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[[Category:Humour|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|Humour]] __NOTOC__ <!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Tony HawksDean Koontz|title=Once Upon a Time in the West… Country|rating=3|genre=Travel|summary=I have often complained in a jokey voice to my partner about life in the sticks, and the way she moved me from an inner-city flat to slumming it in the suburbs with fewer busses, no takeaways within walking-and-keeping-food-hot distance, and no 'Polish' shops for a can of beer whenever you fancy one. Things are different with Tony Hawks, as here he has purposefully decided to up sticks from London to Somewhere, Devon – a tiny village where the people who built their own homes decades ago still live in them, where slugs are a lot more of a problem for the wannabe lettuce-grower than they are for the metropolitan commuter, and where village halls have the power to turn you into both a Pol Pot dictator if you get on their committee and into a quivering, bruise-inducing wreck if you're the wrong gender at a Zumba class…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444794809</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Marian Keyes|title=Making It Up As I Go AlongThe Bad Weather Friend
|rating=4.5
|genre=EntertainmentParanormal|summary=OhBenny is having a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, how the book reviewing gods like to givehe loses his fiancee, and equally like to take awayhis house gets trashed. Here before me is Oh, and someone has delivered a brandreally weird, spanking new collection of journalism by the wonderful Marian Keyes – but disturbing coffin-sized object to his home, and it's a proof copy, so there's no photo of possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the author. thing that has trashed his house! Even if over the years I have stopped reading her novelsThe thing is, I have always turned to Benny is the author picture very last person to remind myself such sights exist in deserve all this worldbad luck. Himself He is a lucky man, for surenice person. But beyond sounding like a letch, what can I say about this – the beauty's third large dose of essays, web columns and other journalism? A really nice person. I can start with agreeing So fortunately for Benny it turns out that I am not the target audiencedelivery to his house is a new friend, but it's easy enough a bad weather friend called Spike, who has been sent to see help him since Benny is clearly under attack from these pages exactly what the target isnefarious forces for being a good person. So much like that test you do – you know the oneSpike is going to take care of Benny, that formulates decisions about the age and commonality will certainly take care of all things in space to come up with how many billions of planets are likely to have alien life on – you can narrow things down quite readily hereBenny's enemies, if he, Benny, and still come up with Harper (a huge number.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0718182529</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Jean-Yves Ferri|title= Asterix and the Missing Scroll (Album 36waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure)|rating= 5|genre= For Sharing|summary=Asterix is those rarest of book series; one designed for kids which is actually even funnier when you are an adult. I used to love Asterix as a child, but now that I reread them I can't help but wonder why, because figure out who exactly they are so full of hilarious jokes that I definitely wouldn't have understood when I was younger. I laughed loud and hard to myself twice within the first two pages of Asterix and the Missing Scroll, so I'd definitely say that this was a hit.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1510100458</amazonuk>1662500491
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Spadge Whittaker1529153050|title=Braver Than Britain, Occasionally's Best Political Cartoons 2022|author=Tim Benson
|rating=4
|genre=Humour
|summary=In Seeking some light relief from the current political turmoil which Spadge researches is coming to seem more and more like an adrenaline sport, I was nudged towards ''Britain's top ten fears and faces them all over the course Best Political Cartoons of a year2022''. We Sharp eyes will have noted that we're quite a fearful society, you know. And not yet through the things we fear most are, in orderyear: heights (acrophobia), snakes (ophidiophobia), public speaking (glossophobia), spiders (arachnophobia), small spaces (claustrophobia), mice (musophobia), needles (trypanophobia), flying (pteromerhanophobia), crowds (agoraphobia) and clowns (coulrophobia)the cartoons run from 4 September 2021 to 31 August 2022.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0993429904</amazonuk> Who can imagine what there will be to come in the 2023 edition?
