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<metadesc>Book review siteExpert, with books full book reviews from most walks of literary life; fiction, biographynon-fiction, crime, cookery and children's books & self-published books plus author interviews and & top tens.</metadesc><h1 id="mf-title">The Bookbag</h1>Hello from The Bookbag, a 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 [[:Category:Interviews|author interviews]], and all sorts of [[:Category:Lists|top tens]] - all of which you can find on our [[features]] page. If you're stuck for something to read, check out the [[Book Recommendations|recommendations]] page.

Reviews by readers from all the many walks of literary life. With author interviews, features and top tens. You'll be sure to find something you'll want to read here. Dig in! Find us on [[File:facebook.gif|link=https://www.facebook.com/TheBookbagCoUk|alt=Facebook]] [https://www.facebook.com/TheBookbagCoUk '''Facebook'''], [[File:twitter.gif|link=http://twitter.com/TheBookbag|alt=Follow us on Twitter]] [http://twitter.com/TheBookbag '''Twitter'''], [[File:instagram_classic_logo.png|link=https://www.instagram.com/thebookbag.co.uk/|alt=Follow us on Instagram]] [https://www.instagram.com/thebookbag.co.uk/ '''Instagram'''] and [[File:LinkedIn.png|link=https://www.linkedin.com/in/the-bookbag-1b12a264/|alt=LinkedIn]] There are currently '''{{PAGESINCATEGORY:Reviews}}''' [[:Category:Reviews|reviews ]] at TheBookbag.

==Reviews of the The Best New Books==

'''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].''' <!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE--> '''Read [[Forthcoming Publications|reviews of books about to be published]].

|isbnauthor=0241985153Sylvie Cathrall|title=The House on A Letter to the Lake|author=Nuala EllwoodLuminous Deep|rating=3.5|genre=ThrillersScience Fiction|summary=We know that something has gone wrong - badly wrong - when the woman who was alone in the house is taken away by the police, but it's going There are few greater joys than a book which lives up to be a while before we learn exactly what has happenedcompelling premise.And this is one of them.|isbn= 0356522776

|authorisbn=Struan Murray and Manuel Sumberac (illustrator)0008517061|title=Orphans of the TideDeath in a Lonely Place|author=Stig Abell|rating=54|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary= In the last city on EarthFormer Metropolitan Police detective, Jake Johnson, anyone can be the vessel of The Enemy - the god who drowned the world - who has come to wreak havoc on the last of humanitysettled into his rustic life at Little Sky. When There’s perhaps a mysterious boy is pulled from little uncertainty about the corpse future of his life with his vet girlfriend, Livia and her daughter Diana, as moving in together would mean a whale, the citizens immediately believe him lot of compromise: does Jake give up his off-grid and relaxing life to move in with Livia or does Livia move to be Little Sky despite her reservations about whether or not this is the Vessel - all except future she wants for young Ellie Lancaster, a girl inventor. As herself and her daughter? For the moment they’re enjoying life in the present and putting the ruthless Inquisition prepares to execute future on the boy, Ellie must prove that he is innocent - even if it means revealing her deepest, darkest secrets...back burner.|isbn=0241384435

|isbn=00082971691786482126|title=The Guest ListJanus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Lucy FoleyElly Griffiths

|summary=The boat trip out to Inis Amploir, off Builders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the Irish coast, might have been enough site was going to put some guests off, but it was hold seventy-five 'luxury' apartments - when they discovered the wedding bones of the yeara child beneath a doorway. There was no skull. Will Slater (television personality, if not yet Was this a celebrity) was to marry Jules Keegan, online magazine publisherritual killing or murder? Inevitably, in the ruined chapel on the islandDr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. The brideIt's sisterdifficult as Ruth knows, Oliviabut Nelson doesn't, would be her only bridesmaid and that she is pregnant with his child as a result of the wedding planner and chef are Aoife and her husband, Freddyone night they spent together some three months ago. They gave a huge discount Her condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is prone to get the couple to the island, but surely it would be worth it for the publicity?sudden bouts of sickness.

