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<metadesc>Expert , full book reviews & recommendations from most walks of literary life; fiction, biography, crimenon-fiction, cookery & children's books & self-published books plus author interviews & top tens.</metadesc>

Hello from The Bookbag, a site featuring books reviews and recommendations Reviews by readers 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 libraryWith author interviews, the charity shop features and the bookshoptop tens. Sometimes it holds the latest releases, but at other times thereYou'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 sure to us by publishers and we promise to tell find something 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 want to read, check out the [[Book Recommendations|recommendations]] pagehere.Dig in!

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==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=1784385166Sylvie Cathrall|title=The Third Reich in 100 Objects: A Material History of Nazi Germany|author=Roger MoorhouseLetter to the Luminous Deep

|genre=HistoryScience Fiction|summary=What is the first image that comes to mind when you think of the Third Reich? Hitler? A swastika? The Nazi salute? The gate There are few greater joys than a book which lives up to a concentration camp? None of these are comfortable images but they are emblematic of the Third Reich's fascist regime in all its iniquitycompelling premise. But some objects and images from that time may be less familiar to you. In And this short volume, Roger Moorhouse has attempted to illustrate the period of the Third Reich through is one hundred of its material artefactsthem. |isbn= 0356522776

|isbn=14091874380008517061|title=The First LieDeath in a Lonely Place|author=A J ParkStig Abell|rating=3.54|genre=ThrillersCrime|summary=On the second of October 37-year-old barristerFormer Metropolitan Police detective, Paul ReeveJake Johnson, returned home has settled into his rustic life at 9 pm to find his house in darkness and the front door openLittle Sky. His wife was in There’s perhaps a little uncertainty about the bedroom future of his life with his vet girlfriend, Livia and her daughter Diana, as moving in together would mean a state lot of shock compromise: does Jake give up his off-grid and relaxing life to move in the bathroom there was a dead man who had been stabbed repeatedly in the neck with Paul's paper-knife. In that moment Paul takes a decision that will be irrevocable: he decides that he and Alice are Livia or does Livia move to Little Sky despite her reservations about whether or not going to ring this is the police future she wants for herself and tell the truth. her daughter? They're going to bury For the body moment they’re enjoying life in woodland the present and go putting the future on as though nothing has happenedthe back burner.

|isbn=15294018011786482126|title=Grave's End The Janus Stone (DS Alexandra CupidiDr Ruth Galloway)|author=William ShawElly Griffiths

|summary=Gram Hickman, who worked for an estate agent, took his girlfriend, Angela Booth, to a house which his firm was marketing. Guildeford Hall was Builders were demolishing an old Kentish oast house and in Norwich - the site was on going to hold seventy-five 'luxury' apartments - when they discovered the market for millions bones of poundsa child beneath a doorway. Gram There was hoping that he could get Angela into bed and he'd brought no skull. Was this a bottle of prosecco alongritual killing or murder? Inevitably, Dr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. It was when searching for somewhere to chill the bottle 's difficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn't, that he found the body she is pregnant with his child as a result of a man in the freezer in the garageone night they spent together some three months ago. DS Alexandra Cupidi and DC Jill Ferriter are on the caseHer condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is prone to sudden bouts of sickness.

|authorisbn= Ukamaka Olisakwe0008551324|title= Ogadinma Or, Everything Will Be All RightThe Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster|rating= 4.5|genre= Literary FictionCrime|summary= The new novel by Ukamaka Olisakwe is a look at It's unusual for anyone from the Hardie family to approach the trauma and heartache of being a woman in 1980s Nigeriapolice. The title is ''Ogadinma Or, Everything Will Be All Right'' Neither side likes or has any respect for the other. Ogadinma But Davie Hardie is the eponymous heroine of the story. We are with her struggling in every scene prison and it is her narrative voice that leads he's prepared to tell the story, although Olisakwe writes in police where the third body of a missing personis buried and who was responsible for her death. This provides a sense of detachment for person, he promises, is someone big and it will be worth the reader and highlights police doing what he wants. And what he wants is to be transferred to an open prison to serve the isolation remainder of Ogadinmahis sentence and to get an early parole date. She Not much to ask, is exiled from her fatherit? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn's home t think so and sent to Lagos where she is married 's even prepared to an older man named Tobe. Their marriage descends into violence do the other thing that Hardie demanded - make certain that DS Max Craigie and indignities and Ogadinma must utilise her resourcefulness to escapeanyone who works with him is kept well away from what's happening.|isbn=1911648160

