Stacking the Shelves/The Sunday Post

Posted May 31, 2025 by Nicky in General / 16 Comments

Hello again, folks! This one’s been written in advance since I’ll be out today, so here’s hoping I haven’t missed anything…

Books acquired this week

None… yet! Today I’m off to York to visit Portal Bookshop and Criminally Good Books, so I imagine there’ll be new books to show off next week. Gotta stock up, since my first exam is on Monday — books to help me relax definitely needed!

Posts from this week

As usual, let’s have a bit of a review roundup!

Fantasy: Drake Hall, by Christina Baehr (3/5 stars)
Classic crime: The Banquet Ceases, by Mary Fitt (4/5 stars)
Poetry: Rapture, by Carol Ann Duffy (5/5 stars)
Non-fiction: A Brief History of the Countryside in 100 Objects, by Sally Coulthard (3/5 stars)
Fantasy manhwa: Solo Leveling, vol 1, by Dubu & Chugong (3/5 stars)
Fantasy: Advocate, by Daniel M. Ford (3/5 stars)
Mystery: Unravelled Knots, by Emmuska Orczy (2/5 stars)

What I’m reading

This week I’ve been focusing on finishing up my books for my Bookspin Bingo card on Litsy. That slowed me up a bit as some of them were slower reads, but here’s what I’ve finished this week and plan to review on the blog at some point:

Today (Saturday) won’t have a lot of time for reading, but I do want to finish Sorcery and Small Magics (Maiga Doocy) today, to get a bingo on my Bookspin Bingo card on Litsy (latest version here!). Sunday I’ll just read whatever strikes me as fun, since my first exam is on Monday (as mentioned above) and I want to be nice and relaxed for it.

In case you were wondering if I ought to be studying, nope: it’s an open book exam, I won’t know the complex material any better for looking at it for two extra days, and because it’s a gruelling experience (8-10 hours of work) I really need to be rested and refreshed.

Hope everyone’s having a good weekend!

Linking up with Reading Reality’s Stacking the Shelves, Caffeinated Reviewer’s The Sunday Post, and the Sunday Salon over at Readerbuzz, as usual!

Tags: books, Stacking the Shelves, weekly roundup

Review – Unravelled Knots

Posted May 30, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Unravelled Knots

by Emmuska Orczy

Genres: Crime, Mystery
Pages: 288
Series: The Old Man in the Corner #3
Rating: two-stars

Synopsis:
Unravelled Knots, created by Baroness Orczy, author of the famous Scarlet Pimpernel series, contains thirteen short stories about Bill Owen, aka The Old Man in the Corner, Orzy's armchair detective who solves crimes for his own entertainment.

His listener and protégé is the attractive young journalist Polly Burton. Polly brings him details of obscure crimes baffling the police, which he helps her to solve. She is fascinated by the unlikely unravelings she hears, but despite her sarcasm and pride in her own investigative talents she remains the learner, impressed in spite of herself.

This is the last of three books of short stories featuring the detective and follows on from those in The Old Man In the Corner and The Case of Miss Elliot.

Emmuska Orczy’s “Old Man in the Corner” stories have an interesting format, whereby the Old Man sits in a teashop and explains various criminal cases that have puzzled the police to a young female journalist. Unravelled Knots contains the last of the stories, with the final one ending on a curious note — it’s not common for the detective in mysteries of this period to be potentially the actual criminal, though there are other examples (Agatha Christie having famously done it, too).

I’m not a huge fan of the Old Man in the Corner and the “solving cases by logic” method he uses, which I’d encountered several times before in various anthologies in the British Library Crime Classics series. There’s not much of a continuous story, and the narrator is mostly a non-entity, so it’s probably better encountered in that bitesize way if you’re not really a fan of that format.

The most interesting thing about reading it like this for me was that ending and the note of ambiguity there. Definitely an interesting way to end things.

Rating: 2/5

Tags: book reviews, books, crime, Emmuska Orczy, mystery

Review – Advocate

Posted May 29, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Advocate

by Daniel M. Ford

Genres: Fantasy, Mystery
Pages: 496
Series: The Warden #3
Rating: three-stars

Synopsis:
Aelis de Lenti is back on her home turf, but it's not quite as welcoming as she remembered....

