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[[Category:Literary Fiction|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|Literary Fiction]]==Literary fiction==__NOTOC__{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mary McCarthy Matthew Tree|title=The GroupWe'll Never Know
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary='Given the attention paid Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to relations between the sexes, it would be tempting to call The Group a forerunner of today's chick lit. It's not.' So writes Candace Bushnelldifferent from his father, the writer behind the TV series Sex and the City, in the introduction to this new Virago Modern Classics edition of The Group by Mary McCarthy. First published in 1963, this novel is about the lives of a group of young women after leaving college in 1933, including careers, relationships, sex, babies, parents, drunk and money. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1844085937</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Janice Galloway|title=Collected Stories|rating=5|genre=Short Stories|summary=In this collection, stories are taken from two previous volumes, Blood and Where You Find It. The forty-two snap shots chronic underachiever whose dreams of life are mainly being exceptional at any of women and young girls, struggling with emotions, sometimes realized his artistic passions all failed miserably and sometimes not. In all, there seems to be an underlying link who had endless crises of isolation and truthself confidence. The settings are varied, from a visit to the dentist So Tim applied himself to the place known as home, to a walk in the evening. We have a peek into the deepest darkest corners of everyday relationships, with lovers, partners and most of all ourselves.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099540398</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Herta Muller|title=The Passport|rating=3|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Meet Windisch. A miller in a small village, he trudges through there, and through his neighbours, and through his lifestudies, counting his days and hours, for reasons that are not initially clear. But he does want something - he is waiting for a passport so he can leave for other climes. The perks of cultivated his job are the bags of flour he leaves by the mayor's house with regularity, as an open bribe, but there might be a bigger sacrifice to have to make.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1852421398</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jennifer Johnston|title=Truth or Fiction|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Caroline Wallace is not a happy woman. She has waited ten years for her lover to propose to her, and now just as he finally does, she has to go to Dublin to interview faded literary star Desmond Fitzmaurice. Desmond promises abilities rather than his tale will be brimful of 'sex daydreams and violence', set himself high but Caroline has no idea of the mystery that lies at the heart of his storyachievable ambitions.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0755330544</amazonuk>B0CVFXPGP8
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Julian BarnesB0C47LV1PC|title=Staring at the SunFragility|author=Mosby Woods
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=JeanCan you make a 's first Incident involved Uncle Leslie, hyacinths and golf tees. It's perhaps best forgotten, but Jean doesnYo birthing person't forget. Uncle Leslie figures large in her life - mostly on the golf course - until the War comes and he runs away to America. He's replaced by Tommy Prosserjoke? And if you could, a grounded pilot who once saw the sun rise twice in one day and excites as many questions in Jean as he ever answers. Tommy is replaced by Michael, a policeman, whom Jean eventually marries. He doesn't know why minks are excessively tenacious of life and he doesn't much care. But Jean does. She cares much less for the Dutch cap that Michael sent her off to obtain before the wedding and much less again for their rather disastrous adventures in the bedroom. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099540096</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Russell Celyn Jones|title=The Ninth Wave (New Stories from the Mabinogion) |rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Pwyll rules a medieval-style fiefdom in a post-climate change Wales. Life is different in many ways - there's a new-but-old social order built on feudalism and horsepower is the main means of transport. But in many ways question should you make it's much the same - people still fight one another, towns still have sink estates, rich boys still have too much time on their hands and precious little meaning in their lives. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1854115146</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Owen Sheers|title=White Ravens (New Stories from the Mabinogion)|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=In the old tale, Branwen ? Or is the sister of Bendigeidfran - the giant King of Britain. She marries the King of Irelandquestion if you did, who doesn't treat her well. She manages to send Bendigeidfran a message via a tamed starling and war and killings ensue. In this new tale, a young girl has just walked away from her brothers who, in the wake of the devastating foot and mouth outbreak, are despoiling their heritage by rustling and illegally slaughtering sheep. She meets an old man who tells her a story involving the superstitions about the ravens in the Tower of London, propaganda work during World War II, and an equally doomed love affair. