Week 2 and we are well into a holiday mood, with our reading.
Today’s guest on the Beach Reads 2015 Blog Tour is Georgia Rose
Beach Reads Blog Tour
I’d like to thank Rosie for inviting me on this tour. I imagine this is what it feels like to be chosen to go on Desert Island Discs and as it’s likely to be the closest I ever get to that I’m treating it the same and much like the choices there these have been hard to make – I didn’t think about that when I eagerly said yes! As an author Rosie has said that I can choose one of my own to promote but in an effort not to do an Elisabeth Schwartzkopf from the Roy Plomley era I shall not, though I will add that I do believe mine would make great beach reads and you can find out everything you need to know about them at Georgia Rose Books
Right onto the easy bit first, my ideal holiday destination. We stumbled upon the delights of Gozo a few years ago and have gone there ever since, not to the same villa or the same village mind, we’re not that predictable! Gozo is the tiny island off Malta, and with no airport of its own it’s reached by ferry, which starts the unwinding process. It’s the place I’d run to if, for some reason, I suddenly had to leave England…well you never know do you 😉 I’m not a great traveller but on Gozo I feel safe. The people are friendly, they actually like the British. They drive on the left and have the same telephone and post boxes as us, there are blue lanterns outside their police stations and being there puts me at ease.
So, onto my choices and I’ve had to go about making these in different ways as it has been so difficult. In the end I’ve chosen a book I’ve read before that I’d recommend, one from an author whose other work I have enjoyed, one I’ve had on my TBR list for ages but just haven’t got to from an author whose writing is new to me, an audio book chosen on recommendation and because of the narration and finally a book that from all I hear about it will be a good, fun read and is again from an author whose work I am yet to sample.
A book I would only read (listen to!) on holiday…Time Was: Time and Again Book 1 by Nora Roberts – Audio
I don’t get time to listen to audio books at home and I like the thought of having one to listen to whilst travelling or during those times on a sun bed when I’m completely relaxed and even holding up a kindle seems too arduous – I know #firstworldproblems…shaming. Anyway following reading a great post by Cathy on the Between The Lines Book Blog I’ve been inspired to try Time Was: Time and Again Book 1 by Nora Roberts.
This is from a genre I don’t usually read as it’s a time travel romance and in more ways than one as the book was originally published about 25 years ago.
The blurb reads – ‘Stranded in the present, time traveler Caleb Hornblower’s biggest problem isn’t returning to the twenty-third century – but falling head over heels for the beguiling Liberty Stone, who shows him a love more powerful than time itself. Though Caleb knows he belongs in the future, how can he leave the past, and Liberty, behind?’
What intrigues me most though, and the reason this is on my list, is that Cathy told me that listening to Luke Daniels (the narrator) is like listening to a play with a full cast and I’m looking forward to that.
A book from my favourite genre…Carla by Mark Barry – Kindle
This was the first book by Mark Barry I read and it is a great introduction to his work and it was whilst I was on holiday last year. It’s psychologically dark, a harrowing romance and I loved it – these are all words which sum up my favourite type of reading matter, along with thriller. It’s the sort of book that leaves you breathless at the end…staring at the wall and I didn’t read anything more that day, I couldn’t, I knew nothing else would come close. I have the paperback but this is fine to read on the kindle though a word to the wise if you are planning on getting Barry’s The Night Porter (and I would if I were you) try to get it in the paperback – there are footnotes you see, to add to the pleasure.
The blurb for Carla:-
‘John Dexter has problems. Real problems. We’re talking episodes in psychiatric hospitals, and then some. Woe betide any woman he falls in love with. But he’s no mad stalker. He knows himself, understand his own motives and behavioural patterns all too well. The problem is, he can’t stop himself. Then he meets Carla. Twenty-two years his junior, with family problems of her own. CARLA is a novel of obsession, love and loss, exploring very real mental health problems. It centres around an average flat and an average pub in an average English town, but its originality, realism and edgy humour has earned it a certain ‘cult’ status in some internet circles.’
I only have to read the first page of this book and I am drawn right back in there, it is ripe for rereading!
