When the Shalom Foundation, run by billionaire American Jew Philip Weinraub, approaches Dr Annie Kendall with a proposition she can't refuse, little does she realise just what the three-month research project she's signed up for will entail. The proposition is quite simple: go to London and research the so-called Jew of Holborn, a Jew who lived in hiding during the Cromwell years (1535 in particular), who found a treasury of ancient Jewish artefacts and later distributed them to synagogues across Europe. Her task is to corroborate this theory and even locate the source of the treasure, "but simply proving that such things found their way to England will be a remarkable coup," as Weinraub… Read more
16 year old Zoey has a crappy home life, an almost-ex-boyfriend who drinks too much, a best friend who's shallow and a geometry test tomorrow. But all this matters for naught when she is Marked by a Vampyre Tracker and must move to the House of Night school in Tulsa, Oklahoma, for four years while her body undergoes the Change into a Vampyre - or rejects it and she dies.
This is a new and original take on the Vampire legends, and mixes in matriarchy and goddess-worship with pleasing effect. Zoey becomes marked in a special way - the Goddess Nyx has given her a special responsibility and added gifts; which she'll need, because something's not right at the House of Night, and her… Read more
I loved this book. It's become one of my favourites, easily so, and - strangely enough, given the subject matter - I would even call it a comfort read. It's a dark story yet I did not find it depressing for a second, due to the quality of the writing. Gibb has a light touch, and holds back from telling us what to feel or how to react: reading this book was like feeling a breeze against your cheek. Even brutality is rendered bittersweet through the light touch of Gibb's word choices. It is never saccharine, never melodrammatic, and opens a door into a world few of us have any idea or understanding of.
PLOT DESCRIPTION (no real spoilers, but please skip if you prefer not to… Read more
