Changes

|authorisbn=Emma Carroll0241636604|title=The Week at World's EndTrading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersAutobiography|summary=FirstIf you were to bring up an image of a city banker in your mind, the title. Weyou're in World's End Close, a mediocre set unlikely to think of houses, where Stevie (Vie to her friends) finds fun only with someone like Gary Stevenson. A hoodie and jeans replaces the family dog pin-stripe suit and with his background is the boy over the road. But we could also be at World's East End, because something taking a great chunk of the fun away is the fact that the Cuban Missile Crisis is kicking offwhere he was familiar with violence, poverty and injustice. The Soviet boats are getting blockaded as America tries There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to reduce the risk London School of nuclear missiles offshore, Economics. Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and not much else is able he has a facility with numbers which most of us can only envy. He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to make the newsbe stupid. That said It was his ability at what was, Vie has news of her own – Annaessentially, a secretive young woman hiding in their coal shedcard game which got him an internship with Citibank. Anna has Eventually, in no short time, taken this turned into permanent employment as a strong interest in the American airforce base behind the Close, said she'd locate something she wanted and leave, failed to leave, and implied her life was at risktrader. But surely this bit of intrigue has got nothing to do with what the Cold War is doing miles away?|isbn=0571364438

|authorisbn=Kiran Millwood Hargrave and Tom de Freston1035021803|title=Julia and the SharkThe Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder|author=C L Miller|rating=43.5|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=Julia, our pre-teen heroine, It's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been packed off with her parents and their cat from back to the family home in SW England to be lighthousekeepers English country village where she grew up. She's back now because of a request for a summerhelp from her beloved aunt, in the far NE of the Scottish islandsCarole. Here be VikingsFreya's former mentor and Carole's close friend, Arthur Crockleford, is dead and the circumstances seem suspicious, that kind of Scottish islandto say the least. Dad is going Arthur was the reason why Freya had not been back to be automating the lanternvillage: Arthur, which is his specialist thingshe feels, while mum will be leaving let her career down badly. Even though they were in algae behind business together as antique hunters, she has not felt able to hunt be near the man or pursue the elusive Greenland sharkprofession she loved. And JuliaAfter the split, wellshe worked in a cafe, she will be homesick met and married James (on the rebound from the love of her life, who was murdered) and Freya and alone – until she suddenly finds company one nightJames have now divorced.|isbn=1510107789

|authorisbn=Freya SampsonAllTomorrowsFutureCover|title=The Last LibraryAll Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)|rating=45|genre=General Science Fiction|summary=''Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to come.'' I am always a little nervous to start a story about a library've heard it said that 'technology' is what happens after you're eighteen. Well, since I am must confess that there have been more than a librarianfew decades of technology in my lifetime. I've kept up reasonably well with what's advantageous to me but I always grit my teeth slightly at 'm left with the thought feeling that it's all getting away from me. Some of the incoming cardiganit is -wearing, hair in a bun, catfrankly -owning, glasses on a chain stereotypes! In this storyquite frightening. Of course, I could research the main character, June, does put her hair in a bun, possibilities and she does own a cat (called Alan Bennett), the probabilities and she has barely any friends and spends her evenings eating the same Chinese takeaway meal once a week whilst end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading books alone! But I didnsomeone who knows what they't immediately throw re talking about or the book out of the window, because latest conspiracy theorist. I needed people I found knew I was interested could trust and who could deliver information in June, and why she lived as she did. Her mum used to be a librarian at the village library, but when she got sick, June gave up on going to University and stayed at home to take care of her mum, as well as taking on a job as library assistant at the local library. And even though her mum sadly died some years ago, she is still working there, still eating her mum's favourite takeaway meal, and still reading her mum's old books. June is stuck, but little does she know, everything in her life is about the changeway I could understand.|isbn=183877369X

|isbnauthor=0008370982Sunny Singh|title=Rock Paper Scissors|author=Alice FeeneyHotel Arcadia|rating=43.5|genre=Thrillers|summary=Amelia Wright The Hotel Arcadia is forty-two and it was the staff raffle at Battersea Dogs Home that gave her a weekend away luxury hotel in an unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a converted chapel in Scotlandterrorist group. Her husbandHiding from the terrorists who are rampaging through, Adamkilling everyone on site, there is Sam, a wartime photographer and Abhi, isn't so keen on the ideahotel manager. Like AmeliaAs Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the residents who are still alive in the hotel, he knows that their marriage has been under strain: he's forms a screenwriter bond with Sam who refuses to be cowed by events, and he's never shy keeps on venturing out of making it clear her room to Amelia that he'd prefer try to spend time with the novels hecapture what's hoping to adapt than with happened through herphotography. Amelia's annoyed that he never enquires about how her day has been - and working with Although they only ever talk over the dogsphone, many of whom have been abused, is never easy. Still - she's won the weekend away, even if it does mean driving for eight hours in her 1978 Morris Minor Traveller with Adam beside their friendship grows as Abhi tries to help her in the passenger seat - keep safe and then doing they both wait to see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by the same thing to come back a couple of days laterterrorists.|isbn=086154742X

