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<metadesc>Book review siteExpert, with books full book reviews from most walks of literary life; fiction, biographynon-fiction, crime, cookery and children's books & self-published books plus author interviews and & top tens.</metadesc><h1 id="mf-title">The Bookbag</h1>Hello from The Bookbag, a site featuring books from all the many walks of literary life - [[:Category:Fiction|fiction]], [[:Category:Biography|biography]], [[:Category:Crime|crime]], [[:Category:Cookery|cookery]] and anything else that takes our fancy. At Bookbag Towers the bookbag sits at the side of the desk. It's the bag we take to the library, the charity shop and the bookshop. Sometimes it holds the latest releases, but at other times there'll be old favourites, books for the children, books for the home. They're sometimes our own books or books from the local library. They're often books sent to us by publishers and we promise to tell you exactly what we think about them. You might not want to read through a full review, so we'll give you a quick review which summarises what we felt about the book and tells you whether or not we think you should buy or borrow it. There are also lots of [[:Category:Interviews|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.
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==Reviews of the The Best New Books==
'''Read [[:Category:New Reviews|new reviews by category]]. '''<br>
'''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].''' <!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE--> '''Read [[Forthcoming Publications|reviews of books about to be published]].{{Frontpage|author=Sylvie Cathrall|title=A Letter to the Luminous Deep|rating=5|genre=Science Fiction|summary= There are few greater joys than a book which lives up to a compelling premise. And this is one of them.|isbn= 0356522776}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=B07XLM3SM60008517061|title=Murder at the Dolphin HotelDeath in a Lonely Place|author=Helena DixonStig Abell
|rating=4
|genre=Crime (Historical)|summary=Elowed Underhay was just twenty seven when she disappeared from Dartmouth in June 1916Former Metropolitan Police detective, Jake Johnson, has settled into his rustic life at Little Sky. There’s perhaps a little uncertainty about the future of his life with his vet girlfriend, leaving Livia and her daughterDiana, Kitty, as moving in the care together would mean a lot of her grandmother. A great deal of money had been spent to find out what happened to her compromise: does Jake give up his off-grid and the conclusion was that she was dead, mainly because there was no evidence to suggest otherwise. Kitty has come relaxing life to terms with this and move in 1933 she was running the Dolphin Hotel in Dartmouth with her grandmother, when her grandmother had Livia or does Livia move to leave to look after Little Sky despite her sister who was ill. She was reluctant to leave Kitty in charge - and Kitty could reservations about whether or not understand why. She's always coped with this is the mix of holidaymakers, boating people future she wants for herself and her daughter? For the naval college on moment they’re enjoying life in the edge of town before - present and she's done every job in putting the hotel. And she particularly cannot understand why her grandmother's friends have been roped in to keep an eye future on things ''and'' why Captain Matthew Bryant has been hired to take charge of security at the hotelback burner.
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=1786482126|title=Seishi Yokomizo and Louise Heal Kawai The Janus Stone (translatorDr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths|rating=4.5|genre=Crime|summary=Builders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the site was going to hold seventy-five 'luxury' apartments - when they discovered the bones of 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, that she is pregnant with his child as a result of the one night they spent together some three months ago. Her condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is prone to sudden bouts of sickness.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0008551324|title=The Honjin MurdersDevil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=To many readers, the phrase It'locked room murder mystery' is enough to make s unusual for anyone from the book one Hardie family to read; preferably quantified by approach the words 'clever' police. Neither side likes or 'good'has any respect for the other. For those who need more, here But Davie Hardie is struggling in prison and he's prepared to tell the extra background – we're in rural Japan in police where the 1930sbody of a missing person is buried and who was responsible for her death. The oldest son of an esteemed family is belatedly getting marriedThis person, he promises, although the whole affair is really not as ostentatious as someone big and it might will be – hardly anybody has turned up, worth the police doing what with it being arranged at great hastehe wants. She only has an uncle representing her family, for one thing. Either way, the celebrations have gone ahead as planned, only for the wedded couple And what he wants is to be slashed transferred to death in their private annex before an open prison to serve the sun rises on their marriageremainder of his sentence and to get an early parole date. What with a man missing parts of his fingers being in the neighbourhoodNot much to ask, is it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and some mysterious use of a traditional musical instrument at she's even prepared to do the time of the crime, this case has a lot of the peculiar about itother thing that Hardie demanded - make certain that DS Max Craigie and anyone who works with him is kept well away from what's happening.|isbn=1782275002
