The Briar Club by Kate Quinn, with Saskia Maarleveld (Narrator), was an assignment for one of my groups.
This is a historical book based on facts, with mostly made up characters. I was fine with the blending of fiction and history.
There are a lot of characters, I liked all of them. I found it easy to tell who is the subject of each section and keep their stories straight.
Two tiny things I puzzled over, and could not decide what I thought -
One - Magical realism popped up in tiny bits. The magical realism did help tell the story, but it felt a bit out of place in a historical book. It either needed a bit more, or maybe none at all.
Two - The characters take turns cooking once a month, some of the recipes were included. They popped up in chapters. I think this was only a negative factor in Audio. I was stuck with listening to the full recipe or had to stop what I was doing, fast forward my phone. I like the fact the recipes were included, but I think they should have been all together in the front or the back of the book.
I maintain accounts on GoodReads and StoryGraph, thanks to youngest getting me organized.
StoryGraph -
In each book post, I utilize https://www.bookseriesinorder.com/
This is a wonderful website that helps clarify the publication order of books and verifies book series. I use this website because there are no spoilers. But if I need a description, I can click over using the links, easily. There are also author bios.
