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<metadesc>Book review siteExpert, with books full book reviews from the many most walks of literary life - ; fiction, biography, crime, cookery and anything else that takes our fancy. There are also lots of author interviews and top tens.</metadesc>Hello from The Bookbag, a book review site, featuring books from all the many walks of literary life non- [[:Category:Fiction|fiction]], [[:Category:Biography|biography]], [[:Category:Crime|crime]], [[:Category:Cookery|cookery]] and anything else that takes our fancy. At Bookbag Towers the bookbag sits at the side of the desk. Itchildren's the bag we take to the library and the bookshop. Sometimes it holds the latest releases, but at other times there'll be old favourites, books for the children, & self-published books for the home. They're sometimes our own books or books from the local library. They're often books sent to us by publishers and we promise to tell you exactly what we think about them. You might not want to read through a full review, so we'll give you a quick review which summarises what we felt about the book and tells you whether or not we think you should buy or borrow it. There are also lots of [[:Category:Interviews|plus author interviews]], and all sorts of [[:Category:Lists|& top tens]] - all of which you can find on our [[features]] page. If you're stuck for something to read, check out the [[Book Recommendations|recommendations]] page.</metadesc>
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Morag Joss0008517061|title=The Night FollowingDeath in a Lonely Place|author=Stig Abell
|rating=4
|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=Distracted by Former Metropolitan Police detective, Jake Johnson, has settled into his rustic life at Little Sky. There’s perhaps a little uncertainty about the discovery that future of his life with his vet girlfriend, Livia and her husband has been having an affairdaughter Diana, as moving in together would mean a middlelot of compromise: does Jake give up his off-aged woman loses concentration while driving along a quiet lane, killing Ruth Mitchell, an elderly cyclist. The woman doesn't wait for grid and relaxing life to move in with Livia or does Livia move to Little Sky despite her reservations about whether or not this is the police to arrive; future she goes home wants for herself and parks her car daughter? For the moment they’re enjoying life in the garage where she smashes it almost beyond recognitionpresent and putting the future on the back burner. When her arrogant husband sees the damage he believes it's been done to punish him and he packs his bags}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1786482126|title=The Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths|rating=4. After a few days 5|genre=Crime|summary=Builders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the woman goes site was going to hold seventy-five 'luxury' apartments - when they discovered the home bones of the dead woman; she a child beneath a doorway. There was no skull. Was this a ritual killing or murder? Inevitably, Dr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. It's difficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn't go to the door, but from a hidden spot nearby that she can see the widower, an elderly gentleman who is clearly not coping well. Wracked pregnant with guilt, the woman makes his child as a decision: result of the only way she can atone for her actions one night they spent together some three months ago. Her condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is prone to step into the shoes sudden bouts of the dead womansickness.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0715638815</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Nigel McCrery0008551324|title=Tooth and ClawThe Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=Another serial killer is on It's unusual for anyone from the loose, and yet again Hardie family to approach the police have failed to connect . Neither side likes or has any respect for the deathsother. Carl Whittley has just tortured a glamorous TV presenter to death - leaving a singularly gruesome tableau - But Davie Hardie is struggling in prison and blown a hapless commuter to smithereens at a railway station. Hehe's planning his next murder already, secreted away in prepared to tell the shed at police where the bottom body of a missing person is buried and who was responsible for her death. This person, he promises, is someone big and it will be worth the garden of the house police doing what he shares with his invalid fatherwants. Carl And what he wants is embittered and lonely - with to be transferred to an open prison to serve the remainder of his mother living away sentence and pursuing a career as a forensic psychologistto get an early parole date. Not much to ask, thereis it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and she's only him even prepared to take care of his severely disabled father: to change do the colostomy bag, to cook, to clean, to, other thing that Hardie demanded - make certain that DS Max Craigie and anyone who works with him is kept well, just to bear it, reallyaway from what's happening. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847248071</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Nick Hornby0008405026|title=An Education: The ScreenplayA Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Jane Casey
