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[[Category:New Reviews|Literary Fiction]] __NOTOC__<!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Friedrich Durrenmatt and John E Woods (translator)295967572X|title=The Execution of JusticePale Pieces|author=G M Stevens|rating=2.5|genre=CrimeLiterary Fiction|summary=ItOur unnamed narrator is about to begin a train journey with his companion Django. Where they's 1957re going and what the purpose of this journey is, and weis uncertain. Django found the tickets 're somewhere in Switzerland, and there's just one case on everyone's lips – the simple fact that a politician has gone into the crowded room of one of those floor somewhere'the place to go' restaurants, and point blank shot a professor everyone there must have known, and ferried a British companion has persuaded our narrator to the airport in his chauffeuraccompany him. Why not? Not much else is clear either -driven Rolls before handing himself but we are probably in to face the murder rap. Of course he's found guilty, even if past as the gun involved has managed pair travel to disappear. He's certainly of much interest, not only to our narrator, a young lawyer called Spaet – even if he rarely gets to frequent such establishments with such people, he is eager to know more, especially once he is actually tasked the station by coach and the man in hand to look into things train is a second timesteam locomotive. But what's this, where he opens his testimony about the affair with the conclusion, that he himself will need to turn killer to redress the balance?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782273875</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Javier Cercas and Frank Wynne (translator)Makenna Goodman|title= The ImpostorHelen of Nowhere|rating= 4.5|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= Enric Marco It could be argued that the pervading theme of this book is malaise - a hard-to-place feeling that something in your life is without doubt an extraordinary mannot quite right. A veteran of the Spanish Civil WarThe protagonist, honoured for his bravery a disgraced professor on the battlefieldbrink of losing both his career and his relationship, embodies this feeling. A political prisoner of two fascist regimesHowever, Goodman counteracts his discomfort with a force which is seductive, radical and unnerving: Helen. A survivor of The connection between Helen and the Nazi concentration campsprotagonist is indirect yet intimate. A prominent figure in As the former owner of the clandestine resistance against Francocountryside house he's tyrannyconsidering, Helen represents a volta in his life, her past tied to his potential fresh start. A tireless warrior for social justice and The realtor who shows the defence of human rights. A national hero. But protagonist around the most extraordinary thing house shares stories about Enric Marco is this: Helen, and describes her as ''an entity that he is really none of these thingspure consciousness, beyond form''. He is Although she lives in an impostor. And Javier Cercas sets out to tell his story – assisted living facility now, Helen has powers beyond comprehension which the reader gets the true story of Spain's most notorious liarsense are not altogether innocuous.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857056506</amazonuk>1804272205

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Sjon Hodgkinson and Ten Hodgkinson (editors)Olga Tokarczuk|title=The Dark-Blue Winter Overcoat and other stories from the NorthHouse of Day, House of Night|rating=35|genre=Anthologies Literary Fiction|summary=A compilation like this should be nigh on brilliant. It's not one author's best short works, itWhat's that the good of a dozen. It's not from world that keeps changing like that? How can one snapshot go on calmly living in timeit?'' The title of this spellbinding work, as some were written the year ''House of Day, House of publication and some in the 1960s. ItNight's not from one tiny patch of author's desk or one set , somewhat reflects this notion of laptop keys, but from shifting realities - the entire Nordic worldsmall, whether that be urban Scandinaviasubtle changes which govern our lives, like the Faroes and other island groupsshift from day to night, or Greenlandhowever quotidian, causing chaos. That is a world that's changing – as But, the Greenland-born author now living constant in Brooklyn, and the Iraqi blood on these pages, testify. It's a world where new roads and new building works mean a family living on that image is the edge of the forest at the beginning of the story are being surrounded by other life by the endhouse, and with stoic against the influence of centuries of folklore featured, a lot more than that changes – sometimes ancient diurnal cycle which nonetheless controls how it seems to be even the characters' species…is perceived.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1782273824</amazonuk>1804271918

