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[[Category:General Fiction|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|General Fiction]]==General fiction==__NOTOC__{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Manu JosephJenny Lecoat|title=Serious MenBeyond Summerland
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Ayyan Mani is a Dalit, an untouchableJean lives on Jersey with her mother where they are celebrating the end of the occupation. During the war, stuck in a flat in MumbaiJean's slums but hoping, somehowfather was arrested for listening to a banned radio and soldiers took him away one night, leaving Jean and her mother waiting for a better future years for his sonnews of him. Working at As the British finally free the Insitute of Theory Channel islands from the Nazis, and Research he uses all his cunning and wiles to stay ahead the war is finally over, their hopes rise that they will finally learn what became of him. But will the truth come as a relief, or will it raise further questions around what else happened during the war? Who was the informer who told the game amongst Nazis about the Brahmin scientists. radio? Does he And what other secrets have been kept throughout the intelligence, and nerves, to convince everyone that his son, against all odds, is a geniusoccupation?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1848543085</amazonuk>1846976537
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Philippe Claudel Onyi Nwabineli|title=Allow Me to Introduce Myself|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Anuri spent her childhood on display to the 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 influencer deals and, basically, monetary gain. 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 take down the content about her. Anuri is battling alcoholism, failing to start her PhD, undergoing therapy and secretly abusing people online and Euan Cameronreceiving money from them for doing so. Most importantly, she is desperately worried about her little sister, who is the new focus of Ophelia's online empire. Can she save her sister, and perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the same time?|isbn=0861546873}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1529153298|title=Monsieur Linh and His ChildThe List of Suspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey
|rating=5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=From a war-ravaged country a bit like a Vietnam or a Cambodia an old man carries the fragile frame of his granddaughter aboard a refugeeIt's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly...) She's not what's worrying Miv's shipfamily, though. Women have been disappearing. Well, they've been murdered, staring at the receding horizon all the weeks it takes but to arrive at a city a bit like a Seattle or a New Yorkhave 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. He and Miv's upset because she are given the basics of a new life together but it's up overheard that her father wants to himmove the family 'Down South'. When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a frightening, Monsieur Linhforeign place, to find friendshipbest avoided. For Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, which he doesSharon, accepting uncomprehendingly and she'll do anything to prevent that. She's not worried about the chatty company of a fellow mourner called Barkdangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to anyone.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906694990</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ed Siegle1035906708|title=InvisiblesDiva|author=Daisy Goodwin
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The closest Brighton usually gets We tend to Brazil is in the pages think of a dictionaryMaria 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'Invisibles'' to make it more manageable in the two are drawn together States. When she was back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the life of Joel Burns, Nazi occupation by a thirty-five year old dentist mother who lives in Brighton as does his mother, Jackie, mercilessly exploited her and partner Debbie from whom he is separated. When Joel sees a news clip made no secret of a bus hijack in Rio de Janeiro, where Joel and Jackie lived until Joel was tenher preference for her elder sister, he is convinced that one of the bystanders is his Brazilian father. What makes this more unusual is that Jackie has always told Joel that his father is dead, although Joel has never quite bought into this story which is at least part of the cause of his problems with Debbie. The solution? Head off to Rio and see if he can track down this person.