The Ocean at the End of the Lane, book review. (Neil Gaiman)

During a visit to the area where he grew up (for a family funeral), our narrator is drawn back to his old stomping ground where he re-experiences a childhood summer living up the lane from Hempstock Farm, Old Mrs Hempstock, her daughter and her granddaughter, Lettie.
The year he met Lettie, Ursula Monkton, and death for the first time, was full of the weird and wonderful, scary and sad, from the opal miner who had recently taken lodgings in his bedroom (meaning he had to share with his sister), killing himself in his parent's car, to a spirit giving out money (which seemed to be the only thing that made humans happy), to Old Mrs Hempstock and her daughter, cooking the most amazing pies, breads, soups and cakes which were so well described I could almost smell them on the page.
Lettie (who appears to be just a few years older than our narrator but has lived a thousand years many times over, has a pond in her garden that she calls an ocean [which, with the assistance of Old Mrs Hempstock, manages to transfer to a bucket later in the story], as well as curling cat tails protruding from the grass which, if you give them a firm enough tug, pull up kittens), takes our narrator with her when she goes to bind the money giving spirit and send it back to its own realm.
When our narrator gets scared and lets go of Lettie’s hand whilst she’s binding the spirit, a worm lodges itself into his foot and, although he manages to get most of it out (in a superbly written but rather gruesome episode in the bathroom), just enough remains, which forms a connection between realms which allows the spirit (Ursula Monkton) to stay, with dire consequences.
As Ursula gets bolder and more powerful, Old Mrs Hempstock has to summons the hunger birds. As the rain lashes and the winds howl, the hunger birds devour the spirit and you think everything is rebalanced but the birds need the tiny piece of worm (Ursula) that’s still inside our narrator, which has worked its way from his foot to his heart. In spite of Old Mrs Hempstock's attempts to banishes the hunger birds, she only succeeds after Lettie makes the ultimate sacrifice to save her friend and so, with deep sadness, she is laid to rest for a while in the ocean - which is back in its rightful place - with the promise that she may return one day.
The Ocean at the End of the Lane is a mix of fear, loss, loneliness and bitter memories of a time gone by, which Gaiman manages to weave into a tale that can be enjoyed by all. There's fantasy, magic, good and evil, all expertly mixed with a reality that bend the rules, and it’s a rollercoaster of love, wonder and amazement with a cold chill running down your neck, accompanied by the most beautifully threatening illustrations and, like the best books, takes you on a journey that is difficult to forget.
Four Stars for, The Ocean at the End of the Lane, then; the book that has hopefully, got me blogging again.

Don't forget to search my blog for your favourite authors and books and if I haven't read them, message me with your recommendations.

Thinner, book review. (Stephen King)

A book with a very distinct message this one, and it's showing its age, too.

Like a lot of King novels (this one was originally released under his pseudonym Richard Bachman by the way), Thinner has a magical realism to it - the world ticks by and all is nice and normal, as it would be for you and I on any given day, but with a twist, a curse, an old Gypsy curse in this case, and it's one of my favourite things about this author's books. Everything is so normal bar that one thing: be it an ancient alien monster that dresses like a clown, a door in time that might help prevent the assassination of John F. Kennedy, or an old man living with a seventy year old mouse, reality is only ever skewed just a little.

Having killed an old Gypsy woman who stepped out in front of his car (he was concentration on his wife's hand down his pant rather than the road), and the police chief and local Judge whitewashing the whole affair, William (Bill) Halleck walks away, scot-free - well, he would have if the old Gypsy, Lemke, hadn't brushed his cheek on the courthouse steps and whispered that one word: Thinner.

The weight starts to drop off immediately, and the first half of this book is all about his cloths getting baggy, seeing his doctor, friends and colleagues, who, along with his wife and daughter, think it's a good thing but then start to worry, all whilst Bill is in denial, pretending to himself that he didn't hear what Lemke said. The second half is Halleck on the road searching for the Gypsy, tracking him down, and it is the better half, more fluid, emotional, but it's also where the age of the book starts to show.

