#WWWWednesday – 24th February 2021

WWWWednesdays

Hosted by Taking on a World of Words, this meme is all about the three Ws:

  • What are you currently reading?
  • What did you recently finish reading?
  • What do you think you’ll read next?

Why not join in too?  Leave a comment with your link at Taking on a World of Words and then go blog hopping!


Currently reading

Masters of RomeMasters of Rome (Rise of Emperor’s #2) by Gordon Doherty & Simon Turney (eARC, courtesy of Aries via NetGalley)

Their rivalry will change the world forever.

As competition for the imperial throne intensifies, Constantine and Maxentius realise their childhood friendship cannot last. Each man struggles to control their respective quadrant of empire, battered by currents of politics, religion and personal tragedy, threatened by barbarian forces and enemies within.

With their positions becoming at once stronger and more troubled, the strained threads of their friendship begin to unravel. Unfortunate words and misunderstandings finally sever their ties, leaving them as bitter opponents in the greatest game of all, with the throne of Rome the prize.

It is a matter that can only be settled by outright war…
 

NickNick by Michael Farris Smith (ARC, courtesy of No Exit Press)

Before Nick Carraway moved to West Egg, and into Gatsby’s periphery, he was at the center of a very different story- one taking place along the trenches and deep within the tunnels of World War I.

Floundering in the wake of the destruction he witnessed firsthand, Nick delays his return home, hoping to escape the questions he cannot answer about the horrors of war. Instead, he embarks on a transcontinental redemptive journey that takes him from a whirlwind Paris romance- doomed from the very beginning – to the dizzying frenzy of New Orleans – rife with its own flavor of debauchery and violence.

An epic portrait of a truly singular era, and a sweeping, romantic story of self-discovery, this rich and imaginative novel breathes new life into a character that many know, but few have pondered deeply. Told with enough alcohol, heartbreak, and profound yearning to paralyze even the heartiest of Golden Age scribes, Nick reveals the man behind the narrator that has captivated readers for decades.


Recently finished

Links from the titles will take you to my reviews

Daughters of Night by Laura Shepherd-Robinson 

She Came To Stay by Eleni Kyriacou 

The Art of the Assassin by Kevin Sullivan 

The Garden of Angels by David Hewson 

The Palazzo Colombina is home to the Uccello family: three generations of men, trapped together in the dusty palace on Venice’s Grand Canal. Awkward fifteen-year-old Nico. His distant, business-focused father. And his beloved grandfather, Paolo. Paolo is dying. But before he passes, he has secrets he’s waited his whole life to share.

When a Jewish classmate is attacked by bullies, Nico just watches – earning him a week’s suspension and a typed, yellowing manuscript from his frail Nonno Paolo. A history lesson, his grandfather says. A secret he must keep from his father. A tale of blood and madness…

Nico is transported back to the Venice of 1943, an occupied city seething under its Nazi overlords, and to the defining moment of his grandfather’s life: when Paolo’s support for a murdered Jewish woman brings him into the sights of the city’s underground resistance. Hooked and unsettled, Nico can’t stop reading – but he soon wonders if he ever knew his beloved grandfather at all. (Review to follow for blog tour)

The Northern Reach by W.S. Winslow 

Frozen in grief after the loss of her son at sea, Edith Baines stares across the water at a schooner, under full sail yet motionless in the winter wind and surging tide of the Northern Reach. Edith seems to be hallucinating. Or is she? Edith’s boat-watch opens The Northern Reach, set in the coastal town of Wellbridge, Maine, where townspeople squeeze a living from the perilous bay or scrape by on the largesse of the summer folk and whatever they can cobble together, salvage, or grab.

At the center of town life is the Baines family, land-rich, cash-poor descendants of town founders, along with the ne’er-do-well Moody clan, the Martins of Skunk Pond, and the dirt farming, bootlegging Edgecombs. Over the course of the twentieth century, the families intersect, interact, and intermarry, grappling with secrets and prejudices that span generations, opening new wounds and reckoning with old ghosts. (Review to follow for blog tour)


What Cathy (will) Read Next

Dangerous WomenDangerous Women by Hope Adams (eARC, courtesy of Michael Joseph via NetGalley)

London, 1841. Two hundred Englishwomen file aboard the Rajah, the ship that will take them on a three-month voyage to the other side of the world. They’re daughters, sisters, mothers – and convicts. Transported for petty crimes. Except one of their number is a secret killer, fleeing justice. When a woman is mortally wounded, the hunt is on for the culprit. But who would attack one of their own, and why?

Based on a true story, Dangerous Women is a sweeping tale of confinement, loss, love and, above all, hope in the unlikeliest of places.

 

#TopTenTuesday Books To Make You Laugh Out Loud

Top Ten Tuesday

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme created by The Broke and the Bookish and now hosted by Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl.

The rules are simple:

Each Tuesday, Jana assigns a new topic. Create your own Top Ten list that fits that topic – putting your unique spin on it if you want. Everyone is welcome to join but please link back to That Artsy Reader Girl in your own Top Ten Tuesday post. Add your name to the Linky widget on that day’s post so that everyone can check out other bloggers’ lists. Or if you don’t have a blog, just post your answers as a comment.

This week’s topic is Books That Made Me Laugh Out Loud.  Unfortunately, I read very few books that get me anywhere near laughing out loud.  Instead, I thought I’d take a look at some of the books that have been on my bookshelves – real or virtual – waiting to be read for a laughably long time.  I’m hoping it may provoke, if not a full-on belly laugh,  perhaps a chuckle or wry smile of recognition.

When Christ and His Saints Slept by Sharon Kay Penman – waiting since 4th May 2013 (according to Goodreads)

The Cleaner of Chartres by Sally Vickers – waiting since 18th June 2013

Behind the Scenes at the Museum by Kate Atkinson – waiting since 11th September 2013

Case Histories (Jackson Brodie #1) by Kate Atkinson – waiting since 11th September 2013

The Rosie Project (Don Tillman #1) by Graham Simsion – waiting since 20th March 2014

Elizabeth Is Missing by Emma Healey – waiting since 8th June 2014

The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy (Harold Fry #2) by Rachel Joyce – waiting since 4th October 2014

Trigger Mortis by Anthony Horowitz – waiting since 2nd September 2015

Nor Will He Sleep (Inspector McLevy #4) by David Ashton – waiting since 29th November 2015

Any Human Heart by William Boyd – waiting since 4th January 2016

Are there any of these you’d recommend I’d pluck from my shelves immediately? P.S. I’d like to reassure Kate Atkinson it’s nothing personal that there are two of her books in this list…