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'''Read [[Forthcoming Publications|reviews of books about to be published]].
{{Frontpage
|isbn=0241636604|title=The Trading Game: A Confession|author=Harry AllenGary Stevenson|rating=4.5|genre=Autobiography|summary=If you were to bring up an image of a city banker in your mind, you're unlikely to think of someone like Gary Stevenson. A hoodie and jeans replaces the pin-stripe suit and his background is the East End, where he was familiar with violence, poverty and injustice. There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to the London School of Economics. Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and he has a facility with numbers which most of us can only envy. He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to be stupid. It was his ability at what was, essentially, a card game which got him an internship with Citibank. Eventually, this turned into permanent employment as a trader.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1035021803|title=Children The Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder|author=C L Miller|rating=3.5|genre=Crime|summary=It's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to the 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, Arthur Crockleford, is dead and the circumstances seem suspicious, to say the least. Arthur was the reason why Freya had not been back to the village: Arthur, she feels, let her down badly. Even though they were in business together as antique hunters, she has not felt able to be near the man or pursue the profession she loved. After the split, she worked in a cafe, met and married James (on the rebound from the Sunlove of her life, who was murdered) and Freya and James have now divorced.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=AllTomorrowsFutureCover|title=All Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)
|rating=5
|genre=TeensScience Fiction|summary= Ra Eun Seo lives in a North Korean town and she ''Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to come.'' I've heard it said that 'technology' is what happens after you're eighteen. Well, I must confess that there have been more than a talented singerfew decades of technology in my lifetime. I've kept up reasonably well with what's advantageous to me but I'm left with the feeling that it's all getting away from me. Life Some of it is hard and food is difficult to come by- frankly - quite frightening. Of course, so Seo I could research the possibilities and her friends Nari and Min go foraging every evening, looking for tree bark the probabilities and edible grasses to supplement end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who knows what they're talking about or the meagre rations of rice latest conspiracy theorist. I needed people I knew I could trust and kimchi at homewho could deliver information in a way I could understand.|isbn=1805140493
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{{Frontpage
|author=Edel RodriguezSunny Singh|title=Worm: A Cuban American OdysseyHotel Arcadia|rating=43.5|genre=Graphic NovelsThrillers |summary=We're The Hotel Arcadia is a luxury hotel in childhood, and we're in Cubaan unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a terrorist group. The revolution has happenedHiding from the terrorists who are rampaging through, and Castrokilling everyone on site, first thought of as a saviour of the countrythere is Sam, has proven himself a Communist, wartime photographer and not done nearly enough to create a level playing field for all. WellAbhi, those hours-long speeches of his were kind of taking his time awaythe hotel manager. Our narrator's family weren't As Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the residents who are still alive in the happiest of places herehotel, an uncle refusing he forms a bond with Sam who refuses to be the good soldier the country demanded (especially as he would probably be shipped off to some minor pro-Communism skirmishcowed by events, such as Angola) and the father being watched and watched, and not liked for his successful keeps on venturing out of her room to try to capture what's happened through her photography business, success being frowned upon. The mother gets Although they only ever talk over the couple jobs with the party phone, their friendship grows as Abhi tries to help her keep safe and they both wait to ease some of see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by the heat, but in this sultry island country, it remains the kind of heat forcing you out of the kitchen…terrorists.|isbn=1474616720086154742X
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=K P O'Donnell1529153298|title=The Vital Link (A Spark in the Ashes)List of Suspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey|rating=3.5|genre=Science General Fiction|summary=VL-15, a prototype robot, is desperate to understand who she It's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher isPrime Minister. Unfortunately (A woman? I mean, before she could find any answershonestly...) She's not what's worrying Miv's family, the world endedthough. Women have been disappearing. Well, consumed in an apocalyptic war between the nations of Drexel and Renada. Over half-a-century laterthey've been murdered, civilisation is starting but to rebuildhave 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Dr Amelia Wong is determined to continue Miv's upset because she's overheard that her fatherwants to move the family 's legacyDown South'. When you're from Yorkshire, building Down South is a world where machines and humans can live together in harmonyfrightening, foreign place, but internal frictions and external enemies might bring it all crashing down againbest avoided. Craig Anderson For Miv, leader of a group of salvagers called the Exhumers, has his entire life turned upside down when he unearths a prototype combat robot: none other than VL-15 herself. Even after being buried for 65 years, move would mean leaving her determination hasn't diminished in the slightestbest friend, and no errant machineSharon, no savage human tribe and she'll do anything to prevent that. She's not even Drexelworried about the dangers or that her Mum's ravaged ecosystem will stop her on her quest for answers…|isbn=B0CKRYFRZMstopped talking - to anyone.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=18389544811398524085|title=The MisperHas Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Kate LondonNicci French|rating=45
