Laura Jacobs, herself a transgender person, approached a wide range of people she had worked with, or networked with, or were recommended by others, tLaura Jacobs, herself a transgender person, approached a wide range of people she had worked with, or networked with, or were recommended by others, to put this book together. Each person tells their own, very personal, experiences of being transgender.
I could not read more than two of these accounts in any one sitting. They are so raw, so well documented, so human. Some of them are extraordinarily beautifully written. It was an emotional roller coaster.
I don’t understand why people hate so much. I don’t understand why people hate perfectly nice people who just happen to have (or choose) a different look, or different lifestyle. The refugee from Argentina’s dictatorship who found America so abominably different from the haven and luxury she expected — that I understand.
But whether I understand or not, that is the reality of the current USA, and a warning to the rest of us. Right-wing policies are growing, across the globe.
If you, like me, have very little knowledge of the LGBTQ++ world, this will open your eyes. One or two of them will explain in horrible detail some things that you may find useful if you are an author, but are otherwise, well, extreme. It will also show you that these transgender people are, above all, people. They have hopes, dreams, aspirations just like mine. Most of the people in the world want much the same thing. It’s how we get manipulated by those who want control.
I want to thank Laura Jacobs and all those brave enough to stand up and tell their stories, and to come forward to fight for the rights of others. This is an important book. It will hopefully help many trans people stuck in an isolated situation, to know they are not alone. But nobody who hates will read it....more
Damyanti Biswas writes incredible short fiction on her blog. This is her first major venture into a novel, and boy, what a novel. Set in a large city Damyanti Biswas writes incredible short fiction on her blog. This is her first major venture into a novel, and boy, what a novel. Set in a large city in India, the characters leap from the page, and most of them scare me silly. Some of this is for their health, safety or other form of welfare, others simply scare me for my own welfare.
The storyline twists around an investigation into what appears to be serial murders of faceless women. That’s literally faceless; their features have been obliterated with sulphuric acid. The one found in the jurisdiction of Jatin is traced to a local slum. Those of you who have read about life in such slums can imagine the filth and the poverty all too well. If not, see my review of Behind the Beautiful Forevers.
You Beneath Your Skin has an incredibly twisted plot that covers many levels of Indian society and the problems each character has in staying one step ahead of their own ruin. The writing is rich and powerful even when talking about the poor and powerless.
There are themes which many will find hard to stomach, and I hesitate to recommend it to my readers. Those stronger than me will find an unforgettable reading experience between these pages....more
I read the second in this series (they sort of follow, but not officially) and loved it. I wanted more. So I went back to the first in the set I’d got I read the second in this series (they sort of follow, but not officially) and loved it. I wanted more. So I went back to the first in the set I’d got as one file on my kindle. Here I found two of the characters Nthanda and Ru, who play a large part in Joining of Lines. No matter, I can cope with the story of their meeting.
It was a great start–fantastic chase up and down and in and out of a city-planet with several hundred levels. As we all know, high equals important and low equals near-destitute. Ru started low. Near-basement level. But Nthanda is searching for someone with the right bloodline to help him continue his Ceelen line. He just sees Ru and thinks he’s in need of help, despite Ru saving his life. So much help that he ends up taking him back to his ship for adoption. Cleaned up, he’s stunningly beautiful, and Nthanda immediately gets the hots for him. Ru has had the hots since the first second, and can’t believe his luck.
Again, a great plot with some really interesting battle scenes in the spaceship, and beyond. It’s just that, in this story, there’s no let up between the hots and the bulging–oh yes, the bulging–of the bodies in tight places (read that either way). This is not romance, it’s pretty much erotica. It really detracts from what is a really good story. I certainly wouldn’t have read Joining of Lines after this. I doubt I’ll read the third in the set, which is between two other characters we’ve met. Frankly, I don’t need to find out more about them. ...more
I wrote this book at Camp NaNoWriMo in 2015, just after I first published The Perihelix. Then I rewrote the Perihelix, so it took a long time to get aI wrote this book at Camp NaNoWriMo in 2015, just after I first published The Perihelix. Then I rewrote the Perihelix, so it took a long time to get around to finalising its sequel.
