Review: An Academic Affair

An Academic Affair by Jodi McAlister
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Sadie Shaw and Jonah Fisher have been bitter rivals since practically the first day of college. For fifteen years they have competed for everything, top of the class, teaching positions, grants, you name it. What both of them want, but neither has, is a permanent teaching position. Meanwhile, the two of them have somehow ended in a house-share *and* co-teach some literature classes. Sadie's speciality is modern romance (ie populist) whereas Jonah's is more traditional Shakespearian drama and the like. Also, at their graduation, Sadie's sister got into a screaming argument with Jonah's father.

Sadie didn't have the greatest start in life, her father left them when she was very young and their mother checked out of parental responsibilities so she was practically raised by her older sister Francesca ('Chess'). As a consequence, money is tight and the two sisters are very close.

Jonah on the other hand comes from a family of academics, his father is famous and his mother was a student/researcher in his father's classes. However, he is not close to any of his family, his father forced them to participate in debates at meal times and pitted sibling against sibling.

Fast forward, Jonah is trying to be a better brother and all round person. He hates the privilege he receives as a middle class white male with connections and tries to be an ally to Sadie (and other females) wherever possible.

When Jonah's father lets slip that his older sister's husband has left her and their two small children for his other secret family, Jonah wants to do whatever he can to help, but being in Sydney while she lives in Tasmania is difficult. Then a teaching job comes up in Hobart which seems perfect. The only trouble is the successful candidate will have expertise in one of four areas, including Shakespearian drama and modern romance. Could this be their fiercest contest?

The employment contract has a clause agreeing to spousal hire (if they are in a similar field) so Sadie concocts a plot to get married, that way Jonah can move to Hobart to be near his sister - after all they have been living together (platonically) for years. But working together every day and spending evenings at home may change things forever.

Told from both POVs, this was a fun romance, with plenty of references to romantic tropes and plot devices (eg forced to share a bed, marriage of convenience etc). As always, great to get some recommendations of other romances to read and/or validation of your reading choices.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

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Review: Hitwoman: The new action-packed hilarious thriller rom-com for 2025

Hitwoman: The new action-packed hilarious thriller rom-com for 2025 by Elsie Marks
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Three and a half stars.

Maisie Baxter is a hitwoman for Novum, a boutique 'ethical' assassination service. She founded the organisation with her boss Gabby, a minor celebrity and charity advocate (think Spring Watch and Save the Hedgehogs), they have expanded and now have a second assassin, Owen (good looking but not very bright), a tech guy, Jason, and an admin person Sophie. One of Novum's key tenets is that Maisie (or Owen) can veto a target if they don't consider them to have committed a heinous crime, something Maisie is very proud of, and she loves that Gabby respects her choices.

When we meet Maisie she is on a job for a mysterious anonymous client (not so odd as who wants a team of assassins to know your name) who is also very specific about what they want Maisie to do and when and how, including arranging for her exfiltration. The job goes without a hitch and later the team are introduced to the mysterious client, Pascal Robertson, elusive billionaire CEO of ILS, a company which has created the world's first green fertiliser. Pascal has discovered that some of his senior management have been selling the fertiliser illegally to terrorist organisations to help them make bombs and he is determined to root out all the bad eggs ... the permanent way.

The following week, Maisie (in disguise) is headed to a Young Farmer's Festival where one of ILS's board is giving a keynote speech. She has orders to assassinate him during that speech. After setting up the tent for the following morning she joins the festivities at the bar and bumps into a handsome man who looks as out of place as she feels, the strong cider helps them form an instant connection and they end up spending the night together. The next day, Maisie watches as the ILS director is making his speech, ready to (literally) push the button, when suddenly a light fitting swings down towards him, killing him instantly. Coincidence? Or is there more than one team of assassins hired? Could it be someone from Removals Inc, Novum's main competitor who would kill their own mother if the price was right?

But when the same guy turns up at Maisie's next hit, she realises sweet, shy Will could be working for the opposition.

This gave off similar vibes to the Brangelina film Mr and Mrs Smith, and probably for that reason I did enjoy it, but it didn't feel very original.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.


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Review: Cairo Gambit

Cairo Gambit by S.W. Perry
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Its 1938, Europe is on the brink of war. Primrose Nevendon lives a rather Bohemian lifestyle as a freelance stage designer with her Italian mother and a collection of artists and philospohers that call themselves (rather grandly) the Bevern Fraternity. Her father Archie left them when she was small and she has barely seen or heard from him since. He is now a director of Anglo-Levantine Oil in Cairo whilst also running his late brother Nim's theatre.

Then two Special Branch police officers come calling, Archie has gone missing in Egypt and they are concerned that he might have sold secrets about British oil pipelines and the like to the Germans and/or Italians, especially since Prim herself was briefly a member of the British Union of Fascists until she realised that they were just as bad as the Communists and didn't really want change for the masses - just for the leaders.

