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{{Frontpage
|author=Ashley Hickson-LovenceMaria Stepanova and Sasha Dugdale (Translator)|title=Wild EastThe Disappearing Act|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Despite her anonymisation of place names and people, Stepanova's message in this short work of autofiction is unmistakable. A novelist named M travels from B (ostensibly Berlin) to the town of F for a literary festival she is to be a guest speaker at. Detoured by erratic train schedules and nudged by forces beyond her control, her journey slowly bends toward a traveling circus. Swept up in this series of events, M eventually offers to step in for a circus performer who has unexpectedly left the show. The train functions as a motif of transience and impermanence, while the circus embodies the reshaping of identity and a retreat into fantasy, an impulse that lies at the very heart of the novel form itself.|isbn=1804272329}}{{Frontpage|isbn=B0GFQ81YQK|title=How the Sky and the Earth Made People: From the Oral Stories of Malagasy Elders|author=Stephanie Zabriskie
|rating=4.5
|genre=TeensChildren's Non-Fiction|summary=Written in verseBefore people came and joined the animals, this is Ronny's story, a young black fourteen year old boy from Hackney who suddenly has to move to Norwich there was only the sky and start at a mostly white schoolthe earth. The move is initiated by Ronny's mum who is worried for Ronny's safety after a tragic event, Everything was quiet until the earth and so Ronny finds himself trying the sky began to tal to settle in a new towneach other. First, a new schoolthe earth created bodies. And then, the sky breathed life into them. These were the first humans and keep himself out of trouble. He listens they belonged to music constantly, both earth and has always dreamed of being a rappersky. But now, in this new schoolAnd so people lived between sky and soil and they planted and learned and remembered, his teacher encourages him especially how they came to be part of a poetry writing workshop group . When they grew old anddied, slowly, Ronny begins their bodies returned to see the connections between rap earth and poetry, their life returned to the sky. And that is why the earth and the power of creativity sky are both revered. Only together can they create human beings. And that is why people must pay attention to, and crafting your wordscare for, both.|isbn=0241645441
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|isbn=1635866847B0GHPMNF6P|title=The Lavender CompanionZookeeper's Dragon: A Magical Modern Fantasy Tale for Grown-Ups|author=Jessica Dunham and Terry Barlin VesciCarolyn Mathews
|rating=4.5
|genre=LifestyleFantasy|summary=ItWhen Phil's strangefather unexpectedly dies, he quits his Canary Wharf finance job to take over the things that make you ''immediately'' feel that this is running of the book for you. Before I started reading ''The Lavender Companion'', I visited the authorfamily's [https://wwwfarm zoo.pinelavenderfarm.com/ website] and thereHe's not expecting much excitement, until he receives an unidentified egg that his new-age stoner uncle Edgar found in a picture of a slice of chocolate cake on the homepage. I don't eat cakes cave in New Zealand, and desserts - but I wanted that cake viscerallysuddenly life is no longer quite what it seems. (There's Then the egg hatches into neither a reptile nor a recipe in the bookbird, which I'm avoiding with some difficultybut a dragon!!) Then I started reading Now he, Edgar, his mother Abi, and the book and I was told zoo's part-time café waitress Pearl have to make a mess raise this little bundle of it. Notes in the margins are sanctioned. You get scales and joy, despite having no idea how to fold down the corners of pages. You suspect that smears of butter would actually raise dragons and not be a problembeing able to tell anyone about it. I ''loved'' But this book already.tiny little dragon may show them love and connection in ways they had never before imagined…
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|author=Jenny ValentineStephanie Zabriskie|title=Us in How Maasai Women Spoke to Cows: From the Before and AfterOral Stories of Maasai Elders
|rating=5
|genre=TeensChildren's Non-Fiction|summary=Elk and Mab are best friends, or more than that even, their friendship ''How Maasai Women Spoke to Cows is a once children’s nonfiction book drawn from the oral traditions of Maasai elders in Ngorongoro, Tanzania.'' The Maasai are a lifetime connectioncattle-herding people and this story writes down its oral tradition explaining how they came to be so. They meet as children one day on a trip out Cattle are status and wealth in Maasai culture but unfortunately they donthis doesn't get each other's contact details at tell the whole story of the time. But then chance brings them back together, intimate and they are inseparable. Something has happened thoughsymbiotic connection its people, something terrible and tragicespecially its women, and now they must work through have with their grief, cows and for the natural world. The oral tradition retelling the many conversations Maasai women have had with their friendshipcows, togetherdoes.|isbn=1471196585B0G9WTGY6J
