I have had The Unseeing by Anna Mazzola in my TBR for two years and every time I intended to read it something prevented me so when The Story Keeper arrived unexpectedly thanks to Jenni Leech at Headline I was determined to read it as soon as I could. I’m delighted to share my review of The Story Keeper today.

The Story Keeper will be published by Tinder Press, part of the Headline Publishing Group, on 26th July 2018 and is available for pre-order here.

The Story Keeper

Audrey Hart is on the Isle of Skye to collect the folk and fairy tales of the people and communities around her. It is 1857 and the Highland Clearances have left devastation and poverty, and a community riven by fear. The crofters are suspicious and hostile to a stranger, claiming they no longer know their fireside stories.

Then Audrey discovers the body of a young girl washed up on the beach and the crofters reveal that it is only a matter of weeks since another girl disappeared. They believe the girls are the victims of the restless dead: spirits who take the form of birds.

Initially, Audrey is sure the girls are being abducted, but as events accumulate she begins to wonder if something else is at work. Something which may be linked to the death of her own mother, many years before.

My Review of The Story Collector

Needing to escape London, Audrey takes a position assisting a collector of local tales on the Isle of Skye.

What a fabulous book! The Story Keeper has absolutely everything to make it such a wonderful read. Firstly, Anna Mazzola writes with such skill that the language, style and descriptions are perfect for the era in which the book is set whilst still being totally fresh and accessible to the modern reader. There’s high quality research that underpins the story making it so convincing without ever detracting from the narrative. I really felt I understood what life was like on Skye in the mid 1800s. I loved the manner in which gender and social politics are an integral part of the story, but presented in such a way as to be velvet smooth within the writing. For me The Story Keeper ranks with the quality and traditions of Mary Shelley and George Eliot in presenting superstition, fable, women, history and social etiquette and mores with remarkable incision and effectiveness in a tapestry of intrigue and mystery.

The plot is intoxicating because Anna Mazzola blurs the lines between superstition and reality so effectively that the reader is unsure what to believe. Everything is both possible and plausible making for a thrilling read. Her descriptions sent a shiver down my spine and the underlying menace, as I never knew who could be trusted and what might happen next, gave me genuine heart-thumping moments. The Story Keeper is a wonderful amalgamation of superstition, violence and deception with crime and social history perfectly balanced.

I loved everything about The Story Keeper. I thought the characters were intense, believable and so convincing. I thought the story line was astonishingly good and brilliantly resolved. I found the weaving of truth and fiction skilled and dynamic so that I enjoyed reading every word.

In my opinion, The Story Keeper is a book of exceptional quality and is not to be missed.

About Anna Mazzola

Anna Mazzola is a writer who, due to some fault of her parents, is drawn to peculiar and dark historical subjects. Her novels have been described as literary crime fiction or historical crime. Anna’s influences include Sarah Waters, Daphne Du Maurier, Shirley Jackson and Margaret Atwood.

Her debut novel, The Unseeing, is based on the life of a real woman called Sarah Gale who was convicted of aiding a murder in London in 1837. Her second novel, The Story Keeper, follows a folklorist’s assistant as she searches out dark fairytales and stolen girls on the Isle of Skye in 1857.

She studied English at Pembroke College, Oxford, before becoming a human rights and criminal justice solicitor. She now tries to combine law with writing and child wrangling, to varying degrees of success.

You can follow Anna on Twitter @Anna_Mazz and visit her website for more information. You’ll also find her on Facebook.

A little while ago I was delighted to read and review The Seven Imperfect Rules of Elvira Carr by Frances Maynard in a post you will find here. When the book was first released I was lucky enough to host an extract that you can read here too.

Today, 12th July 2018, The Seven Imperfect Rules of Elvira Carr is released in paperback and I am thrilled that Frances is staying in with me to tell me more about it.

Staying in with Frances Maynard

I’m just thrilled to welcome you to Linda’s Book Bag, Frances. Thank you for agreeing to stay in with me. 

Looking forwards to it, Linda!  Thanks for inviting me.

Tell me (as if I didn’t know) which of your books have you brought along to share?

I’ve brought along my first novel, The Seven Imperfect Rules of Elvira Carr.  I’ve chosen it because it’s an uplifting and thought-provoking read – ideal for the summer.

