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[[Category:General Fiction|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|General Fiction]]==General fiction==__NOTOC__{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Robert Jackson BennettJenny Lecoat|title=The Company ManBeyond Summerland
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=''The Times'' says Jean lives on Jersey with her mother where they are celebrating the end of the occupation. During the front cover that Bennett is war, Jean'clearly s father was arrested for listening to a writer to watch' so I had high hopes banned radio and soldiers took him away one night, leaving Jean and her mother waiting for years for this novelnews of him. We meet two of As the British finally free the Channel islands from the central charactersNazis, American policeman Garvey and Englishman Hayes. Garvey's working cv the war is straightforward enough - he carries out police workfinally over, some their hopes rise that they will finally learn what became of which is pretty grislyhim. But will the truth come as a relief, or will it raise further questions around what about Hayeselse happened during the war? He appears to be all things to all men but at Who was the end of informer who told the day well, he's 'The Company Man' which gives Nazis about the book its title. radio? And so a complex scenario starts to unravel ...what other secrets have been kept throughout the occupation?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1841497924</amazonuk>1846976537
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Justine KilkerrOnyi Nwabineli|title=Advice for StraysAllow Me to Introduce Myself
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=If you have ever fancied a grown up version of [[The Tiger Who Came Anuri spent her childhood on display to Tea by Judith Kerr|The Tiger who came the world, thanks to Tea]]her step-mother Ophelia's increasingly popular presence on social media, the cover where she posted every step of this Vintage edition should hook you into reading Justine KilkerrAnuri's first novelchildhood for sponsorships and influencer deals and, basically, monetary gain. Here sits a sad Now Anuri is in her twenties and she is slowly trying to regain her confidence and patientto get her life back, suing her step-looking lionmother to take down the content about her. Anuri is battling alcoholism, failing to start her PhD, undergoing therapy and the female figure beside himsecretly abusing people online and receiving money from them for doing so. Most importantly, hidden by an umbrellashe is desperately worried about her little sister, has that same vulnerable look who is the new focus of mother and child in Judith Kerr's classic childrenOphelia's picture bookonline empire. At first this seems like a ridiculous connection Can she save her sister, but thinking about it later I'm struck and perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the analogy, not to mention the similarity in authors' names. same time?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099535262</amazonuk>0861546873
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Heather Gudenkauf1529153298|title=These The List of Suspicious Things Hidden|author=Jennie Godfrey|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Golden girl Allison Glenn was living the perfect teenage life until she was imprisoned for a monstrous crimeIt's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly... ) Now sheShe's not what's worrying Miv's twenty-one and has family, though. Women have been released from prison to live in a halfway housedisappearing. Allison is keen to put the past behind herWell, they've been murdered, but when she returns to her home town of Linden Falls have 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Miv's upset because she soon discovers 's overheard that no one has forgotten her crimefather wants to move the family 'Down South'. When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a frightening, foreign place, best avoided. For Miv, least of all the move would mean leaving her parents best friend, Sharon, and she'll do anything to prevent that. She's not worried about the dangers or that her little sister, BrynnMum's stopped talking - to anyone.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>077830437X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Meg Wolitzer1035906708|title=The UncouplingDiva|author=Daisy Goodwin|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Dory and Robby Lang had one We tend to think of those marriages that everyone envies. They're not just loversMaria Callas as Greek, but she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, New York, they're best friends too in December 1923 and they never seem only moved to tire of each otherAthens when she was thirteen. They're both popular teachers at Eleanor Roosevelt High School (Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 'ElroCallas' to those who know make it well) where their daughter is a studentmore manageable in the States. It's sometimes difficult to have your parent teaching at your school, but everything seems to rub along reasonably well and Dory When she was delighted when daughter Willa got a part back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the school play. It's ''Lysistrata'' and whilst the drama teacher has to tone it down Nazi occupation by a little it still the play about the women mother who refuse to have sex with their men until they call a halt to the war they're fightingmercilessly exploited her and made no secret of her preference for her elder sister, Jackie.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701186216</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Natasha SolomonsAlexander McCall Smith|title=The Novel in the ViolaPerfect Passion Company
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Elise Landau arrived The Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in England Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the online apps in 1938providing a more personal, a refugee from Vienna where tailored service. Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and her family had had look after the business, as Ness is planning to take a trip to Canada to get away for a good lifestylewhile. In England she's destined for Tyneford in Dorset where she'll be Katie is coming out of a break up with a parlour maid bad boyfriend, and so jumps at the big housechance to come home to Edinburgh. She's not exactly looking forward And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, thanks to it44 Scotland Street and the Isabel Dalhousie novels, but she's escaped Vienna with some of new characters who quickly begin to charm. Katie has no experience in running a business, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her motherabilities, and there's jewels sewn into the seams of always her dresses very helpful (and her father's latest novelrather handsome) neighbour, in manuscriptWilliam, is hidden in the body of her viola. Her sister is leaving for the USA and her parents hope to follow. Surely Elise will be able to join them before too long? She knows that she won't like England.lend a hand…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>034099567X</amazonuk>1846976596