It started from a word used in the BBC's Sky at Night astronomy programme - spaghettification. It's the effect of going down a black hole on an object. Say you went feet first. Your head would go down considerably later than your feet, and the acceleration on your feet means they go at a different rate to your head, leading to deformation of your body. Of course, scientists assume that this is impossible to survive in one piece, but then time travel is only possible if you have infinite mass, so let's just cut to fiction and suppose it's possible.
When I rewrote Corsair because of exactly the same comment I had over the Perihelix, I started with the wormhole event and used the spaghettification effect to fill in some back story. After that, it is all perfectly reasonable space adventure. Including harvester machinery that learns to breed, which is a thought developed from a New Scientist webinar on automation...
People are still people, though. Pete is obsessed with the call to save his world using the Perihelix, which means he needs to find a dragon and a cavy, both called George, according to the legend. Lars is feeling a bit sidelined by this, and has his mind on what happened when he was kidnapped (when he's not thinking of sex). Dolores is trying to pass her space pilot's exams, to make a living as a free woman, and Maggie wishes she had firm ground under her feet and a sensible market to go and buy fresh food from.
And there they are, marooned on the other side of the universe. No wonder things get a bit...adult....more
Some books should come with a Government Health Warning. This is one of them. Very little in the blurb gives any indication of the depths of depraviSome books should come with a Government Health Warning. This is one of them. Very little in the blurb gives any indication of the depths of depravity that lurk at Roanoke. The "terrible secret" in the blurb is just not strong enough. I wonder at the author's own sanity in writing such a tale, where incest and grooming, and the insidious preying on developing children's minds, are the key to the whole plot.
I'm sorry if that 'spoils' it for you, but the suspicion comes early, when grandfather puts his hand on the young girl's knee and lets his pinkie slip under the hem of her shorts. If, like an astounding percentage of women of a certain age, of all classes and colours, you have been subject to sexual predation, you will do well to avoid this book, and to put it out of your mind. You do not need to relive any of your youth. You do not need to re-examine the things that made you fight to remain the kind and balanced person that you are striving to be.
The terrifying thing is that Amy Engel has captured the psychology of everyone involved so well. She writes mostly with a vivid certainty that you will experience the heat and desolation of rural Kansas on every page. Occasionally she puts so much craft into her writing that it stands out; too much, Amy, too much. I only highlighted one overblown description early on, but when she gets into description she just goes on, and on, searching for the most perfect, the least clichéd, the most original turn of phrase ever - so much so it becomes painful. She could have cut a couple of pages of Lane's mental self-flagellation in the end sequence - or was it self-discovery, I couldn't work out which, since I had long distanced my emotions from the turmoil within the pages.
The Roanoke Girls will probably win prizes. It will probably be hailed as an important book by right-wingers, especially those that welcome the final judgement on the grandfather. It will probably, heaven help us, be read as a set book in high school five years down the road.
I suppose what incensed me most (if that is possible) was the cool 'questions for reading groups' at the end. Someone expects it to be a set text, obviously. Personally I think it should carry that referral information you get after some tv programmes:
If you, or someone close to you, have been affected by the contents of this programme[book], you can get help and counselling at this number.....
An interesting book for an author to read and critique. That's its good point....more
Too tiresome to continue reading, and anyway it ends in a cliffhanger, so it's not a proper book IMHO.Too tiresome to continue reading, and anyway it ends in a cliffhanger, so it's not a proper book IMHO....more
Well-plotted, funny, sad, informational and explicit. A really good read.
I requested an advance copy of Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows from Net-GaWell-plotted, funny, sad, informational and explicit. A really good read.
