Book picks similar to
Sleepwalking by Julie Myerson


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england
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Elizabeth Is Missing


Emma Healey - 2014
    Yet she refuses to forget her best friend Elizabeth, who she is convinced is missing and in terrible danger.But no one will listen to Maud—not her frustrated daughter, Helen, not her caretakers, not the police, and especially not Elizabeth's mercurial son, Peter. Armed with handwritten notes she leaves for herself and an overwhelming feeling that Elizabeth needs her help, Maud resolves to discover the truth and save her beloved friend.This singular obsession forms a cornerstone of Maud's rapidly dissolving present. But the clues she discovers seem only to lead her deeper into her past, to another unsolved disappearance: her sister, Sukey, who vanished shortly after World War II.As vivid memories of a tragedy that occurred more than fifty years ago come flooding back, Maud discovers new momentum in her search for her friend. Could the mystery of Sukey's disappearance hold the key to finding Elizabeth?

Mrs Queen Takes the Train


William Kuhn - 2012
    Reminiscent of Alan Bennett’s The Uncommon Reader, this lively, wonderfully inventive romp takes readers into the mind of the grand matriarch of Britain’s Royal Family, bringing us an endearing runaway Queen Elizabeth on the town—and leading us behind the Buckingham Palace walls and into the upstairs/downstairs spaces of England’s monarchy.

Unthinkable Sins


Tiffani Quarles-Sanders - 2015
    Jerome Durham is an up-and-coming black politician who faces a dilemma when his elderly mother starts showing signs of dementia. Until now, the family and friends of elderly Hattie Durham have known her to be a God-fearing, law abiding Christian woman. But as her aging mind starts to unravel, Hattie begins confessing to a litany of sins she’s committed throughout her lifetime. During several conversations, she tells stories that describe emotional incidents she went through in her life, unconsciously giving the reasons for the terrible things she did in her later years. Jerome does not know if his mother’s confessional is driven by guilt or revenge, or just an unfortunate random consequence of her illness, but he’s not sure he can wait to find out. His career is at stake if she tells anyone how his own past mistakes are entwined with hers. Neither he nor his wife is about to let that happen.

Starvation Lake


John Carson - 2020
    Every year on the anniversary of her incarceration, she taunts him with a phone call, giving him one message; when I get out, I'll kill you.Now, Bracken has transferred back to Edinburgh from Fife and is thrown into the deep end on his first day back on duty.There's a killer who is emulating Ailsa, threatening to surpass her body count.Bracken knows he needs her on board to help him track the killer down, but she's reluctant to get involved.Then the case takes an unexpected twist, and she agrees to help. But this new killer is taking them down a dark, twisted path, where nobody sees the outcome.Until it's too late.

A Spot of Bother


Mark Haddon - 2006
    A little distant, perhaps, a little cautious, not at quite at ease with the emotional demands of fatherhood, or manly bonhomie. He does not understand the modern obsession with talking about everything. “The secret of contentment, George felt, lay in ignoring many things completely.” Some things in life, however, cannot be ignored.At 61, George is settling down to a comfortable retirement, building a shed in his garden, reading historical novels and listening to a bit of light jazz. Then his tempestuous daughter, Katie, announces that she is getting re-married, to the deeply inappropriate Ray. Her family is not pleased – as her brother Jamie observes, Ray has “strangler’s hands.” Katie can’t decide if she loves Ray, or loves the wonderful way he has with her son Jacob, and her mother Jean is a bit put out by all the planning and arguing the wedding has occasioned, which get in the way of her quite fulfilling late-life affair with one of her husband’s ex-colleagues. And the tidy and pleasant life Jamie has created crumbles when he fails to invite his lover, Tony, to the dreaded nuptials. Unnoticed in the uproar, George discovers a sinister lesion on his hip, and quietly begins to lose his mind. The way these damaged people fall apart – and come together – as a family is the true subject of Haddon’s disturbing yet amusing portrait of a dignified man trying to go insane politely.A SPOT OF BOTHER is Mark Haddon’s unforgettable follow-up to the internationally beloved bestseller THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE DOG IN THE NIGHT-TIME. Here the madness – literally – of family life proves rich comic fodder for Haddon’s crackling prose and bittersweet insights into misdirected love.

A Hole in the Universe


Mary McGarry Morris - 2004
    In her latest tour de force, Gordon Loomis returns to a changed world after twenty-five years in prison. His old neighborhood is blighted by drug dealers; his brother is eager to help but is too caught up in his own life; his loyal friend Delores makes him realize that he’s just as afraid of relationships as he is of going back to jail; and his inherent decency draws the attention of a hungry child whose survival threatens the fragile balance that is Gordon’s freedom.Compelling and taut, suspenseful and compassionate, A Hole in the Universe will continue to resonate long after the last page is turned.On the web: http://www.marymcgarrymorris.com

The Vets at Hope Green


Sheila Norton - 2017
    Unsure whether a busy city life is for her, she flees to her Nana Peggy’s idyllic country village.But despite the rolling hills and its charming feel, life in Hope Green is far from peaceful. On first meeting Joe, the abrupt and bad-tempered local vet, Sam knows she must get him on side, but that is easier said than done...With her dream close enough to touch, will she get there, or will events conspire against her...?

