What I'm reading: Romance, food and fashion in Venice: what could be better?

 Kate Zarelli: COINCIDENTALLY IN VENICE

Watching a piazza in Venice on a webcam helps London office-worker Ashley through the Covid lockdowns and a love affair that turns sour. Made redundant in 2022 she and her best friend Juliet go to Venice and seek out the square. Juliet quickly finds a dishy Italian waiter, but romance for Ashley takes the unlikely form of an Irish accountant from her old firm, beginning a new career as an art restorer.

Ashley and Juliet both start totally different lives in Venice. The wife of Ashley’s ex-boss, now launching herself as an art patron, threatens to put a spanner in the works, but …. No spoilers from this reviewer!

Kate Zarelli also writes as Katie Hutton, rich and intense historical fiction set in the English Midlands. In her Derbyshire novels I have detected a hint of Thomas Hardy. In her contemporary novels I hear sizzling echoes of Carrie Bradshaw and Bridget Jones. Ms Zarelli  brings people and places gloriously to life and light. Coincidentally in Venice has everything its magical setting deserves: romance (with titillating sex scenes) laced with a hint of danger. For food lovers there are some delicious meals, and for fashion-lovers some frocks to die for!

What I'm reading: Guilty till proven innocent

 

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 

My website (davidgeebooks.com) is currently out of action, so I'm back here on my old Blogger page. Bear with me, dear reader(s):    

            * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 

 

Michael Connelly:

RESURRECTION WALK

Mickey Haller, the “Lincoln Lawyer”, takes on the seemingly unwinnable case of a Latina woman who has served five years in prison for the murder of her husband, a murder she confessed to at her trial. She claims she was pressured into the false confession. 

Haller’s dogged investigative assistant, half-brother and now his chauffeur is retired LAPD detective Harry Bosch, hero of more than twenty thrillers by Michael Connelly and currently undergoing chemotherapy for blood cancer. This case progresses from police procedural to courtroom drama. High drama indeed in the courtroom as startling new evidence comes to light. As is so often the case in Connelly’s fiction, corruption is at the heart of the story.

Connolly has served up close to forty novels to date. This is another fine example of his writing: vivid characterisation, a taut plot with frequent revelations and enough tension to keep the reader turning the page. It’s often said – and it’s the truth – that nobody does it better than Michael Connelly.