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[[Category:General Fiction|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|General Fiction]]==General fiction==__NOTOC__{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Bethan DarwinJenny Lecoat|title=Two Times TwentyBeyond Summerland
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=You can tell from Jean lives on Jersey with her mother where they are celebrating the beginning end of this novel that you're in Walesthe occupation. The young Anna (as we travel back in time) is meeting what will be long-term friendsDuring the war, Jean's father was arrested for listening to a banned radio and soldiers took him away one night, Bob leaving Jean and Janeher mother waiting for years for news of him. We find Anna rather proudly introducing her two young sons As the British finally free the Channel islands from the Nazis, and Bob butting in with 'Duwthe war is finally over, good-sized boys for their age ... Make good rugby players one dayhopes rise that they will finally learn what became of him.' But will the Welsh location and all things Welsh is given truth come as a subtle touch.relief, or will it raise further questions around what else happened during the war? Who was the informer who told the Nazis about the radio? And what other secrets have been kept throughout the occupation?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>190678423X</amazonuk>1846976537
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Adrian DawsonOnyi Nwabineli|title=CODEXAllow Me to Introduce Myself
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=When I read the resume Anuri spent her childhood on display to the back cover I immediately thought that it was going world, thanks to be one of those highher step-octanemother Ophelia's increasingly popular presence on social media, action where she posted every second paragraphstep of Anuri's childhood for sponsorships and influencer deals and, basically, type of thrillersmonetary gain. All action Now Anuri is in her twenties and perhaps very little substanceshe is slowly trying to regain her confidence and to get her life back, suing her step-mother to take down the content about her. I was happily proved wrongAnuri is battling alcoholism, failing to start her PhD, undergoing therapy and secretly abusing people online and receiving money from them for doing so. And very early on in the novelMost importantly, as wellshe is desperately worried about her little sister, which was goodwho is the new focus of Ophelia's online empire. Can she save her sister, and perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the same time?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0956577008</amazonuk>0861546873
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Peter Durantine1529153298|title=The Chocolate AssassinList of Suspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey|rating=45
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=In the final days of the Second World War as the allied guns came ever closer a young German was sent on a secret mission to AmericaIt's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly...) She's not what's worrying Miv's family, though. Women have been disappearing. He was only in his late teens but still resisted telling anyoneWell, including the U-boat captain who took him across the Atlanticthey've been murdered, about but to have 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Miv's upset because she's overheard that her father wants to move the nature of his missionfamily 'Down South'. Fifty five years later the U-boat captainWhen you're from Yorkshire, Eric HoestDown South is a frightening, long settled in the Statesforeign place, was murdered at his beach homebest avoided. Samuel GreyFor Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, police detective and part-time student was called in she'll do anything to investigate the murderprevent that. The local police chief thought that She's not worried about the most likely murderer was the neighbour who had reported the crime, but Grey suspected dangers or that the truth was hidden somewhere in Hoesther Mum's backgroundstopped talking - to anyone.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1451579527</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sheila O'Flanagan1035906708|title=A Season to RememberDiva|author=Daisy Goodwin|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=We first meet the Lodge ownerstend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, but she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, New York, a likable couple. They find running their upmarket country house type hotel both exhilarating in December 1923 and exhaustingonly moved to Athens when she was thirteen. The novel is bang up Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to date so O'Flanagan gets in the whole recession/banker-bashing thing early on. As the festive season looms, the unthinkable has happened. Empty rooms. TheyCallas're not used to empty rooms, at any time of make it more manageable in the yearStates. Normally When she was back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the Lodge is a full house. But then Nazi occupation by a slow mother who mercilessly exploited her and steady trickle starts as our characters book in - and the story starts propermade no secret of her preference for her elder sister, so to speakJackie.