General Chat

Greaders please suggest two books as usual. The vote will be pm on Tuesday 1st June

Life Support by Tess Gerritsen
Control was the word Dr Toby Harper lived by. She strove to keep her life in order, her ER in order.
But no-one could have been prepared for the man she admits one quiet night to the Springer Hospital. Delirious and in a critical condition from a possible viral infection of the brain, he barely responds to treatment. And then he disappears without trace.
The subsequent search leads Toby to a second patient with the same infection. And it reveals an upsetting twist – the infection can only be spread through direct tissue exchange,
Soon Toby’s on a trail that winds from a pregnant sixteen year old prostitute to an unexpected tragedy in her own home.
Only then does she discover the unthinkable: a terrifying and deadly epidemic is about to be unleashed


Daughter of Fire by Barbara Erskine
Cartimandua, the young woman destined to rule the great tribe of the Brigantes, watches the invaders come ever closer. From the start her world is a maelstrom of love and conflict, revenge and retribution. Cartimandua’s life becomes more turbulent and complicated as her power grows, and her political skills are threatened by her personal choices. She has formidable enemies on all sides as she faces a decision which will change the future of all around her.

In the present day, historian Viv Lloyd Rees has immersed herself in the legends surrounding the Celtic queen. Viv struggle to hide her visions of Cartimandua and her conviction that they are real. But her obsession becomes even more persistent as she takes possession of an ancient brooch that carries a curse. Bitter rivalries and overwhelming passions are re-awakened as past envelops present and Viv finds herself in the greatest danger of her life.

First Suggestion

Draems of the Day by Mary Doria Russell

"I am sure of this much: my little story has become your history. You won't really understand yor times untill you understand mine......"

Reeling from the after math of the twin tragedies of the graet War and the influinza epidemic, school teacher, Agnes Shanklin has taken the trip of a lifetime to Eygpt and the Holy Land.
But her arrival at Cairo's Semiramis Hotel coincides with an event that will change history. For the year is 1921 and the Cairo Peace Conference is about to preside over nothing less that the creation of the modern Middle East.
At first Agnes becomes a welcome sounding board for the historic players - Churchill, T.E.Lawrence and Lady Gertrude Bell among them - poised to invent the nations of Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan and so decide the fate of the Arab world. But as the days pass, she attracts the attention of a charismatic German spy and is inexorably drawn into duplicitous, dangerous world of geopolitical intrigue...

Compelling and passionately felt, this remarkable novel casts brilliant and perceptive light on what lies behind so many of today's headlines

My Second Suggestion.

Losing You by Nicci French

Nina Landry has given up the city life for the isolated community of Sandling Island, lying off the bleak east coast of England. At night the wind howls, and sometimes they are cut off by the incoming tide. For Nina though, it is home, it is safe.

But when Nina's teenage daughter, Charlie, fails to return from a sleepover on the day they are due to fly to Florida on holiday, the island becomes a different place altogether. A place of secrets and suspicions. Where no one - friends, neighbours or the police- belives Nina's instinctive fear that her daughter is in terrible danger. lone, she undergoes a frantic search for Charlie. And as day turns to night, she begins to doubt not just whether the'll leave the island for their holiday - but whether they will ever leave it again.

"If you're reading this on the train you will miss your stop" Woman and Home.

Ann, wil try to get to a computer while in Torquay (Library etc).

However if I don't get back to you on time, caryy on without me.
I will go along with what ever is decided.

tess

OK Tess and thanks for the suggestions, have a lovely break.

The Dark Tide by Andrew Gross

A bomb explodes in a commuter train station, killing several people, including New York City hedge-fund manager Charles Friedman. At roughly the same time, a suspicious auto accident kills a young man in Greenwich, Connecticut. The detective on that case, Ty Hauck, soon discovers an odd connection between the hit-and-run and the bombing. He investigates and discovers that Charles Friedman was not the man he appeared to be. He also forges a connection with the dead man’s wife, Karen, that leads him into uncharted waters.

Darkly Dreaming Dexter by Jeff Lindsay

Meet Dexter Morgan. He's a highly respected lab technician specializing in blood spatter for the Miami Dade Police Department. He's a handsome, though reluctant, ladies' man. He's polite, says all the right things, and rarely calls attention to himself. He's also a sociopathic serial killer whose "Dark Passenger" drives him to commit the occasional dismemberment.

Will add my books a little later as just about to take a class

x Jill

I am hoping not to have to chase people up this time as I gave the date with last time's results.

My suggestions-

Restoration by Rose Tremain

When a twist of fate delivers an ambitious young medical student to the court of King Charles II he is suddenly thrust into a vibrant world of luxury and opulence. Robert Merivel rises quickly, soon finding favour with the King, and privileged with a position as ‘paper groom’ to the youngest of the King’s mistresses, But by falling in love with her, Merivel transgresses the one rule that will cast him out from his new-found paradise.