Prim decides to travel to Egypt to find her father. On the long air journey she meets Harry Taverner, ostensibly with the British Council to bring British arts and science to Egypt, but in reality to babysit Prim and see whether they can find Archie (or if she knows where he is). Also on board is Mike Luzzatto, an American Jew who deals in real estate, although his real motive is buying land for Jewish settlement.

When she gets to Cairo, Prim discovers that there are a lot of people looking for Archie, some of them not at all nice. The theatre manager was kidnapped, tortured, and murdered to find some clues as to where he might be - but no-one knows.

In their attempts to find Archie, Prim and Harry are drawn into the conflict between the Arabs and the Jews, and both sides' antipathy towards the British. It seems as though Archie may have been trying to play both sides and it spectacularly backfired.

The author had clearly done a lot of historical research but honestly most of the time it felt like a bewildering hotchpotch of politics and all I really got out of it was that all sides were pretty unpleasant, prepared to sanction absolutely anything to the cause as collateral damage - that may also have been a product of the times where extremism was rampant across the world. The story itself got subsumed in the politics and felt like a bit of a damp squib, I was left with the feeling of 'so what?'.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

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Review: Murder on an Italian Island

Murder on an Italian Island by t a williams
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Three and a half stars.

Virgilio invites Dan, Anna and of course Oscar to Elba for a holiday with him and his wife, staying at a swanky hotel where his (sort of) cousin Rita is the manager. Unfortunately there is an unpleasant incident on the first night, a very drunk man comes over and deliberately throws a glass of red wine over Virgilio. Apparently the man, Ignazio, abducted and raped four women in Puglia many years ago, and had been sentenced to twenty years in prison, seeing Virgilio again made him very angry and things could have escalated if Dan hadn't stepped in. The guys are debating whether to move to a different hotel to avoid the man when one of the surf instructors comes running in - they have found a body washed up on the rocks ... it's none other than Ignazio, and Virgilio apparently had another run in with him later that night. Since the body was found on the hotel's private beach, which can only be accessed through the hotel or a locked gate, it seems clear that if it is murder it must have been one of the guests or staff.

Soon Dan and Virgilio are working hard to determine whether Ignazio fell to his own death because he was so drunk (they ruled out suicide as he seemed to feel no remorse), or whether he was pushed, maybe by a relative of one of the girls he attacked?

Then Dan finds another body in the sea. are the deaths connected? An accident seems far less likely now there are two bodies.

This was very good, I was convinced I knew who was the murderer but I was completely wrong - they were never even a suspect!

However, I am trying to eat more healthily and having to read the descriptions of the huge meals Dan eats is making it hard for me to make good choices.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

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Review: How to Lose a Lord in Ten Days: A Novel

How to Lose a Lord in Ten Days: A Novel by Sophie Irwin
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Three and a half stars.

Miss Lydia Hanworth is surprised when Lord Ashton proposes marriage to her, they'd barely spoken previously, and before she can politely decline her aunt and uncle assume it's a done deal. The only saving grace is that Ashton wants to keep the engagement a secret until his father can announce it at a masked ball his cousin Phoebe is throwing in two weeks time.

Lydia's aunt and uncle have threatened her that if she messes this engagement up she will be sent to live with aunt Mildred - a fate worse than death - so she determines she must get Ashton to cry off instead - and ten days spent at his cousin's country house will be just the right opportunity.

As the title might suggest, this book draws heavily on the film How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days as Lydia behaves oddly, wear eccentric clothing, uses inappropriate language and (frankly) lies through her teeth. At first Ashton is perplexed, what happened to the quiet, well-behaved girl he met in London, but when he discovers her true motivation this means war!

Throw in a scheming mama, a strange host, a twin brother with a Sherlock Holmes obsession, a stolen diamond necklace, a widow on the prowl, a young lordling, and a famous explorer who reminds me of Professor Gilderoy Lockhart from the Harry Potter books and you have a rip-roaring rom-com.

I have no idea when this is supposed to be set, the clothing on the cover looks early 1800s but Lydia's twin brother is clearly emulating Sherlock Holmes. Also, Wikipedia tells me that bananas didn't become common items until the 1880s when Fyffes began importing bananas from the Canary Islands to the UK through Southampton Docks (one of Lydia's dresses is compared to a banana). But, if you can suspend disbelief at the language which is used and the ambiguity as to the historical setting this was a fun read.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

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Review: Meet Me at the Seaside Cottages

Meet Me at the Seaside Cottages by Jenny Colgan
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Meet Janey and Essie Carter, mother and daughter respectively. Janey loves living in the tiny town of Carso, working in the local hospital as an audiologist whereas Essie couldn't wait to get away to the hustle and bustle of Edinburgh. But then it all falls apart, Essie's employer is moving to Switzerland and there's no position for her, also she's been there less than two years so she doesn't qualify for redundancy. With no new job on the horizon, realising she has huge credit card debts, and can't afford her flat share Essie reluctantly decides to move back to Carso and her mum's tiny cottage, since her posh boyfriend Connor doesn't seem willing to let her stay with him and his colleague Tris.

