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<metadesc>Book review site, with books from most walks of literary life; fiction, biography, crime, cookery and children's books plus author interviews and top tens.</metadesc><h1 id="mf-title">The Bookbag</h1>Hello from The Bookbag, a book review site, featuring books from all the many walks of literary life - [[:Category:Fiction|fiction]], [[:Category:Biography|biography]], [[:Category:Crime|crime]], [[:Category:Cookery|cookery]] and anything else that takes our fancy. At Bookbag Towers the bookbag sits at the side of the desk. It's the bag we take to the library , the charity shop and the bookshop. Sometimes it holds the latest releases, but at other times there'll be old favourites, books for the children, books for the home. They're sometimes our own books or books from the local library. They're often books sent to us by publishers and we promise to tell you exactly what we think about them. You might not want to read through a full review, so we'll give you a quick review which summarises what we felt about the book and tells you whether or not we think you should buy or borrow it. There are also lots of author [[:Category:Interviews|author interviews]], and all sorts of [[:Category:Lists|top tens]] - all of which you can find on our [[Featuresfeatures]] page. If you're stuck for something to read, check out the [[Book Recommendations|recommendations]] page.

There are currently '''{{PAGESINCATEGORY:Reviews}}''' reviews on the siteat TheBookbag.

Want to find out more [[About Us|about us]]?__NOTOC__

==Reviews of the Best New ReviewsBooks=='''For new reviews by genre [[:Category:New Reviews|click here]].'''

'''For new features Read [[Features:Category:New Reviews|click herenew reviews by category]].'''__NOTOC__<br>

'''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].''' <!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jaclyn Moriarty 1780724047|title=The Spell Book A Dictionary of Listen TaylorInteresting and Important Dogs|author=Peter J Conradi|rating=3.54|genre=TeensPets|summary=Listen TaylorI struggle to resist a book about dogs, but I did wonder why this one was so 's father has just moved in with his girlfriend 'thin'': given that I've never encountered a dog who wasn't interesting or important - and they are adopted into the Zing familyprobably both, with all I was expecting a massive tome. But ''A Dictionary of its delightful eccentricities Interesting and unusual behaviour – the Zings meet every Friday night for dinner and then disappear into the garden shed to work on the Important Dogs'Zing Family Secret'. Marbie Zing is terrified actually ''a rich compendium of doing something wrong the world's most significant and losing Nathaniel beloved dogs'' and Listenit's certainly a rich treasure trove. Her sister Fancy is becoming increasingly disillusioned We begin with her home lifePeter J Conradi's four collies: Cloudy, Sky. Bradley and her daughterMax. They're consecutive rather than simultaneous dogs, but what comes over is Conradi's year two teacher is coming to terms with a break up. The stories of these people come together to create a tale of life, love, for each and ultimately, what being part every one of a family meansthem. I knew that I was in safe hands.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330446363</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=F G Cottam1785769294|title=The Magdalena CurseMan at the Window (Detective Cardilini)|author=Robert Jeffreys|rating=24.5|genre=HorrorCrime|summary=Mark Hunter It's when we read that a young boy is creeping reluctantly to a teacher's bedroom one October night that we realise something is badly wrong. Nowadays you ''might'' hope that something would be done about it fairly quickly but this was 1965 and child abuse was generally regarded as malicious mischief on the sort part of father who the child. The boy would do anything for his son. After losing his wife and daughter be safe that night though - albeit in a tragic accident, his surviving son Adam has become his whole worldthe most horrific fashion. And Adam is an exceptional child – beautiful, incredibly smart and mature beyond his ten years – only recently When hereached Captain Edmund's been channelling bedroom he found the voices of man dead on the dead. Plagued by horrific dreamsfloor, able to speak Russian in the hours after he wakes, drawing occult symbols when he doodles, Hunter believes Adam to be possessedtop of his skull missing. Doctor Elizabeth Bancroft is sceptical, until she meets Adam, The school's initial reaction was that this was a dreadful accident: there had been a cull of kangaroos in some nearby fields and witnesses the horrors it was obviously a stray bullet which had killed the poor boy endures for herselfCaptain.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340980982</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jon Berkeley1786695227|title=The Lightning Key (Circus Trilogy)Invisible in a Bright Light|author=Sally Gardner