|rating=5
|genre=EntertainmentCrime|summary=Adroit marketing? It's sixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. WellShe was never found and the investigation ground to a halt. Now, yesher mother, Helena, and her father are dead in their bed. ''An Education'' has been published Initially, of course, to coincide with the filmit looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but there's general release in something about the positioning of the UKbodies that makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and her boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. Hardly surprising since our national appetite for nosiness seems insatiable and cosy background details prop up every telly series and film these days. As well What looked as the screenplay, Nick Hornby has provided though it was going to be an introduction open-and diary of -shut case is now a complex double murder. Kerrigan is convinced that the filmexplanation lies in Rosalie's successful premiere at the Sundance Festival in Utah. Beyond trivia, I think this fascinating little book presents an excellent 'how to' guide for wannabes from one of Britaindisappearance: others (such as Derwent's most respected screen and novel writersboss, Una Burt) are less convinced.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141044748</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=0571379877|authortitle=The Harvard LampoonKellerby Code|titleauthor=Nightlight: A Parody of Twilight Jonny Sweet
|rating=3.5
|genre=HumourCrime|summary=Most people will have heard of the worldwide phenomenon that Edward Jevons is [[Twilight by Stephenie Meyer|Twilight]]a working-class young man, obsessed with his upper-class friends, Robert and Stanza. Robert's a theatre director. He's also self-obsessed, demanding, handsome and entitled and uses Edward to run errands for him. The books by Stephenie Meyer Edward has been in love with Stanza since their university days - and the film have made he's drunkenly confided how he feels to Robert. Most men in Robert's position would stay away from Stanza or tell Edward that a legend of the romance relationship had begun between vampire them but he's not like most men: Edward Mullen (Robert Pattinson plays is left to stumble upon the movie role) and teenage schoolgirl Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart)two of them kissing in a dark passageway.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849013330</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Kate ElliottJo Callaghan|title=Traitors' Gate (Crossroads)Leave No Trace
|rating=4
|genre=FantasyCrime|summary=Kate Elliott's ''Crossroads'' series has so far come When a man is found crucified on the top of a hill in largeNuneaton, slightly off-putting chunksDCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to the case alongside her sidekick, the AI detective Lock. TheyIt've s their first live case together, having previously been decent reads, by and largevery successful with several cold cases. But when there is a second body found crucified a few days later, Kat is suddenly struggling with a huge cast of wonderfully drawn characters, but the sheer size potential serial killer and slow pace a very high profile case that draws a lot of the action has meant I didn't enjoy them as much as I may otherwise have doneunwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. ''Traitors' Gate'', Will they be able to solve the third case in time, or will Kat find herself taken off the sequence is different in only one aspect; the character development is still therecase and, the huge page count is still therepotentially, but the pacing is out of a lot better.career?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1841498351</amazonuk>139851120X
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Shirley Jackson1399613073|title=The Haunting of Hill HouseMoral Injuries|author=Christie Watson|rating=4.5|genre=General FictionThrillers|summary=There was Olivia, Laura and Anjali met on the first day of medical school and their friendship would keep them inseparable for a quarter of a century. Olivia is ruthlessly ambitious, which is a time before Stephen Kingbonus when you aim to be a cardiothoracic surgeon. There was time before ''The Shining''Laura is a perfectionist and a trauma doctor. There was Anjali is the free spirit of the group and she becomes a time when GP. When we first meet them they'horrorre at a drug and alcohol-fuelled party and it' was not rooted s going to end in blood, guts and goretragedy. I owe a slight apology to Mr King, because along with We don't know who suffered the gutsier side of tragedy or the genre, I consequences. Twenty-five years later there will own be an eerily similar event that he is a master at suspensewill impact the three friends. This time, it's their teenage children who are involved.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141191449</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jill Tomlinson and Paul Howard0241636604|title=The Penguin Who Wanted To Find OutTrading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson
|rating=4.5
