The Letters by Ella Drayton
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The Letters is a well written crime thriller with strong characters, in particular the main protagonist, a female detective called Brodie Barrett. It followed a fairly typical pattern of having several characters who were under suspicion of committing a murder, though most of the suspects were known to Barrett. I found the twist near the end of the book interesting and was not expecting that at all, and the author’s scene setting was quite intriguing at times.

The story has good pace and quite good dialogue. Some of the reactions of certain characters seemed unrealistic, such as the scene in the morgue and, although Brodie is often speaking about protecting her little girl, there is no mention of protecting her from a stalker who is threatening her.

There were many occasions in the novel when I would have welcomed more description of the surroundings, time of day, weather etc, as well as of the characters to add more “colour” to the event that was happening. Unfortunately, I did not find myself rooting for any of the characters but thought that Walker was probably the most intriguing – at least to this reader. Another glance at the text from a copy editor would be helpful for a number of typos, missing words, and errors that jumped out. It is a page-turner and I am sure would appeal to fans of the murder mystery genre.


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Far-Knowing by Melinda Brasher
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

An entertaining and well-written fantasy tale, with plenty of suitable doses of magic, sorcery and sword play has been served up here by a talented author. There are strong female characters in the two main characters, Ista and Kallinesha, who are ably assisted in their heroic tasks by the male love interests. The author introduces intriguing elements of conflict between the heroines from time to time, but this did not prevent me from rooting for each of them to the end of the novel. I enjoyed the idea of over-use of spells causing the main protagonists to feel weary, and consequently becoming vulnerable to their enemies.

Far-Knowing is a story with pace and intriguing twists and turns. There are many well-drawn situations showing skilful powers of description with a mature turn of phrase from Ms Brasher. The main evil character possesses cultured qualities and keeps the reader guessing throughout. I found plenty to recommend to lovers of the fantasy genre in Melinda Brasher’s fascinating novel but would have liked a touch more back-story for the overall setting of the world she has created here.


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Mental Damnation Dream by Konn Lavery
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I almost gave up on reading Mental Damnation: Dream because, not having read any of the series, I found the Introduction and Prologue far too long and wordy. Not until I was half way through chapter one did the story pick up enough to capture my interest. There is the usual problem, therefore, of not capturing the reader’s attention with the first few sentences of the book and them not persisting with it, which in this case would be a big loss! The tale of Krista and her disturbing dreams, Dreadweave Pass and the evil Weaver are all well worth the effort of continuing with the rest of Konn Lavery’s intriguing and highly original novel.

While I cannot say that this could be considered to be a stand-alone novel, I doubt I will be seeking out more books in the series – not being a fan of the fantasy genre – but I can imagine many more readers of such a tale wanting to devour the other books by this author. Lavery writes an extremely good book: captivating, highly descriptive, emotional and hauntingly poignant. Not only is the narrative wonderful and the dialogue natural but we are also entertained by a delightful scattering of beautiful illustrations.

Well worth pursuing past the rather slow start to the book if you enjoy scary fantasy with a touch of page-turning mystery.


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