Electricity by Victoria Glendinning

Set in Victorian, London, Charlotte marries Peter Fisher a brilliant young man passionate about electricity. The two of them travel to Morrow Hall, the home of Lord Godwin, who has hired Peter to convert the home to electrical lighting. Charlotte finds herself drawn to the handsome and charismatic Lord Godwin. 



A victorian novel with a surprising ending. The novel starts out ordinary but suddenly builds into a series of events that kept me reading. 

Crime In Question by Margaret Yorke

Denis is living on the edge of society: neglected and unwanted, he scrapes by on his earnings as an odd-jobber. His is the sort of desperation that will tip into lawlessness at the drop of a monkey wrench. A chance encounter with Len, inmate of the local open prison, enables Denis to prove himself as the accessory to a cunningly contrived crime ... which ends in murder and has Denis running for his life. 


Margaret Yorke does brilliantly at making the crime about the people, not clever forensics or world-weary cops. Very enjoyable. 

Vamps and The City by Kerrelyn Sparks

Darcy Newhart has a fair idea her TV career is over - she is believed by the world to be dead - and she sort of kinda is. She has been a vampire for the last four years - and the other harem members are driving her nuts - she wants out.

She gets an opportunity to work at DVN, the Digital Vampire Network, when she proposes the idea for a show called "The Sexiest Man on Earth," in which a vampire harem (the one that is driving her nuts) picks their new master. What the vampires at DVN don't know is that to give the show a twist, Darcy includes a few mortal men among the candidates. One of those mortals is Austin Erickson, a CIA agent whose mission is to kill vampires. Austin falls instantly in love with Darcy thinking she is human and in need of rescue.


Vampire Chic-Lit.  OK.  Light, fluffy and definitely NOT vampire porn.

Breaking Point by Suzanne Brockmann

Max Bhagat never told Gina Vitagliano he loved her, and now it might be too late. From the moment FBI negotiator Max first met Gina on a plane hijacked by terrorists, she left his orderly, workcentric world shaken and stirred. Their ensuing hot (then cold) romance finally ends when Gina becomes fed up. The last Max hears is that Gina is volunteering for a AIDS group in Kenya, so when he learns that she has been killed in a terrorist bombing in Germany, he immediately leaves to take charge of the case. It turns out that Gina was kidnapped, not killed, and Max vows to do whatever it takes to get her back. Adrenaline rich action, complex, conflicted characters, an entertaining gay sidekick and sex on the kitchen table make for a really good read. I'm glad I started this one on a quiet, stay at home day because I didn't want to put it down.

The Loner by Josephine Cox

After a tragic accident involving his mother, and the disappearance of his father, young Davie flees his hometown of Blackburn, unsure of what the future holds. Devastated, he must escape the haunting memories of the worst night in his young life. With little more than the shirt on his back and a fierce determination to find his father, he sets off on a lonely, friendless road. Back home, those Davie has left behind wait anxiously; Judy, his childhood friend who has held a secret close to her heart these past few years, and Joseph, his grandfather whose guilt at the events that dreadful night burns right to his soul. Will they ever see Davie again? And if he comes back, what then? Eventually, after months of searching and with danger lurking at every turn, Davie finds a friend and a place to stay. Perhaps now his heart and mind will find peace. But his hopes are shortlived when Fate urges him to decide whether to keep running or go back and face his demons. 


An enjoyable, quick read. I liked the characters. The ending seemed a little rushed and too neatly tied up. 

The Dante Club by Matthew Pearl

The literary geniuses of the Dante Club - poets and Harvard professors Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Dr Oliver Wendell Holmes, James Russell Lowell and publisher J. T. Fields - are finishing America's first translation of The Divine Comedy. The powerful old guard of Harvard College wants to keep Dante in obscurity, believing that the infiltration of such foreign superstitions will prove as corrupting as the immigrants invading Boston Harbor. The members of the Dante Club fight to keep their sacred literary cause alive, but their plans fall apart when a series of murders erupts through Boston and Cambridge. Only this small group of scholars realises that the gruesome killings are modelled on the descriptions of Hell's punishments from Dante's Inferno. With the police baffled, lives endangered and Dante's literary future at stake, the Dante Club must shed its sheltered literary existence and find a way to stop the killer. 


 I found this slow to start, but once I got into it really enjoyed it. 

