Book Tag: I’ll Get Around To It Later

In the true spirit of the tag, as soon as I started it, I realised I had another to do first so this has taken me a bit longer than planned!

I was tagged by Sifa Elizabeth Reads, click here to read her post. The tag was originally created by Quote, Unquote and the graphic came from their post.

I'm tagging The Artsy Reader and Quirinus 

A classic book that you have been meaning to read forever but haven’t yet

I'm not 100% sure but I don't think I ever read Through the Looking Glass, the sequel to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. I have this lovely copy with both books so I really should get to it soon.

A book on your shelf that you haven’t read yet

Where do I start??? Here's a picture of my shelf which is already 2 deep so you're only seeing half of the books. Plus I have a few in piles around the house which don't even fit on the shelf.

A book that you got recently that you haven’t read

Peregrine Quinn and the Mask of Chaos by Ash Bond, this is book two and I really enjoyed the first one. I am planning to read this one soon but my plans don't necessarily work out, as we can see!

A book that you’ve had forever but haven’t read

The Girl Who Could Move Sh*t with Her Mind by Jackson Ford

I bought this for my sister years ago and she really enjoyed it so I borrowed it back but still never got round to it!

A book a friend recommended that you haven’t read

There are sure to have been many over the years as my own TBR is so overflowing that recommendations usually fall on the wayside, but Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes is a recent one which does sound intriguing...

A book you’re procrastinating on

I love all Laura Wood's books, including The Agency for Scandal so I really don't know why I haven't read A Season for Scandal yet! It's always on my 'soon' pile and I bought it as soon as it was released so I have no excuse. I guess I just haven't been in the mood or other books have been more urgent. But I WILL read it soon... 

The next book on your TBR

I'm currently in the middle of a few different books but I plan to start Wendington Jones and The Lost Legacy by Daniel Dockery next. This is the second book in a series and I loved the first so I'm really looking forward to it.

Eerie Exhibits: Five Macabre Museum Tales by Victoria Williamson

I have to say, the book title is extremely apt. I'll certainly be looking at museum exhibits a little differently from now on! 

A boy is haunted by the screaming butterflies from his childhood. A little girl just wants her father's attention, but what will she find in the Egyptian section of the museum? A museum guard can't get the new painting out of his mind. A bear out for revenge. A shell whispers dark ideas.

My favourite was the second story. Poor Amy just wanted some cake on her birthday and she's had to be so much more mature than her 7 years. Who can blame her for getting distracted by the spooky sarcophagus? I liked how the story ended too, slightly mysterious but still very satisfying.

Have you ever had a spooky experience in a museum? Let me know in the comments, I'd love to hear about them.

Book Summary

Five unnerving tales of the weird and uncanny from award-winning author Victoria Williamson.

A room full of screaming butterflies.

An unsettling smile on the face of a carved sarcophagus.

A painting that draws its viewer into the disturbing past.

A stuffed bear that growls in the dead of night.

And a shell that whispers more sinister sounds than the sigh of the sea…

Dare you cross the threshold of the old Museum and view its eerie exhibits?

Author Bio

Victoria Williamson is an award-winning author from Glasgow, Scotland, who has worked as an educator in a number of different countries, including as an English teacher in China, a secondary school science teacher in Cameroon, a teacher trainer in Malawi, and an

additional support needs teacher in the UK. Her many visits to Kelvingrove Art Gallery and

Museum from a young age inspired this set of short stories for adults based on the real and imaginary exhibits that captured her interest over the years, and led to her current studies of history and archaeology.

Victoria works part time writing books for the education company Twinkl and spends the rest of her time writing novels for children and adults, and visiting schools, libraries and literary festivals to give author talks and run creative writing workshops. When not writing or talking about books, she’s often to be found up to her knees in mud on an archaeological dig or tangled up in a ball of wool playing with a crochet hook.

I've chosen a Cairo Cocktail to go with my favourite of the stories. Shake the following with ice - 40ml vodka, 20ml blue curacao, 20ml almond syrup, 20ml lemon juice. Pour into a tall glass with ice and top with orange juice. I'll admit I was a bit dubious about the colour when I saw it was mixing blue curacao with orange juice but if you pour the juice slowly you can get a lovely marbled effect.

 

Mystery Solving Heroines

Today's post highlights three very different heroines, but they are all wonderful in their own ways.

