Anne Zaki

Impeccabile research from an author who delivers with every book she gifts the reader. A unique style that takes you through decades of change in the lives of several major and minor characters. You need to leave expectations aside, and enjoy and embrace the leaps in time. It’s well worth the journey. Sometimes it’s confusing but it doesn’t take long to immerse yourself again into the lives of the artisans. Their pains and pleasures resonate with whatever your own life experiences. The knowledge the reader gains of the specialised craft of working with glass; the history you learn of Venice from the past to the present is to précis decades of the life of this fabulous island. Read this book and be delighted.

I really enjoyed this book. Its historical characters were accurately drawn, and the mystery element was often edge-of-the-seat gripping. I learned a great deal about Elizabethan history concerning the English treatment of Catholics and the lengths they went to in their persecution of practitioners. The real life protagonist Bruno was a joy to follow. Author Parris knows her stuff!

A challenging but worthwhile read. Set in Northern Ireland during The Troubles of the 1870s, the unnamed characters are fraught with tension and fear. The narrator, Middle Sister, is an 18yo girl who is caught up in the political terrors of the times, and is being sexually harassed by a monster ‘Milkman’. The author uses passive language to relate anything but passive behaviour. It’s a time capsule; a time before the internet and texting. It asks questions of the reader. Does inaction have repercussions? Can we happily exist in a bubble by ignoring the injustices that affect our neighbours?