Author: Miriam Drori

Author, editor, attempter of this thing called life. Social anxiety warrior. Re-Connections, a collection of short stories, published with Ocelot Press, 15/10/2025.

Categories
Books Reviews

The Queen of Cups Murders by GB Williams

I’m delighted to be part of the blog tour for The Queen of Cups Murders by GB Williams. But…

I began to read this book and decided I didn’t want to read any more of it, and I want to stress that my decision to stop reading had nothing to do with the quality of the book, which is well-written, well-researched and has an interesting plot.

And yet the more I read the less I wanted to read it. It’s simply too much like the true horrific stories that I’ve heard and read over the past thirteen-and-a-half months since 7th October 2023. I only need to turn on the TV or radio to hear more stories from that dreadful day, or from the time since then, and I don’t want to add to those when reading fiction.

Unlike my latest novels, which fit into the cosy crime genre, this novel includes all the gory details. I have read and enjoyed similar stories in the past, but this is not the right time for me.

So instead of a review, there’s an excerpt for you to read, after this:

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY 

GB Williams specialises in complex, fast-paced crime novels. Her works include the recently expanded Locked Trilogy, The Elaine Blake Novels and the stand alone, The Chair. GB was shortlisted for the 2014 CWA Margery Allingham Short Story Competition with the story Last Shakes, now available in Last Cut Casebook. GB is a member of the Crime Writers Association, Crime Cymru, and part of the organising team for Gŵyl CRIME CYMRU Festival, as well as working as a writer and freelance structural editor. 

BLURB

He’s determined to draw a better future. But his morning reading didn’t warn him about the muddy ditch of corpses…

South Wales. Detective Sergeant Madoc Palmer struggles to fit in. Committed to his job, the tarot reader hopes his transfer away from a sabotaging superior is a fresh start. Though he downplays his psychic ability as good instincts, the ploy is tested when two murders trigger strange visions.

As his abilities take an inexplicable leap forward, Palmer navigates the tricky task of guiding the sharp-eyed, evidence-following Detective Inspector Ruth Atkins to the identity of the decayed remains. With his suspicious new DI watching every move, the newcomer fears any slip of the tongue could get him laughed off the force.

Can he reveal his truth without destroying his life or letting a killer slip from their grasp?

Excerpt

From chapter 2, introducing Ruth Atkins and some of her situation.

“Ruth!”

Ruth Atkins had barely stepped through the door, her jacket only half off, and DCI Geraint Evans was already bellowing at her. Mind, being a big man, bellowing was his default. She just didn’t know why he was bellowing at her this time.

“Did I actually do it?” she asked.

Geraint frowned, his caterpillar eyebrows meeting in the middle. Those brows were her barometer to his mood.

“Do what?” he asked.

Good question. Oh, for heaven’s sake. I’m a Detective Inspector. Time to stop being a wuss and get a grip. “Whatever you’re shouting at me for, sir?” Her chin rose as she shrugged her leather jacket back on. He couldn’t know what was going on in her head.

“Sir?” The grey caterpillars stretched up towards Geraint’s thick thatch of salt-and-pepper hair, heavy on the salt. “Guilty conscience, Ruth?”

“No.” Maybe. “Sorry for being late?”

“It’s barely one-minute-past, even I’m not that tight.” His scrutiny sent a billion bugs squirming under her skin. The way he stepped closer could intimidate; his ex-prop-forward frame easily overshadowed her. Luckily, she’d known him long enough to be immune. Mostly. Though she’d known him so long the danger was he’d read her like a book. He thrust a buff file towards her. “Get up to the new housing development at Heolgerrig.”

Oh no. A new case was the last thing she needed today.

“Take Jackson,” he added.

“Sorry, Geraint, can’t.”

Geraint reared. His surprise surprised Ruth.

The door behind her opened but she wouldn’t let that, or her boss’s affront, stop her explanation. “Jackson’s due in court later,” she said. “Witness for the prosecution.”

Geraint grunted, then turned his attention to the new entrant as Ruth checked the scant detail in the file. A robbery. Pallets of valuable goods taken, easy-to-fence items. What had been left behind was a whole lot more worrying.

“Ah, good. You’re here at last,” Geraint said to the newcomer.

Ruth focused on the file.

“Everyone,” Geraint called. “This is Detective Sergeant Madoc Palmer. Madoc, this is everyone.” A murmur of welcome rumbled around the room. “Welcome to the Major Crime Investigation Team. Now go with DI Ruth Atkins, here.”

