5* BOOK REVIEW | 'Pulp' by Robin Talley

Hey guys, and happy Wednesday! Today I am excited to share with you an amazing book I read recently: Pulp by Robin Talley. As soon as news of this book landed in my inbox I knew I had to read it - I have never heard of a book before like it, and I'm happy to say that it was better than I could ever have imagined. 

Pulp is a story about how far we have come, yet still how much further we still have to go. It is about two young women who are facing different battles, yet still have a lot in common. Pulp is also in many ways a love letter to writing and to stories, and how despite everything writing can be escape from the realities of life, when things are at their most difficult.

I was kindly sent this book by Nina Douglas (on behalf of HQ Stories) in exchange for an honest review :)

Intrigued? Check out the blurb here...

In 1955, eighteen-year-old Janet Jones keeps the love she shares with her best friend Marie a secret. It’s not easy being gay in Washington, DC, in the age of McCarthyism, but when she discovers a series of books about women falling in love with other women, it awakens something in Janet. As she juggles a romance she must keep hidden and a newfound ambition to write and publish her own story, she risks exposing herself—and Marie—to a danger all too real.

Sixty-two years later, Abby Zimet can’t stop thinking about her senior project and its subject—classic 1950s lesbian pulp fiction. Between the pages of her favorite book, the stresses of Abby’s own life are lost to the fictional hopes, desires and tragedies of the characters she’s reading about. She feels especially connected to one author, a woman who wrote under the pseudonym “Marian Love,” and becomes determined to track her down and discover her true identity.

In this novel told in dual narratives, New York Times bestselling author Robin Talley weaves together the lives of two young women connected across generations through the power of words. A stunning story of bravery, love, how far we’ve come and how much farther we have to go.

I adored this book. It was everything I could have asked for, and so much more. Everything from the writing style to the characters was so spot on, and has so much YA heart in it too. I have been fortunate to read quite a lot of LGBT+ books over the last few years (yay YA book industry!) but this certainly has to be one of the best, certainly for the way that Talley deals with the dual narrative and how both stories so perfectly interweave. 

I loved the writing style of Pulp so much and I will definitely be returning to Talley's writing. It was so fresh and vibrant and perfectly represented the two protagonists and their obstinate, unwavering creativity. I haven't binged a book in a while but I couldn't help myself but zoom through this one. The writing made me so invested in Janet and Abby and I felt myself feeling protective over them, desperate for the ending of the book to be a happy one.

Janet and Abby are both so similar, even though they are from completely different societies, yet their circumstances are much more common than first expected. The dual narrative really allowed me to examine American society for what it was and how it still is, and how whatever happens, we can't allow ourselves to be complacent. We must keep fighting for those that others marginalise and sideline, and we can't afford to be silent.

Buy Pulp here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Pulp-inspiring-winning-author-Talley/dp/184845712X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1544812692&sr=8-1&keywords=pulp+robin+talley

Check out Robin Talley here: http://www.robintalley.com

Check out my Q&A with Robin Talley here for the Pulp blog tour: http://delightfulbookreviews.blogspot.com/2018/12/pulp-blog-tour-author-interview-5.html

Until next time :)

OH MY GODS BLOG TOUR | 'Four Families in Fiction I Love...'

Hey guys, and happy Saturday! Today I am thrilled to be taking part in the Oh My Gods blog tour celebrating Alexandra Sheppard's amazing new YA novel. This is such a brilliantly written, heartwarming and hilarious book and if you haven't read it already, what are you waiting for?! 

Oh My Gods follows Helen Thomas, who is in pretty much every respect a normal teenager, spending her time hanging out with friends, texting boys and worrying about her exams. There is however, one exception: Helen's family are all Greek gods, and Helen herself is only half-human. And this doesn't come without its problems. If her family blow her cover, a dreadful fate awaits them. Will Helen's family be able to control their craziness for their own, and Helen's sake? 

Intrigued? Check out the blurb here...

Life as a half-mortal teenager should be epic. 

But, for Helen Thomas, it's tragic.

She's just moved in with her dorky dad and self-absorbed older siblings - who happen to be the ancient Greek gods, living incognito in London!