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1854115030</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Shirley Jackson|title=We Have Always Lived In would it land? The Castle|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Mary Katherine Blackwood, also known as Merricat, catch is eighteen, and lives with her older sister Constance in that the family home where 'Blackwoods had always lived'answer for both could well be. Merricat quickly draws the reader into her world by a series of matter of fact but bizarre statements – her likes include her sister and death cap mushrooms, and everyone else in her family is dead. The wealthy Blackwood family has always kept the house 'steady against the world', shutting out other people, and they live near a village. Merricat believes that 'The people of the village have always hated us', and tells us that she hates them too.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141191457</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Deborah Gregory|title=Dancing With The Dead|rating=3|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=I wanted to read ''Dancing with the Dead'', because I'm interested in family history. The blurb on the back of the book also mentioned Gill – our heroine of the piece – was moving from Bristol (my current home) to Lincolnshire (where I was born and brought up). I felt with all these links, the novel could not fail to interest me – but this was not the caseno.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904529305</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Katherine MayMosby Woods|title=Burning OutA Whirly Man Loses His Turn
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Violet has The West isn't the dominant force it all – a well-paid job, and a luxurious apartment all to herselfonce was. Everything Nobody in the West is catered for; her meals, her clothes, and her health are all quite sure how she would like them to be. But the life she mend this or even if mending it is leading is beginning to take its toll. On the verge best course of snappingaction. Governments are flailing. A war here, a drained and somewhat out-of-sorts Violet, withdraws back to her home townpush for climate action there. A feeling that nobody is in actual charge. There, she meets someone familiarImagine then, there was a ghost reminding her of how she used to be ten years earlier – man with precognition. Imagine the strategic advantage in this asset; a young carefree girl, full man who can tell you what will happen given any set of lifecircumstances. Only this isn't a ghostThat man would be valuable, but a girl living right? Perhaps the life Violet once lived – exactly the same. Haunted by the past Violet realizes most valuable asset in history is repeating itself and is convinced events will happen again. Events Imagine then, that will in turn haunt the girlthis man loses this ability.What would governments do to get it back?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1906727392</amazonuk>B0C9SNG8R1
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Tove Jansson0571379559|title=The True DeceiverHouse of Broken Bricks|author=Fiona Williams
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Most people ''The House of my age will have come across JanssonBroken Bricks''s work unwittingly, via is the televised renditions story of the Moomin talesfour people. The readers amongst us would then have been entranced a few years ago to discover that at last Thomas Teal had set about Tess Hembry's roots are in Jamaica: temperamentally she might be happier there, but instead, she lives in the house on the translation into Englishriverbank, first built of The Summer Book and then of a collection of short stories which were published broken bricks. Insubstantial as 'A Winter Book'. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0954899571</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Daniel Kehlmann |title=Me and Kaminski|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=After reviewing several long booksit might look, it's been refreshing to read such a fluent yet pared down story as 'Kaminski stood the passage of time, storms and Me'floods. In it Her husband, Sebastian ZollnerRichard, the obnoxious main character, shoves himself forward in a desperate attempt struggles to research a best seller which will re-ignite grow his career as an art critic. Kaminskivegetables, to complete the proposed subject, was a fashionable painter long ago, but now, ancient delivery rounds - and chronically ill, has virtually slid into oblivionto bring in sufficient money. So the secondThey have twin boys -rate writer is on a loser unless he can dig up some juicy details to hook the art world Sonny and general public.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847249892</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Hilary Dixon|title=When Rooks Speak of Love|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Arthur Transcombe is a middle-agedMax, grey-haired, self-effacing poetthe rainbow twins. Unremarkable really - on the outsideSonny's colouring reflects his mother's Jamaican heritage. Max takes after his father. He hasPeople don't believe that they're related, however, managed to achieve some success much less twins and there's an assumption when Max is out with his poemsmother that she's his nanny. (Being a guest speaker at the Cheltenham Literary Festival is no mean feat). He is also a babe magnet!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904529429</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=David Malouf Claire North|title=RansomHouse of Odysseus
