Book Review #650 - The Game of Their Lives by Nick Richardson

As the Great War raged in 1916, two teams of Australian soldiers played an Australian Rules football match in London. It was the first time the world had seen our national game. But this was more than an exhibition match. It symbolised sport's role in driving young athletes to enlist and fight.

The players came from every corner of the country - some of them stars in the VFL or champions in their city or state leagues. For all of them it was a chance to forget blood and battle and simply play, a final kick of the footy before the Western Front, from where some would never return.

Now, 100 years on, Nick Richardson rekindles an incredible moment in our history and pays tribute to the men who played The Game of Their Lives. 

I received this book for review from Pan Macmillan Australia. 

As I am a huge AFL fan and interested in history, particularly World War I, I had a real interest in reading this book. I also had a further interest from an ancestry perspective as I have a distant cousin who died in WWI that I recently discovered played and umpired football at WAFL level. 

The book mainly follows VFL footballers, but as a sandgroper I was more interested in the WA footballers, particularly the Scullins from Kalgoorlie as that is where my mum was born and I still have a lot of relatives living there. 

What amazed me most about this book was that even though Australia was only a mere 15 years old at the time, football was already being played with the spirit and passion seen today. 

I read this book on the back on watching a number of WWI documentaries, and so I knew what an antagonist Australian Prime Minister Billy Hughes was, but I found it really interesting to learn how desperately he wanted to bring Australian sport down. 

The book is written by a journalist and so the book is unsurprisingly very fact heavy. This made it quite slow to read. 

Book Review #592 - Trial by Fire (The Worldwalker Trilogy #1) by Josephine Angelini

My Rating: 5/5


Source: Pan Macmillan Australia


Buy:  Booktopia | The Book Depository



Goodreads









The exhilaratingly seductive new series from the author of the bestselling Starcrossed series.

Love burns. Worlds collide. Magic reigns.

This world is trying to kill Lily Proctor. Her life-threatening allergies keep her from enjoying many of the experiences that other teenagers take for granted...which is why she is determined to enjoy her first (and perhaps only) high-school party. But Lily's life never goes according to plan, and after a humiliating incident in front of half her graduating class Lily wishes she could just disappear.

Suddenly Lily is in a different Salem - one overrun with horrifying creatures and ruled by powerful women called Crucibles. Strongest and cruelest of all the Crucibles is Lillian . . . Lily's identical other self in this alternate universe. This new version of her world is terrifyingly sensual, and Lily is soon overwhelmed by new experiences.

Lily realizes that what makes her weak at home is exactly what makes her extraordinary in New Salem. It also puts her life in danger. Thrown into a world she doesn't understand, Lily is torn between responsibilities she can't hope to shoulder alone, and a love she never expected.

But how can Lily be the saviour of this world when she is literally her own worst enemy?

This book was the perfect blend of the science fiction and paranormal genres. It has a complicated setting but the world building was really well done and I really enjoyed the idea of the infinite alternate universes. 

The witchcraft in this book was also really well done. I loved that the magic element was done in a very non-conventional way. The magic was more to do with science which was really fascinating and surprisingly very easy to understand. 

The romance in this book was rather complicated and messy. I can see perhaps there being a number of love triangles forming in future books which I'm not too sure about. 

The book mainly follows Lily as she transitions from a world reliant on science to a world completely fearful of science. 

I would have liked more of Lillian. She is the supposed villain in this book but she is not really involved until the end. 

The book ended with a pretty good cliff-hanger and there were a number of unanswered questions so I will be more than likely reading the sequel very soon. 

Book Review #582 - Wind in the Wires (Woody Creek #4) by Joy Dettman

My Rating: 4/5


Source: Pan MacMillan Australia


Buy: Booktopia


Goodreads

The wind is whispering in Woody Creek... Change is in the air

It's 1958 and Woody Creek is being dragged – kicking and screaming – into the swinging sixties. 

Jenny's daughters, Cara and Georgie, are now young women. They have inherited their mother's hands, but that is where their similarity ends. Raised separately, they have never met. A mistake from Cara's teenage years looms over her future, but she believes emphatically in the white wedding and happily ever after myth. Georgie has seen enough of marriage and motherhood. She plans to live her life as her grandmother did, independent of a man. 

But life for the Morrison girls has never been easy, and once the sisters are in each other's lives, long-buried secrets are bound to be unearthed, the dramatic consequences of which no-one could have predicted...

I absolutely loved the first two books in this series and as I thought that the third one dropped away a bit I was looking forward to how I would perceive this one. 

As someone who predominantly reads young adult literature, I enjoyed the young narrators of Georgie and Cara. 

As characters, I loved Georgie and apart from Jenny is probably my favourite character in the entire series. Although I had mixed feelings about Cara I could understand why she was the way she was. 

Cara was born and raised in the city and raised by older parents which is why she came across as rather snobbish and uptight. I did however enjoy her quest for identity and acceptance. 

The past and present combine to bring secrets to light that Jenny had hoped to keep hidden. For the most part the 'secret' was kind of underwhelming and I am still unsure even after a week after finishing the book whether I am okay with the ending or not. 

Margot was as annoying as ever and I am interested to see where her character goes as she is becoming very much like Amber (who ended up in a mental institution). 

I found this to be more of a bridging book as some of the storylines and characters are merging and is setting it all up well for the final two books. 

Overall, this is fast becoming my favourite adult fiction series and also my favourite Aussie series and I highly recommend them. 

Book Review #569 - Moth to the Flame (Woody Creek #3) by Joy Dettman

My Rating: 4.5/5


Source: Pan MacMillan Australia


Buy: Publisher



Goodreads

Moth to the Flame picks up this epic story and we see Jenny bravely moving on with her life.

She takes refuge with Ray King, a slightly sinister, stuttering boy who disappeared from Woody Creek as a teenager but has now reappeared. 

In return for regular "wifely duties", Ray offers Jenny and her three children sanctuary at his house in Melbourne. For a time, she 

is happy. 

But then Jenny's father - the philandering impresario Archie Foote - storms back into her world and chaos reigns again. Archie recognises Jenny's brilliance and offers her a second chance - a way to escape the domestic drudgery and finally fulfill her dream. But when you have three children, one missing husband and another with a dark secret, dreams have a habit of turning into nightmares... 

The way the second book Thorn on the Rose ended I can't believe I waited so long to return to the enchanting little town of Woody Creek. 

I was a bit disappointed therefore that only a portion (the second half) was set there, the other half being set in Melbourne. 

Although I liked how this enabled us to see just how isolated and behind the times Woody Creek was in comparison to the larger city. 

As Jimmy is one of my favourite characters I liked that he played a pivotal role, but didn't like that he wasn't present much. 

Margot is one of the most irritating characters - she is as equally as bad as Sissy or Amber in the first book. 

I love how quickly this story progresses. It doesn't feel like that many pages ago that Jenny was born and now she is 34 years old and likely to be a grandparent soon (not a spoiler as I am only hypothesizing this). 

I nearly stopped reading this book twice due to plot twists I didn't agree with but couldn't stay away from it for very long as I am very much compelled to finish the entire series. 

Right now there are so many elements going on particularly with Jenny's four children and I am looking forward to when they start to merge. 

Overall, I really enjoyed this book. It could easily have been a five star rating but I just felt that it wasn't as good as the previous two. 

This book starts in 1946 and deals with the post-war era. The way that it ends will make you want to have Wind in the Wires in your hands as soon as possible.