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'''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].'''{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stephen Baker1035043092|title=They've Got Your NumberThe Killing Stones (Jimmy Perez)|author=Ann Cleeves|rating=4.5|genre=Popular ScienceCrime|summary=If you are in I can't have been the slightest bit paranoidonly person who was sad when Inspector Jimmy Perez [[Wild Fire (Shetland, worry that ''Big Brother'' is always watching or like Book 8) by Ann Cleeves|left Shetland]] to believe that you are not start a numbernew life on Orkney. It's been seven years since we heard from him, but a free man (or woman)he's now living with Willow Reeves and their young son, then this may not be the book for youJames, as it will do nothing to dispel any well as Cassie, the daughter of those worrieshis former partner. If Willow's also his boss, and she ''should'' be on maternity leave, but when the other handbody of a popular islander, Archie Stout, is found, you think 'in the mathematical modelling aftermath of humanitya storm, she can' sounds like t resist getting involved. He'd been battered about the head with a Neolithic stone - one of the sexiest things ever, and are chomping at the bit to learn more about it, then you might well be interested in what Business Week journalist Baker has to saya pair - which had been stolen from a museum.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099507021</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Rebecca TopePolly Barton|title=Fear in the CotswoldsWhat Am I, A Deer?
|rating=4
|genre=CrimeLiterary Fiction|summary=Thea Osborne is a house sitter by profession. When people go away she moves into their homes and looks after their animals and the property. This time itPolly Barton's winter debut novel is an intellectually playful yet emotionally exposed work that uses translation as both subject and she's spending a month in the Cotswold village of Hampnettgoverning metaphor. It wouldn't be a job for all of us but Thea delights in getting The narrator, newly relocated from London to know Berlin, works translating video games into Japanese through the local people and the area. In the past she's also been involved with the police in solving various cases but process of localisation, rewriting language until it looks as though that might have come to an end as the relationship she had with DS Phil Hollis has crumbled. For the first time Thea feels like an outsider – and a foolish one - when she finds footsteps in the snow which lead comfortably familiar to a body in a nearby fieldnew audience. When the police finally arrive the body has disappeared and the police obviously wonder if she's imagined it all.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0749007478</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Tad Tuleja|title=A Dictionary of Foreign Words and Phrases|rating=3|genre=Home and Family|summary=Take Barton treats this as a look at the cover design of this bookparadoxical act: arguably, and you'd be mistaken in striving for thinking this was a trivia compendium for all those foreign words that have taken part in our English universality, language since whenever they crossed over from their original homes. But the title is definitely honestendlessly repackaged, for its originality at risk of disappearing altogether. From this is , the novel opens out into a dictionary book firstwider, for referenceresonant question: to what extent do we translate ourselves in order to be understood, accepted, and a browser for the trivia buff second.or loved?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0709089562</amazonuk>1804272175
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{{Frontpage
|isbn= Zabriskie1
|title=A Village Where Many Ways Meet: A Story of Belonging and Community, Rooted in Indigenous Wisdom
|author=Stephanie Zabriskie
|rating=5
|genre=Children's Non-Fiction
|summary=''Across many African and Indigenous systems, differences in how children learn, sense , or process the world were not treated as disorders to be corrected. They were understood as natural variations of human intelligence and awareness, each holding value within the community.''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ian Mortimer1787333175|title=1415: Henry VYou Don's Year of Gloryt Have to be Mad to Work Here|author=Benji Waterhouse
|rating=5
|genre=HistoryPopular Science|summary=The medieval, in fact time-honouredI was tempted to read ''You Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here'' after enjoying Adam Kay's first book {{amazonurl|isbn=1509858636|title=This is Going to Hurt}}, view a glorious mixture of King Henry V as one insight into the workings of England's greatest heroes was propagated though not originated by Shakespearethe NHS, humour and again more recently to some extent by Olivier's portrayal in filmautobiography. At least one historian has called him ''the greatest man that ever ruled EnglandYou Don't Have to be Mad...''promised the same elements but moved from physical problems to mental illness and the work of a psychiatrist. I did wonder whether it was acceptable to be looking for humour in this setting but the laughter is directed at a situation rather than a person and it is always delivered with empathy and understanding.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224079921</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Deborah GregoryMaria Stepanova and Sasha Dugdale (Translator)|title=Dancing With The DeadDisappearing Act|rating=34
