Vaguely interesting

Amazed that someone could write so much about one day and make it vaguely interesting, but he does it and writes from harsh experience. Never thought the building of a brick wall could be such an adventure. It makes one realise how lucky one is. This is not anything special though, you are relieved when you get to the end. He did get the Nobel Prize for Literature, but I would rather read Bridget Jones to be honest.

My toddler prefers other sing along books

My 17 month old little boy has this, along with other sing along books, he's never taken to this one.
He much prefers"the wheels on the bus", I'm not sure if it's because this book isn't very colourful.
I have to say I was pretty disappointed with it when it arrived.

was reasonable

having read and enjoyed nearly all of the previous books in the Horus Heresy series, i had high hopes for this one as it is now becoming clear to the loyalist who is with Horus and who's with the Emperor. With the odd shade of grey thrown in with the world eaters and the thousand sons who are on board with the loyalists.

As far as action goes its a very good read with plenty of blood and gore to get your teeth into, but as highlighted, the main characters are all starting to sound very similar, or are being made to sound like all the stereotypical space marines. None of their characters are really being explored as fully as they should be and its starting to get annoying. That goes for all of the Word Bearer Legion as well, we are not given any real reason as to why they have decided to side with horus or the dark powers of chaos. They just have, for all we know they could have been like this from the very start and they have only just decided to act upon ther beliefs.

But on the plus side, it sets the stage for the coming battle and does give us an insight into what the Mechanicum have been up to, for it must of taken a long time to build the word bearer ship and so raises the question, how long have they been planning to rebel, and were they the only one's planning such a thing for any length of time? Has anyone else had any ideas of treachery before Horus?

FABULOUS..............................................

I am rapidly becoming a fan of Matthew Shardlake!
This book is a worthy successor to"Dissolution".
Lord Cromwell, now Earl of Essex, is in a panic as he has promised to demonstrate a horrible substance which could prove to be the ultimate war weapon, to Henry VIII and as he is not in Henry's good books, his head is balancing on the block. However, the secret substance has gone missing and Cromwell is in a sweat.
He calls on Matthew to find it. Before long, our hero finds himself deep in dead bodies and mystery and up to his eyes in suspects.
He is ably assisted by Cromwells representative, Barak, and Guy the apothecary is back from the first book.
This is a very promising series and I look forward to it going on for a long time.
There has been talk of a TV series, with Kenneth Branagh in the role of Matthew, well it cannot come quickly enough for me.
I couldn't lay this book down.
READ IT!!!!!!

Refreshing change

Child 44 is the story of 1953 Soviet Union and Officer Leo Demidov who is suprised to hear that a young boy's murder is covered up. Leo is obliged to obey but something in him knows there is more. The Ministry threaten Leo and exile him to the Ural Mountains only for him to realise that the crime has happened here too.

This is a great easy to read book that I found a refreshing change. I would recommend this book even though some of the twists are abit obvious it did not matter. I look forward to more from this author.

Embarrassing

This will have been the last time I bought a Katie Fforde novel as hardback edition. Its predictable plot was not worth the extra expenditure and the sugary, dove-eyed cover illustration made we want to hide it. It really is a shame, but maybe I'm growing out of books like these.

A thoroughly enjoyable and engaging read

This is the first Philippa Gregory I read and I loved it. I enjoyed reading the story from the viewpoints of the three main characters, all three of them equally well drawn. Katherine Howard was the most engaging to me, throughout her tale she filled me with disbelief, disgust, amusement, scorn and finally, sympathy. The character of Anne of Cleves contrasted sharply with hers but her story was as interesting.

A book I thoroughly enjoyed and I flew through the pages as I was reading at every opportunity I got.

The Great Lincoln Rhyme Conspiracy Thriller

The latest Lincoln Rhyme novel features the recurring Jeffery Deaver topics of identity theft and the individual's right to privacy. As a one-time lawyer, Jeff has long been concerned with protecting both civil and personal liberty and the growth of intrusive surveillance employed by certain agencies.

'The Broken Window' has yet another unhinged serial killer, and develops into the familiar game of cat and mouse between Rhyme, the brilliant quadriplegic forensic scientist, and a very clever criminal sociopath. This killer is an obsessive collector of all manner of consumer goods - the detritus of everyday life - and has access to personal computer data for the victims he targets.