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Mike Bullen1785633074|title= Trust|rating= 4|genre= General Fiction|summary= Greg and Amanda are happy. Unmarried, but together thirteen years and with two young daughters, they are very much in love. Dan and Sarah aren't so fortunate. Their marriage is going through the motions, and they're staying together for the sake of their troubled teenage son. Following a business conference away from home, one bad decision sends a happy couple into turmoil, and turns an unhappy couple into love's young dream. As secrets and betrayals threaten to send both relationships out of control, there's only one thing that can keep everything from falling apart: Trust|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0751559253</amazonuk>}}{{newreviewStaggering Hubris|author=Dan Rhodes|title=When the Professor Got Stuck in the SnowJosh Berry
|rating=4.5
|genre=General FictionHumour|summary= Two people are on a train on their way Members of Parliament like us tobelieve that the country is run by politicians, of all things, a WI meeting where headed by the ladies of All Bottoms will be lectured on Prime minister - the non-existence of God. One ''primus inter pares'' (that's for those of you who are Eton and Oxbridge educated) but the two people reality is Professor Richard Dawkins, rampant atheist, hectoring scientist chappie, and all-round devotee of that the ''Deal or No Dealprime''. The other is Smee, his monomovers are the special advisers -named assistant, amanuensis or 'male secretary'. Smee will come to the fore when SPADS - who are the weather sets in and driving force behind the train journey has to be abandoned some way short of its ultimate destination, Upper Bottomgovernment. Instead We are in the pair fetch up at privileged position of having access to the isolated yet friendly community memoirs of Market HortonRafe Hubris, and the only option for accommodation is taken – yes, man who was behind the died-in-skilful control of the-wool non-believer has to be housed Covid crisis which was completely contained by a retired vicar and his wifethe end of 2020. This clash of titanic opinions, peppered with social faux pas aplenty You might not know the name now but he will provide for a particularly English kind of farcical comedy, but one with certainly be the legs man to go as far as any other Good Books have reached in the past…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1910709018</amazonuk>watch.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Rob Temple0571365884|title=Very British Problems AbroadMy Mess is a Bit of Life: Adventures in Anxiety|author=Georgia Pritchett
|rating=4
|genre=HumourAutobiography|summary=Meet, if you haven't alreadyGeorgia Pritchett has always been anxious, even as a child. She would worry about whether the monsters under the bed were comfortable: it was the phenomenon sort of the Very British Problemlife where if she had nothing to worry about she would become anxious but such occasions were few and far between. In this format they're in pithy little comments (ofOn a visit to a therapist, oohas an adult, when she was completely unable to speak about 140 characters what was wrong with her it was suggested that she should write it down and ''My Mess is a Bit of a Life: Adventures in length, for some reason…) and detail Anxiety'' is the minor things in life that result - or so we like nothing more than to inflate are given to believe.}}{{Frontpage|author=John Boyne|title=The Echo Chamber|rating=5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Meet George Cleverley. He is self-defined as "one of the few television personalities over the age of fifty without a criminal record". He starts this book a major factor of lifebit worried when his mistress tells him she's carrying his child, but then his author wife is getting her kicks with the Ukrainian partner "Strictly Come Dancing" paired her with. They can involve mannershave three children, who are a sad-sack with absolutely no social skills whatsoever, staring at things until they mend themselvesa girl who hangs around with a virtue-signalling, hitting things dittokeyboard warrior "wokester" who wants to save the world's homeless with out-of-date food, or and a fit young lad doing the fact gay hustle thing. Add in a few other characters – therapists, lawyers, random transgender types – that nobody apart from all have two very different connections to his life, and you and I know how have something that suggests an almost farcical approach to queue properlythe modern world. And if What suggests the idea hits the world outside our shoresfarcical approach even more, then – wellhowever, you certainly have a book full of content regarding our attitude and ineptitude abroadis the fact this is bloody funny.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0751558494</amazonuk>0857526219
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Fraser McAlpineStephen Clarke|title=Stuff Brits LikeThe Spy Who Inspired Me
|rating=4
