Book Reviews From The Bookbag
Hello from The Bookbag, a book review site, featuring books from all the many walks of literary life - fiction, biography, crime, cookery and anything else that takes our fancy. At Bookbag Towers the bookbag sits at the side of the desk. It's the bag we take to the library and the bookshop. Sometimes it holds the latest releases, but at other times there'll be old favourites, books for the children, books for the home. They're sometimes our own books or books from the local library. They're often books sent to us by publishers and we promise to tell you exactly what we think about them. You might not want to read through a full review, so we'll give you a quick review which summarises what we felt about the book and tells you whether or not we think you should buy or borrow it. There are also lots of author interviews, and all sorts of top tens - all of which you can find on our features page. If you're stuck for something to read, check out the recommendations page.
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Legends: Battles and Quests by Anthony Horowitz
Bringing things that are this old to an audience this young cannot be an easy feat. Anthony Horowitz must be more than able. An old volume of retold legends and fables from his typewriter in the 1980s has become a series of six books, rejigged on his computer, and presented very nicely by Macmillan. The first to hit the shelves (Legends: Beasts and Monsters) was a successful gift to us of five stories of olden beasties and baddies. Here we get a full half-dozen, and the quality is just as compelling. Full review...
Wishful Thinking by Ali Sparkes
We first meet Kevin covered in sick. He doesn't travel well, and his day out with his gran in the car isn't going as well as he might wish for. He doesn't really seriously wish for anything, but a diverting list of things he'd like – a better complexion, a better chance with the school hottie, a Wii, etc – gets dropped into a stream. And lo and behold, the god of that river, someone called Abandinus, comes to life, thinking he's got a worshipper at last, and might just be prepared to grant some wishes. Full review...
City of Strangers by Ian Mackenzie
Paul Metzger – mid thirties, with a failed marriage, a broken relationship with his brother (who converted to Judaism), and a dying father (who is an ex-Nazi). Straight away there are obvious flaws with his family dynamic. As his writing career fails to take off he's left to churn out thousands of words for articles that have no meaning to him, the dregs of the publishing world. His life isn't quite as high flying as he hoped. But then Paul gets offered a lucrative book deal; the one thing he has wanted for years. The only catch is he has to write about his father. Full review...
The Hand That First Held Mine by Maggie O'Farrell
Lexie Sinclair was sent down from university for the crime of going through a door reserved for men. She could not graduate until she apologised and this she was not going to do. Home was not an option either but when she met the sophisticated Innes Kent she made up her mind to go to London and make her way there. It was the nineteen fifties and Lexie and Innes made a life for themselves in Soho.
In the present day Elina and Ted are struggling to recover from the difficult birth of their first child. Elina is an artist and she’s finding it difficult to come to terms with being a mother. Ted does his best to help but he is having to cope with disturbing visions and memories of his own childhood which don’t seem to agree with what he’s been told by his parents. The further he looks, the stranger are the links which he uncovers. Full review...
The Death of Lomond Friel by Sue Peebles
Rosie was a successful radio presenter when her father, Lomond Friel, had a stroke. Whether or not Rosie was always reckless and impulsive isn't entirely clear, but once she heard about the stroke she took a break from work and began to build her life around making a future for herself and her father. There are two problems here: Rosie isn't really all that capable of looking after herself, never mind her father and Lomond is quietly plotting his own death. He might not be able to speak, to move very much, but he has plans. Full review...
Legends: Beasts and Monsters by Anthony Horowitz
When they say there is nothing new under the sun, they might use this book as evidence - but they'd only be half-right. The legends of the sphinx's riddle, and the capture of the gorgon's head, are as old as the Parthenon hill, but they have never been presented as they have here. They were published in a similar fashion in the 1980s, with a younger Anthony Horowitz offering a large compendium of folk stories, legends and tales of classical derring-do. With the attention span of the current under-twelve, however, to be considered, his publishers have allowed a sprucing up, and a reformatting - one book has been turned into six, with a brace each year from now til conclusion. Full review...
Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter by Seth Grahame-Smith
'Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.' That quote, on the Statue of Liberty, was probably not designed with the inclusion of vampires in mind. But by some means or another North America is rife with the things – hiding in plain sight, as the older ones can bear sunlight, with the help of darkened glasses. It might just come down to one eager young man to rid his new country of such things, on his way to something he’s a bit more known for. Full review...
Murder at Mansfield Park by Lynn Shepherd
Straight away the reader is plunged into the language of Austen's era, so dotted all over are such rather flowery phrases as ' ... conjugal felicity ...' and ' ... her family were not consumptive...' We are also introduced to a host of characters and although Shepherd has thoughtfully provided right at the beginning Names of the Principal Persons, it does bombard and perhaps confuse the reader a little. I must admit to referring to this dratted list time and time again. It does break the flow at the beginning of the novel. But, several chapters in and you're right into the story thereafter. Full review...
