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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!
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=0356512479|author= Alix E HarrowSylvie Cathrall|title= The Once and Future WitchesA Letter to the Luminous Deep|rating= 5|genre= FantasyScience Fiction|summary=''There's no such thing as witches, but there used to be.'' In 1893, after the purges and the burnings, witching has been reduced are few greater joys than a book which lives up to little more than weak charms and simple spellsa compelling premise. If women want to hold power in their hands, to have their voices heard, it And this is now through women's suffrageone of them.|isbn= 0356522776
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Onjali Q Rauf0008517061|title=The Night Bus HeroDeath in a Lonely Place|author=Stig Abell|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=Hector is a bully. Egged on by his two 'friends', he takes other children's sweets, harasses and threatensFormer Metropolitan Police detective, plays pranks at schoolJake Johnson, and gets has settled into trouble his rustic life at every turnLittle Sky. Yet he finds himself frustrated when something actually isn't his fault, but then he isn't believed as everyone expects him to be telling lies. Nothing seems fair. His parents are barely home, and seem to only care There’s perhaps a little uncertainty about the future of his perfect sister and life with his annoying little brother when they arevet girlfriend, Livia and his teachers have abandoned him her daughter Diana, as moving in together would mean a lost cause. So what happens when, lot of compromise: does Jake give up his off-grid and relaxing life to move in trying with Livia or does Livia move to tell Little Sky despite her reservations about whether or not this is the future she wants for herself and her daughter? For the truth & fight to be believed, Hector finds himself embroiled with moment they’re enjoying life in the police; first trying to accuse, present and then trying to save a homeless man from his local park?|isbn=1510106774putting the future on the back burner.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=18497673431786482126|title=Count on MeThe Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Miguel TancoElly Griffiths
|rating=4.5
|genre=Children's Non-FictionCrime|summary=The title and format of this book might lead you Builders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the site was going to think that ithold seventy-five 's either about responsibility - or itluxury's a basic 1-2apartments -3 book for those just starting out on when they discovered the numbers journeybones of a child beneath a doorway. There was no skull. Was this a ritual killing or murder? Inevitably, Dr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. It isn's difficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn't: it's , that she is pregnant with his child as a hymn result of praise to mathsthe one night they spent together some three months ago. It's about why maths Her condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is so wonderful and how you meet it in everyday lifeprone to sudden bouts of sickness.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=18497669200008551324|title=Everything is MINEThe Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Andrea D'AquinoNeil Lancaster
|rating=4.5
|genre=For SharingCrime|summary=Marcello Von Cauliflower Bonaparte Jackson is a schnauzer: what else could you be with a name like that? He knows that you'll realise that heIt's kind, clever and loyal. You'll also need unusual for anyone from the Hardie family to know that everything is '''MINE'''approach the police. And he means ''everything''. It begins with Neither side likes or has any respect for the slipper: mum still has oneother. Why would she need more? You sense that Marcello feels that But Davie Hardie is struggling in prison and he's being generous in allowing thatprepared to tell the police where the body of a missing person is buried and who was responsible for her death. Then This person, he promises, is someone big and it was will be worth the pork choppolice doing what he wants. Well, did you see anyone's name on it? ''And'' what he left wants is to be transferred to an open prison to serve the carrots for Leo. That's another example remainder of Marcello's generosity. There was the acorn which squirrel was gnawing at: there was no documentation his sentence and to prove ownershipget an early parole date. And talking of ownership the tree would provide all the sticks he could ever want Not much to chew. ask, is it? ThereThe new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and she's nothing unreasonable in any of even prepared to do the other thing that Hardie demanded - make certain that, DS Max Craigie and anyone who works with him is there?kept well away from what's happening.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=18497670090008405026|title=It Isn't Rude to be NudeA Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Rosie HaineJane Casey
|rating=5
