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<metadesc>Book review site, with books from most walks of literary life; fiction, biography, crime, cookery and children's books plus author interviews and top tens.</metadesc><h1 id="mf-title">The Bookbag</h1>Hello from The Bookbag, a book review 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 author [[:Category:Interviews|author interviews]], and all sorts of [[:Category:Lists|top tens]] - all of which you can find on our [[Featuresfeatures]] page. If you're stuck for something to read, check out the [[Book Recommendations|recommendations]] page.
'''Read [[:Category:New Reviews|new reviews by category]]. '''<br> '''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].''' <!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Lisa McCannSeishi Yokomizo and Louise Heal Kawai (translator)|title=WakeThe Honjin Murders
|rating=4
|genre=TeensCrime|summary=Janie is seventeen and studying hard for college. SheTo many readers, the phrase 's also working lots of hours at a local nursing home to earn money for college as itlocked room murder mystery's unlikely her alcoholic mother is going enough to provide much in make the book one to read; preferably quantified by the way of resourceswords 'clever' or 'good'. College For those who need more, here is Janie's only chance at a life better than the one sheextra background – we's lived so far and so you can't blame her for being so single-minded re in rural Japan in the pursuit of her goal. Only one thing stands in her way..1930s.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847385036</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jaclyn Moriarty |title= The Spell Book oldest son of Listen Taylor|rating=3an esteemed family is belatedly getting married, although the whole affair is really not as ostentatious as it might be – hardly anybody has turned up, what with it being arranged at great haste.5|genre=Teens|summary=Listen Taylor's father She only has just moved in with his girlfriend and they are adopted into the Zing an uncle representing her family, with all of its delightful eccentricities and unusual behaviour – for one thing. Either way, the Zings meet every Friday night celebrations have gone ahead as planned, only for dinner and then disappear into the garden shed wedded couple to work be slashed to death in their private annex before the sun rises on the 'Zing Family Secret'. Marbie Zing is terrified of doing something wrong and losing Nathaniel and Listentheir marriage. Her sister Fancy is becoming increasingly disillusioned with her home life, and her daughter's year two teacher is coming to terms What with a break up. The stories of these people come together to create a tale man missing parts of life, lovehis fingers being in the neighbourhood, and ultimately, what being part some mysterious use of a family means.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330446363</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=F G Cottam|title=The Magdalena Curse|rating=2.5|genre=Horror|summary=Mark Hunter is traditional musical instrument at the sort time of father who would do anything for his son. After losing his wife and daughter in a tragic accidentthe crime, his surviving son Adam this case has become his whole world. And Adam is an exceptional child – beautiful, incredibly smart and mature beyond his ten years – only recently he's been channelling the voices a lot of the dead. Plagued by horrific dreams, able 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, and witnesses the horrors the poor boy endures for herselfpeculiar about it.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0340980982</amazonuk>1782275002
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jon BerkeleyCixin Liu|title=The Lightning Key (Circus Trilogy)|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=I shall start with a word of advice. When you're being hounded by a circus master, and a magician, for the soul of a tiger that's contained in a tiger's egg that's contained in the brain of your teddy bear, and your best friend - a fallen angel - is trying her best to make sure the other angels do not turn on you in a big way - then you're probably living the third book in a fantasy trilogy. Still - never mind, the angelDeath's efforts will involve you entering a dream world of flight and cloud cities, the chase after your enemies will take you across the world to desert oases and back, and friends new and old will be on board to help.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847384447</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Sue Townsend|title=Adrian Mole: The Prostrate YearsEnd
|rating=5
