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'''Read [[Forthcoming Publications|reviews of books about to be published]].
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1914585402David Chadwick|title=Dashboard Elvis is Dead|author=David F RossHeadload of Napalm
|rating=4.5
|genre=General FictionThrillers|summary=I reviewed David F RossIt's book [[There's Only One Danny Garvey by David F Ross|There's Only One Danny Garvey]] September 1973 in Hicks, California. Hicks is a Mojave desert town of a couple few thousand people with its nearest neighbours of years back LA and remember being absolutely floored by how powerful Las Vegas both a significant drive away. Not much happens in Hicks. A silver mine and affecting it was. It was a grippingdefence contractor are the main local employers but otherwise, emotionally wounding readthere's not much of note other than dive bars and Joshua trees. Life is quiet, and rereading my review of it my main takeaway was that I might not have lavished enough praise on ituntil....|isbn= B0D321VJ76
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=178563335XTom Percival|title=Sea Defences|author=Hilary TaylorThe Wrong Shoes
|rating=5
|genre=Literary FictionConfident Readers|summary=When we first meet Rachel Bird sheWill's a trainee vicarlife is difficult, sitting in on a PCC meeting multitude of ways. He is bullied because he has 'the wrong shoes', he has the wrong shoes because his dad can't work and wondering why theydoesn're held when you need to pick t have enough money for even the children up. Her husbandmost basic of things like food, Christopherand his dad can't work because he lost his job at the college, collects sixwas working a cash-yearin-old Hannah hand job on a building site and her elder brother, Jamie, whilst Rachel holds a sobbing parishionerhad an accident. ThelmaThrow into that mix the fact that his mum and dad are separated, and Will's daughter-life seems bleak in-law won't let her see her grandsonevery direction. Holthorpe, on the Norfolk coastAnd yet, he still has a tiny amount of hope. He is a lovely placegood at art, but Rachel is struggling and clings to develop a real bond with the parish - and she's in awe moments of the vicar, Gailjoy when he is drawing, but then she's been doing the job for more than thirty years. Rachel and Christopher hoped that feel like a walk on light at the beach would do them some good - it was stormy but it was probably what they needed. And then Hannah went missingend of a long, dark tunnel.|isbn=1398527122
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{{Frontpage
|author=Hadeer ElsbaiSylvie Cathrall|title=The Daughters of IzdiharA Letter to the Luminous Deep|rating=45|genre=FantasyScience Fiction|summary= Drawing inspiration from Egypt, ''The Daughters of Izdihar'' explores the There are few greater joys than a book which lives of two women who could not be more different, yet find themselves fighting for the rights of women and weavers – those with magical abilities - in a society pitted against them. Nehal, born into the upper class, wishes to attend the Weaving Academy up to learn to control her abilities and then join the military, but instead she is forced into an arranged marriage with Nico. Giorgina on the other hand did not have a privileged upbringing like Nehal and feels great pressure to provide for her family and maintain their reputation, whilst secretly attending meetings of the Daughters of Izdihar – a group campaigning for women's rights. Giorgina also happens to be in love with Nicocompelling premise. What follows And this is a story one of an unjust society, filled with hypocrisy and cruelty, from which blossoms a group of admirable women fighting for their rights and overcoming their personal obstaclesthem.|isbn=03565204710356522776
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Sarah Todd Taylor0008517061|title=Alice Eclair, Spy Extraordinaire! A Spoonful of SpyingDeath in a Lonely Place|author=Stig Abell
|rating=4
|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=[[Alice EclairFormer Metropolitan Police detective, Spy Extraordinaire! A Recipe for Trouble by Sarah Todd Taylor|Last time around]]Jake Johnson, Alice Eclair had to prove herself as has settled into his rustic life at Little Sky. There’s perhaps a spy little uncertainty about the future of his life with his vet girlfriend, Livia and her daughter Diana, as moving in together would mean a master at all things French and fancy lot of compromise: does Jake give up his off-grid and fondant, as the only way relaxing life to save the day involved being an expert baker and icer on the French railways. Here, we start on a bateau-mouche move in Paris, and even though with Livia or does Livia move to Little Sky despite her reservations about whether or not this is the espionage isn't a complete success it proves to Alice future she wants for herself and her handlers that things are afoot. daughter? And there will never be more feet than at For the World's Fair, reviving moment they’re enjoying life in the huge expo that gave the city the Eiffel Tower present and this time showing all her interwar glories off to putting the world. Once again Alice will have to present future on the front to the world of being a humble yet world-class cake decorator, while seeking out cluesback burner. At stake? Pioneering flight technology that the enemy just cannot be allowed to smuggle out…|isbn=1839940972
