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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>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Frances Stonor SaundersSylvie Cathrall|title=The Woman Who Shot MussoliniA Letter to the Luminous Deep|rating=4.5|genre=HistoryScience Fiction|summary=Most British titled families of the 19th and 20th centuries have produced their fair share of rebels. Yet There are few came as close greater joys than a book which lives up to changing the course of European history as the Honourable Violet Gibson, a compelling premise. And this is one of eight children of Baron Ashbourne, a Protestant Anglo-Irish peer and MP in Disraeli's government during the 1870sthem.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0571239773</amazonuk>0356522776
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Scott Westerfeld0008517061|title=SpecialsDeath in a Lonely Place|author=Stig Abell
|rating=4
|genre=TeensCrime|summary=In the un-named city of the futureFormer Metropolitan Police detective, Jake Johnson, all the adults are living in the delusion that their city is righthas settled into his rustic life at Little Sky. After There’s perhaps a teenage little uncertainty about the future of his life with his vet girlfriend, Livia and her daughter Diana, as an ugly, they all undergo moving in together would mean a welter lot of medical procedures, to make their minds compromise: does Jake give up his off-grid and bodies conform relaxing life to the bland, but gorgeous, society norm. But one young woman is not like that. She is going move in with Livia or does Livia move to a party, looking ugly, and she knows it is Little Sky despite her reservations about whether or not what we look like, but how special we feel inside, that is of most importance. The good news is that this woman is our returning heroine, Tally. the future she wants for herself and her daughter? The bad news is that her ugliness is a temporary disguise, For the moment they’re enjoying life in the present and worse than that - she knows how to feel special inside, because she IS A Specialputting the future on the back burner.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847389082</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Poly Bernatene1786482126|title=When Night Didn't ComeThe Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths
|rating=4.5
|genre=For SharingCrime|summary=One night, after Builders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the sun has gone site was going to bed, hold seventy-five 'luxury' apartments - when they discovered the night doesn't comebones of a child beneath a doorway. There's was no darknessskull. Was this a ritual killing or murder? Inevitably, no moon and no starsDr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. Someone It's going to have to do something about itdifficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn't, so the man in charge rouses that she is pregnant with his child as a group result of children and the one night they do what they can spent together some three months ago. Her condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is prone to bring the nightsudden bouts of sickness.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845394925</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kathryn Stockett0008551324|title=The Help|rating=5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Jackson, Mississippi: 1960. The talk at the bridge club and the tennis club is of what Jackie Kennedy is wearing. They're white women, of course and they're free to play because a coloured woman will be looking after the children, doing the shopping and cleaning the house. They're trusted to bring the children up, but they're not trusted to be honest about the silver. Aibileen is raising her seventeenth white child but something hardened in her heart when her son died whilst the white bosses looked the other way. They took his body to the coloureds' hospital and rolled it off the back of the truck and left.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141039280</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Katie Fforde Devil You Know (Editor) and Sue Moorcroft (EditorD S Max Craigie)|titleauthor=Loves Me, Loves Me NotNeil Lancaster
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short StoriesCrime|summary=What a feast is presented in these forty stories It's unusual for anyone from well-loved and prolific romantic authors, celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of Hardie family to approach the Romantic Novelists' Associationpolice. In a WhoNeither side likes or has any respect for the other. But Davie Hardie is struggling in prison and he's Who prepared to tell the police where the body of the genrea missing person is buried and who was responsible for her death. This person, there are writers from every age grouphe promises, including one or two who might even have been founder members of is someone big and it will be worth the RNA, back in 1960police doing what he wants. My advice And what he wants is to sip through be transferred to an open prison to serve the stories slowlyremainder of his sentence and to get an early parole date. Not much to ask, rather than gobbling them up quickly 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 suffering anyone who works with him is kept well away from indigestionwhat's happening.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0778303373</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Lauren Oliver0008405026|title=Before I FallA Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Jane Casey
