Monthly Post: December 2019 The Case of the Quibbling Cleric – What can you expect?

Big Bona Ogles, Boy! (Send for Octavius Guy, #3) by Michael Gallagher
Current average rating: 4.71 of 5 stars

Oh, No, Octavius!, the latest addition to my Send for Octavius Guy series, is set to be published on January 1st 2020. For those of you unfamiliar with young Octavius (known variously as Gooseberry and Octopus), he’s a skinny, young lad who is now fifteen years old, and who fancies himself a detective. It’s 1853, and the well-heeled residents of Highbury have a problem: the Reverend Allaston Burr, the rector who’s been foisted upon their congregation by an ancient yet legally-binding right known as an advowson. When a final appeal to Queen Victoria fails to remove him from his post, they turn to Gooseberry for help. As you might have guessed, the Reverend Burr is not long for this world. Read on…

This month’s special offer is a free download of Big Bona Ogles, Boy!: Octavius Guy & The Case of the Mendacious Medium (#3). This time young Gooseberry investigates a shadowy Spiritualist medium only to discover that somebody wants her dead. Offer ends on December 31st 2019.

“My favorite Victorian boy investigator sets off to solve a new mystery…Words cannot describe just how much I enjoy Octavius.”—Bethany Swafford, Goodreads Reviewer (5 stars)

Happy investigating!
Michael

Find me on my website Michael Gallagher Writes and on Facebook, and make sure to follow me on Twitter @seventh7rainbow.

The Potter's Field

The Potter's Field by Andrea Camilleri
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The title of the novel refers to the land that was purchased by the priests with the thirty pieces of silver that Judas returned to them before attempting to hang himself. This time Camilleri deals with the subject of betrayal—personal, professional, and even self-betrayal—in a book that is jam-packed with references—biblical, artistic, literary, culinary…the list goes on and on. Quite how Camilleri manages to cram them all into a story that seems painted so lightly is a tribute to his ability as a writer—and to Stephen Sartarelli’s, as his English translator. So what’s it about?
A body is found in a precipitous clay field; it’s been cut into thirty pieces, which Montalbano recognizes as an old Mafia sign. A beautiful Columbian woman reports that her husband has gone missing, whilst Mimi is acting unusually. To say any more would spoil the plot, but I suspect you’ll find yourself wondering (as did I) why the characters take so long to piece things together. I found it impossible to suspend my disbelief.
As for the food references, I’ll just say this…I’ll have what he’s having.

View all my reviews

Monthly Post: November 2019 Just who is Octavius Guy?

Octopus (Send for Octavius Guy, #2) by Michael Gallagher
Current average rating: 4.22 of 5 stars

Simple answer: he’s a minor character from Wilkie Collins’s The Moonstone. I shall let Mr Murthwaite elaborate since he manages to do it without spoilers:

‘Colonel Palgrave! Octavius! Calm yourselves, both of you!’ Mr Murthwaite reprimanded us sternly. ‘Colonel, I’ll have you know that if it were not for this lad here, the little matter of the Moonstone might never have been resolved!’
Colonel Palgrave frowned. ‘The Moonstone, sir?’
‘Before he was elected to Parliament, the MP Mr Franklin Blake was embroiled in a mystery that nearly brought him to the very brink of madness—the theft of a rare and precious jewel. By a concerted effort, he and his friends managed to trace the gem’s location to a certain bank, and yet had this boy not been present on the day the thief redeemed it—well, I dread to imagine the outcome! It is through his efforts and his efforts alone that the perpetrator was ever unmasked. Do not be misled by his age, sir; there is no sharper-eyed, quicker-witted youth in all of England than the lad you see before you in this room.’
—From the forthcoming Oh, No, Octavius!: Octavius Guy and the Case of the Quibbling Cleric. Read on…

This month’s giveaway is a free download of Octopus: Octavius Guy & The Case of the Throttled Tragedienne (#2). When the leading actress dies in mysterious circumstances during a performance of The Duchess of Malfi, Gooseberry feels duty-bound to investigate. It is, after all, a great deal more exciting than the last case he was assigned to: the tracking down of a rich old lady’s errant cat! Offer ends on November 30th 2019.

