Ronali Collings had a fascinating journey to publication. Her children getting older, she realised how much of herself she’d given to everyone else and started writing and taking courses (an MA with Bernadine Evaristo as her mentor) before dropping out of her PhD, stopping writing, and then starting again under the mentorship of her now agent. She kept going this second time and Love & Other Dramas was the phenomenal result.

The book follows Tania and Priya – both in their forties – as well as Helen, Tania’s 66-year-old mother. Tania is newly divorced and looking to find herself (she’s somewhat based on Collings), Priya did not receive a much hoped for promotion after giving her all to her long-standing employer, and Helen is discovering herself after years as an unhappy wife (unhappy is an understatement). The book covers their transitions to new milestones.

There is something incredibly special about Collings’ book and, dare I say, utterly unique. (The more I read, the more I find that there is something unique about the vast majority of authors, but it still deserves a mention, particularly here.) To speak personally, I got to the end of this book, blissfully happy about the film scenes I had had playing in my head and the characters whose faces and general looks I had created and seen in detail, but couldn’t work out what I thought of the writing itself. It took a few minutes of further thinking before I realised that the fact that Collings’ book raced by, as well as the fact it was so easy to visualise, easy to feel deeply about the characters and the connections between them, whether romantic or familial, themselves summed up the writing. Collings is a superb writer. So as not to reiterate what I’ve just listed as positives, the author’s use of character (and with it development) is bar none. This is very much a character-driven book, and highly relatable – they are very British, very multicultural, and just like any person you might meet on the street. The very fact of their everyday-ness is a winning factor and with everything that happens to them being completely believable, it is impossible not to feel a lot for them.

This doesn’t necessarily equate to actively liking them. Tania in particular keeps making the same mistake which is frustrating, if incredibly realistic. Priya could often do with a bit more self-awareness. (Helen gets a pass here as she’s been through hell.) But perhaps that is part of the point – these women and, often, the other people around them, are just so true to life that they make you question your own life decisions, which isn’t generally a comfortable thing to do.

As well as the theme of women coming into their own, the racial backgrounds add a constantly-running background question about how British people of colour, particularly, in this case, people of South Asian heritage, are treated. Priya’s done very well in her job but she’s not done as well as she could due to being a British Indian; she’s the wrong colour. Tania wanted to do ballet when she was younger, but her skin colour didn’t fit the look. She also wasn’t able to cook Sri Lankan food at home without wafting the smell away because her white husband didn’t like it. It’s the things that keep adding up and adding up.

A mention must be made of Helen’s newly found happiness – she starts blossoming from the beginning but once she discovers love her story becomes perhaps the best. She represents an age group in women that is generally forgotten and Collings brings not only her story to life but shines a light on older women as a whole. Helen’s burgeoning relationship with Oscar is a joy to read and she is the character that ends the tale with the most tied threads.

The ending is interesting, both sudden – you’re likely to expect it to continue for a bit longer – and absolutely perfect. You’ll want to read more about the women whilst at the same time recognising and appreciating why Collings leaves it where she does.

Love & Other Dramas is simply wonderful. It’s a book with the power to hit you in a way you haven’t experienced in reading before and the amount is does within its limits of being a look at everyday characters and lives is incredible. Without a doubt, one of the best books of 2022.

Publisher: Embla (Bonnier)
Pages: 269
Type: Fiction
Age: Adult
ISBN: 978-1-471-41308-7
First Published: 19th July 2022
Date Reviewed: 4th May 2023

Falling back in time for a journey.

Publisher: Headline
Pages: 352
Type: Fiction
Age: Adult
ISBN: 978-1-472-26824-2
First Published: 10th December 2020
Date Reviewed: 14th June 2021
Rating: 4.5/5

Mia and Haakon’s daughter, Linnea, is working on an archaeological dig when she finds a Viking-era brooch in the soil. Pricking herself on the pin, she suffers a fall and when she wakes up a bunch of re-enacters are shouting at her. Their use of Old Norse is particularly good, and the dig tents are all gone, but this has to be a joke, right? As the men take her captive and she joins a group of them in a journey across the seas towards Byzantine Istanbul she has to come to accept what has happened and find a way both to live with what’s going on and find her way back. The presence of the group’s handsome second in command, Hrafn, may make this more difficult.