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|isbnauthor=1787333175Livi Michael|title=You Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here|author=Benji WaterhouseElizabeth and Ruth|rating=3.5|genre=Popular ScienceHistorical Fiction|summary=I was tempted to read ''You DonElizabeth and Ruth't Have to be Mad to Work Here'' after enjoying Adam Kay's is a work of historical fiction wrought from the life of the Victorian author Elizabeth Gaskell, best known for her first book {{amazonurl|isbn=1509858636|title=This is Going to Hurt}}novel Mary Barton (1848), a glorious mixture radical critique of insight into the workings treatment of the NHS, humour and autobiographyworking class published under a pseudonym. The ''You DonRuth't Have to be Mad...'from Livi Michael' promised the same elements but moved from physical problems to mental illness s title appears in her novel as Pasley, a young Irish prostitute who was abandoned as a child and the work of finds herself in Manchester's New Bailey Prison after a psychiatristdifficult and unjust hand at life. I did wonder whether it was acceptable to be looking for humour Set in this setting but Manchester between 1839 and 1842, the laughter is directed at a situation rather than a person novel examines the harsh conditions endured by the Victorian working poor and it is always delivered with empathy and understandinginterrogates the extent to which the wealthy (including Gaskell herself) were responsible for addressing these injustices. |isbn=1784633682
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|author=Mariana EnriquezMakenna Goodman|title=A Sunny Place for Shady PeopleHelen of Nowhere|rating=4.5|genre=Short StoriesLiterary Fiction|summary=Mariana Enriquez writes horror It could be argued that the pervading theme of this book is disturbingly realmalaise - a hard-to-place feeling that something in your life is not quite right. The protagonist, achieving a disgraced professor on the brink of losing both his career and his relationship, embodies this uncanny familiarity by basing her paranormal plots on gritty realitiesfeeling. However, Goodman counteracts his discomfort with a force which is seductive, radical and unnerving: her settings include an abandoned field full Helen. The connection between Helen and the protagonist is indirect yet intimate. As the former owner of disused refrigerators due to an urban planning mishapthe countryside house he's considering, an overcrowded homeless shelter and Helen represents a crime-ridden neighbourhood where safety meetings are routine - all within Argentinavolta in his life, her past tied to his potential fresh start. The circumstances of realtor who shows the protagonist around the house shares stories about Helen, and describes her characters are so plausible as ''an entity that is pure consciousness, beyond form''. Although she lives in an assisted living facility now, Helen has powers beyond comprehension which the reader gets the supernatural or otherworldly horror which seeps into these spaces adopts a similarly tangible texturesense are not altogether innocuous. |isbn=18035112301804272205
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|authorisbn=Onyi NwabineliB0GCB1MQ7D|title=Allow Me to Introduce MyselfWhy My Mother Went Away|author=Alan Kennedy|rating=4.5|genre=General FictionAutobiography|summary=Anuri spent her childhood on display I have often wondered how prominent people came to the worldhold their positions. With 'celebrities', thanks to her step-mother Opheliathere's increasingly popular presence on social mediafrequently a book they might or might not have written, where she posted every step of Anuriwhich might or might not tell the true story. It's childhood for sponsorships not often that you find a book that gives the full backstory, and influencer deals and, basically, monetary gain. Now Anuri rarely do you discover a memoir where the telling is in her twenties so perfect that you'll go back and she is slowly trying to regain her confidence reread paragraphs and to get her life backsentences, suing her step-mother to take down just for the pleasure the content about herwords give. Anuri ''Why My Mother Went Away'' is battling alcoholism, failing to start her PhD, undergoing therapy and secretly abusing people online and receiving money from them for doing soone of those rare exceptions. Most importantlyIt's the story of how a boy from the Midlands, she is desperately worried about her little sisterborn at the beginning of the Second World War, who is the new focus would become a Professor of Ophelia's online empirePsychology at Dundee University. Can she save her sisterIn fact, and perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at he was one of the founders of the same time?|isbn=0861546873department.