|genre=For SharingCrime|summary=This could have been one of those books which 'preaches to the choir': the only people who'll buy it are the people who know that nudity is OK and the ones who ''know'' that itIt's shameful will avoid it like they avoid the hotsixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. She was never found and-bothered person in the supermarket who is coughing fit investigation ground to busta halt. ButNow, her mother, Helena, and her father are dead in their bed... Rosie Haines makes Initially, it into something so much more than looks like a book about not wearing clothes. Itstraightforward murder/suicide but there's a celebration something about the positioning of the bodies: bodies large and small that makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and of every possible hueher boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. Bodies with disabilities What looked as though it was going to be an open-and markings-shut case is now a complex double murder. TheyKerrigan is convinced that the explanation lies in Rosalie's disappearance: others (such as Derwent're fine. In facts boss, they're wonderfulUna Burt) are less convinced.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=02412959550571379877|title=TrioThe Kellerby Code|author=William BoydJonny Sweet|rating=3.5|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=It was 1968: the year when Bobby Kennedy Edward Jevons is a working-class young man, obsessed with his upper-class friends, Robert and Martin Luther King were assassinatedStanza. ItRobert's also the year when YSK Films are making a movie in Brightontheatre director. ItHe's called ''Emily Bracegirdlealso 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 Extremely Useful Ladder drunkenly confided how he feels to the MoonRobert. Most men in Robert'', s position would stay away from Stanza or ''Ladder the Moon'' as ittell Edward that a relationship had begun between them but he's known on set. Anny Viklund not like most men: Edward is the female star in a production which is proving left to be just a little bit rackety. There are odd pressures on stumble upon the producer, Talbot Kydd, to employ this old actor friend for a couple two of days because he needs the money, allow a fading star to use his catchphrase, or include them kissing in a song from the leading man, whose musical star is fadingdark passageway.
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=B08B39QNRHJo Callaghan|title=The Curious History of Writer's Cramp: Solving an age-old problem|author=Michael PritchardLeave No Trace
|rating=4
|genre=Popular ScienceCrime|summary=''Society When a man is based found crucified on speech but civilisation requires the written word''top of a hill in Nuneaton, DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to the case alongside her sidekick, the AI detective LockI came to Michael Pritchard It's ''The Curious History of Writer's Cramp'' by a rather strange routetheir first live case together, having previously been very successful with several cold cases. I have problems But when there is a second body found crucified a few days later, Kat is suddenly struggling with my hands which orthopaedic surgeons refer a potential serial killer and a very high profile case that draws a lot of unwanted attention to as 'interesting': I prefer the word 'painful' but I have an interest in the way that hands worktheir AI Future Policing project. An exploration of Will they be able to solve the history of a problem which has defeated some of case in time, or will Kat find herself taken off the best medical minds for some three-hundred-years seemed liked excellent background reading case and so it proved, with the book being as much about the doctors treating the sufferers and the changing medical attitudes as the problem itself.potentially, out of a career?|isbn=139851120X
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|authorisbn=Blake Nuto and Charlotte Ager1399613073|title=Child of GalaxiesMoral Injuries|author=Christie Watson|rating=4.5|genre=For SharingThrillers|summary=What does it mean 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 bonus when you aim to be alive? a cardiothoracic surgeon. What are we made Laura is a perfectionist and a trauma doctor. Anjali is the free spirit of, the group and where are she becomes a GP. When we going? ''Child of Galaxiesfirst meet them they'' is re at a lovely childrendrug and alcohol-fuelled party and it's picture book going to end in tragedy. We don't know who suffered the tragedy or the consequences. Twenty-five years later there will be an eerily similar event that deals with all will impact the big questionsthree friends. Written as a poemThis time, the lyrical words donit't shy away from darkness, nor talk down to the s their teenage children you who are reading to, but rather than work beautifully together with the illustrations to create a powerful, uplifting reading experienceinvolved.|isbn=1912497425
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|authorisbn=Lilja Sigurdardottir and Quentin Bates (translator)0241636604|title=BetrayalThe Trading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson|rating=34.5|genre=CrimeAutobiography|summary=Meet Ursula, the stand-If you were to bring up an image of a city banker in ministeryour mind, drafted in from outside the leading party you're unlikely to cover the post for a yearthink of someone like Gary Stevenson. You might get to meet her hunky husband she can't believe she deserves, A hoodie and jeans replaces the children who are ignorant of just how she spent all her empathy for them on previous jobs in pin-stripe suit and his background is the foreign aid charity sectorEast End, where he was familiar with violence, poverty and injustice. You'll meet her ministry's cleaner, who bizarrely has fallen into There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to the task London School of helping a famous newsreader with her Tinder profileEconomics. You'll certainly meet a homeless tramp, who Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and he has taken one look at a newspaper image facility with numbers which most of Ursula, and, knowing her of old, decided she needs saving from the devil posing beside herus can only envy. You'll meet the ministerial bodyguard and driver the tramp almost immediately forces Ursula He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to acceptbe stupid. But as for the first ministerial case, of a woman demanding her daughter's rape get looked It was his ability at and prontowhat was, nobody can sayessentially, for all records of Ursula's meeting a card game which got him an internship with the woman have been wiped…|isbn=1913193403Citibank. Eventually, this turned into permanent employment as a trader.
