Tag: myweekinbooks

On What Cathy Read Next last week

Tuesday – This week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic was Books With Animals In Their Title/On Their Cover.

Wednesday – As always WWW Wednesday is a 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 published my review of historical mystery, The Sinner’s Mark by S. W. Perry.

Friday – My #FlashbackFriday post saw me revisit my Buchan of the Month Reading Challenge from 2018.

Saturday – I shared my review of Elizabeth Finch by Julian Barnes. 

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New arrivals

Voices of the Dead (Raven, Fisher & Simpson #4) by Ambrose Parry (eARC, Canongate via NetGalley)

1854 marks the dawn of a scientific age. Queen Victoria delivers a healthy heir after receiving chloroform during labour. Florence Nightingale makes headlines as she leads a troop of middle-class women out into the war zones as nurses. In Edinburgh, we see Henry Littlejohn appointed as the city’s police surgeon, dubbing himself as the ‘medical detective’, investigating sudden deaths – whether accidental or intentional.

Never has there been a time where people have been so enthralled by possibilities of science, but this appetite for the amazing is also being fed by a new generation of showmen and magicians, whose invention and ingenuity leave the public often unable to distinguish between the wonders of technology and the art of illusion.

Several mesmeric hospitals pop up in Edinburgh, claiming remarkable cures and offering egalitarian training for men and women. While the medical establishment remains sceptical, Dr James Young Simpson has an open mind, dabbling in seances to give this niche study a fair chance. Having faced discrimination from the medical field on the basis of gender, Sarah Fisher sees the hospitals as a place for opportunity.

Great danger lies in the shadowlands between science and superstition, between genuine medical progress and cynical quackery, thus setting the stage for a grand and deadly illusion.

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On What Cathy Read Next this week

Currently reading

Planned posts

• Book Review: The Chosen by Elizabeth Lowry 
• Book Review: Rivers of Treason by K. J. Maitland
• Blog Tour/Book Review: No Place To Hide by J. S. Monroe

On What Cathy Read Next last week

Monday – I shared My Five Favourite March 2023 Reads.

Tuesday – This week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic put a spotlight on self-published/indie press books and I selected Ten Books From Independent Publishers. 

Wednesday – As always WWW Wednesday is a 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 published my review of short story collection, God’s Children Are Little Broken Things by Arinze Ifeakandu, one of the books shortlisted for the Swansea University Dyland Thomas Prize 2023.

Friday – I shared my review of historical mystery, The Drums of War (Thomas Tallant #3) by Michael Ward. 

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New arrivals

Family Lore by Elizabeth Acevedo (eARC, Canongate via NetGalley)

The Marte women are preparing for a gathering that will change their lives forever

Flor has a gift: she can predict, to the day, when someone will die. So when she decides to host her own living wake – bringing together her family and community to celebrate her long life – her sisters Matilde, Pastora and Camila are concerned. What has she foreseen?

But Flor isn’t the only one with a secret. Matilde has tried to hide the extent of her husband’s infidelity for years, and now must confront the true state of her marriage. Pastora – always on a mission to solve her sisters’ problems – needs to come to terms with her past. And Camila, the youngest sibling, has decided she no longer wants to be taken for granted. Alongside their struggles, the next generation of Marte women face their own tumult of family obligations, infertility, and heartache.

Spanning the three days prior to the wake, Family Lore traces the intertwining stories of these sisters and cousins, mothers and daughters, aunts and nieces, to ask the ultimate question: what does it take to live a good life, for yourself and those you love?

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On What Cathy Read Next this week

Currently reading

Planned posts

• Book Review: Elizabeth Finch by Julian Barnes
• Book Review: The Sinner’s Mark by S. W. Perry
• Book Review: The Chosen by Elizabeth Lowry