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Taking his theme from a small part of Homer's Iliad, Malouf tells the story of the king of Troy, Priam's grief-stricken voyage into the Greek camp to ransom Troy's wealth for the body of his fallen son, Hector, killed by the equally grief-stricken Achilles whose great friend Hector had killed in battle before Achilles took his cruel revenge. Malouf tells the story in sparse, yet lyrical and poetic fashion suggesting the personal stories behind the epic themes that Homer related. It is an exquisitely written piece managing to be both deeply moving as well as a great piece of story telling.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701184159</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=David Vann |title=Legend of a Suicide|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Some books defy categorisation and that's the case with ''Legend of a Suicide''. Is it Literary Fiction? Is it a series of short stories linked by a common theme, or a novella with supporting pieces? Is it fiction with a strong autobiographical thread running through itWhat could matter more than love? The simple answer to all these questions is ''yes'' – for the book is all that and more. It's also a compelling page-turner – I began reading at ten o'clock last night and finished it at three thirty this morning, resenting every moment away from the book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141043784</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Andrew Miller Kay Chronister|title=One Morning Like A BirdDesert Creatures|rating=4|genre=Literary Dystopian Fiction|summary=Tokyo in 1940 With a world that is becoming increasingly inhospitable for humanity, post-apocalyptic fiction can become an almost masochistic thrill. Whether it is a place that we British tend not to give robotic takeover, a great deal world devoid of thought water or a nuclear holocaust, this genre is a way for humans tocathartically experience their most existential fears. Japan entered the war, we say, with the attack on Pearl Harbour in December 1941, completely forgetting ''Desert Creatures'' by Kay Chronister is a new work of post-apocalyptic fiction that Japan, like most aligns many of the rest of the world, was already fears that exist for humanity today. It is a country at war. She had been fighting in China since 1937 and was making in-roads into European colonial territory in the area as wellshocking novel that still manages to find hope.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0340825154</amazonuk>1803364998
}}
{{newreviewfrontpage|isbn=1803363002|author=Sadie Jones Eric LaRocca|title=Small WarsThe Trees Grew Because I Bled There|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction Horror|summary=Even though our world Horror taps into something primeval within us. It is ostensibly at peace, hundreds of localized, unwinnable conflicts continue used as a way to grumble on. Mostly, reflect our darkest emotions and how we only hear as humans react and care about the ones involving process them. Most horror fiction feature a ''Big Bad'our boys', as if war was some giant game whether that is a home invader, a monster or a ghost, it usually something tangible and, by the end of footballthe story, beatable. But it isnEric LaRocca't, and s ''Small WarsThe Trees Grew Because I Bled There'' reflects on the casualties is not like that. It is a collection of war in a story set in Cyprus short stories more interested in the Two-Way Family Favourites era horrors of the nineteen-fiftiesillness, grief and humiliation. It may turn out Horrors that linger and are harder to be an important book as the public mood turns against the defeat than any ''war on terrorBig Bad' in Afghanistan. It's certainly a prescient one.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701184558</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Evelyn WaughMadelaine Lucas|title=A Handful of DustThirst for Salt
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=A complex class society which evolved into a highly sophisticated culture is invariably ''Love, I'd read, was supposed to be a fertile ground for development of social satire, light and British literature would have been hugely depleted if all novels that can be regarded as such were suddenly to disappear. Evelyn Waugh made the genre his ownweightless feeling, and ''A Handful of Dustbut I had always longed for gravity'' is a sublime example of his mastery of it.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141183969</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Bryony Doran Michael Grothaus|title=The China BirdBeautiful Shining People
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Edward is a sad ''But fearing something and solitary figurehaving it come to pass are two different things. Late middle-aged, twisted-spined and hump-backed, a loner who works in the archive basement of the library, lodges with Mrs Ingrams who makes his tea and ruins his laundry, and hoards letters from his mother. Like many an unmarried man with an aging, widowed mother, Edward finds his relationship with her somewhat strained. Unlike many And I'm willing to bet most of those menwhat we fear will never happen, his relationship was always that way. She is rude and demanding, and he either doesn't have the strength or the inclination we can take steps to force the issue with herchange it. Apart from an occasion half-hearted reprimand, he stands back, ignores, makes excuses.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095556302X</amazonuk>}}''
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Agnes Owens Jennifer Saint|title=The Complete NovellasAtalanta