I requested an advance copy of Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows from Net-Galley. The blurb fascinated me, although I did wonder about the erotic bit. What I found was a wonderful piece of suspense writing from inside the London Punjabi community-a community I knew hardly anything about.
The story mixes modern womanhood and the conflicts experienced by British-born Indians. I ached when one woman experienced the dilemma of which passport control channel to go through at the airport. The simple story of how one person's creative writing class is another's adult literacy class turns into something that mixes crime, murder, tradition, sexism, love, hate and betrayal, with erotic stories. What makes it so funny (apart from the beautiful drawn characters) is the use of vegetables to describe body parts; half the widows at the evening class don't know the English words for them, and the other half don't know the Punjabi words. I shall never look at an aubergine again without at least a smirk!
This is a wonderful book, especially for people wishing to understand the Sikh community better-at least the female side. I'm sure the Sikh (male) elders will disapprove of it, so get it while you can. Do you need some tips to spice up your thirty year marriage-well, that's an added bonus.
A funny, warm, compassionate mystery and suspense story-and also explicit. I recommended it to my book club. ;)...more
Kate tells her story shifting between her life before she went to Syria, the events while she was there, and being interviewed in a prison cell about Kate tells her story shifting between her life before she went to Syria, the events while she was there, and being interviewed in a prison cell about what she’s been up to since she got home. It’s immaculately told, the pain, the suffering, the fear, and the love of her life. Kate is strong, and everyone is out to prove she’s gone crazy. She’s determined not to fall into their traps; she’s used to asking tough questions, she can see where her interrogators are heading and can evade them.
So she says.
Eventually, Kate is allowed to go, with some stern warnings and advice from the psychologists. You think, yes, Kate, heed their warnings, you’re cracking up. But she goes back to Syria to get away from the pain of her homecoming.
And then this fast-paced, intricate story goes completely ballistic.
For once, I didn’t get lost in who’s who, or what’s what, even though the unreliable narrators abounded. I started to realise why everyone was acting as dysfunctionally as they are. It all makes sense. But then there’s another twist, and maybe another. And just when you weren’t expecting any more…
My Sister’s Bones turned from being an ‘I’m not really sure I want to read this book’ into a ‘I totally do not want any interruptions’. I finished the second half of the book in one sitting. It’s superbly written; every inch of it drags you into the lives and feelings of the protagonists, and has you whirling inside their messed-up heads. The emotions are raw, the wine bitter.
It’s so good it’s gone straight into my list of Best of 2019. You may not like the start, but I guarantee you’ll stick with it to the finish. Thriller, suspense, mystery—it’s all three. Absolutely brilliant. Add to your list! ...more
A charming tale of an Irish village, where unearthing a body unearths everyone's secrets.
The main problem with this book is that the author's voice, A charming tale of an Irish village, where unearthing a body unearths everyone's secrets.
The main problem with this book is that the author's voice, so distinctively familiar to British readers, wouldn't go away. I could hear him reading this to me the whole time. That could be a plus; he's an engaging personality (although he's also profoundly irritating to some), and he does have an Irish accent, so it helps the sense of place.
And the sense of place is something this book excels with. Both place and time, including the desperation of the teenagers in the 1960s to touch any part of the world they read of in magazines, are deftly woven through beautifully crafted prose. The story is full of description, which keeps it at a pace suitable for the location, but equally will keep some readers in fits of frustration. The characters are generally well-built, sometimes literally, and the author certainly gets inside the head and heart of his overweight - okay, obese - protagonist. The trouble with the characters is that they are very familiar from various rural episodes, and head towards stereotypes. This makes any pretence at a cosy mystery superfluous, as it's pretty obvious from the start who the body is, even with the misdirection, which only serves to confirm deeper suspicions that are finally released near the end.
I was reminded of an infographic I saw recently distinguishing between the genres, crime, mystery and suspense. If only I could remember the detail. But I think this falls into the heading of 'suspense' since you know early on who of three did it, and the flags are pointed early enough for you to narrow it down to the (right) one, but there still remains an interest in how they get found out and whether they get their comeuppance.
