I see you by Clare Mackintosh - Review

  

When Zoe Walker sees her photo in the classifieds section of a London newspaper, she is determined to find out why it's there. There's no explanation: just a grainy image, a website address and a phone number. She takes it home to her family, who are convinced it's just someone who looks like Zoe. But the next day the advert shows a photo of a different woman, and another the day after that…..

Another score from the charity shop, oh they are so good to me. I was lucky enough or unlucky enough if you like to be ill during a week off. So on that day when it was at its height of making me ill. I sat on the sofa and did not leave again until this book was finished.

As you may know I am trying different books from what I would normally read and I am so glad that I am. This book was everything.

Clare’s style of writing had me hooked just as much as the multi-layer story telling.  The different perspectives told in the book was fantastic and I got a real sense of different Characters. They had enough about them to bring them to life and have you rooting for them. Their backstories where weaved in so well with the story nothing felt like exposition.

The real crowing gem of this book is the story. It is so chilling and so close to home for a lot of us and just when you think you have gotten your head around it, Clare goes and ups the ante on you! I found myself holding my breath at times. This is no doubt the reason I had to finish it in one sitting. I had to know.

The ending? Oh it pays off. This is not a story that is going to let you down at the end, the climax was so full of tension and played out beautifully.

Now I must track down her other books!

100% I would recommend.

The Miniaturist - Jessie Burton - A review

Petronella (Nella) Oortman, a poor 18-year-old girl from the Dutch countryside, arrives at the Golden Bend home in Amsterdam of the wealthy merchant Johannes Brandt, who married her a month earlier. Brandt gives her a wedding present of a dollhouse designed to look like their nine room home in miniature, and she engages the services of a local miniaturist to add realistic furnishings to it. The miniaturist, whom she never meets, begins sending her lifelike dolls and furnishings that are eerily accurate, and even seem to predict the future - Wiki 

I left this book last in my TBR for October. I had seen and heard good things about it and again when I found it for 99p I wasn't about to say no. I struggle with that word when buying books. So I was so excited to finally sit down and read it. Alas, I didn't like it. Please don't lynch me!

Without a doubt it is so well written. Jessie knows how to build a beautiful world but it left me so cold. I didn't like hardly any of the characters in the book, the story it self was dark and awful and shameful looking back at what people did to people (let's be honest still do) for who they were but I feel there was a depth missing and I have said this before I am not a published writer so I can't ever be too harsh on anyone that put themselves out there. This book was just not written for me. 

Nella is sulky and annoying and she does seem to come into her own but I'm not sure of her. Brandt is a knob but a kind man and I did warm to him. I couldn't quite wrap my head around the miniaturist and a page of so seems to 'explain all' I wasn't convinced. 

Well you can't win them all and as I said this one just wasn't for me, however the last quarter of the book really had me gripped so the story is there and it is good but not for me. A lot of people love this book so perhaps it's one for you too. 

I would still recommend it. It's too beautiful not too. 

The Green Mile by Stephen King - A Review

I said I would never read the The Green Mile. After watching the film many years ago and it still stays with me. I knew what would be in store for me and I said never. However when I saw a copy sat in my local favourite charity shop for 99p how could I say no? and it was with serious hesitation that I started to read it but I did and I am so glad that I did. 

I am not a stranger to Mr King's work and hand on heart I love nearly everything I have read from him. Firestarter being the first book I ever read and re-read (coming up 3 times now) so I knew I was in good hands but I also knew that he would hold nothing back and I would be so tightly bound in his grasp that I knew I could break at any moment and I did. 

The story it's self is "A first-person narrative told by Paul Edgecombe, the novel switches between Paul as an old man in the Georgia Pines nursing home sharing his story with fellow resident Elaine Connelly in 1996, and his time in 1932 as the block supervisor of the Cold Mountain Penitentiary death row, nicknamed "The Green Mile" for the color of the floor's linoleum. This year marks the arrival of John Coffey, a 6 ft 8 in powerfully built black man who has been convicted of raping and murdering two small white girls" Wiki 

I strapped myself in (bad choice of words!) and held on and let Mr King do his thing. It was tense, it was beautiful and as ever for Mr King it was seamless. I too took on traits of Paul Edgecombe and felt sorry for the inmates especially Eduard "Del" Delacroix when it was his turn to walk the mile and that was all Mr Kings writing because I doubt very much that in real life I could even feel a tiny bit of remorse for that man given what had led him to old sparky. 

of course for me this book is all about John Coffey like the the drink but not spelt the same way. His story was the reason I did not want to pick up the book. The injustice of it all, the Tom Robinson of it all. I was angry. The Novel showed me even more than the film (although that was a long time ago) that John was innocent and the evidence was right there but no one cared to look. Sigh. 

It's a tense story, it's a horrible story beautifully written and with love and care to each character. Mr King got me to care which you would think is a prerequisite for a novel but some people do miss that mark. 

100% I would recommend this book.