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[[Category:New Reviews|General Fiction]]==General fiction==__NOTOC__{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Rachel DeWoskinJenny Lecoat|title=Repeat After MeBeyond Summerland

|summary=September 1989: It is a few months after Jean lives on Jersey with her mother where they are celebrating the end of the occupation. During the Tiananmen Square massacre in Beijingwar, China. Aysha is teaching English at Jean's father was arrested for listening to a private language school in New York City. She makes friends with some banned radio and soldiers took him away one night, leaving Jean and her mother waiting for years for news of her studentshim. Da Ge is angry As the British finally free the Channel islands from the Nazis, and disruptive yet attractive and interesting at the same timewar is finally over, and their hopes rise that they quickly become involved, although his interest in her is not as romantic will finally learn what became of him. But will the truth come asa relief, perhaps, she would like or will it to be. He asks her to marry him so he can stay in raise further questions around what else happened during the war? Who was the informer who told the country. Aysha agrees, although there is still a lot she does not know Nazis about the mysterious, unstable Da Ge.radio? And what other secrets have been kept throughout the occupation?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0715638998</amazonuk>1846976537

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jonathan CoeOnyi Nwabineli|title=The Terrible Privacy of Maxwell SimAllow Me to Introduce Myself|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=Meet Maxwell Sim. Actually, perhaps I should rephrase that so that it doesn't sound like an imperative instruction - for if you do meet him, you might not like the experience. An ex-salesman, he's now in after sales (ie he's stuck on a customer returns counter in a department store); however he is completely awful with regards to other people. His wife has run off with their daughter, all his few friends have forsaken him (and his Facebook wall). We start the book with him trying to patch things up with his father, who's safely in Australia. He finds all those who know of him are already aware he's depressed. Those who don't know him can find him painfully shy, or able to talk away their will to live, gabbling on and on about Watford. But a lot is about to change. He's about to be combined with some people excited about green toothbrushes.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670917389</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Amanda Sington-Williams|title=The Eloquence of Desire|rating=3.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=The novel starts in the post-war austerity years in England and centres around a middle-class, traditional family unit. Sington-Williams gives the reader a detailed description of that period - the bland food, the monotony of commuting to London (some things don't change) and of course, the rain. George, his wife Dorothy and their teenage daughter Susan don't really talk to each other. They tend to skirt round issues and walk on eggshells. Appearances are everything. So a suitably fabricated story is told to their small, family circle of George's company move. George has no choice in the matter. So he does what he always has done up till now, he puts a brave face on for the world and grins and bears it. It's a huge change in their domestic situation. Uprooted to a strange, foreign, tropical country they've only glimpsed in National Geographic.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907230114</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Nikki Dudley|title=Ellipsis|rating=3.5

|summary=Both Anuri spent her childhood on display to the title world, thanks to her step-mother Ophelia's increasingly popular presence on social media, where she posted every step of Anuri's childhood for sponsorships and book cover are slick influencer deals and glossy, basically, monetary gain. Can the contents live up Now Anuri is in her twenties and she is slowly trying to regain her confidence and to get her life back, suing her step-mother to this positive image? Straight away take down the reader is drawn into Daniel's life content about her... but the clock Anuri is tickingbattling alcoholism, failing to start her PhD, undergoing therapy and secretly abusing people online and receiving money from them for doing so. He will soon be spoken Most importantly, she is desperately worried about in her little sister, who is the past tensenew focus of Ophelia's online empire. He dies Can she save her sister, and leaves many, many questions that his immediate family struggle to answer. But as perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the story progresses we discover that secrets have been kept for a long same time. Why? Too disturbing to reveal?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1907230106</amazonuk>0861546873

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Austin Wright1529153298|title=Tony and SusanThe List of Suspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey

|summary=Edward Sheffield hadnIt't exactly been Susans 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly...) She's not what's worrying Miv's childhood sweetheartfamily, but after a family tragedy left him homeless he came to live with Susan and her parents for a year so that he could finish schoolthough. Women have been disappearing. Susan didnWell, they't particularly want him there ve been murdered, but accepted that it was the right thing to dohave 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Years later they met at university when Edward was studying law and after a short relationship they married. The marriage wasnMiv't entirely successful; Edward gave up law to become a writer, relying on Susans upset because she's teaching income overheard that her father wants to support them, but whilst he spent a month away in a remote cabin move the family 'to find himselfDown South' Susan found Arnold instead. Many years – and three children – later Susan receives When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a manuscript from Edwardfrightening, foreign place, best avoided. She wasFor Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, he saidSharon, always his best critic and he would like she'll do anything to prevent that. She's not worried about the dangers or that her opinionMum's stopped talking - to anyone.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848870205</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jess Walter1035906708|title=The Financial Lives of the PoetsDiva|author=Daisy Goodwin