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Christina Hesselholdt and Paul Russell Garrett (translator)Thea Lenarduzzi|title=CompanionsThe Tower|rating=35

|summary=''Companions'How unctuous are the fats of another' is written as a series of monologuess life, where six middle-aged friends take it how dizzying their sugars in turns to narrate scenes from their livesour bloodstream''. In this compelling novel, charting Thea Lenarduzzi assumes the intimate details identity of their holidaysT, dinner partiesthe protagonist of this tale. Just as T's story is being told, familiesthe story of a second protagonist is unveiled: Annie, marriagesthe daughter of a wealthy family in the 19th century, affairs and work lives who died of tuberculosis after being locked in a style that mixes honesty and openness with fantasy and evasiontower, captures T's imagination. The charm of the novel lies in the way the friendsAnnie' voices bicker with one another among the pagess fate is, above all, as we discover that there are always several sides an enticing story to the same T. It is a story. We learn most about the characters not through what they say about themselves but through what the others say about them. Along the waywhich she consumes avariciously, there is heartbreak both in a quest for truth and griefknowledge, but this is always offset by an abundance and in service of humour myth, fable and a writing style that never fails to be refreshingly light-heartedfantasy. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1910695335</amazonuk>1804271799

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Yaba BadoeJon Fosse and Damion Searls (translator) |title= A Jigsaw of Fire and StarsVaim|rating= 4|genre= Literary Fiction|summary=Sante ''All was a baby when she was washed ashore in a sea-chest laden with treasurestrange''. It seems she is the sole survivor of the tragic sinking of a ship carrying migrants and refugees. Her people. Fourteen years on she's a member This haunting phrase encapsulates the pervading sense of Mama Rose's unique and dazzling circus. Butotherworldliness which permeates this story set in Vaim, from their watery grave, the unquiet dead are calling Sante to avenge them. A bamboo flute. A golden bangle. A ripening mango a fictional fishing village in Norway which must paradoxically could not fall... if Sante is to tell their story feel more real for Jatgeir and her ownEline, two of the protagonists caught in its melancholic current. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1786695480</amazonuk>1804271829

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Martha Batalha and Eric M B Becker (translator)Claire-Louise Bennett|title= The Invisible Life of Euridice GusmaoBig Kiss, Bye-Bye |rating= 4.5|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= On the surfaceEverything in this book, however sweet or seemingly innocent, young housewife Euridice Gusmao has it allis steeped in anguish and distortion. A nice-enoughEven a kiss, parent-pleasing husband with usually a steady banking jobsymbol of intimacy and closeness, two young children upon whom to dotebecomes evidence of love lost. When the narrator cries out internally, an immaculate home complete with maid. That's all anyone could ever want'come over here and kiss me, isn't ' it? Not Euridice. She has is less an inexplicable ache inside invitation than a desperate attempt to confirm her for something more, like many of usemotional numbness. Yet each The imagined recipient of her pet projectsthis plea is Xavier, from a desire to publish a recipe book to starting a cottage sewing industry in her living roomex-partner, are met with scorn from her stern husband Antenor. He wants a wife who doesn't draw attention ghost she conjures to herself, whose only domains are her house and test her familydetachment.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>178607298X</amazonuk>1804271934

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= David BergenHelene Bessette and Kate Briggs (translator)|title= StrangerLili is Crying|rating= 4.5|genre= Literary Fiction |summary=''Stranger'' tells First published in 1953 in French, this novel is a timeless text which wrenches the story hearts of Íso, a young Guatemalan woman, its readers just as Bessette wrenches words and her affair with an American doctor. When an accident forces him to return to sentences from their proper position on the Statespage and positions them elsewhere, she is left pregnant and lonely. Her anguish becomes even more profound when her daughter is abducteddisjointed, and taken to live with the doctor and his wifetruncated. What followed - tales of the journey Íso embarked upon in Like the hope lives of finding her baby - was an amazing story of the lengths a mother will go to in order to save her childcharacters, they are often left tragically incomplete.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0715652419</amazonuk>1804271675

