134,828
edits
Changes
no edit summary
There are currently '''{{PAGESINCATEGORY: Reviews}}''' [[:Category:Reviews|reviews]] at TheBookbag.
Want to find out learn more [[About Us|about us]]? __NOTOC__
==The Best New Books==
'''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].'''
{{Frontpage
|isbn=18462767721787333175|title=The End of Bias: How We Change Our MindsYou Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here|author=Jessica NordellBenji Waterhouse|rating=4.5|genre=Politics and SocietyPopular Science|summary=Anyone who is not an able, white man understands bias in that they may no longer even recognise the extent I was tempted to read ''You Don't Have to be Mad to which they suffer from it: itWork Here'' after enjoying Adam Kay's simply first book {{amazonurl|isbn=1509858636|title=This is Going to Hurt}}, a part glorious mixture of everyday lifeinsight into the workings of the NHS, humour and autobiography. White men will always come first''You Don't Have to be Mad... The able will come before '' promised the disabled. Jobs, promotions, higher salaries are same elements but moved from physical problems to mental illness and the preserve work of the white mana psychiatrist. Even when those who wouldn't pass I did wonder whether it was acceptable to be looking for humour in this setting but the medical become laughter is directed at a part situation rather than a person and it is always delivered with empathy and understanding. }}{{Frontpage|author=Maria Stepanova and Sasha Dugdale (Translator)|title=The Disappearing Act|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Despite her anonymisation of an organisation itplace names and people, Stepanova's rare that their views are heardmessage in this short work of autofiction is unmistakable. A novelist named M travels from B (ostensibly Berlin) to the town of F for a literary festival she is to be a guest speaker at. Detoured by erratic train schedules and nudged by forces beyond her control, her journey slowly bends toward a traveling circus. Swept up in this series of events, that their concerns are acknowledgedM eventually offers to step in for a circus performer who has unexpectedly left the show. It's personally appalling The train functions as a motif of transience and degrading for impermanence, while the individuals on circus embodies the receiving end reshaping of identity and a retreat into fantasy, an impulse that lies at the bias but it's not just very heart of the individuals who are negatively impactednovel form itself.|isbn=1804272329
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Teresa DriscollB0GFQ81YQK|title=Her Perfect FamilyHow the Sky and the Earth Made People: From the Oral Stories of Malagasy Elders|author=Stephanie Zabriskie|rating=4.5|genre=ThrillersChildren's Non-Fiction|summary=The novel begins by introducing you Before people came and joined the animals, there was only the sky and the earth. Everything was quiet until the earth and the sky began to Gemma, who at first instance appears tal to be your average studenteach other. First, faced with the familiar horrifying realisationearth created bodies. And then, at the eleventh hoursky breathed life into them. These were the first humans and they belonged to both earth and sky. And so people lived between sky and soil and they planted and learned and remembered, that her graduation outfit is all wrongespecially how they came to be. SuddenlyWhen they grew old and died, Gemma receives an eerie message stating ''He is not who he says he is…'', paving their bodies returned to the way for earth and their life returned to the sinister tone sky. And that remains throughout is why the novel. In a twist of events, earth and after a change of outfit, Gemma is shot in the midst of her graduation ceremonysky are both revered. Only together can they create human beings. With Gemma then in a coma, what follows And that is a complex whodunit with a list of suspects that continues why people must pay attention to grow the further you read, and care for, both.|isbn=1542028752
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=8409290103B0GHPMNF6P|title=If OnlyThe Zookeeper's Dragon: A Magical Modern Fantasy Tale for Grown-Ups|author=Matthew TreeCarolyn Mathews
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary FictionFantasy|summary=Twenty-one-year-old Malcolm Lowry had been sent abroad by his When Phil's fatherunexpectedly dies, cotton-broker AO Lowry: he asked quits his accountant, Mr Patrick, Canary Wharf finance job to ensure that the young man got on board the boat and thereafter Patrick was to send him a monthly allowance. Patrick sent take over the money regularly and a correspondence - running of sorts - sprang up between the two although we hear more about what Lowry has to say than Patrickfamily's farm zoo. It wasnHe't s not expecting much excitement, until he receives an unidentified egg that Lowry senior didn't care for his sonnew-age stoner uncle Edgar found in a cave in New Zealand, and suddenly life is no longer quite what it was that seems. Then the egg hatches into neither a reptile nor a bird, but a dragon! Now he didn, Edgar, his mother Abi, and the zoo't care s part-time café waitress Pearl have to have him in raise this country where he might be a danger little bundle of scales and joy, despite having no idea how to his wife actually raise dragons and other childrennot being able to tell anyone about it. The alcohol problem was obvious even But this tiny little dragon may show them love and connection in ways they had never before Patrick managed to get the young man on his way.imagined…