|authorisbn=0008405026|title=Lun Zhang, Adrien Gombeaud, Ameziane and Edward Gauvin A Stranger in the Family (translatorMaeve Kerrigan 11)|titleauthor=Tiananmen 1989: Our Shattered HopesJane Casey|rating=4.5|genre=Graphic NovelsCrime|summary=I It's sixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. She was never really followed found and the events of Tiananmen Square with much attention when it was playing out – someone investigation ground to a halt. Now, her mother, Helena, and her father are dead in the second half of their teens has other priorities, you knowbed. I certainly didnInitially, it looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but there't know of s something about the weeks positioning of protests and hunger strikes from the students before the massacre bodies that makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and the birth of the Tank Man image, I didn't know how the area had long been a venue for political protest, her boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. What looked as though it was going to be an open-and I didn't know more than -shut case is now a spit about the people involved on either sidecomplex double murder. This book Kerrigan is practically flawless convinced that the explanation lies in giving a general browserRosalie's disappearance: others (such as Derwent's context for the whole season of protests back in 1989boss, Una Burt) are less convinced.|isbn=1684056993

|authorisbn= Joan He0571379877|title= Descendant of the CraneThe Kellerby Code|author=Jonny Sweet|rating=3.5|genre= FantasyCrime|summary=''Heroes cannot be forged without villains''Princess Hesina of the kingdom of Yan has never wanted the throne. Instead of craving powerEdward Jevons is a working-class young man, obsessed with his upper-class friends, she has always considered the crown her inescapable duty Robert and shrank away from the responsibilities of being QueenStanza. To her, it has always been Robert's a distant, faraway futuretheatre director. Until that is He's also self-obsessed, it isn't. When her beloved father suddenly diesdemanding, she is thrust into ruling. But contrary handsome and entitled and uses Edward to the official report, Hesina knows all is not as it seems, her father didn't dierun errands for him. He was murdered.Determined to seek the truth Edward has been in love with Stanza since their university days - and discover her fatherhe's killer, Princess Hesina will stop at nothing drunkenly confided how he feels to find justice, even committing treasonRobert. Under Most men in Robert's position would stay away from Stanza or tell Edward that a relationship had begun between them but he's not like most men: Edward is left to stumble upon the cover two of darkness, her feet lead her to them kissing in a soothsayer to learn what happened that day and who killed the Kingdark passageway.|isbn=1789094046

|author=Pat GrantJo Callaghan|title=The Grot: The Story of the Swamp City GriftersLeave No Trace

|genre=Graphic NovelsCrime|summary=Everything in this world runs When a man is found crucified on pedal-power, and that includes the punk bands. There are three pedallers at the front top of the Heath Robinson contraption taking our lead characters a hill in Nuneaton, DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to the ferry across case alongside her sidekick, the swamp to Falter CityAI detective Lock. It's their first live case together, where having previously been very successful with several cold cases. But when there is a mother and her two sons aim to set up second body found crucified a yoghurt factory. You could say that yoghurt would be the only culture aroundfew days later, for this Kat is suddenly struggling with a really rough-potential serial killer and-ready dump of a place, but everyone is interested in small things very high profile case that growdraws a lot of unwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. For the only money Will they be able to be had – solve the only fortunes to be found case in Falter City – come from algaetime, gunk or will Kat find herself taken off the case and other crud that – well, potentially, out of a career?|isbn=139851120X}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1399613073|title=Moral Injuries|author=Christie Watson|rating=4.5|genre=Thrillers|summary=Olivia, Laura and Anjali met on the use first day of medical school and their friendship would keep them inseparable for a quarter of it a century. Olivia is ruthlessly ambitious, which is never really made cleara bonus when you aim to be a cardiothoracic surgeon. Once there, the two brothers set themselves each up with Laura is a perfectionist and a guide – Lippy, trauma doctor. Anjali is the more forward-thinking, industrious free spirit of the two, with group and she becomes a besuited gent, Penn with GP. When we first meet them they're at a ballsy young teenaged girl with bright red hairdrug and alcohol-fuelled party and it's going to end in tragedy. But which of We don't know who suffered the tragedy or the two consequences. Twenty-five years later there will be an eerily similar event that will come off impact the worse as they make three friends. This time, it's their own way in this dystopian, semi-Apocalyptic hellhole?|isbn=1603094660teenage children who are involved.

