Month: December 2018

Book Review: You Let Me In by Lucy Clarke

Posted on by Libby Price

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“Nothing has felt right since Elle rented out her house . . .
I’M IN YOUR HOUSE
There’s a new coldness. A shift in the atmosphere. The prickling feeling that someone is watching her every move from the shadows.
I’M IN YOUR HEAD
Maybe it’s all in Elle’s mind? She’s a writer – her imagination, after all, is her strength. And yet every threat seems personal. As if someone has discovered the secrets that keep her awake at night.
AND NOW I KNOW YOUR SECRET
As fear and paranoia close in, Elle’s own home becomes a prison. Someone is unlocking her past – and she’s given them the key…”

A friend recommended this in our reading group – and I needed an easy read, and it was only 99p for Kindle – so I downloaded it and devoured it really quickly!

It’s written in 3 different ways – from Elle’s point of view now, in the 3rd person looking at Elle historically, and through the eyes of the person in the house. This keeps it twisting and turning.

A few times you have to suspend belief as the coincidences are just too great – but it doesn’t completely ruin the book.

I have to say I found Elle quite annoying as a main character – and was shouting ‘change the locks’ at her way before she actually did.  There wasn’t really any character I particularly liked – but it still kept me wanting to read to find out what happened.

Overall an easy read that keeps you guessing and wanting to read on.

I’m not sure where this will fit – if anywhere – in my 2018 Reading Challenge – but with only a week to go, and loads of categories unfulfilled – I don’t think that’s the end of the world!!

 

 

 

 

Book Review: I’ll Be Gone In The Dark by Michelle McNamara

Posted on by Libby Price

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I have been trying to complete a reading challenge for 2018 (although have recently accepted I won’t manage it – but hey, life is too short to read books you don’t want to!)  One of the categories is ‘True Crime’ so I asked my reading group (sounds fancier than it is, just some mates on Facebook really!) for recommendations, and one of my friends recommended this.  We have very similar tastes in many things (those people who know us IRL will appreciate that comment #injoke #actuallymid90sreference) so I expected to enjoy it too.

Here’s the Amazon blurb:

“A masterful true crime account of the Golden State Killer – the elusive serial rapist turned murderer who terrorised California for over a decade – from Michelle McNamara, the gifted journalist who died tragically while investigating the case.

‘You’ll be silent forever, and I’ll be gone in the dark.’

For more than ten years, a mysterious and violent predator committed fifty sexual assaults in Northern California before moving south, where he perpetrated ten sadistic murders. Then he disappeared, eluding capture by multiple police forces and some of the best detectives in the area.

Three decades later, Michelle McNamara, a true crime journalist who created the popular website TrueCrimeDiary.com, was determined to find the violent psychopath she called the Golden State Killer. Michelle pored over police reports, interviewed victims, and embedded herself in the online communities that were as obsessed with the case as she was.

I’ll Be Gone in the Dark – the masterpiece McNamara was writing at the time of her sudden death – offers an atmospheric snapshot of a moment in American history and a chilling account of a criminal mastermind and the wreckage he left behind. It is also a portrait of a woman’s obsession and her unflagging pursuit of the truth. Framed by an introduction by Gillian Flynn and an afterword by her husband, Patton Oswalt, the book was completed by Michelle’s lead researcher and a close colleague. Utterly original and compelling, it is destined to become a true crime classic – and may at last unmask the Golden State Killer.”

I enjoyed this at the start – finding the attention to detail in the reporting of all of the different cases really interesting.  And knowing it was all real making it all the more disturbing.

However, I have to confess it got a bit repetitive and boring and didn’t really seem to have any answers.  I kept thinking it would build to it all being solved, but #spoileralert it doesn’t…….

This sounds bad – but I just didn’t really see the point of the book.  I know the author died whilst writing the book – and so I thought that the irony would be that someone else solved it after her death.  But that doesn’t happen.

I guess that reading true crime means it’s not going to have all of the loose ends tied up – but consequently I found that reading it felt like a waste of time!  Perhaps I am just ungrateful – and should have appreciated it for what it was – but definitely not my bag!

But hey – another category ticked off the reading list!!!