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=I wanted to read ''Dancing with the Dead''Despite her anonymisation of place names and people, because IStepanova'm interested s message in family historythis short work of autofiction is unmistakable. The blurb on the back of the book also mentioned Gill – our heroine of the piece – was moving A novelist named M travels from Bristol B (my current homeostensibly Berlin) to Lincolnshire (where I was born the town of F for a literary festival she is to be a guest speaker at. Detoured by erratic train schedules and brought nudged by forces beyond her control, her journey slowly bends toward a traveling circus. Swept up)in this series of events, M eventually offers to step in for a circus performer who has unexpectedly left the show. I felt with all these linksThe train functions as a motif of transience and impermanence, while the circus embodies the reshaping of identity and a retreat into fantasy, an impulse that lies at the very heart of the novel could not fail to interest me – but this was not the caseform itself.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1904529305</amazonuk>1804272329
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Miss ReadB0GFQ81YQK|title=Christmas at Thrush GreenHow the Sky and the Earth Made People: From the Oral Stories of Malagasy Elders|author=Stephanie Zabriskie|rating=4.5|genre=WomenChildren's Non-Fiction|summary=Set in Before people came and joined the rural village of Thrush Greenanimals, this book is there was only the sky and the earth. Everything was quiet until the earth and the latest in a series surrounding familiar characterssky began to tal to each other. There is First, the feisty Ella Bembridgeearth created bodies. And then, who is finally having the sky breathed life into them. These were the first humans and they belonged to admit that old age is creeping up as her eyesight failsboth earth and sky. Friends such as Dimity And so people lived between sky and soil and they planted and learned and Charles Henstock are concerned about herremembered, but she refuses especially how they came to accept any helpbe. Albert Piggott has decided it's time When they grew old and died, their bodies returned to the earth and their life returned to retire now the sky. And that his wife, Nelly, is a successful cafe owner why the earth and the sky are both revered. Only together can afford they create human beings. And that is why people must pay attention to take , and care of him! And relative newcomer Phil Hurst and her husband are arranging the local nativity playfor, despite a number of set-backsboth. Will everything be in place for Christmas? And will independent Ella make a decision about her future?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1409101592</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Matt and DaveB0GHPMNF6P|title=YuckThe Zookeeper's Robotic BottomDragon: A Magical Modern Fantasy Tale for Grown-Ups|author=Carolyn Mathews|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersFantasy|summary=ItWhen Phil's concerned me for a while that it's relatively easy father unexpectedly dies, he quits his Canary Wharf finance job to pick up early readers for girls – princesses, magic soft toys, mermaids and pets abound – but theretake over the running of the family's a much smaller choice for boysfarm zoo. ItHe's important too with early readers not expecting much excitement, until he receives an unidentified egg that his new-age stoner uncle Edgar found in a cave in New Zealand, and suddenly life is no longer quite what it seems. Then the content is ''interesting'' egg hatches into neither a reptile nor a bird, but a dragon! Now he, Edgar, his mother Abi, and reading becomes more than just something which you 'the zoo's part-time café waitress Pearl have'' to do at school raise this little bundle of scales and joy, despite having no idea how to actually raise dragons and moves into not being funable to tell anyone about it. Matt But this tiny little dragon may show them love and Dave have found the answer connection in Yuck.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847382991</amazonuk>ways they had never before imagined…
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{{Frontpage
|author=Stephanie Zabriskie
|title=How Maasai Women Spoke to Cows: From the Oral Stories of Maasai Elders
|rating=5
|genre=Children's Non-Fiction
|summary=''How Maasai Women Spoke to Cows is a children’s nonfiction book drawn from the oral traditions of Maasai elders in Ngorongoro, Tanzania.''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Maxine BarryLivi Michael|title=River DeepElizabeth and Ruth
