Books

If you are aficionado of festive romcoms – and if not, why not, and what did the Grinch do to your cold, dead, tinsel-starved heart? – you will be well aware that they’re all about future love. Two would-be lovers who don’t know they needed to fall in love, or Continue Reading

Who among those of us who read books like others breathe and eat – to be fair we all breathe and eat but let’s just go with this overblown comparison for the sake of the review, shall we? – hasn’t dreamed of someone (very distant with their passing causing us Continue Reading

(courtesy Allen & Unwin Australia) Since 1942, with a break between 1943-1946 and beginning again in 1947, Oslo has sent a minimum twenty-metre tall, eighty-year-old tree to Trafalgar Square in London as a symbol of the enduring bonds between the two countries, established most profoundly during the dark days of Continue Reading

When you think of a romcom novel, you think usually of two people which is fair enough because a relationship isn’t much good if there’s only person in it. Fairly logical when you think about; but when you really dive into a romcom, what keeps you there, and keeps you Continue Reading

(courtesy official Holly Martin site) Full disclosure upfront – I am not a fan of short stories. It’s not how they are written or the characters or the narrative ideas contained within; in a great many cases, these are all superbly presented and you have to admire how the various Continue Reading

(courtesy Harper Collins Publishers Australia) Ever since 1993’s Groundhog Day made time loops a popular mainstream storytelling device, busting it out of the realm of sci-fi where it had been happily resident for some time, they have become a great way of someone being forced to confront the stagnant state Continue Reading

(courtesy Hachette Australia) If you are a faithful reader of the warm and cosy romcoms written by Cathy Bramley, you will likely have read 2022’s The Christmas Project a whole year before you got anywhere near the festive joy of Merrily Ever After. But should you have dropped your Cathy Continue Reading

Like many readers, I buy more far more books than I will likely ever be able to read in a lifetime (and that’s even taking into account impending retirement in the next couple of years when all the time in the world will be a glorious default). I buy them Continue Reading

I am always in two minds about sequels for novels (and honestly, all sorts of storytelling but given this is a book review, let’s stick with books for now). When I love a story and the characters in it, and that’s happens a lot given the ridiculously empathetic soul that Continue Reading