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Cixin Liu0008405026|title=Death's EndA Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Jane Casey
|rating=5
|genre=Science FictionCrime|summary= If IIt'd been paying more attention when I picked this book ups sixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. She was never found and the investigation ground to a halt. Now, her mother, Helena, I would have put it back on the shelfand her father are dead in their bed. Not because I didn't want to read Initially, it, looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but because Ithere'd have figured out s something about the positioning of the bodies that makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and her boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. What looked as though it was the final part of going to be an open-and-shut case is now a trilogycomplex double murder. Coming in part way through a saga Kerrigan is never convinced that the easiest thing to do and itexplanation lies in Rosalie's particularly true in science fiction because without knowing the back-story there are not just people whose names mean nothing to you disappearance: others (when itsuch as Derwent's assumed they willboss, Una Burt) but there are whole concepts that you won't understandless convinced.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0571379877|title=The Kellerby Code|author=Jonny Sweet|rating=3.5|genre=Crime|summary=Edward Jevons is a working-class young man, obsessed with his upper-class friends, Robert and Stanza. This latter is particularly true of Cixin LiuRobert's work – his range is phenomenala theatre director. George R R MartinHe's also self-obsessed, who knows a thing or two about world-creationdemanding, described it as ''a unique blend of scientific handsome and entitled and philosophical speculation, conspiracy theory uses Edward to run errands for him. Edward has been in love with Stanza since their university days - and cosmology'he's drunkenly confided how he feels to Robert. All Most men in Robert's position would stay away from Stanza or tell Edward that a relationship had begun between them but he's not like most men: Edward is left to stumble upon the two of that and morethem kissing in a dark passageway.|isbn=1784971650
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1780894511Jo Callaghan|title=Die Alone|author=Simon KernickLeave No Trace
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary=When a man is found crucified on the top of a hill in Nuneaton, DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to the case alongside her sidekick, the AI detective Lock. It's their first live case together, having previously been very successful with several cold cases. But when there is a second body found crucified a few days later, Kat is suddenly struggling with a potential serial killer and a very high profile case that draws a lot of unwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. Will they be able to solve the case in time, or will Kat find herself taken off the case and, potentially, out of a career?
|isbn=139851120X
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1399613073
|title=Moral Injuries
|author=Christie Watson
|rating=4.5
|genre=Thrillers
|summary=Ray Mason is in prison awaiting trial for murder Olivia, Laura and he's in Anjali met on the vulnerable prisoner unit: as first day of medical school and their friendship would keep them inseparable for a cop he's something quarter of a targetcentury. Olivia is ruthlessly ambitious, but which is a bonus when you aim to be a cardiothoracic surgeon. Laura is a perfectionist and a trauma doctor. Anjali is the unit is not as secure as free spirit of the inmates would have hoped group and Mason is injured in she becomes a riotGP. On his way to hospital heWhen we first meet them they're at a drug and alcohol-fuelled party and it's broken free by armed men and an offer is made going to himend in tragedy. HeWe don's to assassinate t know who suffered the man who is likely to become tragedy or the country's next prime minister and he'll then consequences. Twenty-five years later there will be given a new identity so an eerily similar event that he can start afresh abroadwill impact the three friends. His captors say that theyThis time, it're MI6, but Mason has his doubts. His choices s their teenage children who are limited though and he has personal reasons to believe that it would be better if Alastair Sheridan was deadinvolved.
