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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>

There are currently '''{{PAGESINCATEGORY: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' reviews at TheBookbagll want to read here.Dig in!

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==New There are currently '''{{PAGESINCATEGORY: Reviews==}}'''Read [[:Category:New Reviews|new reviews by genre]]at TheBookbag.'''

'''Read Want to find out more [[FeaturesAbout Us|new featuresabout us]].'''? __NOTOC__{{newreview|author=Angelica Garnett|title=The Unspoken Truth|ratingBest New Books=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=I would not normally start a review with the biography of the author, but The Unspoken Truth is presented as autobiographical fiction by a child of the Bloomsbury Group – in fact the subtitle is 'A Quartet of Bloomsbury Stories'. The blurb on the inside cover even identifies which character is based on the author in each of the four stories, just in case we are not sure.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701184353</amazonuk>}}

{{newreview'''Read [[:Category:New Reviews|author=Amos Oz|title=Rhyming Life and Death|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Rhyming Love and Death is a kind of philosophical love letter to literature, or perhaps more so to fiction. It is a book about how to write, about the compulsion to write, and about the strange world that the writer of fiction must live innew reviews by category]].|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099521024'''</amazonukbr>}}

{{newreview|author=Jean Hannah Edelstein |title=Himglish and Femalese: Why Women Don't Get Why Men Don't Get Them'Read [[:Category:Features|rating=4|genre=Lifestyle|summary=Men arenthe latest features]].'t Martian and women don't hail from Venus. We're all Earthlings apparently; which seems like progress of a sort. Even so we still have trouble understanding each other because we speak different languages – Himglish and Femalese. Luckily Jean Hannah Edelstein is fluent in both and has written this light hearted volume to define the problem and translate.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848091729</amazonuk>}}

'''Read [[Forthcoming Publications|reviews of books about to be published]].{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Valerie Thomas and Korky PaulTom Percival|title=Winnie's JokesThe Wrong Shoes|rating=2.5

|summary=Who turns off Will's life is difficult, in a multitude of ways. He is bullied because he has 'the wrong shoes', he has the lights wrong shoes because his dad can't work and doesn't have enough money for even the most basic of things like food, and his dad can't work because he lost his job at Halloween? The lights witch. What does the college, was working a cash-in-hand job on a building site and had an Australian witch ride on? A broomerangaccident. Yep Throw into that mix the fact that his mum and dad are separated, itand Will's life seems bleak in every direction. And yet, he still has a joke booktiny amount of hope. He is good at art, and clings to the moments of joy when he is drawing, that feel like a light at the end of a long, dark tunnel.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0192729063</amazonuk>1398527122

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Kami Garcia and Margaret StohlSylvie Cathrall|title=Beautiful CreaturesA Letter to the Luminous Deep

|genre=TeensScience Fiction|summary=Teenage boy meets mysterious new stranger in There are few greater joys than a book which lives up to a small towncompelling premise. They fall And this is one of them.|isbn= 0356522776}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0008517061|title=Death in lovea Lonely Place|author=Stig Abell|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary= Former Metropolitan Police detective, he finds out she's harbouring Jake Johnson, has settled into his rustic life at Little Sky. There’s perhaps a dark secret, little uncertainty about the pair future of them try to find out if their relationship can work while she tries to keep him safe from his life with his vet girlfriend, Livia and her world. This kind daughter Diana, as moving in together would mean a lot of book appears compromise: does Jake give up his off-grid and relaxing life to be released every few weeks since [[Twilight by Stephenie Meyer|Twilight]] became so successful – but rarely 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 past few years has it been done as well as it has moment they’re enjoying life in Beautiful Creaturesthe present and putting the future on the back burner.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141326085</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jasper Fforde1786482126|title=Shades of GreyThe Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths

|genre=FantasyCrime|summary=Sometimes with authors you just donBuilders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the site was going to hold seventy-five 't know what youluxury've been missingapartments - when they discovered the bones of a child beneath a doorway. Other times you doThere was no skull. Jasper Fforde has long been on my catch-up listWas this a ritual killing or murder? Inevitably, Dr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. Snippets It's difficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn't, that she is pregnant with his child as a result of Thursday Next and reviews and interviews were enough to convince me I had to get to know this workthe one night they spent together some three months ago.  My chance finally came with the first in a completely new series: Shades Her condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is prone to sudden bouts of Greysickness.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340963034</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sam Mills0008551324|title=BlackoutThe Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster

