Susie Helme

Award-winning novelist and editorial consultant

Tag: food

  • Review: Chantilly Lace

    Review: Chantilly Lace

    Evelyn Kincaid, Chantilly Lace, (2025)

    https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/244024174-chantilly-lace

    One woman’s psychological journey from emotional abuse to healing

    53-year-old Nora is moving house, after her third divorce. Either running away from South Dakota or running toward San Diego. Facing her failures. But her sister Rachel says all three were gaslighting her. Can ‘geography fix what’s broken inside’?

    She’s looking on dating sites for married men. No commitments, no expectations. All she finds is d*** pics. Until ‘BenSD’; he wants ‘an honest connection’. She signs her response ‘Chantilly Lace’.

    I loved the metaphor of her slamming shut her laptop ‘as if the physical act could contain the vulnerability she’s just released into the digital ether’.

    I was surprised when, just after the first online contact with Ben, she’s already worrying about ‘the way predators create false familiarity’. ‘Predators’!? If she’s that afraid of online dating, why is she doing it? I wondered why he was afraid of ‘visibility’ at the marina but didn’t mind her walking up his wife’s driveway in front of all the neighbours.

    Is this a straightforward romance-gone-wrong story? It charts the psychology quite well. Words like ‘predators’, ‘edge’, ‘rawness’, ‘trap’, ‘trained’, ‘boundaries’, ‘cage’ hint at something darker on the horizon. Are Nora’s ‘attachment issues’ really the problem?

    Nora’s healing journey is also charted well. The psychiatrist’s explanation of trauma bonding as ‘addictive, like a slot machine’ really got me thinking. The story the novel tells is an ordinary one – woman of a certain age has affair with married man – yet the damage Nora experiences is heavy. She doesn’t see it until she’s out of it.

    The ‘psychological’ bit of the billing was very accurate. Having personal experience of an affair with a married man, it sounded all too familiar. Every woman who has this experience should read this book. There’s a lot of therapy-speak, but it’s valid – that’s why therapists use these phrases.

    I must say, though, billed as a ‘thriller’, I was expecting a murder or some zombies or something. Ben is a jerk, but a pretty ordinary jerk, nothing seriously dark. It ends the way I expected it would. Disappointing, but then romance is not my favourite genre. I would call it more a psychological journey.

  • Review: The Dark History of the Bible: Untold Scandals, Biblical Myths, and Ancient Religious Controversies

    Review: The Dark History of the Bible: Untold Scandals, Biblical Myths, and Ancient Religious Controversies

    Skriuwer, The Dark History of the Bible: Untold Scandals, Biblical Myths, and Ancient Religious Controversies, (2026)

    https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/246026958-the-dark-history-of-the-bible

    A basic intro to the darker side of the Bible’s history

    How did a bunch of tribal myths evolve into a tool for conquest and oppression?

    The chronologically organised four parts to this book show where it’s going: 1. 2000–586 BCE: the origins of the myths and texts; 2. 538 BCE–70 CE: the formation of the canon; 3. 50–400 CE: politics and orthodoxy; 4. 400 CE–present: weaponisation.

    The prologue is a list of surprising did-you-knows. You may know that the original story about ‘the empty tomb’ did not feature any resurrections (Mark 16 was added later), but did you know the Battle of Jericho never happened? Matt 27:52-53 says that at Jesus’ death, the dead came out of their tombs like zombies. It was perfectly ok for ancient Hebrews to sell your daughter into slavery as long as you didn’t sell her to foreigners. The Hebrew Hell (Sheol) was not fiery.

    It’s difficult to summarise this chock-full book. From Asherah and Baal to the Council of Nicaea, I can’t think of any other historical topic that is this interesting. It’s structured logically, by theme as well as by chronology. It mainly deals with the New Testament, but Yahweh’s pagan past enters the story in Chapter 6, showing the Israelites’ evolution to monotheism as a ‘winding trail of tribal bargains’.

    For a serious study of this subject, you should start with this book, then move to further study on each topic. The topics are not examined in great depth; it’s more a couple of bullet points on a wide range of topics. Each chapter could be a book or two in itself. It’s useful in the sense that it summarises the basic gist of the topic. But round about Chapter 16 the writing begins to suffer, the style become more note-taking than exposition, in places looking as if it wasn’t even edited. We breeze quickly through misogyny, slavery, the Crusades, European colonialism and Zionism, with just a few bullet points each.