|summary=There is a certain type We tend to think of modern fiction I just cannot get along with. It's a narrative that features a concentration on a main character that goes through his plot with unhappinessMaria Callas as Greek, making wrong decisions perhapsbut she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, getting crapped on by lifeNew York, in December 1923 and discussing his woes with the readeronly moved to Athens when she was thirteen. I get Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 'Callas' to the end and think nothing of make it, until I read more manageable in the blurb, where I find the book States. When she was supposed to be hilariously funny, the character an insincere cypher back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for our lives and times, and the whole thing an ironic masterpiece her voice - I should have been disbelieving, disagreeing and dis-everything else with she was raised under the hapless hero. I hate such books - I always only see the sincerity in the narrative, Nazi occupation by a mother who mercilessly exploited her and never the comedy. Thankfullymade no secret of her preference for her elder sister, such is never the case with this bookJackie.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141049138</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Carlos Ruiz ZafonAlexander McCall Smith|title=The Prince of MistPerfect Passion Company|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=During World War Two, Max's father decides to move the whole family to a seaside retreat he knows of - a wooden house far away from the city he's grown his family up in. Nobody seems too keen on the idea, neither of Max's sisters, his mother, nor he - and Max is gifted a pocket watch by his loving, talented mechanic cum engineer cum watchmaker of a father, enscribed as "Max's Time Machine". But the house they move to, and its surroundings, are full of more successful time machines - a stash of early home videos, a public clock that runs backwards, a sunken shipwreck, a yard full of statues of a stone circus... And let's not forget the mysterious, spider-eating cat that joins in with proceedings. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0297856421</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Danielle Trussoni|title=Angelology|rating=4

|summary=The Nephilim have lived among Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the human race since before online apps in providing a more personal, tailored service. Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and look after the days 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 Great Floodchance to come home to Edinburgh. Horrific creatures, the hybrid children of humans and angels And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, their strengthbringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, beauty thanks to 44 Scotland Street and cruelty are unmatchedthe Isabel Dalhousie novels, and they have infiltrated human society completelybut with some new characters who quickly begin to charm. For centuries, Katie has no experience in running a secret societybusiness, students or in a branch of theology known as 'Angelologymatch-making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, and there's always her very helpful (and rather handsome) neighbour, have studied the ways of the heavens and the NephilimWilliam, and waged to lend a secret war against them – a war that has spanned every continent. But the Nephilim grow weak, their blood contaminated by the blood of their human ancestors.hand…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0718155580</amazonuk>1846976596

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Joanne HarrisDean Koontz|title=BlueeyedboyThe Bad Weather Friend|rating=4.5|genre=General FictionParanormal|summary=BB - or ''blueyedboy'' in his online persona - Benny is having a middle-aged man who lives with his mother in the Yorkshire town of Malbryterrifically bad day. He has a dead-end loses his job in a hospital although his mother would have it that , he's of some importance. BB has a way of escaping loses his rather boring life; he writes murderous fantasies on fiancee, and his website in company with other misfits, some of whom he knows in real lifehouse gets trashed. It might be fiction on ''badguysrock'' but he Oh, and Albertine share someone has delivered a troubled history and BB's manipulation of friends and enemies causes his past to unravel.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0385609507</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Ned Beauman|title=Boxerreally weird, Beetle|rating=3|genre=General Fiction|summary=According disturbing coffin-sized object to the blurb for Boxer, Beetlehis home, and it'This s possible that whoever or whatever was inside isa novel for people with breeding… It the thing that has trashed his house! The thing is clever. It , Benny is distinctivethe very last person to deserve all this bad luck. It He is entertaininga nice person. We hope you are too A really nice person.' I like about half of So fortunately for Benny it, sodoes turns out that mean I'm on the way delivery to being those things?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340998393</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Craig Silvey|title=Jasper Jones|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=The title and central character of this book, Jasper Jones his house is a no-usernew friend, a trouble-maker and bad weather friend called Spike, who has, for some reason in his hour of need, sought been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from an unlikely sourcenefarious forces for being a good person. Charlie Bucktin. Charlie Spike is a rather bookishgoing to take care of Benny, quietand will certainly take care of Benny's enemies, unassuming teenager. And although both boys live in the town of Corriganif he, until nowBenny, and Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they haven't spoken a word to each other. They live in different worlds. Until now, that isare.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099537540</amazonuk>1662500491

