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[[Category:General Fiction|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|General Fiction]]==General fiction==__NOTOC__{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Clancy MartinOnyi Nwabineli|title=How To SellAllow Me to Introduce Myself|rating=34.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Canada for stealing. This is a young boy so immoral that he pilfers his own Anuri spent her childhood on display to the world, thanks to her step-motherOphelia's wedding ring to pawn increasingly popular presence on social media, where she posted every step of Anuri's childhood for cash to keep a girl happysponsorships and influencer deals and, basically, monetary gain. After the girl turns out to be less interested Now Anuri is in him than he her twenties and she is in slowly trying to regain her confidence and to get herlife back, he follows his older brother Jim suing her step-mother to Texas, where he gets a job working with Jim in a jewellery storetake down the content about her. As he falls into a life of scams Anuri is battling alcoholism, drugsfailing to start her PhD, hookersundergoing therapy and secretly abusing people online and receiving money from them for doing so. Most importantly, gorgeous womenshe is desperately worried about her little sister, and an obsession with Jimwho is the new focus of Ophelia's girlfriend Lisaonline empire. Can she save her sister, it's clear that this coming of age story is a tragedy waiting to happen.and perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the same time?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099532182</amazonuk>0861546873
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Patrick Marrinan1529153298|title=Degrees The List of GuiltSuspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The Police broke into the apartment in Sandymount Village in Dublin It's 1979 and woke Yuri Komarova rather roughlyMargaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly... ) HeShe's not what'd s worrying Miv's family, though. Women have been drinking heavilydisappearing. Well, smoking dope and was difficult to arousethey've been murdered, but on the floor near his bed was the knife which he had apparently used to stab his mother to deathhave 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. He seemed Miv's upset because she's overheard that her father wants to have no memory of this but he spoke little English and had move the mental age of family 'Down South'. When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a twelve-year oldfrightening, foreign place, best avoided. An interpreter helped with For Miv, the questioning move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and when the case came she'll do anything to trial his defence relied on proving prevent that he had been sleep-walking at the time of the murder and had no intention of killing his mother. This is She's not worried about the most difficult defence to uphold and there was the added problem dangers or that Yuri seemed to have lied her Mum's stopped talking - to the police when he told them that his mother had very little money as some Russian icons were found in a strongbox and they were worth several million Eurosanyone.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709090749</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Katie Kitamura1035906708|title=The LongshotDiva|author=Daisy Goodwin|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Cal and his long-time trainer Riley travel down We tend to the town think of Tijuana Maria Callas as Greek, but she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, New York, in Mexico for a crucial rematch with the undefeated champion RiveraDecember 1923 and only moved to Athens when she was thirteen. Three years earlier Cal Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 'Callas's promising career had been derailed following a close yet devastating defeat at the hands of Rivera. After that defeat Cal carried on fighting but never reached the same heights as before. Now he finally gets the chance to face his nemesis once make it moremanageable in the States. The story takes place When she was back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the two days before the rematch as he Nazi occupation by a mother who mercilessly exploited her and Riley prepare made no secret of her preference for the biggest fight of his lifeher elder sister, a fight that could once again end in tragedyJackie.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847374999</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Laurie GrahamAlexander McCall Smith|title=At SeaThe Perfect Passion Company|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=I've already read Graham's 'The Future Homemakers of AmericaPerfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the online apps in providing a more personal, tailored service.' It was goodNess has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and look after the business, but not particularly memorable so I was keen as Ness is planning to take a trip to Canada to read this novelget away for a while. The reader Katie is introduced to two vastly differing opposites in the shape coming out of Mr a break up with a bad boyfriend, and Mrs Finchso jumps at the chance to come home to Edinburgh. WellAnd so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, Lady Enid (English) bringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and Professor Bernard (American) Finchthe Isabel Dalhousie novels, but with some new characters who quickly begin to be precisecharm. And we're transported straight away onto the decks of the liner 'Golden MemoriesKatie has no experience in running a business, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, and there' s always her very helpful (and Graham starts rather handsome) neighbour, William, to have her fun: with the language, the characters and the whole set-up.lend a hand…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1849162182</amazonuk>1846976596