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Clar Ni ChonghaileJonathan Buckley|title= Rain Falls On EveryoneOne Boat|rating= 54|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= It's 'One Boat'' is a cliché deeply introspective novella that defies traditional narrative structure, drawing the Irish have reader into a picturesque turn contemplative realm of phrasephilosophical musings and fragmented memories flowing from our narrator and protagonist, but clichés only exist because they're trueTeresa. Roddy Doyle put it differently in Set against the evocative backdrop of a recent interview with ''Writing'' magazine, when he said that ''With Irishsmall coastal Greek town, there's another language bubbling under this work masterfully captures the English''magic of its setting and its power to provoke profound introspection. However you express Teresa herself recognises these qualities as the reason she has visited it, that art after the death of expression is woven into every other line of Clár's proseboth her parents. Pick a page at random and you'll find something like ''the sickness that had come to roost in Prompted by her home like a cursed owl'' or ''like he was Godmourning, Jesus her narrative voice is meditative and Justin Timberlake rolled deeply self-aware, inviting the reader into one'' or ''her labyrinthine cogitations. It is a low sobbingbook that not only requires but inspires depth of thought, slow since its narrative structure is fragmentary and inevitable as rain ironically relies on a Sunday'': expressions that catch your smile unawares, or tear at your heart in their mundane sadness. Or sometimes bothanalepsis for its propulsion.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1785079018</amazonuk>1804271764

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Hesene Mete Eowyn Ivey|title=Sinful WordsBlack Woods Blue Sky|rating=43.5

|summary=When we meet him''Black Woods Blue Sky'' tells the story of Birdie, the young mother of toddler Emaleen, Behram is who longs for a student at life beyond the school Alaskan lodge where she works as a bar waitress, a setting which enables her bad habits and her accidental neglect of theologyEmaleen. He loves God with Described as a passion and has a determination to live a life dedicated ''towild card'' God , she feels stuck in her day-to-day life, and yearns to cross the Wolverine river and live on the North Fork to fulfil her desires of a simple life surrounded by His rulesnature. He rents When she meets Arthur Nielson, a property from Lulu Khan strange, taciturn and his wifesolitary man, who says he has a cabin over there, Lady Geshtina she feels called to go - and Khan invites Behram to his own home for a visitbring Emaleen with her. It's a delightful place Without realising it, this calling will transform hers and the wealth of the couple is obvious as is their standing within the local community: Lady GeshtinaEmaleen's late father is buried in what amounts to a mausoleum, but it's not all this which enchants Behram. The couple have twin children and Behram is taken, enthralled by the daughter, Naginalives forever.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1524682527</amazonuk>1472279042

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author= Juan-Tomas Avila LaurelSally Rooney|title= The Gurugu PledgeIntermezzo|rating= 4.5|genre= Literary General Fiction|summary= Juan Tomas Avila LaurelSally Rooney has studied the chessboard of life and is something of a grandmaster at putting it into words. Her dialogue is gripping and so brilliantly frustrating, as her characters never quite say exactly what they feel. Among the many relationships woven into this story, the central one of Equatorial Guinea's best-known dissident writers, for readers to unravel is an author who deserves to be read the world overfraternal connection—or lack thereof—between Ivan and Peter Koubek. With The Gurugu PledgeIvan, a socially awkward chess prodigy, hecontrasts sharply with his older brother Peter, a successful lawyer living in Dublin. Following their father's captured passing after a an angry and incredibly urgent slice of long battle with cancer, the migrant experience – a snapshot of the dangers faced by those crossing the African continent brothers' already strained relationship faces new trials.|isbn=0571365469}}{{Frontpage|author=Fyodor Dostoyevsky|title=White Nights|rating=5|genre=Short Stories|summary=As always in search of Dostoyevsky, the barbed wire fences at Melilla- the Spanish enclave on the North Eastern tip of Moroccocharacter work is sublime. One is never left wondering what a character is thinking or feeling because Dostoyevsky lays bare their innermost dispositions and temperaments with remarkable clarity.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1908276940</amazonuk>0241619785