I've made a Teaquila in honour of Vera's tea shop and the sheer amount of tea people in the old English times drank. 60ml cold black tea, 30ml tequila, 15ml honey vodka, 15ml sugar syrup, 15ml lemon juice, 2 dashes orange bitters. Shake and strain into a glass mug.

Vera Wong's Guide to Snooping (On a Dead Man) by Jesse Sutanto

 

I'll start with Vera because she has to be my favourite mystery-solving heroine. She's so funny, I really love her. I definitely want to be more like Vera, she doesn't let anything faze her!

I have been wanting to try this series for a while and though it probably would have helped to know who some of the characters are, it's not necessary to have read the previous book. I have now bought book 1 though and I'm really looking forward to it.

One of the best things was the friendship between Vera and her neighbour Winifred. I love their sniping which just shows how much they really care about each other. There was so much humour on every page, as well as empathy and emotion. One of very few 5 star reads so far this year!

Book Summary

Vera Wong is perfectly content as a teashop owner. She is definitely not seeking opportunities for amateur sleuthing. But what else is she to do when a distressed woman called Millie asks for her help?

Okay, perhaps Vera wheedled the story out of her. And maybe the case file for Millie’s missing friend Thomas didn’t exactly fall into her lap. Everyone knows a locked briefcase is just asking to be opened by someone handy with a hairpin.

Not even the aroma of chrysanthemum tea can stop Vera from catching the scent of this mystery. However dangerous it is, Vera intends to uncover the truth in the only way that this Chinese mother knows how: by spilling the tea.

Miss Caroline Bingley, Private Investigator by Kelly Gardiner and Sharmini Kumar

 

It took me a little longer to warm to Caroline but as I got to know her and she learned more about her own prejudices I liked her more and more. Its quite interesting to see her grow and realise how little she has actually seen of how other people live. She also has some humour, though it is a lot more straight-laced, but I love her verbal sparring with the gentlemen who clearly have no idea who they are dealing with!

I haven't read Pride and Prejudice so while I know of the main characters I'm not really familiar with anyone else. I don't think this really matters to the story but fans of Pride and Prejudice will enjoy meeting some old friends.

Book Summary

A missing maid. A murder most foul. A highly imprudent adventure.

Two years after the events of Pride and Prejudice, Miss Caroline Bingley is staying at her brother's country estate within an easy ride of Mr and Mrs Darcy's home, Pemberley, and wondering if there's more to life than playing cribbage and paying calls on country neighbours.

So when Georgiana Darcy's maid, Jayani, vanishes – and worse, Georgiana disappears in search of her – Caroline races to London to find them both, and quickly discovers a shocking, cold-blooded murder.

Soon Caroline and Georgiana are careering through the gritty, grimy underbelly of London assisted by Caroline's trusty manservant, Gordon, and demanding answers of shady characters, police magistrates and mysterious East India Company-men to discover the killer. Along the way they uncover the cost of Empire on India and its people… and Miss Bingley's incomparable powers of investigation.

As Caroline puts her superior new talents to work, she finds out exactly what an accomplished, independent woman with a sharp mind and a large fortune can achieve – even when pitted against secrets, scandal, and a murderer with no mercy.

A Game Most Foul by Alison Gervais

 

Jules is attending her dream summer writing seminar, but she finds being new to London is difficult and trying to hide her hearing loss doesn't help either. I liked how determined she was to investigate when one of her new classmates goes missing and she's also not going to let any other mystery go unsolved either!

Her friendship dynamic with Suruthi and Percy (who are about as different as two people can be) is lots of fun to read and Dreams of Antiquity, her great-aunt's antique shop, is wonderful as one of the main settings.

Of course, as a Sherlock  fan I was very eager to find out how he and Watson were going to be involved in the book, this was quite a selling point for me.

Book Summary

Attending the prestigious Ashford College’s writing seminar is a dream come true for Jules Montgomery, but the summer isn’t unfolding as she hoped. Navigating London with her gradual hearing loss is difficult, and hiding it from her classmates is a challenge. Even worse, she can’t seem to shake a case of writer’s block. When a fellow student goes missing, neither the police nor their teacher, Professor Watson, seem that concerned. Jules and her new friends Percy and Suruthi are determined to get to the bottom of the case and they’re not the strange man who frequents Jules’ aunt’s antique shop is eager to help—and his name is none other than Sherlock Holmes.

