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Hello from The Bookbag, a site featuring books from all the many walks of literary life - [[:Category:Fiction|fiction]], [[:Category:Biography|biography]], [[:Category:Crime|crime]], [[:Category:Cookery|cookery]] and anything else that takes our fancy. At Bookbag Towers the bookbag sits at the side of the desk. It's the bag we take to the library , the charity shop and the bookshop. Sometimes it holds the latest releases, but at other times there'll be old favourites, books for the children, books for the home. They're sometimes our own books or books from the local library. They're often books sent to us by publishers and we promise to tell you exactly what we think about them. You might not want to read through a full review, so we'll give you a quick review which summarises what we felt about the book and tells you whether or not we think you should buy or borrow it. There are also lots of [[:Category:Interviews|author interviews]], and all sorts of [[:Category:Lists|top tens]] - all of which you can find on our [[features]] page. If you're stuck for something to read, check out the [[Book Recommendations|recommendations]] page.

<!-- Lesley Thomson Linda Jones -->

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===[[The Playground Murders Deadwood Hall by Lesley ThomsonLinda Jones]]===

[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:CrimeConfident Readers|CrimeConfident Readers]]

Rachel Cater was having an affair with her boss, Chris Philips, an auctioneerIn late December Dylan Beaumont and his sister Emily were on their way to spend the week before Christmas at their grandfather's house. It was, she told her mother, love snowing heavily and you could sense that their parents were becoming annoyed at first sightthe bickering in the back of the car. Her mother Emily was more sceptical and wondered whyrather brusque with her nine-year-old brother's behaviour, if it had been love at first sight, it had taken him so long to do anything about itbut then that's your prerogative when you're a grown-up eleven year old. Still, more than anything, she wanted her daughter to be happy. That The snow was what Rachel wanted too getting heavier and it was why she went to the Philips' family home, determined to have it all out in journey longer when Emily opened the opencar window just a couple of inches. Instead she There was stabbed fifteen times. Her lover was convicted of her murdera dreadful smell and Dylan saw a horrible, snake-like figure clawing at the car window. [[The Playground Murders Deadwood Hall by Lesley ThomsonLinda Jones|Full Review]]

<!-- Dare Denzil Meyrick -->

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===[[The Billion Pound Lie by Bill Dare]]=== [[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:ThrillersCrime|ThrillersCrime]]

Can you imagine what it would be like to win a billion pounds? The UKFew government trade missions arrive by luxury liner, but the cruise ship ''Great Britain''s biggest ever lottery winners were a couple from Ayrshire, who won a £161 million EuroMillions jackpot a few years agois berthed in Kinloch harbour and on board are high-powered international delegates. That It's so much money hard to avoid the suspicion that it landed them on 's not ''entirely'' about work as the billionaires, entrepreneurs and their civil service minders tour the Sunday Times Rich List country, golfing and sightseeing with their entourage of the UK's thousand most wealthy peoplesecurity personnel. So a billion pounds. That It's a lotan event which DCI Daley hopes will pass quickly, right? Can you imagine it? What would you do? Would you try to remain anonymous? Andparticularly as his formal uniform is far too tight for comfort, if you did, how would this affect your relationships with your nearest and dearest? What but it would be like? How could you keep your friends and family from knowing that you were now 's not long before one of the richest people in the country? crew members and a local bird watcher go missing. [[The Billion Pound Lie A Breath on Dying Embers (DCI Daley) by Bill DareDenzil Meyrick|Full Review]]

<!-- Vaughn James -->

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===[[Across the Void The Starlight Watchmaker by S K VaughnLauren James]]===

[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Science FictionDyslexia Friendly|Science FictionDyslexia Friendly]], [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]

Sea epics? So 20th centuryThis is a dyslexia-friendly, science fiction novella for young adults. It tells the tale of Hugo, an unwanted and rather lonely android, who makes a living for himself mending time-travel watches. When one of his clients demands that his broken watch be mended, Hugo realises there is a mystery to be solved, and is only too ready to help. Try An exciting journey of discovery unfolds, which takes Hugo out of his drab attic workroom and into a space epicscary adventure with some amazing new friends, exploring regions of the planet never before known to exist. [[Across the Void The Starlight Watchmaker by S K VaughnLauren James|Full Review]]