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Who is Agnes Owens? A Scottish author who portrays working class life from the nineteen forties and fifties''I was as worthy as any one of them. I would get on board that ship, I vowed. Now an octogenarianI would take my place, apparently Agnes Owens started writing at not just in the age name of 58the goddess. Here are five previously published stories collected into one new editionIt was for the sake of my name, a companion volume to her short stories, published in 2008too. I donAtalanta't think you'll be disappointed.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846971373</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Erick Setiawan Amanthi Harris|title=Of Bees and MistBeautiful Place
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=The first few chapters of this amazing workPadma, had me scratching my heada young Sri Lankan, and pondering, 'what has returned to the Villa Hibiscus on earth the southern coast of her home country. This is this abouta place she spent her formative years. It is not a place she was born into, and where is it going?' It struck me but the one she thinks of as simply bizarrehome. However How she came to be at the Villa, I was quickly reeled inhow it became her home, and the initially disparate cast machinations that have flowed through her life ever since she first arrived there provide the ''score'' for this gentle and yet subtly violent novel. Padma's present fails to escape her past and much like the musical score of charactersa film, who seemed more like caricatures, soon had lives of their own - and fascinating ones that strand weaves its way through everything that happens at that!the Villa.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0755348532</amazonuk>1784631930
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Hilary Mantel178563335X|title=Wolf HallSea Defences|author=Hilary Taylor
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=A revisionist look at Henry VIIIWhen we first meet Rachel Bird she's ministera trainee vicar, Thomas Cromwellsitting in on a PCC meeting and wondering why they're held when you need to pick the children up. Rich Her husband, absorbing Christopher, collects six-year-old Hannah and intelligenther elder brother, itJamie, whilst Rachel holds a sobbing parishioner. Thelma's daughter-in-law won't let her see her grandson. Holthorpe, on the Norfolk coast, is a beautifullovely place, beautiful bookbut Rachel is struggling to develop a real bond with the parish - and she's in awe of the vicar, Gail, but then she's been doing the job for more than thirty years. Rachel and Christopher hoped that a walk on the beach would do them some good - it was stormy but it was probably what they needed. And then Hannah went missing. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007230184</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=A S Byatt1398515388|title=The Children's BookBoy and the Dog|author=Seishu Hase and Alison Watts (translator)
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary General Fiction|summary=Antonia Byatt's Booker-nominated ''The Children's Book'' (her first novel for seven years) is a staggeringFirst of all, it was the earthquake, complex and multi-layered bookdeep in the ocean floor, set between which created the last years of Victoria's reign tsunami and the end of the First World War. Although this is undoubtedly an intelligent book, full of learning and ideasin turn, ranging from class, early feminism, Fabianism caused the nuclear meltdown. The result was complete and anarchismutter devastation. The deaths were uncountable, it is highly readable and accessiblethe loss of livelihoods was widespread. The author's stance is fact that this was a unique time for children in the UK, freed many pets were separated from their owners came far down the 'be seen and not heard' list of priorities but - six months after the early Victorian age, tsunami - Kazumasa Nakagaki discovered a dog outside a convenience store. He wasn't a dog person but before the convenience store owner'treat them like adults' of the post war loss of innocence. It was a time when children, at least rich children, were allowed s comment that he would call Public Health prompted Kazumasa to be free open his car door and adult authors like JM Barrie wrote both about and for children and was also widely read by adultsTamon the dog jumped in.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701183896</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Colm Toibin 0989715337|title=BrooklynPapa on the Moon|author=Marco North|rating=54
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Colm Tóibín's quietly powerful new novel, Brooklyn, opens in the author's own home town of Enniscorthy, County Wexford in the 1950s. We are sitting with his conscientiously introverted heroine, Eilis Lacey, as she watches through the upstairs living room window as her more glamorous older sister Rose walks briskly home from work. Rose is popular at Some frogs had gotten into the local golf club, with many male admirers. Meanwhile, Eilis' three brothers have all gone to England where there is work to be had. There are few opportunities in Enniscorthy, for employment or anything else. Eilis is lucky to be offered a Sunday job in Miss Kelly's grocery shop, a shop Eilis' widowed mother will not enterwell. Later, Eilis will entertain her mother and sister with imitations of Miss Kelly's voice. Showing everything only through Eilis' eyes, Tóibín brilliantly evokes life in the claustrophobically tight-knit town.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670918121</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Daisy Hildyard
|title=Emergency
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=
The summary of this book doesn't come close to explaining what is done with the premise.