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Paul MagrsDean Koontz|title=The Bride That Time ForgotBad Weather Friend|rating=34.5|genre=General FictionParanormal|summary=Christmas Benny is approaching in the seaside town of Whitby having a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and Brenda is busy sprucing up her B&Bhis house gets trashed. She hasn't seen her best friendOh, neighbour and investigating partner Effie for someone has delivered a few weeksreally weird, since Effiedisturbing coffin-sized object to his home, and it's strange gentleman friend Alucard possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that has reappearedtrashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the very last person to deserve all this bad luck. He is a nice person. Brenda and Effie are the guardians of A really nice person. So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the gateway delivery to Hell which just happens to be right on their doorstep in Whitbyhis house is a new friend, but since Effie has shut herself awaya bad weather friend called Spike, Brenda who has turned been sent to her friend Roberthelp him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. Spike is going to take care of Benny, the owner and will certainly take care of the local hotel to help her with her investigations into the ever present strange goings on in the townBenny's enemies, if he, involving vampiresBenny, monsters and Harper (a rather strange carwaitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0755359453</amazonuk>1662500491
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Naomi WoodKatherine Howe|title=The Godless BoysA True Account|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=BritainHannah Masury is living in Boston, having been sent to live with a family who run an inn, and being made to work there from a young age. 1986 When she hears there is to be a hanging of some pirates in the town, she decides to go and watch. The country became Enthralled and horrified in equal measure, Hannah finds herself embroiled in a theocracy during young boy's death at the 1950s hands of two vicious pirates. She hides away, so that they don't find and kill her too, and since then outbreaks of secular terrorism have been dealt with by exile. The atheists have been sent to the Island where they can burn churches escape them completely she runs away to sea, dressing as they please. Aside from a weekly boat bringing donated supplies, boy and joining the exiled must shift notorious Ned Low's pirate ship as best they can on a remote snippet cabin boy. She soon finds herself in the thick of land things when there is a mutiny on board, and from there we are caught up in her rip roaring tale of life on the North Seaocean waves. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0330530127</amazonuk>0861547438
}}
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=When we meet Peter Webster he's a rookie paramedic who takes Jamie Matson works in an emergency call to help upper-class grocery store, for a drunk driver man who's been badly injured in a car crashcontrol freak with all the subtlety of a half brick. It was touch and go as to whether or not Sheila Arsenault made itJamie's son, Bo, but she did and afterwards Webster can't get her out of has his thoughtsproblems'. Every instinct tells him that he shouldnHe't get involved with her – that its asthmatic and the more you read, the more you'll mean trouble – but perhaps it was the long, shining, dark hair suspect that tipped he's on the balance and Webster is involved in an intense love affairautistic spectrum. HeSometimes Jamie needs to take time off at short notice - she's also involved a frequent flier in Sheilathe local A&E and sometimes Bo's life – for better not fit enough to go to school. Missed shifts or for worsethe need to be away on time to pick Bo up from school are occasions when Jamie can be controlled and put in the wrong. It was going to come to a head.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408700735</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Manu JosephB0CKD1L5JL|title=Serious MenRadio Free Olympia|author=Jeffrey Dunn
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Ayyan Mani Petr is a Dalitan orphan. Rescued by the strange, reclusive Bear, an untouchablehe is brought up far from bustling cities and busy human society, stuck in a flat in Mumbaithe forests of Washington's slums but hoping, somehow, for a better future for his sonOlympic Peninsula. Working at the Insitute of Theory After Bear dies and Research he uses all his cunning a brief sojourn in human company, and wiles to stay ahead of armed with only a pirate radio transmitter, Petr goes on a journey through the game amongst forest, broadcasting the Brahmin scientists. Does he have the intelligencestrange, wild and nerves, to convince everyone that his son, against all odds, is a genius?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848543085</amazonuk>rarely heard voices he encounters.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Philippe Claudel and Euan CameronSarah Marsh|title=Monsieur Linh and His ChildA Sign of Her Own|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=From After a war-ravaged country bout of scarlet fever as a bit like child, Ellen Lark loses her hearing. Suddenly plunged into a Vietnam or world of silence, everything about her life changes. Living in a Cambodia an old man carries time when the fragile frame use of his granddaughter aboard a refugee's shipsign language was seen as something only savages do, staring at the receding horizon all the weeks it takes Ellen is sent to arrive at a city a bit like a Seattle or a New Yorkschool where she is taught to lip read, but physically restrained from signing. He and From here, she are given ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the basics of deaf and using a new life together but it's up to himsystem called Visible Speech. At the same time, Monsieur LinhBell is working on other inventions and ideas, to find friendship, which he does, accepting uncomprehendingly the chatty company and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in a complicated tangle of a fellow mourner called Barkespionage.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1906694990</amazonuk>1035401614