|genre=For SharingAutobiography|summary=Otto 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 penguin lives East End, where he was familiar with violence, poverty and injustice. There was no posh public school on his father's feet at CV - but he had been to the bottom London School of the worldEconomics. He's an inquisitive little thing Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and wants to know why they haven't fallen off the worldhe has a facility with numbers which most of us can only envy. His dad explains He also realised that they won't Because I say somost rich people expect poor people to be stupid. Otto and It was his friend Leo gradually expand their horizons from their fathers' feet - they meet other penguin chicksability at what was, essentially, get to know their aunts who watch them when their fathers are awaya card game which got him an internship with Citibank. Eventually, and eventually grow feathers so they're big enough to toboggan on their bellies and swim in the seathis turned into permanent employment as a trader.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140523041X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ryan David Jahn 1035021803|title=Acts of ViolenceThe Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder|author=C L Miller|rating=43.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=Kat Marino is stabbed on her way home from workIt's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to the English country village where she grew up. All she wanted was a hot bath after a hard dayShe's workback now because of a request for help from her beloved aunt, Carole. From this point Freya's former mentor and Carole's close friend, Arthur Crockleford, is dead and the novel skips nimbly from one neighbour circumstances seem suspicious, to say the next, all of whom are absorbed in their own dilemmasleast. There is Arthur was the reason why Freya had not been back to the draftee with a sick mothervillage: Arthur, the nurse who thinks she has run over a babyfeels, the woman who suspects let her husband of cheating and othersdown badly. We are shown what these characters Even though they were doing that eveningin business together as antique hunters, and how these events drag through she has not felt able to be near the man or pursue the morningprofession she loved. We are shown how After the split, she worked in the midst of their own interestinga cafe, poignant met and dangerous concerns a woman is stabbed in married James (on the courtyard onto which all their windows look, through which windows they witness rebound from the attacklove of her life, who was murdered) and Freya and how these people did nothingJames have now divorced.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230743595</amazonuk>
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=AllTomorrowsFutureCover
|title=All Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt
|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)
|rating=5
|genre=Science Fiction
|summary=''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 few 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. Some of it is - frankly - quite frightening. Of course, I 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're talking about or the latest conspiracy theorist. I needed people I knew I could trust and who could deliver information in a way I could understand.}}{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Josh LaceySunny Singh|title=Two Tigers on a StringHotel Arcadia|rating=43.5|genre=Confident ReadersThrillers |summary=Ben's not too keen to be sharing his bedroom with his half-brother, Frank. But you don't have to be the hero of The Hotel Arcadia is a detective adventure such as this book to know luxury hotel in an unnamed city that as Frank's mother has vanished suddenly been violently taken over by a terrorist group. Hiding from the face of the Earthterrorists who are rampaging through, killing everyone on site, there is Sam, Ben will let it lie - for a whilewartime photographer and Abhi, the hotel manager. Nor is it too surprising As Abhi continues to try to see care remotely for the residents who are still alive in the four Misfitz togetherhotel, he forms a bond with Sam who refuses to be cowed by events, and keeps on another caseventuring out of her room to try to capture what's happened through her photography. Although they only ever talk over the phone, their friendship grows as Abhi tries to help her keep safe and they go on the hunt for both wait to see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by the missing womanterrorists.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1407109782</amazonuk>086154742X
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Julia Williams1529153298|title=Last ChristmasThe List of Suspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey|rating=4.5|genre=Women's General Fiction|summary=With Christmas fast approachingIt's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly...) She's not what better way of getting in the spirit of things than by reading this excellent book 's worrying Miv's family, though. Women have been disappearing. Well, they've been murdered, but to have 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Miv's upset because she's overheard that captures her father wants to move the joys and stresses of family 'Down South'. When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a frightening, foreign place, best avoided. For Miv, the festive season so well? The reader follows four different people – Catherine Tinsall and move would mean leaving her husband Noelbest friend, Sharon, Marianne Moore and Gabriel Northshe'll do anything to prevent that. Each of these characters have their own reasons for She's not really looking forward to Christmas (mainly because of worried about the experience of last Christmas) and these reasons slowly become apparent dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to the reader as the story progressesanyone.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847560865</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Nigel McCrery1398524085|title=Core of EvilHas Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Nicci French|rating=45
