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===[[A Danger to Herself and Others American Royals by Alyssa SheinmelKatharine McGee]]===
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]], [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]]
''They needed someone to blameTwo and a half centuries ago, America won the Revolutionary War and I General George Washington was offered the only available scapegoatcrown. Their daughter was my best friend. Playing Today, the scapegoat was House of Washington still sit on the least I could do under the circumstancesthrown with Princess Beatrice next in line.Beatrice'' Seventeen year old Hannah Gold was born mature – or so her parents tell s whole life has been building up to her. She has dined in fancy restaurants, explored ruling the most sophisticated corners of United States and the globe and lived a life of luxurytime for her reign is imminent. [[A Danger to Herself and Others American Royals by Alyssa SheinmelKatharine McGee|Full Review]]
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===[[Train Man by Andrew Mulligan]]===
[[image:2.5star.jpg| stylelink="vertical-alignCategory:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[: top; text-alignCategory: left;"General Fiction|===General Fiction]], [[Louis and Louise by Julie Cohen:Category:Literary Fiction|Literary Fiction]]===
I came to this book thinking I knew just what to expect, even though it is [[image:5starCategory:Andy Mulligan|the author's]] debut in the adult novel market (hence the more mature name – he used to be an Andy).jpg|link= I thought it simple to sum up, the tale of a middle-aged man who knows too much about train travel having his life turned around in the most pleasant way. I hadn't opened it when I'd shelved it alongside [[:Category:{{{rating}}} Star ReviewsChris Cleave|Chris Cleave]] , and [[:Category:General FictionDavid Nicholls|General FictionDavid Nicholls]]. I expected some whimsy, some warmth and some affirmative loveliness.
What would you be like, right now, if you'd been born a different gender? Would it simply be a matter of genetics, and your life would still have unfolded in the same way? Or would the way you had been raised affect who you became in life? This latest novel by Julie Cohen looks at all of the above, covering the stories of Louis and Louise, born on the same day, to the same parents, but in one storyline Lou is a boy, and in the other a girl. Does it really make a difference, the gender box that is ticked when we arrive in this world? We all know that men and women are treated differently, but this story really highlights how things have been in the past, how they still are, and prompts you to think about how they could be..More fool me. [[Louis and Louise Train Man by Julie CohenAndrew Mulligan|Full Review]]
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===[[M for Mammy The Girl at the Window by Eleanor O'ReillyRowan Coleman]]===
[[image:4star5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]], [[:Category:Paranormal|Paranormal]]
The Augustts are, like all familiesTrudy Heaton is going home, to a house where her roots burrow back through the centuries and to a bit complicatedmother she hasn't spoken to for sixteen years. A loving irish family Home, her refuge, their love binds them together – but all express that in very different ways. HoweverPonden Hall, when misfortune strikes the family they are forced where she can heal herself and try to work together in order come to understand each other again, as terms with a family as complicated as the Augustts it's not always what is spoken that makes the most sensetraumatic loss of her husband. Things are shaken up further when Granny Mae-Anne moves in She needs to build bridges with her mother and takes chargeconvince her grieving son that his father is dead. Full Where better than the house full of stern words light and common senseshadow, she's a force of nature who must try that nurtured her throughout her hardest to hold the family together. childhood? [[M for Mammy The Girl at the Window by Eleanor O'ReillyRowan Coleman|Full Review]]
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===[[Queenie Malone's Paradise Hotel We Are Not Okay by Ruth HoganNatalia Gomes]]===
[[image:5star4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General FictionTeens|General FictionTeens]], [[:Category:HumourGeneral Fiction|Humour]], [[:Category:Paranormal|ParanormalGeneral Fiction]]
