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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__
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Paul Bloom
 
|title=How Pleasure Works: The New Science of Why We Like What We Like
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Popular Science
 
|summary=How much would you pay for a jumper that used to belong to Brad Pitt?  What about if I had it dry cleaned for you first? Chances are, if you were considering the first offer, you've just been put off somewhat. But why? The jumper hasn't changed, after all. Do you honestly and rationally, believe that dry cleaning would destroy some of Brad's 'essence', thus making the item less valuable?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847921434</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Jodi Compton
 
|title=Hailey's War
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=At the beginning of the book, Hailey Cain is a 23 year old cycle courier
 
living in San Francisco. The story then takes a step back in time and we
 
discover that she had to leave West Point Military Academy during her
 
final year, for reasons she prefers to keep to herself. I continued to read under the assumption that Hailey had done something which forced her to leave. Her
 
next move is to L.A, where she spent the latter part of her childhood.
 
During these years, her mother with whom she has, at best, a very strained relationship is no source of comfort and Hailey develops a very close attachment to her cousin CJ. Aspects of this relationship make for uncomfortable reading at times.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847373577</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
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==The Best New Books==
|author=Rachel Neumeier
 
|title=The Lord of the Changing Winds (Griffin Mage)
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Fantasy
 
|summary=When a delegation of diplomat, mage and soldiers enter the mountainous, rural areas to the east of the country to investigate - and remove the cause of - rumours of a host of griffins laying waste, the last thing they expect to meet is one of their own kin, a shy teenager at that, helping the beasts out and magically healing them.  But then Kes, the young woman in question, never expected to be there herself.  She would never have assumed she had any powers, but when a mysterious man enters her village to whisk her away and teach her to tend the battle-wounded fabulous creatures, she finds herself entering an unspeakably strange world.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1841498734</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
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'''Read [[:Category:New Reviews|new reviews by category]]. '''<br>
|author=Gareth P Jones
 
|title=The Space Crime Conspiracy
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|summary=Thirteen-year-old Stanley Bound is an ordinary boy from south London who lives above a pub with his bad-tempered half-brother Doug. He is bullied at school, and the situation only gets worse when he discovers that the popular new boy Lance has been both lying and stealing. Lance gets his revenge by framing Stanley, and now no one trusts him, even his grumpy brother. Little wonder, then, that our sad and lonely hero dreams of travelling to distant places to escape his miserable life. But as we all know, that is a dangerous desire: Stanley should have remembered that people who get what they wish for often regret it. By the end of the book he has travelled the universe, been accused of murder, and met more bizarre characters than even his wildest dreams could have created.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0747599815</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
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'''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].'''
|author=Irene Nemirovsky
 
|title=Jezebel
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Literary Fiction
 
|summary=Gladys Eysenach stands in the dock accused of murdering her young lover. She apparently took a gun from her handbag and shot him in the early hours of Christmas Day in her own home.  What happened is clear – Gladys makes no attempt to deny it – but why it happened is less obvious, and Gladys doesn't seem inclined to offer much in the way of explanation.  But gradually, oh so teasingly, we find out what really happened and why.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099520389</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
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'''Read [[Forthcoming Publications|reviews of books about to be published]].
|author=Jessie Little
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{{Frontpage
|title=The Hoozles: My Magical Teddy
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|author=Tom Percival
|rating=4
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|title=The Wrong Shoes
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|rating=5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Willow and her brother Freddie have gone to stay in Summertown with their Aunt Suzy whilst their parents are away for the summerAunt Suzy owns a toy shop in town, and she makes her own special Hoozle soft toys.  Willow and Freddie each have a Hoozle of their own that their Aunt made for them - Willow has Toby the teddy bear and Freddie has Wobbly the LionWillow loves Toby dearly, but it isn't until she is staying with her aunt that she discovers that Toby can come to life and talk to her and she can talk to him! And so begins a summer full of magical adventures for Willow and the Hoozles.
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|summary=Will's life is difficult, in a multitude of waysHe is bullied because he has 'the wrong shoes', he has the 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 the college, was working a cash-in-hand job on a building site and had an accidentThrow into that mix the fact that his mum and dad are separated, and Will's life seems bleak in every direction. And yet, he still has a tiny 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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571247911</amazonuk>
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|isbn=1398527122
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Sylvie Cathrall
|author=Daniel D Victor
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|title=A Letter to the Luminous Deep
|title=The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes: The Seventh Bullet
 