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|author=David ChadwickJeremy Cooper|title=Headload of NapalmDiscord|rating=43.5|genre=ThrillersLiterary Fiction|summary= It's September 1973 in HicksDiscord: a lack of agreement or harmony (as between persons, things, or ideas) The principal example of discord within the novel, as with most instances of discord, is easily located. The two protagonists of the novel, Rebekah Rosen and Evie Bennet, Californiaare as different as they come. Hicks Rebekah is an uptight, traditional and no-nonsense composer close to retirement, while Evie is a Mojave desert town force of nature, bounding onto the musical scene as a few thousand people precocious saxophonist, oozing with its nearest neighbours of LA talent and Las Vegas both a significant drive awaycharm. Not much happens in Hicks. A silver mine The two, predictably, don't always see eye to eye, their approaches different and a defence contractor are the main local employers but otherwise, thereEvie's progressive views at odds with Rebekah's not much of note other than dive bars and Joshua treesconservative leaning. Life is quietHowever, until...something connects them beyond just their musical project: a sort of fragile alliance formed within the clamour.|isbn= B0D321VJ761804272264
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|summary=Will's life is difficult, in a multitude of ways. He is bullied because he has 'the wrong shoes', he has the wrong shoes because his dad can't work and doesn't have enough money for even the most basic of things like food, and his dad can't work because he lost his job at the college, was working a cash-in-hand job on a building site and had an accident. Throw into that mix the fact that his mum and dad are separated, and Will's life seems bleak in every direction. And yet, he still has a tiny amount of hope. He is good at art, and clings to the moments of joy when he is drawing, that feel like a light at the end of a long, dark tunnel.
|isbn=1398527122
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|author=Edward W Said
|title=Representations of the Intellectual
|rating=4.5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=Edward Said's ''Representations of the Intellectual'' is less a strict theory of what intellectuals are and more a passionate argument for what they should be. Said clearly rejects the comfortable image of the intellectual as a detached expert speaking only to other specialists. Instead, he insists on the intellectual as a public figure, often awkward, abrasive, and unpopular, who speaks truth to power even when it is inconvenient or risky.
|isbn=1804272248
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|isbn=0008551375|title=When Shadows Fall (D S Max Craigie)|author=Joan DidionNeil Lancaster|rating=4.5|genre=Crime|summary=Leanne Wilson's body was found at the bottom of a Scottish mountain, seemingly the result of a tragic accident. She'd looked so happy, too, when she posted her intentions on Facebook. Her friends were relieved as she was just out of an unpleasant relationship, but it looked like she was living her best life now. Then it emerged that five other women had died in similar circumstances in the last year. All were experienced climbers, properly equipped for what they were doing and sensible people. None of the 'what a stupid thing to do' explanations applied. They were all alone when they died: DS Max Craigie is certain there's a killer on the loose.}}{{Frontpage|author=Paul B Preciado|title=Dysphoria Mundi|rating=4.5|genre=Politics and Society|summary=''It is never too late to embrace the revolutionary optimism of childhood'' Through this hybrid text, consisting of arias, letters, essays and autofiction, Preciado expresses his own hybrid self, and brings forth a new sensorium as an offering to the new generation, a new feeling mechanism in which detachment is not considered a sign of political apathy. Rather, it is the proportional, valid response to ''the epistemological and political crack we are living through, and the tension between emancipatory forces and conservative resistances that characterize our present'' which Preciado calls ''dysphoria mundi''. The Year whole text is framed against the backdrop of Magical Thinkingthe Covid-19 pandemic as that which has catalysed this revolution, when dysphoria began to emerge on a global scale, or as ''pangea covidica''. Rather than taking this extreme dysphoria as a sign of weakness, or mistaking detachment or withdrawal for political paralysis, Preciado urges his readers to ''use dysphoria as your revolutionary platform''. |isbn=1804271454}}{{Frontpage|author=Samantha Harvey|title=Orbital