LINK TO BUY

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Categories
Books Everyday life Israel Reviews

The “Fictional” World of Loyalty and the Learner

How fictional is the world inhabited by Nathalie, Asaf and friends (and foes)?

On Day 2 of the blog tour for Loyalty and the Learner, I’m pondering this question. Here’s why:

Before I go any further, you can find links to all the tour posts so far in this post.

Yesterday, GB Williams posted this when writing about my book:

…I also know little of life in Israel, other than what we see on the news, which I have tried to forget as the real world is a different one to the world this story inhabits. That’s what fiction is for, taking us away from the real world.

I actually wrote this novel more than a year ago, its publication having been delayed for several reasons. But even before the seventh of October 2023, and going back long before independence in 1948, Israel has been plagued by conflict and wars, by enemies who will agree to nothing less than its complete destruction. It has always known terrorist attacks of various sorts.

By the way, despite all that, I believe Israeli cities are among the safest in the world, especially for women.

Not one of my novels set in Israel – Neither Here Nor There (not currently available), Style and the Solitary and Loyalty and the Learner – mention wars or attacks, other than Asaf saying of Israel’s problems in Loyalty and the Learner, “One of those is the security situation.”

Why?

There are plenty of novels set in Israel that highlight the security situation and explain it much better than I ever could. I wanted to portray ordinary life here, to show the beautiful and the not so beautiful but without the wars. Does that make the world of my novels fictional?

I don’t think so. The reality is that Israelis live in two parallel worlds simultaneously. We work in offices or building sites or fields. We go shopping in markets and supermarkets and smaller shops. We exercise in the gym or by walking, runnning, cycling, dancing. We love to spend time with our families.

The other world is more frightening. We hear about it on the news and hope it won’t come any closer to us, but of course it does, even if it’s only when we run for shelter. No, it’s never only that, because we all know people who’ve been affected much more, who’ve lost family members and had their worlds changed forever in a single moment.

In normal times, but not during the past year, it’s possible to spend whole days, maybe even a week or two, without thinking about wars or attacks. Unless, of course, you’re in the army, or have a child in the army, or find yourself under attack…

Really, it’s often possible to forget you’re in the Middle East for a while. And so, I suggest the world of my novels is not as fictional as you might think.

Loyalty and the Learner is published through Ocelot Press and can be purchased via Amazon and other online stores.

Categories
Books Interviews Reviews

Loyalty and the Learner on Tour

Good news!

Loyalty and the Learner, my new cosy crime novel, is going on tour from 7th October, 2024.

The tour will include extracts from the book, an interview and reviews.

Do return to this post for details, as I’ll be updating the table below with links to the posts.

7thHeather BeveridgeHetty Waite Author
Gail WilliamsGB Williams Crime Blog
8thAnita D HuntPiskie Dreams
9thT.D.HollandTracey Holland
10thLynsey AdamsReading Between the Lines
11thAllison SymesChandler’s Ford Today
12thVal PennyVal Penny
Mason BushellMason’s Menagerie
13thJo FentonJo Fenton Author
Wendy H. JonesBookaholic

In the meantime, here’s a reading from the novel:

Categories
Books

Update on The Way the Crow Flies

Before I begin this update, I must tell you that today is publication day for Loyalty and the Learner, my second Jerusalem Murder Mystery.

You can find the ebook on Amazon and the paperbook on Amazon and on several other online bookshops.

Back to the crow…

I’m ashamed to say that I’m still reading The Way the Crow Flies, which I blogged about on 21st July. My excuse is that it’s 720 pages long, I’ve been extraordinarily busy and I read slowly.

In the previous post, I was stopped by something I quoted from page 187. This time, I was stopped by this on page 632 (I have advanced):

Why do grown-ups insist on childhood “innocence”? It’s a static quality, but children are in flux, they grow, they change. The grown-ups want them to carry that precious thing they believe they too once had. And the children do carry it, because they are very strong. The problem is, they know. And they will do anything to protect the grown-ups from knowledge. The child knows that the grown-up values innocence, and the child assumes that this is because the grown-up is innocent and therefore must be protected from the truth. And if the ignorant grown-up is innocent, then the knowing child must be guilty.

Wow. Thank you for that, Ann-Marie MacDonald. It explains a lot.

