books for holidays – Cristina Sanders' blog

Vianne – book review

Vianne, by Joanne Harris

Nice bit of fanciful storytelling, bit too ‘woo woo’ for me, but hey, it’s coming up to Christmas and this will be a really good present for one of your friends. I asked my local bookseller for a recommendation for something easy and fun, but not rubbish. Not every book needs to be a lit masterpiece but every book must be well written for its audience and have a point, must delight in some way. Vianne, prequel to the splendid Chocolat, is full of entertaining and wistful romps around Marseilles, which was enough to keep me happily engaged. Read it in the hammock if your Christmas is southern hemisphere, or curled up by the fire through the dark afternoons up north.

The Bookshop Dectectives, Dead Girl Gone – Book Review

The bookshop Detectives, Dead Girl Gone, by Gareth and Louise Ward

A disclosure before I write this review. I know these guys. They are good friends and their bookshop is my local. I love the shop, I love the staff, and I love them. They are terrifically supportive of local writers. That makes writing an honest review of The Bookshop Detectives either very difficult or absolutely lovely and, (well, you can guess what is coming as I don’t review books I don’t like) this is one hundred percent the latter. It’s terrific.

Corkscrew You – book review

Corkscrew You, by Catherine Robertson

OK, enough of the serious stuff – fancy something feel-good, easy to read and quite a bit saucy? Catherine Robertson has just launched two vineyard romances, the first in the Flora Valley series, and they are exactly what romances should be. Smoking hot (4 chillies, my friends), all the sex is consensual and, frankly, glorious. The characters are well rounded but as hand-picked as a 1980s pop band – there is the bubbly one, the smart one, the cool executive type, the strong silent one, sporty, ginger – you get the picture. They all bring different things to the party.

Good Material – book review

Good Material, by Dolly Alderton

Andy’s long term girlfriend Jen, with whom has been living for a few years, has broken up with him. He is a scruffy English comedian (I couldn’t help but imagine Josh Widdicombe in the role), not doing so well on the circuit, not hugely ambitious. He thought himself happy with Jen in their ‘tribe of two’ and with their mutual best friends, who have forged ahead, married, started a family while he and Jen roll unburdened into their mid-thirties. The unexpected breakup knocks him sideways. Andy makes his living out of observing others and making comments on the human condition and ‘Good Material’ eventually comes out of his break up. But hell, does he have to suffer for it.

The Night She Fell–book review

The Night She Fell, by Eileen Merriman

Eileen Merriman is delightful. I shared accommodation with her at a book festival last year and we sat by the fire in the evenings drinking wine and chatting about writing, YA books, families, life. I should have locked my door.

Forgotten on Sunday–book review

Forgotten on Sunday, by Valé Perrin

This was a recommendation from my French Canadian friend. She’s young. All her friends loved it. Valérie Perrin is a best selling author in France, and her previous novel Fresh Water for Flowers was a massive hit. But does it work in translation and enchant an older audience? Hell, yes.

Pineapple Street – book review

Pineapple Street, by Jenny Jackson

I asked around for a read that was entertaining and not at all intellectually challenging and Pineapple Street delivered, certainly on the second point. I’m not convinced that it is “wryly funny” or “acutely observed” as billed, or why it is recommended by the New York Times, except for the fact that it is very New York, but there are plenty of those books about. Some women in a super rich family have angst, worry about money and class and are fearful of the domineering matriarch.

Atlas, the story of Pa Salt–book review

Atlas, the Story of Pa Salt by Lucinda Riley and Harry Whittaker

“Everything will be revealed” is promised on the cover and the book absolutely delivers ad nauseam, but no worries, if you’re a fan of ‘less is more’ fiction you won’t have made it this far anyway. The Seven Sisters is a voluminous commitment. A terrific series, I would suggest, for when you’re in isolation for six months or have just moved to a new town and don’t have any friends. It’s a marvellously plot-driven story of beautiful, rich, interesting yet uncomplicated people, who jet around the world, find a birthright and fall in love. I’ve reviewed a few of the others here. Yes, I confess I have read all but one and enjoyed them, although still cringing at the ongoing shivers (there are ten shivers in Atlas and five of them run down spines). I finished the story today as I waited with a torn hamstring for hours to see a doctor. I can honestly say, hand on heart, in a hospital waiting room (and on kindle because the paperback is too heavy), this is the perfect book. You can’t start with Atlas, though, because you’ll have no idea what is going on.

The Axeman’s Carnival – book review

The Axeman’s Carnival by Catherine Chidgey

Last book of the year and an absolute favourite. I devoured this in a couple of long sessions after Christmas and it’s a splendid read, just perfect to take on holiday (or mooch in the hammock at home ignoring things, as I did). I hand on heart recommend this to anyone. It’s such a great yarn. Very rural kiwi.

Three Woman and a Boat–book review

Three Women and a Boat, by Anne Youngson

Inspired, of course, by Jerome K Jerome’s Three Men in a Boat, but updated and given a gender twist, Three Women and a Boat is a feminist book. All three of the women characters (four, including a young friend) are out in the world without being beholden to, or reliant on men. They’re complete. There are men around, but the story is not about their relationships, but the women themselves. And there’s a dog like the one in Jerome’s version, who sparks some of the action, as dogs tend to do.

Anastasia has lived most of her life on a canal barge. But she’s ill, needs to take a break for treatments and is looking for someone to take her boat, The Number One, north to the yards in Uxbridge to get overhauled.

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