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Antti Tuomainen and David Hackston (translator)Stephanie Zabriskie|title=The Rabbit FactorHow Maasai Women Spoke to Cows: From the Oral Stories of Maasai Elders|rating=3.5|genre=CrimeChildren's Non-Fiction|summary=Meet Henri. With ''How Maasai Women Spoke to Cows is a mind so much more focused on maths and calculations than it is other human beingschildren’s nonfiction book drawn from the oral traditions of Maasai elders in Ngorongoro, heTanzania.'s perfect for his job in the insurance company – until they decide he's not The Maasai are a teamcattle-member, that herding people and this story writes down its oral tradition explaining how they'd prefer everyone came to be all open-plan, holistic so. Cattle are status and keen on stupid-as workshopping. This is when he finds his brother has died, having a heart attack while busy changing his Volvowealth in Maasai culture but this doesn's radio channel, t tell the whole story of the intimate and has left Henri everything. Unfortunately (or otherwise) that 'everything' is just an adventure parksymbiotic connection its people, and nothing else. ''YouMeFun'' is so not what Henri wants to occupy his mindespecially its women, but he perks up a little when he sees huge holes in the finances – it runs at a steady money-moving pace, despite some desultory staff ideas, but loans have been made out with their cows and for the amount vanishednatural world. Fortunately (or otherwise) some people are quickly on The oral tradition retelling the scene to explain that missing money – it's been turned into a gambling debt that has also now been inherited by Henrimany conversations Maasai women have had with their cows, and the activities of these guys are not conducive to getting a cheap life insurance plan..does.|isbn=191319387XB0G9WTGY6J
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1471179311Livi Michael|title=The Unheard|author=Nicci FrenchElizabeth and Ruth|rating=43.5|genre=ThrillersHistorical Fiction|summary=Tess, a teacher ''Elizabeth and Jason, Ruth'' is a headmaster, have split up: she and Poppy have moved out work of historical fiction wrought from the life of the family home and Jason is now married to Emily. The separation was amicable - they had just drifted apart. They co-parent three-year-old Poppy who has Victorian author Elizabeth Gaskell, best known for her bedroom in what was first novel Mary Barton (1848), a radical critique of the family home and another in treatment of the flat she shares with her motherworking class published under a pseudonym. It The ''Ruth'seemed'from Livi Michael' to be working well until the day that Poppy came home with s title appears in her novel as Pasley, a menacing drawing of a woman falling from young Irish prostitute who was abandoned as a tall building child and she started swearing, using words she was unlikely to have heard finds herself in either home. Her behaviour deteriorated Manchester's New Bailey Prison after a difficult and there were problems unjust hand at nursery schoollife. Tess turns to a therapist for helpSet in Manchester between 1839 and 1842, then her doctor the novel examines the harsh conditions endured by the Victorian working poor and finally interrogates the police but no one will take what she has extent to say seriouslywhich the wealthy (including Gaskell herself) were responsible for addressing these injustices.|isbn=1784633682
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1471196615Makenna Goodman|title=Iced|author=Felix FrancisHelen of Nowhere
|rating=4.5
|genre=ThrillersLiterary Fiction|summary=Miles Pussett used to It could be a Steeplechase jockey but those days are past and he now gets his thrills from hurling head-first down argued that the threepervading theme of this book is malaise -quartera hard-mile Cresta Run, occasionally reaching eighty miles an hour. He was in St Moritz the same weekend as White Turf to- place feeling that's high-class horseracing something in your life is not quite right. The protagonist, a disgraced professor on the frozen lake brink of losing both his career and against his better judgement he gets talked into helping relationship, embodies this feeling. However, Goodman counteracts his discomfort with a force which is seductive, radical and unnerving: Helen. The connection between Helen and the protagonist is indirect yet intimate. As the saddling former owner of the horses. Itcountryside house he's seven years since he put horseracing behind him considering, Helen represents a volta in his life, her past tied to his potential fresh start. The realtor who shows the protagonist around the house shares stories about Helen, and he swore that hedescribes her as ''d never go back to it. But when he sees an entity that something suspicious is going onpure consciousness, Miles canbeyond form't help but look for answers'. Although she lives in an assisted living facility now, even when it puts him in dangerHelen has powers beyond comprehension which the reader gets the sense are not altogether innocuous.|isbn=1804272205
