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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.

There are currently '''{{PAGESINCATEGORY:Reviews}}''' reviews on the siteat TheBookbag.

Want to find out more [[About Us|about us]]?__NOTOC__

==Reviews of the Best New ReviewsBooks=='''For new reviews by genre [[:Category:New Reviews|click here]].'''

'''For new features Read [[Features:Category:New Reviews|click herenew reviews by category]].'''__NOTOC__{{newreview|author=Steven Lowe and Alan McArthur |title=Is it Just Me or Has the Shit Hit the Fan?: Your Hilarious New Guide to Unremitting Global Misery|rating=3|genre=Humour|summary=''The banks fell over like fat Labradors running over a wet kitchen floor.'' Surely that is the wackiest, most inappropriate simile for the credit crunch and all it has done for the world. You won'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</amazonukbr>}}

'''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].''' <!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Andy StantonGrady Hendrix|title=WhatThe Southern Book Club's For Dinner, Mr Gum?Guide to Slaying Vampires|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersHorror|summary=As soon as heroine Polly turns her back Women, by and leaves the town of Lamonic Bibber for a day at the seasidelarge, Mr Gum falls out with his best friend, causing carnivorous carnage all over have always been the placesubjugated sex. Meat is getting thrown around like it's going out of fashionThroughout history, and we they have been confined to doubt whether Polly and her companions can ever utilise mere bit players who occasionally help hold up the power of love powerful man and put things let nothing stand in his way. Grady Hendrix's new novel ''The Southern Book Club's Guide to rightsSlaying Vampires'' gives women their due. It is an ode to the strong selfless housewife. Especially as Hendrix illustrates this book does not contain by having them go toe to toe with a magic unicorn called Elizabethpredatory male vampire who moves into their quiet cul de sac.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1405248246</amazonuk>1683691431

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Loose Women0008149089|title=Here Come the GirlsThe Cutting Place (DS Maeve Kerrigan)|author=Jane Casey|rating=45|genre=Home and FamilyCrime|summary=This is It was Kim Weldon who found the second volume by first bits of the panelists from that nice ITV series, ''Loose Women''. Just as promised body - she was a mudlarker on the cover, this book is an entertaining night with banks of the girls. It turns out that they're just Thames and when she turned over what looked like usa stick she realised it was a hand, a right hand, in fact. The faces are already familiar DS Maeve Kerrigan and even if you donDI Josh Derwent't know them yets team would later find three other body parts. Identification of the body was not going to be easy, but eventually, with nine contributorsit would be given a name - Paige Hargreaves, you'll soon find a liketwenty-eight-year-minded woman behind one of the celebrity facesold freelance journalist. The women are universally warmHer friend, Bianca Drummond, another journalist, said that she was working on a story which she reckoned would be explosive -hearted and supportive: there will be many a lonely woman who reads this book and feels as if she sat down with a group hadn't been willing to share any of friends for the eveningdetails with Bianca.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444700154</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jean UreJenny Valentine|title=Fortune CookieHello Now

|genre=Confident ReadersTeens|summary=Fudge Cassidy Jude reluctantly moves to a small, quiet seaside town after her Mum and her most recent boyfriend split (making this their 13th post-breakup move) and settle into a big, old house overlooking the Cupcake kid are best friends. If sea - which happens to contain a strange, old sitting tenant named Henry, who stays rooted in the names remind you of house like a certain film then you'd be spot on as ghost thatjust won's where Fudget leave – or can's father got the idea fromt. They're actually chalk and cheese – Fudge As Jude settles into this new, seemingly mundane, reality she is loud mouthed consumed by a longing for her old life in London and opinionated and Cupcake is quiet and thoughtful anger at another forced change – but this will be the combination workslast time, she swears. They've just started at secondary school This world is quiet, dull and Cupcake has rather a lot on her plateyet suffocating for Jude. Her brother Joey has muscular dystrophy and his problems are becoming more obvious. Add to this that her father couldn't cope with That is until the problems and he now has another family. It's just Cupcakeday Novo arrives, Joey and her mother – and not a lot entire concept of moneythe world changes forever.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0007224621</amazonuk>0007466498

