Changes

[[Category:New Reviews|General Fiction]] __NOTOC__<!{{Frontpage|isbn= B0FK5LHKD9|title=The Colour of Memory|author=Christopher Bowden|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=It's been three years since we last reviewed a book by favourite regular Christopher Bowden, so we were very glad to see a new novel arrive here at Bookbag Towers. Like all Bowden's stories, there's a mystery at the heart of ''The Colour of Money''. We like this running theme in an author's work -- Remove -->take a mystery but give it different flavour and atmosphere each time.}}{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Joanna BarnardSaou Ichikawa and Polly Barton (translator)|title= Hush Little BabyHunchback|rating= 54|genre= General Fiction|summary= Babies donI was in the middle of a self-imposed book-buying ban when I made an exception for this one. What first drew me in was the book's bold fuchsia cover, followed by its striking title: ''Hunchback''t break bones for no reason. Something has This is a word I recognised to happen be loaded with historical andcultural baggage, normallyoften used to dehumanise or reduce. Curious, someone else will be involvedI leaned over the display table and turned to the back inside cover. So when There, I discovered the hospital says Oliver has author: Saou Ichikawa, a broken armwoman diagnosed in childhood with congenital myopathy, suspicion lands a condition that causes severe muscular weakness and touches every aspect of her life. The title took on his familynew complexity in light of her biography. Could I had to read it be his mother? But she was out all evening.|isbn=0241700787}}{{Frontpage|author=Jen Beagin|title=Big Swiss|rating=4.5|genre=Humour |summary=I found the premise of this book totally original and addictive. Greta possesses the power to know the population of Hudson, New York's darkest secrets, their intimate lives, drinking with her old colleagues (hence why she smells of booze when they arrive in A&E)their fetishes and fears. Could it be his fatherHow? Sally left him in charge of Her job is to transcribe their sonsex therapy sessions. Sure, there's a confidentiality agreement, as the sex coach who calls himself Om keeps reminding her, but he may have popped out that just makes it more exciting. Like we've all probably wished for at some point in life, Greta can exist passively, placidly, as a while (something she doesn't know…yet) and if he was out then he too was away fly on the wall. That is, until Greta decides to unglue her fly-feet from his son at the time safety of the crimewall and buzz far too close to the sun. Or could it be his half-sister Martha? SheThe sun in this analogy is the sex coach's a responsible teenager most of newest patient, who Greta dubs 'Big Swiss', and who, like the timesun, is bright, blonde and beautiful - and she would have no reason irresistible to harm Greta. Suddenly, the confidentiality agreement, the ethics of her baby brotherprofessional position, but thereher loyalties to Om, fly out of the window. She's a nagging feeling about that night that she just can't shakein too deep.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1785030337</amazonuk>0571378579

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Elif Shafak1784745758|title= Three Daughters of EveDays in June|author=Anne Tyler

|genre= General Fiction|summary=Set in Istanbul in 2016, The day before your daughter''Three Daughters of Eve'' centres on Peris wedding will always be busy but Gail Baines got far more than she asked for. First, a Turkish woman who finds herself thinking back to it was her years job as assistant head at Oxford University to distract herself from the local school. There was a boring dinner party. Her reminiscing is triggered moment when she finds an old polaroid hoped that she would be promoted to head but the discussion moved into the subject of herself, her friends Mona 'people skills' and Shirinbefore she knew what was happening Gail had been sacked or resigned, and depending on who was explaining the rebellious Professor Azursituation. Much When she got home (in the middle of her thoughts revolve around the scandal day: who would have thought that prevented could happen?) her from graduating from her dream universityex-husband was there with a cat. He thinks that he'll be staying and that Gail will be adopting the cat. More of a commentary on religion than a story, And that's before Gail discovers that the novel asks many questions groom hasn't been entirely honest about faith - in particular, Islam - and whether its customs and traditions can be adapted to suit modern his personal life.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241978882</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Andre AlexisSamantha Harvey|title= The Hidden KeysOrbital|rating= 4.5|genre= General Fiction|summary= Tancred Palmieri is a talented thief thrown into the path of Willow Azarian an eccentricIn 2024, unpredictable heroin addict. She is also part of Samantha Harvey won the Azarian dynastyBooker Prize for ''Orbital'', bequeathed almost a million dollars upon her father's death. Each compact yet profound work that unfolds over a single day in the lives of the Azarian children were also gifted a deeply personal memento mori, which Willow is convinced make up an intricate treasure hunt. She enlists the help group of Tancred to steal each item, solve astronauts aboard the mystery and prove she is not blindly following International Space Station. Through a baseless fantasy. Tancred must use all his skills to infiltrate narrative lens that mirrors the homes of each of Willowastronauts's siblingsorbital perspective, uncover the clues hidden Harvey invites readers to see our planet in each item and fight off the rival interests of competing criminals and the policea wholly new light.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1781258422</amazonuk>1529922933