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Matthew SmithJames Baldwin|title= The WakingGiovanni's Room|rating= 4.5|genre= Literary Fiction|summary=Isabel Sykes''Giovanni's Room'' follows the narrator David, 23an American man living in Paris, recounts the recent attempt she made to come to terms as he navigates his torturous affair with the loss of her motherGiovanni, the acclaimed but psychologically disturbed novelist Marianne Sykes. Marianne died an Italian bartender he meets in an unexplained house fire when Isabel was tena gay bar. Inspired by the appearance of Imogen TaylorWhile David is engaged to Hella, an enchanting young woman who wants to write a PhD on her mother's work, Isabel plunges into the depths of her past and an intense new friendship. After discovering that Imogen is not who she seems to betravelling in Spain, Isabel must face the darkest moments from her childhood real tension in order to protect her family the novel arises not from more tragedy. She receives unexpected help his infidelity but from beyond the grave: in the strange, glittering fragments of her motherdeeper conflict within himself. It is David's last, unfinished work, 'Midnightsong'crippling shame and denial of his sexuality that ultimately dooms his relationship with Giovanni.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0995654158</amazonuk>0141186356

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Ali SmithAlba de Cespedes |title= AutumnForbidden Notebook|rating= 54|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= The first part in Ali Smith's four part 'Seasonal' series, Autumn is the story This Italian work of Daniel Gluck and Elisabeth Demand, unexpected friends who used to be neighbours when Elisabeth was a little girl. In a series feminist fiction holds an air of memories suspense and dreams, we discover their friendship tension from Daniel babysitting Elisabeth through to her visits with him now that he is in a home and drawing towards the end of his extremely long and fascinating life. Along the waymoment our protagonist, we get a wonderfully written insight into timeValeria Cossati, memoriespurchases her forbidden notebook, and learns about herself in the fleeting nature of life itselfmost intimate and revealing ways. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0241973317</amazonuk>1782278222

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Nicola Pugliese and Shaun Whiteside (translator)Ottessa Moshfegh|title=MalacquaMy Year of Rest and Relaxation

|summary=We're in Naples, in recent historyAt best, this novel is a scathing critique of modern society and it's raining. It will in fact rain for four days solid – and seeing as it's October everyone's dressed for all seasons and expecting a bit reveals the fragility of greyhuman relationships; at worst, but this it is taking the proverbialcynical, predictable and slightly trite tale of an unlikeable protagonist. It's also making the city rather dangerous – when people report This unlikely heroine, a huge sink-hole appearing in one street it's soon found that a pair of cars went into itslim, attractive and two people have died, and more passed on newly orphaned girl in her twenties is disillusioned with a whole building collapsing. What's more, some strange noises are coming from an abandoned civic palace. Is the city being told something by these strange eventsworld, or can a journalist find a logic behind the circumstances?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1911508067</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Iosi Havilio|title= Petite Fleur|rating= 4.5|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= Every now and then you read a book that leaves you thinking “well I have no idea what just happened but I know I enjoyed it”. This is how I felt after reading Petite Fleurresolves not to lose sleep over it: in fact, the fifth novel (perhaps 'long paragraph' would be more appropriate) from cult Argentinian writer Iosi Havilioher solution lies in her hibernation.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1911508040</amazonuk>1784707422

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Tania HershmanMatthew Tree|title=Some of Us Glow More Than OthersWe'll Never Know

|genre=Short Stories Literary Fiction|summary=I won't be alone in stating that reading short story collections can Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to be slightly awkward. Going through different from A-Zhis father, witnessing a bounty drunk and chronic underachiever whose dreams of ideas being exceptional at any of his artistic passions all failed miserably and characters in short order can be too much, but do you have the right to pick and choose according to what appeals, and what time you have to fill? The sequence has carefully been considered, surelywho had endless crises of self confidence. Such would appear So Tim applied himself to be the case here. The last time I read one of this author's collections, with [[The White Road by Tania Hershman|The White Road]]his studies, the only real difficulty was holding back cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and rationing them, set himself high but here you not only get a whopping forty pieces of writing, they are also spread into sectionsachievable ambitions.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1910061484</amazonuk>B0CVFXPGP8

