Amina Kara

Well, in terms of creating a creepy, tense and menacing atmosphere, the author did an excellent job. You could just feel it as you read and it didn't really let up.

As for the characters, I can't say I found any of them likeable, aside from maybe a couple of them. Atleast three of the men were utterly deplorable!

OH AND WHAT WAS WITH ALL THE DRINKING?! It seemed like all the characters ever did was drink, drink and drink! Im a non drinker, but I could understand maybe a glass or two, but in this case the characters were going through bottles upon bottles. I mean, like seriously?! Maybe it was indicative of the characters, but I found it so excessive!

On a separate note, I'm glad the author included a pronunciation list of all the characters and places, because otherwise I wouldn't have had a clue how to pronounce them! It was really helpful, so thank you to author for adding that.

Thank you to The Book Club Reviewer Group for an eARC of this book.

As far as novellas go, Ryan's are the absolute best.

This was another excellent instalment that added depth to a story already well told! This time, it was following Aeson's journey to Valacia in search of the dragon egg. I'm glad we got this because it really helps us understand the perilous journey Aeson, Dahlen, Erik and a group of others faced just to get their hands on the dragon egg.

It also gave a real insight into Aseon and how far he was willing to go for the cause. The insight really helps us better understand him as a character. Understanding him better is definitely going to stop me from being as harsh on him in the next book.

After everything they went through, I can also understand Dahlen's frustrations when the egg didn't hatch for him. You went through all that only for the egg to hatch for someone else. Yeah, I feel your pain, Dahlen.

This was brilliantly written, with tension from start to finish. Even though we know how some things go, there were still a few heart in mouth moments!

Thank you so much to Ryan Cahill for my eARC of this!

Holy crap! What did I just read?! That was absolutely mind blowing! It was absolutely gripping from start to finish!

The was a definite page turner. Without giving any spoilers away, I honestly didn't see some of twists coming!

That was superbly well written, not just in terms of the characters but also in the way certain topics were addressed.

It was brilliant and I absolutely recommend it!

Thank you to The Book Club Review Group for the chance to read this.

Well, that was a rather interesting take on the famous Romeo and Juliet play.

I admit that at one point I just wanted to give up on the book because Rosaline's behaviour was frustrating me so much, but I'm glad I read through to the end. Having had time to think about it though, it's not really surprising when girls like her and Juliet were shunned by their families or tossed around from person to person, with no one really caring about their well being.

The writing itself was beautiful and I enjoyed it.

Thank you to PH and Natasha Solomons for the chance to read this book.

Another excellent book by David Jackson!

This time it involved Izzy. She worked in a bookshop, but her talent, or was it a curse? lay in being able to read peoples emotions and allowing her to know when someone is lying.

She tries to use her talent for good, but as you can imagine it doesn't go well. No one wants to believe her. They all think she's a crackpot, seeking attention apart from the lovely Detective Josh Frendy.

Despite this, through sheer determination? bravery? She keeps going. I didn't know whether to admire her courage, determination, bravery or tell her to stop putting herself in danger especially when noone seemed to believe her.

David Jackson definitely knows how to write a thriller with plenty of action, dark humour and wit and he's done it again with this one!

I definitely recommend this!

Thank you to PH, NetGalley, David Jackson and publishers Serpent's Tail / Viper / Profile Books for the chance to read this book.

Merged review:

Another excellent book by David Jackson!

This time it involved Izzy. She worked in a bookshop, but her talent, or was it a curse? lay in being able to read peoples emotions and allowing her to know when someone is lying.

She tries to use her talent for good, but as you can imagine it doesn't go well. No one wants to believe her. They all think she's a crackpot, seeking attention apart from the lovely Detective Josh Frendy.

Despite this, through sheer determination? bravery? She keeps going. I didn't know whether to admire her courage, determination, bravery or tell her to stop putting herself in danger especially when noone seemed to believe her.