|genre=General Science Fiction|summary=Adrian Mole is now 39¼ and living, quite literally, in a pigsty, sharing an all too thin party wall with his parents and working in a bookshop. ItIf I's not quite how life was supposed to turn out. As he spends his days wrestling his strong willed 5 year old Gracie into her school uniformd been paying more attention when I picked this book up, trying to reassure glamorous wife Daisy that life in the provinces is not as bad as she I would like to believe, and desperately attempting to talk his mother out of her quest to appear have put it back on the vile shelf. Not because I didn''Jeremy Kyle'' show, worrying over his increasingly frequent visits to the toilet is really the last thing he needs. And yet, the worst is still t want to come. Think a crumbling economy, redundancy, affairs, death, a family member challenging him in the novel writing stakes and a query over the big C – read it's going to be a tough year for the Moles, and therebut because I's little d have figured out that ol' Adrian can do except sit back and watch his life spin out it was the final part of control around him.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0718153707</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Lauren Kate|title=Fallen|rating=4.5|genre=Teens|summary=A 17 year old girl at a new school meets a mysterious and impossibly good-looking boy, who she's immediately drawn totrilogy. He seems determined to either ignore her or be outright rude to her, until he saves her life, and the two of them end up drawn together. This isn't Stephenie Meyer's ''Twilight'', but it certainly has striking similarities.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0385738935</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Gareth Hinds|title=King Lear|rating=3|genre=Graphic Novels|summary=Hound me out of town Coming in part way through a most appropriate manner, but I do not like King Lear. For me, even as a trained actor, the language saga is too dense and rich, never the set-up too archly unfeasible easiest thing to create the great tragedy it's thought to be. To my mind the acclaim do and esteem in which it's held is only mirrored by its own over-long, over-blown blustering.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0763643440</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Paul Theroux|title=A Dead Hand: A Crime particularly true in Calcutta|rating=3.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Set in India, familiar territory for Theroux, ''A Dead Hand'' tells science fiction because without knowing the story of a travel writer suffering from writer's block (also known as 'dead hand') until a chance letter from an American exback-pat, the mysterious Mrs Unger, relating a story of a mystery of a dead body in a hotel leads him there are not just people whose names mean nothing to release his creativity in very unexpected ways. The story is more about obsession and infatuation than you (when it is about the mystery itself as the narrator falls under Mrs Unger's Tantric charms. But does she have more to hide than sheassumed they will) but there are whole concepts that you won's letting on?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241144639</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Toby Lester|title=The Fourth Part of the World: The Epic Story of History's Greatest Map|rating=4.5|genre=History|summary=In 2003 a map was bought for $10 million, the highest price ever paid publicly for a historical document, by the Library of Congress, where it is now on permanent public displayt understand. No ordinary map, this This latter is sometimes described as Americaparticularly true of Cixin Liu's birth certificatework – his range is phenomenal. It is the sole survivor of a thousand copies printed early in the 16th centuryGeorge R R Martin, and was discovered by accident in some archives in who knows a German castle in 1901. The sale and story behind it intrigued Toby Lester so much that he was inspired to discover morething or two about world-creation, and this book is the result.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1861978030</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Steven Lowe and Alan McArthur |title=Is described it Just Me or Has the Shit Hit the Fan?: Your Hilarious New Guide to Unremitting Global Misery|rating=3|genre=Humour|summary=as ''The banks fell over like fat Labradors running over a wet kitchen floor.'' Surely that is the wackiestunique blend of scientific and philosophical speculation, most inappropriate simile for the credit crunch conspiracy theory and all it has done for the world. You woncosmology't get any such namby-pamby animal likenesses from these authors, instead with quite a potty mouth on them they will lambast the modern world, the entire banking system, all those who failed to see it coming, and those millions just seemingly waiting for us all to revert to high-interest, high-risk, high-lending capitalism, so they can get back on the expenses train, and back up the rich lists.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847443656</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Andy Stanton|title=What's For Dinner, Mr Gum?|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|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 is getting thrown around like it's going out All of fashion, that 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 Elizabethmore.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1405248246</amazonuk>1784971650
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Loose Women1780894511|title=Here Come the GirlsDie Alone|author=Simon Kernick
|rating=4