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Amanthi Harris1786482126|title=Beautiful PlaceThe Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths|rating=4.5|genre=Literary FictionCrime|summary= Padma, a young Sri Lankan, has returned Builders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the site was going to hold seventy-five 'luxury' apartments - when they discovered the Villa Hibiscus on the southern coast bones of her home countrya child beneath a doorway. There was no skull. This is Was this a place she spent her formative yearsritual killing or murder? Inevitably, Dr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. It 's difficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn't, that she is not pregnant with his child as a place she was born into, but result of the one she thinks of as homenight they spent together some three months ago. How she came to Her condition will be at the Villaobvious before long, how it became her home, and the machinations that have flowed through her life ever since she first arrived there provide the ''score'' for this gentle and yet subtly violent novel. Padma's present fails not least because Ruth is prone to escape her past and much like the musical score sudden bouts of a film, that strand weaves its way through everything that happens at the Villasickness.|isbn=1784631930
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Nigel Baines0008551324|title=A Tricky Kind of MagicThe Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster
|rating=4.5
|genre=Emerging ReadersCrime|summary=Cooper loves It's unusual for anyone from the Hardie family to perform magic tricksapproach the police. His father was a magician, and named Cooper after Neither side likes or has any respect for the great Tommy Cooperother. But sadly CooperDavie Hardie is struggling in prison and he's father died suddenly, prepared to tell the police where the body of a missing person is buried and now Cooper doesn't quite know who to bewas responsible for her death. This person, he promises, or how to is someone big and it will beworth the police doing what he wants. And when what he wants is to be transferred to an open prison to serve the remainder of his dad's prop rabbit starts talking sentence and to get an early parole date. Not much to himask, he ''really'' is it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't know think so and she's even prepared to do the other thing that Hardie demanded - make certain that DS Max Craigie and anyone who works with him is kept well away from what's going on anymore!|isbn=1444960261happening.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=15420372390008405026|title=Death A Stranger in Heelsthe Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Kitty MurphyJane Casey|rating=45
|genre=Crime
|summary=Set against the backdrop of DublinIt's drag scene, ''Death in Heels'' tells the story of Fi McKinnery and sixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her best friend, Robyn, who is about to debut as drag queen Mae Bbed one summer night. What is meant She was never found and the investigation ground to be a night of excitement soon takes a downward turn when fellow drag queenhalt. Now, Eveher mother, takes to the stage to mock Mae B. As if the night could not get any worseHelena, when Fi heads home she discovers Eve and her father are dead in a guttertheir bed. Fi is adamant that Eve was murdered Initially, yet it looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but there's something about the drag community, positioning of the bodies that makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and the Guards, accept her boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. What looked as though it as was going to be an accidentopen-and-shut case is now a complex double murder. Fi takes it upon herself to solve Kerrigan is convinced that the mystery explanation lies in Rosalie's disappearance: others (such as she fears for her friendsDerwent's boss, but instead ruins relationships as she delves deeperUna Burt) are less convinced.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=18004652700571379877|title=The Lensky ConnectionKellerby Code|author=Conrad DelacroixJonny Sweet|rating=43.5|genre=Thrillers|summary=When we first meet Major Valeri Grozky, it's June 1995 and he's at the Serafimov Cemetry in St Petersburg. He's a pallbearer for his elder brother, Timur, whose death was drug-related. Valeri and Timur's father, Keto, is also a pallbearer and he's disgusted by what his son had become. Valeri thinks differently: he's determined to make his own stand against organised crime and avenge Timur's death. Within a matter of months, his obsession will have cost him his marriage to Marisha and created a dubious link with Natassja Petrovskaya, a journalist. She's determined to expose any and all corruption - and she's less concerned than she ought to be about her own safety. To her, he's a good source. For him, it's a way to get information published, which wouldn't otherwise be possible.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1399702289|title=A World of Curiosities (Chief Inspector Gamache)|author=Louise Penny|rating=5
|genre=Crime