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755375157</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jack Everett and David ColesAlexander McCall Smith|title=Last Mission: the last hours of the Third ReichThe Perfect Passion Company|rating=34.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=We first meet The Perfect Passion Company is a couple of characters living dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the United Statesonline apps in providing a more personal, tailored service. A husband Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and wife and a relation of theirs called Paul. On look after the surfacebusiness, they appear as Ness is planning to take a trip to Canada to be enjoying happy, normal livesget away for a while. But all Katie is not what is seemscoming out of a break up with a bad boyfriend, and so jumps at the chance to come home to Edinburgh. We soon find out that And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the husbandIsabel Dalhousie novels, Carl has but with some secretsnew characters who quickly begin to charm. Pretty big ones. He keeps Katie has no experience in running a picture of Adolph Hitler on display - somewhere business, or in match- making, but Ness has full confidence in his homeher abilities, for example. Links with Germany and his past life are often talked aboutthere's always her very helpful (and rather handsome) neighbour, or rather whispered aboutWilliam, with to lend a handful of trusted 'acquaintances' over a beer or two.hand…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>095653421X</amazonuk>1846976596
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mary E MartinDean Koontz|title=The Drawing Lesson: The First in the Trilogy of RemembranceBad Weather Friend|rating=4.5|genre=General FictionParanormal|summary=Alexander Wainwright Benny is the UK's premier artist. He's just won the Turner with ''The Hay Wagon'' – a painting with having a luminous, moonlit landscapeterrifically bad day. He should be at the peak of loses his powersjob, but he's about to lose loses his muse fiancee, andhis house gets trashed. Oh, more worryinglyand someone has delivered a really weird, there seems disturbing coffin-sized object to be something wrong with his sight home, and it's possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that has trashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the year very last person to come deserve all this bad luck. He is going to be traumatica nice person. A really nice person. The story of So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to his house is told by his a new friend, art dealer Jamie Helmswortha bad weather friend called Spike, who has pieced together what he knowsbeen sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. Spike is going to take care of Benny, what heand will certainly take care of Benny's heard – enemies, if he, Benny, and used Harper (a little artistic licence to fill in the gaps. Itwaitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's a most unusual story which will take you deep into the world of artists and writerswild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1450229360</amazonuk>1662500491
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Cathleen SchineKatherine Howe|title=The Three Weissmanns of WestportA True Account|rating=34.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The novel begins Hannah Masury is living in Boston, having been sent to live with Joseph Weissmanna family who run an inn, or Josie as he and being made to work there from a young age. When she hears there is knownto be a hanging of some pirates in the town, she decides to go and watch. Enthralled and horrified in equal measure, deciding Hannah finds herself embroiled in a young boy's death at the age hands of 78 two vicious pirates. She hides away, so that he no longer wants they don't find and kill her too, and then to be married escape them completely she runs away to Betty after 48 years together. In an attempt to save Bettysea, dressing as a boy and joining the notorious Ned Low's feelings he cites irreconcilable differences, but the truth is he has fallen head over heels in lovepirate ship as a cabin boy. Betty She soon finds herself in the thick of things when there is devastateda mutiny on board, and from there we are caught up in her rip roaring tale of life in tatters, with even on the beautiful Central Park apartment she adores soon lost to herocean waves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1849015716</amazonuk>0861547438
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John Irving1471180158|title=Last Night in Twisted RiverMaybe Tomorrow|author=Penny Parkes