|summary=I shall start with a word The beginning of advice. When you're being hounded by this excellent story will leave the reader more than a circus masterlittle confused: who is the man in the green suit, what is the Reckoning, and a magician, for the soul why are rows of a tiger that's contained people in a tiger's egg that's contained cave? But stick with it – Ms Gardner is very cleverly letting us experience the same disorientation as our heroine. We watch in dismay as the brain of your teddy bearstrange man, who seems to have no eyes, and your does his best friend - a fallen angel - is trying to persuade her best to make sure the other angels do not turn on you in a big way - then you're probably living the third book in a fantasy trilogyanswer his questions. Still - never mindBut for some reason Celeste, the angel's efforts will involve you entering a dream world of flight and cloud citiesdespite her bewilderment, the chase after your enemies will take you across the world to desert oases and back, and friends new remains wary and old will be on board to helpgives nothing away.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847384447</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sue Townsend1912374854|title=Adrian Mole: The Prostrate Years|rating=5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Adrian Mole is now 39¼ and living, quite literally, in a pigsty, sharing an all too thin party wall with his parents and working in a bookshop. It's not quite how life was supposed to turn out. As he spends his days wrestling his strong willed 5 year old Gracie into her school uniform, trying to reassure glamorous wife Daisy that life in the provinces is not as bad as she would like to believe, and desperately attempting to talk his mother out of her quest to appear on the vile ''Jeremy Kyle'' show, worrying over his increasingly frequent visits to the toilet is really the last thing he needs. And yet, the worst is still to come. Think a crumbling economy, redundancy, affairs, death, a family member challenging him in the novel writing stakes and a query over the big C – it's going to be a tough year for the Moles, and there's little that ol' Adrian can do except sit back and watch his life spin out of control around him.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0718153707</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewViolet|author=Lauren Kate|title=Fallen|rating=4.5|genre=Teens|summary=A 17 year old girl at a new school meets a mysterious and impossibly good-looking boy, who she's immediately drawn to. He seems determined to either ignore her or be outright rude to her, until he saves her life, and the two of them end up drawn together. This isn't Stephenie Meyer's ''Twilight'', but it certainly has striking similarities.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0385738935</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Gareth Hinds|title=King Lear|rating=3|genre=Graphic Novels|summary=Hound me out of town in a most appropriate manner, but S J I do not like King Lear. For me, even as a trained actor, the language is too dense and rich, the set-up too archly unfeasible to create the great tragedy it's thought to be. To my mind the acclaim and esteem in which it's held is only mirrored by its own over-long, over-blown blustering.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0763643440</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Paul Theroux|title=A Dead Hand: A Crime in CalcuttaHolliday

|genre=General FictionThrillers|summary=Set in India, familiar territory for Theroux, I''A Dead Hand'' tells the story of a travel writer suffering from writer's block (also known as 'dead hand') until a chance letter from an American ex-pat, the mysterious Mrs Unger, relating a story of a mystery of a dead body in a hotel leads him to release his creativity in very unexpected ways. The story ve never been but understand that travelling is more all about obsession meeting new people and infatuation than it is about the mystery itself as the narrator falls under Mrs Unger's Tantric charmsforming instantaneous bonds with people in often chance situations. But does she have more to hide than sheWell that's letting on?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241144639<exactly what happens when the two main/amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Toby Lester|title=The Fourth Part of the World: The Epic Story of History's Greatest Map|rating=4.5|genre=History|summary=In 2003 a map was bought for $10 million, the highest price ever paid publicly for a historical document, by the Library of Congress, where it is now on permanent public display. No ordinary map, this is sometimes described as America's birth certificate. It is the sole survivor of a thousand copies printed early in the 16th century, and was discovered by accident in some archives only characters meet in a German castle travel agency in 1901. The sale and story behind it intrigued Toby Lester so much that he was inspired to discover more, and this book Beijing - Carrie is the result.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1861978030</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Steven Lowe and Alan McArthur |title=Is it Just Me or Has the Shit Hit the Fan?: Your Hilarious New Guide unsuccessfully trying to Unremitting Global Misery|rating=3|genre=Humour|summary=''The banks fell over like fat Labradors running over get a wet kitchen floor.'' Surely that is the wackiest, most inappropriate simile refund on an extra ticket for the credit crunch Trans-Siberian train and all it has done Violet is trying to unsuccessfully buy a ticket for the worldsame sold-out journey. You won't get any such namby-pamby animal likenesses from these authors, instead with quite a potty mouth on them they will lambast As the modern world, the entire banking systemtwo team up, all those who failed to see it comingtravelling through Mongolia, Serbia and those millions just seemingly waiting for us all to revert to high-interestinto Russia, high-risk, high-lending capitalism, so they can get back on the expenses train, and back up the rich lists.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847443656</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Andy Stanton|title=Whatit could's For Dinner, Mr Gum?|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=As soon as heroine Polly turns her back, and leaves ve been the town start of Lamonic Bibber for a day at the seaside, Mr Gum falls out with his best friend, causing carnivorous carnage beautiful friendship but this a thriller after all over the place. Meat is getting thrown around like so it's going out quickly becomes a tale of fashionobsession, manipulation and we have to doubt whether Polly and her companions can ever utilise the power of love and put things to rights. Especially as this book does not contain a magic unicorn called Elizabethtoxic friendships.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405248246</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Loose Women1912374838|title=Here Come the GirlsNothing Important Happened Today|author=Will Carver

