Forthcoming Publications

1 JULY

Review of I Am Unworthy by Angela Mack Teens Isabel is determined to start fresh. Start again. Sixth form will be different. Her tormentor doesn't go to Gilleford Secondary School anymore. She can escape the hurt, the fear, and the person she became. Josh is determined to keep going, even through the rage, the pain, and using his fists to solve any problem or situation. But he has secrets that threaten to tear him and his brothers apart. When Josh and Isabel's worlds collide, can they make their relationship work? Can they both finally be happy? Or will Josh's time run out? Full Review

9 JULY

Review of The Shelf by Helly Acton Women's Fiction When we meet Amy, she's in a relationship with Jamie. You can't really call it a partnership, because things tend to get done on his terms, but she's sticking around because she hopes she can change him. Ah, yes. Haven't we all been there? Things are looking up when he tells her to pack for a surprise trip. Could this be it? Is he finally going to get down on one knee? Was the work (and the wait) worth it? Full Review

Review of Harrow Lake by Kat Ellis Teens When we first meet 17-year-old Lola, daughter to legendary horror movie director Nolan Nox, she is saying goodbye to New York City - by sneaking out and stealing from its residents. But when she is found by her father's assistant and forced to come home, she arrives to find an unlocked door, a trail of blood, and her father dying in his study. And so, while he recovers, she is sent off to live with her grandmother in Harrow Lake, the small 1920s town in Indiana that served as the location for the film that made her parents famous. But something about this place isn't right. There's a darkness inside the people here. Secrets about her mother and dark tales of the town's cannibal monster 'Mister Jitters' fill every corner, and disturbing happenings plague Lola. But with every passing hour, secrets long buried come painfully to light and she begins to think that these stories may not be stories at all, and something very real and sinister lurks in Harrow Lake. Full Review

13 JULY

Review of Hunter School by Sakinu Ahronglong Autobiography The flyleaf to this little collection tells us that it is a work of fiction. That's possibly misleading. I am not sure whether it is "fiction" in the sense that Ahronglong made it all up, or whether it is as the blurb goes on to say recollections, folklore and autobiographical stories. It feels like the latter. It feels like the stories he tells about his experiences as a child, as an adolescent, as an adult are real and true. But memory is a fickle thing, and maybe poetic licence has taken over here and there and maybe calling it fiction means that its safer and therefore more people will read it. More people should. Full Review

16 JULY

Review of Dark Waters by G R Halliday Crime Twenty-two-year-old Annabelle Whittaker made her second mistake when she opted to drive down the private road in Glen Turrit. It was a long road through some breath-taking scenery and she could push the car to its limits without fear of being caught speeding. When the blond child stepped out in front of her she instinctively jerked the steering wheel and hit a tree. When she came round after the accident she couldn't work out where she was, but it obviously wasn't a conventional hospital. She'd made her first mistake some time ago, although the realisation wouldn't be obvious to her for a long time. She'd made it when she chose to have her father buy her a pale blue BMW M4. Full Review

23 JULY

Review of The Turning Tide (Dandy Gilver) by Catriona McPherson Crime (Historical) Those who were with us at the end of A Step So Grave will remember that Donald was engaged to Mallory Dunnoch. They're now married and Mallory is having twins. When they arrive no one can doubt the charms of Lavinia Dahlia Cherry and her brother, Edward Hugh Lachlan Gilver. There are two drawbacks: they're noisy and they're staying with Dandy and Hugh. Dandy and her detective partner, Alec Osborne, had not taken up the chance to look into a problem at the Cramond ferry when it was offered to them twice before, but suddenly the possibility of being out of the house at Gilverton seems irresistible. Full Review

Review of Shed No Tears by Caz Frear Crime In November 2012 Christopher Masters, the man who would become known as 'the roommate killer', strangled three women in a fortnight. When he was arrested he admitted the killings. A fourth death was attributed to him - that of Holly Kemp - and on occasions, Masters admitted to the killing, then he denied it - then admitted it, then denied it. He played with the police, but there was sufficient evidence on the first three killings to put him away for a long time and the CPS were not convinced about the Holly Kemp case. There was no body and once Masters was murdered in prison, no hope of progressing the case further. Full Review

6 AUGUST

Review of Invisible Girl by Lisa Jewell Thrillers When you wear a hood, you're invisible. Saffyre Maddox is seventeen-years-old and beautiful. By her own admission, she's a bit of a boffin, doing and enjoying maths, physics and biology at A level. Life hasn't been easy for her: most people who have been close to her have died and she's now living with her Uncle Aaron in an eighth-floor flat. Something really, really bad happened to her when she was ten and she self-harmed for a long time. Aaron organised psychological help and for three years Roan Fours was her therapist. He gently unpeeled the layers of her psyche, but somehow managed to miss that 'something really, really bad'. When the therapy ended Saffyre felt cast adrift, but she retained an interest in Roan. Full Review

Review of Every Little Piece of My Heart by Non Pratt Teens Freya was a beautiful, popular and complex girl, loved by many and seemingly stable in her existence as a queen bee 16-year-old student, complete with best friend and the promise of the end of GCSEs just months away. But one day, on January 1st, she just... left. No explanation. No warning. No goodbye. No one heard from her since. A once active social profile left deserted. So, when her best friend Sophie receives a mysterious parcel from her 5 months after, she expects it to contain answers of some kind, but is surprised to find the parcel contains another layer addressed to a complete stranger, and then another layer to another person and another, each containing an item unique to them and Freya, connecting 4 strangers through her mystery and the promise of 'treasure' at the end of it all. With each parcel, a new layer of the story and of Freya is unwrapped - and painful truths come to light that threaten to break bonds, both new and old. Can what's been broken be fixed? And why did Freya leave? Full Review