High Stakes by Erin McCarthy

He's a bloodsucking freak of nature. But, unlike other politicians, Ethan Carrick is actually a nice guy. Not to mention a very hot, wealthy, casino-owning vampire. It's an election year for vampires, which means he'll first have to escape his opponent's hit men. Then he'll have to find a suitable First Lady, preferably here in Vegas.

Brittany Baldizzi fits the bill. She's smart, pretty- and sweeter than a glass of diabetic O-Negative. But her protective sister Alexis steps in with a message for Ethan: Bite me. It's then that he realizes it's the sexy, no-nonsense Alexis who raises his stake. And as much as she denies it, Alexis wouldn't mind a romp in the coffin with him. But can a mere mortal, even one who risks her life for him, make a centuries-old, womanizing vampire feel something entirely new?


 Light, fluffy vampire chick-lit.

Framed In Lace by Monica Ferris

When the historic Hopkins ferry was raised from the bottom of the lake, who would have thought they were literally raising the dead! But there it was - a skeleton - right before their eyes. Unfortunately, the evidence is slim and soggy: The boat sank in 1949, the victim on board was a woman, and near the body is a piece of unidentified lacelike fabric. Sounds like a job for Betsy Devonshire! Betsy knows there's more to this story than what's on the surface. And once she and patrons of her needlecraft shop start lending a hand, they're sure to stitch together the details ...


The needlework aspect of the novel was enjoyable and has me thinking of getting out my cross-stitch again.

The story kept me interested and the cast of supporting characters added depth.

Predatory Game by Christine Feehan

Jess Calhoun is a wounded ghostwalker, he is unable to walk due to torture by terrorist who want to get some of the information and inventions he has in his possession. Jess's legs were battered and shattered and he has undergone some experimental surgery to repair the damage and walk again. However, the bionics have not worked as expected and he is struggling to force intergration of the tech in his legs.

Saber Wynter is a unique ghostwalker, she is an assassin. Raised alone and forced to endure torture to control the psychic powers that allow her to kill with a touch, she has escaped Dr Whitney and will do anything to keep from being brought back into his power. She doesn't know that Whitney has never released her and she is still being controlled by his actions.

Jess must call on his brothers in the ghostwalkers to help protect the woman he loves. Saber who has always been alone must learn to be part of something bigger than she is.

I liked the slow building of trust between Jess and Sabre, their interaction and her trust issues were well done.  

The Sorrow of Sisters by Wendy K Harris

Forty-nine year old Jane sits in her glass-walled designer home tapping out lucrative novels. She has accepted her childlessness, adores her comfortable husband, Chas and copes with her irascible father, Henry. But she is feeling dulled by the weight of her own repetitive fiction. Then Aunt Lillian dies and leaves her Wraith Cottage on the Isle of Wight. Jane has never heard of Lillian and Henry refuses to enlighten her. But Jane's curiosity has been aroused and she decides to investigate. Her inheritance reveals a story more extraordinary than she could have imagined.


Henry raped Lillian, his wife's sister, who was in a lesbian relationship with Emm, his sister.  Lillian had a daughter from the rape, Jane, who Henry abducted.


I just loved it. A very emotional book but well worth it. 

Dangerous Games by Keri Arthur

 In Melbourne’s urban underworld, there’s a nightclub for every fantasy and desire. But for Riley Jenson, one such club has become an obsession. Riley, a rare hybrid of vampire and werewolf, hasn’t come in pursuit of pleasure but of an unknown killer who’s been using the steamy nightspot as his hunting grounds.

Leave it to Riley to find the only ticket into the heavily guarded club: Jin, a deliciously hot-bodied bartender who might just provide the key to unmasking a killer unlike any other in the Directorate’s experience. Taunted by a former colleague turned rogue, distracted by an ex-lover’s attentions, Riley follows Jin into a realm of pleasure she could never have imagined. And as danger and passion ignite, a shocking mystery begins to unravel—one where Riley herself becomes the ultimate object of desire....


Fast paced, engrossing and filled with sexual tension. I do like this series.   This one had a few spanking and pain scenes that were good, some went a bit far for me.  I'm not into blood being spilled.

Prince of Ice by Emma Holly

Prince Corum is born with a defect but his mother had so much trouble even getting pregnant that she chooses to try to hide his problem from those around her. Corum's problem is that of emotion, that he feels too much for the rather Spock-like Yama. Fortunately when an orphan girl, Xishi, plays with Corum when they are both babies it seems that Xishi calms him so the two grow up together until they are eight years old. At that point Corum's mother decides Xishi isn't helping him to grow away from his emotions and she is sent away. Corum grows up on his own, a Prince of Ice, with just his martial arts teacher as a source of warmth and friendship. 

