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<metadesc>Book review siteExpert, with books full book reviews from the many most walks of literary life - ; fiction, biography, crime, cookery and anything else that takes our fancy. There are also lots of author interviews and top tens.</metadesc>Hello from The Bookbag, a book review site, featuring books from all the many walks of literary life non- [[: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. Itchildren's the bag we take to the library and the bookshop. Sometimes it holds the latest releases, but at other times there'll be old favourites, books for the children, & self-published 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|plus 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.</metadesc>
'''Read [[Forthcoming Publications|reviews of books about to be published]].{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Rachel HeathSylvie Cathrall|title=The Finest Type Of English WomanhoodA Letter to the Luminous Deep|rating=4.5|genre=General Science Fiction|summary=It was just after the end of the Second World War and seventeen year old Laura Trelling was at There are few greater joys than a book which lives up to a loose end in her Sussex villagecompelling premise. She didn't really fit in with the other young people and her eccentric parents were becoming more and more isolated, to the extent that Laura was embarrassed by their carelessness And this is one of her welfare. A chance encounter with Paul Lovell was to change everything and before long she was on her way to a South Africa not yet burdened with apartheidthem.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099532743</amazonuk>0356522776
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Bobbie Darbyshire0008517061|title=Truth GamesDeath in a Lonely Place|author=Stig Abell
|rating=4
|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=The central theme in this book is sex - and lots of itFormer Metropolitan Police detective, Jake Johnson, has settled into his rustic life at Little Sky. We're introduced to There’s perhaps a group little uncertainty about the future of mainly twentysomethings his life with his vet girlfriend, Livia and thirtysomethings. Men and women. Most her daughter Diana, as moving in together would mean a lot of them are attractive compromise: does Jake give up his off-grid and hold down glamorous jobs relaxing life to move in with Livia or does Livia move to Little Sky despite her reservations about whether or not this is the future she wants for herself and careers. her daughter? All For the moment they’re enjoying life in rude health, with wonderful social lives the present and trendy homes. They all appear, putting the future on the surface, to be a bunch of shiny, happy peopleback burner. What on earth could be missing?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905614721</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Nia Pritchard1786482126|title=More Than Just A HairdresserThe Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths|rating=24.5|genre=Women's FictionCrime|summary=ItBuilders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the site was going to hold seventy-five 'luxury's a brand new year, and Liverpudlian hairdresser Shirley is looking forward to apartments - when they discovered the months ahead following one hell bones of a new year's eve partychild 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. What It's moredifficult as Ruth knows, shebut Nelson doesn's going to chronicle her adventures in her brand spanking new diary which she will write in diligentlyt, even when that she's feeling is pregnant with his child as a bit 'morning after result of the one night they spent together some three months ago. Her condition will be obvious before'long, not least because Ruth is prone to sudden bouts of sickness.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1870206851</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Anthony Quinn0008551324|title=The Rescue ManDevil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster
|rating=4.5
|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=This love affair tale with It's unusual for anyone from the Hardie family to approach the police. Neither side likes or has any respect for the city of Liverpool other. But Davie Hardie is mostly told through struggling in prison and he's prepared to tell the police where the eyes body of architect Tom Bainesa missing person is buried and who was responsible for her death. With This person, he promises, is someone big and it will be worth the Second World War looming, Baines police doing what he wants. And what he wants is desperately working on a book to capture be transferred to an open prison to serve the memory remainder of buildings that are at riskhis sentence and to get an early parole date. Not much to ask, is it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and appears a man more in love with she's even prepared to do the past other thing that Hardie demanded - make certain that DS Max Craigie and solid, cold structures than mankindanyone who works with him is kept well away from what's happening.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0008405026|title=A Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Jane Casey|rating=5|genre=Crime|amazonuksummary=<amazonuk>0099531933<It's sixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. She was never found and the investigation ground to a halt. Now, her mother, Helena, and her father are dead in their bed. Initially, it looks like a straightforward murder/amazonuk>suicide but there's 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 an open-and-shut case is now a complex double murder. Kerrigan is convinced that the explanation lies in Rosalie's disappearance: others (such as Derwent's boss, Una Burt) are less convinced.
