132,585
edits
Changes
no edit summary
[[Category:Literary Fiction|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|Literary Fiction]]==Literary fiction==__NOTOC__{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Claudie GallayMatthew Tree|title=In the Gold of TimeWe'll Never Know
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=A young Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to be different from his father (I'm not sure we ever know his name) leaves his Montreuil apartment , a drunk and takes chronic underachiever whose dreams of being exceptional at any of his wife artistic passions all failed miserably and their seven-year-old twin daughters on the annual holiday to the coast. They have a house, La Téméraire, overlooking the sea a few kilometres south who had endless crises of Dieppeself confidence. They'd bought the house just after the girls were born and go there every summerSo Tim applied himself to his studies, cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and maybe for a weekend or two in the Spring. Never in winterset himself high but achievable ambitions.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857051261</amazonuk>B0CVFXPGP8
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=B0C47LV1PC
|title=Fragility
|author=Mosby Woods
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary= Can you make a ''Yo birthing person'' joke? And if you could, is the question should you make it? Or is the question if you did, would it land? The catch is that the answer for both could well be.... no.
''Fragility'' is set as the city of Portland, Oregon, cautiously begins to emerge from the restrictions imposed during the covid pandemic}}{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Philippe ClaudelMosby Woods|title=The InvestigationA Whirly Man Loses His Turn
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=And you think you had The West isn't the dominant force it badonce was. Our hero gets off a train at Nobody in the right station, but doesn't get collected by those he's working on behalf of, can't have his order at the bar fulfilled, cannot get West is quite sure how to mend this or even if mending it is the place best course of work on timeaction. Governments are flailing. A war here, a push for climate action there. A feeling that nobody is in actual charge. Imagine then cannot find the hotel almost opposite without , there was a major trek through a snowy, unsavoury but completely empty cityman with precognition. And when he gets to Imagine the hotel - well that and the other people he meets there are strategic advantage in this asset; a whole new category man who can tell you what will happen given any set of oddcircumstances. Is this how things are supposed to That man would be - is this limbovaluable, a nightmare or just a novel our hero is trapped right? Perhaps the most valuable asset inhistory. Imagine then, that this man loses this ability. What would governments do to get it back?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857051547</amazonuk>B0C9SNG8R1
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jenn Ashworth0571379559|title=The Friday GospelsHouse of Broken Bricks|author=Fiona Williams
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=There are five in the Leeke family. Martin ''The House of Broken Bricks'' is the father and he works in the mail sorting officestory of four people. ThereTess Hembry's not a lot of ''pleasure'' roots are in Martin's lifeJamaica: temperamentally she might be happier there, but if you were making a list you'd put Bovril at instead, she lives in the house on the top riverbank, built of itbroken bricks. SheInsubstantial as it might look, it's a labrador stood the passage of time, storms and Martin's obsessed with her trainingfloods. WellHer husband, Richard, he's partly obsessed with struggles to grow his vegetables, to complete the training delivery rounds - and the training is partly an excuse for his other obsessionto bring in sufficient money. Nina owns two labradors and Martin sees them (he They have twin boys - Sonny and NinaMax, that is - not he and the labs) as having a future togetherrainbow twins. It would be easy to be critical, but MartinSonny's wife is in a wheelchair. Paulinecolouring reflects his mother's been unwell since the birth of their youngest childJamaican heritage. Max takes after his father. ShePeople don's not quite doubly incontinentt believe that they're related, but accidents are frequent much less twins and embarrassing. Shethere's also got a penchant for spending on home improvements - despite the fact an assumption when Max is out with his mother that there she''really'' isn't the money for thems his nanny.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444707728</amazonuk>
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Claire North
|title=House of Odysseus
|rating=5
|genre= Literary Fiction
