Books I Read in April/May

Hi!

I haven't done a book post in so long - I'm still crawling through my last pick for the 1,000 Books Challenge (The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides) and to be honest it's almost like a chore to pick it up - I'll give it another week and if I still can't get into it I'll pick another number.

In the meantime, I've set myself the task of reading 50 books this year on Goodreads - it was at 100 but I kept falling behind, so if I manage to clear 50 before the end of the year, I'll increase the number.

Here's what I've read in April/May. (All book images are from Goodreads).

The Fault In Our Stars by John Green 
I adored this book, I have passed it over many times and I was livid with myself for not discovering it sooner. I fell in love with the characters and the story - it was just so beautifully told. If someone had told me last year that a YA novel about a 16 year old cancer patient and a 17 year old amputee would turn out to be one of the most touching, warm, books I'd read in years - I wouldn't have believed them. Please read it! Definitely not in public though. It made me do a Dawson cry.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky 

This one was narrated by teenager Charlie, who is said to be on the Autism spectrum (this isn't said in the book), while others think he may be affected by PTSD. I didn't enjoy this book, I have to say. I found it depressing and upsetting. Think of every bad thing that could possibly happen to someone before they reach adulthood - and it all happens. I just don't think I was in the right headspace for reading it, and Charlie really irritated me. The formatting on my e-copy was all wonky too - for example, when he mentioned the TV show M*A*S*H, it came up on my Kobo as MoreInAInSoInHave - I didn't have a baldy notion what he was on about. The film is on my to-watch list, many people have said that I may enjoy it more than the book.

Coraline by Neil Gaiman 

This was a re-read, and I took my time with it this time. Coraline is a young girl who has parents who are always really busy. They don't pay much attention to what she wants or does - so when Coraline finds an alternate reality with a pretty nifty set of really attentive parents, what's a girl to do? She finds out fairly quickly that the grass is not always greener, and with the aid of a new friend in the form of a talking cat, takes on a pretty impressive villain in order to put things right. 

A Heart So Big by Rio Hogarty 

I bought this after Rio appeared on the Late Late Show here a couple of months ago. A little unassuming woman in her seventies, she looks no different on the outside to any other well-groomed lady. But her story is amazing - Rio has single-handedly fostered over 140 children (even before State support was available) over the past few decades. If she saw a child in need, she stepped in. She's a true fighter, she's absolutely hilarious, and she's one of life's good people. This book was such a great insight into her world - I laughed, I cried, and I fell in love with her. 

The Memory Child by Steena Holmes
This was one of those cheap books that catch my eye on the Kindle charts on Amazon sometimes (that one-click is a danger). Brian and Diane have always planned to have children - when Diane finds out she is pregnant, she begins to panic due to a tragic accident years ago after her mother suffered severe post partum psychosis. Brian, however, is overjoyed - and promises Diane that he will do all he can to help her come to terms with the fact that she is not her mother, and history doesn't have to repeat itself. So why, then, has he disappeared? Why has he not come home from working abroad? Why hasn't he contacted his wife, or seen his baby daughter? Why does the Nanny keep making secret whispered calls? It's told in alternating chapters, so we get to see both Brian and Diane's point of view.

Perfect by Rachel Joyce
Written by the author of "The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry", Perfect is based on the notion that two seconds can change several lives forever. It's set in 1972, when two seconds were added to the clock to balance things out in accordance with the way the Earth is moving (this has happened a few times since, too). For Byron, this becomes an obsession. His friend James has told him about the two seconds and Byron finds it fascinating. Unfortunately, his obsession leads to an incident that will change the lives of everyone in his family spectacularly. Interweaved with the melancholy tale of what happens because of the incident in 1972 is a present-day account of a lonely, isolated man named Jim who suffers with pretty severe OCD, and his blossoming friendships with his workmates. I would recommend this - it's like nothing I've read before, even if the 1972 parts seem like they were set several decades earlier. I was sure I had figured out the ending - I couldn't have been more wrong. Really good.

The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion
Don Tillman wants a wife - a very specific wife. He draws up a questionnaire and will not entertain the notion of even dating any woman who does not measure up to it - then Rosie comes crashing into his life and guess what happens. Leaving predictable romances aside, Rosie asks geneticist Don to help her with something - she needs to find out who her real father is, and she wants Don to find him. Don and Rosie embark on a frankly ludicrous mission to gather as much DNA as possible from all the guys her mother associated with the night Rosie was conceived. This book was okay - it's not that I didn't enjoy it, it's just that it's blatantly obvious even from the cover what's going to happen, and for a man who definitely exhibits most of the symptoms of Aspergers at the start of the book, it's amazing how quickly he can leave all that by the wayside and just "train" himself  - like the combination of how fantastic Rosie is and the fact that Don's so unbelievably intelligent is enough to just get rid of any spectrum disorder almost overnight. Apart from that, and the cocktail party chapter, it was grand.  I've seen it described as "Sheldon in Love" for those of you who are Big Bang Theory fans. I, unfortunately, am not, so that didn't endear it to me.