Between keeping her family's true identities secret, trying to impress her new friends, and meeting an actually cute boy, Helen's stress levels are higher than Mount Olympus.

She needs to rein in her chaotic family before they blow their cover AND her chances at a half-normal social life.

Or is Helen fated for an embarrassment of mythical proportions?

And today I am so happy to have Alexandra Sheppard on my blog, with her four favourite families in fiction!

As one of five siblings and with enough step-parents, aunties and cousins to fill a coach, my family has certainly shaped the person who I am today. But that relationship wasn’t always easy. After a vicious squabble with my sisters over my favourite strappy top/Destiny’s Child CD/eyeshadow palette, I would long for a family that wasn’t quite so….much. 

Getting to know literary families - the ones that were close, loud and over the top - was a revelation to me. It wasn’t just me who had an acutely embarrassing Dad or a little sister with a life-ruining streak (she smuggled my top-secret diary to the cute boys next door - I will never forgive that particular indiscretion). 

Here are a few of my favourite books that capture messily imperfect family life: 

I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith

Set in the 1930s, this novel is the diary of precocious teenager Cassandra Mortmain. She captures the change in fortune of her impoverished, eccentric family when they become friendly with a pair of wealthy brothers from America. There is much to love about this book - the crumbling castle setting, the portrayal of first love - but Cassandra’s family are the stand-out stars. Her stepmother Topaz’ stories of being a muse in her heyday are particularly charming. 

This is one of my very favourite books, and the perfect summer read. I revisit it every year. 

White Teeth by Zadie Smith

The book focuses on two families - the Jones’ and the Iqbals - following their intertwining fates since World War II. It explores what happens when the sins of the fathers are visited upon their children (and grandchildren), and the ways in which different generations struggle to understand one another. Despite the heavy-sounding description, there are few books that make me laugh as much as this sprawling, multi-generational novel.

To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before by Jenny Han

As one of five daughters, I totally related to the close bond between the Covey sisters - and how that bond can be intense in more ways than one. Though it’s firmly a romance story (and a brilliant one at that - is there a more perfect YA boy than Peter Kavinsky?), Han finds ample space to explore the complexity of sisterly relationships. 

The Georgia Nicolson Diaries by Louise Rennison


Georgia Nicolson’s antics have had me snorting with laughter since I was thirteen. I don’t think I will ever stop finding this book series utterly hilarious. Georgia is very much the star of the show but her family (including her bonkers baby sister Libby and Angus the wildcat) is the cringe-making icing on the cake. Uncle Eddie, with his ancient motorbike and awful one-liners, was a particular favourite. 

Thank you so much, Alexandra Sheppard, for appearing on my blog! Make sure you guys check out the rest of the posts on the blog tour :)

Check out my review of Oh My Gods here: http://delightfulbookreviews.blogspot.com/2019/01/book-review-oh-my-gods-by-alexandra.html


Buy Oh My Gods here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Oh-My-Gods-Alexandra-Sheppard/dp/1407188739

Check out Alexandra Sheppard here: https://www.alexandrasheppard.com

Until next time <3

BOOK REVIEW | 'Whiteout' by Gabriel Dylan (****)

Hey guys, and happy Monday! Today I am excited to be sharing with you another book review of an awesome winter read - Whiteout by Gabriel Dylan. This is a book from Stripes' Red Eye horror series and I can assure you that it definitely one hell of a creepy read...

Whiteout tells the tale of a group of Sixth Formers away on what promises to be an amazing ski trip - awesome slopes, beautiful views and a time to get away from their everyday lives. But when a storm comes and cuts the resort off from the rest of the world, the students may have a lot more isolation than they bargained for. And they can't shake the feeling that something is out there. But people are coming to rescue them... right?

I was kindly sent Whiteout by Stripes Books in exchange for an honest review :)

Intrigued? Check out the blurb here...

‘She sat us all down and told us a story. About things that lived in the woods. Things that only came out at night.’

For Charlie, a school ski trip is the perfect escape from his unhappy home life. Until a storm blows in and the resort town is cut off from the rest of the world. Trapped on the mountain, the students wait for the blizzards to pass, along with mysterious ski guide Hanna. 

But as night falls and the town’s long buried secrets begin to surface, the storm is the least of their problems….