|summary= ''What could matter more than love?''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mary Francois RockcastleKay Chronister|title=In Caddis WoodDesert Creatures|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Dystopian Fiction|summary=MiddleWith a world that is becoming increasingly inhospitable for humanity, post-agedapocalyptic fiction can become an almost masochistic thrill. Whether it is a robotic takeover, married and (comparatively speaking) middle class Americans Hallie and Carl seem, at first glancea world devoid of water or a nuclear holocaust, this genre is a way for humans to be happycathartically experience their most existential fears. Hallie (''Desert Creatures'' by Kay Chronister is a poet) and Carl (an architect) have all the trappings new work of post-apocalyptic fiction that aligns many of success including two adult twin daughters and a holiday home in the beautiful Caddis Woodfears that exist for humanity today. However, Carl becomes It is a little shaky on his feet and, while he's able to shrug it off for a while, he begins to realise shocking novel that something's seriously wrong. As his health deteriorates other cracks materialise as he realises his marriage isn't as steady as he thought and so he and Hallie must come still manages to terms with her past and, indeed, futurefind hope.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1555975925</amazonuk>1803364998
}}
{{newreviewfrontpage|isbn=1803363002|author=Sir Compton MackenzieEric LaRocca|title=Whisky GaloreThe Trees Grew Because I Bled There|rating=4.5|genre=HumourHorror|summary=The inhabitants of Great Todday and neighbouring Little Todday enjoy embrocation provided by a tot or two of whiskyHorror taps into something primeval within us. Unfortunately this It is war timeused as a way to reflect our darkest emotions and how we as humans react and process them. To date the sacrifices in the Hebrides have included their young men and Most horror fiction feature a token black-out (the harbour lights remain on so there seems little point) but more follows. The water of life itself is becoming scarcer and they're approaching Lent. The timing 'Big Bad'', whether that is unfortunate as they don't exactly give a home invader, a monster or a ghost, it up for Lentusually something tangible and, but drink extra as Shrove Tuesday approaches in by the spirit end of the season. So, as supplies dwindle to extinctionstory, imagine their surprise when a ship containing practically a million bottles of it en route to America founders off the coastbeatable. Eric LaRocca's ''The community launch Trees Grew Because I Bled There'' is not like that. It is a covert army-like operation to liberate collection of short stories more interested in the alcohol fighting, planning to outwit not the Germans but the islands' Home Guardhorrors of illness, HM Customs grief and Excise and an inept British Intelligence officerhumiliation. Easy then? Well, an easier task than Horrors that which local headmaster George Campbell has. He wants linger and are harder to get married but his mum wondefeat than any ''Big Bad''t let him.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780270925</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Kevin SmithMadelaine Lucas|title=Jammy DodgerThirst for Salt
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Joe is ''Love, I'd read, was supposed to be a salesman on the verge of giving up. Having lost all confidence in his ability to sell vacuum cleaners to Middle Americalight and weightless feeling, he creates and elaborates on a fantasy just but I had always longed for fun. It includes a woman being gravity'serviced' from behind, her partner obscured by a waist high wall. The only thing any over-the-wall voyeur sees is an innocent activity e.g. she may manicure her nails.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1908276118</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jose SaramagoMichael Grothaus|title=Raised from the GroundBeautiful Shining People
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Domingos is a feckless man, a man often neglecting his family, ''But fearing something and hitting his wife due having it come to too much drinking, a man often leaving everyone behind as he chases work and flees his debtspass are two different things. He calls himself a shoemaker but really heAnd I's little different from those around him, who actually do have m willing to move about, chasing bet most of what seasonal agricultural work is available. Certainly his children and their children in turn we fear will mostly be bound never happen, or we can take steps to the land they sprang from - the change it.'latifundio' – and the spirit of both all of them, and of it, throughout the Portuguese twentieth century, are the subjects of this early [[:Category:Jose Saramago|Jose Saramago]] novel, in English for the first time after a thirty-year wait.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846557062</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Kari Hotakainen and Owen F Witesman (translator)Jennifer Saint|title=The Human PartAtalanta|rating=45
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Salme Malmikunnas attends a literary fair with her daughter''I was as worthy as any one of them. I would get on board that ship, Helena but before going insideI vowed. I would take my place, Salme meets an author who offers her a small fortune not just in exchange the name of the goddess. It was for her storythe sake of my name, too. He seeks inspiration and feels that SalmeAtalanta's biography is it. Salme agrees only after a fee increase and so their regular meetings begin. The author gets a story and Salme unloads her past and present onto this stranger. Meanwhile, Salme's family continues speeding towards a devastating event.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857050656</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Thomas KeneallyAmanthi Harris|title=The Daughters of MarsBeautiful Place