Xishi ends up in a school for Pillow Girls and Boys, a training academy for courtesans to the princes and princesses of Yama. Apparently there are physical differences between the Royals and 'normal' Yama, the Rohn, but the Purple Crane school, where Xishi is training, has a royal prince to practise their skills on. His family have cast him out and made it known that he is dead so Prince Pahndin's life, following the death of his wife and mate, is empty; however, he spends time with Xishi and they forge some kind of a friendship, until one of the Pillow Boys reports Xishi and she is sold. 

Fortuitously for Xishi, she is sold to Prince Corum. Cor has changed very much from when they were children and yet they soon find that they are very compatible. However there's a secret behind Xishi's birth which soon begins to leak out, especially when Corum and Xishi find themselves at the mercy of a plot to have them killed for treason. 



This is a good story and an interesting premise. It is complete within itself, but leaves a door open so that we can visit this world again. Yes, the sex is extremely explicit, and there is a great deal of it, but it doesn't feel especially gratuitous. The erotic scenes are an essential part of the storyline and very well done.

I will be looking out for more in this series. 

The Double Bind by Chris Bohjalian

When college sophomore Laurel Estabrook is attacked while riding her bicycle through Vermont's back roads, her life is forever changed. Formerly outgoing, Laurel withdraws into her photography and begins to work at a homeless shelter. There she meets Bobbie Crocker, a man with a history of mental illness and a box of photographs that he won't let anyone see. When Bobbie dies suddenly, Laurel discovers that he was telling the truth: before he was homeless, Bobbie Crocker was a successful photographer who had indeed worked with such legends as Chuck Berry, Robert Frost, and Eartha Kitt. As Laurel's fascination with Bobbie's former life begins to merge into obsession, she becomes convinced that some of his photographs reveal a deeply hidden, dark family secret. Her search for the truth will lead her further from her old life -- and into a cat-and-mouse game with pursuers who claim they want to save her.


I didn't enjoy this as much as I have other's by Bohjalian. It was his usual excellent writing but the ending spoiled it for me.  It was too much of a twist that came out of nowhere and spoiled the story for me.

How I Lived a Year on Just a Pound a Day by Kath Kelly

Kath Kelly was broke. That was ok, as all her friends were, too. But she had an important event to budget for, just a year away. One drunken night, she made a rash decision: to live on just a pound a day for the next twelve months. In 12 month-by-month chapters, she tells how a mission to cut her spending to the bone showed her another side of herself and of human nature. Through a year like no year she had spent before, she discovered how greed and waste was messing up people - to say nothing of the planet - and came to see how much fun can be had on a few pennies a day.


I wouldn't like to do it as tight as she did, but it does make you think about how much do you really nedd to spend.  Brings back memories of our tight budgeting days, and how much fun it often was.

Chasing the Dime by Michael Connelly

Henry Pierce has a whole new life - new apartment, new telephone, new phone line. But the first time he checks his messages, he discovers that someone had the number before him. The messages are for a woman named Lilly, and she is in some kind of serious trouble. Pierce is inexorably drawn into Lilly's world, and it's unlike any world he's ever known. It is a night-time world of escort services, websites, sex and secret identities. Pierce tumbles through a hole, abandoning his orderly life in a frantic race to save the life of a woman he has never met. His skills as a computer entrepreneur allow him to trace Lilly's last days with some precision. But every step into Lilly's past takes Pierce deeper into a web of inescapable intricacy - and a decision that could cost him everything he owns and holds dear. 


A little slow at first, but builds to a fast moving, unexpected twist at the end. Likeable characters, well most of them, enough action and a few surprises.

Overall an enjoyable read. 

Mysteria

A town created as a haven for supernatural beings by a demon who suddenly wants to do good is a wonderful idea. All of the stories take place in Mysteria and are intermingled enough to keep them interesting. The first story tells the tale of Damon, the demon who created Mysteria and then was punished by Satan by being turned into a mortal man and being banished to Mysteria. All of the stories are romances with a bit of paranormal thrown in.


This was a fun anthology. I love the idea of a small town full of magic. I can see the possibility of more stories in Mysteria.