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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.

Reviews by readers from all the many walks of literary life. With author interviews, features and top tens. You'll be sure to find something you'll want to read here. Dig in! Find us on [[File:facebook.gif|link=https://www.facebook.com/TheBookbagCoUk|alt=Facebook]] [https://www.facebook.com/TheBookbagCoUk '''Facebook'''], [[File:twitter.gif|link=http://twitter.com/TheBookbag|alt=Follow us on Twitter]] [http://twitter.com/TheBookbag '''Twitter'''], [[File:instagram_classic_logo.png|link=https://www.instagram.com/thebookbag.co.uk/|alt=Follow us on Instagram]] [https://www.instagram.com/thebookbag.co.uk/ '''Instagram'''] and [[File:LinkedIn.png|link=https://www.linkedin.com/in/the-bookbag-1b12a264/|alt=LinkedIn]] There are currently '''{{PAGESINCATEGORY: Reviews}}''' [[:Category:Reviews|reviews ]] at TheBookbag.

==Reviews of the The Best New Books==

'''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].''' <!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->

|author=Amin MaaloufSylvie 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=0008517061|title=Death in a Lonely Place|author=Stig Abell|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary= Former 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, Livia and her daughter Diana, as moving in together would mean a lot of compromise: does Jake give up his off-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 future she wants for herself and her daughter? For the moment they’re enjoying life in the present and putting the future on the back burner.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1786482126|title=The DisorientedJanus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths

|genre=Literary FictionCrime|summary= Adam has lived Builders were demolishing an old house in Paris for yearsNorwich - 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, speaks French more easily than his native ArabicDr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. In fact he hasn It's difficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn't been back to , that she is pregnant with his homeland for 25 yearschild as a result of the one night they spent together some three months ago. An old friend Her condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is dying…or as Adam prefers prone to think sudden bouts of him a former-friend, perhaps not as harsh as an ex-friend, sickness.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0008551324|title=The Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster|rating=4.5|genre=Crime|summary=It's unusual for anyone from the Hardie family to approach the police. Neither side likes or maybehas any respect for the other. The falling out was a long time ago, But Davie Hardie is struggling in prison and Adamhe's partner has no idea what it prepared to tell the police where the body of a missing person is buried and who was aboutresponsible for her death. This person, even so she urges him to go knowing that he'll regret not promises, is someone big and it will be worth the police doing sowhat he wants. Not knowing whether he's going because And what he needs or wants is to be transferred to an open prison to serve the remainder of his sentence and to get an early parole date. Not much toask, or simply because he was asked, heis it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and she's on even prepared to do the next planeother 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=B07ZQSK9CY

|authorisbn=Anstey Harris0008405026|title=Where We BelongA Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Jane Casey

|genre=General FictionCrime|summary= IIt've always believed that places s sixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. She was never found and buildings absorb what happens within them and reflect it back; this is how we can tell that the investigation ground to a sacred space is sacredhalt. Cate Morris believes a similar thingNow, her mother, Helena, she believes that ''A house absorbs happinessand her father are dead in their bed. Initially, it blooms into looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but there's something about the wallpaper, the wood positioning of the window frames, the bricks: bodies that's how it becomes a home.'' She is having these thoughts as she packs up makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and her homeboss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. She has What looked as though it was going to leavebe an open-and-shut case is now a complex double murder. A combination of circumstances means Kerrigan is convinced that is not only redundant, but also homeless. With nowhere else to go, she has called on her late husbandthe explanation lies in Rosalie's disappearance: others (such as Derwent's family for help. Just for a few weeksboss, Una Burt) are less convinced.|isbn=1471173836

|isbn=17874776810571379877|title=A Shooting at Chateau Rock (A Bruno, Chief of Police Novel)The Kellerby Code|author=Martin WalkerJonny Sweet|rating=43.5

|summary=It was Edward Jevons is a couple of days after old Driant's funeral that Bruno Courrèges got an angry phone call from working-class young man, obsessed with his sonupper-class friends, Robert and Stanza. GastonRobert's father had sold the family farm in order to buy an insurance policy which he had used to secure a life of luxury at an expensive retirement home near Sarlat, owned by a Russian oligarchtheatre director. Before he even got to go there he diedHe's also self-obsessed, apparently of a heart attackdemanding, handsome and the retirement home collected the proceeds of the policy entitled and Gaston uses Edward to run errands for him. Edward has been in love with Stanza since their university days - and Claudette Driant were left with just the contents of the farmhousehe's drunkenly confided how he feels to Robert. The family hadnMost men in Robert't exactly fallen out, but Gaston lived some way s position would stay away and Claudette from Stanza or tell Edward that a relationship had fallen out of favour when she announced that she was gay, begun between them but they werenhe't expecting s not like most men: Edward is left to be almost completely disinheritedstumble upon the two of them kissing in a dark passageway.