The writing on a whole is okay, some of the latter chapters almost reach excellence, but when Halleck thinks of his teenage daughter as having 'coltish legs' and a random stranger unnecessarily uses the N word amongst the many other racist slurs against Gypsies, you begin to realise how times have changed.

That disappointment aside (it was written in the mid 80s - which is NOT an excuse by the way but a possible reason), the last hundred pages fly by, and as tensions rise and Halleck's weight plummets (he was 255 at the beginning, now down to 115), and the ending nears - which I won't spoil - the message I referred to at the beginning becomes blatantly clear.

Treat people how you would like to be treated.

Whether it's yourself, your loved ones, neighbours and strangers alike, and take responsibility for your actions. Think before you speak but speak anyway, but be honest, with yourself and those around you, because if you don't, something terrible could happen, something terrible like . . .

Three stars for Thinner then but only just, and no surprise that it was first published under his pseudonym.

Don't forget to search my blog for your favourite authors and books and if I haven't read them, message me with your recommendations.

Who & what do you read? Questions I get asked as a book blogger (Pt II) Michael J Richardson

Well we've covered the classics, horror and apocalyptic (see 03/10 post), so what's left?

I don't really read crime or thrillers as the few I have read over the years seemed rather formulaic, and I don't read much Sci-fi (although what I have read has mostly been entertaining) but I do read Literary Fiction, authors like Ishiguro, McEwan (Enduring Love being a firm favourite) Cormac McCarthy's sublime No Country for Old Men, Ali & Zadie Smith and Jesmyn Ward to name but a few and although short in length, most have left lasting impressions.
Y/A (Young Adult), books like, Since You've been Gone, Thirteen Reasons Why, We Were Liars, Emma Cline's, The Girls, All The Bright Places, The Hate U Give, After the Fire and of course, John Green's back catalogue (Looking For Alaska being my favourite), have also entertained beyond maybe what I thought they would and are well worth checking out - most of what I write is in the Y/A genre so maybe I'm being slightly biased there - but I often find books in that category have far more substance than their initial subject matter might imply.
Book series then, like Justin Cronin's The Passage, Tolkien's Lord of the Rings (I'll blog about that one soon, after another reread), Ben Aaronovitch with his witty magical Rivers of London novels, Stephen King's Dark Tower, the aforementioned Harry Potters series and Carlos Ruiz Zafon's (yes him again), stunning Cemetery of Forgotten Books collective are some of my all-time favourites, so much so that I have read most of them more than once and some of them too many times to actually remember, and will no doubt do them all again one day.
I also love history and so, Robert Harris and his superb back catalogue is one I can whole heartedly recommend, The Office and the Spy probably being my all-time favourite of his but it's not all fiction. James Holland's Fortress Malta and The Battle of Britain, rate alongside Antony Beevor's Stalingrad and Max Hastings' All Hell Let Lose, as some of the most horrific five star books I have ever had the pleasure (if you can call it that), of reading and are books I'll never hesitate to recommend.
So where does that leave us?
Anywhere I suppose. Which is where I recommend you let your mind wander the next time you're in a bookshop (physical of virtual). Bypass the shelf you think you want, mix it up a bit, pick the book next to the one you thought you wanted, the one in the plain brown wrapping that some shops now sell, and see where it takes you, and if you've got a birthday coming up and someone asks you what they can get you, ask them to surprise you because, if it's any of the above and you've not read them yet, you're in for one hell of a ride.

Happy reading.

Don't forget to search my blog for your favourite authors and books to see if I have read them and if I haven't, why not message me with your recommendations.

Who & what do you read? Questions I get asked as a book blogger (Pt I) Michael J Richardson

For those of you who don't know me, I've been reading and writing since I was a teenager (properly reading that is, not force fed books I had no interest in at school, which excludes Stig of the Dump of course, which was my first serial reading experience), so that's a good thirty years under my belt, but what floats my boat, gets me going back for more?