    It ends, depressingly, with ‘how the Bible’s darkness still shapes our world’, Donald Trump, LGBTQ oppression, the climate crisis, religious extremism and the modern triumph of racism. Are we living in the End Times?

    Includes numerous lush, beautiful colour illustrations.

    An interesting side-factoid about this book is that the royalties are going toward promoting the Frisian language.

  • Review: Ethiopian Bible Apocrypha

    Review: Ethiopian Bible Apocrypha

    Ethiopian Bible Apocrypha, (Ancient Path Publishing, 2025)

    https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/244357902-ethiopian-bible-apocrypha

    The Ge’ez Bible according to the Ethiopians

    Jews had a vibrant community in Ethiopia at least since 365 CE (traditions linking to King Solomon were probably mythical). Oral tradition claims the Tribe of Dan migrated from Israel after the Assyrian conquest (722 BCE). Ethiopian Christianity dates at least to the 4th century (King Ezana of Axum).

    With all the mythology around ‘homeland for the Jews’, we forget that the Jews actually had quite a few ancient homelands. In antiquity, Jews were often merchants, and they moved around a lot, their skill with languages enabling them to negotiate with far afield customers. They often served as mercenaries or doctors; they had advanced knowledge of water storage technology. Especially in Egypt and Babylonia, Jews were respected members of the ruling class.

    Independent Jewish kingdoms of antiquity:

    The Himyarite Kingdom, Yemen, 110BCE-525CE

    Adiabene, Mesopotamia, 30-115CE

    Palestine Hasmoneans 140-37BCE, and the 1st Jewish Revolt of 66-73CE

    The Kingdom of Nehardea, Mesopotamia, 18-33 CE

    The Mohoza Kingdom, Mesopotamia, 495-502CE

    The Khazars, semi-nomadic Jewish state in the Caucasus, 750-950CE

    The Kingdom of Septimania, southern France 462-759

    The Kingdom of Simien, Ethiopia, 4th century CE

    These are the gospels preserved by their churches. Some are so ancient that their facsimiles appear in the Septuagint (3rd C BCE) but not in the Masoritic text (6th-10th C.

    We tend to mistake the canon as a matter of orthodoxy competing with heresy. Often, it was simply a case of access. Copying scrolls and codices was laborious and expensive, and each church tended to use its own favourites or simply whatever they possessed in their reliquary.

    The Paralipomena of Jeremiah (or 4 Baruch) comprises bits that were left out of the Book of Jeremiah but retained in the Ethiopian Bible. Psalm 151 is absent from the Masoritic; the Wisdom of Solomon, the Wisdom of Jesus son of Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), the Book of Tobit and the Book of Judith are preserved in the Septuagint, though their relationship to Ethiopia is unspecified. Bel and the Dragon and Susanna are additions to the Book of Daniel, but why are they Ethiopian? There are some prayers which were preserved in the Ge’ez/Ethiopian as well as the Septuagint. The Book of Jubilees is Essene in origin and considered canonical in the Ethiopian Orthodox church.

    The greatest gem, I thought, is the Book of Meqabyan, uniquely Ethiopian and different from the Greek Books of Maccabees. It was used in Rastafari circles. This version is written in Jamaican patois. Example: ‘Fe ‘Abriham who believed Him Iginnin from him childhood were fe JAH Him trusted friend’.

    This is a hefty tome, one to be selected if you’re a Bible scholar. Though I do so identify, I admit I was more interested in the history of each text and how it came to be preserved than I was in the line by line teachings. It would have been more interesting if the book had written more on differences between the Ethiopian and other traditions.

    It also could have been more interesting if questions around translation had been addressed. I’d love to have seen comparisons—how did the Ethiopians write this line? How did the Septuagint? How did the Masoretic change thing in the Middle Ages? What did these differences mean for religious beliefs and practices?

    A worthy work, notwithstanding that it’s one to sit on a shelf on your library for reference rather than to read page for page.

  • Review: The GLP-1 Diet Meal Plan Cookbook

    Review: The GLP-1 Diet Meal Plan Cookbook

    Derek Wexley, The GLP-1 Diet Meal Plan Cookbook, (2025)

    https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/241646966-the-glp-1-diet-meal-plan-cookbook?