|rating=5
|genre=Women's FictionCrime|summary=Samantha 'Sam' Kingston is, in many ways, your typical American high schooler whose concerns are pretty predictable: boys, friends, fashion, weird parents, annoying little sisters. Today itIt's Cupid Day, a chance to show off just how ''In'' you are at school, as measured by the number of roses you're sent, but Sam's not too worried about thatsixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. She knows she's part of a group who, by most definitions, would be called popular, was never found and though sometimes inside she might feel on the inside investigation ground to a little like an imposterhalt. Now, on the outsideher mother, wellHelena, she's the definition of ''in''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340980893</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Mal Peet and Elspeth Graham |title=Cloud Tea Monkeys|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=Tashi and her mother live below a tea plantation father are dead in Indiatheir bed. Usually Tashi goes along with her mumInitially, and whilst mum picks tea leaves with the other women, Tashi sits under it looks like a tree and plays with a group of monkeys, sharing her fruit with them, allowing them to groom her and playing with the little baby monkeys. One morning, Tashistraightforward murder/suicide but there's mum is too poorly to go to work, so Tashi struggles with something about the positioning of the big tea basket herselfbodies that makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and her boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. The plantation owner derides her, saying she is too little What looked as though it was going to pick the tea, be an open-and Tashi -shut case is worried about how she and her mother will cope with no money to get her mum now a doctor, or to buy foodcomplex double murder. She shares her worries with her monkey friends and somehow, at Kerrigan is convinced that the end of the day, Tashiexplanation lies in Rosalie's disappearance: others (such as Derwent's basket is full of beautiful, freshboss, fragrant tea leaves that Una Burt) are a very rare type of tea called 'Cloud Tea'less convinced.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1406300926</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Alice Taylor0571379877|title=To School Through The FieldsKellerby Code|author=Jonny Sweet
|rating=3.5
|genre=AutobiographyCrime|summary=To School Through the Fields Edward Jevons is the memoir of a farmer’s daughter who grew up in rural County Cork in the 1940s (though the book never mentions the date of when it is set)working-class young man, obsessed with his upper-class friends, Robert and Stanza. Taylor makes it clear at the beginning that she is writing Robert's a nostalgic look back at the era of her childhoodtheatre director. He's also self-obsessed, demanding, before the handsome and entitled and uses Edward to run errands for him. Edward has been in love with Stanza since their university days - and he'changing winds of times drunkenly confided how he feels to Robert. Most men in Robert' and then presents s position would stay away from Stanza or tell Edward that a series relationship had begun between them but he's not like most men: Edward is left to stumble upon the two of anecdotes about her parents, her family and some of the other characters who lived them kissing in her villagea dark passageway.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0863224210</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Anne CassidyJo Callaghan|title=Guilt TripLeave No Trace
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary=Jan Wakefield was surprised to find herself arranging When a man is found crucified on the refreshments for mourners after top of a funeralhill in Nuneaton, not least because she had never met DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to the deceased and was unaware that case alongside her husband was sidekick, the next of kinAI detective Lock. He was working in South America and not expected home for some timeIt's their first live case together, having previously been very successful with several cold cases. Josephine Short had obviously been But when there is a feisty character though. Despite being unmarried she had had second body found crucified a child (at few days later, Kat is suddenly struggling with a time when this would have been frowned upon) potential serial killer and amassed a considerable fortunevery high profile case that draws a lot of unwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. Her grandson Joe was flying home from Lasserta for Will they be able to solve the funeral.case in time, or will Kat find herself taken off the case and, potentially, out of a career?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0749007648</amazonuk>139851120X