A chilling RED EYE horror, perfect for fans of Dawn Kurtagich, Juno Dawson and Charlie Higson.

I have been reading a lot more horror recently, and to be honest, I'm loving every second. There's nothing like the high stakes of a good horror to really bring out the best of the characters, and that is exactly what happened with Whiteout. I enjoyed the dynamics between all the characters, particularly with Charlie and Hanna. I also loved Tara, which may be a controversial choice, but she is a great mixture of hormones and moodiness and confidence and, to be honest, probably who I would be most similar to if I was stranded in a remote ski resort without any form of contact with the outside world. 

I thought the descriptions were amazing and they are definitely what brought this story to life for me. Dylan made incredible use of his setting and exploited every element to bring out the most creepiness possible. The story was filled with so much tension and I couldn't help myself bingeing the book, especially when I got close to the end. The stakes were so astronomically high in this book, and this coupled with Dylan's incredibly cinematic writing, this turned out to be a horror story that will stick with me for a very long time!

And that ending. Damn, that ending.

Make sure you check out the author interview I did with Gabriel Dylan on my blog here.

Buy Whiteout here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Whiteout-Red-Eye-Gabriel-Dylan/dp/1788950720/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1546895874&sr=8-1&keywords=whiteout+gabriel+dylan

Check out Gabriel Dylan here: https://twitter.com/gabrieldylanya?lang=en

Until next time :)

5* BOOK REVIEW | 'Little Liar' by Julia Gray

Hey guys and happy Monday! Today I am excited to be sharing with you a review of a book I read recently, that I feel has been in my TBR pile for the longest time! I didn't really know what to expect when I first picked this up, as I feel like the blurb doesn't give too much away... however before long I was totally gripped, and I couldn't put it down.

Little Liar follows Nora Tobias, who tells a lot of lies. Some are smaller, some are big, some are so big they threaten to collapse everything around her. When Nora meets Bel, older, more tumultous and perhaps even a bigger liar than she is, Nora is introduced to a whole new London, and the glitz and unpredictable glamour of the acting world. But soon things begin to spiral dangerously out of control, and there isn't a lie big enough to help Nora get out of this one...

I was kindly sent Little Liar by Andersen Press in exchange for an honest review :) 

Intrigued? Check out the blurb here...

Nora has lied about many things. But has she told her most dangerous lie of all?

There’s a new art assistant at Nora’s school, and he’s crossed a line. Nora decides to teach him a lesson he won’t forget.

But not everything goes quite to plan, and Nora needs an escape. She befriends the rich and talented Bel, who longs for a part in a remake of a famous film. Bel is unpredictable, jealous and crazy, but she opens up a new world for Nora, and that makes her irresistible. 

As events start to spin wildly out of control, Nora must decide where her loyalties lie – and what deceits she can get away with.

I loved this book. Right from the beginning I got swept into Nora's narrative and, to be honest, I couldn't get enough. She's not a morally sound character, not by any means, but she is complex and interesting and real. I was rooting for her the whole way throughout the book, even when she was being less than decent. There were just so many layers to her character that everything that happened was suprising, and overal made this book a complete joy to read.

I thought all the other characters were also really well developed and facinating in their own right. I particularly liked Nora's relationship with her mother. I haven't really seen a dynamic like theirs in any YA novel before. There were so many mysteries that Nora revealed to the reader gradually throughout the book, which basically kept me on tenterhooks the entire time. We only really find out the truth about Jonah Trace gradually, as if Nora herself doesn't want to tell us what happened. This layering of the narrative was so effective, and made the story so much more exciting to read, for me. 

The chaos really starts to errupt when Nora meets Bel, and this felt to me like part two of the book. This was the part of the book that was very tense, and I just had a feeling throughout that something was going to happen. If you've read Genuine Fraud by E. Lockhart, you will definitely love Little Liar. I loved the psychological aspect, and Bel is just such a brilliant character. Everything about the second half of the book was so unpredictable and compelling. The ending of the book was so well thought-out and brought everything full circle for me, but at the same time it was not simply satisfying. Gray has concocted an absolute corker of a psychological YA thriller, and I can't wait to see what she comes up with next!

