Review: The Secret Rooms by Catherine Bailey

This was a brilliant read! The Secret Rooms - A True Gothic Mystery by Catherine Bailey is the result of a tonne of research delivered in a gripping narrative non fiction style that had me telling multiple people about it before I'd even finished.

If you'd asked me if I cared about the life of the 9th Duke of Rutland and his family, I'd have said no. What about the history of Belvoir Castle? I'd probably have given it a Google, marvelled at the impressive architecture, looked at any available images of the interiors and then moved on. So why did I pick this book up? In one word? The blurb! (Or is that two words?) The blurb contained a really good mystery I wanted to know more about and I love when rooms are locked for decades and then re-entered.

In 1940, John the 9th Duke of Rutland was one of Britain's wealthiest men, yet he died holed up in the servant's quarters of Belvoir Castle. Living out his last days secluded in an area comprising five damp rooms, doctors firmly encouraged him to move to luxurious accommodations elsewhere in the castle but John refused.

After his death, John's son closed up the rooms and they remained locked and untouched for sixty years. Author and researcher Catherine Bailey was one of the first to be granted access to these rooms and there she discovered what John had been feverishly working on right up until his death. Of course I wanted to know, don't you?

The Secret Rooms was published in 2012 and it's mentioned in the blurb so it's not a spoiler to say that John was an obsessive collector and had been organising and cataloguing his family's correspondence. The family archive contained hundreds of files spanning nine hundred years of history and contained tens of thousands of documents. On closer inspection, the author discovered that letters for three distinct periods in John's life - in 1894, 1909 and 1915 - had been removed from the collection. Why? Was he trying to hide something? And what was it?

Bailey draws on the contents of the available letters and diary entries in addition to military records and other sources in order to piece together what happened in John's life during these periods that he was trying to conceal.

Belvoir castle is in Leicestershire and built in the Gothic style with 356 rooms and I loved learning about it. It's an impressive looking structure and thankfully the book includes a comprehensive floor plan which was incredibly useful.

"The servants - maids of all descriptions, odd-job men, footmen, the flag man, the hall porter, the telephone boy, the boiler stoker and the stewards' room boy - were seated on the two benches that ran either side of a long table beneath a photograph of King George VI." Page 14

Of course, this wasn't all of the servants, you also have the housekeeper, butler, valet, chaplain, coal carriers, watermen, watchmen, lamp men and more. It's like Downton Abbey on steroids.

"In 1899, the castle had a groom of chambers, a house steward, an usher of the hall, a chef, a pastry chef, a confectioner, a plate butler, a clockman, a steward's room boy - and housemaids, kitchen maids, scullery maids, footmen, odd-job men, and porters galore." Page 169

"In the castle's grounds, there were hundreds more: grooms, stable lads, dairy maids, studmen, brewers, rat catchers, mole catchers, millers, mechanics, gardeners, groundsmen, gamekeepers, river keepers, huntsmen, kennelmen, slaughtermen, stockmen, horsemen, farm hands and woodsmen." Page 169

Bailey explains that in 1914, there were thirty Dukes - the highest honour the Crown could bestow - and they enjoyed privileges that seem scarcely credible to today's reader. This family had ruled over the neighbourhood for eight hundred years and some of the scenes described of family funerals held on the estate were extraordinary.

The astute among you will have noticed that one of the gaps in John's family correspondence occurred during the First World War and it's fair to say that a good deal of the research Bailey relates takes place during the war. This may deter some readers, however the author strings the narrative together so well by including telegrams (damnation!) and letters that keep the pace trucking along and on topic.

Bailey takes the reader along for the ride and has distilled John's life to a ripping tale and I thoroughly enjoyed getting to the bottom of the three 'secrets'.

In the Acknowledgements section of the book, the author thanks her mother Carol for deciphering and typing out the many thousands of letters she found. I have so many questions about this and the book that I'm currently trying to track down the author in order to invite her to conduct an interview with me for Carpe Librum. Catherine, if you're reading this, I'd love to know more about your research for this book so please get in touch.

The Secret Rooms by Catherine Bailey contains family secrets and cover ups, overzealous matchmaking, military movements and misdeeds, cryptology, pathological behaviour, aristocratic abuse of power and a privileged way of life many of us cannot begin to comprehend.

Highly recommended and an unexpected contender for My Top 5 Books of 2026.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Carpe Librum!

Review: The Silence Factory by Bridget Collins

The Silence Factory by Bridget Collins is a dark and mysterious dual narrative novel and I received it for Xmas in 2024.

Sophia Ashmore-Percy accompanies her husband to Kratos, a remote Greek Island in the 1820s and records her experiences in a journal. Her husband is seeking to capture a rare specimen to study and their relationship breaks down as his obsession intensifies.

Decades later in Victorian England, Henry Latimer is an Aurist working at Argyll's shop when he meets Sir Edward Ashmore-Percy, who invites him to Carthmute House to treat his deaf daughter. While there, Henry learns more about Sir Edward's factories and the production of Telverton silk.

Named for the town where his factory is located, Telverton silk is made from the silk of the mythical Pseudonephila spider. One side of the silk has the ability to block all sound, whilst the other side contains a mysterious warp and whisper. Those exposed to the wrong side of the silk can hear whispers, suffer headaches, or develop an ill queasy feeling with some even questioning their sanity.

Henry becomes obsessed with the potential applications of the silk, readily ignoring the side effects:

"Silence is not only silence, sir, it is attention - it is sanity. It is sleep for infants, medicine for invalids, rest for the working man - it is money for the man who must think or starve. We build walls to shelter our bodies from the world, but we leave our minds open to assault on every side. The Telverton silk, sir, is not a gimcrack. It is the greatest discovery of our age." Page 55

The factory buildings where the unique silk is harvested and woven is extraordinarily loud and sends their workers deaf due to the machinery deployed in the production. As I was reading about the brutal working conditions, it brought to mind the exploitation of child labour in the cotton mills during the industrial revolution.

Both Kratos and Telverton in Northern England are fictional, however this frees the author to create dark and gothic settings in both locations. Despite a real fear of spiders, thankfully I didn't have any nightmares about the mythical creatures at the heart of The Silence Factory but I did find myself wishing I could hold Henry's small square of Telverton silk for just a moment.

Bridget Collins has a knack for producing dark tales that straddle multiple genres and feel unique to her writing style. The Binding was brilliantly unique and made my Top 5 Books of 2019 list, and I thoroughly enjoyed The Betrayals in 2020, giving it 4 stars in my review. The Silence Factory is completely different again; it's historical fiction meets gothic fantasy and I highly enjoyed it.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Carpe Librum!

