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==The Best New Books==
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Rob Keeley1786482126|title=Childish Spirits: 10th anniversary special editionThe Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=Around here, weBuilders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the site was going to hold seventy-five 'luxury're big fans apartments - when they discovered the bones of children's author Rob Keeleya child beneath a doorway. There was no skull. He's Was this a ball of happy positivityritual killing or murder? Inevitably, he understands children, and he writes for their pleasure and enjoyment, not to lecture or hectorDr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. The It's difficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn'Childish Spirits'' series t, that she is one of pregnant with his greatest achievements. It's child as a sequence result of ghost stories centring on Ellie, a stalwart young girl who can cope with anything the spirit world throws at herone night they spent together some three months ago. Her condition will be obvious before long, and Edward, a spoiled lordling and the first spirit Ellie encounters|isbn= 1783064617not least because Ruth is prone to sudden bouts of sickness.
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Jenny Valentine0008551375|title=Us in the Before and AfterWhen Shadows Fall (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster|rating=4.5|genre=TeensCrime|summary=Elk and Mab are best friendsLeanne Wilson's body was found at the bottom of a Scottish mountain, seemingly the result of a tragic accident. She'd looked so happy, or more than that eventoo, their friendship is a once in a lifetime connectionwhen she posted her intentions on Facebook. They meet Her friends were relieved as children one day on a trip she was just out of an unpleasant relationship, but unfortunately they don't get each it looked like she was living her best life now. Then it emerged that five other's contact details at women had died in similar circumstances in the timelast year. But then chance brings them back togetherAll were experienced climbers, properly equipped for what they were doing and they are inseparablesensible people. None of the 'what a stupid thing to do' explanations applied. Something has happened though, something terrible and tragic, and now They were all alone when they must work through their grief, and their friendship, togetherdied: DS Max Craigie is certain there's a killer on the loose.|isbn=1471196585
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{{Frontpage
|author=Kieran Larwood and Joe Todd-StantonPaul B Preciado|title=Dungeon Runners: Hero TrialDysphoria Mundi|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersPolitics and Society|summary=Meet Kit. Like most of the people in his world, it seems, he is an avid fan of Dungeon Running – the sport where a team of warrior, mage and healer enter specially prepared, century-old, magical mazes, and race to the exit, perhaps bothering with the treasure or the big bad and the points they grant you along the way. Unfortunately for Kit, the only thing he's seen of the latest race on the inn TV equivalent 'It is that one team has been retired, eaten, and a new trio of questors is needed. Possibly very unfortunately indeed for Kit, he has taken never too late to embrace the goading from the token bully revolutionary optimism of his world and stumbled into declaring hechildhood'll enter as a team. What chance does this friendless, muscle-free-zone have in actually managing that, and how could he possibly hope to succeed?|isbn=1839945184}}{{Frontpage|author=Saima Mir|title=Vengeance|rating=3.5|genre=Thrillers|summary= I was instantly intrigued by the premise of this novel – an organised crime syndicate in the north of England run by a Muslim woman. The fact that it was the second in a series I hadn't read didn't stop me – I've jumped midway into a few series before (on page and screen) and it needn't be a hindrance if it's good enough. And that wasn't a problem here. Vengeance swiftly brings you up to speed, and I never felt lost.|isbn=0861541561}}
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=B0CYV674G2Samantha Harvey|title=Swanton Morley (John Tanner)|author=David BlakeOrbital|rating=34.5|genre=CrimeGeneral Fiction|summary=It seemed like an open-and-shut case. A manIn 2024, Samantha Harvey won the Booker Prize for ''Orbital'', covered in mud and blood - and carrying a knife, comes into the police station shouting compact yet profound work that he hasn't killed the man. A body at unfolds over a single day in the bottom lives of a freshly dug grave at Swanton Morley church - he's been stabbed to death. DCI John Tanner is just back from his honeymoon, which coincided with the birth group of his daughter Samantha. You would think he'd be grateful for an easy answer but astronauts aboard the words 'perverse' and 'John Tanner' were made for each otherInternational Space Station. He's sleep-deprived to Through a narrative lens that mirrors the point of falling asleep at work but heastronauts's determined orbital perspective, Harvey invites readers to keep going - probably because he can't get any sleep at homesee our planet in a wholly new light.|isbn=1529922933
