City.

This was a fascinating look into the rarely-spoken of world of sexual addiction. Although it is a novel and therefore fiction, the author drew on his own experiences in New York to give a realistic portrayal of a sexual addict.

The tension in the book is very effective. The author manages to catch our attention from the beginning and slowly starts building up the anxiety and fear that the protagonist feels. In a way, we are just as surprised as he is when his life starts spiraling out of his control. It’s not an easy read, because of the emotional trauma we can spy behind the words, but it is a compelling one.

The one issue I had with the book’s structure was the pretty frequent change in tenses, so that we weren’t too sure, throughout the story, which moment was the present one. Other than that, the book flows very well and the writing is simple enough to allow the actions to come through, unadorned.

This is definitely not a book for everyone. There is, of course, a lot of sexual material, so if that makes you uncomfortable, better not choose this one. But if you want to know a bit more about this addiction, then this is a great book to pick up.

 

 

 

The Bird Sisters by Rebecca Rasmussen

When a bird flies into a window in Spring Green, Wisconsin, sisters Milly and Twiss get a visit. Twiss listens to the birds' heartbeats, assessing what she can fix and what she can't, while Milly listens to the heartaches of the people who've brought them. These spinster sisters have spent their lives nursing people and birds back to health.

But back in the summer of 1947, Milly and Twiss knew nothing about trying to mend what had been accidentally broken. Milly was known as a great beauty with emerald eyes and Twiss was a brazen wild child who never wore a dress or did what she was told. That was the summer their golf pro father got into an accident that cost him both his swing and his charm, and their mother, the daughter of a wealthy jeweler, finally admitted their hardscrabble lives wouldn't change. It was the summer their priest, Father Rice, announced that God didn't exist and ran off to Mexico, and a boy named Asa finally caught Milly's eye. And, most unforgettably, it was the summer their cousin Bett came down from a town called Deadwater and changed the course of their lives forever.

Rebecca Rasmussen's masterfully written debut novel is full of hope and beauty, heartbreak and sacrifice, love and the power of sisterhood, and offers wonderful surprises at every turn.

Literary fiction is my favorite type of fiction, so this book immediately caught my eye. It wasn’t as powerful as I expected, but it did have some lovely writing.

Twiss and Milly are the protagonists. They are the two characters who drive the story forward, with Bett, their cousin being a kind of catalyst during one particular summer that changed all their lives. Twiss was well written, her contradictions and issues nicely explored, so that we got a good sense of who she was. Milly was a bit more vague, though we still got a bit of knowledge about what made her who she was. Bett, and the two sisters’ parents didn’t fare quite as well, leaving the reader wanting to know more about them, about their lives.

The writing had a beautiful flow to it that made it easy to read even though we alternated between the past and the present. The imagery was lovely and we could really picture ourselves there, right on their farm.

I would have liked a bit more resolution in the stories. Their parents’ deaths weren’t explained as fully as I would have preferred, and I think a bit more about Bett would have added more oomph to the ending.

I do recommend it, though. It’s a lovely book.

Teaser Tuesdays

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

Grab your current read
Open to a random page
Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Out of Breath by Blair Richmond

"'Be careful, kiddo,' she says. "'This town is full of crazies.'"

 

pg. 4 (ARC)

The Interrogator's Notebook by Martin Ott

Norman Kross is a career interrogator who has worked covertly in some of the most dangerous places in the world. He returns to his LA home, contemplating retirement and coming to terms with his past. He may be a master at unlocking others’ secrets, but he is blind to the truth of his relationship with his wife, sons, father, and friends. Floundering as a teacher, Norman agrees to take on one last assignment, to interrogate a character actor who may be responsible for the death of a director’s daughter. The secrets he uncovers are far more terrifying than any battlefield, any windowless room, any passage in the notebook he feverishly writes in to make sense of what men are capable of behind their masks.

This is definitely one of those books that suck you in as soon as you start reading it. It is a smart thriller that keeps you guessing until the end.

Norman, the protagonist, is a flawed character. Now, this might feel like a cliché, the jaded detective, but it really doesn’t feel like it at all as you read. The author does such a nice job of shaping him into a fully-dimensional character that he is able to avoid Norman being forgotten amidst all the similar characters in this genre.

This book is more than just a thriller, though, since the writing lends itself for deeper analysis. There are some lovely images and thoughtful scenes that we don’t usually get in this genre. It really added to the ambience. The details and descriptions never get in the way of the plot, however, highlighting the important things instead of overwhelming them.