|rating=3.5
|genre=Women's Historical Fiction|summary=Two young women both have ''Elizabeth and Ruth'' is a love work of historical fiction wrought from the Thames. Melisande Ray's beloved hotellife of the Victorian author Elizabeth Gaskell, best known for her first novel Mary Barton (1848), a radical critique of the Ray treatment of Sunshine is on the river bankworking class published under a pseudonym. ItThe ''Ruth'' from Livi Michael's here that guests come title appears in her novel as Pasley, a young Irish prostitute who want to be pampered was abandoned as a child and looked finds herself in Manchester's New Bailey Prison after a difficult and unjust hand at life. Set in Manchester between 1839 and 1842, the way that only novel examines the best hotels can do well, but when Wendell James checks in to harsh conditions endured by the hotel it's not pampering he's looking for. He's buying a piece of land not far from the Ray of Sunshine Victorian working poor and he's sussing out interrogates the competition. There's something personal in there too – if his new hotel means that extent to which the Ray of Sunshine goes under then that would be an added bonus. There's just a slight doubt in his mind when a red-haired maid catches his eyewealthy (including Gaskell herself) were responsible for addressing these injustices.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0709088930</amazonuk>1784633682
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Joe GoresMakenna Goodman|title=Spade and Archer|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary=Sam Spade decides, bravely, to set up his one-man detective agency. It's the 1920s in San Francisco so we have the prohibition era and all that that entails. Many locals, of course, choose to disobey the law, stick two fingers up, so to speak and as a result there's lots of bootleg liquor. Straight away, it's evident that Sam is a man of few words. He has the mannerisms Helen of a cat - stealthy, quick on his feet. He's also a compulsive chain-smoker, but then again, most people were. In that era, holding a cigarette was an elegant, almost essential accessory. How times have changed.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140911323X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Michael Morpurgo and Emma Chichester Clark|title=The Best of Times|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Most children enjoy a good traditional tale and this lovely book by Michael Morpurgo seems to have all the right ingredients – a handsome prince and a beautiful princess who fall in love, get married and live happily ever after. Or do they? Sadly, not long after Prince Frederico marries the lovely Princess Serafina, she becomes very sad. Nobody knows what has caused such great sadness, but poor Prince Frederico is desperate to find a cure for his wife's misery. He tries everything in his power and eventually decides to offer his kingdom to anyone who can make her happy again before she dies of a broken heart. Lots of people come to the palace to try and help but in the end the solution is a simple one provided by some very kind travellers.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405232552</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Shirley Jackson|title=We Have Always Lived In The CastleNowhere
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Mary Katherine BlackwoodIt could be argued that the pervading theme of this book is malaise - a hard-to-place feeling that something in your life is not quite right. The protagonist, also known as Merricata disgraced professor on the brink of losing both his career and his relationship, embodies this feeling. However, Goodman counteracts his discomfort with a force which is eighteenseductive, radical and unnerving: Helen. The connection between Helen and lives with her older sister Constance in the family home where 'Blackwoods had always lived'protagonist is indirect yet intimate. Merricat quickly draws As the reader into her world by a series former owner of matter of fact but bizarre statements – her likes include her sister and death cap mushroomsthe countryside house he's considering, and everyone else Helen represents a volta in his life, her family is deadpast tied to his potential fresh start. The wealthy Blackwood family has always kept realtor who shows the protagonist around the house shares stories about Helen, and describes her as 'steady against the world'an entity that is pure consciousness, shutting out other people, and they live near a village. Merricat believes that beyond form'The people of the village have always hated us'. Although she lives in an assisted living facility now, and tells us that she hates them tooHelen has powers beyond comprehension which the reader gets the sense are not altogether innocuous.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0141191457</amazonuk>1804272205
