Martine Bailey
Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ Author
Born
in Manchester, The United Kingdom
Website
Twitter
Genre
Influences
Daphne du Maurier, Mary Renault, Sarah Waters, the North of England, H
...more
Member Since
January 2012
URL
/martineanne
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Popular Answered Questions
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An Appetite for Violets
20 editions
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published
2013
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A Taste for Nightshade
11 editions
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published
2015
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The Almanack
10 editions
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published
2019
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Sharp Scratch
3 editions
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published
2024
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Prophet, The (A Tabitha Hart mystery, 2)
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Isolation Ward: The nail-biting psychological thriller
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Sharp Scratch: Lorraine Quick, Book 1
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The Prophet
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Isolation Ward: Lorraine Quick, Book 2
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Martine’s Recent Updates
Martine Bailey
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Martine Bailey
rated a book it was amazing
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I have long been a reader of Louisa Treger’s fascinating explorations of women's' lives. I knew of Picasso’s art but confess I knew almost nothing about Dora Maar. The Paris Muse revealed that Dora was photographer and artist with her own unique eye. ...more | |
"decent thriller. did not like any of the characters but that worked well. thanks for the arc, would recommend"
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"This is pre-release edition for review purposes and as a fan of 1980s music and crime drama I found Martine Bailey's Sharp Scratch ticked a lot of boxes for me. So, if you like a gritty, suspenseful read with a great plot and enjoy P.D. James or some"
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"Martine Bailey’s skill in bringing the past to life takes a brilliant new turn with Sharp Scratch, which evokes the gritty reality of a 1980s northern city with the brooding tension of Manchester’s post-punk finest. In the corridors of a run-down hos"
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“On December the twenty-third, the park was hazy from clammy mists that muted and softened all color and distance. Michael had not set off for Whitelow after breakfast, so I bundled myself into my redingote that was as thick and warm as a man's, and pulled on my sable hat and muff. Even so, the chill pinched my nose as I hurried along paths of mushy leaves, sending startled birds pink-pinking up into the air. Claw-like seed pods clung to my skirts; the fine flowers of summer drooped slimy and black. I collected a few posies of evergreens to paint: stiff pine cones, jewel-like berries of black and scarlet, and oval seed pods as lustrous as pearl.”
― A Taste for Nightshade
― A Taste for Nightshade
“Next morning I had to get outside, and so began a period of long walks in the park. Early November continued bright, with the last sun of the year shining low and coppery over the woods. Striding through heaps of rusty autumn leaves, I ached to see beauty dying all around me. I felt completely alone in that rambling wilderness, save for the crows cawing in their rookeries and the wrens bobbing from hedge to hedge. I began to make studies in my book of the delicate lines of drying grasses and frilled seed pods. I looked for some lesson on how best to live from Nature, that every year died and was renewed, but none appeared.”
― A Taste for Nightshade
― A Taste for Nightshade
“The track led into a sort of tunnel made of forest. They left daylight behind, a thousand leaves hemming them into dusky shade. As she traipsed behind Jack's torn blue jacket, he squinted into the foliage, hearkening to every cracking twig or bird-chirrup. After what seemed an age, they came out into blessed sunshine again. They were in a clearing, their ears filled with a thundering wind, the air itself trembling. A few paces further they came upon the source: above them, a waterfall tumbled from a clifftop as high as a church steeple. The water fell in milky blue strands, shooting spray in the air that danced in rainbows of gold, pink and blue. At their feet was a deep and inviting lagoon. It fair took her breath away.
Jack crouched to look at the pool's edge, where a mud bank was scrabbled with marks.
"We should go back," he said. "Something drinks here."
She didn't care. She was spellbound. "Look, a cave!" Across the lagoon stood a dark entrance hung with pretty mosses, like a fairy grotto.
"Just one peep," she whispered, for there was something powerful and secret about the place. "Then we can go back."
But Jack was still peering at the tracks around the water's edge.
"Whatever drinks here, it's not here now. I dare you, Jack. A quick look around the cave and then we'll be on our way." She had a notion, from some story or other, that caves were places where treasure was hidden; she reckoned pirates might have left jewels and plunder behind long ago.
"It's the end of the rainbow," she laughed. "Let's find our crock of gold.”
― A Taste for Nightshade
Jack crouched to look at the pool's edge, where a mud bank was scrabbled with marks.
"We should go back," he said. "Something drinks here."
She didn't care. She was spellbound. "Look, a cave!" Across the lagoon stood a dark entrance hung with pretty mosses, like a fairy grotto.
"Just one peep," she whispered, for there was something powerful and secret about the place. "Then we can go back."
But Jack was still peering at the tracks around the water's edge.
"Whatever drinks here, it's not here now. I dare you, Jack. A quick look around the cave and then we'll be on our way." She had a notion, from some story or other, that caves were places where treasure was hidden; she reckoned pirates might have left jewels and plunder behind long ago.
"It's the end of the rainbow," she laughed. "Let's find our crock of gold.”
― A Taste for Nightshade
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“The poetry of history lies in the quasi-miraculous fact that once, on this earth, once, on this familiar spot of ground, walked other men and women, as actual as we are today, thinking their own thoughts, swayed by their own passions, but now all gone, one generation vanishing into another, gone as utterly as we ourselves shall shortly be gone, like ghosts at cockcrow.”
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“My definition of man is a cooking animal. The beasts have memory, judgement, and the faculties and passions of our minds in a certain degree; but no beast is a cook.”
― The Journals, 1762-95
― The Journals, 1762-95
“A man may meet a woman and be shocked by her ugliness. Soon, if she is natural and unaffected, her expression makes him overlook the faults of her features. He begins to find her charming, it enters his head that she might be loved, and a week later he is living in hope. The following week he has been snubbed into despair, and the week afterwards he has gone mad. (Chapter 17)”
― Love
― Love

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