Hidden Secrets by Carolyn Brown
Mills and Boon in disguise - and not a very good one, either. This was another one-click disaster, based on 4-5 star reviews on Amazon (whoever gave this 5 stars needs an introduction to Stephen King). A tale of four generations of the one family - a 20 year old pregnant divorcee, her mother, her mother, and her mother. Following? Young girl, her Mam, her Granny, and her Great-Granny all up sticks and move to a farm after it's left to the Great-Grandmother in a will. I kept forgetting which one was which, and in the end I genuinely didn't give a shite, I just wanted it to end. I did read to the end of it but it was so schmaltzy and so "happiness =  men" that I'm surprised my eyes didn't fall out on the table from rolling them so much.

The One Plus One by Jojo Moyes
The One Plus One is essentially the story of an unconventional road trip - Jess has done a very bad thing in order to give her daughter a chance at a better life, and needs to get to Scotland for a maths competition so that Tanzie can win some money to sort things out. Ed has also done a very bad thing that might result in prison time, so he needs to get away and clear his head for a few days. They cross each others path and form an unlikely alliance - Ed offers to drive Jess, her daughter Tanzie, stepson Nicky, and their great big dog (whose name I can't remember) to the maths competition. It's good, it's an enjoyable read, but I've (somewhat unfairly) come to expect so much more from Jojo Moyes. This one didn't hit me emotionally at all, maybe because I didn't find myself rooting for Jess at any point. I loved Nicky and Tanzie.

Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim by David Sedaris
Embarrassingly, I'd never read anything by David Sedaris before. I definitely will read some more of his stories - this was so, so funny. The first chapter alone had me crying laughing - the image of his mother standing at the door trying to make small talk about trailers while David shut himself in his room trying to eat all his Halloween candy for fear she might take some of it for the neighbours had me in tears. David treats us to some hilarious family anecdotes in a series of short stories - it's not going to be everybody's cup of tea, but you're in for a treat if you like observational comedy.

The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult
This is a book told from several points of view, and in three parts. In the first part, we meet Sage - a reclusive baker who is struggling with a facial disfigurement after an accident, her affair with a married man, and her assumption that her sisters blame her for the death of a parent. Sage strikes up an unlikely friendship with ninety-something year old Josef Weber at a grief group. Josef is well-loved within the community, and seems like a quiet, happy man - until one night when he confesses to Sage that he is a former Nazi SS Guard and he wants her to help him to die. Sage's Grandmother was a Holocaust survivor - and there begins our real story. The whole middle section of the book is a brutal, harrowing account of the Holocaust as told from the point of view of both Guard and Prisoner. I actually had to put the book aside for a few days, it affected me to the point that I was dreaming about it and woke up in tears. The amount of research Jodi Picoult put into this book is just unbelievable - if you told me it was a real-life account, I'd believe you. By the time we got to the third part of the book, I was fairly sure I'd figured out the ending, but it didn't ruin the story. I could have done without the fairytale woven through the book - a tale Sage's Grandmother wrote during the War in order to help her through it. I do understand why it's there, but I wouldn't have missed it. I also wouldn't have missed that stupid character that worked at the bakery and spoke only in Haiku, or the stupid insta-romance, but the middle section of the book more than makes up for any minor annoyances elsewhere. This one will stay with me for a while!

Summer's Child by Diane Chamberlain
This is a fluffy, light read - definitely what I needed after reading that Picoult one. On the morning of Daria's 11th birthday, she finds a newborn baby girl under an enormous shell on the beach. She carries her home, and her parents end up adopting her and raising her as their own. Roll on 22 years, and the baby is now Shelly (see what they did there, etc), a young woman who wants to find out who her birth mother is. She gets in touch with TV investigator Rory Taylor, who specialises in true life stories. Rory is a former neighbour of Daria and her family, so he comes back to Kill Devil Hills for the summer with his teenage son to see if he can help Shelly find some information about where she came from. Now here's the problem I had with this - by the end of the 20th chapter, Rory had still done bugger all apart from ponce around the beach after a woman he'd just met. The mysterious Grace arrives and starts asking questions about Shelly - does she have something to hide? Course she does. Is Rory too busy thinking with his willy to see that Grace isn't there for him, but she has a weird obsession with Shelly? Indeed he is. Does anyone else in the small community have something to hide? You betcha. Is the ending rushed, predictable, and silly? Yep! Look - it's not terrible. Bring it on holiday with you, it's the absolute perfect beach read. No brain power required!