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Tania Unsworth1035021803|title=The Time Traveller and the TigerAntique Hunter's Guide to Murder|author=C L Miller|rating=43.5|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=Elsie is an ordinary sort of girlIt's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to the English country village where she grew up. The sort She's back now because of small girl who often gets overlookeda request for help from her beloved aunt, and forgottenCarole. She is quietFreya's former mentor and Carole's close friend, and compliantArthur Crockleford, is dead and makes the best of whatever happens circumstances seem suspicious, to hersay the least. So when her parents forget that her school holidays have started before they are free Arthur was the reason why Freya had not been back to take care of herthe village: Arthur, she feels, they have to arrange for let her to go and stay with her Great Uncle for a weekdown badly. Poor ElsieEven though they were in business together as antique hunters, forgotten again, just decides she has not felt able to make be near the man or pursue the best of thingsprofession she loved. On investigating After the house split, she finds that her Great Uncle had lived worked in India as a boycafe, met and he has an enormous tiger rug married James (on the floor rebound from the love of one of the rooms. When Elsie asks him about the rug he seems unhappyher life, and he says he has to keep it because he was the one who shot the tiger when he was 12 years old, murdered) and Freya and he says it was the worst thing he ever didJames have now divorced. So when Elsie suddenly finds herself magically transported back many, many years, to the time in India when her Great Uncle was 12 years old, she believes that she must try to stop him from killing the tiger, in order to put something right that happened a long time ago.|isbn=1788541707
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=1472127013AllTomorrowsFutureCover|title=Agatha RaisinAll Tomorrow's Futures: Hot to TrotFictions that Disrupt|author=M C Beaton Benjamin Greenaway and R W GreenStephen Oram (Editors)|rating=4.5|genre=CrimeScience Fiction|summary=Raisin Investigations had quite a bit of work on hand. The chairman ''Opening up new ways of Philpott Electronics was concerned thinking about his managing director, Harold Cheeseman, who had apparently returned from Australia because his wife did not like it there. This was unusual, as his wife had died before Cheeseman went to Australia. Then there was the Chadwick divorce: Chadwick was convinced that his wife, Sheraton, was seeing another man. Mr Gutteridge wanted Raisin Investigations to instal listening devices in the staff canteen: he wanted shape of things to know what the staff were saying about him and his secretary, who was from Geneva. Apparently, the staff called her The Swiss Roll. Then there was the murdercome.''
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 my lifetime. I've kept up reasonably well with what's advantageous to me but I'm left with the feeling that it's all getting away from me. Some of it is - frankly - quite frightening. Of course, I could research the possibilities and the probabilities and end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who knows what they're talking about or the latest conspiracy theorist. I needed people I knew I could trust and who could deliver information in a way I could understand.