|genre=Crime
|summary=Ryan Kennedy killed a police officer: thereCharlotte Salter was expected at her husband's no doubt about thatfiftieth birthday party but never turned up. He was the fifteenHer children, sons Niall, Paul and Ollie and her daughter, Etty. are all worried but -yearstrangely -old holding the gun and pointing it at DI Kieran Shawher husband, Alec, is not. He pulled the trigger but due to Shortly afterwards, Etty and Greg, find the vagaries body of Greg's father, Duncan Ackerley, in the jury system he river. It was found not guilty of both an easy assumption for the murder police to make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when he couldn't stand the manslaughter of the officerguilt. And so lives must go on. For DI Sarah Collins that means leaving the capital and hoping for a quieter life in the countryside The Salter children are not convinced but when a missing teenager is found on her territory shethere's drawn into a wider investigation - little else they can do but get on with their lives and back into the orbit of Ryan Kennedywonder about what really happened.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=10350252991035906708|title=Went to London, Took the DogDiva|author=Nina StibbeDaisy Goodwin|rating=4.5|genre=AutobiographyGeneral Fiction|summary=Nina Stibbe is returning We tend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, but she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, New York, in December 1923 and only moved to London for a sabbatical after being away for twenty yearsAthens when she was thirteen. SheHer original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 's been at VictoriaCallas's smallholding to make it more manageable in the States. When she was back in Leicestershire which isn't all Athens - supposedly so that conducive to writing, as there's always something smallholding happening she could get appropriate training for her voice - as you might expect. The other side of she was raised under the decision was sealed when Nazi occupation by a room became available (courtesy mother who mercilessly exploited her and made no secret of Deborah Moggach) at a very reasonable renther preference for her elder sister, Jackie.
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|isbnauthor=B0CKD1L5JLChristopher Edge|title=Radio Free Olympia|author=Jeffrey DunnBlack Hole Cinema Club
|rating=4
|genre=General FictionConfident Readers|summary= Petr is an orphan. Rescued by the strange, reclusive Bear, he is brought up far from bustling cities Lucas and busy human societyhis friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, in a place that has the forests nickname of Washington's Olympic PeninsulaThe Black Hole'. After Bear dies All big movie fans, they're looking forward to lots of exciting films, and a brief sojourn in human companymany, many snacks! However, as the movie starts, they very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, and armed with only a pirate radio transmitterthey are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagine. But as they lurch from one film genre to the next, Petr goes can they figure out what on earth is going on a journey through ? Will they ever get back to the forestcinema, broadcasting the strange, wild and rarely heard voices he encounters.to their real lives?|isbn=1839942738
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1635866243Rachel Greenlaw|title=The Knitting Pattern Writing Handbook|author=Kristina McGrath Compass and Sarah Walworth Blade|rating=43.5|genre=CraftsTeens|summary=''I quickly discovered that putting words and numbers on a page wasn't enoughcan hear the song of the sea. Creating a pattern that was correct, clear, concise, and consistent required a great deal The call of trial and error, patiencethe deep, and perseverancethe answering beat in my heart.'' (Introduction byFrancoise Danoy)
A friend recently showed me Rosevear, a knitting pattern for which she'd paid good moneyremote and partially forgotten island, survives on luring ships into the rocks and plundering the wrecks. The first line Mira, like her mother before her, is one of the instructions began: ''Cast off 100 stitchesseven who swim out to survey the ruins – rescuing any survivors and any treasure that lies within...'' It was clear that no good could come of this - But when the Council Watch lays a trap to end the wrecking, they capture the instructions didnisland't get any better - s leader and (finally) PayPal obliged Mira's father. Desperate to save him from death, Mira makes a bargain with a refund when the seller refused wreck survivor who is as charming as he is secretive and with only coordinates to guide her, she couldn't afford sets off in search of a family secret that lies buried deep in the repaymentsea. The pattern looked prettyWith only nine days to unearth what might save her father, but as her journey takes her from the watched streets of foreign islands to the creator didnheart of the smuggler't have the basic knowledge and skills s territory, Mira must be determined to enable her stop at nothing to connect with save the future of her knitters. She should have read ''The Knitting Pattern Writing Handbook''home and the ones she holds most dear.|isbn=0008664730
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{{Frontpage
