YOU by Caroline Kepnes

Rating: ✪✪✪✪✪out of 5 Stars

Release Date:                  UK, Australia, US September 2014

Author’s Website:           Caroline Kepnes on Facebook

Publisher’s Website:      Simon & Schuster  (purchase information)  

AMAZON:                              CLICK HERE

My thoughts:

     I’ve a new obsession that I need to share. I read a lot, but so few books go beyond "pretty good." Maybe once or twice a year I find a book that is a real thrill to discover. Discovering a debut author who has also written the best book I’ve read all year is very exciting. You know the type of book I’m talking about, where you pick it up and flip to the first few pages, thinking: Yeah, what’s so good about you that everyone is talking? Then out of curiosity you unsuspectingly read the first few pages just before you think you’re going to turn out the light. Two hours later you’re thinking: I need to go to sleep—but I can’t. I’m sucked in. Then the next day, the thought of getting back inside that world sends a little tingle up your spine. That’s Caroline Kepnes’ YOU.

     Stephen King’s 1987 Misery was one of those novels, too, that had everyone talking. The insanity and obsession of Annie Wilkes was both mesmerizing and horrifying in equal quantity. In the same year, the film Fatal Attraction gave us the iconic portrayal of obsession with Glen Close aiming her crazy desire at Michael Douglas. They were visceral experiences. Misery and Fatal Attraction spawned a myriad of copycat plots, but I personally don’t think anything has come close to creating their claustrophobic feeling of obsession. That is, until I recently read YOU, debut novel from talented (very talented) U.S. author, Caroline Kepnes.

    YOU is simply brilliant. From the first chapter, you’re sucked into the world of bookstore manager Joe Goldberg, whose instant attraction to a random customer, Guinevere Beck, takes obsession and love to a whole new level. She has a boyfriend, but that’s no problem for Joe. She has a demanding girlfriend who keeps getting in the way. No problem either for Joe. These problems have a way of working themselves out when Joe is around. He tracks the love of his life via social media. (Note, this is, also, a cautionary tale on not revealing too much on your Facebook and Twitter accounts.) Things head down a very dark and dangerous rabbit hole and some people are not coming out alive. That’s love, and Joe will do anything for love.

   Guinevere is a fabulous character, too. She’s not a perfect girl. In fact, she’s self-indulgent, obsessive, and insecure, but Joe still loves her and it’s his hilarious commentary on her and her friend’s failings that make this book so special. Written in second person, we are right inside Joe’s head as he speaks directly in his thoughts to Guinevere, her boyfriend, and anyone else he encounters. This style of writing is unusual, yet it works perfectly in creating the feel for a story that is all about head games. Now you might think being inside the head of an obsessive narcissist with murderous tendencies wouldn’t be the most pleasant of visits, but thanks to Kepnes's witty prose, you actually come to like Joe—he’s kind of cool. Each time you open the pages you are both excited and terrified to discover what he will do next.  I don’t ever want to meet someone like Joe, but boy I sure do love him.

    YOU is one of the most exciting and thrilling reads released this year. A book about obsession will obsess you. When they talk about guilty obsessions this book is it! Great news is that a sequel is on its way.

Thank you to the awesome people at Simon & Schuster Australia for my review copy.

BOOK BLURB

     When aspiring writer Guinevere Beck strides into the East Village bookstore where Joe works, he’s instantly smitten. Beck is everything Joe has ever wanted: She’s gorgeous, tough, razor-smart, and as sexy as his wildest dreams.
     Beck doesn’t know it yet, but she’s perfect for him, and soon she can’t resist her feelings for a guy who seems custom made for her. But there’s more to Joe than Beck realizes, and much more to Beck than her oh-so-perfect façade. Their mutual obsession quickly spirals into a whirlwind of deadly consequences...

  A chilling account of unrelenting passion, Caroline Kepnes’s You is a perversely romantic thriller that’s more dangerously clever than any you’ve read before.

About the author:

Caroline Kepnes is a native of Cape Cod and the author of many published short stories. She has covered pop culture for Entertainment Weekly, Tiger Beat, E! Online and Yahoo. She wrote episodes of 7th Heaven and The Secret Life of the American Teenager. Her directorial debut short film Miles Away premiered at the Woods Hole Film Festival and took third place in the Audience Award for Comedy Short. Caroline is a Brown University graduate who splits her time between Los Angeles and Cape Cod. Her favorite beverages are vanilla latte and root beer flavored vodka. She doesn't do well with flies, needles or freeways.

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The Swimmer by Joakim Zander

Rating: ✪✪✪✪✪ out of 5 Stars

Release Date:                        July 2014

Purchase in Australia:         QBD Bookstore & other good book stores

More Information:                 More Information

Publisher’s Website:            Harper Collins

My thoughts:

When you discover a new author it’s such a thrill, isn't it? I remember, in my twenties, reading Robert Ludlum’s The Matarese Circle, Ken Follett’s Eye of the Needle, Frederick Forsyth’s The Day of the Jackal and being blown away. How did these guys write like this? I was hooked on them and, subsequently, read everything they wrote after that. Somehow over the years I drifted away from spy thrillers. They became cliché, mostly derivative of these master’s genre work.