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=N K Jemisin1399613073|title=The Hundred-Thousand Kingdoms (Inheritance Trilogy)Moral Injuries|author=Christie Watson|rating=4.5|genre=FantasyThrillers|summary=A month after her mother's deathOlivia, outcast Yeine Darr is summoned by her grandfather, king Laura and Anjali met on the first day of the Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, to come to the palace medical school and their friendship would keep them inseparable for a quarter of Skya century. There named one of his three heirs Olivia is ruthlessly ambitious, along with her feuding cousins, she quickly realizes that without allies she will surely lose the contest for the thronewhich is a bonus when you aim to be a cardiothoracic surgeon. Thus begins an epic quest to find her mother's murderer, save her own life, Laura is a perfectionist and fulfil a destiny she never knew she hadtrauma doctor.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1841498173</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=David Conway Anjali is the free spirit of the group and Dubravka Kolanovic|title=The Secret To Teddy's Happiness|rating=3she becomes a GP.5|genre=For Sharing|summary= When the toys discover an old, bedraggled teddy bear, we first meet them they rack their brains to find 're at a way to mend his broken heart, drug and alcohol-fuelled party and it's going to make him smile againend in tragedy. The velvet rabbit We don't know who knows everything offers to tell them suffered the tragedy or the consequences. Twenty-five years later there will be an eerily similar event that will impact the secret of Teddythree friends. This time, it's happiness, but he wants them to do him a favour firsttheir teenage children who are involved.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1862337624</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Martin Kornberger 0241636604|title=Brand SocietyThe Trading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson
|rating=4.5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=If we you were asked to nominate 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 archetypal Cockney actor on large or small screen over pin-stripe suit and his background is the last twenty years or soEast End, where he was familiar with violence, Phil Daniels would undoubtedly come high poverty and injustice. There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to the listLondon School of Economics. Born in Islington in 1958 Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and raised in Kings Cross, 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 graduate of the Anna Scher Theatre in the 1970strader.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847376207</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sam Enthoven1035021803|title=CrawlersThe Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder|author=C L Miller|rating=43.5|genre=TeensCrime|summary=Why are the men that want It's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to take over the world using evil alien beings always so stupid? Steadman is stupidEnglish country village where she grew up. Ever since the Great Fire She's back now because of London trapped a request for help from her in an underground dungeon in 1666beloved aunt, the Queen has been neutralisedCarole. Even then, the great and the powerful couldn Freya't quite bring themselves to kill her. She had too much potential. But they did have the sense to keep her safely locked away. But now Steadman thinks he knows better. He thinks he can rule the world through the Queen s former mentor and heCarole's set her a test. If she passesclose friend, Arthur Crockleford, he will set her free. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0552558702</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Scott Westerfeld|title=Pretties|rating=4.5|genre=Teens|summary=In the unnamed city of is dead and the futurecircumstances seem suspicious, all to say the adults are prettyleast. They've Arthur was the reason why Freya had mental and physical surgery not been back to make them calmthe village: Arthur, placid and perfectly aesthetic human beingsshe feels, let her down badly. If Even though they have any trouble were in business together as young adults it is antique hunters, she has not felt able to be near the problem of what to wear at parties, man or how to get rid of their hangovers when they wake up at 5pmpursue the profession she loved. UnfortunatelyAfter the split, one of these bright young things is our heroineshe worked in a cafe, Tally, one of met and married James (on the few people in rebound from the world to love of her life, who was murdered) and Freya and James have learnt how damnably horrid and sapping the life of Riley can benow divorced.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847389074</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Suzanne BuglerAllTomorrowsFutureCover|title=This Perfect WorldAll Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)
|rating=5
|genre=Women's Science Fiction|summary=Laura Hamley sees herself as a fortunate woman. She has a successful husband, two beautiful children, a big house in a good neighbourhood, and a coterie ''Opening up new ways of friends who fall nicely into thinking about the category shape of people like usthings to come. She's always beautifully turned out, and her position in the social pecking order is never less than high. She simply shrugs off the occasional moments of dissatisfaction - what on Earth could she have to complain about?'