Tilda returns to BrightonSet in a typical American town, to tidy away ''We Are Not Okay'' tells the remains story of her motherfour teenage girls facing the difficulties brought on by high school and growing up as a girl in today's life after her deathsociety. Whilst thereThe novel is told from four different perspectives, those of Lucy, she returns to the Paradise hotelUlana, a haven for eccentrics Trina and misfitsSophia, whose friendship statuses vary from BFFs to sworn enemies. A place where people can be themselvesThe reader is presented with a glimpse into each of their lives, but more importantly their minds, and let go at times the thoughts of thoughts that torment them elsewherethose characters could have been taken directly from my own. Little wonder Gomes has created a heartbreakingly real and relevant novel that Tilda cannot forgive her mother for banishing her as a childfocuses on prominent topic areas which are becoming ingrained in our society, from this place of wonderparticularly in relation to the ''Me Too Movement''. With ''We Are Not Okay'' reminds the help reader of Queenie Malone, caring, and gregarious, Tilda begins to pick apart the tricky and uncertain relationship she had with her sometimes cruel and distant motherimportance of phrases like ''I'm With Her''. [[Queenie Malone's Paradise Hotel We Are Not Okay by Ruth HoganNatalia Gomes|Full Review]]
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===[[Keep Walking Rhona Beech by Kate Tough]]===
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link===Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]], [[The Man Who Came to London by A S Cookson:Category:Women's Fiction|Women's Fiction]]===
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]] ''In 1948, the first set of Caribbean nationals arrived in Great Britain on Life has just hidden behind a corner and stuck a ship called "Empire Windrush". They struggled to find housing. They worked foot out as labourersRhona Beech came past. They faced open discrimination, forcing them She and Mark had been together for nine years and it was beginning to quickly form their own community. Decades later, Freddy makes the same journey.feel '' settled''Does . Then Mark announced that he find 'd got a place job in Canada and he was going whether Rhona wanted to live? Does he face stereotypes? Has Britain moved forward?come with him or not. The ''not'' Freddie arrives in London in bit of the early 2000s, answering sentence was the call for teachersway it worked out and Rhona was left on her own. He thinks about his Well, she wasn't completely on her own Jamaican education: she had friends and family, based on but it's not the British systemsame as having that special someone in your life, that someone who makes you part of a couple. So Rhona had to start again, and rejoining a world that bore little resemblance to the way he was taught English nursery rhymes one she'd left nine years ago - and about the River Thames. He thinks about there's a lot of difference between being in the love middle of cricket your twenties and football, shared by both countries. And he thinks of the generations middle of the diaspora who came before himyour thirties. Freddy does well in his job in East London but he does have to face down some stereotypical attitudes from his pupils - all Jamaicans smoke weed, don't they? Everybody knows that! [[The Man Who Came to London Keep Walking Rhona Beech by A S CooksonKate Tough|Full Review]]
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===[[Liberation Square Equator by Gareth RubinAntonin Varenne and Sam Taylor (translator)]]===
[[image:3.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:ThrillersHistorical Fiction|ThrillersHistorical Fiction]], [[:Category:Historical Literary Fiction|Historical Literary Fiction]], [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]]
In an alternate 1952, Soviet Troops control British StreetsIt strikes me that nobody can speak well of the Wild West outside the walls of a theme park. After D-Day goes horribly wrong Our agent to see how bad it was here is Pete Ferguson, Britain is first occupied by Nazi Germany – only to be rescued by Russian soldiers from who bristles at the Eastindignity of white man against Native 'Indian', who spends days being physically sick while indulging in a buffalo hunt, and who hates the way man – and Americans from woman, of course – can turn against fellow man at the westbat of an eyelid. Dividing But this book is about so much more than the nation between them1870s USA, London soon finds itself split in twoand the attendant problems with gold rushes, a wall running through it like a scarpioneer spirits and racial genocide. When Jane Cawson He finds himself trying to find this book's husband is arrested for version of Utopia, namely the murder of his former wifeEquator, Jane where everything is determined to clear his name. In doing soupside down, Jane follows a trail of corruption that leads her right people walk on their heads with rocks in their pockets to keep them on the highest levels of ground to counter the state anti-gravity, and where, who knows, things might actually be better. But that equator is a long way away – and soon finds herself desperate to stay one step ahead there's a whole adventure full of the murderous secret police… Mexico and Latin America between him and it… [[Liberation Square Equator by Gareth RubinAntonin Varenne and Sam Taylor (translator)|Full Review]]
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===[[When You Read This Needlemouse by Mary AdkinsJane O'Connor]]===
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]], [[:Category:Women's Fiction|Women's Fiction]]