|genre=Home and FamilyThrillers|summary=This Ray Mason is in prison awaiting trial for murder and he's in the second volume by vulnerable prisoner unit: as a cop he's something of a target, but the unit is not as secure as the panelists from that nice ITV series, ''Loose Womeninmates would have hoped and Mason is injured in a riot. On his way to hospital he's broken free by armed men and an offer is made to him. He'. Just as promised on s to assassinate the cover, this book man who is an entertaining night with likely to become the girlscountry's next prime minister and he'll then be given a new identity so that he can start afresh abroad. It turns out His captors say that they're just like us. The faces are already familiar and even if you don't know them yet, with nine contributorsMI6, you'll soon find a like-minded woman behind one of the celebrity facesbut Mason has his doubts. The women His choices are universally warm-hearted limited though and supportive: there will he has personal reasons to believe that it would be many a lonely woman who reads this book and feels as better if she sat down with a group of friends for the eveningAlastair Sheridan was dead.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444700154</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jean UreAkwaeke Emezi|title=Fortune CookiePet
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident ReadersTeens|summary=Fudge Cassidy and The people of the Cupcake kid are best friends. If the names remind you of a certain film then you'd be spot on as town Lucille believe that's where Fudge's father got all the idea frommonsters are gone. They're actually chalk and cheese – Fudge is loud mouthed and opinionated and Cupcake is quiet and thoughtful – but the combination works. They've just started at secondary school and Cupcake has rather a lot on her plate. Her brother Joey has muscular dystrophy and his problems Their children are becoming more obvious. Add raised to this understand that her father couldn't cope with they were saved by the angels, those who rid the problems town of evil, and he now has another familythere are no monsters anymore. It's just CupcakeBut one day, Jam accidentally cuts herself, Joey and bleeds a little onto one of her mother – and not a lot of money's paintings.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007224621</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jenifer Roberts|title= The Madness of Queen Maria: The Remarkable Life of Maria I of Portugal|rating=4.5|genre=Biography|summary=Born in 1734 in Lisbonblood awakens a bizarre, at that time the richest and most opulent city in Europeterrifying-looking creature named Pet, Maria was destined to become the first female monarch in Portuguese history. Married who somehow comes to her uncle Infante Pedro, seventeen years her senior, she had six children (outliving all but one of them), life and became Queen in 1777. A conscientious woman, she had the misfortune declares that it is here to be born in during hunt the 'age of reason', when church and state were vying for supremacymonster. Instinctively a supporter of the old religion, with a humanitarian approach Though Jam tries to state affairs, she was no Queen Elizabeth, no Catherine convince it that all the Greatmonsters are gone, and wore her crown rather reluctantly.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095455891X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=David Hughes|title=Thomas Wogan Pet is Dead|rating=4.5|genre=Graphic Novels|summary=Well, with a title like certain thatthere is one, need I bother with a plot summary? A man has a day out in Morecambestill, then and that the next thing he knows he's monster is hiding in the ultimate waiting room, with a strange array home of animals (a bather best friend, a toad, a sea urchin...), all waiting for... well, something. Yup, as you didn't need telling, he's deadRedemption.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>095580888X</amazonuk>0571355110
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Dave Eggers1686751680|title=The Wild ThingsMy Mummy does weird things / Maman fait des choses bizarres|author=Amelie Julien and Gustyawan
|rating=4
|genre=General FictionFor Sharing|summary=Meet Max. Which child doesn't think that there mother is, well, ''weird''? When I It might be that in the morning their mother doesn't like speaking much, when every self-respecting child knows that that is when you're at your brightest with lots to say he sometimes gets the wrong end ? ''Why'' then does Mummy stick her fingers in her ears? Then there's doing yoga in front of the stick about adultstelevision, or dislikes his motherwhich could be worrying if it wasn't so funny. We won's new boyfriendt go into too much detail about what goes on in the bathroom and the colour changes which have occured when Mummy emerges and frankly, or gets a bit feisty when he feels the need for revenge, I am certainly understating less said the facts. He is a bit of a rascal better about her reactions to say your artistic efforts on the leastwall. But all that might change when he finds himself travelling to a strange land of roisterous animalsI mean, and ends up installed as their king.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241144221</amazonuk>what else would you use paint for?
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jeremy StrongJustine Avery and Liuba Syrotiuk|title=Christmas Chaos for the Hundred-Mile-An-Hour Dog What Wonders Do You See... When You Dream?