|genre=Home and FamilyGeneral Fiction|summary=This Nothing Important Happened Today is the second volume by the panelists from that nice ITV seriesa dark, twisted, ''Loose Women''difficult read. Just as promised on the coverStories about cults often are, but this book is an entertaining night different; it's written with the girls. It turns out a sense of style that theyis quite unlike anything I're just like usve read before. The faces are already familiar and even if you donI can't know them yet, remember ever having read a novel with nine contributorssuch an odd, you'll soon find distinctive narrative voice. While a like-minded woman behind one of slim and relatively small book, the celebrity faces. The women are universally warmslow-hearted and supportive: there will be many a lonely woman who reads this book and feels as if she sat down with a group moving nature of friends for the eveningplot makes it feel far larger than its 276 pages.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444700154</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jean Urewilliamabbey|title=Fortune CookieThe Pursuit of William Abbey|author=Claire North|rating=43.5|genre=Confident ReadersParanormal|summary=Fudge Cassidy and When William Abbey fails to prevent the Cupcake kid are best friends. If the names remind you lynching of a certain film then you'd be spot on as thatyoung boy in 1880's where Fudge's father got South Africa, he finds himself cursed by the idea fromgrieving mother. They're actually chalk and cheese – Fudge is loud mouthed and opinionated and Cupcake is quiet and thoughtful – but A naïve English Doctor, he slowly learns the combination works. They've just started at secondary school and Cupcake has rather a lot on her plate. Her brother Joey has muscular dystrophy and his problems are becoming more obvious. Add to this that her father couldn't cope with weight of the problems and he now has another family. It's just Cupcakecurse upon him, Joey and her mother – and not a lot of money.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007224621</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jenifer Roberts|title=The Madness of Queen Maria: The Remarkable Life as the shadow of Maria I of Portugal|rating=4.5|genre=Biography|summary=Born in 1734 in Lisbon, at that time the richest and most opulent city in Europe, Maria was destined dead boy begins to become follow him across the first female monarch in Portuguese historyworld. Married to her uncle Infante Pedro, seventeen years her senior, she had six children (outliving all but one of them)Never stopping, always growing – it crosses oceans and became Queen in 1777. A conscientious woman, she had the misfortune to be born mountains in during the 'age pursuit of reason', when church and state were vying for supremacyWilliam. Instinctively a supporter of the old religion, with a humanitarian approach As he finds himself unable to state affairs, she was no Queen Elizabeth, no Catherine resist speaking the Great, and wore her crown rather reluctantly.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095455891X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=David Hughes|title=Thomas Wogan is Dead|rating=4.5|genre=Graphic Novels|summary=Well, with a title like truths that, need I bother with a plot summary? A man has a day out he hears in Morecambeothers, then he also learns that the next thing dark shadow is deadly – and seeks to kill the one he knows he's in loves the ultimate waiting room, with a strange array of animals (a bat, a toad, a sea urchin...), all waiting for... well, something. Yup, as you didn't need telling, he's dead.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095580888X</amazonuk>most…