Well, why don't we start with the classics. But wait, what is a classic? A book written over a hundred years ago? Over fifty? Harry Potter will be defined as a classic in the future if not already, so do I include them? Maybe it's Austin, Bronte or Dickens (of which I've liked but not loved - except A Christmas Carol, that will always be a 5 star book in my opinion), or Du Maurier, whose My Cousin Rachel is one of my all-time favourites. Looking further afield we have Jules Verne, not bad, Platonov, weird and Kafka - seriously, I think something got lost in translation like: plot and anything that actually makes sense - and I've never really enjoyed American classics either with Moby Dick, The Scarlet Letter, The Catcher in the Rye and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest all being a bit lacklustre - although I did like, The Great Gatsby and I am Legend is a masterpiece.

How about horror then? But again, what is horror? I recently read Roxane Gay's superb, An Untamed State, one of the most horrific books I've read recently but you'll only find it in the fiction section, as with Khaled Hosseini, who writes about the horrors of war torn Afghanistan in a way that pulls at your heart. I've also read The Girl with all the Gifts and its prequel (zombie apocalypse for those who don't know), but they're no more horrific than Stephen King epics' like The Stand and It, which are simply undefinable in genre. Then there are horror classics like Dracula (superb) Frankenstein (okay) and The Exorcist (seriously creepy) to consider, all having such great characters and depth that to simply call them 'Horror' would do them a great injustice.

I have always loved apocalyptic stories, too, from the short and punchy like, The War of the Worlds, I am Legend and The Day or the Triffids, to huge tomes like The Passage series and of course, the best of the best, The Stand - all fourteen hundred plus pages of it, and how the whole experience of reading books like these leaves you feeling lonely and apprehensive but with a fierce determination that if it were ever to happen to you, you'd be the good guy/girl, be on the right side and survive.

So where does that leave us? Well, this subject is far too long for one post so I'll blog part II in a few days' time and talk it through a bit more with you then. See you soon.

Don't forget to search my blog for your favourite authors and books and if I haven't read them, why not message me with your recommendations.

The Green Mile, book review. (Stephen King)

I happened upon this six-book set on the internet a few weeks ago, and thought it was about time I added it to my collecting, and so, on arrival, I dipped in. Two hours later and I'd finished the first book and was reaching for part two.

Ever read a book you literally can't put down? A book you slip into your pocket in case you have a spare five minutes? A book you take to the little room? You know the one I mean!

Well, this is that book.

Told in the first person by an ageing ex-prison guard from Cold Mountain penitentiary, who worked on E-Block back in the late 20's and early 30's, we quickly find ourselves immersed in the day-to-day running of the establishment, the prisoners, guards and the warden's lives.

E-Block is where death-row prisoners spend their last few weeks, and it's a relatively quiet place, calm and solitary, (but for Percy Wetmore). As the reader is introduced to the various characters on the mile, (the green mile), one becomes accustom to its routines, and before you know it, you're so immersed in the 1930's American penal system, that you forgot you're reading a book of fiction.

You barely get to know some of the inmates before they visit the chair, but the main death-row prisoner is, John Coffey, a mountain of a man, but a man with a gift, a gift for healing.

King's build up, of Coffey curing the narrator's urinal infection, bringing Mr Jingles, (a mouse that's been stamped on by Percy Wetmore), back to life, and then going on to cure the warden's wife's brain tumour, is stunningly good, and the realisation towards the end of the book, that maybe Coffey didn't murder and rape the two young girls he was on death-row for, that maybe he was actually trying to help them, puts a nice twist on proceedings, but the most shocking part, the part that is at the heart of how horrific humans can be, is part four: The Bad Death of Eduard Delacroix.