Review: And How Does That Make You Feel? by Joshua Fletcher

Joshua Fletcher became a Psychotherapist specialising in anxiety after struggling with anxiety in his early 20s and suffering from panic disorder and obsessive compulsive disorder.

In his book, And How Does That Make You Feel? Everything You (N)ever Wanted To Know About Therapy, Joshua Fletcher takes you into his therapy room and shares the therapeutic relationship he develops with four of his patients.

Part memoir, Fletcher is clear early on that finding the right modality of therapy is important, as is finding a therapist that feels right for you. I wasn't aware of all the modalities in this field and the author provides a brief overview of each one.

Unique to this book - at least to my knowledge - Fletcher uses a writing technique that incorporates his inner voices with the text of his book. He refers to them as 'characters at a big round thought table, each voice squabbling, debating and fighting for attention' in his mind. Fletcher has named each of his inner voices, and the ones that pop up throughout his therapy sessions include:

Analytical: seeing things from the perspective of counselling theory

Anxiety: the voice of worry that focusses on threats and unlikely catastrophes

Biology: hunger, fatigue, pain, discomfort, toileting, temperature etc.

Compassion: the willingness to understand and help

Critic: a judging voice

Detective: the voice that searches for clues and meaning

Empathy: trying to imagine and experience how they are feeling

Escapist: the voice encouraging me to avoid difficult feelings

Intuition: a nudge from the gut that goes beyond rationale and reason

Irreverence: bizarre and unexpected thoughts that creep into the therapy room

Saviour: the desire to 'save' a person outside the realms of professional duty

Trigger: jealousy, anxiety, anger, defensiveness and associated trauma

Volition: choosing to listen to a more appropriate voice than the one that initially arises

                                                                                            The Inner Voices of the Therapist

How this works is that he provides details of the session and shares the moment when these inner voices intervene, naming them as he goes. For example, in the case a patient mentions they have a secret they've been hiding for many years, his Detective inner voice will wonder what it is. It seems as though he's constantly receiving information from his inner voices and what emerges is a balancing act between his training, medical knowledge and the comments offered by these voices.

The more I thought about it, the more I realised we all have these to a certain extent but I never thought to name them. I certainly have Biology, Compassion, Critic, Detective, Empathy and Intuition for starters. This insight into a therapist's inner thoughts - or voices - gives the reader some idea of what a therapist is thinking while listening to their patients and it's heartening to know that therapists are often dealing with competing approaches.

Narrating the audiobook himself was a terrific choice and Fletcher changes the names of each of the patients so they can't be identified. One of the patients included was a very famous actress and I was desperate to know who she was. Referred to as Daphne, I understood why the author couldn't share her identity in the book yet it still felt incredibly frustrating not to know who she was. So much so, I found myself wondering if it would have been better to choose someone without a public profile that would keep the reader guessing. Or was that the point?

Another of the patients had an odd relationship with his wife in a scenario that was so unusual I wondered whether it was chosen because it was so strange. Given Fletcher's speciality in anxiety, maybe these four patients were an accurate representation of his patient list but at least two of them seemed to me to be outliers or extraordinary cases and it was hard to learn from their progress.

And How Does That Make You Feel? Everything You (N)ever Wanted To Know About Therapy by Joshua Fletcher will appeal to those considering therapy for the first time or readers curious to know what happens in the therapy room and what the therapist 'really' thinks.

For those who want to know more, Joshua Fletcher is known as Anxiety Josh on social media and has a new book out next month called Same Time Next Week? Living With Anxiety in the Modern World.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Carpe Librum!

Important Notice: Fraudulent Behaviour

I’ve just become aware that an individual is impersonating me and contacting authors using a Carpe Librum email address from a gmail account. They're using my likeness, my logo and valid links to my social media channels and Carpe Librum website address.

These scammers are offering inclusion in The Carpe Librum Guide to Books which isn't a thing and now never will be. This is fraudulent behaviour and has no connection to me or my blog.

To clarify:

• I don't charge authors for book reviews or collaborations
• I don't solicit paid review opportunities via email
• I only communicate using the following email address: tracey@carpelibrum.net

If you receive - or have received - a message that appears to be from me but does not come from the email address listed above, please treat it as suspicious.

Next steps, I plan to report this to Scam Watch and lodge a complaint via Google.

Carpe Librum has been a labour of love these past 20 years, so for scammers to misrepresent me, give authors false hope and trick them into fraudulent collaborations in my name makes me sick. I'm incredibly grateful to the author who did their due diligence and checked with me first and swiftly brought this to my attention. Thanks Steve, your vigilance helps protect the wider writing community.

Carpe Librum!

Review: Devil's Wolf by Paul Doherty

Devil's Wolf by Paul Doherty is the 19th book in the medieval mystery series featuring Sir Hugh Corbett, The Keeper of the Secret Seal. It's September 1311 and as the personal envoy of King Edward II of England, Corbett has been sent north to investigate the veracity of an anonymous letter received by the King promising information that could allow England to exit from the war with the Scots.

Finding himself caught up in the events of the north, Corbett - along with his loyal servants Ranulf-atte-Newgate, Senior Clerk in the Chancery of the Green Wax and Chanson, Clerk of the Stables - must get to the bottom of a series of murders in order to find out what's really happening.

Following the same formula as the 18 books which have preceded Devil's Wolf, Corbett interviews informants, allies and foes; gathers clues; organises his observations; eliminates suspects and contemplates all of the information without sharing with anybody before making his big reveal at the end. Naturally his life is threatened a number of times as the villain/s attempt to disrupt his investigation and evade the King's justice.

Despite being extremely well researched, I have started to question my commitment to this series and was curious to know whether I was reading from a place of obligation or pleasure. I decided to go back and look at the star ratings I've given to each of the 20 books I've read by Paul Doherty; noting the first one I read of his was The Cup of Ghosts from the Mathilde of Westminster series. I was actually quite shocked to find that overall, the average rating for the books I've read by this author between 2006-2026 was 3.27 stars.

Given these stats and the fact that my copy of Devil's Wolf has been on my shelf since 2018, I've decided to stop reading any more of his books. Doherty is a prolific author and there are still 6 more books in the Hugh Corbett series - Death's Dark Valley (Book 20), Hymn to Murder (Book 21), Mother Midnight (Book 22), Realm of Darkness (Book 23), Banners of Hell (Book 24) and Immortal Murder (Book 25) published in 2025 - but I think I'm going to leave it there.