Janey is thrilled to have Essie back home, even if her daughter blames her for the divorce and finds fault with everything, but soon Essie's messiness, unwillingness to do anything around the cottage, and slovenly appearance are driving her to drink.

Luckily, Janey's son Al persuades Essie to join them and Janey's colleagues down the one remaining pub for a quiz night, where Janey runs into the father of one of her former patients, and Al and Essie catch up with their old school friend Dwight (who developed a love of country and western clothing as a child and doesn't seem to have dropped it) who has been working the oil rigs. Dwight has just bought the three dilapidated cottages next to Janey's and intends to do them up and sell them, but after five minutes talking to him Essie realises he hasn't the first clue about budgeting or decorating and volunteers herself as project manager.

Meanwhile, Janey's former patient's father's dog has had puppies in one of the cottages. Lowell is totally clueless and enlists Janey's help with caring for the puppies, which she helped to birth after the first one got stuck.

This was just charming from start to finish. As a woman of Janey's age I identified more with her, especially since Essie came across as a spoilt brat at first, but it was just charming, sweet, funny, all the feels.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

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Review: Births, Deaths and Marriages

Births, Deaths and Marriages by Laura Barnett
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Six people meet at university - specifically at the funeral for a man/boy who was killed in a car accident just a few weeks into term. They spend the next few years inseparable, several of them share a house, and as is perhaps inevitable with young people away from home, there is a lot of secret hooking up, being in love with someone who's in love with someone else, etc, etc.

Fast forward twenty years. Zoe and Rob got pregnant while still at university, got married but subsequently divorced when their son Gabe was five years old. Rancour over, Rob is soon to be married for a second time to a wealthy architect, Rob is a teacher and Zoe is a midwife in Herne Bay, Kent.

Yas, the working class girl with a single mother is now an NHS surgeon.

Al, who was in love with Zoe at university was married, but his wife Estelle died, following which he gave up his job and started working at the family undertakers in Beckenham, Kent.

Indie, who was in love with Al at university, has created a successful coffee business, she is married to Xavier (not one of the university six), who was a successful chef until COVID, when his restaurant went bust.

Finally Rachel, who is married with two small boys. Her husband Mark runs a successful gym business.

Over the past twenty years the tight knit group have drifted apart, particularly after Estelle's funeral, but the invite to Rob's engagement party brings them all back together. In a year there will be a baby, a wedding, a death, a divorce, and other upheavals.

This is described as Four Weddings and a Funeral meets One Day and I can sort of see why, it's also a lot like Cold Feet. After a rocky start, the introductory chapter was quite turgid and I didn't have a clue about anyone, this quickly became a great read - I think it would be even better as a film or a TV series. Laura Barnett did a good job of keeping the characters separate (after the first chapter) which is not easy to do when there is a main cast of six plus spouses/children to remember.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

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Review: Dark in Death

Dark in Death by J.D. Robb
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The 46th outing for this gritty detective series set in the future.

Detective Eve Dallas is called out when a woman is found murdered in the cinema whilst watching the re-run of a classic film, stabbed in the back of the neck with an ice-pick. Her friend had only stepped away for a couple of minutes to answer a page (she was on call). But the plot thickens! A famous author comes into the police station, she is afraid that this murder bears a striking similarity to the murder in the second of her detective novels, and she has also noted an earlier murder of a licensed companion also mirrors the murder in her first book. The only thing is the murderer in the first book was a woman and in the second it was a man. But then looking at the footage from the cinema Eve notices that there are striking similarities between a man and a woman they catch on camera - it appears their murderer likes to don disguises.

After interviewing the author Eve is convinced, the third novel concerns the murder of a rock star's former girlfriend, one famous for all the wrong things, who could drag him down to her level if they get back together. Eve gets her team to profile likely skanky ex-girlfriends, sadly there are several, and warns each of them to look out for a woman matching the description in the novel.

I enjoyed this novel, why do all the books I read from this series seem to happen when its bitterly cold? The premise was interesting and kept me engaged. There were lots of promising leads which turned into dead ends. My only gripe is (and this is only based on the two books I have read recently) that there seems to be a need for several murders before the murderer is caught and there needs to be a showdown where they rescue the latest victim in the nick of time - maybe if I read more of the other 57 books I haven't yet read I may find that is just a coincidence in these two.

Also, who doesn't want to read about a future where a New York cop can marry a former thief billionaire and has an Auto Chef in her car which can dispense a multitude of drinks?