|isbn=B07ZGL6B1B0008551324|title=In Plain Sight The Devil You Know (D I Clare MackayS Max Craigie)|author=Marion ToddNeil Lancaster

|summary=It was a coincidence that Detective Sergeant Chris West and DI Clare Mackay were at 's unusual for anyone from the beach when Hardie family to approach the baby was stolenpolice. They were there Neither side likes or has any respect for the fun run other. But Davie Hardie is struggling in prison and their attention was taken by he's prepared to tell the police where the NEFEW protesters body of a missing person is buried and who tried to disrupt was responsible for her death. This person, he promises, is someone big and it will be worth the racepolice doing what he wants. They're against the planned McIntosh Water bottled water plant And what he wants is to be constructed on Priory Marsh transferred to an open prison to serve the remainder of his sentence and the firm to get an early parole date. Not much to ask, is sponsoring the fun run. it? It was Lisa MitchellThe new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and she's scream which stopped everything. Her daughter, sixeven prepared to do the other thing that Hardie demanded -month-old Abi, had been taken make certain that DS Max Craigie and anyone who works with him is kept well away from her pram whilst no one was looking. Itwhat's a major incident when ''any'' child is abducted but Abi needs regular medication because of a heart problem: without it, she might have only forty-eight hours to livehappening.

|isbn=14711809210008405026|title=FirewatchingA Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Russ ThomasJane Casey

|summary=Detective Sergeant Adam Tyler is in It's sixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. She was never found and the Cold Cas Review Unit at South Yorkshire Police investigation ground to a halt. Now, her mother, Helena, and her father are dead in their bed. Initially, it looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but there are those who think that he's lucky something about the positioning of the bodies that makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and her boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. What looked as though it was going to be there, given that he decked an open-and-shut case is now a superior officercomplex double murder. HeKerrigan is convinced that the explanation lies in Rosalie's there because Tyler came off worse in the exchange - theredisappearance: others (such as Derwent's boss, Una Burt) are less convinced.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0571379877|title=The Kellerby Code|author=Jonny Sweet|rating=3.5|genre=Crime|summary=Edward Jevons is a scar on working-class young man, obsessed with his face to prove it upper- class friends, Robert and the superior officer was forced to take early retirementStanza. ThereRobert's a suggestion too that Tylertheatre director. He's also self-obsessed, demanding, handsome and entitled and uses Edward to run errands for him. Edward has been in love with Stanza since their university days - and he's godmother (shedrunkenly confided how he feels to Robert. Most men in Robert's on the force too) has looked after him and position would stay away from Stanza or tell Edward that his current boss a relationship had begun between them but he's not like most men: Edward is keen left to have stumble upon the two of them kissing in a tame gay dark passageway.}}{{Frontpage|author=Jo Callaghan|title=Leave No Trace|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary=When a man is found crucified on the top of a hill in Nuneaton, DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to put on the town hall steps come Pridecase alongside her sidekick, the AI detective Lock. Either way, heIt's their first live case together, having previously been very successful with several cold cases. But when thereis a second body found crucified a few days later, but without anything really interesting Kat is suddenly struggling with a potential serial killer and a very high profile case that draws a lot of unwanted attention to get his teeth intotheir AI Future Policing project. Will they be able to solve the case in time, or will Kat find herself taken off the case and, potentially, out of a career?|isbn=139851120X

|authorisbn= A K Larkwood1399613073|title= The Unspoken NameMoral Injuries|author=Christie Watson|rating= 4.5|genre= FantasyThrillers|summary= What does it mean to betray someone? What if that someone Olivia, Laura and Anjali met on the first day of medical school and their friendship would keep them inseparable for a quarter of a century. Olivia is ruthlessly ambitious, which is a god? Csorwe has been raised knowing that she would be sacrificed to her god on her fourteenth birthday, yet bonus when the opportunity arises, she chooses you aim to abandon everything she knows be a cardiothoracic surgeon. Laura is a perfectionist and flee with her lifea trauma doctor. Who can blame her? Her god's reach Anjali is limited the free spirit of the group and Csorwe intends to stay far beyond it, yet fate is she becomes a GP. When we first meet them they're at a funny thing drug and when circumstances bring her back within alcohol-fuelled party and it's going to end in tragedy. We don't know who suffered the tragedy or the reach of her god Csorwe learns consequences. Twenty-five years later there will be an eerily similar event that her god remembers herwill impact the three friends. This time, and blames her very much indeedit's their teenage children who are involved.|isbn=1250238900

