The travels of Mary Loosemore

The sparely written account of the all too short life of Wyoming cowboy, Colton H. Bryant.

This is a story that merits the blurb on Alison Weir's Innocent Traitor, "If you don't cry at the end, you have a heart of stone."

Cowboy up cupcake.

Amazon.co.uk link: The Legend of Colton H Bryant - Alexandra Fuller

Telegraph.co.uk article: Colton H Bryant: a modern American tragedy

A rather unexpected combination of a mass murder in a remote Swedish hamlet (OK, that's not an unusual Mankell plotline!) with an account of a 19th century Chinese peasant's kidnap and indenture into the building of the railroads of the American West and commentary on modern Chinese colonialism in Africa and Communist party politics....

A really good read - but we're not talking Wallander so don't expect a classic Scandinavian crime novel.

Amazon.co.uk link: The Man From Beijing - Henning Mankell

A mystery set in Georgian Suffolk combining a code breaking heroine with dashing military men/spies. Tell me dear reader, what would you expect to happen next?

An OK read whilst on a Wild Walk in the Taurus Mountains - I doubt I would have read it through to the end otherwise. A far cry from Daphne du Maurier (let alone Dorothy Dunnett or a Brontë), whatever the blurb says.

Amazon.co.uk link: The Blackstone Key - Rose Melikan

An excellent Frinton charity shop purchase - I think I've found my next series of new crime novels in other countries and cultures, in the form of Barbara Nadel's Istanbuli Inspectors Ikmen and Suleyman.

Amazon.co.uk link: Arabesk - Barbara Nadel

A loan from Janette, Innocent Traitor tells the tale of Lady Jane Grey, who ruled England for 9 days in 1553 between Henry VIII's sickly son King Edward VI and catholic Queen Mary. It made me realise with some surprise that her story hasn't been covered in popular historical fiction before.

I have memories of the powerful picture of Queen Jane in the Ladybird Kings and Queens of Britain part 1 - blindfolded and reaching for the block. It was either The Execution of Lady Jane Grey by Paul Delaroche, or something very similar...

A good read, but, for me, not one that merits the blurb on the front cover, "If you don't cry at the end, you have a heart of stone."

Amazon.co.uk link: Innocent Traitor - Alison Weir