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Thomas MullenKatherine Howe|title=The Many Deaths of the Firefly BrothersA True Account

|summary=The country Hannah Masury is living in deep recessionBoston, having been sent to live with a family who run an inn, and being made to work there from a young age. The economy has collapsed When she hears there is to be a hanging of some pirates in the town, she decides to go and watch. The banks are hated Enthralled and therehorrified in equal measure, Hannah finds herself embroiled in a young boy's 'death at the next round hands of politicianstwo vicious pirates. She hides away, assuring us so that they were not afflicted by the same lack of vision as their predecessorsdon'. Does this sound at all familiar? But just when you think you have strayed into the non-fiction aislet find and kill her too, it all becomes clear. This is 1930s America - full of gangstersand then to escape them completely she runs away to sea, speakeasies, tommy guns, fedoras, beautiful heiresses, bumbling cops dressing as a boy and joining the newly formed FBI, daring bank robberies and kidnapsnotorious Ned Low's pirate ship as a cabin boy. Yes, She soon finds herself in the gang thick of things when there is all herea mutiny on board, but 'The Many Deaths and from there we are caught up in her rip roaring tale of life on the Firefly Brothers' is a lot more than your average gangster book and it's a hugely fun storyocean waves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0007340826</amazonuk>0861547438

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Alexander McCall Smith1471180158|title=The Dog Who Came In From The Cold (Corduroy Mansions)Maybe Tomorrow|author=Penny Parkes

|summary=AhJamie Matson works in an upper-class grocery store, bliss! To sit down once more to an Alexander McCall Smith story and wish only for someone thoughtful to come and serve me tea and biscuits whilst I read! We are back, once again, a man who's a control freak with all the residents subtlety of Corduroy Mansions to earwig on their conversationsa half brick. Jamie's son, Bo, their private thoughts 'has his problems'. He's asthmatic andthe more you read, of course, to catch up with what every onethe more you'll suspect that he's favourite dog, Freddie de la Hay, has been getting up toon the autistic spectrum. Written once again in serial format for The Daily Telegraph each Sometimes Jamie needs to take time off at short chapter is notice - she's a gem, frequent flier in the local A&E and all sometimes Bo's not fit enough to go to school. Missed shifts or the characters we met previously need to be away on time to pick Bo up from school are occasions when Jamie can be controlled and put in Corduroy Mansions are back again the wrong. It was going to come to entertain usa head.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846971616</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Mari StrachanB0CKD1L5JL|title=The Earth Hums in B FlatRadio Free Olympia|author=Jeffrey Dunn|rating=54

|summary=Choosing a child as Petr is an orphan. Rescued by the viewpoint character of a novel requires confidence strange, reclusive Bear, he is brought up far from bustling cities and imagination. To succeed is to convince busy human society, in the reader forests of events at two levels – the childWashington's world within the adult world surrounding herOlympic Peninsula. The very best novels about childhood, like say Harper Lee's classic, 'To Kill After Bear dies and a Mockingbird', also reflect a wider cultural truth. In 'The Earth Hums brief sojourn in B Flat'human company, a claustrophobic Welsh village is both protection and straitjacket as the characters struggle to cope armed with their family secrets. If that sounds only a bit tackypirate radio transmitter, fear notPetr goes on a journey through the forest, because broadcasting the viewpoint character, Gwennistrange, is all whippet wild and sharp cornersrarely heard voices he encounters.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847673058</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Brady UdallSarah Marsh|title=The Lonely PolygamistA Sign of Her Own|rating=43.5

|summary=Golden Richards bursts onto the printed pageAfter a bout of scarlet fever as a child, Ellen Lark loses her hearing. He is the central character and let's be honest, without him there would be no wivesSuddenly plunged into a world of silence, no children, no complicated domestic everything about her life - make that, domestic liveschanges. Immediately I pictured Golden Living in my mind's eyea time when the use of sign language was seen as something only savages do, as Ellen is sent to a Homer Simpson type - school where she is taught to lip read, but with lots more childrenphysically restrained from signing. He's a bumblingFrom here, blustering, bear of she ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the deaf and using a mansystem called Visible Speech. It's as if he's just 'turned At the same time, Bell is working on other inventions and ideas, and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up' for the conception in a complicated tangle of his children, just idly ambled along when they were bornespionage.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0224078062</amazonuk>1035401614