(I quite agree! Linda’s Book Bag readers can read the opening to The Seven Imperfect Rules of Elvira Carr here.)

What can we expect from an evening in with The Seven Imperfect Rules of Elvira Carr?

From an evening in with the book we can expect a tender, funny story about a young woman conquering boundaries and stereotypes to come into her own.  Readers have kindly said: ‘I adored every moment I spent with Elvira.  Still think about her today.  Some books just stay with you.  This is one of those.’ And: ‘I would recommend this book to anybody and everybody.  It is heart-warming, informative and wonderful.’

(And they are absolutely right Frances. My own review is here.)

What else have you brought along this evening and why?

I’ve got a large tea-pot with me and a tin of Fox’s Favourites biscuits.  My central character, Elvira, is an expert on biscuits and their packaging: ‘I liked trying out different brands and varieties and comparing them.  It added another dimension to my life’.

(You needn’t have worried about bringing a teapot. There’s always tea on the go in this house. I think the biscuits are a good idea though…)

I’d also like to introduce two very special guests to you, Linda: David Attenborough (Elvira is a big fan and repeats the words from his animal documentaries in moments of stress), and Delia Smith, whose fail-safe recipes, and liking for cardigans, Elvira finds comforting.  In fact Delia is wearing a cardigan this evening.

(Oh my goodness  – what wonderful guests. David Attenborough is one of my favourite people on the planet. My husband even bought me a trilobite fossil because David Attenborough collects them. Hang on a minute and I’ll fetch it …)

I’ve also brought along something that inspired the story: a netsuke (a small, Japanese toggle, often carved in the shape of an animal).

Elvira discovers that the netsukes brought back from Japan by her father actually came from a museum gift-shop, and it is unravelling this mystery that leads to her having to reconsider everything she had taken for granted, and to finding a new path for herself.

Thanks so much for staying in with me, bringing all those biscuits and such wonderful guests Frances. I’ve so enjoyed hearing more about Elvira because I loved meeting her and her seven imperfect rules when I read the book!

Thanks Linda.  Now we’ve sampled every biscuit in that tin I think it’s time for me to go home!

(Or I could put the kettle on again…)

The Seven Imperfect Rules of Elvira Carr

Funny, heart-warming and ultimately triumphant, The Seven Imperfect Rules of Elvira Carr is the perfect story for anyone who doesn’t quite fit in – and for everyone who chooses not to.

Elvira Carr is twenty-seven and neuro-atypical. Her father – who she suspects was in the secret service – has passed away and, after several Unfortunate Incidents growing up, she now spends most of her time at home with her overbearing mother. But when her mother has a stroke and is taken into care, Elvira is suddenly forced to look after herself or risk ending up in Sheltered Accommodation. Armed with her Seven Rules, which she puts together after online research, Elvira hopes to learn how to navigate a world that’s full of people she doesn’t understand. Not even the Seven Rules can help her, however, when she discovers that everything she thought she knew about her father was a lie, and is faced with solving a mystery she didn’t even know existed . . .

Published by Pan Macmillan, The Seven Imperfect Rules of Elvira Carr is available for purchase through the publisher links here.

About Frances Maynard

Frances teaches English part-time to adults with learning difficulties, including Asperger’s. She is married with one grown-up daughter and lives in Dorset.

You can follow Frances on Twitter @perkinsfran1 and visit her website.

I’m delighted to count lovely Anne Coates as a personal friend and it always amazes me that someone so bright and bubbly writes such incredible crime fiction.

Anne’s third book in the Hannah Weybridge Series, Songs of Innocence (available here) was published earlier this summer and to celebrate that Anne is kindly offering a wonderful audio version of her first two books in the series: Dancers in the Wind and Death’s Silent Judgement to a lucky UK winner. You can enter the giveaway at the bottom of this blog post.

Anne stayed in with me to tell me all about book two Death’s Silent Judgement in a post you can read here. Anne has been on Linda’s Book Bag telling us (here) about writing a sequel and again explaining the influence of reading on writing in a fantastic post you can read here.

Anne’s latest book is Songs of Innocence and it is available for purchase here.