|rating=4.5
|genre=AutobiographyGeneral Fiction|summary=This book is Joan DidionIn 2024, Samantha Harvey won the Booker Prize for ''Orbital''s heartbreaking autobiographical account , a compact yet profound work that unfolds over a single day in the lives of a group of astronauts aboard the grief she endured following her husband's sudden deathInternational Space Station. Books Through a narrative lens that shed mirrors the astronauts' orbital perspective, Harvey invites readers to see our planet in a wholly new light .|isbn=1529922933}}{{Frontpage|isbn=295967572X|title=Pale Pieces|author=G M Stevens|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary= Our unnamed narrator is about to begin a train journey with his companion Django. Where they're going and what the purpose of this journey is, is uncertain. Django found the tickets ''on taboo topics like death are such a beautiful the floor somewhere'' and necessary resource has persuaded our narrator to help people feel less aloneaccompany him. Didion unpicks unpleasant feelings surrounding death like selfWhy not? Not much else is clear either -pity, denial but we are probably in the past as the pair travel to the station by coach and delusion and makes them utterly normal, lends them the train is a human face to wearsteam locomotive.|isbn=0007216858
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|isbn=17395269101035043092|title=Where The Killing Stones (Jimmy Perez)|author=Ann Cleeves|rating=5|genre=Crime|summary=Ican't have been the only person who was sad when Inspector Jimmy Perez [[Wild Fire (Shetland, Book 8) by Ann Cleeves|left Shetland]] to start a new life on Orkney. It've Not Been Losts been seven years since we heard from him, but he's now living with Willow Reeves and their young son, James, as well as Cassie, the daughter of his former partner. Willow's also his boss, and she ''should'' be on maternity leave, but when the body of a popular islander, Archie Stout, is found, in the aftermath of a storm, she can't resist getting involved. He'd been battered about the head with a Neolithic stone - one of a pair - which had been stolen from a museum.}}{{Frontpage|author=Glen SibleyThea Lenarduzzi|title=The Tower|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary= ''How unctuous are the fats of another's life, how dizzying their sugars in our bloodstream''. In this compelling novel, Thea Lenarduzzi assumes the identity of T, the protagonist of this tale. Just as T's story is being told, the story of a second protagonist is unveiled: Annie, the daughter of a wealthy family in the 19th century, who died of tuberculosis after being locked in a tower, captures T's imagination. Annie's fate is, above all, an enticing story to T. It is a story which she consumes avariciously, both in a quest for truth and knowledge, and in service of myth, fable and fantasy. |isbn=1804271799}}{{Frontpage|author=Claire-Louise Bennett|title=Big Kiss, Bye-Bye
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Literary Fiction|summary=''One year after a suicide attempt blows apart musician Brian O’Malley's lifeEverything in this book, however sweet or seemingly innocent, he arrives is steeped in an unfamiliar Devon town to recoveranguish and distortion. Living with an unexpected housemate at his former manager’s holiday homeEven a kiss, usually a symbol of intimacy and closeness, he dreams becomes evidence of reconnecting with everything he has love lost. But as those tentative plans falterWhen the narrator cries out internally, ''come over here and kiss me, he becomes swept up in '' it is less an invitation than a local world desperate attempt to confirm her emotional numbness. The imagined recipient of unlikely friendshipsthis plea is Xavier, mobile discos and surprising romantic possibilitiesher ex-partner, a ghost she conjures to test her detachment.''|isbn=1804271934
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|genre=Crime
|summary=It's sixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. She was never found and the investigation ground to a halt. Now, her mother, Helena, and her father are dead in their bed. Initially, it looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but there's something about the positioning of the bodies that makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and her boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. What looked as though it was going to be an open-and-shut case is now a complex double murder. Kerrigan is convinced that the explanation lies in Rosalie's disappearance: others (such as Derwent's boss, Una Burt) are less convinced.