Smith Simonyi We first meet Sylvia Penton on her birthday and Iris Massey worked together for four yearsher boss, the Prof, during which time Iris left is taking her husband at the altar on their wedding dayout to lunch. Smith, meanwhile, relied on IrisThis is her favourite day of the year, but his attention was on making enough money to cover his mothernot because it's nursing home fees in Wisconsin, running her birthday but because of the branding agency in New York and losing money gambling when special time she gets to spend with the pressures got too much for himman she loves. He was devastated when Iris developed a terminal cancer 's told her that he and died at his wife are going to divorce - Martha is apparently having an affair - and Sylvia is convinced that the age of thirty threeProf will then declare his love and they can be together. He was surprised too when he discovered that Iris had been writing a blog She hasn't fully constructed 'together' in the last six months of her life and own mind - she envisages it as romantic, but her final request imagination hasn't yet progressed to the sexual part of Smith is that he gets the blog published as a bookrelationship. There's time though - she's only been the prof's PA for fifteen years. [[When You Read This Needlemouse by Mary AdkinsJane O'Connor|Full Review]]
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===[[Vera Magpie Vintage 1954 by Laura SolomonAntoine Laurain, Jane Aitken (translator) and Emily Boyce (translator)]]===
[[image:4star4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]] ''I have murdered three husbands.''
As Vintage 1954 starts by thrusting several completely different characters upon us, before deciding to run with them and formulate a plot. So we have an opening line that must take some beatingAmerican biker, just landing in Paris but Vera's telling us unfortunately not with the wife who shared his dream of visiting the truthcity together. The first two husbands, Gary and Harry were abusiveWe have a goth girl who everyone recognises from an American crime show, but Larry was actually is a treasure, humble restorer of antiques. We have a keepercocktail barman, and it's difficult to understand why Vera would infatuated with the goth girl. We also have killed him, particularly when she was likely a man ruling the roost over a whole suite of individual apartments fabricated from the Haussmann-era mansion his family once owned. Finally something conspires to get found out very quickly them together, and now she's in prison with drinking from the same bottle of a mandatory life sentencerare 1954 red wine. Her only friend is ShirleyOnly, one of them has a lesbianbizarre incidence in his family history that also features the same plonk – where a grandfather imbibed, but Vera's not and walked out the door one rainy morning, never to let herself be a victimseen again. She's not keen on having a sexual relationship with Shirley (she wouldn't risk the security But of her life in prison for the sake of a fling)course nobody will be doing any disappearing now, but she is keen on getting an education and she's studying for a degree in English Literature. though – will they? [[Vera Magpie Vintage 1954 by Laura SolomonAntoine Laurain, Jane Aitken (translator) and Emily Boyce (translator)|Full Review]]
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===[[Black Light The Van Apfel Girls are Gone by Laura SolomonFelicity McLean]]===
[[image:3.5star4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]], [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]]
Jim is a university student When Tikka Molloy was eleven andone-sixth years old, as the saying goesVan Apfel sisters disappeared. In the long hot summer of 1992, he hasn't got his troubles to seek. His father committed suicide when he was young and somehow hein an isolated suburb of Australia surrounded by Bushland, the girls vanished during the school's never really managed to connect with his step-fatherShowstopper concert at the riverside amphitheatre. His younger brother would be kindly described as having learning difficulties: if you were being honest you'd just say that he was very difficult, but Jim does his best with and Did they run away? Were they taken? While the search for him. Jim's in love with a woman, but she finds him repulsive and you can understand why: the lookssisters united the small community, the attitudethey were never found. Returning home years later, the (lack Tikka must make sense of that strange moment in time – of) conversational ability and the clothing all leave a lot to be desired. Despite all summer that's he's not about to sit back and allow his life to drift: he's actually writing ''two'' novels shaped her, and he reads excerpts from these to his friends in the pubgirls she never forgot. [[Black Light The Van Apfel Girls are Gone by Laura SolomonFelicity McLean|Full Review]]
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===[[Redemptor Domus The Department of Sensitive Crimes by Gamelyn ChaseAlexander McCall Smith]]===