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0956559913</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Michael DhillonAlexander McCall Smith|title=The Cuckoo Parchment and the DykePerfect Passion Company|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Tristan Jarry The Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the world's most famous artist but he's rather moved on from selling his work for millions and has just kidnapped Angelique Burronline apps in providing a more personal, the step-daughter of the President of the United Statestailored service. She's not an innocent child but an abused Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and abusing womanlook after the business, now as Ness is planning to take a journalist and at times well able trip to Canada to hold her own with Jarryget away for a while. He's got helpers though - and forward planning - and it's not long before Angelique finds herself involved in Katie is coming out of a break up with a trail of destruction bad boyfriend, and death as Jarry works towards his purposeso jumps at the chance to come home to Edinburgh. He intends And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to resurrect Dadaan Edinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the iconic movement founded in 1916 in Zurich Isabel Dalhousie novels, but with the intention of protesting against the warsome new characters who quickly begin to charm. HeKatie has no experience in running a business, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, and there'll tell Angelique so much – but not what he finally intends s always her very helpful (and rather handsome) neighbour, William, to do.lend a hand…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1849235104</amazonuk>1846976596
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Leo BenedictusDean Koontz|title=The AfterpartyBad Weather Friend|rating=4.5|genre=General FictionParanormal|summary=I opened the front cover Benny is having a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and was confronted with the lines 'This book is differenthis house gets trashed. You've Oh, and someone has delivered a really never read a book like this before.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! Confident wordsThe thing is, I thought but will Benny is the book live up very last person to deserve all this lofty expectation I now had? bad luck. He is a nice person. And when I got round A really nice person. So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to reading the notes at the end of the novelhis house is a new friend, I was pleasantly surprised and also rather taken abacka bad weather friend called Spike, I have who has been sent to sayhelp him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. SoSpike is going to take care of Benny, a refreshing and will certainly take on the modern work care of fictionBenny's enemies, if he, I thoughtBenny, as I started on Chapter Oneand Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>022409114X</amazonuk>1662500491
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=David BaddielKatherine Howe|title=The Death of Eli GoldA True Account|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Eli Gold Hannah Masury is recognized as the 'the greatest living writer' - although his claim in Boston, having been sent to this is slipping by by the day as he is on his death bed. He's not live with a nice character - his attitudes family who run an inn, and being made to his five wives and his children are deplorable and he has been bound up in his own 'genius'work there from a young age. He's When she hears there is to be a bit like the best and hanging of some pirates in the worst of Saul Bellowtown, Philip Roth she decides to go and Norman Mailer combinedwatch. Now dying Enthralled and horrified in hospital in New Yorkequal measure, the book explores this event from the perceptive of four people Hannah finds herself embroiled in his life; his eight year old, precocious daughter by his current wife; his first wife watching on the news from an old peoplea young boy's home in England; death at the angst-ridden son hands of his third marriagetwo vicious pirates. She hides away, himself a pale imitation of the author so that his father is; they don't find and kill her too, and a mysterious fourth character who appears then to escape them completely she runs away to have sea, dressing as a very different motive for seeing Gold snr boy and who may be linked to Goldjoining the notorious Ned Low's fourth wife who died pirate ship as a cabin boy. She soon finds herself in the thick of things when there is a mutual suicide pact with her then-husbandmutiny on board, and from which Eli survived. (In fact his identity is revealed there we are caught up in the publisher's blurb her rip roaring tale of life on the jacket, but I'll let you decide if you want to know this or to let the story unfold as I did)ocean waves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0007270836</amazonuk>0861547438
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Alma Katsu1471180158|title=The Taker|rating=5|genre=General Fiction|summary=When Dr Luke Findley begins his nightshift at Aroostook County Hospital in St Andrews, Maine, things are quiet until Lanny McIlvrae is brought in by the police. Lanny is covered in blood and claims she has killed a man and left him in the woods. Desperate to escape, Lanny quickly asks for Luke's help, but he is not sure at first, so Lanny decides to tell Luke her life story, a story that begins in the early Puritan settlement of St Andrews in 1809 and spans nearly two hundred years, taking Lanny from her home to Boston and beyond. A story that is rich, imaginative and entirely authentic, filling the majority of the novel, and there wasn't a moment when I questioned her reliability as she tells Luke everything, chapter by chapter, as he helps her to escape, slowly drawing him and the reader into her world. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846058171</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewMaybe Tomorrow|author=Aimee Bender|title=The Particular Sadness of Lemon CakePenny Parkes
