The only other of the Oz books that I’ve read other than The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (which was the only one I knew as a child) is The Marvelous Land of Oz (1904) but on revisiting it now after many years, I was surprised to find how, besides being a fun and imaginative adventure…
Shelf Control #278: The Secret of Terror Castle by Robert Arthur
Wednesday, the 8th of May, 2024, and time for Shelf Control once again! Shelf Control is a weekly feature created by Lisa at Bookshelf Fantasies, and celebrates the books waiting to be read on your TBR piles/mountains. Since early January 2023, Shelf Control has moved base here to Literary Potpourri. To participate, all you do…
Book Review: The Noh Mask Murder (1949/2024) by Akimitsu Takagi
I received a review copy of this book from Pushkin Press via Edelweiss for which my thanks. If you thought like me that Anthony Horowitz’s ‘Hawthorne and Horowitz’ series makes for a clever and certainly different mystery series where the author is himself a character, the detective’s ‘Watson’ in fact, reading The Noh Mask Murder,…
Six Degrees of Separation: From The Anniversary to Jane’s Country Year (May 2024)
Six Degrees of Separation is a monthly meme hosted by Kate at Books are My Favourite and Best. Inspired by the concept of 'six degrees of separation', originally set out in a short story by Frigyes Karinthy, which suggests that any two people in the world are connected through a chain of six or fewer…
Book Review: Vincent: A Graphic Biography (2024) by Simon Elliott
I received a review copy of this book from Francis Lincoln books via Edelweiss for which my thanks. Vincent: A Graphic Biography (2024) by Simon Elliott tells us the story of Vincent van Gogh using a voice and perspective which became very important to van Gogh’s fame and art and someone I confess I wasn’t…
Book Review: The Man in Lower Ten by Mary Roberts Rinehart
I received a review copy of this book from Chiara Giacobbe at Kazabo Publishing for which my thanks. Described as the ‘American Agatha Christie’ though she was 15 years the latter’s senior, Mary Roberts Rinehart was a prolific writer of short stories, novels, plays and nonfiction. Although she wrote even as a teen, a serious…
Review: ‘Captain Burle’ (1882) by Emile Zola #Zoladdiction2024
Having had to give up on plans to read The Ladies’ Paradise for want of time, I decided to read instead ‘Captain Burle’ (1882) a short story by Emile Zola for #Zoladdiction2024. The story explores themes of honour, friendship, sacrifice, corruption, dissipation, the contradictions many times inherent in people, and indeed also life’s ironies. Captain…
Book Review: The Luck Runs Out (1979) by Charlotte MacLeod
In The Luck Runs Out, Canadian–American author Charlotte MacLeod gives readers a truly enjoyable read, with a different from the usual setting, eccentric, exaggerated characters, a pignapping (with plenty of other animals around-none harmed), plenty of literary references, witty writing but amidst all the fun also a quite solid murder mystery. The book, second in…
Shelf Control #277: To You, Mr Chips by James Hilton
Wednesday, the 24th of April 2024, and time for Shelf Control once again! Shelf Control is a weekly feature created by Lisa at Bookshelf Fantasies, and celebrates the books waiting to be read on your TBR piles/mountains. Since early January 2023, Shelf Control has moved base here to Literary Potpourri. To participate, all you do…
Book Review: The Cheltenham Square Murder (1937) by John Bude #1937Club
Third in the series of mysteries featuring Inspector Meredith by English author Ernest Carpenter Elmore, who wrote as John Bude, The Cheltenham Square Murder is in some ways the typical golden age murder with a closed circuit of suspects in a small tight-knit neighbourhood, but it still has its novelty in terms of the murder…
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