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<metadesc>Book review site, with books from the many 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>
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<metadesc>Expert, full book reviews from most walks of literary life; fiction, non-fiction, children's books & self-published books plus author interviews & top tens.</metadesc>
Hello from The Bookbag, a book review site, featuring books from all the many walks of literary life - [[:Category:Fiction|fiction]], [[:Category:Biography|biography]], [[:Category:Crime|crime]], [[:Category:Cookery|cookery]] and anything else that takes our fancy. At Bookbag Towers the bookbag sits at the side of the desk. It's the bag we take to the library and the bookshop. Sometimes it holds the latest releases, but at other times there'll be old favourites, books for the children, books for the home. They're sometimes our own books or books from the local library. They're often books sent to us by publishers and we promise to tell you exactly what we think about them. You might not want to read through a full review, so we'll give you a quick review which summarises what we felt about the book and tells you whether or not we think you should buy or borrow it. There are also lots of [[:Category:Interviews|author interviews]], and all sorts of [[:Category:Lists|top tens]] - all of which you can find on our [[features]] page. If you're stuck for something to read, check out the [[Book Recommendations|recommendations]] page.
 
  
There are currently '''{{PAGESINCATEGORY:Reviews}}''' reviews at TheBookbag.
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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!
  
Want to find out more [[About Us|about us]]?
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==New Reviews==
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There are currently '''{{PAGESINCATEGORY: Reviews}}''' [[:Category:Reviews|reviews]] at TheBookbag.
'''Read [[:Category:New Reviews|new reviews by genre]].'''
 
  
'''Read [[Features|new features]].'''
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Want to find out more [[About Us|about us]]? __NOTOC__
__NOTOC__
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{{newreview
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==The Best New Books==
|author=Sarah Bakewell
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|title=How to Live: A Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer
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'''Read [[:Category:New Reviews|new reviews by category]]. '''<br>
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'''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].'''
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'''Read [[Forthcoming Publications|reviews of books about to be published]].
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Sylvie Cathrall
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|title=A Letter to the Luminous Deep
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
|genre=Biography
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|genre=Science Fiction
|summary='Chance … really the way things happen,' wrote Howard Beck, the Chicago School sociologist.  I visit Bookbag Towers with few preconceived ideas about the next book for review.  I'll allow myself to fall for a quirky title or appealing cover, despite only a smattering of interest in the subject matter. Just occasionally this way, I stumble on a golden nugget so fascinating and well-written that I realise how lucky I am to be a reviewer. I'm so pleased to have chanced upon this inviting biography of Montaigne by Sarah Bakewell!
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|summary= There are few greater joys than a book which lives up to a compelling premise. And this is one of them.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701178922</amazonuk>
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|isbn= 0356522776
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=0008517061
|author=David Conway and Melanie Williamson
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|title=Death in a Lonely Place
|title=The Great Nursery Rhyme Disaster
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|author=Stig Abell
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=For Sharing
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|genre=Crime
|summary=Little Miss Muffet is fed up of being constantly scared by a spider, so she ups sticks and heads for a different page of the book, to see if the characters of another nursery rhyme will let her join in. She tries one rhyme after another, but things never quite work to plan. Will she find a nursery rhyme that suits her to a T?
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|summary= Former Metropolitan Police detective, Jake Johnson, has settled into his rustic life at Little Sky. There’s perhaps a little uncertainty about the future of his life with his vet girlfriend, Livia and her daughter Diana, as moving in together would mean a lot of compromise: does Jake give up his off-grid and 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 her daughter? For the moment they’re enjoying life in the present and putting the future on the back burner.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340945087</amazonuk>
 
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{{newreview
 
|author=Alistair Duncan
 
|title=The Norwood Author - Arthur Conan Doyle and the Norwood Years (1891 - 1894)
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Biography
 
|summary=At the age of 32 Dr Arthur Conan Doyle moved from London to a house in South Norwood, at that time part of Surrey, in June 1891.  It found him at the stage when he was torn between pursuing a career as an eye specialist and trying to make a living through his writing, after he had sold a few stories to magazines.  Shortly before the move, he had been confined to bed for three weeks with influenza, and while recovering from what had briefly threatened to be a fatal illness (or so he believed), he took the decision to abandon medicine in favour of becoming a full-time author. A few Sherlock Holmes stories had been published, but the man with the deerstalker and pipe had yet to make an impact on the reading public, and his creator could not yet call himself an established writer.  Nevertheless, within the next few years he and the fictional detective were to become household names.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904312691</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1786482126
|author=Jean Ure
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|title=The Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)
|title=Ice Lolly
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|author=Elly Griffiths
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
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|genre=Crime
|summary=It's the funeral. Laurel - Lolly to those that love her - is concentrating very hard and trying desperately to turn into an ice lolly. Ice lollies are frozen, you see, and they don't feel so much. They can't miss people - mothers - who are gone and people who are still around can't hurt them. A frozen heart is a sad thing, but it's a safe thing. Auntie Ellen doesn't like the music at the service, she thinks it's inappropriate. It isn't even a hymn. But it was one of Laurel's mother's favourites, and Laurel think it's just perfect. Special.
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|summary=Builders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the site was going to hold seventy-five 'luxury' apartments - when they discovered the bones 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's difficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn't, that she is pregnant with his child as a result of the one night they spent together some three months agoHer condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is prone to sudden bouts of sickness.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007281730</amazonuk>
 