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jenifer RobertsB0867X8NW7|title=The Madness of Queen Maria: The Remarkable Life of Maria I of PortugalAccess Point|author=T R Gabbay|rating=4.5|genre=BiographyThrillers|summary=Born in 1734 in Lisbon, at that time the richest and most opulent city in Europe, Maria was destined When we first meet Ula Mishkin she's having something of a professional success: using a device of her own invention she's helped a man who has been blind for decades to become the first female monarch in Portuguese historysee an image of a hummingbird. Married She's thirty-six years old and her life is about to her uncle Infante Pedrochange radically as, seventeen years her seniorcycling home, she had six children (outliving all but one of them), and became Queen 's involved in 1777an accident with a bus. A conscientious womanIt's two years before we meet her again and in the meantime, she had the misfortune to be born 's spent 392 days in during the 'age of reason', when church a coma and state were vying for supremacynow walks with a stick. Instinctively a supporter of the old religion, with A professional colleague persuades Ula that she should let out a humanitarian approach spare bedroom to state affairs, she was no Queen Elizabeth, no Catherine the Great, and wore her crown rather reluctantlybring in some income.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095455891X</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=David HughesBen Oliver|title=Thomas Wogan is DeadThe Loop|rating=43.5|genre=Graphic NovelsTeens|summary=WellSet during the aftermath of a Third World War where methods of punishment for criminal activities have been amped up to a horrific level by machines, with The Loop follows the precarious existence of adolescent Luka Kane. In a title like thatworld of Have and Have Nots where Alts [cyborgs] have power over Regulars, need I bother he is trapped inside a living hell with a plot summary? no chance of escape. A man detonator has been sewn inside his heart connecting him to a day out in Morecambe, then trigger held by the next thing he knows he's in the ultimate waiting room, guards who can end his life with a strange array one squeeze. Luka is taunted by limited access to his memories and relentlessly drained of animals (energy through a bat, gruelling daily torture ritual. Doomed to Delay [a toad, risky medical trial where he is a sea urchin...), all waiting guinea pig for... well, something. Yup, as you didn't need telling, Alts in place of execution] after Delay he's deadis in despair.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095580888X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Dave Eggers|title=The Wild Things|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=Meet MaxHis prison is based on the model of an infinity loop designed to make its inmates suffer. When I say he sometimes gets With the only glimmers of hope being the wrong end rumours of rebellion outside and the stick about adultsvisits of sympathetic Alt guard Wren, or dislikes his mother's new boyfriend, or gets a bit feisty when can Luka ever be free? Why has he feels the need been imprisoned? What waits for revenge, I am certainly understating him if he can break the facts. He is a bit of a rascal to say the least. But all that might change when he finds himself travelling to a strange land of roisterous animals, and ends up installed as their king.loop?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0241144221</amazonuk>1912626551

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jeremy StrongKirsty Applebaum|title=Christmas Chaos for the Hundred-Mile-An-Hour Dog Troofriend|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=TrevorAre you tired of your child's troublesome dog, Streaker, has had three puppies. They were fathered, according classmates constantly being horrible to local bully Charlie Smugg, by one of his Alsatians. Trevor would ideally like them? Do you want your child to keep them, at least until Christmas, but his parents have other ideas and put them up for sale. Charlie Smugg declares that he's entitled to half some positive experiences with people? Introducing the new Jenson & Jenson Troofriend 560 Mark IV android! These state-of -the money from -art machines are capable of emulating the sale full range of the puppieshuman emotions without lying, but before they can be sold stealing or bullying. They're the three puppies go missing in the park and it's up perfect companion for any child! Any mention that these androids are beginning to Trevor develop real human feelings are just unsubstantiated rumours and his best friend Tina to try and track them down before Charlie demands his cash!have absolutely no basis in reality…right?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0141327243</amazonuk>1788003470

