Changes

|authorisbn= Claire McGowanB0FK5LHKD9|title=The PushColour of Memory|author=Christopher Bowden|rating= 54|genre= General Fiction|summary= Six mums-It's been three years since we last reviewed a book by favourite regular Christopher Bowden, so we were very glad to-be meet see a new novel arrive here at a prenatal classBookbag Towers. ItLike all Bowden's stories, there's NCT a mystery at the heart of ''The Colour of Money'style'. We like this running theme in an author', s work - take a mystery but not give it different flavour and atmosphere each time.}}{{Frontpage|author=Saou Ichikawa and Polly Barton (translator)|title=Hunchback|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=I was in the proper NCTmiddle 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''. This bit is importanta word I recognised to be loaded with historical and cultural baggage, but you have often used to wait a little dehumanise or reduce. Curious, I leaned over the display table and turned to see whythe back inside cover. This being LondonThere, I discovered the author: Saou Ichikawa, such a class attracts woman diagnosed in childhood with congenital myopathy, a wide variety condition that causes severe muscular weakness and touches every aspect of people, from all sorts her life. The title took on new complexity in light of backgrounds, but for most of the ladies the thing they have in common is her biography. I had to read it's their first baby. Probably after the first one, you don't have time for classes, or think you've got child-rearing down pat.|isbn=15420199900241700787

|isbnauthor=0008378363Jen Beagin|title=One Perfect Morning|author=Pamela CraneBig Swiss|rating=34.5|genre=ThrillersHumour |summary=A husband 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, their fetishes and fears. How? Her job is about to have his throat cut in his own bedtranscribe their sex therapy sessions. To find out Sure, there's a confidentiality agreement, as the sex coach who - and why - calls himself Om keeps reminding her, but that just makes it more exciting. Like we need to go back nine days and twenty years've all probably wished for at some point in life, Greta can exist passively, placidly, as a fly on the wall. MackenzieThat is, Robin until Greta decides to unglue her fly-feet from the safety of the wall and Lily met when they all went buzz far too close to the same college sun. The sun in Monroevillethis analogy is the sex coach's newest patient, who Greta dubs 'Big Swiss', Pennsylvania and twenty years later they're still who, like the best of friendssun, is bright, blonde and beautiful - and irresistible to Greta. When they first met they called themselves Suddenly, the confidentiality agreement, the Spicier Girls as a nod ethics of her professional position, her loyalties to the famous girl band Om, fly out of the window. She's in too deep.|isbn=0571378579}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1784745758|title=Three Days in June|author=Anne Tyler|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=The daybefore your daughter's wedding will always be busy but Gail Baines got far more than she asked for. First, it was her job as assistant head at the local school. Lily There was a moment when she hoped that she would be Adventure Spice, Robin promoted to head but the discussion moved into the Homemaker subject of 'people skills' and Mackenzie - wellbefore she knew what was happening Gail had been sacked or resigned, Mackenzie would be depending on who was explaining the supporting actress situation. When she got home (in the middle of the day: who would have thought that could happen?) her own lifeex-husband was there with a cat. She married Owen, her college sweetheart He thinks that he'll be staying and they have a daughter, Aria, whothat Gail will be adopting the cat. And that's now fifteen-year-oldbefore Gail discovers that the groom hasn't been entirely honest about his personal life.

|isbnauthor=B07WWSCGVSSamantha Harvey|title=The Lies You Told|author=Harriet TyceOrbital|rating=4.5|genre=ThrillersGeneral Fiction|summary=Year six student Robin Spence isn't happy about having to start a new school. She's left In 2024, Samantha Harvey won the school she loved in New York and now sheBooker Prize for 's going to Ashams in North London. It's very upmarket; places are rare as hens' teeth and as the pupils have all been there ''foreverOrbital'', they have their established groups. Robin's going to be an outsider. And why is this happening? Well, a compact yet profound work that unfolds over a matter single day in the lives of a few days her parents' marriage fell apartgroup of astronauts aboard the International Space Station. Andrew Spence is staying in New York - he works for Through a securities firm - and her mothernarrative lens that mirrors the astronauts' orbital perspective, Sadie Roper, has come back Harvey invites readers to London to pick up her practice as see our planet in a criminal barrister. That's easier said than done when you've been out of the market place - and the country - for more than ten yearswholly new light.|isbn=1529922933

