Reader Spotlight: Victoria Stone

Today it's time to get to know a little more about fellow blogger Victoria from https://victorialovesbooks.wordpress.com in this afternoon's reader spotlight feature.

Can you tell us a little bit about yourself?
After my husband and my kids books are my greatest passion and I'm an absolute nerd when it comes to Harry Potter! 

Have you always been a bookworm?  
I have. My mum always says that I would often be shopping with her but my nose would firmly be in a book rather than looking at where I was going. 

Guest Book Review: Christina Courtenay - New England Rocks

Reviewed by Victoria Stone

First impressions, how wrong can you get?
When Rain Mackenzie is expelled from her British boarding school, she can’t believe her bad luck. Not only is she forced to move to New England, USA, she’s also sent to the local high school, as a punishment.

Rain makes it her mission to dislike everything about Northbrooke High, but what she doesn’t bank on is meeting Jesse Devlin…

Jesse is the hottest guy Rain’s ever seen and he plays guitar in an awesome rock band!There’s just one small problem … 

Jesse already has a girlfriend, little miss perfect Amber Lawrence, who looks set to cause trouble as Rain and Jesse grow closer.

But, what does it matter? New England sucks anyway, and Rain doesn’t plan on sticking around …

Does she?

Crime Fiction Week Guest Review: Denise Mina - The Red Road

Reviewed by Victoria Stone 

31st August 1997
Rose Wilson is fourteen, but looks sixteen. Pimped out by her 'boyfriend' and let down by a person she thought she loved, she has seen more of the darkness in life than someone twice her age. On the night of Princess Diana's death - a night everyone will remember - Rose snaps and commits two terrible crimes. Her life seems effectively over. But then a defence lawyer takes pity and sets out to do what he can to save her, regardless of the consequences.

Now
DI Alex Morrow is a witness in the case of Michael Brown - a vicious, nasty arms dealer, more brutal and damaged than most of the criminals she meets. During the trial, while he is held in custody, Brown's fingerprints are found at the scene of a murder in the Red Road flats. It was impossible that he could have been there and it's a mystery that Morrow just can't let go.

Meanwhile, a privileged Scottish lawyer sits in a castle on Mull, waiting for an assassin to kill him. He has sold out his own father, something that will bring the wrath of the powerful down upon him.

Crime Fiction Week Guest Review: Annie Hauxwell - A Bitter Taste

Reviewed by Victoria Stone

She was ten years old, but knew enough to wipe clean the handle of the bloody kitchen knife. The night was stifling; the windows were closed, sealing in the chaos. A table upturned, shattered crockery. Her distraught mother, bare shoulders raw with welts, knelt beside her motionless father. The child snatched up her backpack, and ran... 

London sweats in the height of summer. The parched city has slowed to a claustrophobic shuffle and there's no end in sight. Heroin-addicted investigator Catherine Berlin hides her scars from prying eyes while working on the worst of all cases: matrimonial. 

The capital's junkies suffer from a drought of a different kind. A strung-out ghost from Berlin's past turns up on her doorstep with a desperate plea for help: her ten-year-old daughter is missing. Reminded of a debt owed, Berlin agrees to help, but the search becomes far deadlier than she could ever imagine, drawing her deep into an underworld of corrupt detectives, ruthless drug dealers, and a child killer... 

A Bitter Taste is the thrilling second instalment in the magnificent crime series featuring civilian investigator Catherine Berlin, whose long-standing heroin addiction is only part of her story.

Guest Book Review: Nick Spalding - Love... And Sleepless Nights

Reviewed by Victoria Stone

Sometimes, the hardest part of becoming a parent is keeping a straight face...

Just ask Jamie and Laura Newman, who (thanks to a rather relaxed attitude to contraception) find themselves about to have a baby. It's obviously a terrifying prospect for a newly married couple, but as long as they stick together they'll be just fine... right?

They'd better because the path between falling in love and those first few baby steps is littered with obstacles. Featuring a hilarious cast of characters including an overbearing mother-in-law, a terrifying midwife and at least one chorus of mating humpback whales, Love... And Sleepless Nights is the hilarious follow-up novel all about what happens beyond the happy ever after. 

Falling in love with another person is easy, making a new one is where things get complicated.

Guest Book Review: Andrew Clover - Learn Love in a Week

Reviewed by Victoria Stone

Polly has been married to Arthur for ten years when she meets James Hammond. He's her Road Not Taken. The One That Got Away. He's also rich, and in one week he's inviting her to his hotel in the country to give her the job she's always wanted. He also wants her.

Polly is so tempted. Arthur is gorgeous, but he's grumpy. He insists he can change, but can he? After ten years, can you learn to love? And if you could, would you still choose your partner?