Sam's Fireside - Cosy Book Reviews & Recommendations

“People are willfully blind if it’s something they don’t want to believe.” 👀 I listened to The Lake of Lost Girls for the #LetsEarItAudiobookChallenge for May 🎧📖. One thing it has confirmed for me is that I don't enjoy a podcast within a book, particularly when it's an audiobook 😅 While the story itself was brilliant ✨, with an ending I did not see coming 😳, the podcast narrators spoilt it for me. One was supposed to have an English accent 🇬🇧 and the other an American accent 🇺🇸. However, never have I ever heard anyone speaking with an English accent like that! 😬 Just hire one narrator from each country, for heaven's sake! That aside, I really enjoyed the dual-timeline storyline 🔄, which switched between 1998 and 2022, with a different sister taking centre stage in each timeline—Jessica in 1998 and Lindsey in 2022 👭. I loved how each suspect was built up to the point where I was convinced it might be them 🕵️‍♀️, only for the plot to head off in a completely diff...

“There’s no need to be afraid of the dead. 👻 It’s the living you have to watch out for. 😬” I first listened to Daisy Darker back in 2022 when I was on holiday in Cyprus. 🌞 We had moved out of one house and our new one wasn’t ready, so we were nomads for about a month! 🧳 Because I had so much going on, I never got around to writing a review, so when #thatbonkersbookclub decided to read it in April, it was the ideal opportunity to pick the book up again and finally write my thoughts. ✍️ Now, considering I don’t remember what I had for dinner last night, it came as no surprise that I didn’t remember much of what happened. 😅 No spoilers for those of you who haven’t read it, but I did remember all there was to know about Daisy! It was just as thrilling a read as last time around — characters I wanted to smack, others I felt like throwing in the sea 🌊, and one or two who definitely needed a huge hug. 🤗 I do enjoy a locked-room murder mystery; it often makes me think I’ll be able to wo...

“Have dinner ready… be happy to see your husband and greet him with a warm smile.” The Woman in the Cabin was my April read for the @hook.me.a.book challenge – the  #NeglectedFaithfulsReadingChallenge – and a book that’s been sitting on my shelf for way too long 📚✨ It was dark, full of all sorts of wrongness… and I loved it so much 😈 I had to keep reading. I needed to know if Mary was going to be okay 😰, whether the control-freak husband was going to hurt her 😡, and just what other madness he had up his sleeve 👀 I think this book will send readers one of two ways: you’ll either be completely intrigued (like I was) and desperate to keep turning the pages 📖🔥, or you’ll be hugely frustrated by our female main character — like, kill the b*****d already! 😤 And if you’re big on women’s rights, this might make you properly angry at how any man could treat a woman like this 💔 However you feel, if you enjoy a captive thriller, you’re going to love this one 🖤 If you’re thinking of ...

"The feeling of being watched was just a symptom of her anxiety..." 👀 Full disclosure, I read this one over two years ago, but for some reason I didn't write a review, so when @megbatsbooks wanted someone to buddy read it with her, I thought it would be fun to read it again and see if I remembered much of it. 📚 I remembered bits correctly, particularly who one of the dodgy characters was, but I was wrong about other parts. I had killed someone off, but in fact he was alive and kicking at the end! 😅 Having worked for the NHS for many years, I understand and appreciate the lack of funding, lack of staff, lack of beds, etc. But this story goes way past the normal everyday frustrations and shows a deeper, darker (thankfully incredibly rare) and fictional insight into what happens when one or two unstable people take control. 🏥 Talk about gaslighting at work - poor Dr Wilson must have thought she was going round the twist when all the unexplainable things were happening t...

"2020 has a sci-fi ring to it, I feel, like it might be the year of alien landings 👽 or the one when the gamma rays get us." The Other Passenger is my March read for @hook.me.a.book challenge – the #NeglectedFaithfulsReadingChallenge 📚. It reminded me of why I enjoy a thriller, and after reading this I have decided to try and read some more this year. Let's see how that works out! 🤞 The story switches between the beginning of 2019 and the end, as we roll over into 2020, with Jamie as the most unreliable narrator I've ever heard — honestly — by the middle of the book, I wasn't trusting a word he said! 😅 I was kept guessing throughout The Other Passenger. Just when I raised my eyebrows and thought to myself, "really, that's a poor twist, I don't like that if it's the ending", Louise threw a complete curveball ⚾, turned the story on its head and went streaking off in a completely different direction, which had me hooked all over again! Even ...