    Not-complicated 6-week diet plan to boost protein, including exercise

    Having been on an intermittent fasting Keto diet for many months AND taking weight loss injections, yet losing weight only very, very slowly, I’m interested in cracking my ‘plateau’. I also wouldn’t mind learning some interesting recipes that won’t blow my weight loss.

    First, the science. GLP1 is all about tricking your body into losing weight without feeling deprived. Also, you want to lose fat, not muscle, so keeping up your protein is key, so you won’t end up with ‘Ozempic Face’ gauntness.

    The diet requires protein hits several times a day, which, frankly, I’m not going to do. I just eat one meal a day about 4pm. Maybe that’s why my weight loss isn’t more successful. I’m just not serious enough to devote my attention to it. I’m mainly looking for recipes to vary my usual diet.

    Wexley provides a 6-week breakfast/lunch/snack/dinner meal plan with daily workout routines. The recipes are not difficult, usually just a few ingredients. Rather than the calories, protein grams are counted. Whether I should or not, I don’t eat breakfast – for my fruit, I just have easy-peeler tangerines and berries and yogurt – but there are numerous yummy looking oats+fruits, eggs and smoothie recipes. Adding some things on a regular basis  – couscous, quinoa, chia seeds, flaxseed, avocado, tofu, lentils, turmeric, protein powder, chickpeas –  can improve nutrition and protein levels.

    Recovery is important too. The program suggests herbal tea, 5-minute evening meditation and 7-8 hours of sleep at night. Drinking water (not coffee) is also important.

    I’ve added to my diet repertoire: Lemon Garlic Shrimp with Zucchini Noodles, Mediterranean Lentil Bowl, Baked Tofu and Broccoli with Tahini Drizzle, Tuna and White Bean Salad, Baked Trout with Herbed Cauliflower Rice, Turmeric Lentil Broth, Lemony Chickpea and Sardine Salad.

    This diet plan provides some yummy-looking but not too complicated recipes to lose weight without feeling bored or hungry and a daily plan to enable a fully well-rounded nutritional diet, with an exercise routine built in.

    More colour photographs illustrating the recipes would have enhanced it.

  • Review: Seven Rivers: The Darkness

    Review: Seven Rivers: The Darkness

    B. Luiciano Barsuglia, Seven Rivers: The Darkness (Koa Aloha Media 2025)

    https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/235105617-seven-rivers

    A supernatural journey of redemption

    Cora and Gabe are fighting. She has a baseball bat; he has a gun.

    It ends badly in a devastating car accident, and she ends up at the Seven Rivers Recovery Clinic in bandages. But this is no pristine hospital, no wholesome rehab facility. It starts with the tea–they’re giving her some kind of hallucinogen–then the pain and the terror, the savage bandage changes. The place operates according to an unfamiliar set of rules, which Cora now has to work out. The other residents aren’t welcoming, either. But at least they seem to know why they are there.

    ‘Some are here for recovery; others for redemption. Why are you here?’ Lady asks.

    ‘I’m hiding out, I guess,’ says Cora.

    I liked the parallels between pain and terror, but the horror begins too soon. We need to build up to it. And there’s too little action. We start hearing about ‘the ragged pulse of her fear’ before we even see anything to be afraid of. There’s no explanation as to why she’s ended up in this place and no explanation as to why Gabe is threatening her life.

    The chapter headings read like a ‘Pilgrim’s Progress’–Integrity, Acceptance, Humility. Cora is on a journey of self-discovery and redemption about which we get no clues until page 109. She witnesses horrors. Ex-robbers in a heist gone wrong. Each room, each interaction with the other guests confronts her with the consequences of her guilty past.

    A few too many clichés for me, coupled with some phrases we don’t really know the meaning of–‘an unease that lingered like a shadow’. I liked ‘tremors that shook her very atoms’.

    I liked the Concept–a surreal environment (Purgatory?) forcing someone to accept the consequences of their past behaviour, but Cora’s psychology doesn’t really come through. The unexplainedness contributes a surreal, spooky Kafka-esque atmosphere, yet I didn’t get the sense that Cora was trying to figure it out, which was frustrating. We can’t empathise with Cora’s suffering if we don’t understand why.