Songs of Innocence

A woman’s body is found in a lake. Is it a sad case of suicide or something more sinister? Hannah Weybridge, still reeling from her friend’s horrific murder and the attempts on her own life, doesn’t want to get involved, but reluctantly agrees to look into the matter for the family.

The past however still stalks her steps, and a hidden danger accompanies her every move. The third in the bestselling Hannah Weybridge thriller series, Songs of Innocence provides Hannah with her toughest and deadliest assignment yet…

Here’s a little bit about each of the books Anne is kindly offering to a lucky winner:

Dancers In the Wind

SHE IS HUNTING FOR THE TRUTH, BUT WHO IS HUNTING HER?

Freelance journalist and single mother Hannah Weybridge is commissioned by a national newspaper to write an investigative article on the notorious red light district in Kings Cross. There she meets prostitute Princess, and police inspector in the vice squad, Tom Jordan.

When Princess later arrives on her doorstep beaten up so badly she is barely recognisable, Hannah has to make some tough decisions and is drawn ever deeper into the world of deceit and violence. Three sex workers are murdered, their deaths covered up in a media blackout, and Hannah herself is under threat. As she comes to realise that the taste for vice reaches into the higher echelons of the great and the good, Hannah realises she must do everything in her power to expose the truth …. and stay alive.

You can listen to a sample here.

Death’s Silent Judgement

Death’s Silent Judgement is the thrilling sequel to Dancers in the Wind, and continues the gripping series starring London-based investigative journalist Hannah Weybridge.

Following the deadly events of Dancers in the Wind, freelance journalist and single mother Hannah Weybridge is thrown into the heart of a horrific murder investigation when a friend, Liz Rayman, is found with her throat slashed at her dental practice.

With few clues to the apparently motiveless crime Hannah throws herself into discovering the reason for her friend’s brutal murder, and is determined to unmask the killer. But before long Hannah’s investigations place her in mortal danger, her hunt for the truth placing her in the path of a remorseless killer…

You can listen to a sample here.

About Anne Coates

Anne Coates is a freelance editor and author. While editing and abridging other peoples’ novels and non-fiction, she has contributed short stories to magazines like Bella and Candis and wrote two novels that never saw publication. One afternoon she re-read the second one, saw its potential and rewrote it, restructuring the narrative and adding and subtracting scenes. This work became Dancers in the Wind to be published by Urbane Publications on 13 October, 2016.

Some of her short stories appear in two collections: A Tale of Two Sistersand Cheque-Mate and Other Tales of the Unexpected both published as e-books by Endeavour Press. Anne has also written seven non-fiction books ranging from a history of Women in Sport (Wayland) to Applying to University (Need To Know) and Living With Teenagers (Endeavour Press).

Anne lives in London with three cats who are all rather disdainful of her writing as they have yet to appear in her fiction although a dog has!

You can follow Anne on Twitter @Anne_Coates1 and visit her website. You’ll also find Anne on Facebook.

UK Giveaway

Audio Books of Dancers in the Wind and Death’s Silent Judgement

For your chance to win an audio book of BOTH Dancers in the Wind and Death’s Silent Judgement click here.

Anne will provide the Audible codes and instructions for the winner. I am not responsible for the delivery of the codes!

UK ONLY and the giveaway ends at midnight on Sunday 15th July.

Sometimes a book is offered to me for review and I am devastated I can’t fit it in to my reading schedule. When I saw Iris Yang’s book I just had to invite her on to Linda’s book Bag to tell me all about it.

Staying in with Iris Yang

Thank you so much for staying in with me Iris and welcome to Linda’s Book Bag. Tell me, which of your books have you brought along to share this evening and why have you chosen it?  

I’ve brought along Wings of a Flying Tiger, my first full-length novel just published by Open Books. It is a heroic tale in which ordinary Chinese risked their lives to rescue and safeguard a downed American pilot in WWII in China.

I’m proud to share it because not only it is important, but also I learned along the way that I could do the “impossible” and dreams do come true when one works hard enough.

(Oh. Interesting thought. Tell me more.)