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

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Review: Question of Guilt

Question of Guilt by Sally Rigby
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Sebastian Clifford and Lucinda ‘Birdie’ Bird are private investigators, he's the son of a lord and has recently discovered he has a teenage daughter at university. She's bisexual. They have both left the Police, although she is only thirty. This si the seventh book in the series, none of which I have read before, but it is easy enough to read as a standalone.

Daryl Brackstone approaches the duo, her mother Helen was murdered decades ago by ingesting cyanide and her father was convicted of her murder. Her father died in prison a year ago and a true crime blogger has approached Daryl with evidence that her father may have been wrongly convicted and Daryl wants the duo to uncover the truth.

As they dig deeper it seems that Helen Brackstone was not just a middleclass suburban housewife, she was also a founding member of a group of activists which protested cronyism and investigated corruption. It seems one or both of the detectives assigned to the murder may, at best, have cut corners believing they had a slam dunk suspect, and at worst deliberately framed an innocent man.

Then Birdie starts getting threatening messages and is run off the road by another car - evidently their investigations are getting close to the truth.

This was an interesting detective story. It helped enormously that Birdie is still friendly with her former partner and Sarge so can draw on their knowledge and resources. Similarly, Seb has friends in high places and his father knows a lot of important people, so can effect introductions or provide insights into character.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

Available on Kindle Unlimited.

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Review: We Could Be Heroes

We Could Be Heroes by Philip Ellis
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Will is an English openly gay man who works in a bookshop by day and is trying to make a name for himself on the Birmingham drag queen circuit by night.

Patrick is an American actor, famous for portraying Captain Kismet (sort of Flash Gordon, All American hero who accidentally gets launched into space and finds himself on a strange planet) in a superhero movie, he is in Birmingham filming some additional scenes for Kismet 2 and this film could catapult him into the big leagues (think Marvel franchise). His agent has always told him he can be openly gay or he can be a successful movie star and he has heeded that advice, so much so that he hasn't had a relationship in four years.

One night Patrick's co-star, his stunt man and his nutritionist persuade him to come out on the town and their taxi driver takes them to a gay bar where Will's friends are performing and Will is serving cheap shots as a roving drag queen waitress. They meet ... and the rest is history.

The story is interspersed with flashbacks to 1949 and the husband and wife duo who originally wrote the Kismet comics, their imaginations envisaged a world where they could be their authentic selves whilst having to hide who they really were in real life.

I enjoyed this (sort of). My problem is that it didn't really know what it wanted to be. Is it a romance? Is it a political statement about the way in which current society appears to be reverting back to 1950s views about repressing homosexuality and anything other than heterosexual behaviour? Is it about some idea that stories transport us to other worlds and open our minds to things being different? I don't know and that was the problem for me. Then everything had a lovely happy ever after all wrapped up in a nice bow.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

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Review: Bones of the Buried

Bones of the Buried by David Roberts
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Lord Edward Corinth returns from six months in New York, single once more after his love affair with Lord Weaver's daughter fizzled out. No sooner is he home than Verity Browne comes knocking, she has been in Spain reporting on the fight between the Republic and the fascists with her on-again, off-again boyfriend and Communist Party leader David Griffith-Jones but David has been arrested and convicted of murdering fellow communist Godfrey Tilney, who coincidentally was at Eton with Edward. Verity has come to beg Edward to come to Madrid and help clear David's name. Meanwhile, Basil Thoroughgood from the Foreign Office asks Edward to extend an offer to David, the FO will help him if he agrees to pass on information to them, aka spy.

Soon the body count is mounting, including another fellow Old Etonian, who also happened to be the father of Edward's nephew's best friend. Edward can't help but feel that the deaths of several Old Etonians must have a connection and he is determined to discover the truth.

I think I can only echo others' reviews. I didn't realise that one of the characters was a very thinly veiled Ernest Hemingway (mainly because I have zero interest in him), but it does explain why the character featured so heavily.

I felt that the tension was missing because of the prologue which have the link between the victims and then it was a case of dangling one red herring after another as to the identity of the murderer(s). Also, I feel that the only reason we know the answer is because the murderer(s) confessed, otherwise it could have been another red herring.

Also, both Edward and Verity are becoming unlikeable characters. Apparently he is in love with Verity, despite having lived in New York for six months with another woman, thought he was in love with a second woman, and then had a sexual relationship with a third woman, to pass the time. Indeed, while watching a production of Love's Labour Lost he muses that he could never be celibate for three years in the pursuit of love. Verity on the other hand appears to be easily led and treated as a propaganda and sexual favours machine by David, whilst leaning on Edward and then complaining about him.

I enjoy the historical details about the murky politics on left and right, but I'm not sure how much longer I will continue with the series.

Read on my Kindle Unlimited subscription.

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