A Right Guid Read

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Welcome to Fife’s libraries reader reviews newsletter. All books reviewed in this newsletter are available from Fife Council Libraries. To check the location of a particular title, make a request or to contribute a review, contact your local library or visit [email protected]

Books Reviewed this month Still Alice by Lisa Genova The Colour of Black and White by Liz Loch-head and Willie Rodger Dandy Gilver and an Unsuitable Day for a Murder by Catriona McPherson Bomber by Liza Marklund Spies of the Balkans by Alan Furst Olympos by Dan Simmons House of Dust & Dreams by Brenda Reid Master of Rome by John Stack Midas Code by Boyd Morrison

What’s New? Finders Keepers by Belinda Bauer This isn’t the sort of thing that happens to someone like you by Jon McGregor Shieldwall by Justin Hill Tuscan Rose by Belinda Alexandra

All editions of Right Guid Read are available on www.fifedirect.org.uk

What a wonderful yet sad and heartbreaking story. We are introduced to Dr Alice Howland, a woman with an excellent and intelligent mind used for her career as a Harvard professor, lecturer, researcher and author. We are introduced to Alice’s life, work and family and how her disease is uncovered and how the family and Alice try to cope and live with it. Whilst some of it gets into the more complicated side of drugs and trials and how Alzheimer’s affects the brain and the terminology used, it isn't done in jargon that you can’t follow. I found even the medical explanations were fairly easy to follow and it is only a small part of the story. The bulk of the story is in Alice trying to cope with the loss that comes with the disease, how the family react and cope with each stage and the journey as Alice slowly loses her independence, memory and confidence as Alzheimer's takes over.


Readers who love a mystery set during the Art Deco Period really have to try this series by Catriona McPherson. The genteel aspects of the charac-ters flood through and even though I' was reading the sixth title in the se-ries without having read the previous five, this didn’t leave me feeling out of my depth with the characters and I could certainly understand the story. The characters fit the times; they have various hooks that allow a modern reader to associate with them and, perhaps best of all, the dialogue has an authentic feel. Add to this a wonderful amount of research that was obviously lovingly conducted, a great sense of pace and an author who knows how to divert the reader's attention with ease. Bonus points for the Fife setting, of course!

The Colour of Black and White is Scots Machar Liz Lochhead's first collec-tion of poems for more than a dozen years. These new poems are often about love or death and feature iconic figures with strong outlines. In the first section of the book, you find autobiographical and entirely fictional poems set in her native rural/industrial Lanarkshire. Now she's in her mid-dle years she's decided to own up to this stuff properly, her interest in 'unrespectable' poetry, in black prison 'toasts', in recitations, folk-poems and music hall monologues. The collaboration with the printmaker Willie Rodger was also an essential part of the making of this book. His pared down lino cuts accentuate the beauty of the poetry in this work. Breaking News! Dunfermline Carnegie library will play host to an evening with Liz Lochhead on the 27th of November 2012. More de-tails will follow later in the year on our library events page:

www.fifedirect.org.uk/readingroom

Still Alice by Lisa Genova

Dandy Gilver and an Unsuitable Day for a Murder by Catriona McPherson

The Colour of Black and White by Liz Lochhead and Willie Rodgers

Reader Reviews

I love a good crime story and leading the from the front is the Scan-dinavian crowd at the moment with their brooding landscape, tough people and of course a cracking setting for a solid crime story to keep the reader in their thrall. This title has great pace, a cracking lead character in Annika and when you add to this a realistic quality that when blended with a jour-nalists curiosity it makes a great start to a book that is going to take readers on a journey into darkness. Add to this a stark descriptive style, a deep sense of foreboding within and it's a story that I had a hard time putting down. Just remember to make sure you have a light to hand as sounds in the dark may never be the same again. Haunt-ing and wonderful, scary and tantalising. A cracking read.


This is a good story. With an appealing hero,in Costa Zannis , just the right side of common humanity. A man dealing with difficult events in difficult times. It is a wonderful evocation of another time and place. I cannot speak to the veracity of every written word but i enjoyed every minute of the story. The plot summarised in greek policeman helps to build up escape pipeline out of nazi germany for jews. He doesn't save many but if you save just one person more it is a victory. In many ways not a lot happens in an Alan Furst novel, but they are to be read and savoured for the minor little details that just carry us along.

Every Dan Simmons book I have read has left me wondering what it must be like to live in this guys mind! How he comes up with these amazing, apparently completely disparate threads, and then weaves them into a coherent, massive tapestry of a story is beyond me. There were also a couple of complete 'wow' moments where I just had to put the book down to get my breath back. As I approached the end of the book I repeatedly felt sorry that the story was concluding and that eventually I would run out of pages! I just wanted to read more and more about these amazing characters. I don't think he's left enough here for a sequel and I've no idea if he's planning one but if he did I'd be the first to go and buy it.

