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<!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Alex NyeTananarive Due|title=For My SinsThe Reformatory

|summary=1586: Mary StuartGracetown, Queen of ScotsFlorida. June 1950. After a scuffle with a white boy, has time twelve year-old Robbie Stephens Jr is sentenced to look back over her past life six months at the Gracetown School for Boys, otherwise known as she sitsthe Reformatory. It's a place with a brutal and dark reputation. But the segregated reformatory is a chamber of horrors, incarcerated haunted by her second cousin Queen Elizabeth Ithe boys that have died there. MaryIn order to survive the school governor and his Funhouse, Robert must enlist the help of the school's life hasn't been one of totally pampered royaltyghosts – only they have their own motivations...|isbn=1803366532}} {{Frontpage|author=Katherine Howe|title=A True Account|rating=4. Growing up 5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Hannah Masury is living in FranceBoston, away from her motherhaving been sent to live with a family who run an inn, widowed and then returning being made to Scotland work there from a young age. When she hears there is to claim be a hanging of some pirates in the throne before town, she was even 19decides to go and watch. Enthralled and horrified in equal measure, her struggle with fate started earlyHannah finds herself embroiled in a young boy's death at the hands of two vicious pirates. The tensions between Mary the womanShe hides away, so that they don't find and kill her too, Mary the Catholic and Mary the political force continue through three marriagesthen to escape them completely she runs away to sea, an unsolved murder dressing as a boy and joining the thwarted desire to serve her peoplenotorious Ned Low's pirate ship as a cabin boy. Now it's come to this prison cell but while She soon finds herself in the thick of things when there's lifeis a mutiny on board, and from there's still hope…we are caught up in her rip roaring tale of life on the ocean waves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1905916787</amazonuk>0861547438

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Grace MacallisterSarah Marsh|title= The Magician's LieA Sign of Her Own|rating=43.5|genre= ThrillersGeneral Fiction|summary= The Amazing Arden is the most famous female illusionist After a bout of scarlet fever as a child, Ellen Lark loses her dayhearing. Suddenly plunged into a world of silence, renowned for everything about her notorious trick life changes. Living in a time when the use of sawing sign language was seen as something only savages do, Ellen is sent to a man in half on stage. But one night school where she swaps her trademark saw for an axe. When Arden's husband is found dead later that nighttaught to lip read, the answer seems clear, most of all to young policeman Virgil Holtbut physically restrained from signing. Captured and taken into custody From here, all seems set for Arden's swift confession. But she ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the deaf and using a different story to tellsystem called Visible Speech. Even handcuffed and alone At the same time, Arden Bell is far from powerlessworking on other inventions and ideas, and what she reveals is as unbelievable as it is spellbindingEllen finds herself unwittingly caught up in a complicated tangle of espionage.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1787199967</amazonuk>1035401614

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Helen DunmoreClaire North|title=Birdcage WalkHouse of Odysseus

|genre=Historical Literary Fiction|summary=Bristol 1792: Lizzie married well. John Diner Tredevant is a property developer who has reached ''What could matter more than love?'' The follow-up to the zenith of his lifeexcellent ''Ithaca''s work: building picks up a terrace of prestigious houses overlooking the Avon Gorgefew months after where we left off. In a time of turbulence as France reaches the dawn palace of revolutionOdysseus, Britainwith delicate care Queen Penelope continues to rule without her husband, including Diner, fears it may spreadwho sailed to war at Troy and then by divine intervention never returned home. This puts Lizzie in a difficult position since her mother and step-father both believe in propagating pamphlets and ideas of egalitarianism As ever she remains surrounded by suitors vying for and to all, including women. In other words, they think nothing of spreading ideas the throne of the sort that fanned Western Isles. Having survived – politically and physical – the French flames. However, chaotic storm thatClytemnestra brought to Ithaca's not Lizzie's only problem… there shores, Queen Penelope is on the brink of a darkness in her husband's past fragile peace. One that shatters however with the return of Orestes, King of which she's unawareMycenae, and his sister Elektra, seeking refuge.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0091959403</amazonuk>0356516075

