JESS JUST READS

A BOOK REVIEW BLOG

The Russian Wife by Barry Maitland

When the Russian wife of the owner of one of the most valuable private collections of modern art in the UK is found dead, Detective Chief Inspector David Brock is drawn into a high-stakes world very different to his own. From the dealers and galleries in London’s West End, his investigations take him to Hanover, Miami and New York on the trail of international forgery and fraud.

At the same time, his old colleague Detective Chief Inspector Kathy Kolla, who now leads one of the Metropolitan Police Murder Investigation teams, finds herself at the wrong end of a corruption charge. With her whole career in the balance, she will do almost anything to clear her name.

Barry Maitland’s The Russian Wife is an extension of his well-loved crime series, following UK detectives David Brock and Kathy Kolla. Whilst this may be the 14th novel featuring these characters, Barry offers required explanation when referencing old storylines so that new readers don’t feel lost.

A standard police procedural, the core crime is about the apparent suicide of a Russian woman. But soon, when her lover also appears to commit suicide, it becomes clear there’s more to the story than what’s on the surface.

“They moved back out to the hall and Julian went upstairs to continue his search. Brock waited in the hallway, wondering what Miki had taken from the house in such a hurry; his mother’s computer?”

The Russian Wife is heavily embedded in the world of fine art and art fraud. Strengths include characterisation, particularly the secondary characters. Whilst it’s clear that the Russian wife’s death was not suicide at all, there are quite a few people in her life that could’ve been responsible so it does provide quite a bit of intrigue.

Whilst Barry’s writing style appears quite direct and perhaps flat, it does suit the genre well because it keeps the story stripped and fast-paced. We’re not bogged down by the writing or the prose — only relevant information is kept.

“The following day, Friday, Brock sat at his computer studying Miki Babington’s police record — three separate convictions for drug possessions and supply, two as a juvenile. He’d been lucky to avoid jail time.”

The book is let down by its Kathy Kolla storyline — it doesn’t tie in with the rest of the novel at all. She’s hunting a serial killer, and then suddenly suspended from her job over suspicion of corruption, but the problem appears to solve itself rather quickly without Kathy really doing anything. And then the storyline ends.

It’s incredibly lazy writing and completely unrealistic. The monologue confession is almost too easy, and then when the storyline wraps up Kathy merely moves on and it feels like the entire first half of the book was for nothing. It doesn’t feel like the two characters — Kathy and Brock — are working seamlessly in the book. They’re in conflict, and I think readers will feel disappointed with the plotting.

“Molly listed the three things that were necessary for an artwork to be recognised as authentic: an expert scholar of that artist’s work would have to agree that it looked right; forensic tests would have to confirm that the age and character of the work’s materials were appropriate; and there should be documentation connecting the present owner back to the artist in order to establish provenance.”

Fans of Barry’s works will enjoy this latest offering, but I do think seasoned crime and thriller readers will find themselves a little let down by the plotting of The Russian Wife.

Readership skews male, 30+

Thank you to the publisher for mailing me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

The Russian Wife
Barry Maitland
December 2021
Allen & Unwin Book Publishers

Fancy Meeting You Here by Ali Berg and Michelle Kalus

Sometimes the man of your dreams is standing right in front of you… only ten years in the past. A charming and unconventional love story about trying to rewrite history.

Evie Berry is a thirty-year-old wannabe screenwriter who spends her days managing a London cinema bar and making the podcast Pasta La Vista with her best friend Ben. She’s also obsessed with Hugo Hearst. Have you heard of him? Of course you have. He’s only one of the most influential and not to mention swoon-worthy bestselling writers of his generation.

When Evie’s not hooking up with her on-again, off-again booty call ‘Ever-Ready Freddy’ (and sometimes even when she is), she fantasises about what might have been if she’d met Hugo years ago, when he was just a struggling writer.

After Evie interviews a psychic to the stars on her podcast, her life is catapulted ten years into the past. But the grass isn’t quite as green as she remembers . . .

Romantic comedy Fancy Meeting You Here by Ali Berg and Michelle Kalus explores what it’d be like to re-live your twenties, and pursue the relationship and the life you always felt you were meant to have.

Struggling screenwriter Evie has been ‘writing’ for almost a decade, but hasn’t gotten anywhere. And she’s obsessed with the local – and incredibly famous – writer and actor Hugo Hearst. When she is unexpectedly catapulted ten years in the past, she has the opportunity to meet Hugo while he’s writing his infamous debut novel, and the two spark a connection.