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{{newreview
 
|author=John Wilcox
 
|title=The Shangani Patrol
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=This is the latest in the adventures of Simon Fonthill, a cross between a Victorian James Bond and Indianna JonesAlthough one of a series, it stands alone as a novel.  It's steeped in the history (and there's a lot of it) of the late 19th century when Queen Victoria 'ruled the world.'
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755345614</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=0008551324
|author=Philip Womack
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|title=The Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)
|title=The Liberators
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|author=Neil Lancaster
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
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|genre=Crime
|summary=Ivo's parents have gone off on a South American expedition. As it's the school holidays, Ivo is off to London to stay with some glamorous relatives. Aunt Lydia is a socialite and art expert who arranges exhibitions and parties for the great and the good. Uncle Jago is in finance and there isn't much about wheeling and dealing that he doesn't know. They're fond of Ivo and the kind of guardians who are likely to practise some benign neglect, so what Ivo is really looking forward to about his stay is freedom - he intends to explore London and enjoy everything it has to offer.  
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|summary=It's unusual for anyone from the Hardie family to approach the police. Neither side likes or has any respect for the other. But Davie Hardie is struggling in prison and he's prepared to tell the police where the body of a missing person is buried and who was responsible for her death.  This person, he promises, is someone big and it will be worth the police doing what he wants.  And what he wants is to be transferred to an open prison to serve the remainder of his sentence and to get an early parole date.  Not much to ask, is it?  The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and she's even prepared to do the other thing that Hardie demanded - make certain that DS Max Craigie and anyone who works with him is kept well away from what's happening.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0747595526</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=0008405026
|author=Emily Gravett
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|title=A Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)
|title=Blue Chameleon
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|author=Jane Casey
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
|genre=For Sharing
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|genre=Crime
|summary=The chameleon is feeling blue because he's lonely, so he goes and visits a yellow banana, pink cockatoo, swirly snail, brown boot, and so on. Each time, not only does he change his colour to match the object or animal, but he also contorts himself into a shape that matches them.
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|summary=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/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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230704247</amazonuk>
 
 
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}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=0571379877
|author=Inga Moore
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|title=The Kellerby Code
|title=Six Dinner Sid - A Highland Adventure
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|author=Jonny Sweet
 
|rating=3.5
 
|rating=3.5
|genre=For Sharing
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|genre=Crime
|summary=Sid the cat has six owners in six different houses, and he munches his way through six dinners a day. This big ol' greedyguts has a great life, but then one day his owners all decide they want to go on holiday. They consider putting him in a cattery, but they have strange rules like one meal per cat, not six. They give it some thought, and eventually decide to all go on holiday together, taking Sid with them.
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|summary=Edward Jevons is a working-class young man, obsessed with his upper-class friends, Robert and Stanza.  Robert's a theatre director. He's also self-obsessed, demanding, handsome and entitled and uses Edward to run errands for him.  Edward has been in love with Stanza since their university days - and he's drunkenly confided how he feels to Robert. 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 two of them kissing in a dark passageway.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340988940</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Jo Callaghan
|author=Jaclyn Dolamore
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|title=Leave No Trace
|title=Magic Under Glass
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Teens
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|genre=Crime
|summary=Namira is a trouser girl - a music hall performer. In Lorinar, she's regarded as a faintly risque curiosity but at home in Tiansher it wasn't like this. Performers like her mother were feted and respected and Namira grew up in a palace. In Lorianar, she lives in poverty, performing for drunken fools who don't understand her art. And then suddenly, she's freed from the seedy music hall by Hollin Parry, a wealthy man and a member of Lorinar's Sorcerer Council. Parry has an automaton, a curiosity that plays the piano, and he wants Namira's unique voice to accompany it.
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|summary=When a man is found 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. It's their first live case together, having previously been very successful with several cold cases.  But when there is a second body found crucified a few days later, Kat is suddenly struggling with a potential serial killer and a very high profile case that draws a lot of unwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. Will they be able to solve the case in time, or will Kat find herself taken off the case and, potentially, out of a career?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408802120</amazonuk>
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|isbn=139851120X
 
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}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1399613073
|author=Michael Foreman
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|title=Moral Injuries
|title=Why The Animals Came To Town
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|author=Christie Watson
|rating=3.5
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|rating=4.5
|genre=For Sharing
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|genre=Thrillers
|summary=A young boy looks out of his bedroom window and sees a parade of animals walking up his street. They've come to show him the deserts and ice caps, to warn him of the importance of taking care of Earth. Without the animals, he realises the world would be a much more desolate place.
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|summary=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 a cardiothoracic surgeon.  Laura is a perfectionist and a trauma doctor.  Anjali is the free spirit of the group and she becomes a GP.  When we first meet them they're at a drug and alcohol-fuelled party and it'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 three friends.  This time, it's their teenage children who are involved.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1406318019</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=0241636604
|author=Gaby Morgan (editor)
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|title=The Trading Game: A Confession
|title=In My Sky at Twilight
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|author=Gary Stevenson
|rating=4
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|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
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|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Off the back of the success of Stephenie Meyer's [[Twilight by Stephenie Meyer|Twilight]] series there has been a boom in vampire novels aimed at teenagers. In My Sky at Twilight is perhaps one of the most unusual books to come out of this craze as it is a collection of love poetry aimed at teenage fans of the series.
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|summary=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 familiar with violence, poverty and injustice.  There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to the London School of Economics.  Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and he has a facility with numbers which most of us can only envy.  He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to be stupid.  It was his ability at what was, essentially, a card game which got him an internship with Citibank.  Eventually, this turned into permanent employment as a trader.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230745865</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1035021803
|author=John Burdett
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|title=The Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder
|title=The Godfather of Kathmandu
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|author=C L Miller
|rating=4
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|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Crime
 