|author=Adam Baron and Benji DaviesJames Sherwood Metts|title=Oscar's LionPlanet Storyland|rating=34.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=We start incredibly bluntly, with Oscar hoping to Things have his mother – or father, but mother is more likely – read him his very favourite book been a couple of times before he has to be ready bit sticky for schoolthe Earthlings. But when he enters his parentsAI and automation have been proceeding apace, often replacing jobs they' bedroom, all he sees is a mahoosive male lion on their bed, looking sheepish, re paid to do and admitting other tasks that he won't be hungry for another two daystook time to accomplish. But there are benefits to having a lion around – it can be shown Just as an unspoken threat they were beginning to the bully that ruined a birthday party for Oscar the other month. And it can shapeshift, so he can take it get used to school all this technological change and it can get him out starting to think of a problem. And it's wonderful other, new ways to have around the house – not limiting his biscuit intakespend time, being along came an awful pandemic. Life was pretty much more lax about the rules, shut down and so on. OK, along with it can't work a dimmer switch but it can give Oscar a wonderful time, all the many daily social interactions on which they depend so heavily.|isbn=00085967511736128426
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=B0BC3YTCMRMatthew Tree|title=Good Girls Die|author=Ayura AyiraWe'll Never Know
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Literary Fiction|summary=''This story is not for everyone.'' Lavender Daniels was three weeks short of her fifteenth birthday when The Incident happened. She was a very bright studentTimothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to be different from his father, a bit too nerdy if truth be told, drunk and suffered from vitiligo - people were afraid to hug her in case it's contagious. It's not easy chronic underachiever whose dreams of being a black girl whose skin is 84% white. She had a crush on seventeen-year-old Reggie Anderson but never thought he would notice her. Then he did: Lavender was very good exceptional at math any of his artistic passions all failed miserably and Reggie asked if she would tutor himwho had endless crises of self confidence. She readily agreed: tutoring was something she gladly did at church: this was just an extension. She went So Tim applied himself to his house studies, cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and he raped her. In shock, she even allowed him to give her a lift homeset himself high but achievable ambitions.|isbn= B0CVFXPGP8
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{{Frontpage
|author=V CastroA G Slatter|title=The Haunting Briar Book of Alejandrathe Dead|rating=3.5|genre=HorrorFantasy|summary=''This was There's a part of her past me that had wants to keep this just to stop with hermyself for however long I can. This secret magic of my own, all mine, at last. She would be the one I just want to confront thisenjoy it for a while.''
At some point during her lifeWithin a remote mountain pass, far away from the world, lies Silverton; a town under the protection of the Briar's, Alejandra lost herselfa family of witches who protect the town and the wider world from the Darklands. She feels as if Though she has always wished for magic, Ellie Briar is playing parts the first non-witch to be born into her family for others in generations and as such since she was young, her life – training as a steward revolved around letters and administration rather than spells and potions. When her husband grandmother suddenly dies, Ellie's cousin Audra becomes the Briar Witch, the town's leader, and Ellie takes her children – without ever giving any thought to place beside her. As challenges come her own desiresway left, right and centre, her own futureEllie uncovers the rare ability to communicate with the dead, putting her own identity. Day by day she goes through quotient motions without anyone seeing that there is something fundamentally wrongat the heart of a maelstrom of chaos. For invisible Reeling from one family secret to all but Alejandraanother, there is a darkness threatening Ellie must decide who to consume her. More trust and more she is visited by a ghostdetermine what to do as the Briar witches' legacy, a weeping woman in a fraying white gown dripping with watereverything they have sacrificed to survive, who leaves distress in her wakeis under threat.|isbn=18033656171803364548
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Richard Kadrey1529900360|title=The Pale House DevilGhost Orchid|author=Jonathan Kellerman
|rating=4
|genre=HorrorCrime|summary=Ford It hadn't been Lt Milo Sturgis's fault that Alex Delaware had been badly injured but he felt responsible and Neuland are a couple ofeven after Alex recovered, well, guys Sturgis was reluctant to ask for hire I guess, though really his help on difficult cases. His assertions that there were only open-and-shut cases which didn't need the way I thought help of them through the book was as a couple of strange detectives! psychologist only worked for a while. One of them is livingFinally, you seeit was Robin, and the other is undeadDelaware's partner, and so one of them kills who nudged Milo into asking for help again. She knew that the living, and the other kills involvement was something that the undeadman she loved needed. (Only not each otherThe next case did look simple, obviously)though. They're on Two lovers were murdered in the swimming pool of a job remote property in New York that goes badly, and so they head out to Bel Air. He was the West coast heir to try an Italian shoe empire and she is married to lay low for a while an extremely rich man and find some other work to keep them goingit's not the Italian. But when a young woman called Tilda hires which of them to kill was the 'something' that appears to be haunting a wealthy gentleman's house they find themselves uncovering a whole lot of family history, and a terrifyingly powerful creature that they've never come across before!|isbn=1803363894primary target?
