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Posted in Squad Pod Collective

The Trouble with Sister Francis by Matt Coyne

Posted on by thelotusreaders

Sister Francis is an unlikely nun.

She’s sixty, sweary, drives like a lunatic and smokes like a stacked chimney . . . and she runs the Blessed Assumption Boys Club.

Richie, Bennett, Kenny and Stan are four best friends from the Whittle council estate with little to do but get up to no good. After a run-in with local bullies, they discover the crumbling, forgotten club and find themselves in the company of the most remarkable person they will ever meet.

Set against early 1980s Britain, THE TROUBLE WITH SISTER FRANCIS is a funny, heartwarming, and heartbreaking story of unlikely heroes, quiet rebellions, fierce loyalty and unexpected hope.

And at the centre of it all lies a long-forgotten journal that might just change everything.

I feel like I’ve been living under a rock because I seem to be the only book blogger who hasn’t read Matt Coyne’s Frank and Red, so this was my first introduction to his writing. I didn’t even follow him on social media before now so I went in completely blind. I can honestly say this book was a gem from start to finish. Matt Coyne’s ability to write a novel with the emotional intelligence to balance weighty subjects like war and loss against laugh out loud comedy is akin to Sue Townsend and her wonderful creation Adrian Mole. In fact it was Adrian I thought of when reading these four boys, Richie, Bennett, Kenny and Stan, all from the Whittle Council Estate in Sheffield in the early 1980s. Their dialogue is pitch perfect for a boy of that age, with their slang, swearing and prurient interest in Mrs Bolcheck’s ‘wibblies’. It brought back a memory of my brother and his friend Darren who would hang out together in our Lincolnshire village, hiding behind hedges to shout at a rather well endowed lady ‘show us your tits’. Thank goodness there were no formidable nuns nearby. 

Nostalgia and charm are definitely are a huge factor in the enjoyment of this story, with exactly the right 1980s sweets, pop culture references and Northern humour. For me, it the presence of a nun that drew me in and having been brought up Roman Catholic nuns feature strongly in my memory. In 1980 as I was falling in love with Lady Di like the rest of the world and wondering whether to cut off my hair, I was also making my holy communion. I couldn’t get to Catholic school where we lived so I went to the convent every Monday evening for lessons with Sister Anne, a large, twinkly and very maternal nun who taught me my catechism. She also gave me homework every week, to write out a Bible story and illustrate it. I came across this folder when my mum and dad downsized a few years ago and found various crayon drawings of Jesus and his disciples but thanks to a seven year olds grasp of anatomy I’d placed their arms too low on their bodies. The result was various saints whose spidery hands looked like big throbbing knobs! How did she keep a straight face? 

Sister Francis is more like my rather formidable previous schoolteacher, Sister Joan. She had the sharpness and discipline of a military veteran, but underneath that there was a twinkle that made me think there was a sense of humour and quick wit underneath. Sister Francis drives an old clapped out van as if she’s in a rally car. Smoke seems to billow from the exhaust and the a cigarette she always has on the go. She swears and is often reading the racing post. I have always found nuns to be singular and quirky individuals so I warmed to her immediately. Although she’s a comic character there’s so much more to her. She’s clearly keen on restarting a boy’s club she used to run years ago, with origins of supporting boys who had lost their father in WW2. She has a way of relating to boys from the area and our four friends can see she’s a formidable ally from the first day. When they roll up to the clapped out shed they’re accosted by one of the local priests, asking what they’re doing hanging around the presbytery and accusing them of looking for things to steal. When Sister Francis bursts out of the shed he’s taken aback and the boys notice she uses her sweetest voice and emphasises the holy intentions behind her club, but as soon as he’s gone she lights up and is her sweary self. Behind this exterior are buckets of empathy and determination to help the boys in her care, not that she’s easy on them. The four boys have a deal with her, if they come and help her clean the club house on the last Saturdays of term they can come to the club in the holidays and keep the entrance fee. It’s hard work but they stick at it and I found this so reminiscent of little dens me and my brother would build together in those long summer holidays where the sun seemed to shine endlessly. 

I developed a soft spot for Rich’s Grandad Bob, who has a keen sense of humour and is a great role model for a young boy who has lost his father. I loved how he made Rich laugh with his assessment of Aunt Carole – she has a beard and looks like a pirate. He’s also there for the worse times too, after Rich’s dad died he has enough sense to simply sit with him as the loss hits him, no platitudes or promises, just sitting with him in his grief. Alongside Rich’s 1980s narrative is the journal of another boy who went to the Dead Dad’s Club after the upheaval of WW2. This narrative is evocative of a totally different era as Reginald is evacuated to a small village near Sheffield that’s something of a culture shock after growing up in London. It includes little documents he’s saved that really add to the historic significance of his experiences. Evacuees didn’t always have the best time and Reginald is coping with the boredom of the village and his observations on what passes as news worthy are so funny. He’s also navigating that rite of passage from primary to secondary school and the author really does conjure up those fears about the bigger school, getting lost and being without your usual friends. I wasn’t sure where his story fit with our four main characters and this is kept under wraps until exactly the right moment. This book has been a wonderful mood lifter just when I needed one, like a warm hug in book form. One line made me think about the friends who knew me in my small village at a similar age, one of whom I’ve tried to see regularly more recently. We try to get together at least once a month for cake and a catch up and I remember being taken aback at first by exactly how well she knew me. But of course she does. As Matt Coyne writes ‘real friendships are cast in the everyday’ and even though my friend and I often just walked her dog, cleaned out the rabbits and watched telly we grew up together and that counts for a lot. I heartily recommend this hilarious but heartfelt story that’s a ray of sunshine in book form. 

Out Now from Wildfire Books

Meet the Author

Matt Coyne is from Sheffield, South Yorkshire. In September 2015, his life was turned upside down by the arrival of his son, Charlie. Three months into parenthood, he took to social media to write about his experience as a clueless first-time dad. Within days, his post about surviving the early months of parenthood was shared by millions around the world.

Following this, Matt created his popular blog Man vs Baby, which now has more than 500,000 followers. He is the author of two Sunday Timesbestselling books – Dummy and Man vs. Toddler – both based on Man vs Baby and has written for the Guardian, Telegraph, Private Eye and GQ.

The Trouble with Sister Francis is Matt’s second novel, following his acclaimed, award-winning debut Frank and Red.

Matt lives in Sheffield with his son Charlie, his partner Lyndsay and a Jack Russell terrier with ‘issues’ called Popcorn.

Posted in Wordpress Prompts

The Right Book At The Right Time

Posted on by thelotusreaders

What’s a book you never finished but still think about?

