17 March 2024

Spotlight on...
Paper Forests by Tegan Anderson




Today's spotlight is one of the finalists from 2023 BBNYA. Find it on Goodreads here. For more information on the BBNYA competition, see details at the end of the post. 



Book Summary

Once upon a time, Oliver wakes up in a Forest full of magic and monsters, not quite dead, but not quite alive either. He wakes with three other people whose lives have been cut short, each more tragically than the last.

Together, they embark on a journey that will take them deep into the heart of the Forest, where they will have to face the ghosts of their pasts and their long-hidden secrets. Secrets that will force Oliver to choose between finding a new life in the trees and finding a way home.

Welcome to the Paper Forest.



Author Bio

On a cold Autumn evening back in 2008, seven-year-old Tegan Anderson began to write their first short stories, finding a more creative way to learn their spellings. Many years and many more short stories later, they haven't stopped for anything. Now, they're writing more than they ever believed possible. Tegan may write the worlds they would prefer to exist in but currently lives in Devon with their overflowing bookshelves and expanding imagination.



About BBNYA

BBNYA is a yearly competition where book bloggers from all over the world read and score books written by indie authors, ending with 15 finalists and one overall winner.

If you want some more information about BBNYA, check out the BBNYA Website or take a peek over on Twitter @BBNYA_Official. BBNYA is brought to you in association with the @Foliosociety (if you love beautiful books, you NEED to check out their website!) and the book blogger support group @The_WriteReads.




13 March 2024

A Swift Return by Fiona Barker




Book Summary

Aria has her head in the clouds. Yusuf keeps his feet on the ground. But when they work together to save a bird who has lost her way, something magical happens. When Swift loses her way on her epic migration. Aria and Yusuf come to her rescue and are inspired to think big about looking after the sky above their city. Inspired by Fiona and Howard’s love for wildlife of all kinds, A Swift Return is the follow-up to Setsuko and the Song of the Sea. Howard’s beautiful illustrations evoke a strong sense of place, strengthened by the beautiful Arabic text distilled by Maysoon AbuBlan.



This book has such beautiful full page pictures with wonderful perspectives, views from the sky and the ground and in between. There's so much empathy in the children's expressions. I loved how helping the swift made them friends, then they worked to helped make the city a nicer place for everyone, including the wildlife.



Author Bio

Fiona is a middle-aged, married mum of one. She is positively potty about picturebooks; reading them and writing them. When writing, she longs for alliterative loveliness but is reluctant to rhyme. When reading, she looks for a marriage of words and artwork and loves anything that is fun to read aloud.

Fiona loves doing school author visits and speaking to adults about picture books and children's publishing.

Visit www.fionabarker.co.uk for details of forthcoming events.




To make an Alpine Swift, shake the following ingredients with ice: 40ml gold rum, 20ml Aperol, 20ml pineapple juice, 20ml lime juice, 10ml sugar syrup. Then pour into an ice filled julep cup.






3 March 2024

Lie or Die by A.J. Clack


Described as perfect for fans of TV's The Traitors, Lie or Die publishes on 7th March. I have to admit I hadn't even heard of The Traitors until I read this book so I can't say how true that it but it is definitely worth a read anyway!




Book Summary

When a casting call is announced for new reality TV show Lie or Die, Kass is tricked into auditioning by her best friend. Billed as Big Brother meets Mafia, Lie or Die pits contestants against each other as they try to discover who is a murderous agent and who is an innocent player. But when contestants start to turn up dead (the real kind, not the fake kind), Kass realises that not being eliminated and winning the game is the least of her worries. No longer a game of truth and lies, Kass and her friends are in a fight for survival. 'Reality' just got very real.




This was really fast paced and gripping, I found myself suspecting quite a few characters but never would have guessed the final twist (or multiple twists!).

Kass was a great protagonist, I liked her superpower of being able to tell when people were lying which is a definite bonus for a game like this. At one point I started to wonder if it was going to be an unreliable narrator thing. It is in the name, Lie or Die and they keep saying, trust no one! However, I won't tell you if I was right as I don't want to risk spoilers!!! I'm afraid I just couldn't like Thea. I think she sounded like the crappest friend no matter what Kass had done or how much she defends her. Lewis was really cool though and held the group together.

I never totally understood the game, or how their personalities would help anyone guess who the killers were as their parts in the game were totally random! But in the end it didn't really matter and it wasn't totally necessary for the story.