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jill NewtonSunny Singh|title=Crash Bang Donkey!Hotel Arcadia|rating=3.5|genre=For SharingThrillers |summary=Farmer Gruff spends all his time chasing 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 crows from his cornterrorists who are rampaging through, killing everyone on site, there is Sam, a wartime photographer and Abhi, the hotel manager. Eventually he needs As Abhi continues to try to sleep, so all care remotely for the residents who are still alive in the animals tiptoe aroundhotel, making no noise whatsoever. What's this coming over the hill with he forms a crash and a bang? Oh no! It's a donkey bond with a drum. How's Farmer Gruff going Sam who refuses to get his sleep? If he can't sleepbe cowed by events, howand keeps on venturing out of her room to try to capture what's he happened through her photography. Although they only ever going 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 able to keep rescued before they are discovered by the crows from his corn?terrorists.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1862337209</amazonuk>086154742X
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Olga Grushin1529153298|title=The Concert TicketList of Suspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=It's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly...) She'The Concert Tickets not what's worrying Miv' follows the lives of a s family in Soviet Russia who , though. Women have grown desperately distant from one anotherbeen disappearing. Sergei Well, the fatherthey've been murdered, is a frustrated musician who longs but to play the pre-revolutionary masterpieces of composers like Igor Selinsky but is forced have 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Miv's upset because she's overheard that her father wants to play move the kind of patriotic ditties he despisesfamily 'Down South'. His schoolteacher wife When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a frightening, Annaforeign place, longs for his lovebest avoided. For Miv, but is never quite able to get his attention with the move would mean leaving her shy gestures. Their shiftless sonbest friend, AlexanderSharon, has quietly given up going and she'll do anything to school and spends his days hanging around prevent that. She's not worried about the park, consorting with undesirables. Also living in their house is Annadangers or that her Mum's silent, elderly motherstopped talking - to anyone.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670918482</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Aatish Taseer1398524085|title=The Temple-Goers|rating=3|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Aatish Taseer is probably best known for his journalism, publishing regularly in the Indian press, in Prospect, and perhaps most prolifically in Time magazine. He has won acclaim for his memoir: Stranger to History in which he, raised by his Indian Sikh mother, traces his absent Muslim father across the border in Pakistan – and also for his translations of the short stories of Saadat Hasan Manto.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670918504</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Kate Saunders|title=Beswitched|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Flora is furious at being sent away to boarding school, even one which is very progressive with luxurious facilities and school rock bands. Her parents need to sell her grandmother's house in Italy and build a granny flat at home, and Flora is resentful at having her life turned upside down for a grumpy, unpleasant old woman. On the train, she falls asleep and wakes up to find herself in another era. Trendy 21st century Flora is horrified to find herself in a hideous pinafore dress with a childish haircut and no make up. What has happened to her Ipod, mobile phone and brand new laptopHas Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1407108972</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Julie Cohen|title=Nina Jones and the Temple of GloomNicci French|rating=4.5|genre=Women's Fiction|summary=A sign of a good book, for me, often relates to how easily I can put it down. And then how much I want to pick it back up again. Nina Jones was a particular challenge for me as after reading it for an hour whilst my toddler napped I kept my thumb in the page whilst getting her out of bed, snuck her downstairs still saving my page, put on Cbeebies, and then sat next to her on the sofa to carry on reading for at least another hour, if not a little bit more than that. I then kept it in the kitchen so I could sneak a few more pages in between stirring the spaghetti. And then once my daughter was in bed I went on to absently ignore my poor, tired, over-worked husband (who got bored and went for a bath) so that I could read on to the end of the story. I found myself mentally yelling at a fictional character (I hope it was mentally and I wasn't actually shouting out loud...we have very thin walls), I swooned over the hero, sniggered often and I even cried a little bit too. So, a book that induces such family neglect and an emotional roller coaster of emotions is definitely a good read!