It’s a long time ago but I can’t now remember whether I met Jane Eyre before or after being introduced to Lizzie Bennett.

One thing’s for sure though: both were the first book women of my acquaintance who considered themselves the equal of any man.

In fact, both thought themselves far superior to some of the men they knew.

Even on the cusp of the 70s that was a revolutionary idea so goodness knows what the 19^th century reader must have thought. Continue reading →

Whet your appetite for The Book of Air, a new post-apocalyptic fantasy, by Joe Treasure.

A virus is wiping out most of the human population. In this passage, Jason is describing his departure from London. He tells his story to his dead wife, Caroline, or Caro for short.  

We hit a road block near Chiswick. Hard men in gas masks, playing at soldiers, keeping the neighbourhood clean. Waving their guns at microbes. The real soldiers had buggered off weeks before. Or keeled over. Same all over London, same everywhere. Containment was the Continue reading →

As a little girl I loved silent movies – oh, the edge of the seat excitement when the dastardly villain tied the  platinum blonde heroine to the rail track and gleefully ran off as the puffing Billy engine advanced inexorably.

Would the beautiful blonde perish?

Or would the hero save her in the nick of time?

As a bloodthirsty nine-year-old I never really understood the fatal, bloody implications of the what if…which, perhaps, made the opening chapter of Rachel Amphlett’s new crime thriller Will to Live, the Continue reading →

Timing is everything.

Martin McGuiness, Northern Ireland’s controversial former deputy first minister, died after a short illness on the same day I finished Roger A Price’s new crime thriller Vengeance, which, coincidentally, features a former IRA commander-turned-politician.

And, as I write this review, the terrorist attack on Westminster Bridge is the subject of every news bulletin.

Price couldn’t have made his novel more topical if he’d tried. Continue reading →

Meet Sheryl Browne, whose psychological thrillers After She’s Gone and Sins of the Father, books one and two in the DI Matthew Adams series, are out now.

Find out about the holiday that never was, why there’s room on her sofa for George Clooney and why he can expect to be tempted with cupcakes.

My name: Sheryl Browne.

My family: consists of my son, partner and a selection of odd dogs (I foster disabled dogs and invariably end up keeping most of them).

I was born in… Birmingham, UK, but moved around Continue reading →

It’s a tribute to the authenticity that James L. Weaver brings to his reformed mob enforcer Jake Caldwell in his new thriller Ares Road that I’ve just spent ten minutes deliberating whether I’d want to live with his hard man with a heart of gold.

Common sense suggests men like Jake are TROUBLE.

It’s a tough call, though, because Jake, like his alter ego Jack Reacher in the Lee Child books, is a good guy with a chequered history, who is trying to re-invent himself.

But, Jake, unlike Reacher, is not afraid of commitment and, having re-discovered his former Continue reading →