|genre=HumourGeneral Fiction|summary= With over 100 chapters on different aspects of Britain and BritishnessThis is a spoof spy story, this book is both fascinating and hilariousthat isn't about James Bond. Or Ian Fleming. Just looking at But it features a man called Ian Lemming, who dresses well and 'likes the list ladies' and who works for the secret service, but in the planning side of subjects is enough to produce things more than the active service. Lemming finds himself put on a mission with a sardonic twist of that stiff upper lip: female spy called Margaux, and the chapters cover topics that range from offal to currypair end up stranded in Normandy, from pedantry with Margaux on a desperate mission to banterunearth traitors in the resistance network, from conkers and Lemming desperately trying to rugby. There may be many chapters but this is no academic tome - each chapter is just two to three pages long, each is written keep up with endearing affection, each is easy and satisfying - and quirkily funny - to read.her!|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1857886348</amazonuk>2952163855
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author= John SamuelAfonso Cruz and Rahul Bery (translator)|title= What I Tell You in the DarkKokoschka's Doll|rating= 32.5|genre= HumourLiterary Fiction|summary=A man called Will Well, this looked very much like a book I could love from the get-go, which is fighting fiercely against corruption – desperate to expose his company's dodgy dealings to the press. Overcome with doubt why I picked my review copy up and fear, he goes to kill himselfflipped pages over several times before actually reading any of it. But, at the exact moment he attaches his noose I found things to potentially delight me each time – a weird section in the back of the doormiddle on darker stock paper, he is saved. By a curious housemate or a concerned girlfriend? Nochapter whose number was in the 20, by an Angel. Not the white-feathered guardian Angel you may expect000s, but one who wishes to help Will achieve his endsletters used as narrative form, and so possess on. It intrigued with the body of the hapless Will subterranean voice a man hears in order to finish wartorn Dresden that what he startedlittle I knew of it mentioned, too. It goes without saying But you've seen the star rating that the Angel is hoping things go better than they did comes with the last guy he possessed – a hapless young man from Galilee called Jesus…this review, and can tell that if love was on these pages, it was not actually caused by them. So what happened?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0715650505</amazonuk>1529402697
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= John NivenB08KKQ85FN|title= The Sunshine Cruise CompanyBut Never For Lunch|author=Sandra Aragona|rating= 4.5|genre= HumourShort Stories|summary= Susan Frobisher and Julie Wickham live ''If a woman approaching the menopause can be likened to a Rottweiler in lipstick, an Ambassador nearing retirement resembles a small Dorset town. Friends since schoolpampered peacock about to be released into the company of carrion crows or, more to the point, they live fairly uneventful lives – Susan has a lovely house about to discover the real world of bus timetables and a lengthy marriage to accountant Barrypaying his own gas bills.'' You don't get many better opening sentences than that, whereas Julie is doing slightly less well – living in a council flat do you? We first met His Excellency and working in an old peopleThe Ambassador's home. When Barry is found dead trussed up Wife in a sex dungeon, [[Sorting the Priorities: Ambassadress and Beagle Survive Diplomacy by Sandra Aragona|Sorting the Priorities]] and we learned what it transpires that he was like to be moved around countries like accompanying baggage by the Italian Government but the time has been leading a hidden life come for years, HE to retires and his expensive fetishes lead for Sandra Aragona to become The Wife of Former Ambassador... They have left The Career and settled in Rome. Well 'settled' rather overstates the bank moving to take Susan's home. Struck by both desperation situation and a sense of injusticetheir dog, Sue and Julie conspire to rob a bankBeagle, taking along their friend Jill – a devout Christian conflicted due to lack has no intention of money and a terminally ill grandsonslowing down any time soon, despite being sixteen and Ethel – a foul mouthed resident of the nursing home longing for adventuredeaf.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0434023183</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Marie PhillipsB08GFSK2WZ|title=The Table Of Less Valued KnightsKarma Trap|author=Lisette Boyd|rating=4.5|genre=FantasyWomen's Fiction|summary=Sir Humphrey has been demoted from King ArthurGeorge Jackson is thirty-three years old, absolutely gorgeous to look at - and single. She's not had sex for eight months and she's Round Table to stuck in the Table karma trap: an awful lot of Lesser Valued Knights. The only way to get his comfier seat back bad luck is to redeem himself via being visited on her and she has a questreal talent for attracting drama. Therefore when damsel Elaine seeks help Her life's chaotic: she dealt with the leak from the shower by putting something down at the bottom of the stairs to find absorb the water - then the shower fell through the roof whilst she was in it and left her kidnapped fiancé, Humphrey and his wardstark naked, staring at the teenage giant Conrad, eagerly set forthpervy postman. Meanwhile in the kingdom of Tuft, new Queen Martha She only has run away after to take her mother's dog out for a walk for her to end up with dog poo spattered across her face - and a disastrous wedding to… a… well… disastrous Prince Edwinphoto being taken by someone who shares it around the office. She may not realise it yet, but she too will have a job for Humphrey!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099555875</amazonuk>}}{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Tim FlanneryDavid C Mason|title=The Mystery of the Venus Island FetishPandora's Gardener