|genre=Crime
|summary=Sonchai Jitpleecheep is half 'farang' the son of a brothel madam and an American GI, but it's the latter rather than the former which is likely to hold up his promotion in the Thai police force, where he's a detectiveHe's also the part owner of a brothel where his mother, Nong, is the madam in chargeIt's no problem for his boss, Colonel Vikorn, who has a few illegal interests of his ownHe's currently in competition with the head of the army, General Zinna, to see who can raise the finance for a forty million dollar shipment of heroin which Sonchai's Kathmandu-based guru has for sale.
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|summary=It's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to the English country village where she grew up.  She's back now because of a request for help from her beloved aunt, CaroleFreya's former mentor and Carole's close friend, Arthur Crockleford, is dead and the circumstances seem suspicious, to say the leastArthur was the reason why Freya had not been back to the village: Arthur, she feels, let her down badlyEven though they were in business together as antique hunters, she has not felt able to be near the man or pursue the profession she loved.  After the split, she worked in a cafe, met and married James (on the rebound from the love of her life, who was murdered) and Freya and James have now divorced.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0593055462</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=AllTomorrowsFutureCover
|author=Gary Blackwood
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|title=All Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt
|title=The Great Race: The Amazing Round-The-World Auto Race Of 1908
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|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
|genre=Children's Non-Fiction
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|genre=Science Fiction
|summary=In 1908, Henry Ford's Model T hadn't yet brought cars to the masses. The pioneers of the world of automobiles were experimenting and discovering just what the car could do, by driving right round the world. Except they didn't want to be pioneers. One of the competitors, Antonio Scarfoglio, put it so perfectly when he said 'We had set out to perpetuate an act of splendid folly, not to open up a new way for men. We wished to be madmen, not pioneers.' Isn't that about the best quote you've ever read?
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|summary=''Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to come.''
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0810994895</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=P J Reece
 
|title=Roxy
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=Maddie was at Aunt Gretchen's funeral when she got the phone call to tell her that her father was in a coma and likely to die.  This might sound like a double whammy but Maddie's father had deserted her soon after her birth (during which her mother died) and she was brought up by Aunt Gretchen, who never missed an opportunity to point out that she was an unwanted burden.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1896580017</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
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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.
|author=Richard North Patterson
 
|title=The Spire
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Crime
 
|summary=When student Mark Darrow discovers the body of a black fellow student, Angela Hall, at the foot of the spire in the centre of the college he attends, he little suspects that his best friend will be charged with the murder. Now, sixteen years later, Darrow is back, at the invitation of his mentor and now college provost, Lionel Farr, to become president of the college in order to rebuild its reputation after a case of embezzlement has left the college in a precarious position (conveniently, Darrow has become an ace financial fraud lawyer in the intervening years). As Darrow digs into what happened with the college finances, he also begins to look afresh at the trial of his friend and questions if he really was guilty as charged. He also finds time to start an emerging relationship with the provost's troubled, but beautiful, daughter. Is the real killer still at large and are the two crimes connected?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230705650</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Sunny Singh
|author=Pseudonymous Bosch
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|title=Hotel Arcadia
|title=This Book is Not Good for You
 
 
|rating=3.5
 
|rating=3.5
|genre=Confident Readers
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|genre=Thrillers
|summary=Cass is not having the best of time when it comes to secretsIt's all very well being involved in a top-secret society, designed to keep the secret of the most secretive secret ever, but those pesky people called adults are keeping things from her as well - namely, her very originsCan Max-Ernest and she wade through their junk store base and find the box she was delivered in?  Can they survive the mysterious clown school they end up visiting?  And can they keep a mystical tuning fork from falling into the wrong hands?
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|summary=The Hotel Arcadia is a luxury hotel in an unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a terrorist groupHiding from the terrorists who are rampaging through, killing everyone on site, there is Sam, a wartime photographer and Abhi, the hotel manager.  As Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the residents who are still alive in the hotel, he forms a bond with Sam who refuses to be cowed by events, and keeps on venturing out of her room to try to capture what's happened through her photographyAlthough they only ever talk over the phone, 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 the terrorists.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1409506312</amazonuk>
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|isbn=086154742X
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1529153298
|author=Russell Kirkpatrick
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|title=The List of Suspicious Things
|title=Beyond the Wall of Time (Broken Man)
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|author=Jennie Godfrey
|rating=4
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|rating=5
|genre=Fantasy
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|genre=General Fiction
|summary=A couple of aspects have summed up Russell Kirkpatrick's ''Broken Man'' trilogy for me so farThere has been a fascinating story with some wonderful character building that has made it highly enjoyableThere have also been some of the most detailed maps I have ever seen in a fantasy series, offering more variation than I've seen in maps before and actually adding detail to some parts of the story, not merely acting as a guideI was expecting more of the same from the final part, ''Beyond the Wall of Time'' and very much looking forward to it.
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|summary=It's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister.  (A woman?  I mean, honestly...)  She's not what's worrying Miv's family, thoughWomen have been disappearingWell, they've been murdered, but to have '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 avoidedFor Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and she'll do anything to prevent that.  She's not worried about the dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to anyone.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1841496715</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1398524085
|author=David Hosp
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|title=Has Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?
|title=Among Thieves
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|author=Nicci French
|rating=4
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|rating=5
 
|genre=Crime
 
|genre=Crime
|summary=In 1990, some valuable paintings were stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner museum in Boston in the United States. The police investigation failed to find them and many felt they were lost forever. But soon the paintings and their whereabouts would be impacting on many people's lives…
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|summary=Charlotte 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 - strangely - her husband, Alec, is not.  Shortly afterwards, Etty and Greg, find the body of Greg's father, Duncan Ackerley, in the river. It was an easy assumption for the police to make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when he couldn't stand the guilt. The Salter children are not convinced but there's little else they can do but get on with their lives and wonder about what really happened.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230707238</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1035906708
|author=David Shields
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|title=Diva
|title=Reality Hunger: A Manifesto
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|author=Daisy Goodwin
|rating=5
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|rating=4.5
|genre=Politics and Society
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|genre=General Fiction
|summary='The Novel is Dead' is not really what a novelist wants to read first on picking up a new book – but I persevered with Shields' manifesto and I'm glad I didThis is a thought-provoking wake-up call that any artist, writer or book-lover will enjoy.
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|summary=We tend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, but she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, New York, in December 1923 and only moved to Athens when she was thirteen.  Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 'Callas' to make it more manageable in the StatesWhen she was back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the Nazi occupation by a mother who mercilessly exploited her and made no secret of her preference for her elder sister, Jackie.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>024114499X</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Christopher Edge
|author= Ian Rankin and Werther Dell'Edera
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|title=Black Hole Cinema Club
|title=Dark Entries
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Graphic Novels
 