|authorisbn= M G Leonard and Sam Sedgman0241636604|title= The Highland Falcon ThiefTrading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson|rating= 4.5|genre= Confident ReadersAutobiography|summary= Harrison Beck, or Hal as he prefers If you were to be calledbring up an image of a city banker in your mind, isnyou't exactly pleased when his parents send him off with re unlikely to think of someone like Gary Stevenson. A hoodie and jeans replaces the pin-stripe suit and his uncle Nat, a travel writer, on a long train journey. Although, this isn't any old train; this background is the Highland FalconEast End, the royal trainwhere he was familiar with violence, poverty and this is its last ever journey before it gets sent injustice. There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to a museumthe London School of Economics. A number of high Stevenson is bright - extremely bright -society figures, including film stars, millionaires and aristocrats, will he has a facility with numbers which most of us can only envy. He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to be on this trainstupid. It was his ability at what was, so it is quite the event on the social calendar. Howeveressentially, when a card game which got him an expensive brooch is stoleninternship with Citibank. Eventually, Hal realises that maybe this trip won't be turned into permanent employment as boring as he previously thoughta trader. As the passengers begin to turn on each other, Hal vows to get to the bottom of the mystery…before the train gets to the end of the line.|isbn=1529013062

|isbn=00082752461035021803|title=Perfect Kill (D I Callanach)The Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder|author=Helen FieldsC L Miller|rating=43.5

|summary=When Maggie Campbell realised that It's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to the English country village where she grew up. She's back now because of a request for help from her sonbeloved aunt, Carole. Freya's former mentor and Carole's close friend, BartArthur Crockleford, was missing he was already 200 miles away is dead and just waking from a chemically-induced sleepthe circumstances seem suspicious, to say the least. Maggie knew straight away that something Arthur was wrong. Bart might be twenty but he was considerate of his mother and wouldn't have stayed out all night without letting the reason why Freya had not been back to the village: Arthur, she feels, let her knowdown badly. BesidesEven though they were in business together as antique hunters, he didn't have his phone with him and he wouldn't have gone far without thatshe has not felt able to be near the man or pursue the profession she loved. It's not long before Bart realises that he's aloneAfter the split, trapped she worked in a shipping container cafe, met and married James (on his way to Francethe rebound from the love of her life, where his fate has already been decidedwho was murdered) and Freya and James have now divorced.

|authorisbn= Alyssa SheinmelAllTomorrowsFutureCover|title= What Kind of GirlAll Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)|rating= 45|genre= Women's Science Fiction|summary= '' Doing something when you're scared is braver than doing something when you're notOpening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to come.''

When Mike ParkerI's girlfriend comes into school with a black eye, claiming he gave ve heard it to hersaid that 'technology' is what happens after you're eighteen. Well, her whole world is tipped upside downI must confess that there have been more than a few decades of technology in my lifetime. Her relationship has just ended and now she I've kept up reasonably well with what's advantageous to me but I'm left with the talk feeling that it's all getting away from me. Some of it is - frankly - quite frightening. Of course, I could research the school. Mike was possibilities and the most popular boy in school probabilities and end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who was always so in love with her, everyone knew that, so why did he do knows what he did? Some they're talking about or the latest conspiracy theorist. I needed people believe her I knew I could trust and some don't, but one thing is for sure, this isn't going to blow over any time soonwho could deliver information in a way I could understand.|isbn=0349003297

|author= Holly RiversSunny Singh|title= Demelza and the Spectre DetectorsHotel Arcadia|rating= 3.5|genre= Confident ReadersThrillers |summary= Demelza Clock The Hotel Arcadia is a scientistluxury hotel in an unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a terrorist group. Hiding from the terrorists who are rampaging through, often staying up late to work killing everyone on her various gadgetssite, much to her Grandma Maeve's irritation. Howeverthere is Sam, she has also inherited a certain set of skills that are not especially scientific: Spectre Detectingwartime photographer and Abhi, the ability hotel manager. As Abhi continues to try to summon care remotely for the ghosts of residents who are still alive in the recently deceased. Under the guidance hotel, he forms a bond with Sam who refuses to be cowed by events, and keeps on venturing out of her Grandma Maeve, Demelza begins room to try to master capture what's happened through her newfound skillsphotography. However, there is a mysterious individual on Although they only ever talk over the prowlphone, kidnapping young Spectre Detectors. It's up their friendship grows as Abhi tries to Demelza help her keep safe and her best friend Percy to get they both wait to see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by the bottom of this..terrorists.|isbn=1912626039086154742X