It begins with Lincoln advising the Metropolitan Police on the apprehension of a global professional killer when he's informed that his cousin Arthur - who he grew up with prior to their falling-out - has been arrested on suspicion of murder, and the case against him seems cast-iron. Naturally, flaws are immediately spotted under the Rhyme microscope and Lincoln realises he's up against a cunning killer who murders at will, then frames innocent parties after stealing their identity. He places the other case on hold and diverts his considerable brainpower to the task of apprehending the guilty party, and thus liberating Arthur.

His investigation leads to a cutting-edge data mining company - Strategic Systems Datacorps (SSD) - who among other things, maintain comprehensive profiles of every American citizen, which they sell to companies targeting a particular demographic. SSD also have a full range of other software programs - both analytical and predictive - which they claim to have developed for the greater good. Only when Rhyme's team get into the company's databases does the full extent of their snooping become apparent.

By page 80 we've already had two pieces of Deaver misdirection (both of which we've seen before - many times!) and I began to fear it would turn into the series of contrived scenarios that have marred two or three of the books in the series.

But no, Jeffery reins these in and supplies a number of satisfying twists near the end. To say that the book is meticulously researched (Jeff has his own team to do this), rigorously constructed and is completely ingenious, is a given. To say that the plot is totally implausible is another! But, his characterisation is, as usual, excellent and a comparatively mellow Lincoln Rhyme is assisted by the usual cast - his personal aide, Thom, the lovely Amelia Sachs, Lon Sellitto, Mel Cooper et al.

The kind of surveillance Jeff writes about here just isn't a reality at present, and this is where the book verges on science fiction. But that's no bad thing. Deaver even cites, and quotes from, two very early SF classics - `Brave New World' and `1984' to emphasize this point and to underline the dangers of a totalitarian society where `They' know everything about you.

As with all the Lincoln Rhyme books the main span of this techno-thriller is compressed into a very short space of time - around three days - and this makes the book more immediate and lends it a real page-turning quality. I would think that few will be completely disappointed with this one and absolutely NO-ONE could ever accuse Jeff of not giving the reader his moneys' worth!

In the book's final few pages it becomes obvious who the subject of the next Rhyme thriller will be - but to say any more would be to give the game away!

This isn't quite top-of-the-range Lincoln Rhyme, but it's pretty good stuff. It's certainly better than last year's fairly boring `The Sleeping Doll', featuring his new investigator Kathryn Dance - who's name-checked several times in here. I can see `The Broken Window being read on a number of long flights this summer...

Great for the mind games, not so sure about the diet

Fun and friendly read, which is really good for helping you sort out why you need to diet in the first place, and what you want to get out of it. A lot of diet books take this stage for granted, when it can be the most difficult bit to get right. Without getting the mental attitude right, no diet is going to work long-term - I speak from experience.

As noted by other reviewers, this is an amalgamation of low-carb diets, mostly Atkins. However the authors are not qualified dietitians (nor do they pretend to be), although they are good on practicalities (the section on wardrobe-sorting is great advice). Personally I'm not convinced by any diet that relies heavily on supplements and laxatives, even if mostly in the first stage. I'd still say that at paperback price it's a good investment for helping you get your mind and behaviour patterns under control.

3 1/2 Stars: A Good Book -- But I Expected More!

After reading the first half of the book, I felt that it was going to deserve a 5-star rating. This was due to Lindsay's providing a fresh, surprising, fast-paced writing style and a rather unique main character. However, once I became accustomed to the novelty of his style and the wittiness of the character, I realized the story was too passive for a story about serial killers and not as exciting as I thought it would be. Further, with the exception of Dexter, all of the other characters are not very well-developed nor are they particularly interesting. While I wasn't disappointed in Darkly Dreaming Dexter, it is not a book that I'd urge you to rush out to read.

Billingham's best yet

So how does Mark Billingham cope in his first (almost) standalone novel outside of his D.I. Thorne series? Pretty good, actually. On the surface the subject matter might not appear all that different - London mobs and gangsters and police procedural (or lack of it since his police officers often tend to work in an"unofficial" capacity) - but freed from the restrictions of the lead D.I.'s troubled private life and the increasing banality of the supporting characters over the last few Thorne novels, In The Dark is able to take Billingham's dark exploration of the criminal underbelly of London much further.

It may not always make for pleasant reading, but Billingham's representation of the dangers on the streets of the UK today seems to be pretty accurate. Drive-by shootings, drug deals, street gangland initiations and larger scale criminal activities are all handled by the author with characteristic authenticity for both character and situation. Again, with a strong ear for realistic dialogue, Billingham's strength is in picking up all the aspects of everyday limited hopes and aspirations, revealing the underlying social factors that drive ordinary people into crimes and gangs. His book shows the impact this has, not only on the police officers who have to deal with this on an everyday basis, but also its consequences for the wider community.

