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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.

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'''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].''' <!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Anne Rice1780724047|title=Angel TimeA Dictionary of Interesting and Important Dogs|author=Peter J Conradi|rating=2.54|genre=General FictionPets|summary=Toby OI struggle to resist a book about dogs, but I did wonder why this one was so ''thin'': given that I'Dare is an extremely efficient hit man with ve never encountered a passion for musicdog who wasn't interesting or important - and probably both, history and playing his beloved luteI was expecting a massive tome. He But ''s also something A Dictionary of Interesting and Important Dogs'' is actually ''a lost soul having turned his back on God many years ago. One day while on a rich compendium of the world's most significant and beloved dogs''joband it' he is visited by an Angel who offers him s certainly a chance at redemptionrich treasure trove. Toby agrees to become the Angel We begin with Peter J Conradi's human instrument four collies: Cloudy, Sky. Bradley and help save lives Max. They're consecutive rather than take simultaneous dogs, but what comes over is Conradi's love for each and every one of them. He is sent on an assignment to help a Jewish couple accused of murder I knew that I was in 13th Century Englandsafe hands.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701178140</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ian Mortimer1785769294|title=1415: Henry V's Year of GloryMan at the Window (Detective Cardilini)|author=Robert Jeffreys|rating=4.5|genre=HistoryCrime|summary=The medieval, in fact time-honoured, view of King Henry V as one of EnglandIt's greatest heroes was propagated though not originated by Shakespeare, and again more recently when we read that a young boy is creeping reluctantly to some extent by Oliviera teacher's portrayal in filmbedroom one October night that we realise something is badly wrong. At least one historian has called him 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 greatest man part of the child. The boy would be safe that ever ruled Englandnight though - albeit in the most horrific fashion. When he reached Captain Edmund's bedroom he found the man dead on the floor, the top of his skull missing. The school's initial reaction was that this was a dreadful accident: there had been a cull of kangaroos in some nearby fields and it was obviously a stray bullet which had killed the Captain.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224079921</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Deborah Gregory1786695227|title=Dancing With The DeadInvisible in a Bright Light|author=Sally Gardner|rating=34.5|genre=Literary FictionConfident Readers|summary=I wanted to read ''Dancing with The beginning of this excellent story will leave the reader more than a little confused: who is the man in the Dead''green suit, because I'm interested in family history. The blurb on what is the back Reckoning, and why are rows of people in a cave? But stick with it – Ms Gardner is very cleverly letting us experience the book also mentioned Gill – same disorientation as our heroine of . We watch in dismay as the piece – was moving from Bristol (my current home) strange man, who seems to have no eyes, does his best to persuade her to Lincolnshire (where I was born and brought up)answer his questions. I felt with all these linksBut for some reason Celeste, despite her bewilderment, the novel could not fail to interest me – but this was not the caseremains wary and gives nothing away.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904529305</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Miss Read1912374854|title=Christmas at Thrush GreenViolet|author=S J I Holliday|rating=43.5|genre=Women's FictionThrillers|summary=Set I've never been but understand that travelling is all about meeting new people and forming instantaneous bonds with people in often chance situations. Well that's exactly what happens when the rural village of Thrush Green, this book is the latest two main/only characters meet in a series surrounding familiar characters. There travel agency in Beijing - Carrie is unsuccessfully trying to get a refund on an extra ticket for the feisty Ella Bembridge, who Trans-Siberian train and Violet is finally having trying to admit that old age is creeping unsuccessfully buy a ticket for the same sold-out journey. As the two team up as her eyesight fails. Friends such as Dimity , travelling through Mongolia, Serbia and Charles Henstock are concerned about herinto Russia, it could've been the start of a beautiful friendship but she refuses to accept any help. Albert Piggott has decided this a thriller after all so it's time to retire now that his wife, Nelly, is quickly becomes a successful cafe owner and can afford to take care tale of him! And relative newcomer Phil Hurst obsession, manipulation and her husband are arranging the local nativity play, despite a number of set-backstoxic friendships. Will everything be in place for Christmas? And will independent Ella make a decision about her future?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1409101592</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Matt and Dave1912374838|title=Yuck's Robotic Bottom|rating=4|genre=Confident Readers|summary=It's concerned me for a while that it's relatively easy to pick up early readers for girls – princesses, magic soft toys, mermaids and pets abound – but there's a much smaller choice for boys. It's important too with early readers that the content is ''interesting'' and reading becomes more than just something which you ''have'' to do at school and moves into being fun. Matt and Dave have found the answer in Yuck.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847382991</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewNothing Important Happened Today|author=John E Smelcer|title=The Great DeathWill Carver