|isbnauthor=B083Z3ZZ61Jo Callaghan|title=Broken Silence (DS Nikki Parekh 2)|author=Liz MistryLeave No Trace

|summary=When we 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 meet him Stefan Marcovici has live case together, having previously been in the UK very successful with his daughter Maria for a whileseveral cold cases. He came expecting to work as But when there is a second body found crucified a few days later, Kat is suddenly struggling with a gardener potential serial killer and Maria was a very high profile case that draws a lot of unwanted attention to be a nannytheir AI Future Policing project. Stefan ends up doing slave labour Will they be able to solve the case in time, or will Kat find herself taken off the case and, potentially, out of a chicken factory: you can imagine what happens to an eighteen-year-old girl.career?|isbn=139851120X

|authorisbn=Justine Avery and Daria Yudina1399613073|title=This Book Is Alive! (Living Book)Moral Injuries|author=Christie Watson|rating=4.5|genre=For SharingThrillers|summary= Books ''want'' you to read Olivia, Laura and Anjali met on the first day of medical school and their friendship would keep them! They're not intimidating or standoffish or particular about readersinseparable for a quarter of a century. Books ''want'' Olivia is ruthlessly ambitious, which is a bonus when you aim to be reada cardiothoracic surgeon. Laura is a perfectionist and a trauma doctor. This Anjali is the key message in Justine Avery's latest offering, ''This Book Is Alive!''. By anthropomorphising free spirit of the relationship between book group and young reader, shebecomes a GP. When we first meet them they're at a drug and alcohol-fuelled party and it's sending an invitation going to all end in tragedy. We don't know who suffered the tragedy or the consequences. Twenty- pick me up, read me, five years later there will be my friendan eerily similar event that will impact the three friends. This time, we can go on a journey together. Itit's a great message, don't you think?|isbn= 1948124416their teenage children who are involved.}}

|isbn=02419846530241636604|title=I Made a MistakeThe Trading Game: A Confession|author=Jane CorryGary Stevenson

|genre=ThrillersAutobiography|summary=We know from 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 very beginning 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 there's a tragedy about most rich people expect poor people to happenbe stupid. On It was his ability at what was, essentially, a January evening on card game which got him an internship with Citibank. Eventually, this turned into permanent employment as a very crowded platform trader.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1035021803|title=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 Waterloo Underground station a man falls under an oncoming trainrequest 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. That Even though they were in business together as antique hunters, she has not felt able to be near the man is Matthew Gordonor pursue the profession she loved. Much later we see Poppy Page After the split, she worked in a cafe, met and married James (on the rebound from the love 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=Science Fiction|summary=''Opening up new ways of thinking about the witness box 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 crown court, 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 a very rough ride away from me. Some of it is - frankly - quite frightening. Of course, I could research the possibilities and the prosecuting barristerprobabilities 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.

|author= Maryse CondéSunny Singh|title= The Wondrous and Tragic Life of Ivan and IvanaHotel Arcadia|rating= 43.5|genre= Literary FictionThrillers |summary= We live The Hotel Arcadia is a luxury hotel in an unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a post-world: post-colonialismterrorist group. Hiding from the terrorists who are rampaging through, post-modernism, post-truth. The list goes killing everyone on. There are numerous works that utilise the prefix post- in their categorisationsite, but perhaps none more so than Maryse Condé. In her new novelthere is Sam, ''The Wondrous a wartime photographer and Tragic Life of Ivan and Ivana''Abhi, Condé writes with fervour about the scars left by colonialism on hotel manager. As Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the countries to which it latched itself. Ivan and Ivana residents who are twins born still alive in Guadeloupethe hotel, he forms a French overseas department. They grow up bond with intense Sam who refuses to be cowed by events, and passionate feelings for each otherkeeps on venturing out of her room to try to capture what's happened through her photography. As Although they grow up only ever talk over the phone, their friendship grows as Abhi tries to help her keep safe and move overseas, they both wait to see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by the ravages of a post-colonial society drive them apart with tragic consequencesterrorists.|isbn=1642860697086154742X

