Month: April 2025

Book Review: The Island by Victoria Hislop

Posted on by Libby Price

Later on this year we are taking my parents to Greece to celebrate their respective 75th and 80th birthdays (one for each parent, we haven’t been waiting for 5 years!) Mum has been keen to go to Crete – and more specifically to visit Spinalonga. Pretty much every female friend I’ve mentioned this to has said ‘Oh, have you read The Island by Victoria Hislop?’ Now, Mum had – which is what had piqued her interest in visiting Spinalonga – The Island in question – in the first place, but I hadn’t – until now! Thanks to the kind loan of the paperback from a neighbour of my parents, I’ve joined the club. Here’s the blurb:

“On the brink of her own life-changing decision, Alexis Fielding longs to find out about her mother’s past. But Sofia has never spoken of it. All she admits to is growing up in a small Cretan village before moving to London. When Alexis decides to visit Crete, however, Sofia gives her daughter a letter to take to an old friend, and promises that through her she will learn more.
Arriving in Plaka, Alexis is astonished to see that it lies a stone’s throw from the tiny, deserted island of Spinalonga – Greece’s former leper colony. Then she finds Fotini, and at last hears the story that Sofia has buried all her life: the tale of her great-grandmother Eleni and her daughters and a family rent by tragedy, war and passion. She discovers how intimately she is connected with the island, and how secrecy holds them all in its powerful grip…”

Whilst the book is top and tailed by Alexis’s story – the fundamental part of the book goes back in time to the 1930s and Eleni, Alexis’s great grandmother and her family. It is then a family saga over many years. The descriptions are wonderful and really evocative and you can totally imagine life both on Crete and over the narrow stretch of water on Spinalonga. Learning about how people with leprosy lived was incredibly interesting – and I really enjoyed that aspect. Real world events such as the Second World War are also interwoven throughout the book – and I found out recently how much Greece was part of the war in Europe (my grandfather in law was a prisoner in the Peloponnese in Greece at that time) I had thought of visiting Greece for Classics type history (and we’ve done Athens and Olympia for exactly this) – but this more recent history is equally interesting.

I thoroughly enjoyed the book – and I’m now looking forward to our trip to Crete even more.

At this point I often thank publishers for copies of books – but in this instance, I’d like to thank my parents’ neighbour Wendy for letting me borrow her hard copy!

Book Review: Orbital by Samantha Harvey

Posted on by Libby Price

I have talked before on blog posts about my love of the podcast The Rest Is Entertainment with Marina Hyde and Richard Osman. Well, a few weeks ago Richard recommended some short books – and this, Orbital, was one of them. It won the 2024 Booker Prize – and I’m often put off books that have won prizes, a bit like Oscar winning films TBH – but decided to go with Richard’s recommendation. Here’s the blurb:

“A team of astronauts in the International Space Station collect meteorological data, conduct scientific experiments and test the limits of the human body. But mostly they observe. Together they watch their silent blue planet, circling it sixteen times, spinning past continents and cycling through seasons, taking in glaciers and deserts, the peaks of mountains and the swells of oceans. Endless shows of spectacular beauty witnessed in a single day.
Yet although separated from the world they cannot escape its constant pull. News reaches them of the death of a mother, and with it comes thoughts of returning home. They look on as a typhoon gathers over an island and people they love, in awe of its magnificence and fearful of its destruction.
The fragility of human life fills their conversations, their fears, their dreams. So far from earth, they have never felt more part – or protective – of it. They begin to ask, what is life without earth? What is earth without humanity?”

I started reading this just as the astronauts Suni Williams and Barry Wilmore landed back on earth after their extended 9-month stay in space on the International Space Station (ISS) (a PROPER space trip, not a billionaire sending random women into the edges of space for 11 minutes or anything!) and I really felt I got an insight into life as an astronaut from this book in terms of their day to day routine, exercise, food – and the effect of living in space on the human body.

Whilst the book is set over 24 Earth hours, that encompasses 16 circling of the Earth – and you also learn a lot of the back story of each of the astronauts / cosmonauts during the storyline.

It is beautifully written and really thought provoking. It’s incredibly different too (but in a good way, not in a Goldfinch way – I’m still sorry to various friends for that!) – but also, as Mr Osman pointed out, if you recommend people a short book and they don’t like it – you haven’t wasted too much of their time!

Book Review: The Penthouse by Catherine Cooper

Posted on by Libby Price

I’ve thoroughly enjoyed Catherine Cooper’s previous books, so was pleased to be granted an advance review copy of her new book The Penthouse from Net Galley.

Here’s the blurb:

“Beneath the glamour dark secrets lurk.
World famous singer Enola had it all – fame, fortune, and a breathtaking penthouse view. Then she vanished without a trace, leaving the band’s careers in ruins.
Fifteen years on, the remaining members are reuniting for a series of concerts in Las Vegas. But when mysterious accidents plague them, some start to wonder if Enola is back for revenge.
What happened all those years ago – and who really knows the truth?”