There's also the small matter of how much space these books take up on my bookshelf as I've kept them all. Usually when a book is a 3 star read for me I move it on unless it's signed or has some particular sentimental value. If I can, I might try and sell these online as nobody in Australia is offering them as a set like this. At the very least, I'll enjoy freeing up some additional space on my bookshelf.

This is the longest series I've ever read from the beginning and I didn't get to the 'end' which is disappointing, but there are just too many good prospects waiting on my TBR pile to be held captive to a series for nostalgic reasons. Are you continuing to read a series out of a sense of obligation or completionism?

Now that I've made my decision it feels quite freeing, so as I bid farewell to Sir Hugh Corbett, here are the books in order complete with links to my reviews:

(Book 1) Satan in St Mary's
(Book 2) Crown in Darkness
(Book 3) Spy in Chancery
(Book 4) The Angel of Death
(Book 5) The Prince of Darkness
(Book 6) Murder Wears a Cowl
(Book 7) The Assassin in the Greenwood
(Book 8) The Song of a Dark Angel
(Book 9) Satan's Fire
(Book 10) The Devil's Hunt
(Book 11) The Demon Archer
(Book 12) The Treason of the Ghosts
(Book 13) Corpse Candle
(Book 14) The Magician's Death
(Book 15) The Waxman Murders
(Book 16) Nightshade
(Book 17) The Mysterium
(Book 18) Dark Serpent
(Book 19) Devil's Wolf

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Carpe Librum!

Review: The Woman in the Seal Skin by Lauren Keegan

* Copy courtesy of Simon & Schuster *

Orkney is made up of approximately 70 islands and is located off the north coast of Scotland. It's an isolated part of the world and with an average yearly temperature of 8 degrees celsius I can only imagine how inhospitable it must have been in the 17th century. The Woman in the Seal Skin by Lauren Keegan is set in Orkney in 1695 and is a dual narrative told by our main character Malie and her friend Henrye.

Malie's father is a fisherman and after her mother slipped into the sea and was never seen again, he raised Malie and her brothers alone. Brought up listening to tales of selkies, Malie has always been told her mother was a shape-shifting woman who shed her seal skin to seduce her father.

"Selkies slip from their seal skins and seduce lonely fishermen, but a Finnman takes the form of man and seduces lonely wives. Men, women and the sea, all at their mercy." Page 46

Living on the coast, Malie has an affinity with the sea and now that she's married and expecting her first child, she finds it difficult to resist the pull of the water. With little to no female agency in a male dominated family, Malie is also in an oppressive marriage with few real friends to confide in or lean on.

"My elder brothers circle us like a shiver of sharks." Page 295

The weather is harsh, the living conditions are rough and Malie's life feels stifled and unendurable at times. In fact the harsh environment and desperate conditions reminded me of The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave, set in Norway in 1617.

I read this atmospheric book while on a cruise and being on the ocean certainly enhanced my reading experience. Admittedly, the temperature was warm and humid and I wasn't suffering any of the deprivations Malie was facing on a daily basis, but the author was still able to make me feel cold, hungry and fearful just the same.

"While there was once only fear bubbling beneath my skin, there is something else rising to the surface. Something fierce and uncontrollable. Something wild. Something that simmered in my mother's body too. I believe it's rage." Page 150

The Woman in the Seal Skin by Australian author Lauren Keegan is an historical fiction novel set in Scotland about nature, folklore, motherhood, loss, resilience and domestic violence and will appeal to fans of Hannah Kent and Kiran Millwood Hargrave.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Carpe Librum!

Review: A Far-Flung Life by M.L Stedman

* Copy courtesy of Penguin Random House *

A Far-Flung Life by M.L Stedman is going to be in My Top 5 Books of 2026 list, without a doubt. I finished it last month and I still have a long reading year ahead of me but this Australian historical fiction novel blew me away.

Stedman begins this family saga with the history of the MacBride family who took up country in Western Australia (WA) in the 1800s and established Meredith Downs; an outback sheep station. We join the current MacBride family in 1958 and the author provides an excellent overview of the brutal and unforgiving landscape, describing the fierce nature of the heat, the sun, the wind and the rain and their power to both nurture and destroy.

"Everything that can do you good can also do you harm here - that's just the way of it." Page 7*

The MacBrides have worked the land for generations and family is everything, so when an unexpected tragedy takes place - mentioned in the blurb - the trajectory of their lives takes a dramatic turn. A Far-Flung Life is a generational family saga about life, love, purpose and family that also carries more than its fair share of secrets, heartbreak and loss.

Somehow the beauty of the landscape, the ever present demands of Meredith Downs and the resilience of the characters prevent the narrative from becoming too bleak or dispiriting. By contrast, I felt hopeful, optimistic and energised by the steadfast and inspiring characters doing their best to move forward.

As a kid, my family lived in outback New South Wales for 2 years and we had friends who owned vast sheep stations so I read about the diaries and ledgers of Meredith Downs with great interest.

"There are the ledgers; the wool returns; the vermin records; the Field Book of Meteorological Observations for the Bureau of Meteorology in Melbourne; the cricket score books; and the little greasy shearing tally books stained with lanolin from pulling them in and out of a shirt pocket as you count the wool clip run by run, shed by shed, day by day." Page 49

Diaries are kept of every day events including sheep bought or sold, new motor vehicles, paddock rotations, staff changes and more to enable the station to provide information to the tax man, Lands Department or Undersecretary for Lands in the case of drought relief.

In addition to being character-driven, the novel seems to be a deep reflection on the inevitable passage of time and its impact on the landscape and the people who inhabit it.

"On any old outback property, you can see them, the skeletons of dreams. Houses long abandoned, windmills rusting, fence posts splintered, tank stands collapsed: every one of them was once a hopeful beginning." Page 64

The ready understanding that many generations have been before us and we will soon join them in history is something I love about Ken Follett's novels. He also writes about the passage of time and the evolution of families from generation to generation and it was brilliant to read such an accomplished Australian point of view of our colonial history.

"Every wreck, every ruin is the vestige of a dream, lasting long after the body of its dreamer has been received back into the earth with love or remorse or indifference." Page 64-65

A Far-Flung Life is being promoted by the publisher as 'the biggest Australian novel of the year' and I wholeheartedly agree. I was moved by the characters and their individual plight, and felt a genuine connection to Meredith Downs despite being a proud city dweller and reading this at sea while on a cruise.

In 2012, I read and reviewed The Light Between Oceans by M.L. Stedman and gave it a glowing 5 star review. In an interview with Good Reading recently, I was impressed to read about the detailed level of research Stedman has been conducting since then in order to write A Far-Flung Life and it's definitely been worth the wait. Stedman now has two stellar Australian novels under her belt and I'm sure this is going to be another huge bestseller.