<!-- McLean Stuart MacBride -->

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===[[The Van Apfel Girls are Gone Cold Granite (Logan McRae) by Felicity McLeanStuart MacBride]]===

[[image:4star4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]], [[:Category:General FictionCrime|General FictionCrime]]

When Tikka Molloy DS Logan McRae is just back from a year's sick leave after he was eleven attacked by a killer. He's just about OK and onehe's supposed to be easing himself back into the swing of the job in a gentle way - until three-year-sixth years old, the Van Apfel sisters disappearedDavid Reid's body is discovered in a ditch. In the long hot summer of 1992, in an isolated suburb of Australia surrounded by Bushland, the girls vanished during the school He'd been missing for some time and it came as no surprise that he was dead but he's Showstopper concert at the riverside amphitheatrefirst of several child murders. Did they run away? Were they taken? While the search for To add to the sisters united complications the small communitypolice even have a body but no child reported missing. A serial killer, they were never found. Returning home years latera child killer and abuser, Tikka must make sense of that strange moment is on the loose in time – of Aberdeen and the summer press are missing no opportunity to bay for blood. As if that shaped herwasn't bad enough there seems to be a leak from within Force Headquarters: a local journalist, Colin Miller, and the girls she never forgotquickly finds out everything that's happening. [[The Van Apfel Girls are Gone Cold Granite (Logan McRae) by Felicity McLeanStuart MacBride|Full Review]]

<!-- Stowell Angela Marsons -->

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===[[The Dragon in the Library by Louie Stowell and Davide Ortu Child's Play (IllustratorD I Kim Stone)by Angela Marsons]]===

[[image:4.5star4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Confident Readers|Confident Readers]], [[:Category:Emerging ReadersCrime|Emerging ReadersCrime]]

It There's a prologue and we know that we're dealing with someone who is the start of the summer holidays and Kit has plansvery disturbed. These plans involve climbing trees The descriptions are horrifying, getting muddy and being outside. Her friends, Josh and Alita, on the other hand want to go to the library. Kit hates reading and can't see the point but worst of books at all but is very reluctantly persuaded to go with the others to coldness of the local librarykiller. Once there the children meet the librarian and Kit makes an incredible discovery; the librarian is a wizard! Even more incredibly, Kit is a wizard too and she and her friends have an important task. They must save the library…and save the world! [[The Dragon in the Library by Louie Stowell and Davide Ortu Child's Play (IllustratorD I Kim Stone)by Angela Marsons|Full Review]]

<!-- Stuart MacBride Chiang -->

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===[[All That's Dead (Logan McRae 12) Exhalation by Stuart MacBrideTed Chiang]]===

[[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:CrimeScience Fiction|CrimeScience Fiction]], [[:Category:Short Stories|Short Stories]]

It seemed like Over the past twenty-eight years Ted Chiang has published fifteen science fiction short stories. These magnificent stories have won twenty-seven major science fiction awards so if you are a good idea. Logan 'Lazarus' McRae was back at science fiction fan it is likely that you have already come across some of the work after a year off sickby Ted Chiang. He'd been stabbed I cannot speak highly enough of this collection of short stories, they are so wide ranging in the line of duty their themes and recovery had been slow: he still had some pain. His first case was to be a simple one - just to ease him back into work - but it turned out to be anything but. Professor Wilsonso beautifully written, Chiang has written an absolute masterpiece of a high-profile anti-independence campaigner has gone missing, apparently abducted from his home, but nothing was left behind except some bloodstainscollection. In much the same way that Brexit is dividing people south of the border, thereIf you come across Chiang's going work before, take this opportunity to do so now. Trust me; your imagination will be a war between the pro- and anti-independence factions in Scotland - and the police are not above being involvedgrateful. [[All That's Dead (Logan McRae 12) Exhalation by Stuart MacBrideTed Chiang|Full Review]]