|summary=After Edward Jevons is a harsh winterworking-class young man, obsessed with his upper-class friends, the tiny Canadian village of Three Pines is enjoying the arrival of spring. But something is worrying Chief Inspector Armand Gamache Robert and Inspector Jean-Guy Beauvoir of the Sûreté du QuébecStanza. Gamache had offered help to Robert's a young woman after the murder of her mother: he'd been less certain about her charismatic brothertheatre director. For JeanHe's also self-Guyobsessed, demanding, it had always been the other way aroundhandsome and entitled and uses Edward to run errands for him. Now they're both Edward has been in the village love with Stanza since their university days - and neither can fathom whathe's happeningdrunkenly confided how he feels to Robert. Armand will soon find Most men in Robert's position would stay away from Stanza or tell Edward that theya relationship had begun between them but he're s not just like most men: Edward is left to stumble upon the two of them kissing in Three Pines but in his home and in his lifea dark passageway.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=B0BHR8KWSKJo Callaghan|title=Dukkha|author=Martin HydeLeave No Trace
|rating=4
|genre=HorrorCrime|summary=Sam wakes up chained in When a basement. He rails against his captor and man is found crucified on the injustice top of his imprisonment? Why? a hill in Nuneaton, DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to the case alongside her sidekick, the AI detective Lock. It''Why?'' s their first live case together, having previously been very successful with several cold cases. But of coursewhen there is a second body found crucified a few days later, he knows why. Sam Kat is an erstwhile drug dealer who escaped this down suddenly struggling with a potential serial killer and dirty life by going to a retreat and emerging as very high profile case that draws a neophyte Buddhist monklot of unwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. Recently returning Will they be able to join solve the community case in his old neighbourhoodtime, he knew his past would be hard to escape but he hadn't imagined it exploding into this new life in quite such or will Kat find herself taken off the case and, potentially, out of a violent fashion.career?|isbn=139851120X
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=B09XWSXSKY1399613073|title=Maestro Orpheus and the World ClockMoral Injuries|author=Robert Penee and Joanne GrodzinskiChristie Watson|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersThrillers|summary=Frederick (or FredOlivia, but never Freddy, please) couldn't sleep. A tune, rather like Laura and Anjali met on the ticking first day of medical school and their friendship would keep them inseparable for a quarter of a clock was playing over and over in his mindcentury. It happened every time he came Olivia is ruthlessly ambitious, which is a bonus when you aim to visit his grandfatherbe a cardiothoracic surgeon. He hadn't really wanted to come; after all, he's ten now Laura is a perfectionist and all those old clocks don't appeal to him anymorea trauma doctor. ''Who needs old clocks anyway? All they do Anjali is tell the timefree spirit of the group and she becomes a GP. And time isnWhen we first meet them they're at a drug and alcohol-fuelled party and it't good for anything..s going to end in tragedy. We don'' And that was why he was looking at t know who suffered the clock beside tragedy or the bedconsequences. It was nearly twelve o'clock but at midnight Twenty-five years later there will be an eerily similar event that will impact the clock chimed only six timesthree friends. There was nothing for This time, it but to go and find grandad - but where was he? And why had all the clocks stopped at twelve o'clock?s their teenage children who are involved.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=37562287110241636604|title=CDCThe Trading Game: The happy years with a spectacular IT 'Phenomena'A Confession|author=Hans BodmerGary Stevenson|rating=4.5|genre=HistoryAutobiography|summary=If you were to bring up an image of a city banker in your mind, you''The history re unlikely to think of someone like Gary Stevenson. A hoodie and jeans replaces the pin-stripe suit and his background is the East End, where he was familiar with violence, poverty and injustice. There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to the development of IT could fill books London School of several hundred pagesEconomics.'' Author Hans Bodmer Stevenson is quite right about thatbright - extremely bright - and he has a facility with numbers which most of us can only envy. He has chosen also realised that most rich people expect poor people to tell us about the shortbe stupid. It was his ability at what was, but explosiveessentially, history of the Control Data Company, CDC, for whom he workeda card game which got him an internship with Citibank. It's a fascinating tale Eventually, told in this turned into permanent employment as a mixture of technological summary and wry anecdotetrader.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=15293566601035021803|title=The SanctuaryAntique Hunter's Guide to Murder|author=Emma HaughtonC L Miller
|rating=3.5
