“His right knee was a bloody pulp. His ankle was shattered. The bottom half of his leg hung at an unnatural angle. Bone and sinew and muscle glistened in the light of the still-roaring flmes.” Why, yes, ‘Slaughter’ IS her real name. Pretty Girls tells the tale of three sisters: Julia, Lydia and Claire Carrol. Julia has disappeared years ago and has never been heard from again. Her disappearance has caused a rift in the family: parents Sam and Helen have divorced, and where Helen […]
The Party Princess and the Thug
Thorne McKelvie has meticulously and ruthlessly worked his way up through the ranks of criminal organisation the Hangmen, a group that doesn’t shy away from human trafficking in sweat shops, drug or arms smuggling. The leader of the Hangmen is suspicious of Thorne, however, and worried that he is gunning for his spot next, taking over the whole organisation. So after a series of unexpected attacks on the gang’s and their allies’ warehouses, he sees an opportunity to have Thorne framed and removed as a […]
A war-time fable that didn’t really work for me
Nine-year-old Bruno lives in a big house in Berlin and is not at all happy when the household is packed up and he, his mother, his older sister and the servants are forced to travel by train to a new house, far away in the desolate countryside. He misses the bustling city, the house with such a great banister for sliding down, his grandparents, his friends, even his school. At the new house, there is no one to play with, just a small garden and […]
Endings are the Second Hardest Part (Right After Titles)
I really liked this book right up until the last 10% or so. I don’t want to spoil anything for you, so I’ll move the reason down to the end of the post. Night Film is about an investigative journalist, a filmmaker and his daughter; it’s about living each moment of your life fully. It’s about horror movies and why they scare us. Scott McGrath is a disgraced journalist. After comparing filmmaker Stanislas Cordova to Hitler, McGrath was then accused and found guilty of slandering the director. […]
In which Patty and Katie are scarred for life.
Katistasia: Our slogan should be “Reading crap so you don’t have to since 2015.” Oh, friends. We did something SO STUPID. We decided to read EL James’ Grey. It seemed like an excellent opportunity for snark. Evidently I’ve subjected us to 450 pages of lip biting. Pattistasia: I read the acknowledgements and already hate you. Katistasia: Not nearly as much as I hate myself. I NEED TO GOUGE MY EYES OUT. Seriously though, how can you claim to have written this especially for the fans […]
Scully Can Write!
I liked this book, a lot. I got the audio version from the library read by Scully herself. She’s very very good, which surprises none of us. This book takes place in the world, with involvement in Haiti and Tehran and Antarctica. The characters are diverse and Anderson carries their accents with skill and subtlety. They are believable, families worried about each other, teenagers who sound and behave like (brilliant) teenagers, world leaders who are also human beings, mysterious baddies who are not caricatures. The […]