Buy Little Liar here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Little-Liar-Julia-Gray/dp/1783446919/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1546095364&sr=1-1

Check out Julia Gray here: http://www.thisisjuliagray.com

Until next time :)

BOOK REVIEW | 'Oh My Gods' by Alexandra Sheppard (****)

Hey guys and happy Friday! Today I am thrilled to be sharing with you a review of a fabulous book I read recently, that will start your new year reading off with a bang! 

Oh My Gods is a fantastic book following Helen Thomas, who is in pretty much every respect a normal teenager, spending her time hanging out with friends, texting boys and worrying about her exams. There is however, one exception: Helen's family are all Greek gods, and Helen herself is only half-human. And this doesn't come without its problems. If her family blow her cover, a dreadful fate awaits them. Will Helen's family be able to control their craziness for their own, and Helen's sake? 

Intrigued? Check out the blurb here...

Life as a half-mortal teenager should be epic. 

But, for Helen Thomas, it's tragic.

She's just moved in with her dorky dad and self-absorbed older siblings - who happen to be the ancient Greek gods, living incognito in London!

Between keeping her family's true identities secret, trying to impress her new friends, and meeting an actually cute boy, Helen's stress levels are higher than Mount Olympus.

She needs to rein in her chaotic family before they blow their cover AND her chances at a half-normal social life.

Or is Helen fated for an embarrassment of mythical proportions?

I knew right from reading the blurb that I would love this book, and I was absolutely right! First of all, the cover is fantastic and drew me right in. Whoever designed it deserves the best chocolate money can buy. And it also reflected what the book was about: Helen, and what a wonderful protagonist Helen Thomas is! She was portrayed in a brilliantly realistic way and I loved her relationship with her friends and her family. In the book she has a warm voice and gritty attitude to the lifestyle she has been lumped with. As the years go on I am so happy to see that interesting and multi-dimensional female protagonists are simply becoming the norm in YA literature. I'm glad that from now on kids will be growing up with loads of fabulous characters by their side, not just a few. Speaking of, it was so wonderfully refreshing how diverse this book was, and how diversity was an active discussion in the book. This made me very happy indeed.

The story itself was incredibly well crafted and the huge variety of characters drove the plot forward up until the fantastic ending. The twists and turns kept me hanging on until the last few chapters. Oh My Gods is a book that both at once is comforting and exciting. I'm looking forward to see what Sheppard has up her sleeve next!

Buy Oh My Gods here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Oh-My-Gods-Alexandra-Sheppard/dp/1407188739

Check out Alexandra Sheppard here: https://www.alexandrasheppard.com

Until next time <3

BLOG TOUR | 'Whiteout' by Gabriel Dylan | 5 Minutes With... Gabriel Dylan'

Hey guys, and happy Monday! Today I am so excited to be part of the Whiteout blog tour, to celebrate the publication of this gloriously creepy book by Gabriel Dylan. I read this over the Christmas holidays, and even a roaring fire and a hot chocolate didn't make me feel safe...

‘She sat us all down and told us a story. About things that lived in the woods. Things that only came out at night.’

For Charlie, a school ski trip is the perfect escape from his unhappy home life. Until a storm blows in and the resort town is cut off from the rest of the world. Trapped on the mountain, the students wait for the blizzards to pass, along with mysterious ski guide Hanna. 

But as night falls and the town’s long buried secrets begin to surface, the storm is the least of their problems….

A chilling RED EYE horror, perfect for fans of Dawn Kurtagich, Juno Dawson and Charlie Higson.

And today I am thrilled to welcome Gabriel Dylan to my blog, to talk all things school ski trips, writing the underdog, and how he fell in love with all things horror.

Hey Gabriel, and thanks for being on my blog today! What inspired you to write Whiteout?