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]]
A young boy arrives Long-time followers of The Bookbag will know I'm a die-hard fan of AMS. So you can imagine my excitement at an exclusive faith school on reading a brand new book in a brand new series, described by the scenic North Wales coastauthor himself as Scandi Blanc (as opposed to Scandi Noir)! Here we meet a new detective named Ulf Varg, sent far from his family who works in the Far EastDepartment for Sensitive Crimes, solving those crimes that perhaps fall outside the usual police parameters. As This particular book deals with crimes including someone who is stabbed in the boy travels to knee, the schooldisappearance of an imaginary boyfriend, and a family tragedy causes case of potential werewolves. They're the boy crimes that perhaps nobody else would bother to arrive at the school a vulnerable orphandeal with, with an uncertain future. Plunged into a school full of danger and betrayalI rather enjoyed them, especially the boy is seen as a trophy by friends and enemies alike. With them locked into their scheming and plottingstabbing where you find that actually, it comes to you identify with the boy to attempt to clean up person who committed the pit of filth that crime, rather than the school has becomevictim. [[Redemptor Domus The Department of Sensitive Crimes by Gamelyn ChaseAlexander McCall Smith|Full Review]]
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===[[The Long Path To Wisdom by Jan-Philipp Sendker]]===
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] ==[[:Category:Short Stories|Short Stories]], [[:Category:General Fiction|General FictionThe Things That are Lost by Alan Kennedy]]===
On my travels around the world, I have a tendency to end up in any bookshop that is selling English-language books, and while I buy as many second-hand escapist tales as the next person, what I'm really looking for is the 'local' – the cookbook maybe, the maps definitely, but above all[[image: the folk tales. If I ever get to Burma, I won't need to hunt, I can read before I go4star. jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[The Long Path To Wisdom by Jan-Philipp Sendker:Category:General Fiction|Full ReviewGeneral Fiction]]
The final novel in Alan Kennedy's WW2 trilogy sees Captain Alex Vere taken off active duty and banished to Scotland, providing trade craft spy training. It's stifling and suffocating and feels as much like a prison to Alex as anything the Germans would provide. And where is Justine? Alex hasn't seen her since he went to ''that'' disastrous meeting with John Cabot, instigator of the disinformation campaign, and returned to find her missing. A failed mission is one thing but no Justine is quite another. Alex can't get Justine out of his head. Has she left the service? Does she know too much? Is she even still alive? [[The Things That are Lost by Alan Kennedy|Full Review]] <!-- Szabo Schienmel -->
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===[[Katalin Street A Danger to Herself and Others by Magda SzaboAlyssa Sheinmel]]===
[[image:5star4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]], [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]]
This is a story about ''They needed someone to blame, and I was the pastonly available scapegoat. A specific past, certainly, in Their daughter was my best friend. Playing the form of pre-war Budapest, but also a story about how that past can impact on scapegoat was the present and least I could do under the futurecircumstances. In this book'' Seventeen year old Hannah Gold was born mature – or so her parents tell her. She has dined in fancy restaurants, explored the first most sophisticated corners of three Magda Szabó wrote on the same theme between 1969 and 1987 and now newly translated globe and reissued, we witness lived a heart-rending nostalgia for happier days, guilt about those who did not survive, and a dogged but doomed determination to cling to long-gone times, feelings and experiences which mark the here and now, staining and warping it into another, subtler miserylife of luxury. [[Katalin Street A Danger to Herself and Others by Magda SzaboAlyssa Sheinmel|Full Review]]
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===[[Louis and Louise by Julie Cohen]]===
[[image:5star.jpg|link===Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[Santa Goes on Strike by Jem Vanston:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]]===
[[image:4starWhat would you be like, right now, if you'd been born a different gender? Would it simply be a matter of genetics, and your life would still have unfolded in the same way? Or would the way you had been raised affect who you became in life? This latest novel by Julie Cohen looks at all of the above, covering the stories of Louis and Louise, born on the same day, to the same parents, but in one storyline Lou is a boy, and in the other a girl. Does it really make a difference, the gender box that is ticked when we arrive in this world? We all know that men and women are treated differently, but this story really highlights how things have been in the past, how they still are, and prompts you to think about how they could be...jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:For SharingLouis and Louise by Julie Cohen|For SharingFull Review]]