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=0008420386Sunny Singh|title=Failosophy: A handbook for when things go wrong|author=Elizabeth DayHotel Arcadia|rating=43.5|genre=LifestyleThrillers |summary=What do Malcolm GladwellThe Hotel Arcadia is a luxury hotel in an unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a terrorist group. Hiding from the terrorists who are rampaging through, Alain de Bottonkilling everyone on site, Phoebe Waller-Bridgethere is Sam, Lemn Sissaya wartime photographer and Abhi, Nigel Slaterthe hotel manager. As Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the residents who are still alive in the hotel, Emeli Sandé, Meera Syalhe forms a bond with Sam who refuses to be cowed by events, Dame Kelly Holmes and Andrew Scott have in common? They've all failed and - more importantly - they've been willing keeps on venturing out of her room to try to appear on Elizabeth Daycapture what's podcast happened through her photography. Although they only ever talk over the phone, their friendship grows as Abhi tries to discuss their failures help her keep safe and how life worked out for them afterwardsthey both wait to see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by the terrorists. You'll find the results of these discussions in ''Failosophy''|isbn=086154742X
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=05713626721529153298|title=SnowThe List of Suspicious Things|author=John BanvilleJennie Godfrey
|rating=5
|genre=Crime (Historical)General Fiction|summary=It's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly...) She's not what's worrying Miv's family, though. Women have been disappearing. Well, at least youthey've been murdered, but to have 're a Wexford man.disappeared'doesnSo said Colonel Osborne when he welcomed DI St John (pronounced t sound quite so frightening. Miv'Sinjuns upset because she') Strafford s overheard that her father wants to Ballyglass House just before Christmas 1957. Osborne was master of move the Keelmore Hounds and had done something memorable with the Inniskilling Dragoons at Dunkirkfamily 'Down South'. The niceties had to be established even when there was When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a Catholic priest dead on the library floor with some precious bits of his anatomy missingfrightening, foreign place, best avoided. Strafford was from Roslea at Bunclody and thisFor Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, along with his good-but-shabby suitSharon, marked him out as of Osborneand she'll do anything to prevent that. She's class and obviously Protestant. The dead priest was Father Tom Lawless from Scallanstown, who - despite not worried about the different religions dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - was in the habit of spending time at Ballyglass House. His horse was stabled thereto anyone.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=17874776301398524085|title=The Postscript MurdersHas Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Elly GriffithsNicci French|rating=45
|genre=Crime
|summary=When a 90-yearCharlotte Salter was expected at her husband's fiftieth birthday party but never turned up. Her children, sons Niall, Paul and Ollie and her daughter, Etty. are all worried but -oldstrangely -woman with a heart condition dies peacefully in her armchairhusband, Alec, is not. Shortly afterwards, it really shouldn't be suspicious Etty and that was Greg, find the view taken by DS Harbinder Kaur until she spoke to Peggy Smithbody of Greg's carerfather, Duncan Ackerley, in the river. Natalka Kolisnyk It was adamant an easy assumption for the police to make that there was more to PeggyDuncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when he couldn's death than met t stand the eye - particularly as she knew that there was no heart condition and that Peggy had worried that she was being followedguilt. Then The Salter children are not convinced but there was the fact that Peggy was a 'murder consultant' who helped authors s little else they can do but get on with knotty plot lines in their books: she knew more lives and wonder about murder than any elderly woman should need to knowwhat really happened.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=00083301311035906708|title=The Stolen SistersDiva|author=Louise JensenDaisy Goodwin|rating=34.5|genre=ThrillersGeneral Fiction|summary=When we start ''The Stolen Sisters'' we know that twenty-years on from a dreadful event they are all healthy adults. WellWe tend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, they're healthy but she was born to Greek parents in the physical senseManhattan, but Carly has trust issuesNew York, Leah has OCD in December 1923 and Marie drinksonly moved to Athens when she was thirteen. TheyHer original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 're Callas' to make it more manageable in the Sinclair sisters and one day they were all stolenStates. Carly When she was thirteenback in Athens -years-old and supposedly so that she was in charge of could get appropriate training for her sisters, the eightvoice -year-old twins. Much as she loved them Carly was desperate to get raised under the Nazi occupation by a text from Dean Malden mother who mercilessly exploited her and made no secret of her mobile phone held preference for her attention. Leah and Marie were nattering about a lost ball and a fleece which had been left outside. The gate wasn't shut properly and Brunoelder sister, their boxer dog, escaped. As the three girls went to chase after him they were snatched by two menJackie.