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Laura BartonDean Koontz|title=Twenty-One LocksThe Bad Weather Friend|rating=4.5|genre=General FictionParanormal|summary=This debut novel's central character Benny is 20 year old sales girlhaving a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, Jeannieand his house gets trashed. She lives Oh, and someone has delivered a very humdrum life in a rather uglyreally weird, downdisturbing coffin-at-heel town in sized object to his home, and it's possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the north. thing that has trashed his house! And straight away Barton treats The thing is, Benny is the reader very last person to her lovely, descriptive prosedeserve all this bad luck. For example, when the reader He is given some detail about Jeannie's workplace at the perfume and cosmetics counter where .a nice person. A really nice person. 'So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the lipsticks delivery to his house is a new friend, a bad weather friend called Spike, who has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person... all lined up like chorus girls ...' BartonSpike is going to take care of Benny, and will certainly take care of Benny's writing style is very easy to readenemies, if he, Benny, very fluid and I found myself getting right Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into the story straight away - and caring about JeannieBenny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1849161747</amazonuk>1662500491
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Anne PeileKatherine Howe|title=Repeat It Today With TearsA True Account
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Repeat it Today Hannah Masury is living in Boston, having been sent to live with Tears follows the story of Susannaa family who run an inn, and being made to work there from a sixteen year old girl from young age. When she hears there is to be a broken hanging of some pirates in the town, she decides to go and loveless home who obsessively collects information watch. Enthralled and horrified in equal measure, Hannah finds herself embroiled in a young boy's death at the back hands of a notebook about the father she has never mettwo vicious pirates. When by chance she discovers She hides away, so that he still lives nearby they don't find and kill her too, and then to escape them completely she sets out deliberately runs away to find sea, dressing as a boy and joining the notorious Ned Low's pirate ship as a cabin boy. She soon finds herself in the thick of things when there is a mutiny on board, and seduce himfrom there we are caught up in her rip roaring tale of life on the ocean waves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846687462</amazonuk>0861547438
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Francine Prose1471180158|title=GoldengroveMaybe Tomorrow|author=Penny Parkes
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=On Jamie Matson works in an upper-class grocery store, for a man who's a hot day Nico and her older sister Margaret take control freak with all the subtlety of a boat out onto Mirror Lakehalf brick. Jamie's son, but only Nico returns after Margaret dives off the boat and doesnBo, 'has his problems't resurface. MargaretHe's sudden death tears through Nico asthmatic and her parentsthe more you read, the more you'll suspect that he' lives, and each mourn for her in their own ways on the autistic spectrum. Unable Sometimes Jamie needs to find take time off at short notice - she's a frequent flier in the help she needs from her parents, who are both consumed by their own grief local A&E and sometimes Bo's not fit enough to help Nico go to come school. Missed shifts or the need to terms with her loss, Nico turns be away on time to the vast array of books pick Bo up from school are occasions when Jamie can be controlled and put in Goldengrove, her father's bookshop, for answers, and soon embarks on a dangerous relationship with Margaret's boyfriend Aaron, the only person who seems wrong. It was going to come to understand her griefa head.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848870361</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Julie OrringerB0CKD1L5JL|title=The Invisible BridgeRadio Free Olympia|author=Jeffrey Dunn|rating=54