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The title of this novel first caught my eye. How can food feel emotions? ActuallyJamie Matson works in an upper-class grocery store, it is Rose for a man who discovers that when she is eating she can taste 's a control freak with all the feelings subtlety of a half brick. Jamie's son, Bo, 'has his problems'. He's asthmatic and the person who cooked or prepared more you read, the food. I was a bit worried more you'll suspect that this initial gimmick of he's on the book from which the title is taken would become annoying, but really this is another very well-written and readable novel about growing up in a dysfunctional familyautistic spectrum. Rose is about Sometimes Jamie needs to turn 9 take time off at short notice - she's a frequent flier in the beginning, local A&E and comes home sometimes Bo's not fit enough to find her mother making her birthday cakego to school. She Missed shifts or the need to be away on time to pick Bo up from school are occasions when Jamie can't resist tasting be controlled and put in the cake, and at first it is delicious: 'Warm citrus-baked batter lightness enfolded by cool deep dark swirled sugar'wrong. But then she has 'the sensation of shrinking, of upset, tasting a distance I somehow knew It was connected going to come to my mother'a head.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>009953827X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Guillaume MussoB0CKD1L5JL|title=Where Would I Be Without You?Radio Free Olympia|author=Jeffrey Dunn
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=I love Petr is an orphan. Rescued by the coverstrange, which I think angles this book firmly towards women. With that old Beach Boys hit reclusive Bear, he is brought up far from bustling cities and busy human society, in the Sixties as the title, it encapsulates everything you need to know when choosing this book. Itforests of Washington's not really crime fiction, in that it lacks Olympic Peninsula. After Bear dies and a whodunnit aspect brief sojourn in favour of following the protagonistshuman company, a French cop and armed with only a Scottish master criminalpirate radio transmitter, Petr goes on a journey through a romantic entanglement and into the jaws of death. The interest is in which of forest, broadcasting the two men will gain command of the other – strange, wild and who is really driving the action – when both their attentions are focused on the same girlrarely heard voices he encounters.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906040346</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mischa HillerSarah Marsh|title=Shake OffA Sign of Her Own
|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=''Shake Off'' is the latest from the pen After a bout of Mischa Hellerscarlet fever as a child, Ellen Lark loses her hearing. Suddenly plunged into a student world of the John Le Carre universe where the Spies had to Come In From The Coldsilence, everything about her life changes. Set Living in a time when the 80s against a backdrop use of daggers and cloakssign language was seen as something only savages do, wests and easts and defectors and double agentsEllen is sent to a school where she is taught to lip read, Heller's protagonist, Michel Khoury, hooked on pain killers and posing as a studentbut physically restrained from signing. From here, she ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been tasked with teaching the unlikely mission of scouting for deaf and using a Cambridge location in which to host secret talks between those Palestinians system called Visible Speech. At the same time, Bell is working on other inventions and Israelis who seek a 'secular democratic state for Jewsideas, Christians and Muslims'Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in a complicated tangle of espionage.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846590884</amazonuk>1035401614
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=B0BC3YTCMR
|title=Good Girls Die
|author=Ayura Ayira
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=''This story is not for everyone.''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sam Meekings1472263936|title=The Book of CrowsFigurine|author=Victoria Hislop|rating=45