“The 'case' for our young investigator is darker and more complex this time, reminiscent of Sherlock Holmes, with twists and turns that sometimes rival Agatha Christie. What I enjoyed most though, was Octavius' personal story.”—Anita Dow, Smashwords Reviewer (5 stars)

Happy investigating!
Michael

Find me on my website Michael Gallagher Writes and on Facebook, and make sure to follow me on Twitter @seventh7rainbow.

Police at the Station and They Don't Look Friendly

Police at the Station and They Don't Look Friendly by Adrian McKinty
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I read this for the Crimes & Thrillers reading group I attend, and my heart usually sinks when we get titles like this. Little did I realize what it was: extraordinary historical crime fiction set in Belfast in the 1980s during the troubles, told in one of the most unique first-person voices I have ever encountered. Great stuff!

View all my reviews

Monthly Post: October 2019 Time to follow Octavius Guy on Twitter

Gooseberry (Send for Octavius Guy, #1) by Michael Gallagher
Current average rating: 4.28 of 5 stars

Welcome, dear reader! As some of you will know, I give away one of my novels each month, and October sees the start of Gooseberry’s rotation. It’s a set of cozy historical whodunnits set in the 1850s, featuring characters who first appeared in Wilkie Collins’s The Moonstone, most notably Octavius Guy (Gooseberry), a 14-year-old former pickpocket who fancies himself a detective. There are currently three books in the series (with a fourth on its way): The Case of the Thieving Maharajah, The Case of the Throttled Tragedienne, and The Case of the Mendacious Medium—known respectively as Gooseberry, Octopus, and Big Bona Ogles, Boy! I think it’s fair to say that recently my Twitter folks have taken young Gooseberry to their hearts. Here are just a few of the kind things they have said: Read on… Follow Octavius Guy on Twitter @sendforOctavius.

This month’s offer is a free download of Gooseberry: Octavius Guy & The Case of the Thieving Maharajah (#1). Fourteen-year-old Gooseberry once helped solve the mystery of the Moonstone. Now fate is about to throw him a new case, sending him sleuthing round the Victorian capital once more. Offer ends on October 31st 2019.
“I thoroughly enjoyed this novel and can't wait to read another of Mr. Gallagher’s mysteries. Forget Sherlock Holmes, send for Octavius Guy!”—Brittney L. Divine, author, Smashwords Reviewer (5 stars)
Happy investigating! Michael
Find me on my website Michael Gallagher Writes and on Facebook, and make sure to follow me on Twitter @seventh7rainbow.

Unnatural Causes

Unnatural Causes by P.D. James
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I remember trying this book out years ago, not long after finishing the Agatha Christie canon. I didn’t get very far. The use of language put me off. This time I bore with it and enjoyed it, despite the lubricity (the slipperiness), the amphigoric (a parody of someone’s writing style), and the armigerous (entitlement to bear a coat of arms). It was written in the 1960s, when some of the elements it touches on—homosexuality in particular—would have been considered forward-thinking if not downright risqué. Now it seems laughably out of touch. Quite how our detective Adam Dalgliesh figures things out is often unclear, and yet at its heart this is a fairly decent whodunnit.

View all my reviews

Monthly Post: September 2019 You’re self-published. What’s next?

The Scarab Heart (The Involuntary Medium, #2) by Michael Gallagher
Current average rating: 4.42 of 5 stars

Congratulations! You now have a book to promote. Get yourself on Twitter and use #amwriting and #WritingCommunity hashtags to meet up with fellow writers. If you published through KDP, set up an author page at Author Central and at Author Central UK. Join the Author Program at Goodreads to set up your author page there. Once you have one, you’ll be able to write a blog. Read on…

This month’s special offer is a free download of The Scarab Heart. The Valley of the Kings, 1885. Lizzie is about to meet a young woman named Merit, and her life will never be the same again. Offer ends on September 30th 2019.