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=147228612XB0GCB1MQ7D|title=The Late Train to Gipsy HillWhy My Mother Went Away|author=Alan JohnsonKennedy|rating=4.5|genre=ThrillersAutobiography|summary=We all know I have often wondered how prominent people like Gary Nelsoncame to hold their positions. With 'celebrities', although we probably haventhere't taken much notice of them. They live quiets frequently a book they might or might not have written, uneventful lives and stay mostly under which might or might not tell the radartrue story. In It's not often that you find a city like Londonbook that gives the full backstory, and rarely do you discover a memoir where the telling is so perfect thatyou's quite easy - ll go back and reread paragraphs and even Garysentences, just for the pleasure the words give. ''Why My Mother Went Away''s three flatmates largely ignore himis one of those rare exceptions. The highlight It's the story of his day is watching how a beautiful young woman apply her makeup as she goes to work on boy from the Midlands, born at the beginning of the train each morning: he'd love to ask her for Second World War, would become a date but he doesn't have the courageProfessor of Psychology at Dundee University. Then, on his homeward commuteIn fact, Arina speaks to him and asks for his help. Before long he finds himself on was one of the run from mobsters, Russian secret agents and founders of the Metropolitan policedepartment.
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Claire McGowanJeremy Cooper|title=I Know YouDiscord|rating=43.5|genre=ThrillersLiterary Fiction|summary=''ThenDiscord:'' Casey returns from a walk with the baby, Carsonlack of agreement or harmony (as between persons, and comes across three bodiesthings, almost a whole family taken down.or ideas)
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1529148251Tom Percival|title=Misfits: A Personal Manifesto|author=Michaela CoelThe Wrong Shoes
|rating=5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Will's life is difficult, in a multitude of ways. He is bullied because he has 'the wrong shoes', he has the wrong shoes because his dad can't work and doesn't have enough money for even the most basic of things like food, and his dad can't work because he lost his job at the college, was working a cash-in-hand job on a building site and had an accident. Throw into that mix the fact that his mum and dad are separated, and Will's life seems bleak in every direction. And yet, he still has a tiny amount of hope. He is good at art, and clings to the moments of joy when he is drawing, that feel like a light at the end of a long, dark tunnel.
|isbn=1398527122
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Edward W Said
|title=Representations of the Intellectual
|rating=4.5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=Edward Said's 'How am I able to be so transparent on paper about rape, malpractice and poverty, yet still compartmentalise? It's as though I were telling Representations of the truth whilst simultaneously running away from it.Intellectual'' Before you start reading ''Misfits'' you need to be in is less a certain frame strict theory of mindwhat intellectuals are and more a passionate argument for what they should be. You're not going to read a book Said clearly rejects the comfortable image of essays or the intellectual as a self-help book. You're going to read writing which was inspired by Michaela Coel's 2018 MacTaggart Lecture detached expert speaking only to professionals within the television industry at the Edinburgh TV Festivalother specialists. You might be ''reading'' Instead, he insists on the book but you need to ''listen'' to the words intellectual as though you're in the lecture theatre. The disjointedness will fade away a public figure, often awkward, abrasive, and you'll be carried on a cloud of exquisite writingunpopular, who speaks truth to power even when it is inconvenient or risky.|isbn=1804272248
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=0008433631Sylvie Cathrall|title=Next of Kin|author=Kia AbdullahA Letter to the Luminous Deep
|rating=5
|genre=ThrillersScience Fiction|summary=It was the sort of thing that happened every day, although not to Leila Syed. She'd never driven her nephew, Max, There are few greater joys than a book which lives up to school before but his father, Andrew Hanson, had rung her in a paniccompelling premise. He was supposed to be taking Max to school but he'd been called into work and the delay in getting there could lead to financial losses. As the school was only five minutes out And this is one of Leila's way, could she drop him off? Of course, she could and a sleeping Max was duly strapped into the back of her car. On the way Leila took a phone call - there was panic at her work too, with a problem which could put a multi-million-pound contract at riskthem.|isbn= 0356522776
