April books

[callmemadam]

The Pink House. Catherine Alliott
Local Hero: Making a Scottish Classic , Jonathan Melville
Strangers to the Marsh , Monica Edwards
Magpie Murders, Anthony Horowitz
Hidden in a Dream, Monica Edwards
Henrietta’s War, Joyce Dennys
Voices of the Dead , Ambrose Parry
No Entry, Monica Edwards
Henrietta Sees it Through, Joyce Dennys
Napoleon & Wellington: The Long Duel, Andrew Roberts
Storm Ahead, Monica Edwards

A better title for The Pink House would be ‘Secrets and Lies’. The narrator, Emma, is, we presume in her fifties. When her parents-in-law divorce in their seventies, she and her husband buy the family home, The Pink House, in the country. All the events in the book take place around the wedding of one of their sons. In middle age, Emma has a series of shocks: she has been lied to her whole life; one of her oldest friends actually hates her; her mother-in-law is poison (she knew that); her marriage is in trouble (she didn’t know that) and a romantic figure from her past appears unexpectedly. Sadly, apart from Emma’s children, there is hardly a likeable character in the whole book and I include Emma.

I’ve read books by Catherine Alliott before and quite enjoyed them but I don’t find an exploration of family relationships and a lot of bad behaviour enough to carry a whole book and make it worth reading. And, by the way, ‘Musée de Beaux Arts’ is wrong; it should be ‘des Beaux-Arts’, surely? This kind of error is very irritating. I read this one thanks to NetGalley.

I re-read Magpie Murders because I’m watching the TV series and wanted to see how Horowitz would translate such a complicated plot to the screen. I noticed quite a few changes. I enjoyed the book more on a second reading; I see I was slightly grudging in my previous review. More re-reading with Joyce Dennys’ Henrietta books when comfort reading was called for. Henrietta always sees me through.

I do enjoy a nice, long history book and Andrew Roberts’ Napoleon & Wellington: The Long Duel, was a Kindle deal.

The Monica Edwards books will be discussed in the next thrilling instalment.

Comments

[gwendraith]

Looks like Monica Edwards was flavour of the month :)

[callmemadam]

And will be for some time to come. She wrote a lot of books and I'm only reading them in bed!

[lethe1]

But what do you think of the TV series? I started watching because I love Lesley Manville, and I only found out it was written by Anthony Horowitz during the opening credits. Not generally a fan of his work, although I like this well enough.

[callmemadam]

I like it, in spite of all the changes. I'm amused that my sister, also watching it, is on quite the wrong track! That's just how a mystery should be.
I'm wondering if the ending will be altered and I hope not. Apparently, it was originally on BritBox, where not much notice was taken of it and now it's a big hit on the BBC.