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=In a story that takes us from the elegance of Paris, through the streets of Budapest and on into the Hungarian countryside and the Ukraine this Petr is an epic tale, masterfully toldorphan. It is 1937 and Andras LeviRescued by the strange, a young Hungarian Jewish studentreclusive Bear, he is about to leave his brother Tibor to go brought up far from bustling cities and study architecture busy human society, in Paristhe forests of Washington's Olympic Peninsula. Andras' story unfolds first amongst the beautiful buildings of Paris, the theatres After Bear dies and the barsa brief sojourn in human company, as he struggles in his studies and falls in love armed with only a beautiful ballerina who has pirate radio transmitter, Petr goes on a terrible secret to hide. As the tragedy of World War 2 edges ever closer to Andras, journey through the book moves back to Hungaryforest, to broadcasting the little village where Andras and his brothers grew upstrange, to Budapest where his new family live wild and then on into the forced labour camps across Hungaryrarely heard voices he encounters. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670914584</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Maureen GibbonSarah Marsh|title=Thief|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=It’s summer, and school teacher Suzanne is renting a cabin by a lake. Spending her days reading and swimming, she also finds time to engage in some old fashioned letter writing with a stranger who responded to a personal ad she placed. He’s currently an inmate at the state penitentiary, but Suzanne’s not one to judge, and agrees to give their correspondence a shot. Then she finds out what he’s in for – and it’s not pretty. Breville is a convicted thief and rapist, and Suzanne herself was raped as a teenager, by a friend’s brother. That should be the end A Sign of it: any sensible person would cut off all communication and turn their back on the situation. But Suzanne is different and though she’s acknowledges that it might not be the healthiest of relationships, she maintains the back and forth with Breville.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848871821</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Guy Fraser|title=Avenging the DeadHer Own
|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=It's 1863 and the Superintendent covering the inner city area After a bout of Glasgow has his hands fullscarlet fever as a child, Ellen Lark loses her hearing. First off an alarming forgery scandal has just been discovered and no sooner has he drawn breath than oneSuddenly plunged into a world of silence, two and counting suspicious deaths occureverything about her life changes. InstinctivelyLiving in a time when the use of sign language was seen as something only savages do, I want Ellen is sent to say that it's all gooda school where she is taught to lip read, clean funbut physically restrained from signing. Because it isFrom here, she ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the deaf and using a system called Visible Speech. The language Fraser uses At the same time, Bell is very much of that era which lends the book a particular old-fashioned working on other inventions and rather tweeideas, charm. It's all over the book and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in spades. On almost every page. Let me give you just one endearing example of the flavour of the book 'None of Mrs Maitland's four regulars at her superior guest house for single gentlemen would even dream a complicated tangle of taking another's seat ..espionage.'|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0709090684</amazonuk>1035401614
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=B0BC3YTCMR
|title=Good Girls Die
|author=Ayura Ayira
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=''This story is not for everyone.''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Andrew Grant1472263936|title=Die Twice (David Trevellyan)The Figurine|author=Victoria Hislop|rating=45
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The title is very much at It was in 1968 that Helena McCloud made her first trip to Greece. She was alone: her mother, Greek by birth, had left the family home and in keeping with the thriller genre refused to return, but Mary and itHamish (Helena's both eye-catching and also has parents) felt that it would be a perfectly reasonable explanation which comes right at the very end of the storypity if Helena grew up without knowing her grandparents or understanding her Greek heritage. I must admit Her trip to thrillers generally not being my most favourite reading material. Some can the family apartment in up-market Kolonaki would be a bit flashy, a bit trashy eventhe first of several annual visits. But not this novel. Right from She grew to love her grandmother and the start I felt I family's maid, Dina, but was in for a goodwary - and frightened - of her grandfather, intelligent readretired general Stamatis Papagiannis. There were pointers He was proud of his close connections to this all over the placeJunta and expected his family to uphold his values but saw no reason to accommodate them. For starters, David Trevellyan has a nice line in witty humour. There are numerous snazzy oneHis prejudices included Helena's red hair and green eyes -liners. It all went down very wellinherited from her father's Scottish ancestors.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230747582</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jonathan LeeDean Koontz|title=Who Is Mr Satoshi?After Death|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The novel opens somewhere Michael Mace, Head of Security, at a top secret biological research facility, is among 55 people who die when a virus is released in a bio-hazard accident. Finding himself in a makeshift mortuary, covered in plastic, he has a sense that something very, very bad has happened to him – and only him – as he sits up and looks around at the Home Counties shrouded bodies of his dead friends and Rob Fossick is attending his mother's funeralformer colleagues. The event in itself As he recovers his senses, he realises that there is extremely distressing and also depressing for something different about him; factor in that hecan ''s become a bit of a recluse lately and I could feel the sheer loneliness creeping into Rob's very bones' everything. Lee describes the event as 'Zimmer frames, bifocals, trifocals, dark grey coats with yawning shoulders'Everything''. The apparatus of old ageMichael isn't ''Michael'' anymore.'|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0434020419</amazonuk>1662500467}} {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Hazel McHaffieB0BVDC2VWH|title=Remember RememberThe Grave Listeners|author=William Frank