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
|genre=Crime
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|genre=Science Fiction
|summary=In 1911, author, journalist and celebrated dandy David Graham Phillips was shot multiple times by Harvard educated musician Fitzhugh Coyle Goldsborough, who then committed suicide. The journalist had received on the morning of his death a threatening telegram signed with his own name, but had shrugged it off as during his career as a 'muckraker', to use the term coined for him by Theodore Roosevelt, he'd made many enemies.
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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>184856676X</amazonuk>
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|isbn= 0356522776
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=0008517061
|author=Jennie Rooney
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|title=Death in a Lonely Place
|title=The Opposite of Falling
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|author=Stig Abell
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Historical Fiction
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|genre=Crime
|summary=It is 1862 and when wealthy Liverpool girl Ursula Bridgewater finds herself single and restless after her fiancée Henry Springton leaves her for another woman, she soon turns to travel as a means of escape and sets off on her first expedition.  But she has agreed to stay friends with Henry and cannot quite escape him completely as they continue to write to each other. Ten years later and Ursula has travelled all over the world and is about to embark on a trip around America, but this time she decides to take a companion.
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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>0701182687</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1786482126
|author=K J Parker
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|title=The Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)
|title=The Folding Knife
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|author=Elly Griffiths
|rating=5
 
|genre=Fantasy
 
|summary=Bassianus Arcadius Severus – call him Basso – is a man of many talents. All but guaranteed a life of ease as his birthright, he instead finds himself driven to excel, first as an executive trustee in his father’s bank, and then in the realm of politics. His rise to the zenith of public life is meteoric, fuelled by ambition, ruthlessness, and above all his ability to turn any defeat into a resounding victory. But with the Republic – and Basso’s own position and even life – under threat from enemies old and new, will his fall prove equally thunderous? Welcome to ''The Folding Knife'', the latest fantasy epic from K.J. Parker.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1841495123</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Jean Reidy and Genevieve Leloup
 
|title=Too Pickly!
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=For Sharing
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|genre=Crime
|summary=It's [[Too Purply! by Jean Reidy and Genevieve Leloup|Too Purply!]] with food. That about sums it up, but for those of you who haven't already fallen in love with Jean Reidy's tale of getting dressed, ''Too Pickly!'' looks at a little boy (and his hamster) deciding what to eat. Dish by dish, he rejects them for being too pickly, too wrinkly, too burpy, too stringy, and so on, until he finds the one that's just right.
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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 ago.  Her condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is prone to sudden bouts of sickness.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408807114</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=0008551324
|author=Andrew Grant
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|title=The Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)
|title=Die Twice (David Trevellyan)
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|author=Neil Lancaster
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=The title is very much at home and in keeping with the thriller genre and it's both eye-catching and also has a perfectly reasonable explanation which comes right at the very end of the story.  I must admit to thrillers generally not being my most favourite reading material.  Some can be a bit flashy, a bit trashy even.  But not this novel.  Right from the start I felt I was in for a good, intelligent read.  There were pointers to this all over the place.  For starters, David Trevellyan has a nice line in witty humour.  There are numerous snazzy one-liners.  It all went down very well.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230747582</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Louise Doughty
 
|title=Whatever You Love
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
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|genre=Crime
|summary=Two police officers knock on Laura's door. They break the news to her that her 9 year old daughter Betty has been run over and killed. Betty's friend Willow is in hospital. Immediately, I was drawn into this story of a mother's worst nightmare coming true.
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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>0571254756</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=0008405026
|author=Linda Strachan
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|title=A Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)
|title=Dead Boy Talking
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|author=Jane Casey
|rating=4
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|rating=5
|genre=Teens
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|genre=Crime
|summary=''They say it takes about 25 minutes to bleed to death. I want to scream and yell but there's no one here to hear me and I... I can't breath enough to yell anyway. I'm going to die here, all on my own.''
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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.
 