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Helen Cooper1529395224|title=Letting the Cat Out of the Bag: The Taming Secret Life of the Cata Vet|author=Sion Rowlands
|rating=3.5
|genre=Confident ReadersAnimals and Wildlife|summary=Once again, mice are pitched against catSiôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. In this case, principally, we have Brie the mouse, up against Gorgonzola the cat – His father was a GP and Rowlands didn't want to follow in case you're seeing a connectionhis footsteps, they live in a cheese shop and therefore all particularly when he considered the names used here seem to be the names of cheeses. Anyway, Brie is shunned, scorned and, if you must, mousstrain that being on-tracised, for the way call put on his habits donfather't match s life. When he was seventeen he took the other mice he lives opportunity of doing work experience with. They nibble up paper wrapping from a family friend who was a vet and was convinced this was the cheese job for bedding – he displays it as art and makes stories based on the visuals on ithim. And that story-telling will come in handy one nightBefore long, when he feels all alone and cast outwas at Liverpool University. Ithadn's almost t - as if there were another character from fable who had had to tell stories to keep themselves alivewith so many students - been his dream since he was a child. This makes Brie the top dog in the mouse communityIf anything, though, as all the others had the chance he'd wanted to half-inch some cheese while the cat was distractedbe a professional footballer. But will the story have the successful sequel it needs when that cheese runs out?|isbn=0571376010
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=B0CDZRGT1M0861541774|title=Super Short Stories: Flash Fiction|author=Mark C Wallfisch|rating=4.5|genre=Short Stories|summary=''Got a minute to be amused, entertained, or challenged?''''These 100 stories are super short. None is more than 300 words. You can read one in a flash.''''Some are funny. Some are poignant. All are short.'' Question: how do you review flash fiction? How do you give a flavour of a fully rounded little story if that story is told in fewer than three hundred words? Or do you try to draw out themes from all the flash fictions in a book of them? I don't know! Perhaps we could start by explaining that there really isn't a fixed definition of flash fiction but that for this collection, author Mark C Wallfisch has gone for a three hundred word limit. That's about a single page in your average paperback.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1732898766|title=The Adventures A Nye of Birpus and Bulbus: Book One: The Sour Milk DragonPheasants|author=Wynn Everett-Albanese, Michael Albanese and Indre Ta (Illustrator)Steve Burrows
|rating=4
|genre=For SharingCrime|summary=When we first meet Birpus and Bulbus they're running for their lives in the Forest of Fine Repute. Their greatest fear has come about: the Sour Milk Dragon is chasing them. HeDCI Domenic Jejeune's right behind themclose friend and former colleague, spewing hotDanny Maik, sour milk from his nostrilshas taken a short holiday in Singapore to meet up with an old ally, Guy Trueman. (Please don't try this at home: it won't end well.) Fortunately, they were nearly at Nobby LobMaik was involved in a street brawl -lolly he would later maintain that he was facing a man armed with a knife - and when he killed a ladder of moss and vines was lowered for them, they escapedGhurka. They climbed up Initially, he faced a charge of manslaughter but evidence came to light that suggested that he might have planned to murder the Tree Wee homes high up in man. Now he could be facing the tangled woods where they lived with their Grand Wees, Nester Nook death penalty. Domenic Jejeune can do nothing to help as any interference from another police force could provoke a diplomatic incident and Granny Crannywouldn't help Danny at all.