|author=Antoine LaurainHan Kang|title=The Readers RoomVegetarian|rating=4.5

|rating=3.5|summary=Violaine's publishing house has had a great successThis novel, and it was through the slush pile winner of unsolicited manuscripts. The three people who work in the Readers' Room to sift through what is ninety-nine per cent dross – plus the fourth advisor International Booker Prize in her rarefied mansion up 2016 and penned by an author who received the road – all agreed the book would be a huge smashNobel Prize for Literature this year, and so is as close to unputdownable as it has provengets. But there are several 'howevers' It more than lives up to thatthe acclaim. As inThe story introduces uncanny characters with fragile, however – Violaine herself is not having life all her own wayvividly tangible bodies yet unknowable, for she elusive souls.|isbn=1803510056}}{{Frontpage|author=Sally Rooney|title=Intermezzo|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction |summary=Sally Rooney has been involved in a near-fatal accident, studied the chessboard of life and starts this book coming round from is something of a comagrandmaster at putting it into words. AndHer dialogue is gripping and so brilliantly frustrating, however – despite all urgingas her characters never quite say exactly what they feel. Among the many relationships woven into this story, the author of the book has never once made themselves known central one for readers to unravel is the publishers in personfraternal connection—or lack thereof—between Ivan and Peter Koubek. Ivan, a socially awkward chess prodigy, and in factcontrasts sharply with his older brother Peter, offered up a most peculiar statement-come-threat successful lawyer living in Dublin. Following their last email. What is going to befall Violaine, her memoryfather's passing after a long battle with cancer, her staff – and how much is any of it due to the hit novel? And just where the heck did that come from?brothers' already strained relationship faces new trials.|isbn=19104779740571365469

|isbn=085752612XB0DGDJRHYD|title=Rodham: What if Hillary hadn't Married Bill?Nowhere Man|author=Curtis SittenfeldDeborah Stone

|summary=I was tempted to read ''Rodham'' by the success of Curtis Sittenfeld's ''American Wife''In a quiet suburban house, Patrick is making his final plans. That book wasn't marketed as being a portrait A meticulous man, he makes sure of Laura Bushevery preparation, but down to the word ''thinly-veiled'' seemed to occur very regularly in reviewslast detail. How would ''Rodham'' compare? UnfortunatelySome last reflections, there is a difference: relatively little was known about Laura Bushand then he says goodbye to his wife, which gave the book a freshness which the first third of ''Rodham'' lacks. We've all heard the storiesworld, read the books - about Hillary and particularly about Billhis life. It's still an interesting concepthorribly sad. At work in her shop, though: how would Hillary have fared if she hadn't subsumed his wife Diana is fending off yet another phone call about her own ambitions into Bill's careerageing and ailing mother, if she hadn't had to carry the burden of all Bill's baggage and if she hadn't left her own run at the presidency so late? Could she have who needs extricating from yet another accident. It will be a while before Diana realises what Patrick has done better without the Clinton surname?.

|authorisbn=Anstey Harris1739526910|title=Where We BelongI've Not Been Lost|author=Glen Sibley|rating=4.5

|summary= I've always believed that places and buildings absorb what happens within them and reflect it back; this is how we can tell that a sacred space is sacred. Cate Morris believes 'One year after a similar thing, she believes that suicide attempt blows apart musician Brian O’Malley''A house absorbs happinesss life, it blooms into the wallpaperhe arrives in an unfamiliar Devon town to recover. Living with an unexpected housemate at his former manager’s holiday home, the wood he dreams of the window framesreconnecting with everything he has lost. But as those tentative plans falter, the bricks: that's how it he becomes swept up in a homelocal world of unlikely friendships, mobile discos and surprising romantic possibilities.'' She is having these thoughts as she packs up her home. She has to leave. A combination of circumstances means that is not only redundant but also homeless. With nowhere else to go, she has called on her late husband's family for help. Just for a few weeks.|isbn=1471173836

|author=Frederic Beigbeder and Frank Wynne (translator)Jenny Lecoat|title=A Life Without EndBeyond Summerland

