Trustee from the Toolroom by Nevil Shute

 

This month I choose Trustee from the Toolroom by Nevil Shute

It is my book group’s choice for our meeting on 16 June. It is a modern classic. 

The writing seems very smooth compared with many modern stories. The main character is so very well formed that we like him and we wish him well right to the very end.

Keith Stewart and his wife are very down-to-earth and though not poor they are certainly not as well off as Stewart’s sister and brother-in-law. His sister and brother-in-law are drowned as they cross the world in a small yacht and he becomes the guardian of his young niece Janice.

There are some very powerful descriptions of the sea voyage and though there are many technical details that go right over my head, I don’t feel as if the author is showing off.  These details are important to the two characters in the boat.

The same is true of the engineering detail that we are given as Keith discusses and thinks about his small scale model projects. Again I don’t understand those details but it’s clear they are important to Keith and to the men to whom he talks.

Keith goes on tricky journey to recover some items from the yacht and to make sure his relations have had a decent burial and this creates much of the tension in the story. We are kept guessing right until the last minute about whether it will all come good for the family.

Keith does get some help through the kindness of strangers, which is richly deserved, and that is a reassuring message.              

Find your copy here.   

Note, this is an affiliate link and a small portion of what you pay, at no extra cost to you,  may go to Bridge House Publishing 

 

Silverwood Rising by Jeanett Greaves

 

 This month I choose Silverwood Rising 

This is the fourth and final book in Jeanette Greaves ‘Ransomed Hearts’ series.

 Yes, we certainly all know by now that this series is about werewolves and Greaves has created her own brand of them.  These aren’t ruled by the moon and mostly change between two legs and four at will. Over the four books I feel that I’ve got to know the pack and I wish that they really existed.

By now the general public are aware of their existence and that makes a difference to how the world operates for everyone. 

We get several points of view through a variety of scenes in the book. Yet we get very close to every person so that we really can empathise with them.

The Silverwood Pack still has to face the White Pack and so do other packs they have come to know.  

As the story comes to its climax and resolution we are offered a few more glimpses into how the Whites have become what they are. Some of us may find metaphors for our own world there. Others may just consider this to be a good story. I feel there is room for both. Fantasy works like that anyway.

The story is once more well-structured and the writing remains at all times engaging with a good narrative balance of description, action, dialogue and inner monologue.

This novel is suitable both for the higher end of young adults – 16+ - and for adults.    

 

Find your copy here.   

Note, this is an affiliate link and a small portion of what you pay, at no extra cost to you,  may go to Bridge House Publishing.  

Hearts' Home by Jeanette Greaves

 

This is the third in Jeanette Greaves ‘Ransomed Hearts’ series.

In this one both pace and tension increase. The pack grows as do problems about security and privacy. The hearts are high profile enough as a rock band. But their alternative life makes it even more difficult to manage home and work; now Mark and Andrew each have two families to worry about.     

Jeanette Greaves continues to give attention detail.  She presents a carefully considered world. She knows exactly what the world does but only gives us the amount of information we need at each point.

We are mainly in the point of view of Mark, though we get glimpses of the others too.

Greaves’ writing style tends towards the literary. The pace and tension are such that we want to keep on reading. So altogether a very satisfying read.  Beautiful prose and a good plot.  

The ending is dramatic and clearly paves the way for the fourth book.

I find this book suitable both for the higher end of young adults – 16+ - and for adults.  

Find your copy here 

Note, this is an affiliate link and a small portion of what you pay, at no extra cost to you, may go to the Lancashire Authors’ Association.        

Thorugh All the Spaces by Alison Chisholm

 

This month I was torn again – this time between a poetry collection and a cosy crime. I’ve come down on the side of the poetry collection because I think it might appeal to the readers of this newsletter more. Poetry is unusual for me but a connection with the poet helps here.

Alison Chisholm is a patron of the Lancashire Authors Association and I am the membership secretary. I attended and enjoyed a workshop she ran for us.

I was delighted as well to attend the launch of Alison’s Thorough All the Spaces.
Certainly these lovely poems transport you to all sorts of times and places.
Read Gretel’s point of view about her clever brother who helped them get back home… and realise that she was just as clever.
And what of the heart-felt letter to Henry VIII form is first wife?
Or the story of the feisty Rosa Parks?
And so much more.
It was a real privilege also to hear Alison reading from this inspiring book.

I hope you will enjoy the book too.

Find your copy here.

Note, this is an affiliate link and a small portion of what you pay, at no extra cost to you,  may go to Bridge House Publishing.  

 

Thes Motherless Land by Nikki May

 

I’ve read some great book this month and was quite torn between two:  Abi Daré’s And So I Roar and Nikki May’s This Motherless Land.  And So I Roar is the sequel to Daré’s award-winning story The Girls with the Louding Voice. May’s text just had the edge in readability and story-telling.

Tragic circumstances bring two cousins together. They become the best of friends and then the worst of enemies.   

May’s characters are so well drawn and we get wonderful feelings of times and place as the narrative shifts between modern Nigeria and a faded genteel English countryside.

There are the twists and turns, coincidences and questions about identify we welcome in popular fiction and the fine writing we love in literary fiction.

I saw both Daré and May at a Manchester Literature Festival event. It was such an interesting evening and I returned home with two hefty hardbacks.  Well worth the effort however.      

Find your copy here  

Note, this is an affiliate link and a small portion of what you pay, at no extra cost to you,  may go to Bridge House Publishing.