|authorisbn=Doug Johnstone1529153298|title=The Great Silence|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary=For those who, like me, haven't come across the Skelfs before, I'll risk a quick synopsis List of who's who – although Johnstone does a good job of bringing the backstory in without being heavy handed about it. Skelf isn't some fantastic creature, though it sounds as though it ought to be, it is merely the surname of a family of undertakers. Undertakers and private investigators. Dorothy is the matriarch – Californian by birth and instinct, she married a scot and ended up helping to run the Edinburgh undertaking firm that had been in the family for generations. Recently widowed and now involved with a black Swedish police officer. Swedish by nationality. Scottish police. Daughter Jenny, 46, is haunted by her still-living husband – a violent escaped prisoner. And grand-daughter is about to graduate with a first-class physics degree and join the academic staff next term.|isbn=1913193837}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1901514978|title=There's a Problem With DadSuspicious Things|author=Carlos AlbaJennie Godfrey|rating=4.5

|summary=Life It's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is different for George Lovelace and he can't really understand whyPrime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly... ) HeShe's not what's always done everything he ought to: steady workerworrying Miv's family, husband and father - and a father who was always there for school plays and sports daysthough. So why is he never quite in tune with those around him? Women have been disappearing. Why does he upset people? Why is someone with such a Well, they've been murdered, but to have 'gooddisappeared'doesn' mind unable to progress at work or to relate to his colleagues? Why does he make t sound quite so many breath-taking gaffes? frightening. ItMiv's upset because she's almost become a cliche these days overheard that her father wants to suggest that someone who move the family 'Down South'. When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a little different is frightening, foreign place, best avoided. For Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and she'on the spectrumll do anything to prevent that. She', but George Lovelace has all s not worried about the symptoms of Aspergerdangers or that her Mum's Syndrome: highstopped talking -functioning autismto anyone.

|authorisbn=Louise Candlish1398524085|title=The HeightsHas Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Nicci French|rating=4.5|genre=ThrillersCrime|summary=Ellen doesnCharlotte Salter was expected at her husband't expect to see Kieran that days fiftieth birthday party but never turned up. Her children, sons Niall, Paul and Ollie and her daughter, Etty. are all worried but - strangely - her husband, Alec, is not. She Shortly afterwards, Etty and Greg, find the body of Greg's on sitefather, Duncan Ackerley, visiting a client in the river. It was an easy assumption for a lighting consultation the police to make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when she spies him in a building across he couldn't stand the wayguilt. There The Salter children are lots of things, lots of people, you might see when you look out across London, not convinced but this isnthere't one Ellen expected that day or in fact any other day. Why? Because Kieran has been dead for over two years, s little else they can do but get on with their lives and Ellen knows this for a fact, because she had a hand in his murderwonder about what really happened.|isbn=1471183483

|isbn=00084217141035906708|title=Mrs MarchDiva|author=Virginia FeitoDaisy Goodwin

|genre=Literary General Fiction|summary=The problem began just after the publication We tend to think of George March's most successful novel Maria Callas as Greek, but she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, New York, in December 1923 and only moved to dateAthens when she was thirteen. Everyone Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but Mrs March (we know her first name only on the last page) seemed father changed it to 'Callas' to either be reading make it or had already done somore manageable in the States. Every day Mrs March went to the local patisserie to buy olive bread but on When she was back in Athens - supposedly so that particular morning, Patricia asked, as she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was wrapping the bread, ''but isn't this raised under the first time he's based Nazi occupation by a character on you?'' She mentioned that Johanna, the principal character had 'mother who mercilessly exploited her and made no secret of her mannerisms''. Perhaps this would not have mattered, except preference for the fact that Johanna is the whore of Nantes - ''a weakher elder sister, plain, detestable, pathetic, unloved, unloveable wretchJackie.''