|genre=ThrillersCrime|summary=It was 's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to the quiet which woke Zoey English country village where she grew up - or. She's back now because of a request for help from her beloved aunt, Carole. Freya's former mentor and Carole's close friend, ratherArthur Crockleford, is dead and the absence of circumstances seem suspicious, to say the noise which was a constant in New Yorkleast. Here it Arthur was silent and the heat was overwhelmingreason why Freya had not been back to the village: Arthur, she feels, let her down badly. When Even though they were in business together as antique hunters, she looked out of has not felt able to be near the man or pursue the window all profession she could see was the desertloved. How did she get here? Zoey was house-sitting for Uncle Dan and his two Manx cats and she remembered that she'd been out with Franny and Rocco last night. She knew that she'd had quite a lot to drink but how could she have got to After the desert from New York? She had no memory of getting on a plane but as split, she thought back, worked in a memory of sirenscafe, flashing lights met and of being pushed into a car snagged married James (on the edge rebound from the love of her mindlife, who was murdered) and Freya and James have now divorced.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=AllTomorrowsFutureCover
|title=All Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt
|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)
|rating=5
|genre=Science Fiction
|summary=''Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to come.''
I've heard it said that 'technology' is what happens after you're eighteen. Well, I must confess that there have been more than a few decades of technology in my lifetime. I've kept up reasonably well with what's advantageous to me but I'm left with the feeling that it's all getting away from me. Some of it is - frankly - quite frightening. Of course, I could research the possibilities and the probabilities and end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who knows what they're talking about or the latest conspiracy theorist. I needed people I knew I could trust and who could deliver information in a way I could understand.
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Christopher GoldenSunny Singh|title=Road of BonesHotel Arcadia
|rating=3.5
|genre=HorrorThrillers |summary=The Kolyma Highway… the 'Road of Bones'… the R504. Stretching for Hotel Arcadia is a luxury hotel in an unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a thousand miles across Siberia, it's one of the world's most notorious routesterrorist group. For months of Hiding from the year it's a spread of sheet ice suspended above the permafrost surrounding itterrorists who are rampaging through, while its 'spring' sees it turn into a huge blodge of unremittingkilling everyone on site, apocalyptic-level mudthere is Sam, which dries into rutteda wartime photographer and Abhi, puddly dustthe hotel manager. I don't think google streetview updates it very often. Built because Stalin wanted so much uranium and other Siberian minerals, and because he wanted As Abhi continues to try to give too many people a lesson, it legendarily cost a life every metre it covers. You can easily find documentaries about it online, but that's a bit rich, care remotely for one of our main charactersthe residents who are still alive in the hotel, Felix 'Teig' Teigland, is a film-maker, doing he forms a recce bond with his cameraman buddy, John Prentiss – Sam who's mostly there refuses to encourage the project be cowed by events, and keeps on venturing out of her room to fruition try to claw back some of the funds he'd invested in the paircapture what's prior TV projectshappened through her photography. They pick up their oh-so-chatty local guide, gain Although they only ever talk over the company of a local beautyphone, their friendship grows as Abhi tries to help her keep safe and fetch up at they both wait to see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by the guide's childhood villageterrorists. And that's where things start to go awry…|isbn=1803361476086154742X
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=18387761841529153298|title=Her Majesty the Queen Investigates: Murder Most RoyalThe List of Suspicious Things|author=S J BennettJennie Godfrey
|rating=5
|genre=CrimeGeneral Fiction|summary=It''The Queen, like the sunrise s 1979 and the tidesMargaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, was generally a reliable way of marking timehonestly...) She's not what's worrying Miv' It seemed to begin as a colds family, though. Women have been disappearing. Hardly surprisingWell, reallythey've been murdered, as Prince Philip had been suffering for a couple of days but seemed to be getting betterhave 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Hopefully, the Queen thought, Miv's upset because she's overheard that her cold would go father wants to move the same wayfamily 'Down South'. SheWhen you'd probably caught it re from one of the great-grandchildrenYorkshire, Down South is a frightening, foreign place, best avoided. UnfortunatelyFor Miv, it didn't get better and when the doctor called he diagnosed full-blown flu. She move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and the Duke were due she'll do anything to go to Sandringham by train prevent that day but the doctor put his foot down. HeShe'd have preferred that the queen have a few days' bed rest before venturing out but had to be satisfied with s not worried about the thought dangers or that theyher Mum'd go by helicopter the following day. It was annoying: people would be ready for her today and Her Majesty did not like s stopped talking - to disappointanyone.