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Paul Murray0571379877|title=Skippy DiesThe Kellerby Code|author=Jonny Sweet
|rating=3.5
|genre=Literary FictionCrime|summary=Life in Seabrook College Edward Jevons is a messworking-class young man, obsessed with his upper-class friends, Robert and Stanza. Some of the staff are young enough Robert's a theatre director. He's also self-obsessed, demanding, handsome and entitled and uses Edward to remember their own school days there, but many are certainly too old run errands for thathim. A lot of the boys are victims of ragging and bullying for being too chunky, or too smart Edward has been in love with Stanza since their university days - but some are so chunky and smart therehe's a certain kudos drunkenly confided how he feels to themRobert. The female of the species is a thing only spied Most men in Robert's position would stay away from their own school next door, and only met by selling them ritalin as Stanza or tell Edward that a weight-control pill, or meeting relationship had begun between them at but he's not like most men: Edward is left to stumble upon the very rare combined school discotwo of them kissing in a dark passageway.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241141826</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=A G TaylorJo Callaghan|title=Meteorite StrikeLeave No Trace
|rating=4
|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=Sarah When a man is not readyfound crucified on the top of a hill in Nuneaton, DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to the case alongside her sidekick, the AI detective Lock. SheIt's not ready to forgive the man who their first live case together, having previously been very successful with several cold cases. But when there is her fathera second body found crucified a few days later, for abandoning her Kat is suddenly struggling with a potential serial killer and her young brother Robert eight years agoa very high profile case that draws a lot of unwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. She cannot yet forgive Will they be able to solve the circumstances case in time, or will Kat find herself taken off the case and, potentially, out of her mother dyinga 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 first day of the promise they were forced to makemedical 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 go to Australia with the man, be a cardiothoracic surgeon. Laura is a perfectionist and start a new lifetrauma doctor. She Anjali is certainly not prepared for the meteor strike to smash into Australia just as free spirit of the group and she becomes a GP. When we first meet them they fly above 're at a drug and alcohol-fuelled party and it, which downs 's 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 will impact the plane in a horrid crashthree friends. This time, and seems to carry with it an alien virus which forces many people to drop permanently asleep's their teenage children who are involved.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1409508579</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jane Yolen and Mark Teague0241636604|title=How Do Dinosaurs Eat Their Food?The Trading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson|rating=34.5|genre=For SharingAutobiography|summary=[[How Do Dinosaurs Say Good Night? by Jane Yolen|How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight?]] If you were to bring up an image of a city banker in your mind, you're unlikely to think of someone like Gary Stevenson. A hoodie and jeans replaces the pin-stripe suit and his background is the East End, where he was a witty familiar with violence, poverty and visually creative tale injustice. There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to the London School of Very Bad Bedtime Behaviour for modern children enamoured Economics. Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and he has a facility with numbers which most of dinosaursus can only envy. He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to be stupid. It was his ability at what was, essentially, a card game which got him an internship with Citibank. 'How Do Dinosaurs Eat Their Food?' continues the formula Eventually, this time with table mannersturned into permanent employment as a trader.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007216092</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Cynthia Kadohata1035021803|title=A Million Shades of GreyThe Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder|author=C L Miller
|rating=3.5
|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=At just twelve, Tin is It's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to the youngest elephant handler in his English country villagewhere she grew up. Ever since he can remember She's back now because of a request for help from her beloved aunt, Tin has dreamed of working with elephants Carole. Freya's former mentor and he loves his own elephantCarole's close friend, LadyArthur Crockleford, is dead and the circumstances seem suspicious, to distractionsay the least. Arthur was the reason why Freya had not been back to the village: Arthur, she feels, even spending most of his nights sleeping by let her sidedown badly. Tin is much less keen on school Even though they were in business together as antique hunters, but his parents insist that he goesshe has not felt able to be near the man or pursue the profession she loved. Tin really can't see After the pointsplit, as his sole ambition is to become she worked in a fully-fledged elephant trainer. His parents may talk about opportunities in cafe, met and married James (on the rebound from the world outside his village but if they don't involve elephantslove of her life, he's not interestedwho was murdered) and Freya and James have now divorced. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>184738823X</amazonuk>
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=AllTomorrowsFutureCover