|author=John BoyneChristopher Edge|title=The Echo ChamberBlack Hole Cinema Club|rating=54|genre=General FictionConfident Readers|summary=Meet George Cleverley. He is self-defined as "one of the few television personalities over the age of fifty without a criminal record". He starts this book a bit worried when Lucas and his mistress tells him she's carrying his child, but then his author wife is getting her kicks with the Ukrainian partner "Strictly Come Dancing" paired her with. They have three children, who friends are all booked in for a sad-sack with absolutely no social skills whatsoevermovie marathon at their local cinema, a girl who hangs around with a virtue-signallingplace that has the nickname of 'The Black Hole'. All big movie fans, keyboard warrior "wokester" who wants they're looking forward to save the world's homeless with out-lots of-date foodexciting films, and a fit young lad doing many, many snacks! However, as the gay hustle thing. Add in a few other characters – therapistsmovie starts, lawyers, random transgender types – they very quickly realise that all have two something about this new film format is very different connections to his life, and you have something that suggests they are swept up into an almost farcical approach adventure they couldn't even imagine. But as they lurch from one film genre to the modern world. What suggests the farcical approach even more, howevernext, can they figure out what on earth is going on? Will they ever get back to the fact this is bloody funny.cinema, and to their real lives?|isbn=08575262191839942738

|isbnauthor=0241989094Rachel Greenlaw|title=The Perfect Life|author=Nuala EllwoodCompass and Blade|rating=43.5|genre=ThrillersTeens|summary=In August 2018 we meet a young woman called Imogen and she's viewing a house in Goring-on-Thames and telling 'I can hear the song of the estate agent about her three children, Lavender, Freddie and Barclaysea. The boys are a bit call of a handful which is why shethe deep, the answering beat in my heart.''s making this trip on her own. The house would be perfect for them.

It's Rosevear, a remote and partially forgotten island, survives on luring ships into the rocks and plundering the wrecks. Mira, like her mother before her, is one of the seven who swim out to survey the same month but now we're in Wimbledon ruins – rescuing any survivors and we encounter any treasure that lies within. But when the same young womanCouncil Watch lays a trap to end the wrecking, only this time shethey capture the island's job hunting leader and living in her sister, GeorgieMira'sfather. Desperate to save him from death, spare roomMira makes a bargain with a wreck survivor who is as charming as he is secretive and with only coordinates to guide her, where shesets off in search of a family secret that lies buried deep in the sea. With only nine days to unearth what might save her father, as her journey takes her from the watched streets of foreign islands to the heart of the smuggler's been since territory, Mira must be determined to stop at nothing to save the future of her home and the ones she broke up with her boyfriend, Connorholds most dear.|isbn=0008664730

|author=Darren ShanJames Sherwood Metts|title=Archibald Lox and the Slides of Bon Repell: Archibald Lox series, Volume 2, book 2 of 3Planet Storyland

|summary=SoThings have been a bit sticky for the Earthlings. Having done the impossible AI and unpicked the lock to the Forgotten Cryptautomation have been proceeding apace, from which the Departed communicate with the Merge, Archie now has ''grop'often replacing jobs they' re paid to think about. But before do and other tasks that, soireestook time to accomplish. Soirees! ArchieJust as they were beginning to get used to all this technological change and starting to think of other, much new ways to Inez's amusementspend time, doesn't even know what one of those isalong came an awful pandemic. But he manages to come through the fancy party unscathedLife was pretty much shut down and, even after an uncomfortable encounter along with Kurtisit, whose fledgling romance with Inez was crushed in all the first volume of this seriesmany daily social interactions on which they depend so heavily. |isbn=B093J9TF731736128426

|isbnauthor=B07GZ81J7CMatthew Tree|title=When Fred the Snake Got Squished and Mended|author=Peter CottonWe'll Never Know

|genre=For SharingLiterary Fiction|summary=Meet FredTimothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to be different from his father, a drunk and chronic underachiever whose dreams of being exceptional at any of his artistic passions all failed miserably and who had endless crises of self confidence. WellSo Tim applied himself to his studies, actually, youcultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and set himself high but achievable ambitions.|isbn= B0CVFXPGP8}}{{Frontpage|author=A G Slatter|title=The Briar Book of the Dead|rating=5|genre=Fantasy|summary='' There're going s a part of me that wants to be meeting Fred-Fred keep this just to myself for reasons which will become however long I can. This secret magic of my own, all too obvious very quicklymine, at last. But Ijust want to enjoy it for a while.'m getting ahead ' Within a remote mountain pass, far away from the world, lies Silverton; a town under the protection of myself: Ithe Briar'd better tell you s, a bit more about Fredfamily of witches who protect the town and the wider world from the Darklands. Fred Though she has always wished for magic, Ellie Briar is a snake the first non-witch to be born into her family for generations and even those of us who have a phobia about snakes are going to warm to him. He arrived as such since she was young, her training as a present in a box with holes so that he could breathe steward revolved around letters and administration rather than spells and immediately became part of potions. When her grandmother suddenly dies, Ellie's cousin Audra becomes the Briar Witch, the familytown's leader, and Ellie takes her place beside her. As challenges come her way left, right and centre, Ellie uncovers the rare ability to communicate with the extent that they would take Fred out with them when they went out for dead, putting her at the heart of a walkmaelstrom of chaos. And that was where Reeling from one family secret to another, Ellie must decide who to trust and determine what to do as the problem started. Fred didnBriar witches't legacy, everything they have any road sense. Or brakessacrificed to survive, is under threat.|isbn=1803364548