You see, I was born and raised in China. Although I’ve always loved reading and writing, creative writing was a dangerous career in China. As famous writers and translators, my grandmother and her aunt were wrongfully accused as counter-revolutionary Rightists. I had to choose a safer path—studying science. At age 23, with poor English, little knowledge of the country, and 500 borrowed dollars, I came to the US as a graduate student. Later, I received a Ph.D. in molecular biology and published a number of scientific papers. Yet the passion for creative writing never died, and I worked slowly, but steadily toward the goal.

(Wow. That’s quite a story. You must be so proud of your achievements Iris. China is a country I have yet to visit and I think Wings of a Flying Tiger would be perfect for me as I love books that can transport me to another time and place.)

What can we expect from an evening in with Wings of a Flying Tiger?

Most people in the US are familiar with what happened in WWII in Europe, but not many know what happened in China. Japanese troops were brutal beyond words. For instance, during Nanking Massacre, they killed 300,000 Chinese civilians and surrendered soldiers in six weeks.  For months the streets of Nanking were heaped with corpses and reeked with the stench of rotting human flesh. It was horrible. And my story starts here.

(Crikey. That’s quite a starting point!)

In 1941, under President Roosevelt’s executive order, the American Volunteer Group (the Flying Tigers) was formed, and it aided the Chinese against Japanese forces. The AVG pilots’ brave exploits led the way to victories in China, in the Pacific Theater, and ultimate triumph of the Allied Forces in WWII.

I’m a big fan of the Flying Tigers. What is a better way to say thank-you than writing a book about them? Although the story of the Flying Tigers has been a fascinating topic for over seventy years, most of the books were nonfiction written from the perspective of the pilots. Wings of a Flying Tiger is a rescue story from the points of view of both the airman and the Chinese who saved him.

This book is a work of fiction. But to me, a Chinese-American, it is also personal. As a Chinese, I’m thankful for the Flying Tigers’ bravery and sacrifice; without their help, the course of the Chinese history might have been changed, my family might not have survived, and I might not have existed. As a U.S. citizen, I’m honored to write a book about the American heroes. It’s a privilege. A duty.

(I think Wings of a Flying Tiger sounds fabulous Iris. I think I’m going to have to find space for it after all!)

What else have you brought along and why? 

I’ve brought along a photo of the Flying Tigers’ airplane. The “shark” teeth painted on the noses of the aircraft were there for a psychological reason. An island nation, Japan was believed to be afraid of shark attacks. The Chinese people who saw the planes were not familiar with sharks, but they knew how strong and powerful a tiger could be. So they called the courageous American pilots Fei Hu—a tiger with wings—the Flying Tigers.

It has been a real privilege to stay in with you and find out more about Wings of a Flying Tiger. Thanks so much for being here Iris. I wish you every, well deserved, success.

Wings of a Flying Tiger

World War Two. Japanese occupied China. One cousin’s courage, another’s determination to help a wounded American pilot.

In the summer of 1942, Danny Hardy bails out of his fighter plane into a remote region of western China. With multiple injuries, malaria, and Japanese troops searching for him, the American pilot’s odds of survival are slim.

Jasmine Bai, an art student who has been saved by Americans during the notorious Nanking Massacre, seems an unlikely heroine to rescue the wounded Flying Tiger. Daisy Bai, Jasmine’s younger cousin, also falls in love with the courageous American.

With the help of Daisy’s brother, an entire village opens its arms to heal a Flying Tiger with injured wings, but as a result of their charity the serenity of their community is forever shattered.

Love, sacrifice, kindness, and bravery all play a part in this heroic tale that takes place during one of the darkest hours of Chinese history.

Published by Open Books Wings of a Flying Tiger is available for purchase here. and on your local Amazon.

About Iris Yang

Iris Yang (Qing Yang) was born and raised in China. She has loved reading and writing since she was a child, but in China creative writing was a dangerous career. As famous writers and translators, her grandmother and her aunt were wrongfully accused as counter-revolutionary Rightists, so Iris had to choose a safer path—studying science.

After graduating from Wuhan University and passing a series of exams, she was accepted by the prestigious CUSBEA (China-United States Biochemistry Examination and Application program). At age 23, with poor English, little knowledge of the country, and 500 borrowed dollars, she came to the United States as a graduate student at the University of Rochester.

