Five Rivers Met on a Wooded Plain by Barney Norris
Reviewed by Harriet One quiet evening in Salisbury, the peace is shattered by a serious car crash. At that moment, the lives of five people collide – a flower-seller, a…
The Loving Husband by Christobel Kent
Reviewed by Harriet He was in the room. She didn’t know how long she’d been asleep, but she’d been dreaming. In the dark someone padded between the furniture, and loose…
Multitudes by Lucy Caldwell
Reviewed by Harriet I’ve read and enjoyed all three of the prizewinning Belfast writer Lucy Caldwell’s full-length novels, so, though short stories are not usually my genre of choice, I…
Some Questions for Lucy Caldwell
Asked by HarrietLucy, people always like to know how a writer got started. So can you tell us about your beginnings, and when you realised you were going to be…
Murder in the Museum & Calamity in Kent by John Rowland
Reviewed by Harriet Here at Shiny we love our reprints, and are always delighted to include reviews of one or more of the British Library’s Crime Classics series. So when…
The Narrow Bed by Sophie Hannah
Reviewed by Harriet Nobody who’s a fan of Sophie Hannah’s crime fiction will be surprised to learn that The Narrow Bed features an inexplicable set of crimes, enough twists to make you…
Questions for Sharon Guskin
1. The Forgetting Time is your first novel, and we understand that previously your career has been in the film world. Have you always wanted to write? Pretty much. I first started…
The Forgetting Time by Sharon Guskin
Reviewed by Harriet If I tell you that this book takes the concept of reincarnation as its central premise, will you stop reading straight away? You’d be missing out if…
At the Edge of the Orchard by Tracy Chevalier
Reviewed by Harriet This is the fifth of Tracy Chevalier’s eight absorbing historical novels I’ve read, and in my view it’s the best so far. I was completely sucked in…
Exposure by Helen Dunmore
Reviewed by Harriet I’m sure I’ve read Helen Dunmore before, but it must have been a long time ago as a scan of her previous titles fails to ring any…
An Interview with Professor Janet Todd
Questions by Victoria and Harriet Throughout her long and illustrious academic career, Janet Todd has been a pioneer in women’s writing, recovering lost and neglected authors. She has written biographies…
A Man of Genius by Janet Todd
Reviewed by Harriet Anyone who’s studied, or taken an interest in, women writers of the 18th and 19th centuries will have encountered the work of Janet Todd. She has written biographies of…
Venice by Marie-José Gransard
Reviewed by Harriet I’ve been to Venice twice in my life, both times for regrettably short visits, but unforgettable ones. You can’t help being swept away by the beauty of…
Unicorn: The Poetry of Angela Carter, with an Essay by Rosemary Hill
Reviewed by Harriet I was a slow starter where Angela Carter was concerned. I was given what I now think of as her masterpiece, Nights at the Circus, sometime in the…
Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe & Dracula by Bram Stoker
Reviewed by Harriet I suspect that neither of these two great classics has ever been out of print since their respective first appearances in 1719 and 1897, and a quick…
Josephine Tey: A Life by Jennifer Morag Henderson
Reviewed by Harriet I can’t tell you how excited I was when I heard there was finally going to be a proper biography of the great crime writer Josephine Tey,…
The Long Room by Francesca Kay
Reviewed by Harriet A gripping story of obsession and spies set in eighties London. So says the blurb on the back of this truly excellent novel. But this is no…
Performing King Lear by Jonathan Croall
Reviewed by Harriet The role of King Lear is seen today as the ultimate challenge for the classical actor, the one that provides the supreme test of his abilities in…
Silent Nights: Christmas Mysteries, ed. Martin Edwards
Reviewed by Harriet Christmas is a mysterious, as well as magical, time of year. Strange things can happen, and this helps to explain the hallowed tradition of telling ghost stories…
The Z Murders by J Jefferson Farjeon
Reviewed by Harriet Golden Age crime has always been popular, and each of the so-called queens – Sayers, Christie, Allingham, March, Tey – has her loyal followers. But in the…
Summer by Edith Wharton
Reviewed by Harriet I suppose most people who know about Edith Wharton think of her as a writer whose subject was the social elite – think of The House of Mirth,…
Career of Evil by JK Rowling writing as Robert Galbraith
Reviewed by Harriet I can’t remember ever enjoying writing a novel more than Career of Evil…Robert Galbraith has always felt like my own private playground. So says JK Rowling at the…
Dark Corners by Ruth Rendell
Reviewed by Harriet I can empathise with people who are driven by dreadful impulses. I think to be driven to want to kill must be such a terrible burden. I…
Angel Killer by Andrew Mayne
Reviewed by Harriet First published in America in 2014, Andrew Mayne’s debut novel is just out in the UK. If I described this novel as ‘detective uses magic to solve…