Highly recommended and you can read an EXTRACT here.

* I read an ARC so the page numbers quoted may vary in the final copy.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Carpe Librum!

Review: The Death of Mrs Westaway by Ruth Ware

Published in 2018, The Death of Mrs Westaway is a stand alone mystery novel and my seventh book by Ruth Ware. Like a heroin addict, I'm chasing the high of my very first Ruth Ware novel The Turn of the Key but again didn't manage to reach those giddy, gasp-worthy heights.

Harriet Westaway goes by Hal and when her mother died, Hal took over her job as a tarot card reader in a kiosk on Brighton Pier. Being hassled by a local loan shark, Hal can't believe her luck when she receives a letter advising that her grandmother has died and left her an inheritance. Not knowing much about the Westaway family yet confident it's a mistake, Hal ventures to the Cornwall estate for the funeral, hoping to stay quiet about any mixup and leave with enough to pay her loan shark and outstanding bills.

Needless to say, Hal gets more than she bargained for and the reader is drawn in by the tumbledown estate and fractured family members who don't seem to be mourning the death of Mrs Westaway at all. Secrets abound in this gothic mystery and someone is out to harm Hal.

The setting was gloomy and the atmosphere was tense which kept the pace rolling along however I felt there was too much internalising by our main character as she weighed the ethics of carrying out her deception and then struggled to unearth the truth of her parentage and the death of her mother. This slowed the pace right down and seemed a little repetitive at times.

Ultimately The Death of Mrs Westaway by Ruth Ware will appeal to mystery readers who love a wealthy family with flawed characters, a neglected family estate in need of repair, a nasty as hell housekeeper and generational secrets that will blow it all apart.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Carpe Librum!

Review: The Cross Thieves by Alan Fyfe

* Copy courtesy of Transit Lounge *

The Cross Thieves by Alan Fyfe is the story of two brothers living below the poverty line in a coastal town in Western Australia (WA). It's a short and punchy novel that takes place over the course of one night and I'll admit the structure took a little getting used to.

It's a third-person narrative that regularly dips into the character's internal perspective but is largely written in past tense with some past continuous tense. In addition, there are also letters back and forth from two female characters, one of whom is the mother of our two protagonists.

A narrator addresses the reader directly and offers to 'tell you the whole thing if you've got the right heart to hear it' but their identity and connection to the story or the characters as they pop in from time to time is unclear.

Here's an example where I love the first line, but the rest is confusing.

"You and I are together inside a comfortable room the height, width, and depth of a page. I can try to manipulate you into having the heart I want you to have by telling you that kind of heart is the right kind. But you get to pick what you believe and what you value. You're alone with that choice as much as I'm alone when I decide what to tell you about these skinny boys.
As much as Gark and Pell were alone with their choices about what they valued, what ending they picked to aim at, and what to do with that ridiculous cross." Page 100

Is the narrator telling me I can think and decide for myself? Don't I already do that? And isn't that true for all stories? I often found myself wondering if the story needed this narrator at all.

The inclusion of 80s pop and mysteries of philately that piqued my interest in the blurb are brief - at less than 200 pages it is a short book after all - while Joshua's fascination with the religious meaning in We Built This City by Starship reminded me a little of Patrick Bateman's obsession with music in American Psycho.

The writing also reminded me many times of Tim Winton in terms of the male protagonists living below the poverty line, struggling with their underdog status in the world and living hand to mouth. More than that though, the dialogue and setting in a coastal town in WA in addition to themes of drugs, crime and religion was definitely Wintonesque in my opinion.

Back to the book and the novel has a satisfactory conclusion but the narrator never jumps back in to finalise the story, provide perspective or guide our thoughts about any of the events.

My critique of the story over, I always read the author's Acknowledgements section and there were several issues in this one that affected my overall enjoyment of the book and I'll attempt to outline them here.

The relationship between the brothers was moving and their desperate and ongoing hunger and lack of food or adequate shelter made me feel quite uncomfortable while reading; a testament to the skill of the author. In the Acknowledgements, Fyfe tells us that The Cross Thieves started as an 'impulse to write a neo-epic about people suffering food insecurity' which made perfect sense although there was no resolution or call to action about the issue in the novel, it just 'was'.

Fyfe mentions that the Foodbank's Hunger Report noted that 15% of Australians were experiencing food insecurity in 2018 but a quick Google tells me the figure is now 20% according to the 2025 report. Giving us data that is 8 years old when recent data is more compelling was a lost opportunity.

It's a minor oversight, but the author goes on to claim these problems are easily within reach of solution and that the houseless could be provided with shelter, the hungry fed and the welfare rate increased for a fraction of the price of nuclear submarines. As a Veteran of the ADF, this certainly ruffled my patriotic feathers but acknowledge this is the view of many Australians. While I don't agree with the author's politics, I understand his desire to use this platform to spread his message. Pity there wasn't any advice or resources for those readers motivated to take action other than talk about it on social media, email politicians and take to the streets in protest.

Finally, the author also mentions the following in the Acknowledgements:

"The Cross Thieves is written in a little known (and very old) structure called ring composition. It's not very important that you know what that is, just that it's bloody hard to do." Page 199

Despite a BA in Literature, I readily admit I hadn't heard of ring composition before and even after attempting to educate myself on the basics, I wasn't able to recognise elements of this in the novel. It felt condescending for the author to state that it wasn't 'very important' for the reader to know what it is. In my opinion, it's not important at all! It wasn't relevant to the plot and surely it's enough for those readers who do recognise the achievement to do so as part of their overall appreciation of the book. It seemed to me the author was saying 'even if you have no idea what this is, you should be impressed by my writing ability.'

Perhaps if the author had set aside the difficult task of writing in ring composition and spent more time clarifying the role of the narrator I'd have enjoyed the story of Pell and Gark a lot more. They were certainly compelling characters.

All of the above led me to draw the conclusion that The Cross Thieves by Alan Fyfe is best enjoyed by frequent readers of literary fiction able to recognise the achievements of little known writing structures who also appreciate a healthy dose of politics with their fiction.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Carpe Librum!

Review: Morbidly Curious by Coltan Scrivner

Coltan Scrivner, PhD is a pioneer on the subject of morbid curiosity and in Morbidly Curious - A Scientist Explains Why We Can't Look Away, he endeavours to explain what it is. In the prologue Scrivner firstly explains what it isn't; it's not a pathological, abnormal or unhealthy curiosity. Instead, morbid curiosity is a curiosity about things that are threatening or potentially dangerous and usually falls into the following four categories:

- minds of dangerous people
- physical violence
- bodily injuries
- paranormal dangers

This might present as a fascination with true crime, watching gory medical procedures or playing violent computer games. It's also what drives that irresistible urge to look at a car accident and try to determine what happened from the carnage left behind on the road.