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{{Frontpage
|author=Stephen FabesChristopher Edge|title=Signs of LifeBlack Hole Cinema Club|rating=54|genre=TravelConfident Readers|summary= I was brought up on maps Lucas and first-person narratives his friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, a place that has the nickname of tales of far away places. I was birth-righted wanderlust and curiosity'The Black Hole'. UnfortunatelyAll big movie fans, I didnthey't inherit what Dr. Stephen Fabes clearly had which was the guts re looking forward to simply go out lots of exciting films, and do it. many, many snacks! I also didn't inherit However, as the kind of steady nervemovie starts, they very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, ability to talk to strangers and basic practicality that would have meant that I would have survived if I had been gifted with the requisite 'bottlethey are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagine. In order words I'm not But as they lurch from one film genre to the sort of person who will next, can they figure out what on earth is going on? Will they ever get on a bike outside a London hospital back to the cinema, and not come home for six years. Fabes did precisely that.to their real lives?|isbn=17881612111839942738
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{{Frontpage
|author=Arvin AhmadiRachel Greenlaw|title=How It All Blew UpCompass and Blade|rating=43.5
|genre=Teens
| summary=18-year-old Amir is American Iranian''I can hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, the answering beat in my heart.'' Rosevear, a Muslimremote and partially forgotten island, survives on luring ships into the rocks and plundering the wrecks. Mira, like her mother before her, is one of the seven who swim out to survey the ruins – rescuing any survivors and gayany treasure that lies within. He struggles with his identityBut when the Council Watch lays a trap to end the wrecking, unable they capture the island's leader and Mira's father. Desperate to face telling his parents save him from death, Mira makes a bargain with a wreck survivor who is as charming as he really issecretive and with only coordinates to guide her, she 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, so when another student as 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 his school starts blackmailing him, threatening nothing to show his parents photographs save the future of Amir kissing his boyfriend Amir panics her home and runs awaythe ones she holds most dear.|isbn=0008664730}}{{Frontpage|author=James Sherwood Metts|title=Planet Storyland|rating=4..to Italy! So begins 5|genre=Confident Readers|summary= Things have been a journey bit sticky for Amirthe Earthlings. AI and automation have been proceeding apace, often replacing jobs they're paid to do and his family, where other tasks that took time to accomplish. Just as they were beginning to get used to all discover more about himthis technological change and starting to think of other, new ways to spend time, along came an awful pandemic. Life was pretty much shut down and who he really is, and who he really wants to bealong with it, all the many daily social interactions on which they depend so heavily.|isbn=14714099291736128426
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|author=Antoine LaurainMatthew Tree|title=The Readers RoomWe'll Never Know|genrerating=General Fiction4.5|ratinggenre=3.5Literary Fiction|summary=Violaine's publishing house has had a great success, and it was through the slush pile of unsolicited manuscripts. The three people who work in the Readers' Room Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to sift through what is ninety-nine per cent dross – plus the fourth advisor in her rarefied mansion up the road – all agreed the book would be different from his father, a huge smash, drunk and so it has proven. But there are several 'howevers' to that. As in, however – Violaine herself is not having life chronic underachiever whose dreams of being exceptional at any of his artistic passions all her own way, for she has been involved in a near-fatal accident, failed miserably and starts this book coming round from a comawho had endless crises of self confidence. And, however – despite all urging, the author of the book has never once made themselves known So Tim applied himself to the publishers in personhis studies, cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and in fact offered up a most peculiar statement-come-threat in their last emailset himself high but achievable ambitions. What is going to befall Violaine, her memory, her staff – and how much is any of it due to the hit novel? And just where the heck did that come from?|isbn=1910477974B0CVFXPGP8
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1948124572A G Slatter|title=Think Outside The Briar Book of the Box|author=Justine Avery and Liuba SyrotiukDead|rating=45|genre=For SharingFantasy|summary=''Whenever you find a problem <br>''Wherever thereThere's a puzzle part of me that wants to keep this just to solve <br>''However you get stuck in myself for however long I can. This secret magic of my own, all mine, at last. I just want to enjoy it for a sticky situation <br>''Just think outside the boxwhile.''