Later, she received a Ph.D. in molecular biology, trained as a postdoctoral fellow at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, and worked at the University of North Carolina. Although she has published a number of scientific papers, she has a passion for creative writing, and her short stories have won contests and have been published in anthologies. Currently, Iris is working on a story based on her grandmother, who was the first Chinese woman to receive a master’s degree in Edinburgh in the UK. Iris now lives between Sedona, Arizona and Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Besides writing, she loves hiking, dancing, photography, and travel.

You can follow Iris on Twitter: @IrisYang86351.

My enormous thanks to LoveReading and Avon Books for allowing me to read The Forgotten Guide to Happiness by Sophie Jenkins in return for an honest review. I have been turning down books as I have so many on my TBR but I’d heard such good things about The Forgotten Guide to Happiness that I couldn’t resist and I’m so pleased to have my review today.

The Forgotten Guide to Happiness is published by Harper Collins imprint Avon and is available for purchase here.

The Forgotten Guide To Happiness

Sometimes, happiness can be found where you least expect it…

Twenty-eight-year-old Lana Green has never been good at making friends. She’s perfectly happy to be left alone with her books. Or at least, that’s what she tells herself.

Nancy Ellis Hall was once a celebrated writer. Now eighty, she lives alone in her North London house, and thinks she’s doing just fine. But dementia is loosening Nancy’s grip on the world.

When Lana and Nancy become unconventional house mates, their lives will change in ways they never expected. But can an unusual friendship rescue two women who don’t realise they need to be saved?

My Review of The Forgotten Guide to Happiness

When you’re trying to write a love story, maybe the best way is to live it!

I thoroughly enjoyed The Forgotten Guide to Happiness.

I loved the plot and although it’s relatively simple it is so satisfying to read because not only does it have a lovely romantic heart, the conceit of writing as a catalyst for the book is perfectly handled, so that it is actually a very useful book for aspiring writers as well as a warm, compassionate and engaging story.

Lana is a hugely appealing protagonist. She is flawed, insecure and totally human. Once or twice I found myself telling her ‘No! Don’t DO that’ because I cared about what happened to her. Her search for a sequel to her novel Love Crazy, her self blindness at times and her very human need for love all make her feel like a real person.

However, it is Nancy who steals the book for me. Sophie Jenkins has shown so realistically and sensitively that those suffering dementia are still people and Nancy embodies true identity through her confusion, her larger than life personality and her love of colour. Her speech adds such humour in the story so that whilst I felt sorry that she was suffering the disease, I felt uplifted and positive too. What is so cleverly done is the message that Nancy can remember what really is important in life whereas those not suffering her dementia don’t always have the same skill of recollection.

I also loved the themes present that lift The Forgotten Guide to Happiness above being simply a very entertaining read. The way society behaves towards and treats the vulnerable, the way love and identity are universal concerns, and the fact that truth is sometimes staring us in the face when we don’t want to recognise it, all shine through Sophie Jenkins’ smashing writing.

The Forgotten Guide to Happiness is such a lovely book. It has unexpected depth as well as a lightness of touch so that it’s a perfectly balanced and wonderful read. I loved it.

About Sophie Jenkins

Sophie Jenkins is a serial joiner of writing groups and workshops and a prolific short story writer. To encourage her creativity she regularly enters half-marathons and trains by running from her home in North London to breakfast in the centre of town with a notepad.

The character of Nancy in The Forgotten Guide to Happiness is based on her experiences with her own mother, who was diagnosed with dementia fifteen years ago.

You an follow Sophie on Twitter @sophiejenkinsuk.

Earlier this year I had the pleasure of ‘staying in’ with Lindy Keane Carter here on Linda’s Book Bag as she told me all about her novel Annaliese From Off. You can see what we got up to here.

Today I’m delighted to spotlight the next book from Lindy, Annaliese Sound and True. To celebrate Annaliese Sound and True Lindy will gift a copy of the book to the first three new sign ups to her newsletter and you can find that sign up here.

Annaliese Sound and True is available for purchase here.

Annaliese Sound and True

One woman. Ancient forests. Loggers on every slope.

In 1903, a widow awaits the birth of her third child in a north Georgia town. Annaliese Stregal has inherited her husband’s lumber company, seventeen thousand mountain acres, and his illegitimate child in her household. Originally from Kentucky, she planned to return there after the birth, but loggers are slashing the forests that she has come to love. A man who has quietly loved her for years asks her to sell the company and marry him. Instead, she begins running it with a controversial approach: America’s first scientific forestry principles.