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Alison Jean LesterHan Kang|title= Yuki Means HappinessThe Vegetarian|rating= 34.5|genre= General Fiction|summary= High-tech and high-riseThis novel, kimonos, and big-eyed visuals – through a dynamic juxtaposition winner of the ultra modern International Booker Prize in 2016 and penned by an author who received the traditionalNobel Prize for Literature this year, Japan has succeeded in branding itself both is as an intriguing travel destination that does not cease close to surprise, but at the same time defies being ever wholly full understood by outsidersunputdownable as it gets. All of this has come It more than lives up to be encapsulated and reinforced in Sofia Coppola's cult classic ''Lost in Translation'': the iconic still of Scarlett Johansson standing at the scramble crossing in Shibuya has come to represent Japan in pop culture as much as the more traditional cherry blossom imageryacclaim. The story introduces uncanny characters with fragile, vividly tangible bodies yet unknowable, elusive souls. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1848549628</amazonuk>1803510056

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= S V BerlinSally Rooney|title= The FavouriteIntermezzo|rating= 4.5|genre= General Fiction|summary=Siblings Edward Sally Rooney has studied the chessboard of life and Isobel Vernon haven't spoken in years and live on opposite sides is something of the Atlantica grandmaster at putting it into words. When their mother Mary dies unexpectedlyHer dialogue is gripping and so brilliantly frustrating, as her characters never quite say exactly what they are thrown together feel. Among the many relationships woven into this story, the central one for readers to sort through unravel is the family homefraternal connection—or lack thereof—between Ivan and Peter Koubek. With Edward's diffident but devoted girlfriendIvan, Julie, making an a socially awkward threesomechess prodigy, each stumbles through the practicalities of funeral preparation and house clearingcontrasts sharply with his older brother Peter, trying to make sense of a successful lawyer living in Dublin. Following their emotions and their feelings toward one another. Isobel makes father's passing after a disturbing discovery and her fateful decision has consequences for all of themlong battle with cancer, challenging their beliefs about the past, hopes for the future and understanding of Marybrothers's role in keeping them at once apart and togetheralready strained relationship faces new trials. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0993563384</amazonuk>0571365469

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Julia Claiborne JohnsonB0DGDJRHYD|title=Be Frank with MeNowhere Man|author=Deborah Stone

|summary=In June 2009 Isaac Vargas sends a quiet suburban house, Patrick is making his assistantfinal plans. A meticulous man, twenty-four-year-old Alice Whitleyhe makes sure of every preparation, down to Bel Airthe last detail. Some last reflections, California and then he says goodbye to help Mimi Gillespie produce her long-awaited second novel. Under his wife, the name Mworld, and his life.MIt's horribly sad. Banning, Mimi issued a wildly successful novel back At work in the 1970sher shop, ''Pitched''his wife Diana is fending off yet another phone call about her ageing and ailing mother, which quickly became a modern classic on every American adolescent's list of assigned reading for schoolwho needs extricating from yet another accident. She's the sort of figure Harper Lee was for decades: It will be a one-hit literary wonder and an infamous recluse. But there's one key difference here: Mimi while before Diana realises what Patrick has a nine-year-old son, Frankdone.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782399208</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kay Langdale1739526910|title=The Way Back to UsWhere I've Not Been Lost|author=Glen Sibley|rating=4.5