 Something's gone horribly wrong. It's Christmas Eve and everything is very busy in Santa's grotto. The presents are all ready and waiting to be loaded onto the sleigh and the reindeer are itching to get going. But Santa? Santa is just not in the mood. He is tired of delivering the latest toys to children who only play with them for five minutes. He wishes people would remember what Christmas is really about - a time for families to come together for love and friendship and goodwill to one another. [[Santa Goes on Strike by Jem Vanston|Full Review]]<!-- Mandeville O'Reilly -->
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===[[Every Colour of You M for Mammy by Amelia MandevilleEleanor O'Reilly]]===
[[image:4.5star4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]]
Zoe believes The Augustts are, like all families, a bit complicated. A loving irish family, their love binds them together – but all express that in adding life very different ways. However, when misfortune strikes the family they are forced to years as well as years work together in order to life. Her worldunderstand each other again, like her name, is bursting as with life and colour. She is a family as complicated as the sort of girl who would sing a rainbow is she could. Tristan (or Augustts it''Tree'' as she calls him) s not always what is spoken that makes the oppositemost sense. Things are shaken up further when Granny Mae-Anne moves in and takes charge. Fresh out Full of hospital following a prolonged stay in a psychiatric unitstern words and common sense, he sees she's a world as a grey placeforce of nature who must try her hardest to hold the family together. [[Every Colour of You M for Mammy by Amelia MandevilleEleanor O'Reilly|Full Review]]
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===[[A Spark of Light Queenie Malone's Paradise Hotel by Jodi PicoultRuth Hogan]]===
[[image:4star5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]], [[:Category:Humour|Humour]], [[:Category:Paranormal|Paranormal]]
The Center is Tilda returns to Brighton, to tidy away the last remaining abortion clinic in the state remains of Mississippi and is the source of great controversy when it comes her mother's life after her death. Whilst there, she returns to the Pro-Life versus Pro-Choice debateParadise hotel, a haven for eccentrics and misfits. It is at The Center A place where one manpeople can be themselves, George Goddard, takes it upon himself to get revenge and let go of thoughts that torment them elsewhere. Little wonder that Tilda cannot forgive her mother for the loss of his grandchildbanishing her as a child, in the form from this place of a mass-shootingwonder. What arises is a novel that details With the lives help of the remaining hostagesQueenie Malone, as well as other characters central to the story. One of these characters is Hugh McElroycaring, a hostage negotiator called in to help deflate the situation, who soon discovers that his sister and daughter, Wrengregarious, happened Tilda begins to be at pick apart the clinic that daytricky and uncertain relationship she had with her sometimes cruel and distant mother. [[A Spark of Light Queenie Malone's Paradise Hotel by Jodi PicoultRuth Hogan|Full Review]]
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===[[Jess Castle and the Eyeballs of Death by M B Vincent]]===
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] ==[[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]], [[:Category:Crime|CrimeThe Man Who Came to London by A S Cookson]]===
Dr Jess Castle, the self proclaimed failure of the prestigious Castle family has returned home to the sleepy, idyllic chocolate box town of Castle Kidbury. Rather than being delighted, her family are suspicious, especially her father, the judge. Luckily for Jess, she doesn't have to try too hard to dodge her family's suspicions as a series of gruesome local murders are taking place and that's all anyone is talking about. Jess accidentally finds herself in the thick of the investigation, and to her delight finds that she can actually be useful. But with the small population dwindling and the sense of danger moving ever closer to home, has Jess made a grave mistake getting involved? [[Jess Castle and the Eyeballs of Death by M B Vincent|Full Review]]<!-- Stone -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:17890149214star.jpg|link=httpCategory:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1789014921/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21General Fiction|General Fiction]]
''In 1948, the first set of Caribbean nationals arrived in Great Britain on a ship called "Empire Windrush". They struggled to find housing. They worked as labourers. They faced open discrimination, forcing them to quickly form their own community. Decades later, Freddy makes the same journey.''