|rating=3
|genre=Historical FictionCrime|summary=Meet Archie Meek. He's about to leave the Venus IslandsJohn Cranston is a gardener, where although what he did before he's lived for the last five yearsbecame a gardener, and return to Sydneyhe claims, where he'll take his office in the museum and fill it with all the cultural artefacts he's found and wildlife he's plucked or pickledis classified. That's not to ignore the fact he'll count is just as something quite alien himself, with his filled-out frame, nearly all-over suntan and totemic tattoo, in amongst other changes to his body. But what's this? When well because he gets back, he finds one of the main Venus Islands artefacts that caused him is about to go there be caught up in the first place, a hugecriminal / spy / terrorist plot, macabre ceremonial fetish mask, purloined as corporate artwork. And some of where only he can save the curators he wishes to work alongside have vanishedday. Is the weird society of the museum he's returning to, perchance, even weirder, stranger and more violent than the cannibalistic society he's waving farewell to?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1922079308</amazonuk>0956180523
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Roman DirgeJester_Forever|title=The Cat with Forever After: a Really Big Headdark comedy|author=David Jester|rating=3.54|genre=Graphic NovelsHorror|summary= How many picture books are there about cats? And how many do you know that you would really NOT prefer your children to see? If the answer to the second question Michael Holland is 'none – yet', scratch that last word. The title piece in this collection is, by the author's own admission, his imagining of the Joseph Merrick (the 'Elephant Man') of the feline world – a cocky and brash young man who struggles to sneak up behind a mouse when dies and gets made the shadow offer of his head is lifetime; immortality. We follow Michael, a total giveaway, grim reaper and who can hardly even eat with dignity as bending down to his bowl would break his neck. If that's too dark or oddball for youfriends, try the second major piece, which has Chip (a most revealing foreword – ''Dedicated to stoner tooth fairy) and Naff (a certain girl… I hope your life is filled stoner in the records department) as they grapple with wonderful accomplishments, love their long lives and all the magic you desire… - But I hope your death is slow and horriblefinding a clean surface to sit on in their flat.''|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782762876</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Val Hennessy1683691172|title=Not Far From DreamlandWilliam Shakespeare's Much Ado About Mean Girls|author=Ian Doescher|rating=42.5|genre=General FictionHumour|summary=Ronald Tonks has reached that stage A long time ago, in life which I call upper middle age: you've qualified for your pension but not yet got to the free television licence barrier. What Ronald ''has'' got is a roof that leaks (there's good reason why his home is called 'galaxy far away, all the shack')Star Wars films were crunched up against Shakespeare, and the marriage seemed a dog who is going bald (perfectly suitable one. So much so – so easily did the plots and characters converse in patches) Shakespearean dialogue, and money behave with Shakespearean stage directions – thatthe producers tried again, with [[William Shakespeare's in very short supply. On Get Thee Back to the plus side he has friends, mostly platonic and usually in much Future! by Ian Doescher|Back to the same boat as RonaldFuture]] no less. And that worked. But are simultaneously they downhearted? Well, they are occasionally, but mostly they're generously optimistic and put a real test out to make the most of what they've got, usually bought from charity shops and jumble sales. A film I can''Not Far From Dreamland'' is t even really remember seeing was transcribed into the story of a year (2012) in original Elizabethan lingo. A cult following I had never followed whatsoever was given the life of Ronald Tonksbrand new, his friends and relativesyet oh so ancient, dressing.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0704373874</amazonuk>Here was the true challenge – would I manage to enjoy this, based on little foreknowledge? Oh damn those shiny gold stars for letting the game away…
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Harry Harrison168369094X|title=Bill, the Galactic Hero|rating=3.5|genre=Science Fiction|summary=Meet Bill. HeWilliam Shakespeare's a simple farmer – well, he ''is'' taking a correspondence course in being a Technical Fertiliser Operator – but fate has something else in store. And so does the mechanised, technological, industrial military, which needs several billion grunts Get Thee Back to fight the Chingers, in mankind's first inter-galactic war. Still, at least he gets medals just for signing up. After that it's all downhill, and the likes of Petty Chief Officer Deathwish Drang can only make that a straight line down. Really, what hope is there?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>147320531X</amazonuk>}}{{newreviewFuture!
