Sam is smart, wise-cracking and no holds barred. There’s stockbrokers, anorexic rich girls, trust funds, fraud and much, much more. Determined to prove that it wasn’t her fault, she gets caught up in a web of intrigue, blackmail and Banking. But soon after the unveiling a body is found underneath it. Sam’s just made a big piece for a London bank. Black Rubber Dress is the first of them to reappear. They’re currently being republished by Fahrenheit Press (more on that later) and have come into my orbit. These days she’s better known as Rebecca Chance, best-selling author of glamourous, sexy thrillers, but back in the 90s she wrote the Sam Jones series of mysteries about a sculptor in Camden. This week’s BotW is Black Rubber Dress by Lauren Henderson. Enjoy! Tagged Book of the Week, book reviews, Classics 1 Comment books, stats, The pile, week in books The Week In Books: January 18 – January 24 There’s also a variety of omnibuses (omnibii?) at differing price points (depending on if you want the cover that ties in with the TV series) and DVD releases of both the most recent and the 1980s TV series. Queen Lucia is available for free on Kindle and although it’s not free on Kobo it is available in a variety of file formats for free from Project Gutenberg. And if your group of friends are like this, then maybe consider finding some new ones – constantly trying to one-up everyone else must be exhausting! And then thank goodness that your group of friends are nothing like this. Cringe as Lucia’s (lack of) proficiency in Italian comes under scrutiny. Chuckle as they compete to be best friends with the visiting opera singer. Snigger as the Riseholmians embrace yoga. If you watched the 2014 TV adaptation you’ll recognise some of the plots here. The townspeople’s snobbery leads them into trouble at every turn. Georgie is her best friend (if she can be said to have one when life is a constant competition for superiority), balding and greying and desperate to hide it, he has his faults, but in this book at least is a slightly more sympathetic character than Lucia.īut for all that Lucia is awful, this is such a fun book. She and her husband drop snippets of Italian into conversation to make people think they’re fluent (they’re not), and she practices her piano duets in secret so she can “sight-read” them when Georgie comes over. Emmeline Lucas – Lucia – always wants to have the upper hand, and employs all sorts of underhand methods to dominate the neighbourhood. In Queen Lucia, we meet the residents of Riseholme and their snobbish leader.

I have Miss Mapp waiting on the Kindle in the interests of fairness! This week’s BotW is the first in the Mapp and Lucia series by E F Benson – which doesn’t actually feature Miss Mapp – just Lucia! I’ve read Mapp and Lucia – which is the the fourth boo in the series and have come back to the start.

Whisper of jasmine deanna raybourn