The Amber Shadows, Lucy Ribchester

Bletchley Park, 1941. The place is chock-full of secrets, some more dangerous than others. Honey Deschamps, one of the Park's decryption administration team has been receiving some very odd mail, postmarked Leningrad. It stirs childhood memories of her real father. Could he still be alive and trying to make contact with her, or is this some bizarre test of her loyalty to queen and country? An atmospheric little psychological thriller with insights (good and bad) into life on the home front during WWII.

Clockwork Dynasty, Daniel H Wilson

'all who breathe do not live; all of touch do not feel; and all who see do not judge. Behold the...automat'

June Stefanov has always been fascinated by ancient technology. She has carried her grandfather's tale of an avenging angel impervious to bullets at the battle of Stalingrad for almost as long as she's worn the strange relic he left her around her neck. She has a grant from the mysterious Kunlun Foundation to document and research mechanical antiquities but someone is always a step ahead of her, vandalizing the ancient tech before she can research it but not this time, this time June uses modern methods to wrest a message from her quarry and breaches a hidden world. June reluctantly allies with Peter who has lived among humans for centuries, a warrior who serves no master as his kind slowly dies out. June may hold the key to saving his race, if Peter can keep her alive.

Yesterday, Felicia Yap

Imagine a world where memory is the class divide. After the age of 18 Monos only retain a day of memory. Duos, the elite retain two days worth. Apple's iDiary has superceeded pen and paper and mixed marriages like Mark and Claire Evans' are rare. Mark Evans is a successful novelist and rising political star. Claire, is a Mono housewife.

Mark's mistress Sophia has just been dragged lifeless from the Cam and her diary implicates him in more than infidelity. Sophia claimed to not need an iDiary she claimed to remember everything but DI Hans Richardson reasons that anyone that crazy would lie to their iDiary.

Mark, Claire, DI Richardson and Sophia are the storytellers. All have secrets, even Richardson who is determined to bring Sophia’s killer to justice in his trademark single day.

Dead on Arrival, Matt Richtel

Delta flight #194 inbound to Steamboat Springs has lost contact with the tower. The pilots land the plane but what they find on the runway scares the hell out of them. There’s a doctor on the manifest, one Lyle Martin, in town for an infectious diseases conference and he’s called up to the flight deck. Grumpy and still a little hung over he doesn’t know that this call will save his life. He and the crew; trigger happy co-pilot Jerry and Captain Eleanor Hall seem to be the only survivors of a pandemic that struck whilst they were in the air and now it’s on the plane…

The Marriage Pact, Michelle Richmond

To newlyweds Jake and Alice, The Pact seems like an exclusive club. Beautiful people, lavish parties; a few rules which they are too loved up to really take in and they won't break those rules, will they?

And even if they do break a rule or two, what's the worst that could happen?

Brave New World

Because of 'the book' (and yes, yes I know, I still haven't fixed the banner at the top of the blog) circumstances are applying more pressure than I'm used to. Working on a sequel, blurbing, working, being dragged out to socialize (I really like the socializing bit, it's just the getting there, in a recent chat on FB, I chose teleportation as my most-wanted super power) but I digress. The brave new world of marketing is what prompts this post. I've had to look out from my little corner of the blogosphere and in doing that I've discovered other bloggers who like me do this for the love of books. I've even reached out to a few of them and if that's you and you're reading this then know that I didn't just stick a pin in the phonebook. The blogs I've contacted have similar tastes to me, and I've picked up a few 'must reads' from reading their posts.

August has got some crackers coming including reviews of The Marriage Pact, Yesterday, Clockwork Dynasty, Dead on Arrival, Fox Hunter, Bedlam Stacks and The Map Maker's Daughter.

Library of Light and Shadow, M.J. Rose

It is 1925 and post war New York is a glamourous place. Gifted young artist Delphine Duplessi, a favourite on the society party circuit is known for her ‘shadow paintings’ portraits that lay bare the subject’s darkest secrets. Delphine herself has a secret; her talent is enhanced by powers passed down through the Duplessi line. When her ‘gift’ leads to tragic consequences, Delphine, along with her twin brother and business manager Sebastian sail back to France. Back home Delphine tries to heal, her mother, legendary witch La Lune tries to help her, whilst Sebastian does his best to lure her back to painting again.

Sebastian springs a commission on her, Emma Calve, former opera singer and now owner of a Chateau that has links to alchemist Nicolas Flamel, wants to hire Delphine to ‘shadow paint’ the building and reveal the secrets that Flamel allegedly hid there in the Library of Light and Shadow.

And Delphine is hiding something, someone else from her family, her ex-lover Mathieu. The daughters of La Lune are cursed by love but her love for this man may destroy them both.