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Akwaeke Emezi0241636604|title=PetThe Trading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson
|rating=4.5
|genre=TeensAutobiography|summary=The people 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 town Lucille believe that all pin-stripe suit and his background is the monsters are goneEast End, where he was familiar with violence, poverty and injustice. Their children are raised There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to understand that they were saved by the angels, those who rid the town London School of evil, and there are no monsters anymoreEconomics. But one day, Jam accidentally cuts herself, Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and bleeds he has a little onto one facility with numbers which most of her mother's paintingsus can only envy. The blood awakens a bizarre, terrifying-looking creature named Pet, who somehow comes to life and declares He also realised that it is here most rich people expect poor people to hunt the monsterbe stupid. Though Jam tries to convince it that all the monsters are gone, Pet is certain that there is oneIt was his ability at what was, stillessentially, and that the monster is hiding in the home of her best frienda card game which got him an internship with Citibank. Eventually, Redemptionthis turned into permanent employment as a trader.|isbn=0571355110
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=16867516801035021803|title=My Mummy does weird things / Maman fait des choses bizarresThe Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder|author=Amelie Julien and GustyawanC L Miller|rating=43.5|genre=For SharingCrime|summary=Which child doesnIt't think that there mother is, wells 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'weird''? It might be that in s close friend, Arthur Crockleford, is dead and the morning their mother doesn't like speaking muchcircumstances seem suspicious, when every self-respecting child knows that that is when you're at your brightest with lots to say? the least. ''Why'' then does Mummy stick Arthur was the reason why Freya had not been back to the village: Arthur, she feels, let her fingers in her ears? down badly. Then there's doing yoga Even though they were in front of the televisionbusiness together as antique hunters, which could she has not felt able to be worrying if it wasn't so funnynear the man or pursue the profession she loved. We won't go into too much detail about what goes on After the split, she worked in the bathroom a cafe, met and married James (on the colour changes which have occured when Mummy emerges and frankly, rebound from the less said the better about love of her reactions to your artistic efforts on the walllife, who was murdered) and Freya and James have now divorced. I mean, what else would you use paint for?
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Justine Avery and Liuba SyrotiukAllTomorrowsFutureCover|title=What Wonders Do You See... When You Dream?All Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)|rating=45|genre=For SharingScience Fiction|summary=''The day has ended''<br>''Hasn't it been splendid?'' <br>''But now, it's time, Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to be sure'' <br>''For an entirely different adventurecome.'' <br>
I hope you haven't forgotten how ve heard it feels to be much too excited for bed. If said that 'technology' is what happens after you're a parent at leasteighteen. Well, you'll know how it is to persuade an excited small person I must confess that yes, it is there have been more than a few decades of technology in fact time for bedmy lifetime. I've kept up reasonably well with what'What Wonders DoYou See...s advantageous to me but I'm left with the feeling that it' sets out to cater to these childrens all getting away from me. Instead Some of trying to persuade them that night time is calm time, it takes a slightly different tack. It tells them that sleep is actually an exciting time: a time of dreams in which imagination takes over and has no limit- frankly - quite frightening. But Of course, I could research the trick in accessing this wonderful possibilities and exciting world, is to get calm the probabilities and relaxed first so that you can easily fall asleep and open end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who knows what they're talking about or the door to itlatest conspiracy theorist. |isbn=194812422X I needed people I knew I could trust and who could deliver information in a way I could understand.
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Michael HarrisSunny Singh|title=Solitude: In Pursuit of Hotel Arcadia|rating=3.5|genre=Thrillers |summary=The Hotel Arcadia is a luxury hotel in an unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a terrorist group. Hiding from the terrorists who are rampaging through, killing everyone on site, there is Sam, a Singular Life wartime photographer and Abhi, the hotel manager. As Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the residents who are still alive in the hotel, he forms a Crowded Worldbond with Sam who refuses to be cowed by events, and keeps on venturing 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 both wait to see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by the terrorists.|isbn=086154742X}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1529153298|title=The List of Suspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey
|rating=5