 {{newreviewFrontpage |authorisbn=Sarah Beth Durst1529123941 |title=IceThe Silent Treatment |author=Abbie Greaves |rating=34.5|genre=TeensGeneral Fiction |summary=Cassie lives When we meet Professor Frank Hobbs and his wife, Maggie, Frank is playing chess against his computer, although not very successfully. Maggie, on an Arctic research station the other hand, has just taken some pills - eight of them, in Alaskafact - and before long she will collapse. She loves When Frank rings the ice and the wilderness emergency services in Oxford he has a bit of her remote home and she'd definitely prefer a problem. He has to spend her time on tracking polar bears and fending off frostbite rather than on mixing with her peers and enjoying college admit that he and home comforts back in Fairbanks. However, things arenMaggie haven't all rosyactually spoken for a while. Cassie How long? Well, it's mother died when she was just a baby about six months since he spoke to Maggie and she he can't help feeling a huge hole in really say if it's likely that Maggie has tried to take her heartown life. Her scientist father is remote and unloving and her grandmother left the station after an argument with him when Cassie was still very young. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847386571</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Iain Smyth and Michael TerryRob Harrell|title=The Wide-Mouthed FrogWink

|genre=For SharingConfident Readers|summary=Do you know When Ross is diagnosed with a rare form of cancer, aged 12, his desperate attempts at school to just be 'normal' become impossible. Suddenly he is the joke about cancer kid, and everything he does, how he looks, and how he behaves falls under the scrutiny of the wide-mouthed frog? You must have heard itother kids in school. It's Ross is, understandably, angry. He is facing potential blindness, whilst dealing with an eye sealed in a classicpermanent wink. It's one that you really need He has gloopy eye medicine to try to tell in person, help with your fingers pulling your mouth wide open, but to hopefully spark your memorythe pain, plus the wide-mouthed frog introduces himself need to wear a number hat at all times to protect his face due to the ongoing treatment. With the sudden ghosting by one of animals until he finally comes across a crocodile who eats wide-mouthed frogs, and the frog does his best to disguise who he is whilst saying ''Oohfriends, you don't see many and a series of those round herehorrible memes that someone at school creates about Ross, do you?'' I'm hardly doing it justicenothing about his life is normal any more, but it's very cheesy and funny. Anywayhe has to find new ways to deal with his feelings, this is a book of that jokeand survive.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1408804964</amazonuk>1471409147

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Dr Aaron Carroll and Dr Rachel Vreeman1786485575|title=Don't Swallow Your GumMagpie Lane|author=Lucy Atkins

|genre=LifestyleCrime|summary=When we first meet Dee she'''BANG'''s talking to Nick Law, the new college master. ThatLaw's lately of the sound BBC and he doesn't come with an entirely good reputation: he's a bit of a bully and Dee can sense something of copious urban myths being shot downthat in their first conversation. '''BANG'''She had been planning to return home to Scotland before taking on a new job as a nanny, but somehow she finds herself going to see Mariah, the Danish wife of the master. ThatShe's pregnant and looking for help, not with the sound of new baby but with the old wives slamming the doormaster's daughter by his first wife, as their tales get revealed as baselessAna. '''CLICK'''Felicity is selectively mute: she does talk to her father, but to no one else. That's the noise lots of illThe eight-year-informed websites make as they get closed downold is grieving for her dead mother and struggling at school. All noises come due to this brilliant book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141043369</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Annie TaylorSally Magnusson|title=VioletThe Sealwoman's Gift

|genre=Confident ReadersHistorical Fiction|summary=Violet There is a very special hippolegend that God came to visit Adam & Eve in the Garden. She is extremely small but that does Eve had not make finished bathing her adoptive parents Albert children and Mavis love her any ashamed of those still not cleansed, she attempted to hide them from the lesseyes of God, denying that she had more children that those, already bathed, that she willing paraded for him. However God was not to be deceived, however, they are slightly worried and decreed that Violet has a very unusual habit what was sought to be hidden from the eyes of God would henceforth be hidden from the eyes of turning pink without warning man, and for no explicable reasonso the Elves were born: the hidden folk. They can see man, but man can only see them if they so choose.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1906847371</amazonuk>1473638984