|isbn=1913097811
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage |author=Roddy DoyleSally Oliver |title=Paddy Clarke Ha Ha HaThe Weight of Loss |rating=4 |genre=Literary Fiction |summary= Marianne is grieving. Traumatised after the death of her sister, she awakes to find strange, thick black hairs sprouting from the bones of her spine which steadily increase in size and volume. Her GP, diagnosing the odd phenomenon as a physical reaction to her grief, recommends she go to stay at Nede, an experimental new treatment centre in Wales. Yet something strange is happening to Marianne and the other patients at Nede: a metamorphosis of a kind. As Marianne's memories threaten to overwhelm her, Nede offers her release from this cycle of memory and pain—but only at a terrible price: that of identity itself.|isbn= 086154112X }} {{Frontpage|author=Natalia Garcia Freire|title=This World Does Not Belong To Us
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Early comments on this debut novel from Ecuadorian writer Natalia García Freire include Tremendous, a delight. Iwill agree with the first – tremendous is no understatement – but 'm kind of a reverse literary snob, delight' is perhaps using the expression in that I tend to avoid books that win awards. a way I've found that such books are often very well written, but they're m not always good readingfamiliar with. As shameful as it is I have to admit, I would much rather read for story as for fancy wordsconfess my ignorance of the Spanish-language literary tradition so forgive my generalisation here. Clearly From the little I'm not alone, as have read (in 1993translation, the year Roddy DoyleI don's ''Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha'' won t read Spanish) there does seem to be a tendency towards the Booker Prize, fantastical – the bestseller lists contained [[:Category:John Grisham|John Grisham]], Sue Townsend and Jeffrey Archermystical realism.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099535084</amazonuk>0861541901
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Sarah Waters Jennifer Saint|title=The Little StrangerElektra|rating=54
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=When was 'Elektra' by Jennifer Saint tells the last time you couldn't put a Booker nominated novel down? Sarah Watersstory of three women who live in the heavily male dominated world of Ancient Greece. Cassandra, Clytemnestra, author of acclaimed novels ''Fingersmith'' and ''The Night Watch'' has written a chilling psychological ghost Elektra are all bit players in the story of the Trojan War. Yet Jennifer Saint shows us that kept me guessing until often the silent women have the most compelling stories and the very last pagemost extreme furies.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1844086011</amazonuk>1472273915
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=James Kelman 8409290103|title=How Late It Was, How LateIf Only|author=Matthew Tree
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Sammy has just woken up outside in what looks likes Twenty-one-year-old Malcolm Lowry had been sent abroad by his father, cotton-broker AO Lowry: he asked his accountant, Mr Patrick, to ensure that the young man got on board the boat and thereafter Patrick was to send him a park after monthly allowance. Patrick sent the money regularly and a heavy night correspondence - of drinkingsorts - sprang up between the two although we hear more about what Lowry has to say than Patrick. He can It wasn't remember much – how he got therethat Lowry senior didn't care for his son, or why it was that he is wearing some old trainers and not his new shoes. He doesndidn't know what's happened care to his wallet or why people are staring at have him. He does remember some things – one being in this country where he might be a row of some sorts he'd had with Helen, danger to his girlfriend. Now he has been arrested, beaten up by the police, wife and released back onto the street againother children. He needs to find a way The alcohol problem was obvious even before Patrick managed to get home, the only problem is; he has just gone blindyoung man on his way.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099546272</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Douglas CouplandAntoine Laurain, Le Sonneur and Jane Aitken (translator)|title=Generation ARed is My Heart
|rating=3.5
