Title: The Poetry Pharmacy
Author: William Sieghart
Type: Poetry
Page Count/Review Word Count: 156
Rating: 4*/5
This was a cute little collection, although it did also start to feel a little repetitive after a while. In it, Sieghart basically takes a bunch of different circumstances in which someone might need a poem and then he makes a diagnosis and writes out a prescription in the form of a famous poem. Sieghart has made a name for himself as the proprietor of the Poetry Pharmacy, and he goes to events and listens to people’s troubles and then suggests a poem that might help them.
It’s a pretty cool idea, and the poems in this collection are plenty of fun and come from a wide variety of sources. It’s also presented in a stunning red hardback that quite honestly will make a great addition to your collection even if you don’t read it.
Ruth Ware – The Woman in Cabin 10 | Review
Title: The Woman in Cabin 10
Author: Ruth Ware
Type: Fiction
Page Count/Review Word Count: 344
Rating: 3.5*/5
Ruth Ware – The Woman in Cabin 10
I have mixed feelings about this one because while there were plenty of problems with it, it also kept me reading. In fact, it only took me just over a day to get through it and I think that it does a pretty good job of things if you just take it for what it is – just a mass market thriller, nothing more and nothing less.
Parts of the plot were sloppy and the main character somehow forgot she was sexually assaulted and simultaneously had plenty of disparaging comments for anxiety sufferers while simultaneously suffering from it herself. I feel like Ware only added that element to the character so that she could then have other characters suggest she was imagining things because she took prescription medication. There was also a bit where all of the men were fat and all of the women were skinny, which seemed a bit weird. There were just too many generalisations for me to feel comfortable with it.
Still, it does hook you in right from the very first scene, which turns out to be completely unrelated to the rest of the plot, and you can’t help but keep reading to find out what’s happening. Honestly, I’d seen a couple of bad reviews for it before I even picked it up and I had pretty low expectations, and it actually exceeded those expectations. It was okay, and I preferred it to Gone Girl and The Girl On the Train, the other two books I guess people would compare it to. Perhaps that’s just because it was shorter.
I wouldn’t go out of your way to get a copy of this because it really isn’t worth it. That said, if you can grab it from a second hand shop or pick it up for free somewhere, you could do worse. I expect I’ll have forgotten all about it within a couple of months, but so what?
Ruth Ware
Click here to buy The Woman in Cabin 10.