|summary='As Western Europeans settled Alaska, they brought with them diseases against which the indigenous people had no natural immunity. At the beginning of the twentieth century, fully two thirds of all Alaska natives perished from Nothing Important Happened Today is a pandemic of measlesdark, smallpoxtwisted, and influenzadifficult read. No community was spared. In most casesStories about cults often are, half of a villagebut this is different; it's population died within written with a weeksense of style that is quite unlike anything I've read before. In some casesI can't remember ever having read a novel with such an odd, there were no survivorsdistinctive narrative voice. It was While a slim and relatively small book, the end of an ancient way slow-moving nature of life. Natives still refer to the dreadful period as the Great Deathplot makes it feel far larger than its 276 pages.'|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1842709194</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Maxine Barrywilliamabbey|title=River DeepThe Pursuit of William Abbey|author=Claire North

|genre=Women's FictionParanormal|summary=Two When William Abbey fails to prevent the lynching of a young women both have a love boy in 1880's South Africa, he finds himself cursed by the grieving mother. A naïve English Doctor, he slowly learns the weight of the Thames. Melisande Ray's beloved hotelcurse upon him, as the Ray shadow of Sunshine is on the river bankdead boy begins to follow him across the world. It's here that guests come who want to be pampered Never stopping, always growing – it crosses oceans and looked after mountains in pursuit of William. As he finds himself unable to resist speaking the way truths that only the best hotels can do wellhe hears in others, but when Wendell James checks in to the hotel it's not pampering he's looking for. He's buying a piece of land not far from also learns that the Ray of Sunshine dark shadow is deadly – and seeks to kill the one he's sussing out the competition. There's something personal in there too – if his new hotel means that loves the Ray of Sunshine goes under then that would be an added bonus. There's just a slight doubt in his mind when a red-haired maid catches his eye.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709088930</amazonuk>most…

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Joe Gores1643785036|title=Spade and ArcherThe Wondrous Apothecary|author=Mary E Martin

|genre=CrimeGeneral Fiction|summary=Sam Spade decidesThose who have known Alexander Wainwright, bravely, to set up the landscape artist famous for his one-man detective agency. ItTurner prize winning ''The Hay Wagon''s the 1920s in San Francisco so we have the prohibition era , and all Rinaldo, renowned conceptual artist would say that that entailsthey're chalk and cheese, if not sworn enemies. Many localsIf you've watched the relationship, of courseas has our narrator, choose to disobey the lawart dealer Jamie Helmsworth, stick two fingers upyou'd have said that they were magnets, so to speak drawing and as a result there's lots of bootleg liquorrepulsing each other in equal measure. Straight awayWainwright was at the socially acceptable end of the artistic continuum, but with Rinaldo it's evident was all too obvious that Sam is there was but a man of few wordsfine dividing line between conceptual art and public nuisance. He As time has worn on, he's frequently been brought to the mannerisms attention of a cat - stealthy, quick on his feetthe police. HeOn this latest occasion we see him charged with arson and theft of ''The Hay Wagon''s also a compulsive chain-smoker, but then again, most people were. In that era, holding a cigarette was an elegant, almost essential accessory. How times have changed.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140911323X</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Michael Morpurgo and Emma Chichester ClarkMary H.K. Choi|title=The Best of TimesPermanent Record|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersTeens|summary=Most children enjoy Pablo, a college drop-out, is working at a good traditional tale New York bodega. He's massively in debt, he's avoiding his mother, and this lovely book by Michael Morpurgo seems he finds his joy in creating unusual snacks with random ingredients! Whilst working one evening, he's surprised to have all discover that the right ingredients – girl he is chatting with as he serves is a handsome prince super-famous pop star and , as unlikely as it may seem, they start a beautiful princess relationship. With one character who fall in loveis trying very hard not to be seen or noticed by anyone, get married and live happily ever after. Or do they? Sadly, not long after Prince Frederico marries the lovely Princess Serafinaother who is seen and followed and hounded by everyone all over the world, she becomes very sadit's an interesting clash as they come together. Nobody knows what has caused such great sadness This isn't just a love story though, but poor Prince Frederico is desperate to find a cure for his wifeand actually it's really just Pab's misery. He tries everything story, about the journey he takes in his power and eventually decides to offer life via his kingdom to anyone who can make her happy again before she dies of a broken heart. Lots of people come to the palace to try and help but in the end the solution is a simple one provided by some very kind travellersmeet-up with Leanna Smart.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1405232552</amazonuk>0349003459