|genre=Crime
|summary=Violet Chambers becomes Daisy Wilson through an aromatic cup of teaCharlotte Salter was expected at her husband's fiftieth birthday party but never turned up. Her children, sons Niall, Paul and Ollie and her daughter, flavoured with Christmas rosesEtty. '"There are all kinds of horrible things in the Christmas roseworried but - strangely - her husband," she saidAlec, watching to see whether Daisy could still hear heris not. "Helleborin Shortly afterwards, Etty and hellebrin are both like digitalisGreg, which Ifind the body of Greg've also used befores father, Duncan Ackerley, in the river. It was an easy assumption for the police to make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when he couldn't stand the guilt. The Salter children are not convinced but there's saporin little else they can do but get on with their lives and protoanemonin as wellwonder about what really happened. It's a very nasty cocktail}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1035906708|title=Diva|author=Daisy Goodwin|rating=4."'5|genre=General FictionAnd now Daisy has met her rather sticky - and graphically effluent - end|summary=We tend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, and Violet has become Daisybut she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, Daisy sets her sights on a new townNew York, a new identity in December 1923 and, most importantly, a new victimonly moved to Athens when she was thirteen. Daisy has problems with Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her memory - father changed it to 'Callas' to make it more manageable in the identities go States. When she was back in Athens - supposedly so far that sometimes she can barely remember who is could get appropriate training for her voice - she is now, let alone all was raised under the whos she's been beforeNazi occupation by a mother who mercilessly exploited her and made no secret of her preference for her elder sister, and most certainly not the who with whom she beganJackie. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847243843</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=John Van der KisteChristopher Edge|title=Jonathan Wild: Conman and CutpurseBlack Hole Cinema Club
|rating=4
|genre=HistoryConfident Readers|summary=Born towards the end of the seventeenth century Jonathan Wild was to become the eighteenth century's most famous criminal, plying Lucas and his trade friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, a rather curious fashion. He was born in Wolverhampton place that has the nickname of parents described as ''mean but honest'The Black Hole'. It seems likely that he first travelled All big movie fans, they're looking forward to London lots of exciting films, and many, many snacks! However, as the servant of a lawyer where he was eventually to settlemovie starts, they very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, leaving his wife and child they are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagine. But as they lurch from one film genre to fend for themselves. the next, can they figure out what on earth is going on? It was whilst serving a term of imprisonment in Wood Street Compter that he mixed with Will they ever get back to the cream of London's criminal underclass cinema, and learned the rudiments of his trade.to their real lives?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1848682190</amazonuk>1839942738
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=K M GrantRachel Greenlaw|title=Paradise Red (Perfect Fire Trilogy)Compass and Blade|rating=3.5
|genre=Teens
|summary=We are back in the south of France for the third and final time. In one corner, the 'French', with King Louis and his henchmen rampaging through, warring in I can hear the name song of peacethe sea. In another corner, the local people, struggling in the harsh environment and none too pleased to see their corner The call of the world the location for religious warsdeep, with the Cathar ''heretics'' also present. The lines are drawn, answering beat in a realistically convoluted way, and this book will see one of our heroes cross one such line, just as other people make their own momentous decisions. It will take all the narrative skills of the land itself to get the story across to us.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847247075</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Camilla Noli|title=The Mother's Tale|rating=4|genre=Women's Fiction|summary=''It is early evening. I am suckling my infant son… We are picture perfectheart. Madonna and child''. No doubt about it: a new mother totally smitten with her son. Zach is adorable. Quiet. Undemanding. A happy, generally relaxed, child. Gorgeous.