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The story starts at the end village is isolated and works back in timepoor. This works extremely well as we see Doris Mannering, mother, grandmother and great-grandmother now living in a residential home. The decision to 'put motherIt' into s surrounded by a home was very, very difficult and had been put off time and time againWitching Forest. We come to realize that this was a heartAnd the villagers subsist largely by farming Uphegia plants - its bread-wrenching decisionlike fruit provides nutrition and its blossom provides herbal medicines. The daughter black wood of the forest provides heat and carerwarmth, Jessicaroofs on homes, and even gallows, will always be asking herself if she'd done the right thing, made the right decision for the right reasonsneeded. A veritable minefield. And here The fear of being buried alive is where many an ethical dilemma lies for many families existential superstition in realthe village and that is the reason Volushka, a drunken, self-life similar situationsindulgent, lazy lout of a man is tolerated.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906817294</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John NivenB0BYF82CXT|title=The AmateursSemi-Detached|author=Deborah Stone
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Gary Irvine only wants two things out of life. He'd like to have children 'Bill and he wants to reduce his golf handicap. Nothing extraordinary thereAmanda are living in a semi-detached house, you might think except for the fact that his wifestuck in a depressing rut of boredom and disappointment, Paulinewhen Terry and Fiona – glamorous, is planning to leave him for a self-made carpet millionaire successful and Gary is a dreadful golfer. His handicap is eighteen very much in love – but I'm not entirely certain how he got it down to that level move in the first place. His family doesn't give him much solace eithernext door. His brother Lee is Despite their different outlooks on life, the fringes of the local criminal underworld couples befriend each other and hasn't the wit life appears to keep himself out of trouble with Ranta Campbell, the local overlordimprove for both pairs. Ranta could be quite likeable if But all is not what it wasn't for his penchant seems, and their increasingly interconnected relationships are fated for a certain type of violence designed to keep the others in line rather than to teach the victim a lessontragedy.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099516667</amazonuk>''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Adam RossShalini Boland|title=Mr PeanutThe Silent Bride|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The main couple who tend to take centre stage here Alice and Seth are called David and Alice Pepina match made in heaven. They live a kind of comfortableHe is everything she has been searching for; handsome, accomplished, clever, middlefunny; total and utter husband-class life in busy and bustling Manhattanmaterial. After more than She is all he could possibly want in a decade of generally happy married life togetherwife; beautiful, successful, they want to take confident… and so the inevitable proposal is eagerly accepted by Alice and the next step wedding is planned and have a familyset. Easy When the much-anticipated day arrives, Alice is walked down the aisle by her father, beaming with pride and excitement as she surveys the congregation – their friends assembled to say but things don't quite work out according celebrate this joyful day and when Seth turns to plan. We are taken on various face his approaching bride, Alice'dark' journeys within their marriage. These are situations which most of us can identify with. Some of these situations are painfuls world implodes because she has absolutely no idea who the man at the altar is, stressful, unhappywho is waiting for her to become his wife.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0224087738</amazonuk>1662507089
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Nicholas Shakespeare1787636003|title=InheritanceThe Girls of Summer|author=Katie Bishop|rating=45