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Having lived It was in China for 1968 that Helena McCloud made her first trip to Greece. She was alone: her mother, Greek by birth, had left the family home and refused to return, but Mary and Hamish (Helena's parents) felt that it would be a substantial period of time, Sam Meekings has clearly soaked pity if Helena grew up a great deal of without knowing her grandparents or understanding her Greek heritage. Her trip to the culture; something he has already put to great effect family apartment in his up-market Kolonaki would be the first book, [[Under Fishbone Clouds by Sam Meekings|Under Fishbone Clouds]]of several annual visits. In The Book of Crows She grew to love her grandmother and the family's maid, his third bookDina, he continues to show his talent as a nonbut was wary - and frightened -Chinese raconteur of Chinese cultureher grandfather, but goes one step further by telling a story that spans several periods retired general Stamatis Papagiannis. He was proud of Chinese history, thereby giving his close connections to the reader a glimpse into different peopleJunta and expected his family to uphold his values but saw no reason to accommodate them. His prejudices included Helena's red hair and green eyes - inherited from her father's livesScottish ancestors. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846971721</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Rachel SimonDean Koontz|title=The Story of Beautiful GirlAfter Death|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The book begins with widow MarthaMichael Mace, Head of Security, at a top secret biological research facility, an exis among 55 people who die when a virus is released in a bio-teacher hazard accident. Finding himself in her seventies living alone in her farmhouse a makeshift mortuary, covered in the Pennsylvanian countryside. Martha's life is filled with lonelinessplastic, he has a phone sense that never ringssomething very, very bad has happened to him – and she rarely sees other peopleonly him – as he sits up and looks around at the shrouded bodies of his dead friends and former colleagues. But all As he recovers his senses, he realises that there is set to change one rainy night in 1968 when Lynnie and Homan knock on Marthasomething different about him; he can ''feel''s dooreverything. Lynnie and Homan have escaped from The School for the Incurable and Feebleminded, a harsh institution where people with disabilities are kept away from the rest of the world''Everything''. Martha takes the couple in and soon discovers that Lynnie is carrying a new born babyMichael isn't ''Michael'' anymore. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>184809339X</amazonuk>1662500467}} {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Henry SuttonB0BVDC2VWH|title=Get Me Out Of HereThe Grave Listeners|author=William Frank|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Hapless (and you could also say hopeless) Matt The village is fed up with his rather sad isolated and unexciting lifepoor. So, at every opportunity he wants to spice it up It's surrounded by a bitWitching Forest. But does this strategy work? We're barely pages into And the book when we see that Matt is an outvillagers subsist largely by farming Uphegia plants - its bread-like fruit provides nutrition and-out snobits blossom provides herbal medicines. He knows all The black wood of the designer labels for the best clothesforest provides heat and warmth, the best shoes (handmaderoofs on homes, natch)and even gallows, if needed. The fear of being buried alive is an existential superstition in the best champagne label ... I think you may get my drift here. That's fine. As long as you can pay for this high lifevillage and that is the reason Volushka, what's the problem? Wella drunken, Matt's problem is cash self- or the distinct lack indulgent, lazy lout of it. He's down on his financial luck at the minute so it's time to try another angle ..a man is tolerated.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099535629</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Joolz DenbyB0BYF82CXT|title=The Curious Mystery of Miss Lydia Larkin and the Widow MarvellSemi-Detached|author=Deborah Stone
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=I was ''Bill and Amanda are living in a bit surprised by this book when it arrived. Joolz Denby is semi-detached house, stuck in a punk poetdepressing rut of boredom and disappointment, when Terry and has written four noir crime novelsFiona – glamorous, including Billie Morgansuccessful and very much in love – move in next door. Despite their different outlooks on life, longlisted the couples befriend each other and life appears to improve for the Orange Prizeboth pairs. This quirky little novella with a long title features a large black cat But all is not what it seems, and recipes at the backtheir increasingly interconnected relationships are fated for tragedy. Has Joolz really written a cosy?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0956778607</amazonuk>''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Robert DinsdaleShalini Boland|title=Three MilesThe Silent Bride|rating=4.53
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Captain Abraham Matthews Alice and Seth are a match 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 desperate to catch the villainous Albie Crowe inevitable proposal is eagerly accepted by Alice and bring the youngster to justice that some people would say he was obsessedwedding is planned and set. After six months When the much-anticipated day arrives, Matthews has finally tracked Alice is walked down his preythe aisle by her father, beaming with pride and captures him just three miles from excitement as she surveys the police station. But with Albie's boys trying congregation – their friends assembled to celebrate this joyful day and when Seth turns to rescue himface his approaching bride, other men without AbrahamAlice's moral compass more interested in vengeance than justice, and world implodes because she has absolutely no idea who the man at the Luftwaffe dropping bombs on Leedsaltar is, this who is set waiting for her to be the longest three miles of either of their lives..become his wife.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>057126025X</amazonuk>1662507089