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Beth UnderdownB0C7J9D21B|title=The Witchfinder's SisterA Captive in Algiers (Muhammed Amalfi Mysteries)|author=A J Lewis

|summary=England 1645: Matthew Hopkins When we first meet our hero, his name is good Ettore and he lives at his chosen career: seeking, testing and convicting those with the Devil in themThe House of Beautiful Swallows. His sisterIdyllic as this might sound, Alice, doesnit't realise the full connotations of his actions until, widowed s a bordello and pregnant, she returns homeEttore's mother died when he was born. Alice is grateful to be allowed to live under MatthewHe's roof not been short of mothers, though - but then watches for someone of his sinister finger background in late-eighteenth-century Amalfi, it's difficult to obtain decent employment. The stint working with the preparation of suspicion point in unexpected placesanchovies didn't work out and bastards are considered bad luck on fishing boats. This is Ettore was nothing if not resourceful - and determined - and it was not long before he had a successful business as a man changed from the boy that Alice used to knowguide for visitors. She never then realised that he'd be capable of killing hundreds of people and making her the Witchfinder's SisterHe was even saving some money.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241978033</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Emma HendersonEssie Fox|title= The Valentine HouseFascination|rating= 4|genre= Literary Historical Fiction|summary= In June 1914, Sir Anthony Valentine, The Victorian era is incredibly over-romanticised as a keen mountaineersetting for historical fiction (matched only, arrives with his family to spend the summer in their chaletperhaps, high in by the French AlpsSecond World War) which has often led to more than a few writers mishandling it. There, for 's such a glut of media set in the first time, fourteen-year-old foundling Mathilde starts work as one of era that the hallmarks we'uglies' - village girls employed as servants and picked, ve come to associate with it is believed, are familiar to ensure they don't catch Sir Anthony's roving eye. For Mathilde it is the start point of a life-long entanglement with les anglais - strangebeing cliched, exciting people, far removed from the hard grind of farminghackneyed even. Except she soon finds the Valentines are less carefree than they appear, with a curiously absent daughter no one talks about. It will All this is simply to illustrate that it would be decades - disrupted by war, accidents and a cruel betrayal - before Mathilde discovers the key an easy thing to the mysterydo poorly. And in 1976But despite that, the year Sir Anthonysomething about it still grabs me – and something about this book's great-great grandson comes to visit, she must decide whether to use itdescription did as well.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1444704028</amazonuk>1914585526

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Polly ClarkNicole Jarvis|title= Larchfield|rating= 5|genre= Literary Fiction |summary=I It's early summer when a young poet, Dora Fielding, moves to Helensburgh on the west coast of Scotland and her hopes are first challenged. Newly married, pregnant, she's excited by the prospect of a life that combines family and creativity. She thinks she knows what being a person, a wife, a mother, means. She is soon shown that she is wrong. As the battle begins for her very sense of self, Dora comes to find the realities of small town life suffocating, and, eventually, terrifying; until she finds a way to escape reality altogether. Another poet, she discovers, lived in Helensburgh once. Wystan H. Auden, brilliant and awkward at 24, with his first book of poetry published, should be embarking on success and society in London. Instead, in 1930, fleeing a broken engagement, he takes a teaching post at Larchfield School for boys where he is mocked for his Englishness and suspected - rightly - of homosexuality. Yet in this repressed limbo Wystan will fall A Portrait in love for the first time, even as he fights his deepest fears.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1786481928</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Dinah Jefferies|title=Before the RainsShadow

