Books Technica

The Dinner Party by R.J. Parker

January 26, 2021January 30, 2021 Books TechnicaLeave a comment

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Dinner-Party-addictive-psychological-thriller-ebook/dp/B07Q1KMDJH/

What would you do if you were at a party with your best friends and suddenly someone suggest you should play a game where you deepest, darkest secret could be revealed in front of the people you love the most? Would you join in? Why wouldn’t you since everyone else already agreed to do it. If you back down now, then you definitely have something to hide. And you wouldn’t want people to know that would you?

Let me tell you, The Dinner Party by R.J.Parker took me on a journey, my poor heart wasn’t ready for. There wasn’t even a warning to buckle my seat belt. No one told me what I was getting myself into. No one told me to take the day off and cancel all my plans because this book would devour my whole attention.

R.J. Parker is a master pacer, delivering a suspenseful story, without revealing too much, leaving readers wanting more.

Once I read the first chapter, I couldn’t stop. I didn’t want to stop. I had to know what the hell was going on and I think that an amazing thriller does exactly just that. The Dinner Party follows a fairly simple premise. A couple throws a party for their friends. Once everyone has arrived and had a drink or two one of them suggest a game. What can possible go wrong?

There were so many moments in this book where I was happy that I’m and introvert and that I don’t usually go to parties. The idea of being so naked, so exposed in front of people especially from the perspective of the characters in the story who have secrets hidden, made me feel anxious. R.J. Parker develops the story at a very quick pace but without giving anything away. The characters are so morally grey that when the next day they find out that one of their guests had been murdered you expect that any of them could’ve done it.

Throughout the book, which I luckily picked up on a Saturday morning and finished it on the same day, I found myself saying the publishers name without even realizing. Published by One More Chapter (a division of HarperCollins) the book delivers just that. A nail-biting thriller that hits home with every chapter leaving you wanting more. The Dinner Party in my opinion solidifies this publisher as one to watch out for. Especially if you enjoy this genre as much as I do.

The Institute by Stephen King

January 25, 2021April 10, 2021 Books TechnicaLeave a comment

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Institute-Stephen-King/dp/1529355419

I have been hearing about this a lot in the book community on Instagram and YouTube. I haven’t gotten around to read a lot of King’s works but I did enjoy a couple of his stories that he had published under the name of Richard Bachmann. If you haven’t checked out the Running Man I would highly recommend it.

Now, when it comes to stories that King writes, I automatically expect two things: either to be biting off my finger nails or to read a seemingly fiction novel with a few twists of the fantastical.

Although I have managed to get a copy of Misery I’m still trying to bring myself to read it. It isn’t because I’m afraid that King will disappoint. On the contrary. I’m afraid that it would hit all the right notes and keys and will cause me a couple of sleepless nights.

The Institute definitely falls in the later half of the two. The seemingly normal story we are following, at least in the first part of the story is thoughtfully written. We follow an ex-cop that moves, by coincidence to a small town in the south and stays there. Then we are being introduced to what I like to call the actual protagonist of the story, Luke Ellis who is a gifting young man. At the beginning when it was pointed at the fact that Luke is gifted my fight or flight senses kicked in. There were so many stories written about people who possess supernatural abilities that I loved but also that I didn’t enjoy.

King is great at telling you a story and selling it to you, making even the outrageous feel possible.

In King’s case, he played it smartly. Gifted meant that Luke was very smart and he would soon attend university although he was just twelve. Yes. Twelve. I kept wondering while I was reading when the two story lines would intersect. The idea was compelling enough and at times I found myself wondering whether such a place might actually exist. Whilst the reasoning behind why the Institute would exist was a bit of a stretch, the plot and the characters were written with taste and sense that overall I found myself by the end of the book to buy it.

King is a master at plot. Everyone knows that. King is great at telling you a story and selling it to you. The Institute is testament to his abilities and if anyone has thought that his crown would be taken away, in my opinion King is a leading example of how strong writing and a strong idea can create the most magical of places without too many magical elements required.