“We’ve got to treat men like humans, even if some do inhuman things.” My third of @hook.me.a.book challenges is the #NeglectedFaithfulsReadingChallenge, which I’m using to read physical books that have been sitting on my actual shelf for far too long! 📚✨ First up is Truth Be Told by Kia Abdullah, the second book in the Zara Kaleel series. I’ve just checked and I read the first one at the end of 2022, so yes — I’m a bit behind! 😅 In my experience, male assault isn’t something that’s covered often in books, and it’s a difficult subject to write about. However, Kia handles it with sensitivity and a great deal of research, which I really appreciated. 💛 Zara has her own issues to deal with alongside her work as an assault counsellor, and then she takes on Kamran’s case — not an easy one to manage. I went through a whole range of emotions while reading this: angry, empathetic, and sad, often towards the same characters. 😡💔 The immaturity of youth is portrayed in the boys who attended Ha...

"Hurricanes aren’t just weather; they are monsters that never truly die.” The Storm was my second January listen for another of @hook.me.a.book’s challenges, the #LetsEarItAudiobookChallenge 🎧📚. I’d been seeing this one everywhere on Instagram over the past few weeks, so I finally got around to listening. It took me a while to get into it. The build-up was slow, and I found it took a minute to get to grips with all the different characters — particularly in audio format, where each character had a different narrator 🎙️. However, once I’d heard from them all, I was hooked and the pace picked up more and more. Alongside the multiple points of view, the story also uses a dual timeline — just to confuse me and intrigue me a little further ⏳🤔. After all the twists and turns, I still couldn’t fully work out what had happened in the past or how it was going to play out in the present, especially as the latest hurricane headed towards St Medard’s Bay 🌪️. As the story peaked, I found ...

"How could he have betrayed his beautiful wife like that?" This was one of my January listens for another one of @hook.me.a.book challenges. This time it's the #LetsEarItAudiobookChallenge. I'm pretty sure this is my first Susan Lewis book, and I really enjoyed it. 😊 Of course, I spent most of the story trying to second-guess what was actually happening, but apart from a few inklings, I didn’t see the twist coming at all until it was fully explained. 😲 No One Saw It Coming is told from multiple points of view, but I never felt confused. It was easy to move between perspectives, and I very quickly became invested in each character and desperate to know what would happen next. 📖💭 A great deal of research has clearly gone into the mental health aspects of this novel, and they’re portrayed both sensitively and realistically. It’s quite frightening, really, how sometimes we just can’t understand how someone else’s brain is wired. 🧠 Now that I’ve read one, I’ll definit...

'The illusion of some level of democracy over there keeps the people satisfied.' I have had this book on my shelf for a couple of years (sorry Russell), 🙈 but as the second book in the series is out next week, I decided I would read them back to back. Of course I hadn't looked at the synopsis for ages and so I had no idea what I was getting into, and admittedly it did take me a while to get to grips with the characters, the story and the slight weirdness of it all. However, once I'd got all that sorted in my head, I flew through it.  Britannia Rises starts off a bit slow, but once it gets going the pace really picks up. Before I knew it, I was racing through the pages trying to keep up with the action.. The book is a dystopian take on an alternative view on the monarchy and Britain as we know it. Gone are the days of our adorable Queen, and in steps her son, and more importantly, her grandson who is set to change our country as we know it. All this is in the book, don...

"'You have no idea how much we've saved,' Marina said. I was more worried about how much they'd spent." Quick off the start and a fast pace all the way to the finish line! Dark Horse is another surefire winner from Felix Francis. I devoured Dick Francis books as a teenager, and Felix has expertly picked up the reins to continue his father’s legacy. Sorry — was that a bit corny?! 😂 Imogen is our protagonist, and although she can come across as a bit over-dramatic, she does have good reason. She ditches her controlling and abusive boyfriend and moves to another country for a fresh start. From there, with the occasional high point, it’s pretty much a downhill ride — and not in a good way! There are also little touches of humour scattered throughout — the quote I used at the beginning  made me laugh, and there are lots of little snippets like this throughout.  Dark Horse is a quick read, with lots going on and an ending I definitely didn’t see coming. If you’re n...

'She's turned her lemons into the equivalent of a lemonade conglomerate.' If an author asks me to read their book, I’ll skim the synopsis, say yes or no, and then forget all about it — so I usually go in blind. It could be fantasy, romance, or thriller and I’d have no clue until I start reading! That’s exactly what happened here. When I picked up The Bystander on Sunday, I was a little cautious (as I often am with debut novels), but I needn’t have worried. I was hooked from the very beginning — mystery, suspense, thrills, and even a few cringe-worthy moments! The story felt unique — I’ve never read anything quite like it. The description mentions a shooting, but things quickly take an unexpected turn I didn’t see coming. It also shines a light on issues that are more common than many of us might realize, which made it all the more impactful. Corruption, deceit, violence, and even a dash of romance — if you love a thriller with all that wrapped in, definitely grab a copy of ...