|genre=LifestyleGeneral Fiction|summary= This It's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly...) She's not the book I was expecting it to bewhat's worrying Miv's family, though. Women have been disappearing. For some reason I expected it to be another self-help manual on how to find calm Well, how to step outside the mainstreamthey've been murdered, but it is not that at allto have 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Instead of telling us how, it is more about the Miv's upset because she'whys overheard that her father wants to move the family 'Down South'. Harries examines how weWhen you're eroding solitudefrom Yorkshire, which used to be Down South is a natural part of our human lifefrightening, foreign place, and why that mattersbest avoided. Of course he talks about how some people have found solitude and what has come of that For Miv, and eventually in the final chapter he talks about his own experience of having deliberately sought it outmove would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, but mostly he wanders down the alleys and by-ways she'll do anything to prevent that his thinking . She's not worried about this lost art led himthe dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to anyone.|isbn=1847947662
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Andy Briggs1398524085|title=Ctrl+SHas Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Nicci French
|rating=5
|genre=Science FictionCrime|summary= Life in the near futureCharlotte Salter was expected at her husband's not all badfiftieth birthday party but never turned up. We've reversed global warming Her children, sons Niall, Paul and Ollie and fixed the collapsing bee populationher daughter, Etty. We even created SPACEare all worried but - strangely - her husband, Alec, a virtual-sensory universe where average guys like Theo Wilson can do almost anything they desireis not. But almost anything isn Shortly afterwards, Etty and Greg, find the body of Greg't enough for some. Every days father, normal people are being takenDuncan Ackerley, their emotions harvested - and lives traded - to create death-defying thrills in the river. It was an easy assumption for the rich police to make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and twisted. Now Theo’s mother has disappeared. And as he follows her breadcrumb trail of clues, then committed suicide when hecouldn'll come up against t stand the most dangerous SPACE has to offer: vPolice, AI Bots guilt. The Salter children are not convinced but there's little else they can do but get on with their lives and anarchists - as well as a criminal empire that will kill to stop him finding her wonder about what really happened. . .|isbn=1409184641
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=16098093781035906708|title=The Rabbits' RebellionDiva|author=Ariel Dorfman and Chris RiddellDaisy Goodwin
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident ReadersGeneral Fiction|summary=We're in the realm tend to think of the rabbitsMaria Callas as Greek, only the foxes and wolves have taken over. King Wolfbut she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, His WolfinessNew York, has declared the rabbits don't exist, but the pesky birds have spread rumours from awing that the bunnies are in fact still aroundDecember 1923 and only moved to Athens when she was thirteen. Demanding a propaganda spree, King Wolf orders a humble monkey Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 'Callas' to be his official portrait photographer, but whatever make it more manageable in the poor innocent monkey prints out in his darkroom there is a distinct leporine hintStates. Can King Wolf succeed When she was back in proving himself victorious, can Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the rabbits show their continued existence to all Nazi occupation by a mother who need to know mercilessly exploited her and made no secret of it – and what can the poor monkey caught in between do?her preference for her elder sister, Jackie.
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Innosanto NagaraChristopher Edge|title=M is for MovementBlack Hole Cinema Club
|rating=4
|genre=Emerging Confident Readers|summary=Set Lucas and his friends are all booked in Indonesiafor a movie marathon at their local cinema, in a place that has the not too distant past, this is a story about social changenickname of 'The Black Hole'. Dealing with some difficult issuesAll big movie fans, they're looking forward to lots of exciting films, such as political corruption and nepotismmany, the book is neither boring nor preachy. many snacks! It educates gentlyHowever, with vibrantas the movie starts, challenging illustrationsthey very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, and it portrays how social movements need people who will try, they are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even when it seems that they will failimagine. The message is a positive But as they lurch from one; that in an increasingly uncertain worldfilm genre to the next, we do still have can they figure out what on earth is going on? Will they ever get back to the power cinema, and to instigate change.their real lives?|isbn=16098093511839942738
