Battle Of Aleppo (2012-2016)

Definition: Irenic

Margaret Forster (1938-2016), English Novelist, Biographer, Memoirist, Historian and Literary Critic

To Remain Or Not To Remain, That Is The Question

The Wrong Side of Goodbye (The Harry Bosch Series) by Michael Connelly

Hardback:  Can Harry Bosch find someone who might never have existed?  Unstoppable detective Harry Bosch returns in a new thriller from New York Times best-selling author Michael Connelly.

Harry Bosch is California's newest private investigator.  He does not advertise, he does not have an office, and he is picky about who he works for, but it doesn't matter.  His chops from thirty years with the LAPD speak for themselves.

Harry Bosch is working as a part-time detective in San Fernando, outside of Los Angeles, when he gets an invitation to meet with ageing aviation billionaire Whitney Vance. At eighteen, Vance had a relationship with a girl called Vibiana Duarte, but soon after becoming pregnant, she disappeared.

Now, as he reaches the end of his life, Vance wants to know what happened to Vibiana, and whether there is an heir to his vast fortune.  Bosch is the only person he trusts to undertake the assignment.

"Call it justice or the need to know.  Call it the need to believe that those who are evil will not remain hidden in darkness forever.  Even if doing it doesn't exactly fit inside the rules, sometimes you have to rely on the voice inside that tells you what to do.  There will be one thing that brings it all together and makes sense of things.  Find it and you're gold."

Harry is aware that with the sums of money involved, this could be dangerous - not just for himself, but for the person he is hunting.  But as he begins to uncover the secrets behind Vibiana's tragic story, and discovers uncanny links to his own past, he knows he cannot rest until he finds the truth.

Swift, unpredictable, and thrilling, The Wrong Side of Goodbye (2016) - the twenty-first and latest instalment in the exceptional and outstanding Harry Bosch series - proves once again that "Connelly is still very much in his prime" (Washington Post).

About the author:  A former police reporter for the Los Angeles Times, Michael Connelly is the author of twenty-eight novels including the Harry Bosch series and Lincoln Lawyer series, featuring Mickey Haller, as well as standalone bestsellers such as The Poet (1996).  His books have been translated into thirty-one languages, won numerous awards and sold more than sixty million copies worldwide.  Michael is executive producer of Amazon TV's Bosch, starring Titus Welliver.  He lives with his family in Tampa, Florida.

Rating:  6/5

Christmas Humour #712

This Is What Love Is

Second Sunday of Advent

The Troutbeck Testimony (Lake District Mystery Series) by Rebecca Tope

Hardback:  The spring bank holiday marks one year since Persimmon 'Simmy' Brown opened her florist shop in the idyllic Lake District town of Windermere.  But the long weekend is far from peaceful and, as usual for Simmy, things take a deadly turn.

There is word of a series of sinister dognappings occurring in nearby Troutbeck and whilst taking a walk up Wansfell Pike, Simmy and her father, Russell, stumble on the body of a dog.  Unnerved by a suspicious looking man carrying a large bag and a hushed conversation overheard outside the pub, Simmy and Russell suspect foul play.

When one of the suspects is found on a farmyard with his throat slit, Simmy reluctantly gets caught up in a murder investigation.  But when Russell receives an anonymous death threat, and her assistant Bonnie appears to know more than she is letting on, Simmy has no choice but to do everything she can to find the killer.

The Troutbeck Testimony (2015) is the fourth instalment in the page-turning Lake District Mystery series.

About the author:  Rebecca Tope, a British crime novelist and journalist, lives on a smallholding in Herefordshire, where she plants trees and watches wild birds, but manages to travel the world and enjoy civilisation from time to time as well.  Most of her varied experiences and activities find their way into her books, sooner or later.  In 1992, she founded Praxis books, a small British press.

She is the author of three murder mystery series, featuring the fictional characters of Den Cooper, a Devon police detective, Drew Slocombe, a former nurse, now an undertaker, Thea Osborne, a house sitter in the Cotswolds, and Persimmon Brown, a florist in the Lake District.  Her books are set in real English villages.  She uses a kind of "anti research", avoiding discussion with any of the villagers, but does walk along the footpaths and visits most of the village pubs.

She is currently working on a biography of Sabine Baring-Gould.  Tope is also ghost writer of the novels based on the ITV series Rosemary and Thyme.

Rating:  5/5

The Air Up There In The Clouds

First Sight by Philip Larkin

Keep Calm And Welcome December

Out Of My Depth (True Crime) by Anne Darwin with David Leigh

Paperback:  "It felt like the right time to tell my own story, in my own words..."

In 2002, when mother-of-two Anne Darwin told the world - and her family - that her husband, John, had disappeared while canoeing in the North Sea, her life changed forever.  She had just lied to to the police, the press, her friends and neighbours, insurance companies and her own sons.

While her husband hid in their rental house next door, Anne had to face the music.  She claimed the life insurance payouts, endured the police questioning, accepted the consolations - then left with him to start a new life in Panama.

Now, for the first time, Anne opens up about an extraordinary chain of events:  her decision to take part in her husband's hare-brained scheme;  her life and marriage before, during and after the crime was spectacularly revealed;  her harrowing time behind bars and the runaway train of deceit and guilt that followed their plan to defraud insurance companies with the aid of a canoe.

Out Of My Depth (2016) is the extraordinary true story of a woman's journey from ordinary housewife to Canoe Widow, Panama and prison.  "Anne's often heart-wrenching story is one of extreme regret, remorse, shame and, finally, redemption.  She deserves great credit for being brave enough to tell her side of a story that engrossed millions of people across the world, but that left her in the very depths of despair," wrote Leigh, the co-author, in the Foreword.

*Anne's fee for her book goes to the RSPCA and the RNLI.

About the authors:  Anne Darwin, a softly spoken and unassuming former doctor's receptionist, has done much to repair her relationship with her two sons.  She now works for an animal charity and lives alone.

David Leigh is an award-winning journalist, who developed a remarkable relationship with Anne after uncovering her crime in Panama, shortly before Christmas in December 2007.  He won the London Press Club's Scoop Of The Year Award and the National Association of Press Agencies' news story of the year for his reporting on John Darwin 'Canoe Man'.

Deep And Shallow Characters