Skip to main content

Blog Tour: The Legacy of Old Gran Parks by Isobel Blackthorn

 


SYNOPSIS

Southern Australia, 1983. While Middle-aged stalwart Miriam rolls into town in her broken-down car, Frankie - a deer hunter - is up in the forested hinterland with her gun.

Meanwhile, fisherwoman Old Pearl sits on her front deck with her dog, a glass of whisky in her hand, and Emily, the English backpacker, scrubs out the pie-encrusted kitchen at the roadhouse.

But all is not well.

Gran Parks is stirring.

Four troubled women. One restless spirit.

Who will survive?

REVIEW

This tale lures you to the edge of your seat like you would around a campfire. You don’t know how, you don’t know where or what, but you do know something big is about the happen. Almost as though you are bracing yourself as go down the first fast decline on a rollercoaster.

Old Gran Parks is different in the sense that you know something is not right in a small town, but you don't truly know or understand what is really going on until it presents itself at that moment in time when everything is revealed. Truly, I wasn't expecting anything that actually happened. But I do know one thing, don't always trust what you see. Sometimes things happen in places that you never expect.

Most of all it is an interesting take on the human mind and how we look and take note of certain people and situations. As someone who loves to read literature that goes beyond just the written page, this did excite me. It gave me that basis to look at how we are as humans and how we sometimes make our own problems when we shouldn't have to. 

If you want something that is a bit darker and challenges the deepest and darkest aspect of your soul, you should add this book to your TBR list very soon.

RATING: *** 1/2 (THREE AND A HALF STARS)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR


Isobel Blackthorn is a prolific novelist of unique and engaging fiction. She writes across a range of genres, including gripping mysteries and dark psychological thrillers.

Isobel won the Finalist Award in the Readers' Favourite Book Awards 2020 for her novel A Prison in the Sun. Her short story 'Nothing to Declare' was shortlisted for the Ada Cambridge Prose Prize 2019. Isobel won a Raven Award in 2019 for her dark thriller A Legacy of Old Gran Parks. The Cabin Sessions was nominated for the Bram Stoker Award 2018 and the Ditmar Awards 2018.

Isobel holds a PhD in Western Esotericism from the University of Western Sydney for her ground-breaking study of the texts of Theosophist Alice A. Bailey. Her engagement with Alice Bailey's life and works has culminated in the biographical novel The Unlikely Occultist and the full biography Alice A. Bailey: Life and Legacy.

Isobel carries a lifelong passion for the Canary Islands, Spain, her former home. Four of her novels are set on the islands of Lanzarote and Fuerteventura. These standalone novels are setting rich and fall into the broad nature of travel fiction.

Isobel has led a rich and interesting life and her stories are as diverse as her experiences, the highs and lows, and the dramas. A life-long campaigner for social justice, Isobel has written, protested and leant her weight to a range of issues including asylum seekers and family violence. A Londoner originally, Isobel currently lives in rural Victoria, Australia.

BUY LINKS


FOLLOW THE BLOG TOUR




Comments

Popular posts from this blog

2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke

What can we truly know of the universe? Is the universe simply beyond our comprehension or are we just too ignorant to see what is actually in front of us? What if there is life beyond Earth? What if we can discover it for ourselves? What if, our curiosity gets the better of us all? This book seems to pose many questions to what knowledge we already possess yet, are we looking at life in the right way and how we come to use the environment of Earth around us. It takes us through the story of the human race and how we have expanded our skills and knowledge to become a race which is both rational and intelligent enough to discover the final frontier, space. But what comes after all of this? This is just as an important question as the one in which we ask of how we all got here in the first place. The great thing about this book is that I feel like if you read it before watching the film, you would probably have a better appreciation for Kubrick's vision. In fact, it could be believed...

Blog Tour: The Lore of Prometheus by Graham Austin-King

  SYNOPSIS John Carver has three rules: Don't drink in the daytime, don't gamble when the luck has gone, and don't talk to the dead people who come to visit. It has been almost five years since the incident in Kabul. Since the magic stirred within him and the stories began. Fleeing the army, running from the whispers, the guilt, and the fear he was losing his mind, Carver fell into addiction, dragging himself through life one day at a time. Desperation has pulled him back to Afganistan, back to the heat, the dust, and the truth he worked so hard to avoid. But there are others, obsessed with power and forbidden magics, who will stop at nothing to learn the truth of his gifts. Abducted and chained, Carver must break more than his own rules if he is to harness this power and survive.

A Wedding in the Country by Katie Fforde

  SYNOPSIS Lizzie has just arrived in London, determined to make the best of her new life. Her mother may be keen that she should have a nice wedding in the country to a Suitable Man chosen by her. And Lizzie may be going to cookery school to help her become a Good Wife. But she definitely wants to have some fun first. It is 1963 and London is beginning to swing as Lizzie cuts her hair, buys a new dress with a fashionably short hemline, and moves in with two of her best friends, one of whom lives in a grand but rundown house in Belgravia which has plenty of room for a lodger. Soon Lizzie's life is so exciting that she has forgotten all about her mother's marriage plans for her. All she can think about is that the young man she is falling in love with appears to be engaged to someone else...

Archibald Lox and the Bridge Between Worlds by Darren Shan

It's been a while since Darren Shan has written a children's book. Focusing more on his adult audience these last few years it seemed like this was the avenue he would have stayed in. However, I'm glad he made the transition back. I can't believe how much I have missed him doing a children's book until now. Covid-19 is at least good for one thing. I get to start on a new series that I can't wait to read. This first book in the serial seems different from previous children's books that he has written in the past. Almost mysterious and part of a realm that is more metaphysical rather than anything. Yet still enchanting in a way that makes look at the world in a new-found way In some ways it kind of reminds me of Plato's cave in the sense that there is something more to reality than what most people let on. Something that can be seen to be incomprehensible to the person that has not experienced The Merge and will never understand the importance of it. Once ...

History of a Drowning Boy by Dennis Nilsen

  SYNOPSIS Dennis Nilsen was one of Britain's most notorious serial killers, jailed for life in 1983 after the murders of 12 men and the attempted murders of many more. Seven years after his conviction, Nilsen began to write his autobiography and over a period of 18 years he typed 6,000 pages of introspection, reflection, comment and explanation. History of a Drowning Boy - taken exclusively from these astonishing writings - uncovers, for the first time the motives behind the murders, and delivers a clear understanding of how such horrific events could have happened, tracing the origins back to early childhood. In another first, it provides an insight into his 35 years inside the maximum-security prison system including his everyday life on the wings; his interactions with the authorities and other notorious prisoners; and his artistic endeavours of music, writing and drama. It also reveals the truth behind many of the myths surrounding Dennis Nilsen, as reported in the media. Nils...