Recalled from Lone Pine to investigate claims of murder by magic against her mentor—legendary Warden Bardun Jacques—Aelis takes to the streets of the grand city of Lascenise, and plumbs the deepest secrets of the Lyceum to clear his name. Certain of her success, she doesn't count on thieves, subterranean labyrinths, or the assassins that dog her steps from the moment she leaves her tower.

Behind all of it lurks a ring of unknown wizards who can seemingly reach anyone with their magic. Without knowing who she can trust, Aelis must gather what allies she can to unravel the web of intrigue, murder, smuggling, and theft originating in the halls of magic power. With an old friend from her college days, a war-haunted gnome thief-catcher, and the advice of her imprisoned advisor, Aelis races to save lives and expose a conspiracy that seeks to change the face of the world.

I received a copy of this book for free in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

In some ways, Daniel M. Ford’s Advocate was enfuriating. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still enjoying the story and the world, but everything Aelis’ friends and allies point out to her about not planning ahead, being a bull in a china shop, trampling on other people on her way up — it’s all true, and Aelis hears it and is hurt by it and claims to take it on board… and then keeps doing it!

If she could plan ahead just a little, use her allegedly amazing brain just a bit, she could see so much of this coming, including each of the obvious-as-heck twists at the end.

I want Aelis to be brilliant, once-in-a-generation, able to kick anyone’s ass, but I do want her to earn it. She keeps saying that she has, but then she gets by on vibes, large amounts of money spread around, and what seems like frankly unearned loyalty from her friends and family. She is a good healer, and I mean both technically skilled and driven to help people regardless of their status, station or feelings toward her — even when they’ve wronged her. She’s also loyal to Bardun Jacques, her teacher, but unfortunately to the point of stepping on everyone else’s faces to help him (including people she also owes loyalty). She doesn’t deserve Miralla’s friendship, in particular. And she sees literally nothing coming until way too late.

Sometimes Ford does lampshade this by having her friends say so, but they remain her friends and support her cause and forgive her, no matter what happens, so it doesn’t have much bite.

The more I think about it, the more annoying I found this in Advocate. Aelis just isn’t learning, and we’re three books in. I’d read the next book, because the magic systems of this world are cool, and Aelis’ passion for being a warden and serving people is enjoyable to read about… but in the next book I need to see Aelis face some actual consequences or grow up, or I might have to be done with the series.

It was cool to see the Lyceum, learn more about some of the Archmagisters, and see a bit of the world outside of Lone Pine, though.

Rating: 3/5

Tags: book reviews, books, Daniel M. Ford, mystery, SF/F

WWW Wednesday

Posted May 28, 2025 by Nicky in General / 5 Comments

Yep, it’s that time again!

What have you recently finished reading?

I juuust finished Daniel M. Ford’s Advocate last night. It’s the third book in a series, and there are definitely still things I’m enjoying about the series, but holy crap Aelis really doesn’t learn. You’d swear there was going to be a narrative arc of her getting less arrogant and less inclined to use other people on her climb upwards, but there’s no sign of it yet. I started to find her massively annoying, and really, if she’s supposed to be so clever then there are several twists she should’ve seen coming.

Anyway, my full review will talk about all that at length, but suffice it to say that I’m somewhat losing my patience with the series.

What are you currently reading?

I have a few things on the go at once, as usual, but my main target at the moment is volume four of The Apothecary Diaries, the light novel version. I’m about a third of the way into it, and it does seem to be going by a bit quicker than the third volume did for me, but I think I might take a little break from the series after this book. I don’t own more of it yet, and I think my brain needs time to consolidate!

More slowly, I’m reading The Book Forger by Joseph Hone, which is interesting — I think I vaguely knew something about the forgeries that Hone is talking about, but nothing about the person who created them, or the people who tracked it down. It’d make good fiction!

What will you be reading next?

First priority: finish Maiga Doocy’s Sorcery and Small Magics and Courtney Smyth’s The Undetectables, or possibly DNF the latter if I’m still not vibing with it. Those are the final books I need to finish my Bookspin Bingo card on Litsy, so after that I’ll probably pursue my whim a bit and do some totally undirected reading. That probably means getting back to my rereads of Vivian Shaw’s Greta Helsing books, and finishing up Roger Hutchinson’s history of the Britain through the census, The Butcher, The Baker, The Candlestick Maker. But we’ll see!