Ask any book lover what’s the first thing they get asked by visitors to their home and most will answer “how many of them have you read?” Depending on how this question is asked I have two responses: some people ask this question as if they’re trying to catch you out, as if you’ve furnished your house with books to impress others; others are genuinely interested and I’m happy to tell them that any good library has plenty of choice. There are books in my library that have been there several years without being opened. Others are read the minute they come through the door. No matter how much we read and how varied our library there are books we pick up and struggle with. No matter how much we’re told about how brilliant it is, or how many prizes it’s won, we simply can’t get into it. It might be the wrong time, maybe something has happened in life that means we’re not emotionally prepared for it. Maybe it sounded interesting on the shelf in the bookshop but now you can’t build up the enthusiasm. Maybe you started it but hate the narrative voice or structure. Whatever the reason we all have famous unfinished books and here are a few of mine. I normally don’t do negative posts but I know these authors can take it. They’re bestselling authors with books beloved by the world, in fact I have books by all three on my shelves so I’m sure they won’t mind.

A novel of mind-bending imagination and scope from the author of Ghostwritten and Utopia Avenue

Souls cross ages like clouds cross skies . . .

Six interlocking lives – one amazing adventure. In a narrative that circles the globe and reaches from the 19th century to a post-apocalyptic future, Cloud Atlas erases the boundaries of time, genre and language to offer an enthralling vision of humanity’s will to power, and where it will lead us.

I know everyone thinks this is brilliant. I’ve even read other books by the author and enjoyed them. But I genuinely can’t get into this novel. My rational brain keeps telling me this is a book you need to keep reading to see its full effect and if I just give it a couple more chapters I’ll know what’s going on, but my irrational part is screaming ‘throw it out the window.’ I’ve tried on three different occasions to read this and one of them was in a holiday where I’d run out of books and this was the only one in the house. It’s in a lot of holiday cottages when you start to look and I have a theory. It’s a book people save to read on holiday and then decide life is too short and it’s better to play scrabble and stare at the rain. No matter what I do this book languishes on my shelf until the day comes when I’m ready to read it.

Some people wait their whole lives to find their soul mates. But not Holly and Gerry. Childhood sweethearts, they could finish each other’s sentences. No one could ever imagine them without each other.

When Gerry dies, Holly is devastated. But Gerry has left her a bundle of notes, one for each month of her year, each signed ‘PS, I Love You’.

As the notes are opened, the man who knows Holly better than anyone teaches her that life goes on. With some help from friends and family, Holly laughs, cries and finds that life is for living – but it helps if there’s someone watching over you.

I genuinely did throw this book out of the window and into the garden! It made me bloody furious. Gerry is dying from cancer, but somehow in the final weeks of his life he summoned up the energy to write Holly letters, buy gifts and even go to the travel agents to book a holiday with no one else knowing. In my experience, both providing care for elderly people with cancer and watching my own husband die from MS complications, people in their final weeks rarely have the energy to do all this without help and someone is always with them. I get this is a romance but it did push reality to one side to create something so sickly sweet I couldn’t bear it. One day I might be ready to read this, but a few years after a major bereavement? Absolutely not.

First came the virus. And then came the dreams . . .

A man escapes from a biological testing facility, unknowingly carrying a deadly weapon: a mutated strain of super-flu that will wipe out over 99 percent of the world’s population within a few weeks.

Those who remain are scared, bewildered, and in need of a leader. Two emerge – Mother Abagail, the benevolent 108-year-old woman who urges them to build a peaceful community in Boulder, Colorado; and Randall Flagg, the ‘dark man’, the apostate of death, the warlord of the charnel house and Prince of Evil. 

Now the survivors must choose between them – and ultimately decide the fate of all humanity.

I had a horror reading stage in my late teens and early twenties, powering through James Herbert, Dean Koontz and most of Stephen King. I love Stephen King’s ability to tell such fantastical stories that we believe utterly and scare the wits out of us. Everyone I knew who read widely said his best book is The Stand so I gave it a go. As a reading experience it felt like wading through treacle, plodding along and taking its time to set out the post-apocalyptic world and its leaders. It just wasn’t grabbing me like his other novels and I was really struggling to stay interested. I kept looking at how many pages were ahead and thinking if life’s too short to stuff a mushroom it’s definitely too short for meandering through this. I set it aside and didn’t come back. We’re now thirty years on and I finally picked it up and read straight through. I have no idea why but I really enjoyed it, it’s not my favourite of his books but it isn’t the worst either. I have no idea why I had such an aversion to it: a teenager’s inability to concentrate, being used to more ‘sensational’ novels or that my taste has simply matured. Who knows?

Posted in Wordpress Prompts

Life in Moominvalley

Posted on by thelotusreaders

Which fictional world would be the most fun to vacation in?

I have no doubt that my favourite place to vacation would be in Finland with the Moomins and their various house guests. Many people stay in the blue tower this family call home, on the edge of a lake in Finland. Built a long time ago by Moominpappa it was once lost, but after the Great Flood it is rediscovered in the perfect setting:

“At last they came to a small valley that was more beautiful than any they had seen that day. And there, in the midst of the meadow, stood a house that almost looked like a stove, very elegant and painted blue.”
The Moomins and the Great Flood (1945)

It could easily take a day just to explore this strange house that’s full of the features Moominpappa didn’t have when he was a child like balconies, turrets, secret staircases all topped off with a glass knob that looks like an onion. I mustn’t forget to visit the huge chandelier where the Ancestor hides out. It’s a comfortable house with squishy furnishings, fabrics like plush and velvet, and endless shelves of books and trinkets to enjoy.

“And so the Moominhouse was rather full – a place where everyone did what they liked and seldom worried about tomorrow.”

From Finn Family Moomintroll

The best thing about Moomintroll’s family is that they accept everyone ‘just as you are’ – a promise so important it’s engraved on the inside of my wedding ring. The beauty of this family is that you can belong but you don’t have to fit in. The Moomins simply accept everyone for what and who they are. Snufkin comes and goes for long periods but there’s always a bed for him in the Moominhouse. The Hemulen prefers to wear a dress and has his magnifying glass on a chain around his neck. Even the very naughty ‘Stinky’ takes refuge behind the vacuum cleaner on one occasion!

There’s something magical about snow and the way it seems to muffle noise and cut us off from the rest of the world. Moominmamma and Pappa are always hospitable, feeding their guests well and sharing their celebrations and outings with whoever is around. I could have a gossip with the Snork Maiden or go fishing with Snufkin and Moomintroll, with a hearty picnic packed by Moominmamma. I could go nature walking with the Hemulen who could surprise me with their botanic knowledge. Their celebrations are always lit by dozens of fairy lights flashing between trees or the tiny tube-like Hattifatteners who look like miniature ghosts and feel like stinging nettles if they brush against your legs. The family are so accommodating I doubt they’d mind if I curled up in a window seat with a book watching the snow fall. There’s always a chance of seeing the Northern Lights too, from the warmth of the glass veranda, reflecting their changing colours in the lake. I have no doubt I’d come back with so many new experiences to share, incredible photographs and new friends I can visit whenever I want.

