The blurb for this book made me think it was going to be a 1920s murder mystery. It isn't, at least not in the way fans of the genre might expect! It's more of a take on the vampire trope than a murder mystery novel, and it owes more to gothic horror than to Agatha Christie, so be warned, if that's not your thing, this isn't the book for you. From the title, I genuinely thought the cocktail Nora drinks would have more of a role, given that absinthe has a reputation for being hallucinogenic, but that aspect was never fully explored in the book, which was a surprise to me given that psychoanalysis was also a main character, and I felt it was a missed opportunity. Overall, the book is well written and very readable, but the ending was lacking for me, and didn't deliver on all the set up, hence only 3 stars.

mingham, the UK’s unofficial ‘Second City’, features surprisingly little in contemporary thriller writing, so I was interested in how Kate Mascarenhas would use the city as a setting. I was not disappointed. We meet the novel’s heroine, Dr Nora Dickinson, in the 1920s and as soon as her job as a psychoanalysist is mentioned, we know we are in for a good read as this profession was highly unusual for women of the 1920s. When it becomes clear that Nora operates a sideline as a private investigator, the novel gets more exciting still. What will Nora find when she starts to shadow hedonistic opera singer Berenice?
An unexpected snowstorm finds both women holed up in the opulent Regent Hotel and the atmosphere is becoming more and more gothic, with people disappearing, a huge dog that appears in Faustian fashion to Nora but then fades away, and a ramping up of the threatening atmosphere. As other readers have commented before me, what makes this thriller so excellent is its precise prose combined with the acute psychological insights into the main characters. There are some passages that are overly long (the passages on Nora’s childhood and her prior links to Berenice’s husband, for example) but the overall effect is a fantastic gothic thriller that brings to life a fictional portrait of the 1920s and that deserves a wide readership. Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for the free ARC that made this book review possible.

Normally I would start off my review with a brief overview of the story I've read but, as this book is so unique, I actually think that it's something that needs to be experienced firsthand. Therefore, I'm going to skip my take on the story lest I ruin Hokey Pokey's mystique. Onto the review...

First off, I would just like to say WOW. This book truly was something special. I love a story with magical realism, and this was exactly that. At some parts gross, at others beautiful, Hokey Pokey made me feel all the emotions. Kate Mascarenhas' writing style was beautiful and I loved every second of it.

One of my favourite things about this story was the fact that I had no idea what was going on and what was real at any point, in the best possible way. I also found it interesting, reading this, that all of the characters should have been unlikeable - being selfish, deluded, obnoxious, etc - but for some reason, I adored them all.

Overall, I loved everything about this book and would recommend it highly.

In Hokey Pokey, Mascarenhas has written a novel that is somewhat difficult to categorise. The advertising would have it that this is a locked room type mystery, set in a snowed-in hotel in Birmingham with the usual catalogue of players / suspects. However, the reality is somewhat different. the book is more of a gothic horror, albeit lacking in any real feeling of horror or suspense - the atmosphere does not convey the right level of suspense, horror or malevolence that was surely intended.

Readers who come to the book expecting the former will be disappointed - there is a mystery aspect to the book, but it is secondary to the rather supernatural content. On the other hand, the correct market for the book may well not find it due to the thrust of the advertising.

Characters are reasonably well drawn, although the main protagonist seems to be something of an unreliable narrator, and it is difficult to empathise with her or indeed any of the other characters in the book.

Aimed at the right market, this could be a good seller but at present there is something of a disconnect between the pitch and the target.

I enjoyed this book, I was attracted by the unusual description of it. Set in 1929, in the Regent Hotel in Birmingham, a psychoanalyst checks in to the hotel under a false name. Although this is fictional history, there is a glamour about it. The book is very atmospheric.
The story is a mixture of crime, magic and romance. The two main characters are women. In many ways they are typical of that time. As I settled into reading this book I realised it was not going to be straightforward, it took twists and turns from an everyday setting to magical events and mythical plots. It was however easy to follow, that is important to me when the story changes so much.
This was an unusual read, something that I appreciated for a change to my usual reading.
I look forward to more books by this author.

Not your standard murder mystery!

The book opens with a sumptuous description of the hotel - it takes the reader straight into the setting, following Nora as she moves through the building and it sounds exquisite - Art Deco opulence at its finest. The style reminded me a little of the opening to programmes like Downton Abbey, where the camera follows someone through a building, picking up all the little details that identify the set as that of a period drama.

From the blurb and the front cover, I'd been expecting a straightforward crime novel, something that lay somewhere between cosy and proper crime but with a 1920s twist, perhaps akin to an Agatha Christie whodunnit, but perhaps a little darker in tone. However, it quickly became apparent that this book was anything but that! It was much more supernatural in tone and became extremely dark in places. I think the supernatural element may put some readers off, as it isn't mentioned specifically in the blurb, however, I loved it because it's what gives the book its unique character. It's a very unusual concept, but it's utterly compelling and it is this which leaves the reader never quite sure where they are and what's going on. In this instance, this is a good thing because it keeps them engaged and reading on in an attempt to find out what on earth is going on.