Scrivner is the leading expert on the science behind morbid curiosity and the creator of the Morbid Curiosity Scale. Scientists now use this scale to assess how morbidly curious a person is and where they fall with respect to these four categories. I completed the free Morbid Curiosity Test on the author's website after reading the book and scored an overall score of 4.63 out of 6.0, where the population average is 3.41. As for the four categories mentioned above, I scored highest in the 'Minds of Dangerous People' category which correlates with my interest in true crime and wanting to understand why people commit such terrible crimes.

While I wasn't surprised to learn that morbid curiosity has helped humans across history learn more about the dangers of daily life in order to avoid or survive them, I didn't expect to find that it can positively influence our psychological wellbeing as well.

The author explains how watching a horror movie can actually help someone when they're feeling anxious:

"Horror movies can provide a way for you to hack and redirect your vigilance system. They act as a lure for an anxious mind using a threat centric plot to capture and hold the viewer's attention." Chapter 10, Terrifying Therapy

Who knew watching a horror movie can provide a new and salient threat for your mind to latch on to and which in turn, can out compete other existing sources of anxiety. The author states that those who watch horror movies tend to have more - not less - empathy than the rest of the population. I know two people in particular who regularly watch horror movies and have tonnes of empathy as well as service related PTSD, and I think I better understand now what they're getting out of the experience.

Much of the content in this book is centred around horror movies, computer gaming and haunted houses of the entertainment nature as these were the perfect settings for Scrivner's scientific research. However, this did become a little dull as these aren't the areas of my own morbid curiosity. Along the way, the author sheds light on the fact there is no link between those who play first person shooter games and those who commit mass shootings in the way we've been led to believe. Computer games don't make murderers, but so many boys and men play them that it's likely that those guilty of these crimes also played them.

Ultimately, Scrivner believes:

"Morbid curiosity is an adaptive behaviour that is central to the success of our species."

Sounds to me like a solid reason to embrace our morbid curiosity. Morbidly Curious by Coltan Scrivner is narrated by the author and I'd love to know if you complete his Morbid Curiosity Test.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Carpe Librum!

Review: The Vegemite Cookbook by Vegemite

I prefer Promite to Vegemite, there, I said it! However curiosity got the better of me and I couldn't resist checking out The Vegemite Cookbook: Favourite recipes that taste like Australia by Vegemite. I was keen to discover some new and appetising recipes for this iconic Australian spread but there wasn't much to sink my teeth into.

Vegemite is made in Port Melbourne and I enjoyed seeing how the marketing has evolved over the years, both in the advertisements and the packaging. Having said that, I don't think I'll ever be able to embrace Vegemite Squeezy. In my opinion, squeeze bottles for tomato sauce, mayonnaise, honey and golden syrup were life changers but I just can't get my head around squeezing Vegemite.

Containing only 40 recipes, the book also includes interviews with staff who work for Vegemite which was a nice touch but not terribly interesting to this reader. I found it more compelling to be reminded of the fact Vegemite was given to our soldiers in WWII due to its high nutritional value and rich vitamin B content.

The book offers recipes for - you guessed it - breakfast, lunch and tea and there were the expected recipes like Vegemite on muffins or toast with eggs. My biggest takeaway was that Vegemite can be used in stews and bolognese and while I can't imagine it, I'm going to risk it and give it a go. I certainly won't be trying the Vegemite cheesecake.

What's your favourite way to eat Vegemite?

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Carpe Librum!

Review: Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz

Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz is a modern whodunnit with a confident nod to vintage crime novels and a tipping of the hat to the golden age of detective fiction. Susan Ryeland is an editor at a publishing house tasked with editing the next whodunnit by bestselling author Alan Conway. An unpleasant man, the book begins with a short prologue from Susan's perspective before we dive straight into Conway's new manuscript.

I felt a little wrong footed in the beginning with the introduction of so many characters in the small fictional village of Saxby-on-Avon, however I needn't have worried. Conway - the author of the manuscript - kept the reader on track with helpful hints along the way. Set in the 1950s, there are a number of murders in the manuscript and when we leave Conway's work and return to Susan Ryeland, a contemporary murder takes her by complete surprise.

"You'd have thought that after twenty years editing murder mysteries I'd have noticed when I found myself in the middle of one." Page 60

Susan is a likeable character and successful editor and I enjoyed watching her step out from behind the safety of her desk and begin investigating in the role of amateur detective.

Horowitz generously gives us multiple layered murders to contemplate and solve and I really enjoyed the meta nature of the murder mystery within a murder mystery. As if this weren't enough, Susan makes mention of real world authors and books in the text which added to my enjoyment and will appeal to other self-proclaimed book lovers.

Susan reflects:

"I've always loved whodunnits. I've not just edited them. I've read them for pleasure throughout my life, gorging on them actually. You must know that feeling when it's raining outside and the heating's on and you lose yourself, utterly, in a book. You read and you read and you feel the pages slipping through your fingers until suddenly there are fewer in your right hand than there are in your left and you want to slow down but you still hurtle on towards a conclusion you can hardly bear to discover. That is the particular power of the whodunnit which has, I think, a special place within the general panoply of literary fiction because, of all characters, the detective enjoys a particular, indeed a unique relationship with the reader." Page 156

You can't help but smile at the likelihood Horowitz is sharing his own love of whodunnits here in the guise of Susan. On a meta level, he's also showing us that the detective enjoys a unique relationship with the reader - and by extension the creator of the detective - and that he cherishes it greatly.

The only part of Magpie Murders I didn't enjoy was the confusing page numbering system. The book begins with a short 3 page prologue, then 219 pages of Alan Conway's manuscript entitled Magpie Murders - An Atticus Pund Mystery. Conway's manuscript is helpfully printed in a different font (possibly Courier) and the author demarcates the transition back to the original text by changing the font again. However the page numbering picks up from the prologue beginning on page 4. Confused yet?

And THEN, on page 196 of the text, when we return to the manuscript, the numbering picks up from page 219 where the manuscript previously left off. This confusing page numbering system swaps at least once more in the book and I'm not sure it helps divide the book between manuscript and narrative. The difference in font style more than adequately distinguishes between the two writing styles and without this poor stylistic choice, this would have been a five star read for me.