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 ruins – rescuing any survivors and any treasure that lies within. But Zach isnwhen the Council Watch lays a trap to end the wrecking, they capture the island't her first-borns leader and Mira's father. First there was Cassie. A child Desperate to save him from death, Mira makes a bargain with a wreck survivor who entered the world screaming is as charming as he is secretive and has since learned exactly what power with only coordinates to guide her, she can wring with such lungssets off in search of a family secret that lies buried deep in the sea. Not yet two years oldWith only nine days to unearth what might save her father, Cassie adores as her journey takes her fatherfrom the watched streets of foreign islands to the heart of the smuggler's territory, but even him she manipulates. Her mother Mira must be determined to stop at nothing to save the future of her home and the ones she terrorisesholds most dear.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1409101584</amazonuk>0008664730
}}
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Things are pretty grim have been a bit sticky for Pickythe Earthlings. She is thirteen years old, being bullied at schoolAI and automation have been proceeding apace, often replacing jobs they're paid to do and has other tasks that took time to accomplish. Just as they were beginning to spend her weekends helping her single, working mum get used to all this technological change and starting to take care think of her little brother and her senile grandmother. One eveningother, at her Gran's housenew ways to spend time, she goes up into the attic and tries on along came an old dress that she finds inside an old chestawful pandemic. The dress turns out to be magic, Life was pretty much shut down and she suddenly finds herself back in 17th Century London, struggling along with a strange man who is calling her 'Amelia' and is trying to kill her. Picky ends up embroiled in Amelia's 17th century life as she tries to find out the truth of who is attempting to murder herit, at all the same time as trying to avoid arousing suspicion with her strange behaviour whenever she returns to the present daymany daily social interactions on which they depend so heavily.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0956122280</amazonuk>1736128426
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=John Abbott Nez Matthew Tree|title=Cromwell DixonWe's Sky-Cyclell Never Know|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=Meet Cromwell Dixon. He's a real tinkerer, forever in a barn or somewhere building something manically unusual. Luckily - although his long-suffering mother may disagree with that word - he's around at the birth of powered flight. Will his plans for a pedalled air machine work?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0399250417</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Sue Moorcroft|title=Starting Over|rating=45|genre=Women's Literary Fiction|summary=The story opens when Tess bumps her old reliable car into a breakdown truck. That's rather convenient, since she isn't hurt, and the guy driving it is able to tow her Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to be different from his garagefather, and then give her a lift to her new home. Naturally, since this is the 'chick-lit' genre, Tess drunk and the truck-driver, who goes by the unlikely name chronic underachiever whose dreams of Ratty (an abbreviation being exceptional at any of his surname) feel mutual antipathy artistic passions all failed miserably and who had endless crises of the sort that's clearly going self confidence. So Tim applied himself to leadhis studies, sooner or later, to strong attractioncultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and set himself high but achievable ambitions.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1906931224</amazonuk>B0CVFXPGP8
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mary BeardA G Slatter|title=It's A Don's LifeThe Briar Book of the Dead
|rating=5
|genre=LifestyleFantasy|summary=Professor Mary Beard, feisty Cambridge classics don, keeps an eye open for architectural detail wherever she goes. Even on holiday, she notices the changing urban landscape and records interesting parallels with ancient cities in her sparky blog. She is engaged in writing '' There's a detailed history of Pompeii and suddenly realises, whilst perambulating the backstreets part of the Mexican city of Oaxacan, me that wants to keep this is exactly what Pompeii must have been likejust to myself for however long I can. She observes the low rise shopsThis secret magic of my own, dirt tracks across dusty streets and the close juxtaposition of rich and poor. Impressive portals of grand residential properties tower above humble workshopsall mine, and this prompts her into imaginative reconstructionat last. In her blog, from which this intriguing book is culled, she tells us about I just how Oaxacan encourages her want to ponder again the curious cart ruts of Pompeiienjoy it for a while. She even finds walls splashed with political slogans that are just like Roman ''dipinti''. Indeed, here in Mexico, the local library displays an edifying message in Spanish which originates in Cicero's speech in his Pro Archia, ''Science and letters are the nourishment of youth and the diversion of old age.''|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846682517</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Julian Barnes1529900360|title=Staring at the SunThe Ghost Orchid|author=Jonathan Kellerman
|rating=4
