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[[Category:New Reviews|Literary Fiction]] __NOTOC__<!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Susan BealeMatthew Tree|title=The Good Guy|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction |summary=September 1964: an Indian summer in suburban Massachusetts. Ted McDougall is a twenty-three-year-old Goodyear tyre salesman who lives with his wife Abigail and ten-month-old daughter Mindy in the up-and-coming Elm Grove community. Both Ted and Abigail feel unappreciated in their roles. Ted knows his in-laws wanted him to become a lawyer and join Abigail's father's firm, but he's a good salesman and wishes they wouldn't look down on him for it. Meanwhile Abigail, an American history buff, can't master the domestic arts of cooking and cleaning, much as she tries, and longs to go back to school.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473630339</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Emma Cline|title= The Girls|rating= 4|genre= Literary Fiction|summary=California. Summer 1969. Fourteen year old Evie Boyd is a thoughtful yet bored teenager from a broken home. The attention she craves is nowhere to be found in the form of her neglectful, serial dating mother, or even in the friendship of her fickle best friend Connie. Abandoned by those around her, Evie's path collides with Suzanne – a mysterious older girl who introduces Evie to a strange yet thrilling new life, offering her the intimate relationship her life back home lacks.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784740446</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Simon Van Booy|title= Father's Day|rating= 5|genre= General Fiction|summary=When devastating news shatters the life of six year old Harvey, she finds herself in the care of a veteran social worker, Wanda, and alone in the world save for one relative she has never met - a disabled ex-con, haunted by a violent past he can't escape. Moving between past and present, Father's Day weaves together the story of Harvey's childhood on Long Island, and her life as a young woman in Paris.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780749694</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Thomas Keneally|title=NapoleonWe's Last Islandll Never Know

|summary=It's not usual Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to open be different from his father, a review with the history drunk and chronic underachiever whose dreams of how the book came to be written but with ''Napoleon's Last Island'' the story sheds an intriguing light on the plot. In 2012 author Thomas Keneally was given tickets to an exhibition being exceptional at any of Napoleonic artefacts: uniforms, furniture, china, paintings, military decorations, snuff boxes his artistic passions all failed miserably and memorabilia as well as Napoleon's death maskwho had endless crises of self confidence. He was intrigued as So Tim applied himself to how the exhibits his studies, cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and particularly the mask came to be in Australia. Some pieces in the exhibition had been bought in later set himself high but most came from the descendants of the Balcombe family, who came to the colony in the first half of the nineteenth century, from St Helena via England. The result of Keneally's research into the story is ''Napoleon's Last Island''achievable ambitions.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1473625335</amazonuk>B0CVFXPGP8

{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=B0C47LV1PC|title=The Natural Way of ThingsFragility|author=Charlotte WoodMosby Woods|rating=54

|summary=Yolanda and Verla wake up disorientated. They realise theyCan you make a ''Yo birthing person''ve been drugged. Yolanda thinks that perhaps they are in some kind of mental facility - She knew she was not mad, but all lunatics thought that. Verla just sits, still and frozen, waiting. joke? And soon enoughif you could, two men arrive to reveal their fate. Yolanda and Verlais the question should you make it? Or is the question if you did, along with eight other girls, have been brought to a remote farmhouse surrounded by an electrified fencewould it land? The catch is that the answer for both could well be. Their heads are shaved. They are dressed in uncomfortable, scratchy, Amish-style clothes. They are tied together like a chain gang. And, like any chain gang, their days are marked with forced labourno. Two men, one more cruel than  ''Fragility'' is set as the othercity of Portland, and a so-called nurse are their jailersOregon, not their guardians.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1760291870</amazonuk>cautiously begins to emerge from the restrictions imposed during the covid pandemic