Bomber by Liza Marklund

Spies of the Balkans by Alan Furst

Olympos by Dan Simmons

Reader Reviews

Everyone who loved "The Island" and the film "Captain Corelli’s Mandolin" will enjoy this book. The setting is similar, but the story is different. The setting is a small Cretan village in the early days of World War 2. Through the eyes of two women, one British and one Greek, we experience how the war came to Crete and how it influenced everything and everyone's lives. Their characters are strong, and so are their stories. The author por-trays them both beautifully, and Greek village life is described very vividly. You can almost feel the smells and tastes of Greek food and plants. There is a wonderful love story in the book, but well balanced against hard reality, tragic events, pain and dilemmas. A highly recommended book!


In the final book of the series (maybe) Atticus and Septimus have enemies from within as well as the Carthaginians to deal with. Some whom Atticus serves with despise the fact that he has been promoted above them and made a Prefect as he's Greek. While some in the Senate including dangerous men like Scipio are out to have their pound of flesh as well. There are battles galore in this book and the masters of the sea (Rome), who are vying for power against the Cartha-ginians are in for a few surprises. With Senators not listening to the advice given by Atticus about sea conditions, trouble is in store for the Roman Empire. John Stacks trilogy is, without doubt, worth reading if you like or are interested in the subject (Rome). It's not all battles at sea and Septimus even transfers back to the Ninth Legion for a while in Sicily. Although there's lots of action the best thing about the books is without doubt the relationship between the two men, which goes astray in this final chapter.

Following on from the Noah's Ark Quest, Boyd Morrison turns his consideration to ancient Greece and the myth of Midas and his gift, or curse depending on how you see it, to turn everything into gold. Well it's a fairly fast paced storey which is full of action, and in its way quite a page turner. I certainly found it difficult to stop reading and put the book down for the night when it was time to go to bed! I find Boyd Morrison a very good weaver of stories almost up there with Clive Cussler in his heyday. In a way he writes the perfect story for those times you just want fast action and adventure and a good old battle between good and evil.

The House of Dust and Dreams by Brenda Reid

Master of Rome by John Stack

The Midas Code by Boyd Morrison

Reader Reviews

I would recommend that you read Blacklands and Darkside before reading this bril-liant book. Then it will all make sense and you'll get the very best out of what is an exciting trilogy. The characterisation is excellent. There is plenty of humour, too, usu-ally just when you need a break from the heaviness of the story as it unfolds. The children and young people are believable and well written, in particular the ones with disability. A very sympathetic depiction as well as giving the characters credit for their intelligence. As with the last two books, this has a thrilling last phase, making it impossible to put down. I'm not sure if Belinda Bauer is done with the village of Shipcott and its residents now, but whatever Bauer writes next, I'll be up for it.


Having enjoyed Jon McGregor's novels in the past I had high expectations for his new short story collection. I was not disappointed. These are fantastically created tales of life with a strong connecting theme of place. I had previously read one of the stories from the collection, 'Wires' when it came runner up in the BBC National Short Story Competition last year but as a full collec-tion the stories somehow become even more powerful. If you haven’t read any short stories for a while, I would thoroughly recommended this book to you!

I got completely caught up in this story. A mysterious leaves an infant with the sis-ters of Santo Spirito. A tiny silver key hidden in her wrappings is the one clue to the child's identity. When Rosa turns fifteen, she leaves the nuns and becomes govern-ess to the daughter of an aristocrat and his strange, frightening wife. Their house is elegant but cursed, and Rosa - blessed with gifts beyond her considerable musical talents -- is torn between her desire to know the truth and her fear. Meanwhile, Fascism is growing in Italy, threatening everyone. In the face of hardship, Rosa's intelligence, intuition and her extraordinary capacity for love will have to be enough to ensure her survival. This was a really beautiful novel about sacrifice and reward, of beauty and horror, and of redemption.

Finders Keepers by Belinda Bauer

This isn’t the sort of thing that happens to someone like you by Jon McGregor

Tuscan Rose by Belinda Alexander

New Titles

Shieldwall by Justin Hill This book is a bit slow to start off, but as soon as Godwin comes onto the scene, and his father is disposed of, things really start to pick up. I found myself completely en-tranced by the fascinating story, and the amount of history that is contained within these pages. I was a bit hazy on the historical details of England before the Norman conquest, but this book has lead me to read up on the subject. Both Godwin and Edmund were typically heroic characters, and whether this is true or not, I felt that if they had been portrayed in any other way, it would have made the book less enjoyable. This is not a scholarly work of fiction, but it is a fantastic read, which will probably make you want to find out more about the period in which it is set.

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A Right Guid Read