|authorisbn= Justine Avery and Naday Meldova1529900360|title= Everybody Pees! (Everybody Potties!)The Ghost Orchid|author=Jonathan Kellerman

|genre=For SharingCrime|summary= Can potty training ever be joyous? It often isnhadn'tbeen Lt Milo Sturgis's fault that Alex Delaware had been badly injured but he felt responsible and even after Alex recovered, as any parent will tell youSturgis was reluctant to ask for his help on difficult cases. But really, why shouldn His assertions that there were only open-and-shut cases which didn't need the help of a psychologist only worked for a while. Finally, it be? We all have to learn about our bodily functions just as we have to learn about everything else when we are small. Why shouldnwas Robin, Delaware't potty training be as much fun ass partner, saywho nudged Milo into asking for help again. She knew that the involvement was something that the man she loved needed. The next case did look simple, learning about why though. Two lovers were murdered in the sun swimming pool of a remote property in Bel Air. He was the heir to an Italian shoe empire and she is married to an extremely rich man and it's not the moon take turns in Italian. But which of them was the skyprimary target? |isbn= B098BJZYHH

|isbn=17876344931529395224|title=All Her FaultLetting the Cat Out of the Bag: The Secret Life of a Vet|author=Andrea MaraSion Rowlands|rating=43.5|genre=ThrillersAnimals and Wildlife|summary=It had seemed like one of those serendipitous events which sometimes happenSiôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. Marissa Irvine had been hoping that the opportunity would arise for her son, Milo, to go on His father was a play date. She was concerned that he GP and Rowlands didn't have any friends at his new school. Milo would go home from Kerryglen National School want to follow in an affluent Dublin suburb with his classmate Jacob - and Marissa would pick him up from 14 Tudor Grove a little later. What could be better? Onlyfootsteps, particularly when Marissa arrived at he considered the house, expecting to meet Jacobstrain that being on-call put on his father's mother, Jenny, life. When he was seventeen he took the door opportunity of doing work experience with a family friend who was a vet and was answered by Estherconvinced this was the job for him. Before long, who didn't know Jenny or Jacobhe was at Liverpool University. The phone number sheIt hadn'd t - as with so many students - been given for Jenny his dream since he was not recogniseda child. Milo had disappeared. And so had JennyIf anything, he's nannyd wanted to be a professional footballer.

|authorisbn=Claire North0861541774|title=Notes from the Burning AgeA Nye of Pheasants|author=Steve Burrows

|genre=Science FictionCrime|summary=At its core DCI Domenic Jejeune''Notes From the Burning Age'' by Claire North is s close friend and former colleague, Danny Maik, has taken a spy thriller, short holiday in Singapore to meet up with as many double crossesan old ally, interrogations and night time escapes as Le Carre or FlemingGuy Trueman. However, as Maik was involved in a street brawl - he would later maintain that he was facing a man armed with the best novels, it wears many masks a knife - and its most affecting one is that of he killed a new and timely genreGhurka. Initially, cli-fi, or climate change fiction. North's novel tells he faced a charge of a world devastated by climate change where humans manslaughter but evidence came to light that suggested that he might have been forced planned to start anew and live alongside nature without any of murder the man. Now he could be facing the modern and corrupting "luxuries" (read: fossil fuels, weapons of mass destruction, intensive farming)death penalty. There is Domenic Jejeune can do nothing to help as any interference from another police force could provoke a growing unhappiness with this limiting world, diplomatic incident and one group, the Brotherhood, aims to master these processes no matter the cost to the Earthwouldn't help Danny at all.|isbn=0356514757

