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'''Read [[Forthcoming Publications|reviews of books about to be published]].
{{Frontpage
|isbn=18462767720241636604|title=The End of BiasTrading Game: How We Change Our MindsA Confession|author=Jessica NordellGary Stevenson
|rating=4.5
|genre=Politics and SocietyAutobiography|summary=Anyone who is not If you were to bring up an ableimage of a city banker in your mind, white man understands bias in that they may no longer even recognise the extent you're unlikely to which they suffer from it: it's simply a part think of everyday lifesomeone like Gary Stevenson. White men will always come first. The able will come before A hoodie and jeans replaces the pin-stripe suit and his background is the disabledEast End, where he was familiar with violence, poverty and injustice. Jobs, promotions, higher salaries are There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to the preserve London School of the white manEconomics. Even when those who wouldn't pass the medical become Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and he has a part facility with numbers which most of an organisation it's rare us can only envy. He also realised that their views are heardmost rich people expect poor people to be stupid. It was his ability at what was, that their concerns are acknowledgedessentially, a card game which got him an internship with Citibank. It's personally appalling and degrading for the individuals on the receiving end of the bias but it's not just the individuals who are negatively impactedEventually, this turned into permanent employment as a trader.
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Teresa Driscoll1035021803|title=Her Perfect FamilyThe Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder|author=C L Miller|rating=3.5|genre=ThrillersCrime|summary=The novel begins by introducing you It's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to Gemmathe English country village where she grew up. She's back now because of a request for help from her beloved aunt, Carole. Freya's former mentor and Carole's close friend, who at first instance appears to be your average studentArthur Crockleford, faced with is dead and the familiar horrifying realisationcircumstances seem suspicious, at to say the eleventh hourleast. Arthur was the reason why Freya had not been back to the village: Arthur, she feels, that let her graduation outfit is all wrongdown badly. Suddenly Even though they were in business together as antique hunters, Gemma receives an eerie message stating ''He is she has not who he says he is…'', paving felt able to be near the way for man or pursue the sinister tone that remains throughout profession she loved. After the novel. In split, she worked in a twist of eventscafe, met and after a change of outfit, Gemma is shot in married James (on the rebound from the midst love of her graduation ceremony. With Gemma then in a comalife, what follows is a complex whodunit with a list of suspects that continues to grow the further you readwho was murdered) and Freya and James have now divorced.|isbn=1542028752
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|isbn=8409290103AllTomorrowsFutureCover|title=If OnlyAll Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt|author=Matthew TreeBenjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Science Fiction|summary=Twenty-one-year-old Malcolm Lowry had been sent abroad by his father, cotton-broker AO Lowry: he asked his accountant, Mr Patrick, ''Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to ensure come.'' I've heard it said that the young man got on board the boat and thereafter Patrick was to send him a monthly allowance'technology' is what happens after you're eighteen. Patrick sent the money regularly and Well, I must confess that there have been more than a correspondence - few decades of sorts - sprang technology in my lifetime. I've kept up between the two although we hear more about reasonably well with what Lowry has 's advantageous to say than Patrick. It wasnme but I't m left with the feeling that Lowry senior didnit't care for his sons all getting away from me. Some of it is - frankly - quite frightening. Of course, it was that he didnI could research the possibilities and the probabilities and end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who knows what they't care to have him re talking about or the latest conspiracy theorist. I needed people I knew I could trust and who could deliver information in this country where he might be a danger to his wife and other children. The alcohol problem was obvious even before Patrick managed to get the young man on his wayI could understand.