And so begins Within a remote mountain pass, far away from the latest picture book world, lies Silverton; a town under the protection of the Briar's, a family of witches who protect the town and the wider world from Justine Avery the Darklands. Though she has always wished for magic, Ellie Briar is the first non-witch to be born into her family for generations and as such since she was young, her training as a steward revolved around letters and administration rather than spells and Liuba Syrotiukpotions. ItWhen her grandmother suddenly dies, Ellie's cousin Audra becomes the Briar Witch, the town's leader, and Ellie takes her place beside her. As challenges come her way left, right and centre, Ellie uncovers the rare ability to communicate with the dead, putting her at the heart of a clarion call maelstrom of chaos. Reeling from one family secret to children another, Ellie must decide who to use their imaginations trust and not logic alone when it comes determine what to do as the Briar witches' legacy, everything they have sacrificed to solving problemssurvive, is under threat.|isbn=1803364548
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Agnes Ravatn and Rosie Hedger (translator)1529900360|title=The Seven DoorsGhost Orchid|author=Jonathan Kellerman
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary=Come here for a thriller that interestingly doesnIt hadn't even try to suggest a genre of any kind until webeen Lt Milo Sturgis're a full fifth of the way through. We start with our couple, she a literature lecturer, s fault that Alex Delaware had been badly injured but he big in medical provision felt responsible and decisions at the councileven after Alex recovered, being forced Sturgis was reluctant to move out of their home, a building ask for his help on difficult cases. His assertions that had existed throughout her life since childhood there were only open-and -shut cases which theydidn'd occupied t need the help of a psychologist only worked for over thirty yearsa while. The building heFinally, it was Robin, Delaware's inherited, meanwhile, and which they let out to a single mother, is needed by their adult daughterpartner, who quite blatantly says to its occupant 'take a hike, I'm moving in and you're moving out'nudged Milo into asking for help again. Now, at this stage you may well, if you know this is a genre read, think it's going to be a throwback to those 'home invasion' thrillers Hollywood gave us in She knew that the involvement was something that the 1980s, but noman she loved needed. We avoid genre completely, as I say – instead learning about Greek tragedy, in The next case that has any bearing on what happens heredid look simple, and seeing how an older-middle aged couple live their livesthough. Until at that twenty per cent stage we find something that raises an eyebrow as any crime book should – until Two lovers were murdered in the point where swimming pool of a remote property in Bel Air. He was the evicted tenant heir to an Italian shoe empire and she is found married to have completely vanishedan extremely rich man and it's not the Italian.|isbn=1913193381 But which of them was the primary target?