|summary=Eliza has tragically punctuated childhood memories ''I want all of India that have feed Florence to know my name'' Cast out from Rome, Artemisia Gentileschi arrives in Florence seeking an oasis in which her art can find a home and where her desire to returnfuture can thrive rather than stagnate. Therefore in 1930, following But as some as she enters Florentine society she faces great opposition from the death of her husbandpowerful Accademia, when the British government commission her to photograph scenes self-proclaimed guardians of Indian life, she jumps at the chance. What she doesn't realise is healing magics that not everyone she comes across is delighted with through paintings have the idea. Living within power to protect the Sultana's opulent palace complex is definitely an attraction for her, as is Jay, an Indian price who shows Eliza the real India. However, attractions are sometimes dangerous city and its citizens from plagues and even deadlycurses.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241287081</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Otto de Kat and Laura Watkinson (translator)|title=The Longest Night|rating=3.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Emma all-male Accademia has a philosophy – ''let the dead rest, hoarded power over art and love the living''. The problem with that, as a 96-year-old, is that there are too few living left, architecture for centuries and so while the love remains she will go through her memories, taking a woozy, diaphanous path through guard it above all the major events of her lifeelse. Starting in wartime Berlin with one husbandTo them, Artemisia – an ambitious young woman who gets snatched from her at work, fleeing to another place to wait for peace, promises trouble and wait for him in vain, moving to Holland and finding new love, and so on change – this wispy journey will show all the impacts of war, from rationing right up to exile, death has no place amongst them and survivaltheir society. The memories are coming strongly here and now, as Emma is waiting for at least one of her two sons to visit, and then she will die…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857056085</amazonuk>1803362340

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Adrian GoldsworthyThomas D Lee|title= Vindolanda|rating= 3.5|genre= Historical Fiction|summary= AD 98: in the northern fields of Britannia lies Vindolanda, a Roman auxiliary base situated on the edge of the Roman world. Far from the prosperity and decadence of Rome, the wild and untamed lands around Vindolanda are ripe with rebel tribes and druids set against the destruction of Rome and its armies. In the midst of this destruction is Flavius Ferox; a Briton and Roman Centurion who has been given the task of keeping the peace in this desolate edge of the world. But life in Roman Britain is full of danger and betrayal at every turn, and Ferox knows it will take more than courage to overcome what lies ahead.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784974684</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Jeroen Blokhuis and Asja Novak (translator)|title=The Yellow HousePerilous Times

|genre=Literary FictionFantasy|summary=If you were ''Hate is the needy kind, would you really join path of least resistance'' Set in the drummingnear-out of town of two people accused of murder purely because of their nationality? Would you get distant future, in a feeling world on the verge of belonging just because you were there when someone carried a dead dog down off a mountain? The main character climate collapse, Britain is in this novel doesgreat peril. But he has something that will really get him noted, well-thought-of, included. He has come The British Isles desperately needs a hero (or several) to save the south of France to set up an artists' collective, where he can live and work alongside his counterparts, who can inspire each other day and best each other to create wonderful artrescue what little remains. In fact a muchWhat no-respected guest is on his way now, so surely he can find kinship? The guest's name is, after all, Gauguinone expected was that one of the Knights of the Round Table would answer the call. The main character is, of course, Vincent van Gogh…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1907320563</amazonuk>0356518523

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Antonin Varenne and Sam Taylor (translator)G K Holloway|title=Retribution RoadIn the Shadows of Castles

|genre=Historical Fiction |summary=''Sergeant Bowman wasn't just a hard man, he was something else: a dangerous man.'' If, indeed, there was someone who was ideal for a suicide mission, it was him. Working as a soldier for We begin after the East India Company momentous battle in 1066 and on the rural, remote, outlaw hotbeds day of William of Asia in the 1850s, heNormandy's tasked with taking a boat coronation as King of unknown prospects up England. William's position is not secure and the Irrawaddy new king has many challenges. Imposing authority through a coronation is important. And William is right to try and combat local warlord Pagan Minworry. It doesn't go well – to start withWhile the previous king, Harold, he's supposed to run is dead and the rule likelihood of more pitched battles is over ruffians saved from the gallows, but can't command them until he's forced his way to having the knowledge rebels are stirring and much of the mission he needs first, only for all hell country does not wish to break looserecognise a new overlord. But get back he does, only to find that while his nightmares about what really happened are met with equally dark goings-on, the official record suggests the mission never actually existed…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857053744</amazonuk>1800422466