|author=Eva Bjorg Aegisdottir and Victoria Cribb (translator)Alexander McCall Smith|title=Girls Who LieThe Perfect Passion Company|rating=34.5|genre=ThrillersGeneral Fiction|summary=You might be forgiven for thinking that The Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the dark corners of Iceland have featured online apps in their noirish thrillers and crime books before nowproviding a more personal, tailored service. You think, seeing on the map that we're set in Akranes, Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and finding it's only twenty kilometres from look after the capital citybusiness, that this author as Ness is clutching at the few final straws left. However just because the book aims planning to take a trip to Canada to get away for the usual small-town feel, it's not just in Akranes that our interests liea while. Six months ago Katie is coming out of a woman failed to turn break up for her date eveningwith a bad boyfriend, and was never seen again. This left a teenaged girl not so jumps at all disappointed that she could now live permanently with the couple who had given her foster care before her mother had asked for the girl back, and a couple of delighted adopterschance to come home to Edinburgh. But it left our three detectives at a quandary – mobile phone use was at a high level until it stopped all of a suddenAnd so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, in one placebringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the woman's car was found miles away Isabel Dalhousie novels, but with some new characters who quickly begin to charm. Katie has no experience in running a second placebusiness, and now, after six monthsor in match-making, the body but Ness has been discovered, full confidence in a thirdher abilities, even more remote place. Meanwhileand there's always her very helpful (and rather handsome) neighbour, this narrative is interrupted by a confessional monologue from a mother who found herself with heavy post-natal depressionWilliam, and very little maternal feeling in her body. Is the assumption that is so easy for the reader to make the right one?lend a hand…|isbn=191319373X1846976596

|isbn=B0925KS87N0811771741|title=Dead Man's Grave (DS Max Craigie)InstaKnits for Baby|author=Neil LancasterMelissa Leapman

|genre=CrimeCrafts|summary=Tam Hardie had been determined Melissa Leapman's ''InstaKnits for Baby'' gives us a collection of knits from toys to find blankets. Some will be quick knits - others are of the grave - and it took some finding - 'long, cosy afternoons in an overgrown old cemeteryfront of the fire' variety. It was a strange thing for ScotlandThe projects are divided by the time they's premier criminal ll take to complete - less than five hours, five to doten hours, but Tam was getting old ten to twenty hours and there were things he wanted to domore than twenty hours. OnlyAll the projects are attractive, his family didn't hear from him again after he'd said that hemodern and useable. I perhaps show my age when I wonder about 'd found the grave social- the one which said that it shouldn't be opened media- and his three sons began to worry. Tam Junior, Frankie and Dave wouldnworthy projects't normally go to the police but they werenthat't certain where their father had been and they were worrieds me being picky.

|author=Emily CritchleyDean Koontz|title=The Tiny Gestures of Small Flowers|rating=3|genre=General Fiction|summary= The Tiny Gestures of Small Flowers had all the hallmarks of something good. I was intrigued by the plot, liked the design of the book, and thought the author's work sounded interesting. From the outset it all looked incredibly promising. So what on earth went wrong here?|isbn= 1911427091}} {{Frontpage|author=Sarah Langan|title=Good NeighboursBad Weather Friend

|genre=ThrillersParanormal|summary= If you're of Benny is having a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and his house gets trashed. Oh, and someone has delivered a certain vintagereally weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to his home, and it's hard to read possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the words ''Good Neighbours'' without adding a sing-song ''thing that's when Good Neighbours…become…good friends''has trashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the very last person to deserve all this bad luck. Maple Street He is no Ramsay Street, though, Arlo and Gertie live a world apart from the Melbourne suburbsnice person. A really nice person. They're one of 18 households on So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the crescentdelivery to his house is a new friend, quite new arrivals having moved in a year earlier. They're not quite like all the other families (he's an ex rockerbad weather friend called Spike, she's who has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a former beauty queen) but they've made some friends and their kids have settled ingood person. Spike is going to take care of Benny, and itwill certainly take care of Benny's all going ok. Until it isn't. One hotenemies, clammyif he, sticky, sweaty summerBenny, and Harper (a sinkhole opens up in the park across the way. Itwaitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's a revolting mess of dirt and chaos, but for the residents of Maple Street, the worst is yet to comewild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are.|isbn=17890982111662500491

|author=Lisa ThompsonAdam Stower|title=The Small ThingsMurray and Bun|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Although Anna has friends at school, she feels like she never really fits in. Her family don't have enough money Murray is supposed to let her do after school activitiesbe a humble, tidy and so she feels like her life at home friendly cat, one who is boring in comparison able to theirs. When a new girl joins her classsleep and eat and eat and sleep and, Anna is asked to partner herwell, but things are complicated because whatever takes his fancy next of the new girltwo. But he's a bad magician's cat, Ellieso his favourite bun has been turned into a hyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, is unwell and so the catflap they both use can't attend school in person. Insteadchuck them out, she joins in with not into the class by using regular back garden, but into a robotworld of frightening adventure and whiffs. Can Anna overcome the challenge of making friends with someone through This time round it drops them into a robotViking land, and where a troll hunter is she even interesting enough expected – well, one much bigger than Murray was, to be a good friend honest, but he's turned up and he'll have to Ellie?do…|isbn=17811296490008561249