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=1787333175295967572X|title=You Don't Have to be Mad to Work HerePale Pieces|author=Benji WaterhouseG M Stevens
|rating=5
|genre=Popular ScienceLiterary Fiction|summary=I was tempted to read ''You Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here'' after enjoying Adam Kay's first book {{amazonurl|isbn=1509858636|title=This Our unnamed narrator is Going about to Hurt}}, begin a glorious mixture of insight into train journey with his companion Django. Where they're going and what the workings purpose of the NHSthis journey is, humour and autobiographyis uncertain. Django found the tickets ''You Donon the floor somewhere't Have ' and has persuaded our narrator to be Madaccompany him...'' promised Why not? Not much else is clear either - but we are probably in the past as the same elements but moved from physical problems pair travel to mental illness the station by coach and the work of a psychiatrist. I did wonder whether it was acceptable to be looking for humour in this setting but the laughter train is directed at a situation rather than a person and it is always delivered with empathy and understandingsteam locomotive.
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Onyi Nwabineli0008551324|title=Allow Me to Introduce MyselfThe Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster
|rating=4.5
|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=Anuri spent her childhood on display to the world, thanks to her step-mother OpheliaIt's increasingly popular presence on social media, where she posted every step of Anuri's childhood unusual for sponsorships and influencer deals and, basically, monetary gainanyone from the Hardie family to approach the police. Now Anuri Neither side likes or has any respect for the other. But Davie Hardie is struggling in her twenties prison and she he's prepared to tell the police where the body of a missing person is slowly trying to regain her confidence buried and to get her life back, suing her step-mother to take down the content about who was responsible for herdeath. Anuri is battling alcoholismThis person, failing to start her PhDhe promises, undergoing therapy is someone big and secretly abusing people online and receiving money from them for it will be worth the police doing sowhat he wants. Most importantly, she is desperately worried about her little sister, who And what he wants is to be transferred to an open prison to serve the new focus remainder of Ophelia's online empirehis sentence and to get an early parole date. Can she save her sisterNot much to ask, is it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and perhaps herself she's even prepared to do the other thing that Hardie demanded - make certain that DS Max Craigie and her relationship anyone who works with her father at the same time?|isbn=0861546873him is kept well away from what's happening.
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{{Frontpage
|author=David ChadwickJon Fosse and Damion Searls (translator) |title=Headload of NapalmVaim|rating=4.5|genre=ThrillersLiterary Fiction|summary= It's September 1973 in Hicks, California'All was strange''. Hicks is a Mojave desert town of a few thousand people with its nearest neighbours of LA and Las Vegas both a significant drive away. Not much happens in Hicks. A silver mine and a defence contractor are This haunting phrase encapsulates the main local employers but otherwisepervading sense of otherworldliness which permeates this story set in Vaim, there's a fictional fishing village in Norway which paradoxically could not much of note other than dive bars feel more real for Jatgeir and Joshua trees. Life is quietEline, until...two of the protagonists caught in its melancholic current.|isbn= B0D321VJ761804271829
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{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Tom Percival1035043092|title=The Wrong ShoesKilling Stones (Jimmy Perez)|author=Ann Cleeves
|rating=5
|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=WillI can's life is difficultt have been the only person who was sad when Inspector Jimmy Perez [[Wild Fire (Shetland, in Book 8) by Ann Cleeves|left Shetland]] to start a multitude of waysnew life on Orkney. He is bullied because he has 'the wrong shoesIt's been seven years since we heard from him, but he has the wrong shoes because his dad can't work s now living with Willow Reeves and doesn't have enough money for even their young son, James, as well as Cassie, the most basic daughter 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 accidentformer partner. Throw into that mix the fact that Willow's also his mum and dad are separatedboss, and Willshe ''should''s life seems bleak in every direction. And yetbe on maternity leave, he still has but when the body of a tiny amount of hope. He popular islander, Archie Stout, is good at artfound, and clings to in the moments aftermath of joy when he is drawinga storm, that feel like she can't resist getting involved. He'd been battered about the head with a light at the end Neolithic stone - one of a long, dark tunnelpair - which had been stolen from a museum.|isbn=1398527122