|genre=Literary FictionCrime|summary=JeanIt hadn't been Lt Milo Sturgis's first Incident involved Uncle Leslie, hyacinths fault that Alex Delaware had been badly injured but he felt responsible and golf tees. It's perhaps best forgotteneven after Alex recovered, but Jean doesn't forgetSturgis was reluctant to ask for his help on difficult cases. Uncle Leslie figures large in her life His assertions that there were only open- mostly on the golf course and- until shut cases which didn't need the War comes and he runs away to Americahelp of a psychologist only worked for a while. He Finally, it was Robin, Delaware's replaced by Tommy Prosserpartner, a grounded pilot who once saw nudged Milo into asking for help again. She knew that the sun rise twice in one day and excites as many questions in Jean as he ever answersinvolvement was something that the man she loved needed. Tommy is replaced by Michael The next case did look simple, though. Two lovers were murdered in the swimming pool of a policeman, whom Jean eventually marriesremote property in Bel Air. He doesn't know why minks are excessively tenacious of life was the heir to an Italian shoe empire and she is married to an extremely rich man and he doesnit't much cares not the Italian. But Jean does. She cares much less for the Dutch cap that Michael sent her off to obtain before the wedding and much less again for their rather disastrous adventures in which of them was the bedroom. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099540096</amazonuk>primary target?
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Alexandra Bruce1529395224|title=2012Letting the Cat Out of the Bag: Science or SuperstitionThe Secret Life of a Vet|author=Sion Rowlands
|rating=3.5
|genre=Popular ScienceAnimals and Wildlife|summary=The fuss about 2012 has not started just recentlySiôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. The first book to feature the story His father was from a Yale professor, GP and Rowlands didn't want to follow in 1966. We've also had prog rock bands named after Popol Vuhhis footsteps, particularly when he considered the Maya creation myth. But as the crunch date of December 21st, 2012 - the winter solstice strain that year being on- nears, itcall put on his father's becoming a very big story indeedlife. Even though it sounds absurd - When he was seventeen he took the end opportunity of doing work experience with a 5,125-year family friend who was a vet and was convinced this was the job for him. Before long cycle of the Maya calendar, which started on August 13th, 3114BCE - or he was judged to start then, when they came across this concept a couple of thousand years into that periodat Liverpool University. Surely they couldnIt hadn't predict the future from their 'primitive' state - as with such accuracy?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1934708283</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jeff Kinney|title=Diary of so many students - been his dream since he was a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=It is a truth universally acknowledged that school summer holidays are only enjoyable if you want to enjoy summerchild. Greg here doesn't want to notice itIf anything, and would prefer to spend his days curtains drawn, face glued to late night TV or a computer game, hand either clicking away at a controller or shovelling in snacks. The last thing he needs, then, is his mother, on a ''family togetherness'' trip, and on d wanted to be a budget, with bad ideas of what Greg should be doing insteadprofessional footballer.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141327650</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Rick Yancey0861541774|title=The Monstrumologist: The Terror BeneathA Nye of Pheasants|author=Steve Burrows
|rating=4
|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=In late 19th century AmericaDCI Domenic Jejeune's close friend and former colleague, Danny Maik, young Will Henry has been the apprentice of the sterntaken a short holiday in Singapore to meet up with an old ally, forbidding Dr Warthrop since the death of his parents, who were also employed by the doctorGuy Trueman. The twelve year old boy has seen many things Maik was involved in his service to the monstrumologist a street brawl - he would later maintain that he was facing a man armed with a specialist in monsters knife - and he killed a Ghurka. Initially, he faced a charge of manslaughter but nothing can prepare him for evidence came to light that suggested that he might have planned to murder the fateful day when an elderly grave robber brings man. Now he could be facing the doctor the twin corpses of death penalty. Domenic Jejeune can do nothing to help as any interference from another police force could provoke a young girl diplomatic incident and the headless creature with fangs in his chest who had tried to feast on herwouldn't help Danny at all.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184738546X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Stella WhitelawAlexander McCall Smith|title=Midsummer MadnessThe Perfect Passion Company|rating=4.5|genre=Women's General Fiction|summary=You'll like Sophie GreshamThe Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the online apps in providing a more personal, tailored service. She wanted to be an actress but suffers from paralysing stage fright and when the side effects became too much for Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she worked behind could come and look after the scenes. She's business, as Ness is planning to take a very good prompt despite the fact that you need trip to wrap up very warmly Canada to survive in the prompt corner she loves her job and most of the cast in the theatre companyget away for a while. It's Katie is coming out of a bit of break up with a shock though when she realises that the guest producer from New York is Joe Harrisonbad boyfriend, and so jumps at the man she helped out when he had nothing chance to eat and nowhere come home to sleepEdinburgh. Sophie was a little softer in those days – in the meantime she's had And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to develop a protective shell.