The Family Tree by Sairish Hussain

January 23, 2021April 10, 2021 Books TechnicaLeave a comment

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Family-Tree-Sairish-Hussain/dp/0008297452/

There were so many moments in this book that I stopped and considered what I was reading. Although it isn’t what I normally would read, The Family Tree, tells the story of Amjad’s family and the events that it made fall apart.

I started reading the book as of the WellReadNarative’s Book of The Month over on Instagram. The promise of WellReadNarative is to bring to the forefront books written by POC and LGBTQIA+ authors that would normally wouldn’t get the audience they deserve.

The Family Tree by Sairish Hussain is a beautiful story about being an outsider family in the UK. The heartfelt story of this family is told out of mainly three perspectives: Amjad the father of the family that deals with loss; Saahil the son that struggles to cope with traumatic events and addiction and Zahra the younger daughter of Amjad who is left to pick up the pieces after their family breaks apart.

Crafted to perfection. Sairish Hussain is definitely an author worth keeping your eye on.

I found myself realising after a few pages that there were similarities between the family I was reading and my own. Although I’m not from an Asian family the way the elders try to stuff you with food every time you visit, the way the family pressures the younger generation to excel for the sake of excelling just to name a few, hit home with me.

The Family Tree is a beautiful story that deserves to be read. If not because of the marvellous characters constructed in detail like a sculptor would his work, the at least it should be read for perspective. Hussain manages to bring to the forefront a muslim family, their rituals, their day to day life in a way that makes me wonder why there aren’t this many stories on bestsellers list? It isn’t because the books aren’t good or that they aren’t written well. This book proves that.

The Silent Suspect by Nell Pattison

January 18, 2021April 10, 2021 Books TechnicaLeave a comment

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Silent-Suspect-gripping-Northwood-community-ebook/dp/B08KFT4HS9/

I’ve received an Advanced Reader Copy (also known as ARC) from the publisher Avon to read The Silent Suspect and just let me tell you that a part of me was ecstatic.

Some people choose their books as an automatic purchase depending on the author. I know this because I do it as well. However for some time now Avon had made its way into my shelf. It wasn’t something that I had done consciously but the type of crime thrillers they publish are just so engrossing.

The first book I read that was published by them was by Helen Fields in the DI Callanach series. I still remember devouring the first book and wondering how I had never heard about Helen Fields.

The same thing happened now with Nell Pattison. The Silent Suspect is actually the third book in the Paige Northwood series—a series I hadn’t heard about before. Hence I am starting now to include on the very small list of authors that I consider as an automatic purchase the publisher Avon.

I’m a bit furious at my reading friends because they haven’t actually recommended this to me before. Because let me tell you this is one of the best thriller books I’ve read in a long time.

Paige Northwood is a natural successor to Harry Hole

I usually compare thrillers with other writers/books I loved. The Silent Suspect has the perfect mix in my opinion of character development and story. Although I couldn’t really appreciate the full development of recurrent characters, I was still intrigued and had to finish the book in one sitting.

There aren’t many thriller books in my opinion that manage to achieve what The Silent Suspect does. It has enough of crime elements without to overwhelm the reader with police procedures as we follow a protagonist that is not a police agent. Paige Northwood is a BSL Interpreter for the council (and although it is hinted at her having worked with the police in the past which only intrigued me more and makes me want to read the previous two books in the series) I was invested from the first pages. She comes of as a reliable narrator, the majority of the book being told from her perspective as she is dragged into the scene of a burning house by a frantic client of her friend.

I would recommend the Paige Northwood to be read in order because I believe that Nell Pattison is an exquisite writer. I will go check out her previous two books The Silent House and Silent Night because Paige Northwood is one of the contenders to my all time favourite protagonist in a crime thriller series Harry Hole (followed closely by DI Callanach).

The Silent Suspect is out on 29th of April 2021 which allows sufficient time for readers to enjoy the first two books in the series (not that 3 months would be needed to read the first two books in the series).

Thank you to Avon for providing me with another loveable protagonist, an advance copy of the novel and finally another series that I will have to keep my eye on when it comes to crime thriller novels.