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Simon WestonB0GCB1MQ7D|title=Nelson to the RescueWhy My Mother Went Away|author=Alan Kennedy|rating=45|genre=Confident ReadersAutobiography|summary=Nelson used I have often wondered how prominent people came to pull Mike the Milk's milk float, but he has now retiredhold their positions. He lives in the stable at the back of the dairy along with a couple of tricky rats, Rhodri and RhysWith 'celebrities', there's frequently a pigeon who has no sense of directionbook they might or might not have written, a frog who thinks hewhich might or might not tell the true story. It's not often that you find a secret agent spy book that gives the full backstory, and an old racehorse who spends most of his time sleeping. Rhodri and Rhys find rarely do you discover a mysterious message on Mikememoir where the telling is so perfect that you's fridge ll go back and reread paragraphs and the animals believe that Mike has been invited to Buckingham Palace to receive an MBE. Somehow our herosentences, Nelson, finds himself travelling down to London, pulling a ceremonial coach just for Prince Charles as well as giving a TV interview about his experience.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848510454</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Elizabeth Baines|title=Too Many Magpies|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Becoming a mother brings a whole new world of fear into your life. Suddenly you see the danger in every situation, and fear and trepidation can be become your constant companionspleasure the words give. In this novella, we meet a young mother who ''Why My Mother Went Away'' is married to a logical scientistone of those rare exceptions. They attempt to control their childrenIt's futures on the story of how a scientific basisboy from the Midlands, growing their own fruit and vegetablesborn at the beginning of the Second World War, giving their children nothing sugary, eating no eggs for would become a whole year until any adverse affects from them were disprovedProfessor of Psychology at Dundee University. But after meeting with an enigmatic stranger our young mother begins to struggle as In fact, he introduces ideas was one of freedom into her world. She begins an affair with him, begins to let things slip at home and with the children, yet finds she is still continuously haunted by founders of the sense of an ever-present dangerdepartment.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1844717216</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Katherine MayJeremy Cooper|title=Burning OutDiscord|rating=43.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Violet has it all – Discord: a well-paid job, and a luxurious apartment all to herself. Everything is catered for; her meals, her clothes, and her health are all how she would like them to be. But the life she is leading is beginning to take its toll. On the verge of snapping, a drained and somewhat out-of-sorts Violet, withdraws back to her home town. There, she meets someone familiar, a ghost reminding her lack of how she used to be ten years earlier – a young carefree girlagreement or harmony (as between persons, full of life. Only this isn't a ghostthings, but a girl living the life Violet once lived – exactly the same. Haunted by the past Violet realizes history is repeating itself and is convinced events will happen again. Events that will in turn haunt the girl.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906727392</amazonuk>}}or ideas)
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Tove JanssonTom Percival|title=The True DeceiverWrong Shoes
|rating=5
|genre=Literary FictionConfident Readers|summary=Most people Will's life is difficult, in a multitude of my age will have come across Janssonways. He is bullied because he has 'the wrong shoes', he has the wrong shoes because his dad can's t work unwittingly, via and doesn't have enough money for even the televised renditions most basic of things like food, and his dad can't work because he lost his job at the Moomin talescollege, was working a cash-in-hand job on a building site and had an accident. The readers amongst us would then have been entranced a few years ago to discover Throw into that at last Thomas Teal had set about mix the translation into Englishfact that his mum and dad are separated, and Will's life seems bleak in every direction. And yet, first he still has a tiny amount of The Summer Book hope. He is good at art, and then clings to the moments of joy when he is drawing, that feel like a collection light at the end of short stories which were published as 'A Winter Book'a long, dark tunnel. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0954899571</amazonuk>1398527122
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Daniel Kehlmann Edward W Said|title=Me and KaminskiRepresentations of the Intellectual