|authorisbn= Ashley Poston0241636604|title= Bookish and the BeastThe Trading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson|rating= 34.5|genre= TeensAutobiography|summary= Set after the ExcelsiCon, we are introduced If you were to Rosie Thorne, bring up an image of a Small Towncity banker in your mind, USA girl who has recently lost her mother and is entering her final year you're unlikely to think of high schoolsomeone like Gary Stevenson. Things keep piling up for Rosie, A hoodie and jeans replaces the pin-stripe suit and when she follows a stray dog into what she thinks his background is an abandoned castle in her townthe East End, things just get worse. Rosie accidentally destroys a rare book and where he was familiar with her mother's hospital violence, poverty and funeral costs she has injustice. There was no money to cover the damage. She finds herself working for Vance Reigns, Hollywood royalty posh public school on a paparazzi escape, his CV - but he had been to repay the debtLondon School of Economics.  For most Starfield superfans this would be a dream but Rosie soon realises Vance Stevenson is a jerk bright - extremely bright - and he isn't too fond has a facility with numbers which most of her eitherus can only envy. However He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to be stupid. It was his ability at what was, essentially, as the two are forced to get to know each othera card game which got him an internship with Citibank. Eventually, their guards begin to lower and they discover that maybe this situation might not be so terrible after allturned into permanent employment as a trader. |isbn=1683691938

|authorisbn=Justine Avery and Daria Yudina1035021803|title=Baby Trolls Get a Bad Rap (Underrated Babies Book 1)The Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder|author=C L Miller|rating=43.5|genre=For SharingCrime|summary= It's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to the English country village where she grew up. HoratioShe's back now because of a request for help from her beloved aunt, Saul and Grizelda are three baby trolls who are fed up that everyone forgets about baby trollsCarole. They are ignored in books Freya's former mentor and TV shows Carole's close friend, Arthur Crockleford, is dead and films in favour of their very scary grown upsthe circumstances seem suspicious, to say the least. Our three heroes want equal rights for baby trolls Arthur was the reason why Freya had not been back to the village: Arthur, she feels, let her down badly. They want Even though they were in business together as antique hunters, she has not felt able to be seen near the man or pursue the profession she loved. After the split, she worked in a cafe, met and heard married James (on the rebound from the love of her life, who was murdered) and Freya and they've started a petition about it that they want you to signJames have now divorced. But how should they go about it? |isbn= B07XGN4LGY}}

|authorisbn= Samira AhmedAllTomorrowsFutureCover|title= Mad, Bad All Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Dangerous to KnowStephen Oram (Editors)|rating= 3.5|genre=TeensScience Fiction|summary=''In Opening up new ways of thinking about the end, we all become storiesshape of things to come.''

Spending the summer I've heard it said that 'technology' is what happens after you're eighteen. Well, I must confess that there have been more than a few decades of technology in Paris sounds like a dream for most people, especially art-lovers, my lifetime. I've kept up reasonably well with what's advantageous to me but Khayyam canI't relax and stop thinking about m left with the mess she left behind in Chicagofeeling that it's all getting away from me. On a chance encounter with a descendant Some of Alexandre Dumasit is - frankly - quite frightening. Of course, Khayyam finds herself on a historical journey with him to unveil I could research the truth about possibilities and the 19th century Muslim woman probabilities and end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who may have crossed paths with Alexandre Dumas, Eugene Delacroix and Lord Byron. As the two teenagers travel the city knows what they not only discover themselves, but uncover 're talking about or the true story of the woman latest conspiracy theorist. I needed people I knew I could trust and why it was one that should never have been forgottenwho could deliver information in a way I could understand.|isbn=0349003556