 
Josh is lying in the snow in an alleyway in a pool of his own blood. He stabbed one of his best mates yesterday, and now it's happened to him. He knows he's dying and his thoughts turn to how this could possibly have happened. He wonders where Skye is and what she's doing. He hopes Danny is ok. And, as he goes over the events of the day before, which culminated in his stabbing Ranj, his missing brother Gary keeps intruding into the picture. Why did he go? And did his parents' obsession with Gary's disappearance play a part in what's happened?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905537204</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=0571379877
|author=Jonathan Lee
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|title=The Kellerby Code
|title=Who Is Mr Satoshi?
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|author=Jonny Sweet
 
|rating=3.5
 
|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
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|genre=Crime
|summary=The novel opens somewhere in the Home Counties and Rob Fossick is attending his mother's funeralThe event in itself is extremely distressing and also depressing for him; factor in that he's become a bit of a recluse lately and I could feel the sheer loneliness creeping into Rob's very bones.  Lee describes the event as 'Zimmer frames, bifocals, trifocals, dark grey coats with yawning shoulders. The apparatus of old age.'
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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 directorHe'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>0434020419</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Jo Callaghan
|author=Hazel McHaffie
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|title=Leave No Trace
|title=Remember Remember
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
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|genre=Crime
|summary=The story starts at the end and works back in time.  This works extremely well as we see Doris Mannering, mother, grandmother and great-grandmother now living in a residential homeThe decision to 'put mother' into a home was very, very difficult and had been put off time and time againWe come to realize that this was a heart-wrenching decisionThe daughter and carer, Jessica, will always be asking herself if she'd done the right thing, made the right decision for the right reasons.  A veritable minefield.  And here is where many an ethical dilemma lies for many families in real-life similar situations.
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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 LockIt's their first live case together, having previously been very successful with several cold casesBut 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 projectWill 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>1906817294</amazonuk>
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|isbn=139851120X
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1399613073
|author=Samantha Mackintosh
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|title=Moral Injuries
|title=Kisses for Lula
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|author=Christie Watson
|rating=3.5
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|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
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|genre=Thrillers
|summary=Girls do worry, about all sorts of things. And one of the things they enjoy worrying about most is whether or not they are passing the milestones on life's journey at the same time as everyone else. The fact that they combine this with loud demands to be treated to be an individual is a major reason for stress-related hair-loss and gibbering in parents. Lula is no exception here. Her sixteenth birthday is approaching fast, and unless she gets kissed before then (by pretty well anyone: she's desperate) she is convinced she will be jinxed for life.
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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>1405249625</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=0241636604
|author=Benedict Gummer
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|title=The Trading Game: A Confession
|title=The Scourging Angel: The Black Death in the British Isles
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|author=Gary Stevenson
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=History
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|genre=Autobiography
|summary=The mid-fourteenth century was an unsettled time for EnglandIt was an age which saw the first phases of the protracted Hundred Years’ War with France, and the Scottish war of independence, which came to an end with the capture of King David IIAs if these events were not enough, in 1346 there was the first case of a man in Europe contracting an unknown disease that rapidly swept across the continent, claiming the lives of millions, and one medieval chronicler noted that 'the bodies looked like a macabre lasagne: corpses piled row upon row separated only by layers of dirt'.
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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 StevensonA 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 stupidIt 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>0099548836</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1035021803
|author=Colin Cotterill
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|title=The Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder
|title=Love Songs From A Shallow Grave
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|author=C L Miller
|rating=4.5
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|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Crime
 
|genre=Crime
|summary=Dr Siri Paiboun is about to celebrate his seventy-fourth birthday but it looks as though it might be his lastInstead of being at home with Madam Daeng, his wife of three months, he's in jailIt's not your average run-of-the-mill jail eitherSiri is chained to some lead piping and conditions are not exactly five starMeanwhile Phosy and Dtui are having marriage problems whilst he struggles to investigate the deaths of three women, all skewered by an epee and their thighs showing a letter engraved with a knife.
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|summary=It's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to the English country village where she grew upShe'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 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 lovedAfter 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>1849160457</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
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{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=AllTomorrowsFutureCover
 +
|title=All Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt
 +
|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)
 +
|rating=5
 +
|genre=Science Fiction
 +
|summary=''Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to come.''
  