|genre=TeensCrime|summary=It'I am a murderers 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'I'm standing in s prepared to tell the police where the body of a bookshop, a gun hot in my palmmissing person is buried and who was responsible for her death. The bullet that sat in my barrel thirty seconds ago has pierced flesh This person, blown into brain tissuehe promises, metal now fighting consciousness. The woman slumps ont is someone big and it will be worth the floorpolice doing what he wants. Blood begins And what he wants is to be transferred to an open prison to trickle from her head. It drips onto a pile serve the remainder of signed copies stacked on the floorhis 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' Oh my word! What an explosive beginning s even prepared to a book! But 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 made a boy do something like this? |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571239412</amazonuk>'s happening.

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ebony McKenna0008405026|title=Ondine: The Summer of ShamblesA Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Jane Casey|rating=35|genre=TeensCrime|summary=Ondine de Groot wants out of psychic summercampIt'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, so together with her pet ferret Shamblesmother, Helena, she flees from the tea leaf readings and astral projection classes, back to her family's restaurantfather are dead in their bed. Only Initially, as soon as she leaves summercamp, she starts hearing voices. Specifically it looks like a broad Scottish voice – one straightforward murder/suicide but there's something about the positioning of the bodies that seems to be coming from makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and her ferretboss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. Shambles, What looked as though it transpires, was going to be an open-and-shut case is in fact a man, turned into a ferret by now a witchcomplex double murder. Ondine starts to wonder what Shambles would look like Kerrigan is convinced that the explanation lies in Rosalie's disappearance: others (such as a manDerwent's boss, but her imaginings Una Burt) are soon interrupted by the arrival of handsome Lord Vincent, son of the Duke, who sets Ondine's heart flutteringless convinced.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405249617</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jean Rowden0571379877|title=More Deaths Than OneThe Kellerby Code|author=Jonny Sweet

|summary=Constable Thomas 'Thorny' Deepbriar has Edward Jevons is a broken leg after working-class young man, obsessed with his involvement in upper-class friends, Robert and Stanza. Robert's a case and so is taken by his wifetheatre director. He's also self-obsessed, Marydemanding, handsome and entitled and uses Edward to recuperate run errands for him. Edward has been in the seaside town where love with Stanza since their university days - and he's drunkenly confided how he worked as feels to Robert. Most men in Robert's position would stay away from Stanza or tell Edward that a policeman during relationship had begun between them but he's not like most men: Edward is left to stumble upon the wartwo of them kissing in a dark passageway. He expects }}{{Frontpage|author=Jo Callaghan|title=Leave No Trace|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary=When a man is found crucified on the top of a hill in Nuneaton, DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to be bored - the most interesting thing on case alongside her sidekick, the horizon 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 missing gnomesunwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. Then he bumps into an old colleague - someone who left Will they be able to solve the force case in time, or will Kat find herself taken off the case and, potentially, out of a haze 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 suspicionmedical school and their friendship would keep them inseparable for a quarter of a century. Shortly afterwards Olivia is ruthlessly ambitious, which is a body bonus when you aim to be a cardiothoracic surgeon. Laura is a perfectionist and a trauma doctor. Anjali is found on the beachfree 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. Even stranger is Twenty-five years later there will be an eerily similar event that will impact the dead man three friends. This time, it's their teenage children who are involved.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0241636604|title=The Trading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson|rating=4.5|genre=Autobiography|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 someone that Thorny the East End, where he was familiar with violence, poverty and injustice. There was no posh public school on his colleague thought CV - but he had died during been to the warLondon School of Economics. Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and he has a facility with numbers which most of us can only envy. It seems He also realised that things are not as they seemmost rich people expect poor people to be stupid. Can Thorny work out It was his ability at what is going onwas, essentially, even a card game which got him an internship with Citibank. Eventually, this turned into permanent employment as a broken leg?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709089309</amazonuk>trader.