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Hilary DixonWendy Cheyne |title=When Rooks Speak of LoveFrom the Auld Rock to a Hard Place

|genre=Literary Historical Fiction|summary=Arthur Transcombe is a middle-agedAfter the Jacobite defeat at the Battle of Culloden, grey-hairedmany Scottish estates were given to English lords. They were not kind to their crofting tenants. Many on the mainland were cleared and while this did not happen much on the islands such as Shetland, self-effacing poet. Unremarkable really the new exploitative conditions led many Shetlanders to leave - to port cities on the outside. He hasmainland, however, managed to achieve some success with his poems. (Being a guest speaker at the Cheltenham Literary Festival is no mean feat)North America and even to Australia and New Zealand. He is also a babe magnet!|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1904529429</amazonuk>1838591753

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=A J HealyEle Fountain|title=Tommy Storm and the Galactic KnightsLost|rating=34.5

|summary=Meet Tommy StormLola lives in an Indian city with her father, and her brother, Amit. He's one She lives with them in a nice apartment, and although they are not rich like some of five teenagers snapped up from around the universe girls at school, they have enough money to be a gang of heroic detectives charged with rescuing EVERYTHING from destructioncomfortable. Not just the planetLola spends her time thinking about her school friends, and trying to fit in with them, or the solar systemuntil one day, or even the galaxysuddenly, but EVERYTHINGeverything in her life changes. Nobody seems to know whatAfter taking a work trip away, Lola's going father doesn't come home. They have nobody else to cause this destructionhelp, and as they wait day after day, Lola wonders what will become of them until, finally, or whenthey are evicted from their flat, but he and his friends she and her brother find themselves forced to live on the streets.|isbn=178269255X}}{{Frontpage|author= N K Jemisin|title= The City We Became|rating= 4|genre= Science Fiction|summary= New York is being born, the city has reached critical mass and has matured into a living almost-breathing entity and their ship seem is ready to make its way out into the world. Before it can be established, an ancient evil appears to attempt to destroy it just as it destroyed Atlantis and other forgotten places. The city is not alone through the only birthing process, people proactively going about saving who embody the values are selected to become the living embodiment of the city, some cities have one, some have twelve and New York has six. Together these human-embodiments must defeat the daywoman in white and save New York from very real destruction. So But these are five different boroughs which don't always see eye to eye, it's a pity that they start this book strung up by a nasty loony who's about to kill thempersonality clash on an epic scale and unity is both critical and not remotely guaranteed.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1847247555</amazonuk>0356512665

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Graham McCann0241446732|title=Bounder!Our House is on Fire: The Biography Scenes of Terry-Thomasa Family and a Planet in Crisis|author=Malena Ernman, Greta Thunberg, Beata Thunberg and Svante Thunberg|rating=4.5|genre=BiographyPolitics and Society|summary=When I was in my early teens, it sometimes The Ernman / Thunberg family seemed as if Terry-Thomas perfectly normal. Malena Ernman was one an opera singer and Svante Thunberg took on most of the stars parenting of almost every other five-star British comedy film aroundtheir two daughters. He was certainly one of the most recognizable characters of all with his gapThen eleven-year-toothed grinold Greta stopped eating and talking and her sister, Beata, then nine years old, cigarette holder and inimitable 'Hel-lo!'struggled with what was happening. In such circumstances, it'Hard cheese!'s natural to seek a solution close to home, and best of allbut eventually, it became clear to the angry, family that they were ''Youburned-out people on a burned-out planet're an absolute shower!'|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845134419</amazonuk>. If they were to find a way to live happily again their solution would need to be radical.