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=James KelmanB0C47LV1PC|title=That Was a Shiver, and Other StoriesFragility|author=Mosby Woods|rating=3.54|genre=Short Stories Literary Fiction|summary=This Can you make a ''Yo birthing person'' joke? And if you could, is the question should you make it? Or is the ninth book of short stories by this authorquestion if you did, which means hewould it land? The catch is that the answer for both could well be.... no. ''Fragility's presented just ' is set as many collections of the short form as he has novels. You will find it hard to think city of another author that has been so noted for longer works (what with [[How Late It Was, How Late by James Kelman|How Late It WasPortland, How Late]] winning the Booker) but who is so generous in presenting shorter pieces for the time-poorOregon, or those like me who see the variety in a writer's short or less typical works cautiously begins to be emerge from the more interesting places to turn. Opening these pages, from restrictions imposed during the pen of such an esteemed pro, came with no small sense of anticipation.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1786890909</amazonuk>covid pandemic

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Kate MildenhallMosby Woods|title= SkylarkingA Whirly Man Loses His Turn|rating= 4|genre= General Literary Fiction |summary= Kate and Harriet are best friends growing up together on an isolated Australian capeThe West isn't the dominant force it once was. As Nobody in the daughters West is quite sure how to mend this or even if mending it is the best course of the lighthouse keepersaction. Governments are flailing. A war here, the two girls share everythinga push for climate action there. A feeling that nobody is in actual charge. Imagine then, until there was a fisherman, McPhail, arrives in their small communityman with precognition. When Kate witnesses Imagine the desire that flares between him and Harriet, she is torn by her feelings strategic advantage in this asset; a man who can tell you what will happen given any set of envy and longingcircumstances. An innocent moment That man would be valuable, right? Perhaps the most valuable asset in McPhail's hut history. Imagine then occurs , that threatens this man loses this ability. What would governments do to tear their peaceful community apart. get it back?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1785079239</amazonuk>B0C9SNG8R1

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Joanna Walsh0571379559|title=Worlds from the Word's EndThe House of Broken Bricks|author=Fiona Williams|rating=3.5|genre=Short StoriesLiterary Fiction|summary=We here at ''The Bookbag liked this authorHouse of Broken Bricks''s fairly recent collection is the story of short stories, [[Vertigo by Joanna Walsh|Vertigo]]four people. I myself missed outTess Hembry's roots are in Jamaica: temperamentally she might be happier there, but that seemed to be vignettes from one character's narration – here we get homosexual male narrators and a host moreinstead, as well as much less of she lives in the sadness prevalent before. Having had a brief encounter with this author courtesy of her entry into house on the [[Bookshelf (Object Lessons) by Lydia Pyne|Object Lessons]] seriesriverbank, I was intrigued by her name being stamped on a selection built of shortsbroken bricks. Was Insubstantial as it might look, it 's stood the ideal calling card? passage of time, storms and floods. Let's face itHer husband, the very short story itself can be a postcard – let's sayRichard, from a specific hotel or twostruggles to grow his vegetables, as we see hereto complete the delivery rounds - and to bring in sufficient money. Perhaps I should They have geared myself uptwin boys - Sonny and Max, howeverthe rainbow twins. Sonny's colouring reflects his mother's Jamaican heritage. Max takes after his father. People don't believe that they're related, for such intricate writing on said postcards – much less twins and for the exotic locations from which they came…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1911508105</amazonuk>there's an assumption when Max is out with his mother that she's his nanny.