The Girl Who Chased The Moon by Sarah Addison Allen
I have a soft spot for Sarah Addison Allen's books - the first one I read was Garden Spells, and it reminded me so much of the film Practical Magic (based on an Alice Hoffman book) which was one of my favourite films for years until I overdosed on it - I practically know the script at this stage. Dubbed "magical realism", Sarah's books have a smattering of magic in them - just enough so that it's almost believable. She knocked it out of the park again with this one, a charming tale of teenage orphan Emily, sent to live with her gentle Giant Grandfather Vance in the magical town of Mullaby. Few are happy to see Emily in the town - her mother apparently did a very bad thing years ago that resulted in a death and a ruined family secret. Mysterious Win Coffey takes a shine to Emily, but it was his family that bore the brunt of Emily's mother's mistake. Emily finds an ally in neighbour Julia, who has returned to Mullaby despite having some horrible experiences there as a teen (some at the hands of Emily's mother) in order to turn her Dad's business around so she can sell it off. Add in some magical lights that appear at night, wallpaper that changes depending on your mood, a handsome ex-love, and a baker that can lead people to her with her creations - It's just a gorgeous little book, I really loved it.

Phew!! I've several more on the go at the moment, but I'll leave them for a few weeks (if anyone's still reading, thank you!!) or this post will be double the length.

Any recommendations for me?

Throwback Thursday: The Babysitters Club #1: Kristy's Great Idea

Hi!

Recently I did a little excitement wee dance when the first 20 Babysitters Club books made their way to my Kobo. I've been digging around the internet for years looking for them, and safe to say with the aid of a few bookfinding sites, my day - well folks, it's been made.

The Babysitters Club was a series of books originally written by Ann M. Martin that focused on a group of young friends who set up a babysitting club in their Connecticut neighbourhood. This was so exciting to me because we have family friends in Connecticut, and also because I had an unhealthy obsession with all things American and the fact that there may have been the slightest connection there was the coolest thing ever.

#1: Kristy's Great Idea (Published August 1986)
The books are written from the POV of the person in the title, so this one's from Kristy. We learn that she is 12, she likes sports and thinks she's really good at them, that boys are yuck, and that her parents are divorced. She has a little brother (David Michael, 6) and two older brothers (Sam, 14 and Charlie, 16). Kristy's mother is having trouble finding a babysitter for David Michael despite the fact that she has three older children and a partner (Watson), so Kristy decides to enlist her friends and start a Babysitting Club. Her friends are Mary Anne Spier (based on Ann M. Martin herself), who lives with her uber strict father (her mother died of cancer when she was young), Claudia Kishi, who is the token creative/quirky person and lives with her parents, her totes adorbs (yeah I said it) Grandmother Mimi, and her genius sister Janine (more about her in a minute) and Stacey McGill, who recently moved to Stoneybrook from New York City and has all the glamour one would expect from someone who a) isn't a tomboy, and b) doesn't have a really strict Dad. Stacey can stay up until 10pm on the weekends and has caught cabs on her own. She also has a perm and is super thin. Claudia is really arty, cool and unique despite an obvious hoarding/junk food addiction, and is wearing this outfit at the beginning of the story.

All images credits can be found on Polyvore

Stacey is also pretty slick when it comes to fashion. The first time Kristy meets her, she's wearing this. Well actually, not exactly this, because I couldn't find a pink sweatshirt with sequins AND a parrot on it, so I gave her a brooch instead.

[Source]

There's an almost obvious divide between the girls - Claudia & Stacey on the cool, boy-obsessed side, and Kristy & Mary Anne on the young, just-quit-playing-with-dolls side. Stacey won't accept any of the junk food Claudia inexplicably hides around her room which must mean she's on a diet, right? Wrong. She's actually diabetic but the whole thing is concealed because it's so awkward for her being a diabetic that her entire family had to move. Or something. The diet is mentioned to the point where I want to move just to get away from it, even when Kristy's horny brother Sam meets "foxy chick" Stacey for the first time, he refers to her as "the one on the diet". Here's Kristy's take on the whole mutual attraction between Sam & Stacey: "Most High School boys wouldn't be caught dead with a lowly junior high girl - unless the girl was a knockout." Luckily, Stacey isn't hideous and therefore is free to enjoy an hour of Sam being a total dick to his little brother in order to impress Stacey. Score, dude.