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn= Justine Avery and Naday Meldova1786482126|title=Everybody Toots! The Janus Stone (Everybody Potties!Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths|rating=4.5|genre=For SharingCrime|summary= TootsBuilders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the site was going to hold seventy-five 'luxury' apartments - when they discovered the bones of a child beneath a doorway. There was no skull. Was this a ritual killing or murder? Inevitably, trumps, fartsDr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. Whatever your word for them It's difficult as Ruth knows, find us a child that but Nelson doesn't find them irresistibly funny. Funny to talk about and joke about, that she is. But horribly embarrassing if you let pregnant with his child as a result of the one go at the wrong timenight they spent together some three months ago. In class, say, when everyone will hear it and everyone Her condition will laugh. At you. Justine Avery's latest entry in her ''Everybody Potties!'' series takes aim at any shame associated with tooting and gently and calmly, with the familiar humour attachedbe obvious before long, explains that tooting not least because Ruth is perfectly normalprone to sudden bouts of sickness. Everybody does it: ''Everybody Toots''!|isbn= B09C2RVJ2W}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=17841652630008551375|title=Invite Me InWhen Shadows Fall (D S Max Craigie)|author=Emma CurtisNeil Lancaster
|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=Martin CurranLeanne Wilson's wife, Eliza knew that she had to be home to make his lunch for one o'clock on body was found at the dotbottom of a Scottish mountain, despite seemingly the fact that she was actually painting one result of their properties prior to it being leta tragic accident. If she didnShe't get homed looked so happy, too, there would be troublewhen she posted her intentions on Facebook. There Her friends were relieved as she was some excuse: Martin just out of an unpleasant relationship, but it looked like she was a paraplegic living her best life now. Then it emerged that five other women had died in similar circumstances in the last year. All were experienced climbers, properly equipped for what they were doing and confined to a wheelchair, but don't be too quick to be understandingsensible people. He was also a very unpleasant person: he once told Eliza ''youNone of the 're good at being what a disappointment'stupid thing to do'explanations applied. All this was in ElizaThey were all alone when they died: DS Max Craigie is certain there's mind when she first met Dan Jones who arrived, unannounced, at a killer on the flat just as Eliza was about to leave: he wanted the lease of flat 2, 42 Linden Road and he was desperate to get in before it was advertised as being availableloose.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1784742775Paul B Preciado|title=A Change of Circumstance (Simon Serrailler)|author=Susan HillDysphoria Mundi|rating=4.5|genre=CrimePolitics and Society|summary=Drugs hadn't really been that much 'It is never too late to embrace the revolutionary optimism of childhood'' Through this hybrid text, consisting of arias, letters, essays and autofiction, Preciado expresses his own hybrid self, and brings forth a problem in Lafferton and Detective Superintendent Simon Serrailler had thought of drugs ops new sensorium as an offering to the new generation, a bit of new feeling mechanism in which detachment is not considered a waste sign of timepolitical apathy. They still wereRather, to a great extentit is the proportional, but Serrailler knew that something had valid response to be done. Children as young as nine were being recruited to transport ''the drugs epistemological and political crack we are living through, and the operation running the county lines was tighttension between emancipatory forces and conservative resistances that characterize our present'' which Preciado calls ''dysphoria mundi''. A mule might know the name (although it probably wouldn't be The whole text is framed against the correct one) backdrop of the person who was running him but he certainly wouldnCovid-19 pandemic as that which has catalysed this revolution, when dysphoria began to emerge on a global scale, or as ''pangea covidica''t know anything about those higher up in the organisation. The police might catch Rather than taking this extreme dysphoria as a few sign of the runners but theyweakness, or mistaking detachment or withdrawal for political paralysis, Preciado urges his readers to ''use dysphoria as your revolutionary platform''d never get anywhere near those higher up.|isbn=1804271454
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=B09FS89KX9Samantha Harvey|title=Fall On Me|author=Penelope PottsOrbital|rating=34.5|genre=Women's General Fiction|summary=Life should have been good In 2024, Samantha Harvey won the Booker Prize for Hollie: She was just going into ''Orbital'', a compact yet profound work that unfolds over a single day in the final year lives of her veterinary degree and - three years later - was still working at BB's diner. Bob - the owner - regarded her fondly: he was a good boss. Hollie had moved in with her boyfriend, Marcus: her mother thought he was great and he was doing well in his career. Hollie wasn't quite so certain though: Marcus wanted to control her and most group of all he wanted her to leave her job at astronauts aboard the dinerInternational Space Station. Then there was Through a narrative lens that mirrors the fact that he would be violentastronauts' orbital perspective, both Harvey invites readers to her and to other peoplesee our planet in a wholly new light.|isbn=1529922933