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Theodore Brun3949666079|title=A Mighty Dawn (The Wanderer Chronicles)Noema|author=Dael Akkerman|rating=34.5|genre= Historical General Fiction|summary= A ''This is a story like this needs about some things that happened to me about twelve thousand years ago.'' Maya is a strong central character; it needs young girl living in a warrior who has convictionhunter gatherer village during the Mesolithic era. Climate change is occurring, the Sea of Grass encroaches further and further into Maya's forest home, heart and honourfood is becoming more and more scarce. Hakan has all these What to do? Can the law givers in abundance, but he didn't get them easily. In this coming the federation of age talevillages muster peaceful ways to cope? Can the Traveller, he goes on a quest to find himself after experiencing spiritual figure who interprets the most tremendous wisdom of betrayals. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782399941</amazonuk>All Life, provide solutions?

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=S J Hardman Lea1529125898|title=The Sins of SoldiersGodmersham Park|author=Gill Hornby

|summary=Anson Scott wants to join ''If it were not for the British army and World War I for a different reason than most casual dereliction of his fellow Americansthe odd gentleman's duty, there would no women to teach well-bred daughters at all. He's a journalist wanting ' Anne Sharpe was thirty-one years old when she arrived at Godmersham Park to take up the uncensored inside story position of governess to send back home; twelve-year-old Fanny Austen. She had no experience of teaching but this was a deadly enterprise as, if case of necessity. Until the Germans don't get himdeath of her mother, Anne had a comfortable life and was loved by both parents although her father was frequently absent from the Brits may deem him a spyhousehold. Unperturbed he carries his plan through When her mother died, her father cast her off and finds himself on the French front in 1916would have nothing more to do with her. He has No explanation was offered but she would receive an ally annuity of £35 a year. Her maid, Agnes, would receive nothing but was fortunately taken in British officer David Alexanderby some neighbours.}}{{Frontpage|author=Melissa Fu |title=Peach Blossom Spring |rating=3.5|genre=Historical Fiction |summary= I loved the prelude to Peach Blossom Spring, which a short chapter entitled ''Origins''. Unfortunately it is just the only truly poetic part of a book that I expected more from. Covering Chinese history from 1938 to 2005 as well since not all his enemies are across no manviewed through one family's landperspective. When their home city is set ablaze during the war with Japan, a young mother (Meilin) and her four-year-old son (Renshu) are among those who flee. The two men have a lot in commonstory follows them on their journey across China, more than they know and perhaps more than is good for them as the Somme approachesin Renshu's case eventually to America. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1785890182</amazonuk>1472277538

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=David Gilman1916072038|title=Viper's Blood The House in the Hollow (Master of WarThe Talbot Saga)|author=Allie Cresswell|rating=4.5

|summary=Bowman and commander Thomas Blackstone is one We meet part of Edward III's greatest weapons, bringing him potentially head to head against the Dauphin once againTalbot family in Yorkshire in November 1811. HoweverTwenty-seven-year-old Jocelyn Talbot and her mother have travelled in some discomfort from their home at Ecklington, faced with an elongated stale mate, Thomas' role becomes that of scavenger leader as to the chances of victory make way for a greater chance of starvation amongst house in the armieshollow. There The two women are angry with each other and Jocelyn is well aware of her mother's strengths and weaknesses: ''She is practiced at subterfuge, at concealing, beneath a light at the end facade of respectability, the tunnel thoughdeplorable truth''. Blackstone  Hester is furious about Jocelyn's refusal to go on a trip: an escort mission to Italydo as she was asked, delivering the French Kingwhich has precipitated ''s daughter Isabelle to Milan this violent and her weddingunexpected removal''. Having said that, the light at the end  Then we are told of the tunnel may be an oncoming lance. Isabelle's prospective groom is one birth of the brothers who killed Thomas' wife a child and, soon after, Hester Talbot departs, leaving Jocelyn in shame and daughterisolation in Yorkshire. Death is definitely on the cards… but whose?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784974463</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Rory ClementsAnnabel Abbs|title=CorpusThe Language of Food