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Paul Strathern1035021803|title=The Artist, The Philosopher and The WarriorAntique Hunter's Guide to Murder|author=C L Miller

|genre=HistoryCrime|summary=The interaction between three very differentIt'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, not to say contrasting, personalities of the Renaissance period sets least. Arthur was the reason why Freya had not been back to the scene for what promises 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 an intriguing titlenear the man or pursue the profession she loved. In 1502 After the paths of Cesare Borgiasplit, she worked in a cafe, notorious son met and married James (on the rebound from the love of the equally infamous Pope Alexander VIher life, Niccolò Machiavelli, the intellectual who was murdered) and diplomat, Freya and Leonardo da Vinci, at the time best known as a military engineer though remembered today primarily as a great artist, were destined to crossJames have now divorced.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845951212</amazonuk>

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.}}{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Rachel HeathSunny Singh|title=The Finest Type Of English WomanhoodHotel Arcadia|rating=43.5|genre=General FictionThrillers |summary=It was just after the end of the Second World War and seventeen year old Laura Trelling was at The Hotel Arcadia is a loose end luxury hotel in her Sussex villagean unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a terrorist group. She didn't really fit in with Hiding from the other young people and her eccentric parents were becoming more terrorists who are rampaging through, killing everyone on site, there is Sam, a wartime photographer and more isolatedAbhi, the hotel manager. As Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the extent that Laura was embarrassed residents who are still alive in the hotel, he forms a bond with Sam who refuses to be cowed by their carelessness events, and keeps on venturing out of her welfareroom to try to capture what's happened through her photography. A chance encounter with Paul Lovell was Although they only ever talk over the phone, their friendship grows as Abhi tries to change everything help her keep safe and they both wait to see if they will be rescued before long she was on her way to a South Africa not yet burdened with apartheidthey are discovered by the terrorists.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099532743</amazonuk>086154742X

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Bobbie Darbyshire1529153298|title=Truth GamesThe List of Suspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey|rating=45

|summary=The central theme in this book It's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is sex - and lots of itPrime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly... ) WeShe're introduced to a group of mainly twentysomethings and thirtysomethingss not what's worrying Miv's family, though. Women have been disappearing. Men and womenWell, they've been murdered, but to have 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Most of them are attractive and hold down glamorous jobs and careersMiv's upset because she's overheard that her father wants to move the family 'Down South'. All in rude healthWhen you're from Yorkshire, with wonderful social lives and trendy homesDown South is a frightening, foreign place, best avoided. They all appearFor Miv, on the surfacemove would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and she'll do anything to be a bunch of shiny, happy peopleprevent that. What on earth could be missing?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905614721</amazonuk>She's not worried about the dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to anyone.

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Nia Pritchard1398524085|title=More Than Just A HairdresserHas Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Nicci French|rating=2.5|genre=Women's FictionCrime|summary=ItCharlotte Salter was expected at her husband's a brand new yearfiftieth birthday party but never turned up. Her children, sons Niall, Paul and Ollie and Liverpudlian hairdresser Shirley her daughter, Etty. are all worried but - strangely - her husband, Alec, is looking forward to not. Shortly afterwards, Etty and Greg, find the months ahead following one hell body of a new yearGreg's eve partyfather, Duncan Ackerley, in the river. What's more, she's going It was an easy assumption for the police to chronicle her adventures in her brand spanking new diary which she will write in diligently, even make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when shehe couldn's feeling a bit 'morning after t stand the night beforeguilt. 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>1870206851</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Anthony Quinn1035906708|title=The Rescue ManDiva|author=Daisy Goodwin

|summary=This love affair tale with the city We tend to think of Liverpool is mostly told through the eyes of architect Tom Baines. With the Second World War loomingMaria Callas as Greek, Baines is desperately working on a book but she was born to capture the memory of buildings that are at riskGreek parents in Manhattan, New York, and appears a man more in love with the past December 1923 and solid, cold structures than mankind.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099531933</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Paul Murray|title=Skippy Dies|rating=3.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Life in Seabrook College is a mess. Some of the staff are young enough only moved to remember their own school days there, but many are certainly too old for thatAthens when she was thirteen. A lot of the boys are victims of ragging and bullying for being too chunky, or too smart - Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but some are so chunky and smart thereher father changed it to 'Callas's a certain kudos to themmake it more manageable in the States. The female of When she was back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the species is Nazi occupation by a thing only spied from their own school next door, mother who mercilessly exploited her and only met by selling them ritalin as a weight-control pillmade no secret of her preference for her elder sister, or meeting them at the very rare combined school discoJackie.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241141826</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=A G TaylorChristopher Edge|title=Meteorite StrikeBlack Hole Cinema Club

|summary=Sarah is not readyLucas 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'. SheAll big movie fans, they's not ready re looking forward to forgive the man who is her fatherlots of exciting films, for abandoning her and her young brother Robert eight years ago. many, many snacks! She cannot yet forgive However, as the circumstances of her mother dyingmovie starts, and of the promise they were forced to make, to go to Australia with the manvery quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, and start a new lifethey are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagine. She is certainly not prepared for the meteor strike to smash into Australia just But as they fly above itlurch from one film genre to the next, which downs can they figure out what on earth is going on? Will they ever get back to the plane in a horrid crashcinema, and seems to carry with it an alien virus which forces many people to drop permanently asleep.their real lives?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1409508579</amazonuk>1839942738