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=John Gwynne295967572X|title=The Shadow Of The GodsPale Pieces|author=G M Stevens
|rating=5
|genre=FantasyLiterary Fiction|summary=The Shadow Of The Gods Our unnamed narrator is about to begin a train journey with his companion Django. Where they're going and what the first installment purpose of the Bloodsworn Sagathis journey is, set in the era of is uncertain. Django found the Vikings in the shadow of Ragnarok, when tickets ''on the Gods have battled floor somewhere'' and their bones lie scattered for all has persuaded our narrator to seeaccompany him. This story Why not? Not much else is clear either - but we are probably in the past as the ultimate in High Fantasy, and John Gwynne certainly does justice pair travel to the genre, with mythical creatures, archaic language station by coach and battles galore. This the train is a thick book, with an intricate plot and fascinating characters that are woven together to create a wonderfully realistic and gritty world in which our heroes must do battlesteam locomotive.|isbn=0356514218
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=B09HTWX47X0008551324|title=Endless ObsessionThe Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Dai HenleyNeil Lancaster|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=It's some years since we last caught up with Andy Flood, formerly a DCI in unusual for anyone from the Hardie family to approach the Met but now a well-respected private investigatorpolice. HeNeither side likes or has any respect for the other. But Davie Hardie is struggling in prison and he's married prepared to Laura, formerly his DS in tell the police where the Murder Squad but now working in body of a forensics laboratorymissing person is buried and who was responsible for her death. Flood's daughtersThis person, he promises, Gemma is someone big and Pippa, have flown it will be worth the nest, Pippa police doing what he wants. And what he wants is to be transferred to an open prison to Australia, from where she has very little contact with serve the family, remainder of his sentence and Gemma to married lifeget an early parole date. SheNot much to ask, is it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn's had mental problems since she was abducted many years ago but Andy t think so and Laura hope that married life will provide the support she needs. Flood's business even prepared to do the other thing that Hardie demanded - make certain that DS Max Craigie and anyone who works with him is going kept well and that was why he felt able to turn down the case of Lisa Blackaway from what's happening.
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Peter Papathanasiou1035043092|title=The StoningKilling Stones (Jimmy Perez)|author=Ann Cleeves|rating=3.5|genre=ThrillersCrime|summary=In a town sleazy enough I can't have been the only person who was sad when Inspector Jimmy Perez [[Wild Fire (Shetland, Book 8) by Ann Cleeves|left Shetland]] to make sh*tholes elsewhere look glamorous in comparison, start a teacher has new life on Orkney. It's been transported across town at night in a shopping trolleyseven years since we heard from him, and shebut he's been taped to a tree now living with Willow Reeves and she's had rocks bowled at her their young son, James, as well as if she were Cassie, the world's tallest cricket stumpsdaughter of his former partner. When she Willow's discovered by the town gossip everyone, including the local copsalso his boss, are quite confident the culprit has come from the immigrant detention centre the place is reluctantly home to. An arson attack on that shows the feeling – and itshe ''should''s only fairbe on maternity leave, is but when the general opinion, for the occupants are often setting their own fires in protest at their conditions. Cue the arrival body of George Manolis, a higher rank from the citypopular islander, to sort everything out. Because such an aggrievedArchie Stout, insular community is really going to welcome a Greek-heritaged city boy laying down the law...|isbn=1529416973}}{{Frontpage|isbn=B08Z8BMZ7H|title=The Mystery of Healing|author=A P McGrath|rating=4|genre=Crime (Historical)|summary=We meet Solon in Pergamon found, in the second century aftermath of the common era and hea storm, she can's the physician on duty at the munus - the games put on for the amusement of the populacet resist getting involved. The remuneration isn He't high but d been battered about the work gives the doctor head with a feeling Neolithic stone - one of virtue and hones his skills: Solon ''wants'' the warriors to live. It's quite a spectacle: the magistri are the charge hands and when we first see them, they're sprinkling gold dust onto the lions' manes to make them look more impressive. The sagitarii are the archers and the beastiarii are the condemned criminals who are going to fight for their lives with the wild animals. Today, it's the crocodilespair - which had been stolen from a museum.