|summary=A household revolves around its weakest member and because it's revolving there'One year after a suicide attempt blows apart musician Brian O’Malley's always a danger that some people - such as a spouse - will be spun to the outsidelife, whilst other children, loosely attached he arrives in an unfamiliar Devon town to the main carer will be recover. Living with an unexpected housemate at a distancehis former manager’s holiday home, never completely close, but never escaping eitherhe dreams of reconnecting with everything he has lost. In the centre are the carer and the person who needs that careBut as those tentative plans falter, bonded together he becomes swept up in such a way that it's actually difficult to offer help or even friendshiplocal world of unlikely friendships, mobile discos and surprising romantic possibilities. So it is with Anna and Teddy, who suffers from Spinal Muscular Atrophy, or SMA as it's generally known. He's five now, confined to a wheelchair or his Whizzybug and not putting on much weight as chewing and swallowing are difficult.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473618363</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Hendrik Groen and Hester Velmans (translator)Jenny Lecoat|title= The Secret Diary of Hendrik Groen, 83¼ years OldBeyond Summerland|rating= 4.5|genre= General Fiction|summary= As Jean lives on Jersey with her mother where they are celebrating the end of the occupation. During the old adage goeswar, to walk a mile in someone elseJean's shoes is father was arrested for listening to gain some understanding a banned radio and soldiers took him away one night, leaving Jean and her mother waiting for years for news of what it is to be that personhim. Admittedly As the British finally free the Channel islands from the Nazis, Hendrik Groen isn't much up for long walks any moreand the war is finally over, but he does acquire a swish mobility scooter to zoom around in; one could say their hopes rise that we get to zoom they will finally learn what became of him. But will the truth come as a mile in Groen's shoes, and ohrelief, or will it raise further questions around what else happened during the war? Who was the informer who told the Nazis about the radio? And what fun shoes he wears!other secrets have been kept throughout the occupation?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1405924004</amazonuk>1846976537

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Sarah FranklinOnyi Nwabineli|title= ShelterAllow Me to Introduce Myself|rating= 4.5|genre= Historical General Fiction|summary=Connie Granger has escaped Anuri spent her bombedchildhood on display to the world, thanks to her step-out city homemother Ophelia's increasingly popular presence on social media, finding refuge in the Womenwhere she posted every step of Anuri's Timber Corpschildhood for sponsorships and influencer deals and, basically, monetary gain. For Now Anuri is in hertwenties and she is slowly trying to regain her confidence and to get her life back, this remote community must now serve a secret purposesuing her step-mother to take down the content about her.<br>Seppe Anuri is battling alcoholism, an Italian prisoner of warfailing to start her PhD, is haunted by his memoriesundergoing therapy and secretly abusing people online and receiving money from them for doing so. In the forest camp Most importantly, he finds a strange kind of freedom.Their meeting signals new beginnings. But as they are drawn togethershe is desperately worried about her little sister, who is the world outside their forest haven is being torn apartnew focus of Ophelia's online empire. Old certainties are crumbling Can she save her sister, and both must now make a life-defining choice.<br>What price will they pay for freedom? What will they fight to protectperhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the same time?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1785762990</amazonuk>0861546873

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jennifer McVeigh1529153298|title=Leopard at the DoorThe List of Suspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey

|summary=18 year old Rachel Fullsmith returns home to Kenya after being away at school in England It's 1979 and finds a lot can change in 6 yearsMargaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly... ) Of course she realises her motherShe's death would alter things but shenot what's not prepared for her fatherworrying Miv's live-in family, though. Women have been disappearing. Well, they've been murdered, but to have 'disappeared'companiondoesn' Sara nor Sarat sound quite so frightening. Miv's son Harold sleeping in Rachelupset because she's old roomoverheard that her father wants to move the family 'Down South'. Michael the Kikuyu servant boy she grew up with When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is still there though and now a man with his own ideasfrightening, foreign place, best avoided. Meanwhile For Miv, the unrest between the British rulers move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and she'll do anything to prevent that. She's not worried about the local Mau Mau fighters is increasing and about dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to blowanyone.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241247616</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Lucy Daniels1035906708|title= Summer at Hope MeadowsDiva|author=Daisy Goodwin|rating= 4.5|genre= General Fiction|summary=''Animal Ark'' was a popular series We tend to think of children's books written between 1994 and 2008. The stories focus on a young girl called Mandy HopeMaria Callas as Greek, the daughter of two vets who run a practicebut she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, Animal ArkNew York, in the Yorkshire town of WelfordDecember 1923 and only moved to Athens when she was thirteen. Along with Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her best friend James, the children seek father changed it to 'Callas' to help out creatures make it more manageable in needthe States. The series consisted of 94 books When she was back in total and Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was written raised under the Nazi occupation by a collection mother who mercilessly exploited her and made no secret of authors writing under the pseudonym Lucy Daniels. ''Summer at Hope Meadows'' is the first in a new series her preference for adult readersher elder sister, continuing grown-up Mandy's story now that she is a fully qualified vetJackie.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473653878</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Sophie Divry Alexander McCall Smith|title=The Perfect Passion Company|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=The Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the online apps in providing a more personal, tailored service. Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and look after the business, as Ness is planning to take a trip to Canada to get away for a while. Katie is coming out of a break up with a bad boyfriend, and Alison Anderson so jumps at the chance to come home to Edinburgh. And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the Isabel Dalhousie novels, but with some new characters who quickly begin to charm. Katie has no experience in running a business, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, and there's always her very helpful (translatorand rather handsome)neighbour, William, to lend a hand…|isbn=1846976596}}{{Frontpage|author=Dean Koontz|title=Madame Bovary The Bad Weather Friend|rating=4.5|genre=Paranormal|summary=Benny is having a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and his house gets trashed. Oh, and someone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to his home, and it's possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that has trashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the very last person to deserve all this bad luck. He is a nice person. A really nice person. So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to his house is a new friend, a bad weather friend called Spike, who has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. Spike is going to take care of Benny, and will certainly take care of the SuburbsBenny's enemies, if he, Benny, and Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are.|isbn=1662500491}}{{Frontpage|author=Katherine Howe|title=A True Account|rating=24.5

|summary=''It starts Hannah Masury is living in Boston, having been sent to live with becoming a homeownerfamily who run an inn, then settling and being made to work there from a young age. When she hears there is to be a hanging of some pirates inthe town, then reproducingshe decides to go and watch.'' WellEnthralled and horrified in equal measure, it actually starts a lot before then, with Hannah finds herself embroiled in a set of fractured memories of our heroineyoung boy's childhood – things she recalls her parents and relatives saying both to and about herdeath at the hands of two vicious pirates. It goes through She hides away, so that they don't find and kill her childhoodtoo, and pen letters then to escape them completely she runs away to sea, dressing as a best friend conveying her wishes for her life, those wishes being revised boy and affirmed by joining the liberty notorious Ned Low's pirate ship as a cabin boy. She soon finds herself in the thick of university yearsthings when there is a mutiny on board, those wishes being met with or denied by married life… Someone archly could point out that you should be careful what you wish for, but not even our wise, modern woman could not see the next step after the reproducing – ''standing disappointed and from there we are caught up in front her rip roaring tale of life on the refrigerator''ocean waves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857054686</amazonuk>0861547438

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Tania Hershman1471180158|title=Some of Us Glow More Than OthersMaybe Tomorrow|author=Penny Parkes