|authorisbn= Abi Elphinstone1529153298|title= Jungle Drop (The Unmapped Chronicles)List of Suspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey|rating= 45|genre= Confident ReadersGeneral Fiction|summary= Abi Elphinstone has said that she connects with her world-building through her charactersIt's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly...) She's not what's worrying Miv's family, though. Women have been disappearing. In an interview with [Books For Keeps] Well, she described visualising her characters "wearing head torches which gradually reveal the world they are seeing 've been murdered, but to have 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Miv's upset because she's overheard that her and father wants to move the readerfamily 'Down South'." Just as the darkness of a mine When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is cut through by a spear of light so too do quarrelsome Fox and Fibber get their first glimpse of frightening, foreign place, best avoided. For Miv, the phantasmagorical glow-in-the-dark realm of Jungle Drop when they emerge through the mouth of a Dragon on the Here move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and There Expressshe'll do anything to prevent that. Running from She's not worried about the opprobrium of their demanding and selfish parents, they must address what is in their hearts dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to find what they seekanyone.|isbn= 1471173682

|isbn=B084VNRRD61398524085|title=Killing Mind (D I Kim Stone)Has Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Angela MarsonsNicci French

|summary=It looked very like a suicideCharlotte Salter was expected at her husband's fiftieth birthday party but never turned up. Her children, sons Niall, Paul and Ollie and to begin withher daughter, Etty. are all worried but - strangely - her husband, Alec, is not. Shortly afterwards, that was how both DI Kim Stone Etty and KeatsGreg, find the pathologist called itbody of Greg's father, Duncan Ackerley, in the river. It was only later an easy assumption for the police to make that Stone Duncan had murdered Charlie and her team realised that then committed suicide when Samantha Brown cut her throat, hers was not the only hand holding he couldn't stand the knifeguilt. It was murder. SammyThe Salter children are not convinced but there's parents. Myles and Kate were a little bit reluctant to say what else they can do but get on with their daughter had been doing recently. The property where she was found was less homely than most hotel rooms: her mother was lives and wonder about to accuse her husband of saying that Sammy was readywhat really happened... But what was Sammy ready ''for'' and where was their other daughter, Sophie?

|authorisbn= Hana Tooke1035906708|title= The UnadoptablesDiva|author=Daisy Goodwin|rating= 4.5|genre= Confident ReadersGeneral Fiction|summary= In the winter We tend to think of 1880Maria Callas as Greek, five babies are abandoned at the Little Tulip orphanage but she was born to Greek parents in AmsterdamManhattan, New York, much in December 1923 and only moved to Athens when she was thirteen. Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 'Callas' to make it more manageable in the annoyance of matron GasbeekStates. Twelve years later, Milou, the last of the five babies to be abandoned When she was back in Athens - supposedly so that winter, struggles to work out the identity of she could get appropriate training for her parents from the clues voice - she was abandoned with: a small coffin with claw-marks on raised under the outside, Nazi occupation by a cat doll mother who mercilessly exploited her and made by someone called Bram Poppenmaker and a velvet blanket. She, along with the other four, patiently wait no secret of her preference for Milou's parents to come back and take her home. Howeverelder sister, when the five children are sold to the dodgy merchant Meneer Rotman, they know they have to escapeJackie. And so begins the adventure of a lifetime as the Unadoptables join forces to reunite Milou with her parents, all the time being pursued by the Kinderbureau and Rotman…|isbn=0241417465

