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[[Category:New Reviews|Literary Fiction]] __NOTOC__<!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Aldous Huxley295967572X|title= The Genius and the GoddessPale Pieces|author=G M Stevens|rating= 45|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= So, three books in, I've now got Our unnamed narrator is about to grips begin a train journey with the idea that Huxley doesn't so much want to tell a story as expound his ideascompanion Django. Once you know thatWhere they're going and what the purpose of this journey is, it makes it easier to choose whether to read him or notis uncertain. On balance, I have come down Django found the tickets ''on the side of not – I wonfloor somewhere''t be dashing out and has persuaded our narrator to work my way through accompany him. Why not? Not much else is clear either - but we are probably in the rest of his output past as the way I want pair travel to with, say, Nevil Shute, or George Orwellthe station by coach and the train is a steam locomotive.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784870366</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Dan RhodesMakenna Goodman|title=When the Professor Got Stuck in the SnowHelen of Nowhere

|genre=General Literary Fiction|summary= Two people are on It could be argued that the pervading theme of this book is malaise - a train on their way hard-to-place feeling that something in your life is not quite right. The protagonist, a disgraced professor on the brink of all thingslosing both his career and his relationship, embodies this feeling. However, Goodman counteracts his discomfort with a WI meeting where force which is seductive, radical and unnerving: Helen. The connection between Helen and the ladies of All Bottoms will be lectured on protagonist is indirect yet intimate. As the non-existence of God. One former owner of the two people is Professor Richard Dawkinscountryside house he's considering, rampant atheistHelen represents a volta in his life, hectoring scientist chappieher past tied to his potential fresh start. The realtor who shows the protagonist around the house shares stories about Helen, and all-round devotee of describes her as ''Deal or No Dealan entity that is pure consciousness, beyond form''. The other is SmeeAlthough she lives in an assisted living facility now, his mono-named assistantHelen has powers beyond comprehension which the reader gets the sense are not altogether innocuous.|isbn=1804272205}}{{Frontpage|author=Olga Tokarczuk|title=House of Day, amanuensis or House of Night|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary='male secretary'. Smee will come to What's the fore when the weather sets good of a world that keeps changing like that? How can one go on calmly living in and the train journey has to be abandoned some way short it?'' The title of this spellbinding work, ''House of its ultimate destinationDay, Upper Bottom. Instead the pair fetch up at the isolated yet friendly community House of Market HortonNight'', and somewhat reflects this notion of shifting realities - the only option for accommodation is taken – yessmall, subtle changes which govern our lives, like the died-in-the-wool non-believer has shift from day to be housed by a retired vicar and his wifenight, however quotidian, causing chaos. This clash of titanic opinions, peppered with social faux pas aplenty will provide for a particularly English kind of farcical comedyBut, but one with the legs to go as far as any other Good Books have reached constant in that image is the past…house, stoic against the ancient diurnal cycle which nonetheless controls how it is perceived.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1910709018</amazonuk>1804271918

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Aldous HuxleyThea Lenarduzzi|title= Time Must Have A StopThe Tower|rating= 35|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= Sometimes we start reading "authors" as opposed to specific books, because we feel we ''shouldHow unctuous are the fats of another's life, how dizzying their sugars in our bloodstream''. So it was with me and Huxley In this compelling novel, Thea Lenarduzzi assumes the identity of T, the protagonist of this tale. I seem to remember reading and actually enjoying 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 classic ''Brave New World19th 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 so felt compelled to explore more in service of the oeuvremyth, fable and fantasy. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>178487034X</amazonuk>1804271799

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Michel Houellebecq Jon Fosse and Lorin Stein Damion Searls (translator)|title=SubmissionVaim

|summary=What do you expect from Submission? It is after all from one of Europe's more blunt huge-sellers, one who is most forthright in his opinions, narratives and characters' sexual livesAll was strange''... It has become indelibly linked with a new Europe, after its reception and contents led to publicity on This haunting phrase encapsulates the cover pervading sense of ''Charlie Hebdo'', otherworldliness which resulted permeates this story set in something less savoury than literatureVaim, to say the least. Do you expect it to be about a France fictional fishing village in Norway which paradoxically could not feel more real for Jatgeir and Eline, two of the near future, where a Muslim political party provides the president? Well, don't go into this submissively following your expectationsprotagonists caught in its melancholic current.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1785150243</amazonuk>1804271829