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1472263936Alexander McCall Smith|title=The Figurine|author=Victoria HislopPerfect Passion Company|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=It was The Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in 1968 that Helena McCloud made her first trip Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to Greeceall the online apps in providing a more personal, tailored service. She was alone: Ness has asked her motheryounger cousin Katie if she could come and look after the business, Greek by birth, had left the family home and refused as Ness is planning to take a trip to Canada to return, but Mary and Hamish (Helena's parents) felt that it would be get away for a pity if Helena grew up without knowing her grandparents or understanding her Greek heritagewhile. Her trip to the family apartment in Katie is coming out of a break up-market Kolonaki would be with a bad boyfriend, and so jumps at the first of several annual visitschance to come home to Edinburgh. She grew And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an Edinburgh we already love her grandmother , thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the family's maidIsabel Dalhousie novels, but with some new characters who quickly begin to charm. Katie has no experience in running a business, Dinaor in match-making, but was wary - and frightened - of Ness has full confidence in her grandfatherabilities, retired general Stamatis Papagiannis. He was proud of his close connections to the Junta and expected his family to uphold his values but saw no reason to accommodate them. His prejudices included Helenathere's red hair always her very helpful (and green eyes - inherited from her father's Scottish ancestors.rather handsome) neighbour, William, to lend a hand…|isbn=1846976596
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|authorisbn=Cody Goodfellow0811771741|title=VerticalInstaKnits for Baby|author=Melissa Leapman|rating=3.54|genre=ThrillersCrafts|summary= ThereMelissa Leapman's something about tall buildings that just captures my imagination. Who doesn't love 'InstaKnits for Baby'' gives us a good view collection of knits from up hightoys to blankets. Some will be quick knits - others are of the 'long, after all? Even cosy afternoons in front of the fire' variety. The projects are divided by the drabbest office building is somewhere Itime they'm intrigued ll take to complete - less than five hours, five to ten hours, ten to get inside if it's 40 stories talltwenty hours and more than twenty hours. All the projects are attractive, modern and useable. So I perhaps show my age when I picked up this book – wonder about people who scale tall buildings for fun – I was instantly intrigued'social-media-worthy projects' but that's me being picky.|isbn= 1803363991
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|author=Hannah Gold and Levi PinfoldDean Koontz|title=Finding BearThe Bad Weather Friend
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident ReadersParanormal|summary=[[The Last Bear by Hannah Gold|Last time]]Benny is having a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, April had been on Bear Island, a lot further north than many people would venturehe loses his fiancee, and finding a ridiculously unexpected but delightful friendship with a polar bear – that she called Bearhis house gets trashed. Back homeOh, things on the domestic and family front are someone has delivered a bit advancedreally weird, but not perfect for herdisturbing coffin-sized object to his home, and so can easily be ignored when word comes through from it's possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that has trashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the islands Bear was very last left onperson to deserve all this bad luck. He is a nice person. A really nice person. For So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to his house is a bear doing very Bear-y things new friend, a bad weather friend called Spike, who has been shot and woundedsent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. Desperate Spike is going to make sure hetake care of Benny, and will certainly take care of Benny's OKenemies, if he, Benny, she and her father return to the Arctic and hope that in Harper (a world of very white and very dangerous things, she waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can find one specific white and dangerous thing – and that the friendship can continuefigure out who exactly they are.|isbn=00085820171662500491
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|isbnauthor=1804183210Adam Stower|title=No Reserve|author=Felix FrancisMurray and Bun|rating=4.5|genre=ThrillersConfident Readers |summary=Thirty-four-year-old Theo Jennings shouldn't have been on the rostrum when the colt - as yet unnamed - came up for auctionMurray is supposed to be a humble, but Peter Radwaytidy and friendly cat, the chairmanone who is able to sleep and eat and eat and sleep and, hadn't arrivedwell, so he continued whatever takes his sessionfancy next of the two. To say that But he was shocked when the bidding reached three million pounds would be an understatement. A lovely animal - but three million pounds? Two men had been bidding against each other. Brian Kitman and Elliot 'Mitchs a bad magician' Mitchell were well-known s cat, so his favourite bun has been turned into a hyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, and respected in the racing industry. Jennings was in one catflap they both use can chuck them out, not into the regular back garden, but into a world of the cubicles in the toilets when the two men came in frightening adventure and their conversation revealed that the horse had been deliberately bid up to that figurewhiffs. Both were happy that they had insurance in place. The following morningThis time round it drops them into a Viking land, where a troll hunter is expected – well, the horse one much bigger than Murray was dead in its stall., to be honest, but he's turned up and he'll have to do…|isbn=0008561249