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|author=Antti Tuomainen and David Hackston (translator)Sunny Singh|title=The Rabbit FactorHotel Arcadia
|rating=3.5
|genre=CrimeThrillers |summary=Meet Henri. With The Hotel Arcadia is a mind so much more focused on maths and calculations than it is other human beings, he's perfect for his job luxury hotel in an unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a terrorist group. Hiding from the insurance company – until they decide he's not a team-memberterrorists who are rampaging through, that they'd prefer killing everyone to be all open-planon site, holistic and keen on stupid-as workshopping. This there is when he finds his brother has diedSam, having a heart attack while busy changing his Volvo's radio channel, wartime photographer and has left Henri everything. Unfortunately (or otherwise) that 'everything' is just an adventure parkAbhi, and nothing elsethe hotel manager. ''YouMeFun'' is so not what Henri wants As Abhi continues to try to occupy his mindcare remotely for the residents who are still alive in the hotel, but he perks up forms a little when he sees huge holes in the finances – it runs at a steady money-moving pace, despite some desultory staff ideasbond with Sam who refuses to be cowed by events, but loans have been made out and the amount vanished. Fortunately (or otherwise) some people are quickly keeps on the scene venturing out of her room to try to explain that missing money – itcapture what's been turned into a gambling debt that has also now been inherited by Henrihappened through her photography. Although they only ever talk over the phone, their friendship grows as Abhi tries to help her keep safe and they both wait to see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by the activities of these guys are not conducive to getting a cheap life insurance plan..terrorists.|isbn=191319387X086154742X
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=14711793111529153298|title=The UnheardList of Suspicious Things|author=Nicci FrenchJennie Godfrey|rating=4.5|genre=ThrillersGeneral Fiction|summary=Tess, a teacher It's 1979 and Jason, a headmaster, have split up: she and Poppy have moved out of the family home and Jason Margaret Thatcher is now married to EmilyPrime Minister. The separation was amicable - they had just drifted apart(A woman? I mean, honestly... ) They co-parent three-year-old Poppy who has her bedroom in She's not what was the 's worrying Miv's family home and another in the flat she shares with her mother, though. Women have been disappearing. It Well, they've been murdered, but to have 'disappeared'doesn'seemedt sound quite so frightening. Miv's upset because she' s overheard that her father wants to be working well until move the day that Poppy came home with a menacing drawing of a woman falling family 'Down South'. When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a tall building and she started swearingfrightening, foreign place, using words she was unlikely to have heard in either homebest avoided. Her behaviour deteriorated For Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and there were problems at nursery schoolshe'll do anything to prevent that. Tess turns to a therapist for help, then She's not worried about the dangers or that her doctor and finally the police but no one will take what she has Mum's stopped talking - to say seriouslyanyone.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=14711966151398524085|title=IcedHas Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Felix FrancisNicci French|rating=4.5|genre=ThrillersCrime|summary=Miles Pussett used to be a Steeplechase jockey Charlotte Salter was expected at her husband's fiftieth birthday party but those days never turned up. Her children, sons Niall, Paul and Ollie and her daughter, Etty. are past and he now gets his thrills from hurling headall worried but -first down the threestrangely -quarter-mile Cresta Runher husband, Alec, occasionally reaching eighty miles an houris not. He was in St Moritz Shortly afterwards, Etty and Greg, find the same weekend as White Turf - thatbody of Greg's high-class horseracing on the frozen lake and against his better judgement he gets talked into helping with father, Duncan Ackerley, in the saddling of the horsesriver. It's seven years since he put horseracing behind him was an easy assumption for the police to make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when he swore that hecouldn'd never go back to itt stand the guilt. But when he sees that something suspicious is going on, Miles The Salter children are not convinced but there's little else they can't help do but look for answers, even when it puts him in dangerget on with their lives and wonder about what really happened.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=147228612X1035906708|title=The Late Train to Gipsy HillDiva|author=Alan JohnsonDaisy Goodwin
|rating=4.5
|genre=ThrillersGeneral Fiction|summary=We all know people like Gary Nelsontend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, but she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, although we probably haven't taken much notice of them. They live quietNew York, uneventful lives in December 1923 and stay mostly under the radaronly moved to Athens when she was thirteen. In a city like London, thatHer original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 's quite easy - and even GaryCallas's three flatmates largely ignore himto make it more manageable in the States. The highlight of his day is watching a beautiful young woman apply When she was back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her makeup as voice - she goes to work on was raised under the train each morning: he'd love to ask Nazi occupation by a mother who mercilessly exploited her for a date but he doesn't have the courage. Then, on his homeward commute, Arina speaks to him and asks made no secret of her preference for his help. Before long he finds himself on the run from mobstersher elder sister, Russian secret agents and the Metropolitan policeJackie.