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Sylvie CathrallThea Lenarduzzi|title=A Letter to the Luminous DeepThe Tower
|rating=5
|genre=Science Literary Fiction|summary= There ''How unctuous are few greater joys than 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 book which lives up tower, captures T's imagination. Annie's fate is, above all, an enticing story to a compelling premiseT. And this It is one a story which she consumes avariciously, both in a quest for truth and knowledge, and in service of themmyth, fable and fantasy. |isbn= 03565227761804271799
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=0008517061Claire-Louise Bennett|title=Death in a Lonely Place|author=Stig Abell|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary= Former Metropolitan Police detectiveBig Kiss, Jake Johnson, has settled into his rustic life at Little Sky. There’s perhaps a little uncertainty about the future of his life with his vet girlfriend, Livia and her daughter Diana, as moving in together would mean a lot of compromise: does Jake give up his offBye-grid and relaxing life to move in with Livia or does Livia move to Little Sky despite her reservations about whether or not this is the future she wants for herself and her daughter? For the moment they’re enjoying life in the present and putting the future on the back burner.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1786482126|title=The Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly GriffithsBye
|rating=4.5
|genre=CrimeLiterary Fiction|summary=Builders were demolishing an old house Everything in Norwich - the site was going to hold seventy-five 'luxury' apartments - when they discovered the bones of a child beneath a doorway. There was no skull. Was this a ritual killing book, however sweet or murder? Inevitablyseemingly innocent, Dr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelsonis steeped in anguish and distortion. It's difficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn'tEven a kiss, that she is pregnant with his child as usually a result symbol of the one night they spent together some three months ago. Her condition will be obvious before longintimacy and closeness, not least because Ruth is prone to sudden bouts becomes evidence of sicknesslove lost.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0008551324|title=The Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster|rating=4.5|genre=Crime|summary=ItWhen the narrator cries out internally, 's unusual for anyone from the Hardie family to approach the police. Neither side likes or has any respect for the other. But Davie Hardie is struggling in prison and he's prepared to tell the police where the body of a missing person is buried come over here and who was responsible for her death. This personkiss me, he promises, is someone big and '' it will be worth the police doing what he wants. And what he wants is to be transferred to less an open prison invitation than a desperate attempt to serve the remainder confirm her emotional numbness. The imagined recipient of his sentence and to get an early parole date. Not much to askthis plea is Xavier, her ex-partner, is it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and a ghost she's even prepared conjures to do the other thing that Hardie demanded - make certain that DS Max Craigie and anyone who works with him is kept well away from what's happeningtest her detachment.|isbn=1804271934
}}
{{Frontpage
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=0571379877Annie Ernaux and Alison L. Strayer (translator)|title=The Kellerby CodeOther 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 authorwas 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}}{{Frontpage|author=Maxim Gorky and Bryan Karetnyk (translator)|title=Jonny SweetReminiscences 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
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1529077745
|title=The Dark Wives (D I Vera Stanhope)
|author=Ann Cleeves
|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=Edward Jevons is A man walking his dog in the early morning discovered the body of a working-class young manin the park near Rosebank, obsessed with his upper-class friends, Robert and Stanza. Robert's a theatre directorcare home for troubled teens. He's also selfThe dead man was Josh -obsessed, demanding, handsome and entitled and uses Edward one of the care workers who was due to run errands for himwork a shift the night before but who had never turned up. Edward has been D I Vera Stanhope is called in love with Stanza since their university days to investigate the murder - and he's drunkenly confided how he feels to Robertbut her only clue is the disappearance of one of the residents, fourteen-year-old Chloe Spencer. Most men in Robert's position would stay away from Stanza or tell Edward Some people believe that a relationship had begun between them Chloe was responsible for the death but heVera thinks this is unlikely as the girl's not like most men: Edward is left diary makes it clear that she adored Josh. She knows that she has to find Chloe to discover what happened to stumble upon the two of them kissing in a dark passagewayJosh.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn= B0FK5LHKD9|title=The Colour of Memory|author=Jo CallaghanChristopher Bowden|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=It's been three years since we last reviewed a book by favourite regular Christopher Bowden, so we were very glad to see a new novel arrive here at Bookbag Towers. Like all Bowden's stories, there's a mystery at the heart of ''The Colour of Money''. We like this running theme in an author's work - take a mystery but give it different flavour and atmosphere each time.}}{{Frontpage|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 titleof 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=henleyA|title=Ultimate Obsession|author=Leave No TraceDai Henley