Shoedog by George Pelecanos
If you ever find yourself as a character in a work of fiction, it’s probably best to avoid hitchhikers. The chances are it’s going to turn out very badly for either the driver or the hitchhiker - or both. Constantine is a denim-clad, Marlboro-smoking, drifter and loner with a strong sense of right and wrong who has just returned from a period of travelling around the world and is heading south back home in the US when he is picked up by a man named Polk, driving a muscle car. So what could possibly go wrong? Full review...
Plenty by Yotam Ottolenghi
I'm sure that there are many good reasons for buying the Guardian of a Saturday but I always enjoy Yotam Ottolenghi's New Vegetarian column. I'm not a vegetarian (nor, indeed, is Ottolenghi) but he has a way with vegetables whether they're to be served on their own or as an accompaniment which is fresh, full of flavour and exciting. The background to the food is in Israel and Palestine with the region's rich supply of vegetables, pulses and grains. Full review...
Night-Scented by David Barrie
Isabelle Arbaud is determined to make her mark in the world of luxury brands. Most perfumes are off-shoots of established fashion houses (or celebrity names, but let's not go down that road), but Isabelle has poached her rival's most talented perfumer and given him free rein to produce an irresistible scent which will take her upstart fashion house straight to the top. But – it would seem that someone is determined that she won't succeed. First on and then a second of her financial backers died, the first in circumstances which might have been a accident, but probably wasn't. About the second there could be no doubt. Two bullet holes are fairly conclusive evidence of a suspicious death. Full review...
Hannah's List by Debbie Macomber
It was a year since Dr Michael Everett's wife Hannah died from ovarian cancer and his grief was still as painful as ever. He certainly wasn't ready for what his brother-in-law, Hannah's brother, handed him. It was a letter which Hannah had written some time before her death and not only did she suggest that he should remarry, she went on to name three women she thought would make a good wife for him. Winter Adams was the chef who owned the café on blossom Street, Leanne Lancaster had been Hannah's nurse, but who was Macy Roth? Full review...
Pictures of Lily by Matthew Yorke
As soon as Georgia Myers turns eighteen, she is going to find her biological parents. And she has lots of questions for them too; like where else might she have lived if she had not been given up and does she have any brothers and sisters? Mostly, however, Georgia just wants to ask why?. Why was she given up for adoption? Why her? Full review...
Dreadful Fates by Tracey Turner
Imagine the delight you get, as a book reviewer, when you chance upon a title that stands out, by filling a nice handy gap in the market you'd never even noticed, and doing it so well you want to alert as many people as possible. This is such a time, Dreadful Fates is such a book, and as for the gap… This book hits upon the darker corners of all those copious 'highlights of history for the kids' books, touches upon The Darwin Awards compilations of stupid people dying in stupid ways, and merges with those collections of famous last words and epitaphs some of us like flicking through now and again – and does it all for the under-thirteen audience. Full review...
The Finishing Touches by Hester Browne
As the daughter of its owner, and a highly experience management consultant to boot, Betsy is the obvious choice to call for help in turning around a finishing school failing to make the grade in 21st century London. Except... Betsy never attended the school as a student, and she's not so much 'management consultant' as she is 'shop assistant' – a distinction many a proud parent could be forgiven for missing. With the Tallimore Academy facing financial ruin, however, Betsy isn't so much their best hope as she is their only hope. Full review...
The Not-So Secret Diary of a City Girl by Allie Spencer
Banking analyst, Laura McGregor has her secret diary accidentally uploaded to the Internet. The diary contains her thoughts about her lacklustre relationship with a trader, her attraction towards a “dirt-digging journalist” and massive discrepancies in the accounts of her new manager. Full review...
Ghost Light by Joseph O'Connor
An unknown voice introduces the reader to actress Molly. She doesn't know it but she will be dead fairly soon. It's almost as if she's talking to herself throughout the introduction pages. The language is Irish vernacular so there's lots of good old Irish put-downs, classic descriptions and call-a-spade-a-shovel language. This richness and unmistakable lilt gives the reader a sense of place. Albeit, old Molly is almost living by her wits (which are varied and considerable) in the poorer areas of London. Her conversations with the local people, whether it's the inn-keeper or the local bobby on the beat are absolutely wonderful. She is one fine actress. I could not keep the smile from my face when reading these conversational gems. For example, Molly is trying to have a polite conversation with the inn-keeper Mr Ballantine when they are rudely interrupted 'Men barrel in and out with their swearing and gruffness ... Why can they never sit easy, must they always emit noises, and must the noises be deafening vowels?' Brilliant. The sheer beauty in all of this is that Molly, in her own private thoughts, in her own head, is giving off the most foul language of the lot of them. These conversations are also bitter-sweet. O'Connor's descriptions - especially of people are superlative. He doesn't try too hard (which is a gift in itself) but gets his message over to the reader. Full review...