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Expectations ahead of Thomas Keneally's 'The Daughters of Mars' are understandably high. He regularly features on the Booker shortlist and has won the prize in the past with ''Shindler's Ark''. While his subject matterPadma, World War Ia young Sri Lankan, is hardly has returned to the most original, his slant Villa Hibiscus on the story southern coast of her home country. This is, and this a place she spent her formative years. It is not a book that deserves place she was born into, but the one she thinks of as home. How she came to sit with be at the very best of Villa, how it became her home, and the many books on machinations that subject, including have flowed through her life ever since she first arrived there provide the ''All Quiet on the Western Frontscore'' for this gentle and ''Birdsong''yet subtly violent novel. It Padma's present fails to escape her past and much like the musical score of a film, that good and strand weaves its way through everything that powerfulhappens at the Villa.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0340951877</amazonuk>1784631930
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Joseph O'Connor178563335X|title=Where Have You Been?Sea Defences|author=Hilary Taylor
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Irish novelist Joseph OWhen we first meet Rachel Bird she'Connor has had quite s a 2012trainee vicar, sitting in on a PCC meeting and wondering why they're held when you need to pick the children up. Earlier in the Her husband, Christopher, collects six-year he joined the ranks of such authors as Edna O'Brien-old Hannah and her elder brother, Jamie, [[:Category:Roddy Doyle|Roddy Doyle]] and Seamus Heaney when he became whilst Rachel holds a recipient of the PEN award for his outstanding contribution to Irish literaturesobbing parishioner. Thelma's daughter-in-law won't let her see her grandson. What could possibly top that for Holthorpe, on the Norfolk coast, is a sense of achievement? Well thislovely place, his first book but Rachel is struggling to develop a real bond with the parish - and she's in awe of short stories in 20 yearsthe vicar, must come pretty close to at least equalling itGail, amply illustrating but then she's been doing the reasons job for more than thirty years. Rachel and Christopher hoped that a walk on the panel's decisionbeach would do them some good - it was stormy but it was probably what they needed. And then Hannah went missing.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846556899</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Thomas H Cook1398515388|title=The Crime of Julian WellsBoy and the Dog|author=Seishu Hase and Alison Watts (translator)
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary General Fiction|summary=American travel writer Julian Wells walks out First of all, it was the house he shares with his sisterearthquake, wanders down to deep in the garden lakeocean floor, rows himself out to which created the centre tsunami and slits his wriststhis, in turn, caused the nuclear meltdown. He dies alone as he silently watches his life drip into the waterThe result was complete and utter devastation. DevastatedThe deaths were uncountable, his friend and frequent travel companion Philip Anders, tries to come to terms with the loss the only way he can: by attempting to understandof livelihoods was widespread. Julian dedicated a book to Philip, mentioning a 'crime' The fact that Philip had witnessed. Philip had always thought it to be a flip reference to his comment many pets were separated from years before that it would be a crime for Julian to waste time writing a certain piece, but, in their owners came far down the light list of tragic events, is this actually priorities but - six months after the case? Is there tsunami - Kazumasa Nakagaki discovered a crime in the author's past? As Philip retraces the essence of Julian through his words, the places they visited and people they encountered he slowly uncovers secrets and dog outside a dangerous obsessionconvenience store.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1908800143</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Diana McCaulay|title=Huracan|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=1986 – 30-year-old Leigh McCaulay (''White gal!'') is returning to Jamaica, the land of her birth. Her mother is dead and there is an estate to be settled. Her estranged father is somewhere on the island. Her brother is in England. This isnHe wasn't a dog person but the closest of grieving families. Leigh doesn't even know how her mother died. Indeed, sheconvenience store owner's a bit surprised comment that he would call Public Health prompted Kazumasa to find out she'd gone back to Jamaica. The residual family had left open his car door and Tamon the island not long after the father's desertiondog jumped in.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845231961</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Helene Gremillon and Alison Anderson (translator)0989715337|title=The ConfidantPapa on the Moon|author=Marco North