{{newreview|author=Jane Yolen 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 Mark Teague|title=How Do Dinosaurs Eat Their Food?|rating=3Mira's father.5|genre=For Sharing|summary=[[How Do Dinosaurs Say Good Night? by Jane Yolen|How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight?]] was Desperate to save him from death, Mira makes a bargain with a witty wreck survivor who is as charming as he is secretive and visually creative tale with only coordinates to guide her, she sets off in search of Very Bad Bedtime Behaviour for modern children enamoured 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 dinosaurs. foreign islands to the heart of the smuggler'How Do Dinosaurs Eat Their Food?' continues s territory, Mira must be determined to stop at nothing to save the future of her home and the formula, this time with table mannersones she holds most dear.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0007216092</amazonuk>0008664730

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Cynthia KadohataJames Sherwood Metts|title=A Million Shades of GreyPlanet Storyland|rating=34.5

|summary=At just twelve, Tin is Things have been a bit sticky for the youngest elephant handler in his villageEarthlings. Ever since he can remember, Tin has dreamed of working with elephants AI and he loves his own elephant, Ladyautomation have been proceeding apace, often replacing jobs they're paid to distraction, even spending most of his nights sleeping by her side. Tin is much less keen on school, but his parents insist do and other tasks that he goestook time to accomplish. Tin really can't see the pointJust as they were beginning to get used to all this technological change and starting to think of other, as his sole ambition is new ways to become a fully-fledged elephant trainer. His parents may talk about opportunities in the world outside his village but if they don't involve elephantsspend time, he's not interestedalong came an awful pandemic. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>184738823X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Chloe Hooper|title=The Tall Man: Life was pretty much shut down and Death on Palm Island|rating=4|genre=Politics and Society|summary=Cameron Doomadgee – Mulrunji – was just thirty six years old when he was arrested on Palm Island. Quite why he was arrested was never clear. He wasn't drunk, although he had been drinking beer – and was walking along with it, all the road singing ''Who Let the Dogs Out?'' Senior Sergeant Chris Hurley felt that there was reason to arrest Mulrunji for creating as public nuisance and he was taken to the police station. What happened next was to be the subject of intense media speculation and legal proceedings over the coming years, but within forty five minutes Mulrunji was deadmany daily social interactions on which they depend so heavily.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099520761</amazonuk>1736128426

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Timothy W RybackMatthew Tree|title=HitlerWe's Private Library: The Books That Shaped His Lifell Never Know

|genre=HistoryLiterary Fiction|summary=As the fictional schoolboy hero Nigel Molesworth might have said, 'any fule kno' that Adolf Hitler was notorious for burning books. Nevertheless he was also an avid collector and passionate reader, as around 1200 surviving volumes once in Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to be different from his possession now in the Rare Book Division of the Library of Congressfather, and a smaller quantity in Brown University, Rhode Island, demonstrate. Among them were world literature classics, such as 'Robinson Crusoe', 'Uncle Tom's Cabin', drunk and 'Gulliver's Travels'. He also owned an edition chronic underachiever whose dreams of the collected works being exceptional at any of Shakespeare, in hand-tooled Moroccan leather with a gold-embossed eagle flanked by his initials on the spineartistic passions all failed miserably and who had endless crises of self confidence. The BardSo Tim applied himself to his studies, he once said, was greatly superior to Goethe cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and Schillerset himself high but achievable ambitions.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099532174</amazonuk>B0CVFXPGP8

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Druin BurchA G Slatter|title=Taking The Briar Book of the MedicineDead

|genre=Popular ScienceFantasy|summary=In 1898, Burch points out that '' There's a new drug was developed and marketed for the treatment of tuberculosis by Bayer & Co. TB is such an ancient enemy part of man me that there is apparently evidence of an earlier strain wants to keep this just to be found in Egyptian mummiesmyself for however long I can. The German firm had discovered a chemical that seemed to work wellThis secret magic of my own, and patients and indeed their own staffall mine, who were tested seemed at last. I just want to respond well - enjoy it was named Heroin - and its addictive effects were at first missedfor a while.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845951506</amazonuk>}}''

