I am a huge fan of R.J Ellory - I love Ellory's books, his books are really original with lots of meanings behind them -yet they are so easy to read. All I have read of Ellory's had really impressed me - no book being the same. I would compare this book to "To Kill A Mockingbird" - another amazing read which I highly recommend. Without giving too much away - The story follows the journey of Joseph's life which consists of sadness, challenges and moments which really tests his life. He has a shadow over him from something which has happened. The reader is drawn into this life, and you feel nothing but sorrow for him. Joseph seems like am ...  Read the complete review

I bought this for my mother's birthday last year I think, and I noticed it on her bookshelf a few weeks ago so I decided to give it a read. I must admit that on looking at the first few pages, I wasn't sure it was really my cuppa tea. I'm glad I persevered as it was definitely worth a read, if not for the storyline itself then for Ellory's almost poetic writing style. I think two things made me buy this book; firstly the blurb on the back which made it sound like a mysterious crime/thriller (which I knew my mum liked & I love at the moment too) and secondly because it had a Richard & Judy Galaxy Book Club Award sticker on the front from 2008. ...  Read the complete review

"...rumor had it that a white feather indicated a visitation of an angel." A quote from R J Ellory's A Quiet Belief in Angels and the premise on which the story is built. Joseph Vaughan is a young boy who, at the beginning of the book. comes to believe that a white feather from an angel is a portent of tragedy and tragedy surrounds this boy's childhood, following him throughout his life. In 1939, in the small town of Augusta Falls in Georgia, there is the first of what is to become an obscene series of child murders. The young Joseph, a sensitive boy of twelve years old, is deeply affected by the horrific events and feels that he has ...  Read the complete review

I had never heard of R.J.Ellory before and I only chose to buy this book as part of a Richard and Judy book club deal. But I was pleasantly surprised when I started reading it and found that it was hard to put it down. It is set in a small southern town in America at the start of world war 2 and up to sometime during the vietnam war (late 60's I think). The narrator is a man named Joseph Vaughan who lives with his mum in Augusta Falls, his Dad having died when he was young. The story follows him as he grows up and is slowly involved with the murders of young girls in his town and other counties close by (although he doesn't actually kill them). After his girlfriend Alex .  Read the complete review

A Quiet Belief in Angels is a fantastically powerful and evocative piece of writing. From the start you are drawn into the eventful life of Joseph Vaughan, a 12 year old school boy who matures and changes throughout the book and endures both poignant and difficult events alongside the reader. Both Joseph's future and his reputation become inter-linked with that of a serial child-killer; and through the book's many twist and turns we learn the fate of Joseph, his family, friends and loved ones. As Joseph ages, the serial killer continues to commit his crimes, and Joseph's own future hinges on the killer's next moves. Impressively swift; the book ...  Read the complete review