September is almost upon us and with it comes some fabulous new books to be released.
Here are just ten that I think look great.
Lambing season always brings the unexpected… But no one expected murder
Jude Gray never thought she’d find herself widowed and running a working farm full-time, but here she is, living in the small Malvern village her husband Adam spent most of his life in.
After a particularly gruelling lambing season, she is looking forward to some time off, but there’s no rest for the wicked, especially when she finds the body of one of Adam’s oldest friends on her farm.
Unimpressed with the local constabulary's efforts, Jude starts an investigation of her own. But as the body count rises, danger creeps ever closer to Malvern Farm.
A killer is on the prowl. And all that stands in their way is one woman – and her dog.
A magical life begins at home with this warm and lively introduction to the traditions and practice of kitchen witchcraft.
As spiritualists, healers, and herbalists, witches throughout history have developed various methods of healing through potions, spells, and remedies worldwide. Despite their efforts for good, many have suffered from years of persecution, which has led to a general misunderstanding of their craft. The Kitchen Witch Handbook combats that, providing an assortment of magical traditions from a fresh, modern perspective. If you are interested in Wicca and traditional kitchen potions, spells, and rituals, The Kitchen Witch Handbook is the perfect magical reference.
This hands-on guide introduces the home-based folk witchcraft that has been practiced for countless generations. Learn to weave your magical intentions into food and cooking and use everyday ingredients for mystical purposes.
Brimming with beautiful photography and illustrations, this intriguing and accessible volume offers:
Guidance on creating a magical kitchen and kitchen altar, 100 Recipes and kitchen spells, including a candied lime money spell, rosemary protection cookies, and a lavender simple syrup for clarity and calm, tips on how to incorporate magic and intention into cooking, a glossary of correspondences and magical properties for fruits, vegetables, and other ingredients and a framework for creating your own unique spells at home using the ingredients you have on hand.
Of all the ancient art that captures the imagination, none is more appealing than the Cycladic figurine. An air of mystery swirls around these statuettes from the Bronze Age and they are highly sought after by collectors - and looters - alike.
When Helena inherits her grandparents' apartment in Athens, she is overwhelmed with memories of the summers she spent there as a child, when Greece was under a brutal military dictatorship. Her remote, cruel grandfather was one of the regime's generals and as she sifts through the dusty rooms, Helena discovers an array of valuable objects and antiquities. How did her grandfather amass such a trove? What human price was paid for them?
Helena's desire to find answers about her heritage dovetails with a growing curiosity for archaeology, ignited by a summer spent with volunteers on a dig on an Aegean island. Their finds fuel her determination to protect the precious fragments recovered from the baked earth - and to understand the origins of her grandfather's collection.
Helena's attempt to make amends for some of her grandfather's actions sees her wrestle with the meaning of 'home', both in relation to looted objects of antiquity ... and herself.
Stone Mother by Malve S. Burns
Imagine growing up in a German family right after WWII with no knowledge of your country's horrendous Nazi past or an understanding of your own family's fierce internal struggles.
Marie is a dreamy child of a doctor whose family is offered refuge within the walls of Falkenburg Castle after the war. Within the safety of this thousand-year-old "stone mother," Marie begins her coming-of-age journey dominated by her troubled, often violent mother and comforted by her beloved father.
Soon, Marie is forced to leave the castle and is bounced from a Dickensian Children's institution, to an inspiring private prep school for girls in Heidelberg, to the wild Alaska Highway, and back to Germany, where, at age fifteen, she discovers the full extent of Nazi atrocities and contemplates suicide.
With the help of her mother's former teacher and the spirit prince of Falkenburg Castle, Marie begins to understand her mother's pain. She finds a way to accept-though never condone-what she cannot change. Ultimately, when she faces the transgressions of both her mother and her motherland, she is inspired to engage more fully with her new Germany.
Her new chapter starts now…
Jo Sorsby is hiding from her past when she agrees to run her uncle’s beloved stationery shop. Glimpsing the lives of her customers between the warm wooden shelves, as they scribble little notes and browse colourful notebooks, distracts her from her bruised heart.
When she meets Ruth, a vicar running from a secret, and Malcolm, a septuagenarian still finding himself, she suddenly realizes she isn’t alone.
They each have a story that can transform Jo’s life… if only she can let them in.
The perfect gift for book lovers, The Keeper of Stories meets The Lost Bookshop in this gorgeous novel about secrets, second chances and finding friendship in the most unlikely places.
With DS Manolis on leave in Greece, Senior Constable Sparrow receives a phone call from a man who wants to turn himself in.
