July turned out to be an unusually quiet reading month, but for good reasons. I’ve been spending more time with my daughter and we’ve been on a few trips. We arrived back from Canterbury yesterday after a three day mini break, which included a day at the Whitstable Oyster Festival ~ although neither of us liked oysters, but lots to do there, a food festival, bands, activities on the beach and lots more. The sun also shone for us, I think the only part of the country that wasn’t suffering from a deluge of rain.
So, July’s books:
‘The Puppet Show’ by M. W. Craven ~ thoroughly enjoyed this crime thriller. The two central characters Washington Poe and Tilly Bradshaw are fabulous! Can’t wait to read the next in the series. 4.5 stars.
‘Beasts of the Frozen Sun’ by Jill Crisswell is a richly written YA fantasy adventure 3.5 YA stars as it needed to develop, we went round in circles rather a lot but definitely worth a read if this genre is your thing.
‘American Dreams’ by Kenneth Bromberg is a debut novel and I loved it. ‘The Godfather’ in style and spans generations of immigrants entering New York. 4 stars. This one has its own blog post if you’d like to know more about it.
‘Bone China’ by Laura Purcell is another Victorian gothic descriptive delight, really enjoyed it! 4.5 stars. Read it!
‘The Boy’ by Tami Hoag is the long awaited follow up to ‘A Thin Dark Line’ featuring Cajun cop Nick Fourcade and Detective Annie Broussard. Not as good as book one, but nice to see Fourcade and Broussard again. 3.5 stars.
‘Endgame’ by Daniel Cole ~ the final book in the Ragdoll Trilogy. Loved it! 5 stars.
‘The Girl in the Grave’ by Helen Phifer ~ I struggled with this a bit, plot was good but the writing style jarred with me a bit, which stopped my reading flow. Hopefully this will be tided up in final editing. 3 stars.
Thanks for reading! Tell me if you have any book recommendations as always! 💕
books.tea.and.me 
I have reviewed a couple of the books you have read as well loved The Puppet Show second book Black Summer is even better. I have Endgame to read which I am excited about as I loved the first two, also have The Boy to read before it’s out. Loved The girl in the Grave.
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Hi! I’ve just started reading ‘Black Summer’, really looking forward to seeing Poe & Tilly again ☺️ such a great combo! Hope you enjoy ‘Endgame’ & ‘The Boy’ ☕️
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Thanks I’m sure I will reading The Dirty Dozen my Lynda La Plante at the moment possibly The Boy next Black summer is great I hope you enjoy Poe and Tilly as much as I did next one isn’t out until June next year sadly a long time to wait lol
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Ah the long wait for the next in series… the readers’ constant problem ~ I love Jane Casey’s crime series, and have had to re-read so many times whilst waiting for the next in series 😂
Confession ~ I’ve never read a Lynda La Plante!
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I have to confess I have never read Lynda La Plante either if it hadn’t been on netgalley I’m not sure I would have ever picked it either. But it’s actually quite good as it’s Jane Tennyson who was originally played by Helen Mirren ironically I remember having a blazing row with my first husband over the tv series saying she would have had to work harder than any of the men to have got to the position she was then. Ironically this book dates back to 1976 and Jane has just joined the Flying Squad and is getting a lot of mysoginist comments from all of the men and even the one woman who is a secretary or some sort of admin is obviously feeling threatened by the presence of another woman and one that is a Detective Sergeant. I am actually quite enjoying it. I have read some of Jane Caseys and I think I still have more of hers to read on my kindle. The author of Black Summer does have two books coming out on January 9th they aren’t Poe and Tilly but are books he wrote beforehand that are being re-released so I have pre ordered those. He has had to do some rewrites apparently. I have asked for far too many books from netgalley that haven’t left enough time to read books I have already and others I have bought after reading reviews. Just need to stop looking on netgalley although so happy I got Endgame and Linwood Barclays new book as I have read all of his. Just being really good and reading the books in the order they are released. So hopefully end of next week I can actually read Endgame
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That does sound good, Helen Mirren was brilliant in the TV adaptation.
I’ll check out Craven’s re-releases; I didn’t know about that. Thanks for the heads up. ☺️
I’ve in the middle of Barclay’s ‘Elevator’ one as well, but it’s not holding my attention, hoping it’ll start coming together soon, as I’ve enjoyed previous books from him.
Oh yes, I know that over-requesting feeling from Netgalley well 😂 it’s such a temptation. I’ve been on a mission to reduce my list, I think I’m down to five to go! 🤞🏻
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That’s disappointing you aren’t enjoying Elevator Pitch. I have so far loved all of his books as well as Harlen Cobens. I’m relatively new to netgalley so have learned the hard way didn’t expect to get so many so now have to keep going lol. I won’t say how many I have September and October are full so not going to get anymore for those months for definite. I don’t want it to become a chore to read them. You are very good to get yours down to five. I’m going to work on that. The hard thing is when you just can’t get into a book and you are pushing yourself to read it. I do have some good ones or what look to be good ones coming up though so that should help. Fingers crossed. Lol
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Ooh yes Harlen Coben is fab! Yes, you’re right… it’d be awful to turn our love of reading into a chore ☺️ Happy reading!
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You too
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Just a quickie have you read either of the two books by Will Dean they both sound really good the first is Dark Pines and book two is Red Snow. They both have a character called Tuva Moodyson who I believe is deaf. Both books have good recommendations. I haven’t read them yet but as you have liked some of the similar books to me thought I would see if you gave seen these.
I’m also in a group on Facebook called crime fiction addicts a great group who recommend lots of new books there are also some writers on there if you aren’t already a member.
Thanks
Jackie
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Hi, I haven’t, writing them down now ~ thanks for letting me know. I’m not in any Facebook groups, definitely interested, will have a search now ☺️
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