|title=All Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt
|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)
|rating=5
|genre=Science Fiction
|summary=''Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to come.''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Timothy W RybackSunny Singh|title=Hitler's Private Library: The Books That Shaped His LifeHotel Arcadia|rating=43.5|genre=HistoryThrillers |summary=As the fictional schoolboy hero Nigel Molesworth might have said, 'any fule kno' The Hotel Arcadia is a luxury hotel in an unnamed city that Adolf Hitler was notorious for burning bookshas suddenly been violently taken over by a terrorist group. Nevertheless he was also an avid collector and passionate readerHiding from the terrorists who are rampaging through, killing everyone on site, as around 1200 surviving volumes once in his possession now in the Rare Book Division of the Library of Congressthere is Sam, a wartime photographer and a smaller quantity in Brown UniversityAbhi, Rhode Island, demonstratethe hotel manager. Among them were world literature classicsAs Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the residents who are still alive in the hotel, such as 'Robinson Crusoe', 'Uncle Tom's Cabin'he forms a bond with Sam who refuses to be cowed by events, and 'Gulliverkeeps on venturing out of her room to try to capture what's Travels'happened through her photography. He also owned an edition of Although they only ever talk over the collected works of Shakespearephone, in hand-tooled Moroccan leather with a gold-embossed eagle flanked their friendship grows as Abhi tries to help her keep safe and they both wait to see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by his initials on the spine. The Bard, he once said, was greatly superior to Goethe and Schillerterrorists.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099532174</amazonuk>086154742X
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Druin Burch1529153298|title=Taking the MedicineThe List of Suspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey
|rating=5
|genre=Popular ScienceGeneral Fiction|summary=In 1898It's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, Burch points out honestly...) She's not what's worrying Miv's family, though. Women have been disappearing. Well, they've been murdered, but to have 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Miv's upset because she's overheard that a new drug was developed and marketed for her father wants to move the treatment of tuberculosis by Bayer & Cofamily 'Down South'. TB When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is such an ancient enemy of man that there is apparently evidence of an earlier strain to be found in Egyptian mummies. The German firm had discovered a chemical that seemed to work wellfrightening, and patients and indeed their own staffforeign place, who were tested best avoided. seemed For Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and she'll do anything to respond well prevent that. She's not worried about the dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - it was named Heroin - and its addictive effects were at first missedto anyone.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845951506</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Gigi Amateau1398524085|title=ChanceyHas Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Nicci French|rating=45|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=ChanceyCharlotte Salter was expected at her husband's dam was Starry Night fiftieth birthday party but never turned up. Her children, sons Niall, Paul and Ollie and her owner loved that horse so much that she wanted a foal who was exactly like daughter, Etty. are all worried but - strangely - herhusband, Alec, is not. Shortly afterwards, Etty and Greg, but when Chancey was born she was bitterly disappointed for instead find the body of Greg's father, Duncan Ackerley, in the black Appaloosa with white marking Chancey was born albinoriver. It was only his striped hooves which proved his breedingan easy assumption for the police to make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when he couldn't stand the guilt. The owner was Salter children are not big enough to overcome her feelings convinced but there's little else they can do but get on with their lives and when she fell on hard times it was Chancey who was left out in the field to suffer despite the fact that he was no longer a young horsewonder about what really happened.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140632258X</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sian Rees1035906708|title=Sweet Water and Bitter: The Ships That Stopped the Slave TradeDiva|author=Daisy Goodwin
|rating=4.5
|genre=HistoryGeneral Fiction|summary=The Act for the Abolition We tend to think of the Slave Trade Maria Callas as Greek, but she was passed born to Greek parents in Britain Manhattan, New York, in March 1807, December 1923 and the last legal British slave ship left Africa seven months later. Other countries were slow only moved to follow suitAthens when she was thirteen. Everyone in Britain knew there would be resistance, and when the abolitionist Granville Sharpe purchased land in Sierra Leone Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 'repatriateCallas' freed slaves, Ottobah Cugoana, a former slave living to make it more manageable in London, asked if it the States. When she was possible back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for 'her voice - she was raised under the Nazi occupation by a fountain to send forth both sweet water mother who mercilessly exploited her and bittermade no secret of her preference for her elder sister, Jackie.' Could the slave trade, he wondered, be abolished from West Africa - when West Africa was its source?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845951174</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=SapphireChristopher Edge|title=PreciousBlack Hole Cinema Club
|rating=4
