I find the history of the British Royal family so interesting. Have read numerous biographies of Royal members over the years. Clearly the author has a lot of knowledge and credible sources to back up what she is saying. Learning about the dynamics between Queen Elizabeth and her son, now The King, is fascinating. This book puts into context a lot of the stories, dramas, conflicts and difficulties that royals have faced over the years.

A good book doesn‘t HAVE to have a resolution or message, but it has to leave the reader with SOMETHING.
The author was trying to describe how human love cannot be replicated, even with the best technology…but the message was too weakly presented to be moving or thought-provoking at all.
The style of writing was good, Klara‘s character was okay, but the rest of the characters were more robotic, flat and emotionless than the robot, ironically.

What can I say? I‘m not a fan! This was a hard pan from me. I skim read the second half. Very repetitive, NO character growth or plot progression. What was the point of it? There was some nice prose. I was sick of the characters racism and generalisations and constant whinging…ugh. I had been looking forward to this book for ages because the premise sounded great. It could have been so much better.

My current read - Klara and the Sun by Ishiguro. I‘m loving it. So far an AF (Artificial Friend) is waiting in the shop window, observing the humans in the outside world and hoping someone buys her to take home. It looks to be a story about what it is to be human, and how humans love and interact with each other. Taken from the unique perspective of a robot built to assist and be a companion for humans.

My first 6 of 2024. All enjoyable, but a few were underwhelming. The Bullet That Missed cemented my love for The Thursday Murder Club series. The Push will stay with me for a long time. Mythos was so well done…I just don‘t like Greek myths it turns out, however accessibly written they are.

My first #kenfollett book. It‘s a hefty thing, weighing in at over 1100 pages. A tale set in the 12th century following 3 characters around the building of a cathedral. That sounds dry I know, but trust me, it‘s a real page-turner. I‘m on page 180, and can‘t put it down! There are 3 other books in this series, god help me! 😂

Found this book in the holiday rental I‘m staying at. OMG it is amazing. Characterisation is off the charts, as is scene setting. I really feel for the main characters because of how well their back stories are laid out. Lovely piece of historical fiction set in a small French town during German Occupation in WW2. I‘ve not read Chocolat (the authors famous book) but I‘m going to seek it out now. I predict a 5 star read here.

This book is book is beautiful. It is sublime. So poetic, so captivating. Seriously I can‘t put it down. I understand it can be a bit polarising because of the style of the writing. However it works so well for me. Can see why this had blown up on Book Tok. Seriously - We Were Liars by E.Lockheart. It is worth a try.

My reading goal this year had been 90 books (Actually it had been 25, then 50, then 75…I‘ve surpassed my expectations and thrown myself into reading again) and this book will get me to my goal. I loved the first instalment of the Thursday Murder Club, and cannot wait for more. YouTube has some wonderful interviews Richard Osman had when promoting these books and it‘s made me thirsty to read them all. Will let you know how I get on! #RichardOsman

This book IS worth the hype. A beautifully written gothic novel about a haunting of a family in a creepy dilapidated house at the top of a treacherous mountain. If you like Rebecca or Jane Eyre, then you will like this. It is creepy, captivating, disturbing, and I couldn‘t put it down. Not my usual genre, but it is so well done that it didn‘t matter.

“You and me aren‘t like other people, Pops had said one time when I was frustrated by yet another confusion over an interaction with somebody. Hearing him say it was both harsh and a relief. I knew he was right. Still is. There‘s something about my timing….human interaction is often like a dance I can‘t catch the rhythm to.”
I‘m loving this book so far, sarcastic, blunt, dry, sardonic, witty. As someone with autism I wholly relate to this quote.

This book is so beautifully written. The characters are unlikeable, but they are nuanced and felt so real. The plot moved a little slowly for me, I got bored around the middle mark…but it picked up again in the last 100 pages. I can see why this is a modern classic and a core work of dark academia. Unique, poetic, thought provoking, slow moving. Personally though it lacked something, some spark, some warmth that would have made it perfect.

I‘ve had this memoir on my TBR pile for a little while now. In light of what‘s just happened, I feel compelled to read this right away. ‘Hi my name is Matthew, although you may know me by another name. My friends call me Matty. And I should be dead. If you like, you can consider what you‘re about to read as a message from the beyond, my beyond.‘ … how hauntingly poignant the opening paragraph is. RIP Matthew Perry, you beautiful, fabulous man.

There are so many sentences and paragraphs in this book that i want to remember forever that I‘ve given up jotting them down, instead I‘m ordering a copy of the book for myself. This is a wonderful feminist tale about the life of George Orwell‘s ‘invisible‘ wife and her huge influence on his work and about the invisibility of women, the erasure of women from history and of the lives of wives in this very patriarchal world. #biography #feminist

This book was SO good. It follows the lives of the owners of a nursing home in Sydney and their families and friends. The book follows several characters perspectives going back and forward in time. Many of the characters have emigrated to Australia (or come as refugees) and had faced violence and war in their native Sri Lanka but then also faced racial violence and discrimination in Australia. Very eye opening.

I love Historical Fiction so much because it allows me to hear stories about events and experiences I knew nothing of before. At school we learnt ‘all about‘ the two World Wars…or so I thought. Never were we told about all the foreign labourers from China in their 100‘s of thousands who came to assist the allies. This books tells you about it and appears very well researched. I‘m fascinated to learn more now. It‘s also beautifully written too.

I read this book when I was around 15…20 years later I‘m giving it a re-read…my Lord it is STUNNING! #I don‘t remember the writing being so sublime and beautiful and compelling.I can‘t put it down.
“Does such a thing as the ‘fatal flaw,‘ that showy dark crack running down the middle of a life, exist outside literature? I used to think it didn‘t. Now I think it does. And I think that mine is this: a morbid longing for the picturesque at all costs.”

This little paragraph poetically describes the different stages of life! As someone rushed off my feet with young kids, I totally relate, and sometimes look forward to the winter of my life when things get quieter 🙊

This was so disappointing as I‘d seen lots of hype for the author. Basically if you want a really unrealistic thriller with dialogue that reads like a soap opera (or even fanfiction at times) then this is for you. The plot moves quickly, there are completely ridiculous coincidences everywhere and … ugh, just no, it was bad.

I LOVED this book.Catherine Cookson is magic.She has a way of immersing you in to the characters world and dealing with difficult topics (poverty, domestic violence, oppression etc) in a way that is manageable but gets you thinking, and feeling.In this story we spend some time in the ‘wild West‘ with pioneers and Indians (Native Americans) told through the perspective of 2 new migrants.I felt so immersed in the world,it was just beautifully done.

This book is so cosy. I‘ve always been a fan of the old cosy mystery novels (think Miss Marple, Poirot, Inspector Montalbano, Sherlock Holmes) and it‘s high time to bring new authors into this micro-genre. Osman does a fabulous job of introducing all the characters, it‘s really easy to keep up with them all and the plot moves along a steady pace. It‘s not highly realistic or gritty, or graphic…and that‘s what I love about it.

This book was disturbing and creepy and wrong…but I couldn‘t stop reading it! It‘s a tale of a couple trying to escape poverty so they sign up to a ‘utopia‘, but of course, it‘s not what was promised. The characters were openly flawed and unlikeable, yet I wanted to know more. Atwood‘s writing is just delectable. Highly recommend. Oil lo