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Dave Eggers1643785036|title=The Wild ThingsWondrous Apothecary|author=Mary E Martin

|summary=Meet MaxThose who have known Alexander Wainwright, the landscape artist famous for his Turner prize winning ''The Hay Wagon'', and Rinaldo, renowned conceptual artist would say that they're chalk and cheese, if not sworn enemies. When I say he sometimes gets If you've watched the wrong end of the stick about adultsrelationship, as has our narrator, art dealer Jamie Helmsworth, or dislikes his motheryou's new boyfriendd have said that they were magnets, or gets a bit feisty when he feels the need for revenge, I am certainly understating the factsdrawing and repulsing each other in equal measure. He is a bit Wainwright was at the socially acceptable end of the artistic continuum, but with Rinaldo it was all too obvious that there was but a rascal to say the leastfine dividing line between conceptual art and public nuisance. But all that might change when As time has worn on, he finds himself travelling 's frequently been brought to a strange land the attention of roisterous animals, the police. On this latest occasion we see him charged with arson and ends up installed as their kingtheft of ''The Hay Wagon''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241144221</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jeremy StrongMary H.K. Choi|title=Christmas Chaos for the Hundred-Mile-An-Hour Dog Permanent Record

|summary=Cassie lives on an Arctic research station in AlaskaPablo, a college drop-out, is working at a New York bodega. She loves the ice and the wilderness of her remote home and she He'd definitely prefer to spend her time on tracking polar bears and fending off frostbite rather than on mixing with her peers and enjoying college and home comforts back s massively in Fairbanks. Howeverdebt, things aren't all rosy. Cassiehe's avoiding his mother died when she was just a baby , and she can't help feeling a huge hole he finds his joy in her heart. Her scientist father is remote and unloving and her grandmother left the station after an argument creating unusual snacks with him when Cassie was still very young. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847386571</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Iain Smyth and Michael Terry|title=The Wide-Mouthed Frog|rating=4.5|genre=For Sharing|summary=Do you know the joke about the wide-mouthed frog? You must have heard it. Itrandom ingredients! Whilst working one evening, he's a classic. It's one surprised to discover that you really need to tell in person, the girl he is chatting with your fingers pulling your mouth wide openas he serves is a super-famous pop star and, but to hopefully spark your memoryas unlikely as it may seem, the wide-mouthed frog introduces himself to they start a number of animals until he finally comes across a crocodile relationship. With one character who eats wide-mouthed frogsis trying very hard not to be seen or noticed by anyone, and the frog does his best to disguise other who he is whilst saying seen and followed and hounded by everyone all over the world, it''Ooh, you dons an interesting clash as they come together. This isn't see many of those round herejust a love story though, do you?and actually it'' I'm hardly doing it justice, but its really just Pab's very cheesy and funny. Anywaystory, this is a book of that jokeabout the journey he takes in his life via his meet-up with Leanna Smart.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1408804964</amazonuk>0349003459

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Dr Aaron Carroll and Dr Rachel Vreeman1609809319|title=Don't Swallow Your GumLong-Haired Cat-Boy Cub|author=Etgar Keret, Aviel Basil and Sondra Silverston (translator)

|summary=Violet One day a boy is in the zoo with his father, when the man gets called away on urgent business. The boy isn't hustled into a very special hippocab and taken home first, though, no – he's given hot dog money, and taxi money, and told to just stick around on his own and enjoy himself. She is extremely small but Well, it's no surprise that does not the orphan-for-an-afternoon sensation the lad feels doesn't make her adoptive parents Albert him happy, and Mavis love her any the less. Howeverso he thinks of a species name for himself, and curls himself up into an empty cage, they are slightly worried that Violet has as if he were a very unusual habit of turning pink without warning and for no explicable reasonnew exhibit.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906847371</amazonuk> And it's then the drama begins…

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Hilary Dixon1785785516|title=When Rooks Speak of LoveFucking Good Manners|author=Simon Griffin

|genre=Literary FictionLifestyle|summary=Arthur Transcombe is Manners maketh man, they say. It certainly makes life easier if everybody abides by a middle-agedset of conventions, grey-hairedsome of which are ages old and other which have evolved over time. Manners are not about how much to tip or how you should behave if you get an invitation to Buckingham Palace, self-effacing poet. they have nothing to do with class or financial status: Unremarkable really - on they're about getting the outsidebasics right before we try to deal with more difficult matters. He hasOf course we all have more relaxed manners when we're with family and friends, however, managed but it's best if we learn to distinguish between our public and private lives and to achieve some success with his poemsact appropriately. (Being a guest speaker at ''Fucking Good Manners'' aims to help us on the Cheltenham Literary Festival is no mean feat)way. He is also a babe magnet!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904529429</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=A J Healy0008324859|title=Tommy Storm and the Galactic KnightsFowl Twins|author=Eoin Colfer|rating=3.5