|summary=The producers of Dark Entries, the latest hit reality TV show, are worried.  Yes the six housemates are there, present and correct, and are ready to be scared witless en route to the one way out, and the brilliant prize that might await them somewhere in the merry-go-round of horror that is their new home.  They are already being scared witless, by phantoms - but that's nothing to do with the TV producers.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848563426</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Betty G Birney
 
|title=Holidays According to Humphrey
 
|rating=5
 
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Humphrey the hamster is worried.  Everywhere he turns his little pink ears he hears noises about the school being closedHow can he survive without all his adoring fans in room 26, and what is life like for a classroom pet without a classroom? Luckily, this is only the summer holiday he is misunderstanding, and what do you know - he will soon be meeting familiar faces, not at school, but at summer camp.
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|summary=Lucas and his friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, a place that has the nickname of 'The Black Hole'All big movie fans, they're looking forward to lots of exciting films, and many, many snacks! However, as the movie starts, they very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, and they are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagine.  But as they lurch from one film genre to the next, can they figure out what on earth is going on?  Will they ever get back to the cinema, and to their real lives?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571250904</amazonuk>
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|isbn=1839942738
 
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Rachel Greenlaw
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|title=Compass and Blade
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|rating=3.5
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|genre=Teens
 +
|summary=''I can hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, the answering beat in my heart.''
  
{{newreview
+
Rosevear, a remote 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 any treasure that lies within. But when the Council Watch lays a trap to end the wrecking, they capture the island's leader and Mira's father. Desperate to save him from death, Mira makes a bargain with a wreck survivor who is as charming as he is secretive and with only coordinates to guide her, she 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 watched streets of foreign islands to the heart of the smuggler's territory, Mira must be determined to stop at nothing to save the future of her home and the ones she holds most dear.
|author=Keith Mansfield
+
|isbn=0008664730
|title=Johnny Mackintosh: Star Blaze
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|summary=Before I get into the review of this book, I'd like to suggest that if you haven't read Keith Mansfield's first Johnny Mackintosh book, [[Johnny Mackintosh and the Spirit of London by Keith Mansfield|The Spirit of London]], you go off and read the review of that first and then go and read the book itself. It's a fantastic read. But because this is a sequel, there are obviously going to be some SPOILERS ahead.  
 
 
 
So, done that have you?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849161267</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=James Sherwood Metts
|author=Chinua Achebe
+
|title=Planet Storyland
|title=The Education of a British-Protected Child
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Autobiography
+
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=This book is a collection of autobiographical essays by Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe, whose best known work is the novel Things Fall Apart, published in 1958. Topics covered include Nigerian, Biafran and Igbo history and culture, African literature and the legacy of colonialism in his country and the rest of Africa. Some of the essays are taken from guest lectures at universities around the world and conference papers, and others are written for this book, particularly many of the more personal pieces about Achebe's family.
+
|summary= Things have been a bit sticky for the Earthlings. AI and automation have been proceeding apace, often replacing jobs they're paid to do and other tasks that took time to accomplish. Just as they were beginning to get used to all this 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, along with it, all the many daily social interactions on which they depend so heavily.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846142598</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1736128426
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Norman Russell
 
|title=The Calton Papers
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Crime (Historical)
 
|summary=Philip Garamond had had an abiding interest in botany since his teens and when we first meet him he's on his way to Sotheby's intent on making a bid for the Calton Papers.  Sir George Calton's papers include an unpublished account of Darwin's explorations on the Beagle, some letters and a geographical survey of the British Isles.  Garamond's ambition had always been to own a botanical garden on Madeira, but he lacked the funds and the Calton Papers seemed to be as close as he would get to owning something special.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709089546</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Matthew Tree
|author=Nancy Holder and Debbie Viguie
+
|title=We'll Never Know
|title=Legacy and Spellbound (Wicked)
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
+
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Holly Cathers has returned, and this time, she's more powerful than ever. The war between the House of Cahors witches and House of Deveraux warlocks still rages on, and only one side will eventually triumph.
+
|summary= Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to be different from his father, a drunk and chronic underachiever whose dreams of being exceptional at any of his artistic passions all failed miserably and who had endless crises of self confidence. So Tim applied himself to his studies, cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and set himself high but achievable ambitions.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184738689X</amazonuk>
+
|isbn= B0CVFXPGP8
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Kees van Deemter
 
|title=Not Exactly - In Praise Of Vagueness
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Popular Science
 
|summary=How warm is a warm day? Or rather, given the weather at the moment, how chilly is a chilly day? Is it better to know I want a small helping of peas, or to know that I want 82 peas? There are times when vagueness is more useful than being specific. Kees van Deemter makes this point, sharing many examples from a number of fields, including maths, philosophy, linguistics and AI.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0199545901</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|author=A G Slatter
 +
|title=The Briar Book of the Dead
 +
|rating=5
 +
|genre=Fantasy
 +
|summary='' There's a part of me that wants to keep this just to myself for however long I can. This secret magic of my own, all mine, at last. I just want to enjoy it for a while.''
  