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Antoinette Van Huegten1787636003|title=Saving MaxThe Girls of Summer|author=Katie Bishop|rating=45
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The one-page Prologue sees us at It was the scene of summer when Rachel Evans turned eighteen that she and Caroline went backpacking around Greece and arrived on the crimeisland. Two teenagers and a lot of blood - one of whom will not survive. Seems like an openRachel wasn't exactly innocent but she was, perhaps, naive, so when thirty-andfour-shut case year- but is it? We then go back in time old Alistair Wright started to a medical consulting room take an interest in downtown New Yorkher, she was flattered rather than wary. Hot-shot lawyer It was quite a while before he made any sort of physical approach to her and by that time-pressed, single mum Danielle is trying to understand her severely disabled sonshe was obsessed by him. Even allowing Alistair worked for Henry Taylor, looking after his interests on the normal teenage angst island and racing hormones, things are not good at home. She knows it. Max knows it. And in particular in the bar where all the medical profession at large, know it. Something needs to be done before things get out of handgirls either worked or partied.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0778304086</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Kim EdwardsAmanda Craig|title=The Lake of DreamsThree Graces
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The book opens with a lovely and intriguing sentence Few styles of contemporary fiction interest me like the state-of-the- nation novel. There'My name is Lucy Jarrett and before I knew s something so utterly compelling about any writer who can catch hold of the girl in atmosphere of the window ... I found myself living in a village near day and capture it, crafting an image of the sea country as it stands in Japanone particular moment.To say that Amanda Craig is skilled at doing this would be embarrassingly inadequate: she' Who could fail to be drawn into a story after reading that, I thought. I was hooked immediatelys practically synonymous with the genre of contemporary social fiction at this point. Edwards gives us She has such a fleeting taste gift for weaving the ongoing issues of life in Japan, particularly the importance (almost reverence) day into the lives of nature her characters in a way that feels natural and gardenslived-in, public and private. This sets the tone never making them ciphers for the novel which is captivating and interesting, social commentary but put together beautifullyinstead fully realised people, unhurriedgrappling with issues far larger than themselves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0142428396</amazonuk>140871468X
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Nikesh Shukla152915118X|title=Coconut UnlimitedPineapple Street|author=Jenny Jackson
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=It ''Pineapple Street'' is the early 1990's and Amitstory of three women: Sasha, Anand Darley and Nishant are three young Asian boys in an all white private schoolGeorgiana. As such they Darley and George are considered massively uncool by default. Too bad then that sisters and Sasha is married to their Asian peers in the North London Gujarati enclave known as Harrow think that they are a bunch of stuck up toffsbrother Cord. Soft. Weak. No street cred whatsoever. Worst of all they are labelled as They're Stocktons, only Sasha isn'Coconutst a Stockton by birth so she isn' (brown on the outside, white on t readily accepted into the inside)tribe. There The problem's only one thing for it - start a hip-hop band. The fact that exacerbated when the clan matriarch, Tilda, asks Cord and Sasha if they don't d like to move into the Pineapple Street property. Tilda and Chip have any songsrenovated and downsized to another property, talent a street or initially any idea what hip-hop actually sounds like isnso away, which they own. They won't really a problemneed any of the furniture from Pineapple Street, so Sasha and Cord can move straight in. As everyone knows Nominally, forming they had a band makes you choice but that wasn't the reality. Darley and Georgiana start to call Sasha 'the gold digger'. She's living in 'pretty cool' and after their'' family home. They use it so often that they abbreviate it to 'the girls simply fall at your feetGD'.