“If you like a little bit of Victorian social history, ghostly happenings and tales from Ancient Egypt you are in for a real treat.”—Sausage, Amazon UK Reviewer (5 stars)

Happy investigating!
Michael

Find me on my website Michael Gallagher Writes and on Facebook, and make sure to follow me on Twitter @seventh7rainbow

Monthly Post: August 2019 A guide to formatting for print-on-demand

The Bridge of Dead Things (The Involuntary Medium, #1) by Michael Gallagher
Current average rating: 4.17 of 5 stars

There was a time not so many years ago when there were two BIG players on this playing field. CreateSpace and Kindle Direct Publishing. They were not one and the same, as some people believed, though they were both arms of Amazon, and both used identical templates. CreateSpace has now been subsumed by KDP, so I’m not sure whether you can upload to them any longer. Either way, this time preparing your manuscript for publication is all about using downloadable Word templates—and what a bewildering number of templates there are to choose from! Worry not! Here to help! Read on…

This month’s giveaway is a free download of The Bridge of Dead Things. Murky Victorian London. Lizzie Blaylock is about to discover an unusual talent…one that the people around her are keen to exploit. Offer ends on August 31st 2019.

“I read most of the book in one night simply because I couldn't put it down and when I finally did it was five a.m. Wonderfully haunting and exciting it receives five stars from me...”—Brittney L. Divine author, Smashwords Reviewer (5 stars)

Happy investigating!
Michael

Find me on my website Michael Gallagher Writes and on Facebook, and make sure to follow me on Twitter @seventh7rainbow,

Y is for Yesterday

Y is for Yesterday by Sue Grafton
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

How can I not have read a Sue Grafton before, I kept asking myself? Honestly, I have no idea. I’m just glad it’s been rectified now. So just what can readers expect from Sue Grafton’s final novel?
As you might guess from the title, this is a book with a back story. Ten years previously a group of rich, unlikeable teenagers at an elite private school steal a test paper, make a porn video in which they brutally assault one of their own (which promptly goes missing), and shoot a fellow student (a nice one this time) to death, possibly by accident. Flash forward. When the one who was brandishing the gun is eventually released from prison (having been tried as a minor), a copy of the tape resurfaces, and he finds himself being blackmailed. Private Investigator Kinsey Millhone is hired by his parents to track down the blackmailer.
We, the readers, know who the blackmailer is, because Grafton adds the occasional third-person narrative to explain it. Since none of these characters is in the least bit sympathetic, thank god Kinsey’s world is richly populated with her wonderful acquaintances. And she needs their help, too, because a former nemesis is after her blood.
There’s an awful lot to like here, even with its few faults. The central “case” contains little or no mystery; it’s simply a chain of events presented piece by piece—but then maybe this is Grafton’s style? Then there’s the sales assistant who offers Kinsey advice on how to copy a video. He has no idea what he’s talking about. I’m not a great fan of delaying and delaying the climax to build suspense. At some point the technique starts to work against itself, and all it seems to build is annoyance. Sue Grafton clearly disagrees—and who am I to argue?

View all my reviews

Monthly Post: July 2019 A quick guide to self-publishing ebooks

Big Bona Ogles, Boy! (Send for Octavius Guy, #3) by Michael Gallagher
Current average rating: 4.67 of 5 stars

Welcome, kind reader or perhaps fellow writer! It’s July, and first up I’d like to tell you about an interview I’ve just done with Twitter’s #1PM Chat, a manically interactive account that is fabulous fun and definitely worth following and joining in with. If you’d care to learn a little more about me, you can read the interview here.

So, you’ve decided to self-publish. I won’t pretend it’s a walk in the park, but the easiest way to self-publish is with Kindle Direct Publishing through Amazon. First you need to create an account. It’s a hassle, but you only need do it the once. If you followed my advice from June and kept to a minimal format, you’re now in a great place to format a copy as a Word .docx file for Kindle. Read on…

This month’s special offer is a free download of Big Bona Ogles, Boy!: Octavius Guy & The Case of the Mendacious Medium (#3). This time young Gooseberry investigates a shadowy Spiritualist medium only to discover that somebody wants her dead. Offer ends on July 31st 2019.

“My favorite Victorian boy investigator sets off to solve a new mystery…Words cannot describe just how much I enjoy Octavius.”—Bethany Swafford, Goodreads Reviewer (5 stars)

Happy investigating!
Michael

Find me on my website Michael Gallagher Writes and on Facebook, and make sure to follow me on Twitter @seventh7rainbow.

Lethal White

Lethal White by Robert Galbraith
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

For my hundredth review on Goodreads I wanted something very, very special, and I certainly struck gold with this, J. K. Rowling’s fourth outing as Robert Galbraith.