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1780724047Rachel Greenlaw|title=A Dictionary of Interesting Compass and Important Dogs|author=Peter J ConradiBlade|rating=43.5|genre=PetsTeens|summary=''I struggle to resist a book about dogscan hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, but I did wonder why this one was so the answering beat in my heart.''thin'': given that I've never encountered Rosevear, a dog who wasn't interesting or important - remote and probably bothpartially forgotten island, I was expecting a massive tomesurvives on luring ships into the rocks and plundering the wrecks. But ''A Dictionary Mira, like her mother before her, is one of Interesting the seven who swim out to survey the ruins – rescuing any survivors and Important Dogs'' is actually ''any treasure that lies within. But when the Council Watch lays a rich compendium of trap to end the wrecking, they capture the worldisland's most significant and beloved dogs'' leader and itMira's certainly father. Desperate to save him from death, Mira makes a rich treasure trove. We begin bargain with a wreck survivor who is as charming as he is secretive and with Peter J Conradi's four collies: Cloudyonly coordinates to guide her, Skyshe sets off in search of a family secret that lies buried deep in the sea. Bradley and Max. They're consecutive rather than simultaneous dogsWith only nine days to unearth what might save her father, but what comes over is Conradias her journey takes her from the watched streets of foreign islands to the heart of the smuggler's love for each territory, Mira must be determined to stop at nothing to save the future of her home and every one of them. I knew that I was in safe handsthe ones she holds most dear.|isbn=0008664730
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1785769294James Sherwood Metts|title=Man at the Window (Detective Cardilini)|author=Robert JeffreysPlanet Storyland
|rating=4.5
|genre=CrimeConfident Readers|summary=ItThings have been a bit sticky for the Earthlings. AI and automation have been proceeding apace, often replacing jobs they's when we read re paid to do and other tasks that a young boy is creeping reluctantly took time to a teacher's bedroom one October night that we realise something is badly wrongaccomplish. Nowadays you ''might'' hope that something would be done about it fairly quickly but Just as they were beginning to get used to all this was 1965 technological change and child abuse was generally regarded as malicious mischief on the part starting to think of the child. The boy would be safe that night though - albeit in the most horrific fashion. When he reached Captain Edmund's bedroom he found the man dead on the floorother, new ways to spend time, the top of his skull missingalong came an awful pandemic. The school's initial reaction Life was that this was a dreadful accident: there had been a cull of kangaroos in some nearby fields pretty much shut down and , along with it was obviously a stray bullet , all the many daily social interactions on which had killed the Captainthey depend so heavily.|isbn=1736128426
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1786695227Matthew Tree|title=Invisible in a Bright Light|author=Sally GardnerWe'll Never Know
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident ReadersLiterary Fiction|summary= Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to be different from his father, a drunk and chronic underachiever whose dreams of being exceptional at any of his artistic passions all failed miserably and who had endless crises of self confidence. So Tim applied himself to his studies, cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and set himself high but achievable ambitions.|isbn= B0CVFXPGP8}}{{Frontpage|author=A G Slatter|title=The beginning Briar Book of the Dead|rating=5|genre=Fantasy|summary='' There's a part of me that wants to keep this excellent story will leave 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 reader more than world, lies Silverton; a town under the protection of the Briar's, a little confused: family of witches who protect the town and the wider world from the Darklands. Though she has always wished for magic, Ellie Briar is the man in first 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 potions. When her grandmother suddenly dies, Ellie's cousin Audra becomes the green suitBriar Witch, what is the Reckoningtown's leader, and why are rows Ellie takes her place beside her. As challenges come her way left, right and centre, Ellie uncovers the rare ability to communicate with the dead, putting her at the heart of people in a cave? But stick with it – Ms Gardner is very cleverly letting us experience the same disorientation as our heroinemaelstrom of chaos. We watch in dismay Reeling from one family secret to another, Ellie must decide who to trust and determine what to do as the strange manBriar witches' legacy, who seems everything they have sacrificed to have no eyessurvive, is under threat.|isbn=1803364548}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1529900360|title=The Ghost Orchid|author=Jonathan Kellerman|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary=It hadn't been Lt Milo Sturgis's fault that Alex Delaware had been badly injured but he felt responsible and even after Alex recovered, does his best Sturgis was reluctant to persuade her to answer ask for his questionshelp on difficult cases. But His assertions that there were only open-and-shut cases which didn't need the help of a psychologist only worked for some reason Celestea while. Finally, it was Robin, despite her bewildermentDelaware's partner, 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, remains wary though. Two lovers were murdered in the swimming pool of a remote property in Bel Air. He was the heir to an Italian shoe empire and gives nothing awayshe is married to an extremely rich man and it's not the Italian. But which of them was the primary target?