Published in 2016, Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz is the first book in the Susan Ryeland series with Moonflower Murders published in 2020 and Marble Hall Murders published in 2025 to follow. Magpie Murders has since been adapted for TV and now that I've finished reading it, I'm looking forward to watching the 2022 drama series later in the year. I also have Moonflower Murders on my bookshelf thanks to a generous friend who let me borrow her copy and as soon as I've read it, I look forward to watching the 2024 TV series adaptation.

Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz is highly recommended for those who enjoy a clever meta novel with a mystery within a mystery stuffed full of clues, colourful suspects and even the odd anagram.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Carpe Librum!

Review: The Story Keeper by Anna Mazzola

In 1857, Audrey is on her way from London to the Isle of Skye to interview for the position of Assistant to a collector of folk tales. Miss Buchanan is a spinster and folklorist and rarely leaves her family home of Lanerly Hall; a dilapidated estate owned by her brother.

Some of Mr Buchanan's tenants (referred to as crofters) have been evicted, and Mazzola doesn't shy away from the effects of the Clearances in Skye around this time. The landscape is bleak and the crofters are struggling to make a living and keep food on the table, regularly relying on superstition and folklore rather than religion. Miss Buchanan recognises that local folk tales aren't being shared as freely within the community any more and the displacement of crofters from the land to make way for sheep farming means these stories are being lost.

The crofters distrust their landlord and believe there's something evil about Lanerly Hall so Audrey's job is to earn their trust and record as many stories as she can.

I enjoyed the descriptions of Lanerly Hall but when a local girl washes up dead on the beach nearby and another goes missing, the crofters believe it to be the work of faeries. Meanwhile, Audrey believes someone is responsible and we're given a number of potential suspects.

"Better to be terrified than miserable. If the reality is that people die of starvation and illness, drown themselves out of shame, or leave their impoverished homes in search of a better life, then maybe it's preferable to think that the fairies are taking people away to serve some greater purpose." Page 131

The author creates a dark and foreboding gothic atmosphere full of superstitions, myths, folklore and fairytales. In her historical note at the end of the novel, Mazzola explains the idea for this book came from the West Ham vanishings in the 1880s where a number of children and young adults disappeared from the East End of London. She also shares that the many folk tales relayed to Audrey in the book are adaptations of real folk stories which helped to ground the book firmly in 1800s Scotland.

The Story Keeper by Anna Mazzola was an enjoyable historical fiction mystery and will appeal to fans of books like The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry and The Good People by Hannah Kent.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Carpe Librum!

Review: The Darkroom by A.J. Hewitt

A.J. Hewitt is a former Police Forensic Photographer and Senior Photographic Officer with New Scotland Yard and in her book The Darkroom - Case Files of a Scotland Yard Forensic Photographer, she takes us through her career.

For almost a decade, Hewitt was required to photograph the scenes of workplace accidents, accidental deaths, suspicious deaths, suicides and homicides. She frequently photographed and documented the injuries of survivors of assault, attempted murder and domestic violence.

The author explains how she was able to establish a quick rapport with victims in shock, and the gruelling repetitive nature of the work she conducted. I didn't appreciate just how physical the role is, and Hewitt explains how she had to navigate the sometimes remote and challenging terrain, or operate in tiny spaces with her camera gear without compromising the crime scene.

I never really considered the value of aerial shots and Hewitt was required to produce aerial shots from a police helicopter prior to major events or police operations which provided vital information in the planning stages. It sounds like a great job until the author explains how cold it is hanging out of the window at an angle to get the perfect shot. A particular case in the book that stuck with me was the search for human remains at a rubbish tip that took multiple resources and days of hard labour before partial success. The difficulty in photographing the scene from above was made clear, as was the fact that forensic staff strived to provide as much information as they could to aid in the upcoming court case.

Hewitt spends much of the book citing different cases and scenarios, with the names changed of course. One of the well known incidents she attended was the Marchioness disaster in 1989, which I mentioned in my review of Unnatural Causes - The Life and Many Deaths of Britain's Top Forensic Pathologist by Dr Richard Shepherd. Given Hewitt also took photographs during post mortem examinations I couldn't help but wonder if she and Dr Shepherd often worked alongside each other.

Always respectful of the dead, Hewitt rages against femicide and violence against women and girls.

"Male violence against women and girls is now at epidemic proportions worldwide. Women are exhausted." Chapter 6, No Monsters, Only Men

In her career, Hewitt says she only photographed one scene where a woman had killed a man, and noted that none of her colleagues mentioned doing the same, when they would have given the rarity. Later in the book, Hewitt also laments the epidemic of male suicides.

My only quibble was the number of times the author referred to being one of the only females on site, how rare it was to be the only woman on a search team and the fact that some of the uniforms didn't fit because she was a woman. I know I'm being a little harsh here, but perhaps the fact that I was a woman in the ADF means that this isn't such a big deal to me. I wish her message had been more about why women would be great in this role and encouraging more women to consider this career path instead of continuing to point out how unique she was in her field.

I listened to the audiobook narrated by Emma Spurgin Hussey and the content is quite graphic at times but it won't come as a surprise to those who pick up a book like this wanting to learn more about the role of a forensic photographer.

The Darkroom - Case Files of a Scotland Yard Forensic Photographer by A.J. Hewitt is recommended for readers of true crime and anyone considering a career in police forensic services.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Review: Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V.E. Schwab

I enjoyed The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab so much that it made My Top 5 Books of 2021 so I decided to give her 2025 release Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil a try. First and foremost, this is a well written historical fiction novel with multiple female character points of view. All three characters eventually intersect in this plot spanning multiple centuries and multiple countries.

Alice is our contemporary character in 2019 and a student at a university in Boston. Feeling adrift, a one night stand changes the course of her life and sets her on a path of regret and revenge. In 1521, Maria is aged 10 years old and living with her family in a small town on the Camino de Santiago in Spain. We meet the third character Charlotte/Lottie later in the book and we pick up her backstory from 1827 in London.

This is a character driven book about these three women:

"In fairy tales, big things happen in threes. Three children. Three beds. Three roads. The third bite is poison, the third gift is great, the third door always leads home." Page 338

Now that I've set the scene and have your attention, it's time to drop a bomb... this is a sapphic vampire romance. Yep, you read that right. The paranormal romance genre rarely features in my reading schedule but I took a chance on this based on the strength of the author's writing. And I was right!

The writing in Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil is beautiful. The personal challenges and internal struggles faced by all three women kept my attention and the gothic setting was sublime. As they age over decades and centuries, vampires in Schwab's world start to lose touch with the values and characteristics that made them human.

