Flip through the latest issue of Gulf Weekly.
BOOK OF THE WEEK with Linda Jennings. A Place Called Winter, Patrick Gale, ISBN 9781472205308 (Tinder Press) BD7.800 for Gulf Weekly Book Club members
Picked for the BBC Radio 2 Simon Mayo Book Club, this beautifully written novel will have you in tears by the end of the story.
A privileged elder son, and stammeringly shy, Harry Cane has followed convention at every step. Even the beginnings of an illicit, dangerous affair do little to shake the foundations of his muted existence – until the shock of discovery and the threat of arrest cost him everything.
Forced to abandon his wife and child, Harry signs up for emigration to the newly-colonised Canadian prairies. Remote and unforgiving, his allotted homestead in a place called Winter is a world away from the golden suburbs of turn-of-the-century Edwardian England.
And yet it is here, isolated in a seemingly harsh landscape, under the threat of war, madness and an evil man of undeniable magnetism that the fight for survival will reveal in Harry an inner strength and capacity for love beyond anything he has ever known before.
In this exquisite journey of self-discovery, loosely based on a real life family mystery, Patrick Gale has created an epic, intimate human drama, both brutal and breathtaking. It is a novel of secrets, sexuality and, ultimately, of great love.
* Read it now in paperback
Abattoir Blues, Peter Robinson, ISBN 9781444704990 (Hodder) BD4.500 for Gulf Weekly Book Club members
This is the latest and 22nd novel in the DCI Banks series, which goes from strength-to-strength.
Two missing boys, a stolen bolt gun, a fatal shot, equal three ingredients for murder.
When DCI Banks and his team are called to investigate the theft of a tractor from a North Yorkshire village, they’re far from enthusiastic about what seems to be a simple case of rural crime. Then a blood stain is found in an abandoned hangar, two main suspects vanish without a trace and events take a darkly sinister turn.
As each lead does little to unravel the mystery, Banks feels like the case is coming to a dead end. Until a road accident reveals some alarming evidence, which throws the investigation to a frightening new level.
Someone is trying to cover their tracks – someone with very deadly intent ... If you haven’t encountered Chief Inspector Alan Banks before and were a fan of Morse, you are missing another of the top investigators of British crime and should put that to rights immediately.
* My favourite read-of-the-week
If You Were Me, Sheila O’Flanagan, ISBN 9781472226938 (Headline) BD4.500 for Gulf Weekly Book Club members
From the Number One bestselling author, Sheila O’Flanagan, comes an unputdownable, heart-searching new novel for every woman who still remembers her first love.
On a sultry summer evening in Seville, anything can happen.
Carlotta O’Keefe is happily engaged, and the wedding plans are coming together. She’s clear about her future path, both personally and in her busy career. Maybe Chris doesn’t make her heart race every time she sees him, but you can’t have that feeling for ever, can you?
Then, on a trip to Seville, Carlotta runs into Luke Evans. Luke broke her heart so long ago she’d almost convinced herself she’d forgotten him.
Now, he’s not that boy any more, but an attractive and intriguing man.
He can explain everything that happened way back when and one unexpected, forbidden kiss throws her life upside down.
Suddenly Carlotta’s not so sure of anything anymore and wonders if the girl she was would recognise the woman she has become.
She thought she was living a charmed life but what if she’s got it all wrong and her past is meant to be her future?
What she decides now will shape the rest of her life.