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=1529395224|title=Letting the Cat Out of the Bag: The Secret Life of a Vet|author=Michael J MaloneSion Rowlands|rating=3.5|genre=Animals and Wildlife|summary=Siôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. His father was a GP and 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 opportunity of doing work experience with a family friend who was a vet and was convinced this was the job for him. Before long, he was at Liverpool University. It hadn't - as with so many students - been his dream since he was a child. If anything, he'd wanted to be a professional footballer.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0861541774|title=A Song Nye of IsolationPheasants|author=Steve Burrows|rating=34
|genre=Crime
|summary=Film star Amelie Hart throws DCI Domenic Jejeune's close friend and former colleague, Danny Maik, has taken a short holiday in Singapore to meet up with an old ally, Guy Trueman. Maik was involved in a street brawl - he would later maintain that he was facing a man armed with a knife - and he killed a career Ghurka. Initially, he faced a charge of manslaughter but evidence came to light that suggested that he might have planned to murder the man. Now he could be facing the death penalty. Domenic Jejeune can do nothing to help as any interference from another police force could provoke a diplomatic incident and wouldn't help Danny at all.}}{{Frontpage|author=Alexander McCall Smith|title=The Perfect Passion Company|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=The Perfect Passion Company is only beginning a dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to hit all the heights 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 retire Canada to get away for a while. Katie is coming out of a break up with a bad boyfriend, and so jumps at the highlands with chance to come home to Edinburgh. And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an ordinary guy…an accountant of all thingsEdinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the Isabel Dalhousie novels, though but with some new characters who quickly begin to his credit he would rather be working in forestrycharm. They have found Katie has no experience in running a hideaway on a small Scottish estatebusiness, or in match-making, but things are starting Ness has full confidence in her abilities, and there's always her very helpful (and rather handsome) neighbour, William, to feel wrong between them. lend a hand…|isbn=19131933651846976596
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|authorisbn= Christopher Paolini0811771741|title= To Sleep in a Sea of StarsInstaKnits for Baby|author=Melissa Leapman|rating= 54|genre= Science FictionCrafts|summary= On the moon Melissa Leapman's ''InstaKnits for Baby'' gives us a collection of a distant gas giant, Xenobiologist Kira Navárez is helping with the efforts knits from toys to make blankets. Some will be quick knits - others are of the planet habitable to human life. However'long, a discovery cosy afternoons in front of an ancient alien bunker under the moonfire's surface leaves her bonded with a strange alien entityvariety. After The projects are divided by the entity bonded time they'll take to her loses control and kills half the staff of the research stationcomplete - less than five hours, the United Military Command cruiser Extenuating Circumstances arrives in the system five to take Kira in for examination. Things go from bad to worse when the Extenuating Circumstances is attacked and destroyed by an alien shipten hours, and she has ten to flee to the 61 Cygnus star system. She is revived aboard the freighter Wallfish, crewed by Captain Falconi twenty hours and a rag-tag bunch of misfits, and the news is grimmore than twenty hours. The same aliens that destroyed All the Extenuating Circumstances projects are now wreaking havoc across all of human-occupied spaceattractive, modern and only a mythical weapon known as the Staff of Blue can stop themuseable. As the death toll climbs and more players are introduced into this war, Kira slowly begins to realise I perhaps show my age when I wonder about 'social-media-worthy projects' but that she may have had a greater hand in the conflict than she could've possibly imagined…|isbn=1529046505s me being picky.
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{{Frontpage
|author=Carlie SorosiakDean Koontz|title=My Life as a CatThe Bad Weather Friend
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident ReadersParanormal|summary=This Benny is the story of an alien who has come down to spend some time on earth living as having a humanterrifically bad day. It's something that each member in the alien collective is allowed to do He loses his job, for 1 monthhe loses his fiancee, once they reach a certain ageand his house gets trashed. Leonard comes to earth but gets distracted en routeOh, and so something goes wrong with someone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to his arrival home, and he finds it's possible that instead of landing in Yellowstone Park, ready to work as a park ranger, he whoever or whatever was inside is instead in the body of a cat on the other side of the countrything that has trashed his house! This The thing is, Benny is not what he had planned! the very last person to deserve all this bad luck. Not only He is he in a nice person. A really nice person. So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the wrong place and the wrong body, he delivery to his house is also in the middle of a stormnew friend, stuck in a tree! And so he meets Olivebad weather friend called Spike, the little girl who rows out in has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a boat good person. Spike is going to rescue himtake care of Benny, and will certainly take care of Benny's enemies, if he, Benny, and Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who names him Leonardexactly they are.|isbn=17880060891662500491
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{{Frontpage
|author= Tahi SaihateAdam Stower|title= Astral Season, Beastly SeasonMurray and Bun|rating= 34.5|genre= Literary FictionConfident Readers |summary= We long for our past even though it Murray is supposed to be a place humble, tidy and friendly cat, one who is able to which we can never returnsleep and eat and eat and sleep and, well, whatever takes his fancy next of the two. Tahi Saihate, in her debut novel But he's a bad magician'Astral Seasons cat, Beastly Season'' illustrates how these rose-tinted glasses often lie. Her novel is so his favourite bun has been turned into a meditation on youth hyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, and how the things we do as catflap they both use can chuck them out, not into the regular back garden, but into a teenager can seem intensely important world of frightening adventure and often life-alteringwhiffs. This time round it drops them into a Viking land, where a 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= 19162771010008561249
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn= Andrea StewartB0C47LV1PC|title= The Bone Shard Daughter (The Drowning Empire)Fragility|author=Mosby Woods|rating=4.5|genre= FantasyLiterary Fiction|summary=Can you make a ''I Yo birthing person'' joke? And if you could never be what he wanted , is the question should you make it? Or is the question if I you did not take what I wanted'', would it land? The catch is that the answer for both could well be.... no.