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Emma GeenMosby Woods|title=The Many Selves of Katherine NorthA Whirly Man Loses His Turn|rating=3.54|genre=Science Literary Fiction|summary=As a Bristol-area The West isn'phenomenaut', nineteen-year-old Kit projects herself into t the dominant force it once was. Nobody in the West is quite sure how to mend this or even if mending it is the lab-grown bodies best course of all sorts of creaturesaction. Governments are flailing. She's recently spent A war here, a lot of time as push for climate action there. A feeling that nobody is in actual charge. Imagine then, there was a fox (appropriate given her nickname) and got particularly close man with a vixen named Tomokoprecognition. It's becoming much harder for her to leave Imagine the animal world behind at the end strategic advantage in this asset; a man who can tell you what will happen given any set of her 'jumps'circumstances. Even after BuckleyThat man would be valuable, her neuroengineerright? Perhaps the most valuable asset in history. Imagine then, signals her that this man loses this ability. What would governments do to 'Come home' and she resumes her original body, she has trouble giving up animal tendencies like territorialism, toileting outdoors and raiding bins.get it back?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1408858436</amazonuk>B0C9SNG8R1

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sjon and Victoria Cribb (translator)0571379559|title=Moonstone: The Boy Who Never WasHouse of Broken Bricks|author=Fiona Williams

|summary=Sixteen-year-old Mani Stein - Moonstone in translation - existed on ''The House of Broken Bricks'' is the fringes story of societyfour people. He lived Tess Hembry's roots are in Reykjavik and Jamaica: temperamentally she might be happier there, but instead, she lives in 1918 the night sky (and house on the day for that matter) was lit by the eruptions riverbank, built of the Katla volcanobroken bricks. The Great War was ragingInsubstantial as it might look, or possibly grinding onit's stood the passage of time, but life in the capital carried on much as usualstorms and floods. There were shortagesHer husband, such as coalRichard, struggles to grow his vegetables, but there was to complete the new fashion delivery rounds - and it was for to bring in sufficient money. They have twin boys - Sonny and Max, the movies that Mani lived, seeing every production he could, sometimes several timesrainbow twins. He dreamed about the films, changing them to suit Sonny's colouring reflects his tastes, working mother's Jamaican heritage. Max takes after his own life into the plotsfather. But People don't believe that they're related, much less twins and there was another reason why Mani was a misfit: Mani was gay and frequently made a living as a sex worker's an assumption when Max is out with his mother that she's his nanny.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473613132</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Conor O'CallaghanClaire North|title=Nothing on EarthHouse of Odysseus|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=On a sweltering night in what is a blisteringly hot summer a young girl hammers at a man's door and when let into 'What could matter more than love?'' The follow-up to the house tells him that her father has disappeared excellent ''tooIthaca''picks up a few months after where we left off. Gradually In the palace of Odysseus, with delicate care Queen Penelope continues to rule without her story emergeshusband, of a who sailed to war at Troy and then by divine intervention never returned home on one of those estates so common in Ireland after . As ever she remains surrounded by suitors vying for the collapse throne of the Celtic Tiger with only the occasional house occupied and others only part builtWestern Isles. It could be any one of hundreds of Irish towns at that time Having survived – politically and its main feature is physical – the lack of hope chaotic storm that it will never be any better. Our narrator tells her storyClytemnestra brought to Ithaca's shores, much, he says, as it was told to him and we hear Queen Penelope is on the brink of a life on fragile peace. One that shatters however with the edge return of Orestes, King of povertyMycenae, with strange noises in the nightand his sister Elektra, words written in the dust on the windows mirrored by those written in blue ink on her skinseeking refuge.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1781620342</amazonuk>0356516075

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Per Olov Enquist and Deborah Bragan-Turner (translator)Kay Chronister|title=The Parable BookDesert Creatures|rating=3.54|genre=Literary Dystopian Fiction|summary=It's not only springtime when With a man's fancies turn to thoughts of love – he can also do it in the autumn of his lifeworld that is becoming increasingly inhospitable for humanity, as does the man involved here. But being a wellpost-known author, and being beholden to silence, apocalyptic fiction can he really put his thoughts on paper? It happened become an almost masochistic thrill. Whether it is a long time agorobotic takeover, and he only met the woman concerned a couple world devoid of timeswater or a nuclear holocaust, but with it being such this genre is a powerful event and such a slightly unusual circumstance, what should he do? It takes way for humans to cathartically experience their most existential fears. ''Desert Creatures'' by Kay Chronister is a notebook new work of his father's love poems to his mother, post-apocalyptic fiction that he finds both incomplete and scorched, to give him aligns many of the green light – the voice from the past fears that says to him, 'go exist for it'humanity today. And what we read here It is a resultshocking novel that still manages to find hope.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857059912</amazonuk>1803364998