{{newreview
+
Within a remote mountain pass, far away from the 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 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 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. 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 maelstrom of chaos. Reeling from one family secret to another, Ellie must decide who to trust and determine what to do as the Briar witches' legacy, everything they have sacrificed to survive, is under threat.
|author=Chris Wormell
+
|isbn=1803364548
|title=One Smart Fish
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=For Sharing
 
|summary=Many, many, many years ago, the ocean was full of amazing fish. The most amazing fish was a boring-looking silver fish, who was smarter than all the others. He played chess (against himself), drew pictures and performed plays. One day, he decided to see what life was like on land, so he invented feet and went for a walk. Yep, you've guessed it: it's a picture book about evolution.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224083546</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=1529900360
|author=Stevie Davies
+
|title=The Ghost Orchid
|title=Into Suez
+
|author=Jonathan Kellerman
|rating=4.5
+
|rating=4
|genre=Historical Fiction
+
|genre=Crime
|summary=We are introduced to the main characters Ailsa and Joe Roberts and their young daughter, NiaJoe is a down-to-earth Welshman who's been posted to Egypt with the RAFThey are making a new and exciting life for themselves amidst the heat and poverty of the Middle EastAilsa is English, rather headstrong and cleverHer parents said she'd 'the brain of a boy.' There are two strands to the novel which interweave throughout: the 1950s which see the early married life of Joe and Ailsa and then there's the post-invasion of Iraq period when the grown-up Nia returns to Egypt to lay some ghosts, as it were.
+
|summary=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 casesHis assertions that there were only open-and-shut cases which didn't need the help of a psychologist only worked for a whileFinally, it was Robin, Delaware's partner, who nudged Milo into asking for help again.  She knew that the involvement was something that the man she loved neededThe next case did look simple, thoughTwo lovers were murdered in the swimming pool of a remote property in Bel Air. He was the heir to an Italian shoe empire and she is married to an extremely rich man and it's not the Italian.  But which of them was the primary target?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906998000</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=1529395224
|author=Norah Vincent
+
|title=Letting the Cat Out of the Bag: The Secret Life of a Vet
|title=Voluntary Madness: My Year Lost and Found in the Loony Bin
+
|author=Sion Rowlands
 
|rating=3.5
 
|rating=3.5
|genre=Lifestyle
+
|genre=Animals and Wildlife
|summary=''Voluntary Madness'' is journalist Norah Vincent's account of her visits to three mental health facilities in America. The first is an urban, public hospital that houses mainly homeless, psychotic patients, many of whom are addicted to drugs. In this hospital, the doctors are overworked and jaded and medication is always the answer. Soon, the author finds that her latent depression (which led her to do the book in the first place) is returning. The process of being institutionalised breaks her sense of self-worth down astonishingly fast. Indeed, she suggests that it is the lack of autonomy in institutional life, even for those patients who voluntarily commit themselves, that makes it so hard for them to rebuild independent lives when they finally leave the institution.
+
|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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099513439</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=0861541774
|author=Neal Shusterman
+
|title=A Nye of Pheasants
|title=Everwild
+
|author=Steve Burrows
|rating=5
+
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
+
|genre=Crime
|summary=Neal Shusterman continues his part zany adventure, part philosophical enquiry, and part coming-of-age story that began with Everlost in this follow-up that is perhaps even better than its predecessor.
+
|summary=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 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 penaltyDomenic 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.
 
 
Everlost is a kind of limbo and home to children - Afterlights - who have died, but somehow missed the tunnel and the light - wherever and whatever the light actually is. Adults never make it there, but significant or much-loved objects and buildings sometimes do. Mary Hightower, for instance, is so-called because she took up residence in New York in the Twin Towers. Mary thinks Everlost is a wonderful place and she "saves" the Afterlights she finds by giving them repetitive but addictive tasks to fill eternity.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847387322</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Gabriel Weston
 
|title=Direct Red
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Autobiography
 
|summary=Few people have the ability to convey the minutiae of their profession in ways which engage the reader, answer your unspoken questions and talk in such a way that you're neither patronised nor overburdened with jargonGabriel Weston is one such – and ''Direct Red'' held me as though I was hypnotised for several hours.  She's a surgeon and we're pulled into the intricacies of her world without the need to don mask and gown.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099520699</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Alexander McCall Smith
|author=David Baldacci
+
|title=The Perfect Passion Company
|title=True Blue
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
+
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Jamie Meldon, ex-criminal-defence attorney, now in private practice, leaves his office very late one nightHe's met by the FBI.  Very shortly afterwards Jamie Meldon is dead in a dumpster.  
+
|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 serviceNess 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 charmKatie 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 (and rather handsome) neighbour, William, to lend a hand…
 
+
|isbn=1846976596
Mace Perry is working out, trying to stay fit, trying to stay sane, trying to stay alive long enough to get out jail in a couple of days' timePerry was a cop.  Under-cover, maverick and darn good at her job.  Until she ended up stoned on meth, busted for robbery, convicted and sent down.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230706134</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=0811771741
|author=David Baldwin
+
|title=InstaKnits for Baby
|title=The Kingmaker's Sisters: Six Powerful Women in the Wars of the Roses
+
|author=Melissa Leapman
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Biography
+
|genre=Crafts
|summary=Due to the small amount of surviving personal sources, any book which purports to be a biography of a 15-century subject is almost inevitably going to be more a 'life and times' than a lifeIn the case of women who were sisters but not sovereigns or consorts themselves, the lack of data will be even more acute.
+
|summary=Melissa Leapman's ''InstaKnits for Baby'' gives us a collection of knits from toys to blankets.  Some will be quick knits - others are of the 'long, cosy afternoons in front of the fire' variety.  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 hoursAll the projects are attractive, modern and useable.  I perhaps show my age when I wonder about 'social-media-worthy projects' but that's me being picky.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0750950765</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Dean Koontz
|author=Fred Vargas
+
|title=The Bad Weather Friend
|title=The Chalk Circle Man
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
+
|genre=Paranormal
|summary=Meet Jean-Baptiste AdamsbergAn unlikely police commissaire, he's an acquired taste for his colleaguesShort, ungainly, seemingly thinking about the most obtuse things in his pursuit of the truth, and endlessly doodling, but beneath his deathly slow speech and unexpected diversions into his childhood comes a surprisingly perceptive ability to find the culprit in whatever crime he is forced to solve.
+
|summary=Benny is having a terrifically bad dayHe loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and his house gets trashedOh, and someone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to his home, and it's 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 this 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, a bad weather friend called Spike, who has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person.  Spike is going to take 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 exactly they are.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099488973</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1662500491
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Adam Stower
|author=Jean Reidy and Genevieve Leloup
+
|title=Murray and Bun
|title=Too Purply!
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=For Sharing
+
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=It's time for school, but the young girl and her tortoise don't want to wear any of their clothes. They're too purply, too tickly, too puckery, too prickly, and so on. You get the idea. Adjectives abound in this fun getting dressed book.
+
|summary=Murray is supposed to be a humble, tidy and friendly cat, one who is able to sleep and eat and eat and sleep and, well, whatever takes his fancy next of the two. But he's a bad magician'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 world of frightening adventure and whiffs. 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…
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408803151</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=0008561249
 