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary=When Ex-DCI Andy Flood has been a man is found crucified on the top of a hill in NuneatonPrivate Investigator for some time now, DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to the case alongside her sidekick, the AI detective Lockand he should be doing quite well financially. ItUnfortunately, his daughter's their first live case togetherdefence against a murder charge drained his savings. His wife, Laura, having previously has been very successful with several cold casestrying to persuade him to retire - ''maybe go travelling or go on cruises. But when there is a second body found crucified a few days laterThat's what 'ordinary people do', Kat is suddenly struggling with a potential serial killer and a very high profile case that draws a lot '' He's not been entirely up front about the state of unwanted attention to their AI Future Policing projectsavings. Will they be able When Jack Durban tries to persuade him to solve the take his case in time, or will Kat find herself taken off it's the case and, potentially, out thought of the money he could make that convinces him that this is a career?|isbn=139851120Xmiscarriage of justice that he really should put right.
}}
{{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=General Fiction
|summary=Sally 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 for readers to unravel is the fraternal connection—or lack thereof—between Ivan and Peter Koubek. Ivan, a socially awkward chess prodigy, contrasts sharply with his older brother Peter, a successful lawyer living in Dublin. Following their father's passing after a long battle with cancer, the brothers' already strained relationship faces new trials.
|isbn=0571365469
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1036916375
|title=Just a Liverpool Lad
|author=Peter McArdle
|rating=4
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=If you were to bring up an image of ''Just a city banker in your mind, youLiverpool Lad ''re unlikely to think is a collection of someone like Gary Stevenson. A hoodie memories and jeans replaces reflections from the pin-stripe suit years Peter McArdle spent growing up in and his background is around Liverpool. Some are factual, such as the East Endfamily history of a sea-going family, where he was familiar with violence, poverty and injusticethe docks dominating lives. There was no posh public school on his CV Other stories blend seamlessly into the what-might-have- but he had been to the London School of Economics. Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - It's a book to settle into and he has a facility with numbers which most allow your mind to roam across your childhood memories, to think of us can only envy. He also realised simpler times when life seemed less constrained, despite the blitz that most rich people expect poor people to be stupid. It was his ability at what was, essentially, a card game which got him an internship with Citibankconstant factor in McArdle's early years. Eventually, this turned into permanent employment as a traderI'd never heard of parachute mines before - but they were almost soundless and could appear after the all-clear was sounded.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=10350218031836285493|title=The Antique Hunter's Guide to MurderDouble Life of a Wheelchair User|author=C L MillerRob Keeley|rating=3.5|genre=CrimeConfident Readers|summary=It's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to the English country village where she grew up. She's back now because Will is a keen player of video games, a request for help from her beloved auntconscientious student, Carole. Freya's former mentor a slightly annoying brother and Carole's close a supportive friend. But most of all, Arthur Crockleford, he is dead and the circumstances seem suspicious, to say the leastan aspiring writer. Arthur was the reason why Freya had not been back to the village: ArthurEnglish is his favourite lesson at his school, she feelsMarlowe Park, let her down badlyand one at which he excels. Even though they were in business together as antique huntersThis hasn't gone unnoticed by his headteacher, Mrs Howarth, and she has not felt able suggested to be near the man or pursue the profession she loved. After the split, she worked in Will and his mum that he spends a couple of afternoons a week at a cafedifferent school, met and married James (on the rebound from the love of her lifeStation Road, who was murdered) and Freya and James have now divorcedwhere his ability might be better extended.