|author= Hazel BarkworthSunny Singh|title= HeatstrokeHotel Arcadia|rating= 3.5|genre= CrimeThrillers |summary=''Too hot to sleepThe Hotel Arcadia is a luxury hotel in an unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a terrorist group. Too hot to think straight. Too hot to go back'' During a British heatwave 15-year-old Hiding from the terrorists who are rampaging through, Lily Dixonkilling everyone on site, has left home and is reported missing. Rachel there is Sam, a teacher at Lily's school wartime photographer and Abhi, the mother of Mia, Lily's best friendhotel manager. As Lily's family and Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the residents who are still alive in the police struggle hotel, he forms a bond with Sam who refuses to find any evidence that may lead be cowed by events, and keeps on venturing out of her room to Lily, Rachel takes it upon herself try to start looking for cluescapture what's happened through her photography. However Although they only ever talk over the phone, their friendship grows as the case goes on Rachel becomes fixated on finding Lily and finds herself crossing boundaries, breaking trust Abhi tries to help her keep safe and facing some impossible choices. Will they find Lily? Does Lily want both wait to be found? And see if they will life for Rachel ever be rescued before they are discovered by the same again?terrorists.|isbn=1472265602086154742X

|isbn=15387317381529153298|title=Simple Abundance: 365 Days to a Balanced and Joyful LifeThe List of Suspicious Things|author= Sarah Ban BreathnachJennie Godfrey

|genre=LifestyleGeneral Fiction|summary=Someone once said: itIt's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly...) She's not self-indulgence, itwhat's worrying Miv's therapy! family, though. Women have been disappearing. I think Well, they were talking about shopping've been murdered, but it probably can be applied to most thingshave 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Miv's upset because she's overheard that her father wants to move the family 'Down South'. When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a frightening, foreign place, best avoided. In my caseFor Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, it applies and she'll do anything to writing prevent that. She's not worried about things because I want to, rather than because I can sell it the dangers or because Ithat her Mum've got something s stopped talking - to sellanyone.

|authorisbn=Frederic Gros1398524085|title=A Philosophy of WalkingHas Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Nicci French

|genre= Politics and SocietyCrime|summary= I confess I picked this one Charlotte Salter was expected at her husband's fiftieth birthday party but never turned up from . 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 library body of Greg's father, Duncan Ackerley, in my pre-lockdown forage of random stuffthe river. Now I have It was an easy assumption for the police to go out an buy my own copy so make that I can turn down the pages I have marked Duncan had murdered Charlie and return to its varying wisdom then committed suicide when I need to. Some books draw you in slowlyhe couldn't stand the guilt. This one had me in the first two pages, wherein Gros explains why ''walking is The Salter children are not a sport'convinced but there's little else they can do but get on with their lives and wonder about what really happened.|isbn=1781688370

|isbn=085752612X1035906708|title=Rodham: What if Hillary hadn't Married Bill?Diva|author=Curtis SittenfeldDaisy Goodwin|rating=4.5

|summary=I was tempted We tend to read ''Rodham'' by the success think of Curtis Sittenfeld's ''American Wife''. That book wasn't marketed Maria Callas as being a portrait of Laura BushGreek, but the word ''thinly-veiled'' seemed she was born to occur very regularly Greek parents in Manhattan, New York, in reviewsDecember 1923 and only moved to Athens when she was thirteen. How would Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 'Callas'Rodham'' compare? Unfortunately, there is a difference: relatively little was known about Laura Bush, which gave the book a freshness which to make it more manageable in the first third of ''Rodham'' lacksStates. We've all heard the stories, read the books When she was back in Athens - about Hillary and particularly about Bill. It's still an interesting concept, though: how would Hillary have fared if supposedly so that she hadn't subsumed could get appropriate training for her own ambitions into Bill's career, if voice - she hadn't had to carry was raised under the burden Nazi occupation by a mother who mercilessly exploited her and made no secret of all Bill's baggage and if she hadn't left her own run at the presidency so late? Could she have done better without the Clinton surname?preference for her elder sister, Jackie.

|isbnauthor=0727889230Christopher Edge|title=The Red, Red Snow|author=Caro RamsayBlack Hole Cinema Club|rating=4.5|genre=CrimeConfident Readers|summary=In GlasgowLucas and his friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, Eric Callaghan a place that has the nickname of Inkermann Tattoo Parlour had been 'The Black Hole'. All big movie fans, they're looking forward to the ice show with his wifelots of exciting films, Geraldine and daughtermany, Lisa when he was stabbed in Planet Burger. many snacks! He died within minutesHowever, as the movie starts, they very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, but his murder seemed motiveless and there were no cluesthey are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagine. He was a genuine man and a talented artist: those investigating his death had hit a dead end. There were two deaths But as they lurch from one film genre to investigate in the north of Scotland: it wasn't thought wise next, can they figure out what on earth is going on? Will they ever get back to involve the local murder team as someone on the Glen Riske police force was indirectly involved in the case. Christmas - cinema, and a lot of snow were rapidly approaching.to their real lives?|isbn=1839942738