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=19123748541529395224|title=VioletLetting the Cat Out of the Bag: The Secret Life of a Vet|author=S J I HollidaySion Rowlands
|rating=3.5
|genre=ThrillersAnimals and Wildlife|summary=ISiôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. His father was a GP and Rowlands didn've never been but understand that travelling is all about meeting new people and forming instantaneous bonds with people t want to follow in often chance situations. Well his footsteps, particularly when he considered the strain thatbeing on-call put on his father's exactly what happens when life. When he was seventeen he took the two main/only characters meet in opportunity of doing work experience with a travel agency in Beijing - Carrie is unsuccessfully trying to get family friend who was a refund on an extra ticket for vet and was convinced this was the Trans-Siberian train and Violet is trying to unsuccessfully buy a ticket job for the same sold-out journeyhim. As the two team up Before long, travelling through Mongolia, Serbia and into Russia, it couldhe was at Liverpool University. It hadn've t - as with so many students - been the start of his dream since he was a beautiful friendship but this a thriller after all so it quickly becomes child. If anything, he'd wanted to be a tale of obsession, manipulation and toxic friendshipsprofessional footballer.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=19123748380861541774|title=Nothing Important Happened TodayA Nye of Pheasants|author=Will CarverSteve Burrows
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary=DCI Domenic Jejeune's close friend and former colleague, Danny Maik, has taken a short holiday in Singapore to meet up with an old ally, Guy Trueman. Maik was involved in a street brawl - he would later maintain that he was facing a man armed with a knife - and he killed a Ghurka. Initially, he faced a charge of manslaughter but evidence came to light that suggested that he might have planned to murder the man. Now he could be facing the death penalty. Domenic Jejeune can do nothing to help as any interference from another police force could provoke a diplomatic incident and wouldn't help Danny at all.
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Alexander McCall Smith
|title=The Perfect Passion Company
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Nothing Important Happened Today The Perfect Passion Company is a darkdating agency in Edinburgh, twistedrun by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the online apps in providing a more personal, difficult readtailored service. Stories about cults often are Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and look after the business, but this as Ness is different; it's written with planning to take a trip to Canada to get away for a sense while. Katie is coming out of style that is quite unlike anything I've read before. I can't remember ever having read a novel break up with such a bad boyfriend, and so jumps at the chance to come home to Edinburgh. And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an oddEdinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the Isabel Dalhousie novels, distinctive narrative voicebut with some new characters who quickly begin to charm. While Katie has no experience in running a slim business, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, and there's always her very helpful (and relatively small bookrather handsome) neighbour, the slow-moving nature of the plot makes it feel far larger than its 276 pages.William, to lend a hand…|isbn=1846976596
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn= williamabbey0811771741|title=InstaKnits for Baby|author=Melissa Leapman|rating=4|genre=Crafts|summary=Melissa 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, cosy afternoons in front of the fire' variety. The Pursuit of William Abbeyprojects are divided by the time they'll take to complete - less than five hours, five to ten hours, ten to twenty hours and more than twenty hours. All the projects are attractive, modern and useable. I perhaps show my age when I wonder about 'social-media-worthy projects' but that's me being picky.}}{{Frontpage|author=Claire NorthDean Koontz|title=The Bad Weather Friend|rating=34.5
|genre=Paranormal
|summary=When William Abbey fails Benny is having a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and his house gets trashed. Oh, and someone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to prevent the lynching of a young boy in 1880his home, and it's South Africapossible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that has trashed his house! The thing is, he finds himself cursed by Benny is the grieving mothervery last person to deserve all this bad luck. He is a nice person. A naïve English Doctorreally nice person. So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to his house is a new friend, he slowly learns the weight of the curse upon hima bad weather friend called Spike, as the shadow of the dead boy begins who has been sent to follow help him across the worldsince Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. Never stopping Spike is going to take care of Benny, always growing – it crosses oceans and mountains in pursuit will certainly take care of William. As Benny's enemies, if he finds himself unable to resist speaking the truths that he hears in others, he also learns that the dark shadow is deadly – Benny, and seeks to kill the one he loves the most…Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are.|isbn=1662500491