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755341414</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Ken Bruen|title=The Guards|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary=A woman makes an unlikely choice by asking Jack Taylor to investigate the apparent suicide of Charlotte Salter was expected at her husband's fiftieth birthday party but never turned up. Her children, sons Niall, Paul and Ollie and her teenage daughter in Galway, Etty. Jack is ex Irish police (Garda) are all worried but also a known alcoholic with nothing much else in his life. His approach to investigation is haphazard - he doesn't really have a method beyond asking direct questions andstrangely - her husband, if necessaryAlec, using his fistsis not. Predictably Shortly afterwards, there is more to the suicide case than first meets the eye Etty and JackGreg, aided by his unsavoury friendfind the body of Greg's father, SuttonDuncan Ackerley, uncover some very disturbing secrets in the river. It was an easy assumption for the police to make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and levels of corruption within then committed suicide when he couldn't stand the cityguilt. '' The Guards'' is Salter children are not your conventional crime thriller; itconvinced but there's darker little else they can do but get on with their lives and has a grim realismwonder about what really happened.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0863224105</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Elizabeth Speller1035906708|title=The Return of Captain John EmmettDiva|author=Daisy Goodwin
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Laurence Bartram has survived the warWe tend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, but his life has changed dramaticallyshe was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, New York, in December 1923 and only moved to Athens when she was thirteen. It will never be the same again. ItHer original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 's almost as if he doesnCallas't recognize himselfto make it more manageable in the States. Domestic life is now nonWhen she was back in Athens -existent 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 he has made no-one to please but himself. He is unsettled and edgy. War has obviously left its mark. He retreats graciously and wonders what he'll do with the rest secret of his lifeher preference for her elder sister, Jackie. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1844086070</amazonuk>
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|rating=4
|genre=For SharingConfident Readers|summary=Clive loves wearing green. ItLucas 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's all he ever wears. He thinks he looks mighty snazzy All big movie fans, but his big sister (boo! hiss!) takes every opportunity they're looking forward to call him a cabbagelots of exciting films, mossand many, a sprout or a toad. Clive keeps wearing his green clothesmany snacks! However, as the movie starts, certain they very quickly realise that hesomething about this new film format is very different, and they are swept up into an adventure they couldn'll have t even imagine. But as they lurch from one film genre to the last laugh next, can they figure out what on earth is going on? Will they ever get back to the cinema, and get one over on his sister.to their real lives?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1845394534</amazonuk>1839942738
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{{Frontpage
|author=Rachel Greenlaw
|title=Compass and Blade
|rating=3.5
|genre=Teens
|summary=''I can hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, the answering beat in my heart.''
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Josephine WilkinsonJames Sherwood Metts|title=The Early Loves of Anne BoleynPlanet Storyland|rating=34.5|genre=HistoryConfident Readers|summary=Before her marriage to King Henry VIII, Anne Boleyn had already Things have been courted by three suitors, any of whom might have become her husband - and possibly saved her from her eventual end on a bit sticky for the scaffoldEarthlings. The first was her Irish cousin James ButlerAI and automation have been proceeding apace, later Earl of Ormond, whom she was at one often replacing jobs they're paid to do and other tasks that took time intended to marry in order accomplish. Just as they were beginning to get used to settle a family dispute over the title all this technological change and estates of the Earldom of Ormond. After their marriage negotiations came starting to an end in the face think of legal obstaclesother, she became betrothed new ways to Henry Percyspend time, heir to the Duke of Northumberlandalong came an awful pandemic. With a little help from the scheming Cardinal Wolsey, the DukeLife was pretty much shut down and, who had little time for his sonalong with it, insisted that any idea of marriage between them should be dismissed forthwith. Soon after this all the poet Thomas Wyatt became enamoured of her, but by this time there was fierce competition from his sovereign, and her destiny was sealedmany daily social interactions on which they depend so heavily.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1848684304</amazonuk>1736128426
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Scott WesterfeldMatthew Tree|title=UgliesWe'll Never Know
|rating=4.5