“Moomintroll’s mother and father always welcomed all their friends in the same quiet way, just adding another bed and putting another leaf in the dining-room table. And so the Moominhouse was rather full – a place where everyone did what they liked and seldom worried about tomorrow.”
(Finn Family Moomintroll, 1948)

Posted in Squad Pod Collective

The Bestseller by Jenny Knightsby 

Posted on by thelotusreaders

Therapist Helena Salve knows that client confidentiality is the number one unbreakable rule of her job. But the constant stories of coercive control and threat she hears from her client Belle about her dangerous husband have been wearing her down. One night over too many glasses of wine, she tells her best friend Tala everything that Belle has told her. The problem is, Tala is a down-on-her-luck novelist who is looking for an idea for her new thriller.

Months later, Tala is excitedly telling Helena that her publisher is saying this is going to be her biggest book ever. The story is Belle’s story. Not only is Helena’s job on the line, but if Belle’s husband is as dangerous as she says, her life is too…

Why would Tala do this to Helena? She knows what’s at stake.

Your friends are meant to protect you… aren’t they?

This is a great premise for a thriller and having been a therapist I’m always fascinated by books based on the therapeutic relationship. I think there’s a general fascination about what therapist’s personal lives actually look like. Do they have it all sorted? The answer is invariably no and in this novel there’s so much projection happening between Helena and her client Belle. Confidentiality is the bedrock of any therapeutic relationship, but that can get tricky when the therapist knows the client needs either specialist help or practical help. Helena is there to listen and guide Belle towards her own answers, but the constant disclosure of coercive control is uncomfortable to sit in. The urge to do rather than sit back and listen becomes difficult for Helena and it’s this discomfort that leads to her talking about it with best friend Tala. She asks Belle to bring her husband Julius to the sessions as she’s normally a couple’s counsellor, but that wouldn’t work either because he might take the opportunity to abuse his wife verbally and emotionally in the session. It is impossible to counsel a narcissist.This is an issue for supervision, where Helena should disclose that she’s finding Belle’s passivity and indecision on leaving her husband Julius very difficult. The fact that she doesn’t, tells me she wants to show her supervisor Martha that she’s doing this ‘right’. Helena is a perfectionist and perhaps she seeks approval from her supervisor rather than being totally honest. There’s something about Helena that’s very responsible, aware of her ethical framework and unwilling to break out of it. However, sometimes this demeanour doesn’t seem real.

I found Helena an odd central character because we have access to her inner life but I still felt she was almost ‘missing’ in the story. She feels very flat compared to other characters and it was as if she’d fallen permanently into her counselling role, treating everyone with empathy rather than displaying honest human reactions to events. However, as those events start to spiral out of control, that serene outer surface does start to crack. The author uses flashbacks to give us a picture of how all the characters meet while they’re at university, but also to show us incidents that would have me dumping her boyfriend Dylan, but Helena accepts and forgives. One scene is a dinner with Martha her tutor, but Dylan is late. When he does arrive he’s very drunk and relieves himself on the rug! This would have been an unforgivable red flag for me. Helena seems to have the measured outlook a lot of counsellors have, the ability to think on something for a while and not act on her first emotions. There’s no doubt she’s furious and betrayed when she realises best friend Tala has written a book based on her current client Belle. Inside she’s screaming ‘how could you do this to me?’ She’s terrified of her career and reputation being finished by this breach of confidentiality but she doesn’t show it. She waits and mulls it over, never displaying the emotions underneath. This either shows an ability to rationalise obstacles and work out a response that’s fully thought through, or she’s completely out of touch with her own emotions and unable to express them as soon as they arise. It made me think of the famous book ‘The Body Keeps the Score’ where the author explains how trauma is not just a psychological event, it’s a physiological one too. The trauma is felt bodily and stays within the nervous system, causing physical reactions if not addressed through holistic therapy such as a combination of EMDR, yoga, meditation and neurofeedback. The body stores the trauma as muscle tension, hypervigilance and a rapid heart rate continuing to experience them long after the trauma has passed. I felt like Helena was storing her emotions bodily, without truly feeling and expressing them, that is until events start to spiral out of control.

Tala is Helena’s opposite in every way. She’s impulsive, creative and a torrent of emotion at all stages of her life. There’s clearly been an event that’s affected her permanently and it’s only through flashbacks that we see what this is. It makes sense of her neediness when it comes to relationships and when she thinks she’s found one after years of being single, she isn’t going to give it up easily. I couldn’t believe the audacity of taking Helena’s private impressions and worries for her client and turning them into a sensational thriller. It seems out of character for Tala who has been a steadfast friend for many years. Maybe she didn’t expect the book to take off the way it does and now it’s being advertised on the Tube and on the side of buses she can’t take it back. Risky behaviour isn’t new to Tala, we see in flashbacks that she experimented at university with drink and drugs. There’s an element of mothering in Helena’s relationship with her friend, replacing a missing element in her life? Helena and Dylan are that stable couple Tala runs to when things go wrong, but what about when things go right? As Helena reacts to the new book I wondered how much she was threatened by Tala’s success? If Tala gets her act together and does really well with the book, she might stop being the person who depends on Helena. No longer the person to be pitied and sighed over. When she brings a new boyfriend into the mix it’s as if all the problems in Tala’s life are being resolved at once and she is well aware of this change in their dynamic. 

I loved the way the author wrote about coercive control and as a survivor of this type of relationship it matters when people get it right. One of the worst elements for me was that other people can’t always see it, it’s subtle and hard to pin down when someone is exerting their will over you. It’s rarely straightforward because it exists within the dynamic of your relationship, so one seemingly innocuous word could bring you sharply back into line and leave you dreading the real ‘fallout’ later when you’re alone. The worst thing about this type of relationship is that you start to police yourself, trained into acting the way that pleases the abuser. They might seem to champion you to others, but in truth are jealous of what you’ve achieved and once the reflected glory has worn off they might try sabotage. After leaving my relationship I felt an enormous amount of relief but then self-doubt would creep in as if I’d internalised the abuser’s voice. It’s disorienting because the person you were in love with isn’t real, but just a mask they wear to hide their true self. All of this can be seen in Belle’s relationship with Julius and I think my own experience helped me understand why Helena wants to help this woman, even though she’s struggling to stay within the boundaries of their therapy. It’s very hard to sit back and not give advice in these situations or offer help beyond the counselling room. It was interesting to see how the professional distance became impossible when Martha ended up in hospital and Helena was without supervision. 