The Runes Of Destiny is the continuation, the second innings, of a family saga that started with Echoes Of The Runes. Taking the series beyond slight time-slip and comparative lives towards complete time travel, the book successfully moves the story up a notch.

The narrative and general approach is far greater this time around. If we consider for the purposes of comparison that the first book featured a simple plot and was heavier on characterisation, then The Runes Of Destiny, as much as it is about characters too – it’s a romance after all – is all about the plot. Greater too is the world building, where the Viking period and, most particularly the ninth century Istanbul the story takes you to, is fully detailed and explored.

The beginning stages of Linnea’s time with the Vikings once the initial time travelling has occurred are dealt with well. With her academic background, Linnea’s acceptance of what has happened to her is no sure thing; it takes her a fair few pages before she comes to seriously consider time travel as a possibility. On paper, then, it seems a long time but in terms of the actual passage of days and weeks, it’s not so much. Certainly it’s easier for the reader to acknowledge the change in the location than it is Linnea.

Linnea herself can take a bit of getting used to; when her acceptance level is minimal she sees everything in a negative light and somewhat understandably views most people she comes across unfavorably. As an example she hates Hrafn’s aunt, and whilst the aunt certainly isn’t the most accepting person herself, Linnea lacks the capacity to see herself and the twenty-first century clothes she turned up in in the way they might be viewed in the ninth century, by people already inclined to treat her as a person they’ve captured. Once receptive to the situation, Linnea is far easier to get along with as a reader.

You also get to look at the question of whether a time traveller – should they exist – ought to be allowed to change history or not. Courtenay looks at the smaller elements of life – Linnea’s wish to introduce the faster and more efficient art of knitting to women who are nalbinding.

On the other women in the story, mostly three fellow thralls and the thrall/mistress of the Jarl, there is a good amount of time spent. Linnea doesn’t always think very much of them in terms of time – she is for the most part focused on getting back to the time of chocolate and hospitals – but the time she does spend, and Courtenay’s added information, makes for a decent overview of life for women in their situation. There is a person among them who teeters on the edge of villainy, whilst also being in a vulnerable position, who doesn’t get as much time in terms of time spent with the others, but her position is considered by the narrative as a whole. Hrafn, the Viking, is likeable and well set in his time, with Courtenay paying a nod both to the factual history we know and the difference in personalities that would afford him to be more willing to accept Linnea’s experiences (the author gives a fair amount of time to his disavowing of Linnea’s story of being from the future).

The best part of the book in terms of reader escapism and expectation is arguably the time travel aspect. This takes you both back to the past and forward to our modern day, with both main characters gaining insight into the other’s life. For all our own thoughts might be to do the travelling ourselves, it’s perhaps Hrafn’s glimpse of the future which is the most anticipated element of the story.

The Runes Of Destiny takes an established story and runs with it. It improves on its earlier foundations and then adds bells and whistles to it at least a couple of times over, building further and further on a solid idea.

Charlie and Christina Courtenay (Echoes Of The Runes; The Runes Of Destiny) discuss what the Vikings were really like, time travellers’ historical partners travelling back with them, and predictability and coincidence as plot devices.

To see all the details including links to other apps, the episode page can be found here.

Reading tea leaves. Rewriting destinies.