 

 

 

Going Down Under

Posted on by Libby Price

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Just over 19 years ago (eek!) I worked in Sydney for 3 months. I had an amazing time being an accountant by day and a tourist by night and at the weekends.  I had an inane grin on my face every day when I caught the bus (yes, Libby on a bus!) across the harbour bridge from my flat in North Sydney to the Deloitte office on George Street.  Thankfully there was no social media back then, so not much permanent evidence! This photo is when one of my BFFs came to visit as she’d been working on secondment too, up the coast in Brisbane. How young do we both look?!?! We didn’t look quite that fresh faced after a big night out last week I can tell you!!

The husband and I returned in 2006 when we had the eldest 2 kids. We had a great holiday on the east coast – here’s us on a rainy Bondi Beach and the children in Port Douglas – I’ve actually kept this photo in my wallet ever since (to remind me of when they actually liked each other!!)

Now we’re heading Down Under as a family of 6. We’re doing the recently started 17 hour direct flight to Perth – and catching up with some friends who emigrated a fair few years ago. We’re then flying cross country and time zones to the Great Barrier Reef for Christmas, and then, in proper bucket list style, Sydney for New Year!

I. CAN. NOT. WAIT! Given the festive stress levels, the 17 hour flight to sit (lie) down and drink fizz whilst watching films sounds idyllic – and there should be plenty of sunshine when we get there.

Obviously I will be blogging the sh*t out of the whole trip – so watch this space!!

Although not sure how many more of my husband’s Down Under jokes I can deal with…………………….

 

 

 

 

Book Review: This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay

Posted on by Libby Price

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This book had been on my radar since it became a bestseller when first released – but I hadn’t got round to buying / downloading it.  I’d talked about it to a lovely friend – and next thing I know, Mr Amazon delivered me a hard copy through the post.   I love getting exciting post – especially books (although I did have a minor panic that I’d been ordering stuff after drinking again – so had to check with my friend that she was the sender!!)

Here is the blurb:

“Welcome to the life of a junior doctor: 97-hour weeks, life and death decisions, a constant tsunami of bodily fluids, and the hospital parking meter earns more than you.

Scribbled in secret after endless days, sleepless nights and missed weekends, Adam Kay’s This is Going to Hurt provides a no-holds-barred account of his time on the NHS front line. Hilarious, horrifying and heartbreaking, this diary is everything you wanted to know – and more than a few things you didn’t – about life on and off the hospital ward.”

This book is BRILLIANT – I loved it from start to finish.  Yes, Adam Kay is sarcastic, a tiny bit evil sometimes, and uses foul language – but that pretty much sums up me and my friends too!!

A large proportion of the book is set in labour wards.  Having been there 4 times myself it brings it all back.  I had 2 children on the NHS and paid privately for 2 to be delivered – in fact there’s a whole new blog post that’s sat in my drafts for months just about that subject (I bet my 15 year old daughter’s mates who stalk my blog can’t wait for that one!!) But the one thing I just have to comment on is that Adam talks about delivering a baby for a private consultant, when it would be the consultant getting paid a wedge for doing it – and it’s not like he’d give a refund.  Well!  When child number 3 was born, I’d been induced, and the private consultant decided he’d got time to go back to his office to do some paperwork.  The baby had other ideas and made a very swift arrival – ably delivered by the resident midwife.  The incredibly guilty consultant turned up afterwards – but did write us a 50% refund cheque!!  (Although the cynic in me would say that’s because he already knew we were planning number 4 and he didn’t want to miss out on those fees…….)

Whilst being very cleverly written, and an entertaining read, this book is also a real insight into the life of a doctor.  In fact, just after I’d started reading it, I went to an A Levels option evening for the aforementioned daughter – and was chatting to one of the other Mums whose daughter wants to be a medic.  A GP friend of theirs had given the 15 year old a copy of this book to show her what life as a junior doctor really was like.  Who knew it could be used for recruitment (or possibly anti-recruitment) as well as being an excellent read!

Don’t read this book if you’re easily offended or don’t like bad language – but otherwise, it’s a must read.

As soon as I’d finished it I passed it on to a friend, as I was sure she and her husband (who co-incidentally is also a clever, caustic, anti religion Adam!) would love it. I think wanting to share it is definitely the sign of a good book.