So, what’s in store for Cormoran Strike and his business partner Robin Ellacott this time round? A year after Robin’s disastrous wedding ceremony, a mentally-ill young man comes to Strike’s office with a tale about a murder he thinks he witnessed as a child. Realising the police have been called, he flees, though shortly after Strike is offered a lucrative job by the Minister for Culture, who is being blackmailed by the young man’s dodgy brother. A coincidence perhaps? Or something more?

Rowling admits that this is one of the most challenging books she’s ever written and one of her favourites. Mine too. It’s with sheer writerly delight that she taunts us with Robin’s failing marriage, which Robin tries at all costs to keep from Strike. The increasingly annoying wild child Charlotte turns up, hell bent on inserting herself back into Strike’s life. Let’s be quite clear here. This is a series of cozy mysteries, and thwarting the readers’ desire for the two of them to become more than just business partners is an important part of the template, of equal significance, I would argue, to the whodunnit element of the book.

The whodunnit element in this case twists and turns back in on itself (perhaps a little too often), and quite which crime we’re meant to be looking at (and there are potentially many) is never very clear. That said, I was thoroughly happy to be taken along for the ride. On several occasions I was put in mind of Agatha Christie in the nature of the clues and the way they are delivered. Robin twice gets to go undercover—both of which are a joy to read—and Strike is tight-lipped about the theories he forms, preferring his partner to work it out for herself.

As personal added bonus, and one which really made it come alive for me, I happen to live very close to two of the locations in the book. The Minister for Sport and her husband live a mile west of me, near The Blue, and the house Robin and Matthew rent is barely a couple of miles down the road. Even before Rowling named it, I knew which one it was.

If you’re a fan of the series, you’ll love it. If you’re a fan of whodunnits, you’ll love it. If you’re a cozy mystery armchair detective, I’m sure you can guess just what I was about to say.

View all my reviews

Monthly Post: June 2019 Simple ways to improve your manuscript

Octopus (Send for Octavius Guy, #2) by Michael Gallagher
Current average rating: 4.23 of 5 stars

Whether you plan to self-publish or go the traditional route, there are some basic things you can do to help yourself that don’t require shelling out money.

1. Identify your grammar weaknesses

If there’s something you have a problem with, go online and get it sorted out. There is help out there for practically everything. Is it “stainless-steel” or “stainless steel”? The answer is… Read on…

This month’s giveaway is a free download of Octopus: Octavius Guy & The Case of the Throttled Tragedienne (#2). When the leading actress dies in mysterious circumstances during a performance of The Duchess of Malfi, Gooseberry feels duty-bound to investigate. It is, after all, a great deal more exciting than the last case he was assigned to: the tracking down of a rich old lady’s errant cat! Offer ends on June 30th 2019, and no, there are no strings attached and no review is required. Phew!

“Here is a sensational historical fiction who-dunnit that gives nothing away until the very end. To me, it reads like an old time radio show. It leaves you breathless.”—Connie A., LibraryThing Early Reviewer (5 stars)

Happy investigating!
Michael

Find me on my website Michael Gallagher Writes and on Facebook, and make sure to follow me on Twitter @seventh7rainbow.

The Night Visitor

The Night Visitor by Lucy Atkins
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Olivia is a telegenic academic historian desperate for an idea for her next commercial book. She happens upon a Victorian diary, a deathbed confession that one of the first woman doctors murdered her abusive husband. Vivian is the gatekeeper of said diary, who must be won over.

I’ve looked at other reviews on Goodreads, and people clearly enjoy this book. I did too—to a degree. Atkins summons up a great sense of menace. But I’m not a fan of creating suspense by talking at length about something which is yet to be explained, especially when there’s precious little reason to obfuscate the facts. For Olivia, it’s the “dreadful” thing that her husband has done. For Vivian, it’s the loss of of her dear friend “Bertie”.

Neither woman is especially likeable, and both appear to be liars. Vivian, delivered in the first-person present, lies by omission, if she’s lying at all. As she slides back and forth between the present and her constant reminiscing, the abrupt change of tense can be a little confusing. Olivia, by contrast, is delivered in the third-person perfect from Olivia’s POV. Rather than stating, “She lied,” or, “She couldn’t bear to tell her friend the truth,” Atkins resorts to having her do things she would undoubtedly lie about were she to be caught.