|rating=4
|genre=Confident ReadersFor Sharing|summary=Trevor's troublesome dog, Streaker, 'The day has had three puppies. They were fatheredended''<br>''Hasn't it been splendid?'' <br>''But now, according to local bully Charlie Smugg, by one of his Alsatians. Trevor would ideally like to keep them, at least until Christmas, but his parents have other ideas and put them up for sale. Charlie Smugg declares that heit's entitled time, to half of the money from the sale of the puppies, but before they can be sold the three puppies go missing in the park and itsure''s up to Trevor and his best friend Tina to try and track them down before Charlie demands his cash!|amazonuk=<amazonukbr>0141327243''For an entirely different adventure'' </amazonukbr>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Iain Smyth and Michael TerryHarris|title=The Wide-Mouthed FrogSolitude: In Pursuit of a Singular Life in a Crowded World|rating=4.5|genre=For SharingLifestyle|summary=Do you know This is not the joke about the wide-mouthed frog? You must have heard book I was expecting itto be. It's a classic. It's one that you really need For some reason I expected it to be another self-help manual on how to tell in personfind calm, with your fingers pulling your mouth wide openhow to step outside the mainstream, but to hopefully spark your memoryit is not that at all. Instead of telling us how, it is more about the wide-mouthed frog introduces himself ''why''. Harries examines how we're eroding solitude, which used to be a number natural part of animals until our human life, and why that matters. Of course he finally comes across a crocodile who eats wide-mouthed frogstalks about how some people have found solitude and what has come of that, and eventually in the frog does final chapter he talks about his best to disguise who he is whilst saying ''Ooh, you don't see many own experience of those round here, do you?'' I'm hardly doing having deliberately sought it justiceout, but it's very cheesy mostly he wanders down the alleys and funny. Anyway, by-ways that his thinking about this is a book of that jokelost art led him.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1408804964</amazonuk>1847947662
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Dr Aaron Carroll and Dr Rachel VreemanAndy Briggs|title=Don't Swallow Your GumCtrl+S
|rating=5
|genre=LifestyleScience Fiction|summary=Life in the near future'''BANG'''s not all bad. ThatWe's ve reversed global warming and fixed the sound of copious urban myths being shot downcollapsing bee population. We even created SPACE, a virtual-sensory universe where average guys like Theo Wilson can do almost anything they desire. '''BANG''But almost anything isn't enough for some. That's the sound of the old wives slamming the doorEvery day, normal people are being taken, as their tales get revealed as baselessemotions harvested - and lives traded - to create death-defying thrills for the rich and twisted. '''CLICK'''Now Theo’s mother has disappeared. ThatAnd as he follows her breadcrumb trail of clues, he's ll come up against the noise lots of illmost dangerous SPACE has to offer: vPolice, AI Bots and anarchists -informed websites make as they get closed downwell as a criminal empire that will kill to stop him finding her . . All noises come due to this brilliant book.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0141043369</amazonuk>1409184641
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Annie Taylor1609809378|title=VioletThe Rabbits' Rebellion|author=Ariel Dorfman and Chris Riddell
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Violet is a very special hippoWe're in the realm of the rabbits, only the foxes and wolves have taken over. She is extremely small King Wolf, His Wolfiness, has declared the rabbits don't exist, but the pesky birds have spread rumours from awing that does not make her adoptive parents Albert and Mavis love her any the lessbunnies are in fact still around. However Demanding a propaganda spree, King Wolf orders a humble monkey to be his official portrait photographer, they are slightly worried that Violet has but whatever the poor innocent monkey prints out in his darkroom there is a very unusual habit distinct leporine hint. Can King Wolf succeed in proving himself victorious, can the rabbits show their continued existence to all who need to know of turning pink without warning it – and for no explicable reason.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906847371</amazonuk>what can the poor monkey caught in between do?