|author= Alison WeirChristopher Edge|title= Six Tudor Queens: Katheryn Howard The Tainted QueenBlack Hole Cinema Club|rating= 4|genre= Historical FictionConfident Readers|summary= Lucas and his friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, a place that has the nickname of 'The Black Hole'Katheryn was seven when her mother died''. All big movie fans, thus we are thrust into this tumultuous time in young Katherynthey's life, trying re looking forward to find a homelots of exciting films, both figuratively and literallymany, where she can grow and grieve. Unfortunatelymany snacks! However, Katheryn is followed by bad luck and she learns an important lessonas the movie starts, she they very quickly realise that something about this new film format is too youngvery different, too poor and too unimportant they are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagine. But as they lurch from one film genre to be of any value to anyonethe next, but she can they figure out what on earth is beautiful and surely, that will count for something in going on? Will they ever get back to the endcinema, won't itand to their real lives?|isbn=14722277781839942738

|isbnauthor=1405946172Rachel Greenlaw|title=The Glass House|author=Eve ChaseCompass and Blade|rating=43.5|genre=Historical FictionTeens|summary=Rita lost both her parents in a car crash when she was just six years old: since then she's always craved a family'I can hear the song of the sea. She'd lived with her grandmother in Torquay until she got a job as a nanny with The call of the deep, the Harrington family answering beat in Londonmy heart. Soon her engagement to Fred'' Rosevear, a Torquay butcherremote and partially forgotten island, fell through survives on luring ships into the rocks and plundering the Harringtons became wrecks. Mira, like her familymother before her, is one of the seven who swim out to survey the ruins – rescuing any survivors and any treasure that lies within. In 1971, after But when the Council Watch lays a fire at trap to end the London housewrecking, Jeannie Harringtonthey capture the island's leader and Mira's father. Desperate to save him from death, her children, 13-year-old Hera Mira makes a bargain with a wreck survivor who is as charming as he is secretive and 6-year-old Teddy, along with Rita went only coordinates to the guide her, she sets off in search of a family's house secret that lies buried deep in the Forest sea. With only nine days to unearth what might save her father, as her journey takes her from the watched streets of foreign islands to the heart of Dean. It wasnthe smuggler't ''quite'' dilapidateds territory, but it certainly wasn't Mira must be determined to stop at nothing to save the same standard as future of her home and the London house had been before the fireones she holds most dear.|isbn=0008664730

|isbnauthor=0008386137James Sherwood Metts|title=Just My Luck|author=Adele ParksPlanet Storyland

|genre=ThrillersConfident Readers|summary=Elaine Winterdale took the fall Things have been a bit sticky for the landlordEarthlings. Aged 37AI and automation have been proceeding apace, she got a suspended sentence because a faulty gas boiler had caused the deaths of 29-year-old Reveka Albu often replacing jobs they're paid to do and her 2-year-old son Benkeother tasks that took time to accomplish. Toma AlbuJust as they were beginning to get used to all this technological change and starting to think of other, husband new ways to spend time, along came an awful pandemic. Life was pretty much shut down and father, had found them when he returned homealong with it, all the many daily social interactions on which they depend so heavily.|isbn=1736128426

|author=Justine Avery and Ema Tepic Matthew Tree|title=I Dreamed YouWe'll Never Know

|genre=For SharingLiterary Fiction|summary=It is always a pleasure Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to review be different from his father, a new book by Justine Avery drunk and chronic underachiever whose dreams of being exceptional at any of his artistic passions all failed miserably and ''I Dreamed You'' carries on the tradition beautifully. This little book is the perfect exemplar who had endless crises of our category name, ''For Sharing''self confidence. It is a mother's love letter So Tim applied himself to her childhis studies, told in rhyme form.|isbn=1948124505}} {{Frontpage|author=Sharon Blackie|title=If Women Rose Rooted|rating=5|genre= Biography|summary= I normally say that you can tell how much a book means to me by how many pages have corners turned down. Perhaps an even greater measure of impact is setting out to buy my own copy before I've finished reading the one I've borrowed. I want to avoid clichés like 'powerful' 'inspiring' 'life-changing' – although it is definitely the first two cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and only time will tell about the third – set himself high but clichés exist for a reason and I'm not sure I can succinctly put it any betterachievable ambitions.|isbn=1912836017B0CVFXPGP8

|author=Patrick NessA G Slatter|title=BurnThe Briar Book of the Dead

|genre=TeensFantasy|summary=''On There's a cold Sunday evening in early 1957 - the very day, in fact, part of me that Dwight David Eisenhower took the oath of office wants to keep this just to myself for the second time as President however long I can. This secret magic of the United States of America - Sarah Dewhurst waited with her father in the parking lot of the Chevron gas station my own, all mine, at last. I just want to enjoy it for the dragon he'd hired to help on the farma while.''