|summary=Meet Tommy Storm. HeRelax, everyone – our old friend Artemis may be off planet, but the baddies aren's t getting away with skulduggery any time soon because they now have not one but two members of five teenagers snapped up from around the universe Fowl family to be a gang of heroic detectives charged contend with rescuing EVERYTHING from destruction. Not just the planetThose cute little twins are now eleven (and, frankly, cute no longer) and in this, or the solar systemtheir first independent adventure, or they meet a troll and without even trying manage to make two deadly enemies: a nobleman obsessed with immortality whatever the galaxycost (to other people), but EVERYTHINGand an unusual interrogator-nun. Nobody seems to know what's going to cause this destructionThe boys are chased, or whenkidnapped, but he arrested and his friends and their ship seem to be even killed (though not for long), all with the only people proactively going about saving the day. So it's a pity that they start this book strung up by a nasty loony who's about to kill themhelp of one trainee fairy.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847247555</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Graham McCann1472255798|title=Bounder!: The Biography of Terry-ThomasBad Fire (Bob Skinner)|author=Quintin Jardine

|summary=Spam E-Mails can be incredibly annoying, but most of us will have had to deal with them. Fortunately, we can hit the delete button and forget about them as quickly as they came. I certainly prefer not to torture my friends by sending such rubbish on, no matter how bad my luck is supposed to become if I don't. But I wonder how many of us would react if a spam E-Mail actually was a matter of Nine years ago local councillor Marcia Brown took her own life and death, rather than just claiming to be?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0749007079</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jeanette Winterson|title=The Battle after being accused of the Sun|rating=5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=London 1601. Elizabeth I is getting on in years. Her capital city is shoplifting from a busy, bustling placelocal supermarket. Boats fill the river and people fill the streets. Jack is happy because itIt's his birthday and his present is his heartalways been assumed that she couldn's desire: an excitable black puppy named Max, who's a ''licking and a running and a leaping and a jumping and a tummy in t live with the air and a tail wagging and a barking, racing, braking, spinning energy dog of delight''shame. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>140880042X</amazonuk>}}  {{newreview|author=Jean Ure|title=Love and Kisses|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Tamsin and Katie People were surprised that she committed suicide just thirteen and worried before the court case when she had been adamant that they were boringshe would fight to clear her name. TheyShe said that she'd been best friends since forever and were set up because she was hot on the trail of corruption in the good girlscouncil. Neither missed schoolHer ex-husband has contacted Alex Skinner, skipped her homework nor had boyfriends. WellSolicitor Advocate as well as retired Police Constable Bob Skinner's daughter, that is, not so far. Up until then Tamsin had been the boffin head – consistently strong academically and looking forward to going on to university. All asked that seemed to change when she met Alex. Well, when I say look into clearing Brown'mets name: it' I should perhaps clarify and say that Alex pushed his wheelbarrow into her, from the building site where s something which he worked. Oh, and did I mention feels that he was seventeen, Polish and spoke very little English?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007281722</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Henry Mintzberg|title=Managing|rating=5|genre=Business and Finance|summary=''Study after study has shown that managers work at an unrelenting pace'' How true, though it always makes me wonder why, as a result, there's such a market for bulky management and leadership and general business books like this one. How does anyone who needs or wants to read one ever find the time to do so? This title actually has an answer to this, by providing two books in one, and it is such a simple yet effective solution that I have to start there. You can read this book in one memory of two ways. Option one is to read every word, chapter by chapter, cover to cover. If you have the time I would recommend this approach because the book is very readable, not too repetitive, and quite thought-provokinghis son who was murdered recently.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0273709305</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kathryn FoxB07X6GLQ3Q|title=Blood BornSee Them Run|author=Marion Todd