Back to the enigma that is Janine Kishi - she's 15, she's supposed to be a genius, and she's obsessed with grammar. To the point where she's creepily hanging around outside Claudia's room waiting to correct her friends. She chastises Kristy for using the word "hopefully" wrong and later is found just standing there, puzzled over whether or not there should be an apostrophe in the words "Babysitters Club". Janine. Please.

[Source]

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In fairness, Kristy is a bit of a bitch. Her mother's boyfriend Watson is lovely, and brings home chinese food for them. Kristy refuses to eat it and sits eating a peanut butter & jelly sandwich in rebellion. A sandwich that she has cut into the shape of a snowman. Very mature, Kristy. Please mind my children.

She also has a seriously smart mouth - she asks Watson who's minding his kids while he's bringing chinese food over, and when David Michael mentions a G.I. Joe toy and Watson says his son Andrew isn't into them, Kristy responds with "Oh, all the boys play with them. You just don't know because you're not around. And I bet Karen has a Rainbow Brite too, do you know what that is?." BIIITTCH!!

Kristy's first babysitting assignment doesn't go to plan - she takes a call to sit for twins, Pinky and Buffy (see where this is going?) but oh! Hilarity! They are dogs, they run away for a few minutes and then she puts them back inside and all is okay. Mary Anne sits for Watson's children, Karen and Andrew, who are nice enough but have an irrational fear of the woman next door. They've nicknamed her Morbidda Destiny, a name that I would rob in later years at Halloween. They also have a very large cat named Boo-Boo, who bites. Nice.

Watson and Edie (Kristy's mother) make Kristy wear a dress and they all sit down to fondue (well this IS the 80s) and announce their plans to get engaged. Kristy is a bit of a cow about it but soon sees the error of her ways after dinner. During dinner, Watson "came up with a rule that if your bread fell off your fork and landed in the cheese, you had to kiss the person on your right." Dafuq, Watson? You're sitting beside a TWELVE YEAR OLD GIRL. Naturally, Kristy's bread falls off and she gives Watson a peck on the cheek to the not-at-all-creepy soundtrack of the two Brewer children chanting "Kiss Daddy! Kiss Daddy!". Jesus.

So - the babysitting is off to a great start, we've established Claudia and Stacey are into fashion, Kristy is a tomboy, and Mary Anne has cried about nine times for many varying reasons including "my Dad won't let me spend $3 on pizza". Watson & Edie are sorted, so that just leaves the issue of Stacey's diabetes, which she's kinda forced into revealing at a sleepover because Kristy just can't mind her own goddamn business and had earlier accused Stacey and her mother of keeping secrets. She just met you Kristy, you nosy bitch. Everything is perfect because Kristy has a cousin with diabetes and knows all about it. Of course she does.

QOTD: [Kristy while minding Pinky & Buffy]: "You really haven't lived until a dog has stepped on your face."

World Book Day 2014 - Recently Read and Childhood Favourites

Hi!

I actually forgot all about World Book Day until my son asked for some old books to do a book swap at school (he picked excellent ones to take home - books by Roald Dahl, David Walliams and a Dog Encylopedia). I was going to do some nail art but I had some already done for another occasion so I decided instead to show you a few of my recent reads (or 2014 reads so far) and talk about a few of my favourite childhood books.


Recently Loved

• The Killer Next Door by Alex Marwood This is the second novel by Alex. Her first novel, The Wicked Girls was one of my favourite reads of 2013. This one was just as good - a group of people who seemingly have nothing in common end up, for various reasons, living in an apartment complex owned by an absolute pig of a landlord. He's lecherous, greedy, mean, and inappropriate. One night, a terrible accident happens and the gang have to decide what they're going to do - oh, and did I mention that one of them is a particularly deranged serial killer? Couldn't put it down. I found myself looking forward to night feeds just so I'd get another chapter in!
• The Real Mrs. Brown - Brendan O'Carroll, The Authorised Biography by Brian Beacom I wouldn't be the hugest fan of Mrs. Brown or her boys (though I have on occasion almost wet myself laughing at it, but I have to be in particularly silly humour) but I'm a big fan of Brendan O'Carroll. He's a remarkable man who has maintained a positive outlook on life despite being thrown some huge curve balls in his time. He's witty, hard-working, and has had some ingenious ideas. This biography was sweet, it was heartwarming, and it was funny. A really, really nice read.
• Doctor Sleep - Stephen King One of my favourite things about this was that it prompted me to re-read The Shining before I started it. I'd forgotten how amazing a book it was, and it was brilliant to revisit the world of the Torrances (and indeed Tony). We meet Abra Stone, who also has an amazing gift - and we get to find out what became of young Danny Torrance. A definite must-read!
• The Sugar Queen - Sarah Addison Allen This isn't a new book by any means. I'd read Sarah's book Garden Spells a few years ago and I'd frequently wanted to re-read it, it had a serious Practical Magic vibe to it. Her books all have a somewhat magical quality to them, this one included. Josey lives for romance novels, secret stashes of chocolate and sweets, and has been in love with her mailman from afar for as long as she can remember. One morning she wakes to discover local ex-lady of the night/waitress Della Lee in her closet. Della Lee has escaped a bad relationship and while she's hiding out at Josey's, she helps her to find herself and question what she's doing with her life. It's a really sweet read, it's never going to win an award but you know what? I've read some heinously crap award-winners, so give it a chance if you like your fiction with a healthy dose of magic.