“Evie felt as if she were walking on air on the way home. Apart from her excitement at actually meeting Hugo, and how well they’d seemed to get on, she also felt bolstered by what he had said about his writing process.Her obsession with getting every single word perfect was not only exhausting, but also preventing her from making any real progress.”

Charming and enjoyable, Fancy Meeting You Here is a comfort novel and one that can be devoured in a short sitting. I’m sure all of us have wondered how our lives would alter if we could go back and re-do certain years, and so there’s a universality about this book that readers can relate to. It’s also quite a quirky read — the time travel, the eccentric characters, the novel within a novel.

The premise feels unconventional and unique, so fans of this genre will enjoy the story. Despite being written in third person and solely focused on Evie’s perspective, the book feels intimate and introspective, almost as if it were written in first person. The authors capture the relationship between Evie and Hugo incredibly well — the ups and downs, the chemistry and the tension. Both Evie and Hugo possess insecurities that threaten to throw a spanner in their achievements and career trajectories, and the authors manage the delicate balance of showcasing these characteristics and crafting them to be believable and realistic without appearing over-the-top.

“When she had snuck in well after eleven o’clock, her mum and dad had been on opposite sides of the couch sipping their respective glasses of wine, the tension in the air thick with hurt and disdain.”

There are a few moments in the novel that felt overtly pointed and therefore unnecessary, for example, when Evie is back working at the cinema and feels it’s important to educate her customers and colleagues on feminism and MeToo. This felt too didactic and preachy, borderline cringe. And it was a little too coincidental that a young Freddy would appear at the cinemas while Evie is working there.

Additionally, the ending was predictable but rushed, particularly Evie’s friendship with Ben. There is not as much character development for Evie as I would’ve liked — dating Hugo feels a bit manipulative and resembling entrapment, given how obsessed she is with him and how much she knows about him in the future. I’m not sure she fully registers how unsettling her behaviour is, although I do recognise it in a lot of women’s fiction.

“Hugo looked up at Evie and her heart skipped a beat. His face was so open, his eyes serious. At that moment, he didn’t look like the swanky, celebrity Hugo Hearst. He looked like an insecure man in need of affirmation. In fact, he seemed just like her.”

Punchy and fun, Fancy Meeting You Here is recommend for readers of romance and contemporary women’s fiction. Readership skews female, 25+

Thank you to the publisher for mailing me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

Fancy Meeting You Here
Ali Berg and Michelle Kalus
December 2021
Allen & Unwin Book Publishers

Wish You Were Here by Jodi Picoult

Diana O’Toole is perfectly on track. She will be married by thirty, done having kids by thirty-five, and move out to the New York City suburbs, all while climbing the professional ladder in the cutthroat art auction world. She’s not engaged just yet, but she knows her boyfriend Finn, a surgical resident, is about to propose – days before her thirtieth birthday. Right on time.

But now she is stranded, alone on what was planned to be a romantic idyll with Finn. Unfortunately, Finn is trapped thousands of miles away, and Diana is on one of the world’s most beautiful islands with no food, no luggage, and no place to stay, forced to test her personal limits to survive.

Struggling to find her feet, Diana gradually connects with a local family when a teenager with a secret opens up to her. As Diana helps her fight her demons she learns more about herself, and about the islands of Galapagos, where Darwin developed his theory of evolution. The dramatic and sometimes dangerous terrain reflects Diana’s own experiences, her new relationships and growing awareness that she too is evolving into someone quite different.

A near-death experience brings Diana abruptly back to familiar city surroundings, where she tries to pick up the threads of her old life. Has she changed or have the people around her? Diana is no longer prepared to be just a follower, at work or in her relationships. She breaks down years of estrangement with her mother, takes the initiative in her career, and looks at Finn through new eyes.

Jodi Picoult’s latest novel Wish You Were Here follows art-enthusiast Diana after she’s stranded on a secluded beach holiday. Back at home in NYC, her surgeon boyfriend is realising first-hand how rampant and dangerous COVID is. Spending time with the locals forces Diana to re-evaluate the kind of life she thought she wanted.

From reading the blurb, I wasn’t expecting a COVID book. Diana is stranded in the Galapagos because she travels there without her boyfriend and then the world shuts down. Whilst I wasn’t thrilled at the idea of reading a COVID story — we’ve all lived through it enough for a lifetime — this story does feel universal. We can all imagine what that’d be like, getting stuck halfway across the world. We know how easily it can happen, considering how easily borders can shut — how soon places can be locked down.