|summary=To give support D I Clare Mackay is still relatively new to a vulnerable gang-rape victim, forensic pathologist Anya Crichton offers to drive Giverny Hart to the courthouse on the day St Andrew's: she is due to testify against the notorious Harbourn brotherswas previously at Maryhill Rd station in Glasgow. But when Anya arrives at the house she finds Giverny close to death and faces She's left quite a lot behind including a battle against time relationship that wasn't going anywhere after Tom failed to save support herwhen the chips were down. In the panicShe also left a nasty situation, Anya fails to take note of an important clue which might help tell whether it really was suicide or her own making but not her fault, and St Andrew's is a cleverly staged murderfresh start. Worse still, in trying to save Not long into the girljob she's life, Anya has interfered faced with a crime scene hit and run death and there's little doubt that it wasn't accidental - the case falls apartcard with the number five suggests murder. She blames herself for the Harbourn brothers being allowed Andy Robb was married to walk free and only hours later Sandra. You could say that they had an open marriage but there is news seemed to be a lot of another attack. A pair the 'open' and very little of sisters have been stabbed and raped resulting in the death of one'marriage' left - on both sides, while the other clings to life.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340933097</amazonuk>but would she want him dead?

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Leah Fleming1786540991|title=Remembrance Day|rating=4|genre=Women's Fiction|summary=In the year 2000 an old lady in a wheelchair watches the unveiling of the new war memorial in the village square. There's pride in what has been achieved, in the family who are gathered around her and there are memories too. Some are good but many are not.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847561039</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewThe Impossible Boy|author=Neal Layton|title=Surf's Up (Mammoth Academy)Ben Brooks|rating=34.5

|summary=Having successfully seen off the rather unpleasant humans in earlier volumes, our favourite junior mammoths Oscar ''Oleg and Arabella have nothing much else Emma entered their den to do apart from return to Mammoth Academy for lots more double periods of Difficult Sumsfind a cardboard spaceship standing where they usually sat. They're supposed to be making presentations about what they did during Slowly, the holidays toofront door opened. Smoke billowed out. And out stepped a boy, dressed in a long coat with an even longer scarf, but Oscar hasnwound around his neck.'t done any preparation and, frankly, he can't really remember what he actually did do with all that free time other than no Difficult Sums. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>034098967X</amazonuk>}}

{{newreview|author=Mij Kelly and Louise Nisbet|title=The Happiest Man in the World or the Mouse Who Made Christmas|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=Mouse doesn't like anyone and keeps herself to herself. Her things are her things and she is too selfish to share them with anyone else. One day, an old man moves in to Mouse'"My name's house. He used to be Sebastian Cole," the happiest man in the worldboy said, but now he"But you already know that."'s sad. He's fed up of having given, given, given all his life and never got anything back. He just sits quietly and mopes. This makes Mouse miserable, so one day she decides to cheer him up by giving him a clementine...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340931558</amazonuk>}}

{{newreview|author=Nick Bland|title=The Very Cranky Bear|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=Moose, Lion, Zebra and Sheep head into a cave to get out of the rain, but little And indeed they do they know that Bear is fast asleep in there. When they wake him upEver since the summer, he roars at themwhen their friend Sarah's mother had moved her away, chasing them outside, so they decide Oleg and Emma have been unable to cheer him up somehow. Zebra paints stripes on him, Moose fashions antlers for him and Lion sticks find a mane of straw on him. Unsurprisingly, this makes Bear even crankier, so it's down new friend to Sheep to save the day..take her place.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340989424</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kes Gray and Lee Wildish1447281357|title=Mum and Dad GlueSalvation Lost|author=Peter F Hamilton

|genre=For SharingScience Fiction|summary=A young boyIn the twenty-third century, humanity is enjoying a comparative utopia. Yet life on Earth is about to change, forever. Feriton Kane's parents are splitting upinvestigative team has discovered the worst threat ever to face mankind – and we've almost no time to fight back. He's going through The supposedly benign Olyix plan to harvest humanity, in order to carry us to their god at the usual emotions that children end of divorce go through: worry, feeling unsure, blaming himself, angerthe universe. And as their agents conclude schemes down on earth, denial, and then trying vast warships converge above to get them to stay togethergather this cargo. His method Some factions push for this isn't humanity to flee, to live in hiding amongst the usual response though: he looks for glue stars – although only a chosen few would make it out in time. But others refuse to stick his mum and dad togetherbreak before the storm. ThankfullyAs disaster looms, he finds some wise and kindly advice in animosities must be set aside to focus on just one goal: wiping this enemy from the processface of creation. Even if it means preparing for a future this generation will never see.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340957107</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Clara Vulliamy1471186393|title=The Bear With Sticky Paws Won't Go To Bed|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=It's Pearl's bedtime, but she says she's really busy and isn't going to sleep. She just wants to play and play and play. When the bear with sticky paws rings the doorbell, he whisks her away on an amazing adventure - although as you might expect, Photographer of the bear has a little more energy than Pearl and eventually she does get a little sleepy.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408300648</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewLost|author=Stephen Mackey|title=MikiCaroline Scott|rating=4.5|genre=For SharingHistorical Fiction|summary=It's cold, dark and icy, and Miki and Penguin are trudging May 1921. Edie receives a photograph through the snowpost. But There is no letter or note with it's Midwinter Eve. There is nothing written on the back of the photograph. It is a picture of her husband, when wishes come trueFrancis. They wish Francis has been missing for a treefour years. Technically, lightshe has been "missing, someone strong to power the lights, and finally believed killed" but that is not something that a star that will shine brightly foreveryoung widow can believe. Miki is taken deep below She hangs on the ice to find word 'missing', disbelieving the star, whilst up top Penguin and new friend Polar Bear start to worry about herword killed.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>034095065X</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kristin Cashore1783784350|title=FireThis Golden Fleece: A Journey Through Britain's Knitted History|author=Esther Rutter