Reading the book is an experience in itself - just when you think you have a handle on it, something happens to throw you off balance again. Slowly the disparate elements begin to come together to form a cohesive story and as the pieces fall into place, it all begins to make a horrible sort of sense. Bordering on the macabre in places, this is not a book for the faint-hearted, but if you have the stomach for it, it's well worth a read. It defied every pre-conception I had about it and I absolutely loved it. At times it left me shaking my head, feeling a little nauseous and none of the characters are particularly likeable, but there's something about the whole package that is magical and the ending left me anxious for their future in so many ways.

Hokey Pokey has established Kate Mascarenhas as an auto-buy author for me. I have really enjoyed all her books so far, if enjoyed is the word for something so disturbing and addictive.

Stepping into The Regent is stepping into a world that is both dazzling and hazy, understated and dark.

Nora is a psychoanalyst, who has followed her friends wife from Zurich to England, in an attempt to discover her affair. But when a snowstorm traps everyone from travel, and disappearances and murders begin, you find a lot more to this story than a 20s murder mystery.

This book had me questioning whether the psychological side of this story was more disturbing than the Brothers Grimm style violence, and had me gripped from start to finish. Thank you so much netgalley for the e-arc of this book.

This book was well written and I am sure would be enjoyed my many people. However, it’s not a genre which I enjoy. If I had realised that it was supernatural- a genre which I have never enjoyed, I wouldn’t have applied to read it.

Having said that, I found Nora and Berenice intriguing and enjoyed their blossoming relationship.

If you enjoy supernatural books then this is for you.

100% not what I was expecting at all….this is not a bad thing as it meant I went into the book pleasantly surprised and this continued throughout! A beautiful cover from the debut from this author, I am looking forward to reading more from this author. A great story related to the supernatural - I would recommend!

The 1920s is such a special decade, full of discords. The bright young things and the shell-shocked. The optimism for the future and the inevitability of more war. The development of travel technology and the closing in of nationalism. It’s famous, of course, for Lovecraft’s existential horror, and the beginning of the golden age of crime. And Hokey Pokey sits somewhere squarely between that monstrous horror and desire for a good cosy mystery, with some cultural dissonance mixed in for good measure.

Hokey Pokey follows Nora, a psychiatrist and apparent investigator, as she follows opera icon Berenice to the opulent Regent Hotel in Birmingham, hoping to find evidence of her infidelity to report back to Berenice’s husband. However, a snow storm and some grisly murders mean that Nora and Berenice are stuck together, stranded in the hotel, and find common ground as they investigate further. This precis fails to cover the monstrous weirdness that also pervades this book, seeping in at its edges, like the melting snow outside the Regent, until the book is flooded with it.

At first, I wasn’t sure I was going to like Nora. I have a dislike for detectives who have some kind of otherworldly skill that means only they can solve mysteries — think Sherlock Holmes’s extra-ordinary feats of deduction, or Will Graham’s ‘affinity’ for serial killers. At first Nora appears to have an otherworldly skill … but then it is situated as otherworldly. Nora is very much not your average detective, and this somehow levels the playing field, as the very nature of her extraordinariness comes to the fore of the story.

In Berenice, there is the perfect celebrity idol, in this decade that was just starting to understand the power of celebrity. Berenice brings a glamour and hedonism that is infectious, and I very much enjoyed Nora falling under her spell. It always makes me happy when an apparently heteronormative narrative turns Sapphic!

While the mystery comes to play second fiddle to the weirder, more fairytale-like elements of the story, Hokey Pokey is still an excellent read for those who like to identify a monster. And while it’s not apparent from the very beginning, the horror and fantastical elements in Hokey Pokey will appeal to a wide range of niche audiences.

Hokey Pokey is released on June 8th, and is available to preorder here.

Review written with thanks to the publishers and Netgalley.co.uk for providing an e-advanced review copy.

Well that escalated quickly! This book was not what I expected - I thought it was going to be a thriller set in a hotel in the late 1920’s and it was, but it was also so much more! If you enjoy the supernatural and vampire type stories then this is the book for you! I enjoyed the trip out of my comfort zone!

This is a completely different read than I thought it would be I was thinking Agatha Christie as it is set in the 1920,s in a glamorous hotel in Birmingham.It is not like that at all though it starts off well with the disappearance of a guest and the hotel is snowed in but then it turns into mad fantasy with a creature called a hyring which is able to access a room through a mirror so for me I didn't really enjoy the last part of the story too dark and weird .Thanks to NetGalley for my ARC.