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Peter Owen Jones1398524085|title=Conversations with NatureHas Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Nicci French
|rating=5
|genre=Spirituality and ReligionCrime|summary= One of the comments made when I Charlotte Salter was offered this beautiful book for review was that itexpected at her husband's not very longfiftieth birthday party but never turned up. Having read the book twice overHer children, sons Niall, I'm brought back inescapably to the Spanish proverb that Life may be shortPaul and Ollie and her daughter, Etty. are all worried but it - strangely - her husband, Alec, is broadnot. In this case I Shortly afterwards, Etty and Greg, find the body of Greg'm brought s father, Duncan Ackerley, in the river. It was an easy assumption for the police to the idea make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when he couldn't stand the length of life is not the point; the point is its depthguilt. Peter Owen Jones dives deepThe Salter children are not convinced but there's little else they can do but get on with their lives and wonder about what really happened.|isbn=1912992418
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=19164599431035906708|title=Squeakily BabyDiva|author=Beth WebbDaisy Goodwin|rating=4.5|genre=For SharingGeneral Fiction|summary=Much We tend to think of Maria Callas as mothers love their babiesGreek, there's something they all dread - a squeakily baby. He's so tired but he can't - or won't - go she was born to sleep: insteadGreek parents in Manhattan, New York, he just lies on his blanket in December 1923 and ''wails''only moved to Athens when she was thirteen. The sea offers Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to help. It rocks Baby gently and the waves sing 'Callas'hush, hush''. Think of gentle wavelets falling onto a sandy beach and you have to make it more manageable in the sound perfectlyStates. The mermaids join When she was back in Athens - ''la lou, la lay...'' And supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the Nazi occupation by a moment it seems to have worked as Baby closes his eyes. Then a seagull '''shouts''' mother who mercilessly exploited her and we know exactly what's going to happen nextmade no secret of her preference for her elder sister, Jackie.
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{{Frontpage
|author=Robin StevensChristopher Edge|title=The Ministry of Unladylike ActivityBlack Hole Cinema Club|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=May Wong is Lucas and his friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, a long way from her family in Hong Kongplace that has the nickname of 'The Black Hole'. She’s stuck in her schoolAll big movie fans, Deepdeanthey're looking forward to lots of exciting films, and desperate to get awaymany, and do something useful to help end the war and to get home. She just knows that she would make the perfect spymany snacks! And when she finds herself turned away by the Ministry, she takes matters into her own handsHowever, along with a boy she meets outside as the Ministrymovie starts, Eric. They both go undercover in a large country housethey very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, pretending to be evacuees, in and they are swept up into an attempt to prove that someone there is passing secrets to the Nazisadventure they couldn't even imagine. But there as they lurch from one film genre to the next, can they figure out what on earth is a lot more going on in Elysium Hall than either them have imagined, and suddenly ? Will they find themselves in ever get back to the middle of a murder scenecinema, with even more to try and to unravel and solve.their real lives?|isbn=02414298621839942738
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1919635017Rachel Greenlaw|title=A Thief to Catch a Killer|author=Kitt TownsendCompass and Blade|rating=43.5
|genre=Teens
|summary= Solomon Klyne isn't 'I can hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, the answering beat in my heart.'' Rosevear, a remote and partially forgotten island, survives on luring ships into the rocks and plundering the wrecks. Mira, like her mother before her, is one of the seven who swim out to survey the ruins – rescuing any survivors and any treasure that lies within. But when the Council Watch lays a bad ladtrap to end the wrecking, they capture the island's leader and Mira's father. Desperate to save him from death, so why Mira makes a bargain with a wreck survivor who is as charming as he running around London committing is secretive and with only coordinates to guide her, she sets off in search of a series family secret that lies buried deep in the sea. With only nine days to unearth what might save her father, as her journey takes her from the watched streets of robberies? And how did he learn foreign islands to crack safes? Youthe heart of the smuggler'll have to wait s territory, Mira must be determined to get an answer stop at nothing to save the second question because I avoid spoilers. But I'll answer future of her home and the first one: for his grandmother..ones she holds most dear.|isbn=0008664730