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Kate DiCamillo and Sophie BlackallThea Lenarduzzi|title=The Beatryce ProphecyTower
|rating=5
|genre=Confident ReadersLiterary Fiction|summary=''Stories have joy and surprises How unctuous are the fats of another's life, how dizzying their sugars in themour bloodstream'', we are told here. And none more so than in In this wondrous storycompelling novel, which feels an instant classic with Thea Lenarduzzi assumes the freshness and identity of T, the agelessness it has in equal proportionprotagonist of this tale. We start with Just as T's story is being told, the story of a group of monkssecond protagonist is unveiled: Annie, the Order daughter of a wealthy family in the Chronicles 19th century, who died of Sorrowingtuberculosis after being locked in a tower, captures T's imagination. Annie's fate is, and the demonic goat that loves nothing more than upendingabove all, trampling on and biting the poor Brothersan enticing story to T. Things change drastically when the beast takes It is a totally maternal approach to story which she consumes avariciously, both in a homeless girlquest for truth and knowledge, one who has survived some trauma that has blocked her past from her memory. Elsewhere sits a King and in his castle, desperate to find the girlservice of myth, for it is prophesied that a young child can unseat the throne fable and cause great changefantasy. Who foretold that revolution but the Order of the Chronicles of Sorrowing? But how can a simple, amnesiac lass ever prove a threat to anyone?|isbn=15295008931804271799
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=B09FFJF8YSClaire-Louise Bennett|title=You Can't Wear Panties! (No More Nappies!)|author=Justine Avery and Kate Zhoidik|rating=3.5|genre=For Sharing|summary=''For the bigBig Kiss, grownup girls out there, the potty masters in training, "You Can't Wear Panties!" is a cry (the bigBye-girl kind!) of toilet triumph and persevering panty pride.'' And so it is! This latest book from Justine Avery celebrates a little girl's final goodbye to nappies and pull-ups and graduation to "proper" pants by following her around as she proudly explains to her dog, her cat, her stuffed rabbit and her baby sibling that ''she'' can wear super-duper proper pants, while they cannot. Neither can the flowers, nor the fish, nor the birds. Boy's certainly can't. She's a big girl now and she wants everyone to know it!}} {{Frontpage|author=Nick Lake and Emily Gravett|title=Locked Out LilyBye
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident ReadersLiterary Fiction|summary=Lily isEverything in this book, however sweet or wasseemingly innocent, is steeped in anguish and distortion. Even a kiss, or has beenusually a symbol of intimacy and closeness, very illbecomes evidence of love lost. When the narrator cries out internally, ''come over here and to give her parents relief shekiss me,'s been told to stay with her grandma for a few days. The parents need the relief as Lily's baby sibling it is just about to be born – less an invitation than a child Lily swears she hates already and wants nothing desperate attempt to do withconfirm her emotional numbness. But on tracking back home for word The imagined recipient of this plea is Xavier, her parents (and her plush toy so she can sleep) she finds stonyex-eyed simulacra of her parentspartner, and the babe-in-arms, already installed. These devilish interlopers need to be ousted to get the family back intact, even if it's not the family Lily wants – and all a ghost she has conjures to help test her in the task are some talking animals – Crow, Mole, Mouse and Snakedetachment.|isbn=14711948331804271934
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Greg James and Chris Smith0008405026|title=The Great Dream RobberyA Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Jane Casey
|rating=5
|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=MayaIt's father is sixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. She was never found and the investigation ground to a professor who invented an amazing dream machinehalt. But something went wrong Now, her mother, Helena, and now he can't wake upher father are dead in their bed. Or at least Initially, thatit looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but there's what Maya has been toldsomething about the positioning of the bodies that makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and her boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. In a rather strange dream one night Maya makes a new friend, and discovers that the only way What looked as though it was going to save her dad may be by being asleep. Cue one madcap action adventure story where dreams an open-and reality collide-shut case is now a complex double murder...really...and there Kerrigan is convinced that the explanation lies in Rosalie's disappearance: others (such as Derwent's everything from llamas and bananasboss, dream machines made from hairdresser cast-offs, to a talking cat called Bin Bag!|isbn=024147051XUna Burt) are less convinced.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1800464495Annie Ernaux and Alison L. Strayer (translator)|title= 100 Ways in 100 Days to Teach Your Baby Maths: Support All Areas of Your Baby’s Development by Nurturing a Love of Maths|author=Emma SmithThe Other Girl|rating=4.5|genre=Children's Non-FictionAutobiography|summary=''Babies seem to be We were born with an amazing number sense: understanding shapes in from the womb, being aware of quantities at seven hours old, assessing probability at six months old, and comprehending addition and subtraction at nine months oldsame body.'' Did you know this? I didn't! How ve never really wanted to think about: ''Maths ability on entry to school is a strong predictor of later achievement, double that of literacy skillsthis.''