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|author=Annie Ernaux and Alison L. Strayer (translator)
|title=The Other Girl
|rating=4
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=''We were born from the same body. I've never really wanted to think about this.''
Ernaux's work is always very candid and her tone transparent, but this raw epistolary text must be one of the most intimate accounts I've read. Ernaux writes in direct address to her sister, however, this letter will never reach her. Why? Because Annie Ernaux's sister died of diphtheria at 6 years old, a few months before the vaccine was made compulsory in France, and 2 years before the author was even born. The large and instant void created by the jarring concept of writing to an imaginary recipient emphasises Ernaux's process of reckoning with this giant absence in her life, an absence that she has always felt but often denied.
|isbn=1804271845
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|author=Maxim Gorky and Bryan Karetnyk (translator)
|title=Reminiscences of Tolstoy, Chekhov and Andreyev
|rating=3.5
|genre=Biography
|summary=Biographies are often seen as the form of life-writing which offers less colour; it can be seen as more objective and less personal. I think that Gorky completely rejects this perspective, and offers a vibrant, subjective yet informed portrait of three of his literary contemporaries. In the first section of this book, Tolstoy complains to his friend Gorky that: ''you write not of real life as it is, but of what you yourself imagine it to be. Whom would it help to know how I see this tower, that sea, or that Tartar - why should it interest anyone? Of what use is it?''. Well, Maxim Gorky shows exactly what can be gained from a subjective account, giving us access to how he saw Tolstoy, Chekhov and Andreyev in such privileged detail that one almost feels unworthy of it.
|isbn=1804271977
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|author=Olga Tokarczuk|title=House of Day, House of Night|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=''What's the good of a world that keeps changing like that? How can one go on calmly living in it?'' The title of this spellbinding work, ''House of Day, House of Night'', somewhat reflects this notion of shifting realities - the small, subtle changes which govern our lives, like the shift from day to night, however quotidian, causing chaos. But, the constant in that image is the house, stoic against the ancient diurnal cycle which nonetheless controls how it is perceived.|isbn=1804271918}}{{Frontpage|isbn=13996130731836284683|title=Moral InjuriesThe Big Happy|author=Christie WatsonDavid Chadwick
|rating=4.5
|genre=ThrillersDystopian Fiction|summary=Olivia, Laura and Anjali met on the first day of medical school and their friendship would keep them inseparable for Well! This is a quarter of murder mystery unlike any other! I do love it when I open a century. Olivia is ruthlessly ambitiousbook, which is a bonus when you aim it's nothing like I expected it to be a cardiothoracic surgeon. Laura is a perfectionist , and it takes me on a trauma doctorwild ride. Anjali And that is the free spirit of the group and she becomes a GP. When we first meet them theyjust what happened with ''The Big Happy're at a drug and alcohol-fuelled party and it's going to end in tragedy. We I don't know who suffered the tragedy or want to ruin a similar experience for any of you reading but I'll have to at least set the consequencesscene. Twenty-five years later there will be an eerily similar event Once that will impact the three friends. This time, it's their teenage children who are involveddone, I think you should simply experience this wonderfully original story for yourself.