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Rachel ElliottClaire-Louise Bennett|title= Whispers Through A MegaphoneBig Kiss, Bye-Bye |rating= 4.5|genre= General Literary Fiction|summary= Miriam doesn’t speak. WellEverything in this book, that’s not strictly true. She does speakhowever sweet or seemingly innocent, but nothing above a whisper which makes it hard to have a conversation with her. Particularly as she hasn’t left her house is steeped in three years. But today is the day. She’s going to open that door anguish and walk outsidedistortion. She really is. Ralph has finally twigged (Even a kiss, usually a symbol of intimacy and with no small amount closeness, becomes evidence of surprise) that his wife Sadie doesn’t actually love himlost. And now he’s not sure if she ever really did. Having spent so much time regurgitating his every moment onto Social MediaWhen the narrator cries out internally, Ralph hasn’t really had a chance to think about it. But now he has''come over here and kiss me, '' it is so shockingly awful that he has decided less an invitation than a desperate attempt to run awayconfirm her emotional numbness. And The imagined recipient of all the places he could run away tothis plea is Xavier, he has chosen the same woods that Miriam has picked to be the first place she will visit out-ofher ex-doors. And Sadie? Wellpartner, she’s had enough of reading Tweets and living vicariously through the posts of others. Sadie is going a ghost she conjures to have an adventure of test her owndetachment. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0992918227</amazonuk>1804271934

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Benjamin JohncockHelene Bessette and Kate Briggs (translator)|title=The Last PilotLili is Crying|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction |summary=You'd be forgiven for assuming that debut novelist Benjamin Johncock First published in 1953 in French, this novel is American: ''The Last Pilot'' has the literary weight of a Great American Novel, with a limitless desert setting plus timeless text which wrenches the prospect hearts of soon dominating space, its readers just as Bessette wrenches words and the spare yet profound writing style of Ernest Hemingway or Cormac McCarthy. Johncock is British, but you can tell he's taken inspiration sentences from stories about the dawn of their proper position on the astronaut age, including Tom Wolfe's ''The Right Stuff'' page and films like ''Apollo 13''. His protagonistpositions them elsewhere, Jim Harrisondisjointed, is a fictional Air Force test pilot who rubs shoulders with historical figures like Chuck Yeager and John Glenn in truncated. Like the quest to break the sound barrier and conquer spacelives of her characters, they are often left tragically incomplete.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1908434848</amazonuk>1804271675

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Tessa HadleyJonathan Buckley|title=The PastOne Boat

|summary=Tessa Hadley writes beautifully subtle stories of English family life. Her understated style has a touch of the 1950s or 1960s about it, calling to mind Elizabeth Taylor or early Margaret Drabble, and she seems to adapt classic genres like the novel of manners or the country house novel. Here she deliberately channels Elizabeth Bowen with a setup borrowed from ''The House in ParisOne Boat'': is a deeply introspective novella that defies traditional narrative structure, drawing the novel is divided reader into three parts, titled 'The Present'a contemplative realm of philosophical musings and fragmented memories flowing from our narrator and protagonist, 'The Past', and 'The Present'Teresa. That structure allows for Set against the evocative backdrop of a deeper look at what small coastal Greek town, this work masterfully captures the house magic of its setting and a neighbouring cottage have meant its power to provoke profound introspection. Teresa herself recognises these qualities as the central familyreason she has visited it after the death of both her parents. Prompted by her mourning, her narrative voice is meditative and paves deeply self-aware, inviting the way reader into her labyrinthine cogitations. It is a book that not only requires but inspires depth of thought, since its narrative structure is fragmentary and ironically relies on analepsis for one final shocker of a secretits propulsion.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0224101692</amazonuk>1804271764