|genre=Literary General Fiction|summary=I looked at Jean lives on Jersey with her mother where they are celebrating the end of the calendar occupation. During the other weekwar, Jean's father was arrested for listening to a banned radio and disappointedly realised I have a birthday this year – I knowsoldiers took him away one night, yet another oneleaving Jean and her mother waiting for years for news of him. It won't be one As the British finally free the Channel islands from the Nazis, and the war is finally over, their hopes rise that they will finally learn what became of him. But will the major numberstruth come as a relief, but or will it raise further questions around what else happened during the war? Who was the time when I have informer who told the same number as Heinz varieties looms on Nazis about the horizon. radio? And then a few of what other secrets have been kept throughout the occupation?|isbn=1846976537}}{{Frontpage|author=Onyi Nwabineli|title=Allow Me to Introduce Myself|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Anuri spent her childhood on display to the big 0world, thanks to her step-numbersmother Ophelia's increasingly popular presence on social media, where she posted every step of Anuri's childhood for sponsorships and influencer deals and if all goes well, I'll be an OBE. (Which of course stands for Over Bloody Eightybasically, monetary gain.) Now if that's the extent of my mid-Anuri is in her twenties and she is slowly trying to regain her confidence and to get her life crisisback, I guess I have suing her step-mother to be happytake down the content about her. Our author here doesn't use that exact phraseAnuri is battling alcoholism, but he might be said failing to be living onestart her PhD, undergoing therapy and secretly abusing people online and receiving money from them for doing so. Determined to find out how to prolong life for as long as he wants – he would like to see 400 – he hops right into bed with the assistant to the first geneticist he interviewsMost importantly, and they end up with a childshe is desperately worried about her little sister, which who is at least a way of continuing the life new focus of his genesOphelia's online empire. Can she save her sister, and a motive to keep ongoing. But how can he get to not flick perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the 'final way out' switch, especially when foie gras tastes so nicesame time?|isbn=16428606700861546873

|isbn=B08774SJYN1529153298|title=The Greenbecker GambitList of Suspicious Things|author=Ben GraffJennie Godfrey

|summary=It''I suppose the odd fleeting sense of loneliness s 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is a price all truly successful people must pay for our giftsPrime Minister. (A woman? I tell myself that I do so willinglymean, honestly...) She's not what' Tennessee Greenbeckers worrying Miv's family, though. Women have been disappearing. Isn Well, they've been murdered, but to have 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Miv's upset because she's overheard that her father wants to move the family 'Down South'. When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a name frightening, foreign place, best avoided. For Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and she'll do anything to conjure with? There are hints prevent that it might . She's not have been worried about the name he dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to anyone.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1035906708|title=Diva|author=Daisy Goodwin|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=We tend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, but she was given at birthborn to Greek parents in Manhattan, New York, in December 1923 and only moved to Athens when she was thirteen. Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but many her father changed it to 'Callas' to make it more manageable in the States. When she was back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the Nazi occupation by a mother who mercilessly exploited her and made no secret of us have moved onher preference for her elder sister, Jackie.}}{{Frontpage|author=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, so far as names goNess 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 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 one we were originally saddled Isabel Dalhousie novels, but withsome new characters who quickly begin to charm. Greenbecker Katie has no experience in running a business, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, and there's life always her very helpful (and rather handsome) neighbour, William, to lend a hand…|isbn=1846976596}}{{Frontpage|author=Dean Koontz|title=The Bad Weather Friend|rating=4.5|genre=Paranormal|summary=Benny is one of constant reinventionhaving a terrifically bad day. He tells us that loses his job, he's the foremost chess player never loses his fiancee, and his house gets trashed. Oh, and someone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to have been world championhis home, and it does seem 's possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that he has some considerable talent as far as chess goestrashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the very last person to deserve all this bad luck. He's determined is a nice person. A really nice person. So fortunately for Benny it turns out that he's going the delivery to fulfil what he sees as his destinyhouse 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. He just needs Spike is going to do some study to be able to beat the current players ranked at numbers one take care of Benny, and two in the world. Magnus Carlsen will certainly take care of Benny's enemies, if he, Benny, and Fabiano Caruana will not stand in his wayHarper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are.|isbn=1662500491}}

|author=J Paul HendersonKatherine Howe|title=DaisyA True Account|rating=4.5

|summary=This Hannah Masury is the story of Herod S. Pinkneyliving in Boston, having been sent to live with a rather unusual (yet somehow charming) man family who run an inn, and being made to work there from a young age. When she hears there is to be a hanging of some pirates in search of a woman called Daisythe town, whom he first sees in an episode of Judge Judy on television she decides to go and watch. Enthralled and instantly falls horrified in love with her! Rod is writing the novel of his questequal measure, guided by an embittered ex-literary agent who is now clearing glasses Hannah finds herself embroiled in a pub for a livingyoung boy's death at the hands of two vicious pirates. Determined to She hides away, so that they don't find and meet Daisykill her too, and then to escape them completely she runs away to sea, dressing as a boy and joining the book takes us through Rodnotorious Ned Low's life, introduces us to his friendspirate ship as a cabin boy. She soon finds herself in the thick of things when there is a mutiny on board, and tells us from there we are caught up in her rip roaring tale of what happens in his quest for lovelife on the ocean waves.|isbn=08573033090861547438