}}
 
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=B0C47LV1PC
 +
|title=Fragility
 +
|author=Mosby Woods
 +
|rating=4
 +
|genre=Literary Fiction
 +
|summary= Can you make a ''Yo birthing person'' joke? And if you could, is the question should you make it? Or is the question if you did, would it land? The catch is that the answer for both could well be.... no.
  
{{newreview
+
''Fragility'' is set as the city of Portland, Oregon, cautiously begins to emerge from the restrictions imposed during the covid pandemic
|author=Rachel Isadora
 
|title=The Twelve Dancing Princesses
 
|rating=3
 
|genre=For Sharing
 
|summary=Bookbag recently loved Rachel Isadora's take on [[The Night Before Christmas by Rachel Isadora and Clement Clarke Moore|The Night Before Christmas]], which put the classic Christmas poem in an African setting. This time round, she has turned her eye to the Grimms' 'The Twelve Dancing Princesses'.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0142414506</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=1529431735
|author=Gemma Malley
+
|title=The Winter Visitor
|title=The Returners
+
|author=James Henry
|rating=5
+
|rating=4
|genre=Teens
+
|genre=Crime
|summary='Ducks are cool. Whatever happens, whatever gets thrown at them, they just carry on, their little legs paddling. Unfazed. They always look like they're smiling.'
+
|summary=It's February 1991 and Essex is bitingly cold, which made Bruce Hopkins' return all the more surprising. He'd been exiled on the Costa del Sol as a wanted drug smuggler for a decade. The return has come about because he's had a letter from his ex-wife, saying that she's ill and hasn't long to live.  It's hard to feel any sympathy when Hopkins is abducted, stripped to his underwear and sent to a watery grave in the boot of a stolen Ford Sierra. Is it a warning from a Spanish gang or a problem closer to home?
 
 
Will almost wishes he could be a duck. He has precious little to smile about. Sitting watching those ducks go about their business so blithely by the pond, he can't help but remember his mother who committed suicide there some years ago, when Will was just a tiny lad.  
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408800918</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Alex Bell and Tim McDonagh
|author=Alex Milway
+
|title=The Glorious Race of Magical Beasts
|title=Mousebeard's Revenge (Mousehunter Trilogy)
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=If you started this trilogy way back when, you would probably never expect the pirate, Mousebeard, and the hero and heroine, Emiline and Scratcher, to be working together.  But they are - so deep is the world of Old Town in intrigue, subterfuge and wicked plans, that they need to combine forces - and get other returning characters back on hand and on their side - to counter Mousebeard's enemies once and for allOnly, one great thing has changed.  Yes, that's right.  Mousebeard has had a shave...
+
|summary=Eli is a busy lad – by day an apprentice in the wondrous library we start by visiting with him, and in the evening a helper at the dessert cafe his gran owns and runsEli lives with his lovely gran, too – for there is a generation missing in the family. A few short years ago, Eli's parents were both lost to the titular race, a globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have to navigate the world in the company of a magical beastThis has made the race anathema to the pair – but when a bad incident at the eatery leads to a confession from gran, Eli knows his only hope is to dare to enter what he most hates, with the sole aim the prize of magic at the end – the only thing to possibly save his gran.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571245102</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=0571382231
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Chris Mullin
 
|title=A Very British Coup
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=No one had anticipated that Labour would win the election, not least because the party leader was Harry Perkins, a former steel worker.  His manifesto included promises to remove all American bases from British soil, public control of finance and the dismantling of media empires.  There were a few other things too – but they'll do for starters.  The establishment – to a man – was appalled.  Press barons, media stars, bishops and civil service mandarins knew that, for the good of the country (not themselves, ''of course'') something had to be done and ''obviously'' the end would justify whatever means they had to take to achieve their aims. Harry Perkins had to be removed from office.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846687403</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Orson Scott Card
 
|title=Ender in Exile
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Science Fiction
 
|summary='Ender in Exile' is the most recently published in the series set in the universe of 'Ender's Game', a long standing and one of the best known series of science-fiction by Orson Scott Card. It's been defined as an 'interquel', fitting chronologically between 'Ender's Game' and the 'Speaker for the Dead', the first two (and probably the best two) novels in the sequence. Technically speaking, 'Ender in Exile' actually fits in-between the last chapters of 'Ender's Game' and describes in more detail events outlined in the resolving sections of 'Ender's Game'. Confusingly for the uninitiated, 'Ender in Exile' is also a sequel to the 'Shadow of the Giant', a parallel sub-series from the universe of the 'Ender's Game'.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1841492272</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Sue Roe
 
|title=The Private Lives of the Impressionists
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Biography
 
|summary=In the early 1860s a group of young Parisian artists were keen to exhibit their work, despite opposition from the official art worldTheir protests at being spurned by the Salon, the French equivalent of the Royal Academy, resulted in their paintings being shown at the rather disparagingly-named Salon des Refusés, where crowds and critics came to view - and jeer.  When they held the first of their own exhibitions a few years later, one reviewer said that they 'seem to have declared war on beauty', while another assured his readers that every canvas must have been the work of some practical joker who had dipped his brushes in paint, smeared it onto yards of canvas, and signed the result with several different names.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099458349</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Angela McAllister and Alex T Smith
 
|title=My Mum Has X-Ray Vision
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=For Sharing
 
|summary=Milo suspects his mum has x-ray vision. She can see through the ceiling downstairs when he's jumping on her bed. She can see through the outside wall when he's making potions in the garden in her saucepans. Is she really a superhero? Milo puts her to the test...
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1407105388</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}