|genre=General FictionConfident Readers|summary=Precious Jones is Lucas and his friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, a sixteen year old black girl from Harlem – well she's never actually been out place that has the nickname of Harlem – and when we meet her she's pregnant by her own father for the second time. Her first child was a girl and she was born with DownThe Black Hole's Syndrome. With unconscious irony Precious calls her ''Little Mongo'All big movie fans, they' re looking forward to lots of exciting films, and leaves her to live with her grandmother. many, many snacks! When her second pregnancy becomes obvious she's expelled from school However, as the movie starts, they very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, and joins they are swept up into an alternative education programmeadventure they couldn't even imagine. Precious really wants But as they lurch from one film genre to learn and the book next, can they figure out what on earth is going on? Will they ever get back to the story of her journey from illiteracy cinema, and to maturity.their real lives?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099548720</amazonuk>1839942738
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Dean Hale, Shannon Hale and Nathan Hale Rachel Greenlaw|title=Calamity JackCompass and Blade
|rating=3.5
|genre=Confident ReadersTeens|summary=''I was born to scheme'', declares our hero Jack. With flashbacks we see the young lad and a pixie friend, larking about for revenge or small profit. But when his mother's bakery gets more and more into the red, can hear the size song of the profit has to increasesea. And when you add in revenge against the local crime lord - a giant The call of a man - so does the size of deep, the target of the japeanswering beat in my heart.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0747587426</amazonuk>}}''
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|rating=4.5
|genre=TeensConfident Readers|summary=Isabel Things have been a bit sticky for the Earthlings. AI and her sister Ruth are slaves. But automation have been proceeding apace, often replacing jobs they should be free - Miss Mary Finch left a will 're paid to do and other tasks that said sotook time to accomplish. But Miss Mary Finch is dead and her greedy nephew and heir denies Just as they were beginning to get used to all knowledge of the will. So Isabel this technological change and Ruth are sold starting to the Locktons and taken think of other, new ways to New Yorkspend time, along came an awful pandemic. The Revolutionary War is underway Life was pretty much shut down and New York is a dangerous place. The Locktons are loyalists, but along with it, all the patriots are in control of the citymany daily social interactions on which they depend so heavily. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0747598061</amazonuk>1736128426
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Lorraine JenkinMatthew Tree|title=Chocolate Mousse and Two SpoonsWe'll Never Know
|rating=4.5
|genre=Women's Literary Fiction|summary=From the first sentence: 'With one hell Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to be different from his father, a drunk and chronic underachiever whose dreams of a crash, Lettie Howell’s dinner service hit the wall…', I knew that I was going to enjoy this tale. An opening thus full being exceptional at any of expletive his artistic passions all failed miserably and resounding Welsh Voice immediately makes it clear who’s the boss and I can relax, knowing I’m in competent handswho had endless crises of self confidence. WelcomeSo Tim applied himself to his studies, Lorraine Jenkin, to my handful of favourite chick-lit authorscultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and set himself high but achievable ambitions.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1870206959</amazonuk>B0CVFXPGP8
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Tom WolfeA G Slatter|title=The Bonfire Briar Book of the VanitiesDead
|rating=5
|genre=Literary FictionFantasy|summary=In his own mind, bond trader Sherman McCoy is '' There's a 'Master part of the Universe'me that wants to keep this just to myself for however long I can. He has a pleasant wifeThis secret magic of my own, a beautiful mistressall mine, and a sweet six year old daughterat last. Henry Lamb is I just want to enjoy it for a black student from the projectswhile. Under normal circumstances, it's clear that McCoy's world and Lamb's world would never overlap. But when McCoy and his mistress Maria Ruskin end up lost in the Bronx, and an accident leads to Lamb being hit by McCoy's Mercedes, a chain of events start which will lead to his downfall.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099548798</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kate Cole-Adams1529900360|title=Walking to the MoonThe Ghost Orchid|author=Jonathan Kellerman
|rating=4
|genre=Literary FictionCrime|summary=We meet It 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 main character Jessicahelp of a psychologist only worked for a while. Finally, it was Robin, or Jess as she is usually calledDelaware's partner, deep in an emotional black holewho nudged Milo into asking for help again. She can see no light at knew that the end of involvement was something that the tunnelman she loved needed. And right from the startThe next case did look simple, right from page one, we have a sense of though. Two lovers were murdered in the beautiful and poetic language swimming pool of Cole-Adamsa remote property in Bel Air. 'Time He was the heir to an Italian shoe empire and she is married to an extremely rich man and I have a new arrangement. We leave each other alone.it' And indeed time is s not important in this novelthe Italian. We have all the time in the world would probably be the motto But which of them was the medical staff - if they had one. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849161348</amazonuk>primary target?