Just as her baby is born with a life-threatening defect, a desperate logger arrives with plans for her ancient trees. As new strengths emerge in Annaliese, she astonishes herself by pursuing erotic pleasure and revenge.

In this sequel to Annaliese From Off, the woman who reluctantly left the parlors of Louisville now blazes a trail in a male-dominated world.

“Mother, lumber mill owner, innovator, Annaliese discovers her strengths and passion as she thwarts male domination and greed. You’ll cheer her on every step of the way. Annaliese, Sound and True is a beautiful, evocative book from an important new voice in fiction.”

— Mary Alice Monroe, New York Times bestselling author

About Lindy Keane Carter

Lindy Keane Carter is a journalist whose work over the last 40 years has appeared in numerous national magazines, trade publications, and academic medical journals.  Her non-fiction articles as well as her fiction have won awards, including being selected in 2003 and in 2009 as a winner in the South Carolina Arts Commission’s Fiction Project contest. Earlier, she won second place in a fiction contest sponsored by the South Carolina Academy of Authors.  Lindy, the mother of two daughters and a son, is a medical science writer in South Carolina.

You can find Lindy on Facebook and visit her website for more information.

My grateful thanks to Stephan Collishaw at Noir Press for a copy of The Last Day by Jaroslavas Melnikas in return for an honest review. I don’t read nearly enough fiction in translation and am delighted to have this Lithuanian book here on Linda’s Book Bag today.

Published by Noir Press, The Last Day is available for purchase here.

The Last Day

Winner of BBC Book of the Year

Jura finds that the favourite rooms in his house, each designed to reflect an aspect of his personality, are disappearing one by one. He remembers perfectly well playing the piano in ‘The Grand Piano Room’. However, the other members of his family deny the room ever existed.

A man publishes a book listing the dates that everybody in the world will die. A family counts down the days to the death-date of their son.

An architect receives letters from God giving him choices which throw him into a moral dilemma.

My Review of The Last Day

A collection of eight short stories reflecting on the philosophy of life.

My goodness. The Last Day is one of the most thought-provoking books I have read in a very long time. I’m not sure I understood all Jaroslavas Melnikas’ allusions and intentions, but this collection certainly made me consider the nature of life, identity, truth, religion and philosophy.

The quality of imagination in creating these stories is exceptional and they have lost nothing in Marija Marcinkute’s translation. The stories are intense and the prose is eloquent and meaningful. The variety of syntax and the rhetorical questions made me think hard about my own life and the realities we create for ourselves – not always truthfully. Jaroslavas Melnikas lays bare the manner in which we can be self-deceptive, how we make frequently selfish choices and how we construct our own life’s narrative, sometimes only too thoughtlessly as in On The Road. I found many of his approaches and allegorical ideas very unsettling. There’s a nightmarish quality to many of the stories (especially with the disappearing rooms in The Grand Piano Room) and the concept of knowing exactly which day I will die on as happens in The Last Day confirmed for me that I do not want to know. This story is also an effective salutary tale of how we have become inured to social media, living our lives in public, even at its most intimate of moments such as our deaths.

I found myself attributing meaning and interpretations that may be very wide of the author’s intentions. In A.A.A I became convinced that the title was onomatopoeic for the sound of the increasingly challenging questions being asked – Eh? Eh? Eh? Both The Author and It Never Ends made me consider alternative realities far more than any science fiction I have read.

I’m not sure quite what I think of The Last Day. I’m puzzled, disturbed and unsettled by these stories. I’m going to have to return to them time and time again as I have a feeling their meanings and significance will shift and alter as my life moves on and changes, so that I am bringing different reader experiences to them. Whatever my final thought are, The Last Day holds some very special stories; they are utterly fascinating and I really recommend them.

About Jaroslavas Melnikas

Jaroslavas Melnikas is one of the most inventive and interesting Ukrainian and Lithuanian writers today. La Croix wrote of him, ‘He meditates, like Dostoyevsky, on the relationship between sin and freedom.’

