British fiction – Scuffed Granny

Songbirds by Christy Lefteri

This book is many things – a love story, a tale of family and community, a discourse on loss but, most importantly, a depiction of prejudice

William Boyd delivers again – great story, vividly told, with an engaging and strong female narrator enhanced by “lost” photos

A reasonable thriller throughout with strong elements of suspense that, for me, just failed to deliver all it promised

A glimpse of the fading days of the dominance of the Hudson’s Bay Company, woven into a gripping tale of murder, lust and individual courage

A novella about a war veteran, Tom Birkin, uncovering a painting in a church in an English village over a month – a vignette of his life

Worth reading for the island setting only, which I warmed to immediately in Samson’s description, but felt much less for the characters

A tale of a missing girl is the starting point which evolves into a delving into and a scrutiny of the lives of ordinary villagers

An island house, a family occasion, a stormy night – the elements of an Agatha Christie style thriller which keeps you guessing ’til the end

Emily arrives in Cyprus timidly and with trepidation but the experience that she has there changes her life forever

An easy read of a murder mystery featuring a French journalist and an ancient artefact