"Now and then, she wakes to find another little corner of her emptied, some aspect crumbled away in sleep. Perhaps it was a shard of insecurity. A sliver of regret. Sabine probes her mind, trying to find the nature of the absence, like a tongue searching for a missing tooth, but never does." Page 265

Schwab addresses the topic I was most interested in when reading the Anne Rice Interview with the Vampire series: what is it like to be immortal? (Don't worry, there are no sparkly vampires here). The author examines the toll it takes on all three of the characters, including the challenges they face maintaining their existence in the world without revealing their secret nature and evading the dangers that pursue them.

This statement from a male vampire to one of our characters reminded me of the relationship between Lestat and Louis:

"If you wish to stay, then you may do so as my guest, and I will be your gracious host. But you will live as I do, by a certain set of rules. There will be no skulking about in shadows, no victims stolen from the street and cast in the canal. I will show you how to savor every soul you take. How to claim space, and bend minds, how to enthrall, enchant, and masquerade. How to be the last one they think of when the bodies go missing." Pages 206-207

Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil is a unique genre-blending novel that defies easy categorisation and will appeal to a range of readers as a result. Straddling historical fiction, fantasy and queer romance and championing strong feminist characters, this book may appeal to you even if you don't like vampire novels. And if you believe books about vampires aren't for you, consider this:

"And here is the awful thing about belief. It is a current, like compulsion. Hard to forge when it goes against your will, but easy enough when it carries you the way you want to go." Page 401

Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V.E. Schwab is about female agency, love, power, hunger, control, rage and revenge and is highly recommended for Anne Rice fans.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Review: Unusual Hotels of the World by Steve Dobson

I borrowed a copy of Unusual Hotels of the World by Steve Dobson from the library and it features 100 hotels across 40 different countries. Unfortunately Australia wasn't one of the countries included which was a real shame as I'd expected to find a number of curious and unusual offerings in my home country.

Instead Dobson gives us an abundance of art hotels, treehouse accommodation, caravans and way too many igloo hotels when I was hoping for a little more eccentricity.

As for highlights, I loved the look of the spa hotel Rogner Bad Blumau designed by Austrian artist Hundertwasser and the floating aquarium in Sweden had me looking up the Hotel Utter Inn for more photographs. A hotel in the Netherlands even lets you sleep overnight in an industrial crane and rotate it over the dock.

You'll also find accommodation in retired train carriages, airstream caravans and decommissioned planes which is nothing new. I wish the author had limited the inclusion to just one windmill, one airstream caravan, one art hotel, one treehouse, one igloo, one hanging pod/tent and one lighthouse instead of giving us multiple offerings of the same types of accommodation in different countries.

This would have made room for more of the 'out there' hotels and perhaps provided scope to include additional countries. I know Australia has some unique offerings that would have worked perfectly within the author's theme but sadly these were overlooked.

Visiting the author's website in an attempt to track down his Instagram account for my Bookmark Monday post, I unintentionally learned more about him. Steve Dobson is a marketer in the hospitality and tourism market and built ‘The Unusual Company Ltd’ and 'GoUnusual', a publishing and online media group which promotes properties around the world. Without digging any further - because my care factor is quite low to be honest and I have other books to read - I think I understand why this collection isn't anywhere near as well rounded as it could have been.

Definitely a missed opportunity but Unusual Hotels of the World by Steve Dobson was an enjoyable armchair travelling experience during a holiday period when I wasn't travelling anywhere.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Celebrating 4 Million Page Views!

In June 2025 I celebrated reaching 3 Million Page Views and I can't believe I'm sharing this, but my web traffic has continued to grow and today I'm celebrating because...

Carpe Librum has just reached 4 Million Page Views!

My monthly stats continue to increase and I'm now receiving an average of 122,000 visitors to my site every month, up from 77,000 just six short months ago.

After sharing My Top 5 Books of 2025 last week and the reading challenges I'm participating in this year, this is an awesome milestone to celebrate and a terrific start to my blogging year.

If you're reading this not so humble brag, thanks for being a valued subscriber or occasional / first time visitor. I love this legacy of reading and reviewing I've been building over the last 20 years and I don't have any plans of slowing down.

My 2026 reading year has well and truly kicked off and I hope you have a huge stack of books you plan to get through this year.

Carpe Librum!

Review: Cape Fever by Nadia Davids

* Copy courtesy of Simon & Schuster *

Cape Fever by Nadia Davids is a gothic tale of desire and revenge set in 1920s South Africa. Soraya is hired as the live-in house maid and companion to Mrs Hattingh in a grand house in an unnamed British colony which could easily be Cape Town.

The novel begins in a seemingly familiar upstairs downstairs historical fiction style plot I've read and loved before. The list of daily, weekly, fortnightly and monthly chores Soraya is expected to carry out feed this fascination and the class distinction is clear.

Separated from her betrothed and letting Mrs Hattingh believe she can't read or write, Soraya accepts a generous offer from her employer to write a letter to him once a week on her behalf. This becomes a weekly ritual for both women that seems genuine and generous in the beginning as they sit together, read his reply and compose a response.

"It's as though she's shown me a door, told me about the riches that lie beyond it, opened it very slightly, enough for the warm gold glow behind it to spill out, just a little, with both of us knowing she can shut it whenever she likes." Page 73

Soraya comes from a Muslim community and the juxtaposition of the two cultures is ever present, with Mrs Hattingh continuing to assert her dominance and superiority at every opportunity. The writing is evocative and I particularly enjoyed her description of smells. I'm going to include the full quote here so that you can enjoy it and I can read it again and again in the future.

Soraya notices that in big houses with high ceilings and long corridors, the smells of people disappear into nothing.

"In the Quarter, smells stay. There's the smell in our houses of incense burning both now and fifty years ago, of a thousand meals past and the ones bubbling on stoves this minute. Sticking to every wall, woven into every curtain, the reek of chopped onions and pressed garlic, the trace of scattered methi, diced chilies, dried bay leaves; of spices - whole, roasted, ground, cast in hot oil - and of meat braising, bones boiling, fat spitting, broth cooking, sugar burning, rose water steaming, tea brewing, mint leaves just torn, ginger beer just poured. It's the smell of more in good times and of keeping an eye in lean ones. In our house, also, the whiff of my mother's soaps, the sweet jasmine my father planted at the front gate, the sticky heat of my and my sisters' sweat, the rush of the tides my brother brings back with him from a day at the beach and the fish he carries, still on the hook, sea fresh, glassy-eyed, salt crusted, scales shining." Pages 30-31

After reading this I desperately wanted to visit Soraya's house and inhale some of those scents, and absorb the swirl of life and history that had taken place there.

Constantly in each other's company, Soraya is unable to leave her position as her family desperately need her wages to get by, yet the relationship between the two women slowly begins to sour until it reaches an exciting and unexpected climax.