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Helen SlavinB0BC3YTCMR|title=The Stopping PlaceGood Girls Die|author=Ayura Ayira

|summary=How often do you pick up a book with no idea at all where it ''This story is likely to lead? How often does such a book still have you wondering a hundred pages in? Not bemused, not lost, absolutely sure that it is going to lead somewhere, but still with no clue as to exactly wherefor everyone. How often do you get to the end of a book and think, simply, "Wow!"?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847391869</amazonuk>}}''

{{newreview|author=Naomi Alderman|title=Lavender Daniels was three weeks short of her fifteenth birthday when The Lessons|rating=3Incident happened.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=James has been used to being She was a very clever at schoolbright student, a bit too nerdy if truth be told, and suffered from vitiligo - people were afraid to hug her in case it 's contagious. It's not easy being a black girl whose skin is 84% white. She had a shock for him when he goes to Oxford University to find there are lots of people who are more able than crush on seventeen-year-old Reggie Anderson but never thought he iswould notice her. He is already struggling when Then he falls did: Lavender was very good at math and seriously hurts Reggie asked if she would tutor him. She readily agreed: tutoring was something she gladly did at church: this was just an extension. She went to his knee, house and he is also very lonelyraped her. Then he meets Jess In shock, who invites she even allowed him to give her a party at Mark’s house. Mark soon invites Jess, James and other friends to move in to his run down mansionlift home.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670916293</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Christy Lefteri1472263936|title=A Watermelon, a Fish and a BibleThe Figurine|author=Victoria Hislop|rating=4.5

|summary=It is 20 July 1974 was in 1968 that Helena McCloud made her first trip to Greece. She was alone: her mother, Greek by birth, had left the small coastal town of Kyreniafamily home and refused to return, Cyprusbut Mary and Hamish (Helena's parents) felt that it would be a pity if Helena grew up without knowing her grandparents or understanding her Greek heritage. The radio continues Her trip to report that the Turkish forces did not manage family apartment in up-market Kolonaki would be the first of several annual visits. She grew to invadelove her grandmother and the family's maid, Dina, but was wary - and that they were thrown back into the seafrightened - of her grandfather, even as retired general Stamatis Papagiannis. He was proud of his close connections to the Greek Cypriot population realises that they have been invadedJunta and expected his family to uphold his values but saw no reason to accommodate them. The story of this novel is set over just eight days, His prejudices included Helena's red hair and is told green eyes - inherited from the alternating viewpoints of three charactersher father's Scottish ancestors.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849161275</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Heidi W DurrowDean Koontz|title=The Girl Who Fell From the SkyAfter Death|rating=3.5

|summary=Set in 1980s AmericaMichael Mace, Head of Security, at a top secret biological research facility, ''The Girl Who Fell From The Sky'' is among 55 people who die when a story built around a tragic event virus is released in a young girl’s childhoodbio-hazard accident. The opening scene introduces you to RachelFinding himself in a makeshift mortuary, an elusive young girlcovered in plastic, not blackhe has a sense that something very, not white but ''light skinned-ed'' as she is packed off very bad has happened to live with her grandma after a devastating family event. Immediately, Durrow highlights race him – and identity only him – as the primary themes, he sits up and we follow blue-eyed Rachel as she struggles between two worlds – looks around at the white world shrouded bodies of her Danish mother, his dead friends and the other black world of her African-American Gformer colleagues.I As he recovers his senses, he realises that there is something different about him; he can ''feel'' everything. father ''Everything''. Michael isn't ''Michael'' anymore.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1851687459</amazonuk>1662500467}} {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Diane ChamberlainB0BVDC2VWH|title=Before the StormThe Grave Listeners|author=William Frank