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=We start Jamie Matson works in 1954an upper-class grocery store, in for a man who's a control freak with all the middle subtlety of nowhere, in a log-cutters' encampmenthalf brick. The cook lives alone with his twelve year old Jamie's son, in some kind of comfort - a decent jobBo, 'has his problems'. He's asthmatic and the more you read, familiarity with the harsh surroundings and more you'll suspect that he's on the hardened people inhabiting itautistic spectrum. But a pair of tragedies Sometimes Jamie needs to take time off at short notice - one involving she's a fatal work accident with a young teenager new frequent flier in the local A&E and sometimes Bo's not fit enough to the job, force the pair go to fleeschool. They leave behind a red herring that they hope will force Missed shifts or the local brutal policeman need to be away on time to get the wrong impression, pick Bo up from school are occasions when Jamie can be controlled and a best friend put in the shape of Ketchum, the most hardened logger in the camp as a kind of safety-net, but their destiny, spread over the next few generations, will prove wrong. It was going to still be populated with tragedy, romance, despair - and the constant look over their shoulder come to the tiny settlement of Twisted Rivera head.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0552776572</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Tony BaylissB0CKD1L5JL|title=Past ContinuousRadio Free Olympia|author=Jeffrey Dunn
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The author's note tells Petr is an orphan. Rescued by the reader that this book 'was inspired by strange, reclusive Bear, he is brought up far from bustling cities and busy human society, in the suicide forests of the authorWashington's sonOlympic Peninsula.' Chapter 1 opens with the reader being After Bear dies and a brief sojourn in no doubt that the schoolboy Matthew has a knack human company, and armed with computers. He's only a bit of a whiz-kid. He's also shy and tongue-tied which makes him a bit of pirate radio transmitter, Petr goes on a loner as well. He stands out at school for all journey through the wrong reasons but he's coping with it - just. And early on in forest, broadcasting the book we meet Sophie. She's a big part of this book. She's around Matthew's age. She is bright strange, wild and clever. Her adoptive parents would probably say that she's too clever for her own goodrarely heard voices he encounters.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907230173</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Sam HayesSarah Marsh|title=Someone Else's SonA Sign of Her Own|rating=43.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The book opens with Carrie Kent. Successful television presenter and mother After a bout of teenagerscarlet fever as a child, MaxEllen Lark loses her hearing. Ms Kent immediately comes across as hard-headed, business-like, aloof and rather distant but that's the whole pointSuddenly plunged into a world of silence, of course. Very good at everything about her day joblife changes. But as a mother? Her television show is Living in a reality programme, dealing with well, basically time when the dregs use of society: singlesign language was seen as something only savages do, young mumsEllen is sent to a school where she is taught to lip read, drug addicts etcbut physically restrained from signing. Carrie knows that these people keep her From here, she ends up in designer shoes another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the deaf and bags but she keeps them at arm's lengthusing a system called Visible Speech. She wouldn't want to catch something. Carrie sails through her life with At the same time, Bell is working on other inventions and ideas, and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in a self-satisfied smile on her face. You can just tellcomplicated tangle of espionage.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0755349873</amazonuk>1035401614
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Brooke MorganB0BC3YTCMR|title=TrappedGood Girls Die|author=Ayura Ayira|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Ellie Walters ''This story is 36, divorced and keen to start a new life away from her cheating and control-freak ex-husband. Fulfilling a life-long dream, she decides to take her 15-year-old son, Tim, to live with her in the small town of Bourne. As she soon becomes good friends with her next-door neighbour, Louisa Amory, Ellie finally feels she is making a life of her own. She begins to feel a sense of freedom and independence but not for how long? When strange events start occurring Ellie is forced to face some painful and guilty memories connected to a tragic accident nineteen years ago; memories which she would rather forgeteveryone. It is clear that someone has discovered her well-kept secret and is reluctant to let her forget about it. As a campaign of terror against Ellie unfolds she must come to terms with what happened all those years ago and try to discover who her tormentor is. Vulnerable and afraid, she relies on Louisa's friendship to help her through the ordeal. However, when a misunderstanding causes a rift between Ellie and Louisa's son, Joe, the women's friendship is threatened. Alone and afraid, she suddenly finds herself trapped in a nightmare from which she must do all she can to escape.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099536285</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Carmine Abate1472263936|title=The Homecoming PartyFigurine|author=Victoria Hislop