Percy Wetmore is the antithesis of John Coffey: He is a cruel, vindictive, educated white man with friends in high places, and with his connections he pulls a few strings, struts around like he owns the place, even managing to convince the warden to put him 'out front' for an execution.

I won't describe the results here, you'll have to read the book, but be warned, this part will make your toes curl, (if you've seen the film, you'll have a taste of what happens), and I won't divulge how old the narrator is at the end of the book either, or which friend from the mile still visits him, or what happens to Percy Wetmore, but what I can and will tell you, is that this is one of King's finest books, (I've yet to read them all), and that you should all grab a copy and give yourselves nightmares; you'll thank me for it in the end!

Five stars then, and a very Merry Christmas to all you bibliophiles out there.

Foxglove Summer, book review. (Ben Aaronovitch)

If you're in need of a book that has, Wizard police investigating child kidnapping in the heart of Herefordshire, whilst trying to track down invisible Unicorns that can only be seen at full moon, then this is the book for you.

If you're after a book which is fun, fast a bit bonkers but a damned good read, then this is also the book for you.

If you're into this series, you'll know that this is the first book set outside of London, and I have to admit, after four previous books, I think this was the right time to break from tradition, introduce new characters and get a bit of country air.

Nightingale's still there, well, he's on the other end of the phone, as is Peter's ex-partner, Lesley May, who texts him a few times throughout the book, keeping the narrative active.

Beverley Brook is here too, all naked and sexy, and she and Peter's relationship moves on a few notches, as they search for the two missing eleven year old girls who left their homes in the middle of the night and vanished.

There is country policing, country pubs and countryside, to deal with, and with much mirth and a little bit of help, Peter Grant gets the job done.

With an ex practitioner living virtually on the doorstep, the enquires start there, but on further investigation of the original statements, taken when the girls disappeared, P.C Grant soon uncovers that one of the girls has an invisible friend!

Of course, normally, invisible friends turn out to be imaginary, but of course this book isn't normal, this is wizard policing after all, and the invisible friend turns out to be a Unicorn from an alternate timeline, an invisible Unicorn with very powerful friends.

With a trip into the unknown, some clever policing and a large chunk of luck, the two girls are returned, and all seems right with the world; only one of the girls isn't quite who she used to be!
There is much to like about this book, and what with book 5.7 just out, (The Furthest Station), it's an ideal time to read it.
Three and a half stars.

Broken Homes, book review. (Ben Aaronovitch)

This is part four of Ben Aaronovitch’s magical journey with the Met Police, and it’s a good one.

There are strange things happening in London, especially south of the river.

Why would a normal man, run a red light and crash into another car? Why did that same man kill a woman and leave her body in a shallow grave? Why would someone leave a tube station, only to walk back down to the platform and jump in front of a train? And why was a very rare and expensive, magical book, pawned at a bookshop of the Charring Cross road, having been stolen from an ex-practitioner's house in leafy Hampstead?

With some diligence, a bit of luck and a hell of a lot of help, Peter Grant and Lesley May manage to advance their magic, whilst: trying to track down the faceless man, avoid being killed by a homicidal Russian, Varvara Sidorovna, police the Spring Court for the God and Goddess of the Thames, protect the monstrosity that is the grade two listed tower at Skygarden, (an ugly concrete sky scrapper built by an eminent architect who designed the building to harness large quantities of magic), and walk the dog.

Sky, the wood nymph, dies when her trees are attacked. Abigail is taken on as an ad hoc apprentice. Molly works her way through one of Jamie Oliver’s cook books. The book thief is discovered at his house, cooked from the inside! Nightingale rescues Peter and Lesley from certain death and the Skygarden tower blow up with Peter standing on the roof.

Quite a lot happens then, and all wrapped up in a little over three hundred and fifty pages.

Well, this book is worth reading for the farm scene alone; it is one of the best scenes so far in this entire series. Nightingale steams into an already tense situation, where Peter and Lesley have been overpowered, and are about to die a very uncomfortable death at the hands of the not so friendly Varvara, but with much magic and trickery, Nightingale manages to wreck the barn, destroy a bungalow, capture the villains, and . . .