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Shirley Jackson1609809319|title=We Have Always Lived In The CastleLong-Haired Cat-Boy Cub|rating=4.5|genreauthor=Literary Fiction|summary=Mary Katherine Blackwood, also known as Merricat, is eighteen, and lives with her older sister Constance in the family home where 'Blackwoods had always lived'. Merricat quickly draws the reader into her world by a series of matter of fact but bizarre statements – her likes include her sister and death cap mushrooms, and everyone else in her family is dead. The wealthy Blackwood family has always kept the house 'steady against the world', shutting out other people, and they live near a village. Merricat believes that 'The people of the village have always hated us'Etgar Keret, Aviel Basil and tells us that she hates them too.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141191457</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Simon Weston|title=Nelson to the RescueSondra Silverston (translator)|rating=45

|summary=Nelson used to pull Mike One day a boy is in the Milk's milk floatzoo with his father, but he has now retiredwhen the man gets called away on urgent business. He lives in the stable at the back of the dairy along with The boy isn't hustled into a couple of tricky ratscab and taken home first, Rhodri and Rhysthough, a pigeon who has no sense of direction, a frog who thinks – he's a secret agent spy given hot dog money, and taxi money, and an old racehorse who spends most of told to just stick around on his time sleepingown and enjoy himself. Rhodri and Rhys find a mysterious message on MikeWell, it's fridge and no surprise that the animals believe that Mike has been invited to Buckingham Palace to receive orphan-for-an MBE. Somehow our hero-afternoon sensation the lad feels doesn't make him happy, Nelsonand so he thinks of a species name for himself, finds and curls himself travelling down to Londonup into an empty cage, pulling a ceremonial coach for Prince Charles as well as giving if he were a TV interview about his experience.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848510454</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Elizabeth Baines|title=Too Many Magpies|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Becoming a mother brings a whole new world of fear into your lifeexhibit. Suddenly you see the danger in every situation, and fear and trepidation can be become your constant companions. In this novella, we meet a young mother who is married to a logical scientist. They attempt to control their childrenAnd it's futures on a scientific basis, growing their own fruit and vegetables, giving their children nothing sugary, eating no eggs for a whole year until any adverse affects from them were disproved. But after meeting with an enigmatic stranger our young mother begins to struggle as he introduces ideas of freedom into her world. She begins an affair with him, begins to let things slip at home and with the children, yet finds she is still continuously haunted by then the sense of an ever-present danger.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1844717216</amazonuk>drama begins…