The book is told in 2 timelines – back in the early 2000s when there’s been an X Factor / Pop Idol type competition with a girl band (Breathe) and boy band (This Way Up) and they become entwined. Then Enola suddenly goes missing and no one knows what has happened to her. Then there’s a current timeline when the 2 remaining members of the bands are doing a money spinning come back show in Vegas which appears to be cursed. There were characters throughout the book that you could imagine being real (a Simon Cowell style manager for example).

As well as being told by the band members – you also have the points of view of other supporting characters such as Enola’s Mum (who lived out her fame hungry ways through her daughter) and an obsessive Enola fan.

There are lots of twists and turns – as you’d expect from a Catherine Cooper book – and it’s not immediately obvious why the book is called The Penthouse in the first place!

I have to say I devoured the book in one day whilst ‘holding the bags’ at Alton Towers, and the short chapters were perfect for picking up and putting down whilst walking between rides.

It came out yesterday, so if you like the sound of it you can have it right away! Thank you to the publishers and Net Galley for my ARC.

Book Review: Table for One by Emma Gannon

Posted on by Libby Price

Having enjoyed Emma Gannon’s previous book Olive (which frighteningly was almost 5 years ago!) I request an advance review copy of her book ‘Table for One’ from Net Galley. Here’s the blurb:

“Willow has everything worked out.
*The steady partner
*The successful career
*The grown-up house
Until she doesn’t – and she’s cast adrift on the sea of heartbreak, grieving a future with no clear path.
With her life transformed beyond recognition, and her friends busy ‘moving forwards’, Willow has never felt more alone.
But she’s in good company.
And when inspiration arrives from an unlikely source, she rekindles the relationship she longs for – but has long neglected… The one with herself…“

At the start of the book Willow is living and working with her boyfriend Dom. I have to say he comes across as a complete dick from very early on – and Willow being dumped by him should (and eventually is) the making of her.

Willow doesn’t really seem to have a depth of friendships with people – even though she’s been friends with them a long time (weirdly I remember this from Olive too – which makes me wonder if the author has been burnt by ‘friends’ in the past?)

Then Willow is given a writing assignment by a previous employer – to write about her seemingly ‘smug married’ life (she has neglected to mention she’s single again) compared to Naz, an influencer who’s USP is that she’s happily single by choice. Willow and Naz do get to know each other – and Willow is let behind the social media curtain that Naz lives through.

The one constant in Willow’s life is her Aunt Carla, who has been a mother figure to her for a very long time. Their relationship was really lovely – and I think Carla was my favourite character in the whole book.

Overall the book shows that Willow needs to be happy and content in herself, not just with the expected accoutrements of a 30 something life. I though the ending was really clever – as if Willow was sitting down to write this exact book!

I enjoyed this – and thank you to Net Galley and the publisher for my ARC.

Book Review: The Suspect by Rob Rinder

Posted on by Libby Price

I was lucky enough to be granted an advance review copy of Rob Rinder’s debut novel ‘The Trial‘ a couple of years ago – and thoroughly enjoyed it. I was then given an advance review copy of his book coming out later this year, The Protest, at which point I realised I’d missed book two. As it’s a series, and I loved Adam Green in the first book, I parted with hard cash for the middle book, and second in the series, The Suspect. Here’s the blurb:

“When the UK’s favourite breakfast TV presenter dies live on air in front of millions of viewers, the nation is left devastated.
More devastated still when it becomes clear that her death was not an accident.
The evidence points to one culprit: celebrity chef Sebastian Brooks. But junior barrister Adam Green is about to discover that the case is not as open-and-shut as it first seemed.
And although her angelic persona would suggest otherwise, she was not short of enemies in the glittery TV world . . .
Can Adam uncover the truth?”

In my review of The Trial, I commented that Rob Rinder had ‘written what he knows’ by making Adam a Jewish trainee barrister – well, Rob has now combined his second career with his first – to double down on this – with daytime TV now featuring too! Whilst this would probably stand alone as a ‘whodunnit’ – I think it really helps to have read the first book in the series to have the background on lots of the characters.

The book really does seem like it’s an open and shut case – as the death of a TV presenter is witnessed on live TV – but you think that really it can’t be – as that would be a pretty dull book! This case is the main element – with other cases, and the lives of Adam and his chamber-mates intertwined, along with the phonecalls Adam has with his Mum (which were a favourite part of the first book too!)

Lots of the characters are ‘familiar’ from TV personalities we know and love – but tropes are tropes for a reason I guess! I enjoyed this element of it as it made it feel more real.

It was another twisty and turny storyline, with the intricacies of the UK legal system woven through, which you know are going to be legitimate because of Rob’s background. Overall I enjoyed it and am looking forward to the third instalment of Adam Green’s career later this summer.