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{{Frontpage
|isbn=AllTomorrowsFutureCover1009473085|title=All Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that DisruptThe Conservative Effect 2010 - 2024|author=Benjamin Greenaway Anthony Seldon and Stephen Oram Tom Egerton (Editors)
|rating=5
|genre=Science FictionPolitics and Society|summary=Sometimes it's simpler to explain a book by describing what it ''isn't''Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things and that applies to come''The Conservative Effect: 2010-2024 - 14 Wasted Years?''. If you're looking for an easy read which will deliver the inside story about what ''really'' Ihappened on certain occasions, then this isn've heard it said t the book for you. If that 'technology' is s what happens after you're eighteenlooking for, I don't think Anthony Seldon's book, {{amazonurl|isbn=B0BH7SKG2S|title=Johnson at 10}}, can be bettered for those tumultuous years. Well, I must confess that there have been more than It's a few decades of technology in my lifetimecompelling read and should be compulsory for anyone who thinks Johnson should return to politics. I've kept up reasonably well with what's advantageous to me but IThe Conservative Effect'm left with the feeling that it's all getting away from me. Some of it is - frankly - quite frighteningan entirely different beast. Of course, I could research It's the possibilities and seventh book in a series which looks at the probabilities impact a government has made and end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who knows what they're talking about or co-editor Sir Anthony Seldon regards this as the latest conspiracy theoristmost important. I needed people I knew I could trust This book follows the well-established format: a series of experts from various fields review the state of the nation when the coalition took over in 2010, the changes that occurred and who could deliver information the situation in a way I could understand2024.
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{{Frontpage
|author=Sunny SinghJenny Valentine|title=Hotel ArcadiaUs in the Before and After|rating=3.5|genre=Thrillers Teens|summary=The Hotel Arcadia Elk and Mab are best friends, or more than that even, their friendship is a luxury hotel once in an unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a terrorist grouplifetime connection. Hiding from the terrorists who are rampaging through, killing everyone They meet as children one day on site, there is Sam, a wartime photographer and Abhi, trip out but unfortunately they don't get each other's contact details at the hotel managertime. As Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the residents who But then chance brings them back together, and they are still alive in the hotelinseparable. Something has happened though, he forms a bond with Sam who refuses to be cowed by eventssomething terrible and tragic, and keeps on venturing out of her room to try to capture what's happened now they must work through her photography. Although they only ever talk over the phonetheir grief, and their friendship grows as Abhi tries to help her keep safe and they both wait to see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by the terrorists, together.|isbn=086154742X1471196585
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=15291532981787333175|title=The List of Suspicious ThingsYou Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here|author=Jennie GodfreyBenji Waterhouse
|rating=5
|genre=General FictionPopular Science|summary=ItI was tempted to read 's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly...) She's not whatYou Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here''s worrying Mivafter enjoying Adam Kay's familyfirst book {{amazonurl|isbn=1509858636|title=This is Going to Hurt}}, a glorious mixture of insight into the workings of the NHS, thoughhumour and autobiography. Women have been disappearing. Well, they've been murdered, but to have 'disappeared' doesnYou Don't sound quite so frighteningHave to be Mad... Miv's upset because she's overheard that her father wants promised the same elements but moved from physical problems to move mental illness and the family 'Down South'work of a psychiatrist. When you're from Yorkshire, Down South I did wonder whether it was acceptable to be looking for humour in this setting but the laughter is directed at a situation rather than a frightening, foreign place, best avoided. For Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, person and it is always delivered with empathy and she'll do anything to prevent that. She's not worried about the dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to anyoneunderstanding.