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Andrew MillerEowyn Ivey|title= The CrossingBlack Woods Blue Sky|rating= 3.5

|summary= Tim and Maud seem''Black Woods Blue Sky'' tells the story of Birdie, the young mother of toddler Emaleen, to everyone around themwho longs for a life beyond the Alaskan lodge where she works as a bar waitress, mismatcheda setting which enables her bad habits and her accidental neglect of Emaleen. SheDescribed as a ''wild card'', quite literally, falls into his she feels stuck in her day-to-day life, and they build yearns to cross the Wolverine river and live on the North Fork to fulfil her desires of a simple life – jobssurrounded by nature. When she meets Arthur Nielson, a housestrange, taciturn and solitary man, who says he has a boatcabin over there, she feels called to go - and bring Emaleen with her. Without realising it, then this calling will transform hers and Emaleen's lives forever.|isbn=1472279042}} {{Frontpage|author=Sally Rooney|title=Intermezzo|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction |summary=Sally Rooney has studied the chessboard of life and is something of a childgrandmaster at putting it into words. Tim needs MaudHer dialogue is gripping and so brilliantly frustrating, needs as her to complete himcharacters never quite say exactly what they feel. Among the many relationships woven into this story, wants desperately the central one for readers to completer herunravel is the fraternal connection—or lack thereof—between Ivan and Peter Koubek. Ivan, to help her. But what if Maud is already complete? What if she doesn’t need help? When tragedy strikesa socially awkward chess prodigy, Maud will find herself miles away from anyonecontrasts sharply with his older brother Peter, on a journey that will change everythingsuccessful lawyer living in Dublin. Following their father's passing after a long battle with cancer, and test her to the utmostbrothers' already strained relationship faces new trials.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1444753495</amazonuk>0571365469

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Andrew Michael HurleyFyodor Dostoyevsky|title= The LoneyWhite Nights|rating= 5|genre= Literary FictionShort Stories|summary= It's As always a privilege when you're given an advance reading copy of something – and a real 'block' when you read in Dostoyevsky, the small print that says 'not for resale or quotation'character work is sublime. Fair comment on the resale bit, but when you get something as brilliant as ''The Loney'' being required not to quote One is never left wondering what a character is just plain unfairthinking or feeling because Dostoyevsky lays bare their innermost dispositions and temperaments with remarkable clarity.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1473619823</amazonuk>0241619785

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Eli Horowitz, Matthew Derby and Kevin MoffettJames Baldwin|title=The Silent HistoryGiovanni's Room

|genre=Science Literary Fiction|summary=Well, they kept this quiet – for reasons that will become obvious. A couple of years ago people in America were giving birth to problematic kids. They (the children) were soon found to be unnaturally quiet – perhaps crying with hunger or pain, but never even trying to 'ooga-wooga' their way into their parentsGiovanni's Room'' hearts. They were later found to be completely unable to speakfollows the narrator David, they could not read and indeed they could not understand anything said to theman American man living in Paris, or shown themas he navigates his torturous affair with Giovanni, as an instructionItalian bartender he meets in a gay bar. They were physically unable While David is engaged to parse anything as languageHella, and were who is travelling in a silent world of their own. But right about now they and we are combining worlds – schools are being set upSpain, and funds are being made available, and people are coming down on the endless divide as to whether they are just problematic, disabled – or even real tension in the novel arises not from his infidelity but from the blesseddeeper conflict within himself. In a couple It is David's crippling shame and denial of years, however, the problems the virus his sexuality that is causing these people to be born ultimately dooms his relationship with will be shown to be a major problem – and that is before the kids themselves changeGiovanni. For they will be able to switch their mental abilities much like a blind man can hear more than the average, and will be able to comprehend body and facial language much more coherently than anyone else. Throughout this timeline, however, people will be working hard to try and study the problem, and put it right – if indeed 'right' is the correct word…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>009959286X</amazonuk>0141186356

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Meike ZiervogelAlba de Cespedes |title=KautharForbidden Notebook

|summary=Meet Lydia. She's a normal British girl, interested in following both her father, This Italian work of feminist fiction holds an air of suspense and Nadia Comaneci, into the world of gymnastics but not brave enough to pull off tension from the larger set pieces, and with not much more to interrupt her days than wondering why boys always have to talk about their willies. Now meet Kautharmoment our protagonist, a white British convert to IslamValeria Cossati, devoted follower of the precepts of purchases her religionforbidden notebook, ardent wife and stalwartly self-fulfilling, no-nonsense and satisfied. But what is this – why is she talking of being alone learns about herself in a desert, the most intimate and why is she directly addressing her god regarding how she ''can't perform any movementrevealing ways. Because it is torn apart''? Has something gone wrong?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1784630292</amazonuk>1782278222