Categories
Books Holidays memories

Loyalty

I’m back at last and ready to fill in some of the spaces since my last post, six weeks ago, if not earlier.

The first event hasn’t happened yet, but it will happen in just five days. Loyalty and the Learner will be published on 9th September.

Hints on the contents of Loyalty and the Learner.

Loyalty and the Learner is the second in the series of Jerusalem murder mysteries. The first was Style and the Solitary.

In Style and the Solitary, the murder took place in an office. This time, it takes place in an apartment. Next time, … that’s a secret for now. Nathalie, Asaf and a few other characters are back, and there are several new ones, some friendly and others not so much.

You don’t have to have read Style and the Solitary to understand Loyalty and the Learner. Just click on the link for the ebook, which can be pre-ordered now. The paperback will be available from various online bookshops.

Here’s another project I’ve been involved in and haven’t had a chance to announce:

WE ARE THE BULLIES is a collection of stories written from the point of view of a bully. I have one story in it, called Owning Your Space, and I also edited the collection. For me, it was interesting to put myself in a position I’ve never been in.

The book is available from various sites. I suggest searching for ‘we are the bullies miriam drori’.

What I did on holiday

In the middle of July, I attended a fun-filled and exhausting five-day festival of Israeli folk dancing in the Czech Republic.

Then I spent three weeks in the UK, visiting friends and family and attending an action-filled writers’ summer school known as Swanwick.

We were once with the same publisher.

I recently joined a fascinating tour of the new National Library in Jerusalem, but I could never write a post about it as good as this one.

Monday marked a year since I lost my husband. This is what I wrote on Facebook:

“Today is the second of September, exactly a year since the sudden, although expected, death of my husband, David, after 45 wonderful years of marriage. I feel as if I had exactly five weeks to grieve before that event was superseded by one that changed the lives of everyone in Israel and has repercussions for the whole world. I’m coping with my loss, smiling at the memories, and am aware that people all around me are suffering much more.”

We’re planning to hold an exhibition of David’s art shortly.

Lhasa, Tibet, 2019

Categories
Books Reviews

Hunter’s Rules by Val Penny

Welcome all. Today I want to tell you about a new book, published just five days ago. In fact, this post is part of the blog tour.

Hunter’s Rules

A bloody scene brings Hunter and Meera’s romantic plans to an abrupt end. 

A young woman attacked in a hotel lift has life changing injuries. Her wounds match those inflicted on two women who were murdered.

When Hunter is identified as a suspect in the case, he must establish his innocence to lead his team and solve this bloodcurdling crime.

Is the same person responsible for all three crimes?
Will the girl in the lift finally identify who is targeting these young women ?

Hunter will stop at nothing until he catches the unhinged killer.

Hunter’s Rules is available from Amazon US, Amazon UK and elsewhere.

My Review

The familiar characters are back in Hunter’s Rules, the sixth in the series of DI Hunter Wilson Crime Thrillers by Val Penny. I loved spending time with them again, albeit not a lot of time as I whipped through another page turner from this prolific author.

I also enjoyed meeting new characters, especially Eileen, who remains strong and positive, despite having suffered horrific injuries. Naturally, not all the characters are nice, and some turn out to be thoroughly bad. Will Hunter see to it that they get their just deserts?

Like all the other books in this series, the setting is Edinburgh, and I was happy to be introduced to new parts of this varied and colourful city.

Topics in the novel include drugs, blackmail, prison life, science, medicine and relationships. But a clue to the main theme is on the cover: “FOLLOW HUNTER’S RULES AND THE EYES HAVE IT…” I’ll say no more.

I received a free copy of this book for the Reading Between the Lines blog tour in return for an honest review.

Val Penny: BIO

Val Penny has an Llb degree from the University of Edinburgh and her MSc from Napier University. She has had many jobs including hairdresser, waitress, banker, azalea farmer and lecturer but has not yet achieved either of her childhood dreams of being a ballerina or owning a candy store.

Until those dreams come true, she has turned her hand to writing poetry, short stories, nonfiction books, and novels. Her novels are published by SpellBound Books Ltd.

Val is an American author living in SW Scotland. She has two adult daughters of whom she is justly proud and lives with her husband and their cat.

You can find Val at the following places:

Categories
Books

What’s the Job of an Author?