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|authorisbn=Sarah WilsonB0C47LV1PC|title=This One Wild and Precious Life: the path back to connection in a fractured worldFragility|author=Mosby Woods|rating=3.54|genre= LifestyleLiterary Fiction|summary= My favourite Mary Oliver line is the one in which she asks Can you make a ''Yo birthing person''What joke? And if you could, is the question should you make it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?'' I get to love that line so much because my answer Or is ''This! Precisely this.'' I'm lucky enough to be living my one wild and precious life the way I want to. Sarah Wilson question if you did, would it land? The catch is equally lucky. In her book that takes Oliver's words as her title (though I can't see that she acknowledges the source) she pushes us to think about whether we really ''are'' living the life we want – the best life that we answer for both could well be living. Her answer is an unequivocal ''... no, we are not. ''. DonFragility't care what you're doingis set as the city of Portland, she thinks you (weOregon, I) could be doing more…And she's effing furious about cautiously begins to emerge from the restrictions imposed during the fact that we are not.|isbn=1785633848covid pandemic
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|isbn=18399484931529431735|title=A World of DogsThe Winter Visitor|author=Carlie Sorosiak and Luisa UribeJames Henry|rating=54|genre=Children's Non-FictionCrime|summary=In the interests of full disclosureIt's February 1991 and Essex is bitingly cold, I must tell you that Iwhich made Bruce Hopkins'm a sucker for dogsreturn all the more surprising. In nearly eight decades, I've never met one I didn't trust and IHe've loved most of them. I wish I felt d been exiled on the same about human beingsCosta del Sol as a wanted drug smuggler for a decade. So, any book The return has come about dogsbecause he's had a letter from his ex-wife, Isaying that she'm going to sit down s ill and devour. Then Ihasn'm going t long to go back and read it properlylive. And so it was with ''A World of Dogs'It's hard to feel any sympathy when Hopkins is abducted, with ninety-six pages devoted entirely stripped to his underwear and sent to my four-legged friends. Author Carlie Sorosiak found herself a watery grave in the accidental owner boot of an American Dingo - she's learned quite a lot about dogs since thenstolen Ford Sierra. Is it a warning from a Spanish gang or a problem closer to home?
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|isbnauthor=1405951680Alex Bell and Tim McDonagh|title=The Safe House|author=Cameron WardGlorious Race of Magical Beasts
|rating=4
|genre=ThrillersConfident Readers|summary=Jess Walker accepted Eli is a busy lad – by day an offer (OK, actually she was gently nudged into it apprentice in the wondrous library we start by her friendvisiting with him, Rupert) to caretake and in the evening a luxury property in helper at the Australian outback dessert cafe his gran owns and runs. Eli lives with his lovely gran, too – for there is a couple of monthsgeneration missing in the family. After A few short years ago, Eli's parents were both lost to the problems she'd had at worktitular race, it seemed like just a globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have to navigate the world in the break she neededcompany of a magical beast. She was no longer a data analyst for This has made the Metropolitan police in London: she was Jess who was returning race anathema to the country of her birth and in need of pair – but when a bad incident at the space eatery leads to a confession from gran, Eli knows his only hope is to dare to get over enter what he most hates, with the traumatic end sole aim the prize of her relationship with Charles. A few weeks in magic at the Otway Ranges in Victoria sounded like just end – the ticketonly thing to possibly save his gran.|isbn=0571382231
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|authorisbn=Rachel Harrison178763681X|title=Bad DollsKnife Skills for Beginners|author=Orlando Murrin
|rating=4
