Review: As White As Snow by Salla Simukka

Publication Date: 3rd March 2015
Publisher: Skyscape
Length: 224 pages

Huge thanks to Netgalley for sending me a copy in exchange for an honest review

The heat of the summer sun bakes the streets of Prague, but Lumikki’s heart is frozen solid.
Looking to escape the notoriety caused by the part she played in taking down Polar Bear’s crime ring, seventeen-year-old Lumikki Andersson escapes to Prague, where she hopes to find a few weeks of peace among the hordes of tourists. But not long after arriving, she’s cornered by a skittish and strange young woman who claims to be her long-lost sister. The woman, Lenka, is obviously terrified, and even though Lumikki doesn’t believe her story—although parts of it ring true—she can’t just walk away.
Lumikki quickly gets caught up in Lenka’s sad and mysterious world, uncovering pieces of a mystery that take her from the belly of a poisonous cult to the highest echelons of corporate power. On the run for her life again, Lumikki must use all her wits to survive, but in the end, she just may discover she can’t do it all alone.

After the tense and fast paced ride of the first book in the trilogy ‘As Red As Blood’ I was very eager to get straight back into Lumikki’s world and this time to explore Prague with her. Unfortunately this book didn’t grab me in the same way as the first.

The story wasn’t as engaging this time, it took much longer to really get into the story and by that point we were reaching the climax and there wasn’t enough time to properly invest. I’m not really sure what it was about it that didn’t work. A combination of pacing, slow plot and characters. It followed the same formula as the first, with characters being introduced slowly, first with no names, and then later with names and motives. But instead of building the suspense like it did in the first book it dragged it out and left the plot barely moving for most of the book.

This instalment also suffered from problems in translation. The writing is very clunky and awkward, much more so than in the first book, which was frustrating as it felt as though that was not how it would have read originally. It’s almost enough to make me want to learn Finnish so I can read it as it was intended!

However, these frustrations aside this was still a very good book. I loved Lumikki, I loved finding out tiny pieces about her life and her history and I loved that we learnt more about the relationship she had the previous year. Also a huge amount of love for the person she was in love with being transgender and going through gender reassignment. It was an unexpected yet wonderful twist, and I loved seeing pieces of their relationship. I’m hoping that we will actually meet him in the final instalment in the trilogy now that the build-up has reached this this point.

So whilst this book didn’t appeal to me in the same way as the first one, and suffered from several issues with pacing that left me feeling frustrated for the first part as I waited for the story to start pulling together and to draw me in, this is still a very good book. Not quite up to the standard of the first book but still a good bridge before the third one, which I am very anxious to read.

Review: The Anatomist's Wife by Anna Lee Huber

Scotland, 1830. Following the death of her husband, Lady Darby has taken refuge at her sister's estate, finding solace in her passion for painting. But when her hosts throw a house party for the cream of London society, Kiera is unable to hide from the ire of those who believe her to be as unnatural as her husband, an anatomist who used her artistic talents to suit his own macabre purposes.
Kiera wants to put her past aside, but when one of the house guests is murdered, her brother-in-law asks her to utilize her knowledge of human anatomy to aid the insufferable Sebastian Gage--a fellow guest with some experience as an inquiry agent. While Gage is clearly more competent than she first assumed, Kiera isn't about to let her guard down as accusations and rumors swirl.
When Kiera and Gage's search leads them to even more gruesome discoveries, a series of disturbing notes urges Lady Darby to give up the inquiry. But Kiera is determined to both protect her family and prove her innocence, even as she risks becoming the next victim...

So after my truly terrible experience with ‘Jackaby’, I was back to square one in my search for books like the ‘Lady Julia’ series by Deanna Raybourn. Until that is, I came across Angie’s review of ‘The Anatomist’sWife’ and without further ado I ordered it for the next day.

It is a very rare and utterly wonderful feeling to sink into a book and adore everything about it. To actually want to slow down your reading and savour the words. And then to discover that the book is the first in a series and there are several already published so you can continue to enjoy them at your leisure instead of the torturous wait of a year that new releases leave us with. ‘The Anatomist’s Wife’ gave me that feeling in spades. I haven’t felt so absorbed, captivated and enthralled by a book and savoured every page since I discovered ‘Silent in the Grave’ – and my love of that is well documented.

Everything about this book was perfection. I loved Kiera from the start. I loved her backstory that slowly came out – piece by terrible piece. I loved the setting, her family, the atmosphere of fear and terror that seeped into everything, and most of all I loved her tempestuous relationship with Gage. There are so many similarities with the ‘Lady Julia’ series, but not in a bad way, merely the time period, the subject matter and the intriguing and wonderful relationship between the heroine and the investigator involved.

The writing is sublime, the pacing wonderful and the slow climb of tension to the terrifying peak when all is revealed deftly handled. It is a quiet book, one that builds beautifully and is engaging and effecting. I loved that we were introduced to Kiera after the trauma and spectacle of her husbands death and the spectacle that followed. We find her at a point of exhaustion – everything is too much and beyond the capabilities of her recovering mind and spirit. And it was so wonderful to watch her come alive, to confront her past and her demons, to come to terms with it and be able to begin to heal, but also to be able to embrace what her past has taught her, and to begin to seize life again. And of course part of that was her relationship with Gage. I loved that she wasn’t afraid to stand up to him, she never succumbed to thinking he knew best – in fact to start with she is convinced that he has no real idea what he’s doing which was both amusing and brilliant to read. They are such a perfect pair and their friendship is tackled so wonderfully – another brilliant example of the slow burn and how effectively it can be utilised.

I cannot wait to read the rest of the series, one which is now a firm favourite based merely on this first book. I want to find out more about Kiera and see where her new found confidence and gumption takes her next, and of course, see her next meeting with the wonderful Mr Gage. This is a beautiful book, quiet, horrifying and at points genuinely terrifying. I savoured every page of it and cannot recommend it enough.