⏳🎸The Other Times Of Caroline Tangent by Ivan D Wainewright… A Book Blog Tour Review!!!! ⏳🎸

Love the cover!!!!

Publication Date: Out today

Formats: Paperback & Ebook

Price: Pb £8.99/ Ebook £1.99

Publisher: Grimsdyke Press

I would like to say a huge thank you to Anne Cater and Random Things Tours for organising this brilliant and fascinating book’s tour. I would also like to say a huge thank you to Grimsdyke Press for gifting a copy for me to read and to review, I am so grateful for what you do. A huge thank you to the creative genius behind this book, Ivan D Wainewright, this book really blew my mind, it took you on a fabulous journey, one in which many of us would have loved to actually go on. I mean who wouldn’t want to revisit legends of music at gigs in any time period (well maybe not too far back, though that would have been interesting). Intrigued? let’s head to the blurb and find out more.

If you could travel back in time to see any concert, who would you go see? Caroline Tangent’s husband, Jon has invented a time machine so they can visit iconic gigs in history: Woodstock, David Bowie, Edith Piaf in 1930’s Paris – an inexhaustible bucket-list. But they can’t tell anyone they’re doing so. As their trips to the past continue, they begin to realise how it could change a devastating moment from their own past. But for Caroline, it’s clear they don’t want the same outcome. Until, on one trip, one of them does something unthinkable which will change both their lives forever.

How on earth do I try and review this wonderful, nostalgic and at times deeply unnerving book. I am not saying this is in anyway bad or terrible, it is so not, just that there are so many wonderful, hilarious funny moments and moments of joy and wonder for them (and for the reader moments of pure envy and longing and a dream that a machine like this could be made… obviously not and hopefully it will stay that way). With any discovery like this, there will always be moments where the other party, be it a spouse, lover or maybe a friend of the inventor, there will be a moment of clashing of thoughts and feelings where one person is thinking morally and the other is tempted to change a certain situation.

I also loved how each bit of the past they went to was believable and felt so real and tangible that you could almost believe that you too had been transported with them to that time, either in 1930’s Paris, or freezing cold, wet Liverpool or even in a hot humid USA waiting for The Boss (Bruce Springsteen if you didn’t know lol) to turn up and perform. I also how they didn’t focus on the big questions or worries but on the little details so that when they did turn up in another time period they may look a bit odd but not too strange to stand out.

I loved the characters, especially Bee and Caroline, who were just brilliant with each other and what true friends are made of and it makes what happens later just truly tragic and ooff got me in the chest and yes I did have a little cry (But anyway no spoilers). There was one character though who I really disliked, that is Jon, I found him intensely selfish, childish and also psychotic and very gaslighting and just awful in nature to not just to Caroline but their friends. There is also a moment where you feel it coming and you just wish it wouldn’t but of course it does and that’s the moment where if it was on TV you would be shouting out swear words and wanting and hoping that it wasn’t what you thought. I wish I could go into more detail, but I really don’t want to spoil this wonderful book for you, all I can say is, that think of Dr Who meets the Time Machine, but instead of battling aliens or morlocks, you or they are battling a person who has lost any moral feeling and also has this quality of its all about me, and YOU are the one to blame for everything (as I said above a person who has either been spoilt or has not been able to grow into adulthood properly and feels threatened by anyone who they think look down on them). So what do they do, they belittle them and make them feel small, so what would happen if they had the power to change that and make them… well disappear in time…. would you do it?

As a well loved advert once said (maybe not in these exact words lol) ” this is not just any time machine novel, this is a novel about finding who you are and working out what is most important to you”. And along the way having a rocking and rolling time. I would highly recommend this book to anyone who loves music, time travel novels and just wants something a little bit different with heart.

Ratings: 5 🌟 with a large ☕️ and a large 🍰 and maybe a few 🍪s or two if you get peckish I can guarantee you will be hooked.