No, I’m not going to spoil it for you. I’m not even going to tell you why Lesley shots Peter in the back at the end. I’ll just let you read it for yourselves.

Four and half well deserved stars for this one then. On to book five: Foxglove Summer.

Moon over Soho, book review. (Ben Aaronovitch)

Oh I do love a quick dip into books about magic policing, chimeras and sex!

It's quite apt I think, that out of the first four books, this one is the most racy because it's set in Soho, and Soho is, or used to be, synonymous with sin.

That aside, we have another wonderful jaunt with P.C. Peter Grant, through the pitfalls of policing in the capital, whilst trying to practice magic, learn Latin, keep the status quo between the King and Queen of the Thames, and last but not least, catch criminals.

There's an illegal practitioner of magic in London, three girls who died when a bomb dropped on a jazz club in World War II, renting an apartment off of Denmark Street, and there's The Pale Lady; she bites men's penises off with her vagina.

The death of a journalist, who had the misfortune of meeting the Pale Lady, leads P.C. Grant on a journey of jazz venues, where he finds a group of musicians whose lead saxophonist has recently passed on, suspiciously. It turns out he's not the only one; after further investigation, it appears that quite a few jazz musicians have met with untimely deaths recently.
There are also people being magically spliced together with animals.

So, during this escapade, P.C. Grant steals an Ambulance, running amok through the streets of the West End - just managing to save his wards life by dumping him in the river - helps his friend and fellow P.C., Lesley May, (who lost her face in book one), come to terms with her disfigurement, whilst keeping the families of the Thames happy enough to avoid a turf war.

Just like with Rivers of London, I enjoyed this book a lot, and it is in fact, the second time I've read it.

It is funny, fast paced, original and at around four hundred pages, just the right length.

A four star book then, and on to book three, Whispers Underground.

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, book review. (J.K.Rowling)

Oh yes, oh yes oh yes!!!

I could hurl a hundred superlatives at this book, most of which you've probably heard before, but they’d all be deserved.

So, Harry Potter's sixth year at Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry, and what a year.

I like to think of this one as a history book: not one of those big boring books that goes on and on about a long forgotten civilisation, a King or a Queen, but a book about Harry's past, his connection with Voldemort, and one that delves deep into the Dark Lord’s past, by way of memories in the pensieve in Dumbledore's office; memories that the headmaster has spent many years collecting.

Harry has inherited his god-father's house and the vile elf, Kreacher, who he puts to good use following Draco Malfoy. Harry knows that Draco is up to something, he overheard him threatening the owner of Borgin and Burkes in Knockturn alley, he just doesn't know what.

There are potions to master, (somewhat helped by an old potions book he finds in the spares cupboard, annotated and proclaiming to be the property of the half-blood prince; there's Snape to avoid, quidditch to play and an uncorrupted memory to extract from their new potions master, Professor Horace Slughorn; who taught Tom Riddle before he became Lord Voldemort.

There are girls, there's snogging and there's Ginny Weasley, who Harry is starting to see in a different light.

To top it all, there are Horcruxes to find, hidden objects that contain parts of Voldemort's soul, and this is where these books are so clever. It is here, in book six, that we discover that Tom Riddle's diary - which Harry destroyed in The Chamber of Secrets, (book two) - was in fact a Horcrux. Dumbledore has already destroyed another, Voldemort's grandfather's ring, and with Horace Slughorn relinquishing his untainted memory, they now know that they have four more to find, excluding the part of soul that resides in Voldemort himself.

So, over five hundred pages in and the adventure begins, but Draco has succeeded in his task, Death Eaters have entered the school, the dark mark hangs heavy above the astronomy tower, Dumbledore is disarmed, Harry immobilised, Snape . . .