<!-- Louise Voss Lawrence -->

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[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] ==[[:Category:Crime|CrimeRose, Interrupted by Patrice Lawrence]]===

If you were looking back to when it began you'd have to say that it was before 1995. Meredith Vincent (that wasn't her name then) had gone to Greenham Common on her seventeenth birthday, dressed as a teddy bear, to protest about nuclear weapons. It was whilst she was there that she met Samantha, fell head over heels in love with her and went to live in a squat in London, leaving behind her A levels, her recently-widowed mother - and her twin brother, Pete, to look after her. Samantha was there occasionally but Meredith was drawn into forming a band with the boys from the squat and against all the odds Cohen went on to become a sensation and it wasn't long before Meredith was living in a mansion rather than the squat[[image:4star. jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[The Last Stage by Louise Voss:Category:Teens|Full ReviewTeens]]

Rose and her brother Rudder have recently escaped from cult-like fundamentalist Christian sect, the Pilgrims, along with their mother. While Mum works endless hours at agency cleaning jobs trying to keep the rent paid on their tiny flat, Rose and Rudder are trying to navigate the worldly world. It's not easy when everything is new and the rigid rules you've always lived by are suddenly missing. [[Rose, Interrupted by Patrice Lawrence|Full Review]]<!-- Ian Mathie Kate Atkinson -->

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===[[Wild Child: Growing Up a Nomad Started Early, Took My Dog (Jackson Brodie) by Ian MathieKate Atkinson]]===

[[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:AutobiographyCrime|AutobiographyCrime]]

For Ian Mathie fans there is good and bad news. Ian has come up with I guess that most of us have made the odd impulse purchase but Tracy Waterhouse, security chief at the missing link Merrion Centre in his narrativeLeeds, blew most people's ideas of an impulse purchase out of the story of water one morning. Seeing a known prostitute dragging a very unusual childhood (yestoddler through the shopping mall whilst cursing at her, Waterhouse followed the very years that made him woman and bought the amazing man he became)girl for £3000. The bad – well itdifficulty of a purchase like this is knowing what to do next and Tracy's hardly news two years later – is that the book humdrum life is published posthumously. As always, it's beautifully written, replaced with many exciting moments. What I most enjoyed was the feeling that many one of the questions in Ian Mathie's later books are answered in ''Wild Child'' with a satisfying clunk. Seemingly all that's now left in the drawer is unpublishablestress, fear and an overwhelming love for four-year-old Courtney. [[Wild Child: Growing Up a Nomad Started Early, Took My Dog (Jackson Brodie) by Ian MathieKate Atkinson|Full Review]]

<!-- Martin Walker Chloe Daykin -->

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===[[The Body Fire Girl, Forest Boy by Chloe Daykin]]=== [[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Confident Readers]] Maya has to escape. She's on the run in a country she doesn't know and has no idea who to trust. Raul is escaping too - travelling back to his home where a terrible tragedy happened, ready to stir up trouble. When their paths collide in the Castle Well (A Brunomiddle of the jungle, Chief the sparks begin to fly. As modern world corruption meets the magic and legends of Police Novel) ancient times, can Maya draw on her hidden light to find the way through to the truth? [[Fire Girl, Forest Boy by Martin WalkerChloe Daykin|Full Review]]===

[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Crime|Crime]] Claudia Muller was an American, studying art history and being mentored by an eminent French art historian and Resistance war hero in Limeuil in Perigord. She was beautiful, wore designer clothes and was well-liked by everyone. She didn't parade her wealth, or her father's White House connections. In fact, her closest friend was a man recently released from prison. So when she left a lecture saying that she felt ill, and her body was later found at the bottom of the castle well it seemed that the likeliest explanation was that this had been a dreadful accident with the only people to blame being the builders who had left the well unsealed. [[The Body in the Castle Well (A Bruno, Chief of Police Novel) by Martin Walker|Full Review]] <!-- Nayeri Angela Marsons -->

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===[[The Ungrateful Refugee Child's Play (D I Kim Stone) by Dina NayeriAngela Marsons]]===