|isbn=0008350388B0C47LV1PC|title=We Need to Talk About MoneyFragility|author=Otegha UwagbaMosby Woods|rating=54|genre=Politics and SocietyLiterary Fiction|summary=Can you make a ''To be a dark-skinned Black woman Yo birthing person'' joke? And if you could, is the question should you make it? Or is the question if you did, would it land? The catch is to that the answer for both could well be seen as less desirable, less hireable, less intelligent and ultimately less valuable than my light-skinned counterparts...'' ''We Need to Talk About Money'' by Otegha Uwagba ''0.7% of English Literature GCSE students in England study a book by a writer of colour while only 7% study a book by a womanno.'' ''The Bookseller'' 29 June 2021

Otegha Uwagba came to ''Fragility'' is set as the UK from Kenya when she was five years old. Her sisters were seven and nine. It was her mother who came firstcity of Portland, with her father joining them later. The family was hard-workingOregon, principled and determined that their children would have cautiously begins to emerge from the best education possible. There was always a painful awareness of money although this did not translate into a shortage of anything: it was simply carefully harvested. When Otegha was ten restrictions imposed during the family acquired a car. For Otegha, education meant a scholarship to a private school in London and then a place at New College, Oxford.covid pandemic

|isbn=17876318691529431735|title=The Rising TideWinter Visitor|author=Sam LloydJames Henry

|genre=ThrillersCrime|summary=Lucy LockeIt's early life hadnFebruary 1991 and Essex is bitingly cold, which made Bruce Hopkins't been easy but shereturn all the more surprising. He'd built been exiled on the Costa del Sol as a good and decent life in the aftermathwanted drug smuggler for a decade. SheThe return has come about because he's now married to Daniel, who cohad a letter from his ex-owns Locke-Povey Marine on Penleith Beachwife, and they live at Wild Ridge on Mortis Point with Billie, Lucysaying that she's daughter ill and Fin, the child she had with Danielhasn't long to live. They have financial difficulties, some caused by Nick Povey, DanielIt's partner hard to feel any sympathy when Hopkins is abducted, stripped to his underwear and so-called best friendsent to a watery grave in the boot of a stolen Ford Sierra. Nick and Daniel have Is it a history together warning from the time they both spent in a children's Spanish gang or a problem closer to home but it's difficult to think that Nick has Daniel's best interests at heart, particularly where Lucy, or money, is concerned.?

|author=Hannah PeckAlex Bell and Tim McDonagh|title=Kate on the CaseThe Glorious Race of Magical Beasts|rating=3.54

|summary=Meet KateEli is a busy lad – by day an apprentice in the wondrous library we start by visiting with him, although I got and in the impression she'd rather be evening a Catherine – helper at the dessert cafe his gran owns and one specific Catherine at thatruns. For Catherine Rodriguez Eli lives with his lovely gran, too – for there is Kate's idol, and a generation missing in the author of our heroine's favourite possession, ''The Special Correspondent Manual''family. Armed with a plucky fatherA few short years ago, that book, and her talking mouse called Rupert, she is all equipped to manage a train ride Eli's parents were both lost to the Arctictitular race, a globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have to see her scientist mother for navigate the first time world in yonksthe company of a magical beast. However, this is This has made the race anathema to the pair – but when a train ride with bad incident at the eatery leads to a differenceconfession from gran, for on board Eli knows his only hope is a greedy-seeming harridan and her catto dare to enter what he most hates, a thief with the sole aim the prize of magic at the end – and two glowing eyes, shining from the darkness in a blink-and-you'll-miss-them style. It's definitely a case for a new young investigative journalist..only thing to possibly save his gran.|isbn=184812970X0571382231