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Philip K DickOttessa Moshfegh|title= Humpty Dumpty in OaklandMy Year of Rest and Relaxation|rating= 3.5|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= Dick At best, this novel is known primarily as a science fiction writer, most famously for scathing critique of modern society and reveals the novel that spawned the film ''Blade Runner''. I read that novel - [[Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K Dick|Do Androids Dream fragility of Electric Sheep?]] - when I was about ten or elevenhuman relationships; at worst, a good ten years or so before it is the film came out cynical, predictable and – to be fair – slightly trite tale of an unlikeable protagonist. This unlikely heroine, a good five years or so before I was fully capable of understanding the philosophical slim, attractive and ethical issues embedded newly orphaned girl in her twenties is disillusioned with the world, but resolves not to lose sleep over it. Not before: in fact, however, I was capable of asking the kind of questions that would get me the kind of answers that form my standpoint on those issuesher solution lies in her hibernation.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1473209579</amazonuk>1784707422

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Stephanie Bishop Matthew Tree|title= The Other Side of the WorldWe'll Never Know|rating= 4.5|genre= Literary Fiction |summary= This is Timothy Wyndham wants nothing more than to be different from his father, a beautifully written book, located both in England drunk and Australia, about adulthood, changing responsibilities, chronic underachiever whose dreams of being exceptional at any of his artistic passions all failed miserably and the universal desire for identity and belongingwho had endless crises of self confidence. This theme is also reflected in the search for union and fulfilment in the marriage of Henry and CharlotteSo Tim applied himself to his studies, struggling with the changes imposed on them by parenthood cultivated his abilities rather than his daydreams and family life across two continentsset himself high but achievable ambitions. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1472230612</amazonuk>B0CVFXPGP8

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Chang Ying-Tai and Darryl Sterk (translator)B0C47LV1PC|title= The Bear Whispers To Me: The Story of a Bear and a BoyFragility|author=Mosby Woods|rating= 4|genre= Literary Fiction |summary=Award winning Taiwanese writer Chang Ying-TaiCan you make a 's emotive'Yo birthing person'' joke? And if you could, elegiac fable is a meditation on the art of storytelling. Its immersive detail and enchanting musical cadences give question should you make it a magical? Or is the question if you did, dream like quality. It is a special work as would it land? The catch is one of that the few examples of Taiwanese fiction available in Englishanswer for both could well be.... no. The blind Paiwan poet Monaneng said of aboriginal Taiwanese culture:

"With tender care let us ''Fragility'' is set as the city of Portland, Oregon, cautiously begins to emerge from the restrictions imposed during the covid pandemic}}{{Frontpage|author=Mosby Woods|title=A Whirly Man Loses His Turn|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary= The West isn't the dominant force it once was. Nobody in motion our blood the West is quite sure how to mend this or even if mending it is the best course of action. Governments are flailing. A war here, a push for climate action there. A feeling that nobody is once again warmin actual charge.<br>Let us recall our songsImagine then, our dances, our sacred ritualsthere was a man with precognition.<br> And Imagine the tradition strategic advantage in this asset; a man who can tell you what will happen given any set of unselfish mutual coexistence between us and circumstances. That man would be valuable, right? Perhaps the earthmost valuable asset in history. Imagine then, that this man loses this ability. This is exactly what "The Bear Whispers What would governments do to Me" effortlessly does.get it back?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0993215408</amazonuk>B0C9SNG8R1

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Fred Uhlman0571379559|title=ReunionThe House of Broken Bricks|author=Fiona Williams