A book I’ve been meaning to read for ages…One Way Fare (Null City Book 1) by Barb Taub – Kindle
I have read the other two Null City books, Don’t Touch and Tales from Null City, and have wanted to tackle the first one for a while. These books are from a genre I wouldn’t usually choose, urban fantasy, but I’ve challenged myself to read many things since publishing and my eyes have been opened…as they say. Barb Taub is a terrifically engaging writer and her quick wit shines through in her stories so I’m sure I will be as absorbed by her first one as I have been by the others.
The blurb:-
A thrilling chase through time and space, Null City is only a Metro ride away, littered with slick rock stars, stoic warriors, and Nephilim – the descendants of angels. Superpowers suck. If you just want to live a normal life, Null City is only a Metro ride away. After one day there, imps become baristas, and hellhounds become poodles. Demons settle down, become parents, join the PTA, and worry about their taxes. Null City is the only sanctuary for Gaby Parker and Leila Rice, two young women confronting cataclysmic forces waging an unseen war between Heaven and Hell. Gaby and her younger brother and sister are already targets in the war that cost their parents’ lives. Should they forsake the powers that complete their souls and flee to Null City? Meanwhile, Leila has inherited a French chateau, a mysterious legacy, and a prophecy that she will end the world. Gaby and Leila become catalysts for the founding and survival of Null City. It just would have been nice if someone told them the angels were all on the other side.
A book that I believe I could truly escape with is…Diamonds and Dust by Carol Hedges – Paperback
Like so many others when I pack for a holiday my books go in first. In these days of having a kindle packing is easier but I always take my ‘just in case’ paperback. I’m fearful of something going wrong with the kindle or of me not being able to lie near enough to the plug socket it is currently being charged at so I need a back up.
Now I’ve only heard good things about this book, about the writing, about its authenticity and I do love a good murder. I’m also not very good at choosing books set in the past yet always enjoy them when I do so what’s not to love here?
The blurb:-
When a horrific murder takes place on a dark night in 1860’s London, it changes two women for ever. New light is cast upon past lives they thought they knew so well, and suddenly their futures become intertwined. The death of her uncle will leave eighteen-year-old Josephine King an orphan, an heiress and the owner of a priceless diamond, The Eye of the Khan. For Lilith Marks, a chance finally arises to end her life as a highly paid prostitute and to prove herself as a serious businesswoman. Set against the backdrop of the great gas-lit city, the two women are drawn together in their quest to discover just who killed the man they both loved. Diamonds & Dust is a page-whizzing narrative, with an intricate and absorbing plot that entices you through the teeming streets of Victorian London. If Wilkie Collins, Charles Dickens and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle all washed up on a desert island, they might have come up with something like this.
For my fun read, because from everything I’ve read it will be, I choose…Bootcamp Bride by Lizzie Lamb – Kindle
A few years ago I tried to read Emma by Jane Austen on a sun bed, what a mistake. I have learnt that holidays are not the time for trying to get into a book where the height of excitement involves a letter arriving in a village…at least not for me.
So as I’m not keen on fluffy romances or anything too lightweight I think this will hit the spot nicely – romance, suspense and danger, humorously told – what more could you want.
Take an up-for-anything reporter. Add a world-weary photo-journalist. Put them together . . . light the blue touch paper and stand well back! Posing as a bride-to-be, Charlee Montague goes undercover at a boot camp for brides in order to photograph supermodel Anastasia Markova. At Charlee’s side and posing as her fiancé, is Rafael Ffinch award winning photographer and survivor of a kidnap attempt in Columbia. He’s in no mood to cut inexperienced Charlee any slack and has made it plain that once the investigation is over, their partnership – and fake engagement – will be terminated, too. Soon Charlee has more questions than answers. What’s the real reason behind Ffinch’s interest in the boot camp? How is it connected to his kidnap in Columbia? In setting out to uncover the truth, Charlee puts herself in danger … As the investigation draws to a close, she wonders if she’ll be able to hand back the engagement ring and walk away from Rafa without a backward glance.
Many thanks again Rosie for asking me on this tour, there are so many books I could have chosen and will indeed be carrying with me on my upcoming holiday but I hope that for the purposes of this tour I have chosen wisely J
Rosie Amber 