|genre=Short StoriesCrime|summary=It's been some time since I've read any horrorChef Paul Delamare took a teaching job at a residential cookery school in Belgravia. I He didn't really want to but celebrity chef Christian Wagner had a couple way of misspent teen years reading Stephen King, borrowing the books from a boy I fancied at school getting both men and scaring myself half silly with them women to do what he wanted. Paul ''somehow'' got the point impression that I couldnhe't shut my bedroom curtains d be at night for fear of the vampires outside! Donschool to assist Paul, who had a broken arm, but it didn't worry turn out that way. The teaching - and the problems - this short story collection isn't like that! are all his own. It doesnThe one thing he hadn't have those jump scares, and I didn't have expected was for someone to read it during daylight hours only! turn up dead. But it is creepyUnfortunately, he was the person who discovered the body and I found most of everyone knows that feeling came from the fact police consider that these are stories about women, living normal lives, and that at least in part, person to be the horrors arises from very normal situations such as a breakup, trying a new dieting app, going to a hen party and a coping with griefprime suspect.|isbn=1803363932
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|isbnauthor=1394159544Sarah Marsh|title=Recycling for Dummies|author=Sarah WinklerA Sign of Her Own|rating=3.5|genre=LifestyleGeneral Fiction|summary=''Recycling one ton After a bout of plastic can save up to 16scarlet fever as a child, Ellen Lark loses her hearing.3 barrels Suddenly plunged into a world of oil.'' ''Recycling one ton of paper can save 17 trees from being cut down.'' If you send an apple core to landfillsilence, it will take between 6 months and 2 years to decomposeeverything about her life changes. A glass bottle will take up to 1 million years. As Living in a just-post-WWII babytime when the use of sign language was seen as something only savages do, I faced Ellen is sent to a dilemma: reducingschool where she is taught to lip read, reusing and recycling is part of my DNAbut physically restrained from signing. NEVER throw away anything that might ''possibly'' come in handy now or From here, she ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the futuredeaf and using a system called Visible Speech. NEVER buy anything if you can cobble together something that would serve At the purpose. Almost everything can be used one more same time , Bell is working on other inventions and any purchase must pass the test of 'Is this absolutely essential?' On the other handideas, I suspected I was guilty of wishcycling: assuming that something must be recyclable (toothpaste tubes - I'm looking at you) and dropping it Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in the kerbside bin. Yes, I could go searching on the internet - and get conflicting advice - but what I needed was a recycling biblecomplicated tangle of espionage.s|isbn=1035401614
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Lauren St John1803816759|title=Finding WonderThe Unravelling|author=Will Gibson
|rating=4
|genre=Confident ReadersScience Fiction|summary=RooIt's life has become almost impossibly difficult. Her mum died when she was young, 2038 and now she finds herself awoken in Joe is a bored cop policing the middle wealthy and peaceful New York City. Joe longs for a bit of adventure and to get stuck into some really gritty crime detection. But then something goes horribly wrong with the night by the police banging on her door to tell her AI system that her dad has dropped dead on his way now runs everything, making life easier for many, and riots start to the corner shop spread. Finally, Joe gets to buy a lottery ticketdo some real policing. When asked what other family she has, she can only name her aunt, Joni, who she knows her dad didn't think very highly In the aftermath of. But she has no one else, the rioting global pop star Suki is kidnapped and so off she goes Joe is assigned to live with bring her unreliable aunthome. Things continue Joe isn't the only one trying to get worse for Roosave Suki - Dylan, as when she a British superfan and Joni leave London in Jonitech nerd, is also on the case. What went wrong? Did the system fail or was it hacked? And how is Suki's old campervan, it breaks down in the middle of nowhere and then bursts into flames! Poor Roo!|isbn=0571376169kidnapping connected?
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=14483097431529421284|title=The Devil Stone (DCI Christine Caplan)Laying Out the Bones|author=Caro RamsayKate Webb|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=In the village It was one of Cronchie on those flash downpours that the West coast of Scotland, five members of British weather often delivers in a wealthy family are found murderedheatwave. The only item missing from In a gully, a human skeleton came to the home is surface and forensic testing proved the Devil Stone: myth says that if the stone is removed from Otterburn Housebody to be Lee Geary, death will followwho had disappeared nine years earlier. The only suspects are He'd been a known Satanists but in many waysdrug user and had learning disabilities, that's an easy conclusion given that two so it could have been a simple case of them 'discoveredmisadventure but DI Matt Lockyer wasn' the bodyt convinced. The Senior Investigating Office is DCI Bob Oswald but when Geary was a townie, so what was he disappears, DCI Christine Caplan is pulled in doing out on Salisbury Plain alone? There are connections to the suicide of Holly Gilbert and to two other deaths which were not considered suspicious at the time. Lockyer and DC Gemma Broad of the Major Crimes Review Unit (that'shadow' hims cold cases to you and me) investigate.