|summary=We're first introduced to Laurel's son, Andy. He's a teenager with some sort of mental disorder. He's the pivotal character of the story The village is isolated and he's also the undisputed starpoor. I recently read ''HenryIt's Sisters'' surrounded by Cathy Lamb and decided that every family should have a HenryWitching Forest. Now I'll enlarge on that And the villagers subsist largely by saying that every family should have a Henry farming Uphegia plants - or an Andy. Both of these teenagers are 99% innocent and adorable its bread- it's that other 1% that is worrying. Andy's descriptions of people, places like fruit provides nutrition and situations are truly uniqueits blossom provides herbal medicines. He has a language all The black wood of his own. So immediately, as a reader, I was drawn right into the world of Andy forest provides heat and therefore right into the heart of the story.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0778303381</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Ninni Holmqvist|title=The Unit|rating=5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Dorrit inhabits a world where society is split into two camps. Not male or female, or young or oldwarmth, but those who are Necessary and an asset to their communities versus those who are Dispensable and a drain roofs on civilization. It’s not a birth right, nor a class firmly established from childhoodhomes, and everyone gets the chance to make a good go of it. Buteven gallows, if you’re a childless woman needed. The fear of 50, or a childless man of 60, being buried alive is an existential superstition in the village and not working in a ‘needed’ industry your time that is up, and you are quietlythe reason Volushka, and without any fuss, transported to a Second Reserve Bank Unit for Biological Material (‘the Unit’) where you will spend the rest of your days. Here you will participate in any number of psychological and physiological experimentsdrunken, donate cells for research and give up your body parts one by one as Needed people require themself-indulgent, until the day lazy lout of your final donation when you ultimately and rather ironically become a valuable member of society by losing your lifeman is tolerated.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1851687440</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sue RulliereB0BYF82CXT|title=Cinema BlueSemi-Detached|author=Deborah Stone

|summary=Frankie is a twenty nine year old woman ''Bill and Amanda are living in Paris and working a semi-detached house, stuck in a supermarket while she tries to put her life back together after a split from her husband. The split, depressing rut of boredom and what led up to it, was clearly distressingdisappointment, when Terry and exactly what happened is revealed through a series of flashbacks to the time when Frankie was Francesca, whose life was controlled by her husband, JP. The news that JP has had an accident throws Frankie into confusionFiona – glamorous, because it seems that he turned to drink after she left him successful and she blames herselfvery much in love – move in next door. In the meantimeDespite their different outlooks on life, Frankie is entering into a relationship with the enigmatic Antoine, who couples befriend each other and life appears to be doing something rather strange in the flat below hersimprove for both pairs. Will Frankie be able to retain her new identity? Will the relationship with Antoine go anywhereBut all is not what it seems, or is he just as bad and their increasingly interconnected relationships are fated for her as JP was?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>190452947X</amazonuk>tragedy.''

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Bobbie DarbyshireShalini Boland|title=Love, Revenge and Buttered SconesThe Silent Bride|rating=43

|summary=Three people Alice and Seth are travelling on a train heading to Invernessmatch made in heaven. He is everything she has been searching for; handsome, accomplished, clever, funny; total and utter husband-material. She is all he could possibly want in a wife; beautiful, successful, confident… and so the inevitable proposal is eagerly accepted by Alice and the wedding is planned and set. Their destination When the much-anticipated day arrives, Alice is walked down the townaisle by her father, beaming with pride and excitement as she surveys the congregation – their friends assembled to celebrate this joyful day and when Seth turns to face his approaching bride, Alice's library where world implodes because she has absolutely no idea who the book group meets on man at the last Friday of each month. They each have their own reasons altar is, who is waiting for going but none of them realise that the weekend is going her to have far reaching consequences for them allbecome his wife.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1905207379</amazonuk>1662507089

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Christine Dwyer Hickey1787636003|title=Last Train From LiguriaThe Girls of Summer|author=Katie Bishop|rating=45

|summary=The heroine in this novel is BellaIt was the summer when Rachel Evans turned eighteen that she and Caroline went backpacking around Greece and arrived on the island. SheRachel wasn's a rather unassuming young woman who has had a rather unassuming childhood - save for the fact that t exactly innocent but she was motherless at , perhaps, naive, so when thirty-four-year-old Alistair Wright started to take an early age and interest in her relationship with the father is a little strained, to say the leastshe was flattered rather than wary. Bella needs It was quite a while before he made any sort of physical approach to breatheher and by that time she was obsessed by him. So she leaves the drizzle of England Alistair worked for Henry Taylor, looking after his interests on the blue skies island and heat of Italy. Her father has propelled her into ''gentle'' employment there. She's tentative about in particular in the bar where all the whole thing but warms to it by degreesgirls either worked or partied.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1843549883</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=David EaglemanAmanda Craig|title=Sum: Tales from the AfterlivesThree Graces