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Raja Alem, Katharine Halls (translator) and Adam Talib (translator)Claire North|title= The Dove's NecklaceHouse of Odysseus|rating= 35|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= I always hated Lit-Crit at school, so it came as something as a surprise that I ended up reviewing books, for fun. Now I understand. Finally, I see why literary critics get so up-in-arms about lowly book reviewers. There is a difference. This book explains it all. The author is ''the first woman to win the International Prize for Arabic fictionWhat could matter more than love?'' for this book.  The book also follow-up to the LiBerator prize for excellent ''the best book translated into GermanIthaca'' in 2014picks up a few months after where we left off. I suspect it's not done yetIn the palace of Odysseus, with delicate care Queen Penelope continues to rule without her husband, who sailed to war at Troy and then by divine intervention never returned home. As ever she remains surrounded by suitors vying for the throne of the Western Isles. ''The Times'' tells us Having survived – politically and physical – the chaotic storm that it Clytemnestra brought to Ithaca''exemplifies everything that s shores, Queen Penelope is currently shaking on the foundations brink of Arab societya fragile peace.'' I am sure One that not only will more plaudits fall upon shatters however with the author and the book, but also that it will become a classicreturn of Orestes, spoken King of in the same breath as the international classics: ProustMycenae, Márquezand his sister Elektra, Joyce, Rushdie, Nabokov…seeking refuge.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0715651757</amazonuk>0356516075

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Daniel Kehlmann and Ross Benjamin (translator)Kay Chronister|title=You Should Have LeftDesert Creatures|rating=4.5|genre=General Dystopian Fiction |summary=Our narrator With a world that is becoming increasingly inhospitable for humanity, post-apocalyptic fiction can become an almost masochistic thrill. Whether it is a screenwriterrobotic takeover, tasked with coming up with a sequel to his hit movie ''Besties'' – world devoid of water or a nuclear holocaust, this genre is a film which helped pay way for a house, but which his actress wife keeps letting him know, isnhumans to cathartically experience their most existential fears. 't 'Desert Creatures'art''. To concentrate, the family – he, the wife, and their four year old daughter – have rented by Kay Chronister is a large, modern house at the end new work of a horrid, hairpin bendpost-filled road, in a charming alpine landscape. But things aren't right. The couple are at loggerheads too much, things keep unsettling our narrator, and apocalyptic fiction that aligns many of the sole shopkeeper fears that exist for miles around humanity today. It is ready with the Hammer Horror styled warnings of strange eventsa shocking novel that still manages to find hope. Quickly we see the book's title in all its galling clarity – but it isn't too late to get out… is it? And out of what, exactly?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1786484048</amazonuk>1803364998

{{newreviewfrontpage|isbn=1803363002|author= Tove JanssonEric LaRocca|title= Letters From KlaraThe Trees Grew Because I Bled There

|genre= Literary FictionHorror|summary= Famed in the UK for her creation of the Moomin family, Jansson Horror taps into something primeval within us. It is rather belatedly beginning used as a way to gather the richly deserved esteem for her adult writingsreflect our darkest emotions and how we as humans react and process them. For that I offer my heart-felt thanks to publishers Most horror fiction feature a ''Sort of booksBig Bad'' , whether that is a home invader, a monster or a ghost, it usually something tangible and Thomas Teal, who has been responsible for most by the end of the translationsstory, beatable. Receiving this one, two things strike: firstly Eric LaRocca's ''The Trees Grew Because I somehow seem to have missed one Bled There'' is not like that. It is a collection of short stories more interested in the serieshorrors of illness, grief and secondly therehumiliation. Horrors that linger and are harder to defeat than any ''Big Bad'll come a time sooner rather than later when there'll be no more to be had. The former will be rectified, the latter is a sad thought.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1908745614</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Tom Malmquist and Henning Koch (translator)Madelaine Lucas|title=In Every Moment We Are Still AliveThirst for Salt|rating=4.5