|summary=Hans Schwarz was a jew and attended ''The House of Broken Bricks'' is the Karl Alexander Gymnasium, the most famous grammar school in Wurttembergstory of four people. At sixteen he didnTess Hembry't really have a friend and was slightly apart from the other cliques s roots are in his classJamaica: temperamentally she might be happier there, but instead, until she lives in the arrival house on the riverbank, built of Konradin von Hohenfelsbroken bricks. Insubstantial as it might look, it's stood the elegantly-dressed son passage of time, storms and floods. Her husband, Richard, struggles to grow his vegetables, to complete the aristocracydelivery rounds - and to bring in sufficient money. For some reason Hans They have twin boys - Sonny and Konradin became the best of friendsMax, spending a glorious summer walking in the Swabian hills, comparing their coin collections and talking about everythingrainbow twins. Only slowly does it occur to Hans that whilst Konradin is made welcome in Sonny's colouring reflects his home, Hans can only visit Konradinmother's home when Jamaican heritage. Max takes after his parents are absentfather. This was February 1932 People don't believe that they're related, much less twins and in the closing years of the Weimar Republicthere's an assumption when Max is out with his mother that she's his nanny.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1860463657</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Ivan VladislavicClaire North|title=101 DetectivesHouse of Odysseus|rating=3.5|genre=Short StoriesLiterary Fiction |summary=101 Detectives had me baffled. ''What could matter more than love?'' The book comprises of follow-up to the excellent ''Ithaca'' picks up a collection few months after where we left off. In the palace of stories which explore multiple themes from 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 perspective throne of one personthe Western Isles. The stories are as varied as Having survived – politically and physical – the characters presenting chaotic storm that Clytemnestra brought to Ithaca's shores, Queen Penelope is on the tale to youbrink of a fragile peace. This exquisitely written book leaves you asking many questions One that shatters however with the return of Orestes, King of Mycenae, and pondering many ideashis sister Elektra, seeking refuge. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1908276568</amazonuk>0356516075

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Jan-Philipp SendkerKay Chronister|title= Whispering ShadowsDesert Creatures|rating= 5|genre= Literary Fiction|summary= Paul Leibovitz was a journalist. That was before. Before he had a small child, who did not survive as long as he should have. Before the end of the marriage that did not survive the loss of a child. Now Leibovitz himself, merely survives. He lives in a kind of self-imposed exile on Lamma, third largest of the Hong Kong islands, a place of greenery and solitude.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846973309</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Jo Walton|title= The Just City|rating= 3.54

|summary=Urged on by her brother ApolloWith a world that is becoming increasingly inhospitable for humanity, goddess Pallas Athene founds the Just City of Atlantis – a city based on Plato’s republicpost-apocalyptic fiction can become an almost masochistic thrill. Filling Whether it with an assortments is a robotic takeover, a world devoid of adults collected from throughout timewater or a nuclear holocaust, as well as ten thousand ten year olds, (one of whom this genre is a disguised Apollo)way for humans to cathartically experience their most existential fears. Whilst ''Desert Creatures'' by Kay Chronister is a new work of post-apocalyptic fiction that aligns many of the city flourishes, the arrival of Socrates may prove fears that exist for humanity today. It is a shocking novel that still manages to be a fly in the ointment…find hope.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1472150767</amazonuk>1803364998

{{newreviewfrontpage|isbn=1803363002|author= David FinkleEric LaRocca|title= The Man With The OvercoatTrees Grew Because I Bled There|rating= 3.5|genre= General FictionHorror|summary=Horror taps into something primeval within us. It is used as a way to reflect our darkest emotions and how we as humans react and process them. Most horror fiction feature a ''Big Bad''Why would anyone - he was soon to ask himself innumerable times - take , whether that is a home invader, a coat from monster or a complete stranger only because ghost, it had been offered?'' Skip Gerber steps off usually something tangible and, by the elevator after a long day at work; the foyer end of his office building is busy and buzzy and he does not notice the man holding the overcoat until the man hands it to Skip telling him to story, beatable. Eric LaRocca's ''take very good care of itThe Trees Grew Because I Bled There''. Skip unthinkingly grasps the coat and before he has the chance to realise what he is doing - and not like that he . It is now holding an overcoat a collection of unknown providence - short stories more interested in the man disappears out horrors of the exit door illness, grief and humiliation. Horrors that linger and are harder to the buildingdefeat than any ''Big Bad''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0992618525</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Rebecca DinersteinMadelaine Lucas|title=The Sunlit NightThirst for Salt|rating=45