David Jackson definitely knows how to write a thriller with plenty of action, dark humour and wit and he's done it again with this one!

I definitely recommend this!

Thank you to PH, NetGalley, David Jackson and publishers Serpent's Tail / Viper / Profile Books for the chance to read this book.

A well written book (style and research wise), but it wasn't really for me. I personally felt it didn't really tell me anything I didn't know and I found parts of it repetitive.

I do have to give credit to the author for the effort she put into researching the topic.

Thank you to Pigeonhole for the chance to read this.

This was a fantastic read! Full of tense, fast paced action which is right up my street.

I also loved the fact that it was partly based in my neck of the woods which added to my enjoyment of the story.

I loved Mallory as a character and I hope we see more of him in future books.

Thank you to PH and Ant for the chance to read this book.

If you like fast paced, action packed thrillers then this is definitely one for you! Highly recommend it.

I really enjoyed Call Me Mummy, so I was really looking forward to this and it didn't disappoint!

It was tough to read at times and very sad and heartbreaking too.

It was very, very tense at times too because you really couldn't tell what was going to happen from one page to the next.

Once again a very well written book by Tina.

Thank you to PH and Tina for the chance to read this book.

This is such a good series! I came across it thanks to some random browsing on Amazon and I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it!

Well, I started with the Street Rats of Aramoor series by Michael and I loved that.

Ayrion and some other characters from SRoA make a reappearance, whilst we're introduced to some new characters too.

Ayrion and Ferrin are by far my favourites!

I love the world of Aldoran and can't wait to return to it in the next book! It can't come out soon enough!

Highly recommend it!

Rating: 3.5

I'm so torn by this book, because the first half was so good and had the potential to be really amazing. Sadly, for me, the second half of it let me down. It just fell really flat, especially in terms of how clichéd a certain aspect of it turned out to be, and also how unbelievable part of the story was..Like, I just couldn't get past the actions of a character or the reasons given for said actions.

The writing was good to start with especially since it really created a tense and creepy atmosphere.

The setting was such a good one, and if not for what I mentioned above, it could've been such an amazing read.

Thank you to PH and Sinéad for the chance to read this book.

This was a very good read.

It was well written and the story flowed at a good pace.

I liked how well the characters were written especially with Sam and her anxiety and fears in relation to her pregnancy. I thought that was really well portrayed. I liked both her and Paul as characters.

I do have to admit though, that some of the scientific bits possibly went over my head. I'd probably have to read it again to properly understand it.

I haven't read the previous books in the Sam Shephard series, but I might give them a go.

Thank you to The Book Club Reviewer Group for a copy of this one.

This was a brilliant read. I mean with a multi-million dollar deal on the table and a mansion full of guests, what could possibly go wrong, right?!

Well, in this case, and without giving too much away, literally everything it seems, especially with tensions running high and seemingly everyone hiding some secret or other.

There were some very unlikeable/questionable characters, although there were a couple I liked.

I didn't realise this was part of a series so will definitely go back and read the previous two books.

Thanks you to PH and Rachael for the chance to read this book.

Wow! What an excellent read that was!!! It was so, so good!

I think it's definitely going to be my favourite read of the year!

The book had everything from grizzly murders, twist and turns and some not so nice characters!

It was so well written and kept the pace up throughout!

If I'd had a physical copy of the book, I would have read it in one go! I cannot recommend it highly enough!

Thank you to PH and Lesley Mcevoy for the chance to read this thrilling book!

I listened to the audiobook of this and it was fabulously narrated by Trevor! I'm not usually keen on audiobooks so that's saying something.

It was a brilliant book, which was only made better by Trevor's narration of it. I think it's what really helped to bring the country/people/culture to life.

I know I'm (way) late to the party but if you haven't read this book, then read it! Or like I did, listen to the audiobook!