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Hilary DixonInnosanto Nagara|title=When Rooks Speak of LoveM is for Movement
|rating=4
|genre=Literary FictionEmerging Readers|summary=Arthur Transcombe Set in Indonesia, in the not too distant past, this is a middle-agedstory about social change. Dealing with some difficult issues, grey-hairedsuch as political corruption and nepotism, self-effacing poet. Unremarkable really - on the outsidebook is neither boring nor preachy. He hasIt educates gently, howeverwith vibrant, managed to achieve some success with his poemschallenging illustrations, and it portrays how social movements need people who will try, even when it seems that they will fail. (Being The message is a guest speaker at positive one; that in an increasingly uncertain world, we do still have the Cheltenham Literary Festival is no mean feat)power to instigate change. He is also a babe magnet!|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1904529429</amazonuk>1609809351
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=A J Healy1780724047|title=Tommy Storm A Dictionary of Interesting and the Galactic KnightsImportant Dogs|author=Peter J Conradi|rating=3.54|genre=Confident ReadersPets|summary=Meet Tommy StormI struggle to resist a book about dogs, but I did wonder why this one was so ''thin'': given that I've never encountered a dog who wasn't interesting or important - and probably both, I was expecting a massive tome. HeBut 's one 'A Dictionary of five teenagers snapped up from around the universe to be Interesting and Important Dogs'' is actually ''a gang rich compendium of heroic detectives charged with rescuing EVERYTHING from destruction. Not just the planet, or the solar system, or even the galaxy, but EVERYTHINGworld's most significant and beloved dogs'' and it's certainly a rich treasure trove. Nobody seems to know whatWe begin with Peter J Conradi's going to cause this destructionfour collies: Cloudy, or when, but he Sky. Bradley and his friends and their ship seem to be the only people proactively going about saving the dayMax. So itThey's a pity that they start this book strung up by a nasty loony whore consecutive rather than simultaneous dogs, but what comes over is Conradi's about to kill love for each and every one of them.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847247555</amazonuk> I knew that I was in safe hands.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Graham McCann1785769294|title=Bounder!: The Biography of Terry-ThomasMan at the Window (Detective Cardilini)|author=Robert Jeffreys
|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=Spam E-Mails can It's when we read that a young boy is creeping reluctantly to a teacher's bedroom one October night that we realise something is badly wrong. Nowadays you ''might'' hope that something would be incredibly annoying, done about it fairly quickly but most this was 1965 and child abuse was generally regarded as malicious mischief on the part of us will have had to deal with themthe child. Fortunately, we can hit The boy would be safe that night though - albeit in the delete button and forget about them as quickly as they camemost horrific fashion. I certainly prefer not to torture my friends by sending such rubbish When he reached Captain Edmund's bedroom he found the man dead onthe floor, no matter how bad my luck is supposed to become if I don'tthe top of his skull missing. But I wonder how many of us would react if The school's initial reaction was that this was a spam E-Mail actually was dreadful accident: there had been a matter cull of life kangaroos in some nearby fields and death, rather than just claiming to be?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0749007079</amazonuk>it was obviously a stray bullet which had killed the Captain.
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jeanette Winterson1786695227|title=The Battle of the Sun|rating=5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=London 1601. Elizabeth I is getting on in years. Her capital city is a busy, bustling place. Boats fill the river and people fill the streets. Jack is happy because it's his birthday and his present is his heart's desire: an excitable black puppy named Max, who's a ''licking and a running and a leaping and a jumping and a tummy Invisible in the air and a tail wagging and a barking, racing, braking, spinning energy dog of delight''. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>140880042X</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewBright Light|author=Jean Ure|title=Love and KissesSally Gardner
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Tamsin and Katie were just thirteen and worried that they were boring. They'd been best friends since forever and were The beginning of this excellent story will leave the reader more than a little confused: who is the man in the good girls. Neither missed schoolgreen suit, skipped her homework nor had boyfriends. Well, that what isthe Reckoning, not so far. and why are rows of people in a cave? Up until then Tamsin had been But stick with it – Ms Gardner is very cleverly letting us experience the boffin head – consistently strong academically and looking forward to going on to universitysame disorientation as our heroine. All that seemed We watch in dismay as the strange man, who seems to change when she met Alex. Wellhave no eyes, when I say 'met' I should perhaps clarify and say that Alex pushed does his wheelbarrow into best to persuade her, from the building site where he workedto answer his questions. OhBut for some reason Celeste, and did I mention that he was seventeendespite her bewilderment, Polish remains wary and spoke very little English?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007281722</amazonuk>gives nothing away.