{{newreviewfrontpage|isbn=1803363002|author=Maggie O'FarrellEric LaRocca|title=This Must Be the PlaceThe Trees Grew Because I Bled There|rating=45|genre=Literary FictionHorror|summary=Maggie OHorror taps into something primeval within us. It is used as a way to reflect our darkest emotions and how we as humans react and process them. Most horror fiction feature a ''Big Bad'Farrell's globe-trotting seventh novel opens in 2010 with Daniel Sullivan, an American linguistics professor. He lives with his wife Claudettewhether that is a home invader, a French actress who retreated from the limelightmonster or a ghost, it usually something tangible and their two children in a remote home in Donegal. It was 10 years ago that he first came here and met Claudette , by chance when her van had a flat tire; he struck up a conversation with her son Ari and gave the boy tips for dealing with his stutterend of the story, beatable. Now, preparing to fly back to Brooklyn for his fatherEric LaRocca's ninetieth birthday party, he's caught 'The Trees Grew Because I Bled There'' is not like that. It is a collection of short by a long-lost voice he hears on stories more interested in the radiohorrors of illness, grief and humiliation. It belongs to Nicola Janks, a former lover he last saw 24 years ago; when he learns Horrors that she died soon after they were together, he determines linger and are harder to figure out whether he played a role, even if he doesndefeat than any ''Big Bad''t like what he finds.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755358805</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Joanne HarrisMadelaine Lucas|title=Different ClassThirst for Salt

|summary= St Oswald's Grammar School For Boys is in crisis. A murdered schoolboy'Love, I'd read, was supposed to be a procession of new Head Masterslight and weightless feeling, but I had always longed for gravity'' Told from a(nother) new Head Masterretrospective view, a Crisis Intervention Team and a potential merger young woman unravels the year-long relationship that once defined her. Overlaid with St Oswald's all female counterpartlater wisdom, Mulberry House. Roy Straitley is not altogether dismayed at the prospect of delaying his retirement; St Oswald's has been his life, narrator relives the affair with a man and boy and a crisis is a crisis twenty years her senior from its inception – the summer after all is said and done, isn't it? It's probably his duty finishing university – to stay and right its sorrowful end the shipsummer after. So when Set against the latest backdrop of an isolated Australian coastal town ''Thirst for Salt'' details the new Head Masters and his duo of crisis managers walk into the staff room, Straitley can't quite believe his 24-year-old eyes. The new Head is an ex-pupil of St Oswaldnarrator's; a boy whodeepening relationship with her older lover, depicting its all-consuming nature, in his time at the esteemed old School caused such an uproarious scandal that one of the Masters ended up in prison! how it changed her perspective on both romantic and familial relationships and how it altered her irrevocably.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0385619235</amazonuk>0861546490

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Bill BeverlyMichael Grothaus|title= DodgersBeautiful Shining People|rating= 54

|summary= Judging a book by its cover can mislead. It can especially mislead if you don't look closely at the cover 'But fearing something and having it come to pass are just grabbed by the two different things. And I'm willing to bet most of what we fear will never happen, or we can take steps to change it.'feel' ' or 'Beautiful Shining People'style'' of revolves around the design question of the thingidentity and acceptance. Of what it means to be human. Being misled Of what is real and what is not necessarily a bad thing. For reasons best left in the depths of my addled brainartificial, and whether the styling development of Dodgers had me thinking 'noir'. I was expecting late fifties, early sixties. If I'd looked closer, I'd have seen that it technology is much more contemporary than thatexciting or frightening. Then again…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1843448572</amazonuk>191458564X