Tags: books, WWW Wednesday

Review – Solo Leveling, vol 1

Posted May 28, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Solo Leveling

by Dubu, Chugong

Genres: Manga
Pages: 320
Series: Solo Leveling #1
Rating: three-stars

Synopsis:
Known as the the Weakest Hunter of All Mankind, E-rank hunter Jinwoo Sung's contribution to raids amounts to trying not to get killed. Unfortunately, between his mother’s hospital bills, his sister's tuition, and his own lack of job prospects, he has no choice but to continue to put his life on the line. So when an opportunity arises for a bigger payout, he takes it… only to come face-to-face with a being whose power outranks anything he’s ever seen! With the party leader missing an arm and the only healer a quivering mess, can Jinwoo somehow find them a way out?

Someone I follow online has been super enthusiastic about Solo Leveling for a while, so when I found volume one of the manhwa in the local indie bookshop, it seemed like a sign (especially as it didn’t seem much like anything else they have in stock). I liked the art okay, though I didn’t always keep track of who was who very well, probably in part because they were a bit “cannon fodder” ish — this book is really an introduction, and ends with Jinwoo’s first solo instance.

I enjoyed it, though it really does feel like just reading a prologue. It sets up the world and the basics pretty well (it helps for me that I’m familiar with gaming, admittedly), and it gives us a solid feel for who Jinwoo is and what he wants/needs out of life.

I’m curious to see where it goes, and I might check out the light novels as well. It’s hard to say whether it’s for me just from this first volume, because it feels like things could turn out really different once it gets into the meat of the story. We’ll see!

Rating: 3/5

Tags: book reviews, books, Chugong, Dubu, manga, SF/F

Review – A Brief History of the Countryside in 100 Objects

Posted May 27, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 2 Comments

A Brief History of the Countryside in 100 Objects

by Sally Coulthard

Genres: History, Non-fiction
Pages: 333
Rating: three-stars

Synopsis:
For most of human history, we were rural folk.

Our daily lives were bound up with working the land, living within the rhythm of the seasons. We poured our energies into growing food, tending to animals and watching the weather. Family, friends and neighbours were often one and the same. Life revolved around the village and its key spaces and places – the church, the green, the school and the marketplace.

And yet rural life is oddly invisible our historical records. The daily routine of the peasant, the farmer or the craftsperson could never compete with the glamour of city life, war and royal drama. Lives went unrecorded, stories untold.

There is, though, one way in which we can learn about our rural past. The things we have left behind provide a connection that no document can match; physical artefacts are touchstones that breathe life into its history. From farming tools to children’s toys, domestic objects and strange curios, the everyday items of the past reveal fascinating insights into an often-forgotten way of life. Birth, death, celebration, work, crime, play, medicine, beliefs, diet and our relationship with nature can all be read from these remnants of our past.

From ancient artefacts to modern-day memorabilia, this startling book weaves a rich tapestry from the fragments of our rural past.

Sally Coulthard’s A Brief History of the Countryside in 100 Objects pretty much explains itself in terms of content. Each entry is pretty short, and focused on a particular item (though it may ramble around the subject before or after introducing the item). Each is included as a pen-and-ink sketch, usually at the end of the chapter.

I found at times that the objects were… not what I’d choose, or the potted histories were a bit rambly/random, but overall it’s a format I enjoy in and of itself, and I had fun reading it. I’d say take the historical accuracy with a heaping of salt, as it lacks any kind of references (not just numbered references, but in my edition, any kind of references at all). More one to read for entertainment and to see someone else’s train of thought on the matter than for information.