|isbn=17874775331529153298|title=The Lantern Men (Dr Ruth Galloway)List of Suspicious Things|author=Elly GriffithsJennie Godfrey

|genre=CrimeGeneral Fiction|summary=Everything has changed for Dr Ruth GallowayIt's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly...) She's no longer providing assistance not what's worrying Miv's family, though. Women have been disappearing. Well, they've been murdered, but to the police and isnhave 'disappeared' doesn't even working at the University of North Norfolksound quite so frightening. SheMiv's upset because she's lecturing at Cambridge and has moved from overheard that her beloved Saltmarsh cottage father wants to live with Dr Frank Barker in Cambridgemove the family 'Down South'. Her daughterWhen you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a frightening, Katieforeign place, has settled into school better than she could ever have hoped and life is looking goodbest avoided. Settled. She can't help thinking about Harry NelsonFor Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Katie's fatherSharon, because Katie sees him regularly and thereshe's a close relationship with his familyll do anything to prevent that. You might She''almost'' think s not worried about the dangers or that Ruthher Mum's life is settling downstopped talking - to anyone.

|isbn=183895015X1398524085|title=A Bit of a Stretch: The Diaries of a PrisonerHas Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Chris AtkinsNicci French

|genre=Politics and SocietyCrime|summary=Documentary filmmakers donCharlotte Salter was expected at her husband't usually get s fiftieth birthday party but never turned up. Her children, sons Niall, Paul and Ollie and her daughter, Etty. are all worried but - strangely - her husband, Alec, is not. Shortly afterwards, Etty and Greg, find the run body of establishments within the Mountbatten-Windsor Hotel GroupGreg's father, Duncan Ackerley, but after getting involved in the river. It was an illegal tax scheme easy assumption for the police to fund his latest film, Chris Atkins was invited for a five-year staymake that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when he couldn't stand the guilt. The first nine months were spent in HMP Wandsworth, which is probably the oldest, largest Salter children are not convinced but there's little else they can do but get on with their lives and most dysfunctional prison in Europewonder about what really happened.

|isbn=12501685461035906708|authortitle=Sarah KozloffDiva|titleauthor=A Queen In HidingDaisy Goodwin|rating=34.5|genre=FantasyGeneral Fiction|summary= World-building is the backbone by which fantasy novels live and die. And what a pleasureWe tend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, but she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, thenNew York, in December 1923 and only moved to get a novel with world-building you actually want Athens when she was thirteen. Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to delve into. Sarah Kozloff's debut novel presents a startlingly rich and layered world, with a complex history of connecting nations that seems certain Callas' to have make it more to tap, and manageable in the characters are interesting – if a little underdevelopedStates. But it's When she was back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the Nazi occupation by a world I could – mother who mercilessly exploited her and did – eagerly buy into, and the struggle made no secret of each Queen to discover and hone her magical talent felt very real and very aptpreference for her elder sister, Jackie.

|isbnauthor=1543987877Christopher Edge|title=Learn to Love: Guide to Healing Your Disappointing Love Life|author=Dr Thomas JordanBlack Hole Cinema Club|rating=4.5|genre=LifestyleConfident Readers|summary=''Learn to Love: Guide to Healing Your Disappointing Love Life'' is Lucas and his friends are all booked in for a book about love relationships rather than movie marathon at their local cinema, a book about love. The two greatest emotions are love and grief and love is place that has the opposite nickname of grief: ''if you love'', Dr Thomas Jordan tells us, ''you will inevitably grieve'The Black Hole'. Your love relationships begin the moment youAll big movie fans, they're born looking forward to lots of exciting films, and end only when you die. many, many snacks! Whilst we all come into However, as the world hoping to give movie starts, they very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, and receive love there they are many people for whom love is not quite so simpleswept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagine. Some people suffer multiple disappointments - sometimes repeating But as they lurch from one film genre to the same mistakes - and this eventually becomes resignation. next, can they figure out what on earth is going on? For people who are making Will they ever get back to the same mistakes repeatedlycinema, self-preservation, in the form of resignation is a necessity.and to their real lives?|isbn=1839942738