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Andy Larkham's life and career are going nowhere. He works for a small publishing house, Carpe Diem, It was the summer when Rachel Evans turned eighteen that specialises in publishing self-help books, his fiancée is about to dump him she and he has no money Caroline went backpacking around Greece and mountains of debtarrived on the island. And that Rachel wasn's before we begin to talk about his dysfunctional family. His only real role model t exactly innocent but she was the Montaigne, perhaps, naive, so when thirty-four-year-loving teacherold Alistair Wright started to take an interest in her, Stuart Furnivall, whose funeral he is late forshe was flattered rather than wary. But an unexpected inheritance of £17 million has It was quite a habit while before he made any sort of changing one's outlook on lifephysical approach to her and by that time she was obsessed by him. But while he trades self-help Alistair worked for help yourselfHenry Taylor, Andy also realises that he has inherited a mysterylooking after his interests on the island and in particular in the bar where all the girls either worked or partied.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846553156</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Cath StaincliffeAmanda Craig|title=The Kindest ThingThree Graces|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Imagine that your partner Few styles of contemporary fiction interest me like the state-of twenty or -the-nation novel. There's something so years discovers that they are dying from a terminal diseaseutterly compelling about any writer who can catch hold of the atmosphere of the day and capture it, crafting an image of the country as it stands in one particular moment. Now imagine To say that theyAmanda Craig is skilled at doing this would be embarrassingly inadequate: she've asked you to help them to die s practically synonymous with the genre of contemporary social fiction at this point. She has such a little sooner, on their own terms. What would you do? This is gift for weaving the ongoing issues of the day into the dilemma lives of her characters in a way that faced Deborah feels natural andlived-in, after she went ahead and helped her husband Neil to dienever making them ciphers for social commentary but instead fully realised people, she found herself charged and standing trial for murder grappling with her own teenage daughter, Sophie, testifying against herissues far larger than themselves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1849012083</amazonuk>140871468X
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Eliza Graham152915118X|title=JubileePineapple Street|author=Jenny Jackson
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=As ''Pineapple Street'' is the village celebrates the Queenstory of three women: Sasha, Darley and Georgiana. Darley and George are sisters and Sasha is married to their brother Cord. They're Stocktons, only Sasha isn's Golden Jubilee two people cant a Stockton by birth so she isn't help but think back to readily accepted into the Silver Jubileetribe. Evie Winter and her niece Rachel have vivid memories of the day when EvieThe problem's daughter Jessamy wandered off exacerbated when the clan matriarch, Tilda, asks Cord and Sasha if they'd like to move into the mystery of her disappearance has never been solvedPineapple Street property. She was eleven years oldTilda and Chip have renovated and downsized to another property, brighta street or so away, athletic and loved by her mother and cousinwhich they own. There would seem to be no explanation as to why she might have disappeared They won't need any of her own free will the furniture from Pineapple Street, so Sasha and no evidence that she was abductedCord can move straight in. Life has carried onNominally, they had a choice but it has not been that wasn't the samereality. It has not been easyDarley and Georgiana start to call Sasha 'the gold digger'. She's living in ''their'' family home. They use it so often that they abbreviate it to 'the GD'.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330509268</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Michael RobothamEmily Critchley|title=Bleed For MeOne Puzzling Afternoon
|rating=4
|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=An ex-detective 84 year old Edie has lived in the same small town for almost her whole life, but now she is found dead in facing a pool of blood in move as her son wants to move to another house and bring Edie to live with his teenager's bedroomfamily, as Edie is starting to lose her memory. She runs from However, Edie is tormented by the scene memory of her childhood friend, Lucy, who went missing over 60 years ago, and the worry that there was a secret she was keeping for Lucy that somehow might be the thing that reveals the crimetruth of what happened all that time ago. Is this the easiest cut-and-dried case ever? This novel is told After 'seeing' Lucy in the first person by high street, just as she was the investigating psychologistlast time she saw her, Professor Joe O'Loughlinshe starts to find pockets of memories coming back to her. He's got a lot going on in his life right now. His health And yet as she remembers the past, she is not good so he's to keep popping pills to try forgetting more and get through another working more in her day. He's also newly separated and his daughters seem to talk a completely different language. He feels old and very ragged round the edgesday life. Into this mix, he discovers that Will she uncover the teenager everyone is talking truth about, the teenager whoLucy's been discussed disappearance before her move, and described as a cold-blooded killer, is his daughter's best friend. Could his life get any worse, he thinks. Yes. Big-time.before her memories are gone forever?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1847442188</amazonuk>1804181250
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Madelaine Lucas
|title=Thirst for Salt
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary= ''Love, I'd read, was supposed to be a light and weightless feeling, but I had always longed for gravity''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Mario Puzo0008506337|title=Six Graves to MunichThe Garnett Girls|author=Georgina Moore|rating=45