Rating: 3/5

Tags: book reviews, books, history, non-fiction, Sally Coulthard

Review – Rapture

Posted May 26, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Rapture

by Carol Ann Duffy

Genres: Poetry
Pages: 62
Rating: five-stars

Synopsis:
Rapture, Carol Ann Duffy's seventh collection, is a book-length love-poem, and a moving act of personal testimony; but what sets these poems apart from other treatments of the subject is that Duffy refuses to simplify the contradictions of love, and read its transformations -- infatuation, longing, passion, commitment, rancor, separation and grief -- as simply redemptive or destructive. Rapture is a map of real love, in all its churning complexity. Yet in showing us that a song can be made of even the most painful episodes in our lives, Duffy has accessed a new level of directness that sacrifices nothing in the way of subtlety of expression. These are poems that will find deep rhymes in the experience of most readers, and nowhere has Duffy more eloquently articulated her belief that poetry should speak for us all

I remembered Rapture being my favourite of Carol Ann Duffy’s collections, and I think it’s definitely high on the list, on reread, though it’s been a long time since I read the others. Her poems are always so readable: you know what she’s trying to say easily, even as the imagery is bright and the words are being played with. I generally prefer that over something more opaque, pedestrian as that may make some people think me — but I think Carol Ann Duffy’s poems have plenty to dig for, even while being readable and surface-level straightforward.

All of that is present here, along with the love and loss and longing. If I had to pick a favourite, it’d be ‘Art’:

“Art, the chiselled, chilling marble of our kiss;
locked into soundless stone, our promises,
or fizzled into poems; page print
for the dried flowers of our voice.“

Rating: 5/5

Tags: book reviews, books, Carol Ann Duffy, poetry

Review – The Banquet Ceases

Posted May 25, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

The Banquet Ceases

by Mary Fitt

Genres: Crime, Mystery
Pages: 247
Rating: four-stars

Synopsis:
It is 1947 and a sumptuous banquet at Fairfield Manor is underway to celebrate Bernard Smith-William's recovery from a serious illness. Among the guests are Bernard's childhood friend Rupert Lavering and his wife Louise. A war veteran and recipient of the Victoria Cross, Rupert has had trouble adjusting to peacetime, and was given a loan by Bernard to get started as a stockbroker six months previously. The wealthy Bernard is obsessed with Louise and uses the evening to separate the couple, threatening to ruin Lavering's new business unless she agrees to divorce Rupert and marry him. Louise refuses and Bernard takes action, but the next morning he is found poisoned in his study. Circumstances initially point to Rupert, but it turns out several of the guests at Fairfield Manor have grievances against Bernard Smith-Williams, and that anyone in the house could have accessed the atropine that killed him.

I’d never heard of Mary Fitt, a queer mystery writer (and scholar) who grew up and lived in Wales (though she was born in Birmingham). It seems kinda weird, having read The Banquet Ceases, that the British Library Crime Classics haven’t republished anything of hers, because it seems right in line with their usual stuff — but fortunately Moonstone Press have, which gave me a chance to try this out.

It’s very Golden/Silver Age in setup, but I felt it had slightly more interest in the psychology of the characters than some. I felt like I got to know Rupert and Louise, and the victim’s mother, in a way I hadn’t expected to — and it was very much from their point of view, not the detectives. I believe the police officer Mallett is Fitt’s recurring detective, but we get very little from his point of view.

The way it works out is a bit odd/atypical, too; we don’t get a real final answer to the crime until after the mystery has wrapped up with the suicide of the suspect, which looks like an admission of guilt.

Overall I found it an engaging mystery, and interesting as someone who’s studied crime fiction as well. I’ll definitely look for more of Fitt’s work; several of them are (like The Banquet Ceases) on Kobo Plus, so there’s plenty of scope for me to explore!

Rating: 4/5

Tags: book reviews, books, crime, Mary Fitt, mystery

Review – Drake Hall

Posted May 25, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Drake Hall

by Christina Baehr

Genres: Fantasy
Pages: 203
Series: The Secrets of Ormdale #2
Rating: three-stars

Synopsis:
Edith’s ancient home is full of secrets…and dragons are the least of them.

As the new dragon keeper in the hidden valley of Ormdale, Edith expects her first dragon mating season to involve venomous bites and amorous wyverns. She doesn’t expect to find herself growing closer to an inconveniently appealing suitor next door, or to stumble upon a dragon poacher lurking in the outbuildings, or to uncover a family scandal in the Abbey.

Fortunately, Edith has a mentor to help her sort things out, the spellbinding Helena Drake of Drake Hall. Or does Helena harbour secrets of her own?

For Edith, the dragons were always going to be the easy part.