This is one thriller that I would recommend for all lovers if this genre or anyone looking for an edge-of-your-seat read.

 

 

 

 

 

Musing Mondays

Musing Mondays asks you to muse about one of the following each week…
• Describe one of your reading habits.
• Tell us what book(s) you recently bought for yourself or someone else, and why you chose that/those book(s).
• Tell us what you’re reading right now — what you think of it, so far; why you chose it; what you are (or, aren’t) enjoying it.

I'm reading Cobweb Bride by Vera Nazarian, which I got from Netgalley. I'm really enjoying it so far. It's got fantasy and it's a rather original version of the whole Persephone and Hades myth. I'm about halfway through and I'll definitely be reading the sequels when they come out.

Follow Friday

Activity! Hopefully warm weather for most of us is here soon…so tell us about your favorite outdoor reading spot. Or take a picture.

Well, I don't really have an outdoor reading spot. This is not because there aren't nice spots in my backyard but because I have a very, very obsessive bird. Let me explain: I have a pet mynah bird, one I've raised since he was a baby. He's become really attached to me, considers me his mom. This little mynah bird follows me around the entire house and sleeps on my shoulder, but since he doesn't have his wings cut, I'm too afraid to let him out. The problem is that if he sees me sitting outside, he starts crying and pecking at the door. It's too sad. I can't put him through that. Yeah, I know, I'm spoiling him, but he's too adorable to make him stress out. I can read inside.

The first picture is when he was a baby. He had a little injured foot from where he fell off his nest. His parents abandoned him, so I started taking care of him.

And that's him now, perched, as always on my shoulder.

Evidence of Life by Barbara Taylor Sissel

On the last ordinary day of her life, Abby Bennett feels like the luckiest woman alive. But everyone knows that luck doesn't last forever…As her husband, Nick, and daughter, Lindsey, embark on a weekend camping trip to the Texas Hill Country, Abby looks forward to having some quiet time to herself. She braids Lindsey's hair, reminds Nick to drive safely and kisses them both goodbye. For a brief moment, Abby thinks she has it all—a perfect marriage, a perfect life—until a devastating storm rips through the region, and her family vanishes without a trace.

When Nick and Lindsey are presumed dead, lost in the raging waters, Abby refuses to give up hope. Consumed by grief and clinging to her belief that her family is still alive, she sets out to find them. But as disturbing clues begin to surface, Abby realizes that the truth may be far more sinister than she imagined. Soon she finds herself caught in a current of lies that threaten to unhinge her and challenge everything she once believed about her marriage and family.

With a voice that resonates with stunning clarity, Barbara Taylor Sissel delivers a taut and chilling mystery about a mother's love, a wife's obsession and the invisible fractures that can shatter a family.

 

This book started off well, lots of potential in the first few chapters. For a mystery/thriller, it was a really good start, quickly establishing the characters, the setting, never detailing things in excess which can slow down the plot. The tension started at once, so that the reader immediately got a sense that things were just a bit off. As I said, great beginning.

The problem with this book is that once the mystery starts, nothing really new happens. We get a few clues here and there, but it’s hard to maintain the tension without adding much plot. And that’s the problem. Nothing much happens after the first few chapters. The same information is recycled over and over from different sources and we get nothing fresh until close to the end, when everything seems to happen at once.

What really bugged me, though, was the lack of cohesion at the end. So many things were left unresolved, or at least unexplained, that it made me wonder why I bothered to read the book at all. There was no sense of closure at all. I’ve run across this many times in this genre, so maybe it’s something inherently difficult to do with thrillers, but it still should be required for the author to provide a proper ending.

I’d pass on this one and read something else.

 

 

 

 

 

Teaser Tuesdays

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

Grab your current read
Open to a random page
Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!


From The Bird Sisters by Rebecca Rasmussen


"'I kept telling her,  a bird's nothig to cry over,' she said about her daughter. 'When you've had your heart broken, you'll run over a person and you won't even notice.'"

pg. 4

Musing Mondays

Musing Mondays asks you to muse about one of the following each week…
• Describe one of your reading habits.
• Tell us what book(s) you recently bought for yourself or someone else, and why you chose that/those book(s).
• Tell us what you’re reading right now — what you think of it, so far; why you chose it; what you are (or, aren’t) enjoying it.



Right now, I'm reading The Hobbyist by Darryl Shelly. It's about a man struggling with sexual addiction. The topic is fascinating, especially since we don't really read too much about these kinds of things. I've just started it so I can't give too much of an opinion, but it does sound very interesting.