    In the end, she confronts the fear of death, something I don’t see treated in many novels, surprising considering that it’s probably the biggest fear humans face.

  • Review: Detectives Roy & Roscoe Mysteries Books 1–7

    Review: Detectives Roy & Roscoe Mysteries Books 1–7

    Tony Bassett, Detectives Roy & Roscoe Mysteries Books 1–7 (The Book Folks Crime thriller and mystery 2025)

    https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/243115585-detectives-roy-roscoe-mysteries-books-1-7

    Absolutely perfect crime novels

    I congratulate Bassett on the publication of this compendium. I am a fan of his crime fiction and have read and reviewed several of the books in this collection.

    His writing is excellent, his characters colourful, and his plots are always exciting.

    What I like most about Bassett’s novels is the (what seems to me to be) realistic police procedures, the great characters and the great plots. The working lives of the characters are portrayed realistically. Bassett’s policemen have believably cop-like dialogue and avoid clichés (donuts, etc). We never lose sight of the people while the plot is gathering facts. The large cast of coppers and suspects all have inter-connecting stories, and we see fascinating peeks inside the suspects’ private lives.

    Bassett is a master of suspense. We find out the clues at the same time the detectives find them, meaning that the pacing is comfortable, slowly developing, then a rush of drama. As in real life, some of the leads don’t pan out, which gives it a true-to-real-life feel. Not everything is done by our heroine; also as in real life, there are multiple officers involved.

    We’re never given too much all at once, and usually about three-fourths into the story, just when it’s getting almost too complicated to follow, we are given a summary of the suspects, clues and alibis through the mouths of the police in a team operational briefing. So, we never have to think, ‘hang on, what was that clue back on page 23?’ Bassett is skilled at weaving necessary backstory into the dialogue. You probably get enough clues to solve the crime yourself, although I usually don’t.

    I like that his main detective, Sunita Roy, is of non-Anglo heritage, making her a little bit out of ordinary from what we’re used to. She’s an interesting woman as well as police detective. Though she’s not full of herself, she has a keen mind, and when cracks the case, it’s usually because she has done a bit of lateral thinking that her bosses haven’t considered. The crime is always solved in some innovative way.

  • Review: The Better Angels

    Review: The Better Angels

    Robin Holloway, The Better Angels (Holand Press 2025)

    https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/8009771617

    The invasion of St. Helena Island in South Carolina by the Union forces drives away the white planters, leaving the ex-slaves considered ‘contrabands of war’, neither free nor slave.

    Northern white abolitionists like Laura Towne build a school to educate the children.

    While initially flabbergasted by the differentness of the culture and frustrated by their subservience, Laura spends her whole life loving and working in the good interests of ‘her people’.

    The ‘Port Royal Experiment’ is sincerely dedicated to bettering the lives of the ex-slaves, but there is debate on how to go about it. Some think the most important thing is to return the cotton fields to productivity and integrate the ex-slaves into the capitalist system. Laura loves and respects them, but fears for their vulnerability in the new world. Jupiter, the elegant black carriage driver, believes the blacks must fight for their freedoms.

    The first year’s cotton crop is not good, so they are ‘forced’ to list the plantations for sale. Mr Philbrick is trusted to make the initial investment, promising to offer plots to the freedmen ‘when it is possible’, but ‘possible’ keeps getting delayed. Will they get their ‘40 acres and a mule’ as promised? Will they get the vote?

    The structure is a mixture of diary entries, letters and exposition. Some of the exposition seems to be in the POV of Jupiter, but this is not clear. A very worthy subject, but as a novel, I found myself wanting a love story or some drama, or some slight fault in Laura’s angelic character.

    This is all about the psychology of oppression and the complexity of relationships when love is mixed with exploitation. It is also about angels. Fortunately, there are people on this earth and in history who dedicate their lives to making the world a better place.

    This review first appeared in Historical Novels Review.

  • Review: The Midnight Frequency

    Review: The Midnight Frequency

    Vicki Regan, The Midnight Frequency (2025)

    https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/231121146-the-midnight-frequency

    Time-travelling adventure to save the world, again and again

    Radio host Sarah Collins asks her late night audience to phone in with their ‘weirdest experiences’. Then, she has the weirdest experience of her life. She picks up a caller claiming to be a time traveller speaking from 2045 with a chilling prediction about Flight 2409. The prediction proves true, and Sarah receives more warning calls. The next one warns, ‘they’re coming for you.’