|genre=Literary General Fiction|summary=For some reason I find myself unable to start this reviewFew styles of contemporary fiction interest me like the state-of-the-nation novel. So IThere'll mention this book starts with s something so utterly compelling about any writer who can catch hold of the atmosphere of the endday and capture it, and see where we go from therecrafting an image of the country as it stands in one particular moment. Of course, To say thatAmanda Craig is skilled at doing this would be embarrassingly inadequate: she's practically synonymous with the key – genre of contemporary social fiction at this book does just that – starts with point. She has such a gift for weaving the end ongoing issues of our human life here on Earth (or wherever you happen to be reading this) and posits forty possibilities the day into the lives of what happens thereafter, her characters in the hereafter. It's not so much 'Five People You Meet a way that feels natural and lived-in Heaven' as 'Forty Heavens you Might Meet People In', never making them ciphers for social commentary but instead fully realised people, grappling with issues far larger than themselves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1847674283</amazonuk>140871468X

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John Buchan152915118X|title=Sick Heart RiverPineapple Street|author=Jenny Jackson

|summary=This was ''Pineapple Street'' is the story of three women: Sasha, Darley and Georgiana. Darley and George are sisters and Sasha is married to their brother Cord. They're Stocktons, only Sasha isn't a surprise for meStockton by birth so she isn't readily accepted into the tribe. It’s rare for a book The problem's exacerbated when the clan matriarch, Tilda, asks Cord and Sasha if they'd like to come move into the Pineapple Street property. Tilda and Chip have renovated and downsized to my attention from the reviewing gods that’s another property, a rerelease street or so away, which they own. They won't need any of a 1930s novelthe furniture from Pineapple Street, so Sasha and one that surfaced a couple of years ago nowCord can move straight in. But when it strikes me as startlingly ConradianNominally, updated for they had a choice but that wasn't the times, reality. Darley and perfectly able Georgiana start to stand alongside one of literature’s greats, then it’s just a sign those reviewing gods are on call Sasha 'the gold digger'. She's living in ''their'' family home. They use it so often that they abbreviate it to 'the ballGD'.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184697030X</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=David SartofEmily Critchley|title=River of JudgementOne Puzzling Afternoon

|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=Finn Jackson 84 year old Edie has lived in the same small town for almost her whole life, but now she is facing a move as her son wants to move to another house and bring Edie to live with his family, as Edie is an oilmanstarting to lose her memory. However, Edie is tormented by the memory of her childhood friend, Lucy, who went missing over 60 years ago, an engineer and he's developed the worry that there was a new way of extracting oil which doesn't ravage secret she was keeping for Lucy that somehow might be the countryside in thing that reveals the way truth of traditional methodswhat happened all that time ago. HeAfter 's set up a company seeing' Lucy in the high street, just as she was the last time she saw her, she starts to take advantage find pockets of this along with his friend Aaron Philips, who's the money manmemories coming back to her. He's short of an operations manager – And yet as she remembers the past, she is forgetting more and has been for a while – after the tragic death of Shufang Su more in a site accidenther day to day life. She was a geologist but had apparently flouted safety regulations Will she uncover the truth about Lucy's disappearance before her move, and you know that there before her memories are going to be repercussions from her death.gone forever?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0956415202</amazonuk>1804181250

Told from a retrospective view, a young woman unravels the year-long relationship that once defined her. Overlaid with later wisdom, the narrator relives the affair with a man twenty years her senior from its inception – the summer after finishing university – to its sorrowful end the summer after. Set against the backdrop of an isolated Australian coastal town ''Thirst for Salt'' details the 24-year-old narrator's deepening relationship with her older lover, depicting its all-consuming nature, how it changed her perspective on both romantic and familial relationships and how it altered her irrevocably.|isbn=0861546490}}{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Robert Dickinson0008506337|title=The Noise of StrangersGarnett Girls|author=Georgina Moore|rating=3.5

|summary=In a dystopian Brighton where the Council The love affair between Margo Garnett and the Amex company are the only major employerspoet Richard O'Leary was all-consuming, and council departments have very different purposes to those apparently on both sides. Margo was just sixteen when they have fell in our own country today love. Richard was twenty- notably the sinister Parks - four couples share dinner parties one and discuss described by Margo's mother as little as possible, due 'an older man'. Her parents worried that Richard's influence would take her away from what they felt she could achieve - going to Oxford and having a glittering career. In the problems event, they have trusting each othereloped and Richard took her away from the Isle of Wight. When Margo did go to Oxford and went on to become a Councillor is killed well-respected journalist. The couple had three children: Rachel, Imogen and Sasha. Life was lived in a car crashLondon and holidays were spent at Sandcove, and one the family home on the Isle of Wight. Even then the couples witness it, it triggers a by-election which leads doubts about Richard's drinking were never far from Margo's mind: ''she would never be able to political manouevring which theyleave him in charge''re all caught up in.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095625151X</amazonuk>Then Richard left them.