ItWithin a remote mountain pass, far away from the world, lies Silverton; a town under the protection of the Briar's 1950s America but not as we know it, a family of witches who protect the town and the wider world from the Darklands. In this alternate USThough she has always wished for magic, there Ellie Briar is still a Cold War with the Russiansfirst non-witch to be born into her family for generations and as such since she was young, still her training as a concomitant arms racesteward revolved around letters and administration rather than spells and potions. And When her grandmother suddenly dies, Ellie's cousin Audra becomes the Briar Witch, the stain of racism is just as crushing - something mixed-race Sarah town's leader, and Ellie takes her place beside her Japanese American friend Jason are only too well aware of. As is challenges come her way left, right and centre, Ellie uncovers the rare ability to communicate with the deeply unpleasant town deputydead, Kelbyputting her at the heart of a maelstrom of chaos. But Reeling from one thing is ''very'' different. In this alternate worldfamily secret to another, there are dragons. The dragons live in an uneasy peace with humans Ellie must decide who to trust and communication is minimal. But a few of these winged creatures determine what to do hire out their labour as the Briar witches' legacy, everything they have sacrificed to human in return for gold - they are dragonssurvive, after allis under threat.Poor Frankie! |isbn= 14063755001803364548

|authorisbn= Angela Woolfe1529900360|title= Roxy and Jones: The Great Fairytale Cover-UpGhost Orchid|author=Jonathan Kellerman|rating= 4.5|genre= Confident ReadersCrime|summary= After her father gets married for the umpteenth timeIt hadn't been Lt Milo Sturgis's fault that Alex Delaware had been badly injured but he felt responsible and even after Alex recovered, Roxy Humperdinck is sent Sturgis was reluctant to live with her halfask for his help on difficult cases. His assertions that there were only open-and-sister Gretel in Rexopolis, the capital city of shut cases which didn't need the Kingdom help of Illustria. Gretel works as a toilet cleaner psychologist only worked for the Ministry of Soupa while. Why does a country like Illustria need an entire ministry dedicated to soup Finally, you ask? Wellit was Robin, after Roxy finds a secret passage in her bathroom and meets a snarky young woman known only as JonesDelaware's partner, who nudged Milo into asking for help again. She knew that the involvement was something that the man she soon finds out whyloved needed. Turns out The next case did look simple, fairy tales are real, and though. Two lovers were murdered in the Ministry’s official job is to safeguard all knowledge swimming pool of them and monitor a remote property in Bel Air. He was the living fairy tales. And, when heir to an evil queen breaks out of a maximum-security prison Italian shoe empire and threatens she is married to reinstate her reign of terror, Roxy an extremely rich man and Jones hold it's not the fate Italian. But which of them was the world in their young hands…so, no pressure then!|isbn=1406391379primary target?

|authorisbn=Kat Dunn1529395224|title=Dangerous RemedyLetting the Cat Out of the Bag: The Secret Life of a Vet|author=Sion Rowlands|rating=43.5|genre=TeensAnimals and Wildlife|summary= It's Paris, 1794Siôn Rowlands fell into veterinary science accidentally. The Revolution is five years old His father was a GP and the country Rowlands didn't want to follow in the midst of violent political turmoil between the Revolutionaries, trying to maintain their control by whatever means necessaryhis footsteps, and particularly when he considered the Royalists, still loyal to monarchy intent. Caught in a no manstrain that being on-call put on his father's land between life. When he was seventeen he took the two warring factions is the Battalion opportunity of doing work experience with a family friend who was a vet and was convinced this was the Deadjob for him. Led by a disillusioned revolutionary Before long, he was at Liverpool University. It hadn's daughter, the band of outcasts have made t - as with so many students - been his dream since he was a name for themselves rescuing innocent citizens from the violent falloutchild. But they may have gotten in over their heads with their latest rescue, Olympe If anything, he'd wanted to be a girl with a disturbing history and powers that might just make her the spark that blows up the powder-keg of revolutionary Parisprofessional footballer. |isbn=1789543649