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Richard Jay Parker178730101X|title=Stop MeKeep Him Close|author=Emily Koch

|summary=Spam E-Mails can be incredibly annoyingAlice had two children: Benny (well, but most of us will have had to deal with them. FortunatelyBenoît, we can hit the delete button actually) and forget about them as quickly as they cameLouis. I certainly prefer not to torture my friends by sending such rubbish on, no matter how bad my luck is supposed to become if I donLou't. But I wonder how many of us would react if a spam E-Mail actually was a matter of life s seventeen and death, rather than he's just claiming got his A level results and he and his brother are going out to be?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0749007079</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jeanette Winterson|title=The Battle of the Sun|rating=5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=London 1601celebrate. Elizabeth I is getting on Someone has to find something to celebrate in years. Her capital city is a busythe letters, D, bustling place. Boats fill the river D and people fill the streetsE. Jack is happy because Alice has always had a good relationship with nineteen-year-old Benny but it's his birthday a touch problematic with Lou and his present is his heart's desire: an excitable black puppy named Maxbeing honest, whohe's a ''licking and a running and a leaping and a jumping and a tummy in the air and a tail wagging and a barking, racing, braking, spinning energy dog of delight''not terribly likeable. The letters which kept coming to my mind were ADHD. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>140880042X</amazonuk>

  {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jean Ure0241396840|title=Love and KissesKeeper|author=Jessica Moor

|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=Tamsin and Katie were just thirteen and worried that they were boring. TheyStraw worked in the women'd been best friends since forever s refuge and were the good girls. Neither missed school, skipped women who lived there liked and respected her homework nor had boyfriends. Well, that is, not so far. Up until then Tamsin had been the boffin head – consistently strong academically She treated them well and looking forward seemed to have an understanding of what they were going on to universitythrough. All that seemed to change when Why then did she met Alex. Well, when I say 'met' I should perhaps clarify and say that Alex pushed his wheelbarrow jump from the local suicide spot into her, from the building site where he worked. river below? Oh, and did I mention There had been no signs that he she was seventeen, Polish unhappy and she and spoke very little English?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007281722</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Henry Mintzberg|title=Managing|rating=5|genre=Business her boyfriend seemed to have been content together - and Finance|summary=''Study after study Noah has shown that managers work at an unrelenting pace'' How true, though it always makes me wonder why, as a resultdecent alibi for the time when she died, but what other explanation could there's such a market be for bulky management and leadership and general business books like this one. How does anyone who needs or wants to read one ever find the time to do soher death? This title actually has an answer to this, by providing two books in one, and The police are convinced that it is such a simple yet effective solution that I have to start there. You can read this book in one of two ways. Option one is to read every word, chapter by chapter's suicide, cover to cover. If you have but the time I would recommend this approach because the book is very readable, not too repetitive, and quite thought-provokingwomen who knew her believed otherwise.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0273709305</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kathryn Fox1838880658|title=Blood BornMurder at Enderley Hall (Miss Underhay)|author=Helena Dixon

|summary=To give support to a vulnerable gang-rape victim, forensic pathologist Anya Crichton offers to drive Giverny Hart to It's the courthouse summer of 1933 and Kitty Underhay is on her way to visit the day family which she never knew she is due to testify against had, at Enderley Hall. Her grandmother, Mrs Treadwell, and Great Aunt Livvy are back at the notorious Harbourn brothersDolphin Hotel in Dartmouth. But when Anya arrives Kitty gets easily bored working at the house Dolphin - every day is much the same - but her real reason for going away is that she finds Giverny close to death and faces needs a battle against time to save break after her. In the panicrecent adventures, Anya fails to take note of an important clue which might help tell whether it really was suicide or a cleverly staged murder. Worse stillinvolved three vicious murders, in trying to save the girl's life, Anya has interfered with a crime scene and the case falls apart. She blames herself for the Harbourn brothers being allowed to walk free and only hours later there is news of another an arson attack. A pair of sisters have been stabbed and raped resulting in the death of one, while the other clings to an attempt on her life.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340933097</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Leah Fleming1788638026|title=Remembrance DayWhere the Innocent Die (D I Ridpath)|author=M J Lee