Recently Hated

• Saving Rachel by John Locke The only reason I bought this was because it was really cheap on the Kobo website and I was sick of converting things I'd bought for Kindle. I wish I'd saved myself the bother of even downloading it - it's absolutely one of the worst "books" I've ever, ever read. The main character is disgusting, a real misogynistic ass. He's cheating on his wife and constantly makes references to how brilliant he is and how clever he is. He refers to the women in his life as if they were pieces of meat with breasts attached. The premise reeled me in - man cheats on wife, wife is kidnapped, man panics and gets involved with criminals - I think John Locke is incredibly good at writing a synopsis. He's a genius at it, because he made this sound like a Harlan Coben or Andrew Gross novel when really - it reads like nothing more than the ramblings of a horny, hyperactive, oversexed pre-pubescent teenage boy obsessed with breasts. Oh no, sorry, not breasts. "Titties". Seriously... I struggled to finish it, even though the chapters were 1-3 pages each of snappy, short dialogue. Awful beyond belief. 

Currently Reading

• The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides I'm reading this as part of my 1001 Books Challenge. Honesty Corner - I haven't touched it yet. I'm behind on all my reading challenges, but I will catch up!!
• If You Lived Here, You'd Be Perfect By Now by Robin Hardwick Essentially a book-by-book pisstake of the first 100 Sweet Valley High books. Not half as entertaining as Kitty's particular brand of actual-laugh-out-loud sarcasm, but still very funny.
• The Silent Wife by A.S.A Harrison This is a thriller written from both the perspective of the murderer and victim - we're told at the very beginning that the wife is going to kill her husband, so it's not a spoiler - but it's so mind-numbingly boring and mundane that I'm looking for excuses to put it away. I do want to give it a chance, but I'm struggling with it. Harrison is one of a number of people who have sadly found fame posthumously - she passed away before she could see the success of her work.
• Carrie by Stephen King Having read The Shining and Doctor Sleep, I got a grá for Mr. King again after many years. He was always my favourite author as a teen, so it's been a hell of a long time since I've read any of his better known works. I'm revisiting Carrie at the moment and loving every minute of it, and I plan to re-read as many of his books as I can over the coming months.

Childhood Favourites

Leaving aside acres of Sweet Valley High books, Malory Towers, St. Claire's and Point Romance, here are 6 of my all-time favourites from my pre-teen years.

• What Katy Did by Susan M. Coolidge I re-read this a thousand times - Katy was warned by her father not to play on the swing in the shed because it wasn't set up properly. Boisterous Katy defies him, falls off, and ends up temporarily paralyzed. Her beautiful wheelchair-bound cousin comes to visit her and helps her to appreciate what she has in life. In this book they play a game called Kikeri that I've never forgotten - I'm sure it's what we called Murder in the Dark. 
• The Faraway Tree Stories by Enid Blyton This series was the ultimate in fantasy reading - imagine a magical tree filled with all kinds of interesting unusual folk. That in itself is a great story, but add in a couple of regular children who befriend them and get to visit the different lands that appear at the top of the tree and you have a series that's magnetic even as an adult. I'll be buying this for my eldest son's next birthday. 
• The Babysitter by R.L. Stine I loved all the Point Horror books but this one was my favourite - it's basically When a Stranger Calls but much milder on the graphic violence and general ick-ness. Other favourites are April Fools, The Cheerleader, Prom Date.
• Sam, Bangs and Moonshine by Evaline Ness I'd forgotten all about this book until I stumbled across it again a few years ago. It's just really enchanting - Sam is a little girl who has a cat (bangs) and has a bit of a problem with telling lies, or making up fantastical stories (her father calls them Moonshine). She ends up in serious trouble when a friend is in danger, but she eventually realises that while the truth is best, we all need a little bit of Moonshine in our lives.
• Goosebumps: The Haunted Mask by R.L. Stine I pretty much read the entire Goosebumps series, but this is the one that has stayed with me. It's genuinely creepy - Carly Beth wants to scare her friends at Halloween and comes across the scariest, most gross mask she can find. Unfortunately, when she puts it on - it becomes her face. 
• The Secret Island by Enid Blyton This is one of the first books I remember keeping in my bedside locker to re-read over and over again. A group of children escape to an island and have to basically do a Tom Hanks on it and get inventive to survive - even sneaking back on to the mainland at one point and managing to manoeuver a cow out by boat to get milk! It's absolutely brilliant. 