Jaroslavas Melnikas is a Lithuanian of Ukrainian descent. He studied at Lvov University and at the M. Gorki Institute of Literature in Moscow. He has written six books of fiction and a collection of philosophical essays in Lithuanian, as well as several books of poetry and prose in Ukrainian and a novel in French. He is winner of the BBC Book of the Year for the stories in this collection.

You can find him on Facebook.

I’m a huge fan of historical fiction and live in East Anglia so when Jan Surasky got in touch about her writing I simply had to invite her to stay in with me to tell me more.

Staying in with Jan Surasky

Welcome to Linda’s Book Bag, Jan. Thank you for agreeing to stay in with me.

Thank you for inviting me. It is an honor. You have a very cozy place here.

That’s very kind of you! Tell me, which of your books have you brought along to share this evening and why have you chosen it?

I have brought my historical novel Rage Against the Dying Light. It is the story of Celtic Queen Boudicca who is the first known woman in history to stand up against invading Romans who have harmed her and her young daughters instead of meekly succumbing to Roman rule. I have brought the novel because although Boudicca lived in the first century she could have been you or me. She fought as a woman protecting what she loved and not as a queen.

(Wonderful subject for a book Jan. I happen to live quite close to where she did so I’m intrigued by Rage Against the Dying Light.)

What can we expect from an evening in with Rage Against the Dying Light?

I think you can expect a well-written book, at least that is what I hear from my readers. Many have mentioned that they feel like they are in first century England because I have taken time to put them there with descriptions that should be right on the mark. They can smell the beautiful wildflowers that were so much a part of Boudicca’s youth as she rode her beautiful white pony through the pastures beneath the castle where she lived as a princess and taste the wonderful food she packed to picnic among the trees of the nearby forests.

(Sounds great!) 

But, the story is of course the most important. Boudicca’s stand against the Romans has been celebrated throughout the ages and her courage is her legacy, perhaps inspiring the many courageous deeds in the centuries that followed. The Romans did conquer England, but they never conquered the spirit of Celtic Queen Boudicca.

(That’s a very good point!)

What else have you brought along and why?

I have brought some big, juicy turkey legs cooked on a spit over an open fire, some wonderful cheeses brought from Europe traded for swords embedded with precious stones turned by Celtic craftsmen, some fresh, hot bread and some mead. If you don’t imbibe, I have brought you some clear, cool water from a nearby stream.

(The mead will be fine thanks Jan. It’s just wine that doesn’t agree with me.)

Also, a fresh fish caught barehanded in a river ready to turn slowly over a fire in an outdoor pit. While it is cooking, I hope we can head down to the nearby pasture to gather the beautiful wildflowers to gaze upon while we enjoy our freshly cooked supper.

That sounds a plan to me Jan. Thanks so much for staying in with me to tell me all about Rage Against the Dying Light. I’ve really enjoyed our chat.

Rage Against the Dying Light

Of all the woman warriors in myth and legend, few are more storied than Boudicca, the fierce red-headed queen who led the most celebrated Celtic rebellion in history. But, here, for the first time, Jan Surasky imagines Boudicca’s enthralling story of bravery and triumph from the Celtic perspective. In her extremely researched, vividly told novel, Boudicca bursts to life as never before.

After a politically matched marriage to a much older king her world turns dark. Romans invade and at the king’s death attack the palace, breaking a pact that would have saved the tribe from doom, publicly humiliate Boudicca and assault her two young daughters.

Betrayed and outraged she leads thousands of warriors into an epic battle to avenge her daughters and rid her beloved island of Roman tyranny. Beautifully written, grand in scope and intimate in detail, Rage Against the Dying Light resonates with the queen’s indomitable spirit placing her alongside no lesser woman warrior than Joan of Arc herself.

Rage Against the Dying Light is available for purchase through the links here.

About Jan Surasky

Jan Surasky has worked as a book reviewer, movie critic, and entertainment writer for a San Francisco daily newspaper. Her many articles and short stories have been published in national and regional magazines and newspapers. She has also taught writing at a literary center and a number of area colleges near her home in upstate New York. Her award-winning novels include Rage Against the Dying Light, Back to Jerusalem, and The Lilac Bush is Blooming.

You can find out more on Jan’s website.