Revision as of 13:13, 24 April 2024

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Review of

A Letter to the Luminous Deep by Sylvie Cathrall

5star.jpg Science Fiction

There are few greater joys than a book which lives up to a compelling premise. And this is one of them. Full Review

0008517061.jpg

Review of

Death in a Lonely Place by Stig Abell

4star.jpg Crime

Former Metropolitan Police detective, Jake Johnson, has settled into his rustic life at Little Sky. There’s perhaps a little uncertainty about the future of his life with his vet girlfriend, Livia and her daughter Diana, as moving in together would mean a lot of compromise: does Jake give up his off-grid and 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 her daughter? For the moment they’re enjoying life in the present and putting the future on the back burner. Full Review

1786482126.jpg

Review of

The Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway) by Elly Griffiths

4.5star.jpg Crime

Builders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the site was going to hold seventy-five 'luxury' apartments - when they discovered the bones 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's difficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn't, that she is pregnant with his child as a 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. Full Review

0008551324.jpg

Review of

The Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie) by Neil Lancaster

4.5star.jpg Crime

It's unusual for anyone from the Hardie family to approach the police. Neither side likes or has any respect for the other. But Davie Hardie is struggling in prison and he's prepared to tell the police where the body of a missing person is buried and who was responsible for her death. This person, he promises, is someone big and it will be worth the police doing what he wants. And what he wants is to be transferred to an open prison to serve the remainder of his sentence and to get an early parole date. Not much to ask, is it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and she's even prepared to do the other thing that Hardie demanded - make certain that DS Max Craigie and anyone who works with him is kept well away from what's happening. Full Review

0008405026.jpg

Review of

A Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11) by Jane Casey

5star.jpg Crime

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/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. Full Review

0571379877.jpg

Review of

The Kellerby Code by Jonny Sweet

3.5star.jpg Crime

Edward Jevons is a working-class young man, obsessed with his upper-class friends, Robert and Stanza. Robert's a theatre director. He's also self-obsessed, demanding, handsome and entitled and uses Edward to run errands for him. Edward has been in love with Stanza since their university days - and he's drunkenly confided how he feels to Robert. 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 two of them kissing in a dark passageway. Full Review

139851120X.jpg

Review of

Leave No Trace by Jo Callaghan

4star.jpg Crime

When a man is found 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. It's their first live case together, having previously been very successful with several cold cases. But when there is a second body found crucified a few days later, Kat is suddenly struggling with a potential serial killer and a very high profile case that draws a lot of unwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. Will they be able to solve the case in time, or will Kat find herself taken off the case and, potentially, out of a career? Full Review

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Review of

Moral Injuries by Christie Watson

4.5star.jpg Thrillers

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 a cardiothoracic surgeon. Laura is a perfectionist and a trauma doctor. Anjali is the free spirit of the group and she becomes a GP. When we first meet them they're at a drug and alcohol-fuelled party and it'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 three friends. This time, it's their teenage children who are involved. Full Review

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Review of

The Trading Game: A Confession by Gary Stevenson

4.5star.jpg Autobiography

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 familiar with violence, poverty and injustice. There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to the London School of Economics. Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and he has a facility with numbers which most of us can only envy. He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to be stupid. It was his ability at what was, essentially, a card game which got him an internship with Citibank. Eventually, this turned into permanent employment as a trader. Full Review

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Review of

The Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder by C L Miller

3.5star.jpg Crime

It's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to the English country village where she grew up. She's back now because of a request for help from her beloved aunt, Carole. Freya's former mentor and Carole's close friend, Arthur Crockleford, is dead and the circumstances seem suspicious, to say the least. Arthur was the reason why Freya had not been back to the village: Arthur, she feels, let her down badly. Even though they were in business together as antique hunters, she has not felt able to be near the man or pursue the profession she loved. After the split, she worked in a cafe, met and married James (on the rebound from the love of her life, who was murdered) and Freya and James have now divorced. Full Review

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Review of

All Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt by Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)

5star.jpg Science Fiction

Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to come.

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. Full Review

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Review of

Hotel Arcadia by Sunny Singh

3.5star.jpg Thrillers

The 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, killing everyone on site, there is Sam, a wartime photographer and Abhi, the hotel manager. As Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the residents who are still alive in the hotel, he forms a bond with Sam who refuses to be cowed by events, and keeps on venturing out of her room to try to capture what's happened through her photography. Although they only ever talk over the phone, 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 the terrorists. Full Review

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Review of

The List of Suspicious Things by Jennie Godfrey

5star.jpg General Fiction

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, they've been murdered, but to have '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. For Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and she'll do anything to prevent that. She's not worried about the dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to anyone. Full Review

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Review of

Has Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter? by Nicci French

5star.jpg Crime

Charlotte 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 - strangely - her husband, Alec, is not. Shortly afterwards, Etty and Greg, find the body of Greg's father, Duncan Ackerley, in the river. It was an easy assumption for the police to make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when he couldn't stand the guilt. The Salter children are not convinced but there's little else they can do but get on with their lives and wonder about what really happened. Full Review