|authorisbn=Darren Shan178763681X|title=Archibald Lox and the Forgotten Crypt: Archibald Lox series, Volume 2, book 1 of 3Knife Skills for Beginners|author=Orlando Murrin|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=The second trilogy Chef Paul Delamare took a teaching job at a residential cookery school in ShanBelgravia. He didn's t really want to but celebrity chef Christian Wagner had a way of getting both men and women to do what he wanted. Paul ''Mergesomehow'' saga opens with our hero, Archie, back in London in got the world of impression that he'd be at the Born. It's not been easyschool to assist Paul, who had a broken arm, explaining to his foster parents where hebut it didn's been, or slipping back into ordinary life and forgetting about Inez t turn out that way. The teaching - and his other friends in the Merge, but Archie has done problems - are all his best.own. The one thing he hadn't expected was for someone to turn up dead.. well Unfortunately, except for visiting veteran locksmith Winston in Big Ben's clock tower he was the person who discovered the body and except for fiddling with everyone knows that the police consider that sneaky master lock in Seven Dials every time he can sneak awayperson to be the prime suspect.|isbn=B093H8DPQZ

|isbnauthor=0571365884Sarah Marsh|title=My Mess is a Bit A Sign of Life: Adventures in Anxiety|author=Georgia PritchettHer Own|rating=43.5|genre=AutobiographyGeneral Fiction|summary=Georgia Pritchett has always been anxious, even After a bout of scarlet fever as a child, Ellen Lark loses her hearing. She would worry Suddenly plunged into a world of silence, everything about whether her life changes. Living in a time when the monsters under the bed were comfortable: it use of sign language was the sort of life seen as something only savages do, Ellen is sent to a school where if she had nothing is taught to worry about lip read, but physically restrained from signing. From here, she would become anxious but such occasions were few ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the deaf and far betweenusing a system called Visible Speech. On a visit to a therapistAt the same time, as an adultBell is working on other inventions and ideas, when she was completely unable to speak about what was wrong with her it was suggested that she should write it down and ''My Mess is Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in a Bit complicated tangle of a Life: Adventures in Anxiety'' is the result - or so we are given to believeespionage.|isbn=1035401614

|authorisbn=Alex Cotter1803816759|title=The House on the EdgeUnravelling|author=Will Gibson

|genre=Confident ReadersScience Fiction|summary=FaithIt's family home 2038 and Joe is teetering on a bored cop policing the edge wealthy and peaceful New York City. Joe longs for a bit of a cliffadventure and to get stuck into some really gritty crime detection. But then something goes horribly wrong with the AI system that now runs everything, making life easier for many, and riots start to spread. Finally, literallyJoe gets to do some real policing. Is that crack in In the garden getting bigger? Is aftermath of the house starting to slope a little? And as the house seems to be falling apart, so rioting global pop star Suki is Faith's family. Her dad has disappeared, kidnapped and her mum Joe is struggling assigned to cope, barely leaving bring her bedhome. So that leaves Faith in charge, taking care of her little brother Noah, taking care of her mum, feeding everyone, getting Noah Joe isn't the only one trying to schoolsave Suki - Dylan, a British superfan and avoiding awkward questions from interfering teachers. Is her little brother okay? Why tech nerd, is he obsessed with what he claims is a ghost in also on the cellarcase. What went wrong? What should she do about Did the house? Can she find a way to raise enough money to fix system fail or was ithacked? WhatAnd how is Suki's happened to her dadkidnapping connected? Why did he disappear? Maybe he'll come back if she manages to get funding for the house? She carries the weight of all these worries on her constantly, and she doesn't know how much longer the cliff will hold together, or how long she can keep on keeping on.|isbn=1788008626

|isbn=00082690411529421284|title=Risk of HarmLaying Out the Bones|author=Lucie WhitehouseKate Webb

|summary=DCI Robin Lyons is back It was one of those flash downpours that the British weather often delivers in her native Birmingham after her less-than-comfortable departure from the Meta heatwave. She might have been reinstated but In a gully, a human skeleton came to the whole episode left a nasty taste in her mouth. She was now working for Detective Chief Superintendent Samir Jaffrey - then surface and forensic testing proved the man body to be Lee Geary, who had broken her heart nearly twenty disappeared nine years beforeearlier. She He'd been a known drug user and her fifteen-year-old daughter had learning disabilities, so it could have moved out been a simple case of her parent's home into a rented house misadventure but thereDI Matt Lockyer wasn's still t convinced. Geary was a difficult situation with her brother Luke who has gone townie, so what was he doing out on Salisbury Plain alone? There are connections to the suicide of his way Holly Gilbert and to make life difficult for Robin since she was a young childtwo other deaths which were not considered suspicious at the time. HeLockyer and DC Gemma Broad of the Major Crimes Review Unit (that's married cold cases to Natalie, now you and has a young child but he's still got it in for Robinme) investigate.

