flametreepress – Tattered Covers & Broken Spines

A Flame Tree Press January 2019 release by Catherine Cavendish

3/5 Star Review

If there is one element of horror that I never tire of – it’s that of the ghost story. It’s what drew me to The Haunting of Henderson Close and made it seem a perfect choice to kick off my February TBR for Women in Horror Month.

Hannah, divorcée and empty-nester, has moved to Edinburgh to start her new life and dream job. She works as a tour guide in a haunted attraction, an actual haunted alley, dressing in period garb, and sharing its history with tourists. Almost immediately, Hannah begins to experience sights, sounds, and smells that do not belong in her time – they belong to the past.

Overall, this was a fun read – the characters were well-developed and Cavendish handles the transitions between the present and the past quite well. The story is fast-paced and honestly, the book was hard to put down.

Without giving away any spoilers, the story started to fall apart for me during the last quarter of the book. There seemed to be too many additional plot points introduced without enough pages left to truly flesh them out – it left for a bit of a muddy ending.

This was my first read from Catherine Cavendish and I would most certainly try her again – this book had me hooked nearly all the way to the end. If you have a recommendation for one of her titles – I’d love to hear about it.

As a note, I received The Haunting of Henderson Close as a galley from Flame Tree Books in exchange for an honest review.

A debut novel from Robin Triggs

4/5 Star Review

I requested this title for one reason: Antarctica. I am endlessly fascinated by the icy, desolate continent and will devour any books – fiction or non-fiction – that are set there. There is something in the isolation that I find both alluring and utterly terrifying.

Night Shift proved itself to be an enjoyable whodunnit that contained all of the fear and paranoia of John Carpernter’s The Thing mixed with the almost cozy quality of Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express.

I don’t want to give too much away, but the basic premise is this: Anders Nordvelt is sent to the Australis base in the Antarctic as a last-minute replacement for their head of security. He joins a team of twelve others who have been working together for the last six months – each with a specific skill set geared toward the success of their mission. Anders arrives as the base is being locked-down for the winter. They will be self-sustaining for the next six months with no shipments going in or out. As the night shift begins – everything starts to fall apart.

For me, Night Shift read as a character-driven mystery more than it was a horror or science-fiction novel – although it did contain elements of both. There is an almost casual world-building element that introduces a near-future, dystopian society where most of the world is controlled by a single, governing body – The Company. I appreciate that the author did not overly saturate the novel with dry details and instead chose to divulge a little bit at a time. It allowed you both the time to slowly acclimate to the world and to crave more knowledge of it.

Every character in this novel was fully fleshed out and not a one was wasted, or served as a throw-away character. Overall, this was a mature first novel and thoroughly enjoyable. I read that this is the first of a planned trilogy and I hope that is the case – I would love to read more novels set in this new world.

As a note, I received Night Shift as a galley from Flame Tree Books in exchange for an honest review.