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1529379385Maxim Gorky and Bryan Karetnyk (translator)|title=The Madness Reminiscences of Crowds (Chief Inspector Gamache)|author=Louise PennyTolstoy, Chekhov and Andreyev|rating=43.5|genre=CrimeBiography|summary=Biographies are often seen as the form of life-writing which offers less colour; it can be seen as more objective and less personal. I think that Gorky completely rejects this perspective, and offers a vibrant, subjective yet informed portrait of three of his literary contemporaries. In the Canadian village first section of Three Pinesthis book, weTolstoy complains to his friend Gorky that: 're post-pandemic: the scars are still there but 'you write not of real life as it is starting , but of what you yourself imagine it to get back to normalbe. The villagers are beginning Whom would it help to return to the Bistro and the Auberge. Theyknow how I see this tower, that sea, or that Tartar - why should it interest anyone? Of what use is it?'re visiting each other's homes and having friends and relatives to stay. A young Sudanese woman who has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize is one such visitor and she soon proves that not all saints are necessarily pleasant people to Well, Maxim Gorky shows exactly what can be around - gained from a bit like Vincent Gilbertsubjective account, known giving us access to how he saw Tolstoy, Chekhov and Andreyev in the village as the Asshole Saintsuch privileged detail that one almost feels unworthy of it.|isbn=1804271977
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn= B09F4CTKJR1529077745|title= Flights for FreedomThe Dark Wives (D I Vera Stanhope)|author= Steven BurgauerAnn Cleeves
|rating=4.5
|genre=Historical FictionCrime|summary=It's A man walking his dog in the early morning discovered the later stages body of World War I and a man in the United States has just entered park near Rosebank, a care home for troubled teens. The dead man was Josh - one of the conflict. Petrol Petronus is care workers who was due to work a young American shift the night before but who has signed had never turned up and joined the 17 Aero Squadron. This company was the first US Aero Squadron D I Vera Stanhope is called in to be trained in Canada, investigate the first to be attached to murder - but her only clue is the RAF and disappearance of one of the first to be sent into residents, fourteen-year-old Chloe Spencer. Some people believe that Chloe was responsible for the skies to fight death but Vera thinks this is unlikely as the Germans in active combatgirl's diary makes it clear that she adored Josh. But before She knows that can happen, Petrol she has to master flying the notoriously difficult but majestic Sopwith Camelfind Chloe to discover what happened to Josh.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=183885410XOlga Tokarczuk|title=The Dark Remains|author=William McIlvanney and Ian RankinHouse of Day, House of Night|rating=3.5|genre=CrimeLiterary Fiction|summary=Bobby Carter was a lawyer and consigliere to one of the major crime families in nineteen seventies Glasgow. DC Jack Laidlaw is on the CID team charged with the investigation. I say ''on What's the team'' but Laidlaw never really seems to be good of a part of world that keeps changing like that? How can one go on calmly living in it. He does his own thing, goes his own way and ?'' The Dark Remainstitle of this spellbinding work, '' uncovers the truth House of Day, House of why Bobby CarterNight''s body was found behind one , somewhat reflects this notion of Glasgow's seedier pubsshifting realities - the small, subtle changes which govern our lives, like the shift from day to night, however quotidian, causing chaos. But, the constant in that image is the house, stoic against the ancient diurnal cycle which nonetheless controls how it is perceived.|isbn=1804271918
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=19424102551836284683|title=Tokyo Zangyo (Detective Hiroshi)The Big Happy|author=Michael PronkoDavid Chadwick
|rating=4.5
|genre=CrimeDystopian Fiction|summary=''Zangyo: overtime work, often unpaid''Well! This is a murder mystery unlike any other!