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Henry Mintzberg1912374854|title=ManagingViolet|author=S J I Holliday|rating=3.5|genre=Business and FinanceThrillers|summary=I''Study after study has shown ve never been but understand that travelling is all about meeting new people and forming instantaneous bonds with people in often chance situations. Well that managers work at an unrelenting pace'' How true, though it always makes me wonder why, as s exactly what happens when the two main/only characters meet in a result, there's such travel agency in Beijing - Carrie is unsuccessfully trying to get a market refund on an extra ticket for bulky management the Trans-Siberian train and leadership and general business books like this oneViolet is trying to unsuccessfully buy a ticket for the same sold-out journey. How does anyone who needs or wants to read one ever find As the time to do so? This title actually has an answer to thistwo team up, by providing two books in onetravelling through Mongolia, Serbia and into Russia, it is such could've been the start of a simple yet effective solution that I have to start there. You can read beautiful friendship but this book in one a thriller after all so it quickly becomes a tale of two ways. Option one is to read every word, chapter by chapter, cover to cover. If you have the time I would recommend this approach because the book is very readable, not too repetitiveobsession, manipulation and quite thought-provokingtoxic friendships.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0273709305</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kathryn Fox1912374838|title=Blood BornNothing Important Happened Today|author=Will Carver
|rating=4
|genre=CrimeGeneral Fiction|summary=To give support to Nothing Important Happened Today is a vulnerable gang-rape victimdark, twisted, forensic pathologist Anya Crichton offers to drive Giverny Hart to the courthouse on the day she is due to testify against the notorious Harbourn brothers. But when Anya arrives at the house she finds Giverny close to death and faces a battle against time to save herdifficult read. In the panicStories about cults often are, Anya fails to take note of an important clue which might help tell whether but this is different; it really was suicide or a cleverly staged murder. Worse still, in trying to save the girl's life, Anya has interfered written with a crime scene and the case falls apartsense of style that is quite unlike anything I've read before. She blames herself for the Harbourn brothers being allowed to walk free and only hours later there is news of another attackI can't remember ever having read a novel with such an odd, distinctive narrative voice. A pair of sisters have been stabbed While a slim and raped resulting in relatively small book, the death slow-moving nature of one, while the other clings to lifeplot makes it feel far larger than its 276 pages.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340933097</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Leah Flemingwilliamabbey|title=Remembrance Day|rating=4|genre=Women's Fiction|summary=In the year 2000 an old lady in a wheelchair watches the unveiling The Pursuit of the new war memorial in the village square. There's pride in what has been achieved, in the family who are gathered around her and there are memories too. Some are good but many are not.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847561039</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewWilliam Abbey|author=Neal Layton|title=Surf's Up (Mammoth Academy)Claire North
|rating=3.5
|genre=Confident ReadersParanormal|summary=Having successfully seen off When William Abbey fails to prevent the rather unpleasant humans lynching of a young boy in earlier volumes1880's South Africa, he finds himself cursed by the grieving mother. A naïve English Doctor, he slowly learns the weight of the curse upon him, our favourite junior mammoths Oscar as the shadow of the dead boy begins to follow him across the world. Never stopping, always growing – it crosses oceans and Arabella have nothing much else to do apart from return to Mammoth Academy for lots more double periods mountains in pursuit of Difficult SumsWilliam. They're supposed As he finds himself unable to be making presentations about what they did during resist speaking the holidays tootruths that he hears in others, but Oscar hasn't done any preparation he also learns that the dark shadow is deadly – and, frankly, seeks to kill the one he can't really remember what he actually did do with all that free time other than no Difficult Sums. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>034098967X</amazonuk>loves the most…
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ursula Jones and Sarah Gibb1643785036|title=The Princess Who Had No KingdomWondrous Apothecary|author=Mary E Martin
|rating=4
|genre=Confident ReadersGeneral Fiction|summary=Those who have known Alexander Wainwright, the landscape artist famous for his Turner prize winning ''The princess who has no kingdom wanders around in a cart pulled by her horse PrettyHay Wagon'', and Rinaldo, renowned conceptual artist would say that they're chalk and cheese, if not sworn enemies. She If you's very politeve watched the relationship, friendlyas has our narrator, and kind-heartedart dealer Jamie Helmsworth, but she feels like something is lacking because she doesnyou't d have a kingdom said that they were magnets, drawing and repulsing each other in equal measure. Wainwright was at the socially acceptable end of her own. The other royals she meets treat her nicely enoughthe artistic continuum, but with Rinaldo it was all too obvious that there's always was but a feeling that shefine dividing line between conceptual art and public nuisance. As time has worn on, he's not quite as good as them because she isn't frequently been brought to the attention of the princess police. On this latest occasion we see him charged with arson and theft of anywhere''The Hay Wagon''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846160421</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mij Kelly and Louise NisbetMary H.K. Choi|title=The Happiest Man in the World or the Mouse Who Made ChristmasPermanent Record