|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=I think with Douglas Coupland you either love him or hate him[[:Category:Antoine Laurain|Antoine Laurain]] books have always been black and white and read in my house. So And so was this one, although I suppose I should probably say straight off could have spelled that he's more accurately – this one of my favourite writers. I've read all his fictionwas, and I just about peed my pants with excitement at getting to review this latest offering, ''Generation A''. Those in the know will see that he is jumping off from his earlier novel, ''Generation X'', that dealt with three disillusioned twenty-somethings who seem to have opted out of life, working 'Mcjobs' in the Californian desert black and white and telling each other stories to pass the timered. HereYes, with he has an artistic collaborator on this new generationpiece, thereand I think it's storytelling again, this time amongst five characters, all from different places in possible to say not one page lacks the world, and different ages, who are brought together through one singular event in each influence of their lives - they are each stung by a beesome striking visual ideas.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0434019836</amazonuk>1913547183
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sam SavageB098FFFBH9|title=The Cry of the Sloth|rating=3.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Meet Andrew Whittaker. In some untold time of recent American history, he is forced through a failed marriage and an artistic temperament at odds with so many other people, to let properties to tenants he does not like, for $120 a month. The lodgers might not like the state of the buildings - ceilings falling through and so on - but that's another matter. He would much prefer to be left alone in front of his little Olivetti typewriter and create art. He runs a literary journal, of a kind, called "Soap", which no-one likes, no-one reads (and often, with dodgy, cheap printing, no-one could physically read it anyway), and which makes him poorer in time, money and spirit.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0297856499</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewSnowcub|author=Emily Bronte |title=Wuthering HeightsGraham Fulbright|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=In 1801 Lockwood, one of our narrators, arrived at Wuthering Heights on the Yorkshire moors. He was renting nearby Thrushcross Grange from the rude and surly Heathcliff, but when one of HeathcliffFourteen-year-old Rachel is her school's dogs attacked him animal rights project leader and she and her friend are producing a competition entry to highlight the weather turned against him he was forced to stay overnightway in which human beings exploit the animal world. In his room he found She gets a diary written by a young girl by the name great deal of Catherine Earnshawsupport from her family: father Pip Harrison, who was close to Heathcliff as a child lecturer at Imperial College, London, mother Kate and it was this which caused Lockwood to have her twin, Nick. Kate runs the family business, a terrifying dream toy shop called Cornucopia in Putney, which Catherineis where we'll meet Rachel's ghost fought to get into the room through the window. His screams of fear brought Heathcliff to the room and when Lockwood told him what he had seen Heathcliff asked him to leave the room and then sobbed as be begged Cathy to come in. Lockwood persuades the housekeeper, Nelly Dean main (our other narratorif unsuspected), to tell him the story behind what has happenedsource of information: five soft toys.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>009953052X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Roberto Bolano Yancey Williams|title=Amulet|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=The novel is set in the late 1960s, a time Crosshairs of political unrest and tension in Mexico. The narrator and protagonist seek refuge when the army invades the university. Ensconced in a fourth floor w.c., she commences to recollect her earlier life and experiences amongst the literati of Mexico, and the world of academia. She frequently refers to herself as ''the mother of Mexican poetry'', and this is indeed an apt, if somewhat generous, description, as she does emerge as a maternal figure. She is an engaging character, tolerated, rather than liked by her acquaintances, and it's her very lack of sophistication which makes her such a real and believable narrator. Poetry is her main love in life - she lives and breathes it, and all else fades into insignificance for her.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330511831</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jonathan Tulloch |title=A Winding RoadDevil|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=''A Winding Road'' is an unusual novel comprised of three separate (though structurally interspersed) narratives. The main one, which is set in the present and binds the other two together, follows the sordid escapades of one Piers Guest, art dealer, or, as he prefers, art advisor. Piers swans about London meeting clients, having affairs and generally doing just whatever he pleases with little thought for the consequences. The second narrative is (mostly) set in Nazi Germany and its main concern is a folklorist, Ernst Mann, and how he is viewed by his family after he joins the SS. His actions and motivations are questioned and obsessed about. The third narrative, set in Auvers-Sur-Oise in 1890, is a fictional account of the last days of Van Gogh's life, when he painted some of his most famous work. It features Dr. Gachet who famously treated the artist plus some of Dr. Gachet's other patients of Tulloch's own invention. Piers is alerted to the existence of a lost painting by Van Gogh which has been discovered in the archives of Ernst Mann.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224071149</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Colum McCann |title=Let The Great World Spin|rating=45