Now there are two mysteries to solve. What happened to their missing classmate? And how can it be that Watson and Holmes—two fictional characters from the Victorian era—are alive and well in the 21st century? The only way to find answers might lie in a quote from one of Watson’s old “You see, but you do not observe.” Jules may not be able to hear all that well, but without her hearing aids, she can certainly see more than the average person. And nothing about this is case is average.

Picture Book Special

Picture books can have a reputation as being very simple and undemanding but there can be so much to them and the illustrations themselves can say so much. They can take you from highs to lows and everything in between! Make yourself a lovely cocktail and then browse the pretty selection, who needs kids to enjoy an adorable illustrated book?

I've adapted a traditional cocktail to make my own version, a Cookie Gin Fizz! Usually served in a tall highball, I've made mine in a flute with a candy cane garnish. In a shaker, mix 30ml gin, 20ml lemon juice and 15ml gingerbread syrup with ice. Strain into your glass, top with tonic and add some pomegranate seeds. Yum!

Leave Me Alone! by Vera Brosgol

Grandma just wants a bit of peace to do her knitting so she goes on a wonderful adventure, but nearly everywhere she goes, her kitting still gets interrupted. She has to go quite far in order to really get away but then does she really want all that solitude?

Vera is one of my favourite graphic novelists and her picture book was just as wonderful as her other books.

Do Not Say These Words by Frances Tosdevin

Your mission is to read this book without laughing, chuckling, sniggering and most certainly without giggling, ok??? Your only dispensation is to say the words just this once, while reading aloud. But never again!

Hmmmm, somehow I was not convinced that anyone would succeed, I definitely didn't...

Gathering the Glimmers by Ffion Jones

Wren is lost in the woods and her worry about making it out safely is taking over, until she starts to notice the glimmers! This book starts off quite dark and creepy, you can feel the stress and danger. Then the feeling of relief as the tone changes along with Wren's emotions.

The illustrations were amazing, strangely realistic while somehow otherworldly at the same time.

Fishing for Condiments by Ashley Baxendale, Anna Kukleva (illustrator)

Little Neget is worried he and his grandfather won't catch any fish for their dinner. Home is full of condiments which are no use at all without some tasty fish to put them on! This one was a little too simple for me, and felt like maybe I was missing part of the story. But the illustrations were beautiful and I loved the close relationship between Neget and his grandfather.

Murder At Merry Beggars Hall by Kay Blythe

Book Summary

Jemima Flowerday combines her skills as a dressmaker and sleuth to solve crime in the crumbling stately homes of 1920s Britain.

December 1922, and society dressmaker Jemima Flowerday receives a letter from Lady Hamlash of Merry Beggars Hall, requesting three new gowns for the Christmas season. Lady Hamlash does not travel, so Jemima will need to visit the Hall in deepest Suffolk to work in situ.

The commission appeals to Jemima for more than one reason. It will bring her some much-needed income. More interestingly, the remote manor house was the scene of a grisly murder earlier that year, when Lady Hamlash, inspecting her plants in the walled garden, found a man’s severed head beneath a terracotta asparagus cloche.

The murder was never solved.

Jemima, addicted to mystery novels and with a proud history of solving crimes in her own world, is sure she can crack the case. That ambition becomes a little more complicated when, within hours of her arrival at Merry Beggars Hall, the household cook dies in front of her...

This book was very easy to get into and I immediately warmed to Jemima. She is a sympathetic and down to Earth character, never taking advantage of her elevated status. She's also pretty smart and it seemed that she figured some things out quite quickly, so I wasn't sure why she didn't tell the police her suspicions earlier on! The descriptions of the places and the other characters were great too, I could picture their expressions, sitting around the dinner table.

I particularly enjoyed seeing the growing respect between Jemima and the inspector and I think there could be another story there in future. It would be very cool if she continued helping the police, or even became a civilian assistant.

I will definitely be looking forward to the next book in the Jemima Flowerday Mystery series!

Author Bio

Kay Blythe, who also writes as Natalie Meg Evans, is an award-winning historical author on both sides of the Atlantic, having reached the New York Times top 100 list with her debut novel, The Dress Thief.

Writing crime as Kay Blythe fulfils a long-held ambition.

It's cocktail hour at Merry Beggars Hall. Take your pick from a Strawberry Cosmopolitan or a Passion Fruit Daiquiri! For the Cosmo, blend 50ml vodka, 30ml strawberry puree, 30ml cranberry juice and 15ml lime juice with ice. For the Daiquiri, blend 50ml rum, 30ml passion fruit and 15ml lime juice with ice.