{{Frontpage |isbn=1529123941 1471180158|title=The Silent Treatment Maybe Tomorrow|author=Abbie Greaves Penny Parkes|rating=4.5 |genre=General Fiction |summary= When we meet Professor Frank Hobbs and his wifeJamie Matson works in an upper-class grocery store, for a man who's a control freak with all the subtlety of a half brick. Jamie's son, MaggieBo, Frank is playing chess against 'has his computer, although not very successfullyproblems'. MaggieHe's asthmatic and the more you read, the more you'll suspect that he's on the other hand, has just taken some pills autistic spectrum. Sometimes Jamie needs to take time off at short notice - eight of them, she's a frequent flier in fact - the local A&E and before long she will collapsesometimes Bo's not fit enough to go to school. When Frank rings Missed shifts or the emergency services in Oxford he has a bit of a problem. He has need to be away on time to admit that he pick Bo up from school are occasions when Jamie can be controlled and Maggie haven't actually spoken for a whileput in the wrong. How long? Well, it's about six months since he spoke It was going to Maggie and he can't really say if it's likely that Maggie has tried come to take her own lifea head.

|authorisbn=Camilla BruceB0CKD1L5JL|title=You Let Me InRadio Free Olympia|author=Jeffrey Dunn

|summary= EccentricPetr is an orphan. Rescued by the strange, isolated romance novelist Cassandra Tipp has been missing for a year reclusive Bear, he is brought up far from bustling cities and has been pronounced legally dead by her lawyersbusy human society, in the forests of Washington's Olympic Peninsula. Her will instructs her niece After Bear dies and nephew to enter her home a brief sojourn in human company, and find armed with only a pirate radio transmitter, Petr goes on a journey through the key to their inheritance in an old manuscript left in her office: forest, broadcasting the last story she'll ever tellstrange, wild and rarely heard voices he encounters.|isbn=1787633179

|author= Becky Albertalli and Aisha SaeedSarah Marsh|title= Yes No Maybe So A Sign of Her Own|rating= 43.5|genre= TeensGeneral Fiction|summary= ''We might give it our all and crash and burnAfter a bout of scarlet fever as a child, Ellen Lark loses her hearing. But we might win. We might actually change things. And that maybe makes it still worth going for, don't you think?''Jaime has been spending his summer helping his cousin with campaigning in time for Suddenly plunged into a special election. When his mother encourages him to go canvassingworld of silence, he can't think of anything worseeverything about her life changes. However, Jaime has always wanted to be Living in a politician and decides there is no time like when the present to conquer his fear use of speaking sign language was seen as something only savages do, Ellen is sent to the public. Maya is a Pakistani-American Muslim girl who school where she is having the worst summer of her lifetaught to lip read, but physically restrained from signing. Her parents are going through a separation From here, she ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has zero plans for been teaching the summer to help take her mind off things deaf and her only close friend is permanently busy. To help occupy her, her parents offer to buy her using a car if she agrees to go canvassingsystem called Visible Speech. The pair could possibly be At the worst canvassing duo in historysame time, as neither of them really want to be there, but as the campaign goes Bell is working on they discover that they careother inventions and ideas, and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in a lot, about the election - and maybe even about each other?complicated tangle of espionage.|isbn=14711846681035401614

|authorisbn=Elliot ReedB0BC3YTCMR|title=A Key to Treehouse LivingGood Girls Die|author=Ayura Ayira|rating=4.5

