Can a book deliver a mood?

I love a good mystery. I raced through all the Agatha Christie books from the age of 18, I am quite fond of Ian Rankin's Rebus novels and I'm working my way through the Inspector Wallander novels by Henning Mankell. I love the way they make me think about the plot, looking for signs to spot the perpetrator, waiting for the twist that makes me draw a sharp intake of breath.

Crime thrillers are also my favourite type of television programme too (apart from sport), so Waking the Dead was a favourite of ours and I discovered the Wallander books through the television adaptations of the novels - although I have to say, I prefer Swedish series to the one made for the UK.

If you've been following me on Twitter recently, you'll notice I have a new obsession. It's called The Killing (or Forbrydelsen to give its original title). It's a Danish crime thriller in 20 episodes about the investigation into the murder of a young woman. It's been showing 5 nights a week on BBC Four over the last month, in preparation for a new series showing soon. It was shown earlier in the year (which I missed) and it became a huge hit in the UK, gaining around 500,000 viewers per episode - which is a lot for BBC Four. It is brilliant - some of it is gut-wrenching, it's heartbreaking at times and it's really dark, with twist and turns aplenty. It seems like half of Copenhagen have been suspects in the previous 19 hours. I love it for the same reason I love reading mysteries - not only has it been playing with my emotions, I become an amateur detective and try to look for signs and work out before they do whodunnit.

Alongside this in the last few weeks, I've been reading a book to review for the Tesco Books blog. They contacted me with a novel idea - instead of grouping books by basic genres, they have chosen to group books by the mood it creates. The list they sent were grouped into three categories and I chose the "books to make you think and talk" as my favoured category because that is what I like to get out of a book. All I then had to do was choose a book.

Almost without thinking about it, I chose The Suspect by Michael Robotham as it seemed like it was a popular book. Instinctively, I had chosen another mystery. I probably should have guessed by the title but I swear I didn't really think about what type of book it was.

The story is narrated by Joseph O'Loughlin, a clinical psychologist with a private practice and a comfortable lifestyle. Joe gets involved in the investigation of a murder when the police ask him for help. The victim turns out to be a former colleague of his. Then, he starts to become concerned about one of his patients who suggests he may have been involved in the murder. Before he knows it, he's drawn into the centre of the investigation when the spotlight turns on him and he becomes a suspect. In order to prove himself innocent, Joe needs to discover the truth about his patient whilst keeping ahead of the police. Not easy when you've recently been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease.

I loved this book. The case was very complex; even though you were fairly sure whodunnit throughout, you were kept thinking as you are never totally sure, and there are twists and turns  aplenty to keep you reading. The pace of the book started slowly and then built up, such that the third and final part is conducted at a breathless pace. I couldn't put it down so all other plans got put on ho whilst I finished it and read over 100 pages in one afternoon. And the final twist, I didn't spot in advance and yes, it drew the sharp intake of breath from me when it was revealed. So, yes, it made me think - and talk, as I spent a while explaining it to my husband.

I noticed various similarities between The Killing and The Suspect. In both cases, the central character is wrongfully accused of a serious crime and puts themselves at serious risk of becoming the next victim of the respective killers. Both are quite dark and bleak, making for uncomfortable reading or viewing, tackling difficult subjects, not just murder. Both plots reveal themselves slowly, like scales falling away gradually to reveal the truth. In that respect, they were a good fit to be experiencing at the same time, even though neither of them are particularly cheerful. I finished the book on Tuesday night, just hours before I watched episode 18 which was especially shocking and upsetting that day. Already drained from both those events, I watched United 93 before bed to round off my perfect. I figured I was already depressed, so I may as well watch a difficult film that day, rather than depress myself again another time.

The book definitely delivered the mood. The Suspect made me do nothing but think and talk. Yes, it's uncomfortable to keep reading sometimes but it's like a rollercoaster ride - the adrenaline keeps you going going through the peaks and troughs. As I don't do real rollercoasters, this is MY adrenaline rush.

That's probably why I loved this book.