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary FictionPolitics and Society|summary=After reviewing several long books, itEdward Said's been refreshing to read such ''Representations of the Intellectual'' is less a fluent yet pared down story as 'Kaminski strict theory of what intellectuals are and Me'more a passionate argument for what they should be. In it, Sebastian Zollner, Said clearly rejects the comfortable image of the obnoxious main character, shoves himself forward in intellectual as a desperate attempt detached expert speaking only to research a best seller which will re-ignite his career as an art criticother specialists. KaminskiInstead, he insists on the proposed subjectintellectual as a public figure, was a fashionable painter long agooften awkward, but nowabrasive, ancient and chronically illunpopular, has virtually slid into oblivion. So the second-rate writer who speaks truth to power even when it is on a loser unless he can dig up some juicy details to hook the art world and general publicinconvenient or risky.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1847249892</amazonuk>1804272248
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Louis BarfeSylvie Cathrall|title=Turned Out Nice Again: The Story of British Light EntertainmentA Letter to the Luminous Deep|rating=45|genre=EntertainmentScience Fiction|summary=Light entertainment is often looked down upon, as if it's There are few greater joys than a book which lives up to a bit naff, tepid and ignorablecompelling premise. What's often forgotten And this is that it's hugely popular, enjoyable and much of it is of the highest quality. Louis Barfe's Turned Out Nice Again tells the complete story one of British light entertainmentthem.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1843543818</amazonuk>0356522776
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jim Helmore and Karen Wall1786482126|title=Oh No, Monster Tomato!The Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths|rating=4.5|genre=For SharingCrime|summary=Marvin is entering Builders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the Great Grislygust Growsite was going to hold seventy-Offfive '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 just like him, his tomatoes arenNelson doesn't growing very big. He takes the only sensible course of action: he sings , that she is pregnant with his tomatoes child as a songresult of the one night they spent together some three months ago. The results are spectacular. Victory Her condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is surely within his graspprone to sudden bouts of sickness.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140524741X</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Joseph Delaney 0008551375|title=The Spook's Stories: Witches|rating=4|genre=Teens|summary='Warning: Not to be read after dark,' are the only words on the back of ''The Spook's Stories'', and on the inside flap, 'The Times' warns us that this book is 'seriously scary'... The whole thing kicks-off relatively tamely, though, with a story about a young Spook When Shadows Fall (a sort of monster-hunterD S Max Craigie) who falls in love with a witch and is forced to bear the consequences when the witch's sister comes to stay and exhibits a taste for the neighbor-children.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0370329961</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Lisa Unger|title=Die For YouNeil Lancaster|rating=34.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=Best-selling novelist Isabel Connelly is married to successful video game designer Marcus RaineLeanne Wilson's body was found at the bottom of a Scottish mountain, seemingly the result of a tragic accident. Or She'd looked so happy, too, when she thinksposted her intentions on Facebook. But when her husband fails to return from work, Her friends were relieved as she realises something is wrong. Going to his office to try to find was just out what happens to himof an unpleasant relationship, but it looked like she gets attacked and ends up was living her best life now. Then it emerged that five other women had died in similar circumstances in hospital, while his co-workers are killedthe last year. Things get worse for her All were experienced climbers, however, when investigating detective Grady Crowe reveals that Marcus Raine has been dead properly equipped for several years, what they were doing and sensible people. None of the man she married was using 'what a false identitystupid thing to do' explanations applied. Infuriated by the betrayal, and the realisation that she They were all alone when they died: DS Max Craigie is certain there's been living a lie for killer on the past five years, Izzy takes matters into her own hands and sets out to find her husband and work out why he lied to her for so long. Ignoring police warnings, she delves deeper and deeper into a nasty underworld, and finds a tale which has its roots in Prague and rivals anything she could have plotted in one of her novelsloose.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099522179</amazonuk>
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{{Frontpage
|author=Paul B Preciado
|title=Dysphoria Mundi