|genre=FantasyHistory|summary=Possessed of great beauty, the kind that drives men madIt was December and Esther Rutter was stuck in her office job, Fire is used writing to people trying to kill her. She isnshe't used to them doing it by accidentd never met and preparing spreadsheets. When a poacher in the woods outside The job frustrated her and even her home accidentally shoots knitting did not soothe her, Fire is hard pressed mind. January was going to keep be a time for making changes and she decided that she would travel the temperamental Lord Archer from killing him. But as sure as Fire is length and breadth of the man did not mean to cause her harmBritish Isles with occasional forays abroad, she is discovering and telling the story of wool's history and how it had made unsure by and changed the strange fog that exists landscape. She'd grown up on a sheep farm in Suffolk - '' a free range child on the manfarm'' - and learned to spin, knit and weave from her mother and her mother's mindfriend. This was in her blood.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905200129</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Justin Scroggie1401286208|title=Eye SpyBlack Canary: Uncovering the Secrets of the World Around YouIgnite|author=Meg Cabot and Cara McGee|rating=43.5|genre=TriviaConfident Readers|summary=Signs are everywhereMeet Dinah Lance. I wasn't really one of those who thought our roads were littered Frustrated that her policeman father will not allow her to try and follow in his footsteps, and seemingly lumbered with too many traffic signs until the day I was driven past being a pair of speed regulation signscheerleader at school, positioned at the exit end of she is desperate to find her voice. But it's actually more a one-way street but facing the illegal way up it. Not all signs, case of courseher voice finding her, are quite as unnecessarywhen she gets frustrated or plain dissed at school her vocal outcry can shatter glass better than any opera singer. You could almost call it a weapon, or indeed as blatantly visiblea power. But in order for her to call herself a superhero, there has to be a whole path of steps for her to take – one of which is where this pictorial guide to countless coded messages, signifiers and other similar factoids comes in.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340994487</amazonuk>will be into her past…

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jose Saramago 1789017977|title=Small MemoriesRonnie and Hilda's Romance: Towards a New Life after World War II|author=Wendy Williams

|genre=AutobiographyHistory|summary=Having Ronnie Williams was the son of Thomas Henry Williams (known as Harry) and Ethel Wall. There's some doubt as to whether or not they were ever married or even Harry's birthdate: he claimed to have been born in 1922 and lived through so much of the twentieth century1863, with an author's view of change but he was already many years older than Ethel and people, Jose Saramago has certainly experienced he might well have shaved a lotfew years off his age. Civil Wars For a while the family was quite well-to-do but disaster struck in the neighbouring Spain; the growth of his country 1929 Depression and five-year- which still left it as western Europe's poorestold Ronnie had to adjust to a very different lifestyle. Here One thing he allows us witness did inherit from his father was his need to be well-turned-out and this would stay with him throughout his mind drifting through his childhood, in life. He joined the country and army at eighteen in Lisbon, and provides a subtle and gentle memoir1942.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184655148X</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Eoin Colfer1542015421|title=And Another Thing ... Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Part Six of Three (Hitchhikers Guide 6) The Royal Baths Murder|author=J R Ellis