Authors Blurb:

Ivan D Wainewright

Ivan D Wainewright lives in Kent (England) with his partner, Sarah and their slightly neurotic rescue Staffie, Remi. Before moving to Kent, he lived in North London, Leeds and Singapore. When not writing, he can be found watching (and occasionally) playing football, running, listening to music from Chumbawamba to Led Zeppelin, arguing over politics and trying to cook. He has been an independent IT consultant for many years, working solely with charities and not-for-profit organisations.

I hope you have enjoyed this magical, mystery tour into what it would be like if someone you know had invented a time machine that could go back to a moment of live gig history, to be honest I have never come across this type of question within time travel stories, its always been about history and the past like momentous events such as, walking around medieval London, or maybe Roman Rome. Rather than gigs, but here’s the thing its so unique and brilliant and wow I just love the idea of being able to visit a gig which you would never have been able to view firsthand, as either too young or way before your time. This book is every music fans dream, and if you are intrigued and want to buy it you can find it in Waterstones, maybe independents but I would ask first, and of course Amazon. I will leave you now to say Happy Reading and see you all soon!!!

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🎸 🥁 🎵 The Twenty Seven Club by Lucy Nichol…A Book Blog Tour Review!!! 🎸 🥁 🎵

Love the cover!!!

Publication Date: Out now!!!

Formats: Paperback & Ebook

Price: £7.99

Publisher: Lark

I would like to say a huge thank you to Anne Cater and Random Things Tours for organising this fascinating and moving book’s tour. I would also like to thank Lark (the publishers) and Netgalley for allowing me access to review the digital copy of this book, and I would also like to say thank you to the author Lucy Nichol for highlighting Mental health especially when it comes to stars and the ripple effect of a musician’s death can have on everyone. So what’s this book all about I hear you say? lets head over to the blurb and find out.

It’s 1994. The music industry is mourning Kurt Cobain, Right Said Fred have re-emerged as an ‘ironic’ pop act and John Major is the country’s prime minister. Nothing is as it should be.

Emma, a working-class rock music fan from Hull, with a penchant for a flaming Drambuie and a line of coke with her best mate Dave down The Angel, is troubled.

Trev, her beloved whippet, has doggy IBS, and her job ordering bathroom supplies at the local caravan company is far from challenging. So when her dad, Tel, informs her that Kurt Cobain has killed himself aged 27, Emma is consumed with anxiety.

Janis Joplin, Brian Jones, Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix….why have so many rock musicians died aged 27? and will Emma be next to join The Twenty Seven Club?

Ok where do I start with this intriguing and fascinating book, at the beginning I hear you shout, well of course, but I do have to say a few words before we find out what I thought of this book. Just a warning this book is extremely expletive throughout the book and some of the content is pretty descriptive, just a warning. I also have to admit that I wasn’t a huge fan of that language within the book (sorry if that makes me sound like a prim and nervous woman, I am not I don’t mind swearing where its needed because I am not a saint lol, but when its in nearly every paragraph…. I kind of feel thats a bit much).

Having said all of that I did get into the story (once I ignored the swearing) and found myself hooked into Emma’s life, for me this was not walking down memory lane, which I thought it would be, this shone a bleak and painful light on people who were trying to scrape a living during the 90’s in Hull of all places, and one in which as a young child I never knew and never came into contact with. I do now, sympathise and empathise with the main character’s anxiety of having reached a certain age where many famous stars, musicians especially, had either died or passed before they reached 30, due to drugs, drinking problems and within that mixture the pressure of being famous and yes being clinically depressed. For so many fans in the 90’s it was the death of Kurt Cobain that really made everyone gasp with shock and horror and probably made people like Emma stop and think about their life and choices. When I turned 27, I also felt a moment of sadness and guilt at having lived more years than Amy Winehouse, another musician who lost her life at a young age, and having that endless question which will never be answered of why? I felt the same again when I heard Chester Bedingfield (of Linkin Park) and Avicii also too their own lives, for me these our my childhood and also adult music heroes/idols which shocked and devastated my world.