|genre=Crime (Historical)Fiction|summary=A suicidal overdose and the murder of upper class Cecil Langley and his wife are two events that may be unconnected. However this Eliza Acton is England in 1936, a magnet for opposing forces and their first moves in preparation for the coming conflict, assisted or prevented by a royal crisis (depending on which side you're on). Cambridge history professor Tom Wilde may fall into the middle of this accidentally to begin with but his curiosity poet who has been piqued enough to ensure he's not walking away.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785762613</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Beatrice Colin|title= To Capture What We Cannot Keep|rating= 4|genre= Historical Fiction|summary=Paris, February 1887, and work on never had the foundations of Eiffel's daring tower is about slightest inclination to begin. Engineer Emile Nouguier, taking photographs of the site from a tethered hot air balloon for tourists nearby, chances to meet a young widow from Glasgow named Caitriona Wallace, and his own foundations start to shift. Over the next two years as the tower slowly rises in the Champ de Mars, what began as boil an impossible dream becomes solid reality – Cait and Emile's love for each otheregg. In When tasked with writing a world where more than bustles and corsets hem her in, will Cait be able to break free of her oppressive future, and given their different social strata, can Emile re-shape his?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1760291722</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Deanna Raybourn|title= A Perilous Undertaking (Veronica Speedwell Mystery)|rating= 4|genre= Historical Fiction|summary=Veronica Speedwell did not choose to be an investigator by profession. She wascookery book, first and foremostshe recruits Ann Kirby, a scientist; local woman with a lepidopterist and adventuress who travelled the world looking for exciting butterfly specimenstroubled home life. HoweverTogether, when her latest expedition was cancelled due to an unfortunate incident with a giant tortoisethey test, craft, Veronica refine and her taxidermist friend Stoker took up reshape the challenge world of a murder investigation as an interesting diversion. The case seemed to an open-and-shut one; Miles Ramsforthdomestic cookery, an art patron, had been accused of murdering his pregnant mistress, Artemisia. He was discovered at the scene, covered in her blood and had both reinventing the motive recipe book and circumstances to commit the crime. He would hang by changing the end face of the week if Veronica and Stoker could not find the 'real' killercookery writing forever.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0451476158</amazonuk>1398502227

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jemima BriggesFreya Marske|title=Counting the CostA Marvellous Light

|summary=The year Robin Blyth is 1794 and we meet our young protagonistnudged into a job in the Civil Service, Maria, in desperate circumstancesmuch to his chagrin. Alone There he meets Edwin Courcey and terrified, she has concluded learns that her only option is to take her own life by throwing herself into the surging river watersstreets of London are threaded with magic. Months previouslyDesperate to remove a curse that threatens to swallow him, she was cruelly violated by Robin follows Edwin to the master of countryside, where the house where she worked hedgegrows bristle with incantations and now, in the advanced stages of her pregnancy, the future seems bleakpeople shimmer with power. Luckily, There they uncover a pair sinister plot that threatens the lives of gypsy women find Maria and take her all magicians in. Following a traumatic labour, Maria becomes desperately ill and when she recovers, her baby is gone. Alone again, Maria is free to start a new life. With a clever disguise, she becomes the dowdy 'Miss Dinchope' and takes a position as a housekeeper for the village rectorBritish Isles.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1785899139</amazonuk>1529080886

