Playthings by Alex Pheby

Reviewer: Catriona Troth

What We Thought: 

As the stark, black cover suggests, the innocent-sounding title, Playthings, hides a dark and troubled history.

It refers to a statement by Daniel Paul Schreber, an early 20th Century German judge who documented his own psychotic breakdown, that those around him were not real, but merely ‘playthings of a lower God.’ Schreber’s account of his breakdown was used by Freud in the early development of psychoanalysis.

Playthings is the Pheby’s fictional account of Schreber’s third and final breakdown, and his incarceration, under increasingly disturbing conditions, in an asylum.

What we experience, through reading the book, is Schreber’s comparatively lucid moments, with little idea of how much time has passed between episodes. To begin with, we are inclined to believe his protestations that he is perfectly well again and should be allowed to go home. But then the sense of dislocation and loss of control intensifies. Is the mysterious figure called Alexander, who follows him round the asylum, a distillation of Schreber’s fears and fancies, or a projection of his own guilt? And what about the orderly, Muller? He seems solid enough to begin with, but then that line, too, begins to blur.

Pheby’s writing creates moments of intense focus, as Schreber’s senses home in on some trivial detail in his environment.

“The pattern of the blanket came toward him in ever closer magnification the longer he stared. Grids of red and green entwined like the mesh of the ether, intersections picked out in gold thread, and below that motif, the brown webbing around which each fibre was woven.”

Pheby uses the type of chapter headings that were common in 19th and early 20th C novels, that flag what is about to happen in the chapter. At first this seems like a device to make the books seem as if written contemporarily with the setting. But read them carefully and they have a more unsettling effect. At times they provide context that you’d miss if you skipped over them, allowing you to take a step back from Schreber’s direct experience.

Playthings’ historical setting adds other dimensions to the story. We see the early, faltering and ultimately failing attempts at enlightened treatment of mental illness. And we observe its social background – the hypermasculinity of Prussian society and its intolerance of those who fail to fit its mould, its growing anti-Catholic and anti-Semitic sentiment.

A fascinating and unsettling read.

You’ll Enjoy This If You Loved: Nathan Filer’s The Shock of the Fall; Hannah Green’s I Never Promised You A Rose Garden, Michel Faber's The Crimson Petal and the White

Avoid If You Dislike: Exploring mental illness at close quarters

Perfect Accompaniment: A glass of brandy in a darkened room

Genre: Literary Fiction

Available from Amazon

Shameless by Paul Burston

Reviewer: David C Dawson www.davidcdawson.co.uk.

What We Thought:
This is a real Marmite of a book. You either love it or you hate it. I first read Shameless several years ago and I laughed out loud many times while reading it. The book is like Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City - except with far more drugs and gay bitchiness.

Paul Burston was a well-known writer on gay topics for the London-based Time Out magazine by the time Shameless, his first novel, came out in 2001. He has published three novels since, and several short stories.

Thirty-two year old Martin works in advertising. He is kind and decent, unsuited to the cut and thrust of corporate life. At the start of the book, his boyfriend of four years has run off with a male prostitute. His friends John and Caroline are far too distracted by their drug-use and egotistical problems to be of any use to Martin. With no one to turn to, he decides to throw himself into a wild, hedonistic lifestyle. One that he feels he missed out on in his youth.

This is when Burston exposes Martin to the full on, and potentially destructive world of late 1990s gay London. The caricatures of gym bunnies, leather men, twinks and cocaine clubbers are brilliantly drawn. Martin is drawn into the excesses of a shameless, self-obsessed, cliquey world. Because Burston writes this as a morality tale, Martin ultimately finds that there is a price to pay.

Paul Burston’s style of writing is fresh and easy to read. His observations are shockingly accurate. I cannot tell you how I know this. Trust me, they are.

Shameless is witty, bitchy, trashy, camp, sweet and frothy, but always lots of fun. The characters of Martin, John and Caroline are fully formed and true to life. The essence of the London club-scene jumps from the pages. Paul Burston's books are accessible and unpretentious. His stories rocket along, like an express train. They are filled with humour, pathos and occasional insight.

I strongly recommend this book, unless you are of a nervous disposition. If you are, I would simply say, you should get out more.