{{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=Sarah Duncan
 
|title=Kissing Mr Wrong
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Women's Fiction
 
|summary=Kissing Mr Wrong is the first book I have read by Sarah Duncan and it has definitely given me an appetite to read more. It tells an absorbing tale with many different threads that bind together well and with a main character that I loved. Indeed, it has all of the ingredients for a riveting read – one that I didn't want to put down.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755345959</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Sunny Singh
|author=Joanna Simmons and Jay Curtis
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|title=Hotel Arcadia
|title=The Aargh to Zzzz of Parenting: An Alternative Guide
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|rating=3.5
|rating=4.5
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|genre=Thrillers
|genre=Home and Family
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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 managerAs 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.
|summary='All in all, having kids is an intense rollercoaster rideIt plunges up and down, and there’s lots of screaming and vomiting involved.'  So that pretty much sums it up.  Advertised as: 'a comprehensively unhelpful, advice-free look at life', the authors talk about Antecedents and Behaviour, without (fortunately) going too deeply into the Consequences of several dozen baby-related topicsBut this definitely isn’t the rocket science of a parenting manual, or the touchy-feely of a misery memoir, rather a blackly comic gallop round pragmatic parenthood, instantly recognizable by anyone who’s been through the mill themselves.
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|isbn=086154742X
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>022408626X</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1529153298
|author=John Niven
+
|title=The List of Suspicious Things
|title=The Amateurs
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|author=Jennie Godfrey
|rating=4
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|rating=5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Gary Irvine only wants two things out of lifeHe'd like to have children and he wants to reduce his golf handicapNothing extraordinary there, you might think except for the fact that his wife, Pauline, is planning to leave him for a self-made carpet millionaire and Gary is a dreadful golferHis handicap is eighteen – but I'm not entirely certain how he got it down to that level in the first placeHis family doesn't give him much solace eitherHis brother Lee is on the fringes of the local criminal underworld and hasn't the wit to keep himself out of trouble with Ranta Campbell, the local overlordRanta could be quite likeable if it wasn't for his penchant for a certain type of violence designed to keep the others in line rather than to teach the victim a lesson.
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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, though.  Women have been disappearingWell, they've been murdered, but to have 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frighteningMiv'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 thatShe's not worried about the dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to anyone.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099516667</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1398524085
|author=Kevin Brooks
+
|title=Has Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?
|title=iBoy
+
|author=Nicci French
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
|genre=Teens
+
|genre=Crime
|summary=Tom Harvey is wandering along after school on his way to meet up with his friend Lucy when he hears his name called from up high in one of the tower blocks on his estate. He doesn't have time to look up before everything goes up. Waking up in hospital days later, Tom discovers he has fragments of a shattered iPhone embedded in his brain. And still worse, his friend Lucy has been gang-raped in a brutal attack that Tom had been so closed to walking in on.  
+
|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>0141326107</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=1035906708
|author=Daniel Waters
+
|title=Diva
|title=Passing Strange (Generation Dead)
+
|author=Daisy Goodwin
|rating=4
+
|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=Karen DeSonne, the sexiest zombie amongst the many differently biotic teenagers in Oakvale, gets a turn at centre stage in the latest in Daniel Waters's ''Generation Dead'' series.
 