“The ocean is flirting with the shore, rushing over it and then retreating. A movement draws my attention as a ragged outcropping of rock suddenly animates — not lava rock, as it turns out, but a tangle of marine iguanas that slide into the waves, diving down.”

The strength of this book lies in its depiction of COVID-19, the pandemic, and life on the front line for healthcare workers. Diana’s boyfriend is a surgeon and initially unphased when COVID infiltrates the USA. But, over time, through emails he writes to Diana, we come to understand the full extent of what COVID is like inside those hospital walls. For most of us, this is the most insight we’ll ever get, and Jodi tackles the pandemic with compassion and sensitivity. I’m sure she’ll have many readers who lost a loved one to COVID-19, and perhaps reading this latest novel might help them understand that what happened was completely outside their control.

Other strengths include how easily Jodi captures characters and their conflicts. Over time, Diana starts to question her job, her career, and her relationship, and the turmoil is handled realistically. Additionally, Jodi leaves each chapter and section with an opportunity of observation for reflection. This encourages readers to keep turning the page, feeling invited into the storyline.

“The sound comes from behind me and when I whip around, the spray of water keeps me from seeing anything. I turn away and it happens again. But this time when I turn, I’m a foot away from the curious stare of a sea lion. His eyes are black and soulful, his whiskers bob.”

Admittedly the love story between Diana and Gabriel didn’t quite feel realistic — I couldn’t help but feel it was a little rushed, as the climax of their story neared. And the friendship between Diana and Beatriz, and how Diana prompts Gabriel to re-connect with his daughter over her sexuality, felt a little didactic in its dialogue and interactions. Some of Jodi’s previous books I haven’t really liked as much because they felt a bit preach-y, and Diana and Beatriz’s relationship felt like a similar vein.

As the novel is split into two sections, Diana’s story in the Galapagos had to be established, developed and wrapped within a much shorter time frame and it did feel like there was room for expansion.

“I think of Finn, telling me to leave New York City. I think of the paid-in-full room waiting for me within walking distance of these docks. If the island is locking down for two weeks, then they must be assuming that’s how long it will take for the virus to be controlled.”

Timely and atmospheric, Wish You Were Here is part life story and part romance. It’ll make you miss international travel, and life before COVID. Although please note this book is heavily embedded within the pandemic, and some people won’t be interested in reading about it. Readership skews female, 25+

Thank you to the publisher for mailing me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

Wish You Were Here
Jodi Picoult
November 2021
Allen & Unwin Book Publishers

The Stranger in the Lifeboat by Mitch Albom

Adrift in a raft after a terrible shipwreck, ten strangers struggle to survive while they wait for rescue.

After three days, short on water, food and hope, they spot a man floating in the waves. They pull him on board – and the survivor claims he can save them.

But should they put their trust in him? Will any of them see home again? And why did the ship really sink?

Atmospheric and imaginative, Mitch Albom’s The Stranger in the Lifeboat is quite a compact novel – at just over 250 pages in a gorgeous hardback, ten shipwreck survivors try to last in a lifeboat in the middle of the ocean. Days turns to weeks, and soon their supplies are running low. When they pull in a stranger floating in the ocean, he claims to be God – the group are more worried about sharing their rations than they are about understanding where he’s come from.

The story moves back and forth between past and present. In the past, the ten survivors are on the water trying their best to last. One of them, a man named Benji, narrates this perspective and writes his experiences in a notebook. In the present, someone discovers an empty lifeboat along a secluded beach and inside is a notebook detailing what happened on that lifeboat. As the novel progresses, we come to understand what happened to the survivors and how that lifeboat ended up on the beach – empty.

“I grabbed the safety rope along its side. Whoever had been waving that flashlight was gone. I can only imagine he or she was thrown off by those waves. I tried to look for a body in the water, but another wave began curling into form, so I gripped the rope with both hands, and instantly I was tossed again.”

Mitch’s writing is poignant and the premise is enough to entice and engage until the final pages. The story and the characters’ survival is surprisingly detailed, and I found Benji’s narration inviting and compelling. You’re drawn into their secrets, and the overarching mystery around how the luxury ship sunk is a plot device designed to keep you turning pages until the very end.

Whilst not all survivors in the lifeboat are memorable, they’re not meant to be. Naturally, not everyone is going to survive until rescue, so Mitch keeps the focus centred on pivotal characters – Benji, Lambert, God, and a silent young girl called Alice.

The other pivotal storyline is that of Chief Inspector Jarty LeFleur, who is determined to find out what happened to the survivors when an empty lifeboat washes up on a deserted beach. He is still grieving the tragic death of his daughter, and the resulting estrangement from his devastated wife. Studying the lifeboat and the notebook he finds inside allows him to come to terms with what happened to his family.