|rating=4
|genre=For SharingTeens|summary=Mouse doesn't like anyone and keeps herself to herself. Her things are her things and she Pablo, a college drop-out, is too selfish to share them with anyone elseworking at a New York bodega. One day, an old man moves in to Mouse He's house. He used to be the happiest man massively in the worlddebt, but now he's sad. He's fed up of having givenavoiding his mother, given, given all and he finds his life and never got anything back. He just sits quietly and mopes. This makes Mouse miserable, so joy in creating unusual snacks with random ingredients! Whilst working one day she decides to cheer him up by giving him a clementine...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340931558</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Nick Bland|title=The Very Cranky Bear|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=Mooseevening, Lion, Zebra and Sheep head into a cave he's surprised to get out of discover that the rain, but little do they know that Bear girl he is fast asleep in there. When they wake him up, chatting with as he roars at themserves is a super-famous pop star and, chasing them outsideas unlikely as it may seem, so they decide start a relationship. With one character who is trying very hard not to cheer him up somehow. Zebra paints stripes on himbe seen or noticed by anyone, Moose fashions antlers for him and Lion sticks a mane of straw on him. Unsurprisingly, this makes Bear even crankier, so it's down to Sheep to save the day...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340989424</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Kes Gray other who is seen and Lee Wildish|title=Mum followed and Dad Glue|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=A young boyhounded by everyone all over the world, it's parents are splitting up. He's going through the usual emotions that children of divorce go through: worry, feeling unsure, blaming himself, anger, denial, and then trying to get them to stay an interesting clash as they come together. His method for this This isn't the usual response just a love story though: he looks for glue to stick his mum , and dad together. Thankfullyactually it's really just Pab's story, about the journey he finds some wise and kindly advice takes in the processhis life via his meet-up with Leanna Smart.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0340957107</amazonuk>0349003459
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Clara Vulliamy1609809319|title=The Bear With Sticky Paws Won't Go To Bed|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=It's Pearl's bedtime, but she says she's really busy and isn't going to sleep. She just wants to play and play and play. When the bear with sticky paws rings the doorbell, he whisks her away on an amazing adventure Long-Haired Cat- although as you might expect, the bear has a little more energy than Pearl and eventually she does get a little sleepy.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408300648</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewBoy Cub|author=Stephen Mackey|title=Miki|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=It's cold, dark and icyEtgar Keret, Aviel Basil and Miki and Penguin are trudging through the snow. But it's Midwinter Eve, when wishes come true. They wish for a tree, lights, someone strong to power the lights, and finally a star that will shine brightly forever. Miki is taken deep below the ice to find the star, whilst up top Penguin and new friend Polar Bear start to worry about her.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>034095065X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Kristin Cashore|title=FireSondra Silverston (translator)
|rating=5
|genre=FantasyConfident Readers|summary=Possessed of great beautyOne day a boy is in the zoo with his father, when the kind that drives men mad, Fire is used to people trying to kill herman gets called away on urgent business. She The boy isn't used to them doing it by accident. When hustled into a poacher in the woods outside her cab and taken home accidentally shoots herfirst, though, no – he's given hot dog money, and taxi money, Fire is hard pressed and told to keep the temperamental Lord Archer from killing himjust stick around on his own and enjoy himself. But as sure as Fire is the man did not mean to cause her harm Well, she is made unsure by it's no surprise that the strange fog that exists in orphan-for-an-afternoon sensation the manlad feels doesn't make him happy, and so he thinks of a species name for himself, and curls himself up into an empty cage, as if he were a new exhibit. And it's mind.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905200129</amazonuk>then the drama begins…
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Justin Scroggie1785785516|title=Eye Spy: Uncovering the Secrets of the World Around YouFucking Good Manners|author=Simon Griffin
|rating=4