 
 
Karen has always worn a disguise. When she was alive, her various camouflages hid the crippling depression that engulfed her so often and eventually led to her suicide. Now she's dead, make up, hair dye and blue contact lenses enable her to "pass" as a living girl. She talks fluently and her movements are fluid, unlike most of her differently biotic peers, whose pauses, stutters and jerky movements mark them out for all to see.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847389600</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Adam Ross
 
|title=Mr Peanut
 
|rating=3.5
 
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The main couple who tend to take centre stage here are called David and Alice Pepin.  They live a kind of comfortable, middle-class life in busy and bustling Manhattan.  After more than a decade of generally happy married life together, they want to take the next step and have a familyEasy to say but things don't quite work out according to plan.  We are taken on various 'dark' journeys within their marriageThese are situations which most of us can identify with.  Some of these situations are painful, stressful, unhappy.
+
|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 thirteenHer 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>0224087738</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Christopher Edge
|author=Kirsty Robinson
+
|title=Black Hole Cinema Club
|title=Grass Stains
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Women's Fiction
+
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Being the editor of a style magazine has its perks: free tickets, free gigs, endless parties, alcohol and drugs. And that is what Louisa's life consists of – one continuous binge. Louisa spends her life going from one party to another, but it's not all it's cracked up to be and her life is starting to fall apart.
+
|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>009954119X</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1839942738
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Rachel Greenlaw
|author=DO Dodd
+
|title=Compass and Blade
|title=Jew
+
|rating=3.5
|rating=4
 
|genre=Literary Fiction
 
|summary=A man regains consciousness to find himself stifled. Pushing and pulling at the weight on top of him, he gradually realises the horrific truth. He's in a mass grave and he's covered with bodies. He has no memory of who he is or how he came to be there. He struggles out. He finds a uniform and he puts it on. He takes a gun and he buckles on its holster. He finds a man and a woman, naked on a bed. He shoots the man. He gets into a car and he drives into town, where he's greeted as the man in charge. 
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1842433512</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Keith Gray
 
|title=Losing It
 
|rating=5
 
 
|genre=Teens
 
|genre=Teens
|summary=Doing it for the first time... you know, ''Losing'' It. It.
+
|summary=''I can hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, the answering beat in my heart.''
 
 
Sex. They talk about it a lot, teenagers. And eventually, they do it. But when is the right time? Where is the right place? Who is the right person? Is everyone else doing it already? Will they be cheap if they do it too? Or will they be left behind on the peripheries of all that's important in life? And there's so much eagerness in teenagers - not just for sex, but for everything. They sure do hate to wait. But sometimes, it's better to wait. The trick for the poor things, I suppose, is knowing when exactly to stop waiting. And when you've never done it, how on earth can you possibly know that?!
 
  
Stepping into the breach come eight of my favourite writers in today's teen market, each with a story about virginity.  
+
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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849390991</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=0008664730
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=James Sherwood Metts
|author=Camilla Reid and Ailie Busby
+
|title=Planet Storyland
|title=Lulu's Loo
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=For Sharing
+
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=We've been here before, as Lulu introduced us to her [[Lulu's Shoes by Camilla Reid and Ailie Busby|shoes]], [[Lulu's Clothes by Camilla Reid and Ailie Busby|clothes]] and [[Lulu's Christmas by Camilla Reid and Ailie Busby|Christmas]]. Here, she's kind enough to show us all that goes on with her loo, nappies and potty. As before, there are plenty of interesting flaps to lift and things to explore.
+
|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>1408802651</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1736128426
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Matthew Tree
|author=Maria Edgeworth
+
|title=We'll Never Know
|title=Helen
+
|rating=4.5
|rating=3.5
 
 
|genre=Literary Fiction
 
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Sweet-tempered Helen Stanley has been left penniless and homeless after her uncle's death.  Soon her best friend Cecilia writes to encourage Helen to come and live with her and her new husband, General Clarendon at Clarendon Park. Helen soon finds herself settled in to Clarendon Park and reacquaints herself with Cecilia and more importantly with Cecilia's mother, Lady Davenant, who considers Helen a daughter, and even prefers her to Cecilia.
+
|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>0956003893</amazonuk>
+
|isbn= B0CVFXPGP8
 