A warning for anyone who likes their stories neatly tied up: you are likely to be furious with the ending.

SPOILER ALERT: If, like me, you’re left wondering who was responsible for chopping off the daughter’s hair, I’ve seen one potential explanation. It was Vivian. This is based entirely on a phrase she uses about the night in question: “The whole episode is a little hazy…” p333. Vivian denies it, but since Atkins offers no other explanation, this is as close as it gets to an answer.

View all my reviews

The Dry

The Dry by Jane Harper
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

After many years of enforced absence, police officer Aaron Falk returns to his home town to attend the funeral of his former best friend, who, it would seem, took his own life, having just murdered his wife and his young son. But this is a town with old secrets that Falk must uncover.

I’d read the second book in this series, Force of Nature, and was tempted to try the first one. While I managed to put everything together when I was two-thirds of the way through, I enjoyed learning more about Falk—something Harper doesn’t really achieve in Force of Nature. A very nice read for a whodunnit.

View all my reviews

Monthly Post: May 2019 The rise and rise of vanity publishers

Gooseberry (Send for Octavius Guy, #1) by Michael Gallagher
Current average rating: 4.13 of 5 stars

Once upon a time, before the advent of ebooks, there lived a much despised, poor relation to the beloved publisher, and its name was the Vanity Press. Or so many writers believed. But here’s the thing. Unbeknownst to said writers, it provided a valuable service to those who simply wanted to write a book, hold it in their hands, and maybe give it away to their extended families to read—their memoirs, as likely as not, to be recorded for posterity before they died. Given how easy it is to self-publish these days, I would have thought such services a thing of the past. Apparently not, as I discovered when Michael Mills, one of my writing friends on Twitter, contacted me to ask my opinion of an advertisement he’d seen. I’m really delighted that he agreed to discuss the matter with me. Read on…

This month’s offer is a free download of Gooseberry: Octavius Guy & The Case of the Thieving Maharajah (#1). Fourteen-year-old Gooseberry once helped solve the mystery of the Moonstone. Now fate is about to throw him a new case, sending him sleuthing round the Victorian capital once more. Offer ends on May 31st 2019.
“Sometimes you see a book and just know you’re going to love it…An absolute treat for fans of Collins’ novel and a successful novel in its own right.”—Emma Hamilton, LibraryThing Early Reviewer (5 stars)
Happy investigating! Michael
Find me on my website Michael Gallagher Writes and on Facebook, and make sure to follow me on Twitter @seventh7rainbow.

The Woman in the Window

The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Rear Window. Charade. Gaslight. The references come thick and fast for the films that shaped this book. There’s even a line from Gilbert and Sullivan’s HMS Pinafore (Goodness me – why, what was that? Silent be, it was the cat), which only just escapes getting attributed to Shakespeare. Agoraphobic, alcoholic, shut-in Ruth Fox lives life vicariously by spying on her neighbours. Then a family moves into the house across the park. Ruth meets the son and his mother, then witnesses the woman’s murder through the kitchen window. The police are called…and a woman she has never seen before appears claiming to be the boy’s mother.
I’m not generally a fan of first-person narrators who use the present tense, especially if the style of writing goes out of its way to be active. Here it is positively hyperactive, and we have an unreliable narrator to boot. And yet, this is a rare example of a book that claims to be a page-turner and it turns out to be just that. Actually it was so well written that I literally gasped for breath when, towards the end, the narrator is proved unreliable, and her case falls to shreds about her. How could Finn possibly resurrect any of it? The trouble with being so audacious is that, when he does rekindle the story, it feels mediocre compared to what’s gone before and its twists are predictable and expected.
It’s still a good book. It’s just not the great one it could have been.

View all my reviews

Tombland

Tombland by C.J. Sansom
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I am so conflicted about this book. It is undeniably extraordinary, and an extraordinary feat for Sansom, which fans of Shardlake have eagerly awaited. But it also goes on far too long, and many of its basic themes are repeated to no great purpose. The motives for the original murder are unconvincing, possibly because the murderer’s character has not been sufficiently developed. That said, the history is fascinating, the battle scenes spring to life from the page, and it’s a treat to meet up with some familiar old friends. Not the place to start for uninitiated.

View all my reviews

Monthly Post: April 2019 Now we are six!