So when I was handed The Swimmer by Joakim Zander, I wasn’t expecting to become excited about the genre again. But Zander’s book has everything that Ludlum, Follett, and Forsyth's books did. His skill with words, the imminent feeling of  suspense, and a layered, intriguing story combine perfectly for an exciting read. What makes it even more amazing is that this is a translation from Zander’s native Swedish.

Klara Waldeen was orphaned as a child and raised by her grandparents in an isolated area of Sweden. As an adult, she now lives in Brussels and works as a political aide.

A million miles away, in another life and another country, an old spy who had prioritized his job over his family now ponders his choices in life; his only solace, swimming. Then, on Christmas Eve, Klara is dragged into a race against time and unseen enemies via an ex-lover Mahmoud Shammosh when he, inadvertently, comes across sensitive information. Thus begins a wild chase across Europe against pursuers who will kill to maintain their secret. Elsewhere, Swedish lobbyist, George Lööw, is assigned a client with a suspicious agenda. He suddenly finds his life threatened and involved in the pursuit against his will. 

When the retired spy realizes who Clara is, he, too, becomes embroiled in the chase. Little does Klara know that a man she doesn’t know, but has always wondered about, may be the only person who can save her.

After setting up the characters, this book ramps up and doesn’t let you go. The Swimmer has an unassuming cover, but within that cover is an explosive read that will have any spy-thriller fan rejoicing. This is the perfect thriller.

About the author:

Joakim Zander was born in 1975 in Stockholm, Sweden. He was raised in the small town of Söderköping but, growing up, he also lived in Syria and Israel and was a high-school exchange student in the USA. After completing his military service in the Swedish Navy, he studied law at Uppsala University and later earned a PhD in Law from Maastricht University. Cambridge University Press published his dissertation, The Application of the Precautionary Principle in Practice, which was awarded the Rabobank Prize. Zander has worked for the European Parliament and the European Commission in Brussels, Belgium. He currently lives in Helsinki, Finland where he serves as a lawyer for the EU during the day and writes at night. The Swimmer is his first novel.

The Clifton Chronicles: Be Careful What You Wish For by Jeffrey Archer

Rating: ✪✪✪✪✪ out of 5 Stars

Release Date:                      March 2014

Author’s Website:              http://www.jeffreyarcher.co.uk/site/

Purchase in Australia:       QBD Bookstore & other good book stores

Purchase Book U.S.:          Amazon

Publisher’s Website:          Pan MacMillan

Only Time Will Tell: THE CLIFTON CHRONICLES 1       Released 2011

The Sins of the Father: THE CLIFTON CHRONICLES 2    Released 2012

The Best Kept Secret: THE CLIFTON CHRONICLES 3     Released 2013

What You Wish For: THE CLIFTON CHRONICLES 4       Released March 2014

My thoughts:

Since Not A Penny More, Not a Penny Less, I’ve idolized Jeffrey Archer as an author. Jeffrey Archer is the master of characterization and suspense. Somehow he commands that you care about the results of a high school exam, the vote for a board Chairman, or whether a cruise-ship will meet its construction deadline. None of these challenges are exciting mysteries. Yet we must know the answer. 

At age 74, after 35 years as a best-selling author, and over 270 million copies of books sold, Lord Archer has brought us a great series: The Clifton Chronicles, which follows the life and story of Harry Clifton and his heirs. We meet Harry in 1919 Bristol and follow him and his friends through to the 1940’s and the Second World War, and in Be Careful What You Wish For, the fourth volume we are taken through 1957 to ’64.

This book is essentially Harry Clifton’s wife, Emma Barrington-Clifton’s, story. Readers enjoy front row seats at the boardroom drama of Barrington’s, Emma’s family’s ship-construction company. The board-members are gambling the future of the company on the building of a luxury liner. High stakes criminal Martinez, who bears a murderous grudge against the Clifton family, is out to scuttle Barringtons, and there is much fun with wheeling and dealing in shares and board appointees. Like the previous books, this leaves us hanging on a cliff. It has all the twists, turns, dirty tricks, tragedies and vendettas that have made this series so fabulous. 

Jeffrey Archer is possibly the greatest storyteller of our time. The Clifton Chronicles, his most ambitious story, requiring of Archer a commitment of more than five years, with rumors that the five-part series may become seven. The series only curse is that there’s a year's wait after each book.

.  

Book Blurb:

The Clifton Chronicles Series

Only Time Will Tell Released 2011

The epic tale of Harry Clifton's life begins in 1919, in the backstreets of Bristol. His father was a war hero, but it will be twenty-one tumultuous years before Harry discovers the truth about how his father really died and if, in fact, he even was his father.