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0704372045</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Elizabeth HaynesEmily Critchley|title=Into The Darkest CornerOne Puzzling Afternoon|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=The book didn't actually look that appealing84 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 starting to lose her memory. The cover However, Edie is on tormented by the sepia side memory of dull. I didn't know her childhood friend, Lucy, who went missing over 60 years ago, and the author's name and worry that there was a secret she was keeping for Lucy that somehow might be the title didn't really grab me. When I started reading we were straight into thing that reveals the transcript truth of a court case in which it seemed what happened all that a police officer was being questioned in court about his relationship with a womantime ago. He After 'seeing' Lucy in the high street, just as she was accused the last time she saw her, she starts to find pockets of being violent memories coming back to her, but it seemed that the boot was really on the other foot. Then we were into a story – or even two stories – with two time lines some four years apartAnd yet as she remembers the past, she is forgetting more and more in her day to day life. Within ten minutes I couldnWill she uncover the truth about Lucy't put it down.s disappearance before her move, and before her memories are gone forever?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0956251579</amazonuk>1804181250
}}
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Raj and his two beloved brothers live on ''Love, I'd read, was supposed to be a Mauritian sugar plantation. World War II rages far away light and close tooweightless feeling, but Raj is blissfully unaware of anything beyond his immediate surroundings. Life is poor and hard and RajI had always longed for gravity''s father takes out the privations of his life on his sons and his wife - drunken beatings are a regular occurrence. But his mother is loving and kind, and skilled at healing, and his brothers are constant playmates. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849164010</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Daphne Kalotay0008506337|title=Russian WinterThe Garnett Girls|author=Georgina Moore|rating=45
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The novellove affair between Margo Garnett and poet Richard O'Leary was all-consuming, apparently on both sides. Margo was just sixteen when they fell in love. Richard was twenty-one and described by Margo's mother as 'an older man'. Her parents worried that Richard's structure goes back and forth influence would take her away from the past what they felt she could achieve - going to the present dayOxford and having a glittering career. The book opens with NinaIn the event, now elderly, in pain they eloped and in a wheelchair: Richard took her away from the Isle of Wight. waiting Margo did go to die basicallyOxford and went on to become a well-respected journalist. And even although she's lived an interesting lifeThe couple had three children: Rachel, now all she has for company is a daily home-helpImogen and Sasha. I Life was struck straight away by how prickly Nina is lived in London and I could feel all those emotions seething underneath holidays were spent at Sandcove, the family home on the surfaceIsle of Wight. So Even then the question is - why has doubts about Richard's drinking were never far from Margo's mind: ''she decided would never be able to sell some of her exquisite jewellery. Is it to help pay the bills? Or some other reason? We find out by degreesleave him in charge''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099553244</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Diane Janes1914585402|title=Why Don't You Come For Me?Dashboard Elvis is Dead|author=David F Ross
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Over a decade ago JoI reviewed David F Ross's book [[There's Only One Danny Garvey by David F Ross|There's daughter was abducted from in front Only One Danny Garvey]] a couple of a shop whilst she years back and remember being absolutely floored by how powerful and her husband were on holidayaffecting it was. The pushchair It was found on a cliff edge but there was no trace of Laurengripping, even on the beach below. Occasionally Jo receives postcards with an old picture of her daughter on the front simply saying that the writer still has Lauren. The policeemotionally wounding read, the people who know what happened believe the cards to be a hoax. Jo believes differently. She also realises that as she has moved house and remarried and the story has faded from press attention someone is going to a great deal rereading my review of trouble to keep track of herit my main takeaway was that I might not have lavished enough praise on it.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849011257</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=G S MattuLucy Ashe|title=Sons Clara and FascinationOlivia|rating=34.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=This book concentrates on emotionsThe year is 1933. Take an impressionable young man, add in a chance (The place?) encounter with an attractive older woman Sadler's Wells. Ballerinas Clara and then stand well back as Olivia are sisters, twins no less. Identical on the fireworks explode and as familyoutside but not, we learn, friends and colleagues get sucked in to their deepening relationshipon the inside. I must say I'm And not keen on the title (stage, either. Because there's a little pretentious for lot that builds a work of fiction in my opinion and more suited dancer. Some things that can be taught or learnt – discipline, attention to poetry) detail – and even when it was ever so gently explained later on in some things, that ''je ne sais quoi'', that don't come from the book (twice) I still didnclassroom. A stage presence, a charm, a ''joie de vivre''t warm to it. All in allThe difference between a hard-worker, not off to the greatest of startsand a star. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1907756000</amazonuk>0861544080