Bob is sixty-five years old, confined to a Perth nursing home. But thirty years ago, he killed a man in the remote northern Kimberley mining region. He offers to show Sparrow where the body is, but there's a catch: Sparrow must travel north with him under the guise of being his carer.
They are accompanied on the drive by another nursing home resident: Luke, thirty years old, paralysed in a motorbike accident. As they embark on their road trip through the guts of Western Australia, pursued by outback police and adrenaline-soaked miners, Sparrow begins to suspect that Bob's desire to head north may have sinister motivations. Is Luke being held against his will? And what lies in store for them when they reach their goal?
North-east India, 1945. Tensions are rising, but fourteen-year-old Joya doesn't pay much attention to 'political business' - she is more concerned with doing well at school and having fun with her best friends.
Yet when her father disappears without a trace, Joya's life falls apart. Forced to drop out of school and support her mother by working in a garment factory, she refuses to accept that her father is gone forever, spending her nights sewing him a suit from scraps of fine material.
But as political unrest grows and rumours of corruption spread, Joya questions the true nature of her father's disappearance. And who is the sinister figure known only as the two-tailed snake?
I have a gift. I see people as ghosts before they die.
Of course, it helps that I'm the one killing them.
The night after her father's funeral, Claire meets Lucas in a bar. Lucas doesn't know it, but it's not a chance meeting. One thoughtless mistyped email has put him in the crosshairs of an extremely put-out serial killer. But even before they make eye contact, before Claire lets him buy her a drink, before she takes him home and carves him up into little pieces, something about that night is very wrong. Because someone is watching Claire. Someone who is about to discover her murderous little hobby.
The thing is, it's not sensible to tangle with a part-time serial killer, even one who is distracted by attending a weekly bereavement support group and trying to get her art career off the ground. Claire will do anything to keep her secret hidden - not to mention the bodies buried in her garden. Let the games begin...
Stephen. John. Edward II. Richard II. Richard III. These five are widely viewed as the worst of England’s medieval kings. Certainly, their reigns were not success stories. Two of these kings lost their thrones, one only avoided doing so by dying, another was killed in battle, and the remaining one had to leave his crown to his opponent. All have been seen as incompetent, their reigns blighted by civil war and conflict. They tore the realm apart, failing in the basic duty of a king to ensure peace and justice. For that, all of them paid a heavy price. As well as incompetence, some also have reputations for cruelty and villainy, More than one has been portrayed as a tyrant. The murder of family members and arbitrary executions stain their reputations. All five reigns ended in failure. As a result, the kings have been seen as failures themselves, the worst examples of medieval English kingship. They lost their reputations as well as their crowns. Yet were these five really the worst men to wear the crown of England in the Middle Ages? Or has history treated them unfairly? This book looks at the stories of their lives and reigns, all of which were dramatic and often unpredictable. It then examines how they have been seen since their deaths, the ways their reputations have been shaped across the centuries. The standards of their own age were different to our own. How these kings have been judged has changed over time, sometimes dramatically. Fiction, from Shakespeare’s plays to modern films, has also played its part in creating the modern picture. Many things have created, over a long period, the negative reputations of these five. Today, they have come to number among the worst kings of English history. Is this fair, or should they be redeemed? That is the question this book sets out to answer.
The Lost Flock is the story of the remarkable and rare little horned sheep, known as Orkney Boreray, and the wool-obsessed woman who moved to one of Scotland’s wildest islands to save them.
It was Jane Cooper’s passion for knitting that led her to discover the world of rare-breed sheep and their wool. Through this, Jane uncovered the ‘Orkney Borerary’ – a unique group within the UK’s rarest breed of sheep, the Boreray, and one of the few surviving examples of primitive sheep in northern Europe.
As her knowledge of this rarest of heritage breeds grew, she took the bold step to uproot her quiet suburban life in Newcastle and relocate to Orkney, embarking on a new adventure and life as farmer and shepherd.
Jane was astonished to find that she was the sole custodian of this lost flock in the world, and so she began investigating their mysterious and ancient history, tracking down the origins of the Boreray breed and its significance to Scotland’s natural heritage.
From Viking times to Highland crofts and nefarious research experiments in Edinburgh, this is a so-far untold real-life detective story. It is also the story of one woman’s relentless determination to ensure a future for her beloved sheep, and in doing so revealing their deep connection to the Scottish landscape.
An unforgettable story of a heritage breed and the importance of its existence.
*Disclosure: I only recommend books I would buy myself and all opinions expressed here are my own. This post contains an affiliate link from which I may earn a small commission.
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