|genre=Short Stories General Fiction|summary=I won't be alone Jamie Matson works in stating that reading short story collections can be slightly awkward. Going through from Aan upper-Zclass grocery store, witnessing for a bounty man who's a control freak with all the subtlety of ideas a half brick. Jamie's son, Bo, 'has his problems'. He's asthmatic and characters in short order can be too muchthe more you read, but do the more you have 'll suspect that he's on the right autistic spectrum. Sometimes Jamie needs to pick take time off at short notice - she's a frequent flier in the local A&E and choose according sometimes Bo's not fit enough to what appeals, and what time you have go to fill? The sequence has carefully been considered, surelyschool. Such would appear Missed shifts or the need to be away on time to pick Bo up from school are occasions when Jamie can be controlled and put in the case herewrong. The last time I read one It was going to come to a head.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=B0CKD1L5JL|title=Radio Free Olympia|author=Jeffrey Dunn|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary= Petr is an orphan. Rescued by the strange, reclusive Bear, he is brought up far from bustling cities and busy human society, in the forests of this authorWashington's collectionsOlympic Peninsula. After Bear dies and a brief sojourn in human company, and armed with [[The White Road by Tania Hershman|The White Road]]only a pirate radio transmitter, Petr goes on a journey through the only real difficulty was holding back and rationing themforest, but here you not only get a whopping forty pieces of writingbroadcasting the strange, they are also spread into sectionswild and rarely heard voices he encounters.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1910061484</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Jane JohnsonSarah Marsh|title= Court A Sign of LionsHer Own|rating= 3.5|genre= Historical General Fiction |summary= Kate Fordham arrived After a bout of scarlet fever as a child, Ellen Lark loses her hearing. Suddenly plunged into a world of silence, everything about her life changes. Living in a time when the sunlit city use of Granada sign language was seen as something only savages do, Ellen is sent to a year agoschool where she is taught to lip read, but physically restrained from signing. In From here, she ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the shadow of deaf and using a system called Visible Speech. At the Alhambrasame time, one of the most beautiful places Bell is working on earthother inventions and ideas, she works as a waitress serving tourists and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in a busy barcomplicated tangle of espionage.|isbn=1035401614}}{{Frontpage|isbn=B0BC3YTCMR|title=Good Girls Die|author=Ayura Ayira|rating=4. She pretends she5|genre=General Fiction|summary=''This story is not for everyone.''s happy with  Lavender Daniels was three weeks short of her new life – but how could she fifteenth birthday when The Incident happened. She was a very bright student, a bit too nerdy if truth be? Kate's alonetold, afraid and hiding under a false name. And fate is about to bring her facesuffered from vitiligo -people were afraid to-face with hug her greatest fearin case it's contagious. Five centuries ago, It's not easy being a message, in black girl whose skin is 84% white. She had a hand few could read, was inscribed in blood crush on a stolen scrap of paperseventeen-year-old Reggie Anderson but never thought he would notice her. The paper Then he did: Lavender was folded very good at math and pressed into one of the Alhambra's wallsReggie asked if she would tutor him. She readily agreed: tutoring was something she gladly did at church: this was just an extension. There it has lain, undisturbed by the tides of history – the Fall of Granada, the expulsion of its last Sultan – until Kate discovers it She went to his house and he raped her. Born of love In shock, in she even allowed him to give her a time of danger and desperation, the fragment will be the catalyst that changes Kate's life foreverlift home. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1786694336</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Julie Cohen1472263936|title=TogetherThe Figurine|author=Victoria Hislop