In an empire controlled by a bone shard magic that powers animal-like constructs, an heir to the throne, a smuggler, and a warrior will fight to find their place in the world. Lin ''Fragility'' is set as the emperor's forgotten daughter, kept locked away in a palace city of secrets and closed doors. When her father refuses to recognise her as heir to the thronePortland, she vows to show him she is capable of reviving a dying empire and in secretOregon, she cautiously begins to unlock one door after another, searching for emerge from the mysteries of her past and the forbidden art of bone shard magic. Yet Lin is playing a deadly game and her quest for power will come at great cost. With revolution in restrictions imposed during the air and creeping closer and closer to the gates of the palace, Lin must decide just how far she will to go to become a catalyst of change and save her people.|isbn=0356514943covid pandemic
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Sharon Doering1529431735|title=She Lies CloseThe Winter Visitor|author=James Henry
|rating=4
|genre=ThrillersCrime|summary= Ava Boone was five years old when she went missingIt's February 1991 and Essex is bitingly cold, around 6 months agowhich made Bruce Hopkins' return all the more surprising. There has He'd been no sign of her since, and no arrests have been madeexiled on the Costa del Sol as a wanted drug smuggler for a decade. And yet, this book is not The return has come about Ava. Not really. This book is about Grace, who has just discovered her neighbour in her new house is a suspect in Avabecause he's disappearance. As had a single mother to two young childrenletter from his ex-wife, saying that she's really wishing this sort of information had come ill and hasn't long to live. It's hard to feel any sympathy when Hopkins is abducted, stripped to his underwear and sent to light before they moved a watery grave inthe boot of a stolen Ford Sierra.|isbn=1789094194 Is it a warning from a Spanish gang or a problem closer to home?
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{{Frontpage
|author=Yara Evans Alex Bell and Luciana BettiTim McDonagh|title=The Adventures Glorious Race of an Urban Fox: Maggie ArrivesMagical Beasts
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Black Cat Eli is a busy lad – by day an apprentice in the wondrous library we start by visiting with him, and Tabby Cat are minding their own business in their own house when the evening a very alarming thing happenshelper at the dessert cafe his gran owns and runs. A creature - Eli lives with his lovely gran, too – for there is a large, dog-like creature - appears generation missing in their housethe family. Black Cat A few short years ago, always one Eli's parents were both lost to take chargethe titular race, challenges this fearsome creature with a globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have to navigate the courage he can muster. Tabby Cat backs him.... from world in the company of a rather safe distancemagical beast. The creature is indignant - ''I'm not a dog. I'm a fox!''|isbn=1511658649 }}{{Frontpage|isbn=1712435728|title=Jamie's Keepsake|author=Michael Gallagher|rating=4.5|genre=Teens|summary=When we first meet Alex Hannah, he's just being released from This has made the Southern General Hospital. The nurse thinks he'll come back race anathema to visit the other patients pair – but Alex has no intention of doing that: he's been there for when a year, on bad incident at the same ward where his brother died and noweatery leads to a confession from gran, with Eli knows his hair all shorn offonly hope is to dare to enter what he most hates, he's going home in his dead brother's clothes. He wants to get outside and back with his friends: his brother, Forbes, says that the fresh air will do him good and sole aim the prize of magic at the end – the only thing to possibly save his mother tells him that he's not to mention TB and to say it was tonsillitis. Good luck with that one, Alexgran.|isbn=0571382231
}}

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