|rating=5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The riddle is the whole crux of the bookIt was in 1968 that Helena McCloud made her first trip to Greece. So we're taken right backShe was alone: her mother, albeit brieflyGreek by birth, had left the family home and refused to Bavaria return, but Mary and Hamish (Helena's parents) felt that it would be a pity if Helena grew up without knowing her grandparents or understanding her Greek heritage. Her trip to the family apartment in up-market Kolonaki would be the year 1886, via the Prologuefirst of several annual visits. So, the scene is now set, foul play is most definitely afoot She grew to love her grandmother and lots of questions should pop into the readerfamily's mind. Such as who? Why? etc. So farmaid, Dina, so goodbut was wary - and frightened - of her grandfather, I thoughtretired general Stamatis Papagiannis. We then fast-forward straight He was proud of his close connections to present-day Germany the Junta and due expected his family to an unfortunate hunting accident, something which was a secret, is uphold his values but saw no longerreason to accommodate them. His prejudices included Helena's red hair and green eyes - inherited from her father's Scottish ancestors.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241952123</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Padgett PowellDean Koontz|title=The Interrogative MoodAfter Death|rating=2.53
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=SoMichael Mace, Head of Security, at a top secret biological research facility, what is among 55 people who die when a novel? Does it need virus is released in a plotbio-hazard accident. Finding himself in a makeshift mortuary, covered in plastic, he has a sense that something very, climax very bad has happened to him – and only him – as he sits up and resolution? Characters who grow? A setting? Themes which explore looks around at the human condition? And must it entertain? Padgett Powell challenges our perceptions shrouded bodies of fiction with a book his dead friends and former colleagues. As he recovers his senses, he realises that explores what it there is to be a novel, but without any preconditionssomething different about him; he can ''feel'' everything. How far he succeeds is down to the individual reader ''Everything''. But I thought I Michael isn'd give it a got ''Michael'' anymore.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846683661</amazonuk>1662500467}} {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ken FollettB0BVDC2VWH|title=Fall of GiantsThe Grave Listeners|author=William Frank|rating=54
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=This The village is isolated and poor. It's surrounded by a thumping, great read at 850 pagesWitching Forest. And the villagers subsist largely by farming Uphegia plants - its bread-like fruit provides nutrition and its blossom provides herbal medicines. We meet a clutch The black wood of families who are all vastly different in terms of classthe forest provides heat and warmth, roofs on homes, outlookand even gallows, values etcif needed. I have to admit at The fear of being buried alive is an existential superstition in the outset village and that this is the first Ken Follett book I've read even although two of his previous books are in my everreason Volushka, a drunken, self-growing 'to read' pile. So although I know indulgent, lazy lout of him, my reading expectations were wide-opena man is tolerated.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230710077</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Linda SargentB0BYF82CXT|title=Paper WingsSemi-Detached|author=Deborah Stone
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=In ''Bill and Amanda are living in a wood semi-detached house, stuck in Kent two children played happily a depressing rut of boredom and as is the way with children they sometimes went where they shouldn'tdisappointment, but it was the nineteen fifties when Terry and the worry was more about whether they would injure themselves by falling down an abandoned well than the problems which we worry over half a century later. It was a place for plans and gamesFiona – glamorous, projects they didn't always tell their parents about successful and generally growing upvery much in love – move in next door. Ruby loved climbing trees Despite their different outlooks on life, the couples befriend each other and longed life appears to flyimprove for both pairs. Peter was more sensible but the pair were inseparableBut all is not what it seems, and their increasingly interconnected relationships are fated for tragedy.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0956483305</amazonuk>''
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Michelle PaverShalini Boland|title=Dark MatterThe Silent Bride|rating=53
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=It's January 1937 Alice and dark clouds of impending war Seth are gathering over Europea match made in heaven. Jack Miller He is in Londoneverything she has been searching for; handsome, accomplished, clever, working as a clerk funny; total and living in one lonely roomutter husband-material. He should probably think himself lucky because many people have neither job nor home She is all he could possibly want in this Great Depressiona wife; beautiful, successful, but he doesn't. He feels lonely confident… and so the inevitable proposal is eagerly accepted by Alice and isolated the wedding is planned and angry that a career in research physics was snatched away from him by economic circumstanceset. So when When the much-anticipated day arrives, Alice is walked down the chance of becoming aisle by her father, beaming with pride and excitement as she surveys the wireless operator for an Arctic expedition comes alongcongregation – their friends assembled to celebrate this joyful day and when Seth turns to face his approaching bride, he jumps Alice's world implodes because she has absolutely no idea who the man at it - even though the team comprises of the exact privileged young men he most resentsaltar is, who is waiting for her to become his wife. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1409123782</amazonuk>1662507089