I'll be eagerly looking out for more by A.J. Clack and hope I won't have to wait too long!



Author Bio

A.J. Clack moved from a small village in Wales to London, to pursue a career in television. She worked on a wide range of shows from Teletubbies to Friends, while also writing plays for the Edinburgh Fringe and development scripts/pilots for childrenʼs television. She now lives in Essex with a houseful of teenagers and can often be found freezing on the side of a rugby pitch.



While on holiday in Mauritius, we asked for a blue cocktail and this is what showed up! It matched the book so beautifully 😍

I have no idea what it's called but I think it involves tropical juice, probably plenty of rum, and definitely blue curacao.





11 February 2024

The Haunting of Lake Lucy by Sandy Deutscher Green




Book Summary

With his fear of dark, enclosed places, 13-year-old Jayce is the last person to check out the dilapidated lake house next door. Instead, he opts to write a note to the ghost he’s convinced is haunting the house, as well as his dreams. Getting his twin sister to deliver it to the mailbox is draining his snack supply, but so worth it because: THE GHOST WRITES HIM BACK. Now Jayce must uncover the dark secret of a cursed lake—or remain haunted forever.



Jayce is the quieter of the twins but he still has an adventurous spirit and when he dreams of the ghost next door he gets his sister to help with the investigation. What he finds is both more mundane and more spooky than he imagined! With the letters from the ghost, Jayce's dreams and the creepy mist appearing, you never know what is real or what is imagination.

This is a great option if you want to try out a poetry style novel. Even though I'm not used to reading poetry, the writing flowed really easily. I also enjoyed the clever use of different formats, like highlighted words telling a different story. I would have liked more of those as I expected a bit more variety in the book.




To make the Lucy cocktail, add 15ml lemon thyme syrup, 15ml lemon juice and 3 raspberries into a tall glass and muddle the fruit. Fill the glass with ice, add 45ml of raspberry vodka then stir to mix and chill. Top with sparkling water.




21 January 2024

Betrothal and Betrayal by Janet McGiffin




Book Summary

Seventeen-year-old Thekla needs her quick wits and knife to track down her betrothed, a soldier who has left her at the altar for the third time. Elias the monk travels with her to Constantinople where she meets Irini of Athens, an extraordinarily beautiful orphan her same age who has been brought by powerful Emperor Constantine to marry his son, Co-Emperor Leon. The two women join forces to survive this vigorous capital of the Roman Empire of the East which is rocked by religious and political strife. But will Thekla help the ambitious and ruthless Irini of Athens find the power that she craves?



I loved Thekla immediately, she was so feisty and no-nonsense. Her knife gets a LOT of use and I think should have it's own twitter account. It's practically a character itself and I bet it would have tons of stories to tell!

This was easy to get into and very easy to read, however it was a little bit lacking in suspense, which stopped me from getting completely gripped in the story. Everything just seemed to happen a bit too easily for Thekla, and even when real trouble did strike, it passed over very quickly, though I must admit I enjoyed not having to put up with too much angst!

The descriptions of all the food sounded so delicious, this is not one to read on an empty stomach! I loved all the Greek words included in the story and it was good to have the glossary at the end.



Author Bio

Janet McGiffin divides her time between her apartment in Manhattan, her family in Washington State, and her friends in Athens, Greece. She was born in Fairfield, Iowa into a newspaper family and learned to write copy as a teenager by writing obituaries for the Ellensburg Daily Record in Washington state. After university, she worked for the Milwaukee Health Department where she gained first-hand knowledge for her best-selling mystery series published by Fawcett Press, NY, featuring Doctor Maxine St. Clair, an ER doctor in an inner-city hospital. She worked as a press officer for the Washington state senate, then moved to Athens, Greece where she wrote grant proposals for small non-profit women’s organizations in Mediterranean countries. She also wrote a humor column for the Athens News newspaper with field archaeologist Adrian Vrettos, wrote two English language easy readers for Cambridge University Press, UK, and a series of hiking articles for greecetravel.com. She researched her Byzantine-era Empress Irini Series through extensive travel in Greece, followed by six months of research at the Bodleian libraries in Oxford, England. She enjoys hiking in Greece, England, Wales, and Scotland.



I'm sure Emperor Constantine would love a Constantine's Cosmo before going into battle. To make the cocktail, shake the following ingredients with ice and find strain into  a coupe glass. 50ml vodka, 20ml elderflower liqueur, 25ml raspberry-lychee puree, 25ml lemon juice.