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Alice AdamsJennifer Saint|title=Invincible SummerAtalanta|rating=3.5

|summary=As Alice Adams's debut novel opens 'I was as worthy as any one of them. I would get on board that ship, I vowed. I would take my place, not just in the summer name of the goddess. It was for the sake of 1995my name, four university friends are lounging on Bristoltoo. Atalanta''s Brandon Hill Princess. Warrior. Lover. Hero. Abandoned at birth for being born a daughter rather than a son, drinking Atalanta is raised under the protective eye of the goddess Athemis and contemplating what fashioned into a formidable huntress, one who longs for adventure. When the opportunity comes – to join the Argonauts, a fierce band of warriors, descendent from the future holds. ThereGods themselves – Atalanta seizes the chance to fight in Artemis's Eva Andrews, raised name and carve out her own legendary place in Sussex by history. What follows is a single father; siblings Sylvie whirlwind of challenges and Lucien Marchant, neglected by their alcoholic mother; discovery and Benedict Waverleythrough it, a rich kid whose parents have a holiday home on Corfu. Eva has a crush on LucienAtalanta must remember Artemis' fatal warning: that if she marries, while Benedict is besotted with Evait will be her undoing.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1509814701</amazonuk>1472292154

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Birgul OguzAmanthi Harris|title= HahBeautiful Place|rating= 35|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= I was interested to receive this book for review as I knew it was written in Padma, a modernyoung Sri Lankan, interesting style, being effectively a collection has returned to the Villa Hibiscus on the southern coast of short stories, but appearing more in her home country. This is a novel structureplace she spent her formative years. I It is not a place she wasborn into, however, rather disappointed with but the bookone she thinks of as home. Whilst it does have some very fine examples of prose writing within How she came to be at the storiesVilla, I felt disconnected from the narratorhow it became her home, who is and the daughter of a recently deceased man who was involved in a Turkish military coup in 1980. There is therefore a lot of examples of machinations that have flowed through her life ever since she first arrived there provide the narrator relating the conversations they had shared regarding ''revolutionscore'', for this gentle and the way this had affected the daughteryet subtly violent novel. Padma's upbringing present fails to escape her past and childhood. Another 'story' then delves into much like the musical score of a seemingly disconnected wander film, that strand weaves its way through everything that happens at the town, whereby we see the narrator working at gutting fish, and talking about a man she finds repulsive, but who appears to be in love with herVilla. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>9462380740</amazonuk>1784631930

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Chuck Palahniuk178563335X|title=Make Something UpSea Defences|author=Hilary Taylor

|genre=Short Stories Literary Fiction|summary=What are When we to make of that subtitle-seeming writing first meet Rachel Bird she's a trainee vicar, sitting in on the front cover – a PCC meeting and wondering why they''stories re held when you can't unread''? Does that not apply to all good fiction? Clearly it is here due to the reputation of the author, and the baggage his name brings need to pick the pagechildren up. We'd expect a dramatic approach from anything Palahniuk writesHer husband, Christopher, collects six-year-old Hannah and an added frissonher elder brother, an extra layerJamie, from which we might be forced to shrink backwhilst Rachel holds a sobbing parishioner. But a lot of the contents donThelma's daughter-in-law won't quite go that farlet her see her grandson. YesHolthorpe, things are dramatic, when society starts attaching defibrillators to itself, to create on the perfectNorfolk coast, simple, care- (''The Price is Right''-a lovely place, and Kardashian-) free happiness. A man buys a horse for his daughter – but boy Rachel is it the wrong horse to buy. A man falls in love – yes, sometimes the plot summaries of these stories really are better off for being short (speaking of which, don't turn struggling to develop a real bond with the threeparish -page entrant here as a taster, itand she'll put you off by dint s in awe of beingthe vicar, almost uniquely hereGail, a nothing story). A call centre worker can't convince people hebut then she's on been doing the level and even in their country – until someone starts riffing back to himjob for more than thirty years. A housing estate report conveys bad regulation violations, but not as bad as Rachel and Christopher hoped that a walk on the happenings at a 'Burning Man'beach would do them some good -styled festival, in a very clever couple of talesit was stormy but it was probably what they needed. But many too are the instances where that extra step has been taken.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099587688</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Aliya Whiteley|title= The Arrival of Missives|rating= 4And then Hannah went missing.5|genre= Literary Fiction|summary=In the aftermath of the Great War, Shirley Fearn dreams of challenging the conventions of rural England, where life is as unchanging as the seasons. The scarred veteran Mr Tiller, left disfigured by an impossible accident on the battlefields of France, brings with him a message: part prophecy, part warning. As Shirley's village prepares for the annual May Day celebrations, where a new queen will be crowned and the future reborn, she must choose between change and renewal – will the missives Mr Tiller brings prevent her mastering her identity?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907389377</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= P K Lynch1398515388|title= Armadillos|rating= 4.5|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= Aggie is one of Texas' downtrodden. Dirt poor The Boy and abused. ''a 'sub' from a 'sub' family'' … ''Her father and brother enact that 'sub'-ness on her, week in, week out.'' ''She has only the vaguest notion that there is something wrong with the abuse she endures..''|amazonuk=<amazonuk>178507959X</amazonuk>}}{{newreviewDog|author=Tarjei Vesaas, Torbjorn Stoverud Seishu Hase and Michael Barnes Alison Watts (translatorstranslator)|title=The Birds