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=It's 1975 and Camille, having lost her father a while ago, is now coming to terms with the recent death of her mother. After plucking up courage and strength, she goes through the condolence cards but there's one item in Some frogs had gotten into the correspondence pile that's out of place. It's addressed to her but from Louis (whom she doesn't know) about Annie (of whom she's never heard). As Louis pours out his story, reminiscing about his youth in wartime France, Camille is convinced it's a mistake; she shouldn't have received itwell. However the envelope is definitely addressed to her and, what's more, this won't be the last instalment of Louis' sad memoir that comes through the post.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1908313293</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Peter TerrinDaisy Hildyard|title=The GuardEmergency|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Harry and Michel are very good at their job, even if we might think their job is not that great. They and they alone are responsible for protecting the building they live in. Designed as an impregnable fortress containing many immense, palatial apartments inhabited by the ultra-rich, the only way in The summary of this book doesn't come close to explaining what is through the basement carpark, where they reside in their own small patch of territory. They are certainly diligent – inspecting their stash of munitions twice a day, even if nothing could possibly interfere done with their supply of bullets, and navigating around the large expanse of space where each of the forty floors above them has space for three supercarspremise. But while one seems to be dreaming of things he might not get to witness – promotion to guarding villas in Elysian fields with becoming owner's wives, the other seems to be hearing things that might not actually be there to be heard…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857050877</amazonuk>1913097811}}
{{newreviewFrontpage |author=Richard FordSally Oliver |title=CanadaThe Weight of Loss |rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Richard Ford's ''Canada'' opens with one Marianne is grieving. Traumatised after the death of her sister, she awakes to find strange, thick black hairs sprouting from the best opening lines that I've read bones of her spine which steadily increase in size and volume. Her GP, diagnosing the odd phenomenon as a long time: 'Firstphysical reaction to her grief, I'll tell about the robbery our parents committed. Then about the murdersrecommends she go to stay at Nede, which happened lateran experimental new treatment centre in Wales. The robbery Yet something strange is happening to Marianne and the most important partother 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.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0747598606</amazonuk>086154112X }} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Kevin PowersNatalia Garcia Freire|title=The Yellow BirdsThis World Does Not Belong To Us
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Daniel Murphy ('Murph') is 18, in the American army and about to embark Early comments on his first tour of duty in Iraq. By his side is John Bartlethis debut novel from Ecuadorian writer Natalia García Freire include Tremendous, three years older and more experienced in the armya delight. However neither of them has any notion of I will agree with the sort of life or job they will face when they get there. The fighting first – tremendous is dirty, unpredictable and not set out in any text book. Their commanding officer, Sergeant Sterling, is sadistic and without any apparent humanity. But everything will be alright: Bartle has made a promise to Murphno understatement – but 's mother, a promise that will ricochet from the US to Iraq and back again.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444756125</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Ian McEwan|title=Sweet Tooth|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Ian McEwan's ''Sweet Tooth'delight' is part spy novel but more perhaps using the expression in a love story and a tale of deception and half truths. Itway I's also, more subtly, a book about the power, role and importance of fictionm not familiar with. Set in the 1970s, with frequent musical and political references I have to confess my ignorance of the UK at that time, Serena Frome is a beautiful, CambridgeSpanish-educated daughter of an Anglican bishop with a taste for unsuitable romanceslanguage literary tradition so forgive my generalisation here. From an early affair with a man who turns out the little I have read (in translation, I don't read Spanish) there does seem to be homosexual, to an affair with an older lecturer she moves on to a surprise job at MI5 where she had a crush on one of her bosses, again and awkward, repressed and unattractive individual before encountering talented author Tom Haley as part of her job with whom she once again falls in love. Few of these men are what they seem, and neither for that matter is Serena when she has to hide her job from Haleytendency towards the fantastical – the mystical realism.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0224097377</amazonuk>0861541901
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jeet ThayilJennifer Saint|title=NarcopolisElektra