Year One by Nora Roberts

January 15, 2021April 10, 2021 Books TechnicaLeave a comment

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Year-One-Chronicles-Nora-Roberts-ebook/dp/B06XZQH2VW/

Here’s the thing. I like to be surprised. I like to pick up a book and be knocked off of my feet with amazing, captivating stories. And this book has done that, for various different reasons.

I might be the only one who thought that Nora Roberts has only written romance. I remember my mom being very excited to read her romance novels and somehow, in my small mind, I had categorised her as an author to be exclusively a romance writer.

Shame on me for thinking that. Shame on me for pushing her in a box that she definitely doesn’t belong in. Shame on me for thinking that one author can be fitted into only one genre.

Nora Roberts is not only a romance author. She is a masterful story teller who’s able to see past genre. Who can write compelling stories with interesting—and sometimes twisted—characters. She’s a good cook, that knows her recipes and adds the perfect amount of character, plot and twists into a pot and lets it simmer.

Now was it a smart idea to read Year One in the middle of a pandemic, when the story is about a pandemic? Absolutely not! The book hit too close to home. The story starting with a hunting trip in Scotland. In Scotland of all countries!!

The accuracy with which the first 20-30 pages described the pandemic through which the whole world went through in 2020 and is still currently going through, made me at times afraid. I had, on multiple occasions and to no fault of Nora Roberts as an author, stopped. Simply put the book down, went in my bedroom, closed the door, went under the blankets and cried for a good half an hour. It was too much.

I read because I like to escape reality. I like to be immersed in a story and follow characters I’ve never met because the real world is too difficult to deal with. When I was plunged into a fictional world, that resembled oh-so-well the reality in which we were living, I couldn’t cope.

But I did finish the book. I did read it through cover to cover and it was… *chef’s kiss* perfect! The story in itself follows four characters through their way of coping with the fact that the world as they knew it ended. Irrevocably and irreparably ended. To a certain degree, I found myself criticising myself. Here I was whining that I haven’t left the small town I’m living for 8 months but the characters in the book had to leave their lives behind. If they wanted to survive they had to uproot themselves and go into the unknown with the hope that they would find peace.

I would recommend Year One to anyone who is a fan of the fantasy genre but also to anyone who feels that the world outside their window, feels too strange and too broken to be ever pieced back together. I hope you get the comfort from this book, although it is categorised as fantasy, that you need to understand that not all is lost. And there are better times coming.

The Darkest Part Of The Forrest by Holly Black

January 7, 2021April 10, 2021 Books TechnicaLeave a comment

“In the woods is a glass coffin. It rests on the ground, and in it sleeps a boy with horns on his head and ears as pointed as knives….”

Some stories are written to be read and shelved.

Some stories are written to be adored but never read.

This story has been written to be read and loved and when you’ve finished it you can’t help but tell someone about it.

The Darkest Part of The Forrest by Holly Black has become an instant favourite of mine. I usually don’t get to enjoy the fairytale type of stories as my brain is weird in such a way to reject anything that is anything close to a fairytale. Yet Black managed what many haven’t managed to do. Trick my mind. Make it believe that although there is a magical setting, and although there are elements hidden through out the text that––in retrospect—should have made my brain shut down, it didn’t.

The magic of Black’s writting manages to conjure something refreshing. Something that many tried to do and failed. To bring a new breath into a story that has been told before.

Although it is loosely based on one of my favourite balads in German literature called Erlkönig—having studies it in school—it never crossed my mind that a retelling might be ever based on it. Partially, because I always thought that the original ballad had been perfect in my mind, but also because the elements that Black brings to the story are not things that I thought would fit into the mix.

The Darkest Part of The Forrest is a great story, fairly a quick read for anyone who looks to get lost in a story that takes a folk story—a twisted classic in my opinion—making it feel brand new. It is the perfect start for anyone who enjoys stories set in the real world—or some what similar to the real world—with magical elements, a bad ass female character and queer representation.