Two Serious Ladies by Jane Bowles
First published in 1943, this is the story of Christina Goering and Frieda Copperfield who are two strained and constrained women who want to break free, although it is not entirely clear what it is they want to break free from. Society? The conventions of heterosexuality? The boredom of their female lives? Anyway, Christina is a wealthy spinster who takes a companion, Miss Gamelon, into her home where they settle into a routine of being catty to each other. Soon Christina's male friend, Arnold, moves in with them too, and later when they all move to a falling-down house on an island they are joined there by Arnold's father who has walked out on his wife. Christina leaves the house, trying to improve herself in some manner perhaps, but becoming a sort of prostitute, falling into relationships as a 'kept woman'. Mrs Copperfield, meanwhile, takes a trip to Panama with her husband. The couple drift apart as Frieda finds herself attracted to the seedy underworld of prostitution, drinking in bars and brothels, falling for a prostitute named Pacifica and leaving her husband to move in with her. Full review...
The Funfair of Fear! - A Measle Stubbs Adventure by Ian Ogilvy and Chris Mould
There is one thing Measle could really be called afraid of. Not the usual teenage things, like having a bath, no. He's lived through being inches high and stuck in a nightmarish train-set diorama with an evil cockroach and worse for company, and as a result, he's going to be afraid of a wrathmonk – a warlock turned bad – such as the one who put him there. So you'll pity him when it becomes obvious a gathering of wrathmonks are forming, to get their revenge on Measle's newly-found family. But what are wrathmonks in turn afraid of, I hear you ask? That's right – a garden gnome. Full review...
Firespell: The Dark Elite by Chloe Neill
Lily Parker is sent to boarding school in Chicago when her parents get the opportunity to do some prestigious research work in Germany. She was expecting bitchy classmates, and she gets them – but she wasn’t prepared for her suitemate, Scout, who stays out late at night and reappears covered in bruises, a school full of secret hiding places, a principal who knows her parents and seems to have an entirely wrong idea about their work – or a mysterious group of supernatural teens called the Dark Elite. Full review...
The Werewolf and the Ibis (Something Wickedly Weird) by Chris Mould
The 'Something Wickedly Weird' series is a splendid mix of Gothic horror and cartoon-style fun. The scrawny young hero, young Stanley Buggles, who lives in a 'darkened industrial town', as the first page tells us, is plunged into an adventure from the moment he arrives (all alone, as tradition dictates) at Crampton Rock. He has inherited his great-uncle's mansion, a vast old pile on an island linked to the mainland by a long winding footbridge. The right atmosphere of isolation and claustrophobic unease is created immediately, especially when we learn that letters are only collected from the island once a fortnight. Whatever is on this island, Stanley will have to deal with it alone. Full review...
A Perfect Proposal by Katie Fforde
I have read most of Katie Fforde's books and each and every one has proved to be enjoyable and entertaining. A Perfect Proposal comes up to the same high standard and, having just finished reading it, it has left me wanting more! Her style is very relaxed and easy going and she always creates believable characters that you can't help caring about. Full review...
The Last Patriarch by Najat El-Hachmi
Najat El-Hachmi's debut novel, The Last Patriarch is a difficult book - both in terms of content and style. It's a story of physical and sexual abuse in a patriarchal Moroccan family, an immigrant story, when first the father and then the family move to Catalonia, and ultimately a story of the narrator, the patriarch's daughter, breaking free of her past as she takes on different cultural values. Narrated entirely from the perspective of the patriarch, Mimoun Driouch's unnamed daughter, the story is also concerned with cultural and imagined histories, and the importance of origin stories. Full review...
The Birth of Love by Joanna Kavenna
The Birth of Love has four interwoven storylines about characters in different times, past, present and future. The common theme is birth. Full review...
The Cardturner by Louis Sachar
How are we supposed to be partners? He can’t see the cards and I don’t know the rules!
17-year-old Alton Richards is shoehorned into becoming the driver and cardturner for his blind, octogenarian, bridge-playing, but above all rich, uncle by his grasping parents - who are up to their eyeballs in debt and have a weather eye on potential legacies. Alton sighs but goes along with it. He's used to being told to call Lester Trapp his favourite uncle and he's used to his unrepentently mercenary parents. Full review...