|summary=''This story is the story not for everyone.'' Lavender Daniels was three weeks short of her fifteenth birthday when The Incident happened. She was a young boyvery bright student, William Tycea bit too nerdy if truth be told, who is being raised by his uncle after the death of his mother and his fathersuffered from vitiligo - people were afraid to hug her in case it's abandonmentcontagious. However, it isnIt't told in the usual narrative ways not easy being a black girl whose skin is 84% white. Instead, the book is made up of glossary entries, written by William, as She had a way of describing certain events, situations crush on seventeen-year-old Reggie Anderson but never thought he would notice her. Then he did: Lavender was very good at math and emotionsReggie asked if she would tutor him. It runs alphabetically, starting with ABSENCE, then moving She readily agreed: tutoring was something she gladly did at church: this was just an extension. She went to ALPHABETICAL ORDERhis house and he raped her. As I began In shock, she even allowed him to read I did find myself thinking 'what on earth?!' but I soon grew used to the style, and was instead caught up in William's storygive her a lift home.|isbn=1911545418

|authorisbn= T R Hendrick1472263936|title= What if They KnewThe Figurine|author=Victoria Hislop|rating= 45|genre= General Fiction|summary= Itwas in 1968 that Helena McCloud made her first trip to Greece. She was alone: her mother, Greek by birth, had left the family home and refused to return, but Mary and Hamish (Helena's 2025parents) felt that it would be a pity if Helena grew up without knowing her grandparents or understanding her Greek heritage. Underneath a lodge Her trip to the family apartment in up-market Kolonaki would be the first of several annual visits. She grew to love her grandmother and the Blue Mountain resort in Pennsylvaniafamily's maid, is a secret facility. HereDina, Dr Benton but was wary - and his team are making some critical scientific advances on behalf frightened - of the Benefactorher grandfather, their anonymous funderretired general Stamatis Papagiannis. Already, He was proud of his close connections to the team have succeeded in teleporting small primates from one place Junta and expected his family to uphold his values but saw no reason to anotheraccommodate them. But, unbeknownst to the Benefactor, Dr Benton has also coded for another type of teleportation altogether His prejudices included Helena's red hair and green eyes - travel through time. And heinherited from her father's ready to testScottish ancestors. If successful, Benton has a very specific use for his technology in mind|isbn=1734277211

|author=H G Parry Dean Koontz|title=After Death|rating=3|genre=General Fiction|summary= Michael Mace, Head of Security, at a top secret biological research facility, is among 55 people who die when a virus is released in a bio-hazard accident. Finding himself in a makeshift mortuary, covered in plastic, he has a sense that something very, very bad has happened to him – and only him – as he sits up and looks around at the shrouded bodies of his dead friends and former colleagues. As he recovers his senses, 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 Unlikely Escape of Uriah HeepGrave Listeners|author=William Frank

|summary=Brothers Rob The village is isolated and Charley have struggled to see eye to eye for years - Rob poor. It's surrounded by a sensible lawyer who exists in Witching Forest. And the "normal" world villagers subsist largely by farming Uphegia plants - its bread-like fruit provides nutrition and Charley a man who is blessed with an ability he can't fully control - one which allows him to bring literary characters into the real worldits blossom provides herbal medicines. After years The black wood of protecting Charleythe forest provides heat and warmth, roofs on homes, Rob wants to discharge his duties and leave Charley to his own devices - but circumstances soon take choices out of both their hands. As literary characters begin to appear everywhereeven gallows, it soon becomes clear that someone out there shares Charley's powers and intends to use them for nefarious gainsif needed. Rob The fear of being buried alive is an existential superstition in the village and Charley must team up to stop that is the madness reason Volushka, a drunken, self- in indulgent, lazy lout of a battle to win before they, the characters and the world reach The End…|isbn=0356513777man is tolerated.

|isbn=1643785036B0BYF82CXT|title=The Wondrous ApothecarySemi-Detached|author=Mary E MartinDeborah Stone

|summary=Those who have known Alexander Wainwright, the landscape artist famous for his Turner prize-winning ''The Hay Wagon''Bill and Amanda are living in a semi-detached house, stuck in a depressing rut of boredom and Rinaldodisappointment, the renowned conceptual artist would say that they're chalk when Terry and cheeseFiona – glamorous, if not sworn enemiessuccessful and very much in love – move in next door. If you've watched Despite their different outlooks on life, the relationship, as has our narrator, art dealer Jamie Helmsworth, you'd have said that they were magnets, drawing and repulsing couples befriend each other in equal measure. Wainwright was at the socially acceptable end of the artistic continuum, but with Rinaldo, it was all too obvious that there was but a fine dividing line between conceptual art and public nuisance. As time has worn on, he's frequently been brought life appears to the attention of the policeimprove for both pairs. On this latest occasionBut all is not what it seems, we see him charged with arson and theft of 'their increasingly interconnected relationships are fated for tragedy.'The Hay Wagon''.