|genre=Women's FictionCrime|summary=In It was easy to assume that the year 2000 an old lady in death of the young Chinese girl at the Immigrant Removal Centre was suicide. Her throat was cut, there was a wheelchair watches lot of blood and the knife was on the floor at the unveiling side of the new war memorial in bed, She was due to be deported that day. But... how did the knife get into the secure centre and why was the girl's room the only one which was unlocked? DI Thomas Ridpath, the village square. coroner's officer, is sent to investigate and he quickly becomes suspicious, There's pride a snag though: the inquest is due to open in what has been achieveda couple of days' time, in the family who girl's parents are gathered around her coming over from China and there are memories toothey want to take their daughter's body home with them. Ridpath has just five days to solve the case. Some are good but many are notThe coroner is disinclined to delay the inquest: for her, it's about giving closure to the parents.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847561039</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Neal Layton1471166023|title=Surf's Up Burnt Island (Mammoth AcademyBen Kitto)|author=Kate Rhodes|rating=34.5|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=Having successfully seen off The 5th of November was D I Ben Kitto's thirty-fifth birthday and the rather unpleasant humans in earlier volumesoccasion for the usual bonfire celebrations, our favourite junior mammoths Oscar but it would be marred this year by the discovery of Professor Alex Rogan's body on a bonfire. He'd obviously been alive when he was put on the fire and Arabella can only have died a terrible death. The body was first discovered by Jimmy Curwen, better known on St Agnes as the Bird Man because he speaks little or nothing much else to do apart from return to Mammoth Academy for lots more double periods and his only concern is the welfare of Difficult Sumsthe birds he looks after. They're supposed His instinct is to be making presentations about what they did during the holidays too, but Oscar hasncover Rogan't done any preparation s body and, frankly, he can't really remember what he actually did uses his sheepskin coat to do this, with all the result that free time other than no Difficult Sumshe's the prime suspect. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>034098967X</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Ursula Jones and Sarah GibbElliot Reed|title=The Princess Who Had No KingdomA Key to Treehouse Living

|genre=Confident ReadersGeneral Fiction|summary=The princess who has no kingdom wanders around in This is the story of a cart pulled by her horse Pretty. She's very politeyoung boy, friendlyWilliam Tyce, who is being raised by his uncle after the death of his mother and kind-hearted, but she feels like something is lacking because she doesnhis father't have a kingdom of her owns abandonment. The other royals she meets treat her nicely enough However, but there's always a feeling that she's not quite as good as them because she it isn't the princess of anywhere.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846160421</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Mij Kelly and Louise Nisbet|title=The Happiest Man told in the World or the Mouse Who Made Christmas|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=Mouse doesn't like anyone and keeps herself to herself. Her things are her things and she is too selfish to share them with anyone elseusual narrative way. One day Instead, an old man moves in to Mouse's house. He used to be the happiest man in the world, but now he's sad. He's fed book is made up of having given, given, given all his life and never got anything back. He just sits quietly and mopes. This makes Mouse miserableglossary entries, so one day she decides to cheer him up written by giving him a clementine...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340931558</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Nick Bland|title=The Very Cranky Bear|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=MooseWilliam, Lion, Zebra and Sheep head into as a cave to get out way of the rain, but little do they know that Bear is fast asleep in there. When they wake him up, he roars at them, chasing them outside, so they decide to cheer him up somehow. Zebra paints stripes on himdescribing certain events, Moose fashions antlers for him situations and Lion sticks a mane of straw on himemotions. Unsurprisingly It runs alphabetically, this makes Bear even crankierstarting with ABSENCE, so it's down to Sheep to save the day...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340989424</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Kes Gray and Lee Wildish|title=Mum and Dad Glue|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=A young boy'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 moving to stay togetherALPHABETICAL ORDER. His method for this isn't the usual response though: he looks for glue As I began to stick his mum and dad together. Thankfully, he finds some wise and kindly advice in the process.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340957107</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Clara Vulliamy|title=The Bear With Sticky Paws Wonread I did find myself thinking 't Go To Bed|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=It's Pearlwhat on earth?!'s bedtime, but she says she's really busy and isn't going I soon grew used 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 - although as you might expectstyle, the bear has a little more energy than Pearl and eventually she does get a little sleepy.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408300648</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Stephen Mackey|title=Miki|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=It's cold, dark and icy, and Miki and Penguin are trudging through the snow. But itwas instead caught up in William'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 herstory.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>034095065X</amazonuk>1911545418

