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  Published: 2020, Penguin Books Genre: Fiction Themes: Slavery, American Southern States, supernatural powers My rating (out of 5): ❤❤❤❤ Over the last year I have read several books that tackle the unimaginably difficult topic of slavery, and I have every respect for authors who give a voice to all those people who had no voice for the whole of their lives.  The Water Dancer carefully captures life for the slaves living on a huge plantation in Virginia, where the owner grows tobacco as a main crop, and has so many 'Tasked' working for him that their humble cabins form an entire street.  This is where we find young Hiram who is the son of the white estate owner and his enslaved mother has just been taken away to be sold. Ta-Nehisi Coates then introduces an unexpected twist to the story of Hiram and that is the ability to perform 'Conduction' and transport his body out of danger when he is under great stress.  I have to confess that I struggled with a fantasy ele...

  Published: 2020, Peepal Tree Genre: Fiction Themes: Islands of Central America, legend, ancient tribes, historic legacy My rating (out of 5):  ❤❤❤❤ A thousand years before the story begins, the Mermaid of Black Conch was a young woman living with her tribe on a tiny island in the Caribbean Sea.  She had yet to find a husband, and the other women in her village grew jealous of her as the sound of her voice and the sinuous movements of her dancing drew much attention from their men.  These women conspired against her, and using a powerful curse, they turned her into a mermaid doomed to swim in the depths of the oceans for all time. She remained hidden for hundreds of years, but one day in 1976, drawn to the sound of a local fisherman strumming his guitar, she raised her barnacled, seaweed-clotted head from the sea.  David Baptiste meant her no harm and returned to the same spot day after day to lure her back and gain her trust, but later he came to realise that ...

  Published:  2021, Harper Collins Genre: Fiction Themes:  Antarctic research, extreme weather, communications, injury My rating (out of 5):  ❤❤❤❤ Before starting this book you will need to switch your imagination to 'wide screen' and channel your inner David Attenborough as you picture the stark white landscape of Antarctica.  You must be prepared to mentally stand in the extreme cold and feel the force of the wind crashing against your body while you watch the field workers go about their business.  Jon McGregor will take you across the ice and snow with Robert 'Doc' Wright, a veteran of the Antarctic, and his two young researchers Luke and Thomas and very quickly you will understand the constant danger of just being in that environment. When an unauthorised expedition goes wrong, the whole team are plunged into mortal danger, and each man finds himself alone and fighting for his life against the elements.  What happens next tests the limits of their...

  Published: 2019. First time in English 2020, Bloomsbury Genre: Fiction Themes:  Spanish Civil War, love, family, Chile, political refugees My rating (out of 5):  ❤❤❤❤❤ Inside the back cover of this book it says that Isabel Allende is one of the most widely read authors in the world, and her books have been translated into at least forty-two languages selling more than seventy-four million copies.  After reading A Long Petal of the Sea, I fully understand why. The story begins in 1939, at the end of the Spanish Civil War, when half a million refugees escaped Franco by walking from Spain to France.  They walked through bitterly cold conditions, with barely enough food to keep them alive, and among their numbers was a heavily pregnant young woman called Roser who was leaving without the baby's father Guilleme.  He is away fighting for the Republican Army so her escape is enabled by his brother, Victor, who carries her carefully in the sidecar of an old motor...

  Published: 2000, Headline Publishing Group Genre: Fiction Themes:  Family, mental health, loyalty, bereavement My rating (out of 5):  ❤❤❤❤ Imagine you wrote a gripping multi-generational family story, and just as you were about to set off to the publisher with the hard-copy, the wind took your pages and scattered them all across the street.  You hastily pick everything up and head to your appointment intending to put the pages in order during the cab journey, but on the way you realise:  This works. Well, I'm sure that's not what happened at all, but that's what reading this book feels like.  You start almost at the end, then you bounce back about twenty years, then just over the page you are back to present time in a whole new setting.  The narrator can change several times within one chapter, and there are no headings to give you a steer, so there will be no skim-reading here.  Maggie O'Farrell wants your full attention, and she gets it, becau...

  Published: 2020, Myriad Editions Genre: Fiction Themes: Love story, Irish famine, slavery, nineteenth century America My rating (out of 5): ❤❤❤❤❤ Based on the true story of the author's great-great-grandparents, this is a fictionalised account of a forbidden love that defied all the societal rules in nineteenth century America. Sarah is a house slave working for the owner of a cotton plantation and Henry is an Irish immigrant who came to America on a coffin ship having fled the famine in his own country.  They meet on a dirt road as Sarah is returning to her owners after a few days of being rented out to a neighbour, and Henry is a jobbing blacksmith travelling along looking for work.  They both have to shelter under a tree when a violent thunderstorm brings torrential rain and Henry has his first encounter with a slave. Henry has always known hunger and poverty but until he came to America he has never known of people being owned as property and treated as th...

  Published: 2020, Penguin Random House Genre:  Fiction Themes: parenting, death of a friend, road trip, stand up comedy My rating (out of 5):  ❤❤❤❤ If you ever feel in need of a book that will give you a hug and tell you that everything will be alright, then this is the book for you.  You will quickly come to love little Norman Foreman, who is only twelve years old and suffers from terrible psoriasis, but you won't care because this is a boy who deserves to be loved. Norman and his Mum are a family of two and he has never met his father as Mum isn't entirely sure who he is: ' There's a good chance Norman's father is one of four people.  Now I know how that makes me sound, but it's a fairly reasonable alternative to the other scenario, which is that he would quite possibly have been one of several more if circumstances had allowed.' Mum (Sadie) is warm and kind with a wicked sense of humour and there is nothing in the world that she wouldn't do for Norma...