|author=Mary H.K. ChoiShalini Boland|title=Permanent RecordThe Silent Bride|rating=43|genre=TeensGeneral Fiction|summary=Pablo, Alice and Seth are a college drop-out, is working at a New York bodegamatch made in heaven. He's massively in debtis everything she has been searching for; handsome, accomplished, he's avoiding his motherclever, funny; total and utter husband-material. She is all he finds his joy could possibly want in creating unusual snacks with random ingredients! Whilst working one eveninga wife; beautiful, successful, he's surprised to discover that confident… and so the girl he inevitable proposal is chatting with as he serves eagerly accepted by Alice and the wedding is a super-famous pop star planned and, as unlikely as it may seem, they start a relationshipset. With one character who When the much-anticipated day arrives, Alice is trying very hard not to be seen or noticed walked down the aisle by anyone her father, beaming with pride and excitement as she surveys the other congregation – their friends assembled to celebrate this joyful day and when Seth turns to face his approaching bride, Alice's world implodes because she has absolutely no idea who the man at the altar is seen , who is waiting for her to become his wife.|isbn=1662507089}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1787636003|title=The Girls of Summer|author=Katie Bishop|rating=5|genre=General Fiction|summary=It was the summer when Rachel Evans turned eighteen that she and followed Caroline went backpacking around Greece and hounded by everyone all over arrived on the worldisland. Rachel wasn't exactly innocent but she was, perhaps, naive, it's so when thirty-four-year-old Alistair Wright started to take an interesting clash as they come togetherinterest in her, she was flattered rather than wary. This isn't just It was quite a love story thoughwhile 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 actually itin particular in the bar where all the girls either worked or partied.}}{{Frontpage|author=Amanda Craig|title=Three Graces|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary= Few styles of contemporary fiction interest me like the state-of-the-nation novel. There's really just Pabsomething so utterly compelling about any writer who can catch hold of the atmosphere of the day and capture it, crafting an image of the country as it stands in one particular moment. To say that Amanda Craig is skilled at doing this would be embarrassingly inadequate: she's story, about practically synonymous with the genre of contemporary social fiction at this point. She has such a gift for weaving the ongoing issues of the day into the journey he takes lives of her characters in his life via his meeta way that feels natural and lived-up in, never making them ciphers for social commentary but instead fully realised people, grappling with Leanna Smartissues far larger than themselves.|isbn=0349003459140871468X

|authorisbn=Daniel Kraus152915118X|title=Blood SugarPineapple Street|author=Jenny Jackson|rating=4.5

|summary=This ''Pineapple Street'' is the story of three women: Sasha, Darley and Georgiana. Darley and George are sisters and Sasha is married to their brother Cord. They're Stocktons, only Sasha isn't a difficult read. And not because of the dark subject matter – thatStockton by birth so she isn'll come later – but because of t readily accepted into the way in which ittribe. The problem's told. This might put a lot of readers offexacerbated when the clan matriarch, Tilda, asks Cord and to be honest itSasha if they'd be hard like to blame them. Kraus tells move into the story in a distinctive voice unlike any other I've read; an erratic dialect with heavy and frequent slangPineapple Street property. The immediate effect is disorientating Tilda and distracting, Chip have renovated and it takes some time downsized to feel naturalanother property, a street or so away, which they own. It They won's a struggle to acclimatise to Jody's voicet need any of the furniture from Pineapple Street, to get acquainted with his mannerismsso Sasha and Cord can move straight in. Nominally, they had a choice but the story wouldnthat wasn't be the same without it, reality. Darley and somehow it worksGeorgiana start to call Sasha 'the gold digger'. It shouldn She's living in 't, but 'their'' family home. They use it so often that they abbreviate it doesto 'the GD'.|isbn=1789091934

|isbnauthor=B07W4MNBSGEmily Critchley|title=Be Careful Who You Marry|author=Lizzy MumfreyOne Puzzling Afternoon