“The proper protocol was to replace the bag immediately and call in higher authorities. Pass it up. Step out of the way. LeFleur knew this. But he also knew the moment he called his bosses, he would be excluded from the process.”

Admittedly, interwoven throughout the story are news reports that felt incredibly jarring. News reporters would reflect on some of the victims of the sunken ship by detailing their life to date, and I found it didn’t add anything to the overall story – to be honest, I skipped these parts entirely. Additionally, these sections interrupted the narrative flow and the pacing, taking us out of the lifeboat and somewhere else entirely – I was always interested in the survivors more than the media element of the book.

Another area of the book I couldn’t quite get behind was the dialogue and language from the character claiming to be the ‘Lord’. At times, what he said felt caricature and stereotypical, and it detracted from the otherwise-engaging scenes.

“We made vain attempts at catching fish – from trying to club them to trying to grab them over raft sides – but without a hook, there is not much chance.”

Recommended for readers of short fiction and short stories – literary readers may also find something to love in these pages. Readership skews 30+

Thank you to the publisher for mailing me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

The Stranger in the Lifeboat
Mitch Albom
November 2021
Hachette Book Publishers

A Marvellous Light by Freya Marske

Young baronet Robin Blyth thought he was taking up a minor governmental post. However, he’s actually been appointed parliamentary liaison to a secret magical society. If it weren’t for this administrative error, he’d never have discovered the incredible magic underlying his world.

Cursed by mysterious attackers and plagued by visions, Robin becomes determined to drag answers from his missing predecessor – but he’ll need the help of Edwin Courcey, his hostile magical-society counterpart. Unwillingly thrown together, Robin and Edwin will discover a plot that threatens every magician in the British Isles.

Freya Marske’s debut novel A Marvellous Light is both fantasy and queer romance, set in early 1900s Edwardian England. The confident — but slightly clueless — Robin Blyth finds himself thrust into the hidden world of magic and the victim of a curse he can’t control.

Readers will enjoy the premise of the novel, the integration of magical realism throughout the story, and the leading characters Robin and Edwin. Both these men are grappling with the situation before them — Robin, determined but ultimately in over his head, and Edwin, unfortunately plagued with meagre magic and constantly tormented by his siblings.

Notably, this is the first book in a planned series, and Freya does leave much to be answered. There is enough world-building in this as the first book, but still much to be explored in sequels.

“Robin’s second impression was that Lord Hawthorn had also been visited by disruptive thieves during the night, because the room into which they were led was a morass of belongings strewn over every surface.”

Family dynamics is a strong element in this story — how Robin and Edwin both interact with family amidst society. I can’t quite explain it, but this book feels suited to seasoned readers — those who know exactly what they’re looking for in a novel. Those who love genre fiction and romance, and unsuspecting characters thrust into an alternate world that they’re ill-prepared for. Personally, I found the opening of the novel quite slow and impenetrable, but admittedly it got better as it went on.

When Robin is attacked by thugs and finds himself cursed, he must work together with Edwin to end the curse and find the object these thugs are so desperate to uncover. Stylistically, Freya writes in third person but moves back and forth between Robin and Edwin’s POV. Freya’s writing is sharp and succinct — her description allows for emotional and depth, without being fluffy or over-the-top.

“Edwin settled himself back against the leather of the seat. It was real. The rattle of the window in its frame was real. Robert Blyth was not exactly imaginary — no, he was too solid, too broad-shouldered, his voice too loud and too warm: the voice of someone who’d never had cause to make himself smaller.”

Admittedly, I felt that the blend of magical realism and romance was not seamlessly executed. Moments of romantic tension seemed so far removed from the plot lines that the core mystery of the novel seemed forgotten. There’s a sequence of sex scenes in the middle of the novel that didn’t feel easily embedded — the rest of the novel centres entirely around the mystery element that I felt quite surprised to find sex scenes in the novel at all. Whilst they were sensual, and I’m sure they’ll be appreciated by some readers, I’m not sure they fit easily into this book where they are.

“Excitement crawled over Robin’s scalp. He didn’t think Courcey actually meant him any harm; the man was far too prickly. If he’d been trying for charm Robin might have been worried.”

Recommended for readers of fantasy romance, and perhaps magical realism. I wouldn’t recommend this book to reluctant readers. Readership skews female, 25+

Thank you to the publisher for mailing me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

A Marvellous Light
Freya Marske
November 2021
Pan Macmillan Publishers