Reviews – What Cathy Read Next…

On the blog last week

Tuesday – This week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic was a freebie on the theme of genre. I shared ten Historical True Crime Novels, i.e. novels based on or inspired by real cases.

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. I also published my review of The Shock of the Light by Lori Inglis Hall.

Friday – I shared my Top 3 February 2026 Reads.

Saturday – I took part in the #6Degrees of Separation meme forging a book chain from Wuthering Heights to The Infernal World of Branwell Bronte. I also joined other gardeners for the #SixonSaturday meme, sharing six things happening in my garden this week.

New on my shelves

The Wasp Trap by Mark Edwards (Penguin)

Summer 1999. Will joins five other idealistic graduates working for an eccentric psychology professor. They’re going to launch a website to change online dating forever. No-one expects it to end in tragedy.

Twenty-five years later, Will gets an invitation: a dinner party. A chance to see the old gang again. But as soon as he arrives, something doesn’t seem right. There’s an unexpected guest. The hosts are clearly keeping a secret. And on the way in, Will is sure he heard crying.

Everyone has something to hide about what really happened that summer. But only one of them is willing to kill to find the truth…

Relative Failures: The Lives of Willie Wilde, Mabel Beardsley and Howard Sturgis by Matthew Sturgis (ARC, Apollo)

History remembers the greats – but what about those who lived alongside them?

In the cultural ferment of late nineteenth-century London, three fascinating but often overlooked figures navigated the world in the shadow of their celebrated brothers. Willie Wilde, the hapless yet charming older sibling of Oscar, never quite matched his brother’s literary genius. Mabel Beardsley, the striking and ambitious sister of Aubrey, played a crucial role in his artistic ascent before forging her own path on the stage. And Howard Sturgis, a minor novelist with a sharp wit, watched as his brother Julian achieved the success he himself never quite grasped.

Moving through bohemian clubland, West End theatres, literary salons, and the pages of The Yellow Book, these siblings were more than just footnotes to history. Their lives – filled with ambition, scandal, devotion, and missteps – offer a fresh perspective on the glittering world of the 1890s.

Drawing on family history, sharp storytelling, and original research, Matthew Sturgis reveals the vibrant, overlooked figures who shaped their era. For lovers of literary and cultural history, it is an invitation to explore the road less travelled – a sidelight that, as Mabel Beardsley knew well, can sometimes be the most illuminating.

What Remains After A Fire: Stories by Kanza Javed (W.W. Norton) Longlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize 2026

A haunting, powerful collection of stories spanning modern-day Pakistan and the diaspora in the US, from a sparkling new literary talent.

In eight unflinching and stunningly crafted stories, Kanza Javed unspools the lives of characters desperately trying to forge a path for themselves on the margins of society. An addict teaches his young son to shoot feral dogs on the streets of Lahore. A Christian nurse gets drawn into a plan to trap the ghost of her patient’s former lover. A Pakistani student in a small Appalachian town grapples with a startling act of violence that shatters her illusions of safety and freedom. A lonely wife becomes increasingly obsessed with a cloth worry doll left behind by a previous tenant.

Written with sharp insight and remarkable empathy, these stories reach across divides of class, gender, and religion as Javed deftly examines questions of identity and agency, belonging and loss. What Remains After a Fire is a moving portrayal of fiercely resilient characters who desire more than what their circumstances can offer them—and what these desires ultimately cost them.

What I’m currently reading

I’m reading Helm, one of the books on the shortlist for the Winston Graham Historical Prize 2026 and an author review copy of Words for Patty Jo. I’m also listening to the audiobook of The Wasp Trap, my book club’s pick for March.

Look out for…

Book Review: Love Lane by Patrick Gale
Book Review: A Private Man by Stephanie Sy-Quia

It’s the first Saturday of the month which means it’s time for 6 Degrees of Separation.

Here’s how it works: a book is chosen as a starting point by Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best and linked to six other books to form a chain. Readers and bloggers are invited to join in by creating their own ‘chain’ leading from the selected book.

Kate says: Books can be linked in obvious ways – for example, books by the same authors, from the same era or genre, or books with similar themes or settings. Or, you may choose to link them in more personal or esoteric ways: books you read on the same holiday, books given to you by a particular friend, books that remind you of a particular time in your life, or books you read for an online challenge. Join in by posting your own #6Degrees chain on your blog and adding the link in the comments section of each month’s post. You can also check out links to posts on X using the hashtag #6Degrees.

This month’s starting book is Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë chosen because of the recent release of a new film adaptation. For a change it’s a book I’ve read. Links from each title will take you to my review or the book description on Goodreads.

The latest adaptation of Wuthering Heights isn’t the first. There was a 1939 version starring Laurence Olivier as Heathcliff and Merle Oberon as Cathy. Later Laurence Olivier played the role of Charles Strickland in a TV adaptation of The Moon and Sixpence by W. Somerset Maugham, based on the life of artist Paul Gaugain.

I Am Not Your Eve by Devika Ponnambalam is the story of Teha’amana, Tahitian muse and child-bride of Paul Gauguin. It was shortlisted for the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction 2023. Gaugain died on the island of Atuona in French Polynesia.

Another author who died on a tropical island – in this case Upola, an island in Samoa – is Robert Louis Stevenson. His novel Weir of Hermiston, set in the Napoleonic Wars, was unfinished at the time of his death.

Game of Hearts by Katy Moran (first published as False Lights) is set in a world where Napoleon defeated the Duke of Wellington at the Battle of Waterloo and England is under French occupation.

Game of Hearts is set in Cornwall which is also the location for Daphne du Maurier‘s most famous novel, Rebecca.

Daphne du Maurier was also the author of The Infernal World of Branwell Brontë, a biography of the brother of the Brontë sisters. An unsubstantiated rumour that circulated for a time was that he not his sister Emily was the author of Wuthering Heights. Oh look, we’ve come full circle.

[Bonus links: Laurence Olivier starred in the 1940 film adaptation of Rebecca alongside Judith Anderson as Mrs Danvers. She also appeared in the same TV version of The Moon and Sixpence he did. And George Sanders, who played Jack Favell in Rebecca, also played Charles Strickland in a 1942 film version of The Moon and Sixpence.]