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Novels about narcotic substances are notoriously hard to pull off. The challenge is to make 'Elektra' by Jennifer Saint tells the induced events interesting and meaningful to story of three women who live in the, presumably, non-induced readerheavily male dominated world of Ancient Greece. In ''Narcopolis''Cassandra, Jeet Thayil pulls this off surprisingly well for meClytemnestra, although it's fair to say that it won't be everyone's tasteand Elektra are all bit players in the story of the Trojan War. It's not a book Yet Jennifer Saint shows us that often the Bombay/Mumbai tourist office will be keen to promote. A cover quotation links silent women have the book to a similar vein (OK, that's a poor choice of words in the circumstances) to ''Trainspotting'' most compelling stories and that's not far from the markmost extreme furies.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0571275761</amazonuk>1472273915
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Zadie Smith8409290103|title=NWIf Only|author=Matthew Tree
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Fans of Zadie Smith have Twenty-one-year-old Malcolm Lowry had a seven year wait since her last book ''On Beauty''. In ''NW''been sent abroad by his father, cotton-broker AO Lowry: he asked his accountant, Mr Patrick, Smith returns to more of the issues addressed in her brilliant debut novel [[White Teeth by Zadie Smith|White Teeth]]. Set in parts of London ensure that should be obvious from the title, young man got on board the book takes boat and thereafter Patrick was to send him a monthly allowance. Patrick sent the lives money regularly and a correspondence - of four people who grew sorts - sprang up on a rough estate and looks at how they have moved on - or not. All four still live nearby between the estate where they grew uptwo although we hear more about what Lowry has to say than Patrick. There It wasn't that Lowry senior didn's multi-cultural tension and the t care for his son, it was that he didn't care to have and have nots of power and money and Smith looks at how much individuals are him in control of their destiny and ability this country where he might be a danger to rise out of their upbringing, his wife and how chance encounters can bring you back other children. The alcohol problem was obvious even before Patrick managed to your past with a bumpget the young man on his way.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241144140</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Fuminori NakamuraAntoine Laurain, Le Sonneur and Jane Aitken (translator)|title=The ThiefRed is My Heart|rating=3.5|genre=CrimeLiterary Fiction |summary=The Thief [[:Category:Antoine Laurain|Antoine Laurain]] books have always been black and white and read in my house. And so was this one, although I could have spelled that more accurately – this one was, and is content roaming the streets of Tokyo, living black and white and red. Yes, he has an artistic collaborator on the contents of its wealthier citizens' pockets untilthis piece, his original partner in crime (literally) introduces him to Kizaki, a local shady big shot. Kizaki wants the Thiefand I think it's help on a straightforward job. He will just be possible to say not one of a team tasked with breaking into a rich speculator's home, scaring him a little, taking page lacks the contents influence of his safe and departing. No rough stuff and the financial settlement Kizaki offers will more than compensate the pickpocket for his timesome striking visual ideas.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1780339135</amazonuk>1913547183
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=A N WilsonB098FFFBH9|title=The Potter's Hand|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=The man of clay that A N Wilson throws onto his storytelling wheel in ''The Potter's Hand'' is the great Josiah Wedgwood, but this is much more than a historic telling of his life. Indeed, Josiah already has a thriving business at the start of the book. What Wilson does particularly impressively is to put Wedgwood's achievement and works into the context of the politics and social philosophy of the times, sandwiched between the two great revolutions in America and France. In order to do this, Wilson has to play slightly loose with artistic licence by altering dates and time lines a bit, but it works well. He also balances the real historic figures with several key figures of his own invention and where the historic figures don't quite fit with his narrative, he alters their ages and invents 'facts' to the benefit of the fictional narrative.