[[image:4.5star4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Politics and Society|Politics and Society]], [[:Category:BiographyCrime|BiographyCrime]]

Here in the West, we see news reports about immigrants on There's a regular basis – some media welcoming them, some scaremongering about them. But all of those stories are written by journalists – almost always western, prologue and almost always, no matter how deep the investigative journalism they carry out, outsiders to the world and the situations we know that refugees find themselves in. Itwe's rare that we find out the journeys from the refugees themselves – and this re dealing with someone who is a rare opportunity to do thatvery disturbed. The descriptions are horrifying, in this intelligent, powerful and moving work by Dina Nayeri -someone who was born in but worst of all is the middle coldness of a revolution in Iran, fleeing to America as a ten-year-oldthe killer.[[The Ungrateful Refugee Child's Play (D I Kim Stone) by Dina NayeriAngela Marsons|Full Review]]

<!-- Douglas Lindsay Gregory -->

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[[image:3.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] ==[[:Category:Crime|CrimeI Hold Your Heart by Karen Gregory]]===

The body of a nine-year-old boy was found at the bottom of a well which had been sealed for two hundred years - but the boy had only been dead for less than two days and there was no sign of how the body had got into the well[[image:4. The owners of the property are adamant that the well was sealed when they went to open it, but DI Ben Westphall would be entitled to have his doubts5star. Belle McIntosh holds some strange views, particularly about the way that the government is controlling everyone through drugs which are added to the water supply which led to her wanting to reinstate the well. Her wife, Catriona Napier, is more moderate, but doesn't seem to have a lot of knowledge about what's going on on the fa jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[Boy in the Well (DI Westphall 2) by Douglas Lindsay:Category:Teens|Full ReviewTeens]]

Gemma has just started her A levels at school. She's a keen student and she has a good, close set of friends. Gemma loves country music and in her spare time she enjoys writing and singing country songs. She's pretty good at it too. Home life is busy - Gemma's brother Michael has a chance at a football career and the whole family, propelled by Gemma's rather over-invested dad, is supporting him with everything they've got. Gemma hasn't had a serious boyfriend yet, so when the handsome Aaron appears and an instant attraction fizzles between them, Gemma is keen to see where romance could lead... [[I Hold Your Heart by Karen Gregory|Full Review]]<!-- Nick Louth Davis -->

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===[[The Body What's That in the Mist Dog Years? by Nick LouthBen Davis and Julia Christians]]===

[[image:4star4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:CrimeConfident Readers|CrimeConfident Readers]]

Muriel Hinkley George and Gizmo have been together ever since George was walking her born. Gizmo has always been a fun, adventurous dog when she found the body on and a quiet country laneloyal friend, but just south of Exmoor. She didn’t recognise him - no one would for a long time as it was obvious recently, George has noticed that he’d been the victim of he's starting to slow down a hit-and-runlittle. He had no face - most of it was smeared on A visit to the road vets leaves George worried that Gizmo might not be around for very much longer, and when D I Jan Talantire came so he begins to look at write Gizmo a bucket list, of all the body she realised adventures that there was absolutely nothing on him which would allow for identificationthey can still have together in Gizmo's last days. All the labels had been cut out of But are they his clothes and there was no wallet and no phone. Hi was Mister Nobody. last days? And who will help George to stay calm when Gizmo is gone? [[The Body What's That in the Mist Dog Years? by Nick LouthBen Davis and Julia Christians|Full Review]]

<!-- Denise Mina Hlad -->

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===[[Conviction The Long Flight Home by Denise MinaA L Hlad]]===

[[image:4star4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:ThrillersHistorical Fiction|ThrillersHistorical Fiction]]