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Katherine May1785785516|title=Burning OutFucking Good Manners|author=Simon Griffin

|genre=Literary FictionLifestyle|summary=Violet has it all – a well-paid jobManners maketh man, and a luxurious apartment all to herselfthey say. Everything is catered for; her meals, her clothes, and her health are all how she would like them to be. But the It certainly makes life she is leading is beginning to take its toll. On the verge easier if everybody abides by a set of snappingconventions, a drained some of which are ages old and somewhat out-of-sorts Violet, withdraws back to her home townother which have evolved over time. There, she meets someone familiar, a ghost reminding her of Manners are not about how she used much to be ten years earlier – a young carefree girl, full of life. Only this isn't a ghost, but a girl living the life Violet once lived – exactly the same. Haunted by the past Violet realizes history is repeating itself and is convinced events will happen again. Events that will in turn haunt the girl.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906727392</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Amanda Downum|title=The Drowning City|rating=3.5|genre=Fantasy|summary=In a nutshell, tip or how you're reading this because should behave if you're wondering whether The Drowning City is goodget an invitation to Buckingham Palace, bad they have nothing to do with class or mediocre. Youfinancial status: they've probably glanced at re about getting the rating and guessed the latterbasics right before we try to deal with more difficult matters. IOf course we all have more relaxed manners when we'm afraid re with family and friends, but it's not quite that simple. This is a debut that provokes decidedly mixed feelingsbest if we learn to distinguish between our public and private lives and to act appropriately. I started off convinced that I was going ''Fucking Good Manners'' aims to love this book. The cover art is effortlessly cool, the premise intriguing, help us on the characters laden with potential for greatness and the backdrop is certainly evocativeway.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1841498149</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Tove Jansson0008324859|title=The True DeceiverFowl Twins|author=Eoin Colfer

|genre=Literary FictionConfident Readers|summary=Most people of my age will have come across Jansson's work unwittinglyRelax, everyone – our old friend Artemis may be off planet, via but the televised renditions baddies aren't getting away with skulduggery any time soon because they now have not one but two members of the Moomin talesFowl family to contend with. The readers amongst us would then have been entranced Those cute little twins are now eleven (and, frankly, cute no longer) and in this, their first independent adventure, they meet a few years ago troll and without even trying manage to discover that at last Thomas Teal had set about make two deadly enemies: a nobleman obsessed with immortality whatever the translation into Englishcost (to other people), first of and an unusual interrogator-nun. The Summer Book boys are chased, kidnapped, arrested and then even killed (though not for long), all with the help of a collection of short stories which were published as 'A Winter Book'one trainee fairy. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0954899571</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Daniel Kehlmann 1472255798|title=Me and KaminskiThe Bad Fire (Bob Skinner)|author=Quintin Jardine

|genre=Literary FictionCrime|summary=After reviewing several long books, itNine years ago local councillor Marcia Brown took her own life after being accused of shoplifting from a local supermarket. It's always been refreshing to read such a fluent yet pared down story as 'Kaminski and Meassumed that she couldn't live with the shame. In it, Sebastian Zollner, People were surprised that she committed suicide just before the obnoxious main character, shoves himself forward in a desperate attempt court case when she had been adamant that she would fight to research a best seller which will re-ignite his career as an art criticclear her name. Kaminski, She said that she'd been set up because she was hot on the trail of corruption in the proposed subjectcouncil. Her ex-husband has contacted Alex Skinner, was a fashionable painter long agoSolicitor Advocate as well as retired Police Constable Bob Skinner's daughter, but now, ancient and chronically ill, has virtually slid asked that she look into oblivion. So the second-rate writer is on a loser unless clearing Brown's name: it's something which he feels that he can dig up some juicy details has to hook the art world and general publicdo in memory of his son who was murdered recently.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847249892</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Louis BarfeB07X6GLQ3Q|title=Turned Out Nice Again: The Story of British Light EntertainmentSee Them Run|author=Marion Todd

|genre=EntertainmentCrime|summary=Light entertainment D I Clare Mackay is often looked down upon, as if itstill relatively new to St Andrew's: she was previously at Maryhill Rd station in Glasgow. She's left quite a bit nafflot behind including a relationship that wasn't going anywhere after Tom failed to support her when the chips were down. She also left a nasty situation, of her own making but not her fault, tepid and ignorable. WhatSt Andrew's often forgotten is that ita fresh start. Not long into the job she's hugely popular, enjoyable faced with a hit and run death and much of there's little doubt that it is wasn't accidental - the card with the number five suggests murder. Andy Robb was married to Sandra. You could say that they had an open marriage but there seemed to be a lot of the highest quality. Louis Barfe's Turned Out Nice Again tells open' and very little of the complete story of British light entertainment.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1843543818</amazonuk>'marriage' left - on both sides, but would she want him dead?