I'm happy to see my eldest boy reading books - at the moment he's loving The Twits by Roald Dahl, The Diary of a Wimpy Kid series by Jeff Kinney, and Gangsta Gran by David Walliams.

Read anything good lately?

Panti vs RTE: My Two Cents

Hi!

As I've mentioned before, I'm going to try and keep all the baby-related things on the blog for Wednesdays, and I do have one coming up in a bit, but I had to get this out and on here because my blood is still boiling.

If you haven't heard about Panti VS RTE, you can read about it here: http://www.thejournal.ie/rte-no-comment-damages-saturday-night-show-1287287-Jan2014/

I wanted to write something but I didn't know where to put it, so I sent it in an e-mail to rte. No doubt nothing will come of it, so I'm putting it down here too just to add my support for Rory and my horror at the prospect that one cent of mine will go to funding that organisation.

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Hi,

As someone who pays their Television Licence fee on time and without complaint despite rarely watching RTE programming, I am outraged that there is even the most minute of possibilities that one cent of my money may have gone to John Waters, Breda O'Brien, or The Iona Institute.

You are responsible for inviting guests on to your talkshows - be it the Late Late, Marian, or The Saturday Night Show. It is up to you to ensure that those guests are treated fairly and without bias. On the night in question when Rory O'Neill (Aka Panti Bliss) was a guest on The Saturday Night Show, he was specifically asked by host Brendan O'Connor to clarify who he was referring to when he mentioned homophobia in the media. Perhaps Mr. O'Connor could do with a lesson in presenting if you wish to avoid this kind of situation in the future. 

For RTE to first use the death of Tom O'Gorman as a reason for removing the interview was laughable, considering his name hadn't even been mentioned - but to then award damages to John Waters (who gets paid to write some of the most misogynistic drivel I've ever had the misfortune to read), Breda O'Brien (who stated in an article published in the Irish Times on 11/01/14 that there is "no hatred" in calling homosexuality "intrinsically disordered" and then referred to a homosexual person as "a gay"), or David Quinn & The Iona Institute (who seem to have an inordinate obsession with homosexuality and make it their mission to tell others what they can and can't do with their lives) is downright appalling.

I am disgusted, but sadly not shocked. You have proven yourselves to be what I have long suspected of you - a company full of back-slapping, fearful cowards who are not doing a service to the public. You are doing a disservice to much of the country, especially the LGBT community. By issuing an award to those who have threatened legal action shows that you will support a vile organisation promoting prejudice, bigotry, misogyny and homophobia over someone who promotes equality and justice for the gay community. Rory O'Neill was asked to name names by one of your employees. You failed O'Connor in this situation too, by making him read out that ludicrous apology. He is employed by you to ask questions and present an unbiased opinion. In doing a U-turn on this, you made him look ridiculous, as if he had been chastised by the Headmaster.

Homophobia, by its very definition in the Merriam-Webster dictionary, is "irrational fear of, aversion to, or discrimination against homosexuality or homosexuals". Therefore by leading a campaign to disallow same-sex marriage or adoption based solely on the fact that both individuals are of the same sex, are Mr. Quinn and his Iona Institute not, indeed, homophobic?

In speaking to the Irish Catholic yesterday, David Quinn stated "The accusations had to be challenged. They were aimed at closing down debate on same sex marriage and adoption." [Source: http://www.catholicireland.net/rte-apologises-homophobic-accusations-saturday-show/]

The Provision of Services section in the Public Service Broadcasting Charter states that RTE, in the case of its programming, will "maintain and cherish its freedom from political control or influence and from all other vested interests, whether commercial, religious, social or cultural."

I will no longer publicise or support any RTE programming. I will no longer follow your social media accounts. I will not be tuning in to see your news, your soaps, or your endless repeats. I will not listen to your radio stations. I will not be watching any of your one-sided debates in the run up to the debate on same-sex marriage.

Sharon Leavy

Blog: Behind Green Eyes

Twitter: @shannairl

Book Review: The Dark Water by Helen Moorhouse

Hi!

I did it! I finally finished a book! My reading mojo has flown out the window over the past few months, I just could not concentrate. It turned out my iron levels were quite low, which may explain it - but I managed to get through this.

