REVIEW: The Silent Companions

The Silent Companions
Author: Laura Purcell
Genre: Gothic, Horror
Rating: 4/5
Publisher: Raven Books
Source: Bloomsbury India


This is a deeply unsettling, wonderfully atmospheric and truly creepy novel. We first meet Elsie Bainbridge as a patient in an asylum, where she is suspected of murder. The progressive Dr Shepherd encourages her to write down her story, as she is refusing, or unable, to speak. What emerges is her recounting how she married Rupert Bainbridge, largely to help save her brother’s match factory. However, although the marriage was one of convenience, Elsie found herself surprisingly happy to be the wife of her new husband. Sadly, though, she shortly finds herself both pregnant and widowed; sent by her brother to stay at her husband’s country house, The Bridge.

The Bridge, where her husband, Rupert, recently died. She has never been there before, and is accompanied by a spinster companion, Sarah, a poverty stricken relative of her husband. The house leaves a lot to be desired, with two inexperienced maids and Mrs Holt, the housekeeper. Locals believe the house is cursed, once inhabited by a witch, with a history numerous strange deaths and accidents.

Elsie hears strange sounds and hissing which unnerves her. The house is littered with 'companions' constructed of wood and painting intended to startle, Dutch in origin. One looks uncannily like Elsie, they appear to move, with new ones appearing out of thin air, sinister and exuding menace. 



Unsettled and lonely, Elsie begins to hear noises at night. Exploring with Sarah, the pair uncover some strange wooden Dutch ‘companions,’ which are lifelike, cut out paintings. Initially Elsie thinks they are interesting and unusual, but soon the companions seem to have a life of their own… Along with the companions, Sarah uncovers a diary from Anne Bainbridge, her ancestor, written two hundred years before. Anne, and her husband, Josiah, are thrilled that Charles I and his wife, Henrietta Maria, are to visit their house. However, Josiah is keen that their mute daughter, Hetta, is kept away from the royal visitors. Tragedies also seem to follow the house throughout the years, leaving a sense of deep disquiet and unease among the locals. 

 It was interesting and addictive to read. And, I just wanted to learn the truth about the wooden figures, the silent companions and what the old diaries from the 1700-century will tell. And, what really happened to Elsie's husband Rupert? Did he just die, and are the servants really sincere? What really happened in the house that is said to be cursed? I just love haunted houses, cursed houses, placed in a desolate landscape with an atmosphere of doom. 

If you like a book with dual storylines, mysteries, and especially love to read about old houses that are said to be cursed than you will love this book. The Silent Companions is a book that took me by surprise and I loved how I slowly was bulled into the story and how I just needed to read one more chapter. Love books like that! 
The last few chapters do get a bit silly and over-the-top, and I think the ending would have had more impact if it'd been a little more ambiguous. 

Overall, very clever, entirely captivating and a darned good read.

Thank you Bloomsbury India for sending me a review copy of this !

Review: Silver And Salt

Silver And Salt
By: Elanor Dymott
Genre: Jonathan Cape
Rating: 3.5/5
Source: Vintage Books


On the death of her father, a celebrated photographer, Ruthie returns to his villa in remote, wild Greece. After 15 years in exile she is welcomed by her older sister, Vinny. Together they build a fragile happiness in their haven above the sea, until the arrival of an English family at a neighboring cottage, and one young girl in particular, triggers a chain of events that will plunge both women back into their dark pasts, and entirely derail their present lives. This is a story of love and violence, and of what happens when a child is lied to by someone who has their trust.

Max is a photographer, who marries Sophia, an opera singer, and then takes her away from her career in London and on his work trips with him. Eventually the couple have two daughters and while Max is frequently traveling, when he is home, he is abusive to both his wife and his children. This eventually pushes Sophia into mental illness and Beatrice, Max's sister, eventually comes to care for the children. Their two daughters Vinny and Ruthie, are very different; while Vinny is older and focused on school, Ruthie is younger and still craves her father's attention, although he continues to be abusive. After their father passes away, the sisters meet at his villa in Greece to reconnect. Things are going fairly well until a family arrives at a neighboring villa, which triggers both the girls to remember the violence from their past.