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Janet Evanovich1787636003|title=Wicked AppetiteThe Girls of Summer|author=Katie Bishop|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Take one rather ditzy girlIt was the summer when Rachel Evans turned eighteen that she and Caroline went backpacking around Greece and arrived on the island. Add a funny Rachel wasn't exactly innocent but she was, extrovert friendperhaps, and anothernaive, more sensible one. Stir so when thirty-four-year-old Alistair Wright started to take an interest in two seriously attractive men, an unhinged pet or twoher, she was flattered rather than wary. It was quite a slapstick plot while before he made any sort of physical approach to her and an unending series of carsby that time she was obsessed by him. What have you got? A Janet Evanovich novel! This has been the formula for the winning 'Stephanie Plum' series Alistair worked for yearsHenry Taylor, about a hopelessly incompetent bounty hunter who never quite manages to choose between looking after his interests on the two hunks island and in her life, and it has given much pleasure and amusement. But even particular in the bar where all the best formulas get stale, so this year Ms Evanovich has branched out into something new. Well, almostgirls either worked or partied.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755352769</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Alan HamiltonAmanda Craig|title=Two UnknownThree Graces|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The story is based 'between Few styles of contemporary fiction interest me like the wars', state-of-the 1920s to be exact-nation novel. WeThere're introduced to s something so utterly compelling about any writer who can catch hold of the main characters: a small family unit atmosphere of motherthe day and capture it, father and two childrencrafting an image of the country as it stands in one particular moment. On To say that Amanda Craig is skilled at doing this would be embarrassingly inadequate: she's practically synonymous with the surface genre of contemporary social fiction at this normal, middle-class set-up all appears fine - but underneath, things are far from finepoint. The father, Ian is actually She has such a gift for weaving the ongoing issues of the step-father to day into the twins. And through various detailed lives of her characters in a way that feels natural and sometimes unusually lengthy parentlived-child conversations and chats the reader is filled in , never making them ciphers for social commentary but instead fully realised people, grappling with the background story. A bit staccato in places, I have to admitissues far larger than themselves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1907230130</amazonuk>140871468X
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Brian Freeman152915118X|title=The Bone House|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=The novel opens with one of the central characters, Mark. And straight away we see that he has an eye for the girls - young girls, it would seem. He's a married man, so tongues start to wag. The book's front cover depicts a house going up in flames and on the very first page there's another mention of fire, Billy Joel's hit song 'We Didn't Start The Fire.' So, fire seems as if it's going to play an important part in this book. And it does. Big-time.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755348788</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewPineapple Street|author=Rebecca Hunt|title=Mr ChartwellJenny Jackson
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=For a couple ''Pineapple Street'' is the story of years now Esther Hammerhans has lived alone three women: Sasha, Darley and Georgiana. Darley and money George are sisters and Sasha is a little tightmarried to their brother Cord. She works in the House of Commons library but it doesnThey're Stocktons, only Sasha isn't pay particularly well. Letting the spare room to a lodger seemed like a good idea, but Stockton by birth so sheisn's somewhat surprised when she sees Mr Chartwell's silhouettet readily accepted into the tribe. ItThe problem's exacerbated when the size of a mattress clan matriarch, Tilda, asks Cord and Mr Chartwell is a dogSasha if they'd like to move into the Pineapple Street property. A large black dog. At home in KentTilda and Chip have renovated and downsized to another property, a street or so away, Winston Churchill wakes upwhich they own. HeThey won's reaching t need any of the end of his time in parliament furniture from Pineapple Street, so Sasha and Cord can move straight in some ways he. Nominally, they had a choice but that wasn's not surprised t the reality. Darley and Georgiana start to sense that therecall Sasha 's a visitor in the roomgold digger'. It She's someone he hasnliving in ''their'' family home. They use it so often that they abbreviate it to 't seen for a while, but the presence of the huge, mute hulk who watched him with a tortured expression was only to be expected. WinstonGD's black dog was back.