Snap: The Sunday Times Bestseller

Product Information

But I totally agree that both are just lazy ways to achieve emphasis in a way that a better-worded sentence could have easily done. I mean, he got her books cos she loved reading even if it wasn’t through the best of means, you know? Having also read and enjoyed "The Beautiful Dead" by Belinda Bauer this book "Snap" was always going to be a winner, I wasn't disappointed - I loved every captivating minute. On the plus side, there is a good mystery scene set up quite early on – we have the police investigations; Jack Bright, aged 14, trying to support himself and two younger sisters in a house full of mice and newspapers; and Catherine While, a pregnant woman who disturbs a burglar… The various strands of story interweave and one or two of the characters (well, Jack) shows some sign of developing complexity. There are just so many plot holes (a very unique and distinctive knife is used to commit a murder and the police never think to look into the sale of that knife?

It’s just about marketing, and I wish people would understand that and pick up some good stuff and read it. With the odd exception I can’t reveal for fear of spoiling the book for others, I enjoyed meeting all the characters in Snap, but it was Jack who held my attention most. New characters (Catherine and Adam) seem at first to be irrelevant to the main story and to run parallel, but Bauer skilfully weaves their stories together and we gradually begin to guess how they are connected. There are several examples of this in the story, in particular the decision of Jack’s mother to get in a stranger’s car.Oddly enough, I don’t have much difficulty with the various Scottish and Irish dialects but English slang is an absolute mystery to me. I was pretty bored on and off with this story and had trouble focusing because I felt like there was nothing happening. Three years later, Jack is still in charge - of his sisters, of supporting them all, of making sure nobody knows they're alone in the house, and - quite suddenly - of finding out the truth about what happened to his mother . DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Grove Atlantic via Netgalley for providing a digital ARC of Snap by Belinda Bauer for review. There's a very serious storyline running through the book of survival and family loyalty, realistic, emotional but dark and dangerous with a hint of humour that has fast become a trademark of Belinda Bauer's work.

The two I’m dreading the most are Washington Black and The Overstory… I keep hearing fantastic things but they just don’t seem like my kind of books. What makes Snap standout from other books in the genre is the premise of a little boy trying to come to terms with what happened to his mother, care for his family, and try to right wrongs. When I visited Liverpool, I was so desperate, I couldn’t understand a thing, I thought I was useless.ABOUT THIS BOOK: On a stifling summer's day, eleven-year-old Jack and his two sisters sit in their broken-down car, waiting for their mother to come back and rescue them.