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Philip WildingHeather Fawcett|title=Cross Country Murder SongEmily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The novel opens 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 (unnamed) central character in a therapy session in downtown New Yorkvery first encyclopaedia of faeries. The air Whilst she is charged brilliant at research and tension speaking to faeries, she is present, big-timenot so good with people. This So when she finds herself far, far North in the small village of Hrafvsnik, having somehow offended the village matriarch, she is one troubled human beingnot sure what she has done, nor how to redeem herself and put her final investigations for her book back on the right track. And of courseEnter Wendell Bambleby, childhood issues her dashingly handsome and experiences are dominant in this question insufferable rival who arrives unexpectedly, all charm and answer sessiondelight, much to Emily's frustration. We soon find out that this individual has secrets in his basement. But why is he here? It all becomes too much, What does he packs a bag and hits the road and so want? And what exactly is going on with the story starts proper.faerie folk around Hravsnik?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099539934</amazonuk>0356519120
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Asa Jones1398515388|title=The Illustrated Mind of Mike ReevesBoy and the Dog|rating=3.5|genre=Fantasy|summaryauthor=Mike Reeves doesn't have his troubles to seek. His wife was brutally raped some four or five years ago and whilst she might seem to be recovered she cannot stand to be touched by a man – any man, Mike included. Quite suddenly Mike was alone, in every way – until he found himself drawn to the darker arts and began to dabble in Tarot, the Runes and I Ching. He's guided by two spirits. Sean is a wise and benevolent older man and Debbie, well she… isn't. She's the one who satisfies Mike's sexual needs. If that's all sounding rather good, then hesitate a moment, for with the good comes the bad Seishu Hase and the bad is in the form of Tony a Alison Watts (verytranslator) real-life gangster who's been doing his own dabbling in the spirit world. When their worlds clash Mike has a problem which could well be more than he can handle.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>160693905X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Margaret Forster|title=Diary of an Ordinary Woman
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=After reading First of all, it was the introductionearthquake, I couldn't help but sneak a sly read at deep in the author's note right at ocean floor, which created the end of tsunami and this, in turn, caused the novelnuclear meltdown. I don't usually do this. I'm glad I did as the information is both surprising The result was complete and revelatoryutter devastation. Back to the beginning The deaths were uncountable, and Chapter 1 ... We meet the 13 year old Millicent in 1914loss of livelihoods was widespread. By her written statements and recorded mannerisms, we see The fact that she's a girl who knows her own mind. For example, she thinks writing in her diary every single day could be dull and boring so she's made a golden rule that she's only going to write something many pets were separated from their owners came far down when she feels like it. Some may call her precocious the list of priorities but I liked Millicent right from - six months after the start. Courtesy of her diary we find out that she's part of tsunami - Kazumasa Nakagaki discovered a dog outside a large and boisterous familyconvenience store. She doesnHe wasn't appreciate all the noise and chatter from her siblings. She craves peace and quiet to think and to read. She's a prolific reader. She also believes that she's smart and clever and wants to 'do' something with her life when she grows up. She's not sure what exactly dog person but she certainly doesn't want to be a mere housewife and mother.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099449285</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Matt Dunn|title=The Accidental Proposal|rating=3.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Edward Middleton seems like a pretty decent guy. He always stops to buy a Big Issues from Billy, a local homeless man and he takes his elderly widowed neighbour shopping once a week. These are some of the reasons why his girlfriend, Sam, loves him so much. One night, after a friendconvenience store owner's wedding, Sam asks Ed if comment that he would also like to get married call Public Health prompted Kazumasa to which Ed enthusiastically replies 'yes'. However, the following morning, whilst nursing open his hangover, he cannot work out if it was a hypothetical question or an actual proposal. His best mate Dan is no help at all car door and is quite incredulous that anyone should ever want to marry EdTamon the dog jumped in.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847395244</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=William StyronChristopher Bowden|title=The Suicide RunMr Magenta