|rating=4.5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=''It is never too late to embrace the revolutionary optimism of childhood''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jaclyn Moriarty Samantha Harvey|title=The Spell Book of Listen TaylorOrbital|rating=34.5|genre=TeensGeneral Fiction|summary=Listen Taylor's father has just moved in with his girlfriend and they are adopted into the Zing familyIn 2024, with all of its delightful eccentricities and unusual behaviour – Samantha Harvey won the Zings meet every Friday night Booker Prize for dinner and then disappear into the garden shed to work on the 'Zing Family Secret'. Marbie Zing is terrified of doing something wrong and losing Nathaniel and Listen. Her sister Fancy is becoming increasingly disillusioned with her home lifeOrbital'', and her daughter's year two teacher is coming to terms with a break up. The stories compact yet profound work that unfolds over a single day in the lives of these people come together to create a tale group of lifeastronauts aboard the International Space Station. Through a narrative lens that mirrors the astronauts' orbital perspective, love, and ultimately, what being part of Harvey invites readers to see our planet in a family meanswholly new light.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0330446363</amazonuk>1529922933
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=F G Cottam295967572X|title=The Magdalena CursePale Pieces|author=G M Stevens|rating=2.5|genre=HorrorLiterary Fiction|summary=Mark Hunter Our unnamed narrator is about to begin a train journey with his companion Django. Where they're going and what the sort purpose of father who would do anything for his sonthis journey is, is uncertain. After losing his wife Django found the tickets ''on the floor somewhere'' and daughter in a tragic accident, his surviving son Adam has become his whole worldpersuaded our narrator to accompany him. And Adam Why not? Not much else is an exceptional child – beautiful, incredibly smart and mature beyond his ten years – only recently he's been channelling clear either - but we are probably in the voices of past as the dead. Plagued by horrific dreams, able pair travel to speak Russian in the hours after he wakes, drawing occult symbols when he doodles, Hunter believes Adam to be possessed. Doctor Elizabeth Bancroft is sceptical, until she meets Adam, station by coach and witnesses the horrors the poor boy endures for herselftrain is a steam locomotive.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340980982</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jon Berkeley0008551324|title=The Lightning Key Devil You Know (Circus TrilogyD S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=I shall start with a word of adviceIt's unusual for anyone from the Hardie family to approach the police. When you're being hounded by a circus master, and a magician, Neither side likes or has any respect for the soul of a tiger that's contained other. But Davie Hardie is struggling in a tigerprison and he's egg that's contained in prepared to tell the police where the brain body of your teddy bear, and your best friend - a fallen angel - missing person is trying buried and who was responsible for her best to make sure the other angels do not turn on you in a death. This person, he promises, is someone big way - then you're probably living and it will be worth the third book in a fantasy trilogypolice doing what he wants. Still - never mind, And what he wants is to be transferred to an open prison to serve the angel's efforts will involve you entering a dream world remainder of flight his sentence and cloud cities, the chase after your enemies will take you across the world to desert oases and backget an early parole date. Not much to ask, and friends is it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and old will be on board she's even prepared to helpdo 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>1847384447</amazonuk>
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{{Frontpage
|author=Thea Lenarduzzi
|title=The Tower
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary= ''How unctuous are the fats of another's life, how dizzying their sugars in our bloodstream''.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Lauren KateClaire-Louise Bennett|title=FallenBig Kiss, Bye-Bye
|rating=4.5
|genre=TeensLiterary Fiction|summary=A 17 year old girl at Everything in this book, however sweet or seemingly innocent, is steeped in anguish and distortion. Even a new school meets kiss, usually a mysterious symbol of intimacy and impossibly goodcloseness, becomes evidence of love lost. When the narrator cries out internally, ''come over here and kiss me,'' it is less an invitation than a desperate attempt to confirm her emotional numbness. The imagined recipient of this plea is Xavier, her ex-looking boypartner, who a ghost sheconjures to test her detachment.|isbn=1804271934}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0008405026|title=A Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Jane Casey|rating=5|genre=Crime|summary=It's immediately drawn sixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. She was never found and the investigation ground toa halt. He seems determined to either ignore her or be outright rude to Now, hermother, Helena, until he saves and her lifefather are dead in their bed. Initially, and it looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but there's something about the two positioning of them end up drawn togetherthe 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. This isn Kerrigan is convinced that the explanation lies in Rosalie't Stephenie Meyers disappearance: others (such as Derwent's ''Twilight''boss, but it certainly has striking similaritiesUna Burt) are less convinced.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0385738935</amazonuk>