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Review of

Diva by Daisy Goodwin

4.5star.jpg General Fiction

We tend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, but she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, New York, in December 1923 and only moved to Athens when she was thirteen. Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 'Callas' to make it more manageable in the States. When she was back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the Nazi occupation by a mother who mercilessly exploited her and made no secret of her preference for her elder sister, Jackie. Full Review

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Review of

Black Hole Cinema Club by Christopher Edge

4star.jpg Confident Readers

Lucas and his friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, a place that has the nickname of 'The Black Hole'. All big movie fans, they're looking forward to lots of exciting films, and many, many snacks! However, as the movie starts, they very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, and they are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagine. But as they lurch from one film genre to the next, can they figure out what on earth is going on? Will they ever get back to the cinema, and to their real lives? Full Review

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Review of

Compass and Blade by Rachel Greenlaw

3.5star.jpg Teens

I can hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, the answering beat in my heart.

Rosevear, a remote 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 any treasure that lies within. But when the Council Watch lays a trap to end the wrecking, they capture the island's leader and Mira's father. Desperate to save him from death, Mira makes a bargain with a wreck survivor who is as charming as he is secretive and with only coordinates to guide her, she 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 watched streets of foreign islands to the heart of the smuggler's territory, Mira must be determined to stop at nothing to save the future of her home and the ones she holds most dear. Full Review

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Review of

Planet Storyland by James Sherwood Metts

4.5star.jpg Confident Readers

Things have been a bit sticky for the Earthlings. AI and automation have been proceeding apace, often replacing jobs they're paid to do and other tasks that took time to accomplish. Just as they were beginning to get used to all this 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, along with it, all the many daily social interactions on which they depend so heavily. Full Review

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Review of

We'll Never Know by Matthew Tree

4.5star.jpg Literary Fiction

Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to be different from his father, a drunk and chronic underachiever whose dreams of being exceptional at any of his artistic passions all failed miserably and who had endless crises of self confidence. So Tim applied himself to his studies, cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and set himself high but achievable ambitions. Full Review

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Review of

The Briar Book of the Dead by A G Slatter

5star.jpg Fantasy

There's a part of me that wants to keep this just to myself for however long I can. This secret magic of my own, all mine, at last. I just want to enjoy it for a while.

Within a remote mountain pass, far away from the world, lies Silverton; a town under the protection of the Briar's, a family of witches who protect the town and the wider world from 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 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. 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 maelstrom of chaos. Reeling from one family secret to another, Ellie must decide who to trust and determine what to do as the Briar witches' legacy, everything they have sacrificed to survive, is under threat. Full Review

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Review of

The Ghost Orchid by Jonathan Kellerman

4star.jpg Crime

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 help of a psychologist only worked for a while. Finally, it was Robin, Delaware's partner, who nudged Milo into asking for help again. She knew that the involvement was something that the man she loved needed. The next case did look simple, though. Two lovers were murdered in the swimming pool of a remote property in Bel Air. He was the heir to an Italian shoe empire and she is married to an extremely rich man and it's not the Italian. But which of them was the primary target? Full Review

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Review of

Letting the Cat Out of the Bag: The Secret Life of a Vet by Sion Rowlands

3.5star.jpg Animals and Wildlife

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. Full Review

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Review of

A Nye of Pheasants by Steve Burrows

4star.jpg Crime

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 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. Full Review

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Review of

The Perfect Passion Company by Alexander McCall Smith

4.5star.jpg General Fiction

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 (and rather handsome) neighbour, William, to lend a hand… Full Review

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Review of

InstaKnits for Baby by Melissa Leapman

4star.jpg Crafts

Melissa Leapman's InstaKnits for Baby gives us a collection of knits from toys to blankets. Some will be quick knits - others are of the 'long, cosy afternoons in front of the fire' variety. 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 'social-media-worthy projects' but that's me being picky. Full Review

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Review of

The Bad Weather Friend by Dean Koontz

4.5star.jpg Paranormal

Benny 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's 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 this 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, a bad weather friend called Spike, who has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. Spike is going to take 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 exactly they are. Full Review

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Review of

Murray and Bun by Adam Stower

4.5star.jpg Confident Readers

Murray is supposed to be a humble, tidy and friendly cat, one who is able to sleep and eat and eat and sleep and, well, whatever takes his fancy next of the two. But he's a bad magician'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 world of frightening adventure and whiffs. 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… Full Review

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Review of

Fragility by Mosby Woods

4star.jpg Literary Fiction

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.

Fragility is set as the city of Portland, Oregon, cautiously begins to emerge from the restrictions imposed during the covid pandemic Full Review

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Review of

The Winter Visitor by James Henry

4star.jpg Crime

It's February 1991 and Essex is bitingly cold, which made Bruce Hopkins' return all the more surprising. He'd been exiled on the Costa del Sol as a wanted drug smuggler for a decade. The return has come about because he's had a letter from his ex-wife, saying that she's ill and hasn't long to live. It's hard to feel any sympathy when Hopkins is abducted, stripped to his underwear and sent to a watery grave in the boot of a stolen Ford Sierra. Is it a warning from a Spanish gang or a problem closer to home? Full Review

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Review of

The Glorious Race of Magical Beasts by Alex Bell and Tim McDonagh

4star.jpg Confident Readers

Eli is a busy lad – by day an apprentice in the wondrous library we start by visiting with him, and in the evening a helper at the dessert cafe his gran owns and runs. Eli lives with his lovely gran, too – for there is a generation missing in the family. A few short years ago, Eli's parents were both lost to the titular race, a globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have to navigate the world in the company of a magical beast. This has made the race anathema to the pair – but when a bad incident at the eatery leads to a confession from gran, Eli knows his only hope is to dare to enter what he most hates, with the sole aim the prize of magic at the end – the only thing to possibly save his gran. Full Review