|author=Chris HautyRachel Greenlaw|title=Deep StateCompass and Blade|rating=3.5|genre=ThrillersTeens|summary= Hayley Chill is a fighter''I can hear the song of the sea. She is every kind The call of fighterthe deep, and well-trained the answering beat in most of themmy heart. She's army infantry ' Rosevear, a remote and she boxes for fun – partially forgotten island, survives on luring ships into the rocks and she winsplundering the wrecks. Always. She wins because she Mira, like her mother before her, is focussedone of the seven who swim out to survey the ruins – rescuing any survivors and any treasure that lies within. She works hardBut when the Council Watch lays a trap to end the wrecking, mentally they capture the island's leader and physicallyMira's father. Desperate to save him from death, Mira makes a bargain with a wreck survivor who is as charming as he is secretive and with only coordinates to guide her, she knows how to deal with sets off in search of a family secret that lies buried deep in the painsea. She is not so much cold With only nine days to unearth what might save her father, as controlled. This fight is against someone she is not expected her journey takes her from the watched streets of foreign islands to the heart of the smuggler's territory, Mira must be determined to stop at nothing to beat. And save the future of her home and the ones she is being watchedholds most dear.|isbn=14711856050008664730

|author=H G Parry James Sherwood Metts|title=The Unlikely Escape of Uriah HeepPlanet Storyland|rating=4.5|genre=General FictionConfident Readers|summary=Brothers Rob and Charley Things have struggled to see eye to eye been a bit sticky for years - Rob a sensible lawyer who exists in the "normal" world - Earthlings. AI and Charley a man who is blessed with an ability he canautomation have been proceeding apace, often replacing jobs they't fully control - one which allows him re paid to do and other tasks that took time to bring literary characters into the real worldaccomplish. After years of protecting Charley, Rob wants Just as they were beginning to get used to discharge his duties all this technological change and leave Charley starting to his own devices - but circumstances soon take choices out think of both their hands. As literary characters begin other, new ways to appear everywherespend time, it soon becomes clear that someone out there shares Charley's powers and intends to use them for nefarious gainsalong came an awful pandemic. Rob Life was pretty much shut down and Charley must team up to stop , along with it, all the madness - in a battle to win before many daily social interactions on which they, the characters and the world reach The End…depend so heavily.|isbn=03565137771736128426

|isbnauthor=1444776185Matthew Tree|title=HavenWe't they Grown|author=Sophie Hannahll Never Know

|genre=ThrillersLiterary Fiction|summary=It was when Beth Leeson was ferrying her son, Ben, Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to a football match that she found herself on Wyddial Lane in Hemingford Abbots. Actuallybe different from his father, It's a little disingenuous to say 'found herself' as Beth had made a deliberate detour on the grounds that she didn't find herself in this neck drunk and chronic underachiever whose dreams of being exceptional at any of the woods very often his artistic passions all failed miserably and she was curious to see where a family who'd come into money had lived before they'd all lost contact twelve years agoendless crises of self confidence. And it might have gone no further So Tim applied himself to his studies, cultivated his abilities rather than that had Beth not seen a car draw up and her friend Flora get out along with two children she called Thomas his daydreams and Emily. Beth remembered the names well - set himself high but these children were about three and five and Flora's children - Thomas and Emily - would now be fifteen and seventeenachievable ambitions.|isbn= B0CVFXPGP8

|isbnauthor=1529123763A G Slatter|title=Miss Austen|author=Gill HornbyThe Briar Book of the Dead

|genre=Historical FictionFantasy|summary=It'' There's a part of me that wants to keep this just to myself for however long been known that Cassandra Austen burned most I can. This secret magic of my own, all mine, at last. I just want to enjoy it for a while.'' Within a remote mountain pass, far away from the world, lies Silverton; a town under the letters which she and other members protection of the extensive Austen Briar's, a family had exchanged with or about her sister Janeof witches who protect the town and the wider world from the Darklands. What Though she has always wished for magic, Ellie Briar is not known is ''why'' the first non-witch to be born into her family for generations and as such since she did this was young, her training as a steward revolved around letters and at this stage - more administration rather than two hundred years after Janespells and potions. When her grandmother suddenly dies, Ellie's cousin Audra becomes the Briar Witch, the town's death - a definitive answer is unlikely leader, and Ellie takes her place beside her. As challenges come her way left, right and centre, Ellie uncovers the rare ability to forthcoming. Gill Hornby has provided us communicate with some possible answers in the dead, putting her at the heart of a book that proved maelstrom of chaos. Reeling from one family secret to another, Ellie must decide who to trust and determine what to do as the Briar witches' legacy, everything they have sacrificed to be far more emotionally complex than I was expectingsurvive, is under threat.|isbn=1803364548