}}
 
}}
 +
{{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=Nicholas Shakespeare
+
|isbn=1803364548
|title=Inheritance
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=Andy Larkham's life and career are going nowhere. He works for a small publishing house, Carpe Diem, that specialises in publishing self-help books, his fiancée is about to dump him and he has no money and mountains of debt. And that's before we begin to talk about his dysfunctional family. His only real role model was the Montaigne-loving teacher, Stuart Furnivall, whose funeral he is late for. But an unexpected inheritance of £17 million has a habit of changing one's outlook on life. But while he trades self-help for help yourself, Andy also realises that he has inherited a mystery.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846553156</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=1529900360
|author=Pamela Fudge
+
|title=The Ghost Orchid
|title=A Change For The Better
+
|author=Jonathan Kellerman
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Women's Fiction
+
|genre=Crime
|summary=
+
|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 cases. His 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 againShe 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?
Jo Farrell had spent all her life caring for other people. After she lost her alcoholic husband and her demanding, hypochondriac mother she had time for herself, but when she looked in the mirror she wasn't particularly impressed by what she sawThe middle-aged, slightly plump woman with grey curls reminded her of her mother and the clothes she was wearing did little to help eitherIt was something odd which helped her to change.  The very scruffy man from downstairs (the sort you would cross the road to avoid) came to borrow a newspaper and somehow they got talking about what needed to be done to change her life.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709090609</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=1529395224
|author=Cath Staincliffe
+
|title=Letting the Cat Out of the Bag: The Secret Life of a Vet
|title=The Kindest Thing
+
|author=Sion Rowlands
|rating=4
+
|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
+
|genre=Animals and Wildlife
|summary=Imagine that your partner of twenty or so years discovers that they are dying from a terminal diseaseNow imagine that they've asked you to help them to die a little sooner, on their own terms. What would you do?  This is the dilemma that faced Deborah and, after she went ahead and helped her husband Neil to die, she found herself charged and standing trial for murder with her own teenage daughter, Sophie, testifying against her.
+
|summary=Siôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentallyHis 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>1849012083</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=0861541774
|author=Peter James
+
|title=A Nye of Pheasants
|title=Dead Like You
+
|author=Steve Burrows
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Crime
 
|genre=Crime
|summary=Brighton is faced with a serial rapist who appears to have a fetish for shoes - after the rape, he removes the woman's shoes and takes them with him. Detective Superintendent Roy Grace is immediately reminded of a previous unsolved case that he was involved in several years before, during which a young girl disappeared, never to be found. It was precisely at that time that Grace's own wife, Sandy, disappeared and, although he is now having a child with another woman, he has never been able to forget Sandy. If the rapist has reared his ugly head again, why has he chosen to do so after so long? Could it be a copycat rapist? And will Grace's memories of Sandy help him to find some clue as to her disappearance?
+
|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 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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230706878</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Alexander McCall Smith
|author=Giorgio Faletti
+
|title=The Perfect Passion Company
|title=I Kill
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Crime
 
|summary=Monte Carlo: not generally a place associated with moderation and temperance of any kind and therefore probably the perfect setting for a killing spree by a serial killer with a particular fetish for extreme souvenir gathering.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849012954</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Eliza Graham
 