"She walks away, her slight frame straight, arms soft and graceful, once a girl who would have practiced with a book on her head, and I marvel that she can so easily show me her back when the kitchen is full of knives." Page 151

Cape Fever by Nadia Davids is a slow burn gothic psychological suspense thriller about class, colonialism, power, loneliness, love, loss, grief, secrets and betrayal and I loved it. Highly recommended.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

2026 Reading Challenge Sign Ups

I've had an annual reading goal of 75 books for the last six years but at the beginning of 2025 I decided to set my goal at 65 books. The plan was to free up valuable reading time to focus on larger books and it worked! I achieved my goal, read some chunky books and enjoyed The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas, the longest book I've ever read coming in at 1,276 pages.

This year I'm participating in my first ever slow read and I'm going to be tackling the Wolf Hall trilogy by Hilary Mantel. It contains approximately 2,000+ pages so I'm reducing my annual reading goal (again) to 60 books this year in order to accommodate the series. Here are the three reading challenges I'm participating in during 2026.

Wolf Crawl 2026

Wolf Crawl is a year long slow read challenge hosted by Simon Haisell from Footnotes and Tangents to read the Wolf Hall trilogy by Hilary Mantel. The series is about the life of Thomas Cromwell and the reign of Henry VIII and comprises Wolf Hall, Bring Up the Bodies and The Mirror and the Light.

A slow read is a deliberate, community-focused method of reading a book at a gentle pace. Guided by Simon, there is a reading schedule to follow each week and readers can also explore the weekly supplemental materials (artworks, further history etc.) or discuss the book with readers around the world.

This is my first time subscribing on Substack but given the additional resources and discussion on offer, I think it's going to be worth it. If you'd like to join me I can gift one month of paid subscriber benefits to Footnotes and Tangents for 5 Carpe Librum readers so feel free to email me or leave a comment below if you're interested.

If you want to read the trilogy with me, here's the schedule:
5 January 2026: Wolf Hall (17 weeks)
4 May 2026: Bring Up the Bodies (12 weeks)
27 July 2026: The Mirror and the Light (23 weeks)

Non Fiction Reader Challenge 2026

Hosted by fellow Aussie book blogger Shelleyrae at Book'd Out, I'm signing up to complete the Nonfiction Nibbler level of the challenge. For this, I'll need to read and review 6 books from any 6 of the categories listed below.

1. History
2. Memoir/Biography
3. True Crime
4. Science
5. Health
6. Food
7. Humour
8. South East Asia
9. Lost or found
10. Television
11. Subculture
12. Published in 2026

Historical Fiction Reading Challenge 2026

Hosted by Marg at The Intrepid Reader, I'm signing up to complete the Medieval Reader level again this year and will need to read and review 15 historical fiction books in order to successfully complete the challenge.

Historical fiction remains my favourite genre and last year I read 17 historical fiction novels and two of them made my Top 5 Books of 2025 list so here's to another great year of reading.

Are you challenging yourself in 2026? I'd love to know if you have any reading goals or if you're participating in any reading challenges this year. You can track my progress throughout the year over on the Challenges 2026 page.

Carpe Librum!

My Top 5 Books of 2025

2025 was an excellent year of reading for me. I read 65 books, gave 5 star ratings to 13 of them and when it was all said and done, I enjoyed putting this list together of My Top 5 Books of 2025.

I'm pleased with the variety in this list, with two books from publishers, one backlist book from 2017, two historical fiction novels, two debut novels, one Australian author and one audiobook. I started compiling these Top 5 Book lists in 2014 and this is the only time two memoirs have made my Top 5 list in the same year so that's a first!

Here are my Top 5 Books of 2025 in the order I read them:

1. Dunstan by Conn Iggulden

Set in the year 934, this is the story of a young boy raised to become a Benedictine monk, but who went on to become an Abbot, Bishop and Archbishop and reform the English Church.

Dunstan was canonised after his death and became England's favourite saint for almost 200 years, but according to this reimagining of his life, in addition to defeating the devil, he was also a liar, murderer and maker of Kings. Published in 2017, Dunstan by Conn Iggulden was a fascinating tale of talent, intellect, vengeance, duty, miracles, exile and ambition.

2. The Names by Florence Knapp

It's 1987 and Cora sets out to register the name of her newborn son. She has three options, go with family tradition and name him Gordon after her controlling husband, name him Julian which means sky father or give him the name his nine year old sister suggests which is Bear, because it sounds soft, cuddly and kind but can also be brave and strong.

The novel then splits into three narratives for each of the names and we catch up with the three boys every seven years to see how their lives turn out.

The Names by Florence Knapp is a carefully considered exploration of each of the three lives and a remarkable debut. I found myself recommending it a lot and it was definitely a standout favourite for the year.

3. All The Way to the River by Elizabeth Gilbert

A memoir about relationships, love and addiction, the author lays her soul bare to the reader, declaring early on that she is a sex and love addict, romantic obsessive, a fantasy and adrenaline addict, a world-class enabler and a blackout codependent.

All The Way to the River is a celebration of love, an exploration of death and grief with some light moments and even a little humour. Far from a misery memoir, the author undertakes the most unflinching look deep within herself to understand her actions and behaviour on the deepest level and I found it incredibly illuminating.

Gilbert then embarks on the painfully slow process of rebuilding her life after it had been shattered; thus giving hope to all who read her words. This is possibly the best memoir I've ever read.

4. Raising Hare by Chloe Dalton

This memoir documents the author's life changing experience finding a baby hare (leveret) on a country lane near her home in the English countryside. From the outset the author strived not to stroke or cuddle the leveret, believing it should remain wild and one day be released into its natural habitat.

Dalton's detailed observations and interactions with the leveret were endearing and greatly entertaining and I enjoyed following her experiences narrated by Louise Brealey. Ultimately I'll remember Raising Hare by Chloe Dalton for the nature writing and sheer wonder of raising a wild animal in a domestic setting and I found myself wishing I had a leveret to keep me company while I'm reading.

5. By Her Hand by Marion Taffe

Set in Mercia in 910AD, young Freda is inspired by stories, loves to forage in the woods and dreams of being able to write. Lucky to survive a brutal attack on her village by Danish raiders, Freda is placed in a women's abbey where she slowly learns to read and write.

Freda is a feisty character and Marion Taffe expertly brings this period in English history alive, skillfully helping the reader make sense of the complicated politics of 10th century Wessex. The writing was sublime and I can't believe By Her Hand was a debut novel for Australian author Marion Taffe.
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Have you read any of the books on the list or plan to? What was your favourite book/s in 2025?

Carpe Librum!