|author=Ian Doescher
|title=William Shakespeare's The Phantom of Menace
|rating=4.5
|genre=Humour
|summary= Join usA long time ago, good gentlesin a publishing house far away, [[:Category:Ian Doescher|someone]] thought it wonderfully wacky to rewrite the story of Star Wars in Shakespearean pentameter, colliding two entirely different genres and styles in such a clever way they seemed perfectly suited. It was then duly repeated for a merry reimagining of `all the other films in the main Star Wars cycle, and clearly someone's buffing their quills ready for Episode 1' as only Shakespeare could have written itNine, the title of which became public knowledge the day before I write. 'Tis a true Shakespearean drama In the hiatus, however, filled the effort has been made to see if the same shtick works with sword fightsother texts, soliloquies and doomed romance…all to riff on other seemingly unlikely source materials in glorious iambic pentameter and coupled with gorgeous illustrationsiambs. Hold on And could we have anything more suitably unsuitable-seeming than Back to your midichlorians: The plays the thingFuture, wherein you'll catch the rise with its tales of Anakin!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1594748063<time travel, bullying, and parent/amazonuk>child strife like no other?
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1473669065|title=Queenie Malone's Paradise Hotel|author=AttaboyRuth Hogan|rating=5|genre=Humour|summary=Tilda returns to Brighton, to tidy away the remains of her mother's life after her death. Whilst there, she returns to the Paradise hotel, a haven for eccentrics and misfits. A place where people can be themselves, and let go of thoughts that torment them elsewhere. Little wonder that Tilda cannot forgive her mother for banishing her as a child, from this place of wonder. With the help of Queenie Malone, caring, and gregarious, Tilda begins to pick apart the tricky and uncertain relationship she had with her sometimes cruel and distant mother.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1683690346|title=The Book of HugsCon Artist|author=Fred Van Lente
|rating=4
|genre=Humour
|summary=A hug's Comic-Cons are a hugplace of wonder and sanctuary for many people, OK? You either doand when Comic book artist Mike Mason arrives at San Diego Comic-Con, or you donhe't. Some people might be a little more enthusiastic about the process whilst others are more elegant in s looking for both that and sanctuary with other fans and creators, plus the execution chance of the hugmaybe, but basically you just get on maybe reuniting with his ex. However, when his rival is found dead, Mike is forced to navigate every dark corner of the con in order to clear his name – from cosplay flash mobs and do it intrusive fans to zombie obstacle courses – Mike must prove his innocence and then forget about it, right?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0867197978</amazonuk>in doing so, may just unravel a dark secret behind a legendary industry creator.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Christopher Fowler1473669588|title= Bryant and May – The Burning ManFalling Short|author=Lex Coulton
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary= The Peculiar Crimes Unit (PCU) has a new set of overlords. For reasons that were explored in the previous couple of outings they have been transferred to the City Of London Police. The Met are still the big players in the area. City of London Police only police the old city, the square mile, the financial district in other words, that has very little in the way of street crime, because no-one lives there anymore and the people who work there are, by and large, either too rich to need to steal, or too smart to have to do so on the streets.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857522043</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Catharina Ingelman-Sundberg
|title=The Little Old Lady Who Struck Lucky Again!