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn= Kay Chronister0571379559|title= Desert Creatures|rating= 4|genre= Dystopian Fiction|summary= With a world that is becoming increasingly inhospitable for humanity, post-apocalyptic fiction can become an almost masochistic thrill. Whether it is a robotic takeover, a world devoid The House of water or a nuclear holocaust, this genre is a way for humans to cathartically experience their most existential fears. ''Desert Creatures'' by Kay Chronister is a new work of post-apocalyptic fiction that aligns many of the fears that exist for humanity today. It is a shocking novel that still manages to find hope.|isbn=1803364998}}{{FrontpageBroken Bricks|author=Christopher Fowler|title=Word MonkeyFiona Williams
|rating=5
|genre=AutobiographyLiterary Fiction|summary= It's 'The House of Broken Bricks'' is the first story of August four people. Tess Hembry's roots are in Jamaica: temperamentally she might be happier there, but instead, she lives in the middle house on the riverbank, built of a cool wet summer in East Angliabroken bricks. I decided not to swim at Insubstantial as it might look, it's stood the pool in favour passage of going to my beach huttime, storms and floods. The weather closed inHer husband, rain arrivedRichard, and I decided not struggles to do that either. When I finished reading this bookgrow his vegetables, I realised it was because (a) I wanted to finish reading this book complete the delivery rounds - and (b) I did not want to do so anywhere near my shackbring in sufficient money. No spoiler alertsThey have twin boys - Sonny and Max, the dust jacket tells us who Christopher Fowler rainbow twins. Sonny'wass colouring reflects his mother' – and his first chapter tells us about s Jamaican heritage. Max takes after his terminal diagnosisfather. There is something very strange about being made to laugh by a man who repeatedly reminds you People don't believe that he is dyingthey're related, much less twins and you know he actually there's an assumption when Max is at out with his mother that point, because he does. He didshe's his nanny.|isbn=0857529625
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=15290776991529425867|title=The Raging Storm Lost and Never Found (Two RiversA D I Wilkins Mystery)|author=Ann CleevesSimon Mason
|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=''It's all bloody peculiarIn Oxford, isn't it, Sir?'' Well yes, it isthere are two D I Wilkins. Jem Rosco blew into the local pub one evening in the middle Raymond Wilkins is of an autumn galeNigerian descent, stayed for about a month Balliol educated and then turned upalways exquisitely dressed. D I Ryan Wilkins, naked son of Ryan and dead, in a small boat, anchored in Scully Cove close to the village father of GreystoneRyan, in Devonis not. Rosco had the status He's not any of those things. He's white, originated from a national treasure: a renowned adventurertrailer park, round the world sailor and all round barely educated (reading's not ''celebrityreally''his thing) and his wardrobe consists mainly of shell suits and trackies. I They're usually in lime green or acid yellow. You might wonder if you'nearly'' said 'all-round good egg' but as we'll find outre being introduced to a police procedural written for laughs. Well, he could be more than a little bit close with money and his background isnyou't exactly an open bookre not. Where did he get The two men are just different sides of the money for his first boat? same policing coin. How did he finance Sometimes the trip?combination works brilliantly well. Sometimes it's problematic.
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=B0CC9W7GLRMosby Woods|title=On the Beach: The Winter Visitor|author=Chris Green and Jenny FiondaA Whirly Man Loses His Turn|rating=54|genre=For SharingLiterary Fiction|summary=Kit and Teal were just beginning to wonder whether The West isn't the dominant force it once was better . Nobody in the West is quite sure how to be at homemend this or even if mending it is the best course of action. Governments are flailing. A war here, bored but warma push for climate action there. A feeling that nobody is in actual charge. Imagine then, or frozen cold and building sand sculptures on there was a snowy beach when a large slab of silvery ice drifted onto the shorelineman with precognition. On top of Imagine the ice was strategic advantage in this asset; a polar bearman who can tell you what will happen given any set of circumstances. As the ice bumped onto the sandThat man would be valuable, right? Perhaps the bear woke and with wobbly legs moved from the icemost valuable asset in history. Kit was all for making a run for itImagine then, but Teal knew that the bear was hungry and gave him one apple and then another. He obviously needed to be taken home on the bus and given a good meal and somewhere to sleepthis man loses this ability. What else would you governments doto get it back?|isbn=B0C9SNG8R1
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