|isbnauthor=B07S6DBCFTRachel Greenlaw|title=Little Girls Tell Tales|author=Rachel BennettCompass and Blade|rating=43.5|genre=CrimeTeens|summary=In 2004 Rosalie''I can hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, the answering beat in my heart.'' Rosevear, Beth a remote and Dallin were walking in partially forgotten island, survives on luring ships into the boggy wetlands by Rosalie rocks and Dallin's cottageplundering the wrecks. Beth and DallinMira, both twelve-years-oldlike her mother before her, got ahead is one of ten-year-old Rosalie the seven who swim out to survey the ruins – rescuing any survivors and it wasn't long before she realised any treasure that she was lostlies within. Trying But when the Council Watch lays a trap to find her way back end the wrecking, they capture the island's leader and Mira's father. Desperate to the main path she found save him from death, Mira makes a bargain with a skeletonwreck survivor who is as charming as he is secretive and with only coordinates to guide her, but when she finally got sets off in search of a family secret that lies buried deep in the sea. With only nine days to unearth what might save her father, as her journey takes her from the road she could never find her way back watched streets of foreign islands to the bog when she'd seen heart of the body. Most people didnsmuggler't believe hers territory, putting Mira must be determined to stop at nothing to save the story down to future of her vivid imaginationhome and the ones she holds most dear.|isbn=0008664730

|isbnauthor=0008273790James Sherwood Metts|title=Remain Silent|author=Susie SteinerPlanet Storyland|rating=4.5|genre=CrimeConfident Readers|summary=When we first meet Matis Things have been a bit sticky for the Earthlings. AI and Dimitriautomation have been proceeding apace, Matis is in a bad way, vomiting and obviously traumatised. When heoften replacing jobs they's able re paid to speak he tells Dimitri do and other tasks that ''Lukas is dead''. Lukas was in his late teens and he and Matis had come took time to Cambridgeshire from Klaipeda in Lithuaniaaccomplish. They'd answered an advert offering good money and accommodation in return for their labour: Just as they could have a decent life ''were beginning to get used to all this technological change and'' send money home starting to think of other, new ways to their familiesspend time, along came an awful pandemic. SadlyLife was pretty much shut down and, along with it doesn't work out like that. When they arrive in , all the UK - many daily social interactions on an old, uncomfortable bus, - which they're dropped at a filthy house where several men have to share rooms and sleep on dirty mattresses on the floor. It's modern slavery, which isn't uncommon amongst agricultural workersdepend so heavily.|isbn=1736128426

|author=Amin MaaloufMatthew Tree|title=The DisorientedWe'll Never Know

|summary= Adam has lived in Paris for years, speaks French Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more easily than his native Arabic. In fact, he hasn't been back to be different from his homeland for 25 years. An old friend is dying…or as Adam prefers to think of him a former-friend, perhaps not as harsh as an ex-friendfather, or maybe. The falling out was a long time ago, drunk and chronic underachiever whose dreams of being exceptional at any of his artistic passions all failed miserably and Adam's partner has no idea what it was about, even so she urges him to go knowing that he'll regret not doing sowho had endless crises of self confidence. Not knowing whether he's going because he needs or wants So Tim applied himself tohis studies, or simply because he was asked, he's on the next planecultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and set himself high but achievable ambitions. |isbn=B07ZQSK9CYB0CVFXPGP8

