Hosted by Lipsy Lost & Found my Wednesday post gives you a taste of what I am reading this week. A similar meme is run by Taking on a World of Words
I am currently reading The Dress Thief by Natalie Meg Evens as a change from all things dark and dastardly.
Blurb
Alix Gower may be poor but she’s also ambitious, and she’d do anything to secure her dream job in one of Paris’s premier fashion houses. But Alix also has a secret: she supports her family by stealing from the very houses she so adores.
But can Alix risk her reputation and her relationships forever? And is the handsome English reporter she keeps bumping into really to be trusted? Amazon
I have just finished reading Poison Panic: Arsenic deaths in 1840s Essex by Helen Barrell as I thought it was perfect timing, now that we are thinking about the big Christmas dinner, to brush up on poisoners…
Blurb
For a few years in the 1840s, Essex was notorious in the minds of Victorians as a place where women stalked the winding country lanes looking for their next victim to poison with arsenic. It’s a terrible image – and also one that doesn’t seem to have much basis in truth – but this was a time of great anxiety.
The 1840s were also known as the ‘hungry ’40s’, when crop failures pushed up food prices and there was popular unrest across Europe. The decade culminated in a cholera epidemic in which tens of thousands of people in the British Isles died. It is perhaps no surprise that people living through that troubled decade were captivated by the stories of the ‘poisoners’: that death was down to ‘white powder’ and the evil intentions of the human heart.
Sarah Chesham, Mary May and Hannah Southgate are the protagonists of this tale of how rural Essex, in a country saturated with arsenic, was touched by the tumultuous 1840s. Amazon
Next I intend to read Give Me The Child by Mel McGrath which was published to great acclaim earlier this year.
Blurb
Imagine your doorbell rings in the middle of the night.
You open the door to the police.
With them is your husband’s eleven-year-old love child. A daughter you never knew he had.
Her mother has been found dead in their south London flat.
She has nowhere else to go.
WOULD YOU TAKE HER IN? Amazon
What do you think? Any of these take your fancy? Please do leave your thoughts in the comments box below.
Wow, Give Me the Child looks sooo good…I have to read it! Thanks for sharing, and enjoy all of your books. The Dress Thief looks tempting, too. Here’s MY WWW POST
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It looks so good, I’m hoping to get to it very soon! Thanks for visiting 🙂
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I like the look of The Dress Thief and think may already be on my tbr somewhere.
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Give Me The Child sounds good. I seem to have missed this one so need to add to the list x
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Hahaha! Well, I certainly won’t be gatecrashing your Christmas dinner, that’s for sure! That one does sound like fun though – is it fictionalised or non-fiction? I couldn’t really tell from the blurb.
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You may just have uncovered my cunning plan to reduce the number of guests this year… 😉
It is a non-fiction book covering some trials of ‘poisoners’ which makes for fascinating reading. My poisoner books are at eye-level from the dining table…
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🤣
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Like Fiction Fan said, if you were going to invite me to Christmas dinner, after that comment about poisoners, er, sorry, I have other plans 😁
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Haha perhaps that’s why I advertise my interest of poisoners so widely at this time of year – current guest list 10 – lets see how much it reduces before the big day 🙂
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I have to say, Cleo, that Poison Panic looks good. I always enjoy finding out more about true-life crime as well as fiction crime, and that one sounds like an interesting perspective on it.
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Poison Panic was a great read full of historical details about the ‘crimes’ committed.
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I read Give me the Child a few months ago and really enjoyed it. The author is also lovely! It’s very suspenseful, and I had sick feeling of dread the entire time I read it…
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Oh good to know – I like that point where you are so wrapped up in the story you’re dreading what is coming next!
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Give Me The Child sounds amazing! 🙂
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Doesn’t it just, I’m hoping for a few spare hours (don’t know where I intend to find them) to read it!
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I loved Give Me the Child. I can’t wait to read your review!
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Oh wow, Give Me the Child sounds intense. I’d like to think I’d take the kid in though – not their fault- but man, that would be tough!!
-Lauren
http://www.shootingstarsmag.net
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All three of your books look and sound great. I’d be hard pressed to choose which to read first.
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Oh I must start Give Me The Child! I’m currently engrossed in If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio – so addictive. Also Jenn Ashworth’s A Kind Of Intimacy, which I got in Waterstones for £1 in the sale a couple of years ago. Just started it, but v v promising!
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