Emma Types Stuff

If you are still following me on social media at this point, I can assume you are either a fan of The Traitors or like me enough to somehow overlook my excited memes about murder, banishments and breakfasts.  The BBC reality series returned to brighten up our January after becoming a national obsession in late 2022. The show came from nowhere to become a word-of-mouth hit, with Traitors Amanda and Wilf ascending to national heroes, alongside faithful 'Maddie Marple' and - of course - Claudia Winkleman's knitwear. In what is essentially Werewolf , meets Among Us , meets The Crystal Maze , twenty-two players arrive at a Scottish castle in the hope of winning £120k. A number of them are secretly assigned 'traitors' and must meet every night to 'murder' a faithful. After the death is announced at breakfast, the whole group must work together to win money in folk horror-themed challenges, and then gather at the round table to evict a member of the group. It'

I tell myself that I don't fall for BookTube hype, but I totally do. Case-in-point, the fact that I immediately loaned Penance [Eliza Clark] after watching one glowing review for it.  A 'true-crime' novel set on the night of Brexit, with an unreliable narrator? Sign me up.  Fortunately, it more-or-less lives up to several positive reviews I've since seen, though I think claims that it's got something truly deep to say about true-crime are wildly overstated. Is it a gripping, thought-provoking novel? Yes. Deep?  . ..Meh.    Penance is written in the style of a non-fiction true-crime novel. On the night of the Brexit referendum in 2016, three teenage girls kidnap and torture another girl, and then set a beach hut on fire to try and destroy the body. A journalist shamed in the infamous phone-hacking scandal then sees his opportunity to write a book about a crime largely overlooked by media. We are told at the beginning that book is controversial, featuring inaccuracies

Very occasionally you can read a book that you don't enjoy, and think is terrible, and still not hate it. For me that is usually because there is some other emotional factor involved, which is the case with The Maidens [Alex Michaelides].  I bought it knowing that the reviews were lacklustre, but I was willing to read a comically pretentious Dark Academia thriller for a bit of fun. I popped it on as an audiobook during a deeply upsetting family crisis, which involved hours of driving and a solid day of cleaning in terrible circumstances. I didn't need anything clever, I needed something easy to follow and distracting while I was scraping years of filth off a kitchen floor and bursting into tears at random moments.   So it was only when I had a few moments to myself, much later, that I was able to go 'oh wait, it really was awful.'  The book follows Mariana, a fantastically wealthy group therapist, who is in deep mourning for her husband. She is guardian to her niece, Zo

Please accept my apologies for the pun in the title. It had to be done.  The Appeal [Janice Hallet] is a proper bestseller. You see it propped up appealingly (sorry again) in bookshops and newspapers breathlessly review the latest work by the author. As recent mystery novels go, The Appeal is second only to Richard Osman's books in success, and the similarity of the cover designs can only be intentional. Despite being a mystery lover, I'd avoided this book for childish reasons. I increasingly find myself irritated by Osman's whole schtick and therefore the similarity of the covers was enough excuse for me to assume The Appeal was a knock-off of a series I was already inclined to avoid.  Then someone told me what it was actually about. So here's the thing to know about me... I LOVE meta and epistolary novels. I've talked before about e , a novel told via office emails in an advertising agency, which I mentioned in a glowing review for Several People are Typing , whic

I want to be a completionist, but I'm really not. I tend to wander off from books I don't enjoy, rather than admit I don't enjoy them. Recognising that has been the reason I've read more this year, as I haven't been stalling for weeks on a book that bores me.  So I DNFd a fair amount of books this year, for both serious and petty reasons. This list is a nice way to examine the trends in the books I just don't like...  In Which I Discover I Dislike YA Fiction...  The Devil's Revolver by V.S McGrath A promising start and a genre I enjoy (fantasy westerns/feminist westerns) but I don't like quest journey stories (sorry LOTR fans).  Dread Nation by Justina Ireland I tried twice and failed. This civil war era zombie western with a black heroine should be my thing, and yet it was too YA. As you'll see... this is the year I realised I hate YA fiction even when I love the concept of the book.  Serpent & Dove by Shelby Mahurin YA and Romantasy... this boo

Here is where you can see a list of everything I read in 2024 and find links to any blog posts mentioning those books. To see my 2023 list, go here .  January Scorched Grace [Sister Holiday Mysteries 1] Shadows in Bronze [Falco 2] Honey & Pepper  A Thief in the Night  Venus in Copper   [Falco 3] Linghun  Our Secret Wedding [Sky High Scaffolding 1] Strong Poison [Lord Peter Wimsey 5] The Writing Retreat  The Lighthouse Witches February Payback's a Witch [Thistle Grove 1] Compound a Felony: A Queer Affair of Sherlock Holmes  Burning Books for Pleasure and Profit [Short Story] A Blink of the Screen Jurassic Park Lime Gelatin and Other Monsters  Miss Marple: The Complete Short Stories  True Crime Story E. M Forster: Collected Short Stories  Gaslight Arcanum Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil  The Thursday Murder Club [The Thursday Murder Club 1] Pirate's Queen March Bunny Persephone [Short Story] Defending Jacob  Dead Famous: An Unexpected History of Celebrity The Watche