|summary=This is a love story told backwardsIt was in 1968 that Helena McCloud made her first trip to Greece. She was alone: her mother, in the most beautiful mannerGreek by birth, so that we know from had left the very beginning that Emily family home and Robert love each other enormouslyrefused to return, but Mary and Hamish (Helena's parents) felt that he is about to break it would be a pity if Helena grew up without knowing her grandparents or understanding her heart in the most dreadful way in order to protect a secret that they've lived with for decadesGreek heritage. Seeing their love unfold Her trip to the family apartment in reverse is beautifulup-market Kolonaki would be the first of several annual visits. We get She grew to know them once they have already gotten to know each otherlove her grandmother and the family's maid, Dina, but was wary - and it makes for an unusual and interesting structurefrightened - of her grandfather, retired general Stamatis Papagiannis. The secret they hold is referred He was proud of his close connections to throughout, the Junta and expected his family to uphold his values but it isn't revealed until very late in the booksaw no reason to accommodate them. IHis prejudices included Helena'm guessing very few readers will figure it out. Even once you know, you want to go back s red hair and read the whole story again in the light of the information you now holdgreen eyes - inherited from her father's Scottish ancestors.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1409171744</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Kate MildenhallDean Koontz|title= SkylarkingAfter Death|rating= 43|genre= General Fiction |summary= Kate and Harriet are best friends growing up together on an isolated Australian cape. As the daughters Michael Mace, Head of the lighthouse keepersSecurity, the two girls share everythingat a top secret biological research facility, until is among 55 people who die when a virus is released in a bio-hazard accident. Finding himself in a fishermanmakeshift mortuary, McPhailcovered in plastic, arrives in their small community. When Kate witnesses the desire he has a sense that flares between something very, very bad has happened to him – and only him – as he sits up and Harrietlooks around at the shrouded bodies of his dead friends and former colleagues. As he recovers his senses, she he realises that there is something different about him; he can ''feel'' everything. ''Everything''. Michael isn't ''Michael'' anymore.|isbn=1662500467}} {{Frontpage|isbn=B0BVDC2VWH|title=The Grave Listeners|author=William Frank|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=The village is torn isolated and poor. It's surrounded by her feelings a Witching Forest. And the villagers subsist largely by farming Uphegia plants - its bread-like fruit provides nutrition and its blossom provides herbal medicines. The black wood of envy the forest provides heat and warmth, roofs on homes, and longingeven gallows, if needed. An innocent moment The fear of being buried alive is an existential superstition in McPhail's hut then occurs the village and that threatens to tear their peaceful community apartis the reason Volushka, a drunken, self-indulgent, lazy lout of a man is tolerated. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785079239</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Zoe DuncanB0BYF82CXT|title= The Shifting PoolsSemi-Detached|author=Deborah Stone|rating= 2.54|genre= General Fiction|summary= Perhaps the most overused phrase in fiction publishing is ''lifeBill and Amanda are living in a semi-affirming''detached house, closely followed by ''human condition''. The Shifting Pools takes this to stuck in a whole new level. Its blurb boasts that it is ''charged throughout with the beautiful urgency depressing rut of life''boredom and disappointment, whatever that means. It isn't. And that's the problem. This isn't a bad bookwhen Terry and Fiona – glamorous, but it sets itself up to failsuccessful and very much in love – move in next door. A cardinal rule of writing is ''focus Despite their different outlooks on life, the small stuff''couples befriend each other and life appears to improve for both pairs. If you set out to write a ''life affirming'' novel that answers But all the ''big questions''is not what it seems, you'll struggle. And it is this trap that Zoe Duncan falls into. In her quest and their increasingly interconnected relationships are fated for profundity she loses her waytragedy. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785630369</amazonuk>''

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Sarah HealyShalini Boland|title= The Sisters ChaseSilent Bride|rating= 4.53|genre= General Fiction|summary=Mary Alice and BunnySeth are a match made in heaven. That's how it He is everything she has always been ever since Bunny was born. Two sisters with an unbreakable bondsearching for; handsome, accomplished, clever, twisted together so tight that they were two sides of the same coinfunny; total and utter husband-material. Bunny was Mary's whole world; nothing else really mattered She is all he could possibly want in a wife; school...friends...boys...wellbeautiful, maybe one boysuccessful, but he was something altogether extraordinaryconfident… and so the inevitable proposal is eagerly accepted by Alice and the wedding is planned and set. When the unthinkable happenedmuch-anticipated day arrives, Alice is walked down the aisle by her father, Mary beaming with pride and Bunny found themselves completely alone in excitement as she surveys the world, congregation – their friends assembled to celebrate this joyful day and that's when Mary decided Seth turns to take an unforgettable road tripface his approaching bride, just Alice's world implodes because she has absolutely no idea who the two of them, across man at the United Statesaltar is, in search of a place where they could belongwho is waiting for her to become his wife.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0544960076</amazonuk>1662507089

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Joy Rhoades1787636003|title=The WoolgrowerGirls of Summer|author=Katie Bishop|rating=5|genre=General Fiction|summary=It was the summer when Rachel Evans turned eighteen that she and Caroline went backpacking around Greece and arrived on the island. Rachel wasn's Companiont exactly innocent but she was, perhaps, naive, so when thirty-four-year-old Alistair Wright started to take an interest in her, she was flattered rather than wary. It was quite a while before he made any sort of physical approach to her and by that time she was obsessed by him. Alistair worked for Henry Taylor, looking after his interests on the island and in particular in the bar where all the girls either worked or partied.}}{{Frontpage|author=Amanda Craig|title=Three Graces|rating=4.5

