On What Cathy Read Next last week
Monday – I shared my review of the latest in the Handheld Classics series, Latchkey Ladies by Marjorie Grant.
Tuesday – As part of the blog tour, I published my review of crime thriller, The Night Shift by Alex Finlay. This week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic was Books on my Spring 2022 TBR.
Wednesday – WWW Wednesday is my weekly opportunity to share what I’ve just read, what I’m currently reading and what I plan to read next… and to take a peek at what others are reading.
Thursday – I made another trip Down The TBR Hole in my continuing attempt to prune my To-Read shelf on Goodreads.
Friday – I published my review of Lean on Me by Serge Joncour and over on Instagram shared my thoughts on Yinka, where is your huzband? by Lizzie Damilola Blackburn as part of the blog tour.
Saturday – Indulging my other love besides books – gardening – I took part in the weekly #SixonSaturday meme.
New arrivals
The Girl From Lamaha Street by Sharon Maas (ARC, Thread Books)
“One thing stood out in all the books I read. These children were all white. They had blue eyes and soft straight hair. Not a single child in a story was brown like me. How could that be right?”
Growing up in British Guiana in the 1950s, Sharon Maas has everything a shy child with a vivid imagination could wish for. She spends her days studying bugs in the backyard of her family home on Lamaha Street, eating fresh mangoes straight from the tree and losing herself in books tucked up on her granny’s lap, surrounded by her uncles and aunts.
But Sharon feels alone in a house full of adults. Her parents are divorced and her father is busy campaigning for British Guiana’s independence. With her mother often away for work, there’s a void in Sharon’s heart, and she craves rules and structure. The books she devours give her a glimpse of life in a faraway country: England. And although none of the characters in the books she reads look like her, her insatiable curiosity eventually leads Sharon to beg to be sent to boarding school, just like her literary heroes.
Reality comes as a shock. Being the only dark-skinned girl in a sea of posh white girls is a stark contrast to life in her warm homeland, where white people are a small minority. Sharon thrives in her new life. She does well academically, and horse-riding brings her self-discipline and joy in equal measure. But something is not quite right. Writing weekly letters to her mother, she begins to doubt whether this cold country is the right place for her. Is England really her home, and is this where she truly belongs?
The Swallowed Man by Edward Carey (ARC, Gallic Books)
Trapped inside a giant sea beast with only the contents of the swallowed schooner Maria to sustain him, Geppetto yearns for the wooden boy he created out of greed but came to cherish as a son. The ship provides materials for the carpenter to make art in memory of Pinocchio and the other loves of his life. But the candles are running out, and the mind can only survive for so long without company.
Edward Carey, acclaimed author and illustrator of Little, marries words and pictures in a tender story of fatherly pride and regret, and of the power of art and imagination.
Washington Black by Esi Edugyan (Serpent’s Tail)
When two English brothers take the helm of a Barbados sugar plantation, Washington Black – an eleven year-old field slave – finds himself selected as personal servant to one of these men. The eccentric Christopher ‘Titch’ Wilde is a naturalist, explorer, scientist, inventor and abolitionist, whose single-minded pursuit of the perfect aerial machine mystifies all around him.
Titch’s idealistic plans are soon shattered and Washington finds himself in mortal danger. They escape the island together, but then then Titch disappears and Washington must make his way alone, following the promise of freedom further than he ever dreamed possible.
From the blistering cane fields of Barbados to the icy wastes of the Canadian Arctic, from the mud-drowned streets of London to the eerie deserts of Morocco, Washington Black teems with all the strangeness and mystery of life. Inspired by a true story, Washington Black is the extraordinary tale of a world destroyed and made whole again.
The Shadows of Men by Abir Mukherjee (Harvill Secker)
Calcutta, 1923. When a Hindu theologian is found murdered in his home, the city is on the brink of all-out religious war. Can officers of the Imperial Police Force, Captain Sam Wyndham and Sergeant Surendranath Banerjee track down those responsible in time to stop a bloodbath?
Set at a time of heightened political tension, beginning in atmospheric Calcutta and taking the detectives all the way to bustling Bombay, the latest instalment in this ‘unmissable’ (The Times) series presents Wyndham and Banerjee with an unprecedented challenge. Will this be the case that finally drives them apart?
A Sunlit Weapon (Maisie Dobbs #17) by Jacqueline Winspear (eARC, Allison & Busby)
Late September, 1942. Jo Hardy, a 22-year-old ferry pilot, is delivering a Spitfire to Biggin Hill Aerodrome when she realizes someone is shooting at her aircraft. When she returns to the location on foot, she finds an American serviceman in a barn, tied up and gagged. Jo hurries away, but can’t shake the image of the serviceman from her mind.
Several days later, when Jo recounts the story to several other women, she receives the news that Erica, another ferry pilot – flying the same route she had – has been killed in a crash near Kent. Erica’s death is attributed to “pilot error,” but Jo is convinced there is a link between her own experience and Erica’s – and that of Jo’s dead fiancé, who was killed over a year earlier under inexplicable circumstances in the same area.
At the suggestion of an Australian colleague, Jo takes her suspicions to Maisie Dobbs, along with two pages of coded notes she found in the barn. If someone is trying to take down much-needed pilots, Maisie wants to find out why – and what happened to the bound American serviceman. But before she can even begin to investigate, her new husband, Mark Scott, finds the documents and demands to know how they came to be in her possession: The papers pertain to an upcoming diplomatic mission by Eleanor Roosevelt on behalf of the United States’ president – and now the First Lady’s safety has been compromised. To protect Eleanor’s life – and possibly the safety of all of London – Maisie must quickly uncover the connection between the pilot deaths, the mysterious American soldier, and the top-secret documents.
A Taste for Killing (Bradecote and Catchpoll #10) by Sarah Hawkswood (eARC, Allison & Busby)
Godfrey Bowyer, the best but least likeable bow maker in Worcester, dies of poisoning, though his wife Blanche survives. The number of people who could have administered the poison should mean a very short investigation for Bradecote and Catchpoll, but perhaps some was pulling the strings, and that widens the net considerably. Could it be the cast-out younger brother or perhaps Orderic the Bailiff, whose wife has been pressured into a relationship with Godfrey? Could it even be the wife herself?
With Bradecote eager to return to his manor and worried about his wife’s impending confinement, and Walkelin trying to get his mother to accept his choice of bride, there are distractions aplenty, though Serjeant Catchpoll will not let them get in the way of solving this case.
On What Cathy Read Next this week
Currently reading
Planned posts
- Blog Tour/Book Review: The Woman with the Map by Jan Casey
- Top Ten Tuesday – Books With Adjectives In Their Title
- WWW Wednesday
- Book Review: China Room by Sunjeev Sahota
Peach Blossom Spring by Melissa Fu (eARC, Headline)
Open Water by Caleb Azumah Nelson (Viking)
The Sunken Road by Ciarán McMenamin (Vintage)
Fortune by Amanda Smyth (Peepal Tree) 
