Book Review: Summerlong by Dean Bakopoulos

Book Review: Summerlong by Dean Bakopoulos

Friday, 8 July 2016

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As far as I’m concerned, a summer holiday is good for a number of things: firstly, the opportunity to relax and get a good tan; secondly, the opportunity to shut off from the world and finally; the opportunity to read, read, read. Summerlong by Dean Bakopolous is the absolutely perfect summer read.

I’ve never read anything by Dean before but I was still pretty excited when this book hit my inbox. I started it a few weeks ago, after my exams finished and it ended up being the first book I completed by the pool on my holiday to Spain. The story follows a couple, Claire and Don, and their separate summers. Each is dissatisfied in their relationship and each form relations with outside characters. Eventually, everyone links back together and the story evolves into a complex, almost philosophical tale of finding oneself, loss and togetherness. I must admit that I loved the secondary characters a lot more than the two protagonists, particularly ABC, and I felt that I felt a lot more sorry for her and her situation than I did for Don and Claire combined. The loss that she suffered was a heavy burden to carry and I personally wouldn’t have the personal strength that she had. Looking just at the book’s cover, you couldn’t possibly imagine that the book would have themes as dark as the ones it does, but that just goes to show that looks can be deceiving and you definitely shouldn’t judge a book by its cover!

The novel dealt with quite a few difficult subjects, principally suicide and loss, and I believe that it did so in a very subtle and appropriate way. I definitely enjoyed this book a lot more than I thought I would, and I got through it pretty quickly. It was one of those that once you start it, you find it quite difficult to put it down and that’s definitely a good thing. It was pretty melancholic at times but I love books that make you think about difficult matters and this melancholy definitely appealed to me as a reader. I was a bit disappointed not to find out entirely what happened after the main event at the end had passed, but there has to be an end, I suppose! The only negative I can come up with about the book was there was a lot of unnecessary weed smoking, but beggars can’t be choosers!

It was easy to get into, easy to get through and a shame to finish. Incredibly quirky and not at all what I expected! I’d definitely recommend getting hold of a copy if you fancy something a bit different and slightly edgy! Thanks very much to the team at Blackfriars for my review copy!

4.5/5

Book Review: The Rumour by Elin Hilderbrand

Book Review: The Rumour by Elin Hilderbrand

Sunday, 3 July 2016

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I love me a good chick-lit. I was lucky enough to receive a review copy of The Rumour by Elin Hilderbrand last month and it’s safe to say that this book epitomises the chick-lit genre and everything it stands for.

The story principally follows the friendship between two women and their families – Madeline, an author and her husband and son, and Grace, her best friend and her husband and their twin daughters. The story is set in Nantucket, an island off the coast of Cape Cod and follows the two families over the course of a single summer. The setting is pretty apt if I’m honest with you as it’s a very fabulous beach read. As is probably the case with most small-knit communities, the rumours and the gossip of the island spreads like wildfire and the two friends find themselves caught up in a feud after Grace discovers that Madeline, struggling to write the novel she’s promised to her publishers, has based the plot of her newest tale around the scandalous affair that she has found herself in. There are a number of different twists and turns throughout the book and different scandals make themselves apparent, and chaos seems to be everywhere Madeline turns.

The character relationships in this book were very well formed and I particularly loved the fact that the book had multiple narrators. I feel like this really allowed the audience the opportunity to get to know all of the characters and it definitely added to the overall flow of the novel. I loved that there was more than just one rumour circulating around the island and how everything ended up being interrelated and every character had a purpose in the overall plot of the novel. I really enjoyed reading about the relationship between Grace and Benton, although I must say I don’t condone infidelity in the slightest, as well the blossoming friendship between the twins, Allegra, and Hope.

The book was a very easy read and I got through it incredibly quickly. It was something that allowed me to get back into reading quickly and easily and wasn’t the predictable ending that I expected. The characters, for the most part, were very likeable although I found myself a tad irritated by Grace and the way her character developed. I loved Madeline entirely, on the other hand, and was a bit put out by her decision not to publish the book she deserved to have written.

As always, thanks to the team at Hodder for my copy of the book. I’ll be passing it on to my mother to see whether she enjoys it as much as I did!

4/5

Goodreads: July To Read

Goodreads: July To Read

Friday, 1 July 2016

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I swear I say this every month, but WHO can believe it’s actually July? Time is going by so quickly! July’s going to be a pretty busy one for me, having just moved house and started a new job, graduation and induction onto my new masters course but of course, I’ll be making plenty of time to read alongside all of this! I have a fair few books on my monthly to-read list and I’m arguably being slightly over ambitious but oh well, any I don’t finish can just be pushed over to August! I’m trying to get through as many of my Netgalley ARCs as I can as I have quite a few in my dashboard and want to get my ratio back on track!

I’m about 350 pages through House Rules by Jodi Picoult at the moment and I’m absolutely loving where it’s headed. I’ve read quite a few books by Jodi before, most notably The Storyteller, which I voted as being one of my top reads of 2015. I’m aiming to finish this one before this post goes live, but who knows, everything’s a bit hectic at the moment!

I was sent a copy of Fell by Jenn Ashworth through Nikki at Sceptre, a branch of Hodder Books. This one is one that I can’t wait to get started with as it sounds like something that would be right up my street! I absolutely love the cover art and think it looks like a really beautiful book. It falls into the supernatural genre which isn’t what I normally go for but I’m more than willing to go out of my comfort zone and see how this one pans out!

I was recently lucky enough to be auto-approved on Netgalley by the AMAZING Penguin UK Michael Joseph. Obviously, as a book nerd, this thrilled me beyond belief and I took advantage of it by downloading a few of the books listed on their page. Amongst these, the 3^rd book by Giovanna Fletcher entitled Always with Love. My cousin Leah absolutely raves about Giovanna’s books and although I haven’t yet read any of her back catalogue, I’m really looking forward to seeing what the fuss is about. I also received Liane Moriarty’s Truly Madly Guilty. I read her book The Husband’s Secret in 2014 and thought it was a really fabulous read, so I’m hoping that this one is up to the same standard. Finally, I also received a copy of Dear Amy by Helen Callaghan which, as a psychological thriller, is a book I’d go out and buy myself. I’m hoping that this one lives up to the hype and doesn’t disappoint!

From Simon and Schuster Fiction I have a copy of The Regulars by Georgia Clark. I know absolutely nothing about this one so it’s going to be a bit of a mystery when I start it, but I think I’m going to let it stay that way rather than read up on it like I normally do! Finally, from Sourcebooks Fire, I’m looking forward to getting stuck into a YA book, You Before Anyone Else by Julie Cross and Mark Perini. Again, I don’t know much about this one but I presume from the fact that there’re two authors that there are alternating perspectives and narrations.

Thanks to all of the aforementioned publishing houses for sending me copies of these books! I’m so excited to get stuck into them all!

What are you planning on reading this month?