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Assaf Gavron1914585402|title=Croc-AttackDashboard Elvis is Dead|author=David F Ross

|summary=Eitan Enoch is known as Croc to his friends. I reviewed David F Ross's book [[There's Only One Danny Garvey by David F Ross|There's Only One Danny Garvey]] a good reason but couple of years back and remember being absolutely floored by how powerful and affecting it's about to become rather more famous than Croc would likewas. It's begins on the morning that he takes his regular bus to work – the Little Number 5 – and a fellow passenger worries about the dark-skinned man with was a suit bag who's sitting at the front. Just before Croc gets off at his stop he asks why people are so paranoid gripping, emotionally wounding read, and wonders whether rereading my review of it's impossible for dark-skinned guys with suit bags to get my main takeaway was that I might not have lavished enough praise on buses any moreit.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007327463</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Heather GudenkaufLucy Ashe|title=The Weight of SilenceClara and Olivia

|summary=On a hot August morning in The year is 1933. The place? Sadler's Wells. Ballerinas Clara and Olivia are sisters, twins no less. Identical on the small town of Willow Creekoutside but not, Iowawe learn, Calli Clark and Petra Gregory are reported missingon the inside. They are both seven years oldAnd not on stage, live in the same streeteither. Because there's a lot that builds a dancer. Some things that can be taught or learnt – discipline, attention to detail – and are some things, that ''je ne sais quoi'', that don't come from the very best of friendsclassroom. Calli has suffered from selective mutism from the age of four when she witnessed A stage presence, a charm, a traumatic event in her home''joie de vivre''. As The difference between a result Petra has become Calli’s voicehard-worker, speaking for her and is even able to tell others what Calli is thinkinga star.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0778303691</amazonuk>0861544080

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Katherine Hall PageHeather Fawcett|title=The Body in the BasementEmily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries

|summary=The central character with Emily Wilde is an expert academic scholar on faerie lore, and she has travelled extensively, and researched meticulously, to write her life's work, the unforgettable name very first encyclopaedia of Pix is one of those 'apple pie' momsfaeries. The family Whilst she is brilliant at research and speaking to faeries, she is her lifenot so good with people. Every summerSo when she finds herself far, far North in the small village of Hrafvsnik, most members de-camp to having somehow offended the coastvillage matriarch, she is not sure what she has done, nor how to get away from it all, recharge redeem herself and put her final investigations for her book back on the batteriesright track. But this particular yearEnter Wendell Bambleby, her dashingly handsome and insufferable rival who arrives unexpectedly, Pix notesall charm and delight, is going much to be a Emily''summer of womens frustration.'' Pix But why is he here? What does he want? And what exactly is a middle-aged, middle-of-going on with the-road, ordinary person ... until she makes some gruesome discoveries.faerie folk around Hravsnik?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0709090390</amazonuk>0356519120

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Aifric Campbell1398515388|title=The Loss AdjustorBoy and the Dog|author=Seishu Hase and Alison Watts (translator)

|summary=Caro's job is to 'adjust' people's lossesFirst of all, it was the earthquake, deep in the ocean floor, which created the tsunami and this, in turn, caused the nuclear meltdown. Working for a large insurance company, she deals day to day with people grieving for their lost or stolen belongings The result was complete and utter devastation. Digital cameras with priceless honeymoon photos The deaths were uncountable, laptops with work files and engagement rings. It's Caro's responsibility to assess the case and decide on whether to financially reimburse or notloss of livelihoods was widespread. But Caro knows well The fact that sometimes it's not about many pets were separated from their owners came far down the list of priorities but - six months after the moneytsunami - Kazumasa Nakagaki discovered a dog outside a convenience store. Her job requires emotional sensitivity and He wasn't a dog person but the sort of manner convenience store owner's comment that invites people he would call Public Health prompted Kazumasa to open up to you. Her years of experience have made her an expert his car door and Tamon the dog jumped in dealing with everyone else's loss. But not her own.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846687306</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Bill SheehyChristopher Bowden|title=The Argentine KidnappingMr Magenta|rating=3.54

|summary=Son Cardonsky Christopher Bowden's latest novel is the type a patient untangling of guy that would make even the biggest a seemingly ordinary woman's life, carried out by her nephew after she has died. The aunt who always provided a safe harbour and a little bit of cowards want indulgence to take on the playground bully on their behalf. Which, funnily enough, is how Bernie Gould acquires Son Cardonsky as his 'best-friend-forever'; at least, a young nephew had had a much more interesting life than that is, Son considers Bernie nephew Stephen had ever realised and it seems to him an obligation to be his best friend in the world, even if Bernie can't quite see find it the same wayall out.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0709089945</amazonuk>B0B6Z9VJDW