|isbn=17863323880571379559|title=The First Day House of SpringBroken Bricks|author=Nancy TuckerFiona Williams|rating=4.5|genre=ThrillersLiterary Fiction|summary=Sometimes I wonder if I take my pleasures too sadly - and ''The First Day House of SpringBroken Bricks'' was one such occasion. The writing is superb and completely compellingthe story of four people. The characterisation is excellent and Tess Hembry's roots are in Jamaica: temperamentally she might be happier there, but instead, she lives in the house on the plot grips you and won't let goriverbank, built of broken bricks. SoInsubstantial as it might look, whatit's stood the problem? passage of time, storms and floods. WellHer husband, Richard, struggles to grow his vegetables, to complete the problem is Chrissiedelivery rounds - and to bring in sufficient money. They have twin boys - Sonny and Max, the main characterrainbow twins. When we first meet her sheSonny's just eight years old, small for her age and she readily tells us that shecolouring reflects his mother's just killed someone - a two-year-old boyJamaican heritage. Max takes after his father. ShePeople don's completely cold about what shet believe that they're related, much less twins and there's done an assumption when Max is out with her main memory being his mother that whilst she was killing - suffocating - her hands seized up. There's a clue that Chrissie isn't completely responsible for her actions a little later in the book: when will Steven come back, she wonders? Hasn't he been dead for long enough?his nanny.

|authorisbn=Catherine Steadman1529425867|title=The Disappearing ActLost and Never Found (A D I Wilkins Mystery)|author=Simon Mason

|genre=ThrillersCrime|summary= British actress Mia Eliot In Oxford, there are two D I Wilkins. Raymond Wilkins is on the cusp of successNigerian descent, Balliol educated and always exquisitely dressed. Great success. If the rumours are true D I Ryan Wilkins, son of Ryan and father of Ryan, award season is going to treat her well, acknowledging her for her latest, critically acclaimed productionnot. She He's going places but so, unfortunately, is her partnernot any of those things. And the places he He's going take him towards lieswhite, deceit and originated from a pretty young trailer park, barely educated (reading's not ''really'' his thing ) and his wardrobe consists mainly of shell suits and trackies. They're usually in the form of his new co-starlime green or acid yellow. It You might wonder if you's re being introduced to a good time police procedural written for Mia to escapelaughs. Well, and pilot season in LA provides you're not. The two men are just different sides of the excusesame policing coin. Sometimes the combination works brilliantly well. Sometimes it's problematic.|isbn=1471189783

|author= Christophe MedlerMosby Woods|title=Madrigal: A Closely Guarded SecretWhirly Man Loses His Turn

|genre=Historical Literary Fiction|summary= Set against The West isn't the backdrop of dominant force it once was. Nobody in the English Civil War, a secret plan (code-named Madrigal) West is discovered by Sir Robert Douse in the summer of 1642. As a loyal servant of the King, and Head of the Secret Service, quite sure how to mend this or even if mending it is Robert's duty to uncover the details best course of the plan and follow the clues to uncover one of the most guarded secrets in history—especially since the plot could affect the Kingaction. Governments are flailing.|isbn=B095HY8SXQ}}{{Frontpage|author=Tasha Suri|title=The Jasmine Throne|rating=4|genre=Fantasy|summary= On the night of her sacred burningA war here, Princess Malini defies her brother and refuses to step on to the pyrea push for climate action there. She is immediately sent to be imprisoned on the Hirana: an ancient temple A feeling that was once filled with a community of people who got powers from the mysterious deathless waters. But now the temple nobody is nothing more than an overgrown, decaying ruinin actual charge. One dayImagine then, Malini witnesses there was a girl kill someone man with magicprecognition. Instead of reporting her for such a gruesome crime, Malini claims that the girl saved her from an attacker and begs for Imagine the girl to become her own personal maidservant.|isbn=0356515648}}{{Frontpage|isbn=B088YWF5BC|title=The Lies We Tell|author=Jane Corry|rating=4|genre=Thrillers|summary=Sarah Wallace said that she grew up on a council estate strategic advantage in Kent and that she had two brothers and two sisters. It seemed to have been this asset; a loving, stable family. When we first meet her, she man who can't sleep because her son, Freddie, who's nearly sixteen, hasn't come home by the time he sort tell you what will happen given any set of half-promised he'd circumstances. That man would be in by. Her husbandvaluable, Tom, is fast asleep: they're moving house right? Perhaps the most valuable asset in the morning but he's still going to be going to work and he needs his sleephistory. He wakes, thoughImagine then, when Freddie does come in and overhears him tell his mother that he's killed someonethis man loses this ability.What would governments do to get it back?|isbn=B0C9SNG8R1