You’ll enjoy this if you like: The Gay Divorcee: Paul Burston, Tales of the City: Armistead Maupin

Avoid if you don’t like: Occasional explicit sex description and drug usage

Ideal accompaniments: A very pink gin

Genre: Humour, LGBTQ

Available from Amazon

I Let You Go by Clare Mackintosh

Reviewer: Gillian Hamer, author of The Charter, Closure, Complicit, Crimson Shore & False Lights (www.gillianhamer.com)

What we thought: As a big crime fiction fan I was excited to read this thriller after it appeared on the Sunday Times bestseller list and won the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year 2016. Also, I was intrigued to read that the author had spent numerous years working in a real-life CID role and how that would come through in the writing.

To be honest, all my boxes were totally ticked by this novel. The narrative is strong, with a good hook that soon captivates the reader. Characterisation was handled with a professionalism, so each person was real and engaging, and yet there was a cleverly handled sense of secrecy about the storyline too that kept you reading. I liked the first person POV and how the differing sides of the story were gradually revealed while maintaining an excellent pace throughout. This novel cannot have been an easy one to write, and it does not have the feel of a debut novel.

In short, this is a story of guilt, fear and redemption. When a five-year-old boy is killed by a hit and run driver, what appears to be a straightforward investigation soon ends in one dead end after another, until after an anniversary appeal, a year later, the police get a lead that takes them on a totally unexpected journey. Without giving too much away, the twist in the middle of the novel really worked for me, and unsettled me as a reader. Having engaged with characters, it’s always a real skill to turn the reader’s world upside down!

Highly recommend this to anyone who enjoys dark thrillers and gritty crime fiction. Some of the scenes of domestic violence may not be to everyone’s tastes, and a few times I found myself biting back tears. But I was very impressed with the novel and was sad to see it come to the end – and within 24 hours I had downloaded I See You the author’s follow-up novel.

You’ll enjoy this if you like: B A Paris, Jo Nesbo, Tara Lyons.

Avoid if you don’t like: Police procedurals and scenes of domestic violence.

Ideal accompaniments: Warm fresh baked bread with blackcurrant jam and a frothy coffee.

Genre: Crime.

Available from Amazon

The Glorious Heresies by Lisa McInerney

(Audiobook read by Shelley Atkinson)

Reviewer: JJ Marsh

What we thought: You can see why this won the Bailey’s Prize.

McInerney has a skill with voice, but not just the one. This novel is populated by voices, personalities and characters, causing the reader to change her/his mind every chapter and make you care about every last one of them, even if they get on your nerves. By the end, it feels like this is your own extended, unruly, frustrating and loveable family.

The book is set in the city of Cork, Ireland. It’s big and small and complex and simple and sad and yes indeed, glorious.

There’s a dead man on the floor and someone has to clear up the mess. One body affects several lives. A criss-crossing series of connections mean that one accident has a ripple effect, disrupting some futures and dredging some pasts. Some stories make you laugh, others induce tears of frustration and impotence. And the chance meetings and coincidences, drawing every thread into the tapestry is beautiful and somehow inevitable.
A wonderful patchwork of stories connect to make a rich, emotionally arresting whole commentary on faith, beliefs and community, as if The Sopranos was set in Cork.

I listened to the audio version and Shelley Atkinson’s talented voice draws you into the story so effectively, you feel like more of a bystander than a reader.

A real treat.

You’ll enjoy this if you liked: The Works by Joseph Connolly, The Casual Vacancy by JK Rowling or Inishowen by Joseph O’Connor

Avoid if you don’t like: Social commentary, swearing, violence

Ideal accompaniments: Pork scratchings, a glass of Tullamore Dew and The Pogues singing Dirty Old Town

Genre: Literary fiction 

Buy on Amazon

The Moth Catcher by Ann Cleeves

Reviewer: Gillian Hamer, author of The Charter, Closure, Complicit, Crimson Shore & False Lights. (www.gillianhamer.com)


What we thought: I am a huge fan of Ann Cleeves and her style of writing. I love her Shetland series and I equally adore her Vera series. So, you can probably tell already that this is going to be a glowing review.