|summary=Frances comes from ''Love, I'd read, was supposed to be a light and weightless feeling, but I had always longed for gravity'desperately artistic family' Told from a retrospective view, her father a medical illustrator and young woman unravels the year-long relationship that once defined her mother an interior designer. Along Overlaid with her younger sister Sarahlater wisdom, she grew up in a tiny one-bedroom apartment in Manhattan: bunk beds for the girls and narrator relives the affair with a fold-out sofa bed for man twenty years her senior from its inception – the parents. The claustrophobic atmosphere has gotten summer after finishing university – to everyone and now, with Frances graduating from college, it looks like its sorrowful end the family might fall apartsummer after. Her parents argue constantly and disapprove Set against the backdrop of Sarahan isolated Australian coastal town 's fiancé (not 'Thirst for Salt'just'details the 24-year-old narrator' because he isn't Jewish). Frances has s deepening relationship with her own romantic crisis: after a pregnancy scareolder lover, Robert breaks up with her. A highdepicting its all-flyer with a future in politicsconsuming nature, he tells how it changed her that her art has no purpose; it isn't helping anyone. 'What does perspective on both romantic and familial relationships and how it matter if you do what you love, if what you love doesn't matter?' she asks altered her father. Still, she has no other prospects, so agrees to take up a painting apprenticeship in the furthest reaches of Norway; 'All I had was a direction, northirrevocably.'|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1408863049</amazonuk>0861546490

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Claire FullertonMichael Grothaus|title=Dancing to an Irish ReelBeautiful Shining People

|summary=Hailey ''I was as worthy as any one of them. I would get on a sabbatical from her job board that ship, I vowed. I would take my place, not just in the music business in Los Angeles and taking name of the goddess. It was for the holiday sake of my name, too. Atalanta'' Princess. Warrior. Lover. Hero. Abandoned at birth for being born a daughter rather than a lifetime to Irelandson, when she walked into Atalanta is raised under the protective eye of the Galway Music Centre goddess Athemis and found fashioned into a job which she simply couldn't turn downformidable huntress, one who longs for adventure. She also found When the opportunity comes – to join the Argonauts, a home in a local villagefierce band of warriors, a liking for descendent from the Gods themselves – Atalanta seizes the rural life chance to fight in Artemis' name and a man whom she could lovecarve out her own legendary place in history. Liam Hennessy was What follows is a talented accordion player: music was his life whirlwind of challenges and discovery and whilst he was more attracted to Hailey than he had ever been to another woman through it wasn, Atalanta must remember Artemis't entirely clear whether 'love' could ever fatal warning: that if she marries, it will be on the cards for himher undoing.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0990304256</amazonuk>1472292154

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jessie Greengrass Amanthi Harris|title=An Account of the Decline of the Great Auk, According to One Who Saw It Beautiful Place|rating=3|genre=Short Stories|summary=The title story, which appears first, is exactly what it says on the tin: one hunter's story of travelling to remote islands to take part in massive culls of great auks, until they were simply gone. It's always hard to believe that species that once numbered in their millions, such as the passenger pigeon, could go extinct so quickly, but when you read about the brutal slaughter tactics here – swinging clubs and boiling birds alive – you can see how a flightless bird was a sitting target. The narrator makes no real attempt to defend himself: the birds were there for the taking; that was that. Still, he regrets their extinction, because 'in any loss you can see a shadow of the way that you will be lost yourself.' (Those interested in the great auk's extinction may also want to read the 2013 novel ''The Collector of Lost Things'' by Jeremy Page.)|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473610850</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Patricia Park|title=Re Jane|rating=3.5

|summary= Growing up in FlushingPadma, a young Sri Lankan, New York –Jane Re has long been hoping returned to escape the Villa Hibiscus on the southern coast of her whole lifehome country. A half-Korean, half-American Orphan, Jane struggles to find This is a place she spent her formative years. It is not a place as a spirited and intelligent young woman growing up in a strict and mirthless familyshe was born into, observing but the traditional Korean principle one she thinks of “Nunchi” (a combination of good manners, obligation and hierarchy)as home. Desperate How she came to escapebe at the Villa, how it became her home, Jane is thrilled when and the machinations that have flowed through her life ever since she becomes first arrived there provide the au pair ''score'' for a rich couple – two Brooklyn based professors of English, who have adopted a young Chinese girl into their familythis gentle and yet subtly violent novel. Jane soon falls for Padma's present fails to escape her past and much like the man musical score of the family, but their blossoming affair is soon curtailed by a family deathfilm, prompting Jane’s return to Koreathat strand weaves its way through everything that happens at the Villa. As she learns more about herself, her history and her culture, Jane must make huge decisions about her life, her future, and her man…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0525427406</amazonuk>1784631930