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Nancy Farmer1529395224|title=The Islands of Letting the Blessed (Sea Cat Out of Trolls Trilogy) |rating=4|genre=Confident Readers|summary=In this third adventure, Jack, a fourteen year old Saxon apprentice bard, and Thorgil, a bad-tempered shield maiden, follow the Bard Dragon Tongue on a quest to quell the draugr - the malevolent spirit Bag: The Secret Life of a drowned mermaid mistakenly summoned to Jack's village and who seeks revenge for her earlier ill treatment at human hands.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184738630X</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewVet|author=Sophie McKenzie|title=The Hostage (Medusa Project)Sion Rowlands
|rating=3.5
|genre=TeensAnimals and Wildlife|summary=Teenagers Nico, Kitty, Ed Siôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. His father was a GP and Dylan were implanted with the Medusa gene when they were babies. Now theyRowlands didn're adolescentst want to follow in his footsteps, particularly when he considered the intended psychic abilities are coming to the forestrain that being on-call put on his father's life. Nico has When he was seventeen he took the power opportunity of telekinesis 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 - he can move objects as with so many students - been his minddream since he was a child. Ed can read other people If anything, he's thoughts. Dylan has an invisible protective shield and no weapon can harm herd wanted to be a professional footballer. Kitty has visions that predict the future. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847385265</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Garth Nix0861541774|title=Into Battle (The Seventh Tower)A Nye of Pheasants|author=Steve Burrows|rating=3.54|genre=TeensCrime|summary=We've made it to book five in Garth NixDCI Domenic Jejeune's Seventh Tower seriesclose friend and former colleague, Danny Maik, so has taken a quick recap: The Dark World is blocked from the Sun by short holiday in Singapore to meet up with an enchanted Veil created by Tal's forebears to protect it from the creatures who inhabit Aenir old ally, Guy Trueman. Maik was involved in a street brawl - he would later maintain that he was facing a man armed with a spirit land full of magic knife - and magical beastshe killed a Ghurka.Aenir is lit and warmed by the Sun Initially, he faced a charge of manslaughter but evidence came to light that suggested that he might have planned to murder the Dark World uses sunstones - crystals grown and charged with light and heat in Aenirman. Some inhabitants of Now he could be facing the Dark World - the Chosen - also bind some of Aenir's creatures death penalty. Domenic Jejeune can do nothing to themselves help as spiritshadows or spiritguardsany interference from another police force could provoke a diplomatic incident and wouldn't help Danny at all. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007261233</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Don FelderAlexander McCall Smith|title=Heaven And Hell: My Life in the Eagles, 1974 - 2001The Perfect Passion Company
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=''A Disobedient Girl'' follows two women struggling to retain control of their lives in the face of servitude. Latha The Perfect Passion Company is a servant girl to the affluent Vithanage familydating agency in Edinburgh, whose daughter, Thara, is Latha's age. As children, the girls are the best of friends, but they are destined run by Ness and operating as an alternative to be separated by class, which is made painfully obvious when boys come into all the picture. Meanwhile, Biso serves online apps in providing a cruel and drunken husband who beats her and terrorises her childrenmore personal, one of whom is another man's love childtailored service. Biso's husband murdered Ness has asked her lover in a hateful rage when he uncovered her affair and she realises that she must escape his house younger cousin Katie if she could come and her children are look after the business, as Ness is planning to live. Latha too seeks escape, but she finds it in the arms of Thara's boyfriend and this sets off take a chain of events that will echo far into her future.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670917958</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Debby Holt|title=Recipe For Scandal|rating=4|genre=Women's Fiction|summary=There's evidently a market trip to Canada to get away for scandalous tales, or else many a women's weekly would have gone while. Katie is coming out of business by nowa break up with a bad boyfriend, but and so jumps at the chance to come home to Edinburgh. And so begins this booknew story from Alexander McCall Smith, though full of scandalbringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, is slightly different. This isn't council estate scandal or even trashy celebrity scandal, it's juicy, firmly middle class scandal of thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the type [[:Category:Zoe Heller|Zoë Heller]] might write aboutIsabel Dalhousie novels, and it's wickedly captivating.