|rating=3.5
|genre=Humour
|summary=Following the success of ''The Little Old Lady Who Broke All the Rules'Lex Coulton's debut novel is a story about mistakes, failures, the League of Pensioners are back – and this time, they’re in Vegas! I haven’t read the first book but it was on my list when the opportunity arose to review this onerelationships. The idea of the League of Pensioners marching towards main protagonist, Frances Pilgrim, is a sixth form English teacher who has recently fallen out with her best friend Jackson, a fairer world through fun work colleague and frolics was hugely appealing to me and this is a stand alone novel so I thought I would dive straight in grappling with this onethe increasingly eccentric behaviour of her mother. This relationship is complicated by the fact that Frances's father disappeared at sea when she was five years old.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1447274903</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Winshluss1683690133|title=In God We Trust|rating=4.5|genre=Graphic Novels|summary=To start with, a rhetorical test. How about God and Adam playing badminton day in and day out, until one gets bored and decides to create Eve? Or the defeater of Goliath and the saviour of the Israelites being one Conan the Barbarian? Or this as a test – Jesus Himself failing to have a successful session of tequila slammers with Gabriel due to the holes through His hands? I barely need mention that in these pages God does battle with Superman, for you to have answered the test and put yourself firmly in one of two camps for this book – one very much opposed to buying it, and one very much in favour.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0861662350</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=David Walliams and Tony Ross|title=The Queen's Orang-Utan|rating=5|genre=For Sharing|summary=The Queen felt trapped in the palace with all those stuffed animals which she has been given on foreign tours. There are mountains of them and every night she would dream of escaping. When her birthday drew near the family dutifully asked her what she would like as a present. The Prince was thinking of a gold, diamond encrusted stairlift whilst the Duke was considering a great big bottle of brandy. The Royal Baby had some decorated thimbles in mind, but the Queen became just a little snappish as she explained that what she really wanted was 'OneMy Lady's own orang-utan'. And she didn't mean a stuffed one, either.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0008135134</amazonuk>}}{{newreviewChoosing|author=Jack Sheffield|title=Silent Night|rating=3.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=I read a couple of Jack Sheffield’s books about five years ago, and enjoyed them very much. They were written in a similar style to those popularised by, for instance, James Herriot or [[:Category:Gervase Phinn|Gervase Phinn]], told mostly in the first person, describing the author’s first couple of years as Headmaster at a small village primary school in Yorkshire. The village of Ragley is fictional, as are most of the characters, but the incidents Kitty Curran and situations encountered are based on the author’s experience.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0552167045</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=J Robert Lennon|title=See You In Paradise|rating=3|genre=Short Stories|summary=Lennon writes with a relaxed, easy style and his characters are instantly recognisable as people from everyday walks of life, without being in any way stereotypical. Many of the people in these stories are dealing with normal frustrations, and Lennon is cleverly detached enough not to make them individuals that you're obviously supposed to root for (the only exception is the industrialist in the eponymous tale, who is an archetypal capitalist fat cat). There are some very clever characterisations – in ''Weber’s Head'', for example, the narrator is a flawed individual whose opinions of his housemate are gradually revealed to be unreliable and unfair. For me, the most unsettling story is ''No Life'', because it portrays a decent couple at the mercy of people more powerful and influential than them. There is no supernatural or bizarre element at work here, just ordinary characters at the mercy of social power.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781253358</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Lynne Truss|title=Cat out of Hell|rating=3|genre=Horror|summary=Meet Alec Charlesworth. He's retired and decamped to an isolated coastal cottage with just his dog and loving memories of his colleague wife, now that she has died before her time. But the fusty librarian cannot rest too long before engaging in exploring some unusual computer files that were pinged across by someone at the college he worked at, just before he left. Bizarrely they show photographic and audio evidence of a talking cat called Roger, replete with Vincent Price voice – although they are also damaged by being included alongside some bad screenplay attempts about said cat. Worryingly, we soon see what at the most only a few of the characters can, that this cat is being accompanied by unusual and unexpected death – much like Alec's wife. It's only when Roger testifies to having been pushed through the ends of endurance and out the other side that we begin to doubt where the true evil in this story lies…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099585340</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Jimmy Hansen and Mychailo Kazybird|title=Wallace & Gromit : The Complete Newspaper Strips Collection Vol 2Larissa Zageris
|rating=4
|genre=Humour