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|author=Claire McGowanChristopher Edge|title=I Know YouBlack Hole Cinema Club
|rating=4
|genre=ThrillersConfident Readers|summary=Lucas and his friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, a place that has the nickname of 'The Black Hole'Then:. All big movie fans, they'' Casey returns from a walk with re looking forward to lots of exciting films, and many, many snacks! However, as the babymovie starts, Carsonthey very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, and comes across three bodiesthey are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagine. But as they lurch from one film genre to the next, almost a whole family taken down. ''Now:'' Rachel can they figure out what on earth is out for a walk with her doggoing on? Will they ever get back to the cinema, Brandy, when she comes across a body in the woods.and to their real lives?|isbn=15420199741839942738
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1529148251Rachel Greenlaw|title=Misfits: A Personal Manifesto|author=Michaela CoelCompass and Blade|rating=3.5|genre=Politics and SocietyTeens|summary=''How am I able to be so transparent on paper about rapecan hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, malpractice and poverty, yet still compartmentalise? It's as though I were telling the truth whilst simultaneously running away from itanswering beat in my heart.''
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=0008433631James Sherwood Metts|title=Next of Kin|author=Kia AbdullahPlanet Storyland|rating=4.5|genre=ThrillersConfident Readers|summary=It was Things have been a bit sticky for the sort of thing that happened every dayEarthlings. AI and automation have been proceeding apace, although not often replacing jobs they're paid to Leila Syed. She'd never driven her nephew, Max, do and other tasks that took time to school before but his father, Andrew Hanson, had rung her in a panicaccomplish. He was supposed Just as they were beginning to be taking Max get used to school but he'd been called into work all this technological change and the delay in getting there could lead starting to financial losses. As the school was only five minutes out think of Leila's wayother, could she drop him off? Of coursenew ways to spend time, she could and a sleeping Max was duly strapped into the back of her caralong came an awful pandemic. On the way Leila took a phone call - there Life was panic at her work toopretty much shut down and, along with a problem it, all the many daily social interactions on which could put a multi-million-pound contract at riskthey depend so heavily.|isbn=1736128426
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{{Frontpage
|author= Justine Avery and Naday MeldovaMatthew Tree|title=Everybody Toots! (Everybody Potties!)|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary= Toots, trumps, farts. Whatever your word for them, find us a child that doesnWe't find them irresistibly funny. Funny to talk about and joke about, that is. But horribly embarrassing if you let one go at the wrong time. In class, say, when everyone will hear it and everyone will laugh. At you. Justine Avery's latest entry in her ''Everybody Potties!'' series takes aim at any shame associated with tooting and gently and calmly, with the familiar humour attached, explains that tooting is perfectly normal. Everybody does it: ''Everybody Toots''!|isbn= B09C2RVJ2W}} {{Frontpage|isbn=1784165263|title=Invite Me In|author=Emma Curtisll Never Know
|rating=4.5
|genre=CrimeLiterary Fiction|summary=Martin Curran's wife, Eliza knew that she had Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to be home to make different from his lunch for one o'clock on the dotfather, despite the fact that she was actually painting one of their properties prior to it being let. If she didn't get home, there would be trouble. There was some excuse: Martin was a paraplegic drunk and confined to a wheelchair, but don't be too quick to be understanding. He was also a very unpleasant person: he once told Eliza ''you're good at chronic underachiever whose dreams of being a disappointment''. All this was in Eliza's mind when she first met Dan Jones who arrived, unannounced, exceptional at the flat just as Eliza was about to leave: he wanted the lease any of flat 2, 42 Linden Road his artistic passions all failed miserably and he was desperate to get in before it was advertised as being available.