• Book Review – Looker – Laura Sims

    I’ve never crossed their little fenced-in garden, of course. I stand on the sidewalk in front of the fern-and-ivy-filled planter that hangs from the fence—placed there as a sort of screen, I’m sure—and have a direct line of view into the kitchen at night. I’m grateful they’ve never thought to install blinds. That’s how confident they are. No one would dare stand in front of our house and watch us, they think. And they’re probably right: except for me. 

  • Book Review – Tarikshir – Khayaal Patel

    A small princely state in Rajasthan is the last bastion of resistance against the might of the British Empire. While unrest surrounding the sudden death of the king of Devangarh grows, young prince Rudra Pratap Chauhan prepares to ascend the throne. But the kingdom is in turmoil. The Devangarh army is outnumbered and the British forces are closing in. To make matters worse, Rudra discovers the king’s death may not have been accidental after all. The strange appearance and disappearance of a mysterious hooded stranger and a series of ritualistic murders in which the bodies have been drained of blood, spread panic across the realm. As Rudra struggles to manage…

  • #Giveaway Book Review – Death By The River – Alexandrea Weis and Lucas Astor

    Book Review – Death By The River – Alexandrea Weis and Lucas Astor Genre: Young Adult, Thriller Published: October 2, 2018 by Vesuvian Books Swathi’s Rating – 4/5 Verdict: A nail biting Serial Killer thriller from a skillful duo So today, I share my honest thoughts of my reading experiences along with a fantastic Giveaway for you all to enter and WIN! Go ahead, scroll through the page and you might know why you should get the book for yourself! Good luck! Plot: A High School “American Psycho” SOME TRUTHS ARE BETTER KEPT SECRET. SOME SECRETS ARE BETTER OFF DEAD. Along the banks of the Bogue Falaya River, sits the abandoned St. Francis Seminary.…

  • Book Review – Three Strikes – Ross Klavan, Tim O’Mara and Charles Salzberg

    I Take Care of Myself in Dreamland by Ross Klavan Bartok is horribly scarred. Wounded in the Army, he roams through 1970’s New York, a city of perpetual night, punctuated by crime and populated by streetwalkers, hooker bars, strip clubs, easy drugs and a feeling of doom. There’s one thing on his mind: an experience he had when his Army truck exploded, an experience he calls Red River. More than bliss, more than spiritual. But nothing goes right. Bartok loses his girl, his money, any possibility of support and decides that he’s finished, he’s going to end it but before he does, he’s going out on the town for one…

  • Author Interview with Marianne Holmes

    Author Interview with Marianne Holmes Hello everyone! How have you been this October? Hope all is well with y’all! It is my pleasure to invite and introduce Marianne Holmes today at Syllables of Swathi! She is none other than the author of the best selling Literary Fiction A little Bird Told Me, that released earlier this year! Click here to read my full review of the book, and enjoy the blurb of it! Read further to learn more about this Marianne and her lovely book. She also shares her writing experiences, and talks about her inspiration, favorite authors and her pet fishes – Infinity Flame and Mars!!! Author Biography: Marianne…

  • Book Recommendation: Pieces of Her – Karin Slaughter

    What if the person you thought you knew best turns out to be someone you never knew at all . . . ? Andrea Cooper knows everything about her mother, Laura. She knows she’s spent her whole life in the small beachside town of Belle Isle; she knows she’s never wanted anything more than to live a quiet life as a pillar of the community; she knows she’s never kept a secret in her life. Because we all know our mothers, don’t we? But all that changes when a trip to the mall explodes into violence and Andrea suddenly sees a completely different side to Laura. Because it turns out…

  • Book Review – November Road – Lou Berney

    Everything changes in an instant, and few events have had more far reaching impact than JFK’s assassination. When the shots rang out Frank Guidry, top lieutenant in Carlos Marcello’s New Orleans based crime organization, realized he helped to orchestrate the president’s murder and that there was now a very real target on his back. For Charlotte in small-town Oklahoma, it was the moment that crystalised the end of her marriage. She had to take her daughters and leave her husband—no small thing in 1963. Both fleeing their past lives, Frank and Charlotte meet in a roadside hotel in New Mexico, and see in one another their only hope of safe…

  • Book Review – The Darkest Place – Jo Spain

    'Island of the Lost was the isle's name long before the hospital was built. In winter, they say the fog falls so heavy there that you can't see your hand in front of your face. Storms rage so forcefully you can be blown from the cliffs. Once St. Christina's was built, the name took on a new meaning. Very few who went into that place ever left.' Christmas day, and DCI Tom Reynolds receives an alarming call. A mass grave has been discovered on Oileán na Caillte, the island which housed the controversial psychiatric institution St. Christina's. The hospital has been closed for decades and onsite graves were tragically common.…

  • Book Review – The Secrets We Carried – Mary McNear

    A young woman travels home to Butternut Lake, confronting her past and the tragedy she and her friends have silently carried with them for over a decade while also facing an unknown future Butternut Lake is an idyllic place—but for one woman, her return to the lake town she once called home is bittersweet… Sometimes life changes in an instant.

  • Giveaway|Book Review – A Fatal Obsession by James Hayman

    Zoe McCabe is a beautiful young actress on the verge of stardom who has been basking in the standing ovations and rave reviews she’s been getting from critics and fans alike for her portrayal of Desdemona in an off-Broadway production of Othello. As she takes her final bows, Zoe has no idea that, seated in the audience, a man has been studying her night after night, performance after performance. A man whose carefully crafted plans are for the young actress to take a starring role in a far deadlier production he has created just for her.