The Sinister Booksellers of Bath by Garth Nix

From a quiet bookshop in Bath, the Sinister (as in left-handed) Booksellers keep an eye on the activities of beings of the Old World, particularly the goddess Sulis Minerva who lives in the hot spring. One day, unpacking a parcel they stumble on an old map, which pulls bookseller Merlin into its depths. His sister, Vivien, and his on/off girlfriend, Susan, follow in an attempt to save him, and all three find themselves trapped in a sorcerous world created by an Ancient Sovereign, and guarded by living marble statues. Escaping from the map is only the beginning of their problems though, as they realise they aren't the first to be lured in, but might, in a very unpleasant way, be the last.

I've done that weird thing here of joining in with a series on book 2, but I found it didn't hamper my enjoyment. Nix fills in enough of the previous events to enable the reader to understand the background to book 2, but without telling the whole story and robbing us of a desire to read it.

On to book 2 though, and its Sinister Booksellers ... set in an alternate 1980s where magic and the humdrum everyday world exist side by side, it's a non-stop exciting read with very little quiet down-time for either characters or readers (though the characters do find time to sample quite a lot of delicious-sounding cake). For the 'booksellers' this is all comparatively in a day's work - their role is after all to keep people safe from the magical world and to keep that world secret -  but for Susan things are different. Until recently she'd assumed she was as average as the next person, but finding out her father was an Ancient Sovereign known as The Old Man Of Coniston has changed all that. She'd like to go back to how things were but having an ancient being pursuing her, feeling the call of her father's realm, plus  her growing relationship with Merlin, all seem to be acting against that.

I've seen The Sinister Booksellers of Bath described as YA but more off a crossover/ YA plus book, one as appealing to adult readers as their younger counterparts. It's not without its breath-holding moments but nothing too terrifying. A 5 star read which I'd definitely recommend to fans of Neil Gaiman or Alan Garner.

Go As A River by Shelley Read

On an autumn day in 1948 Victoria Nash, delivering peaches from her family farm, meets Wilson Moon, just passing through town, and in a few minutes both their lives are changed forever. Propelled by impetuous emotion they embark on a secret love affair, not thinking of the consequences.

Stepping in to the role of housekeeper after her mother's death, Victoria's life was probably destined to be one of drudgery; cooking and cleaning for her father and brother, helping in the orchard, selling the fruit. Till she meets Wilson, she's accepted this without question, but now through grief and adversity she discovers a stronger, more independent side to her nature. She's forced to make her decisions, uproot herself, and start over again elsewhere. Like a river, having encountered an immovable rock, she follows a different course.

Not quite a family saga, more the story of one woman's life, but sure to appeal to llovers of the former, Go As A River is a story of love, compassion, and strength versus small-town attitudes and prejudice, set among the stunning mountainous scenery of Colorado. The racism Wilson encounters is shocking, especially its outcome and general acceptance by the town's inhabitants. In contrast the writing is beautiful, and will leave you longing for juicy peaches fresh from the tree, but I found the ending a little too sentimental for my my liking.

 

The Foxglove King by Hannah Whitten

At thirteen Lore was found on the streets and taken in by a gang of poison-dealers, helping spy on their rivals. So far she's much like any other abandoned child on the streets of the city, but she also has a hidden, untapped ability to work highly illegal 'death magic'. She keeps this talent closely hidden, until one day a seemingly everyday drug drop goes wrong and she attracts the attention of the Presque Mort, the king's warrior monks. Arrested, she expects death or banishment but King August has a use for her - to uncover who or what has been killing the inhabitants of scattered villages, and to spy on his son, Bastian. Thus, Lore finds herself thrown into the strange (to her) world of the court, with its protocol and parties, where no one can be taken at face value or trusted - least of all, perhaps, Prince Bastian, and the Presque Mort monk Gabriel instructed to keep an eye on Lore and initiate her into the ways of the Court.

Having read Hannah Whitten's For the Throne, I'd rather expected something similar - a fairytale setting in which the foxglove king would be a flower-surrounded fairy - but instead the setting is more urban (though still that never, never time of fantasy novels) and the foxgloves are not the beautiful purple flowers but the drug derived from them.

The story is just as compelling though. There are so many things to love about this book. The world building is brilliant -  both the overall religious set up of quarreling gods and sainted kings, with a magic system which derives its power from death (mortem) and life (spiritum),  and the in detail political divide between the rich and the poor, where the poison which brings relief is freely available to the rich, but only obtained illicitly by the poor. The plot is a twisty intrigue-filled thriller, with Lore uncertain whose version of events to believe, and to further muddy the waters there's a love triangle.thrown in, as Lore finds herself torn between stiff, repressed Gabriel, and idle, pleasure-loving Bastian.

I really enjoyed it and look forward to book 2 of the series.

The Garnett Girls by Georgina Moore

As a teenager, Margo ran away from home to live with her older boyfriend, Richard. Their love affair continued, they married and had three daughters - Rachel, Imogen, and Sasha. Then one day Richard left, leaving Margo plunged into despair, and the girls having to fend for themselves. When she picked herself up, Margo vowed that her girls would never suffer as she had. So she brings them up to be well-educated, strong career women, to marry safe, dependable men, to create for themselves the life that she would have wanted, but somewhere long the way the girls, trying so hard to live up to Margo's expectations, lose sight of themselves and their own desires. Now young women, each successful in her field, they have to confront the impact of their father's sudden disappearance from their lives before they can find true happiness.

