Someone in the Attic by Andrea Mara

 

Julia’s young daughter, Isla, has been following the latest craze on her phone where, through the wonders of photoshop (or some such), it appears that a black clad figure can emerge from the attic into the living area of a specific house, when one day Isla realises the house she is looking at is the same one she and her family have moved into after their arrival in Ireland from America.

There have been lots of books with a stranger in the attic theme, they are always creepy, and this one is no exception. It has the usual elements of fear and suspense but also explores making evidence fit a narrative. When videos keep coming showing more of the interior of the house and they have obviously not been made from copies of Isla’s  earlier posts, Julia has to try and work out who is targeting the house and why, and this involves delving into her past before she left Ireland.

There are some great red herrings and I did lots of second guessing which made this a most enjoyable book for me. I am a rusted-on Andrea Mara fan, and Someone in the Attic did it for me, as always.

Published by Penguin

The Piano Woman by Rozzi Bazzani

 

The Piano Woman by Rozzi Bazzani is a dual timeline story, one of my favourite genres. Maddison, a successful novelist living in Melbourne, is surprised to receive a letter from a solicitor in England informing her that she is the last surviving female relative of Lady Rose Hampton of Hebden in Kent, and it has taken many ears to find her. As such, Maddie reads, she has inherited an antique grand piano.

Maddie has been going through a troubling time, having discovered the man she loved had been pretty much a serial betrayer; to make matters worse, she is experiencing writer’s block for the first time, and the deadline for her new book is looming. Maddie has been an orphan since she was eighteen when her mother died, and has only vague memories of her grandmother, Abigail, who had died years before then. She makes a decision to go to Kent to claim her inheritance and, hopefully, learn about her family background.

This is a beautiful story which, as Maddie is finding connections to her English relatives in the present day, switches to the early twentieth century. The main characters are easy to keep track of because of each one’s individuality and it was easy to picture them and become lost in the drama, mystery and romance they were all part of. It is a very different book to the Detective Bec Harpin series, and just as engrossing. I read it in a day because I couldn’t put it down!

Top marks, Rozzi.

Published by S & B Books

A Sociopath’s Guide to a Successful Marriage by M K Oliver

Lalla Rook is a sociopath who will destroy (sometimes literally) anyone who gets in her way. She is very good at committing the most heinous crimes, blaming them on other people and getting away with them. The secret to Lalla’s success is that she is able to convince herself that the stories she comes up with in covering up her crimes are true, and sticking by them causes her no problems at all.

Lalla is the fascinating, mesmerising creation of M K Oliver, a man who has taken the brave step of writing in the first person from a woman’s point of view. Of course, Lalla, having no moral compass, is not your average woman and her innermost thoughts are up for grabs.

Although Lalla is incapable of loving other humans, I was pleased to see she has a degree of fondness for her cat.  Being a cat lady myself, I understand this perfectly. This book is great fun in a thieving, conniving, murderous kind of way and I’ve got to say I loved it.

Top marks, Mr Oliver!

Published by Harper Collins

How to Kill a Guy in Ten Dates by Shailee Thompson

 

Jamie has been working for a year on her dissertation: “All’s Fair in Love and Gore: The Intersection of Romantic Comedies and Slasher Films in the Late Twentieth and Early Twenty-First Centuries”, towards her PhD in Cinema Studies at NYU. She takes a break from her studies to have a night out with her best friend, Laurie. They are going speed dating.

After a promising start to the evening it becomes apparent to Jamie  that life is imitating art as she and Laurie find themselves in the middle of a slasher-movie scenario. Fortunately, Jamie has memorised a list of ten ways to survive a slasher, and the book then follows the story of the rest of the evening.

Wild and wacky, weird and wonderful and all that sort of thing, this is an immensely entertaining book, and like nothing I have ever read before. The rom-com bits are sweet and touching amongst all the gore and had me hoping desperately for a happy ending; I mean, I’ve watched lots of rom-coms but my only experiences of slasher movies have been accidental glimpses as I leave a room where someone else is watching one, so I didn’t know how it would end.

It was a riotous read, and great fun, and I would recommend it to anyone whose sense of humour has no set boundaries! Top marks, Shailee Thompson.

Published by Simon & Schuster.