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=In the dying days of the Second World War Michael RoganThe love affair between Margo Garnett and poet Richard O'Leary was all-consuming, an American Intelligence officer apparently on both sides. Margo was just sixteen when they fell in love. Richard was captured twenty-one and tortured described by Margo's mother as 'an older man'. Her parents worried that Richard's influence would take her away from what they felt she could achieve - going to Oxford and having a group of seven menglittering career. In the event, most they eloped and Richard took her away from the Isle of whom were senior Gestapo officers trying Wight. Margo did go to Oxford and went on to obtain the secrets which Rogan could give thembecome a well-respected journalist. The couple had three children: Rachel, Imogen and Sasha. His wife Life was lived in another room London and he could hear her screams. Ten years laterholidays were spent at Sandcove, when he had recovered from the appalling injuries he suffered he made up his mind that he would avenge family home on the death Isle of his wife at the hands of the seven menWight. ItEven then the doubts about Richard's drinking were never far from Margo's no easy task as he doesnmind: ''she would never be able to leave him in charge''t even know who they are.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184916276X</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Chioma Okereke1914585402|title=Bitter LeafDashboard Elvis is Dead|author=David F Ross|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Jericho, (whoI reviewed David F Ross's female by the way), is a beautiful young woman. Shebook [[There's curious about the outside world so like many before her, sheOnly One Danny Garvey by David F Ross|There's taken the brave step Only One Danny Garvey]] a couple of sampling life in years back and remember being absolutely floored by how powerful and affecting it was. It was a biggripping, emotionally wounding read, bustling city. She returns to her home village with some rather pretentious airs ... and a rich suitor in tow. By sheer coincidence Jericho's mother had attended an interview in her past at her daughter's new boyfriend's family home. A veritable mansion with ' ... sweeping rooms rereading my review of it my main takeaway was that took longer than a river to crossI might not have lavished enough praise on it.' What a lovely way of describingluxury in an essentially poor area of Africa. Everyone thinks the next natural step is marriage and babies but is it?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1844086275</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Keith ColquhounLucy Ashe|title=Five Deadly WordsClara and Olivia|rating=34.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Five Deadly Words follows The year is 1933. The place? Sadler's Wells. Ballerinas Clara and Olivia are sisters, twins no less. Identical on the story of charismatic former dictator Lucasoutside but not, we learn, on the inside. And not on stage, either. Because there's a lot that builds a dancer. Some things that can be taught or learnt – discipline, as he charms attention to detail – and some things, that ''collectsje ne sais quoi' people during his exile in London. The story is seen mostly ', that don't come from the point of view of Helen Berlinclassroom. A stage presence, the bright young Detective Constable who is put in charge of Lucasa charm, a ''joie de vivre'' safety. Helen finds herself caught up in matters which become increasingly out of her depth as she falls further into the former dictator's worldThe difference between a hard-worker, and a star.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1904529496</amazonuk>0861544080
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Don BoydHeather Fawcett|title=MargotEmily Wilde's Secrets|rating=5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Margot is a psychologist who specialises in sexual disorders and obsessions. She lives and works for herself in Barcelona amongst the ex-pat community, and although she only has a dozen or so clients at any one time, spends much of her week living at her office. Her clients, both male and female, are bewildering and fascinating in equal portions, and the description of the therapy sessions make fascinating and revealing reading.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0955405149</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Steven Carroll|title=The Art Encyclopaedia of the Engine DriverFaeries
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Carroll Emily Wilde is an expert academic scholar on faerie lore, and she has chosen a bygone era in the 1950s travelled extensively, and also a bygone but much treasured mode of transportresearched meticulously, whether itto write her life's Australia or work, the UKvery first encyclopaedia of faeries. Immediately I'm drawn in Whilst she is brilliant at research and speaking to the storyfaeries, she is not so good with people. Both So when she finds herself far, far North in the title small village of Hrafvsnik, having somehow offended the village matriarch, she is not sure what she has done, nor how to redeem herself and put her final investigations for her book's front cover are arresting and originalback on the right track. The novel centres on one evening in this suburban neighbourhood when Enter Wendell Bambleby, her dashingly handsome and insufferable rival who arrives unexpectedly, all its residents are invited charm and delight, much to a celebration partyEmily's frustration. Carroll see-saws back and forth as But why is he here? What does he shares the individual lives with us. want? It And what exactly is an engaging style.going on with the faerie folk around Hravsnik?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099537273</amazonuk>0356519120