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709089147</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Bonnie Greer|title=Obama Music|rating=3|genre=History|summary=This is an interesting readEdinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the Isabel Dalhousie novels, but unless I'm missing something, the focus of the book seems a little difficult with some new characters who quickly begin to graspcharm. It's best if I start with the author's intentions as set out Katie has no experience in her Prologue. It is running a mixture of tales of her own life growing up on the South Sidebusiness, she writesor in match-making, interspersed with stories and observations about Obama, linking it with the musicbut Ness has full confidence in her abilities, musicians and music scene, past and present, including hip hop, country, classical, and rock'n'roll. All of these, she notes, were heard on the Presidentthere's Inauguration Day. To them she adds the blues, gospelalways her very helpful (and rather handsome) neighbour, soul and jazz of the South SideWilliam, when the people began to build the great institutions and great solidarity that enabled him to become the most powerful man on the planet.lend a hand…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1906558248</amazonuk>1846976596
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=P J Parrish0811771741|title=Dead of WinterInstaKnits for Baby|author=Melissa Leapman
|rating=4
|genre=CrimeCrafts|summary=Loon LakeMelissa Leapman's ''InstaKnits for Baby'' gives us a collection of knits from toys to blankets. Some will be quick knits - others are of the 'long, Michigan is picture-postcard pretty – an idyll that sits serenely and snugly cosy afternoons in front of the midst of a pine-peppered winter wonderlandfire' variety. Louis Kincaid needs a little serenity in his life The projects are divided by the time they'll take to complete - less than five hours, five to ten hours, ten to twenty hours and on arrival in Loon Lake he feels almost as if he has come home. Life has not been easy for Kincaidmore than twenty hours. A troubled, unhappy child of mixed raceAll the projects are attractive, passed around various institutions modern and foster homes, Louis figures useable. I perhaps show my age when I wonder about 'social-media-worthy projects' but that if he is going to put some integrity back into the world, he will need to wear a badge to do it's me being picky.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847391346</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Russell Celyn JonesDean Koontz|title=The Ninth Wave (New Stories from the Mabinogion) Bad Weather Friend
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary FictionParanormal|summary=Pwyll rules Benny is having a medieval-style fiefdom in terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and his house gets trashed. Oh, and someone has delivered a postreally weird, disturbing coffin-climate change Walessized object to his home, and it's 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 deserve all this bad luck. Life He is a nice person. A really nice person. So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to his house is different in many ways - there's a new-but-old social order built on feudalism friend, a bad weather friend called Spike, who has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. Spike is going to take care of Benny, and horsepower is the main means will certainly take care of transport. But in many ways itBenny's much the same - people still fight one anotherenemies, if he, towns still have sink estatesBenny, rich boys still have too much time on their hands and precious little meaning in their livesHarper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1854115146</amazonuk>1662500491
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Owen SheersAdam Stower|title=White Ravens (New Stories from the Mabinogion)Murray and Bun
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Murray is supposed to be a humble, tidy and friendly cat, one who is able to sleep and eat and eat and sleep and, well, whatever takes his fancy next of the two. But he's a bad magician's cat, so his favourite bun has been turned 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. This time round it drops them into a Viking land, where a troll hunter is expected – well, one much bigger than Murray was, to be honest, but he's turned up and he'll have to do…
|isbn=0008561249
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=B0C47LV1PC
|title=Fragility
|author=Mosby Woods
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=In the old taleCan you make a ''Yo birthing person'' joke? And if you could, Branwen is the sister of Bendigeidfran - question should you make it? Or is the giant King of Britain. She marries question if you did, would it land? The catch is that the King of Ireland, who doesn't treat her answer for both could wellbe.... She manages to send Bendigeidfran a message via a tamed starling and war and killings ensueno.