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1784742775|title=A Change of Circumstance (Simon Serrailler)|author=Susan Hill|rating=5|genre=Crime|summary=Drugs hadn't really been that much of a problem in Lafferton and Detective Superintendent Simon Serrailler who had thought of drugs ops as a bit of a waste endless crises of timeself confidence. They still were, So Tim applied himself to a great extenthis studies, but Serrailler knew that something had to be done. Children as young as nine were being recruited to transport the drugs cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and the operation running the county lines was tight. A mule might know the name (although it probably wouldn't be the correct one) of the person who was running him but he certainly wouldn't know anything about those higher up in the organisation. The police might catch a few of the runners set himself high but they'd never get anywhere near those higher upachievable ambitions.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=B09FS89KX9|title=Fall On Me|author=Penelope Potts|rating=3.5|genre=Women's Fiction|summary=Life should have been good for Hollie: She was just going into the final year of her veterinary degree and - three years later - was still working at BB's diner. Bob - the owner - regarded her fondly: he was a good boss. Hollie had moved in with her boyfriend, Marcus: her mother thought he was great and he was doing well in his career. Hollie wasn't quite so certain though: Marcus wanted to control her and most of all he wanted her to leave her job at the diner. Then there was the fact that he would be violent, both to her and to other people.B0CVFXPGP8
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{{Frontpage
|author=John GwynneA G Slatter|title=The Shadow Of The GodsBriar Book of the Dead
|rating=5
|genre=Fantasy
|summary=The Shadow Of The Gods is the first installment '' There's a part of me that wants to keep this just to myself for however long I can. This secret magic of my own, all mine, at last. I just want to enjoy it for a while.'' Within a remote mountain pass, far away from the Bloodsworn Sagaworld, set in lies Silverton; a town under the era protection of the Vikings in the shadow Briar's, a family of Ragnarok, when witches who protect the Gods have battled town and their bones lie scattered the wider world from the Darklands. Though she has always wished for all to see. This story magic, Ellie Briar is the ultimate in High Fantasyfirst non-witch to be born into her family for generations and as such since she was young, her training as a steward revolved around letters and administration rather than spells and John Gwynne certainly does justice to potions. When her grandmother suddenly dies, Ellie's cousin Audra becomes the genreBriar Witch, with mythical creaturesthe town's leader, archaic language and battles galoreEllie takes her place beside her. This is a thick bookAs challenges come her way left, with an intricate plot right and fascinating characters that are woven together centre, Ellie uncovers the rare ability to create communicate with the dead, putting her at the heart of a wonderfully realistic maelstrom of chaos. Reeling from one family secret to another, Ellie must decide who to trust and gritty world in which our heroes must determine what to do battleas the Briar witches' legacy, everything they have sacrificed to survive, is under threat.|isbn=03565142181803364548
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=B09HTWX47X1529900360|title=Endless ObsessionThe Ghost Orchid|author=Dai HenleyJonathan Kellerman
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary=Ithadn't been Lt Milo Sturgis's some years since we last caught up with Andy Floodfault that Alex Delaware had been badly injured but he felt responsible and even after Alex recovered, formerly Sturgis was reluctant to ask for his help on difficult cases. His assertions that there were only open-and-shut cases which didn't need the help of a DCI in the Met but now psychologist only worked for a well-respected private investigatorwhile. HeFinally, it was Robin, Delaware's married to Laurapartner, who 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, formerly his DS though. Two lovers were murdered in the Murder Squad but now working swimming pool of a remote property in a forensics laboratoryBel Air. Flood's daughters, Gemma and Pippa, have flown He was the nest, Pippa heir to Australia, from where an Italian shoe empire and she has very little contact with the family, is married to an extremely rich man and Gemma to married life. Sheit's had mental problems since she was abducted many years ago but Andy and Laura hope that married life will provide not the support she needsItalian. Flood's business is going well and that But which of them was why he felt able to turn down the case of Lisa Black.primary target?