The Life and Opinions of Maf the Dog, and of his friend Marilyn Monroe by Andrew O'Hagan

This is the charming and entertaining 'memoir' of the maltese terrier given for Christmas 1960 by Frank Sinatra to Marilyn Monroe. 'Maff' or 'Maffia Honey', as Marilyn named him, is a dog of aristocratic birth and temperament, an encyclopaedic knowledge of the arts, an astonishing command of languages and a refined taste in moral and metaphysical philosophy. In addition, Maff has access not just to the thoughts but to the feelings of the humans around him. Being, of his nature, without pride, vanity, or ambition, but well-endowed with the large reserves of love, affection and curiosity equally natural to his species, Maff furnishes an attractive and stimulating commentary on the American scene just at the point where it ceased to defer to the high culture of Europe and began, itself, to define the focus and to govern the direction of popular culture.

Ann.... I'm back again and yet not joining in.
I did tell you before that I have to read as I want to.
If I join the club, it becomes a chore as if I were reading for school!!

BUT, can I make a suggestion ~Please?

HOUSE RULES
by
Jodie Picoult

The first book I have ever read of hers and it was a real page turner.
About a child with a form of autism... an amazing read.
Well I thought so anyway.
whatever you are all reading.... enjoy, there is no better pastime, is there?

Deanna X

Thanks Deanna, I love Jodi Piccoult's books. Not read that one though, is it out in paper back?

No time for Goodbye by Linwood Barclay
1983, 14-year-old Cynthia Bigge wakes up with a raging hangover following a night out with her unsuitable boyfriend and the ensuing row with her father, to find that her entire family (mother, father and brother) have disappeared. The story then brings us forward 25 years, with Cynthia married to Terry Archer, an English teacher, and the mother of an 8-year-old daughter. The story is henceforth told through the eyes of her husband as they try to unravel the mystery of what really happened to her family so many years before.

Night Crossing by Robert Ryan
In 1938, Ulrike Walter, a beautiful young German musician, is engaged to be married to Erich Hinkel, a member of the Hitler Youth. But when she meets Inspector Cameron Ross, a Scotland Yard policeman, whose father is a colonel in British Intelligence, her life will be changed for ever. When war is declared, Ulrike flees Germany for the safety of England but is instead cruelly imprisoned as an enemy alien. Her only hope of rescue is Cameron, who, despite his better judgement, is falling in love with her. Then Erich is captured by the British and incarcerated in a prisoner of war camp in England. He faces interrogation by Cameron Ross, the one man who stands between him and Ulrike, the woman who means more to Erich than life itself...

I am in UK between 10th and 16th July so if the next book choices fall then I will pass mine on to Ann before I go

x Jill

I'm not too sure about that Ann.
Perhaps not.
It is her new one and I treated myself to it from Amazon.
Hard back and ...hard to hold, but easier in bed. ha ha
Deanna XX

n

x Jill

Thanks for nudging Jill, I had computer problems yesterday everything froze on me so couldn't get on here. I will check the list and see who I have to chase up.

Recommended

1) Good Faith by Jane Smiley

Anyone who has read a book by her will know how good she is – she can pick up a topic and run with it and make it so so interesting.
Good Faith is about the greedy Real Estate business in the eighties – not a subject that I would’ve normally found interesting. However, one is drawn in – it starts with a likeable good sort and trusting bloke who is lured down the windy road of easy money.
Her characters are so believable and most people will probably find someone in there that they either recognise or are familiar with. It is an extremely good novel, reveals the nice and not so nice in people and how certain events shape our lives.

2) Touch of Frost by R D Wingfield.

This is Wingfield’s first book – Like the television series – it is funny only more so. Frost shows even worse behaviour than in the series where he is played by David Jason. One is hooked into the story from page 1 – love the interaction by the various characters in the police force and their little idiosyncrasies.
Detective Inspector Jack Frost, officially on duty, is nevertheless determined to sneak off to a colleague’s leaving party. But first the corpse of a well-known local junkie is found blocking the drain of a Denton public lavatory – and then, when Frost attempts to join the revels later on, the nubile daughter of a wealthy businessman is reported missing.
Sleepy Denton has never known anything like the crime wave which now threatens to submerge it. – robbery – hit and run - multiple rapist on the loose – it is all happening.
Frost is reeling under the strain but Frost manages to assure his superior he has it under control....


Persey

Looking through the reviews I can see there is a very good choice of books/authors there and I think this time round it is going to be quite difficult to pick only two.

Persey

May Blossom

The Self Preservation Society by Kate Harrison and

about a young girl scared of everything, nuclear Holocaust the lot, a self confessed scardey-cat. She now works in Accident Prevention at the local council, trying to protect the world from conker injuries, killer tea-cosies and death by chocolate. Then Jo survives a hit and run accident and realises she has beaten the odds. Maybe a bit of living dangerously is what she needs?

Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
set in 1960's Nigeria, a country blighted by civil war, three lives intersect. Ugwu, a boy froma poor village, works as a houseboy for a university lecturer. Olanna, a young woman, has abandoned her life of privilege in Lagos to live with her charismatic new lover, the professor. The third is Richard, a shy Englishman in inthrall to Olanna's enigmatic twin sister. When the shocking horror of the war engulfs them, their loyalties are severely tested as they are pulled apart and thrown together in ways that none of them imagined....

n