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|isbnauthor=1643785036Adam Stower|title=The Wondrous Apothecary|author=Mary E MartinMurray and Bun|rating=4.5|genre=General FictionConfident Readers |summary=Those who have known Alexander WainwrightMurray is supposed to be a humble, the landscape artist famous for his Turner prize winning ''The Hay Wagon''tidy and friendly cat, one who is able to sleep and eat and eat and sleep and Rinaldo, renowned conceptual artist would say that they're chalk and cheesewell, if not sworn enemieswhatever takes his fancy next of the two. If youBut he've watched the relationships a bad magician's cat, as so his favourite bun has our narratorbeen turned into a hyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, art dealer Jamie Helmsworth, you'd have said that and the catflap they were magnetsboth use can chuck them out, drawing and repulsing each other in equal measure. Wainwright was at not into the socially acceptable end of the artistic continuumregular back garden, but with Rinaldo it was all too obvious that there was but into a fine dividing line between conceptual art world of frightening adventure and public nuisancewhiffs. As This time has worn onround 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 frequently been brought to the attention of the police. On this latest occasion we see him charged with arson turned up and theft of he''The Hay Wagon''.ll have to do…|isbn=0008561249
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|authorisbn=Mary H.K. ChoiB0C47LV1PC|title=Permanent RecordFragility|author=Mosby Woods
|rating=4
|genre=TeensLiterary Fiction|summary=Pablo, Can you make a college drop-out, is working at a New York bodega. He's massively in debt, he's avoiding his mother, and he finds his joy in creating unusual snacks with random ingredients! Whilst working one evening, heYo birthing person''s surprised to discover that the girl he is chatting with as he serves is a super-famous pop star andjoke? And if you could, as unlikely as it may seem, they start a relationship. With one character who is trying very hard not to be seen or noticed by anyone, and the other who question should you make it? Or is seen and followed and hounded by everyone all over the worldquestion if you did, would itland? The catch is that the answer for both could well be.... no. 's an interesting clash as they come together. This isn't just a love story though, and actually itFragility's really just Pab's storyis set as the city of Portland, about Oregon, cautiously begins to emerge from the journey he takes in his life via his meet-up with Leanna Smart.|isbn=0349003459restrictions imposed during the covid pandemic
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|isbn=16098093191529431735|title=Long-Haired Cat-Boy CubThe Winter Visitor|author=Etgar Keret, Aviel Basil and Sondra Silverston (translator)James Henry|rating=54|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=One day a boy It's February 1991 and Essex is in the zoo with his fatherbitingly cold, when which made Bruce Hopkins' return all the man gets called away more surprising. He'd been exiled on urgent businessthe Costa del Sol as a wanted drug smuggler for a decade. The boy isnreturn has come about because he't hustled into s had a cab and taken home firstletter from his ex-wife, though, no – hesaying that she's given hot dog money, ill and taxi money, and told hasn't long to just stick around on his own and enjoy himselflive. Well, itIt's no surprise that the orphan-for-an-afternoon sensation the lad feels doesn't make him happyhard to feel any sympathy when Hopkins is abducted, stripped to his underwear and so he thinks sent to a watery grave in the boot of a species name for himself, and curls himself up into an empty cage, as if he were a new exhibitstolen Ford Sierra. And Is it's then the drama begins… a warning from a Spanish gang or a problem closer to home?
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|isbnauthor=1785785516Alex Bell and Tim McDonagh|title=Fucking Good Manners|author=Simon GriffinThe Glorious Race of Magical Beasts
|rating=4
|genre=LifestyleConfident Readers|summary=Manners maketh manEli is a busy lad – by day an apprentice in the wondrous library we start by visiting with him, they sayand in the evening a helper at the dessert cafe his gran owns and runs. It certainly makes life easier if everybody abides by Eli lives with his lovely gran, too – for there is a set of conventions, some of which are ages old and other which have evolved over timegeneration missing in the family. Manners are not about how much A few short years ago, Eli's parents were both lost to tip or how you should behave if you get an invitation to Buckingham Palacethe titular race, they a globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have nothing to do with class or financial status: navigate the world in the company of a magical beast. they're about getting This has made the basics right before we try race anathema to deal with more difficult matters. Of course we all have more relaxed manners the pair – but when we're with family and friendsa bad incident at the eatery leads to a confession from gran, but it's best if we learn Eli knows his only hope is to distinguish between our public and private lives and dare to act appropriately. ''Fucking Good Manners'' aims enter what he most hates, with the sole aim the prize of magic at the end – the only thing to help us on the waypossibly save his gran.|isbn=0571382231
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