I typically stray away from adult or contemporary fiction, but this book sounded interesting so I gave it a chance and I did enjoy it. The book does deal with some very serious issues, such as abuse and mental illness, so reader be warned. This is the first I have read by the author and enjoyed her writing style. The book moves along at a steady pace and I felt like I got to know both Vinny and Ruthie fairly well. Overall, I enjoyed the book and would recommend it to anyone who is a fan of this genre, just be prepared that it does deal with some hard topics. 

This was an emotional book, I enjoyed reading it.
Thank you to the publisher for sending this book !

REVIEW: The Stopped Heart

The Stopped Heart
By: Julie Myerson
Gnere:  Fiction, mystery, suspense
Rating: 4/5
Publisher: Vintage
Source: Penguin Random House



This book takes a stranger who enters a family home and turns it into something so much more complex than I could ever have forecast. Let me just rave about the characters for a while. Indulge me. There are characters in this book that I despised with every single bone in my body and those that I embraced and wanted to protect and care for. The depth of each character, their presence in the book, their humanness, just everything was freaking brilliant.

The book took me to some dark places in the human psyche and shocked me with choices made by human beings towards other human beings. Truly, I now believe that some people are just born in darkness and it follows them wherever they go. The Stopped Heart is an exceptional work of fiction that had me feel every single emotion on the spectrum, I could NOT put this book down. Life stopped from the moment I started to read it. I can't do it justice with this review

It is a story full of atmosphere, a truly emotional look at love, loss, life, death and all the stuff in between. Julie Myerson weaves a haunting and evocative web here as we learn about Mary, living with devastation, caught up in the moment unable to move on. Alongside her and us the readers, is Eliza, 100 years earlier, about to experience some devastation of her own. 

As the narrative links the two characters, through event and circumstance, through emotion and a hint of other, Julie Myerson writes with true sense of feeling, painting a real picture of different lives lived in the same area many years apart. Tragedy links the two - this is both horrific and very real throughout - you know that something is coming for Eliza but trust me you will not be prepared. And Mary, her loss is tangible, you can taste it - as she struggles to maintain her relationship with her Husband, also grieving, as she tries to find some semblance of a life worth living, this is beautifully done.

This novel is beautifully written. The characters leap off the page with their clarity. The description and events are so realistically rendered that I felt I WAS there. It was an expose on the devastation of grief as well as a chilling portrayal of obsession. I've read some reviews that said the ending let the story down. I disagree. In my mind it couldn't have ended any other way. A chillingly dark, atmospheric, historical suspense thriller, which I will recommend to all who don't mind a dash of paranormal. Definitely one of my favorites this year so far...

There are ghosts/visions and creepy uncomfortable moments, but a book I could read at night alone without totally freaking myself out.

Start to finish, 2 days which indicates a good compelling read.

Highly recommend this novel.



Thank you Penguin Books for sending this book for review !

REVIEW: The Islamic Enlightnment

The Islamic Enlightenment
Genre: Religious, non fiction,
            History
Publisher: Liverlight
Source: Penguin Random House
Rating: 4/5


An interesting recreation of Islam's modernization over the past few centuries, focused specifically on three major sites of change in Iran, Turkey and Egypt. This is a standard intellectual history, and charts the lives of most of the well-known Islamic thinkers of this period (Afghani, Abduh, Kemal, Tahtawi, Ale Ahmad etc.), while also recounting the works of a few other lesser-known writers and activists. De Bellaigue's basic contention is that Islam as we know it today has been radically and irrevocably shaped by the forces of modernity. Even ferociously "anti-modern" approaches to religion are colored by their interaction with the thing they are rejecting. Islamism is not a rejection of modernity as much as an articulation of a different way of being modern, one that attempts to take inspiration and guidance from the past. Like quantum physics once something is being observed its own behaviors necessarily change, and Islam's interplay with Enlightenment ideas once it encountered them is no different.