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=0241636604Sally Rooney|title=The Trading Game: A Confession|author=Gary StevensonIntermezzo
|rating=4.5
|genre=AutobiographyGeneral Fiction |summary=If you were to bring up an image Sally Rooney has studied the chessboard of life and is something of a city banker in your mindgrandmaster at putting it into words. Her dialogue is gripping and so brilliantly frustrating, you're unlikely to think of someone like Gary Stevensonas her characters never quite say exactly what they feel. A hoodie and jeans replaces Among the many relationships woven into this story, the pin-stripe suit and his background central one for readers to unravel is the East End, where he was familiar with violence, poverty fraternal connection—or lack thereof—between Ivan and injusticePeter Koubek. There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to the London School of Economics. Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and he has Ivan, a facility socially awkward chess prodigy, contrasts sharply with numbers which most of us can only envy. He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to be stupid. It was his ability at what was, essentiallyolder brother Peter, a card game which got him an internship successful lawyer living in Dublin. Following their father's passing after a long battle with Citibank. Eventuallycancer, this turned into permanent employment as a traderthe brothers' already strained relationship faces new trials.|isbn=0571365469
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|authorisbn=Leanne Egan1836285493|title=Lover BirdsThe Double Life of a Wheelchair User|author=Rob Keeley|rating=4.5|genre=TeensConfident Readers|summary=When new girlWill is a keen player of video games, Isabela conscientious student, moves to Lou's hometown a slightly annoying brother and a supportive friend. But most of Liverpool from London Lou immediately feels Isabel's disdain for everything around herall, he is an aspiring writer. A misunderstanding between them leaves them hating each otherEnglish is his favourite lesson at his school, but Lou feels her pulse racing every time she looks at Isabel or speaks with herMarlowe Park, and that's definitely because Isabel makes her feel so cross, isnone at which he excels. This hasn't it? Because Lou is straightgone unnoticed by his headteacher, isn't she? Even though none of her relationships with boys have gone very well so farMrs Howarth, and she's never had has suggested to Will and his mum that he spends a good kiss with any couple of them? So she just finds herself watching Isabel, and wanting to hang out with her because fighting with her is funafternoons a week at a different school, and she definitely just hates IsabelStation Road, doesn't she?|isbn=000862657Xwhere his ability might be better extended.
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|author=Max BoucheratJenny Valentine|title=The Last Life of Lori MillsUs in the Before and After|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersTeens|summary=We meet Lori on the first evening she's got the house to herself – no neighbour to pop inElk and Mab are best friends, babysitter poorlyor more than that even, mother at work, just an avidly rule-breaking eleven year old, on her lonesometheir friendship is a once in a lifetime connection. What could possibly go wrong? Snuggled in a blanket fort, she has They meet as children one main intention, and that is to log day on to Voxminer, the world-building, critter-collecting game that is a hit in Loritrip out but unfortunately they don't get each other's worldcontact details at the time. But first Lori then chance brings them back together, and they are inseparable. Something has a tiny inkling that this stormy night doesn't find herself entirely on her ownhappened though, and then she finds something even more spooky. For the server she terrible and her bestie tragic, and nobody else should be able to enter shows signs of tampering. When malevolent eyes spark up on her phone screennow they must work through their grief, and her safe place in the game has been doctored – welltheir friendship, where is a girl to turn?together.|isbn=00086664821471196585
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Fyodor Dostoyevsky1787333175|title=White NightsYou Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here|author=Benji Waterhouse
|rating=5