Knowing these people who you look up to as immortal, godlike human beings, suddenly and tragically die, makes you question your own mortality and also leaves you feeling more fragile and lost. Because in your mind deep down in the depths a voice will say ‘well if they have gone, why don’t you follow’. This is what this book delves into and brings to the light and also what Emma herself battles to overcome and try to make sense of. This book deals with Mental Health brilliantly especially anxiety and panic attacks ( I know medically they are different but with my own experience I get anxious.. which builds and builds and then develops into a full blown panic attack, that is if I don’t get to deal with it before it escalates).

Its not just about the bad times either, there are some rather chaotic, rocking jams, parties that make you want to crank up the volume and just party (yes like its 1999). If you remember what is like back in the 90’s this book is definitely one for you and will also take you right back there. I did grow to love this one, its definitely a slow burner, and one that has a fascinating and intriguing question how do you find yourself when you are lost? and will anyone be there to help? and also like the song why do the good die young?

Ratings: 4 ⭐️s with a large ☕️ and a large 🍰 whilst listening to 90s rock on your phone.

Authors Blurb:

Lucy Nichol

Lucy Nichol is a mental health campaigner and PR consultant, and a former columnist with Sarah Millican’s Standard Issue magazine. She has written for The Independent, The I Paper, NME, Red Magazine, Den of Geek, Men’s Fitness, Metro, and Huff Post. Her first book, A Series of Unfortunate Stereotypes, a non-fiction mental health memoir, was published by Trigger in 2018. Lucy has worked with the media in PR and marketing for almost 20 years and has experienced Generalised Anxiety Disorder for even longer.

I hope you have enjoyed this intriguing and fascinating journey back to the 90’s and one tragic death that shocked, traumatised and shaped the lives of teenagers around the world and even to this day. If you are intrigued by this book please please please go out and buy this now on Amazon and I think Waterstones too. I will leave you now to say Happy Reading and see you all soon!!!

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🎸 🎶 A Song For A New Day by Sarah Pinsker.. A Book Blog Tour Review!!! 🎸 🎶

Love this cover!!!

Publication Date: Out now!!!

Format: Paperback & Ebook

Price: £8.99

Publisher: Head of Zeus ( an Ad Astra book)

I would like to say a huge thank you to Jade Gwilliam for inviting me to take part on this book’s wonderful tour, I would also like to say a huge thank you to Head of Zeus for sending me a copy of this fascinating book. Thank you also goes to the author, the creative genius, Sarah Pinsker for creating such a realistic and terrifying look at what our world (could) and (might) turn into, with some brands not being mentioned but I do have my suspicions (wink wink). Anyway what is this fabulous book about I hear you say? well lets head over to the blurb and find out.

Before.

Luce Cannon is on the road. Success is finally within her grasp: her songs are getting airtime; the venues she’s playing are getting larger. But mass shootings, bombings and now a strange contagion are closing America down around her. The gig Luce plays tonight will turn out to be the last-ever rock show as the world’s stadiums, arenas and concert halls go dark for good.

After.

Rosemary is too young to remember the Before. She grew up, went to school and works in the virtual world of Hoodspace. Only a few weeks working for StageHoloLive, which controls what is left of the music industry, her job is to find a new talent, search out the illegal backroom jams and bring musicians into the Hoodspce holographic limelight they deserve.

But when Rosemary sees how the world could actually be, that won’t be enough.

I was hooked from the first page, of this devastating yet, heartwarming and brilliant, sharply written novel on what it takes to believe in what is true to you and be brave enough to see what is wrong and make some adjustments to be able to be flexible and adapt. I loved all these unique and fascinating characters, especially Rosemary, Luce and all the other characters that are met with along the way. It feels surreal to read something that has a pandemic which sweeps across America and which changes how they live in the world to the point that there’s barely any socialising unless its virtual and an almost phobia of even coming into contact with anyone, due to fear of diseases and the idea of hugging someone is anathema. This is so close to reality it felt raw and sore (don’t worry in a good way as the plot is a worse case scenario which helps ground you).