|summary=We're somewhere in rural ScandinaviaFirst of all, on it was the shores of a large lakeearthquake, but deep in a community relying on the farmland that is scattered ocean floor, which created the tsunami and this, in amongst turn, caused the woodsnuclear meltdown. Our chief concerns are brother The result was complete and sister – Mattis utter devastation. The deaths were uncountable, and Hegethe loss of livelihoods was widespread. The fact that many pets were separated from their owners came far down the list of priorities but - six months after the tsunami - Kazumasa Nakagaki discovered a dog outside a convenience store. He, Mattis, is what the other villagers call wasn'simple' – sure, he knows a few things about life, and what makes t a clever dog person and what makes a well-turned phrase, and how to talk to girls and when to not stare at them, but the convenience store owner's comment that he is definitely not quite as the others would wish. Those others include his sister, who is seeing her life waste away in listening call Public Health prompted Kazumasa to open his chatter, knitting jumpers to make ends meet, car door and regretting in her own small way what has got her to middle-age Tamon the dog jumped in this situation. But from this galling introduction, you should take away }} {{Frontpage|isbn=0989715337|title=Papa on the bigger picture – even if there is no way out, Moon|author=Marco North|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=''Some frogs had gotten into the life well.'' ''Walter stood waist-deep in this countryside is brilliantly conveyedthe fragrant water, full naked except for his beaten leather hat. Long strands of sun as well as shadetheir eggs wove around him, sticky gray pearls with tadpoles inside them. Two of labour the dogs leaned over the opening and barked down at the strange noise of idleness, and wit and charm the buckets as much as hardshiphe filled them. I defy you '' How is that for an opening? The style of this novel in the form of interconnected short stories goes from succinct and laconic to read this wistful and think this corner musing, turning on a sixpence. And author Marco North, who has the most wonderful turn of Scandinavia bleakphrase, starts as he means to go on.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0914671200</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Nicola BarkerDaisy Hildyard|title=The Cauliflower®Emergency

|summary=Nicola Barker teasingly refers Marianne is grieving. Traumatised after the death of her sister, she awakes to herself as this book's 'collagist'find strange, piecing together diverse documents to create a picture thick black hairs sprouting from the bones of Sri Ramakrishna (1836–1886)her spine which steadily increase in size and volume. Her GP, diagnosing the odd phenomenon as a largely illiterate guru who attracted followers physical reaction to his intense worship of the goddess Kaliher grief, recommends she go to stay at Nede, an experimental new treatment centre in Wales. His life story Yet something strange is happening to Marianne and the other patients at Nede: a sticky mass metamorphosis of contradictions:|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785150669</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Toni Morrison |title= God Help the Child|rating= 4|genre= Literary Fiction|summary=A truly complex and emotionally raw portrayala kind. As Marianne's memories threaten to overwhelm her, that seeks to cover issues Nede offers her release from this cycle of race, gender, memory and paedophilia. A slim volume, yes, but one pain—but only at a terrible price: that is powerful in its punchof identity itself.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099555921</amazonuk>086154112X }}{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jesus Carrasco and Margaret Jull Costa (translator)Natalia Garcia Freire|title=Out in the OpenThis World Does Not Belong To Us|rating=35