|authorisbn=Joanne M Harris0861541774|title=A Pocketful Nye of CrowsPheasants|author=Steve Burrows|rating=54|genre= Confident ReadersCrime|summary= I have always been of the mind that once youDCI Domenic Jejeune're above picture-book level s close friend and before you get former colleague, Danny Maik, has taken a short holiday in Singapore to graphic sex & violencemeet up with an old ally, there is no difference between books for children and books for adultsGuy Trueman. There are good books Maik was involved in a street brawl - he would later maintain that he was facing a man armed with a knife - and poor oneshe killed a Ghurka. And Joanne Harris does not produce poor ones. ''A Pocketful Initially, he faced a charge of Crows'' is clearly aimed at the younger readers as witness the use of the middle initial in the author's name manslaughter but evidence came to differentiate from her adult offers. Ignore light that suggested that if you he might have loved anything from ''Chocolat'' onwards you will know that Harris is mistress of planned to murder the modern fairy taleman. This is no differentNow he could be facing the death penalty. It is an utter delightDomenic 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.|isbn=1473222184

|author= Maggie Tokuda-HallAlexander McCall Smith|title= The Mermaid, the Witch and the SeaPerfect Passion Company|rating= 4.5|genre= TeensGeneral Fiction|summary= On The Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the pirate ship Doveonline apps in providing a more personal, Flora the girl tailored service. Ness has assumed asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and look after the identity of Florian the man in an attempt business, as Ness is planning to take a trip to Canada to fit in with the crewget away for a while. Life Katie is hard as coming out of a break up with a piratebad boyfriend, trust and empathy are so jumps at the first things chance to come home to be discardedEdinburgh. And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, but anything has bringing us to be better than starving on the streets. Meanwhilean Edinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the young Lady Evelyn Hasegawa boards the DoveIsabel Dalhousie novels, headed off to be married but with some new characters who quickly begin to charm. Katie has no experience in running a military man shebusiness, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, and there's never met on some far-flung colony of the Nipran Empire. Neither of them expects always her very helpful (and rather handsome) neighbour, William, to be thrown together by fate, never mind fall in love…lend a hand…|isbn=15362043151846976596

|authorisbn=Frederic Beigbeder and Frank Wynne (translator)0811771741|title=A Life Without EndInstaKnits for Baby|author=Melissa Leapman

|genre=Literary FictionCrafts|summary=I looked at the calendar the other week, and disappointedly realised I have Melissa Leapman's ''InstaKnits for Baby'' gives us a birthday this year – I know, yet another onecollection of knits from toys to blankets. It won't Some will be one quick knits - others are of the major numbers'long, but cosy afternoons in front of the time when I have the same number as Heinz varieties looms on the horizonfire' variety. And then a few of The projects are divided by the big 0-numbers, and if all goes well, Itime they'll be an OBE. (Which of course stands for Over Bloody Eighty.) Now if that's the extent of my midtake to complete -life crisisless than five hours, I guess I have five to be happy. Our author here doesn't use that exact phraseten hours, but he might be said ten to be living onetwenty hours and more than twenty hours. Determined to find out how to prolong life for as long as he wants – he would like to see 400 – he hops right into bed with the assistant to All the first geneticist he interviewsprojects are attractive, modern and they end up with a child, which is at least a way of continuing the life of his genes, and a motive to keep ongoinguseable. But how can he get to not flick the I perhaps show my age when I wonder about 'social-media-worthy projects'final way outbut that' switch, especially when foie gras tastes so nice?|isbn=1642860670s me being picky.

|author=Holly JacksonDean Koontz|title=Good Girl, The Bad BloodWeather Friend|rating=4.5|genre=TeensParanormal|summary=A month on from the explosive conclusion to the Andie Bell mystery, Benny is having a new normal has settled over Little Kiltonterrifically bad day. Max Hastings' assault trial thunders on He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, Pippa's viral podcast detailing her journey of discovering the truth about Andie and Sal's deaths has gained massive media attentionhis house gets trashed. Oh, Cara and her sister Naomi are reeling from the realisation that their fathersomeone has delivered a really weird, Elliot Warddisturbing coffin-sized object to his home, had murdered Sal Singh and kidnapped a girl he thought it's possible that whoever or whatever was Andie after she stumbled out of inside is the thing that has trashed his house! The thing is, bleeding, and disappeared into Benny is the nightvery last person to deserve all this bad luck. He is a nice person. A really nice person. As So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the town tries delivery to heal againhis house is a new friend, a bad weather friend called Spike, six years on who has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from the events nefarious forces for being a good person. Spike is going to take care of that nightBenny, tragedy strikes again. Jamie Reynolds, older brother to one and will certainly take care of PippaBenny's best friends has gone missing. And soenemies, if he, alongside her difficult life as a semi-famous eighteen-year-oldBenny, she is once again taken down and Harper (a dark, twisted path to discover the truthwaitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are.|isbn=14052977511662500491