Publisher: Berkley (Penguin)
Pages: 304
Type: Fiction
Age: Adult
ISBN: 978-1-984-80327-6
First Published: 4th August 2020
Date Reviewed: 13th November 2020
Rating: 4.5/5

Like Aunt Evelyn, Vanessa can predict people’s futures, only – unlike Evelyn – she does not appreciate the ability as it takes her over and she is forced to speak the prediction aloud. This has only ever led to people running away, predicting bad news too often, and all-consuming headaches. Now grown up and wanting a better life than the one she’s living, and hoping for love beyond the odds (fortune tellers do not have long-term romance in their destinies), Vanessa agrees to spend a couple of weeks in Paris with her aunt as Evelyn opens her tea shop, to try to tame her talent into something more bearable. Paris is the city of love, and Vanessa finds her match, but she knows better than to hope for more than a few days, just like her Aunt whose own love life has been troubled.

This book could be received in two ways; for my British readers, this book is like Marmite if liking or disliking Marmite involved the ability to make an active decision rather than a knee-jerk reaction. Ergo, then, if picked up with an idea for a ‘normal’ book with some fun and travels in it, Lim’s latest is likely to be a disappointment. In this context, the book could be called lacking true conflict, too nice, and rather odd.

And I want to say that and have chosen those words precisely because this review will not be looking at Lim’s book from that point of view. This is because, if picked up as an escape, with a view for fun and a much happier, colourful, version of the world – Paris, here, particularly, of course – where people largely get on (and when they don’t, it’s fixable) are successful, and where magical things happen (more magical realism than outright fantasy), then Vanessa Yu’s Magical Paris Tea Shop is an utter delight.

So, like the situation with Marmite if we had something of a decision in the way we respond to it.

All this to say, perhaps, that this is a (‘the’, actually, I’d say) book to pick up when you’re wrapped up in blankets, it’s pouring with rain outside, and you want something that will make you feel good, euphoric even. (It’ll also work in the summer, more as a shady-under-the-tree or after the picnic rather than a beach read.) This book makes you feel… awesome. There is a special something about it that lifts off the page and envelopes you in goodness, even when Vanessa’s struggling.

Vanessa’s character progression is important; she narrates and her character is well-formed, however beyond her the most important elements are the atmosphere, the location, and the art. (The other characters do take a back seat in this way.) Lim’s use of Paris combines the better parts of the stereotype with the sorts of specific details that get left out of the stereotype – Paris is the city of love and happiness… and of these specific works of art that you’ll not find mentioned online quite so much. This is mostly thanks to Vanessa’s artistic nature – she stands and looks at things, and then sits down to memorialise them on paper.

Needless to say, the details inherent in creating art form a large part of the book. Another aspect that is used similarly is food, though this can be diverting. Food – the eating and description of it, formed much of Lim’s previous work, Natalie Tan’s Book Of Luck and Fortune, and the character was a chef. Vanessa, whilst her family is similar in this way, is not, and so it doesn’t work quite so well as the art – the narrative effectively pauses during meals, but it does pick right back up again following their conclusion.

So, as said, Vanessa Yu’s Magical Paris Tea Shop is a pick-me-up, a magical story that is pretty impossible not to enjoy for the brightness it brings with it. Whilst you will remember the plot, it’s the value of the atmosphere, the use of location, and the symbolism of the magical realism elements Lim uses that will etch itself most into your memory – with its goodness and uniqueness, it would be difficult to forget the effect this book has on you, and quite possibly difficult not to want to keep it to hand.

I received this book for review.

This week’s podcast episode is with Tammye Huf. Email and RSS subscribers: you may need to open this post in your browser to see the media player below.

Charlie and Tammye Huf (A More Perfect Union) discuss her great-great-grandparents’ relationship as an 1840s Irishman and a Black American slave, the way owners used Christianity to support their views of a racial hierarchy, and the lengths reached in order to label people by skin colour.

To see all the details including links to other apps, I’ve made a blog page here.

This week’s podcast episode is with Joanna Hickson. Email and RSS subscribers: you may need to open this post in your browser to see the media player below.

Charlie and Joanna Hickson (First Of The Tudors; The Tudor Crown; The Lady Of The Ravens also The Agincourt Bride; The Tudor Bride; Red Rose, White Rose) discuss the royal and noble individuals of the War of the Roses, the women who made an impact, the ever-present question of who killed the princes in the tower, and, on another topic entirely, using weasels to prevent conception.