|summary=Meet the boy. We never learn his name – in fact we learn very little in Early comments on this bookdebut novel from Ecuadorian writer Natalia García Freire include Tremendous, such as where or when we are, and whya delight. What we do know is that he has left home. We get I will agree with the feeling his father first – tremendous is too handy with punishment, no understatement – but that can't be a delight' is perhaps using the only reason for him first hiding out expression in an olive grove overnight, then fleeing across the plains surrounding his familya way I's villagem not familiar with. Especially as he's chosen one I have to confess my ignorance of the most awkward, attritional times to cross said plains – the land is in the middle of a horrendous droughtSpanish-language literary tradition so forgive my generalisation here. When he tries to steal his first provisions from an aged goatherd, however, he finds some light and liquid, but is this substitute father figure ever going to be enough to help From the boy flee what he needs to?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>009958218X</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Philip Dent|title=Mutable Passions: Charlotte Bronte: A Disquieting Affair|rating=3|genre=Historical Fiction |summary=As the 200th anniversary of Charlotte Brontë's birth approacheslittle I have read (in translation, it is a perfect time for reading about her. Philip DentI don's second novel chooses a lesser known period of her life t read Spanish) there does seem to dramatize. All her siblings are now dead; during be a hard winter when she is unable to visit her best friend, Ellen Nussey, Charlotte spends her time finishing ''Villette'', her final novel. The family servant, Tabby, ribs Charlotte about her romantic prospects tendency towards the fantastical – including Patrick Brontë's curate, Arthur Bell Nicholls. Charlotte responds with indignation: 'I could no more kiss the lips of a man with a beard as big as rooks' nests than I could yours, Tabbymystical realism.'|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>178589093X</amazonuk>0861541901

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Miroslav PenkovJennifer Saint|title=Stork MountainElektra

|genre=General Literary Fiction|summary=A young man, his grandfather and a stork with a broken wing are the 'Elektra'company of rebels'' at by Jennifer Saint tells the heart story of this lively tale set three women who live in Bulgaria's Strandja Mountains. The storks that return to the mountains each spring are migrants, like so many heavily male dominated world of the people that have passed through the region over the centuriesAncient Greece. The young narrator is also in transitCassandra, born in BulgariaClytemnestra, but raised and educated Elektra are all bit players in America. The the story opens with his return to Bulgaria in search of his grandfather who has broken off contact with his family in Americathe Trojan War. But Yet Jennifer Saint shows us that often the silent women have the most compelling stories and the young man's motives are not as clear cut as first appearsmost extreme furies.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1473622182</amazonuk>1472273915

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Elisa Albert8409290103|title= After BirthIf Only|author=Matthew Tree|rating= 4.5|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= This book is definitely not for anyone who has a rosy picture of new motherhood. In factTwenty-one-year-old Malcolm Lowry had been sent abroad by his father, cotton-broker AO Lowry: he asked his accountant, Mr Patrick, I would probably avoid it if you are contemplating giving birth in to ensure that the young man got on board the near futureboat and thereafter Patrick was to send him a monthly allowance. For any woman who has ever struggled through Patrick sent the first few months of motherhood, however, or money regularly and a partner correspondence - of somebody who is going through itsorts - sprang up between the two although we hear more about what Lowry has to say than Patrick. It wasn't that Lowry senior didn't care for his son, it is an astounding was that he didn't care to have him in this country where he might be a danger to his wife and revelatory readother children. Never The alcohol problem was obvious even before have I read a more searing, honest and open discussion of Patrick managed to get the emotional upheaval a woman often goes through after giving birthyoung man on his way.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>009959014X</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Ayelet Gundar-GoshenAntoine Laurain, Le Sonneur and Jane Aitken (translator)|title= Waking LionsRed is My Heart|rating= 3.5|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= If the point of ''literature'' - as opposed to the less exalted though just-as-worthwhile forms of writing - is to force you to think about the real world[[:Category:Antoine Laurain|Antoine Laurain]] books have always been black and white and read in my house. And so was this one, the political worldalthough I could have spelled that more accurately – this one was, the painful life-as-we-know-it worldand is, whilst catching you up in a story about something that never really happenedblack and white and red. Yes, but, you knowhe has an artistic collaborator on this piece, might well have done so…and if you and I think that matters, then you must read this bookit's possible to say not one page lacks the influence of some striking visual ideas.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1782271562</amazonuk>1913547183