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905490690</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Alice de SmithEmily Critchley|title=Welcome to LifeOne Puzzling Afternoon|rating=3.54|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=It's 84 year old Edie has lived in the 80s. Freya same small town for almost her whole life, but now she is 14 facing a move as her son wants to move to another house and an only child. She lives bring Edie to live with his family, as Edie is starting to lose her parents in Cambridgememory. So far However, so normal. Except... Freya's home life Edie is slightly tormented by the memory of her childhood friend, Lucy, who went missing over 60 years ago, and the worry that there was a-typicalsecret she was keeping for Lucy that somehow might be the thing that reveals the truth of what happened all that time ago. She After 's on first name terms with seeing' Lucy in the parental figures (no affectionate ''Mum'' or ''Daddy'' here) and is under high street, just as she was the distinct impression that they spend their days imagining life without last time she saw her, she starts to find pockets of memories coming back to her. Her best friend And yet as she remembers the past, she is a middle aged housewife on whose son she has a rather too obvious crush. Her mother communicates with her through lists forgetting more and shows more in her affection in day to day life. Will she uncover the oddest ways. Her father has just moved his business associate in, but hetruth about Lucy's not just sleeping in the spare room.disappearance before her move, and before her memories are gone forever?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1843549840</amazonuk>1804181250
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{{Frontpage
|author=Madelaine Lucas
|title=Thirst for Salt
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary= ''Love, I'd read, was supposed to be a light and weightless feeling, but I had always longed for gravity''
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Andrea Newman0008506337|title=A Bouquet of Barbed WireThe Garnett Girls|author=Georgina Moore|rating=2.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=For those of you whoThe love affair between Margo Garnett and poet Richard O've never heard of itLeary was all-consuming, A Bouquet of Barbed Wire apparently on both sides. Margo was most famous as a landmark 70's TV series based on this 1969 novel by Andrea Newmanjust sixteen when they fell in love. I'd never read the book before Richard was twenty- in fact Ione and described by Margo'm not even sure I knew there s mother as 'an older man'was'. Her parents worried that Richard' s influence would take her away from what they felt she could achieve - going to Oxford and having a book - or seen glittering career. In the TV series but I was aware of event, they eloped and Richard took her away from the controversy it created at the time Isle ofrelease so lapped up the chance Wight. Margo did go to Oxford and went on to read become a well-respected journalist. The couple had three children: Rachel, Imogen and Sasha. Life was lived in London and holidays were spent at Sandcove, the rerelease, accompanying family home on the remake Isle of Wight. Even then the TV series which has just starteddoubts about Richard's drinking were never far from Margo's mind: ''she would never be able to leave him in charge''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846687721</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=William Nicholson1914585402|title=All the Hopeful LoversDashboard Elvis is Dead|author=David F Ross
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=I had previously read Nicholsonreviewed David F Ross's book [[There's Only One Danny Garvey by David F Ross|There'The Society Of Others'' s Only One Danny Garvey]] a couple of years back and remember being absolutely floored by how powerful and thoroughly enjoyed affecting it so I was looking forward to reading this book. Nicholson writes It was a modern-day story which is relevant and bang up to date. We first meet Laura and Belinda. Two middle-agedgripping, emotionally wounding read, middle-class wives and mothers. Feeling sort rereading my review of okay with their lives generally but all too aware also, it my main takeaway was that the marital 'spark' in their marriages is now a low peep - if there at all. Belinda in particular, knows she is bumbling along in life. She's I might not sure what to do to make things more interesting in the sex departmenthave lavished enough praise on it. A fling would probably help - but would it be the answer?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184916388X</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Ruth DugdallLucy Ashe|title=The Woman Before MeClara and Olivia|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=WeThe year is 1933. The place? Sadler're introduced to one of s Wells. Ballerinas Clara and Olivia are sisters, twins no less. Identical on the outside but not, we learn, on the female central charactersinside. And not on stage, Roseeither. ThereBecause there's been a serious house fire and lot that builds a baby has been involveddancer. Rose is implicated. But is she innocent Some things that can be taught or guilty? Unfortunately for Roselearnt – discipline, attention to detail – and some things, that ''je ne sais quoi'', shethat don's been in the wrong place at t come from the wrong time - and she's put behind barsclassroom. Five years is A stage presence, a long time for charm, a young woman with the rest of her life to lead''joie de vivre''. Even more soThe difference between a hard-worker, if you're telling anyone and everyone that you are, in fact, innocent of the crimea star. But is anyone listening?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1907461159</amazonuk>0861544080