{{newreview|author=Joseph Delaney |title=The Spook's Stories: Witches|rating=4|genre=Teens|summary='Warning: Not to be read after dark,' are the only words on the back of ''The Spook"My name's Stories''Sebastian Cole, and on " the inside flapboy said, 'The Times' warns us "But you already know that this book is ."'seriously scary'...

The whole thing kicks-off relatively tamely, thoughAnd indeed they do. Ever since the summer, with a story about a young Spook (a sort of monster-hunter) who falls in love with a witch and is forced to bear the consequences when the witchtheir friend Sarah's sister comes mother had moved her away, Oleg and Emma have been unable to stay and exhibits find a taste for the neighbor-childrennew friend to take her place.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0370329961</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Lisa Unger1447281357|title=Die For You|rating=3.5|genre=Crime|summary=Best-selling novelist Isabel Connelly is married to successful video game designer Marcus Raine. Or so she thinks. But when her husband fails to return from work, she realises something is wrong. Going to his office to try to find out what happens to him, she gets attacked and ends up in hospital, while his co-workers are killed. Things get worse for her, however, when investigating detective Grady Crowe reveals that Marcus Raine has been dead for several years, and the man she married was using a false identity. Infuriated by the betrayal, and the realisation that she's been living a lie for the past five years, Izzy takes matters into her own hands and sets out to find her husband and work out why he lied to her for so long. Ignoring police warnings, she delves deeper and deeper into a nasty underworld, and finds a tale which has its roots in Prague and rivals anything she could have plotted in one of her novels.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099522179</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewSalvation Lost|author=Lisa McMann|title=WakePeter F Hamilton

|genre=TeensScience Fiction|summary=Janie In the twenty-third century, humanity is seventeen and studying hard for collegeenjoying a comparative utopia. She's also working lots of hours at a local nursing home to earn money for college as it's unlikely her alcoholic mother Yet life on Earth is going about to provide much in the way of resourceschange, forever. College is JanieFeriton Kane's only chance at a life better than investigative team has discovered the one she's lived so far worst threat ever to face mankind – and so you canwe't blame her for being so single-minded in the pursuit of her goal. Only one thing stands in her way..ve almost no time to fight back.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847385036</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jaclyn Moriarty |title=The Spell Book of Listen Taylor|rating=3.5|genre=Teens|summary=Listen Taylor's father has just moved supposedly benign Olyix plan to harvest humanity, in with his girlfriend and they are adopted into order to carry us to their god at the Zing family, with all end of its delightful eccentricities and unusual behaviour – the Zings meet every Friday night for dinner and then disappear into the garden shed to work universe. And as their agents conclude schemes down on the 'Zing Family Secret'. Marbie Zing is terrified of doing something wrong and losing Nathaniel and Listen. Her sister Fancy is becoming increasingly disillusioned with her home lifeearth, and her daughter's year two teacher is coming vast warships converge above to terms with a break upgather this cargo. The stories of these people come together Some factions push for humanity to create a tale of lifeflee, love, and ultimately, what being part of to live in hiding amongst the stars – although only a family means.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330446363</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=F G Cottam|title=The Magdalena Curse|rating=2.5|genre=Horror|summary=Mark Hunter is the sort of father who chosen few would do anything for his son. After losing his wife and daughter make it out in a tragic accident, his surviving son Adam has become his whole worldtime. And Adam is an exceptional child – beautiful, incredibly smart and mature beyond his ten years – only recently he's been channelling the voices of But others refuse to break before the deadstorm. Plagued by horrific dreamsAs disaster looms, able animosities must be set aside to speak Russian in focus on just one goal: wiping this enemy from the hours after he wakes, drawing occult symbols when he doodles, Hunter believes Adam to be possessedface of creation. Doctor Elizabeth Bancroft is sceptical, until she meets Adam, and witnesses the horrors the poor boy endures Even if it means preparing for herselfa future this generation will never see.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340980982</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jon Berkeley1471186393|title=The Lightning Key (Circus Trilogy)Photographer of the Lost|author=Caroline Scott