20 AUGUST

Review of Love Frankie by Jacqueline Wilson Teens Frankie is nearly fourteen. Being nearly fourteen is not easy when your mum has been diagnosed with MS when your dad has decided to leave her for another woman, when your older sister has turned into the girliest girl who ever lived, and, above all when Sally and her mates are bullying you at school. Oh, and when Sam, your best friend since forever, suddenly starts sending out signs that he might fancy you - and you don't fancy him back. Poor Frankie! Full Review

Review of The Doors of Eden by Adrian Tchaikovsky Science Fiction Wow – this novel is gigantic, in every sense of the word. "Epic" is a word that's thrown around a lot these days, but if a book ever earned the name it's this one. It's a doorstopper full of big ideas, and at times it almost felt too big for my brain. Full Review

27 AUGUST

Review of Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know by Samira Ahmed Teens In the end, we all become stories Spending the summer in Paris sounds like a dream for most people, especially art-lovers, but Khayyam can't relax and stop thinking about the mess she left behind in Chicago. On a chance encounter with a descendant of Alexandre Dumas, Khayyam finds herself on a historical journey with him to unveil the truth about the 19th century Muslim woman who may have crossed paths with Alendre Dumas, Eugene Delacroix and Lord Byron. As the two teenagers travel the city they not only discover themselves, but uncover the true story of the woman and why it was one that should never have been forgotten. Full Review

3 SEPTEMBER

Review of Voyage of the Sparrowhawk by Natasha Farrant Confident Readers Set in England in the aftermath of World War One, this is the story of two children, Lotti and Ben, who have lost everyone they love, but don't want to let go of their last, tiny glimpses of hope. Ben is living on a narrowboat on the canal, lying to the police about his brother's imminent return from the battlefields to take care of him. Lotti, meanwhile, has been expelled from school and is back at home; it's a beautiful house that belongs to her but that her terrible Aunt and Uncle currently have guardianship for. The day Lotti meets Ben (the day she steals a dog!) is the beginning of a deep, and powerful friendship. It sees them become each other's family, and undertake a perilous trip to France, in the boat, to try to find out the truth of the people they both love. Full Review

8 SEPTEMBER

Review of She Lies Close by Sharon Doering Thrillers Ava Boone was five years old when she went missing, around 6 months ago. There has been no sign of her since, and no arrests have been made. And yet, this book is not about Ava. Not really. This book is about Grace, who has just discovered her neighbour in her new house is a suspect in Ava's disappearance. As a single mother to two young children, she's really wishing this sort of information had come to light before they moved in. Full Review

10 SEPTEMBER

Review of The Bone Shard Daughter (The Drowning Empire) by Andrea Stewart Fantasy I could never be what he wanted if I did not take what I wanted In an empire controlled by a bone shard magic that powers animal-like constructs, an heir to the throne, a smuggler, and a warrior will fight to find their place in the world. Lin is the emperor's forgotten daughter, kept locked away in a palace of secrets and closed doors. When her father refuses to recognise her as heir to the throne, she vows to show him she is capable of reviving a dying empire and in secret, she begins to unlock one door after another, searching for the mysteries of her past and the forbidden art of bone shard magic. Yet Lin is playing a deadly game and her quest for power will come at great cost. With revolution in the air and creeping closer and closer to the gates of the palace, Lin must decide just how far she will to go to become a catalyst of change and save her people. Full Review

1 OCTOBER

Review of The Time Traveller and the Tiger by Tania Unsworth Confident Readers Elsie is an ordinary sort of girl. The sort of small girl who often gets overlooked, and forgotten. She is quiet, and compliant, and makes the best of whatever happens to her. So when her parents forget that her school holidays have started before they are free to take care of her, they have to arrange for her to go and stay with her Great Uncle for a week. Poor Elsie, forgotten again, just decides to make the best of things. On investigating the house she finds that her Great Uncle had lived in India as a boy, and he has an enormous tiger rug on the floor of one of the rooms. When Elsie asks him about the rug he seems unhappy, and he says he has to keep it because he was the one who shot the tiger when he was 12 years old, and he says it was the worst thing he ever did. So when Elsie suddenly finds herself magically transported back many, many years, to the time in India when her Great Uncle was 12 years old, she believes that she must try to stop him from killing the tiger, in order to put something right that happened a long time ago. Full Review

19 AUGUST 2021

Review of End of Summer by Anders de la Motte Crime In the summer of 1983, little Billy Nilsson goes missing. He was chasing a rabbit, through the garden, and into the maize field behind. He has not been seen since. In the present day, Veronica Lindh is a grief counsellor running group therapy sessions for the bereaved – although she clearly has problems of her own: anxiety, panic attacks, a scar on her arm that she keeps obsessively hidden and she is barely hanging on to her job. It's clear that she has just returned to work after an episode that seems to have resulted in restraining orders against her, a deal of therapy, a change of location and her supervisor is watching closely. As well, he needs to. Full Review