I’m reading a 720-page book by an author I didn’t know: Ann-Marie MacDonald. It’s one of the few books I saved from the large pile I gave away before moving, and I’m so glad I did. The book is called

The Way the Crow Flies

One of the things I love about this book is the way the author comes up with thoughts that make me think

Wow, I never thought of it that way before!

or

Wow, that’s so true!

So far, I’ve only read up to page 187 and this author has managed to do this to me several times. But this time, on page 187, I had to stop reading for some extra reflection.

It’s 1962 on an air force base in Canada, and Jack, one of the main characters has just realised that one of his neighbours, who comes from Germany, is Jewish. In fact, from his eight-year-old daughter, although he hasn’t revealed to her the meaning of the tattoo on his arm, he knows that the neighbour was in a concentration camp.

Jack finds himself replaying conversations with Henry Froelich. Einstein is a Jew. It had sounded anti-Semitic from Froelich’s lips last summer. Of course there is nothing wrong with the word “Jew” – especially if you are one – but there is something about the single syllable, it sounds less polite than “Jewish”. Perhaps the noun sounds anti-Semitic because Jack has rarely heard it pronounced by people other than anti-Semites.

It’s so true. It was true in 1962, and in 2003 when the book was first published, and it’s just as true now. But I’ve never thought about it before. It makes me think of Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice, but that was written a long time ago and many words have had their meanings changed since then:

I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions; fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer as a Christian is? If you prick us do we not bleed? If you tickle us do we not laugh? If you poison us do we not die? And if you wrong us shall we not revenge?

Coming back to Ann-Marie MacDonald, I think this is an important job of authors: to point out truths that readers have glossed over and not considered properly before. Of course, not all novels do this, nor do they have to, but I love it when they do.

It’s taken me a long time to reach page 187. I hope I can find more time for this book and the rest goes more quickly. It’s so well-written.

Categories
Books short stories The writing process

From Dull to Bright

I do enjoy creating a max. 500-word story each month for the Furious Fiction competition from the Australian Writers’ Centre. I warm to the themes and criteria they choose, and look forward to spending what I can of the weekend (because that’s all they allow) being as imaginative as I can.

Here were the rules for this month:

  • Each story had to strongly feature a relationship between TWO characters. 
  • Each story had to include someone whispering.
  • Each story had to include the words JAR, UNIFORM, NEEDLE and EDGE. (Certain variations were allowed)

I decided to take a dull story and polish it to a shine. I did that by adding something new to the ending and greatly exaggerating something in the middle, but otherwise only by the way I wrote it.

My story wasn’t featured, but the fact that it was longlisted is, I think, a testament to the fact that a lot of what makes a story stand out lies simply in the writing. I could probably have improved my story, and maybe it could have been featured.

Here it is:

A Bedtime If Story

If this were pure fantasy, you’d say the numbers were unrealistic. But it’s true; their relationship lasted for fifty years, from age twenty to age seventy.

If this were pure fantasy, you’d say it needs more conflict. But it’s true; there really wasn’t much, or at least nothing worth mentioning.

If this were pure fantasy, you’d say it needs detail. I can provide that. I can talk of raising children, of delightful trips to near and far places, of long walks in various natural and unnatural settings, of together visits to museums, castles, plays, musicals, concerts, weddings, friends. I can mention how he fixed things in the house while she sewed buttons on his uniform and other clothes. How, in later years, it became increasingly difficult to thread the needle, a fact she never mentioned. How they quickly learned to avoid friction by avoiding topics because staying together was much more important, and maybe that’s why no significant conflict appears in this story.

If this were pure fantasy, you’d say the relationship is still too smooth, even though cracks are starting to appear. You’d say it jars with anything you’ve ever heard. That if you’d been sitting on the edge of your seat, waiting for the climax, you’d have fallen off it by now as sleep conquered your senses.

If this were pure fantasy, you’d have given up on the story by now. You’d have expected the end to be an accident in which they died together holding hands. Or a long, drawn-out illness, one partner caring for the other with love and tenderness. In reality, long and drawn-out was expected. Both feared that outcome. He didn’t relish the prospect of becoming gradually incapacitated; she wondered about her caring abilities, in particular about whether she possessed any. Pure fantasy would have put those fears to the test. Reality followed a shorter and easier trajectory. He fell and hit his head. No one knew why he fell.