Please note that the question about the fear of pregnancy and childbirth includes a couple of mentions of a weasel’s particulars.

To see all the details including links to other apps, I’ve made a blog page here.

The one with the most importance in this context, and he won’t be the last…

Publisher: HarperCollins
Pages: 494
Type: Fiction
Age: Adult
ISBN: 978-0-008-13970-4
First Published: 1st December 2016
Date Reviewed: 16th October 2020
Rating: 5/5

Jasper Tudor and his brother Edmund, half-brothers to Henry VI, inevitably fall on the Lancasterian side of the argument. As young men, Edmund marries the even younger Margaret Beaufort, and Jasper begins a relationship with distant relative, Jane Hywel. With Henry’s position at threat from the supporters of the York (and the later Edward IV), Jasper’s life is full of battles. And then there’s the other, perhaps more pressing, factor – Edmund and Margaret’s child, Henry, has more than one claim to the throne in his blood and he is going to require protection.

First Of The Tudors is Hickson’s fourth novel, an absolute triumph of a tome that manages to look in detail at the War of the Roses both accurately and with good pace and continued excitement, and with an undeniably wonderful immersive quality that makes an already well-known subject and people fascinating all over again.

Let’s tackle that accuracy first. Hickson uses a fair mixture of facts and fiction. She includes details that are often thought dry – dates, locations, details of troop movements, in a way that is balanced by her fiction. Specifically, her use of dialogue and narrative – particularly narrative – means that you get a good grounding in those ‘dry’ facts without needing to take a break, the fiction and the quality and thoughtfulness of her writing making the pages turn one after the other. Suffice to say that the page count, whilst it might look daunting at the outset, becomes a fact for indifference pretty quickly. (On a further note, picking up the similarly-numbered The Tudor Crown, directly afterwards, was one of the very few times I’ve looked at a book and found a large page count trivial.)

On the assertion of immersion, this is inevitably also the result of the dialogue and writing but in addition the use of location and the world building in general. There’s something special about Hickson’s narration in this regard that’s difficult to pinpoint exactly – it’s a quality that’s undeniably all her own and just really good to read. It works best in the more modest locations, likely because its in those places where the situation in the country (and, as the book goes on countries) is more relaxed and presumably quieter, but the castles and battlements and so on are pretty awesome, too.

Whilst Jasper narrates approximately half the tale, Jane Hywel narrates the other half. Jane, a semi-fictional character (her family is real, and Jasper did have a relationship and illegitimate children, we just don’t know who with) provides us with a necessarily different perspective on the War in her more ordinary situation; she also heads up a good focus on women at the time. On this, Hickson spends a very good amount of time on the role of Margaret Beaufort – she is pushed to the fore, as it were, given the backup and evidence, albeit sometimes fictional, for the points about her strength that we are told about in non-fiction.

On that ‘sometimes fictional’, we’re looking at the letters she sends to Jasper, which inevitably history, such as we know, has not kept primary evidence of but likely existed. In these we see a leader, a person as important as any of the leading men of the time, someone who worked in the background and got things done.

We also see a good amount about and of Elizabeth Woodville’s role, though it is invariably not as distinct.

And laced through it all, a gentle romance, a story that surely bares a fair semblance to the reality. It’s well written and well done in general, filling in gaps and padding out the life of a man we don’t know so much about but should, Jasper’s role in Henry VII’s ascension to the throne paramount.

First Of The Tudors presents a lesser-known man and an even lesser-known woman, bringing them to the front of the stage. It brings in the younger years of Margaret Beaufort, the life of Edmund Tudor, and well explains the backdrop, both immediate and further afield, to which Henry VII came to fight for the crown. It’s engaging, it’s fun (yes, indeed!). It’s splendid.

An heirloom with more significance than is usual.

