Book reviews: The Trad Wife’s Secret, The Cardinal, Human Remains, The Cure, One Night at the Chateau
Janet Gordon, who lives in Takeley, reviews best-sellers and debut fiction for the Indie
Have you noticed how new words and phrases evolve and suddenly we’re all using them, as if they’ve been around for years?
Take the word gossip. It used to be that that’s what we did – we gossiped and we called it gossip. Now we say spill the tea, which means share the gossip. Where did it come from? Who knows.
Another new term that seems to have popped up is trad wife - a shortened version of traditional wife – which means a woman who embraces traditional gender roles of marriage expectations in a stay-at-home role, often reverting back to the traditional 1950s role of cooking, cleaning and managing the family home. And this trad role is often combined with being an influencer.
The Trad Wife’s Secret by Liane Child (HQ £9.99, Kindle £2.99)
Madison March is the very definition of a trad wife. She has the perfect husband – the double M husband Michael March - and four children, Mason, Myron, Molly and Matilda.
Days are spent baking sourdough (I tried it once, came out like a brick) and growing vegetables with the home-schooled children playing on their Montana (another M) homestead whilst Madison takes Insta pics for her account @TrulyMadison.
However, all is not well as @TrulyMadison is not getting the likes it previously was. Is Madison losing her touch?
And, of course, like all good trad wives, Madison relies on household help. So there’s a housekeeper, a driver, a new tutor arriving just at the opening of the story and a controlling husband. @TrulyMadison needs a new schtick (Yiddish word for a new gimmick). What will it be?
This is a terrific read. Could it be based on those American trad wives – and one in particular – who keep forcing themselves into our consciousness?
The Cardinal: The Secret Life of Thomas Wolsey by Alison Weir (Headline £25, Kindle £12.99)
When we were medieval re-enactors, my husband and I performed around the South East as part of the Swords of Chivalry and our period was the 14th century. However, if I come clean, my favourite historical periods were the Regency and, of course, the Tudors.
There have been loads of Tudor writers and I read Murder Most Royal by Jean Plaidy countless times as a youngster. Plaidy used to write under lots of pseudonyms and I suppose her most famous were Victoria Holt and Phillippa Carr.
But my all-time favourite Tudor author has to be Alison Weir and I think I’ve probably read most of her novels.
Her latest is The Cardinal and this one I passed over to my husband to read whilst he was in Princess Alexandra Hospital, where it attracted a lot of attention from other Tudor and Alison Weir fans. I lost count of how many times he had to point out to people that it wasn’t actually published yet and of how many people took pictures of the cover so that they could order it.
The Cardinal is an absolutely fascinating look at the life of Tom Wolsey, a brilliant theologian and political tactician who rose to the pinnacle of power under Henry VIII. The king trusted Wolsey implicitly.
However, the two came to metaphorical blows when Wolsey was convinced that Anne Boleyn shouldn’t be queen whereas, as we all know, Henry VIII was convinced that the only way in which she would sleep with him was to make her queen. Wolsey was in charge of obtaining the Papal dispensation. By opposing Anne, Wolsey made a lifelong enemy of her, which eventually led to his downfall.
But this is the story of the man behind Hampton Court Palace – a palace that Henry commented, when visiting, was grander than the king’s own palaces.
Wolsey built such a powerful power base of both politics and the Church, and there was a wayward son by the woman he loved, but could never marry.
We all know how Anne Boleyn ended up and my husband was kept enthralled. He found the whole inside story so fascinating and so compelling that he simply couldn’t put it down. Alison Weir is one hell of a writer.
Human Remains by Jo Callaghan (Simon & Schuster £18.99, Kindle £9.99)
We hear a lot about AI taking over the world. In fact, Kate Thompson’s Holocaust memoir with Renee Salt is riding high in the Sunday Times best-seller lists and has now been plagiarised by two AI writers – a case where AI is definitely not needed.
On the other hand, a recent article explained how AI could read X-rays and find fractures that had been missed. I certainly wish an AI thing could have read my X-ray when I was checked for an ankle break, which was missed. It was only when I had a second X-ray privately that the break was discovered and my ankle was put in a boot for three months.
In Human Remains, we have an AI detective known as Lock. Lock appears as a hologram and it’s disconcerting to try to get hold of him, only to find your hand going right through his body.
This is the third in the series featuring the Future Policing Unit and DCS Kat Frank. Kat wears a bracelet on her wrist which allows her to bring Lock “to life”.
They are called to a Warwickshire farm where a body has been discovered on the banks of a river. The skeleton is determined to be less than 70 years old and, therefore, within the scope of the FPU, so Lock performs a virtual autopsy, doing complicated assessments which saves hours and days of police time.
When the skeleton is determined to have been strangled, a podcaster decides that the Aston Strangler is back - a killer put away by DCS Frank several years earlier. With the podcaster calling for a retrial, Kat is under severe stress. And then another body is discovered near to the first body.
I just love Lock. However, I would suggest that you read In the Blink of an Eye followed by Leave no Trace prior to reading Human Remains. Not that they aren’t standalone reads – they definitely are – but it’s interesting to see how Lock and his relationship with Kat Frank develops.
The Cure by Eve Smith (Orenda Books £9.99, Kindle £7.99)
We all want to live forever, don’t we? Well, Ruth is working out her national service as a researcher looking into the disease which killed her young daughter. Whilst doing this, she discovers that the drug has an unexpected side effect - just one jab reverses ageing and guarantees a long and healthy life.
When Ruth’s discovery is hijacked by one of her colleagues, SuperJuve – a “first class upgrade” - is born.
But with seniors living until 120 and the world becoming so over populated, laws are passed that seniors are tracked down at the age of 120 – and executed!
Wow, this is certainly a great read and really gets you thinking. It’s another one my husband enjoyed whilst in PAH.
One Night at the Château by Victoria Henry (Orion £9.99, currently free on Kindle)
I need to lighten the mood and what better way than a romantic novel from Victoria Henry.
It’s the stuff of romantic dreams – jump in the car and drive down to the south of France to a gorgeous French château.
But for openers, Connie’s life has fallen apart. With her husband running off with another woman (an older woman to boot) and the magazine that she works for going bust, she is jobless and husbandless and needs to sell the family home.
But it’s godmother to the rescue (I do love how all romantic novels can conjure up godmothers – I don’t even have a middle name, let alone a godmother).
Her godmother asks Connie to come and help her at her château, which Connie knows very well having spent idyllic summers there in her 20s, cooking, ironing and generally running the château.
What Connie doesn’t realise until she arrives is just how neglected the château now is. And, in best romantic novel form, Connie knows just how to cope.
Take this with you on the Eurostar down to France.