After getting through the first character exposition, I found the extended journeys back into the histories of each inhabitant tedious. I suspect many readers will find the same. It's well written, and a good first novel, but has its faults, not least tendency to wallow. I wonder if it would have reached the surface of the publishing wannabe heap had the author not been well-known? I wonder if I would have read it differently if I had remained in ignorance of his identity? We will never know.
Dear Amy is a first novel by Helen Callaghan, and it deals with child abduction in East Anglia. For non-UK readers, there was a notorious child abductDear Amy is a first novel by Helen Callaghan, and it deals with child abduction in East Anglia. For non-UK readers, there was a notorious child abduction in Fenland over ten years ago now (how can it be that long, it seems like yesterday), which gave rise to a number of new child protection laws and procedures. The girls and their abductor lived in Soham, a small village, so references to the Soham children, or murders, arise from that.
What I was certain of as this story unfolded was: there had been a new child abduction, a teenager; there had been a very similar abduction some ten or more years earlier, which had never been completely solved i.e. no dead body, but evidence that suggested one might be buried in the marshes; the protagonist and narrator of the book, Margot Lewis, has a lot of personal problems, but she's battling on against them and life in general. She's a school-teacher, anxious about her students, and the pits that are our current educational system, and she does a weekly Agony Aunt column in her local paper, under the name of Dear Amy. There is an interest (who might become a love interest) who does academic research into missing children.
The great strength of this book is that while the facts are there, you are never entirely sure of what really is a fact, because as Margot presents the tale, she starts to doubt herself, and thus you doubt yourself, too. As unreliable narrators go, Margot's a good one. Even when you start to realise what exactly is going on, there are still elements of doubt - have you read too much into it? Are trustworthy people just good actors? With the occasional addition of a first-person narrative from the currently-abducted child, this keeps you on your toes, if not the edge of your seat. There was one point when I got terribly anxious that the silly person was going to do entirely the wrong thing....
A first-class psychological thriller that I really couldn't put down. One of those books that leaves you wanting more... and sitting thinking for an hour afterwards. Not for people with personality disorders. ...more
Most enjoyable scifi sexy romp with flesh-eating plants!
I wasn’t sure what to expect from ‘scifi romance’. What I found was a full-on, exciting and wMost enjoyable scifi sexy romp with flesh-eating plants!
I wasn’t sure what to expect from ‘scifi romance’. What I found was a full-on, exciting and well-plotted science fiction action adventure, complete with space ships going wrong, crash landings, aliens with particularly nasty eating habits, and baddies with a shady past. Oh, of course the protagonists also have shady pasts, and that’s good too. Well, maybe the heroine and her chums aren’t that shady, maybe they are innocent. Then again, is anyone really innocent if they are out digging up fossilised alien poo in search of biotechnical wizardry to make their fortunes? These are ideas I like!
The book is well-written, gripping, full of rounded characters, especially those who are really one-dimensional. The planetary vistas are spectacular, the future technology is sexy and believable, and the sex is too. What makes this more interesting is that we have a dual-point narration: both Ankari Markovich and Viktor Mandrake deliver chapters, which was quite a switch. I think Ankari gets the lion’s share though.
Ruby Lionsdrake does a mean line in heroes, and this is no exception. I’m really glad I have books 2 and 3 in the series already tucked in my Kindle!
For romantics or science fiction aficionados, it’s all about the people and double-dealing in space. With believable future science thrown in....more
This is a free sampler of stories that led to and give some back story about my new scifi series The Viridian System. The first book in the series, ThThis is a free sampler of stories that led to and give some back story about my new scifi series The Viridian System. The first book in the series, The Perihelix, will be out in January 2016....more
If you haven’t seen the tv series or read earlier books in the series, then you need to start at the beginning, since Inspector Montalbano’s disgust aIf you haven’t seen the tv series or read earlier books in the series, then you need to start at the beginning, since Inspector Montalbano’s disgust at Sicilian politics and their effect on policing get him very depressed in this episode. In fact, it one of the darkest ones, since the crimes he sets out to solve are also more depressing than usual. Again the author has just the right touch of police procedural, comic turns, beautiful description and favourite characters to keep the reader hooked. This is one of his best....more
I’m not sure that I should be critical of a Neil Gaiman book, but it’s definitely odd. It starts like a Middle Grade Every grown-up should read this.