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1398524085Mariana Enriquez|title=Has Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Nicci FrenchA Sunny Place for Shady People
|rating=5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=Mariana Enriquez writes horror that is disturbingly real, achieving this uncanny familiarity by basing her paranormal plots on gritty realities: her settings include an abandoned field full of disused refrigerators due to an urban planning mishap, an overcrowded homeless shelter and a crime-ridden neighbourhood where safety meetings are routine - all within Argentina. The circumstances of her characters are so plausible that the supernatural or otherworldly horror which seeps into these spaces adopts a similarly tangible texture.
|isbn=1803511230
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1529934753
|title=The Protest
|author=Rob Rinder
|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=Charlotte Salter was expected at her husbandFor a little while, it looked as though Sir Max Bruce, the country's fiftieth birthday party but never turned most famous living artist, was not going to show upfor the opening of his retrospective at the Royal Academy. Her childrenStill, sons Niallhe arrived in the nick of time, Paul complete with his two wives and Ollie and her daughtersix children, Ettyone of whom filmed what happened. are all worried but - strangely - her husband Being an influencer, Alecyou tend to do things like that, is notbut it was fortunate that there was a record of the protest. Shortly afterwardsLexi Williams, Etty an intern at the RA, grabbed a spray can of blue paint from under a chair and Gregproceeded to spray Bruce in the face, find whilst shouting ''Stop the body of GregWar''s father, Duncan Ackerley, in the river. It was seemed to be part of an easy assumption for the police to make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when he couldnongoing series of 'blue-face't stand the guiltattacks, but this was different. The Salter children are not convinced but there's little else they can do but get on had been laced with their lives cyanide, and wonder about what really happenedSir Max Bruce was dead.
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{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=1035906708Ariel Saramandi|title=Diva|author=Daisy GoodwinPortrait of an Island on Fire
|rating=4.5
|genre=General FictionPolitics and Society|summary=We tend to think In this powerful collection of Maria Callas as Greekessays, but she was born Saramandi seeks to Greek parents in Manhattanintradermally dissect the sociopolitical fabric of Mauritius, New York, in December 1923 tunneling deep into the wounds left by colonialism and only moved slavery to Athens when she was thirteenexpose how these legacies still shape modern life. Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to Saramandi describes the country at one stage as ''rotting'Callas' to make it more manageable in , a blunt yet apt metaphor for the systemic decay brought about by the Statesmalignant forces of racism, patriarchy, environmental degradation and governmental dysfunction. When she was back Each essay in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the Nazi occupation by this collection serves as a mother who mercilessly exploited her and made no secret kind of her preference for her elder sisterdiagnostic, Jackiecharting the various diseases afflicting the island state.|isbn=1804271616
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{{Frontpage
|author=Christopher EdgePekka Harju-Autti|title=Black Hole Cinema ClubLoveVortex and the Drakor's Curse
|rating=4
|genre=Confident ReadersFantasy|summary=Lucas and his friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinemaIt's the eighteenth century, a place that has the nickname time of 'The Black Hole'discovery and Britain is expanding its foreign trade. All big movie fansCaptain Julius Hawthorne, they're looking forward an experienced Scottish sea captain, is sent to lots of exciting films, and many, many snacks! However, as the movie startsAndaman Islands in his endeavour. Along with his son, they very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very differentPeter, and they are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagine. But as they lurch from one film genre to the nexttheir cat, Michi, can they figure out what set off on earth is going on? Will they ever get back a perilous voyage to these faraway lands. The islands are beautiful and stunning in their scenery and the cinemaislanders' leader, Aarav, and is keen to their real lives?establish good relations.|isbn=1839942738B0DS1VGHH3