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Peter Papathanasiou1529395224|title=Letting the Cat Out of the Bag: The StoningSecret Life of a Vet|author=Sion Rowlands
|rating=3.5
|genre=ThrillersAnimals and Wildlife|summary=In Siôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. His father was a town sleazy enough GP and Rowlands didn't want to make sh*tholes elsewhere look glamorous follow in comparisonhis footsteps, a teacher has been transported across town at night in a shopping trolley, and she's been taped to a tree and she's had rocks bowled at her as if she were particularly when he considered the worldstrain that being on-call put on his father's tallest cricket stumpslife. When she's discovered by he was seventeen he took the town gossip everyone, including opportunity of doing work experience with a family friend who was a vet and was convinced this was the local cops, are quite confident the culprit has come from the immigrant detention centre the place is reluctantly home tojob for him. An arson attack on that shows the feeling – and it's only fair, is the general opinion Before long, for the occupants are often setting their own fires in protest he was at their conditionsLiverpool University. Cue the arrival of George Manolis, It hadn't - as with so many students - been his dream since he was a higher rank from the city, to sort everything outchild. Because such an aggrieved If anything, insular community is really going he'd wanted to welcome be a Greek-heritaged city boy laying down the law..professional footballer.|isbn=1529416973
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=B08Z8BMZ7H0861541774|title=The Mystery A Nye of HealingPheasants|author=A P McGrathSteve Burrows
|rating=4
|genre=Crime (Historical)|summary=We meet Solon in Pergamon in the second century of the common era and heDCI Domenic Jejeune's the physician on duty at the munus - the games put on for the amusement of the populaceclose friend and former colleague, Danny Maik, has taken a short holiday in Singapore to meet up with an old ally, Guy Trueman. The remuneration isn't high but the work gives the doctor Maik was involved in a street brawl - he would later maintain that he was facing a man armed with a feeling of virtue knife - and hones his skills: Solon ''wants'' the warriors to livehe killed a Ghurka. It's quite Initially, he faced a spectacle: the magistri are the charge hands and when we first see them, they're sprinkling gold dust onto of manslaughter but evidence came to light that suggested that he might have planned to murder the lions' manes to make them look more impressiveman. The sagitarii are the archers and Now he could be facing the beastiarii are the condemned criminals who are going to fight for their lives with the wild animalsdeath penalty. Today, itDomenic Jejeune can do nothing to help as any interference from another police force could provoke a diplomatic incident and wouldn's the crocodilest help Danny at all.
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|author=Kate DiCamillo and Sophie BlackallAlexander McCall Smith|title=The Beatryce ProphecyPerfect Passion Company|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersGeneral Fiction|summary=''Stories have joy The Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and surprises operating as an alternative to all the online apps in them''providing a more personal, we are told heretailored service. And none more so than in this wondrous story, which feels an instant classic with the freshness Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and look after the agelessness it has in equal proportionbusiness, as Ness is planning to take a trip to Canada to get away for a while. We start Katie is coming out of a break up with a group of monksbad boyfriend, and so jumps at the Order of the Chronicles of Sorrowingchance to come home to Edinburgh. And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, and the demonic goat that loves nothing more than upendingbringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, trampling on thanks to 44 Scotland Street and biting the poor Brothers. Things change drastically when the beast takes a totally maternal approach to a homeless girlIsabel Dalhousie novels, one but with some new characters who quickly begin to charm. Katie has survived some trauma that has blocked her past from her memory. Elsewhere sits no experience in running a King business, or in his castlematch-making, desperate to find the girlbut Ness has full confidence in her abilities, for it is prophesied that a young child can unseat the throne and cause great change. Who foretold that revolution but the Order of the Chronicles of Sorrowing? But how can a simplethere's always her very helpful (and rather handsome) neighbour, William, amnesiac lass ever prove to lend a threat to anyone?hand…|isbn=15295008931846976596
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|isbn=B09FFJF8YS0811771741|title=You Can't Wear Panties! (No More Nappies!)InstaKnits for Baby|author=Justine Avery and Kate ZhoidikMelissa Leapman|rating=3.54|genre=For SharingCrafts|summary=Melissa Leapman's ''InstaKnits for Baby'For the big, grownup girls out there, the potty masters in training, "You Can't Wear Panties!" is gives us a cry (the bigcollection of knits from toys to blankets. Some will be quick knits -girl kind!) others are of toilet triumph and persevering panty pride.the 'long, cosy afternoons in front of the fire' And so it is! This latest book from Justine Avery celebrates a little girlvariety. The projects are divided by the time they's final goodbye ll take to nappies and pullcomplete -ups and graduation less than five hours, five to "proper" pants by following her around as she proudly explains ten hours, ten to her dog, her cat, her stuffed rabbit twenty hours and her baby sibling that ''she'' can wear super-duper proper pants, while they cannotmore than twenty hours. Neither can All the flowersprojects are attractive, nor the fish, nor the birdsmodern and useable. Boy I perhaps show my age when I wonder about 's certainly cansocial-media-worthy projects't. Shebut that's a big girl now and she wants everyone to know it!me being picky.}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Nick Lake and Emily GravettDean Koontz|title=Locked Out LilyThe Bad Weather Friend