I wrote a review of Helen's first book The Dead Summer here last year - I loved it. I found it a really good ghost story and as I said at the time, it completely reeled me in. This one - not so much.

Image: Easons.com

First of all, let's get the back cover out of the way:

Martha Armstrong has started again - new city, new home, new future. Yet she's troubled by her partner Will's obsession with the paranormal and an unwelcome face from her past. Troubles which threaten the happiness she thought she had found.

Her friend Gabriel McKenzie, a psychic medium, is troubled too - disturbed by ghosts he suddenly cannot see and haunted by ones he can't escape. Who is the strange intruder that leaves him mysterious messages in his apartment and watches him sleep at night?

So when a desperate call for help comes for Gabriel, Martha and Will make a decision to help him - a decision that takes them North, to the bleak Highland beauty of Dubhglas Castle and its lake, where mysterious occurrences are terrifying the staff. Could they be connected to Gabriel's nocturnal visitor and, worse still, to the powerful spirit of the brutal Jack Ball?

Together, they uncover the secret that shattered Gabriel's family and split a young couple apart, fifty years before.

Is it always best to uncover the past, or are some secrets best left lying in the Dark Water?

I hate doing negative reviews because I understand how long it takes to write a novel, and how passionate writers can feel about their characters. But I really, really didn't like this book at all. I found it a complete let down after the first novel.

It seems very cobbled together - there's too much going on. There's the stuff going on between Martha & Will, Martha & her ex, Dan, then Martha & her friend Sue (who is completely irrelevant), then Martha & her daughter Ruby who only really becomes important towards the end, then there's the feud between Will & Gabriel that is miraculously cured in no time, then there's a whole host of characters from the past - Claire, Martin, Jack, Laurence - enough. Seriously.

It had the makings of a great horror - the first few chapters suggested a really creepy haunting that needed to be investigated, but it took a horrendously boring turn after a couple of chapters and to be honest I struggled to pick it up. I've actually been saving it for when I'm sitting in waiting rooms and I need to pass the time, I couldn't bring myself to pick it up at home. Martha is not likeable, and by the time I got to the end I couldn't have cared less whether she came away unscathed or not.

The "baddie" of the piece wasn't remotely scary, and to bring the Krays into it felt completely out of place and a poor attempt at linking him to some well-known "bad" people. The final elimination of the baddie was rushed, nonsensical, and ridiculous. As was Dan's exit. One minute he's there all guns blazing and the next minute he's gone like a rocket?! What?!

I couldn't understand why Will was even still speaking to Martha by the end of it, to be honest. You can do much better, Will, seriously. She's a pain in the hoop. No doubt a wedding will feature in the next installment, with irritating best friend Sue in bridesmaid mode and adorable daughter Ruby all flowergirl-ed up. While I'm on the subject of Sue - why was she even there?! At one point I thought she was just brought in as a partner for Gabriel, but she was completely surplus to requirements in every scene she was in.

Considering Gabriel was pretty much central to the story, he didn't get much attention at all. I could have done with more Gabriel and less Martha. Much less Martha. The "twist" at the end where Gabriel speculates about Martha is laughable. I just hope to god that this doesn't mean the next book will also feature the same characters.

I hate to be horrible, but if you're expecting another novel as good as The Dead Summer, just approach this with an open mind. Maybe it's me, maybe I just don't have the patience, but I doubt it - very, very disappointed with this book overall.

I will read the next book, Sing Me To Sleep, but I'll be reading it on the back of how much I enjoyed the first book.

I'll be donating this one to the library.

Book Review: Jojo Moyes - The Last Letter From Your Lover

Hi!

I have only recently started reading Jojo Moyes' books - I've no idea why I was so late to that particular party, but I got there eventually with the purchase of Me Before You a few months ago. I devoured it, I adored it, I cried at the end, then I cried again because I had finished it. You know something is good when you actually miss it, and that's how I felt after reading Me Before You. I picked another of her novels up a few weeks ago, the 2010 release The Last Letter From Your Lover.

Image Source: booktopia

As always, I'll start off with the back cover:

"Know this at least: somewhere in this world is a man who loves you... 

A man who has always loved you and, to his detriment,

suspects he always will."

1960. Jennifer Stirling lives a life of luxury with her wealthy husband. On paper, she has it all. In reality, she's dangerously devoted to another man who is asking her to risk everything...

2003. Ellie Haworth works as a journalist for a national newspaper and is in love with a charming writer. On paper, she should be happy. In reality, her career is foundering and the man who holds her heart belongs to someone else...