It seems that the lives of these three friends and their paths into adulthood hinged on a single night. I thought the author managed these flashbacks well, placing them absolutely perfectly for maximum effect. It seems everyone has secrets but they are slowly revealed creating a very addictive read with short, pacy chapters that make you want to read just one more – I desperately wanted to know where Martha’s cat had gone! The tension is almost unbearable as I worried about Helena overstepping with her client, or the client finding out what’s in Tala’s book and somehow passing that on to Julius. Would Helena be safe? As her well-ordered life starts to fall apart Helena starts to lose her belongings, forget her schedule and have terrible nightmares. She has no access to Martha and her relationship with Tala is broken. I wondered if she was heading for a breakdown. You may see the twist coming, but that doesn’t detract from the story. Eyes are opened, secrets past and present are revealed and I devoured the last few chapters late at night, unable to wait till the morning to find out what happened. This was an excellent thriller, full of psychological drama and really nailed the experience of being a counsellor with a problematic client. I also loved the ‘meta’ structure of reading a book about a book and just like Tala’s new novel this one should be a bestseller. 

Out now from Mountain Leopard Press

Meet the Author

Jenny Knightsby is a hospital doctor based in West London. The Bestseller was shortlisted for the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize 2024 and is Knightsby’s debut novel.

Posted in Personal Purchase

Under the Blazing Sun by Jenny Lund Madsen

Posted on by thelotusreaders

Hannah is miserable. Her love life is in ruins, her contract demands a sequel to her bestselling crime debut – and she’s out of ideas. After a mortifying TV interview, her agent ships her off to a sun-drenched Sicilian villa with a simple order: finish the book. No distractions. No excuses.

But inspiration doesn’t strike – murder does. When a night out ends in murder, Hannah finds herself at the centre of a murder investigation … again. The police want her out of the way, and the only person who seems to believe her is a young but charming Italian police officer. That is, until she doesn’t.

Soon Hannah is chasing suspects, fleeing crime scenes, and doing whatever it takes to avoid becoming the next victim. She came to write a crime novel. Now she’s trapped inside one. Dark, sly and deliciously atmospheric, Under the Blazing Sun is the second novel in the award-winning series featuring accidental sleuth and disgruntled literary author Hannah, whose pursuit of plot twists keeps turning dangerously real.

I loved the author’s first book in this series and I devoured this one in a day. Hannah is once again fretting over writing her latest book, disgusted that copies of the romance novel she poured her heart into is being ignored, while the crime novel she wrote in one month for a bet is a bestseller. Hannah is a brilliantly flawed character full of writer’s neurosis, hating that she is forced to write what will sell rather than the books she aspires to write. Again she’s on a deadline and as a last resort her editor Bastian finds her a quiet villa in Sicily with its own swimming pool. No distractions and plenty of time to unwind and write the novel she’s had an advance to produce. I love this character because she says and does the things I want to, but my inhibitions keep it inside. She has no such restrictions, happily saying what she thinks when she thinks it. Her disgust with the crime genre and Jorn Jensen in particular is so funny. I wonder if she has ever had a thought or need she didn’t express? She’s also totally unregulated and this is what lands her in trouble every time. She decides to walk to the village without thought about the heat, how far it is and which direction she takes. So when it comes to going back to the villa she has no idea which hill to take and ends up exhausted and on the verge of sunstroke on her way back. This is where she is found by Hans and Greta who take her to their incredible house to clean up and drink something. This turns into dinner, wine and a night spent in their house. It’s when she wakes up in a strange place that she and the housekeeper Lucette find a dead body. Greta has been murdered and Hans is nowhere to be found. Has he been kidnapped or could he be the murderer? Hannah seems to have an inability to weigh up a decision before taking action. There’s so much going on in her head that it’s very hard for her to remain in the present. I’m always wishing she’d slow down a minute and breathe, but the only times she seems to do this are in the water. 

This hot Italian island couldn’t be further from Hannah’s Scandinavian home and is a great backdrop for a murder. Hannah is a fish out of water here and she notes the contrast between the cold and snow of her last case and the relentless heat and dryness of Sicily. The area throws up different obstacles too. There’s the rather sexist and misogynistic Sicilian police, aside from their one female recruit Carlotta. Hannah has to consider the local community and possible objections to people like Greta who are making money by bringing even more tourists into the area. There’s the possibility of corruption too with links between the Mafia, business and local government. We see the contrast of what the area is like for holiday makers and wealthy incomers, as opposed to the young people in the area who are struggling to find work and homes without moving away. The young police detective Carlotta wants to be the difference in the police force, banding together with Hannah on a couple of occasions and proving to be quite the distraction. Hannah is still in love with Margret and is dangling on an open ended waiting game. They’re not in a relationship until Margret can extricate herself from her marriage and make the best decisions for her children. Hannah isn’t always patient with this and doesn’t seem to realise that if Margret was in her life permanently so are her children. When she imagines them together I’m not sure the children feature in that picture. It was interesting to see her getting more than she bargained for and having the cheek to ask Margret’s police officer husband for help! He voices what many readers might be thinking when he tells her she’s the most annoying person he’s ever met. 

The case is an absolute maze of connections and suspects and despite her aversion to crime as a genre, she’s just as caught up in the mystery of this murder as any reader would be. She’s utterly reckless, in a comical way and there’s a chase on a moped during the final chapters that is clumsy and hilarious to imagine. Sparks fly when Jorn Jensen appears, but she can’t deny he helps make things happen. His arrogance is brilliant and when he suggests they write a crime novel together I thought Hannah might hit him with something heavy. The creepy moment in the basement, including Jensen’s cardboard cut out made me laugh and worry about her safety at the same time. This is a dark humour that I love. Jorn’s statement that he has ‘enormous sex appeal’ and it’s that and not his wealth that attracts women shows what sort of brash and conceited character he is, but there’s no denying his bravery and quick thinking. They are quite the investigative team, despite her reticence about working with him. Hannah’s instincts are good. She won’t accept the police’s conclusion that Hans killed his wife, reasoning that he adored her and couldn’t have done it. Instead she follows the money, often blundering into compromising situations and dangerous people. If the conclusion teaches her anything it’s that people will murder for very unexpected reasons. This is a brilliant second instalment of Hannah’s adventures and I’m going to resolve to be a little more Hannah and say what I think here and there. 

Out now from Orenda Books

Posted in Squad Pod

Loch Bound by Rebecca Templeton 

Posted on by thelotusreaders

Mermaids. Monsters. Magic. But this story is no fairy tale . . . 