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident ReadersParanormal|summary=Lily Benny ishaving a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, or wasand his house gets trashed. Oh, or and someone has beendelivered a really weird, very illdisturbing coffin-sized object to his home, and to give her parents relief sheit's been told possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that has trashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the very last person to stay with her grandma for deserve all this bad luck. He is a few daysnice person. A really nice person. The parents need So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the relief as Lily's baby sibling delivery to his house is just about a new friend, a bad weather friend called Spike, who has been sent to be born – help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a child Lily swears she hates already and wants nothing good person. Spike is going to do with. But on tracking back home for word take care of her parents (Benny, and her plush toy so she can sleep) she finds stony-eyed simulacra will certainly take care of her parentsBenny's enemies, and the babe-in-armsif he, already installed. These devilish interlopers need to be ousted to get the family back intactBenny, even if itand Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's not the family Lily wants – and all she has to help her in the task wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are some talking animals – Crow, Mole, Mouse and Snake.|isbn=14711948331662500491
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{{Frontpage
|author=Greg James and Chris SmithAdam Stower|title=The Great Dream RobberyMurray and Bun|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Maya's father Murray is supposed to be a professor humble, tidy and friendly cat, one who invented an amazing dream machineis able to sleep and eat and eat and sleep and, well, whatever takes his fancy next of the two. But something went wrong, and now he can't wake up. Or at least, thats a bad magician's what Maya cat, so his favourite bun has been toldturned into a hyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, and the catflap they both use can chuck them out, not into the regular back garden, but into a world of frightening adventure and whiffs. In This time round it drops them into a rather strange dream Viking land, where a troll hunter is expected – well, one night Maya makes a new friendmuch bigger than Murray was, and discovers that the only way to save her dad may be by being asleep. Cue one madcap action adventure story where dreams and reality collide...really...and therehonest, but he's everything from llamas turned up and bananas, dream machines made from hairdresser cast-offs, he'll have to a talking cat called Bin Bag!do…|isbn=024147051X0008561249
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=1800464495B0C47LV1PC|title= 100 Ways in 100 Days to Teach Your Baby Maths: Support All Areas of Your Baby’s Development by Nurturing a Love of MathsFragility|author=Emma SmithMosby Woods|rating=4.5|genre=Children's Non-Literary Fiction|summary=Can you make a ''Babies seem to be born with an amazing number sense: understanding shapes in the womb, being aware of quantities at seven hours old, assessing probability at six months old, and comprehending addition and subtraction at nine months old.Yo birthing person'' Did joke? And if you could, is the question should you know thismake it? I didn't! How about: ''Maths ability on entry to school Or is a strong predictor of later achievementthe question if you did, double would it land? The catch is that of literacy skillsthe answer for both could well be.... no.''
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=15293793851529431735|title=The Madness of Crowds (Chief Inspector Gamache)Winter Visitor|author=Louise PennyJames Henry|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=In the Canadian village of Three PinesIt's February 1991 and Essex is bitingly cold, wewhich made Bruce Hopkins're post-pandemic: return all the scars are still there but life is starting to get back to normalmore surprising. The villagers are beginning to return to He'd been exiled on the Bistro and the AubergeCosta del Sol as a wanted drug smuggler for a decade. TheyThe return has come about because he're visiting each others had a letter from his ex-wife, saying that she's homes ill and having friends and relatives hasn't long to staylive. A young Sudanese woman who has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize It's hard to feel any sympathy when Hopkins is one such visitor abducted, stripped to his underwear and she soon proves that not all saints are necessarily pleasant people sent to be around - a bit like Vincent Gilbert, known watery grave in the village as the Asshole Saintboot of a stolen Ford Sierra. Is it a warning from a Spanish gang or a problem closer to home?