What books make you think and talk?


(I was sent a copy of this book to read and review. Tesco also sent me a bar of chocolate and a bookmark. I have not received any further compensation and all opinions and words are my own.)

A round up of thank yous

I've had a few things sent to me in the last few weeks so it's high time I said thanks for them. Where are my manners?

Firstly, Robinsons sent me a skills kit to try out so the children can practice and become a Champion of the Playground. Children can win their own kit by entering codes from special  bottles of Fruit Shoot at fruitshoot.com. The kit contains a drawstring bag (always handy), a skipping rope with digital counter, a hacky-sack, also with counter and a webcam. The counters rack up points the more you play with them and generate a code you enter on the website to progress through a game. The webcam is there to allow you to play some interactive games on the website but unfortunately, I couldn't get the webcam to work on my laptop so we never got to try it but the children had fun doing keepy-uppies with the hacky-sack. We were given a leaderboard to have a champion of the household but the children commandeered it and made up their own scoring system. I'm not sure who won but we also had a crown and it's been worn a few times, mostly by Missy Woo who thinks she is a princess. Thanks to Robinsons - who actually sent us two kits, one of which we donated to the children's school. 

Calling canny shoppers! Win £12 off a £50 order when you try Tesco online grocery shopping like I did.

Photo credit- cnina

I like to think that I'm a bit of a canny shopper. I have to be. I plan my meals weekly, then write a shopping list. Some weeks, thanks to buying special offers to freeze, I've kept my bill down to about £30. Most weeks, it's closer to £50. I go to Costco for various things on top of that, but that doesn't add much to the weekly bill.

I like to shop online when I don't want to trail around a supermarket. It has benefits over being there but there are also downsides too. If I have kids with me, I don't have to drag them out of the toy aisle if I'm sat at home doing the shopping on the laptop but you can't pick up any last minute bargains. I've tried them all but tend to stick to one favourite site.

Tesco provided me with a voucher to try their online grocery shopping, because they have added new features to their website to make shopping easier, so I gave them another go.

They say the favourites feature is better and loads items bought on previous orders and from items you have bought in store when you use your Clubcard. However, my list was disappointingly short, which is odd as I do shop in-store semi-regularly.

What was more useful to me was the fact the items on multibuy promotions are flagged as soon as you add them to your basket so that you don't miss out. I've been on other sites that don't flag this up until you reach checkout which can be annoying so I definitely liked it.

I also liked the fact they won't charge you anymore if they substitute for something more expensive. Substitutions are often the worst part of online supermarket shopping and I've missed out on offers before because of this. And you can still reject the substitution when it turns up, and you can also reject anything you don't think is fresh enough too. They are meant also to put anything on a short date in blue bags but I had no short dated items - which is definite progress as many is the time I have had things delivered for a week and it has a use by date of the following day!

Tesco have added a special offer tab, giving details of all special offers. However, I didn't find this  particularly helpful. The groupings were too broad and you had long lists to wade through, even by departments and you couldn't filter down further. I also found product searches annoying. I searched for cauliflower and it made me choose from different departments. It didn't make clear that "Vegetables and Fruit" were frozen items! When I found the right category, one of the options was a cabbage. Equally, if you searched for yogurts, you had a great long list of products to look through and you weren't able to filter it further by type of yogurt (ie small pots, multipacks, large pots etc) or by manufacturer which would have speeded up finding the products I actually wanted. It's not fun wading through 200 items.

I would also like the option to sort the items in different ways - like showing the cheapest items at the top of the list, which I can do elsewhere. If you do that, you can just look at the items up to the budget you might have set yourself for that item. Without this, you had to scroll through the whole list. 

Finally, although delivery slots were plentiful, a two hour delivery slot is less convenient than the one hour slots I'm used to and I don't understand why Tesco do not offer it. I would have liked the option. The delivery man was very polite and brought all the boxes into the kitchen as I had opted not to have bags.

I think Tesco have made improvements and have made their grocery shopping online easier, but I do think they could still do more to make it user-friendly and quicker to complete a weekly shop.