|summary=For me there You are two important areas a lass of twenty-eight. Plucky, penniless and in Regency-era London the cover of this book where three letters are arranged in meaningful ways. The first race is with the Son to find a suitable suitor -Uor else doom yourself to life as an eternal spinster. Along your journey, you'll be accompanied by Lady Evangeline Youngblood -N in their obligatory red a fiesty noble eager to save you from a life alone, and white fontfired by a rogueish sense for adventure. No minor paper could hold Wallace and GromitWhen it comes to suitors though, their adventures you'll have to be in what is (unfortunately) the most widely read tabloid in make the country. And elsewhere is C-B-Eultimate decision between witty, suggesting that even the storytellers at Aardman Animations who are not household names are feted pretty and revered as artistic expertswealthy Sir Benedict Granville, wholesome, raising many laughs rugged and much money for caring Captain Angus MacTaggart, or the country courtesy of their creative outputmad, bad and terrifyingly sexy Lord Garraway Craven. Together these short collections of letters show just how much WaG are major creationsWith orphans, werewolves, long lost lovers and if ancient Egyptian artefacts along the proof was needed way, it's clear this much longer collection of their daily comic strips provides it in spadesisn't going to be an easy decision...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782760822</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=Stibbe_Xmas|title=Dear Committee MembersAn Almost Perfect Christmas|author=Julie SchumacherNina Stibbe
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Jason Fitger (Jay) is a Professor of creative writing and literature at a small university in the American mid-west. He is also a frustrated novelist with a colourful personal history, much of which bleeds into his professional life, with interesting results.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007586345</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|title=Mapp and Lucia Omnibus
|author=E F Benson
|rating=3.5
|genre=Humour
|summary=Miss Elizabeth Mapp rules Christmas – the town time of Tilling - she is traditional trauma. You only have to think about the centre of turkey for that – once upon a time it was leaving it sat on the social lifedownstairs loo to defrost overnight, and spends her days enjoying bridgeif that failed the hair-dryer shoved inside it treatment was your next best bet. Nowadays it's all having to make sure it's suitably free-range and organic – but not too organic that you can go and visit it, polite conversation and civilised paintingget too friendly with it to want to eat it. When Mrs Emmeline Lucas arrives Christmas, though, is of course also a time of great boons. It's cash in town (known hand for a lot of plump people who can hire red suits and beards, it was always a godsend for postmen with all the thank-you letters to all aunties you saw twice a decade that your parents made you write out in long-hand as Lucia), Miss Mapp finds her life truly shaken upa child, and as for the cultured, fashionable and progressive Lucia makes her home in the townmakers of Meltis Newberry Fruits – well, did they even try and swiftly rises to the top sell them any other time of the ranks amongst the social scene in Tilling.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849908478</amazonuk>year?
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|titleisbn=Encyclopedia ParanoiacaDoescher_Will|author=Henry Beard and Christopher Cerf|rating=4|genre=Popular Science|summarytitle=WeWilliam Shakespeare're screwed. Wherever we look, whatever we think of doing, there is a reason why we shouldn't be doing it, and people to back that reason up with scientific data. Take any aspect of your daily life – what you eat, how you work, how you rest even, what you touch – all have problems that could provoke a serious illness or worse. And outside that daily sphere there are economic disasters, nuclear meltdowns, errant AI scientists and passing comets that could turn our world upside down at s the Force Doth Awaken: Star Wars Part the blink of an eye. Perhaps then you better read this book first – for it may well turn out to be your last…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0715649213</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|title=Diary of a Mad DivaSeventh|author=Joan RiversIan Doescher|rating=34.5
|genre=Humour
|summary=The late Joan Rivers wasA long time ago, without in a doubtgalaxy far away, there was a character. Actressman called William Shakespeare, comedianwho was able to create a series of dramatic histories full of machinations most foul, writer, director, presenter, she was well known in the USA rulers most evil and beyond for her sharp tongue rebellious heroes and no holds barred personaheroines most sturdy. This was You may or may not have noticed the cinematic version of his original stage play for ''The Force Doth Awaken'', but here at last of we get the dozen books she publishedactual script, her final title before her death complete with annoying-in September 2014.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0425269027</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|title=The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy - The Nearly Definitive Edition|author=Douglas Adams|rating=5|genre=General Fiction|summary=There are few series that have garnered such a cult following as 'The Hitchhikers Guide different-ways-to the Galaxy'. Whether the fans have come -before droids anew, returning heroes from the radio serieselsewhere in his oeuvre, and people keeping it in the (impossibly hard) computer game, or the (well intentioned but not particularly good) film, they are everywherefamily til it hurts. Ask a room And if you need further encouragement, don't forget his audience only demanded three parts of people what Henry VI – here the meaning of life series is, and you can be pretty sure a good few will pipe up with '42so popular we' re on to part seven – surely making this over twice as the answer.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0434023396</amazonuk>good…
}}
 
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