|genre=Confident ReadersHistorical Fiction|summary=I shall start May 1921. Edie receives a photograph through the post. There is no letter or note with it. There is nothing written on the back of the photograph. It is a word picture of adviceher husband, Francis. Francis has been missing for four years. When you're being hounded by a circus masterTechnically, and a magicianhe has been "missing, for the soul of a tiger that's contained in a tiger's egg believed killed" but that's contained in the brain of your teddy bear, and your best friend - a fallen angel - is trying 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 something that a fantasy trilogyyoung widow can believe. Still - never mind, She hangs on the angelword 'missing's efforts will involve you entering a dream world of flight and cloud cities, disbelieving the chase after your enemies will take you across the world to desert oases and back, and friends new and old will be on board to helpword killed.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847384447</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sue Townsend1783784350|title=Adrian MoleThis Golden Fleece: The Prostrate YearsA Journey Through Britain's Knitted History|author=Esther Rutter

|genre=General FictionHistory|summary=Adrian Mole is now 39¼ It was December and living, quite literally, Esther Rutter was stuck in a pigstyher office job, sharing an all too thin party wall with his parents writing to people she'd never met and working in a bookshoppreparing spreadsheets. 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 The job frustrated her and even her school uniform, trying to reassure glamorous wife Daisy that life in the provinces is knitting did not as bad as she would like to believe, and desperately attempting to talk his mother out of soothe 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 needsmind. 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 January was going to be a tough year time for the Moles, making changes and there's little she decided that ol' Adrian can do except sit back she would travel the length and watch his life spin out breadth of control around him.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0718153707</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Lauren Kate|title=Fallen|rating=4.5|genre=Teens|summary=A 17 year old girl at a new school meets a mysterious the British Isles with occasional forays abroad, discovering and impossibly good-looking boy, who shetelling the story of wool's immediately drawn to. He seems determined to either ignore her or be outright rude to her, until he saves her life, history and how it had made and changed the two of them end up drawn togetherlandscape. This isn She't Stephenie Meyerd grown up on a sheep farm in Suffolk - 's ''Twilighta free range child on the farm''- and learned to spin, 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 I do not like King Lear. For me, even as a trained actor, the language is too dense knit and weave from her mother and rich, the set-up too archly unfeasible to create the great tragedy ither mother's thought to befriend. To my mind the acclaim and esteem This was in which it's held is only mirrored by its own over-long, over-blown blusteringher blood.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0763643440</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Paul Theroux1401286208|title=A Dead HandBlack Canary: A Crime in CalcuttaIgnite|author=Meg Cabot and Cara McGee

|summary=As soon as heroine Polly turns Meet Dinah Lance. Frustrated that her policeman father will not allow her backto try and follow in his footsteps, and leaves the town of Lamonic Bibber for seemingly lumbered with being a day cheerleader at the seasideschool, Mr Gum falls out with his best friend, causing carnivorous carnage all over the placeshe is desperate to find her voice. Meat is getting thrown around like But it's going out actually more a case of fashionher voice finding her, and we have to doubt whether Polly and as when she gets frustrated or plain dissed at school her companions vocal outcry can ever utilise the shatter glass better than any opera singer. You could almost call it a weapon, or a power . But in order for her to call herself a superhero, there has to be a whole path of love and put things steps for her to rights. Especially as this book does not contain a magic unicorn called Elizabeth.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405248246</amazonuk>take – one of which will be into her past…