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Patrick Woodhead1398515388|title=The Forbidden TempleBoy and the Dog|author=Seishu Hase and Alison Watts (translator)|rating=34.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=LucaFirst of all, it was the earthquake, deep in the ocean floor, a mountaineer trying to escape from his disappointingly unsupportive parents which created the tsunami and a past accidentthis, witnesses something strange in turn, caused the distancenuclear meltdown. The result was complete and utter devastation. The deaths were uncountable, while watching his climbing partner Bill put and the kibosh on loss of livelihoods was widespread. The fact that many pets were separated from their latest skyowners came far down the list of priorities but -bursting Himalayan ascent six months after the tsunami - Kazumasa Nakagaki discovered a mountain shaped like dog outside a perfect pyramid, circled by other peaks he's never seen beforeconvenience store. Back in England nobody else seems to have seen them either, He wasn't a dog person but colleagues mention mysterious Shangri-La style Buddhist sanctuaries - could this be the prime one, hidden from prying eyes for centuries? Nobody wants convenience store owner's comment that he would call Public Health prompted Kazumasa to declare it actually exists at all. Meanwhile, Himalayan natives are trying to pull open his car door and Tamon the wool over Chinese occupiers' eyes regarding a very sacred personagedog jumped in.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848090773</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Ken McClureChristopher Bowden|title=Dust to Dust (Steven Dunbar)Mr Magenta
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=John Motram Christopher Bowden's latest novel is a cell biologist. Hepatient untangling of a seemingly ordinary woman's life, carried out by her nephew after she has died. The aunt who always provided a promising safe harbour and well-though a little bit of academic and his pet subject is - Black Death. Intrigue is high on the agenda right from the beginning. Motram is invited indulgence to a meeting along with other high-fliers in their respective fields. This meeting is top secret. Motram is, however, mystified. The situation appears pretty straightforward, so why all this cloak-young nephew had had a much more interesting life than that nephew Stephen had ever realised and-dagger stuff, he wonders. And why has everyone it seems to refer him an obligation to the patient only as 'Patient X?'find it all out. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846971268</amazonuk>B0B6Z9VJDW
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Robert RyanJennifer Mason|title=Signal RedPartitions of Unity
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Ryan has certainly researched thoroughly for this novel - Here at Bookbag Towers, we first met Elizabeth Cromwell, dominatrix and it shows. Straight away the blurb on the back cover tells us there's an 'afterword' unintentional detective in [[Preposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery by Bruce ReynoldsJennifer Mason|Preposterous]], no less than the ringmaster/leader when she investigated and unravelled a series of the Great Train Robbery gangdisappearances. Notice how itIn 's always given capital letters. Even all these decades down the line, those readers 'Partitions of a certain age remember it and perhaps shake their head in amazement. And thereUnity's also a very useful 'aftermath' section as Ryan painstakingly , she sets out all the robbers' names and what's happened since that date in the summer of 1963her mind to solving a murder. Perhaps, like others, I also assumed the leader, the top man if you like, was Ronnie Biggs. No so, apparently. I also remember television footage of his release from prison on compassionate grounds only a year or so ago. The crime seems to have achieved almost mythical proportions - some would say it's up there with what were you doing when JFK was assassinated?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>075535818X</amazonuk>B09LQR9FRF
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|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Meet Katherine Kenton. A movie star of great renown, she's always on TV Five strangers come together in one moment as someone famous - or the wife of somebody who happens a suicide bomber prepares to be famous and male, whether they were actually ever wedded. She herself has had copious real-life marriages, making somebody out of detonate his vest on a nobody on many an instanceLondon tube line. Her shelves of 'best lifetime' awards are groaningAs their fates overlap, and their dusting is a job akin to painting the Forth bridge. The person who dusts them story is narrator for this booktold in backwards order, but she does more than that. She is everything leading up to "Miss Kathie" - general housekeeper, housemate, and string-pullerthe fateful moment. But what might those strings be being pulled for? When Katherine meets a new toyboy, and our narrator seems to get in the way, to what purpose might this be?