While you suppress another yawn, I’ll leave you with a fact to dwell on. If I let you into a secret and whispered their names, tossing and turning would be the outcome. In fact, even if I didn’t…

Categories
Extraordinary events Israel

Same Siren, New Place

Holocaust Remembrance Day started off fittingly dark.

This year we remember the Holocaust in the aftermath of the 7th October massacre, the worst tragedy that has befallen the Jewish people since the Holocaust. There are some who want to call that day another Holocaust, but most disagree. During those awful years, while a few brave individuals risked their lives to save others, most Jews had nowhere to turn. Today, we have a state and an army.

In recent years, when the siren went off, I’ve stood on the balcony facing Jerusalem’s Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Museum. This year, in Tel Aviv, I took a short walk ending at Jerusalem Beach.

There I stood on the raised platform, watching the movement around me. On one side, the waves constantly rose and fell on this windy day. On the other side, people walked or ran past and traffic came in waves, often halting at the traffic light. In the distance, four young men kicked and headed a ball to each other.

At ten o’clock, the siren went off and everything stopped. Traffic came to a standstill, walkers and runners stood still, the young men let the ball roll to a stop as they, too, stood still. Only the waves continued to roll, oblivious to the occasion. Two minutes later the siren stopped, traffic started up, people continued their activities and I walked home.

I’m thinking of the six million who died in the Holocaust. I’m thinking of the one thousand two hundred who died on 7th October. I’m thinking of all the hostages still in Gaza after seven months, who didn’t hear the siren and probably don’t know that today is Holocaust Remembrance Day. I’m thinking please, bring them home.

Categories
Books Israel memoir Reviews

Places We Left Behind by Jennifer Lang: Book Review

“A memoir-in-miniature” says the front cover, the words hovering over a cardboard box, its flaps raised, inviting me to unpack it. Written on the side of the box is the author’s name, leaving me in no doubt about the contents within.

But I’m wrong, not about the overall goal of this book but about the way it’s presented. The chapters are short, flash-fiction style, and all the words have been chosen with care and precision, clearly requiring several rewrites. And not only that. The formatting is also special. There are words crossed out, tables and diagrams, short lines, indented lines, framed lines, columns, blank spaces.

I have to admit that, as a person who struggles with visual clues, I don’t always understand the reasons for all these unusual formats. But I’m certain there are reasons as I read the book, and even more so at the end when I read the book-club-type questions. “What do you think is the difference between her [Jennifer’s] use of strikethroughs vs parentheses?” For me, the answer doesn’t matter; what’s important is that reasons exist, proving that everything in this book was carefully thought out.

And yet, none of this interfered with my enjoyment of the memoir, my wish to discover how the story would continue and end. I wasn’t disappointed.

Rereading my review of a few days ago, I notice I didn’t even mention the love story the memoir tells, the differences of opinion between the two players in the story, caused by their different backgrounds and attitudes towards religion. It made me keep thinking: surely this is the part when they agree to separate.

Although the love story formed the whole plot, it was the telling of it that made this book special.

Places We Left Behind

“For anyone who has ever loved deeply and been willing to take risks for the sake of love.” Rachel Barenbaum author of Atomic Anna

When American-born Jennifer falls in love with French-born Philippe during the First Intifada in Israel, she understands their relationship isn’t perfect.

Both 23, both Jewish, they lead very different lives: she’s a secular tourist, he’s an observant immigrant. Despite their opposing outlooks on two fundamental issues—country and religion—they are determined to make it work. For the next 20 years, they root and uproot their growing family, each longing for a singular place to call home.

In Places We Left Behind, Jennifer puts her marriage under a microscope, examining commitment and compromise, faith and family while moving between prose and poetry, playing with language and form, daring the reader to read between the lines.

Jennifer Lang

American-French-Israeli hybrid; obsessed with identity, language, home, belonging

1995-today: Stories in BabyCenter, Parenting, Parents, Natural Solutions, Woman’s Day, Real Simple, Baltimore Review, Under the Sun, Barren Magazine, Quarter After Eight, Citron Review and on NPR

MFA in Writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts; an Assistant Editor at Brevity Journal

Yogini, practicing since 1995, teaching since 2003

IG: jenlangwrites
FB: jenlangwrites

AWARDS for Places We Left Behind:
*Finalist in Multicultural Nonfiction in American Book Fest’s 20th Annual Best Book Awards
*Finalist in Multicultural Nonfiction in the IAN Book of the Year Awards 2024
*Gold Book Award Winner of Literary Titan