Kilmara, Scotland. 1725. For fifty years, Iris has accepted the curse that blighted her life. By night, she is a heartbroken woman, destined to walk the misty shores of Kilmara without growing older. By day, she is Moireach, a terrifying monster imprisoned in the murky depths of Loch Moine.

When bodies begin appearing on the shore, the villagers are convinced Moireach is responsible. So a hunter – the rugged, ruthless Henry Carver – is summoned to slay the monster of the loch. 

Iris must break her curse before she is killed for crimes she cannot believe she has committed. But as Kilmara’s hunt for the monster becomes ever more fevered, she and Henry are drawn together in a dangerous game of impossible attraction. 

And when a figure from Iris’s past suddenly reappears, she must choose what – or who – she is willing to sacrifice to win her freedom.

Because there is no happily-ever-after when you are the monster.

I love books where monsters are used in a clever way and I also love books set in Scotland and this brings the two together beautifully. I’ve recently been reading about mermaids and their dual narrative of being beautiful women with long hair, beautiful faces and glistening scales or terrifying sea monsters dragging sailors into the deep and eating them alive. It’s a long way from the Little Mermaid. However, what is common is the misogyny of the narrative – an early Syrian goddess was said to have had an illicit relationship with a youth, ashamed of her actions she then drowned herself in a lake. She was forgiven by the gods but from then on had the upper body of a woman and the lower body of a fish, thus remaining celibate for life as punishment. I’ve never liked the tale of The Little Mermaid who falls in love with a man and wishes to live on land. She can have her wish granted and have human legs, but is doomed to having pain like knives in them. The wish to be and live like a human has to have a penance attached. The fashion for taxidermy, curiosities and freak shows in Victorian Britain meant that many women were performing as mermaids but also strange mixes of animals were being sewn together and shown as mermaids, such as the strange example at the Horniman Museum in London. In this story she’s a truly fearsome creature named Moireach with yellow eyes, sharp teeth, shiny scales and the drive of a predator. She lives in the loch, only changing after dark when she reverts back to her human form – Iris. As a young girl Iris defied her father and fell in love with Thane. He forbade their relationship, as the daughter of a laird she had to marry well and for the clan’s gain not her own. Devastated she visited a witch hoping to be free of her father’s obligations, but the witch cursed her and she became banished to the loch by day. Now even fifty years later, when Iris emerges she is still the beautiful girl of her youth. Thane has never come for her and now when dead men are being found around the loch with their hearts ripped out the name of the monster is on everyone’s lips. Her childhood friend Duncan, now an old man, knows it cannot be Iris. She isn’t capable. He hides her with all the love and loyalty he had fifty years earlier, even though she chose someone else. The current laird has made a big decision, he’s hired a hunter of monsters, a man called Henry Carver and he has never failed to catch his prey. 

The backdrop of this story is perfect, using the mist, cold and breathtaking landscape to add to its mystery. There are parallels with Outlander here in the feel of this place, making good use of Scotland as a thin place where the paranormal, time travel and a history of monsters seems part of life. With the historical backdrop of the witch trials it’s also a dangerous place, particularly for a woman. Iris talks about the smell of the burnings and how women must be careful, but it’s no easier being a monster when men are turning up dead. The background of misogyny and brutal witch trials hangs over them all and shows a willingness to believe in magic, curses and female malevolence. It’s not just witches though, other fantastical creatures exist here like the seelies and selkies and there’s more one woman with powers a man would kill for. All of these things appear to be aligned with the nature that surrounds them and we can see that wildness as Iris changes to Moireach. It’s not just the yellow eyes and scales but the way she becomes a predator with only one goal. However she has only killed things in the loch, never on land before. She has always been able to keep her dual personalities separate before, never feeling Moireach at night when she leaves the lake. Now that separation is becoming harder. Is that because of the presence of the hunter or is the curse changing? Will Iris will be lost forever? 

The hunter is an interesting character, made solitary by loss and preferring to keep moving from place to place. His opinions on grief are based on hard experience, when his wife died he didn’t just lose her, but also that part of himself. The part that loved her. He knows that grief doesn’t go away, he’s had to learn to live with that dead part. When he sees Iris in her human form something awakens in him, even though he notices that she seems like a wild creature. She’s always around at night, wearing men’s clothing and runs away if he tries to get too close, with her flaming red hair trailing behind her. There is something between them and it could be love, or it could be his hunter’s instinct kicking in. Iris can feel it too, even though her aim has always been to break the curse and find Thane, the man she was in love with and wanted to marry. I felt like Iris grew up in the course of the story. It’s as if Duncan’s protection of her has kept her a young girl in mind as well as looks. Maybe she needed to break out a little in order to gain some wisdom and perspective. If she does break the curse, will Thane come for her? She would need to decide whether she wants the life she expected when she was cursed or if the time she’s spent as Moireach has changed her outlook? I also started to wonder if Duncan had a vested interest in keeping her under control. 

Reading this felt like being a child again and discovering a fairy tale. One that’s rooted in darkness. Yes, some elements are fantastical, but it doesn’t read like fantasy. It’s more like a hybrid of historical fiction and fairy tales with aspects of a thriller. The pace speeds up as Iris begins to run out of time and we still don’t know why she was cursed, who cursed her and what will finally break it. There are those in the village who may seem kind, but could benefit from keeping Iris in her watery prison. As she takes us back to those fateful days in flashback, when her family were all together and her father didn’t yet know about Thane. I was engrossed with the tangled web of lies and betrayal but also by the question of what life Iris would choose if she could lift the curse. Would she pick the life she’d always wanted or had things changed? She has memorialised her relationship with Thane but he has let her down by not coming for her as she’d expected. Maybe she would want a different life, rooted in her present reality instead of the fantasy she has held all this time. There are some unexpected revelations too, making for an exciting and absorbing conclusion. I thoroughly enjoyed this dark and feminist take on the mermaid stories we’re used to and I look forward to what the author writes next. 

Meet the Author

Rebecca Templeton has had a love of books from a very early age and had lofty childhood aspirations of being a writer, though she ended up joining the legal profession instead. When her husband encouraged her to start writing again, she rediscovered her creative outlet and hasn’t looked back since.

When not writing or working, Rebecca can usually be found crocheting giant blankets, baking or watching Gilmore Girls. She is also owned by a couple of very energetic children.

Posted in Personal Purchase

Dissection of A Murder by Jo Murray

Posted on by thelotusreaders

A dead judge. A silent defendant. And a courtroom full of liars.

When Leila Reynolds is handed her first murder case, she’s shocked at how high-profile it is: the murder of a well-respected, well-known judge. This shouldn’t be the kind of case she’s leading; it’s way beyond her expertise. But the defendant, Jack Millman, is clear. He wants her, and only her.

To make things worse, he’s refusing to talk. How is she supposed to prove herself on what appears to be an unwinnable case?