I know that most of you already know the ending to this book, you've probably seen the film, but I put it to you, that unless you have read this book, you do not know the ending.

The battle between the Death Eaters and The Order, Snape and Malfoy's escape, the burning of Hagrid's hut, and the most moving part of all, Dumbledore's phoenix and its lament, echoing hauntingly through the corridors and classrooms of Hogwarts.

If a book could have more than five stars out of five, this would be the one. Simply put, this book if stunning.
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, here I come.

Rivers of London, book review. (Ben Aaronovich)

I just had to re-read this classic series again, before book six came out. (Too late!)

It's been a few years now, and what with Rivers of London, Moon over Soho, Whispers Underground and Broken Homes, starting to blend into one, I sort of needed a refresher.

Well, I've finished book one and I'm half way through book two, and if anything, I'm liking them more now than the first time.

Ben Aaronovich paints a picture of the secret magical wing of the Metropolitan police force, (which consists of: one man - who is over a hundred years old - a vampire ghost, and an H.Q called The Folly), very convincingly, and then, P.C Grant starts talking to a ghost in Covent Garden and the Folly has a new recruit.

P.C. Peter Grant, who, up until that fateful night, was just a regular probationary constable, is our main character here. On the discovery of ghosts being real and their ability to inflict serious damage on the living, (our first victim is beheaded), our story begins.

The normal police take a very dim view of the Folly and its purpose, until an ancient malevolent ghost starts killing people that is. After that results are expected and expected fast.

Whilst spending a lot of the book discovering that magic is real, trying to learn it, (as well as Latin), P.C Grant, also finds himself embroiled in the middle of a feud between the mother and father of the river Thames. (Hence the book’s title).

With centuries of history and immense power between them, the two entities, along with their extended families, control all the river of London; the Thames of course being the biggest. With much fumbling, and only a small amount of destruction, our intrepid trainee magician, mediates the situation the best he can.

There is horror in this book, fun, laughter, genuine intrigue and as you tread the cobbles of one of the most famous placing in the world, (Covent Garden), you get trapped; trapped in a world of magic, policing, and fear, a world that hovers behind a thin veil between normality and fiction.

Exquisitely researched, so much so that I thought the author was a Jazz playing ex policeman, who wondered the streets of London of an evening, smoking something that could result in his arrest, and it’s fast paced too.
The chase at the end, with P.C Grant running through a London that gets magically younger, before finally disappearing altogether, going back to pre-Roman times, is just fantastic.

So, five big fat delicious stars for this book then, and with Moon over Soho under way, I'll be back in touch in a week or so with another update.

Keep reading and don't forget your Children in Need donation.

Revival, book review (Stephen King)

Not up to his normal standard this one but intriguing all the same. 

King does what he does best at the beginning of this book, he hooks you in with great characters and dangles the carrot of what might be. (I read the first sixty pages in one sitting)

He accomplishes this twofold. Firstly the book is narrated by the main character, (Jamie Morton) who hints at thing that haven't happened but inevitably will and secondly, the chapter names are a list of what they contain, therefore giving the reader a hint as to where things are going.

Take chapter three as an example: 'The Accident. My Mother's Story. The Terrible Sermon. Goodbye.'

The terrible sermon is mentioned earlier in the book so we know it is coming, but when it does, it still hits hard because the writing is so good. 

The story moves through the decades and we witness the characters growing up and getting older. My favourite part is when Jamie is a teenager (Not surprising since I write mainly about teens in my young adult books), how he joins a band - something which I suspect has an autobiographical element to it - and how he finds first love. Then, there's drugs, drink, women, and always, where ever he goes, just around the corner, is the minister who conducted the terrible sermon, Charles Jacobs.

The lighting storm is interesting and sets the scene for the latter part of the book. There is loss and recovery, family tensions and more, which all adds depth to the book, but ultimately, the ending isn't the best. 

The mysterious 'other world' that Charles Jacobs is looking for, felt a bit hashed, as if the author only had ninety-five percent of a story and had to quickly make up the remaining five. 