 There's been a lot of hype about The Garnett Girls  - the author is, after all, a publicist - but it's a stunning, captivating debut that definitely lives up to everything I've read about it. A warm, intimate story of the Garnett family - Margo the matriarch, and her girls, Rachel, Imogen, and Sasha - their loves and losses, the secrets they keep, and the younger generation's struggles for independence from their mother's overwhelming influence and expectations. In many ways, living up to Margo's standards has stunted her daughters' emotional development, and I felt it was telling that Rachel, Imogen and Sasha are more often seen as a trio - the Garnett girls - rather than as individuals and as women.

The story is not wholly set on the Isle of Wight but Sandcove, the family home, plays such an important part in the Garnett's lives that it's like a character in itself. It's the place they come to to settle family disagreements, to heal, to find themselves, to party on the beach till dawn. 

I loved every page - and I now want to live by the beach and drink cocktails every night.

Emily Wilde's Encylopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett

Emily Wilde is a respected professor of fairy lore, a meticulous cataloger of the ways and tales of the Folk, but so far the much-desired position of tenure-ship continues to elude her. To obtain this she's embarked on a mammoth project - an Encyclopaedia of Fairies, which will collate all the information held on them, their world, and their interactions with humans. One last section is needed - a study of the previously unrecorded fairies of the northern island of Ljosland  - so accompanied only by Shadow, her faithful dog, Emily heads off on an adventure which will change her life.

Her approach on her previous field trips has been one of professional, detached interest, more attuned to the nuances of associating with the Fae Folk than the local villagers or her colleagues. She expects this project to be no different, but there are surprises in store for her - dangers, friendship, and marriage proposals from not one but two fairy kings!

Overall it's a light but enchanting story, with a backdrop of cold, snowy beauty contrasting with warm, cozy interiors, and perilous  encounters with the Folk to give it a little 'edge'.

Emily is one of those heroines - socially awkward, unintentionally rude, determined to keep even those who would help her at arms' length - that you'll either take to instantly, or not get along with at all. Reading between the lines of her field notes, and seeing the real Emily beneath that clumsy exterior, I was definitely on her side. Her colleague, Wendell Bambleby, who turns up uninvited, is the opposite - charming, handsome, making friends wherever he goes, just somehow too perfect - and actually I could see why he would irritate after a while. They don't seem like a well-matched pair but under her gruffness, it's obvious that Emily cares for him more than she'd like to admit.

I'm  delighted to see that there are plans for further Emily Wilde stories, and I'll be looking out for them.

The Witches of Vardø by Anya Bergman

 

Off the northern-most coast of Norway lies the small island of Vardø, site in the mid-seventeenth century of a notorious series of witch trials. Anya Bergman's novel brings us a fictional account of those times, seen from two points of view - that of wealthy Anna Rhodius, imprisoned in this remote fortress by her former lover, the King; and that of sixteen year ago fisherman's daughter, Ingeborg, whose mother is falsely accused of witchcraft. Ingeborg desperately wants to save her mother, and will go to any lengths to do so. Anna meanwhile is interested in protecting herself and negotiating a way to return to her former life. 

The numbers involved in the real trials were horrific (91 people executed over a period of years) but Bergman has reduced them to handful without losing any of the terror and helplessness that these women must have experienced. As is frequently the case, there's a trail of fear and misogyny behind the accusations - women denounced for 'seducing' married men, the local Sami people victimised for being 'different', anyone who vaguely steps beyond the rigid bounds of propriety being considered fair game. And the treatment of women in general, as totally subordinate to men, and threatened for voicing their own opinions, is unthinkable now.

Although I'd heard of many instances of witch-hunts, from Pendle to Salem, Scotland to Essex, I hadn't realised that the fervour for them had spread to Norway, apparently influenced by King James VI (Scotland) and I (England), and his writings on Daemonologie. Reading The Witches of Vardø led me off down a lot of wormholes, finding more about the historical events, and learning more about the remote landscape of its setting.

Manilla Press

The Witch and the Tsar by Olesya Salnikova Gilmore

Half-human, half-immortal, Yaga lives alone in the forest as she has done for centuries, only encountering people when they come seeking her herbal wisdom and magic charms. Then one day her seclusion is broken by the arrival of an old friend, Anastasia, wife of the Tsar Ivan, seeking help for a mysterious illness. To keep her safe, Yaga must return with her to Moscow, and immerse herself in the affairs of men.

In the city, she finds a ruler growing increasingly tyrannical, intent on crushing anyone who speaks against him, in the centre of a court full of rumours and intrigue. Ivan himself though is being manipulated by forces he couldn't begin to understand - immortal powers, treating Russia as a battleground for their own aims.

Set in 16th century Russia during the reign of Ivan the Terrible, this debut is an interesting mix of myth and history, giving a feminist twist to the scary stories of the witch Baba Yaga, creating a very human, relatable woman, and setting her within a firm historical perspective. 

The period of Russian history is a compete blank to me, so I found the depictions of Ivan's court and the wars which ravaged Eastern Europe fascinating (and found myself falling down a rabbit-hole of fact checking and discovering more via Google). Somehow though the whole meshing of historical and fantasy elements didn't quite work for me and the later part of the book failed to hold my attention as the earlier part had.