|author=Anstey HarrisA G Slatter|title=Where We BelongThe Briar Book of the Dead

|genre=General FictionFantasy|summary= I've always believed ' There's a part of me that places and buildings absorb what happens within them and reflect it back; wants to keep this is how we just to myself for however long I can tell that . This secret magic of my own, all mine, at last. I just want to enjoy it for a sacred space is sacredwhile. Cate Morris believes a similar thing, she believes that ''A house absorbs happiness Within a remote mountain pass, it blooms into far away from the wallpaperworld, lies Silverton; a town under the wood protection of the window frames, the bricks: thatBriar's how it becomes , a homefamily of witches who protect the town and the wider world from the Darklands.'' She Though she has always wished for magic, Ellie Briar is having these thoughts the first non-witch to be born into her family for generations and as such since she packs up was young, her training as a steward revolved around letters and administration rather than spells and potions. When her grandmother suddenly dies, Ellie's cousin Audra becomes the Briar Witch, the town's leader, and Ellie takes her place beside her home. She has As challenges come her way left, right and centre, Ellie uncovers the rare ability to leave. A combination communicate with the dead, putting her at the heart of a maelstrom of circumstances means that is not only redundant but also homelesschaos. With nowhere else Reeling from one family secret to goanother, she has called on her late husbandEllie must decide who to trust and determine what to do as the Briar witches's family for help. Just for a few weekslegacy, everything they have sacrificed to survive, is under threat.|isbn=14711738361803364548

|isbn=17874776811529900360|title=A Shooting at Chateau Rock (A Bruno, Chief of Police Novel)The Ghost Orchid|author=Martin WalkerJonathan Kellerman

|summary=It was a couple of days after old Drianthadn't been Lt Milo Sturgis's funeral fault that Bruno Courrèges got an angry phone call from Alex Delaware had been badly injured but he felt responsible and even after Alex recovered, Sturgis was reluctant to ask for his sonhelp on difficult cases. GastonHis 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 father had sold 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 family farm swimming pool of a remote property in order Bel Air. He was the heir to buy an insurance policy which he had used Italian shoe empire and she is married to secure a life of luxury at an expensive retirement home near Sarlat, owned by a Russian oligarchextremely rich man and it's not the Italian. Before he even got to go there he died, apparently But which of a heart attack, and them was the retirement home collected primary target?}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1529395224|title=Letting the proceeds Cat Out of the policy Bag: The Secret Life of a Vet|author=Sion Rowlands|rating=3.5|genre=Animals and Gaston Wildlife|summary=Siôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. His father was a GP and Claudette Driant were left with just Rowlands didn't want to follow in his footsteps, particularly when he considered the strain that being on-call put on his father's life. When he was seventeen he took the contents opportunity of doing work experience with a family friend who was a vet and was convinced this was the farmhousejob for him. The family Before long, he was at Liverpool University. It hadn't exactly fallen out, but Gaston lived some way away and Claudette had fallen out of favour when she announced that she - as with so many students - been his dream since he was gaya child. If anything, but they werenhe't expecting d wanted to be almost completely disinheriteda professional footballer.

|isbn=B083Z3ZZ610861541774|title=Broken Silence (DS Nikki Parekh 2)A Nye of Pheasants|author=Liz MistrySteve Burrows

|summary=When we first DCI Domenic Jejeune's close friend and former colleague, Danny Maik, has taken a short holiday in Singapore to meet him Stefan Marcovici has been up with an old ally, Guy Trueman. Maik was involved in the UK a street brawl - he would later maintain that he was facing a man armed with his daughter Maria for a whileknife - and he killed a Ghurka. He Initially, he faced a charge of manslaughter but evidence came expecting to work as a gardener and Maria was light that suggested that he might have planned to murder the man. Now he could be a nannyfacing the death penalty. Stefan ends up doing slave labour in a chicken factory: you Domenic Jejeune can imagine what happens do nothing to an eighteen-year-old girlhelp as any interference from another police force could provoke a diplomatic incident and wouldn't help Danny at all.

|author=Justine Avery and Daria YudinaAlexander McCall Smith|title=This Book Is Alive! The Perfect Passion Company|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=The Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the online apps in providing a more personal, tailored service. Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and look after the business, as Ness is planning to take a trip to Canada to get away for a while. Katie is coming out of a break up with a bad boyfriend, and so jumps at the chance to come home to Edinburgh. And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the Isabel Dalhousie novels, but with some new characters who quickly begin to charm. Katie has no experience in running a business, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, and there's always her very helpful (Living Bookand rather handsome)neighbour, William, to lend a hand…|isbn=1846976596}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0811771741|title=InstaKnits for Baby|author=Melissa Leapman