The book seems to have been intended as a rebuttal to the asinine claim made by some pop intellectuals that Islam is not modern and needs to be confronted by modern ideas. It generally accomplishes this, and is thus worthwhile for people seeking to understand contemporary Islamic thought and practice around the world - though I regret that he did not include South Asia. De Bellaigue does a good job of crafting a coherent narrative that enriches ones understanding of contemporary political events in many Muslim countries, places that are far from being mired in ancient ideas today, for better and worse.


The book demonstrates that Muslim countries have adopted and still desire enlightenment even when some of them are governed by Islamic movements. Turkey, Iran and Egypt are profiled before WW1 to the present. 

If Islam engaged so successfully with modernity until the First World War, why since then has reactionary revivalism been able to impose itself on ever larger swathes of the Muslim world?

The rise of Islamism is a blowback from the Islamic Enlightenment – a facet, however detestable, of modernity itself.

Although Muslims were not the authors of the achievements that we now associate with the Enlightenment. No Istanbul blacksmith discovered movable type. No Muslim Voltaire sniped at the clerics by the Nile. But there is a great difference between accepting that Muslim civilization did not initiate the Enlightenment and saying that it did not accept its findings or eat of its fruit. This is a big claim to make. It means that Muslims are either congenitally barred or – even worse – have deliberately cut themselves off from experiences that many consider being universal. It means that the lands of Islam have remained aloof from science, democracy and the principle of equality. It is a claim that is often heard in today’s divided, rebarbative, edgy world, and it is nonsense.


Thank you to Penguin Books for sending me a review copy of this !

Review: Water In May

Water In May
Author: Ismee Williams
Genre: YA, Contemporary
Rating: 4/5
Publisher: Abram Books And Chronicles



Mari is fifteen and when she found out that she was pregnant, she soon grows to love her baby. In him, she sees a chance for a family member who will always love her and never leave her. But when she finds out that her son has a heart condition, it all gets even more complicated.

I quickly grew to sympathize with Mari. Her mother took off when she was seven, her dad is in prison and her grandmother always makes her feel like she's a burden. But she has her girls and her boyfriend, who all support her.

The relationship that I most enjoyed, was the one between Mari, Yaz, Teri and Heavenly, her best friends, as they always hung around together and just had a really close bond, which was really great to read. The one between Mari and her unborn son, where also great to read. You could always tell that she really loved her son.

This is a fascinating contemporary that deals with heavy themes like teen pregnancy, sick babies, absent parents and drugs, all while never slipping in a too dramatic mood. Despite all of this happening, the story still manages to spread hope and it was really nice to see that.

I would write a spoiler, but I wont, that's the whole point of reading..just to let you know - this book has heavy content, Spanish in every other sentence and the slang! Oh, as a reader I got to know all Mari's grammar and punctuation errors. I also found this pregnancy sad, because there are pregnancies who are carried at the very young age and they do have these gene issues, something not right during the pregnancy..as a woman in general, I think it is something completely heartbreaking for both parents and does not matter the age, although being more mature we have more stability and we see more than a 15 year old who seeks love. 

I was most fascinated by the medical surgery staff roles, completely surprising and down to earth attitude, especially when one is 15 years old...

Water in May challenges stereotypes about single mothers. It presents Mari as a fighter, strong, determined, and wanting the best for her child. The people around her might not think his life is worth saving, but Mari does. And her love for him makes her capable of great sacrifice. It’s a heartwarming tale about how one life can change and challenge others.

My only criticism is of the personal sort. This novel won't hit everyone the same way. For me, it didn't hit just right. It's not for lack of a point or emotional appeal or character growth or good writing--it has all those things--but I thought it could stand up to more plot. The beginning and ending are excellent, but the in-between of doctor visits and moving from place to place wasn't quite enough. But overall? A solid debut. I would really like to see more of Williams' work in this setting, and I'm looking forward to her novels to come.


And a big thank you to publishers for sending me a review copy of this book !