When Ellie stumbles upon a set of passionate love letters from the 1960s, both women's lives entwine. And as she pieces together the fragments of the past romance, what she unearths dramatically transforms her life, and Jennifer's in the process.

The book starts off in the present day, from Ellie's point of view. She's involved with a married man, running away from all the problems in her life, and refuses to believe that she is anything other than blissfully happy. When she discovers a love letter from the 1960s, it has such a profound effect on her that she resolves to get to the bottom of it.

From about page 20 on, we are taken back in time to the 1960s to the life of Jennifer Stirling and her husband Laurence - a wealthy, successful, glamourous couple. Jennifer has just woken up from a car accident that left her with a damaged arm and a head injury that rendered her unable to remember great chunks of her life. To the outside world, Jennifer and Laurence are the perfect couple. But all is not well - along with Jennifer's partial memory loss, there are a circle of people who seemingly don't want her to remember every detail of her life before the accident, a husband who is losing his patience at her inability to just accept the here and now and stop asking questions, a housekeeper who knows more than she's letting on - and Jennifer is left feeling like a huge part of her life is missing.

When she stumbles upon letters written with more passion and love for her than she could ever imagine her husband showing, she is determined to find out more about who wrote them, what happened to him, and why they aren't together.

I LOVED the way this book was written. I loved that the majority of the book was entirely devoted to Jennifer's story, and the romance was so beautiful and passionate. I loved that we weren't jumping from the 60s to the 00s every second chapter - because Ellie's story, while the catalyst for later events, is not the main point of this book, and to be honest, I didn't find her very likeable. I adored Jennifer and her lover. The longing they had for each other in their encounters had me in tears more than once.

I don't want to say too much in case I spoil it, which I would hate to do, because it's truly such a beautiful story to watch unfold - but I can say that I picked this up at 12 pm today and couldn't put it down until I had every last page read. Not too many books do that for me anymore - I've some on my reading list that I'm dreading trying to get through.

An utterly timeless love story - make sure you have tissues for the end.

Book Review - The Wicked Girls by Alex Marwood

Hi!

I haven't done a book review here in a while, so I thought I'd do one on this, one of the books I bought last month.

Alex Marwood is the pseudonym of a press journalist currently living in London. The Wicked Girls is a crime/thriller, was published in 2012, and if you haven't read it, you need to put it on your must-read list. Now.

Back cover spiel:

The noise was overwhelming, the feral, chanting voices of strangers wanting justice.

THAT'S US. WE'RE THE GIRLS WHO KILLED CHLOE WE ARE THE DEVIL NOW.

Twenty-five years ago two little girls were imprisoned for murder. Now journalist Kirsty Lindsay is reporting on a series of sickening attacks on young women and her investigation leads her to cleaner Amber Gordon.

For Kirsty and Amber, it is the first time they have seen each other since that dark day when they were children. Aware of the danger they are in and with new identities - and families - to protect, they will do anything it takes to keep their wicked secret hidden...

When I initially started reading this book, it took a while to get into it. I think I was trying to guess what was going to happen, which is a really bad habit of mine. Once you relax into it, it gets absorbing pretty quickly. Both female leads are strong characters, and they're so well-developed, I felt like I really knew them both by the end of the book. It's difficult to write a really comprehensive review without revealing a load of spoilers, but I'll try and give you some idea of what to expect from it. 

What lengths would you go to to protect the ones you love? What would you do if you were getting on with your life, and suddenly had to deal with the worst event in your past all over again? That's what happens to Amber and Kirsty.

While we already know from the cover that the two girls committed a terrible offence all those years ago, we don't know the circumstances or the actual events surrounding that fateful day - until all is slowly revealed in short flashback chapters. It left me feeling slightly different about the whole lot - I didn't have sympathy for either, initially, but that had changed a little bit by the end.

Would things have turned out differently if both girls had been given exactly the same opportunities to get their lives back on track after that horrific day? One of the women had to fight for everything she had, while the other seemed to have a little more encouragement. One was punished, while the other one was not only punished, but expected to know and do better. Both women ended up with very different outcomes at the end - begging the question, as I put forward in my synopsis of the book on Goodreads (there's a button over there on the right sidebar if you want to be my friend there), are we a product of our genes, or our environment?

Who knows - but it is a very scary prospect to think of something in your past rearing its ugly head right out of the blue. I think that's what was the most frightening thing for me (not that I've a load of skeletons, but y'know) - the actions of an unrelated person brought the past mistakes of both these girls right back to haunt them. The tension bounces off the page, and I felt sick for the characters more than once. 

An absolutely brilliant piece of writing, and unlike another popular crime novel that everyone seems to be reading at the minute, this one has an ending worthy of the rest of the book.

Highly recommended.