{{newreview|author=Gigi Amateau|title=Chancey|rating=4|genre=Confident Readers|summary=ChanceyWithin a remote mountain pass, far away from the world, lies Silverton; a town under the protection of the Briar's dam was Starry Night and her owner loved that horse so much that she wanted , a foal family of witches who was exactly like her, but when Chancey was born protect the town and the wider world from the Darklands. Though she was bitterly disappointed has always wished for instead of magic, Ellie Briar is the black Appaloosa with white marking Chancey was first non-witch to be born albino. It into her family for generations and as such since she was only his striped hooves which proved his breedingyoung, her training as a steward revolved around letters and administration rather than spells and potions. The owner was not big enough to overcome When her feelings grandmother suddenly dies, Ellie's cousin Audra becomes the Briar Witch, the town's leader, and when she fell on hard times it was Chancey who was Ellie takes her place beside her. As challenges come her way left out in , right and centre, Ellie uncovers the field rare ability to suffer despite communicate with the dead, putting her at the fact that he was no longer heart of a young horsemaelstrom 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.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>140632258X</amazonuk>1803364548

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sian Rees1529900360|title=Sweet Water and Bitter: The Ships That Stopped the Slave Trade|rating=4.5|genre=History|summary=The Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade was passed in Britain in March 1807, and the last legal British slave ship left Africa seven months later. Other countries were slow to follow suit. Everyone in Britain knew there would be resistance, and when the abolitionist Granville Sharpe purchased land in Sierra Leone to 'repatriate' freed slaves, Ottobah Cugoana, a former slave living in London, asked if it was possible for 'a fountain to send forth both sweet water and bitter.' Could the slave trade, he wondered, be abolished from West Africa - when West Africa was its source?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845951174</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewGhost Orchid|author=Sapphire|title=PreciousJonathan Kellerman

|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=Precious Jones is a sixteen year old black girl from Harlem – well sheIt hadn't been Lt Milo Sturgis's never actually fault that Alex Delaware had been out 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 Harlem – and when we meet her shea psychologist only worked for a while. Finally, it was Robin, Delaware's pregnant by her own father partner, who nudged Milo into asking for the second timehelp again. Her first child She knew that the involvement was a girl and something that the man she was born with Down's Syndromeloved needed. With unconscious irony Precious calls her ''Little Mongo'' and leaves her to live with her grandmotherThe next case did look simple, though. When her second pregnancy becomes obvious she's expelled from school and joins an alternative education programmeTwo lovers were murdered in the swimming pool of a remote property in Bel Air. Precious really wants He was the heir to learn an Italian shoe empire and the book she is married to an extremely rich man and it's not the story Italian. But which of her journey from illiteracy to maturity.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099548720</amazonuk>them was the primary target?

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Dean Hale, Shannon Hale and Nathan Hale 1529395224|title=Calamity JackLetting the Cat Out of the Bag: The Secret Life of a Vet|author=Sion Rowlands

|genre=Confident ReadersAnimals and Wildlife|summary=Siôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. His father was a GP and Rowlands didn''I was born t want to schemefollow in his footsteps, particularly when he considered the strain that being on-call put on his father'', declares our hero Jacks life. With flashbacks we see When he was seventeen he took the young lad and opportunity of doing work experience with a pixie family friend, larking about who was a vet and was convinced this was the job for revenge or small profithim. But when his mother's bakery gets more and more into the redBefore long, the size of the profit has to increasehe was at Liverpool University. And when you add in revenge against the local crime lord It hadn't - as with so many students - been his dream since he was a giant of child. If anything, he'd wanted to be a man - so does the size of the target of the japeprofessional footballer.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0747587426</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sue Grafton0861541774|title=U is for UndertowA Nye of Pheasants|author=Steve Burrows|rating=54