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Yan LiankeB098FFFBH9|title=The Four BooksSnowcub|author=Graham Fulbright|rating=4.5

|summary=''The Four Books'' Fourteen-year-old Rachel is a difficult, challenging novel and not for the feint hearted, or for someone looking for a page-turner. It really challenges the readerher school's perceptions animal rights project leader and she and opens up her friend are producing a gateway competition entry to an era that is difficult to imagine for anyone brought up highlight the way in which human beings exploit the animal world. She gets a western culture. Set in Maoist China it tells the story great deal of four protagonists support from her family: father Pip Harrison, a lecturer at Imperial College, London, mother Kate and a memorable antagonisther twin, Nick. The four Kate runs the family business, found guilty of anti-revolutionary crimes are undergoing re-education a toy shop called Cornucopia in a work camp governed by the child. With an Orwellian feelPutney, which is where we'll meet Rachel'The Four Books'' will come to be regarded as an undoubted masterpieces main (if unsuspected) source of information: five soft toys.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099569493</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Yann MartelYancey Williams|title=The High Mountains Crosshairs of Portugalthe Devil|rating=4.5|genre=General Literary Fiction|summary=Tomas Award-winning crime writer Eddie Jablonski is being thrust into the twentieth Century, and he doesn't like it. He has given himself the job of seeking something out in the High Mountains of Portugal, based getting on an ancient religious diary he found working in an archiveyears and, despite his strenuous objections and thanks to do so he needs the use of his uncledaughter, finds himself living - or imprisoned, from Eddie's brand new car to get him there and back point of view - in time. His jaw drops when he learns he will have to do the driving himself, for he cannot make head nor tail room 315 of what anything on the infernal machine does and why. It is Garden of course Eden nursing home, with only a certain kind of progresstrusty nursing aide, a looking forwardJenkins, which has become quite anathema for palatable company. Nothing is going to him – for ever since he lost keep Eddie from his beloved wife, beloved child and father, all stock-in the space -trade of a weekwriting though, so here, he has walked everywhere backwards – shielding himself from what really is ahead with a padded behindfor his readers, and never letting sight of what he has lostare his wanderings through his life's work.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1782114696</amazonuk>0986031658}}{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Antonio Moresco and Richard Dixon (translator)0008421714|title=Distant LightMrs March|author=Virginia Feito

|genre=General Literary Fiction|summary=Our unnamed narrator might as well be The problem began just after the publication of George March's most successful novel to date. Everyone but Mrs March (we know her first name only person aliveon the last page) seemed to either be reading it or had already done so. He knows he's not – he still goes down Every day Mrs March went to the nearest inhabited village local patisserie to buy things to eat and other necessitiesolive bread but on that particular morning, Patricia asked, and he sees planes spreading their contrails over as she was wrapping the remote area he lives in – bread, ''but isn't this the first time he might as well be. 's based a character on you?'' A lot of his thoughts are about lifeShe mentioned that Johanna, however, for he has little to do except notice the nature around him, from the smell of lilies burgeoning with nobody else to see them in principal character had 'her mannerisms''. Perhaps this deserted villagewould not have mattered, to except for the swallows darting across fact that Johanna is the ravines of the countryside. Life – and the nature whore of Nantes - ''a light that he sees spring into activity every night at what he thought was a totally lifelessweak, plain, detestable, pathetic, empty forest area on land separated from his lookout post in his back garden by a deepunloved, wooded gorge…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0914671421</amazonuk>unloveable wretch.''