Emma's Bookish Lifestyle

An Ocean of Minutes  by Thea Lim The premise of this book is that the US has been hit by a deadly flu pandemic. Its 1981 and Frank has caught the virus and his girlfriend Polly is left with the difficult choice of risking everything, leaving him and taking a leap of faith into the future. With the use of time travel, there are some trying to thwart the virus, but this comes at a high cost.  Polly must sign up for a one-way-trip to the future and has to work of the cost of the trip to enable Frank to receive the lifesaving treatment he needs. Polly arranges to meet Frank in Galveston, Texas of the future when she arrives in 1993.  Unbeknownst to Polly there has been an administrative error and she is re-routed to 1998 and Frank is not at the meeting point. This book is based around dual timelines, introducing the couple of Frank and Polly to us in 1979 when they first meet and begin their relationship together, alongside the alternative future G...

the darkness by Ragnar Jónasson My rating: 4 of 5 stars Firstly I would like to thank Michael Joseph for the opportunity to give a true and honest review of this book. This is my first experience of a Nordic Noir Thriller and I have to say I am so glad I started with Ragnar Jonasson. He is a well-respected author from Reykjavik and began his career at the age of 17 translating the works of Agatha Christie into Icelandic. This particular novel was the runner-up of the Novel of the Year Award 2015 in Iceland. This is a start of a new trilogy based around Detective Inspector Hulda Hermannsdottir a member of the Reykjavik police force who is being forced into early retirement by her commanding officer. Hulda uses this conversation to utilise her final days investigating the cold case of a young female asylum seeker found dead in the remote countryside. Her death was ruled as a suicide after a short investigation, but it soon becomes clear to Hulda that there is a...

The Hoarder by Jess Kidd My rating: 4 of 5 stars This is the story of Maud Drennan a carer and unwanted psychic. Maud see's saints and things others can't see. So when she starts working with the belligerent Cathal Flood she finds herself drawn into the mysteries of his home. Hidden amongst the detritus of his hoarding in his grandios house she finds he begins to open up to her. With the assistance of her housebound transgendre landlady and her troop of saints, Maud begins to uncover what lies beneath the strange activities taking place at Cathal Flood's home and finds herself not only flashing back to events from her past when her sister when missing but also being sought by someone trying to ensure the truth of the past remains hidden. This was something I listened to on audio book and I have to say that the narration of Aoife McMahon and her irish lilt was extremely cathartic and enjoyable to listen too. Aoife managed to relay the humour and carry th...

A Portable Shelter by Kirsty Logan My rating: 4 of 5 stars I am not one to always get on with a book based in magical realism however, I had heard such good things about this book I could not resist giving it a chance. This book is based on a gay couple Ruth and Liska who have moved to a remote coastal cottage in Scotland while Ruth carries their first child. Each of them spends time telling the baby stories containing moral and life lessons from what they have learnt. This includes many magical realism tales including selkies, werewolves and child-eating witches. They agree not to tell stories to the baby so each of them are relaying their tales in secret from each other. I really did enjoy the small tales included within the overall story of Ruth and Liska however, was somewhat disappointed when the concluding story was about Death. I felt sad that the child was not born during the final pages of the book and felt extremely curious to find out with a mot...