This week I still had two ebooks to finish before I could start on my new library books. The latter are now piled up next to my bed and I can’t wait to make a start!

Life Ruins by Danuta Kot

The first ebook was Life Ruins by Danuta Kot. Here is the blurb:

Three very different people, connected by a thread of violence  … and hope.

Kay, recently widowed and coming to terms with life on her own, feels she has hit rock bottom. For years she and her husband fostered difficult children – including Becca, whom trouble follows like a stray puppy. And now Becca seems to be in the worst trouble of her life.

A girl has been attacked so savagely she can’t be identified. She’s alive, but only just. Becca, tossed out of university and just let go from her dead-end job, is certain she knows who the victim is. But no one will believe her.

A body, briefly glimpsed at the bottom of an abandoned mineshaft, vanishes when the police investigate. Jared, recovering from an almost fatal injury and addicted to painkillers, knows he saw something terrible in that mine… but he has no evidence, and fears he’s losing his grip on reality.

And then Jared and Becca meet. Becca, strong-minded and fiercely independent, is confident they can figure out what’s going on. She pulls Kay into the mix, knowing they’ll need all the help they can get … because the police don’t believe them. And more girls are vanishing …

Can these three help each other to rebuild their lives from the ruins of the past? 

By by the way, this blurb has been a bit mangled on Goodreads. I gave the book three stars on the site and wrote the following:

I enjoyed the setting of this book as I am very familiar with the area, although it does come across as very bleak and grim, whereas the Yorkshire coast is beautiful! The main characters were interesting and well drawn. The plot, however, was a bit of a mish-mash and confusing in parts. All of the driving up and down the coast and inland became very repetitive and quite boring. There were some exciting moments and I hope that the writer takes any criticism on board, because I am sure that her writing will improve over time.

The book does have some genuinely good and exciting parts, with lots of action, but I found it quite hard to maintain my full attention at times.

The Chalk Man by C J Tudor

My second read of the week was The Chalk Man by C J Tudor. This is the blurb:

In 1986, Eddie and his friends are just kids on the verge of adolescence. They spend their days biking around their sleepy little English village and looking for any taste of excitement they can get. The chalk men are their secret code; little chalk stick figures they leave for each other as messages only they can understand. But then a mysterious chalk man leads them right to a dismembered body, and nothing will ever be the same.

In 2016, Eddie is fully grown, and thinks he’s put his past behind him. But then he gets a letter in the mail, containing a single chalk stick figure. When it turns out his other friends got the same messages, they think it could be a prank … until one of them turns up dead. That’s when Eddie realizes that saving himself means finally figuring out what really happened all those years ago.

I have just written my thoughts about this book. Perhaps I have been a little unfair, but my poor concentration these days means that I need a lot of excitement and action in a book. This is a five star read for many people on Goodreads, whereas I only gave it three. Mind you, some don’t like it at all! Isn’t this the wonderful thing about books? There is a book out there for everyone!

This book was very cleverly written with different time periods in alternate chapters – this was handled very well. I liked seeing events through the characters’ points of view as children, then as adults. The mystery elements and plot points slowly unfolding was very well done. There were some parts where I began to lose concentration, and that is why I have awarded three stars rather than four.

On the whole, though, this book is well worth reading.

The Redeemer by Jo Nesbo

Now now that I have written this blog post, I will return to my latest read: The Redeemer by Jo Nesbo, the first on my library book pile. A good book and a pot of tea are my idea of heaven 😍😍😍.

Happy Reading to you all!

Best wishes,

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