A debut novel for this author and I feel it was well written. Loved the mystery and the thrill of the story. Look forward to more from this author.

This was an unusual but compelling read. It was not what I expected but it was an intriguing tale non the less. There were clear Agatha Christie vibes - the story is set to a 1920s backdrop, the hotel guests are snowed in and there is a game afoot.
Not the historical fiction I expected but still a good read.

This book was an instant favourite. Its flashbacks slowly fleshed out the protagonist and had some truly chilling moments. It had elements of mystery and a slightly indefinite ending to really get the imagination going. Massive recommend!

Hokey Pokey is my first book from Kate Mascarenhas and I am impressed. An escapist, supernatural, part-historical, part-crime novel with some truly original characters. At first glance it appears to be a locked-room mystery but Hokey Pokey proves to be so much more than that. I'd compare it to The seven deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle. The cover is gorgeous and accurately captures what a multi-layered, slippery, lush novel this is.

I read an eARC of this book so thank you to Net Galley, the author and the publisher for allowing this.

This book was far darker than I expected. From the blurb I wasn’t expecting the graphic horror that was contained. It was a really well written book but I’d strongly advise checking content warnings if there are subjects you find distressing before reading this. I might not have read this if I was aware in advance of some of the content it contained.

Warning aside, it’s excellent writing, tense, atmospheric, creepy. I read a previous book by this author that I found fascinating so I was keen to read more from them. While the earlier book was around time travel, this novel centres on psychology. There’s often times when you’re wondering what’s real and what’s not in this book, and questioning the sanity of many of the characters. We have an unreliable narrator in this story and we learn more about what has happened in her past to explain her behaviour in the present.

The setting of the hotel is unnerving, particularly as the guests are trapped in through heavy snow. The cast of characters are deliberately unlikeable leaving you unsure who to trust. Some very good reveals in the present storyline.

I did find this very well written, tense and engaging. It is very dark and if you enjoy that style of book then this has a lot to offer.

I chose this book based on the cover and the blurb - thinking it would be a 1920's Agatha Christie type of murder mystery, so I was a little surprised by the direction the writing took. It is set in a hotel, a fictional Birmingham hotel in February 1929. The descriptions of the hotel are wonderful - the different rooms, the staff including the female floor wardens(!), the cocktails, and the lazy wealth of everyone there.
However, from there on in the book diverges from a traditional whodunnit. Nora Capek or Nora Dickinson is staying in the hotel in order to track somebody down, but as we learn more about her past, we find there is a lot more going on than first meets the eye. It is hard to be more precise without giving away much of the plot, but true to say the book becomes much darker and gruesome than any Agatha Christie I've ever read.
My main reason for not giving the book a higher score is that I didn't much like the main character. She appears unsure of who she is - with reason as we find out later - but I disliked the way she was bullied by her mother and then by Leo. I also found the section in Zurich with Leo quite long and involved without enough pace or enough to keep my interest.
I actually did enjoy the ending and found the final few chapters of the book, when several threads are pulled together, and I had understood what was going on, to be rewarding and satisfying.
All in all, not what I was expecting and possibly not a book I'd have chosen to read. Quite gruesome, gothic and fantastical, and not really fitting easily into any one genre.
With thanks to Netgalley and Head of Zeus for an arc copy in return for an honest review.

This was a very surprising book in that the blurb on the back doesn’t give you any clue of the horrors and darkness to come. You think you’re starting on a Agatha Christie-esque thriller and soon you’re dealing with something very much darker.
The book actually kept me really gripped until the end which seemed rushed and a bit confused. Until the last 50 pages I was enjoying the very dark direction it was taking.
Thank you to Net Galley for this surprisingly gripping read.

Hokey Pokey by Kate Mascarenhas was one of those books that I couldn’t put down until I finished it and left me thinking about the story long after I finished the book- but while I’m still not sure if this was a book I liked, it is a book I won’t forget!
I received a copy for a free and unbiased opinion.
I was looking forward to a complicated psychological story and while there were elements of this, the book took a marked turn into another genre ( I don’t want to spoil the twist) which threw me. Nora is a complex character and her story is revealed bit by bit, I was never quite sure what was real and what wasn’t ( I really enjoyed this bit). There is also a murder in the background which adds more tension and mystery to the story as well as an interesting romance.
I loved the description of a British hotel in 1929, fascinating and the author has done her research with plenty of period detail.
I did feel there was a lot going on, and at times I found it hard to keep track of all the strands. I have to admit to having a strong physical reaction to one of the references to cannibalism which I think is a mark of the author’s skill as a writer,
I’ve would recommend Hokey Pokey would enjoy a book that challenges them but with plenty of atmospheres and historical detail.
Content Warning
References to Cannibalism