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847396542</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Dana Fowley|title=How Could She?|rating=4|genre=Autobiography|summary=From the age of five Dana Fowley was subjected to unimaginable sexual abuse and before long her sister would be subjected but with some new characters who quickly begin to more of the samecharm. She was raped by Katie has no experience in running a business, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her motherabilities, and there's partner and taken to the homes of always her grandparents where she was abused by them very helpful (and others. At other times she was forced to go rather handsome) neighbour, William, to the homes of other men where she was raped and abused. Did her mother not know what was going on? Did she turn lend a blind eye? It was neither of those. Her mother was a willing participant in the abuse and organised much of it.hand…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>009952225X</amazonuk>1846976596
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Simon Robson0811771741|title=CatchInstaKnits for Baby|author=Melissa Leapman
|rating=4
|genre=Literary FictionCrafts|summary=CatharineMelissa Leapman's husband Tom is away on business in Birmingham, and so Catharine awakes alone ''InstaKnits for the first time in their little cottage at the end Baby'' gives us a collection of their lane. They moved there a few months previously, and since then Catharine has spent her days quietly awaiting her husband's return knits from worktoys to blankets. She is sure that she Some will figure outbe quick knits - others are of the 'long, some day, what her purpose cosy afternoons in life isfront of the fire' variety. She thought it might be The projects are divided by the time they'll take to complete - less than five hours, five to have a babyten hours, but they have been trying for some time ten to twenty hours and it hasn't happened as yetmore than twenty hours. Meanwhile she waits, and thinksAll the projects are attractive, modern and waitsuseable. In the lounge stands her piano, a stark reminder of the life she didnI perhaps show my age when I wonder about 'social-media-worthy projects't manage to realise because although she studied music she found, quite quickly, but that in spite of being passionate she lacked any kind of talent for it whatsoever. So, on this day, alone at home, Catharine finds herself tormented by the piano's presence and over-thinking every second of the dayme being picky. She worries away at who she is, and what her life is, as her loneliness and the day itself unravel around her.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224090232</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Nick WadleyDean Koontz|title=Man + DogThe Bad Weather Friend
|rating=4.5
|genre=HumourParanormal|summary=Throughout my life IBenny is having a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and his house gets trashed. Oh, and someone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to his home, and it've lived with dogs s possible that whoever or deeply regretted whatever was inside is the fact thing that I lacked has trashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the very last person to deserve all this bad luck. He is a canine companionnice person. A really nice person. Watching So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to his house is a dog – or better stillnew friend, a bad weather friend called Spike, the interaction between dogs – who has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. Spike is infinitely better than anything on television going to take care of Benny, and itwill certainly take care of Benny's sheer joy to see how man and dog interacts and howenemies, if he, so oftenBenny, and Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they hold a mirror up to each otherare.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1564785521</amazonuk>1662500491
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jules StanbridgeAdam Stower|title=A Date in Your DiaryMurray and Bun
|rating=4.5