What I also love about this novel is that Luce Cannon (get it loose cannon lol….I will walk away now) is a sort of rough, rocker who is really a one woman band, her band mates at the beginning can come and go but she is the main stay and lodestone around which the band operates. I love the snapshots of before the shutdown and the new change in the world and how people interested with one another, it felt like our time now just before Covid struck, I also loved the feeling of total chaos and anti climax the whole build up is, because it doesn’t happen all at once there are signs here and there, but like most people you ignore it and move on, which is what Luce and her band do, which turns out at that time to be the last ever proper gig in a venue. For me this hits hard, as I can remember my last ever gig and the feeling then, though I didn’t know it would be my last feeling of euphoria and joy and togetherness with people I love ( I hope its not my last feeling forever and that this book is not prophetic, I want to sing and dance like I did before with no worries of a virus sweeping everything and everyone away).

I also loved Rosemary’s character, a girl who grew up not knowing anything different and that the virtual world is her life and thats fine its normal, and yet as soon as she leaves her virtual world and discovers that yes there is another world to explore and that yes if you conquer your fears of the outside, diseases, people and contact, that actually you can live and be happy, and maybe the big companies such as HoloLive and (another company which I am sorry to say I have forgotten not due to the book just my brain being useless) and how they have made it so its only them you have to go through…… does this sound slightly familiar to you? (🍏 & 🪟&🤖) ahem I won’t say more about that lol. But this really does highlight fears of big companies taking over the market and making it so that people only can get their stuff from them and forget about the little independents who have products which are more than likely way better, yet because of the big companies threatening them with lower prices they (the independents) have to force their prices up, which then means less people want to buy from them and in turn leads them to sell up, possibly be bought out by a bigger company or even not at all.

Instead of clothes, and the high street, we see this conflict with music and concerts and how the pandemic has meant that live shows and pop up jamming sessions have become illegal, enter Rosemary who is a talent scout for HaloLive, and we see her meet a strange, odd yet fun, mad, genius and brilliant collection of musicians and singers but all playing in illegal dens and though she does succeed in her quest to scout out new talent, she also realises that this destroys the uniqueness of what she has been privileged to have seen and realises that this cannot continue to be both separate from each other. We also see her become stronger in who she is and how she interacts with other people especially with Luce and her friends.

This is a fantastic, epic, scintillating rocking adventure story which takes you on a journey through a what if scenario… what if we did go on a permanent lockdown? what if all the technology giants merged into two distinct but different areas of making people interact virtually and selling their own products? and what if there are people who don’t follow that and want to be free and live outside the claustrophobic sedentary lifestyle that is forced on them? this fantastic novel focuses on the subjects that we are now only starting to question, and also what would happen if the world stopped and how would music survive?.

This also had a very troubadour feeling, almost bard like in tone, the quest to search for musicians, the travelling around the states (or what was states) to sing in illegal jam sessions and play songs to help ease the pain of today, remembering yesterday and feel better about tomorrow and also to be fixed in enjoying the here and now and not worry about the next day. This book sang to me, it sang to that little rebellious rock chick hiding away inside of me thats waiting for the day to be let loose in bars, clubs and venues again, because what this book also says, is that there is always hope and we humans will always find a way to bring music closer to us.

Ratings: 5 🌟s with some 🥃 or 🍻s or 🍹 this is one to kick back to and put on a rock album maybe a Bob Dylan or Frank Turner just something that speaks to you and read this book.

Authors Blurb:

Sarah Pinsker

Sarah Pinsker is a singer, songwriter and author. Her short stories have won the Nebula, Sturgeon and Philip K Dick Awards. Currently finishing her second novel and fourth album, she lives with her wife in Baltimore, Maryland.

I hoe you have enjoyed going on this weird, wonderful and musical journey with me and I hope you will want to read this amazing and heartwarming book and fall in love with both Rosemary and Luce. If you are interested you can find this book on Waterstones, any independents (though please check with them and see if they can send it you) and of course on Amazon. I cannot recommend this book highly enough, if I go on I will only repeat myself but seriously any rock or music fan will love this book. I will leave you now to say Happy Reading and see you all again soon!!!

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