Only Time Will Tell takes a cast of memorable characters from the ravages of the Great War to the outbreak of the Second World War, when Harry must decide whether to take his place at Oxford, or join the fight against Hitler's Germany.

In Jeffrey Archer's masterful hands, you will be taken on a journey that you won't want to end, even after you turn the last page of this unforgettable yarn, because you will be faced with a dilemma that neither you, nor Harry Clifton could ever have anticipated.

Only Time Will Tell: THE CLIFTON CHRONICLES 1      Released 2011

The Sins of the Father: THE CLIFTON CHRONICLES 2   Released 2012

The Best Kept Secret: THE CLIFTON CHRONICLES 3    Released 2013

What You Wish For: THE CLIFTON CHRONICLES 4      Released March 2014

About the author:

Jeffrey Archer, whose novels and short stories include Kane and Abel, A Prisoner of Birth and Cat O' Nine Tales, has topped the bestseller lists around the world, with sales of over 270 million copies. He is the only author ever to have been a number one bestseller in fiction (seventeen times), short stories (four times) and non-fiction (The Prison Diaries). The author is married with two sons and lives in London and Cambridge. www.jeffreyarcher.com

Runner by Patrick Lee

Rating: ✪✪✪✪✪ out of 5 Stars

Release Date:                      February 2014

Author’s Website:               http://www.patrickleefiction.com

Purchase in Australia:       QBD Bookstore & good bookstores

Purchase Book U.S.:          Amazon U.S.A.

Publisher’s Website:          Penguin

My thoughts:

The first thing you will notice about “Runner” by Patrick Lee is the striking cover (Australian/UK version)The next thing is that the hours have gone by and you haven’t stopped reading. Time just runs away with this book.

It takes off from the first page at a gallop and never stops. In the beginning, you’re reading a thriller, then it seamlessly morphs into a techno sci-fi story. Last time I enjoyed a story in this genre as much, I was reading a Michael Crichton (I really miss Crichton) book.

Sam Dryden, a highly skilled ex-special forces soldier is taking an evening jog when he encounters eleven-year-old Rachel fleeing heavily armed men who are trying to kill her. Sam’s instincts kick in and, before he knows it, he’s helped the girl temporarily escape her pursuers.

However there’s something unusual about Rachel, and Dryden finds himself in the middle of a mystery that he needs to solve to save the girl. Rachel has no memory of her past except for the last two months, until Dryden begins to realize why she is the subject of the intensive search. She is a very special girl.

The secrets, danger, and pace don’t let up until the end, which if you are anything like me will come not long after you start reading. You literally cannot put this book down, a rare experience for me lately. The perspective fluidly switches between Rachel and Sam and their pursuers, who utilize state of the art technology in their pursuit.

Co-incidentally while I was reading “Runner” another avid reader friend told me about a great series that I must read as I was telling her about “Runner.” Turned out we were talking about books from the same author. So Lee’s trilogy “The Breach Series” “is now high on my list of must-reads.” We're both now big fans of Patrick Lee. Excuse the cliché but run to your nearest book outlet and grab this book?  Ready… set… go.

P.S. The red cover is the U.S. version. I much  prefer the Australian/UK version.  Its the reason I picked it up from my huge  pile of review books.

Book Blurb:

Sam Dryden, retired special forces, lives a quiet life in a small town on the coast of Southern California. While out on a run in the middle of the night, a young girl runs into him on the seaside boardwalk. Barefoot and terrified, she's running from a group of heavily armed men with one clear goal—to kill the fleeing child. After Dryden helps her evade her pursuers, he learns that the eleven year old, for as long as she can remember, has been kept in a secret prison by forces within the government. But she doesn't know much beyond her own name, Rachel. She only remembers the past two months of her life—and that she has a skill that makes her very dangerous to these men and the hidden men in charge.

Dryden, who lost his wife and young daughter in an accident five years ago, agrees to help her try to unravel her own past and make sense of it, to protect her from the people who are moving heaven and earth to find them both. Although Dryden is only one man, he's a man with the extraordinary skills and experience—as a Ranger, a Delta, and five years doing off-the-book black ops with an elite team. But, as he slowly begins to discover, the highly trained paramilitary forces on their heels is the only part of the danger they must face. Will Rachel's own unremembered past be the most deadly of them all?

About the author:

Patrick was born in west Michigan in 1976. His accomplishments over the next eighteen years

included waiting for Nintendo to be invented and then playing lots of Nintendo. In his twenties he sold two screenplays to movie studios in Los Angeles, but neither was produced. Patrick blames Hollywood's prejudice against rugged, Brad Pitt-aged protagonists. On the other hand, even Patrick's limited success in the movie business was a great way to avoid doing any actual work for the entirety of his twenties.

In his early thirties he started writing novels, and managed to sign with the coolest agent in the business: Janet Reid at FinePrint, who promptly sold the first two books of the Travis Chase series to HarperCollins. Patrick's relatives expressed relief that he probably wouldn't end up sleeping on their couches.