Elizabeth McGregor

Ondanks de overvloed aan informatie over allerlei soorten uitheemse bomen, heb ik wel genoten van dit verhaal. David en Anna hebben een bijzondere relatie als ze beiden studeren in Oxford. Maar dan vertrekt Anna plotseling en blijft David verbijsterd achter. Anna is teruggegaan naar Boston waar ze weer bij haar moeder gaat wonen. David schrijft brief na brief maar krijgt nooit antwoord. 10 Jaar later wordt hij gebeld door Grace, Anna's moeder. Zij vraagt hem om naar Boston te komen omdat Anna een ernstig ongeluk heeft gehad en in coma in het ziekenhuis ligt en omdat zij hem nodig heeft om voor Rachel, zijn dochter te zorgen. Totaal in de war reist David af naar Amerika. Hij heeft nooit geweten dat hij een dochter had. Rachel blijkt een meisje te zijn dat aan autisme (Asperger) leidt en een passie heeft voor landkaarten en bruggen. Door het navertellen van het reisverhaal van de botanicus Ernest Wilson, dat hij eerder aan Anna had verteld vlak voor zij vertrok, probeert hij tot haar door te dringen en haar uit haar coma te halen, geholpen door de tekeningen van Rachel. Ik vond het wel een mooi verhaal.… (mehr)

This is one of those psychological thrillers with an added dash of horror level suspense that will have you gripping the book and flipping pages as your attention is captured by an intense storyline. Beware you may find yourself staying up late into the night trying to get from one cover to the next without stopping; if you do, you won’t be disappointed. It’s definitely one of the more unique thrillers on the market.

The creepy, skin tingling factor is set on high as you’re taken through a story that will yank you through twists and turns you never saw coming. It’s not overly fast paced but what she lacks for in pep is more than made up in character development with a complex group of people who are richly described and given realistic storylines.

Fair warning, the book opens with a bit of a rough start and a character it’s hard to care about, in fact she irritated me to the point I wanted to pay for her therapy myself. Something horrific is also done to a living entity and I’m just going to leave it at that; one of the character’s is channeling their inner sociopath so let’s just say it was pretty rough reading for a bit.… (mehr)

I read this book for the book club at work. Its not a book I would normally read - and I found it slow going at first. If it wasn't for a book club, I would have given up within the first 20 pages. I'm glad I read it - but it was slow going, not a lot of action. I was mostly intrigued about the Painter, Richard Dadd - The sections devoted to him were very interesting.

This is a story mainly about Catherine Sergeant. Unfortunately, she wasn't very interesting - I found John Brigham, the new love, to be more intriguing - with a mentally ill sister, and his connection to the painter Dadd. This book is very subtle in its writing. The author rights paragraphs in sentences. I suspect that if I read the story differently (eg, not as a story, but as a poem) I might feel differently about it.… (mehr)

A somewhat convoluted, but still very interesting examination of the death of Sir Theodosius Boughton, for which his brother-in-law John Donellan was tried and convicted. Cooke runs through the circumstances of Boughton's death, the complicated questions of who would benefit from his death, and offers a thorough rundown of Donellan's trial.

The complex nature of the case creates some issues for the narrative, which bounces back and forth a bit and repeats itself occasionally. But Cooke's done an admirable job of trying to unpack this case for modern readers.… (mehr)