|genre=Science FictionCrime|summary=Of all When Damian Penrose was murdered there was no shortage of suspects: he was a deeply unpleasant man. In fact the big books announced for this year, this one must have raised only surprising thing was that there wasn't more eyebrows than manyof a queue waiting to do the dirty deed. Why try What was a bit of a headline maker was that Penrose was a crime writer and write a new Hitchhikerthat he was strangled in the midst of Harrogate's Guide to crime writing festival. He went for a swim at the Galaxy bookRoyal Baths and never returned, when way before his body being found by the end, its creator Douglas Adams receptionist. DCI Jim Oldroyd was proving quite hopeless at such a task? the man tasked with investigating the crime. And why approach an Irishman, Eoin Colfer, when It would not be the originals - tempered with their humour which could only be described as Monty Python doing a sci-fi Terry Pratchettdeath, and with their cups it was only because of the quick actions of tea and dressing gownshis sergeant, Andy Carter, could only be described as very English? Well the answer is most evident - Colfer is a world-beater when it comes to knocking up a storythat Oldroyd's was not one of them.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0718155149</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Harlan CobenDaniel Kraus|title=Tell No OneBlood Sugar|rating=54

|summary=I've been meaning to get around to reading some or all of Harlan Coben's work, because if the reviews are to be believed and you are a fan of the 'Bloody Knife /Blunt Instrument' thriller, the man This is quite simply not capable of turning out a duff novel. But you know how it is, what with one thing and another and a bulging pile of books to be difficult read and reviewed, I just somehow hadn't managed to give him my full attention. Until now.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1409117022</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=John Peel and Sheila Ravenscroft|title=Margrave And not because of the Marshes|rating=4.5|genre=Entertainment|summary=John Peel was without doubt one dark subject matter – that'll come later – but because of the most important disc jockeys of all timeway in which it's told. Born in Merseyside in 1939, he began his career in mid-60s America before returning home to join Radio London and then become one This might put a lot of the original Radio 1 teamreaders off, where he stayed until his death 37 years later. I admired the man for his passion for playing the music nobody else would give the time of day (even if I didn't always enjoy it myself) and his readiness to say exactly what he thought, even if be honest it was not what his employers at the BBC wanted 'd be hard to hear, and I always enjoyed reading his columns in the music weeklies and later Radio Timesblame them. Nevertheless I found much of his show unlistenable towards Kraus tells the end, recall some of his rather curmudgeonly remarks on air (guest slots on Radio 1's Round Table review programme come to mind), and thought his build-'em-up, knock-'em-down stance rather irritating after story in a while. So distinctive voice unlike any other I approached this book 've read; an erratic dialect with an open mind as a fan, but not an uncritical one.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0552551198</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Luca Turin heavy and Tania Sanchez |title=Perfumes: The A - Z Guide|rating=5|genre=Lifestyle|summary=Wonderful, wonderful, wonderfulfrequent slang. The only thing that could be conceivably better than reading ''Perfumes'' would be to read it while sampling the scents it reviews, but even without the olfactory component, ''Perfumes'' immediate effect is a delight: Turin (a lyrical scientist) disorientating and Sanchez (an analytically enthusiastic collector) not only treat perfume creation as high artdistracting, but turn perfume criticism into an art form (or at least a sophisticated genre of writing) tooand it takes some time to feel natural. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846681278</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=David Malouf |title=Ransom|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Taking his theme from a small part of HomerIt's Iliad, Malouf tells the story of the king of Troy, Priam's grief-stricken voyage into the Greek camp a struggle to acclimatise to ransom TroyJody's wealth for the body of his fallen sonvoice, Hector, killed by the equally grief-stricken Achilles whose great friend Hector had killed in battle before Achilles took to get acquainted with his cruel revenge. Malouf tells the story in sparsemannerisms, yet lyrical and poetic fashion suggesting but the personal stories behind the epic themes that Homer related. It is an exquisitely written piece managing to be both deeply moving as well as a great piece of story telling.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701184159</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Steven M Gillon|title=The Kennedy Assassination: 24 Hours After|rating=4.5|genre=History|summary=The assassination of President Kennedy came at a pivotal moment in my life and for more than forty years Iwouldn've read most of what has been written about t be the eventsame without it, and somehow it works. Itshouldn's been of variable qualityt, but the books fed the curiosity of people entranced by the charismatic young President who died so publicly. I'd come to the point of wondering if there was anything new to be said, but Stephen Gillom has looked at what happened from an unusual and largely overlooked angle – the first twenty four hours of Lyndon Johnson's Presidencyit does.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>046501870X</amazonuk>1789091934