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Patricia Duncker178563335X|title=Sophie and the Sibyl: A Victorian Romance|rating=4Sea Defences|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=''Sophie and the Sibyl'', consciously modelled on John Fowles's ''The French Lieutenant's Woman'', is a postmodern blending of history, fiction, and metafictional commentary. Brothers Max and Wolfgang Duncker really were George Eliot's German publishers, but the accident of their surname matching the author's makes them her clever stand-in. As the novel opens in 1872, the venerable English author is exploring Homburg and Berlin in the company of her 'husband' while ushering her latest novel, ''Middlemarch'', into German translation. Max, a young cad fond of casinos and brothels, has two tasks: ensuring Eliot's loyalty to their publishing house, and securing Countess Sophie von Hahn's hand in marriage.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140886052X</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Sara Baume|title=Spill Simmer Falter WitherHilary Taylor

|summary=Every Tuesday he goes into townWhen we first meet Rachel Bird she's a trainee vicar, sitting in on a PCC meeting and wondering why they're held when you need to pick the children up. This particular Tuesday he sees an advert for Her husband, Christopher, collects six-year-old Hannah and her elder brother, Jamie, whilst Rachel holds a rescue dog thatsobbing parishioner. Thelma's been badly treated by its previous ownerdaughter-in-law won't let her see her grandson. Somewhere Holthorpe, on the ad strikes Norfolk coast, is a resonance lovely place, but Rachel is struggling to develop a real bond with the parish - and he adopts she's in awe of the dogvicar, calling it Oneeye (yesGail, one word, just like that). Gradually over shared meals a friendship grows and develops over the seasons as the spill of spring turns to summerbut then she's simmer, through been doing the falter of autumn job for more than thirty years. Rachel and Christopher hoped that a walk on to withering winterthe beach would do them some good - it was stormy but it was probably what they needed. And then Hannah went missing.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0992817064</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Michael Laub1398515388|title=Diary of The Boy and the FallDog|author=Seishu Hase and Alison Watts (translator)|rating=4.5

|summary=Diary First of all, it was the earthquake, deep in the ocean floor, which created the tsunami and this, in turn, caused the Fall is a story about regretnuclear meltdown. The result was complete and utter devastation. The deaths were uncountable, guilt and resentmentthe loss of livelihoods was widespread. It's told The fact that many pets were separated from their owners came far down the point list of view of an unnamed narrator, who reflects on not just his own life priorities but - six months after the tsunami - Kazumasa Nakagaki discovered a dog outside a convenience store. He wasn't a dog person but also the lives of convenience store owner's comment that he would call Public Health prompted Kazumasa to open his father car door and grandfatherTamon the dog jumped in.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099581795</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Antoine Laurain, Emily Boyce (translator) and Jane Aitken (translator)0989715337|title=The Red NotebookPapa on the Moon|author=Marco North|rating=54|genre=General Literary Fiction|summary=Meet Laure''Some frogs had gotten into the well. She's a widow in her 40s, who is entering her Parisian apartment building one night when she's mugged, and her handbag stolen. Meet Laurent, a middle ''Walter stood waist-aged bookseller, who happens upon the handbag the following morning deep in the streetfragrant water, just before the binmen take it away, never to be seen againnaked except for his beaten leather hat. More or less snubbed when trying to hand it to the police as lost propertyLong strands of their eggs wove around him, he decides to take it upon himself to reunite the bag sticky gray pearls with its rightful ownertadpoles inside them. He has no idea their names are so intimately linked, and despite a lot Two of things being in the bag (including dogs leaned over the titular notebook) there is no cash, no phone opening and no ID documentation barked down at all. What's more – and what looks like making the idea even more fruitless – he has no idea that Laure has fallen into a coma as a result strange noise of the mugging…buckets as he filled them.''|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1908313862</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Edward Parnell |title= How is that for an opening? The Listeners |rating= 4 |genre= Literary Fiction |summary=May 1940. William Abrehart has not spoken since the mysterious death style of his father, choosing instead to spend his days this novel in the woods that surround his home. A promise he made form of interconnected short stories goes from succinct and laconic to his dying father means that he is responsible for the wellbeing of his two sisterswistful and musing, and their withdrawn motherturning on a sixpence. Over And author Marco North, who has the course most wonderful turn of a weekendphrase, ghosts of the past cause buried secrets, lies and promises starts as he means to come spilling out - culminating in a series of shocking eventsgo on. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781331065</amazonuk>