|genre=Short StoriesPopular Science|summary=As always in Dostoyevsky, the character 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.|isbn=0241619785}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0008385068|title=The Midnight Feast|author=Lucy Foley|rating=4.5|genre=Thrillers|summary=ItI was tempted to read 's midsummer on the Dorset coast and guests gather at The Manor. It's their opening weekend and splendid celebrations are promised. ItYou Don's all headed up by Francesca Meadows. The Manor was her ancestral home and she's converted it into an impressive retreat for the wealthy and famous. Her husband, Owen, was the architect and work is still ongoing on parts of the site. The heat is oppressive and amongst the guests are enemies as well as friends. Old scores are going t Have to be settled and it wonMad to Work Here't be long before a body is found.}}{{Frontpage|author=James Baldwin|title=Giovanni's Room|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction |summary=''Giovanniafter enjoying Adam Kay's Room'' follows the narrator David, an American man living in Paris, as he navigates his torturous affair with Giovanni, an Italian bartender he meets in a gay bar. While David is engaged to Hella, who is travelling in Spain, the real tension in the novel arises not from his infidelity but from the deeper conflict within himself. It is David's crippling shame and denial of his sexuality that ultimately dooms his relationship with Giovanni.|isbn=0141186356}}first book {{Frontpageamazonurl|isbn=B0DGDJRHYD1509858636|title=Nowhere Man|author=Deborah Stone|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=In a quiet suburban house, Patrick This is making his final plans. A meticulous man, he makes sure of every preparation, down to the last detail. Some last reflections, and then he says goodbye Going to his wife, the world, and his life. It's horribly sad. At work in her shop, his wife Diana is fending off yet another phone call about her ageing and ailing mother, who needs extricating from yet another accident. It will be a while before Diana realises what Patrick has done.Hurt}}{{Frontpage|author=Virginie Despentes|title=King Kong Theory|rating=4|genre=Autobiography |summary=''King Kong Theory'' is a hard-hitting memoir and feminist manifesto, which can be seen as a call to arms for women in a phallocentric society broken at its core. Originally written in French, the book is a collection glorious mixture of essays in which Virginie Despentes explores her experiences as a woman through insight into the complex prism workings of her varied life: from rape to sex work and pornography. Though these discussions are intertwined, their placement within the book can feel somewhat disjointedNHS, a reflection of their original form as independent essayshumour and autobiography.|isbn=191309734X}}{{Frontpage|author=James Baldwin|title=Giovanni 's Room|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction |summary='You Don'Giovanni's Room'' follows the narrator David, an American man living in Paris, as he navigates his torturous affair with Giovanni, an Italian bartender he meets in a gay bar. While David is engaged t Have to Hella, who is travelling in Spain, the real tension in the novel arises not from his infidelity but from the deeper conflict within himselfbe Mad. It is David's crippling shame and denial of his sexuality that ultimately dooms his relationship with Giovanni.|isbn=0141186356}}{{Frontpage|author=Alba de Cespedes |title=Forbidden Notebook|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=This Italian work of feminist fiction holds an air of suspense and tension from the moment our protagonist, Valeria Cossati, purchases her forbidden notebook, and learns about herself in the most intimate and revealing ways.|isbn=1782278222}}{{Frontpage|author=Ottessa Moshfegh|title=My Year of Rest and Relaxation|rating=3|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=At best, this novel is a scathing critique of modern society and reveals the fragility of human relationships; at worst, it is the cynical, predictable and slightly trite tale of an unlikeable protagonist. This unlikely heroine, a slim, attractive and newly orphaned girl in her twenties is disillusioned with '' promised the world, same elements but resolves not moved from physical problems to lose sleep over it: in fact, her solution lies in her hibernation.|isbn=1784707422}}{{Frontpage|author=Jo Callaghan|title=Leave No Trace|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary=When a man is found crucified on mental illness and the top work of a hill in Nuneaton, DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to the case alongside her sidekick, the AI detective Lockpsychiatrist. It's their first live case together, having previously been very successful with several cold cases. But when there is a second body found crucified a few days later, Kat is suddenly struggling with a potential serial killer and a very high profile case that draws a lot of unwanted attention I did wonder whether it was acceptable to their AI Future Policing project. Will they be able to solve the case looking for humour in time, or will Kat find herself taken off this setting but the case and, potentially, out of laughter is directed at a career?|isbn=139851120X}}{{Frontpage|isbn=B0DB64PYV5|title=The White Rose|author=Dave Baines|rating=4|genre=Dystopian Fiction|summary=In 2033, situation rather than a superstorm known as the White Rose devastates the Northern Hemisphere. And person and it's not a storm that gathers, wreaks havoc, then dissipates. Instead, it hovers across half the Earth is always delivered with its octopus-like tentacles, not giving up empathy and never going awayunderstanding.
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