|summary=Tom Malmquist is ''Love, I'd read, was supposed to be a poet from Sweden. Originally published in Swedish in 2015light and weightless feeling, this is his first work of prose. While itbut I had always longed for gravity''s being marketed as  Told from a novelretrospective view, it reads more like a stylized memoiryoung woman unravels the year-long relationship that once defined her. Similar Overlaid with later wisdom, the narrator relives the affair with a man twenty years her senior from its inception – the summer after finishing university – to Karl Ove Knausgaardits sorrowful end the summer after. Set against the backdrop of an isolated Australian coastal town ''Thirst for Salt'' details the 24-year-old narrator's booksdeepening relationship with her older lover, depicting its all-consuming nature, how it features the author as the central character changed her perspective on both romantic and narrator, familial relationships and the story of grief how it tells is a highly personal onealtered her irrevocably.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1473640008</amazonuk>0861546490

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Michel DeonMichael Grothaus|title= Your Father's RoomBeautiful Shining People|rating= 4.5

|summary= ''But fearing something and having it come to pass are two different things. And I don't feel altogether qualified m willing to bet most of what we fear will never happen, or we can take steps to review Michel Déonchange it.'s 2004 fictionalised memoir ' 'Your Father's RoomBeautiful Shining People'', translated here into English for revolves around the first timequestion of identity and acceptance. I hadn't heard of Déon before receiving my copy, let alone read any of his books, published over a 70 year period Of what it means to much acclaim in his homelandbe human. But it's part of Of what is real and what is artificial, and whether the pleasure development of book reviewing to read with no prior knowledge technology is exciting or prejudice, all the more so if you discover an absolute gemfrightening.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1910477346</amazonuk>191458564X

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Naomi AldermanJennifer Saint|title= The PowerAtalanta|rating= 5|genre= Literary Fiction|summary=It started with ''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 name of the girls and spreadgoddess. From younger woman to older woman, it It was awoken and everything changed. Womankind now has for the power sake of electricity in their fingertips andmy name, slowly too. Atalanta'' Princess. Warrior. Lover. Hero. Abandoned at firstbirth for being born a daughter rather than a son, Atalanta is raised under the balance protective eye of power in the world starts shiftinggoddess Athemis and fashioned into a formidable huntress, one who longs for adventure. We follow When the opportunity comes – to join the stories of different peopleArgonauts, in different walks a fierce band of lifewarriors, who see this descendent from the very beginning and hurtle towards 'Gods themselves – Atalanta seizes the eventchance to fight in Artemis'name and carve out her own legendary place in history. One thing in this startling new development What follows is certaina whirlwind of challenges and discovery and through it, Atalanta must remember Artemis' fatal warning: that if she marries, patriarchal archetypes and chauvinist thinkers are in for the shock of their lives. Literallyit will be her undoing. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0670919969</amazonuk>1472292154

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Anna PitoniakAmanthi Harris|title=The FuturesBeautiful Place|rating=45

|summary=When we first meet Evan PeckPadma, a young Sri Lankan, he has just started at Yale Collegereturned to the Villa Hibiscus on the southern coast of her home country. This is a place she spent her formative years. It is not a place she was born into, where he plays ice hockeybut the one she thinks of as home. Like lots of How she came to be at the other playersVilla, he is actually Canadianhow it became her home, from small-town British Columbia. One night after a party Evan meets Julia Edwards at their dorm and they go out the machinations that have flowed through her life ever since she first arrived there provide the ''score'' for pizzathis gentle and yet subtly violent novel. She technically has a boyfriend from Padma's present fails to escape her Boston boarding school days, but they soon break up past and before long Julia and Evan have become inseparablemuch like the musical score of a film, as they will remain for that strand weaves its way through everything that happens at the rest of their college yearsVilla.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0718184564</amazonuk>1784631930