It's strange how September 1940 - as WWII rages on, bombs rain down on Britain, destroying the worst homes and lives of days can start in such an ordinarya people on the edge. In Epping Forest, mundane way. And so it was for Anna McDonald as she sorted out gym kit Susan Shepherd and packed lunches her grandfather Bertie live together raising homing pigeons with the birds proving a comfort for Susan following the loss of her two daughtersparents. It didn't begin These pigeons are more than just birds to go wrong until Susan though – in each one, and especially in Duchess, she opened the door sees a distinct personality and forms a close bond. Meanwhile, young pilot Ollie Evans leaves Maine to head to her best friend, Estelle Britain and realised that her husband was at join the top of Royal Air Force. Working with the stairsNational Pigeon Service, dressed as though for a holiday rather than the work clothes she'd been expecting - and he was carrying a suitcase. He soon meets Susan and Estelle were leaving together is tasked with air-dropping hundreds of homing pigeons into German- occupied France, where many will not survive. As the mission is planned, the bond between Ollie and they were taking AnnaSusan grows stronger, but when Ollie's two daughters with them. There was another problem which neither Hamish nor Estelle knew about. Anna wasn't actually Anna McDonald. She was Sophie Bukaranplane is downed behind enemy lines, the woman it may be Duchess who had been involved in the rape case against four footballers. provides an unexpected lifeline and ensures that hope of a reunion for Susan and Ollie remains… [[Conviction The Long Flight Home by Denise MinaA L Hlad|Full Review]]

<!-- Donnelly Peter Wohlleben -->

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===[[Stepsister Walks In The Wild by Jennifer DonnellyPeter Wohlleben and Ruth Ahmedzai Kemp (Translator)]]===

[[image:4.5star4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:FantasyAnimals and Wildlife|Animals and Wildlife]], [[:Category:Politics and Society|FantasyPolitics and Society]]

''People will not forget. Or forgive. An ugly girl instruction manual for the forest'' is how Wohlleben's publisher described the idea for this book, and that's basically what it is too great an offense...– although right at the end the world author says that it is made for men. An ugly girl can never not intended to be forgivena reference book, but an appetiser.''[[Walks In The Wild by Peter Wohlleben and Ruth Ahmedzai Kemp (Translator)|Full Review]]

''Stepsister'' tells the gripping story of Cinderella's 'ugly' stepsister, Isabelle. We've been told this fairy-tale over and over again throughout our lives and know the characters well. But have you ever wondered what happened to the sisters after Cinderella married the Prince? Or why the sisters disliked her so much? [[Stepsister by Jennifer Donnelly|Full Review]] <!-- Gilly Macmillan M T Edvardsson and Rachel Wilson-Boyles -->

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===[[The Nanny A Nearly Normal Family by Gilly MacmillanM T Edvardsson and Rachel Wilson-Boyles (translator)]]===

[[image:4star4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Crime|Crime]], [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]]

We know that something wrong is happening're going to hear this story through the viewpoints of three different people: Adam Sandell, his wife, Ulrika and his daughter Stella. Adam's a body is being dumped pastor in deep water. The rower pulls away and rows back to the boat house Church of Sweden and then she walks back to Lake HallUlrika is a lawyer. Stella is, well, just difficult. As you begin reading you suspect You sense that you know who she's always been difficult and there have even been occasions when Ulrika has been killed let slip that she wishes that Stella was more like her best friend, Amina Bešic - and who dumped no one has ever said that if they don't think that the body, but other person is better. We first meet the family on Stella's 18th birthday and we get a sense of Adam's controlling nature. Permission has to be patient: all will be revealed before too longgiven for a glass of wine for Stella at the celebration meal. [[The Nanny A Nearly Normal Family by Gilly MacmillanM T Edvardsson and Rachel Wilson-Boyles (translator)|Full Review]]

<!-- Weaver Green -->

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===[[No One Home The House of Light by Tim WeaverJulia Green]]===

[[image:3star4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:ThrillersConfident Readers|ThrillersConfident Readers]]

Long after the police have given Bonnie is growing up on cold missing persons casesa slightly strange island, David Raker picks them living with her grandfather, scavenging for food, and rubbish that has washed up on the beach that she and tracks them downher grandfather can use to make things. He's called to There is some sort of ban against anyone else landing on the island, and lots of suspicion around those who live there, including a particularly disturbing case where a small village great fear of nine people all vanished overnight two years agoanyone who gets sick. Raker But when Bonnie is on the beach one day and his associate must delve discovers not only an intact boat, but a young boy cowering beneath, rather than turn him in to the lives of these people to work out how authorities she takes him home and why nine people have gone missing. They are being threatened to stop but something about the mystery keeps drawing Raker further inhides him, putting smuggling him boiled eggs and blankets in personal perilthe shed whilst she tries to figure out what to do. [[No One Home The House of Light by Tim WeaverJulia Green|Full Review]]