Characterisation is one of Cleeves’s major strengths. Every character in the book is a living, breathing, believable person in their own right, with their own idiosyncrasies, their own strengths and weaknesses. And strong characterisation is important in this novel as we are faced with a murder in a small, rural community where every single member of the locality could be a suspected killer. And with so many lives to juggle, it could be easy for the characters to blur, but Cleeves does an excellent job balancing each one throughout.

Vera and her team find themselves dealing with a double murder enquiry, when two male victims, who initially seem to have no connection with each other are found dead in and around the grounds of a country estate. With Vera’s instinct and grit, she soon begins to peel away the layers of each person’s life story, until a connection is discovered, and the killer is unmasked.

There are the usual twists and turns, and moments of conflict and drama, that mark our Cleeves’s clever writing style and attention to detail. But most of all for anyone who enjoys crime fiction, this is a lesson in how to write a pacy, gripping page turner, without the need for melodrama or clever deception. A thoroughly solid, entertaining read, and as ever I look forward to the next one.

You’ll enjoy this if you like: Val McDermid, Peter James, Ian Rankin.

Avoid if you don’t like: Clever female leads.

Ideal accompaniments: Takeaway pizza and a bottle of Guinness.

Genre: Crime Fiction.

Available on Amazon

Her Turn to Cry by Chris Curran

Reviewer: Liza Perrat, author of Spirit of Lost Angels, Wolfsangel and Blood Rose Angel

What we thought: Having loved Chris Curran’s debut novel Mindsight, I was eagerly awaiting her second and Her Turn to Cry proved to be just as gripping and page-turning.

It is 1965 and Joycie Todd, a famous model, lives with her photographer boyfriend, Marcus. She seems to have it all. However, we soon learn that events from Joycie’s past have left her damaged and unhappy. Despite Marcus bolstering her modelling career, and his obvious love for her, Joycie is unable to reciprocate his attentions.

Growing up in the 1950s, with her father and his friend as a popular theatre act, Joycie’s mother disappears. Rumour says she ran off with a man, but when Joycie finds a bloodstained rug under the bed, and is haunted by nightmares and snippets of memories from her past, she begins to ask questions. When Joycie reconnects with her aunt, she is propelled to seek the truth about her parents, if she is ever to settle in her present life.

The author smoothly switches between the past and the present, as we follow Joycie on her gripping journey towards the truth. I had a real sense of the 50s dilapidated English coastal towns and the performers of the old music halls, along with the backstage atmosphere, right to “present” day 1965.

Themes of abuse and power are deftly handled, yet the author doesn’t shy away from the realities of those times.

I found Her Turn to Cry an addictive page-turner, as Joycie develops and eventually blooms into her true self. With incredible suspense, excellently-drawn characters and a thrilling plot, I would highly recommend this to readers of crime and psychological thrillers.

You’ll like this if you enjoy: Crime Fiction, tales of dark family secrets.

Avoid if you don’t like: stories that deal with abuse of power, prejudice and hatred.

Ideal accompaniments: Serve of fish and chips on the harbourfront.

Genre: Psychological Thriller

Available on Amazon

Hampstead Fever by Carol Cooper

Reviewer: Liza Perrat, author of Spirit of Lost Angels, Wolfsangel and Blood Rose Angel

What we thought: I’m always keen to read the sequel to books I’ve enjoyed, so was delighted to find Carol Cooper had written Hampstead Fever, following her wonderfully entertaining debut, One Night at the Jacaranda. I felt I was meeting old friends again, following their lives and interactions which began during a night of speed dating at the Jacaranda Club. However, it is not just the old friends we catch up with; new characters, and events, come into play in Hampstead Fever.

Through witty and entertaining dialogue, and suspense-infused events –– adultery, a mysterious illness, break ups and reunions –– the author vibrantly depicts the singles’ scene in London, and the lives of those playing it out. We empathise with her characters, their strengths and their flaws, as they each find themselves caught up in complicated webs.

Carol Cooper’s experience as a doctor shines through in her meticulous research, her compassion and her empathy, all of which add many more layers to this tale than is at first imagined.

If you’re looking for an easy, page-turning read this summer, I would highly recommend you grab a copy of Hampstead Fever!

You’ll like this if you enjoy: Carol Cooper’s One Night at the Jacaranda

Avoid if you don’t like: tales of interacting human lives.

Ideal accompaniments: Cold glass of bubbly

Genre: Contemporary fiction

Available on Amazon