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1398515388James Sherwood Metts|title=The Boy and the Dog|author=Seishu Hase and Alison Watts (translator)Planet Storyland
|rating=4.5
|genre=General FictionConfident Readers|summary=First of all, it was Things have been a bit sticky for the earthquakeEarthlings. AI and automation have been proceeding apace, deep in the ocean floor, which created the tsunami often replacing jobs they're paid to do and other tasks that took time to accomplish. Just as they were beginning to get used to all thistechnological change and starting to think of other, in turnnew ways to spend time, caused the nuclear meltdownalong came an awful pandemic. The result Life was complete pretty much shut down and utter devastation, along with it, all the many daily social interactions on which they depend so heavily. The deaths were uncountable|isbn=1736128426}}{{Frontpage|author=Matthew Tree|title=We'll Never Know|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary= Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to be different from his father, a drunk and the loss chronic underachiever whose dreams of being exceptional at any of livelihoods was widespread. The fact that many pets were separated from their owners came far down the list his artistic passions all failed miserably and who had endless crises of priorities but - six months after the tsunami - Kazumasa Nakagaki discovered a dog outside a convenience storeself confidence. He wasn't a dog person but the convenience store owner's comment that he would call Public Health prompted Kazumasa So Tim applied himself to open his car door studies, cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and Tamon the dog jumped inset himself high but achievable ambitions.|isbn= B0CVFXPGP8
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1529153050A G Slatter|title=Britain's Best Political Cartoons 2022|author=Tim BensonThe Briar Book of the Dead|rating=45|genre=HumourFantasy|summary=Seeking some light relief from the current political turmoil which is coming '' There's a part of me that wants to keep this just to seem more and more like an adrenaline sportmyself for however long I can. This secret magic of my own, all mine, at last. I was nudged towards just want to enjoy it for a while.''Britain Within a remote mountain pass, far away from the world, lies Silverton; a town under the protection of the Briar's Best Political Cartoons , a family of 2022witches who protect the town and the wider world from the Darklands. Though she has always wished for magic, Ellie Briar is the first non-witch to be born into her family for generations and as such since she was young, her training as a steward revolved around letters and administration rather than spells and potions. When her grandmother suddenly dies, Ellie's cousin Audra becomes the Briar Witch, the town's leader, and Ellie takes her place beside her. Sharp eyes will have noted that we're not yet through As challenges come her way left, right and centre, Ellie uncovers the rare ability to communicate with the year: dead, putting her at the cartoons run heart of a maelstrom of chaos. Reeling from 4 September 2021 one family secret to another, Ellie must decide who to 31 August 2022. Who can imagine trust and determine what there will be to come in do as the 2023 edition?Briar witches' legacy, everything they have sacrificed to survive, is under threat.|isbn=1803364548
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Lisa Gray1529900360|title=The Dark RoomGhost Orchid|author=Jonathan Kellerman
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary=What if you knew someone was dead, because youIt hadn't been Lt Milo Sturgis'd watched them die several years ago, s fault that Alex Delaware had been badly injured but then you come across a photograph that seemed to show their murder happened in a different place he felt responsible and time? This is what happens even after Alex recovered, Sturgis was reluctant to Leonard in this storyask for his help on difficult cases. He is an exHis assertions that there were only open-and-crime reporter shut cases which didn't need the help of a psychologist only worked for a newspaperwhile. Finally, it was Robin, and since leaving journalism heDelaware's found himself an unusual hobby where he finds oldpartner, undeveloped rolls of film and develops them in his own dark room at homewho nudged Milo into asking for help again. One of these photographs turns out to show She knew that the involvement was something that the murder scene of a young woman he met some years agoman she loved needed. The next case did look simple, and who he ''thought'' he had watched die though. Two lovers were murdered in front the swimming pool of him one night a remote property in a hotelBel Air. He'd felt guilty ever since that night, was the heir to an Italian shoe empire and she is married to an extremely rich man and lost everything because of it - his fiancee and his career - but now finds himself wondering if she hadn't really died s not the night she Italian. But which of them was with him, what on earth actually happenedthe primary target?|isbn=154203535X