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Meet Mary Watson - Christopher Bowden's latest novel is a distant second to John Watsonpatient untangling of 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 course was indulgence to a distant second young nephew had had a much more interesting life than that nephew Stephen had ever realised and it seems to Sherlock Holmes. Fed up with staying at home while her new husband spends too much time at 221b Baker Street, or away with Holmes sleuthing, she gets him an obligation to dabble her own feet in the underworld waters when a certain Professor Moriarty comes callingfind it all out.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1907685006</amazonuk>B0B6Z9VJDW
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jon Stephen FinkJennifer Mason|title=A Storm In The Blood|rating=3.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=''A Storm In The Blood'' is based on a true story involving the police force and the government Partitions of the day trying to suppress racial tensions in early 20th century London. It has resonance for our modern times as we grapple with similar situations and problems.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0956544517</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Allegra Goodman|title=The Cookbook CollectorUnity
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Here at Bookbag Towers, we first met Elizabeth Cromwell, dominatrix and unintentional detective in [[Preposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery by Jennifer Mason|Preposterous]], when she investigated and unravelled a series of disappearances. In ''The Cookbook CollectorPartitions of Unity'' is all about emotions. Concentrating on two, young, American women who are vastly different in many areas of their lives and also on their outlook on life, Goodman digs deeper she sets her mind to find out what makes them tick - what makes them get up in the morningsolving a murder...|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1848875398</amazonuk>B09LQR9FRF
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Craig SmithWill Carver|title=Cold RainThe Daves Next Door
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Life was pretty good for Dr David Albo. He'd just had fifteen months away from his job Five strangers come together in one moment as an associate professor of English at a university in the mid-western USA. He lived on a plantation-style farmhouse with a beautiful and intelligent wife and a step-daughter who adored him. He was even going back suicide bomber prepares to work in the expectation that he might well be offered a full professorship in the not-too-distant future and just to put the icing detonate his vest on the cake he's been clear of alcohol for two years. Yes; life was very good.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>190580234X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Anna Gavalda|title=Consolation|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=We meet Charles, the main character right at the start. And straight away, it's no secret that, as a middle-aged professional (he's an architect and a successful one at that) he's jadedLondon tube line. Been-thereAs their fates overlap, done-that and got-the-bloody-tee-shirt just about sums him up pretty well. He's acquired (somehow) a beautiful, witty and clever partner and also a step-daughter whom he adores. As the story deepensis told in backwards order, I soon acknowledged that the step-daughter seems leading up to be about the only true love in his life. He's luke-warm about the rest of his family and that includes his partner and his ageing parents. Is this man going through some mid-life crisis, would be an obvious question to askfateful moment.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099531925</amazonuk>1914585186}} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Sam HawkenJennifer Mason|title=The Dead Women of JuarezPreposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=They say that ''A struggling poetry zine, a good idea is to write about what you know. Wellmom-and-pop mobile diner in the Northern California redwoods, Klaffke seems to have heeded that piece of advice. She writes here about a fictional fashion writer called Sara B (note the pretentious second capital letter) 400-meter hurdler who is just missed the central character. And although Sara B is now in her middle years2004 Olympics, shea women's still acting like track coach with a teenager. She's got the younger boyfriend/loveryen for bullwhips, got the latest fashion look which she can deftly put her stamp on, got the invites to the best parties in the best venues a billionaire with the musta state-beof-seenthe-with minor celebrities. But - is she happy? I knowart S&M dungeon, a man serving a life sentence in Alabama, an enigmatic signature, K(s, x), it seems on a silly questioncheap oil painting, but is it?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0778304337</amazonuk>}}an erotic art dealer in Georgia...''
}}