Losing is not an option. She must find the most persuasive argument. Trials aren’t won by convincing judges or fellow barristers – they’re all about convincing a jury.

Suddenly, Leila finds herself fighting not only to keep Jack out of prison, but also to keep her own secrets buried.

It’s true what they say – there are two sides to every story.

Guilty or not guilty?

Wow! This was a ‘devour in one sitting’ thriller in the high stakes setting of a barrister’s chambers and an incendiary case where two of their barristers have been requested; one in prosecution and one in defence. The defendant has requested Leila, an up and coming young barrister who has just heard she’s getting a mention in an exclusive legal publication. The man who’s keen to let Leila know she has him to thank for that mention, is her previous mentor Julian. As a pupil she had to work under Julian to complete her training and he’s now going to be her opponent in court. Even more complicated is the fact that they’re now husband and wife. This is a murder case and the victim was a high court judge, Anton Smythe, who died in a flat above a nightclub after being hit in the head with a doorstop. The accused is Jack, who works as security for the nightclub owner and lives on the premises. Leila is surprised that his solicitor has requested her because she has defended this client before, and lost. When they meet again for instructions, Jack tells her he will be pleading not guilty but offers no defence. She absolutely refuses to put him on the stand and his solicitor agrees. They should argue his case if he will trust them with the truth. Jack sticks to his guns, he will not say a word about his defence until he is on the stand. Could this be paranoia? Although to be a judge like Anton means you have powerful friends, maybe it is sensible to keep his story under wraps for now. 

I’m a big fan of legal dramas like Silk and North Square so the setting in a barrister’s chambers definitely appealed to me. I loved Maxine Peake as Martha, she was Northern, intelligent, quick with a put down and nobody’s fool. Leila comes across as more of a gentle character than that, but definitely intelligent, determined and perhaps driven by a background that has its secrets. I intensely disliked Julian, but he is so well-written. There was a definite power imbalance between them, especially since she’d been his pupil. He must have seen her star quality and I had the thought that maybe he’d married Leila to keep her under him, both literally and figuratively. The layers of charm and ease soon fall away as the case starts. 

“You want someone whose mind is in alignment with yours, but whose appetite for dominance will never exceed your own”. 

When Leila is congratulated on her mention he makes sure to comment that without his influence it wouldn’t have happened. I noticed that his ex-wife seems to want to talk to Leila, something she’s avoiding but might be worthwhile. As lines are drawn in the court room there’s a definite misogyny in how Julian gangs up with the police witnesses against her, but because he can couch it in terms of prosecuting competently even though she’s his wife, it’s hard to narrow down his intentions. Is he just serving the best interests of his client? Or is he trying to rattle his wife and make her feel like she’s dependent on him? As the case continues their once calm married life becomes more fraught and separate. Leila isn’t sure whether it’s just the case and the distance needed to be opponents or whether something more fundamental is wrong. The other thing that struck me as odd is that it’s Leila who goes to spend Friday evenings having fish and chips with her mother-in-law Audrey who is in the early stages of dementia. Julian never goes with her. When she does have one lucid moment Leila asks what she thinks about her son. ‘You can’t trust him she says very quietly. Thats why he doesn’t come to see me. He hates women who can see through him.” Maybe Leila is just starting to see the real man she married. There is also mystery around Leila’s background, definitely a poorer area of the North East than Durham but she seems to have no family. It’s as if she has totally reinvented herself. She calls it a wretched life that’s left it’s mark: 

“It’s the smaller, subtler things I’m now fiercely protective of, like feeling safe when I turn the light off before I go to sleep […] recognising my body is my own and I now get a say in who touches it. The things I had to do to get here you’d be horrified to know.”

It feels as if her relationships have been transactional even when she’s had a choice. Could Julian just be another rung on the ladder? It seems he wasn’t her first mentor and she wonders often whether this past will catch up with her. The twist is very good indeed. I had an inkling, but it is a proper ‘sixth sense’ moment where you’ll want to flick back through the book and see the clues you missed. This is a high drama, high stakes, legal battle and only one of them can win. The tension is unbearable as Jack takes the stand, it almost feels like a done deal but no one is expecting his testimony. The fall out is seismic. This is such a clever thriller with a cast of characters you won’t like but will be fascinated with. It’s very well written by an author who knows this profession and its pitfalls for women, particularly working class ones. It feels like social commentary – with the well educated, upholders of the law and all their status, against the ordinary, working class person who’s usually in the dock. Can the law be the great equaliser it seems or are some people more equal than others? This was a great debut with a fast pace and some brilliant ‘oh my God’ moments. 

Meet the Author

Jo grew up in Teesside during the 90s when working class girls were told they probably shouldn’t try to become barristers. Thankfully, she ignored everyone. After studying Classics at Newcastle University, she went to law school and did just that. Jo was a criminal barrister before leaving the profession to look after her two children. She lives in North Yorkshire.

Posted in Wordpress Prompts

Always Relating to Fictional Characters

Posted on by thelotusreaders

Who is the fictional character you relate to the most?

It so hard to pick one character when there are so many loves in my fictional life and so many versions of me to choose from. In children’s fiction it’s the Snork Maiden – short, plump, blonde hair and utterly in love with love. Then there are all those characters from my later childhood like Jo March and Anne of Green Gables, – the tomboys, strong willed, stubborn young women who don’t want the norm and dream bigger than those around them. Neither want to marry Laurie or Gilbert and live a small town life where they stay home and have babies. They want to be writers and both get their big adventure. Jo goes to New York, she writes stories and goes to the opera and joins a men’s debating club as well as being the governess to two small children. Imagine my disgust when I do a quiz on Facebook and find out that of all the March sisters I am most like Amy. As for Anne she goes to university, she teaches and meets different people than those back home in Avonlea. Yes she marries Gilbert in the end, but only after she chooses to come home herself.

Saoirse Ronan as Jo March in Little Women

I relate most to Louisa Clarke in Jojo Moyes’s Me Before You, with her bumbling character and bumble bee tights. She’s a working class girl whose ambitions feel out of reach and she’s so caught up in the lives of her family that she doesn’t make plans in her own. Lou loves fashion and colour which is definitely something we share. When she gets a job as carer to Will Traynor her life starts to change. Will’s family are wealthy so they’ve never moved in the same circles but an accident has left him quadriplegic and he’s back, living in his own part of the family home. Lou is a bubbly and kooky sort of girl and she’s never done this sort of work. Slowly they start to understand one another and they each teach the other person something. Will sees that Lou is under confident and doesn’t have the nerve to follow her dreams in case she fails. She thinks she’s going to open up Will’s world, he’s been depressed since his accident and doesn’t really participate in life so she starts to suggest going out more. He’s reluctant, but he sees someone who hasn’t had the experiences in life he’s had mainly down to his family having money. So he takes her to the theatre/opera, slowly opening up her world.