|genre=TeensLiterary Fiction|summary="This city is a paradise, Tally. It feeds you, educates you, keeps you safe. It makes you pretty." And that's meant literally. As soon as they're sixteen years old, ugly people like Tally are completely rebuilt - no Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more freckles, dull eyes, rough skin, or ideas about biting their fingernailsthan to be different from his father, and made a pretty. It's scientific, drunk and obviously chronic underachiever whose dreams of benefit, considering the parties, status being exceptional at any of his artistic passions all failed miserably and love afforded to prettieswho had endless crises of self confidence. But is it essential? When her best friend is prettified Tally finds a new friend, Shay, who has secrets to share in the few weeks before the operation they're due So Tim applied himself to have on the same day. Secrets of another place, another wayhis studies, cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and of people staying forever ugly - through choiceset himself high but achievable ambitions.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1847389066</amazonuk>B0CVFXPGP8
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Preston Rutt and Ben RedlichA G Slatter|title=Tortoise vs. Hare - The Rematch!Briar Book of the Dead
|rating=5
|genre=For SharingFantasy|summary=Harry 'The Hurricane' Hare has been licking his wounds since There'Steady' Eddie Tortoise beat him in the famous races 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. It's time I just want to enjoy it for a rematch, and Harrywhile.'s been training hard. Eddie couldn't possibly win again, could he?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845394186</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Nicole Dryburgh1529900360|title=Talk to the HandThe Ghost Orchid|author=Jonathan Kellerman
|rating=4
|genre=TeensCrime|summary=We first met Nicole Dryburgh in her book ''The Way I See Ithadn't been Lt Milo Sturgis's fault that Alex Delaware had been badly injured but he felt responsible and even after Alex recovered, which she wrote at eighteen, Sturgis was reluctant to ask for his help on difficult cases. His assertions that there were only open-and -shut cases which detailed her battles with cancer and didn't need the loss help of her sighta psychologist only worked for a while. Finally, it was Robin, Delaware's partner, who nudged Milo into asking for help again. We loved She knew that the warts-and-all picture of her life involvement was something that the man she gave us thenloved needed. The next case did look simple, and so we though. Two lovers were really pleased murdered in the swimming pool of a remote property in Bel Air. He was the heir to see that an Italian shoe empire and sheis married to an extremely rich man and it's written a second booknot the Italian. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340996978</amazonuk> But which of them was the primary target?
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ian Mathie1529395224|title=Letting the Cat Out of the Bag: The Man Secret Life of Passagea Vet|author=Sion Rowlands
|rating=3.5
|genre=AutobiographyAnimals and Wildlife|summary=Ian MathieSiôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. His father was a GP and Rowlands didn's association with Africa began 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 posted to what was then Northern Rhodesia when Mathie was just four years old. School seventeen he took the opportunity of doing work experience with a family friend who was in a convent vet and was run by German and Italian nuns and for a while he convinced this was the only white child amongst a couple of hundred Africansjob for him. Even when Before long, he was joined by others he was still part of an ethnic minority although he didnat Liverpool University. It hadn't realise it! He - as with so many students - been his dream since he was taught in the local language and grew up with the local childrena child. It was his home and was If anything, he'd wanted to be the centre of his life for decades to comea professional footballer.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0955312418</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=K A S Quinn0861541774|title=The Queen Must Die (Chronicles A Nye of the Tempus) Pheasants|author=Steve Burrows
|rating=4
|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=In this historical time-travelling extravaganzaDCI Domenic Jejeune's close friend and former colleague, Katie Berger-Jones-Burg (I knowDanny Maik, it's has taken a mouthful, but stay short holiday in Singapore to meet up with me) is the daughter of Mimi, an ex-girl band member who has been married three timesold ally, so far, hence Katie's hyphenated nameGuy Trueman. Katie has come home from school to find Maik was involved in a street brawl - he would later maintain that Mimi has gone off he was facing a man armed with another man, Dr Fishberg, a knife - and as she begins to stress about the potential new addition to her surname she crawls into her hidey-hole space beneath her bed to escape for he killed a little whileGhurka. Here she keeps her diary and her stash of books, and she curls up to read her latest bookInitially, he faced a compilation charge of letters from Princess Alice, Queen Victoria's youngest daughtermanslaughter but evidence came to light that suggested that he might have planned to murder the man. She starts to feel a bit sleepy, but is suddenly startled awake by a flash of lightNow he could be facing the death penalty. She finds herself in Victorian England, underneath Domenic Jejeune can do nothing to help as any interference from another police force could provoke a sofa diplomatic incident and staring into the eyes of Princess Alice, who is just as startled as she iswouldn't help Danny at all.