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0224087150</amazonuk>1914585186}} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Caryl PhillipsJennifer Mason|title=In the Falling SnowPreposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=We are introduced to the central character Keith right away and discover lots about him. His personal and professional CV is laid bare before us. He's one mixed up'A struggling poetry zine, middlea mom-and-agedpop mobile diner in the Northern California redwoods, nota 400-quitemeter hurdler who just missed the 2004 Olympics, a women's track coach with a yen for bullwhips, a billionaire with a state-middleof-class man. He appears to be rather weakthe-willed and almost seems to fall into situationsart S&M dungeon, rather than choose to be part of them. When a man serving a life sentence in his marital relationship Alabama, an enigmatic signature, K(now s, x), on a downward spiral)cheap oil painting, his wife most definitely wore the trousersan erotic art dealer in Georgia.. I found Keith a very infuriating person. I wanted to take him by the scruff and give him a good old shake and then shout 'wake up and smell the coffee, before it's too late.'|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099539748</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Maggie O'FarrellB0B2N7MVYM|title=The Hand That First Held MineCalculations of Rational Men|author=Daniel Godfrey
|rating=5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Lexie Sinclair was sent down from university for It's the crime 10th of going through a door reserved for men. She could not graduate until she apologised and this she was not going to do. Home was not an option either but December 1962 when she met the sophisticated Innes Kent she made up her mind to go to London and make her way there. It was the nineteen fifties and Lexie and Innes made a life for themselves in Soho. In the present day Elina and Ted are struggling to recover from the difficult birth of their we first child. Elina is an artist and she’s finding it difficult to come to terms with being a mothermeet Dr Joseph Marr. Ted does his best to help but he is having to cope with disturbing visions and memories of his own childhood which don’t seem Just to agree with put what he’s been told by his parents. The further he lookshappens in context, the stranger are the links which he uncoversCuban missile crisis is still very fresh in people's minds.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>075530845X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Sue Peebles|title= The Death of Lomond Friel|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Rosie was a successful radio presenter when her father, Lomond Friel, world has barely had a strokechance to breathe out. Whether or But for Joe Marr, it's not Rosie was always reckless and impulsive isnthe missile crisis that't entirely clear, but once she heard about s at the stroke she took a break from work and began to build her life around making a future for herself and her father. There are two problems here: Rosie isn't really all that capable front of looking after herself, never his mind her father and Lomond is quietly plotting his own death. He might not be able to speak, to move very much, but he has plans.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701184302</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Najat El-Hachmi|title=The Last Patriarch|rating=3.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Najat El-Hachmi's debut novel, The Last Patriarch is a difficult book - both in terms been convicted of content and stylemurder. It's a story of physical and sexual abuse in a patriarchal Moroccan family, an immigrant story, when first the father and then With the family move to Catalonia, and ultimately a story current state of the narratormedical knowledge, the patriarchit's daughter, breaking free of her past as she takes on different cultural values. Narrated entirely from hard to think otherwise than that the perspective of the patriarch, Mimoun Driouchprosecution would never have been brought but Joe Marr has spent his first few days in HMP Queen's unnamed daughter, the story is also concerned with cultural and imagined historiesBench, and the importance of origin stories.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846687179</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Sarah Blake|title=The Postmistress|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=The reader is in no doubt that a war is ragingrelatively new prison. He'And bombs were falling on Coventry, London and Kent. Sleek metal pellets shaped like the blunt tipped ends of pencils ...' The Americans howevers just getting used to his roommate, are carrying on with their daily lives regardless. They are completely unfazed and uninvolved. Apart from one or twoMervyn, namely radio reporter Frankie. She reports from London as it happens and she is gradually becoming more and more concerned that her fellow Americans will be called upon. But she seems learning to be a lone voice blowing in wary of the wind. Also, as you may expect, there are plenty of raised eyebrows as to why a woman is doing a man's jobMcArthur brothers. She should be at the kitchen sink or having babies, shouldn't she?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670918687</amazonuk>
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