|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=It was coming up 84 year old Edie has lived in the same small town for almost her whole life, but now she is facing a move as her son wants to move to another house and bring Edie to live with his family, as Edie is starting to Halloween in 1987 lose her memory. However, Edie is tormented by the memory of her childhood friend, Lucy, who went missing over 60 years ago, and the worry that there was a group secret she was keeping for Lucy that somehow might be the thing that reveals the truth of sixth-form schoolgirls wondered what they would be doing when they were fiftyhappened all that time ago. When youAfter 'seeing're only seventeen that seems positively ancientLucy in the high street, but Liz just as she was convinced that ''your entire life depends on who you marry''the last time she saw her, she starts to find pockets of memories coming back to her. The only eligible boys were And yet as she remembers the Young Farmers past, she is forgetting more and the idea of living more in a farmhouse and having a couple of children called Will and Olly appealed her day to Charlotte, or perhaps William and Oliver if you were Elizabeth who was determined to marry the rather superior Patrick Shepley-Bothamday life. The place to start their search was obviously Will she uncover the Young Farmerstruth about Lucy' Halloween disco that weekend. There was just one problem - there were too many Elizabeths in the class.s disappearance before her move, and before her memories are gone forever?|isbn=1804181250

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 man twenty years her senior from its inception – the summer after finishing university – to its sorrowful end the summer after. Set against the backdrop of an isolated Australian coastal town ''Thirst for Salt'' details the 24-year-old narrator's deepening relationship with her older lover, depicting its all-consuming nature, how it changed her perspective on both romantic and familial relationships and how it altered her irrevocably.|isbn=0861546490}}{{Frontpage|class-"wikitable" cellpaddingisbn="15" 0008506337<!-- Will Carver -->|title=The Garnett Girls|-author=Georgina Moore| stylerating="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"5|genre=General Fiction[[image:1912374838.jpg|linksummary=httpThe love affair between Margo Garnett and poet Richard O'Leary was all-consuming, apparently on both sides. Margo was just sixteen when they fell in love. Richard was twenty-one and described by Margo's mother as 'an older man'. Her parents worried that Richard's influence would take her away from what they felt she could achieve - going to Oxford and having a glittering career. In the event, they eloped and Richard took her away from the Isle of Wight. Margo did go to Oxford and went on to become a well-respected journalist. The couple had three children://wwwRachel, Imogen and Sasha.amazon Life was lived in London and holidays were spent at Sandcove, the family home on the Isle of Wight.co 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''.uk/dp/1912374838/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]

{{Frontpage| styleisbn="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"1914585402|title=Dashboard Elvis is Dead|author=David F Ross|rating=4.5|genre=[[Nothing Important Happened Today by Will Carver]]===General Fiction[[image:4star.jpg|linksummary=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] I reviewed David F Ross's book [[:Category:General FictionThere's Only One Danny Garvey by David F Ross|General FictionThere's Only One Danny Garvey]] Nothing Important Happened Today is a dark, twistedcouple of years back and remember being absolutely floored by how powerful and affecting it was. It was a gripping, difficult emotionally wounding read. Stories about cults often are, but this is different; and rereading my review of it's written with a sense of style my main takeaway was that is quite unlike anything I've read before. I can't remember ever having read a novel with such an odd, distinctive narrative voice. While a slim and relatively small book, the slow-moving nature of the plot makes might not have lavished enough praise on it feel far larger than its 276 pages. [[Nothing Important Happened Today by Will Carver|Full Review]]}}<!-- Claire North -->{{Frontpage|-author=Lucy Ashe| styletitle="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|Clara and Olivia[[image:williamabbey.jpg|linkrating=http://www.amazon.co4.uk/dp/0316316849/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]] 5| stylegenre="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"General Fiction|summary===[[The Pursuit of William Abbey by Claire North]]=== [[image:3year is 1933. The place? Sadler's Wells.5starBallerinas Clara and Olivia are sisters, twins no less.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]]Identical on the outside but not, [[:Category:Paranormal|Paranormal]]we learn, [[:Category:Fantasy|Fantasy]]  When William Abbey fails to prevent on the lynching of inside. And not on stage, either. Because there's a lot that builds a young boy in 1880dancer. Some things that can be taught or learnt – discipline, attention to detail – and some things, that ''je ne sais quoi''s South Africa, he finds himself cursed by that don't come from the grieving motherclassroom. A naïve English Doctorstage presence, he slowly learns the weight of the curse upon hima charm, as the shadow of the dead boy begins to follow him across the worlda ''joie de vivre''. Never stoppingThe difference between a hard-worker, always growing – it crosses oceans and mountains in pursuit of Williama star. As he finds himself unable to resist speaking the truths that he hears in others, he also learns that the dark shadow is deadly – and seeks to kill the one he loves the most… [[The Pursuit of William Abbey by Claire North|Full Review]]isbn=0861544080}}