I’m not sure that I should be critical of a Neil Gaiman book, but it’s definitely odd. It starts like a Middle Grade book, but gets both darker and more adult, yet keeps the fairytale approach going, which makes you wonder. But wonder is the name of the game, and it is definitely a fairytale for adults, with some wonderful flights of the imagination, and many weird goings-on. Yet the protagonist is a young man of the YA variety, and his romance with a fairy is the heart of the story. They bicker and squabble and it all seems very real, except for the situation in which they are mired. Mired literally at times. The antagonist and his adventures are particularly well done, although sometimes the three (or is it four?) strands to the plot seem so very different, you wonder what’s going on.
Unusually for me, I might re-read it, to see if I gain more from it next time. Maybe I just need to get in touch with my inner child better....more
Fingersmith is essentially the tale of what happens when a girl, Susan, is required to act as a lady’s maid to Maud Lilly, as part of a plot to steal Fingersmith is essentially the tale of what happens when a girl, Susan, is required to act as a lady’s maid to Maud Lilly, as part of a plot to steal her fortune. There are presentiments of things to go wrong in the execution of this dastardly deed in Susan’s narrative comments of ‘what was to happen later’, but the twist took me completely by surprise! The second part is told from Miss Lilly’s point of view, which explains much, but gives nothing away for the final section. It’s a masterful piece of half-delivered truth being entirely misdirection.
What struck me from the outset was the detailed description of minutiae in the dwelling (I”m not sure I should call it a house) where Susan lives. What lies on the dressing table, the washing flung over the clothes horse to dry in front of the fire, all tell their own story about the inhabitants, their situation, their mundane or exotic lives. Too much description can kill a story. The right amount, without cliche, can build form, and suggest things about the environment that build tension, especially where characters should remain silent. The mouldering windowframe with fingernail-sized crescent shapes where people have tried to open it in the past; the damp spots around the corners of the ceiling… I became aware of the building of dread – dread rather than terror or horror is the emotion of the gothic novel – and the compulsion to read on to see what happens.
This was a slow read – at least for the first part, before the twist. There was a lot to savour. After that it fairly raced along, concern for both women and their fates pulling me back as soon as I was able. A fingersmith is a thief in Victorian parlance, but the role of gloves in the tale is another issue, one which made me wonder, and wonder….
It’s a masterful piece, not for under 18s, but I’m sure most of my reading friends would find, as I did, the thrills and creepiness to make them want to read Ms Waters’ work, unless they are offended by LGBT themes. ...more
Well, my bookclub hated it. The librarian had suggested it thinking it was light and amusing. Most of our ladies were put off by the first chapter, whWell, my bookclub hated it. The librarian had suggested it thinking it was light and amusing. Most of our ladies were put off by the first chapter, which was lewd, filthy and self-indulgent. I marched womanfully into the next chapter which was charming, floridly written, tense and sympathetic as the boy sabotaged the shooting event of hundreds of pheasant for sport. The book see-sawed between passages of elegance and delightful character sketches, and ludicrously over-the-top, effulgent even, caricatures. The story was slight, and reminded me of a bastardised PG Wodehouse in its archaic country house mannerisms, but rewarded the doggedly determined with an absurd ending which despite being delivered at the end of a particularly turgid stream-of-consciousness from the main character, seemed to make some sort of sense. In fact, it was pretty much like 50 Shades of Stephen Fry. And the real problem is, I've written this in a pale copy of the overblown language that he uses....more
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