Emilia Clarke as Louisa in the film version of Me Before You

I relate to this because I arrived on my late husband’s doorstep with only a photograph and address. We’d written and talked on the phone for several months but never met. When we did meet we went for dinner and talked for hours. Before I left he asked me if I wanted to go to the ballet and I said yes, I’d never seen one. We saw Romeo and Juliet by the Northern Ballet and I was entranced with it. We came home late that night and ate scrambled eggs and bacon with Buck’s Fizz at midnight. Six weeks later we got married. It was crazy, but I simply didn’t want to be anywhere else. He totally opened up my world with opera, jazz, theatre and supported me to do the English degree I’d always wanted to do. I was learning so much about culture and art, but also about love. On our honeymoon week I had to learn about intermittent catheters from a man called Richard who we dubbed the King of Piss. We didn’t get out of bed much except to order Chinese food which we’d eat in bed, showing each other our favourite films and listening to music, reading the papers together. He’d travelled and I’d never had a passport. He’d spent time in New York, played rugby for London Irish, and learned both scuba diving and tall ship sailing after becoming a wheelchair user. He was adventurous and believed I could do these things too. I think this is exactly what Will gave Louisa, but she gave him a sense of family that was warm and loving. She saw him and not the disability, something he was even struggling to do for himself. She let him know he was still everything he was before his accident and the rest was just logistics.

I believe I taught Jerzy to laugh at himself. To find his situation annoying but not unbearable. I taught him that family look after each other and that true friends don’t say ‘we must get together’ but never ring. They pop in and put their own kettle on. I taught him that loving someone means you’ll fight for them, to make their life the best it can possibly be. I taught him to stop and look around once in a while. To enjoy the small things. Unfortunately for Louisa, Will decides that his life is still not how he wants to live and he opts to go abroad for assisted dying. This has been heavily criticised in disability circles for the trope of using a disabled character to teach or improve the life of an able bodied person, only to be discarded once the lesson is learned.

I also had to lose Jerzy. Not in the same way Lou lost Will but we had that discussion. Once he was unable to swallow food without aspirating and had to be PEG fed through a tube into his stomach he lost a lot of the joy he had in food, one of his great passions. He said later that he wished he’d made the choice back then, had he not wanted to stay with me. However, pneumonia and sepsis weakens the body and when it’s a repetitive cycle it’s exhausting. I was essentially doing the work of several nurses by the end with skills in PEG feeding, catheterising, suctioning the airway, chest physio and many other things. I was tired. He was exhausted. One night he was taken to hospital again and he never returned. He spent weeks in hospital and eventually chose to suspend treatment. When he died at 5am in the morning the world stopped making sense.

What Jerzy left me with was similar to what Will left Louisa with. So many experiences and a confidence I’d never had before. He had more faith in me than I had. I got a first in my English degree, then went on to get a diploma in therapeutic counselling, after five years of study. I even started a PhD – although I didn’t finish. I also got that passport and went to New York and Venice, two bucket list destinations. More recently I’ve started to write for myself and have the confidence to put my writing out into the world. Jerzy taught me more than anyone or anything else in life because he taught me how to love, to commit to someone even when the going is almost impossible, to laugh every single day and I hold what he said to me before he died very close to my heart. He’d watched his father struggle after his mother was killed in a car accident and he didn’t want me to be stuck. I’ve resolutely moved forward and kept going even when I made terrible mistakes, never forgetting and keeping him lodged firmly within my heart. Now all I need are those bumble bee tights.

Posted in Netgalley

The Wine Dark Sea by Victoria Hislop 

Posted on by thelotusreaders

Greece, 1946. In the power vacuum remaining after the Second World War, a brutal civil war erupts between rival left- and right-wing factions. The conflict spirals as the country pays a bitter price in human lives and fighting soon erupts in the mountains, turning villages into battlefields and pulling ordinary women and children into the fray.

When the government soldiers come to Kalopetra, Fotini is nursing her newborn second child. She urges her daughter, Iliana, to hide with the older children as she and the other women are herded into trucks. Weeks later, soldiers return for the children . . . but they are not to be reunited with their mothers, a wholly different fate awaits them.

Fotini finds herself transported to a prison on the island of Chios, where she befriends Markella, whose little son, Nikos, is wise beyond his years. After months of imprisonment, when Fotini and Markella find themselves separated from one another – and from Nikos – Fotini vows to hunt not only for her own child but for Markella’s too. 

The Wine-Dark Sea tells of families flung apart across continents and of a strong, determined mother who resolves not to let war destroy hers.

This epic story from Victoria Hislop really taught me a lot about a period of history I know little about. She has taken an incredible amount of research for this novel and I imagine some of it was harrowing. She has taken the stories from women living through this time and shown some of them through one family, magnifying their power. The events happen after the end of WW2, a turbulent time that has already seen the punishment of Nazi collaborators and now many would like to see the end of their right wing government. The setting is one little village called Kalopetra where Fotini’s husband has gone to fight for government forces against the communists. This immediately causes a schism in the family because Fotini’s sister Stella has a husband who fights for the communists. The sudden divide is causing friction across the village, but the women left behind must work together if they’re to survive. When government forces come to the village they capture all the women and Fotini is allowed to bring her baby son with her. However, her older daughter Iliana is left behind along with a group of older children. How will they survive? That moment of Iliana chasing the truck with her mother unable to do anything to reassure her is burned into my memory. Although soon enough communist forces will round up the children and move them into camps where they are fed, clothed and then sent on to other countries like Yugoslavia. After having the entire burden of the other village children on her shoulders, Iliana is relieved to be fed and clothed by such kind people and so the process of brainwashing begins. All Fotini can think about is returning to her peaceful village and living the rustic existence that has survived for centuries, she doesn’t know that her way of life is already dead and nothing will be the same again. 

The author uses Fotini as her main narrator, but we also have chapters from Iliana’s perspective as she grows into adulthood and some through Nikos, the clever son of Fotini’s friend in their camp. These two narratives show how far and wide one family could be spread as Iliana thrives in the communist way of life and Nikos is chosen for a programme directly backed by the Queen of Greece. Iliana sums it up perfectly when she asks:

“Was there a single family on earth that had remained intact, or in the place they belonged or wanted to be.” 