<!-- Marrs Foster -->

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| style=''"vertical-align: top; text-align: left;''"|===[[The Passengers Check Mates by John MarrsStewart Foster]]===

[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Science FictionConfident Readers|Science FictionConfident Readers]], [[:Category:ThrillersTeens|ThrillersTeens]]

In the near futuremany ways Felix is a typical boy in Year 7, self-drive cars are enjoying playing games on his PS4 and hanging out with his friend Jake at the norm - weekend. However Felix is struggling at school. He is not a convenient and easy way of transportproblem child but he does have a problem. HoweverHis ADHD makes it hard for him to concentrate, when someone hacks he keeps getting into the systems of eight self-drive cars, their passengers trouble and his grades are set on a fatal collision courseslipping. When his Mum suggests that he spends more time with his grandfather Felix is horrified. Ever since Grandma died his Granddad has been grumpy and more eccentric than before. As everyday commutes turn into terror-filled journeys, All he wants to do is sit in the public have to judge who should survivedark and play chess. Felix knows that this will be extremely boring. But with every aspect of these passangers being examined by the public - will they turn out sometimes we learn valuable lessons where we least expect to be what they seem? and perhaps Granddad and Felix can help each other. [[The Passengers Check Mates by John MarrsStewart Foster|Full Review]]

<!-- Toon Jane O'Connor -->

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===[[If You Could Go Anywhere Needlemouse by Paige ToonJane O'Connor]]=== [[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]], [[:Category:Women's Fiction|Women's Fiction]] We first meet Sylvia Penton on her birthday and her boss, the Prof, is taking her out to lunch. This is her favourite day of the year, not because it's her birthday but because of the special time she gets to spend with the man she loves. He's told her that he and his wife are going to divorce - Martha is apparently having an affair - and Sylvia is convinced that the Prof will then declare his love and they can be together. She hasn't fully constructed 'together' in her own mind - she envisages it as romantic, but her imagination hasn't yet progressed to the sexual part of the relationship. There's time though - she's only been the prof's PA for fifteen years. [[Needlemouse by Jane O'Connor|Full Review]]<!-- Various-->|-| style=''width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;''|[[image:1529006031.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1529006031/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style=''vertical-align: top; text-align: left;''|===[[Return to Wonderland by Various Authors]]===

[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Women's FictionConfident Readers|Women's FictionConfident Readers]], [[:Category:Short Stories|Short Stories]]

Angie is someone who always wanted to travelIn following a young girl called Alice down the rabbit hole a few years ago, but it's taken her 27 years to leave when the small mining town first book she was in south Australia which has been the only home she[[Alice's ever known. She doesnAdventures in Wonderland (150th Anniversary Edition) by Lewis Carroll and Anthony Browne|hit 150 years of age]], I found that I didn't do things by half thoughreally find too much favour with it. The wacky-for-the-sake-of-it did not gel, and once she does feel able I don't remember loving it more as a child. But I would suggest I am the perfect audience for this book. I had every chance to go (following enjoy these short stories that come at the core from a family death) she leaves not only the towntangent, that show the state and benefits of the countryoblique glance. I've always preferred coming to an author's output through their least obvious, but also the continentallegedly throw-away pieces, and finds herself following in her motherit's the same with franchises – I'd more likely go for Bree Tanner's footsteps and heading short novella than the whole Twilight saga (although that remains just a hunch, for obvious reasons). For another thing, there was every reason to Italy. expect some kind of greatness here – with Carroll much loved by millions, surely pieces written with that love in mind could only provide for success after success? [[If You Could Go Anywhere Return to Wonderland by Paige ToonVarious Authors|Full Review]]