|summary=1945: The war is in its dying days and creating problems far from Few styles of contemporary fiction interest me like the state-of-the different fronts-nation novel. For instance, in Australia, what There's something so utterly compelling about any writer who can be done with catch hold of the atmosphere of the Italian POWs brought into day and capture it, crafting an image of the country? The solution seems to be their use as cheap labourit stands in one particular moment. In To say that Amanda Craig is skilled at doing this way Kate Dowdwould be embarrassingly inadequate: she's father agrees to take two onto his sheep farm in drought-ridden New South Walespractically synonymous with the genre of contemporary social fiction at this point. Kate is initially wary She has such a gift for weaving the ongoing issues of the two men – Vittorio and Luca – but gradually she realises that not all dangers come from outside day into the lives of her community. Life on characters in a sheep station may be harsh way that feels natural and lived-in, never making them ciphers for social commentary but for Kate it's going to get a lot worseinstead fully realised people, grappling with issues far larger than themselves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1784741345</amazonuk>140871468X

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Jonathan Levi152915118X|title= SeptimaniaPineapple Street|author=Jenny Jackson|rating= 4.5|genre= General Fiction|summary= First and foremost a tale ''Pineapple Street'' is the story of lovethree women: Sasha, Septimania delivers the frustrations Darley and Georgiana. Darley and agony of two people who find each other George are sisters and then lose each otherSasha is married to their brother Cord. They're Stocktons, all on only Sasha isn't a Stockton by birth so she isn't readily accepted into the same daytribe. But what a momentous day! Life takes Malory and Louisa off in totally different directions but strangely their paths cross again and again. Malory The problem's exacerbated when the clan matriarch, searching to uncover his pastTilda, moves asks Cord and Sasha if they'd like to Rome move into the Pineapple Street property. Tilda and discovers great Chip have renovated and incredible facts about his ancestry. Louisadownsized to another property, a brilliant mathematicianstreet or so away, is head hunted for which they own. They won'secret' work t need any of the furniture from Pineapple Street, so Sasha and is signed up by her father for Cord can move straight in. Nominally, they had a life timechoice but that wasn's contract with t the American Governmentreality. Darley and Georgiana start to call Sasha 'the gold digger'. She completely disappears from Malory's life and he has no way of knowing how to find her againliving in ''their'' family home. They are both trapped in their separate livesuse it so often that they abbreviate it to 'the GD'.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>071565196X</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Antoine Laurain, Jane Aitken (translator) and Emily Boyce (translator)Critchley|title=The PortraitOne Puzzling Afternoon

|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=Meet Pierre-Francois. He should by rights be an antiques dealer84 year old Edie has lived in the same small town for almost her whole life, but now she is facing a move as he made a fortune selling on his first collection (of erasers) while at school, her son wants to move to another house and funded both bring Edie to live with his university and carnal educationfamily, with prostitutes, by trading tooas Edie is starting to lose her memory. He However, Edie istormented by the memory of her childhood friend, howeverLucy, a patent and intellectual property lawyerwho went missing over 60 years ago, and his wife is forever demanding the worry that there was a reduction in secret she was keeping for Lucy that somehow might be the space his collections take up in their flat. But he still dabbles – although this latest visit to thing that reveals the showrooms will cause a lot truth of unexpected incidentwhat happened all that time ago. In amongst After 'seeing' Lucy in the grot at a low-key sale he finds an ancient pastelhigh street, showing himself – a bewiggedjust as she was the last time she saw her, antique version she starts to find pockets of himselfmemories coming back to her. And yet as she remembers the past, even if, however, nobody else sees the connection between Pierre-Francois she is forgetting more and more in her day to day life. Will she uncover the picturetruth about Lucy's subject. Stilldisappearance before her move, as an effeminate uncle told him, ''real objects carry memory of their past owners'' – and Pierre-Francois is intent on finding the truths behind those before her memories. Little does he know just what he will discover…are gone forever?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1910477435</amazonuk>1804181250