The Thirteenth Tale


Diane Setterfield - 2006
    The enigmatic Winter has spent six decades creating various outlandish life histories for herself -- all of them inventions that have brought her fame and fortune but have kept her violent and tragic past a secret. Now old and ailing, she at last wants to tell the truth about her extraordinary life. She summons biographer Margaret Lea, a young woman for whom the secret of her own birth, hidden by those who loved her most, remains an ever-present pain. Struck by a curious parallel between Miss Winter's story and her own, Margaret takes on the commission. As Vida disinters the life she meant to bury for good, Margaret is mesmerized. It is a tale of gothic strangeness featuring the Angelfield family, including the beautiful and willful Isabelle, the feral twins Adeline and Emmeline, a ghost, a governess, a topiary garden and a devastating fire. Margaret succumbs to the power of Vida's storytelling but remains suspicious of the author's sincerity. She demands the truth from Vida, and together they confront the ghosts that have haunted them while becoming, finally, transformed by the truth themselves. The Thirteenth Tale is a love letter to reading, a book for the feral reader in all of us, a return to that rich vein of storytelling that our parents loved and that we loved as children. Diane Setterfield will keep you guessing, make you wonder, move you to tears and laughter and, in the end, deposit you breathless yet satisfied back upon the shore of your everyday life.

Afternoon of a Good Woman


Nina Bawden - 1976
    Today she is more conscious than usual of the thinness of the thread that separates good from bad, the law-abiding from the criminal. Sitting in court, hearing a short, sad case of indecent exposure and a long, confused theft, she finds herself simultaneously examining her own sex life, her own actions and intentions. A tour de force, Nina Bawden¹s ingeniously constructed novel counterpoints public appearance with private behavior. The result is a marvelous picture of a not always admirable but engagingly complex, very human heroine.

Blood In The Sand


Kelly Clayton - 2015
    DCI Jack Le Claire has left London, the Metropolitan Police and, for the most part, his recent troubles far behind him. Returning home to Jersey in the Channel Islands, and bored of run-of-the-mill cases, Le Claire cannot help but miss his days at the Met and secretly longs for something more challenging. A chance file review throws up more than anyone could have expected. How far would you go to claim your birth-right? When family tragedy strikes, New York lawyer Grace Howard travels to Jersey. However, all is not as it first appears in this island community and before long Grace is caught up in a murder enquiry. In her time of greatest need Grace doesn't know who she can trust. The island's wealthy inhabitants hide their secrets well. Everyone has something to hide, don't they? Running from his own past, and struggling to prove he is up to the job, Le Claire battles against a web of lies and half-truths as he tries to stop an elusive killer. Does Jersey + inheritance = murder? Find out in Blood In The Sand.

The House


Simon Lelic - 2017
    It seemed like their dream home: tons of space, the perfect location, and a friendly owner who wanted a young couple to have it.So when they made a grisly discovery in the attic, Jack and Syd chose to ignore it. That was a mistake.Because someone has just been murdered. Right outside their back door.And now the police are watching them...

Courthouse Cowboys: A Modern Tale of Murder in Montana


P.A. Moore - 2011
    The trial involving the disabled teen with Klinefelter's syndrome was featured on Dateline, NBC, City Confidential, Discovery, TLC, Rolling Stone, and Sports Illustrated. As you follow Paige Defalco's one woman quest for justice in small town Montana, you'll ride with her in the front car of the roller coaster, wondering if this former cynical prosecutor turned defense attorney will recover the soul she misplaced, 'somewhere between the Catholic Church and the Courtroom.'Thanks for checking it out and please let me know, through your honest review, what you think!P.A. Moore

The First Time Ever


L.M. Krier - 2017
    With a promising career in front of him. Then he meets someone who could change everything but who can’t live with his police role. Ted’s wanted to be a copper since he was nine. Can he find a new opening within the force which is his surrogate family? Despite being trained to shoot to kill, Ted’s good with people. They like him, they trust him, so they talk to him. His skills get him noticed and he’s seconded to help with a big CID operation. It isn’t long before he’s facing his first murder case. Has he made the right choice in switching jobs? Or is he, as his Firearms boss warns him, about to commit career suicide?

Lush Life


Richard Price - 2008
    Wry, profane, hilarious, and tragic, sometimes in a single line, Lush Life is his masterwork. I doubt anyone will write a novel this good for a long, long time." — Dennis Lehane"So, what do you do?" Whenever people asked him, Eric Cash used to have a dozen answers. Artist, actor, screenwriter… But now he's thirty-five years old and he's still living on the Lower East Side, still in the restaurant business, still serving the people he wanted to be. What does Eric do? He manages. Not like Ike Marcus. Ike was young, good-looking, people liked him. Ask him what he did, he wouldn't say tending bar. He was going places--until two street kids stepped up to him and Eric one night and pulled a gun. At least, that's Eric's version.In Lush Life, Richard Price tears the shiny veneer off the 'new' New York to show us the hidden cracks, the underground networks of control and violence beneath the glamour. Lush Life is an X-ray of the street in the age of no broken windows and "quality of life" squads, from a writer whose "tough, gritty brand of social realism…reads like a movie in prose." — Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times.

The Matchmaker


Stella Gibbons - 1949
    Unsuited to a quiet life, Alda attempts to orchestrate -- with varying degrees of success -- the love affairs of her neighbours. Her unwilling subjects include an Italian POW, a Communist field-hand, a battery-chicken farmer and her intelligent friend Jean.