|genre=TriviaLifestyle|summary=Signs are everywhereManners maketh man, they say. I wasn't really one of those who thought our roads were littered with too many traffic signs until the day I was driven past It certainly makes life easier if everybody abides by a pair set of speed regulation signsconventions, positioned at the exit end some of a one-way street but facing the illegal way up itwhich are ages old and other which have evolved over time. Not all signs, of course, Manners are quite as unnecessarynot about how much to tip or how you should behave if you get an invitation to Buckingham Palace, they have nothing to do with class or indeed as blatantly visiblefinancial status: they're about getting the basics right before we try to deal with more difficult matters. Of course we all have more relaxed manners when we're with family and friends, which is where this pictorial guide but it's best if we learn to countless coded messages, signifiers distinguish between our public and private lives and other similar factoids comes into act appropriately. ''Fucking Good Manners'' aims to help us on the way.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340994487</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jose Saramago 0008324859|title=Small Memories|rating=4|genre=Autobiography|summary=Having been born in 1922 and lived through so much of the twentieth century, with an author's view of change and people, Jose Saramago has certainly experienced a lot. Civil Wars in the neighbouring Spain; the growth of his country - which still left it as western Europe's poorest. Here he allows us witness to his mind drifting through his childhood, in the country and in Lisbon, and provides a subtle and gentle memoir.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184655148X</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewFowl Twins
|author=Eoin Colfer
|rating=5
|genre=General FictionConfident Readers|summary=I've been meaning to get around to reading some or all of Harlan Coben's workRelax, because if the reviews are to everyone – our old friend Artemis may be believed and you are a fan of the 'Bloody Knife /Blunt Instrument' thrilleroff planet, but the man is quite simply not capable of turning out a duff novel. But you know how it is, what with one thing and another and a bulging pile of books to be read and reviewed, I just somehow hadnbaddies aren't managed to give him my full attention. Until getting away with skulduggery any time soon because they now.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1409117022</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=John Peel and Sheila Ravenscroft|title=Margrave of the Marshes|rating=4.5|genre=Entertainment|summary=John Peel was without doubt have not one but two members of the most important disc jockeys of all time. Born in Merseyside in 1939, he began his career in mid-60s America before returning home Fowl family to join Radio London and then become one of the original Radio 1 team, where he stayed until his death 37 years latercontend with. I admired the man for his passion for playing the music nobody else would give the time of day Those cute little twins are now eleven (even if I didn't always enjoy it myself) and his readiness to say exactly what he thought, even if it was not what his employers at the BBC wanted to hearfrankly, cute no longer) and I always enjoyed reading his columns in the music weeklies this, their first independent adventure, they meet a troll and later Radio Times. Nevertheless I found much of his show unlistenable towards without even trying manage to make two deadly enemies: a nobleman obsessed with immortality whatever the end, recall some of his rather curmudgeonly remarks on air cost (guest slots on Radio 1's Round Table review programme come to mindother people), and thought his build-'em-up, knock-'em-down stance rather irritating after a while. So I approached this book with an open mind as a fan, but not an uncritical one.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0552551198</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Luca Turin and Tania Sanchez |title=Perfumes: The A unusual interrogator- Z Guide|rating=5|genre=Lifestyle|summary=Wonderful, wonderful, wonderfulnun. The only thing that could be conceivably better than reading ''Perfumes'' would be to read it while sampling the scents it reviewsboys are chased, but even without the olfactory componentkidnapped, ''Perfumes'' is a delight: Turin (a lyrical scientist) arrested and Sanchez even killed (an analytically enthusiastic collector) though not only treat perfume creation as high art, but turn perfume criticism into an art form (or at least a sophisticated genre of writingfor long) too. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846681278</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=David Malouf |title=Ransom|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Taking his theme from a small part of Homer's Iliad, Malouf tells all with the story help of the king of Troy, Priam's grief-stricken voyage into the Greek camp to ransom Troy's wealth for the body of his fallen son, Hector, killed by the equally grief-stricken Achilles whose great friend Hector had killed in battle before Achilles took his cruel revengeone trainee fairy. Malouf tells the story in sparse, yet lyrical and poetic fashion suggesting the personal stories behind the epic themes that Homer related. It is an exquisitely written piece managing to be both deeply moving as well as a great piece of story telling.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701184159</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Steven M Gillon|title=The Kennedy Assassination: 24 Hours After|rating=4.5|genre=History|summary=The assassination of President Kennedy came at a pivotal moment in my life and for more than forty years I've read most of what has been written about the event. It's been of variable quality, but the books fed the curiosity of people entranced by the charismatic young President who died so publicly. I'd come to the point of wondering if there was anything new to be said, but Stephen Gillom has looked at what happened from an unusual and largely overlooked angle – the first twenty four hours of Lyndon Johnson's Presidency.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>046501870X</amazonuk>
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