Review of Janni Lee Simner's Bones of Faeries

The war between humanity and Faerie devastated both sides. Or so 15-year-old Liza has been told. Nothing has been seen or heard from Faerie since, and Liza's world bears the scars of its encounter with magic. Trees move with sinister intention, and the town Liza calls home is surrounded by a forest that threatens to harm all those who wander into it. Then Liza discovers she has the Faerie ability to see--into the past, into the future--and she has no choice but to flee her town. Liza's quest will take her into Faerie and back again, and what she finds along the way may be the key to healing both worlds. 
Janni Lee Simner's first novel for young adults is a dark fairy-tale twist on apocalyptic fiction--as familiar as a nightmare, yet altogether unique.

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Wow this is a great book this book is a mix of fantasy and dystopian and it mixes it really well. There's no love story between the two main characters even though they are interested in each other. The story doesn't focus on it and neither does the main female character because she has a job to do. The other thing I loved in this story is that all the characters are gray meaning there are no distinct good and bad characters. They all make dicitions based on there on experience and knowledge and there dissionions have consequences. I highly recommend this book  5/5 diamonds

Review of Keigo Higashino's Malice: A Mystery

悪意

Acclaimed bestselling novelist Kunihiko Hidaka is found brutally murdered in his home on the night before he’s planning to leave Japan and relocate to Vancouver. His body is found in his office, a locked room, within his locked house, by his wife and his best friend, both of whom have rock solid alibis. Or so it seems.

At the crime scene, Police Detective Kyochiro Kaga recognizes Hidaka’s best friend, Osamu Nonoguchi. Years ago when they were both teachers, they were colleagues at the same public school. Kaga went on to join the police force while Nonoguchi eventually left to become a full-time writer, though with not nearly the success of his friend Hidaka.
As Kaga investigates, he eventually uncovers evidence that indicates that the two writers’ relationship was very different that they claimed, that they were anything but best friends.  But the question before Kaga isn't necessarily who, or how, but why. In a brilliantly realized tale of cat and mouse, the detective and the killer battle over the truth of the past and how events that led to the murder really unfolded. And if Kaga isn't able to uncover and prove why the murder was committed, then the truth may never come out. 

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This is the only book in Higashino's Kyoichiro Kaga series available in English. It's book 4 in the series. Even though it's the fourth book in the series you do get a back story for the main character Kyoichiro Kaga. This story is entirely character driven and from the start like in his Detectitive Galileo series you find out who the killer is. The best part of the book is finding out why he did it. My main problem in this book is that it spent too much time explaining, there were parts that I just had to skim over because it when into (in my opinion) over explanation mode. Besides that it was a decent read I gave it.  3/5 diamonds

Review of Keigo Higashino's The Salvation of Saints

聖女の救済 (Seijo no Kyusai)

Yoshitaka, who was about to leave his marriage and his wife, is poisoned by arsenic-laced coffee and dies. His wife, Ayane, is the logical suspect—except that she was hundreds of miles away when he was murdered. The lead detective, Tokyo Police Detective Kusanagi, is immediately smitten with her and refuses to believe that she could have had anything to do with the crime. His assistant, Kaoru Utsumi, however, is convinced Ayane is guilty. While Utsumi’s instincts tell her one thing, the facts of the case are another matter. So she does what her boss has done for years when stymied—she calls upon Professor Manabu Yukawa.

But even the brilliant mind of Dr. Yukawa has trouble with this one, and he must somehow find a way to solve an impossible murder and capture a very real, very deadly murderer.
Salvation for a Saint is Keigo Higashino at his mind-bending best, pitting emotion against fact in a beautifully plotted crime novel filled with twists and reverses that will astonish and surprise even the most attentive and jaded of readers. 

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The Salvation of Saints is book 5 in the Detective Galileo series. This is a really engaging book. Like his other books you already know from the first chapter who committed the crime. It's how they went about committing it and then covering it up that is the most interesting part. In this book the Detective Galileo is less present and less annoying then in the Devotion of Suspect X, which for me makes it a better read. I definitely recommend this book, if you’re going to read just one of Higashino's books in the Detective Galileo series that are available in English this is the book to read.  4/5 diamonds 

Review of Keigo Higashino's The Devotion of Suspect X

(容疑者Xの献身, Yōgisha Ekkusu no Kenshin)

Yasuko Hanaoka is a divorced, single mother who thought she had finally escaped her abusive ex-husband Togashi. When he shows up one day to extort money from her, threatening both her and her teenaged daughter Misato, the situation quickly escalates into violence and Togashi ends up dead on her apartment floor. Overhearing the commotion, Yasuko’s next door neighbor, middle-aged high school mathematics teacher Ishigami, offers his help, disposing not only of the body but plotting the cover-up step-by-step.

When the body turns up and is identified, Detective Kusanagi draws the case and Yasuko comes under suspicion. Kusanagi is unable to find any obvious holes in Yasuko’s manufactured alibi and yet is still sure that there’s something wrong. Kusanagi brings in Dr. Manabu Yukawa, a physicist and college friend who frequently consults with the police. Yukawa, known to the police by the nickname Professor Galileo, went to college with Ishigami. After meeting up with him again, Yukawa is convinced that Ishigami had something to do with the murder. What ensues is a high level battle of wits, as Ishigami tries to protect Yasuko by outmaneuvering and outthinking Yukawa, who faces his most clever and determined opponent yet. 


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This is my first Keigo Higashino novel and my introduction into the Detective Galileo series. Now I think I need to warn people who can't read Japanese for this novel is not the first in the series it's the third so you don't get a back story. There no explanation on how or why detective Galileo (who isn't even a detective but a physicist)  is involved and to be honest I wish for a huge part of the book that he wasn't involved at all.  I find that the whole story would have been just fine without that character. Any way I really do love the different approach that Higashino takes in his novels, he tells his readers from the start who committed the crime. The real mystery is how they've (the criminals) covered their tracks and how the police try to uncover the truth.  3.5/5

Japan June Wrap up

Hey Everyone,

This month I participated in Japan June which was started by Sabrina +unmanagedmischief Mercedes' +MercysBookishMusings and Colleen +LittleGhostCreations  on Youtube their channels are below if you want to get more details

Mercedes' video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RyF8D6mVXpM
Colleen's video  https://ww.youtube.com/watch?v=RVyiwC2pk

The books I read this month were all by Keigo Higashino since he is the only Japanese author on my TBR shelf at the current moment.

The books I read were

    

In the next couple of weeks I'll be posting my reviews for all of these books

Cheers