The Scarab Heart (The Involuntary Medium, #2) by Michael Gallagher
Current average rating: 4.39 of 5 stars

Bring on the cake…crack open the bubbly…this month my website turns six! It’s interesting to reflect how much both Malane—who built it and who now maintains it for me—and I have learned over the intervening years. Everything, really. Neither of us knew diddly squat when we started down this road. I still wouldn’t, had I not been obliged to take over for a while a few years back. That was a steep learning curve I’m not anxious to repeat. Last month I decided it was high time I started advertising my books on Twitter. Up till then, while I may have run the occasional advert, I tried to limit them to a maximum of three per month. Why, I hear you ask? Read on…

This month’s special offer is a free download of The Scarab Heart. The Valley of the Kings, 1885. Lizzie Blaylock has sworn not to use her powers, but her powers have other things in mind. Offer ends on April 30th 2019.

“As much as I loved The Bridge of Dead Things ~ I adored The Scarab Heart! These books are marvelous, really and truly something special!”—Paula Fetty-King, Goodreads Reviewer (5 stars)

Happy investigating!
Michael

Find me on my website Michael Gallagher Writes, on Facebook, and follow me on Twitter @seventh7rainbow

Force of Nature

Force of Nature by Jane Harper
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Five went out, four came back. In her follow-up to The Dry (which I haven’t read, but I really should), Harper’s detective, Aaron Falk, is called into a case when one of his informants goes missing on a corporate team-building retreat in the fictional Giralang Ranges outside of Melbourne. The prestigious accounting firm BaileyTennants is suspected of money laundering, so what has become of Alice, Falk’s whistle-blower?
This well-written, well-paced thriller flashes back and forth between the investigation at hand and what happened on each of the four days of hike from the perspectives of the five women. A lot can go wrong in the bush—and it does—as Harper builds the suspense. I was particularly impressed with her ability to write fight scenes. The action gets quite physical at times, and this was conveyed brilliantly by the writing.
I would be happy to revisit this series again.

View all my reviews

Monthly Post: March 2019 Taking back control over Twitter

The Bridge of Dead Things (The Involuntary Medium, #1) by Michael Gallagher
Current average rating: 4.15 of 5 stars

“I went out for beer and when I got back I found a hundred new notifications waiting for me,” as one account put it. If you’ve ever been tagged in a popular, ongoing conversation with 36 others taking part, you will know how overwhelming this can feel. The Friday follow (#FF) trains on which the writing community thrives are a prime example of this. There’s not much you can do once the notifications are there, but you can certainly nip it in the bud—by muting the conversation. Read on…

This month’s giveaway is a free download of The Bridge of Dead Things. Murky Victorian London. When 13-year-old Lizzie starts having fits, the people around her begin to realize that she may have unusual powers. Offer ends on March 31st 2019.

“I have got to say, these books are unlike any other I have read...almost impossible to put down.”—Helene Gårdsvold, Amazon.com Reviewer (5 stars)

Happy investigating!
Michael

Sirens

Sirens by Joseph Knox
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Full disclosure in the interests of fairness: I read this for my Crimes & Thrillers reading group, and I am not a fan of the Noir sub-genre.
We’re in present day Manchester. The name of the city is never once mentioned, but some of the locations are so specific, it can be nowhere else (see accompanying photo of Beetham Tower, a nightmarish skyscraper that provides one of the book’s main settings). Our hard-boiled, first-person narrator is Aiden Waits, a disgraced yet still active police constable in his late twenties. Aiden’s moral compass is both murky and complex. He’s happy to lie about the drugs he snorts, yet, like knights of old, he is the epitome of chivalry. (view spoiler)[For example, when he steals drugs from the evidence locker at the beginning of the book, while they may be for his personal use I am certain he does it so the woman his partner just framed will be allowed to walk free. (hide spoiler)] This gallant behaviour repeats itself with nearly every woman he comes into contact with. Aiden only wishes to save them, and thereby save himself.

As far as the writing style goes, there is some interesting and effective repetition of paragraphs that gives a nice sense of deja vu, though I personally could have done with a little less “the-city-at-night-is-a-sparkling-but-treacherous-mistress” type mise-en-scene. Then again, it is the mainstay of noir. Also the editor might have highlighted a couple of issues. There’s a character whom we are told speaks for the first time, when in fact he has already spoken on the previous page; the fight at the climax is described in only the sketchiest of terms, so it feels like a rather big let down.
Having said that, it’s not at all bad. Aiden is a great main character, and if I enjoyed this genre I’m sure I would devour the whole series. I can’t imagine Knox losing any sleep over my review. He’ll be too busy signing his option with ITV.