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|isbnauthor= B09F4CTKJRAlex Bell and Tim McDonagh|title= Flights for Freedom|author= Steven BurgauerThe Glorious Race of Magical Beasts|rating=4.5|genre=Historical FictionConfident Readers|summary=It's Eli is a busy lad – by day an apprentice in the later stages of World War I wondrous library we start by visiting with him, and in the United States has just entered evening a helper at the conflictdessert cafe his gran owns and runs. Petrol Petronus Eli lives with his lovely gran, too – for there is a young American who has signed up and joined generation missing in the family. A few short years ago, Eli's parents were both lost to the titular race, a globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have to navigate the world in the 17 Aero Squadroncompany of a magical beast. This company was has made the race anathema to the pair – but when a bad incident at the first US Aero Squadron eatery leads to be trained in Canadaa confession from gran, Eli knows his only hope is to dare to enter what he most hates, with the first sole aim the prize of magic at the end – the only thing to be attached possibly save his gran.|isbn=0571382231}}{{Frontpage|isbn=178763681X|title=Knife Skills for Beginners|author=Orlando Murrin|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary=Chef Paul Delamare took a teaching job at a residential cookery school in Belgravia. He didn't really want to the RAF but celebrity chef Christian Wagner had a way of getting both men and women to do what he wanted. Paul ''somehow'' got the first to impression that he'd be sent into at the skies school to fight assist Paul, who had a broken arm, but it didn't turn out that way. The teaching - and the Germans in active combatproblems - are all his own. The one thing he hadn't expected was for someone to turn up dead. But before Unfortunately, he was the person who discovered the body and everyone knows that the police consider that can happen, Petrol has person to master flying be the notoriously difficult but majestic Sopwith Camelprime suspect.
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=183885410XSarah Marsh|title=The Dark Remains|author=William McIlvanney and Ian RankinA Sign of Her Own
|rating=3.5
|genre=CrimeGeneral Fiction|summary=Bobby Carter After a bout of scarlet fever as a child, Ellen Lark loses her hearing. Suddenly plunged into a world of silence, everything about her life changes. Living in a time when the use of sign language was seen as something only savages do, Ellen is sent to a lawyer and consigliere school where she is taught to one of lip read, but physically restrained from signing. From here, she ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the major crime families in nineteen seventies Glasgowdeaf and using a system called Visible Speech. DC Jack Laidlaw At the same time, Bell is working on the CID team charged with the investigationother inventions and ideas, and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in a complicated tangle of espionage. I say |isbn=1035401614}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1803816759|title=The Unravelling|author=Will Gibson|rating=4|genre=Science Fiction|summary=It''on s 2038 and Joe is a bored cop policing the team'' but Laidlaw never really seems to be wealthy and peaceful New York City. Joe longs for a part bit of itadventure and to get stuck into some really gritty crime detection. He does his own thingBut then something goes horribly wrong with the AI system that now runs everything, making life easier for many, goes his own way and ''The Dark Remains'' uncovers riots start to spread. Finally, Joe gets to do some real policing. In the truth aftermath of why Bobby Carterthe rioting global pop star Suki is kidnapped and Joe is assigned to bring her home. Joe isn's body t the only one trying to save Suki - Dylan, a British superfan and tech nerd, is also on the case. What went wrong? Did the system fail or was found behind one of Glasgowit hacked? And how is Suki's seedier pubs.kidnapping connected?