Christina Baehr’s Drake Hall is the second book of the series, and I think it got off the ground a bit faster than the first book — certainly I didn’t stall partway through reading, and felt pretty impelled through it. I did feel a bit cringy about certain aspects, and I’m not sure what’s going to happen when her cousin finds out what Edith’s been writing exactly (feels like a prime moment for some stupid misunderstanding).

It was definitely interesting to see Edith ending up somewhat in opposition to a particular character; it’s not something I’d been expecting, from the build-up, though we got hints in that direction pretty quickly in this installment.

I’m not quite sold on the potential romance, still, but there does now feel like there’s some space for it to grow, so… we’ll see!

Overall it feels a bit like an episode, or a part of a bigger book, rather than a standalone novel (in some ways, at least) — I’m glad I have the next one to continue onto.

Rating: 3/5

Tags: book reviews, books, Christina Baehr, SF/F

Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted May 24, 2025 by Nicky in General / 16 Comments

Happy weekend! I’ve had a slow start today due to fitting a work thing in this morning, but hopefully a weekend of video games and books awaits me. My exams are creeping closer, but I try to keep my weekends as calm as possible all the same. Nobody can be on 100% of the time!

I hope everyone else is having the kind of weekend they want, so far.

Books acquired this week

Okay, deep breath! As you may recall from last week, I’d ordered quite a few books as a treat after realising I’d waaay oversaved for my taxes. The books I got for myself were exclusively non-fiction this time, though I had a few fiction arrivals for other reasons. Let’s do the non-fiction first!

First, a selection of the V&A museum’s “Fashion in Detail” books…

I’ve already read those and love them, I definitely intend to get more of these books from the V&A. But more about that when I post the reviews!

Next up, the somewhat more… random… non-fiction books! There is a bit of a history theme this time, no pop-science, though.

Finally, I did also get a small poetry collection, to test out what I think of the “Poetry Prescription” collections:

I did also get a book from my wife, received my preorder of a new book by Vivian Shaw, and seem to have forgotten to mention my latest British Library Crime Classic. So here they are, too!

So that’s a very exciting haul… and I’m likely to get some more books next weekend, as I’m meeting up with a friend specifically for the purpose of a bookshop trip. Usually I help him find more books than his budget will hold, but that doesn’t stop me stocking up too. Oh noooo… 😉

Posts from this week

As usual, a quick roundup of reviews posted this week:

Fantasy: A Letter from the Lonesome Shore, by Sylvie Cathrall (5/5 stars)
Romance manga: A Side Character’s Love Story, vol. 12, by Akane Tamura (4/5 stars)
Fantasy: Necrobane, by Daniel M. Ford (4/5 stars)
Classic crime short stories: Metropolitan Mysteries, ed. Martin Edwards (3/5 stars)
Poetry: Gitanjali, by Rabindranath Tagore (4/5 stars)
History: Fighting Fit: The Wartime Battle for Britain’s Health, by Laura Dawes (4/5 stars)
Fantasy comic: The All-Nighter, vol 1, by Chip Zdarsky et al (3/5 stars)

I still have lots of reviews written up but unposted, but slowly we’ll catch up if I keep posting at this rate!

What I’m reading

Let’s start with the usual sneak peek at what I’ve finished reading in the past week! I’m fully caught up on writing reviews, but as ever, it’ll be a while before most of them are posted.

As you see I’ve been reading quite a bit of poetry — a number of these were rereads, because I was curious what I thought of them as an adult, and also whether I want to keep them, since these have all been kept at my parents’ house quite a while, since I finished my first degree. I’ll be re-reviewing these since either they were never reviewed on the blog, or they deserve the reconsideration a decade later!

As usual, I haven’t included any rereads I’m not going to review again, though there were a couple: I’ve been rereading The Scum Villain’s Self-Saving System and Vivian Shaw’s Greta Helsing series.

As for this weekend, my plans involve a return to reading fiction to try to finish off my Book Spin Bingo card on Litsy — though I’m also delving into one of my new books, Medieval Graffiti, and finding that fascinating. I’ll probably do some rereading, too, and generally try to follow my whim and get refreshed for a hard work of study ahead.

Hope everyone has a great week!

Linking up with Reading Reality’s Stacking the Shelves, Caffeinated Reviewer’s The Sunday Post, and the Sunday Salon over at Readerbuzz, as usual!

Tags: books, Stacking the Shelves, weekly roundup