NOS4A2 by Joe Hill

Charlie Manx burned a man to death in his black 1938 Rolls Royce Wraith, but that’s not the worst of it. Rumor has it that he kidnapped dozens of children, taking them to a place he calls “Christmasland.” The only child ever to escape was a very lucky girl named Victoria McQueen.

Vic has a gift – she can ride her bike through the Shorter Way bridge and she’ll come out the other side wherever she needs to be, even if it’s hundreds of miles away. Vic doesn’t tell anyone about her ability; no one would understand.

When Charlie Manx finally dies after years in prison, his body disappears...after the autopsy. The police and media think someone stole it, but Vic knows the truth: Charlie Manx is on the road again...and he has her kid. And this time, Vic McQueen’s going after him...

This book’s premise is fabulous. It’s something I would have picked up even if I hadn’t been lucky enough to receive an ARC. I’ve never read anything by Joe Hill before, so I was very curious to see what his writing would be like, considering who his father is (Stephen King).

The story is definitely unique, so that’s definitely something for which to applaud him. The one thing about the horror genre, as much as I love it, is that it can get a bit repetitive. But this story was brand new. It is fast-paced, though I think it could have done with a teensy bit of editing here and there. His writing is not as crisp as I would have liked it, but there are some wonderful images in the last few chapters, especially in the ones that take place in Christmasland. Some, however, were overdone. There were some moments where you can see the writer thinking “how do I freak them out even more?” and that’s never effective. There are some overdone scenes, where the real tension is lost behind a bunch of “scary” images.

I did enjoy it, though. It didn’t quite make my skin crawl, but it got close. Mr. Hill obviously has a pretty good ear as to what makes people look under their beds.

Follow Friday

What is a book you didn’t like that all your friends raved about or what book did you love that wasn’t popular?


My sister absolutely gushed over Catch 22 by Joseph Heller. I was game, always willing to try books even if the premise didn't particularly interest me. I hated it. Truly hated it. I know there are a lot of people out there who think it's the best book ever written, etc. but I couldn't wait to finish it. It's the kind of book that makes me want to throw against the wall.
There are many books I love that other people to which I've recommended them didn't enjoy. One that comes to mind is The Egyptologist by Arthur Phillips. It's a bit bizarre, ok, but it's a fabulous one. 

Teaser Tuesdays

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

Grab your current read
Open to a random page
Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

From Bones Buried in the Dirt by David S. Atkinson

"I ran at them and held the log above my head with both hands. I yelled really loud."

 

pg. 11

Musing Mondays

Musing Mondays asks you to muse about one of the following each week…
• Describe one of your reading habits.
• Tell us what book(s) you recently bought for yourself or someone else, and why you chose that/those book(s).
• Tell us what you’re reading right now — what you think of it, so far; why you chose it; what you are (or, aren’t) enjoying it.

I'm reading Evidence of Life by Barbara Taylor Sisse. It's pretty good so far, lots of tension and mystery. It has a fast-paced plot that really keeps you wondering. Hopefully, it's able to maintain that kind of momentum until the end.

Sky on Fire by Emmy Laybourne

In this sequel to MONUMENT 14, the group of survivors, originally trapped together in a superstore by a series of escalating disasters, has split in two. Most of the kids are making a desperate run on their recently repaired school bus for the Denver airport where they hope to reunite with their parents, be evacuated to safety, and save their dying friend.

But the world outside is dark and filled with dangerous chemicals that turn people into bloodthirsty monsters, and not all the kids were willing to get on the bus. Left behind in a sanctuary that has already been disturbed once, the remaining kids try to rebuild the community they lost. But when the issues are life and death, love and hate, who can you really trust?

This is the second book in the Monument 14 series, a post-apocalyptic young adult series that actually manages to stay original and very frightening.

It’s rare to find sequels that are better than the first book, but I think this one fits the case. I thought at it was much more tense than the first one, the edge-of-you-seat feeling remains pretty much from beginning to end. The plot is fresh, with no zombies or vampires or anything like that, just basic human nature. Oh, and toxic compounds, but that’s not even the truly important part of the book.

The characters are all pretty well developed, which is a feat when you take into account how many there are. The writing is simple but sharp, keeping the pace at a good clip. The only thing that I lowered the book in my eyes was the ending. The author abruptly sets us up for a third book, which in my opinion, is not needed. The book would have left more of an effect on the reader if it’d ended in this book.

If you like post-apocalyptic stories, then I do recommend this series. You do have to start with the first book, though, otherwise you’ll be completely lost. It’s a fun one.