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|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Page gives us another ''The Body In The...'' book within a tried Emily Wilde is an expert academic scholar on faerie lore, and tested format. The book jacket covers are always bright she has travelled extensively, and jazzy and this one is no exception. Weresearched meticulously, to write her life're deep in Norways work, its picturesque countryside and world-famous fjords. We are in the company very first encyclopaedia of two different but interesting womenfaeries. Mother Whilst she is brilliant at research and daughterspeaking to faeries, she is not so good with people. Pix So when she finds herself far, far North in the daughter (I think small village of Hrafvsnik, having somehow offended the name sounds as if it belongs to someone young) village matriarch, she is a mother in middle-age with teenage children. She not sure what she has responsibilitiesdone, but at times she behaves like a sixteen year old nor how to redeem herself and I suppose that is part of put her final investigations for her appealbook back on the right track. She cannot seem to say ''no'' to anyone Enter Wendell Bambleby, her dashingly handsome and now finds herself enlisted to solve an unexplained death insufferable rival who arrives unexpectedly, all charm and a missing person. The latter is the more important as the missing persondelight, Kari, is related much to UrsulaEmily's best friendfrustration. Yes, perhaps a few too many names at the beginning of But why is he here? What does he want? And what exactly is going on with the book to grapple with but it soon settles down.faerie folk around Hravsnik?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0709090641</amazonuk>0356519120
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Marcelo Figueras1398515388|title=KamchatkaThe Boy and the Dog|author=Seishu Hase and Alison Watts (translator)|rating=34.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Initially I First of all, it was very excited the earthquake, deep in the ocean floor, which created the tsunami and interested when The Bookbag was given this novel to review. Set at a time in which I lived , in Buenos Airesturn, I caused the nuclear meltdown. The result was looking forward to a fictionalised account of these traumatic years - made all the more appealingcomplete and utter devastation. The deaths were uncountable, as and the narrator purported to be the eldest loss of the family's two sons - 10 year old 'Haroldo' as he comes to be known, having by necessity left his former identity behind. In this respect, I livelihoods was to be sadly disappointedwidespread. The majority fact that many pets were separated from their owners came far down the list of priorities but - six months after the novel comprises recollections from an adult Haroldo tsunami - not quite what the Amazon blurb, nor the précis on the cover, leads the reader to believe! In fairness, the author canKazumasa Nakagaki discovered a dog outside a convenience store. He wasn't be blamed for this - a dog person but I felt mislead by the dust jacket - which may have coloured my enjoyment, convenience store owner's comment that he would call Public Health prompted Kazumasa to open his car door and which lead, Tamon the dog jumped in part, to the relatively low star rating which I gave the book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1843548267</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=PJ VanstonChristopher Bowden|title=Crump|rating=3|genre=General Fiction|summary=It's Kevin Crump's first day as a lecturer at Thames Metropolitan University - an ex-polytechnic. It's the happiest day of his life, and he can't wait to see all that it holds, and make a difference to all his students. And then it hits him: the relentless pettiness of authority figures, the students who can't string two sentences together, the lowering of standards in search of higher test scores, so more money from foreign students, and political correctness gone (as I believe the saying goes) mad.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848762852</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Alex Chance|title=Savage BloodMr Magenta