|title=Jubilee
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=As the village celebrates the Queen's Golden Jubilee two people can't help but think back to the Silver JubileeEvie Winter and her niece Rachel have vivid memories of the day when Evie's daughter Jessamy wandered off and the mystery of her disappearance has never been solvedShe was eleven years old, bright, athletic and loved by her mother and cousinThere would seem to be no explanation as to why she might have disappeared of her own free will and no evidence that she was abductedLife has carried on, but it has not been the same.  It has not been easy.
+
|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 whileKatie is coming out of a break up with a bad boyfriend, and so jumps at the chance to come home to EdinburghAnd 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…
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330509268</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1846976596
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=0811771741
|author=Jamie Rix
+
|title=InstaKnits for Baby
|title=The Incredible Luck of Alfie Pluck
+
|author=Melissa Leapman
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
+
|genre=Crafts
|summary=Poor Alfie PluckHe lives with his two aunts who are grotesquely disgusting, and who call him their Household Drudge.  They reminded me of some of Roald Dahl's most appalling creationsCompared to Alfie's aunts, Harry Potter's Dursley relatives are warm and friendlyAlfie is decidedly down on luck.
+
|summary=Melissa Leapman's ''InstaKnits for Baby'' gives us a collection of knits from toys to blanketsSome will be quick knits - others are of the 'long, cosy afternoons in front of the fire' varietyThe 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 useableI perhaps show my age when I wonder about 'social-media-worthy projects' but that's me being picky.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444001019</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Dean Koontz
|author=Anna Dale
+
|title=The Bad Weather Friend
|title=Magical Mischief
+
|rating=4.5
|rating=4
+
|genre=Paranormal
|genre=Confident Readers
+
|summary=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.
|summary=Mr Hardbattle runs a dusty old bookshop where magic has moved in. Its smell puts customers off and it regularly causes chaos such as the books rearranging themselves of their own accord. But this bookseller is a nice man who doesn’t want to disturb the magic too much by getting out the vacuum cleaner, and on the whole they get used to each other. Now though, he is facing a huge rent increase. Enter two customers, young Arthur and Miss Quint, who agree to help him find a nice new home for the magic, and to help look after the shop while Mr Hardbattle travels to visit some people who have answered an advert offering the magic a new home.
+
|isbn=1662500491
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408800438</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Adam Stower
|author=Michael Robotham
+
|title=Murray and Bun
|title=Bleed For Me
+
|rating=4.5
|rating=4
+
|genre=Confident Readers
|genre=General Fiction
+
|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 twoBut 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…
|summary=An ex-detective is found dead in a pool of blood in his teenager's bedroom.  She runs from the scene of the crime.  Is this the easiest cut-and-dried case ever?  This novel is told in the first person by the investigating psychologist, Professor Joe O'Loughlin.  He's got a lot going on in his life right nowHis health is not good so he's to keep popping pills to try and get through another working day.  He's also newly separated and his daughters seem to talk a completely different language.  He feels old and very ragged round the edges.  Into this mix, he discovers that the teenager everyone is talking about, the teenager who's been discussed and described as a cold-blooded killer, is his daughter's best friend.  Could his life get any worse, he thinks.  Yes.  Big-time.
+
|isbn=0008561249
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847442188</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=B0C47LV1PC
|author=Cathy Hopkins
+
|title=Fragility
|title=Million Dollar Mates
+
|author=Mosby Woods
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Teens
+
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=It's nine months since Jess Hall's mother died and she's still finding it difficult to come to terms with what's happened.  She and her brother Charlie have been living with Gran but all that's about to change.  Jess' Dad has got the job of general manager at Number 1, Porchester Park.  These apartments are not just up-market they're where the A-listers live and after some initial reluctance about leaving Gran Jess is excited.  There's an Olympic-size pool where she can swim and both she and Charlie will be able to have their own rooms in the house that goes with the job. Everyone at school envies here and it looks as though she's living the dream.
+
|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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847387578</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
+
''Fragility'' is set as the city of Portland, Oregon, cautiously begins to emerge from the restrictions imposed during the covid pandemic
|author=Catherine O'Flynn
 
|title=The News Where You Are
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=The main character in this novel is Frank Allcroft.  Husband, father, son and also a bit of a minor celebrity as he's beamed into the region's television screens nightly, presenting the local news.  Make that minor with a small 'm'.  He comes across as a likeable, middle-aged man, content with his lot and with his home life.  But he does have some personal issues to attend to.  In particular, his grumpy, sometimes forgetful, elderly mother who is now living in a retirement home.  Mother and son give each other lots of grief on a regular basis.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670918555</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 +
{{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?

Revision as of 07:59, 8 May 2024

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Review of

The Wrong Shoes by Tom Percival

5star.jpg Confident Readers

Will's life is difficult, in a multitude of ways. He is bullied because he has 'the wrong shoes', he has the 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 the college, was working a cash-in-hand job on a building site and had an accident. Throw into that mix the fact that his mum and dad are separated, and Will's life seems bleak in every direction. And yet, he still has a tiny 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. Full Review

0356522776.jpg

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

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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

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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

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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

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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

{{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?