A Week of April Showers – Sunday Post

It has been a fairly typical mid april in the Uk with alternating showers and sunshine. The trees have still got blossom on them and the pollonators are out in force.

The child is away at scout camp this weekend. It feels odd, but quite nice at the same time. I guess I better get used to it as she will be an adult in 4 years and I doubt she will hang around long after she finishes school.

I have been working in the private hospitals around the county this week. Completely different from the NHS, the food is better but the paperwork is immense. Also the patients expect a higher standard of care as they are paying a fortune for it. The irony is that they pay their permanant nursing staff less than the NHS rates.

I have had a very good reading week this week with five books finished and many of them have been wonderful.

The Memory of Animals

by Claire Fuller

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I can understand how this book may be a little bit too close to home with the Covid pandemic still a very recent memory but this disease that is killing people here is quite different. This book is often bleak but the ending is guardedly hopeful and my main criticism is that apart from the protagonist all the other characters are decidedly unlikable people.

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Fever Dream

(Pendergast Series #10)

Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child

narrated by René Auberjonois

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

Who knew Pendergast had been married, well he certainly didn’t talk about it much and the realization that her death was not an accident leads him down a rabbit hole taking his friends with him. It’s not going to win any literary prizes but it was a diverting read. The ending did leave it unfinished however to lead towards the next book in the series.

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The Silence of the Lambs

by Thomas Harris

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 4.5 out of 5.

I saw the movie years ago but the Story Grid book analysis have led me to seek out the original text and it doesn’t dissapoint. The movie was pretty true to the book and it’s a great story. I will have to read the rest of the series now.

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Where We Belong

by Anstey Harris

Narrated by: Tania Rodrigues

also published as The Museum of Forgotten Memories

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 5 out of 5.

I really enjoyed this book. Told in the first person by Cate who is forced to return to her late husbands family home, which is also a museum. This is a book about the burden family secrets and the destructive power they can have. About the reality of living with somebody with a depression so profound it leads to suicide and moving on from that. I did shed a tear at the end.

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Agatha Raisin and the Terrible Tourist

(Agatha Raisin #6)

by M.C Beaton

⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 3 out of 5.

Light reading but an engaging mystery nonetheless. This time set on the turkish half of the island of Crete where Agatha heads to chase James after he indavertantly nearly made her a bigamist (in the last book). I have no idea why she keeps chasing him but she can’t seem to help herself.

Thursday: Book Review – I Know Who You Were by Nick Curran ★★★★☆

I will be linking this to the Sunday Post over at the Caffeinated Book Reviewer, The Sunday Salon at Readerbuzz.