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===Freddie arrives in London in the early 2000s, answering the call for teachers. He thinks about his own Jamaican education, based on the British system, and the way he was taught English nursery rhymes and about the River Thames. He thinks about the love of cricket and football, shared by both countries. And he thinks of the generations of the diaspora who came before him. Freddy does well in his job in East London but he does have to face down some stereotypical attitudes from his pupils - all Jamaicans smoke weed, don't they? Everybody knows that! [[What's Left Unsaid The Man Who Came to London by Deborah StoneA S Cookson|Full Review]]===
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]]  Sasha has a lot on her plate. Husband Jeremy is distant and absent and the marriage needs work. Son Zac is entering a rebellious adolescent phase and it's hard to know how to redirect him. Mother Annie, an alcoholic, is beginning the journey into dementia and has never been an easy person at the best of times. Thank heavens for her lovely dog, Sebastian, and his unconditional love. [[What's Left Unsaid by Deborah Stone|Full Review]] <!-- Ellis Rubin -->
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===[[Liberation Square by Gareth Rubin]]===
[[image:5star.jpg|link===Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]], [[:Category:Historical Fiction|Historical Fiction]], [[The Place Where Love Should Be by Elizabeth Ellis:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]]===
[[image:4starIn an alternate 1952, Soviet Troops control British Streets. After D-Day goes horribly wrong, Britain is first occupied by Nazi Germany – only to be rescued by Russian soldiers from the East, and Americans from the west. Dividing the nation between them, London soon finds itself split in two, a wall running through it like a scar. When Jane Cawson's husband is arrested for the murder of his former wife, Jane is determined to clear his name.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] In doing so, Jane follows a trail of corruption that leads her right to the highest levels of the state – and soon finds herself desperate to stay one step ahead of the murderous secret police… [[:Category:General FictionLiberation Square by Gareth Rubin|General FictionFull Review]]
''Edward is six weeks old and I’ve had no sleep. I had thirty stitches in my perineum, the wounds still tug and itch. They had to do the stitches twice because the first lot became infected. The old-school midwife told me I wasn’t paying enough attention to personal hygiene. I must shower twice a day, or better still, take a salt bath. Do they really expect me to do that? Have they ever tried to shower when a baby is crying and you’re so tired you can barely stand and your partner is banging around downstairs because he’s late for work again?'' I think most women have felt like this shortly after having a baby. Many of them simply managed to put one foot in front of the other until things calmed down but some will have found it harder and developed post-natal depression[[The Place Where Love Should Be by Elizabeth Ellis|Full Review]] <!-- Bowden Mary Adkins -->
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===[[When You Read This by Mary Adkins]]===
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link===Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[The Amber Maze by Christopher Bowden:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]]===
[[image:4starSmith Simonyi and Iris Massey worked together for four years, during which time Iris left her husband at the altar on their wedding day. Smith, meanwhile, relied on Iris, but his attention was on making enough money to cover his mother's nursing home fees in Wisconsin, running the branding agency in New York and losing money gambling when the pressures got too much for him. He was devastated when Iris developed a terminal cancer and died at the age of thirty three. He was surprised too when he discovered that Iris had been writing a blog in the last six months of her life and her final request of Smith is that he gets the blog published as a book.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General FictionWhen You Read This by Mary Adkins|General FictionFull Review]]
Hugh Mullion goes away to Dorset for the weekend and, while waiting for his wife to arrive, finds a mysterious key down the back of an antique chair. The grubby and torn label to which is attached reads... [[The Amber Maze by Christopher Bowden|Full Review]] <!-- Hajaj Laura Solomon -->