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848879512</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewSnowcub|author=Jake Arnott|title=The House of RumourGraham Fulbright|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Jake Arnott sees to be one of those authors Fourteen-year- like [[:Category:Will Self|Will Self]] whom youold Rachel is her school'll love or loathe. Occasionally, you'll swing from one extreme s animal rights project leader and she and her friend are producing a competition entry to highlight the other and I'll confess to being a little nervous when I opened way in which human beings exploit the bookanimal world. We really weren't ''that'' keen when we read [[The Devil's Paintbrush by Jake Arnott|The Devil's Paintbrush]]. Using the deck She gets a great deal of Tarot cards as the structure of the book we look support from her family: father Pip Harrison, a lecturer at the twentieth century through the life of Larry ZagorskiImperial College, London, mother Kate and her twin, Nick. Imagine history being gently folded together like Kate runs the family business, a cake mixture with episodes sliding against each othertoy shop called Cornucopia in Putney, flavouring that which they touch. Imagine the real - Aleister Crowley (reprising his appearance in is where we''The Devilll meet Rachel's Paintbrush''main (if unsuspected), Rudolf Hess, Ian Fleming, Cyril Connolly, Jim Jones and L Ron Hubbard blended with a transexual prostitute, a British pop singer and Larry, who writes pulp science fictionsource of information: five soft toys.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340922729</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Alison MooreYancey Williams|title=The LighthouseCrosshairs of the Devil|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=When we first meet Futh he's on a North Sea ferry Award-winning crime writer Eddie Jablonski is getting on in years and, despite his way strenuous objections and thanks to a walking holiday in Germany. Therehis daughter, finds himself living - or imprisoned, from Eddie's no sense point of enthusiasm or anticipation: Futh's middle aged and recently separatedview - in room 315 of the Garden of Eden nursing home, seemingly without friends or family. He always wanted with only a dogtrusty nursing aide, but keeps stick insectsJenkins, for palatable company. The holiday seems Nothing is going to be something whichkeep Eddie from his stock-in-trade of writing though, when it is overso here, he will have done it and will then return to for his new flat. It begins and will end at Hellhausreaders, a guesthouse run by Bernard and are his wanderings through his wife Ester. He gets on well enough with Ester but is at a loss to understand a rather hostile encounter with Bernard. He sets out the following morning for a week of walking, thinking and remembering. Meanwhile Ester - untouched by her meeting with Futh - continues her lonely life punctuated by the occasional casual sexual encounter which she barely hides from Bernard's work.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1907773177</amazonuk>0986031658}} {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Nicola Barker0008421714|title=The YipsMrs March|author=Virginia Feito
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Stuart Ransom is a golfing has-been and heThe problem began just after the publication of George March's the only one who doesn't realise itmost successful novel to date. If his recollections are anything to go by Everyone but Mrs March (and who can tell?) he was we know her first name only on a par with the best. Times have changed though; the handicap isn't what last page) seemed to either be reading it once was and age and alcohol have taken their toll. However, hope springs eternal and there's always one more match, or had already done so perhaps this is it. Meanwhile Gene, who splits his time between working at Every day Mrs March went to the hotel in which Stuart is staying and reading electricity meterslocal patisserie to buy olive bread but on that particular morning, encounters an agoraphobicPatricia asked, exotic tattooist. Valentine is a woman struggling with an unhealthily precocious 2 year-oldas she was wrapping the bread, a brother flirting with criminality and a brain-injured mother who has become more than a little eccentric. Add Gene's wife Rev Sheila and her personal crisis into 'but isn't this the mix and it becomes a recipe for disaster, itfirst time he's just based a case of waiting for it to erupt.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007476655</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Iain Broome|title=A is for Angelica|rating=5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Gordon and Georgina Kingdom spent years being like many other couples. character on you?'' They had jobs, friends, holidaysShe mentioned that Johanna, a springer spaniel named Kipling and a life together. Then Georgina became ill and Gordon took early retirement to nurse her better. He treats retirement with the same methodical efficiency he employed at work. He records Georginaprincipal character had 's care, her progress and shares her waking moments, feeding her and sitting with hermannerisms''. HoweverPerhaps this would not have mattered, as she spends a lot of time asleep, Gordon except for the fact that Johanna is left to entertain himself and so, the same man who led the local Neighbourhood Watch, watches his neighbours, noting points whore of interest and visible activities in alphabetically filed dossiers. TheyNantes - ''re all there: Don across the road who borrows garden tools on a more permanent basis than Gordon would likeweak, art award winner young Benny who paints with his eyes shutplain, the lady next door who throws footballs over the fence and the new woman across the roaddetestable, Angelica. Exceptpathetic, when Angelica moves into the streetunloved, Gordonunloveable wretch.''s interest becomes more focused than usual.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>190877598X</amazonuk>
}}