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jennifer Bohnet1529431735|title=Follow Your StarThe Winter Visitor|author=James Henry|rating=3.54|genre=Women's FictionCrime|summary=It's three years since Nanette Weston left MonacoFebruary 1991 and Essex is bitingly cold, which made Bruce Hopkins' return all the more surprising. SheHe'd been engaged to exiled on the Costa del Sol as a Formula 1 racing driver and had lived the life of the wealthy but wanted drug smuggler for a serious car accident had ended all thatdecade. The accident could have killed her fiancé and she lost her driving licence return has come about because of the alcohol he's had a letter from his ex-wife, saying that she'd consumeds ill and hasn't long to live. Her slow recovery was hindered by the end of her engagement but sheIt's found some contentment hard to feel any sympathy when Hopkins is abducted, stripped to his underwear and sent to a watery grave in being the boot of a stolen Ford Sierra. Is it a nanny warning from a Spanish gang or a problem closer to two young childrenhome?}}{{Frontpage|author=Alex Bell and Tim McDonagh|title=The Glorious Race of Magical Beasts|rating=4|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Eli is a busy lad – by day an apprentice in the wondrous library we start by visiting with him, and in the evening a helper at the dessert cafe his gran owns and runs. Eli lives with his lovely gran, too – for there is a generation missing in the family. When her friend and employerA few short years ago, VanessaEli's parents were both lost to the titular race, remarries and takes an extended honeymoon a globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have to navigate the world in the Amazon Nanette company of a magical beast. This has made the race anathema to the pair – but when a bad incident at the eatery leads to a confession from gran, Eli knows his only hope is asked to take dare to enter what he most hates, with the children back sole aim the prize of magic at the end – the only thing to Monaco where their father livespossibly save his gran.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0709089090</amazonuk>0571382231
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=J R Stephenson178763681X|title=Crooked JusticeKnife Skills for Beginners|author=Orlando Murrin|rating=2.54|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=Meet Barry JohnsChef Paul Delamare took a teaching job at a residential cookery school in Belgravia. YouHe didn'll see him coming - t really want to but celebrity chef Christian Wagner had a way of getting both men and women to do what hewanted. Paul ''s five hundred pounds if hesomehow's an ounce. Just don't ever lend him money - got the impression that he won't pay it back. A businessman with a share of a nightclub on Cyprusd be at the school to assist Paul, he goes there for who had a customary breakbroken arm, but it didn't turn out that way. The teaching - and finds his sort-of mollthe problems -type sort-of girlfriend has been installed as the bar dancer. He manages to tread both on the toes of are all his local colleague and some Greek rivalsown. And when a rival in London chases him up The one thing he hadn't expected was for thousands of pounds owed he decides someone to pack up and shut turn updead. It's a big stone that hides himUnfortunately, but he leaves a very awkward trail for was the person who discovered the body and everyone wanting knows that the police consider that person to upturn it and get their revengebe the prime suspect.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0955855713</amazonuk>
}}