Tesco have also given me voucher codes for £12 off a £50 spend for 10 of my blog readers to win so they can try Tesco.com grocery shopping too. Please note that these codes are for first time Tesco.com grocery shoppers only. The codes are valid from 28th February for orders delivered on or before 11th March 2011.

To be in with a chance of winning one of these codes, first follow my blog through Google Friend Connect, Networked Blogs or become an email subscriber. Then, leave a comment below and tell me your tip for saving money on your grocery shopping.

All entries must be received by midday on 28th February. The winners will be drawn at random. Codes will be emailed to the winners after the draw is made, so please ensure your email address is recorded in your Disqus profile or you leave an email address within your comment.

Terms and Conditions

1. There are 10 prizes of a code to receive £12 off your online grocery shop when you spend £50 or more. 

2. Code is valid from February 28th 2011 on a single grocery order, delivered on or before 11th March 2011. 

3. Customers must spend & have delivered £50 or more of groceries from Tesco.com/grocery. 

4. Purchases from Wine By the Case do not qualify. 

5. £50 minimum spend excludes purchases of tobacco, infant milk formulae, prescription medicines & the service charge. 

6. Valid on purchases from Tesco.com/grocery groceries site only. 

7. Valid for first-time Tesco.com grocery shoppers only. 

8. Cannot be used in conjunction with other coupons. This coupon is and shall remain the property of Tesco Stores Limited and is not for resale or publication.

9. All entrants must be following this blog via Google Friend Connect or Networked Blogs or be an email subscriber. 

10. Entries must be made via the comments on this post and all comments must be received before midday on Monday 28th February. 

11. Winners will be drawn at random from all qualifying entries. 

12. The Five Fs blog's decision on all matters is final.

(I was kindly given a voucher code for £50 off a £75 order so that I could try out Tesco's online grocery shopping site. I have received no other compensation. The opinions stated here are my own, and have not been influenced by the aforementioned compensation.)

Review: Tesco's Back to School Pack

So, a week or two ago, I was tagged by the lovely notSupermum to receive a Tesco Back to School pack. It arrived this morning, a bit late for most people's return to school, but still useful nonetheless, particularly as Monkey seems to wear out or destroy things, being the type of "typical" boy that runs around as much as he can at playtimes.

Inside this lovely box - which was fetchingly tied with a smart black bow - was all this:

2 skirts
2 pairs of boys trousers
1 pair of girls non-iron trousers
2 packs of 3 white polo shirts
1 pack of boys white shirts
1 girls white shirt
2 packs of pencils
2 packs of gel pens
2 packs of exercise books

And on top, a treat for Mummy - a £30 voucher to spend on the Clothing at Tesco website. Monkey and Missy Woo descended on the stationery as they LOVE pens, pencils and crayons (unfortunately, I don't as half of it has ended up on our walls at some point). Missy Woo even deliberately drew in all the other pages of her book that school gave her to do stuff in over the summer so that she could start on a pack of exercise book.

The clothing is of very nice quality, although obviously, we've not had chance to road test them fully through everyday wear and tear, and a wash. One thing I will say is that the most creased thing to come out of the box was the pair of girls non-iron trousers! Hmm, thinking that might need a bit of work on it as I reckon I'm going to have to iron them before Missy Woo gets round to wearing them. Pretty much everything is labelled as having "Dirt Defence" to help prevent stains and improve the removal of any stains in the wash. Again, this is another good thing for Monkey as he is one of the world's messiest eaters and is a big fan of pasta with tomato-based sauces. Time will tell whether they look as good after he's worn them a few times and I've washed them!

Overall, it was a great pack - something, literally, for everyone (except Daddy, he might have to have a look in on the voucher), so a big thanks to notSupermum for tagging me and giving us some Wednesday excitement as Monkey and Missy Woo LOVE parcels arriving for them to open!

(I was provided with a pack, contents listed as in the post, to review. This included a clothing voucher. I  have received no other compensation. The opinions stated here are my own, and have not been influenced by this compensation.)