Book-Mad-Mum

Behind Closed Doors by B.A. Paris My rating: 5 of 5 stars OH MY DAYS!!!! I am going to start this review by saying that you absolutely MUST read this book...I promise you won't be disappointed!!! Grace and Jack appear to have it all...he is a well off lawyer defending Domestic Abuse victims and Grace gave up a good job as a fruit buyer for Harrods to keep house when they married and also to prepare their home for Millie, her sister who has Downs Syndrome. The plan is that when Millie reaches the age of 18 she will leave her residential school to live with Jack and Grace. In the meantime, they entertain friends at dinner parties, and have exotic holidays, but all is not what it seems when the front door closes. Jack is actually a very sinister character and he is written in such a chilling way, that at times I honestly forgot to breathe when I was reading about him. Grace's character is very plausible, the way she initially gave in to his dema

The Cake Shop in the Garden by Carole Matthews My rating: 5 of 5 stars I absolutely adored this book, and when I sat down to read it, sometimes it felt like the pages were turning themselves...I couldn't read it quickly enough!! Fay Merryweather runs a café from her home, and a cake shop aboard her narrow boat moored at the bottom of the garden in Milton Keynes. She has a domineering mother who has taken herself to her bed and runs poor Fay raged. She is in a completely dead-end relationship with Anthony and her sister who lives in New York is constantly begging for both emotional and financial support. When Danny Wilde strides up the garden one morning looking for work as an odd-job man, Fay's life starts to move in a different direction. I sometimes got frustrated that Fay just couldn't seem to use the word "no" and was used by everyone as a doormat. Saying that I loved her, and really wanted things to go her way. I was so dis

The Pink Suit by Nicole Mary Kelby My rating: 2 of 5 stars This book seemed to have so much promise but sadly it failed to deliver. The story is based around the suit that Jackie Kennedy wore the day that JFK was assassinated and the fictional part of the book was the story of the young dressmaker who copied the original Chanel design in raspberry pink for the First Lady which became iconic but for all the wrong reasons. Before I read the book, I knew nothing about what actually happened to Jackie on the day of the assassination, I didn't know that she insisted on wearing the blood stained suit when her husband's successor was sworn in on Air Force One, declaring "let them see what they have done." The book was really just a narrative about sewing, Chanel, and now and then a few references to then references to Maision Blanche. I wouldn't recommend this book, it didn't really go anywhere, the story was the run up to the assa

The Headmaster's Wife by Thomas Christopher Greene My rating: 4 of 5 stars I picked this book up from the Quick Choice section in my local library, and if I'm completely honest, I chose it simply because of the title. I seem to have a passion about reading books about Schools, which I think stems back to my childhood when I read and fell in love with the Mallory Towers books. I didn't know what the story involved, and so fell into the unknown, which was a lovely treat and I wasn't left disappointed. The book is in three parts, Acrimony, Expectations and After. When I read the first part, which tells the story of Arthur Winthrop, a middle aged Headmaster, who is found wondering Central Park naked, I loved him as a character and felt great sympathy for him. I must admit, that I did figure out one little twist in the first part straight away, but the other one at the end of that part of the book made me gasp! Then came Expectations, whic