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{{Frontpage
|author=Annie Ernaux and Alison L. Strayer (translator)
|title=The Other Girl
|rating=4
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=''We were born from the same body. I've never really wanted to think about this.''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Paul TherouxMaxim Gorky and Bryan Karetnyk (translator)|title=A Dead Hand: A Crime in CalcuttaReminiscences of Tolstoy, Chekhov and Andreyev
|rating=3.5
|genre=General FictionBiography|summary=Set in India, familiar territory for Theroux, ''A Dead Hand'' tells Biographies are often seen as the story form of a travel writer suffering from writer's block (also known life-writing which offers less colour; it can be seen as 'dead hand') until more objective and less personal. I think that Gorky completely rejects this perspective, and offers a chance letter from an American ex-patvibrant, subjective yet informed portrait of three of his literary contemporaries. In the mysterious Mrs Ungerfirst section of this book, relating a story Tolstoy complains to his friend Gorky that: ''you write not of a mystery real life as it is, but of a dead body in a hotel leads him what you yourself imagine it to release his creativity in very unexpected waysbe. The story Whom would it help to know how I see this tower, that sea, or that Tartar - why should it interest anyone? Of what use is more about obsession and infatuation than it is about the mystery itself as the narrator falls under Mrs Unger?''s Tantric charms. But does she have more Well, Maxim Gorky shows exactly what can be gained from a subjective account, giving us access to hide than she's letting on?how he saw Tolstoy, Chekhov and Andreyev in such privileged detail that one almost feels unworthy of it.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0241144639</amazonuk>1804271977
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Toby Lester1529077745|title=The Fourth Part of the World: The Epic Story of History's Greatest MapDark Wives (D I Vera Stanhope)|author=Ann Cleeves
|rating=4.5
|genre=HistoryCrime|summary=In 2003 A man walking his dog in the early morning discovered the body of a map man in the park near Rosebank, a care home for troubled teens. The dead man was bought for $10 million, Josh - one of the highest price ever paid publicly for care workers who was due to work a historical document, by shift the Library of Congress, where it is now on permanent public displaynight before but who had never turned up. No ordinary map, this D I Vera Stanhope is sometimes described as America's birth certificate. It called in to investigate the murder - but her only clue is the sole survivor disappearance of one of a thousand copies printed early in the 16th centuryresidents, and was discovered by accident in some archives in a German castle in 1901fourteen-year-old Chloe Spencer. The sale and story behind it intrigued Toby Lester so much Some people believe that he Chloe was inspired to discover more, and responsible for the death but Vera thinks this book is unlikely as the resultgirl's diary makes it clear that she adored Josh. She knows that she has to find Chloe to discover what happened to Josh.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1861978030</amazonuk>
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Olga Tokarczuk
|title=House of Day, House of Night
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=''What's the good of a world that keeps changing like that? How can one go on calmly living in it?''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Andy Stanton1836284683|title=What's For Dinner, Mr Gum?The Big Happy|author=David Chadwick
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident ReadersDystopian Fiction|summary=As soon as heroine Polly turns her back, and leaves the town of Lamonic Bibber for a day at the seaside, Mr Gum falls out with his best friend, causing carnivorous carnage all over the place. Meat Well! This is getting thrown around like it's going out of fashion, and we have to doubt whether Polly and her companions can ever utilise the power of love and put things to rights. Especially as this book does not contain a magic unicorn called Elizabeth.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405248246</amazonuk>}}murder mystery unlike any other!