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Stephan Collishaw178563335X|title= The Song of the StorkSea Defences|author=Hilary Taylor|rating= 4.5|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= Stephan Collishaw has achieved When we first meet Rachel Bird she's a trainee vicar, sitting in on a rare feat – PCC meeting and wondering why they're held when you need to pick the children up. Her husband, Christopher, collects six-year-old Hannah and her elder brother, Jamie, whilst Rachel holds a novel set amidst sobbing parishioner. Thelma's daughter-in-law won't let her see her grandson. Holthorpe, on the horrors Norfolk coast, is a lovely place, but Rachel is struggling to develop a real bond with the parish - and she's in awe of Nazi tyranny the vicar, Gail, but then she's been doing the job for more than thirty years. Rachel and Christopher hoped that does not shy away from human suffering, a walk on the beach would do them some good - it was stormy but does not drown in it eitherwas probably what they needed. And then Hannah went missing. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785079190</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Sabrina Mahfouz1398515388|title= The Things I Would Tell You: British Muslim Women WriteBoy and the Dog|author=Seishu Hase and Alison Watts (translator)|rating= 4.5|genre= AnthologiesGeneral Fiction|summary= What does First of all, it mean to be British was the earthquake, deep in the ocean floor, which created the tsunami and Muslim? This is a question these writers tackle with stunning claritythis, in turn, caused the nuclear meltdown. Modern day British society has a varied sense of cultural heritage; it is a society that is changing The result was complete and moving forward as it adds more utter devastation. The deaths were uncountable, and more voices to the population, but is also one that has an undercurrent loss of anxiety and fear towards those that are minoritieslivelihoods was widespread. So this collection displays how all The fact that fear is received; it comes in many pets were separated from their owners came far down the form list of stereotypical labels priorities but - six months after the tsunami - Kazumasa Nakagaki discovered a dog outside a convenience store. He wasn't a dog person but the convenience store owner's comment that he would call Public Health prompted Kazumasa to open his car door and racial prejudice, which are themes eloquently reproduced hereTamon the dog jumped in.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0863561462</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= David Szalay0989715337|title= All That Man Is|rating= 5|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= Two teenage boys on an Inter Rail trip around Europe find themselves staying with a frustrated housewife Papa on the outskirts of Prague, a driftless young Frenchman discovers sexual fulfilment on a package holiday in Cyprus, a lovestruck Hungarian minder is embroiled in a prostitution racket at an upmarket London hotel, a Belgian academic is forced to confront his egotism when his partner becomes pregnant, a Danish tabloid journalist exposes a high-ranking politician's love affair, a property developer inspects a new project in the French alps, a Scot living in Croatia fails in love and business, a Russian millionaire confronts divorce, an elderly English politician survives a road accident in Italy. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099593696</amazonuk>}}{{newreviewMoon|author= Elizabeth Hay|title= His Whole LifeMarco North|rating= 54|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= If you think that ''un-put-down-able'' is Some frogs had gotten into the greatest accolade for a book, think againwell. ''Put-down-able'' can be stronger praise:  ''His Whole Life'' is putWalter stood waist-down-able. It encourages you to put it down, to wrap yourself deep in the slow-moving storyfragrant water, the exquisite writing, the subtleties naked except for his beaten leather hat. Long strands of the characterstheir eggs wove around him, and just walk around for a while sticky gray pearls with tadpoles inside them slowly sinking in; it encourages you to come back to it again . Two of the dogs leaned over the opening and again; mostly it encourages you to put it barked down, to read it slowly, because you donat the strange noise of the buckets as he filled them.''t want it to end.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857055445</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Phillip Lewis|title= How is that for an opening? The Barrowfields|rating= 4|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= Just before Henry Aster's birth, his father, a frustrated novelist style of this novel in the form of interconnected short stories goes from succinct and lawyer, reluctantly returns laconic to the remote North Carolina mountains in which he was improbably raised wistful and installs his young family in musing, turning on a gothic mansion - nicknamed 'the vulture house' - worthy of his hero Edgar Allan Poesixpence. ThereAnd author Marco North, Henry grows up under who has the desk most wonderful turn of this fierce and brilliant man. But when a death in the family tips his father toward a fearsome unravellingphrase, what was once a young son's reverence is poisoned, and Henry flees, not starts as he means to return until years later when he, too, must go home againon.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473636825</amazonuk>