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=0241425425Sally Rooney|title=The Man Who Died Twice|author=Richard OsmanIntermezzo
|rating=4.5
|genre=CrimeGeneral Fiction |summary=Elizabeth Best was a little surprised when she received Sally Rooney has studied the letter. It came from a man whose body she had helped to pull from the Thames chessboard of life and who had never existed but then this is the sort something of conundrum which retired spies have to deal with on a regular basisgrandmaster at putting it into words. When she visits Her dialogue is gripping and so brilliantly frustrating, as her characters never quite say exactly what they feel. Among the sender of many relationships woven into this story, the letter (he's moved into central one for readers to unravel is the Cooper's Chase Retirement Village) it comes as no surprise that it's someone fraternal connection—or lack thereof—between Ivan and Peter Koubek. Ivan, a socially awkward chess prodigy, contrasts sharply with whom she has his older brother Peter, a long professional history - and who used to be her husbandsuccessful lawyer living in Dublin. HeFollowing their father's made passing after a bad mistake - something to do long battle with a mask being removed within cancer, the range brothers' already strained relationship faces new trials.|isbn=0571365469}}{{Frontpage|isbn= 1836285493|title=The Double Life of a CCTV camera on Wheelchair User|author=Rob Keeley|rating=5|genre=Confident Readers|summary= Will is a keen player of video games, a raidconscientious student, a missing twenty-million pounds in diamonds slightly annoying brother and a few death threatssupportive friend. But most of all, he is an aspiring writer. HeEnglish is his favourite lesson at his school, Marlowe Park, and one at which he excels. This hasn's now in hiding with t gone unnoticed by his headteacher, Mrs Howarth, and she has suggested to Will and his mum that he spends a couple of afternoons a week at a young woman called Pollydifferent school, Station Road, who's where his MI5 handler as well as being an incompetent waitressability might be better extended.
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Andrew Sharp1009473085|title=The Chef, the Bird Conservative Effect 2010 - 2024|author=Anthony Seldon and the BlessingTom Egerton (Editors)|rating=45|genre=General FictionPolitics and Society|summary= Chef Mlantushi Sometimes it's simpler to explain a book by describing what it ''isn't'' and that applies to ''The Conservative Effect: 2010- Mozzy to his employer 2024 - is, in his mind14 Wasted Years?''. If you're looking for an easy read which will deliver the inside story about what ''really'' happened on certain occasions, then this isn't the head chef of a safari business catering to VIP guests in an unnamed African countrybook for you. Mozzy is earnest and dedicated to his task and he puts all of himself into creating fine cuisine dishes If that's what you're looking for the guests , I don't think Anthony Seldon's book, {{amazonurl|isbn=B0BH7SKG2S|title=Johnson at BOD-W safaris but his dream is to become the head chef of 10}}, can be bettered for those tumultuous years. It's a restaurant in London or a big American city. Even compelling read and should be compulsory for anyone who thinks Johnson should return to win a Michelin starpolitics. He ''The Conservative Effect'' is thwarted in this ambition by his boss, Mr Bin (Ben to you and me) who incurs Mozzyan entirely different beast. It's disapproval for his scruffy ways, his uninterest the seventh book in his guests a series which looks at the impact a government has made and co- shock, horror editor Sir Anthony Seldon regards this as the most important. This book follows the well- his allowing established format: a series of experts from various fields review the state of bush animals into the housenation when the coalition took over in 2010, the changes that occurred and the situation in 2024.|isbn=B09926MK8H
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Alex FoulkesJenny Valentine|title=Rules for VampiresUs in the Before and After|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersTeens|summary= Eleonore Von Motteberg (Elk and Mab are best friends, or 'Leo' for short) more than that even, their friendship is a Vampireonce in a lifetime connection. She drinks blood, she sleeps during the They meet as children one day, and she can Grimwalk (turning into on a flock of bats to travel around, although not all of trip out but unfortunately they don't get each other's contact details at the time. But then chance brings them remember to come back). Pretty cool stuff. Nowtogether, on the night of her hundredth birthnight, she has to go out and hunt her first humanthey are inseparable. However Something has happened though, instead she ends up killing two humans by accident something terrible and burning down an orphanage. Oops! And to make things worsetragic, the ghosts of one of the orphans and the evil master of the orphanage come back to haunt her. Sonow they must work through their grief, not only does Leo have to team up with the friendly ghost Minna to stop the ghost of the Orphanmaster before he becomes unstoppably powerfuland their friendship, she has to do it all while hiding it from her familytogether. Did I mention vampires and ghosts hate each other? Yeah, there's a reason why there are rules for vampires…|isbn=147119955X1471196585
}}