This was a brilliant book that I thoroughly enjoyed reading! The evocative style of writing used by the author really bought the characters to life. So much so that with one particular character you really wanted to reach into the pages and literally throttle said character. I read this on the Pigeonhole app and I don't think I've ever seen a character evoke such strong feelings of dislike amongst me and my fellow readers! It just goes to show how well the characters were written that it evoked such feelings in us as readers.

The story itself was brilliantly written with plenty of twists and turns. It also wasn't without its fair share of heartbreak, which literally broke your heart.

I would highly recommend this book to fellow readers.

Unfortunately this book just didn't do it for me. It's not the author's fault, I just couldn't find myself relating to the characters, who honestly were vile and really unlikable!

I really did try to give it a go, but between the characters being so unlikeable and their actions just making me want to give them a really good shake, it didn't make for a very enjoyable reading experience and I found myself skimming to the end just to get the gist of the story.

It was well written enough, but as I said before, it just wasn't for me.

Thank you to Pigeonhole and Helen for the chance to read this book.

So, this was my second attempt at reading this book. I couldn't get into it the first time round. I suppose it just wasn't the right time when I tried to read it the first time.

I decided to give it another go after managing to get an audiobook of it (thanks, Tracy Fenton!) and this time I really ended up enjoying it!

I loved how we travelled from Geneva to Rio to Paris. I thought the descriptions of these places were beautifully done!

I loved reading about Maia's and Izabela's stories, although the two time periods couldn't have been more different. I found myself really feeling sorry for poor Izabela. I mean I can understand her father wanting to have a good life, but to use his daughter to further his social standing was just sad to me (even though he did love his daughter).

I loved this book and look forward to reading the rest of the books in the series!

This was an absolutely fantastic book! Thrilling, twisty and full of tension.

I liked Sive, but as for Aaron and the rest of his friends I really struggled to understand why or how any of them were friends considering how they were constantly trying to outdo each other in terms of their achievements in life. Their constant sniping and one-upmanship was annoying.

Saying that, I still loved the book. It was compelling and if I'd had a physical copy of the book, I would likely have read it in one go!

I felt sorry for Sive, especially when Aaron kept refusing to keep an open mind and point blank refused to accept that a certain line of enquiry might actually be linked to his daughter's disappearance. Like, hello, your daughter is missing so surely you'd want to keep an open mind about something like that no matter how unlikely it might've seemed to you?!

Urgh, he really was an annoying, arrogant ass of a character!

Anyway, on that note, thank you to PH and Andrea Mara for the chance to read this excellent book!

Highly recommend it!

This could have been such a good book. It had a good premise and the book started off well, but then it just went downhill.

The main character was very unlikeable and the decisions she made were ridiculous and implausible. For someone who didn't want to risk losing her adopted son, Revelle didn't half make some awful decisions!

The way the book ended was a disappointment to me too (I can't say too much without spoiling it for anyone who might want to read the book).

Thank you to PH (Pigeonhole) and Brooke Robinson for the chance to read this book.

This was a lovely read.

I loved Sunny as a character, especially since in some ways I could really relate to her.

I really enjoyed following her on her journey as she got to know herself better.

It was both heartbreaking and heartwarming at the same time.

Thank you to PH and Sukh Ojla for the chance to read this book.

I found it so hard to rate/review this book!

On the one hand, to start with I felt empathy for Constance, but somewhere along the way, I stopped and just wanted to give her a good shake! Her unhealthy obsession with Samuel just annoyed me, especially when he was just an arrogant, selfish womaniser! I honestly do get that she was damaged, but urgh, she was so frustrating!

On the other hand, the fact that I kept reading until the end, tells you that it was well written especially capturing Constance's grief/losses, and despite not liking the characters (Edward aside) they were well written too.

Thank you to Pigeonhole and Charlotte for the chance to read this book.

I know most people in my online bookclub who read this with me loved it, but I was sadly in the minority.

It wasn't that the book was badly written or anything like that. I just couldn't bring myself to like the main character which made it difficult to really enjoy the book.

Thank you to PH and Isabelle Schuler for the chance to read this book.