<!-- Nick Griffiths Elphinstone -->

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| style="''vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"''|===[[Mayhem in the Archipelago Rumblestar (The Unmapped Chronicles) by Nick GriffithsAbi Elphinstone]]===

[[image:4star4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:ThrillersConfident Readers|ThrillersConfident Readers]]

In Latvia Rumblestar follows the haphazard adventures of the conspirators meet in a rather unpleasant locationanxious 11-year-old Casper Tock who timetables his every movement, but it's their plans which matter makes countless to them. In Moscow two men delight in all do lists and is hounded by wealthy bullies with the uncertainty in the Balticabsurdly humorous and appropriate names of Candida Cashmere Jumps and Leopold Splattercash. In Washington the Undersecretary is He stumbles across a womanmagic portal by accident just like Lucy of Narnia fame, but the personal pressures on meets a feisty girl troubled by her are the same as the men in Moscow are obliged to sufferpast and is plunged into a perilous quest. In Stockholm three members a kingdom where the dark mythological forces of SÄPO, Midnights threaten the Swedish Secret Service, know that weather Marvels (equated here to the time has come for them to make a move. They'd talk moremiracle of nature) conjured by magical creatures, but their wives would get difficult and there's a rather pleasing tart which mustn't be missedonly unlikely heroes can battle against evil. [[Mayhem in the Archipelago Rumblestar (The Unmapped Chronicles]) by Nick GriffithsAbi Elphinstone|Full Review]]

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===[[Watchwords The Evil Occupants of Easingdale Castle by Philip NealRay Filby]]===

[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Short StoriesTeens|Short StoriesTeens]] This satisfying collection of short stories has a provenance at least as beguiling as the provenance of the antique watches that inspired it.

Philip Neal lost Jason likes chess. He's pretty good at it too - a watchlevel eight on his computer programme, with level ten being Grand Master level. He's also good at systems, having contributed to the relational database that has streamlined his school's administration. It was a watch he was fond of Jason's school, Easingdale Comprehensive, is very big on technology and had been told was like a 1930s Cartier. Instead of mourning its losshead, Mr Johnston, he began is keen to collect vintage watches that resembled itinvolve his pupils wherever they show promise. And thatSo Jason's how he became a watch collectorfriends have also helped out. An eBay purchase led him to Liz is great with hardware and helped with the Antique Watch Company watch repairers in Clerkenwellschool's card reader system. The eBay purchase was Becky has a fake, but the friendship that grew between the buyer flair for software and the repairer has recommended lots of watches was not and the seed of an idea for curriculum-enhancing apps. And Bill is a book was borntalented programmer... [[ Watchwords The Evil Occupants of Easingdale Castle by Philip Neal Ray Filby|Full Review]]

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===[[Fall Down Dead (Cooper and Fry) Stone Cold Heart by Stephen BoothCaz Frear]]===

DS Dev Sharma is delighted - if delight DC Cat Kinsella is back at the right word Met after a secondment to apply the London Mayor's Office: the hours were good but the job was boring. She's grateful to a murder case be back with the old team - but heher partner DS Luigi Parnell, boss DCI Kate Steele and DC Rénee Akwa. She's still not prepared to say anything about the identity of her boyfriend: the knowledge that she's got in a result when relationship with Aiden Doyle, the husband brother of a murder victim is found with the knife, standing over the body, and admitting to the moreover a murder. DI Ben Cooper is concerned with a suspicious death on Kinder Scoutwhich her father might have had some involvement could finish her career. A party Kinsella and Parnell are called to the discovery of walkers - the New Trespassers Walking Group - got lost in the fog and problems arose when one body of the party a young woman: Naomi Lockhart was injured. The group split up to find helpAustralian, or at least a mobile signal, but when they're rescued they're one short just twenty-two years old and the her body of Faith Matthew was found at the bottom of Kinder Downfall. It looked like a dreadful accidentdiscovered by her flat mate, Kieran Drake, but Cooper wasn't happy about the way the body had fallen. Things are not always as they seem an ex- in either caseoffender. [[Fall Down Dead (Cooper and Fry) Stone Cold Heart by Stephen BoothCaz Frear|Full Review]]