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Natasha Hastings and Alex T Smith1529395224|title=The Miraculous SweetmakersLetting the Cat Out of the Bag: The Frost FairSecret Life of a Vet|author=Sion Rowlands
|rating=3.5
|genre=Confident ReadersAnimals and Wildlife|summary=Siôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. His father was a GP and Rowlands didn''The River Thames had frozen t want to death follow in its sleep.'' And thus his footsteps, particularly when he considered the Frost Fair could happen – people trading strain that being on the completely iced-over river, like our heroine Thomasinacall put on his father's father life. When he was seventeen he took the opportunity of doing work experience with his gingerbread a family friend who was a vet and confectionery shopwas convinced this was the job for him. Thomasina will be working the Fair too – but her twin brother won'tBefore long, as he dies in Chapter Onewas at Liverpool University. It hadn't - as with so many students - been his dream since he was a tragedy she feels no small guilt for, and which has made her father a sullen, closed shop – and her bed-bound mother has spoken not a word – not even opened her eyes, more or less – in the four years since, eitherchild. But into the dark, frosted London comes Inigo, with supreme magical powersIf anything, and a willingness to help Thomasina. Not only can he introduce her 'd wanted to the fantastical Other Frost Fair, using the river surface at night for no end of mystical beasts and characters and their happenings, but he has be a unique proposal for Thomasina, which will shake her world to its coreprofessional footballer.|isbn=0008496056
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|authorisbn=Jane Goodall and Douglas Abrams 0861541774|title=The Book A Nye of Hope Pheasants|author=Steve Burrows|rating=54|genre=Politics and Society Crime|summary= The done thing is DCI Domenic Jejeune's close friend and former colleague, Danny Maik, has taken a short holiday in Singapore to read meet up with an old ally, Guy Trueman. Maik was involved in a book all the way through before you sit down to review itstreet brawl - he would later maintain that he was facing a man armed with a knife - and he killed a Ghurka. I’m making an exception here Initially, because I don’t want he faced a charge of manslaughter but evidence came to lose any of light that suggested that he might have planned to murder the man. Now he could be facing the experience of reading this amazing book, I want death penalty. Domenic Jejeune can do nothing to capture it help as it hits meany interference from another police force could provoke a diplomatic incident and wouldn't help Danny at all. And it is hitting me. This beautiful book has me in tears. |isbn=024147857X
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|isbnauthor=1529504767Alexander McCall Smith|title=The Christmas Doll (The Repair Shop Stories)|author=Amy Sparkes and Katie HickeyPerfect Passion Company|rating=4.5|genre=For SharingGeneral Fiction|summary=Susan was very young when she was evacuated from London The Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in 1939 Edinburgh, run by Ness and nervous about how she would be greeted when she got operating as an alternative to her final destinationall the online apps in providing a more personal, tailored service. She needn't have worried though as Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she went to could come and look after the home of Mr and Mrs Russellbusiness, who couldn't have been kinder as Ness is planning to take a trip to Canada to herget away for a while. She even had her own room - all Katie is coming out of a break up with a bad boyfriend, and so jumps at the chance to come home to herselfEdinburgh. Gradually she relaxed And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and began the Isabel Dalhousie novels, but with some new characters who quickly begin to enjoy her lifecharm. SheKatie has no experience in running a business, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, and there'd help Mrs Russell with the baking s always her very helpful (and when it came rather handsome) neighbour, William, to Christmas Eve Susan and Mr Russell put the decorations on the Christmas tree. The best surprise happened the following morning.lend a hand…|isbn=1846976596
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|authorisbn=Lilja Sigurdardottir and Quentin Bates (translator)0811771741|title=Red as BloodInstaKnits for Baby|author=Melissa Leapman
|rating=4