|isbn=1529900360|title=The Ghost Orchid|author=Rory ClementsJonathan Kellerman|titlerating=4|genre=Crime|summary=HitlerIt hadn't been Lt Milo Sturgis's fault that Alex Delaware had been badly injured but he felt responsible and even after Alex recovered, Sturgis was reluctant to ask for his help on difficult cases. His assertions that there were only open-and-shut cases which didn't need the help of a psychologist only worked for a while. Finally, it was Robin, Delaware's partner, who nudged Milo into asking for help again. She knew that the involvement was something that the man she loved needed. The next case did look simple, though. Two lovers were murdered in the swimming pool of a remote property in Bel Air. He was the heir to an Italian shoe empire and she is married to an extremely rich man and it's not the Italian. But which of them was the primary target?}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1529395224|title=Letting the Cat Out of the Bag: The SecretLife of a Vet|author=Sion Rowlands

|genre=ThrillersAnimals and Wildlife|summary=So, Hitler had Siôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. His father was a secret? TwoGP and Rowlands didn't want to follow in his footsteps, if you include particularly when he considered the strain that being on-call put on his father's life. When he was seventeen he took the reproductive detail mentioned in opportunity of doing work experience with a family friend who was a certain sing-song aspersionvet and was convinced this was the job for him. But this is a secret that is counter to thatBefore long, and in fact is a secret that Hitler himself doesnhe was at Liverpool University. It hadn't even know about- as with so many students - been his dream since he was a child. His neiceIf anything, Geli Raubal, the attractive young woman he seemed 'd wanted to be very a professional footballer.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0861541774|title=A Nye of Pheasants|author=Steve Burrows|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary=DCI Domenic Jejeune's close friend and former colleague, Danny Maik, has taken a short holiday in Singapore to in the early 1930smeet up with an old ally, had had his daughter behind his backGuy Trueman. Protected under Maik was involved in a false identity ever since, the girl is completely ignorant of her past, street brawl - he would later maintain that he was facing a man armed with a knife - and the truth is he killed a very rare thingGhurka. Martin BormannInitially, he faced a charge of manslaughter but evidence came to light that suggested that he might have planned to murder the 'gatekeeper' to Hitler and his right hand man, knows – and is desperately intent on wiping the slate clean and removing all connected with her existence from . Now he could be facing the Reichdeath penalty. So itDomenic Jejeune can do nothing to help as any interference from another police force could provoke a diplomatic incident and wouldn's down to Tom Wilde, an American history professor t help Danny at Oxbridge, to go in and extract her, in this most shadowy race against timeall.|isbn=1838770275

|isbnauthor=0241985110Alexander McCall Smith|title=All the Rage (D I Fawley)|author=Cara HunterThe Perfect Passion Company

|genre=CrimeGeneral Fiction|summary=A very beautifulThe Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, but extremely distressed teenage girl was picked up run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the online apps in providing a minicab driver on the outskirts of Oxfordmore personal, tailored service. She didn't want Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and look after the business, as Ness is planning to take a trip to go Canada to get away for a while. Katie is coming out of a break up with a bad boyfriend, and so jumps at the police station or the hospital: she just wanted chance to be taken come hometo Edinburgh. The driver wasn't And so certain though - begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and after dropping the girl at home he went Isabel Dalhousie novels, but with some new characters who quickly begin to the policecharm. Katie has no experience in running a business, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, which is why DI Adam Fawley found himself talking to Faith Appleford and there's always her mother. Both were adamant that this was nothing more than an April Foolvery helpful (and rather handsome) neighbour, William, to lend a hand…|isbn=1846976596}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0811771741|title=InstaKnits for Baby|author=Melissa Leapman|rating=4|genre=Crafts|summary=Melissa Leapman's joke which had gone wrong''InstaKnits for Baby'' gives us a collection of knits from toys to blankets. No crime had been committed and Faith didnSome will be quick knits - others are of the 't want to take long, cosy afternoons in front of the matter any furtherfire' variety. Fawley and his team werenThe projects are divided by the time they't prepared ll take to complete - less than five hours, five to leave it at that ten hours, ten to twenty hours and more than twenty hours. All the projects are attractive, modern and they began investigatinguseable. What they found strange was I perhaps show my age when I wonder about 'social-media-worthy projects' but that Faith Appleford didn't seem to have much of a historys me being picky.