|summary=Several years ago I joined DCI Domenic Jejeune's close friend and former colleague, Danny Maik, has taken a funny little book group short holiday in LondonSingapore 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 one of the first books we read was he killed a Sue Grafton alphabet bookGhurka. I hadInitially, up he faced a charge of manslaughter but evidence came to this point, never read any crime fiction, foolishly feeling myself above such books, and so I was dubious about what I'd light that suggested that he might have planned to say about itmurder the man. That book changed my literary lifeNow he could be facing the death penalty. I devoured it. I couldnDomenic Jejeune can do nothing to help as any interference from another police force could provoke a diplomatic incident and wouldn't get enough! I immediately searched for help Danny at all the other books in the series and read them quickly, one by one, swiftly followed by a delicious plunge into the world of Agatha Christie which gave me a joyously long reading list. And so now, years later, I find myself with the latest book in the alphabet series lying in my lap, a happy smile on my face as I found I read voraciously once again!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>023070932X</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jethro AdlingtonAlexander McCall Smith|title=Online Therapy: Reading Between The Perfect Passion Company|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=The Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the online apps in providing a more personal, tailored service. Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and look after the business, as Ness is planning to take a trip to Canada to get away for a while. Katie is coming out of a break up with a bad boyfriend, and so jumps at the chance to come home to Edinburgh. And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the LinesIsabel 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…|isbn=1846976596}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0811771741|title=InstaKnits for Baby|author=Melissa Leapman

|genre=Home and FamilyCrafts|summary=You can get most things online these days and even therapy is becoming more widely available on the internet. It might seem like Melissa Leapman's ''InstaKnits for Baby'' gives us a simple step to take but many collection of the signals beyond the spoken word are not available knits from toys to the online therapistblankets. In a faceSome will be quick knits -to-face situation body language is an added form others are of communication and even small changes the 'long, cosy afternoons in skin tone can give clues as to state front of mindthe fire' variety. In a situation where these clues The projects are not available itdivided by the time they's essential ll take to complete - less than five hours, five to ten hours, ten to make twenty hours and more than twenty hours. All the most of projects are attractive, modern and useable. I perhaps show my age when I wonder about 'social-media-worthy projects'allbut that'' the clues offered by the written words me being picky.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904312748</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Laurie Halse AndersonDean Koontz|title=ChainsThe Bad Weather Friend

|genre=TeensParanormal|summary=Isabel Benny is having a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and her sister Ruth are slaveshis house gets trashed. But they should be free Oh, and someone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin- Miss Mary Finch left a will sized object to his home, and it's possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that said sohas trashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the very last person to deserve all this bad luck. But Miss Mary Finch He is dead and her greedy nephew and heir denies all knowledge of the willa nice person. A really nice person. So Isabel and Ruth are sold to fortunately for Benny it turns out that the Locktons and taken delivery to New York. The Revolutionary War his house is underway and New York 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 dangerous placegood person. The Locktons are loyalists Spike is going to take care of Benny, and will certainly take care of Benny's enemies, if he, Benny, but the patriots and Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are in control of the city. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0747598061</amazonuk>1662500491

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Lorraine JenkinAdam Stower|title=Chocolate Mousse Murray and Two SpoonsBun

|genre=Women's FictionConfident Readers |summary=From the first sentence: 'With one hell of Murray is supposed to be a crashhumble, Lettie Howell’s dinner service hit the wall…'tidy and friendly cat, I knew that I was going one who is able to enjoy this talesleep and eat and eat and sleep and, well, whatever takes his fancy next of the two. An opening thus full of expletive But he's a bad magician's cat, so his favourite bun has been turned into a hyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, and resounding Welsh Voice immediately makes it clear who’s the boss and I catflap they both use can relaxchuck them out, knowing I’m in competent handsnot into the regular back garden, but into a world of frightening adventure and whiffs. WelcomeThis time round it drops them into a Viking land, where a troll hunter is expected – well, Lorraine Jenkinone much bigger than Murray was, to my handful of favourite chick-lit authors.be honest, but he's turned up and he'll have to do…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1870206959</amazonuk>0008561249

{{newreview|author=Tom Wolfe|title=The Bonfire of the Vanities|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=In his own mind, bond trader Sherman McCoy is a 'Master of the Universe'. He has a pleasant wife, a beautiful mistress, and a sweet six year old daughter. Henry Lamb is a black student from the projects. Under normal circumstances, itFragility'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 is set as the Bronxcity of Portland, and an accident leads to Lamb being hit by McCoy's MercedesOregon, a chain of events start which will lead cautiously begins to his downfall.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099548798</amazonuk>emerge from the restrictions imposed during the covid pandemic