Publisher: Headline (Hachette)
Pages: 280
Type: Fiction
Age: Adult
ISBN: 978-1-472-26826-6
First Published: 17th September 2020
Date Reviewed: 5th March 2020
Rating: 3.5/5

Mia is utterly taken by the Viking-era ring in the museum in Sweden – it is exactly the same as hers, a ring she was given by her grandmother. When a fellow academic, Berger, sees what she’s wearing, she’s thought to be a thief, but as the truth of her ownership finds him, he suggests further studies. Living in London with her fiancé, it’ll be rather different travelling to Sweden and staying far longer at her grandmother’s small estate than she’s used to, even if Mia now owns it, but Berger’s suggestion to do an archaeological dig there is too intriguing. She leaves Charles in London and moves into Birch Thorpe, but on the first day, instead of Berger, a man called Haakon arrives in his stead. He’s not very polite, but something draws Mia to him. Meanwhile we hear about Ceri, a Celtic woman stolen from home by Vikings, strangely drawn to her Swedish captor, Haukr, as he is to her.

Echoes Of The Runes is a time-slip story – ever so slightly in literal terms but with a fair resonance – looking at an effective repeat of a relationship without reincarnation.

The set up, particularly in terms of historical information in both narrative threads, is wonderful. Courtney’s attention to getting things correct and her dedication to making it interesting and accessible, easy to learn and take away with you, is apparent from the moment the modern day fictional studies start and the historical Ceri starts getting to grips with her new situation. This information includes details of archaeology; the author strikes a good balance, giving a good amount of information but never too much and always nestling it amongst the threads of the story.

The characters are well drawn. Mia’s fiancé Charles doesn’t really fit in, but then that’s effectively the point. New man Haakon (because you know he will be – more on this in a couple of paragraphs’ time) is pretty abrasive at first, domineering in a way that doesn’t seem to gel with Mia’s own personality, but then given the premise of the story, this may well be a liberty taken by Courtney so that Haakon can be as much like Haukr as possible without breaching the realms of what is realistic for a historian when compared to a Viking invader. Mia herself is fair, as is her counterpart, Ceri, where in the first the needs of the story and in the second the literal abduction play their parts.

Where characterisation doesn’t work so much is in the relationships – whilst some elements are, again, dictated by the situation, both pairings could have done with more time prior to the getting together. It’s obvious very early on that the two characters from each time period will be together, which given the genre and general concept is a good thing, but the time between first meeting and getting together is pretty short – more so in the modern day thread – and thus it can be difficult to see the chemistry in terms of characterisation.

In regards to the predictability of the story, that the basic concepts are predictable is no bad thing. Knowing the rough trajectory you are on is very welcome; the book’s balance of information and escapism is perfect. However the main reason to mention predictability is due to the series of coincidences in the two stories, the predictable nature inherent in them once you get used to comparing them. Usually, coincidences can be a problem, however in Courtney’s book they are included as part of the point – the modern day characters note them, discuss them. The threads follow one another, a historic tale repeating itself in the future as much as it can given the realistic restrictions the author has created, and understandably, given the general idea of spirits and even, though it’s not mentioned as such, the concept of unfinished business, there are many counterparts. It could be called too much, but it’s more something to consider both for its use in the story and as a thought-out device.

The one thing that is difficult is the world building – with so much time spent on the couples and on the time-slip factor, there are fewer details about the landscape and locations themselves, meaning a more limited sense of place and time than you might have hoped for. There are plenty of small mentions but not quite enough to stitch it all together.

Two smaller elements of note: the majority of each narrative is set in a different season to the other which brings a nice balance to the book over all, and the look at attitudes to disability forms a good additional element that asks you to consider not only the historical context but the present day, too.

Echoes Of The Runes does have times where it loses its way, but over all it is a good read. Its strengths are particularly so, and the slight meta hint to it in the form of the question of coincidences is an interesting component. It will leave you with lessons learned but, more over, a good reading experience that will allow you to properly relax into the story.