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===[[The Water Thief Vera Magpie by Claire HajajLaura Solomon]]===
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]], [[:Category:Literary Fiction|Literary Fiction]]
Nick is in the middle of wedding preparations when he decides to leave his fiancée behind in London and take up a post in some un-named west African country providing engineering support for the building of a children's hospital'I have murdered three husbands. He has no idea what he is getting himself into. [[The Water Thief by Claire Hajaj|Full Review]]''
As an opening line that must take some beating, but Vera's telling us the truth. The first two husbands, Gary and Harry were abusive, but Larry was a treasure, a keeper, and it's difficult to understand why Vera would have killed him, particularly when she was likely to get found out very quickly and now she's in prison with a mandatory life sentence. Her only friend is Shirley, a lesbian, but Vera's not one to let herself be a victim. She's not keen on having a sexual relationship with Shirley (she wouldn't risk the security of her life in prison for the sake of a fling), but she is keen on getting an education and she's studying for a degree in English Literature. [[Vera Magpie by Laura Solomon|Full Review]] <!-- Melissa Leet Laura Solomon -->
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===[[Landslide Black Light by Melissa LeetLaura Solomon]]===
[[image:4star3.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]], [[:Category:Women's Fiction|Women's Fiction]]The area where Jill and Susie lived wasn't highly populated so it was fortunate that they became such good friends, despite the fact that Susie was a year older than Jill. Susie lived with her mother, an alcoholic, and Jill lived with ''her'' mother, who dedicated herself to her garden. Jill's father was Jay Tutle, the photographer, but he spent much of his time working away - often for months on end. In reality there was little difference between the two families: Mrs Smith's alcoholism caused serious illness whilst Susie was still young. Joy and tragedy would visit Jill's home. ''Landslide'' is the story of how what happened determined the course of Jill's life and how great tragedy can breed resilience and hope. [[Landslide by Melissa Leet|Full Review]]
Jim is a university student and, as the saying goes, he hasn't got his troubles to seek. His father committed suicide when he was young and somehow he's never really managed to connect with his step-father. His younger brother would be kindly described as having learning difficulties: if you were being honest you'd just say that he was very difficult, but Jim does his best with and for him. Jim's in love with a woman, but she finds him repulsive and you can understand why: the looks, the attitude, the (lack of) conversational ability and the clothing all leave a lot to be desired. Despite all that's he's not about to sit back and allow his life to drift: he's actually writing ''two'' novels and he reads excerpts from these to his friends in the pub. [[Black Light by Laura Solomon|Full Review]]  <!-- Wilson Chase -->
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===[[Aftershocks Redemptor Domus by A N WilsonGamelyn Chase]]===
[[image:3.5star4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Literary Fiction|Literary Fiction]], [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]]
In a country very much like New Zealand, but A young boy arrives at an exclusive faith school on the same time most avowedly notscenic North Wales coast, two women will find lovesent far from his family in the Far East. Strong love too, for our narrator will say that her first attraction for her partner was As the only thing boy travels to make sense of all those exaggerated songs she'd heard, and books and poems she'd read, and plays she'd acted in – works of art that had until then seemed sheer hyperbole. It was entirely unrequited love for quite some time, but it does burgeon, or so we're promised from the offschool, because of something quite drastic – a major earthquake very much like family tragedy causes the one that hit Christchurch, but boy to arrive at the same time most avowedly notschool a vulnerable orphan, with an uncertain future. This book then is the combined exploration Plunged into a school full of danger and betrayal, the lovers boy is seen as a trophy by friends and enemies alike. With them locked into their scheming and plotting, it comes to the story boy to attempt to clean up the pit of filth that the quakeschool has become. [[Aftershocks Redemptor Domus by A N WilsonGamelyn Chase|Full Review]]
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