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=19424102551529421284|title=Tokyo Zangyo (Detective Hiroshi)Laying Out the Bones|author=Michael PronkoKate Webb
|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=''Zangyo: overtime workIt was one of those flash downpours that the British weather often delivers in a heatwave. In a gully, a human skeleton came to the surface and forensic testing proved the body to be Lee Geary, often unpaidwho had disappeared nine years earlier. He'' It's the cultured been a known drug user and had learning disabilities, isnso it could have been a simple case of misadventure but DI Matt Lockyer wasn't itconvinced. Geary was a townie, so what was he doing out on Salisbury Plain alone? The hours for There are connections to the suicide of Holly Gilbert and to two other deaths which you're paid are really just a statement were not considered suspicious at the time. Lockyer and DC Gemma Broad of the minimum youMajor Crimes Review Unit (that'll be required s cold cases to do: youand me) investigate.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0571379559|title=The House of Broken Bricks|author=Fiona Williams|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary='ll work more hours to get the job done and done to 'The House of Broken Bricks'' is the satisfaction story of bullies like Shigeru Onizukafour people. When he was found dead in front of Senden CentralTess Hembry's headquarters roots are in Tokyo Jamaica: temperamentally she might be happier there was nothing , but instead, she lives in the way house on the riverbank, built of regret or griefbroken bricks. Insubstantial as it might look, even from it's stood the passage of time, storms and floods. Her husband, Richard, struggles to grow his familyvegetables, but there was a mild curiosity as to whether he'd jumped from complete the roof of the building or been assisted delivery rounds - and to bring in his descentsufficient money. Gossip revolves around They have twin boys - Sonny and Max, the fact that he left the roof at the exact same spot that an employee, Mayu Yamase, had committed suicide some three years earlierrainbow twins. Sonny's colouring reflects his mother's Jamaican heritage. Max takes after his father. ShePeople don'd accused Onizuka of bullying her t believe that they're related, much less twins and forcing her to work there's an unreasonable amount of overtimeassumption when Max is out with his mother that she's his nanny.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=02414254251529425867|title=The Man Who Died TwiceLost and Never Found (A D I Wilkins Mystery)|author=Richard OsmanSimon Mason
|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=Elizabeth Best was a little surprised when she received the letterIn Oxford, there are two D I Wilkins. It came from a man whose body she had helped to pull from the Thames and who had never existed but then this Raymond Wilkins is the sort of conundrum which retired spies have to deal with on a regular basisNigerian descent, Balliol educated and always exquisitely dressed. When she visits the sender D I Ryan Wilkins, son of Ryan and father of the letter (heRyan, is not. He's moved into the Coopernot any of those things. He's Chase Retirement Village) it comes as no surprise that itwhite, originated from a trailer park, barely educated (reading's someone with whom she has a long professional history - not ''really'' his thing) and his wardrobe consists mainly of shell suits and who used to be her husbandtrackies. HeThey's made a bad mistake - something to do with a mask being removed within the range of a CCTV camera on a raid, a missing twenty-million pounds re usually in diamonds and a few death threatslime green or acid yellow. HeYou might wonder if you's now in hiding with re being introduced to a young woman called Pollypolice procedural written for laughs. Well, whoyou're not. The two men are just different sides of the same policing coin. Sometimes the combination works brilliantly well. Sometimes it's his MI5 handler as well as being an incompetent waitressproblematic.
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Andrew SharpMosby Woods|title=The Chef, the Bird and the BlessingA Whirly Man Loses His Turn
|rating=4
|genre=General Literary Fiction|summary= Chef Mlantushi - Mozzy to his employer - is, The West isn't the dominant force it once was. Nobody in his mind, the head chef of a safari business catering to VIP guests in an unnamed African country. Mozzy West is earnest and dedicated quite sure how to his task and he puts all of himself into creating fine cuisine dishes for the guests at BOD-W safaris but his dream mend this or even if mending it is to become the head chef best course of a restaurant in London or a big American cityaction. Governments are flailing. Even to win A war here, a Michelin starpush for climate action there. He A feeling that nobody is thwarted in this ambition by his bossactual charge. Imagine then, Mr Bin (Ben to you and me) who incurs Mozzy's disapproval for his scruffy ways, his uninterest in his guests and - shock, horror - his allowing of bush animals into the house.|isbn=B09926MK8H}}{{Frontpage|author=Alex Foulkes|title=Rules for Vampires|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary= Eleonore Von Motteberg (or 'Leo' for short) is there was a Vampireman with precognition. She drinks blood, she sleeps during Imagine the day, and she strategic advantage in this asset; a man who can Grimwalk (turning into a flock of bats to travel around, although not all tell you what will happen given any set of them remember to come back). Pretty cool stuffcircumstances. NowThat man would be valuable, on right? Perhaps the night of her hundredth birthnight, she has to go out and hunt her first humanmost valuable asset in history. HoweverImagine then, instead she ends up killing two humans by accident and burning down an orphanagethat this man loses this ability. Oops! And What would governments do to make things worse, the ghosts of one of the orphans and the evil master of the orphanage come get it back to haunt her. So, not only does Leo have to team up with the friendly ghost Minna to stop the ghost of the Orphanmaster before he becomes unstoppably powerful, she has to do it all while hiding it from her family. Did I mention vampires and ghosts hate each other? Yeah, there's a reason why there are rules for vampires…|isbn=147119955XB0C9SNG8R1
}}