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Steven BurgauerB09F4CTKJR|title=The Night of The Eleventh SunFlights for Freedom|author= Steven Burgauer

|summary=The word 'NeanderthalIt' s the later stages of World War I and the United States has become equated with people deemed to have just entered the conflict. Petrol Petronus is a backward attitude young American who has signed up and outlookjoined the 17 Aero Squadron. But what do we know of This company was the original Neanderthals from over 200first US Aero Squadron to be trained in Canada,000 years ago? Here American author [[:Category:Steven Burgauer|Steven Burgauer]] melds the knowledge of anthropologists, archaeologists first to be attached to the RAF and historians with the story of Strong Arms, his family and their struggle first to be sent into the skies to survive fight the Germans in a very effectiveactive combat. But before that can happen, and informative wayPetrol has to master flying the notoriously difficult but majestic Sopwith Camel.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1419671545</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Meelis Friedenthal and Matthew Hyde (translator)Christophe Medler|title=The Willow KingMadrigal: A Closely Guarded Secret|rating=34

|summary=Meet Laurentius. He's Set against the backdrop of the English Civil War, a scholar newly arrived in Estonia secret plan (code-named Madrigal) is discovered by Sir Robert Douse in the seventeenth century, aiming to study moresummer of 1642. But things aren't going well for him – As a long-standing illness seems to be returningloyal servant of the King, and Head of the weather and roads are awfulSecret Service, heit is Robert's late – duty to uncover the details of the plan and his only friend, a parakeet, won't even survive follow the first two days ashore. He's entering a weird world, what's more – clues to uncover one imbued with evil smells, peopled by strange characters with stranger ideasof the most guarded secrets in history—especially since the plot could affect the King. Can his modern ideas, and thinking about the soul, bear him through his course?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1782271740</amazonuk>B095HY8SXQ

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ian Ross1471187179|title=The Mask of Command (Twilight of Empire)A Beautiful Spy|author=Rachel Hore|rating=54

|summary= Warning: spoilers ahead for previous books Minnie is an 'ordinary' girl living an unexciting life in the seriesa leafy provincial suburb. 305AD: Castus Aurelius, following The book is set in the death of his predecessor, has been promoted 1930s and Minnie is expected to live up to commander (or vir perfecctissiums) of the Roman forces at the Rhine. Heher mother's also been ordered expectations and find a nice young man to take Crispusmarry, Constantine's son produce children and heir, for spend the character-building experiencerest of her days looking after her husband and their home. That complicates matters as when Castus Unfortunately, this isn't trying what she wants to do at all and neither does she want to keep Crispus alivecontinue working as a secretary. As a result of a chance meeting, she finds herself drawn into espionage, he's finding it difficult working for the secret service and effectively living a double life - attempting to increase his own chance infiltrate the Communist Party of survival, especially considering how Great Britain. Minnie finds herself torn between what she perceives as her duty and the friends she has made - and likes - whilst working for the last Rhine commander met his endCommunist Party.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784975257</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Sophia TobinAfonso Cruz and Rahul Bery (translator)|title= The VanishingKokoschka's Doll|rating=32.5|genre= Historical Literary Fiction|summary=1814Well, this looked very much like a book I could love from the get-go, which is why I picked my review copy up and flipped pages over several times before actually reading any of it. In I found things to potentially delight me each time – a weird section in the middle of the Yorkshire Moors in an isolated spot lies White Windowson darker stock paper, a house shadowed chapter whose number was in mystery the 20,000s, letters used as narrative form, and intrigueso on. Living in this desolate household is Marcus Twentyman, It intrigued with the subterranean voice a hard drinking and complicated man and his sisterhears in wartorn Dresden that what little I knew of it mentioned, the hardened widow Hestertoo. Brought to White Windows is Annaleigh, a young runaway from London who has come to Yorkshire to be But you've seen the new housekeeper to the Twentyman's star rating that comes with the hope of leaving her painful past behind her. At firstthis review, Annaleigh believes she may have found sanctuary but soon realises she has become entangled in a web of conspiracy and dangercan tell that if love was on these pages, leaving her trapped and more alone than everit was not actually caused by them. So what happened?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1471151603</amazonuk>1529402697