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Kristin CashoreWill Dean |title=FireBlack River

|genre=FantasyCrime|summary=Possessed of great beauty, Tuva Moodyson returns - and this third book in the kind that drives men madTuva Moodyson mystery series delves deep into her personal life, Fire is used returning her to people trying to kill the isolated town of Gavrik and into a desperate search for hermissing best friend. She isn't used to them doing it With the Midsommar sun blocked out by accident. When a poacher in the woods outside her home accidentally shoots herdark pines of the forest, Fire is hard pressed Tuva fights to keep the temperamental Lord Archer from killing himsave her friend. But as sure as Fire is the man did not mean who’ll be there to cause her harm, she is made unsure by the strange fog that exists in the man's mind.save Tuva?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1905200129</amazonuk>1786077116

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Justin Scroggie1782407480|title=Eye SpyBird Love: Uncovering the Secrets The Family Life of the World Around YouBirds|author=Wenfei Tong and Mike Webster|rating=4.5|genre=TriviaAnimals and Wildlife|summary=Signs are everywhere. I wasnwas a little perturbed when I looked at the blurb for ''Bird Love''t really one on a couple of those who thought our roads were littered with too many traffic signs until on-line booksellers: ''exploring the day sex life of birds'' it said. I was driven past very nearly passed over the book, but a pair closer examination suggested that the book is about the ''family life'' of speed regulation signsbirds, positioned at which is rather different. If the book was confined to the exit end sex life of a onebirds, you would be missing an opportunity to understand how birds live day-to-way street but facing day, bring up their families and cope in the illegal way up itwild. Not all signsonly that, you have missed the treat of course, are quite as unnecessary, or indeed as blatantly visible, so many beautiful illustrations about a wide variety of birds which is where run through this pictorial guide book from the first page to countless coded messages, signifiers and other similar factoids comes inthe last.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340994487</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jose Saramago Camilla Bruce|title=Small MemoriesYou Let Me In

|summary=I've Eccentric, isolated romance novelist Cassandra Tipp has been meaning to get around to reading some or all of Harlan Coben's work, because if the reviews are to be believed missing for a year and you are a fan of the 'Bloody Knife /Blunt Instrument' thriller, the man is quite simply not capable of turning out a duff novelhas been pronounced legally dead by her lawyers. But you know how it is, what with one thing and another Her will instructs her niece and a bulging pile of books nephew to be read and reviewed, I just somehow hadn't managed to give him my full attention. Until 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 one of the most important disc jockeys of all time. Born in Merseyside in 1939, he began his career in mid-60s America before returning enter her home to join Radio London and then become one of find the original Radio 1 team, where he stayed until his death 37 years later. I admired the man for his passion for playing the music nobody else would give the time of day (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 key to hear, and I always enjoyed reading his columns their inheritance in the music weeklies and later Radio Times. Nevertheless I found much of his show unlistenable towards the end, recall some of his rather curmudgeonly remarks on air (guest slots on Radio 1's Round Table review programme come to mind), 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=Perfumesold manuscript left in her office: The A - Z Guide|rating=5|genre=Lifestyle|summary=Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful. The only thing that could be conceivably better than reading ''Perfumes'' would be to read it while sampling the scents it reviews, but even without the olfactory component, ''Perfumes'' is a delight: Turin (a lyrical scientist) and Sanchez (an analytically enthusiastic collector) not only treat perfume creation as high art, but turn perfume criticism into an art form (or at least a sophisticated genre of writing) 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 the story 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 revenge. Malouf tells the last 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 Johnsonshe's Presidencyll ever tell.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>046501870X</amazonuk>1787633179