|genre=For SharingCrafts|summary= Books Melissa Leapman's ''wantInstaKnits for Baby'' you gives us a collection of knits from toys to read them! Theyblankets. Some will be quick knits - others are of the 'long, cosy afternoons in front of the fire're not intimidating or standoffish or particular about readersvariety. Books The projects are divided by the time they'll take to complete - less than five hours, five to ten hours, ten to twenty hours and more than twenty hours. All the projects are attractive, modern and useable. I perhaps show my age when I wonder about 'wantsocial-media-worthy projects'but that' to be reads me being picky.}}{{Frontpage|author=Dean Koontz|title=The Bad Weather Friend|rating=4.5|genre=ParanormalThis |summary=Benny is the key message in Justine Avery's latest offeringhaving a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, ''This Book Is Alive!''and his house gets trashed. By anthropomorphising the relationship between book Oh, and young readersomeone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to his home, sheand it's sending an invitation possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that has trashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the very last person to deserve all - pick me upthis bad luck. He is a nice person. A really nice person. So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to his house is a new friend, read me, be my a bad weather friendcalled Spike, we can go on who has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a journey togethergood person. It Spike is going to take care of Benny, and will certainly take care of Benny's enemies, if he, Benny, and Harper (a great message, donwaitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny't you think?s wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are.|isbn= 19481244161662500491}}

|isbnauthor=0241984653Adam Stower|title=I Made a Mistake|author=Jane CorryMurray and Bun

|genre=ThrillersConfident Readers |summary=We know from 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 very beginning that theretwo. But he's a bad magician'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 regular back garden, but into a tragedy about to happenworld of frightening adventure and whiffs. On This time round it drops them into a January evening on Viking land, where a very crowded platform 3 of Waterloo Underground station troll hunter is expected – well, one much bigger than Murray was, to be honest, but he's turned up and 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 man falls under an oncoming train''Yo birthing person'' joke? And if you could, is the question should you make it? Or is the question if you did, would it land? The catch is that the answer for both could well be.... That man no. ''Fragility'' is Matthew Gordon. Much later we see Poppy Page in set as the witness box city of a crown courtPortland, Oregon, getting a very rough ride cautiously begins to emerge from the prosecuting barrister.restrictions imposed during the covid pandemic

|authorisbn= Maryse Condé1529431735|title= The Wondrous and Tragic Life of Ivan and IvanaWinter Visitor|author=James Henry|rating= 4.5|genre= Literary FictionCrime|summary= We live in a post-world: post-colonialismIt's February 1991 and Essex is bitingly cold, post-modernism, post-truthwhich made Bruce Hopkins' return all the more surprising. The list goes He'd been exiled onthe Costa del Sol as a wanted drug smuggler for a decade. There are numerous works that utilise the prefix post The return has come about because he's had a letter from his ex- in their categorisation, but perhaps none more so than Maryse Condé. In her new novelwife, saying that she''The Wondrous and Tragic Life of Ivan s ill and Ivanahasn't long to live. It's hard to feel any sympathy when Hopkins is abducted, Condé writes with fervour about the scars left by colonialism on the countries stripped to which it latched itself. Ivan his underwear and Ivana are twins born sent to a watery grave in Guadeloupe, a French overseas department. They grow up with intense and passionate feelings for each other. As they grow up and move overseas, the ravages boot of a post-colonial society drive them apart with tragic consequencesstolen Ford Sierra.|isbn=1642860697 Is it a warning from a Spanish gang or a problem closer to home?

|author= Abi ElphinstoneAlex Bell and Tim McDonagh|title= Jungle Drop (The Unmapped Chronicles)Glorious Race of Magical Beasts|rating= 4|genre= Confident Readers|summary= Abi Elphinstone has said that she connects Eli is a busy lad – by day an apprentice in the wondrous library we start by visiting with her world-building through her charactershim, and in the evening a helper at the dessert cafe his gran owns and runs. In an interview Eli lives with [Books For Keeps]his lovely gran, she described visualising her characters "wearing head torches which gradually reveal too – for there is a generation missing in the world they are seeing family. A few short years ago, Eli's parents were both lost to her and the titular race, a globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have to navigate the reader." Just as world in the darkness company of a mine is cut through by a spear of light so too do quarrelsome Fox and Fibber get their first glimpse of magical beast. This has made the phantasmagorical glow-in-race anathema to the-dark realm of Jungle Drop pair – but when they emerge through a bad incident at the mouth of eatery leads to a Dragon on the Here and There Express. Running confession from the opprobrium of their demanding and selfish parentsgran, they must address what Eli knows his only hope is in their hearts to find dare to enter what they seekhe most hates, with the sole aim the prize of magic at the end – the only thing to possibly save his gran.|isbn= 14711736820571382231