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Mary GibsonChristina Hammonds Reed|title=Bourbon Creams and Tattered Dreams (The Factory Girls)|rating= 4|genre= Historical Fiction|summary=Where did it all go wrong? Only a short time ago, Matty Gilbie was a star of the silver screen with a glittering future predicted for her. As the 'Cockney Canary', her melodic singing voice and stunning good looks had ensured that her first foray into movies was a runaway success. Unfortunately that success came with a price: Matty's business partner Frank Rossi frittered away their money and turned violent and controlling. Bruised and battered from a particularly vicious beating from Frank, Matty secretly makes her escape back to her home in Bermondsey, and the comfort of family and friends. Frank is not one to be crossed, however, and vows to do whatever it takes to win Matty back. Can she ever be truly free?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784973335</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Shirley McKay|title=1588: A Calendar of Crime (A Hew Cullan Mystery)Black Kids

|genre=Crime (Historical)Teens |summary=A lot of crime happens in St Andrews during 1588 and therefore in the life of law lecturer and local investigator Hew Cullen too. As we travel through the year with him, his recently wedded English wife Frances, doctor brother in law Giles and his sister Meg, the wise woman, we also encounter some of his most interesting cases. In fact there's one to match each of the yearChristina Hammonds Reed's big festivals: Candlemas, Whitsun, Lammas, Martinmas and Yule.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846973635</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Lesley Lokko|title=The Last Debutante|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=In 1936 in Chalfont Hall in Dorset young Kit Algernon-Waters can't really understand what's going on: at thirteen years old she's been banished to have supper in the nursery whilst everyone else debut novel is dining downstairs with set against the guests. Even her elder sister, Lily, who's sixteen is dining with these unnamed 'guests'. Kit has tapped all her usual sources to find out who backdrop of the visitors are1992 Los Angeles riots, but a reaction to no avail. All she's managed to work out (well, let's be honest 'find out by eavesdropping' is closer to the truth) is that the visitors are German. Kit's parents, Lord and Lady Wharton, are short of money and it's important that at least one absolution of their daughters makes four police officers for beating a good marriage. Six months later Lily is married to one of the Germanblack man, living in some style in Germany. Within a couple of years she's mixing with some dubious companyRodney King, including Unity Mitford. It was even rumoured that she'd met Hitler.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140914254X</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Stef Penney|title=Under a Pole Star|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=1948: Elderly Flora Mackie is invited on a press trip nearly to the North Pole; a trip that takes her back through her life. Flora remembers her childhood with her father on whaling ships in the seas around Greenland, her marriage born of ambition and misaligned lust and the result: the Arctic exploration team she led in the late 19th century. This was a trip that had many knock-on effects including death and love.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1786481162</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Morgan McCarthy|title= The House of Birds|rating= 4.5|genre= Historical Fiction|summary=Oliver has spent years trying to convince himself that he's suited to a life of money making in Told from the city, and that he doesn't miss a childhood spent in pursuit perspective of mysteryAshley Bennett, when he cycled around the cobbled lanes of Oxford, exploring its most intriguing corners. When his girlfriend Kate inherits novel follows her evolution from a derelict house - and a fierce family feud - she's determined to strip it, sell it and move on. For Oliver though, the house has an allure, and amongst the shelves silent bystander when confronted with matters of a discarded, leather bound and gilded volumesrace, he discovers one that conceals a hidden diary from the 1920s. So begins a quest to discover the identity of the author, Sophia Louis. It is a portrait of war woman finding her voice and marriage, isolation and longing and a story that will shape the future of the abandoned house - and of Oliver - foreverembracing her heritage.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1472205847</amazonuk>1471188191