Whiteout was inspired by a trip to the Austrian Alps several years ago – I’d recently moved inland from Cornwall and really missed surfing, so I taught myself to snowboard on a dryslope near the school where I teach. A few months after, I got asked to lead a sixth form ski trip to Austria and, although I’d hardly ever seen real snow, I thought ‘yeah, why not?’ The trip to the Alps was a little hellish, twenty seven hours on a coach, and the resort was in the middle of nowhere at the top of a mountain. But once we arrived I fell in love with it – Hochkar was isolated, atmospheric, and stunningly beautiful. And a few days later a storm came in, with the locals saying that it was more snow than they’d had in thirty years, and we got snowed in. I was there one night, standing on the balcony, looking out over the moonlit slopes, and I suddenly thought ‘what if there’s something out there? Something that doesn’t want us to leave?’ Once the idea came to me, I couldn’t get rid of it. And I’ve always loved vampire mythology, like Salem’s Lot and Nosferatu, so once I started writing I couldn’t stop.

(Hochkar, the Austrian village that inspired the setting for Whiteout)

Tell us a bit more about the main character, Charlie. Do you have anything in common with him?

I love the outsiders and the underdogs, and Charlie is one of those. And I guess I was a little similar growing up – I didn’t really fit in, my head was always buried in a book or a comic, and I just wasn’t interested in conventional sports, so I never fell in with any of the teams or cliques. And then one day I saw some kids surfing and asked my parents if I could try it, and I was absolutely hooked. A lot of my friends came from hanging out at the beach, and surfing gave me a kind of belonging and a sense of direction, a place I fitted in. And I put a little of that into Charlie’s character, with his love of snowboarding and the way he doesn’t belong, and how he’s at his happiest out on the slopes. The other influence on Charlie was some of the kids I work with in my day job, running a sixth form and teaching English. There’s so many pupils I meet who have to deal with awful things – loss of family members, illness, awful home lives – and they are incredibly brave in the way they cope with whatever life throws at them and I wanted to put a little of that into the character of Charlie.

Do you normally come up with plot or characters first?

Most of the time it’s the plot, and then the characters fall into place afterwards, although the character of Hanna in Whiteout was there with me right from the start and in many ways I see her as the protagonist with all that the mountains have taken from her. With Whiteout, I tried lots of different ways to write it, but in the end I really enjoyed the claustrophobic nature of the story, and the way that the resort of Kaldgellan was almost a character in its own right and the story was confined to just a few days – somehow it made writing it that little bit more urgent.

What made you want to write a horror story?

I grew up on a diet of Stephen King, Richard Laymon, James Herbert, and all those other really cool horror writers, at an age where I probably shouldn’t have been reading them, so they felt a little forbidden and impossible to put down. And I love a scare, and the psychological side of the horror genre. Stephen King’s The Stand is one of my top three books of all time, and I really enjoy the genre and the way it takes you away from the real world. I’ve tried writing in other genres, particularly fantasy as the other author I read a lot growing up was David Gemmell, but I liked the contemporary nature of horror and the way you can put all these creepy and otherworldly elements into a modern day setting.


What's so special about YA literature?

For me, it’s definitely the pace of the writing. I’ve got a very short attention span, so a book has to grab me right away and keep hold of me, and I find YA as a genre really does that. Recently I’ve read Sally Green’s Half Bad, Pierce Brown’s Red Rising, and Alex Bell’s Frozen Charlotte and I found them all really hard to out down, although my book of the year so far would be Neal Schusterman’s Scythe. I loved the concept of the novel and the way it takes a utopia and slowly drags it down into disrepair. Also, the writing of all of the above authors is top notch – there’s no dumbing down or pulling punches, which I think is so important.

What advice would you offer aspiring writers?

Keep at it. I was in my early twenties when I started writing and now I’m much older! But I wrote because I loved it, with the idea of publication or anyone even reading my stuff a distant, unachievable dream. So it certainly hasn’t come overnight for me. And I guess read a lot, and write what you love. I think if you enjoy writing it, the chances are your target audience will enjoy reading it, too.

Sum up Whiteout in three words...


Scary Snowy Vampires!

Thank you so much, Gabriel, for taking the time to answer my questions!

Make sure you guys check out the rest of the posts on the blog tour, and keep an eye out for my review coming very soon :)

Buy Whiteout here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Whiteout-Red-Eye-Gabriel-Dylan/dp/1788950720/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1546895874&sr=8-1&keywords=whiteout+gabriel+dylan

Check out Gabriel Dylan here: https://twitter.com/gabrieldylanya?lang=en

Until next time :)