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848873700</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Robert WilliamsAlexander McCall Smith|title=Luke and JonThe Perfect Passion Company|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Luke's mum died 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 car accident 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 ago and since then his father has let things go. The house has been repossessed Katie is coming out of a break up with a bad boyfriend, and they are forced so jumps at the chance to move come home to a new townEdinburgh. The And so begins this new place is falling down - it's all they can afford after story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the debts were paidIsabel Dalhousie novels, but with some new characters who quickly begin to charm. Neither Luke nor his father are really that bothered Katie has no experience in running a business, or in match- what can a house be when making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, and there's no mum to fill it with always her brightness very helpful (and vivacity and love? The bottle rather handsome) neighbour, William, to lend a hand…|isbn=1846976596}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0811771741|title=InstaKnits for Baby|author=Melissa Leapman|rating=4|genre=Crafts|summary=Melissa Leapman's ''InstaKnits for Baby'' gives us a collection of whisky that has begun knits from toys to live blankets. Some will be quick knits - others are of the 'long, cosy afternoons in his fatherfront 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 's hand though social-media- worthy projects' but that's a worry for Luke; that makes him feel rather sick insideme being picky. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571249639</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Melanie RoseDean Koontz|title=Coming HomeThe Bad Weather Friend
|rating=4.5
|genre=Women's FictionParanormal|summary=We meet the narrator of this story drinking coffee from Benny is having a thermos in a lay-by, on a cold grey terrifically bad day. All her worldly possessions are travelling with her in her car He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, including her catand his house gets trashed. She Oh, and someone has clearly made some momentous decisiondelivered 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 on her way the very last person to somewhere newdeserve all this bad luck. I assumed that as story unfolded, I'd learn more about her and where she was goingHe is a nice person.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847561063</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=P C Cast|title=Divine by Choice (Goddess of Partholon)|rating=3|genre=Fantasy|summary= A few months after really nice person. So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the Formorian war, Shannon Parker delivery to his house is living the high life. Hailed as Goddess Incarnatea new friend, married to a man (wellbad weather friend called Spike, centaur) who was born has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. Spike is going to love hertake care of Benny, carrying her first childand will certainly take care of Benny's enemies, if he, Benny, the next daughter of Epona and royally spoiled with amazing jewels and clothes, life really Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can't get much betterfigure out who exactly they are.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0778303586</amazonuk>1662500491
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Stephanie TillotsonAdam Stower|title=Cut on the BiasMurray and Bun
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short StoriesConfident Readers |summary=If 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'Cut on s cat, so his favourite bun has been turned into a hyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, and the Bias'' is in your local bookshopcatflap they both use can chuck them out, you will surely be won over by not into the feisty coverregular back garden, but into a world of frightening adventure and whiffs. Stories about women and their clothes are about identityThis time round it drops them into a Viking land, so what better start to where a set of short stories troll hunter is expected – well, one much bigger than a fashion statement cover featuring the bags in which said clothes arrive home?Murray was, to be honest, but he's turned up and he'll have to do…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1906784132</amazonuk>0008561249
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{{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.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=1529431735
|title=The Winter Visitor
|author=James Henry
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|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?