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=This was one of those books whereAward-winning crime writer Eddie Jablonski is getting on in years and, after I closed itdespite his strenuous objections and thanks to his daughter, I sat very quietlyfinds himself living - or imprisoned, just breathing out and breathing in, holding onto the last moments from Eddie's point of a good story. Although it was a little slow to start, I found myself more and more caught up view - in the characters' lives, how they were all so cleverly interlinked, woven together. The core room 315 of the story takes place on the 7th Garden of AugustEden nursing home, 1974with only a trusty nursing aide, the day that Philippe Petit walked on a high wire between the twin towers of the World Trade Centre in New YorkJenkins, and we begin with his high wire walkfor palatable company. Petit Nothing is never directly named, and although there are flashes back going to keep Eddie from his training stock-in-trade of writing though, so here, for the eventhis readers, and are his feelings and experience at the time, wanderings through his is not the focus of the story, but merely the hook upon which all the other characters hang togetherlife's work.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0747597227</amazonuk>0986031658}} {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=A S Byatt0008421714|title=PossessionMrs March|author=Virginia Feito
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=A S Byatt won The problem began just after the Booker Prize for Possession in 1990 and this new edition publication of the George March's most successful novel is part of a celebration of Booker winners produced by Vintage Booksto date. Presumably in an attempt to make these literary prize-winners more accessible, Vintage has published Everyone but Mrs March (we know her first name only on the series in mass market format. This edition of Possession is therefore similar in size and appearance last page) seemed to an airport lounge blockbuster. More on that latereither be reading it or had already done so.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099535157</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Andrew J H Sharp |title=The Ghosts of Eden|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=1983: Michael Lacey, a consultant surgeon is flying into Uganda Every day Mrs March went to attend a medical conference. On the plane he struggles against his memories of a child buried in Africalocal patisserie to buy olive bread but on that particular morning, against his claustrophobiaPatricia asked, and against as she was wrapping the unwelcome conversation of his neighbouring passenger: a passenger apparently afflicted by a native curse.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0955861330</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Iris Murdoch|title=The Seabread, The Sea|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=''What an egoist I must seem in but isn't this the preceding pagesfirst time he's based a character on you?'' Charles Arrowby reflects towards the end of the book. An aging celebrity, he is certainly She mentioned that – vainJohanna, self-regarding and obsessivethe principal character had 'her mannerisms''. But he is one of the most engaging literary characters I Perhaps this would not have ever come acrossmattered, and this tale of his withdrawal to a remote coastal cottage is a tour de force.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099529793</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=John Banville|title=The Infinities|rating=3.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Adam is being watched over by a god. No, not except for the fact that Adam - this one Johanna is a young man, in his twenties, staring out the window at the midsummerwhore of Nantes - ''s dawn breaking, in his old family home, where his father - Adam senior - lies comatose, dying from a stroke. And not that godweak, either - this is Hermesplain, who will be our narrator as the family (Adam's wifedetestable, motherpathetic, younger sister) wake up to the new dayunloved, and have cause to remember other timesunloveable wretch. We'll see also that Zeus, too, is one of the household gods - and is still doing his old, randy, visitation tricks.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330450247</amazonuk>'
}}