|genre=ThrillersCrafts|summary=When Flosi’s wife goes missing, all the evidence seems Melissa Leapman's ''InstaKnits for Baby'' gives us a collection of knits from toys to point towards her having been kidnappedblankets. The ransom note tells him not to have any contact with Some will be quick knits - others are of the police'long, so instead he enlists cosy afternoons in front of the help of Arora, a financial investigatorfire' variety. She manages to persuade Flosi that they will need the help of The projects are divided by the police, and she calls her detective friend, Daniel, whom she met when he was investigating her sister’s disappearance. Together, time they start 'll take to secretly investigate Gudrun’s disappearancecomplete - less than five hours, trying not five to arouse the suspicion of anyoneten hours, since they have no idea who ten to twenty hours and more than twenty hours. All the kidnappers might beprojects are attractive, yet the more they uncover, the more confusing things becomemodern and useable. I perhaps show my age when I wonder about 'social-media-worthy projects' but that's me being picky.|isbn=1914585321
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|isbnauthor=0861541995Dean Koontz|title=Wolf Pack|author=Will DeanThe Bad Weather Friend
|rating=4.5
|genre=CrimeParanormal|summary=The story began when Tuva Moodyson drove her Hilux pickup truck on the road north of VisbergBenny is having a terrifically bad day. She sees blood on the road He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and a creature on its side near the pine treeshis house gets trashed. It will turn out to be BroncoOh, and someone has delivered a Swedish Elkhoundreally weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to his home, who and it's possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that has been attacked by trashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the very last person to deserve all this bad luck. He is a wolfnice person. Tuva takes Bronco and his owner, Bengt Nyberg, to the vetA really nice person. Bronco didn't make So fortunately for Benny it but on turns out that the way, Nyberg told Tuva that he was out looking for delivery to his niecehouse is a new friend, twenty-year-old Elsa Nyberga bad weather friend called Spike, who had gone missing. She'd has been working at Rose Farm and Moodyson's journalist's instincts are soon brought sent to the forehelp him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. Rose Farm Spike is now home going to a group take care of Benny, and will certainly take care of survivalists but back in 1987 the then ownerBenny's enemies, if he, Johan Svenson murdered his wifeBenny, and his two eldest children and then killed himselfHarper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are. His newborn child, just four weeks old survived. Does this have any connection to the disappearance of Elsa Nyberg?|isbn=1662500491
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|author=Alison HughesAdam Stower|title=FlyMurray and Bun
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers|summary=This Murray is supposed to be a very impressive readhumble, as it does a lot of what mainstream teen tidy and tween fiction still struggles with. Its focus friendly cat, one who is courtesy able to sleep and eat and eat and sleep and, well, whatever takes his fancy next of the first-person narration from Flytwo. But he's a bad magician's cat, so his favourite bun has been turned into a secondary school lad with cerebral palsyhyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, a down-on-her-luck single mom nearing retirement from being a cleanerand the catflap they both use can chuck them out, a carer while at schoolnot into the regular back garden, and but into a bundle world of assumptions people lay on himfrightening adventure and whiffs. First they assume that with This time round it drops them into a broken body comes Viking land, where a broken mindtroll hunter is expected – well, then they decide one much bigger than Murray was, to be honest, but he's a maths savant – they even believe they can get away with calling him Fly, which isnturned up and he't his real name, but everybody just uses it.ll have to do…|isbn=15253058320008561249
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|isbn=3791388398B0C47LV1PC|title=New European Baking: 99 Recipes for Breads, Brioches and PastriesFragility|author=Laurel KratochvilaMosby Woods|rating=4.5|genre=CookeryLiterary Fiction|summary=This is probably one of the most unusual baking books ICan you make a ''Yo birthing person've encountered. It's built around 99 recipes for breadsjoke? And if you could, brioches and pastries but is the recipes are interwoven with some thought-provoking writing on how bread - and baking - have changed in the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. We start with question should you make it? Or is the basics - the equipment question if you'll need (there's nothing extravagant or indulgent) and the ingredientsdid, where the author would it land? The catch is particular. You might not have realised that different salts can change the flavour and sensation on answer for both could well be.... no. ''Fragility'' is set as the tongue city of the finished product butPortland, apparentlyOregon, they do.cautiously begins to emerge from the restrictions imposed during the covid pandemic
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