    As subsequent events prove the predictions her mysterious caller warns of, Sarah finds herself in danger from federal agents and from shadowy corporate bad guys who are trying to manipulate time for who knows what reason.

    She meets an ally, Dr Eleanor Hastings, an expert on ‘temporal anomalies’, and the two embark on a frantic mission to prevent the disasters their time traveller predicts. ‘Why me?’ Sarah wonders. Eleanor explains that her voice over the airwaves is ‘an anchor point across timelines’.

    Each time a disaster threatens, Eleanor says, ‘Let’s go save the world, again’. When they do, Sarah’s caller tells her she’s changed the timeline, ‘the future is now uncertain.’

    Timey-wimey conundrums ensue. In different timelines, different realities exist. Sarah’s mentor from the future tells her, time manipulation means ‘never being certain which version of reality you’re experiencing’.

    It’s tremendously exciting; by Chapter 2 Sarah is already running for her life and facing global destruction. The mechanics of the time traveling are more or less satisfactorily explained, though we never quite find out why the bad guys are doing this.

    The ending is quite cute, and does have a bit of finality, yet it’s open-ended enough to make you want to read Book 2.

    This novella is Book 1 in The Midnight Frequency Series.

  • Review: Among the Okapi

    Review: Among the Okapi

    John S Taylor, Among the Okapi (FriesenPress 2023)

    https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/152204115-among-the-okapi

    Memories of Africa cause ramifications for everyone back home

    The last students have left Anatomy class at Waverly College in Toronto where Fred is lab demonstrator. He’s determined to ask his head of department Dr Smith for a pay rise. An affair with the landlady Inge has not saved him from paying rent, but his mind is on a student from his hometown of Darby whom he remembered from high school, Esther.

    John Lyon is studying the sales figures of his lager-brewing company. A phone call promises that his son Jason will come home to visit. Wife Daphne is out at a meeting with the arts committee. Esther, their niece, orphaned at age 10, is staying there for a while. The two cousins have never met.

    Dr Smith commissions Fred to edit the study he did in Africa on the okapi. Esther, a vegetarian, wants to be excused from dissecting white rats. Dr Smith thinks she look familiar. Fred and Esther bond during a spot of undercover activity.

    Chapter 5, we break to quoting every other chapter from Dr Smith’s African journal—his tale of the okapi and of Alice. Every other chapter, however, goes back to the present-time narrative, so we don’t break the continuity.

    Dr Smith seems obsessed with a Mark Van Dusen, someone from the Africa days.

    These two sets of characters revolve around each other. Jason finally tells Dr Smith, ‘every time there’s been a serious problem in my family, it’s somehow connected to you.’

    The characters are all very well developed, and their histories intersect in interesting, complex ways. I would have liked a bit more enlightenment earlier on concerning Van Dusen. When we finally learn, it’s suitably astonishing, with misunderstandings all around.

    A very well written story.

  • Review: Dread: An Appalachian Horror Tale

    Review: Dread: An Appalachian Horror Tale

    David Grayson, Dread: An Appalachian Horror Tale (2025)

    https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/44288015-dread?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=gKTPYT6mDr&rank=1

    Something is stirring in the woods

    Ed awakes to deranged screams outside his cell in the Sanatorium. Fortunately his lunatic cellmate Joseph is still asleep. Ed remembers a different kind of torture in Fallujah.

    The first few paragraphs describe Ed’s life in the Sanatorium, but the Opening features interchanges between Joseph and other patients, making it more personal and more compelling.

    On page 16, we get the first hint of some horror, the mention of ‘lights in the woods’. The suspense builds from there. First, the monthly supplies of food and medicine didn’t arrive. The truck is discovered empty, the driver missing. The guards are behaving strangely. A series of events begins, which might otherwise be just normal glitches in the daily routine. But they build. Meanwhile, Ed flashes back to Fallujah.

    I was rather annoyed that the bad guys were never explained. Were they zombies? Why were they attacking the Sanatorium?

    Otherwise, this is an easy-to-digest novella, a lovely bit of horror just before bedtime.