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jean UreSally Rooney|title=Fortune CookieIntermezzo
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Sally Rooney has studied the chessboard of life and is something of a grandmaster at putting it into words. Her dialogue is gripping and so brilliantly frustrating, as her characters never quite say exactly what they feel. Among the many relationships woven into this story, the central one for readers to unravel is the fraternal connection—or lack thereof—between Ivan and Peter Koubek. Ivan, a socially awkward chess prodigy, contrasts sharply with his older brother Peter, a successful lawyer living in Dublin. Following their father's passing after a long battle with cancer, the brothers' already strained relationship faces new trials.
|isbn=0571365469
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn= 1836285493
|title=The Double Life of a Wheelchair User
|author=Rob Keeley
|rating=5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Fudge Cassidy Will is a keen player of video games, a conscientious student, a slightly annoying brother and the Cupcake kid are best friendsa supportive friend. If the names remind you But most of a certain film then you'd be spot on as that's where Fudge's father got the idea fromall, he is an aspiring writer. They're actually chalk and cheese – Fudge English is loud mouthed his favourite lesson at his school, Marlowe Park, and opinionated and Cupcake is quiet and thoughtful – but the combination worksone at which he excels. TheyThis hasn've just started at secondary school t gone unnoticed by his headteacher, Mrs Howarth, and Cupcake she has rather a lot on her plate. Her brother Joey has muscular dystrophy suggested to Will and his problems are becoming more obvious. Add to this mum that her father couldn't cope with the problems and he now has another family. It's just Cupcake, Joey and her mother – and not spends a lot couple of moneyafternoons a week at a different school, Station Road, where his ability might be better extended.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007224621</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jenifer Roberts1009473085|title=The Madness of Queen Maria: The Remarkable Life of Maria I of PortugalConservative Effect 2010 - 2024|author=Anthony Seldon and Tom Egerton (Editors)|rating=4.5|genre=BiographyPolitics and Society|summary=Born in 1734 in Lisbon, at Sometimes it's simpler to explain a book by describing what it ''isn't'' and that time applies to ''The Conservative Effect: 2010-2024 - 14 Wasted Years?''. If you're looking for an easy read which will deliver the richest and most opulent city in Europeinside story about what ''really'' happened on certain occasions, Maria was destined to become then this isn't the first female monarch in Portuguese historybook for you. Married to her uncle Infante PedroIf that's what you're looking for, seventeen years her seniorI don't think Anthony Seldon's book, she had six children (outliving all but one of them){{amazonurl|isbn=B0BH7SKG2S|title=Johnson at 10}}, can be bettered for those tumultuous years. It's a compelling read and became Queen in 1777should be compulsory for anyone who thinks Johnson should return to politics. ''The Conservative Effect'' is an entirely different beast. A conscientious woman, she had It's the misfortune to be born seventh book in during a series which looks at the 'age of reason', when church impact a government has made and state were vying for supremacyco-editor Sir Anthony Seldon regards this as the most important. Instinctively This book follows the well-established format: a supporter series of experts from various fields review the old religion, with a humanitarian approach to state affairsof the nation when the coalition took over in 2010, she was no Queen Elizabeth, no Catherine the Great, changes that occurred and wore her crown rather reluctantlythe situation in 2024.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095455891X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=David HughesJenny Valentine|title=Thomas Wogan is DeadUs in the Before and After|rating=4.5|genre=Graphic NovelsTeens|summary=WellElk and Mab are best friends, with a title like or more than thateven, need I bother with their friendship is a plot summary? A man has a day out once in Morecambe, then the next thing he knows he's in the ultimate waiting room, with a strange array of animals (a bat, a toad, a sea urchin...), all waiting for... well, somethinglifetime connection. Yup, They meet as you didnchildren one day on a trip out but unfortunately they don't need telling, heget each other's dead.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095580888X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Dave Eggers|title=The Wild Things|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=Meet Maxcontact details at the time. When I say he sometimes gets the wrong end of the stick about adultsBut then chance brings them back together, or dislikes his mother's new boyfriendand they are inseparable. Something has happened though, or gets a bit feisty when he feels the need for revengesomething terrible and tragic, I am certainly understating the facts. He is a bit of a rascal to say the least. But all that might change when he finds himself travelling to a strange land of roisterous animalsand now they must work through their grief, and ends up installed as their kingfriendship, together.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0241144221</amazonuk>1471196585
}}