|genre=Women's FictionConfident Readers |summary=Harry knows that Murray is supposed to be a woman needs 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 man like a fish needs a bicycle, but she also knows therebad magician's cat, so his favourite bun has been turned into a difference between what we need hyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, and what we want – and she wants a bloke. More specificallythe catflap they both use can chuck them out, she wants a date for not into the latest in regular back garden, but into a string world of friend-frightening adventure and-family weddingswhiffs. This time round it drops them into a Viking land, a wedding where, thanks to a 'tricky' seating plantroll hunter is expected – well, she will be sitting on the same table as her most recent ex...and his new girlfriend. With no prospects in sightone much bigger than Murray was, Harry comes to the conclusion that internet dating might be the way to go. At besthonest, shebut he's turned up and he'll find a guy who ticks all her boxes and will joyfully accompany her have to the wedding before they live happily ever after, and at worst, well, she might get a story out of it, never a bad thing for a magazine journo.do…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0755347137</amazonuk>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 it land? The catch is that the answer for both could well be.... no.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Helen Black1529431735|title=DishonourThe Winter Visitor|author=James Henry
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary=Modern lives. Lily Valentine It's February 1991 and Essex is heavily pregnant and trying to get her own law firm up and running (having been sacked from her previous job for a tendency to be a trifle too ''independent'bitingly cold, which made Bruce Hopkins' – or maybe just disorganised). Ryan is a boy from return all the sink estatesmore surprising. Thin, angry, rebellious, but with an ability to charm and He'd been exiled on the Costa del Sol as a serious talent wanted drug smuggler for art that gets lost in his gansta-speak and tendency to skive off school. Lailla and Aasha are good Muslim girlsa decade. HardThe return has come about because he's had a letter from his ex-workingwife, sober, appropriately dressed, dutiful saying that she's ill and hasn't long to their familieslive. TheyIt're also English teenagers, with a fair dose of what that normally implies. Jack s hard to feel any sympathy when Hopkins is a copper, overlooked for the interesting cases (like murder), good at child protection, in love with Lilyabducted, addicted stripped to the job, always trying his underwear and sent to do a watery grave in the right thing, and not always succeedingboot of a stolen Ford Sierra. His current clean-living and caring attitude is driving Lily Is it a warning from a Spanish gang or a problem closer to distraction.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847560725</amazonuk>home?
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Panos KarnezisAlex Bell and Tim McDonagh|title=The ConventGlorious Race of Magical Beasts
|rating=4
|genre=General FictionConfident Readers|summary=Our Lady of Mercy Eli is a small convent on busy lad – by day an apprentice in the wondrous library we start by visiting with him, and in the Spanish sierra made up of evening a handful of devoted nuns who live their helper at the dessert cafe his gran owns and runs. Eli lives simplywith his lovely gran, carrying out their daily duties like clockwork. However things change when too – for there is a suitcase containing a newborn baby is left mysteriously outside generation missing in the convent doorsfamily. The Mother Superior A few short years ago, Sister Maria InesEli's parents were both lost to the titular race, believes the baby to be a miracle and plans globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have to keep him navigate the world in the convent, but the other sisters do not agreecompany of a magical beast. During This has made the events that follow the true characters of the nuns inside the convent are revealed and the peace that the sisters enjoy is stripped away race anathema to show the tension that has been bubbling away under the surface.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224079344</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Joe Meno|title=The Great Perhaps|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Jonathan Casper faints pair – but when he sees clouds. His wife Madeline worries about everything, not least the way a bad incident at the pigeons that she is studying are murdering each other. Their seventeen year old daughter Amelia wants eatery leads to overthrow the evil empire of capitalism and is making her own bomba confession from gran, while fourteen year old Thisbe Eli knows his only hope is looking for God and praying to him. Jonathan's fatherdare to enter what he most hates, seventy six year old Henry, is planning his disappearance. Jonathan and Madeline may be on with the sole aim the verge prize of splitting up, magic at the end – the only thing to the dismay of both daughterspossibly save his gran.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0330512471</amazonuk>0571382231
}}