One of the benefits of a communist system is that women are seen as equal to men and this intrigues Iliana who knows that if they’d remained in Kalopetra her fate would have been the same as her mother and grandmother. She’d be married to someone in the village and bring up babies. Here she could learn to drive or even fly a plane. She longs to be an engineer and hopes if she studies hard she will have the opportunity to go to university. It’s easy to see how a young woman like her would see communism as an improvement on what she expected from life, scratching out a living from the land and being second to a man. In the government camp Fotini is holding out against signing a confession that she was a communist. Those who do sign the waiver are set free but forever marked as traitors to the government, especially in the eyes of their fellow villagers. Fotini doesn’t want that hanging over their family when they return home. She doesn’t know whether her husband is alive or dead, but isn’t longing for his return. She makes friends within the camp, particularly with Markella who comes from an island with a leper colony where she used to work. It’s where she plans to return. As her baby Mitsos grows he plays with Markella’s interesting boy Nikos, something of a child prodigy when it comes to numbers. His fascination is with ships and he will build them out of any material he can find to hand. It’s not long before he’s noticed and singled out for a different institution backed by the Queen. From there he seems to disappear and Fotini is determined to find both her daughter and Nikos when she is released. When she is released it’s clear one thing hasn’t changed – the generosity of Greek people. As Fotini and Mitsos travel to search for the lost children people take them in, share their own dwindling food supplies and clothe them too. It restores her faith in humanity that there is still such generosity left in a people who have been tearing each other apart. There is a glimmer of hope for the future. 

I really enjoyed the later parts of the novel where we see Fotini piecing life back together in the city of Piraeus. It’s a massive change for this country girl but she can see the benefits of more job opportunities, entertainments like the cinema and eating good Greek food again at a lovely restaurant run by Demetrios. He’s such a kind man and gently reminds Fotini that she can’t spend the rest of her life wandering and looking for the children. The best thing she and Mitsos can do is stay in one place and hope the children find her, the place she was trying to get back to is gone. There was so much material to choose from in this book that it could have filled a trilogy. I had questions about all sorts of characters, such as Fotini’s relationship with her sister Stella. I also had questions about Nikos’s journey and his adoptive mother, there just seemed to be more about her that could have been explored. However, I loved Iliana’s growth and her life as an adult living under communism. The differences between Greece and Hungary were fascinating and imagine some very heavy editing of this material had to be done to get it into one novel. As always the author captures the beauty of the Greek islands, their isolation and wildness and how this conflict disrupts a way of life that existed for centuries. The book symbolically ends with a circular dance that’s life affirming and perhaps a way of capturing, just for a few moments, that lost way of being. 

Out from Headline Books September 24th 2026

Meet the Author

Victoria Hislop is the international bestselling author of The Island and The Return. In the United Kingdom, she writes travel features for The Sunday Telegraph, The Mail on Sunday, House & Garden, and Woman & Home. The Island sold over a million copies in the UK and has been translated into 24 languages. Victoria’s second novel, The Return, has been published in more than a dozen languages. She lives in Kent, with her husband Ian and their two children.

Posted in Wordpress Prompts

Dolly Moo aka Fat Bird, The Chonk, Fatty Moo Moo

Posted on by thelotusreaders

Share a photo of your pet and tell us one thing that makes them uniquely them.

This is Dolly. I had to share several pictures because I’m always photographing the pets, particularly Dolly because she stays still the most. We saw her online at the RSPCA and I knew straight away. So we got in the car and called them on the way. Can we come to see Dolly? Yes, when would you like to come. Is now alright, we’re outside? Experience has taught me that when you know it’s your cat you have to go for it. She was a gregarious little cat that first day. Barely a year old and already had a litter of kittens. She came out of her enclosure and strutted up and down the walkway saying hello to all the other cats. Now she does that here. We’re a tucked away little lane of four 18th Century cottages and in the morning I hear her go out of the cat flap and visit each house in turn. Saying good morning to the neighbours as they start their day.

She’s now progressed to visiting them. Especially in summer when doors and windows are open. It’s weird enough that she sleeps in our bathroom sink, but I know the neighbour was shocked to find her sleeping in theirs when he went to the loo in the night. She pops up onto their porch and slips through the open window and sleeps with their daughter too.

She is an absolute gannet when it comes to food. We feed her twice a day, but have had to reduce it as she also eats elsewhere. Once when we returned from holiday we were greeted by an elderly man who lives just over our garden fence in another cottage. He was very anxious that we should come and collect our pregnant cat. I assured him she wasn’t pregnant, just fat and he told us he didn’t mind her being there but she’d taken over their conservatory and ‘mother’ was getting worried she might give birth. He went scurrying back to fetch her and about ten minutes later he reappeared with Dolly laid in his arms like a baby. We’ve found out since he calls her Madame La Blanc and feeds her from time to time. This is a much more flattering name than Fat Bird or Fat Girl that she gets at home. Our neighbours call her Chonk and Fatso, but if I hear them I message and say ‘stop fat shaming my cat.” They adore her and send us videos of her trying to catch pigeons with very little success.

We noticed one winter that she’d stopped sitting with us in the evening. Nights were drawing in and we had the log burner in so we were very surprised that she wasn’t warming her tummy. One Saturday night a week later the neighbours sent us a picture of her laid in front of their open fire watching Strictly. It became a habit and at the end of the show she asks to be let out again and is usually home before that week’s eliminated celebrity has finished their final dance. I wouldn’t mind but we’re watching the same thing. As soon as the series is over she’s back home again on Saturdays.

Every morning, after breakfast she comes upstairs and arranges herself on my lap in bed. My other half starts work early so he feeds them and lets Dolly upstairs when he brings my breakfast – in bed, every morning for eight years. I got a good one. She will never lie on the bed or even my left leg. It has to be the right leg or nothing at all. I’m not allowed to move. I will rub her head whether I like it or not. She will fling an iPad out of my hand if I’m not paying attention.

This is where she waits for visitors, delivery drivers, the postie. Everyone must pay the toll of a head rub before passing through.

She likes to be enclosed. I bought a wicker tray to sit on the footstool but it only took a week for Dolly to commandeer it and now it’s her bed. She will push everything out of her path to get comfy.

Every so often she has a mad burst of energy and runs up a tree or onto the garage roof. She is remarkably sprightly for a large cat, unfortunately she has a similar penchant for the Christmas tree and has to have supervised access.

Most of the time she’s my companion. She’s usually next to me when I’m reading, indoors and outdoors. When I run a bath I hear her thundering up the stairs to the bathroom and she leaps into the sink. While I read in the bath she sleeps there as if we’re two besties on a spa weekend. When it’s hot she likes me to run the tap and soak her in cool water. She’s also a fan hogger, making sure she’s at the right angle for the most benefit. She hates it when I wear slidy satin pyjamas because she slips off me in bed. She’s our little peacekeeper, trying to calm relations between our male cat Max and our new addition Minka. She is very adept at keeping the dog in check too. We don’t know what we’d do without this massive ray of sunshine in our lives. She’s such a big personality and I’m so glad we found her.