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Virginie Despentes and Frank Wynne (translator)Madelaine Lucas|title= Vernon Subutex 1Thirst for Salt|rating= 5|genre= General Literary Fiction|summary= Vernon Subutex is ''Love, I'd read, was supposed to be a light and weightless feeling, but I had always longed for gravity'' Told from a retrospective view, a young woman unravels the year-long relationship that once defined her. Overlaid with later wisdom, the narrator relives the affair with a wanted mantwenty years her senior from its inception – the summer after finishing university – to its sorrowful end the summer after. Following Set against the death backdrop of Alex Bleach, Vernonan isolated Australian coastal town ''Thirst for Salt''s generous benefactor and publicly adored musician, Vernon now has details the last recordings of Alex24-year-old narrator's drug induced ramblings. Kicked out of his apartment the story follows Vernon as he couch surfs his way across Parisdeepening relationship with her older lover, depicting its all-consuming nature, pursued by journalists and media moguls desperate to cash in how it changed her perspective on Bleach's death. Eventually finding himself out of luck, friends both romantic and money Vernon is left sleeping rough, half mad familial relationships and forced to bear witness to a shocking act of violencehow it altered her irrevocably. In a world of capricious friends and grasping avaricious journalists who can Vernon trust?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857055410</amazonuk>0861546490

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Rowena MacDonald0008506337|title= The Threat Level Remains SevereGarnett Girls|author=Georgina Moore|rating= 3.5|genre= General Fiction|summary=Grace Ambrose isnThe love affair between Margo Garnett and poet Richard O't Brigitte JonesLeary was all-consuming, honest; for one thing she doesn't keep a diaryapparently on both sides. Grace is our typical misogynistic Hollywood stereotype supporting female character Margo was just sixteen when they fell in love. She is the Richard was twenty-one and described by Margo's mother as 'secretly hot chickan older man'. Her parents worried that Richard' who will suddenly s influence would take off their glassesher away from what they felt she could achieve - going to Oxford and having a glittering career. In the event, shake out their hair they eloped and Richard took her away from the Isle of Wight. Margo did go to Oxford and reveal themselves went on to have been beautiful all alongbecome a well-respected journalist. We follow Grace The couple had three children: Rachel, Imogen and her romantic adventures (Sasha. Life was lived in London and misadventures) over three years of her life holidays were spent at Sandcove, the family home on the House Isle of CommonsWight. Even then the doubts about Richard's drinking were never far from Margo's mind: ''she would never be able to leave him in charge''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1910709158</amazonuk>Then Richard left them.

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Matt Haig1914585402|title=How to Stop TimeDashboard Elvis is Dead|author=David F Ross

|summary=Tom is an albatross. ThatI reviewed David F Ross's book [[There's not to say he has a freakish wingspan, or anything, but it means heOnly One Danny Garvey by David F Ross|There's not Only One Danny Garvey]] a mayfly. In contrast to all us regular humans with our temperamental bodies living out short lifespans, he ages at a speed roughly one-fifteenth couple of that at which we do, years back and barely gets touched remember being absolutely floored by any diseasehow powerful and affecting it was. It means he will live for several more centuries than the ones he has witnessed so far, but ever since his mother was drowned as a witch due to his teenaged self never ageinggripping, emotionally wounding read, he has known the best thing for him – and others – is to regularly move on. Solitude has been tempered since the late Victorian era, when other people even older than him press-ganged him into their society rereading my review of albatrosses, but the fact of the matter is it my main takeaway was that falling in love really is a no-no. But that's I might not to say have lavished enough praise on it never happened, and that's not to say that he can't feel things for the albatross daughter he's not seen for centuries. It might be the only thing he has to live for…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782118616</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Dane HuckelbridgeLucy Ashe|title= Castle of WaterClara and Olivia|rating= 4.5|genre= General Fiction|summary= Barry Bleeker The year is 1933. The place? Sadler's Wells. Ballerinas Clara and Sophie Ducel Olivia are two very different people destined to take the same journeysisters, twins no less. As they are both aboard a flight to Identical on the Marquesas Islandsoutside but not, we learn, their tiny plane crashes leaving Barry and Sophie on the only survivorsinside. And not on stage, either. Until recentlyBecause there's a lot that builds a dancer. Some things that can be taught or learnt – discipline, Barry was an investment banker in New York before he decided attention to leave his life behind detail – and pursue his dream of paintingsome things, that ''je ne sais quoi'', that don't come from the classroom. Sophie meanwhileA stage presence, was a French architect who along with her husband Etienne was planning charm, a honeymoon of ''joie de vivre''. The difference between a lifetime. Now Barry and Sophie are alone on an uninhabited island in the South Pacifichard-worker, where they must learn to put aside their differences and survivea star.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0008217858</amazonuk>0861544080