Billingham weaves each of these realist elements extremely well into a thrilling storyline which is not short of twists and surprises. The novel might end on a somewhat dark, bleak note, and there might not be any neat epilogue to wrap everything up the way some readers might like, but the In The Dark is stronger and all the more realistic for it.

Long winded !!

Long winded and not as interesting as the first two. For me Dissolution is the best of the lot. However Shardlake is a great fictional creation and certainly the best of this popular genre of writing.

new age drivel

I doubt I would have been so offended by this book had it not been for the pretentious fawings of so many people who claimed it had changed their life. I was intrigued. I was then very disappointed. What a load of new age drivel. Change my life my foot. This book is pretentious and seems to have been lifted from an array of other superior novels and fables. I felt cheated by the rave reviews and am still somewhat dumbfounded by it.

Another fab summer read!

I've read all of Adele Parks books, and thoroughly enjoyed them all. This book has a different pace to the other books, but again, I couldn't put it down! I would definitely recommend this to anyone who fancies a good summer holiday read.

captivating

beautifully written novel - not having read his novels before i didnt know what to expect and not really having much interest in history - im now completely converted its an awesome read - devastating and tragic

Brilliant!

Yes, it's as good if not better than"The Lady of Hay" although at times I felt like kicking Jess to switch on her mobile!

Rough reality for hurt heroes

These fighters have seen war. They have seen war, they have lived war. And they have survived. One is a drunk storyteller, living in some forgotten village. The other one is the head of his tribe, entertaining himself away in the steppe grasses with all young girls eager enough to enter his tent. The other one serves her Emperor. With distaste. Seeing the reality she fought for crumble away.

This is their tale. Of how their enemy found them, how their gods interfered on their behalf and the final battle. The bloody, gory, rough final fight.

What we have here is slightly reminiscent of Fritz Leiber. Of companions and their adventure. What Morgan does however, to the world of fantasy, is to make it real. Nasty. Grimy. Rarely have I read a fantasy book and almost tasted the winds of the steppe, felt the mud cling to my boots in the city and smelled the scraped off remains of a corpse propelled by a corpsemite. (Is introducing such a nasty creature that early in the book intended as a joke on JK Rowling, who basically started every Potter with a new species not seen in any of the previous books?)

This book is a landmark. Hopefully it's also the beginning of a new series. The reason I'm reluctant to give it 5 stars, is that I think Morgan held himself back. There's a restraint in this book that makes it great, focusing on the moments highlighted in the flow of action. Yet there is so much more to this material... I really do hope to be able to dive into this world again!

Pure Loeb Greatness

I'm not going to write a huge review of this here, suffice to say if you liked Long Halloween, Dark Victory, Haunted Knight, the Dark Knight Returns and all those sort of Batman stories you're in no way going to be disapointed by this. In fact you're probably going to love it. One of the greatest Batman stories out there. Be sure to read part 1 first!

The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald

I have to agree with some previous reviewers for the start of my own review of the great gatsby. Whether this book lives up to its reputation as a masterpiece i am unsure, it is, however, a great read and i highly reccomend it.
I feel that some of the story may be lost on me, as although the author tries, and quite often succeeds, to transport me to the east coast of the united states during the early twentieth century, i feel i sometimes cannot relate to the somewhat unfamiliar surroundings.
This however is almost definatley a lack of imagination on my part, and the author creates a vivid, vibrant and very real portrait of the period. The characters, especially Gatsby are very alive on the page, and the story, is beautiful, yet tragic, and served to me as some kind of modern parable about true friends and loneliness. Definatley a book to add to the 'must read' list!

Gut wrenching

This is one of my all time favourite books. It has a wonderful air of tension which builds ratchet like throughout the book and makes even the most banal things seem creeping and evil. What is brilliant about this book is that it ricochets between the boredom of living in grinding poverty under a big brother fascistic state where everything is proscribed, and the absolute terror of the same. It is so accurate in its emotional descriptions it's chilling.

Winston, the hero is just an ordinary man whose gesture towards freedom starts as something so simple and ends as something so momentous and tragic you can't quite believe where it all started. The layers of meaning and symbolism in the book help to build up this crescendo type movement and you can read it and read it and still be profoundly affected and amazed by something new.
It has some of the best lines of any book and is gut wrenchingly horrible whilst being unspeakably brilliant all at the same time.