|isbnauthor=1529400279Dean Koontz|title=Six Wicked Reasons|author=Jo SpainThe Bad Weather Friend

|genre=CrimeParanormal|summary=It was early summer 2018 and Adam Latimer returned home to Spanish Cove after an absence of ten yearsBenny is having a terrifically bad day. The family had thought him dead - in factHe loses his job, he loses his fiancee, that's what the private detective and his mother had insisted upon had told themhouse gets trashed. He was cagey about exactly where he'd been but he seemed contentOh, if not happyand someone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to be his home. What brought him? Well, nine years ago his mother died and heit'd seen s possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the ''in memoriam'' in thing that has trashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the paper: very last person to deserve all this was the first he'd heard about what had happenedbad luck. His three sisters and two brothers had mixed feelings about his return, but his father He is delighteda nice person. A really nice person. In fact, he's determined So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to have his house is a party. Onlynew friend, with Frazer Latimera bad weather friend called Spike, what happens who has been sent to be about help himsince Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. He has an announcement Spike is going to make - ittake care of Benny, and will certainly take care of Benny's nine years since Kathleen died and enemies, if he's been lonely. He's met Ana, a Polish immigrantBenny, and Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they're getting marriedare.|isbn=1662500491

|author=Penny ChrimesAdam Stower|title=Tiger HeartMurray and Bun

|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Murray is supposed to be a humble, tidy and friendly cat, one who is able to sleep and eat and eat and sleep and, well, whatever takes his fancy next of the two. But he's a bad magician'Fly never meant to end up in s cat, so his favourite bun has been turned into a hyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, and the catflap they both use can chuck them out, not into the cage with regular back garden, but into a man-eating tigerworld of frightening adventure and whiffs. She just saw her chance This time round it drops them into a Viking land, where a troll hunter is expected – well, one much bigger than Murray was, to skedaddlebe honest, but he's turned up and she took he'll have to do…|isbn=0008561249}}{{Frontpage|isbn=B0C47LV1PC|title=Fragility|author=Mosby Woods|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary= Can you make a ''Yo birthing person'' joke? And if you could, is the question should you make it? Or is the question if you did, would itland? The catch is that the answer for both could well be. And even when ... no. ''Fragility'' is set as the cloud city of soot cleared Portland, Oregon, cautiously begins to emerge from the restrictions imposed during the covid pandemic}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1529431735|title=The Winter Visitor|author=James Henry|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary=It's February 1991 and she saw the golden eyes of a killer staring into hersEssex is bitingly cold, she still didnwhich made Bruce Hopkins't turn round and climb back up return all the chimney straightawaymore surprising. He'Cos there was worse waiting for her back d been exiled on the roofCosta del Sol as a wanted drug smuggler for a decade. The return has come about because he's had a letter from his ex-wife, saying that she's ill and hasn'What an opener! And theret long to live. It's plenty more hard to feel any sympathy when Hopkins is abducted, stripped to his underwear and sent to a watery grave in the boot of a stolen Ford Sierra. Is it a warning from a Spanish gang or a problem closer to come!|isbn=1510107045home?

|author=Tanya LandmanAlex Bell and Tim McDonagh|title=Jane Eyre: a RetellingThe Glorious Race of Magical Beasts|rating=54|genre=TeensConfident Readers|summary=A young woman, fresh from living Eli is a busy lad – by day an apprentice in the wondrous library we start by visiting with horrid relatives who could care less about herhim, and years in the evening a dreary school, moves into Thornfield Hall with only one intent – to have something like helper at the life she wants – dessert cafe his gran owns and runs. Eli lives with only one jobhis lovely gran, to tutor too – for there is a young half-French girl, whose father is almost always absentgeneration missing in the family. When he does turn up he seems to be darkA few short years ago, brooding and troubled – but thatEli's nothing compared parents were both lost to the darkertitular race, more broody and even more troubled secret a globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have to navigate the world in the housecompany of a magical beast. Yes, if you know Jane Eyre then you know This has made the race anathema to the rest pair – but if you don'twhen a bad incident at the eatery leads to a confession from gran, for whatever reason, this Eli knows his only hope is a wonderful book to turn dare to enter what he most hates, with the sole aim the prize of magic at the end – the only thing topossibly save his gran.|isbn=17811291260571382231