The journey getting there however was good and well worth a week or so of one’s time. 

One of Mr Kings smaller, more manageable books this one, reminding me of the Hard Case file book he wrote a few years back, 'Joyland', which does end up with a small cameo appearance here.

A solid 3 stars for this one then; not a masterpiece, but a pleasant read all the same.

Harry Potter, the early years. Book reviews. (J.K Rowling)

So much has been said about these books, by so many, that you're probably wondering what there is to add. 

Well, lots really, both likes and dislikes.

I like the simplicity of the first two books; the fact that they are short and get to the crux of the matter, whilst adding elements to the overall story as a whole, is clever.

Take Dobby the house-elf for example. How can he save Harry Potter in book seven, if Harry doesn't save him in book two? Tom Riddles diary is another example, a Horcrux in book two, yet we don't really start learning about Horcruxes until book six; again, clever!

Another thing I like about the books over the films, is that they have more depth.

Harry and Ron get invited to Nearly Headless Nick's 500th death-day party in The Chamber of Secrets, and as a reader, we learn exactly what year the books are set. Again, very clever!

There's the last task at the end of the first book, the one set by Professor Snape, where Hermione helps Harry solve the riddle of the potions, so he can go on and find the philosophers stone; something you’ll never know about if you’ve only ever watch the film.

Then there’s Neville Longbottom, who features more in the books than any 'would be movie goer' might imagine; going into the forbidden forest at the end of book one instead of Ron is the best example, but there are others.

The third book was all shaping up to be another fabulous read, when time travel was introduced. Now I understand that Hermione had to adhere to a strict set of rules when using the time turner, but one has to question Voldemort’s lack of intellect when it comes to this.

We all know that he splits his soul into seven (well eight really) so as to survive any would be attack on his person, gathers an army of like-minded dark wizard supporters, before being defeated when his own spell rebounds and kills him.

But eleven years later and it's all kicking off again, three years after that and the Dark Wizard is back, but what does he do? The greatest wizard of all time! He spends the next few years chasing Harry, using ever more elaborate schemes to try and trap and kill the boy, when all he really needs to do, is get a time turner, go back to the beginning, and get a mate to kill him instead.

That would of course make for a shit book, but come on! If you introduce time travel, you've got to be prepared to accept that anything can happen.

Still love the book through, just thought it was the weakest of the three.                                     
So, four and a half stars for book one, four and a half for book two, but only four for book three. 

The Snow Child, book review. (Eowyn Ivey)

This one came about simply because I saw it everywhere.
I'd see it on peoples shelves on coffee tables, I'd see it in shop windows, on Goodreads, I'd see it in my local charity shop, and as you might know by now, when the charity shop has a book, I find it hard to resist. 
So, not recommended in any way, I went into this book with my eyes wide open. 
I read the end before the beginning, which sounds weird but it’s a good idea because you get a sense of the history behind the story and the author’s influences, which sets things up nicely. (I'd recommend you start there.) 
The story itself was intriguing. A couple who can't have children relocating to the isolation that is Alaska, to avoid the questions, the looks, the pressures.  
So, having settled in, our two main characters start to make a go of it, but there's always that nagging doubt, that unspoken word, that the move was wrong, that they should go back home, give it all up. That is until a child appears, a young girl hidden in the snow. 
I liked the main characters, and the sense of isolation that only a good book can portray. I liked the mystical aspect too, which reminded me a little about how I write. Was this magic, Gods will, or just dumb luck? I liked the cold, the chill, the ever present danger of being lost, or worse, attacked by wild animals in the vast northern tundra of Alaska. Reading this book in the summer did nothing to warm me.
So, why only three stars? Well I suppose the book just wasn't me. The writing was good, the characters fine, the story was somewhat quirky, which isn’t always a bad thing, and I did enjoy it, but I didn't bond with it.
I guess, some you do, some you don't.