|isbnauthor=B084H8F2CFAdam Stower|title=The Body Under the Bridge|author=Nick LouthMurray and Bun

|genre=CrimeConfident Readers |summary=DCI Craig Gillard was annoyed Murray is supposed to be pulled away from the funeral service for a serving police officerhumble, tidy and friendly cat, particularly when he discovered that he was one who is able to take charge sleep and eat and eat and sleep and, well, whatever takes his fancy next of the enquiry two. But he's a bad magician's cat, so his favourite bun has been turned into a missing woman. Beatrice Ulbricht was twenty-five years old hyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, and the catflap they both use can chuck them out, not into the regular back garden, but into a student world of music at the Royal College of Musicfrightening adventure and whiffs. She had been due This time round it drops them into a Viking land, where a troll hunter is expected – well, one much bigger than Murray was, to play with the other members of the Lysander String Quartet at the Church of St Martin-in-the-Fields be honest, but hadnhe't s turned upand he'll have to do…|isbn=0008561249}}{{Frontpage|isbn=B0C47LV1PC|title=Fragility|author=Mosby Woods|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary= Can you make a ''Yo birthing person'' joke? And if you could, is the question should you make it? Or is the question if you did, would it land? The catch is that the answer for both could well be.... no. Gillard didn ''t understand why his immediate involvement was necessary until Chief Constable Alison Rigby explained that BeatriceFragility's father was Karl-Otto Ulbricht, Germany's Minister is set as the city of Justice.Portland, Oregon, cautiously begins to emerge from the restrictions imposed during the covid pandemic

|authorisbn= Linda Scott1529431735|title= The Double X EconomyWinter Visitor|author=James Henry|rating=54|genre= Politics and SocietyCrime|summary=It's February 1991 and Essex is bitingly cold, which made Bruce Hopkins'Women are economically disadvantaged in every country in return all the world'more surprising. He'd been exiled on the Costa del Sol as a wanted drug smuggler for a decade. It The return has come about because he's had a bold statement for an opening chapterletter from his ex-wife, but itsaying that she's far from hyperbole as the following pages explainill and hasn't long to live. This book shines a light on what It's hard to feel any sympathy when Hopkins is happening in different placesabducted, stripped to his underwear and sent to a watery grave in the impact on the local and world economyboot of a stolen Ford Sierra. What can be learnt Is it a warning from the great strides in gender-equalising legislation in the westa Spanish gang or a problem closer to home? What can be done about the selling of young women into marriage, and what can chimpanzees and bonobos teach us about mothering?|isbn=0571353606

|author=J Paul HendersonAlex Bell and Tim McDonagh|title=DaisyThe Glorious Race of Magical Beasts

|genre=General FictionConfident Readers|summary=This Eli is a busy lad – by day an apprentice in the story of Herod Swondrous library we start by visiting with him, and in the evening a helper at the dessert cafe his gran owns and runs. Pinkney Eli lives with his lovely gran, a rather unusual (yet somehow charming) man who too – for there is in search of a woman called Daisy, whom he first sees generation missing in an episode of Judge Judy on television and instantly falls in love with her! the family. Rod is writing A few short years ago, Eli's parents were both lost to the novel of his questtitular race, guided by an embittered exa globe-literary agent who is now clearing glasses trotting adventure where all entrants have to navigate the world in the company of a pub for a livingmagical beast. Determined This has made the race anathema to find and meet Daisy, the book takes us through Rod's lifepair – but when a bad incident at the eatery leads to a confession from gran, introduces us Eli knows his only hope is to his friendsdare to enter what he most hates, and tells us with the sole aim the prize of what happens in magic at the end – the only thing to possibly save his quest for lovegran.|isbn=08573033090571382231