The Postmistress by Sarah Blake
The reader is in no doubt that a war is raging. 'And bombs were falling on Coventry, London and Kent. Sleek metal pellets shaped like the blunt tipped ends of pencils ...' The Americans however, are carrying on with their daily lives regardless. They are completely unfazed and uninvolved. Apart from one or two, namely radio reporter Frankie. She reports from London as it happens and she is gradually becoming more and more concerned that her fellow Americans will be called upon. But she seems to be a lone voice blowing in the wind. Also, as you may expect, there are plenty of raised eyebrows as to why a woman is doing a man's job. She should be at the kitchen sink or having babies, shouldn't she? Full review...
The Train Set of Terror: A Measle Stubbs Adventure by Ian Ogilvy and Chris Mould
You will feel sympathy for Measle from the very start of this book. Not only is he an orphan, and stuck friendless in a horridly dingy house on the wrong side of the train tracks, but he shares his life with its main torment - his guardian, Basil Tramplebone. Basil makes no effort to improve Measle or his lot - he does not educate him, keeps Measle and his inheritance a great distance apart, and feeds him slop. Measle would even like to have a bath now and again - but not in the putrid brown and green gunk coming from the taps. The only thing that redeems Basil at all is that he owns the world's best train set, one Measle would love to get to know a lot better. Unfortunately for Measle, he's about to get that wish granted... Full review...
April and Oliver by Tess Callahan
After spending their childhoods together, April and Oliver haven't seen each other for many years. It is only after the death of April's little brother that they find their lives overlapping again. April is reckless, damaged, and struggling from one day to the next whereas Oliver is mature and sensible. He is now a law student, engaged to the sweet, gentle Bernadette who is the antithesis of April. Seeing April's life in tatters, Oliver tries to rescue her from herself, yet the more entangled he becomes the more his own seemingly perfect life starts to fall apart. Full review...
The Suffocating Sea: A DI Horton Marine Mystery Crime Novel by Pauline Rowson
Anyone who loves murder mystery novels will know there is a big difference between a policeman and a copper, and Pauline Rowson’s character DI Andy Horton in The Suffocating Sea is every bit a copper. Tough on the outside, soft on the inside Horton is just the chap to start nosing around a suspicious fire on board a boat – at least that’s where it starts, because DI Horton is about to discover he is more involved in the mystery than just as an investigating officer. Full review...
The Pleasure Seekers by Tishani Doshi
Essentially this is a love story between two people - Babo from Madras and Sian from small-town Wales. You could argue that two more disparate cultures would be hard to imagine. Factor in that the novel opens in the heady, free love days of the 1960s and a very entertaining story starts to unfold. Full review...
Star Crossed: Taurus Eyes by Bonnie Hearn Hill
Logan McRae is excited by the prospect of attending a writers' camp hosted by author Henry Jaffa, who starts off by asking them all to write a project idea and then shuffles them around. Instead of her longed-for astrology feature, Logan ends up having to write about folk singer Sean Baylor, whose ghost may be haunting the locality. The only person who doesn't have to switch is the cute boy at the camp, Jeremy, who Jaffa allows to keep his original topic – of Sean Baylor. So, Logan and Jeremy end up fighting over research material while also clearly wanting to get to know each other better – does the ghost exist? Will they get it together? Who will write the best article and get it published? The answers to all these questions and more lie inside the second book in the Star Crossed series (along with some temporary tattoos!) Full review...
The Waiting Room by F G Cottam
On the outskirts of ex rock star Martin Stride's country estate lies the disused Shale Point Station. Abandoned in the 1960s the railway line has been dug up and removed and all that remains is the crumbling platform and eerie waiting room. Martin is quick to employ Britain's top ghost hunter Julian Creed to investigate the strange and threatening occurrences of the waiting room that he and his children have witnessed – the sound and smell of a steam train, male voices singing a famous World War One song, and most frightening of all, the leering face of a soldier at the waiting room window. Full review...
Globish: How the English Language Became the World's Language by Robert McCrum
We British tend to forget just how insignificant we are.
Tiny geographically. Tiny in population. Tiny, whatever we tell ourselves, on the world stage.
Yet our language is spoken in various forms worldwide by approximately four billion people; about a third of the world's population. How did that happen? This is what Robert McCrum attempts to explain. Full review...
Apple Pie ABC by Alison Murray
Take one traditional rhyme (A was an apple pie, B bit it...), mix it up a bit with new words, add a pinch of sweet girl and a dash of naughty dog, and you've got a recipe for... well, a unbelievably cliched first line in a review from me, but also a super book. Full review...