View all my reviews

Monthly Post: February 2019 Further thoughts about Twitter

Big Bona Ogles, Boy! (Send for Octavius Guy, #3) by Michael Gallagher
Current average rating: 4.67 of 5 stars

Hello February! Last month I talked about my resolutions regarding Twitter and how I use it. The sentiments seemed to resonate with a good number of my Twitter folks, who kindly tweeted back to me their concerns, and, around the same time, some rather serious issues started being raised within the #amwriting community, so this month I thought I’d take a look at some of these. Read on…

This month’s special offer is a free download of Big Bona Ogles, Boy!: Octavius Guy & The Case of the Mendacious Medium (#3). This time young Gooseberry investigates a shadowy Spiritualist medium, only to discover that somebody wants her dead. Offer ends on February 28th 2019.

“Thank you so much for writing these books, and for bringing these characters to life. I have a feeling they'll always be lurking around in my head. Excellent, excellent, excellent!”—Laura Brook LibraryThing Early Reviewer (5 stars)

Happy investigating!
Michael

Find me on my website Michael Gallagher Writes, on Facebook, and follow me on Twitter @seventh7rainbow

Murder at the Brightwell

Murder at the Brightwell by Ashley Weaver
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

It’s the early 1930s, and upper-class occasional socialite Amory Ames, trapped in a failing marriage, agrees to help an old flame to dissuade his sister from wedding the wrong kind of man. Together they decamp to the Brightwell Hotel on the south coast of England, where the sister is holidaying with her fiancé and numerous friends, and where eventually one of the party will die.

This is Weaver’s first novel and the beginning of a series of mysteries featuring amateur sleuth Amory Ames. It is as much a romance as a whodunnit, and at times my attention waned when it roamed into the romantic. The sound-bite review which the publishers have chosen for the cover (“An elegant Christie-esque romp”) may help with sales, but it does the author no favours. While it may be set in the 1930s, neither the plot, nor the characters, nor the style of writing mirror Agatha Christie’s in any sense. By setting up expectations in the reader’s mind, comparisons are inevitable—and that seems remarkably unfair to the author, whose writing style is quieter and more reflective.

There is a great red herring which Weaver develops extremely well, which any Crimes & Thrillers enthusiast will recognize and enjoy from the start, though for my money I would have welcomed a few more motives scattered about amongst the suspects, and a sight more insight from our sleuth. But who knows? That may come with Book II.

View all my reviews

Monthly Post: January 2019 My New Year’s resolutions regarding Twitter!

Octopus (Send for Octavius Guy, #2) by Michael Gallagher
Current average rating: 4.23 of 5 stars

In 2018 I managed to come to terms with Twitter, mainly because I finally got myself a smartphone. I started off with something like 11 followers in March. Thanks mainly to the huge and highly supportive writing community, I’m now on my way to 3,000. I’ve had some brilliant conversations with some brilliant people along the way; I feel as if I have made some friends. Would you believe I even hooked up with two of my favourite authors, Steven Saylor and M. R. C. Kasasian? And yet, as great as this undoubtedly is, not everything is peaches in the Twitterverse. Read on…

This month’s giveaway is a free download of Octopus: Octavius Guy & The Case of the Throttled Tragedienne (#2). When the leading actress dies in mysterious circumstances during a performance of The Duchess of Malfi, Gooseberry feels duty-bound to investigate. It is, after all, a great deal more exciting than the last case he was assigned to: the tracking down of a rich old lady’s errant cat! Offer ends on January 31st 2019, and no, there are no strings attached and no review is required. Phew!

“Historical fact is deftly combined with fiction that makes Octavius’s world a new form of old London that I am eager to visit again. Pour some tea or a wee dram, put your feet up, and enjoy cover to cover.”—Gladread LibraryThing Early Reviewer (5 stars)

Happy investigating!
Michael

Find me on my website Michael Gallagher Writes, on Facebook, and follow me on Twitter @seventh7rainbow