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Loose Women1789017977|title=Here Come the GirlsRonnie and Hilda's Romance: Towards a New Life after World War II|author=Wendy Williams

|genre=Home and FamilyHistory|summary=This is Ronnie Williams was the second volume by the panelists from that nice ITV series, ''Loose Women''. Just son of Thomas Henry Williams (known as promised on the cover, this book is an entertaining night with the girlsHarry) and Ethel Wall. It turns out that There's some doubt as to whether or not theywere ever married or even Harry're just like us. The faces are s birthdate: he claimed to have been born in 1863, but he was already familiar many years older than Ethel and even if you don't know them yet, with nine contributors, you'll soon find he might well have shaved a few years off his age. For a likewhile the family was quite well-minded woman behind one of to-do but disaster struck in the celebrity faces1929 Depression and five-year-old Ronnie had to adjust to a very different lifestyle. The women are universally warmOne thing he did inherit from his father was his need to be well-turned-hearted out and supportive: there will be many a lonely woman who reads this book and feels as if she sat down would stay with a group of friends for him throughout his life. He joined the eveningarmy at eighteen in 1942.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444700154</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jean Ure1542015421|title=Fortune CookieThe Royal Baths Murder|author=J R Ellis|rating=43.5|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=Fudge Cassidy and the Cupcake kid are best friends. If the names remind you When Damian Penrose was murdered there was no shortage of suspects: he was a certain film then you'd be spot on as that's where Fudge's father got the idea fromdeeply unpleasant man. They're actually chalk and cheese – Fudge is loud mouthed and opinionated and Cupcake is quiet and thoughtful – but In fact the combination works. Theyonly surprising thing was that there wasn've just started at secondary school and Cupcake has rather t more of a lot on her plate. Her brother Joey has muscular dystrophy and his problems are becoming more obvious. Add queue waiting to this that her father couldn't cope with do the problems and he now has another familydirty deed. It's just Cupcake, Joey and her mother – and not What was a lot bit of money.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007224621</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jenifer Roberts|title=The Madness of Queen Maria: The Remarkable Life of Maria I of Portugal|rating=4.5|genre=Biography|summary=Born in 1734 in Lisbon, at a headline maker was that time the richest Penrose was a crime writer and most opulent city in Europe, Maria that he was destined to become the first female monarch strangled in Portuguese history. Married to her uncle Infante Pedro, seventeen years her senior, she had six children (outliving all but one of them), and became Queen in 1777. A conscientious woman, she had the misfortune to be born in during the 'age midst of reasonHarrogate', when church and state were vying for supremacys crime writing festival. Instinctively He went for a supporter of swim at the old religionRoyal Baths and never returned, with a humanitarian approach to state affairs, she was no Queen Elizabeth, no Catherine his body being found by the Great, and wore her crown rather reluctantly.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095455891X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=David Hughes|title=Thomas Wogan is Dead|rating=4receptionist.5|genre=Graphic Novels|summary=Well, with a title like that, need I bother with a plot summary? A DCI Jim Oldroyd was the man has a day out in Morecambe, then tasked with investigating the next thing he knows he's in crime. It would not be the ultimate waiting roomonly death, with a strange array and it was only because of the quick actions of animals (a bathis sergeant, a toadAndy Carter, a sea urchin...), all waiting for... well, something. Yup, as you didn't need telling, hethat Oldroyd's deadwas not one of them.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095580888X</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Dave EggersDaniel Kraus|title=The Wild ThingsBlood Sugar

|summary=Meet MaxThis is a difficult read. When I say he sometimes gets And not because of the wrong end dark subject matter – that'll come later – but because of the stick about adults, or dislikes his motherway in which it's new boyfriendtold. This might put a lot of readers off, or gets and to be honest it'd be hard to blame them. Kraus tells the story in a bit feisty when he feels the need for revenge, distinctive voice unlike any other I am certainly understating the facts've read; an erratic dialect with heavy and frequent slang. He The immediate effect is disorientating and distracting, and it takes some time to feel natural. It's a bit of a rascal struggle to acclimatise to Jody's voice, to say get acquainted with his mannerisms, but the story wouldn't be the leastsame without it, and somehow it works. But all that might change when he finds himself travelling to a strange land of roisterous animalsIt shouldn't, and ends up installed as their kingbut it does.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0241144221</amazonuk>1789091934