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=David AbbottJennifer Mason|title=The Upright Piano PlayerPartitions of Unity

|summary=The central characterHere at Bookbag Towers, one Mr Henry Cage (he'd approve of the courteous form of address) is whitewe first met Elizabeth Cromwell, dominatrix and unintentional detective in [[Preposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery by Jennifer Mason|Preposterous]], middle-aged when she investigated and middle-class. He appears to have unravelled a perfect, enviable lifeseries of disappearances. Reaping the substantial rewards In ''Partitions of a successful business, heUnity''s acquired along the way a lovely London home, she sets her mind to solving a wife and a familymurder.. All boxes ticked, you'd think.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1906694842</amazonuk>B09LQR9FRF

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Joanna DaviesWill Carver|title=FreshersThe Daves Next Door|rating=3.54

|summary=Going Five strangers come together in one moment as a suicide bomber prepares to Uni is meant to be one of the best times of your lifedetonate his vest on a London tube line...that first taste of freedom from your familyAs their fates overlap, learning independencethe story is told in backwards order, meeting new friends and discovering who you are. Oh, and a little studying of course! This book charts leading up to the first 'fresher' year of three students, Lois, Cerys and Hywel who are studying at Aberystwyth University during 1991/1992. I was interested because I did my first degree just a couple of years after this, and also I studied a post grad at Aberystwyth. Turns out this wasn't exactly a nice happy trip down memory lane however..fateful moment.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1906784140</amazonuk>1914585186}} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=D J TaylorJennifer Mason|title=Ask AlicePreposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery

|summary=The central character Alice''A struggling poetry zine, has had a humble start mom-and-pop mobile diner in life but ' ... the silence of Northern California redwoods, a 400-meter hurdler who just missed the Kansas flat ... and the distant murmur of the freight trains 2004 Olympics, a women' is not s track coach with a yen for her. She dreams bullwhips, a billionaire with a state-of -the bright lights of the big cities and although she is naive and unworldly-art S&M dungeon, a man serving a life sentence in Alabama, an enigmatic signature, K(s, x), on a cheap oil painting, fancies herself as an actresserotic art dealer in Georgia. Painful and difficult decisions are made as she reaches for her goal. Her talent and resourcefulness see her through; give her a modest roof above her head in this precarious profession.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099531984</amazonuk>}}''

{{newreview|author=Rhys Thomas|title=The Suicide Club|rating=4.5|genre=Teens|summary=Craig Bartlett-Taylor's third attempt at killing himself This is nearly successful – except when he announces in class that he's taken just a whole bottle sample of pills, new boy Frederick Spaulding-Carter steps the cast of characters and settings in and saves his lifePreposterous. Freddy attains instant celebrity as a heroAs you can see, and our narrator Richard Harper is as impressed as anyone elsesome keeping up will be required! The basic premise of this mystery story goes like this...|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0552774979</amazonuk>B09STS96HS

{{newreview|author=Richard Flanagan|title=Wanting|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=Read the blurb Move on the back of Flanagan's ''Wanting,'' and you'll think it's the usual post colonial tale of Britain as enemy number one, ''wanting'' to impose its rule on everyone else. In a way it is such a tale, but what makes it more interesting is the story of a little girl caught up in the wider historical events.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848870779</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Patricia Duncker|title=The Strange Case of the Composer and His Judge|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=It's rural France, and 2000 is barely begun, when hunters come across a spread of human corpses in the mountains. Several families, all in the same cult, seem to have killed themselves on their path to wherever. If so, this is a problem, for the last time it happened, in Switzerland a few years previous, nobody could work out why – and who was there to dispose of some of the evidence. This isn't a problem for the policeman involved, as he fell desperately in love with the investigative judge in collaborating on the initial case. Combining again, they see a link with everybody involved in both cases, a famous conductor /composer.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408807041</amazonuk>}}[[Newest Graphic Novels Reviews]]