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|author=Rachel GreenlawHelene Bessette and Kate Briggs (translator)|title=Compass and BladeLili is Crying|rating=34.5|genre=TeensLiterary Fiction|summary=''I can hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, the answering beat First published in 1953 in my heart.'' RosevearFrench, this novel is a remote timeless text which wrenches the hearts of its readers just as Bessette wrenches words and partially forgotten island, survives sentences from their proper position on luring ships into the rocks page and plundering the wrecks. Mirapositions them elsewhere, like her mother before herdisjointed, is one of the seven who swim out to survey the ruins – rescuing any survivors and any treasure that lies withintruncated. But when the Council Watch lays a trap to end the wrecking, they capture Like the island's leader and Mira's father. Desperate to save him from death, Mira makes a bargain with a wreck survivor who is as charming as he is secretive and with only coordinates to guide her, she sets off in search lives of a family secret that lies buried deep in the sea. With only nine days to unearth what might save her fathercharacters, as her journey takes her from the watched streets of foreign islands to the heart of the smuggler's territory, Mira must be determined to stop at nothing to save the future of her home and the ones she holds most dearthey are often left tragically incomplete.|isbn=00086647301804271675
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|author=James Sherwood MettsTom Percival|title=Planet StorylandThe Wrong Shoes|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary= Things have been Will's life is difficult, in a bit sticky for multitude of ways. He is bullied because he has 'the wrong shoes', he has the Earthlings. AI wrong shoes because his dad can't work and automation doesn't have been proceeding apaceenough money for even the most basic of things like food, often replacing jobs theyand his dad can're paid to do t work because he lost his job at the college, was working a cash-in-hand job on a building site and other tasks had an accident. Throw into that took time to accomplish. Just as they were beginning to get used to all this technological change mix the fact that his mum and starting to think of otherdad are separated, new ways to spend timeand Will's life seems bleak in every direction. And yet, along came an awful pandemiche still has a tiny amount of hope. Life was pretty much shut down He is good at art, andclings to the moments of joy when he is drawing, along with itthat feel like a light at the end of a long, all the many daily social interactions on which they depend so heavilydark tunnel.|isbn=17361284261398527122
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|author=Matthew TreeSylvie Cathrall|title=We'll Never KnowA Letter to the Luminous Deep|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Science Fiction|summary= Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more There are few greater joys than a book which lives up to be different from his father, a drunk and chronic underachiever whose dreams compelling premise. And this is one of being exceptional at any of his artistic passions all failed miserably and who had endless crises of self confidence. So Tim applied himself to his studies, cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and set himself high but achievable ambitionsthem.|isbn= B0CVFXPGP80356522776
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|author=A G SlatterGuadalupe Nettel and Rosalind Harvey (Translator)|title=The Briar Book of the DeadAccidentals|rating=4.5|genre=FantasyShort Stories|summary='' There's a part of me that wants to keep this just to myself for however long I can. This secret magic of my own, collection was truly enchanting in all mine, at last. I just want to enjoy it for a while.'' Within a remote mountain pass, far away from the world, lies Silverton; a town under the protection senses of the Briar'sword: spellbinding with its fantastical, a family magical elements and charming in its gentle portrayal of witches who protect the town nature and the wider world from the Darklandshuman relationships. Though she has always wished for magic, Ellie Briar is the first non-witch to be born into her family for generations Guadalupe Nettel writes intelligently and as such since she was youngprecisely, her training as stories structured by a steward revolved around letters and administration rather than spells and potions. When her grandmother suddenly dies, Ellie's cousin Audra becomes the Briar Witch, the town's leader, and Ellie takes her place beside her. As challenges come her way left, right and centre, Ellie uncovers the rare ability wisdom that appears to communicate with the dead, putting her at the heart of a maelstrom of chaos. Reeling from one family secret want to another, Ellie must decide who to trust and determine what to do as teach us something about the Briar witches' legacy, everything they have sacrificed to survive, is under threatworld.|isbn=18033645481804271470
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