Reviews 

Another library book via P. I am not reading at all fluently at the moment; this was quite a good book but I didn’t really enjoy it at...

I hate this but after about 160 pages I gave up on this. It was all unmitigated hard work. So I didn’t progress any further. Very...

I don’t know when I last read this book, but I thought it was absolutely wonderful this time round. It is quite beautifully constructed;...

Rescued a load of rather low grade thrillers from the attic in a search for other books, as in Simon Raven novels, none of which I could...

Bought this with the last chunk of a Xmas book voucher, because it was well positioned in Waterstones as you went through the door. I...

Bought this, slightly conned by Waterstones’ promotion, as it is being serialised on the TV. Don’t think I have read a Le Carré since...

I think this guy is good. Hard to summarise this thematically, as there a multiple strands – Richard I’s attempt to recover the Cross...

A wonderful book and change from Zola by a writer I had never heard of. Cartwright writes about modern South Africa from a liberal...

Lots of books to read at the moment, as I cashed in my Waterstones voucher which D gave me for my birthday. This was shortlisted in some...

I read this to compare and contrast with no.342 above, and despite being better known and perhaps regarded, I thought it was pretty dire....

Had been meaning, not very actively, to re-read this for some time, partly to remind myself of the plot. It is actually very good. What...

This year’s aeroplane read. Never read any Michael Connelly before and, by chance, this looks like a re-issue of his first published...

A bit of a need to read something masculine and classic (no connection meant) after the above. Leaves thinks highly of this, and, having...

This is totally different; a kind of 17th century 'Brokeback Mountain'. It is huge in scope, covering bloody bits of the civil war which...

Marketed (a bit) as the new John Le Carré, I thought perhaps it was at first, but it is actually quite derivative (of Le Carré). The plot...

It took me six chapters and nearly 100 pages to find out what I wanted to know. Chapter 7 summarises the recent Middle East history,...

Paddy got this from the library and enjoyed it, initially. I didn’t; it is the sort of book I can’t really see the point of writing,...

John Harvey is obviously a friend of Connelly and recommended him. This was one of the courtroom, as opposed to more overt, thrillers,...

I found this very dull until about the last two chapters when it suddenly blazed into life. Perhaps Carey’s early life was dull as the...

Not sure what pointed me in this direction; maybe a surfeit of detective novels. I had read this may years before (bought my copy in...