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The bookChristopher Bowden's cover latest novel is a very good clue as to its content: weapons dripping in blood and decapitated heads. The novel starts with Professor Edward Quinn on a rather unusual journey. It seems to end abruptly and in plenty of spilled blood, gore and horrendous scenes of carnage. Meanwhile, in Atlanta, USA, Dr Cortez has been cheating on his wife. His one-night stand proves satisfactory and interesting in all sorts patient untangling of ways. Suddenly, he's involved in an extremely worrying medical situation. It needs to be sorted - and quickly. Cortez is a young, modern professional but heseemingly ordinary woman's human alsolife, so not without his hang-upscarried out by her nephew after she has died. The conversations between himself aunt who always provided a safe harbour and his even more successful wife, are bang on. They hit the right note. Many will identify with the couple. At times you can almost hear the friction between them. And the man-to-man conversations between Charlie Cortez and his buddy Dan are terrific. Trying hard to be big shots in a social situation when really they are out little bit of their depth. A great introduction indulgence to this part of the story, I thought.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0434019364</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Elizabeth Buchan|title=Separate Beds|rating=4|genre=Women's Fiction|summary=Annie and Tom Nicholson looked like the sort of people you would envy. Both a young nephew had rewarding jobs, Tom in the World Service and Annie in hospital management. They had a lovely home much more interesting life than that nephew Stephen had ever realised and three grown-up children. But all is not as it seems. For five years they have had separate existences after a family row when Tom caused his elder daughter to walk out of the house and never return. There hasn't been a catalyst which would have caused them to separate but Tom moved into his daughter's vacated room and he and Annie have lived together - but apart. It could have gone on indefinitely but then Tom came home one day and dropped the bombshell which could well finish them off.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141019891</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Geoff Dyer|title=Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi|rating=3|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Meet Jeff. He's a journalist living in London, with a fine line in delaying his work effort and a keen eye for detail. He can see how the world is made better by a smile from a random shopkeeper - yet seems too grumpy him an obligation to try find it himself. Instead he suspects his habit of walking round, mouthing or speaking all out his own inner thoughts is making him seem a scary old man. He can partly address this, by dying his hair. And he can stop walking round London when he gets commissions to report back from the modern arts Biennale in Venice. Soon, however, the only work of art he's at all worried about goes by the name of Laura...|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>184767271X</amazonuk>B0B6Z9VJDW
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Diane ChamberlainJennifer Mason|title=Secrets She Left BehindPartitions of Unity
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=This is the third novel I've read by Diane Chamberlain Here at Bookbag Towers, we first met Elizabeth Cromwell, dominatrix and I felt as if I was visiting an old friend. I enjoyed the other two books and this one looked promising. Although many of the characters spill over from unintentional detective in [[Before the Storm Preposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery by Diane ChamberlainJennifer Mason|Before The Storm'Preposterous]] this current book is , when she investigated and unravelled a series of disappearances. In ''Partitions of Unity'', she sets her mind to solving a stand alonemurder... |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>077830387X</amazonuk>B09LQR9FRF
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Priya BasilWill Carver|title=The Obscure Logic of the HeartDaves Next Door
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Lina is from Five strangers come together in one moment as a suicide bomber prepares to detonate his vest on a devout Muslim family and lives with her aunt while she studies law at university; where she meets AnilLondon tube line. Anil As their fates overlap, the story is a Kenyan boy from a non-practicing Sikh family who dreams of becoming a ground-breaking architect. The two fall told in love but as backwards order, leading up to the lies they have to tell their respective families become more and more elaborate they are forced to make some difficult decisionsfateful moment.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0385611455</amazonuk>1914585186}} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Diana EvansJennifer Mason|title=The WonderPreposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Lucas ''A struggling poetry zine, a mom-and Denise have been brought up by their grandmother on a canal boat -pop mobile diner in west Londonthe Northern California redwoods, after a 400-meter hurdler who just missed the death of their parents. Now they are in their 20s2004 Olympics, and their grandmother Toreth is gone. Denise is a practical and responsible young womanwomen's track coach with a yen for bullwhips, getting on a billionaire with her job as a floriststate-of-the-art S&M dungeon, but her younger brother Lucas is a dreamerman serving a life sentence in Alabama, an enigmatic signature, still trying to establish what he wants to do with his lifeK(s, and increasingly distracted by trying to find out more about his identityx), about who his parents wereon a cheap oil painting, especially his fatheran erotic art dealer in Georgia...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099479052</amazonuk>}}''
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