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ed SiegleB0BC3YTCMR|title=InvisiblesGood Girls Die|author=Ayura Ayira
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The closest Brighton usually gets to Brazil is in the pages of a dictionary, but in ''Invisibles'' the two are drawn together in the life of Joel Burns, a thirty-five year old dentist who lives in Brighton as does his mother, Jackie, and partner Debbie from whom he is separated. When Joel sees a news clip of a bus hijack in Rio de Janeiro, where Joel and Jackie lived until Joel was ten, he is convinced that one of the bystanders is his Brazilian father. What makes this more unusual is that Jackie has always told Joel that his father is dead, although Joel has never quite bought into this This story which is at least part of the cause of his problems with Debbienot for everyone. The solution? Head off to Rio and see if he can track down this person.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0956559913</amazonuk>}}''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Leo Benedictus1472263936|title=The AfterpartyFigurine|author=Victoria Hislop
|rating=5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=I opened the front cover and It was confronted with the lines 'This book is differentin 1968 that Helena McCloud made her first trip to Greece. YouShe was alone: her mother, Greek by birth, had left the family home and refused to return, but Mary and Hamish (Helena've really never read s parents) felt that it would be a book like this beforepity if Helena grew up without knowing her grandparents or understanding her Greek heritage.' Confident words, I thought but will Her trip to the book live family apartment in up to this lofty expectation I now had? -market Kolonaki would be the first of several annual visits. And when I got round She grew to reading love her grandmother and the notes at the end family's maid, Dina, but was wary - and frightened - of the novelher grandfather, I retired general Stamatis Papagiannis. He was pleasantly surprised proud of his close connections to the Junta and also rather taken aback, I have expected his family to uphold his values but saw no reason to sayaccommodate them. So, a refreshing take on the modern work of fiction, I thought, as I started on Chapter OneHis prejudices included Helena's red hair and green eyes - inherited from her father's Scottish ancestors.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>022409114X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=David BaddielDean Koontz|title=The After Death |rating=3|genre=General Fiction|summary= Michael Mace, Head of Security, at a top secret biological research facility, is among 55 people who die when a virus is released in a bio-hazard accident. Finding himself in a makeshift mortuary, covered in plastic, he has a sense that something very, very bad has happened to him – and only him – as he sits up and looks around at the shrouded bodies of Eli Goldhis dead friends and former colleagues. As he recovers his senses, he realises that there is something different about him; he can ''feel'' everything. ''Everything''. Michael isn't ''Michael'' anymore.|isbn=1662500467}} {{Frontpage|isbn=B0BVDC2VWH|title=The Grave Listeners|author=William Frank
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Eli Gold is recognized as the 'the greatest living writer' - although his claim to this The village is slipping by by the day as he is on his death bed. He's not a nice character - his attitudes to his five wives and his children are deplorable isolated and he has been bound up in his own 'genius'poor. HeIt's surrounded by a bit like the best and the worst of Saul Bellow, Philip Roth and Norman Mailer combinedWitching Forest. Now dying in hospital in New York, the book explores this event from And the perceptive of four people in his life; his eight year old, precocious daughter villagers subsist largely by his current wife; his first wife watching on the news from an old people's home in England; the angstfarming Uphegia plants - its bread-ridden son of his third marriage, himself a pale imitation like fruit provides nutrition and its blossom provides herbal medicines. The black wood of the author that his father is; forest provides heat and a mysterious fourth character who appears to have a very different motive for seeing Gold snr and who may be linked to Gold's fourth wife who died in a mutual suicide pact with her then-husbandwarmth, from which Eli survived. (In fact his identity is revealed in the publisher's blurb roofs on the jackethomes, and even gallows, but I'll let you decide if you want to know this or to let the story unfold as I did)needed.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007270836</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Alma Katsu|title=The Taker|rating=5|genre=General Fiction|summary=When Dr Luke Findley begins his nightshift at Aroostook County Hospital in St Andrews, Maine, things are quiet until Lanny McIlvrae fear of being buried alive is brought an existential superstition in by the police. Lanny village and that is covered in blood and claims she has killed a man and left him in the woods. Desperate to escape, Lanny quickly asks for Luke's help, but he is not sure at first, so Lanny decides to tell Luke her life storyreason Volushka, a story that begins in the early Puritan settlement of St Andrews in 1809 and spans nearly two hundred yearsdrunken, taking Lanny from her home to Boston and beyond. A story that is rich, imaginative and entirely authenticself-indulgent, filling the majority lazy lout of the novel, and there wasn't a moment when I questioned her reliability as she tells Luke everything, chapter by chapter, as he helps her to escape, slowly drawing him and the reader into her worldman is tolerated. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846058171</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Aimee BenderB0BYF82CXT|title=The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=The title of this novel first caught my eye. How can food feel emotions? Actually, it is Rose who discovers that when she is eating she can taste the feelings of the person who cooked or prepared the food. I was a bit worried that this initial gimmick of the book from which the title is taken would become annoying, but really this is another very wellSemi-written and readable novel about growing up in a dysfunctional family. Rose is about to turn 9 at the beginning, and comes home to find her mother making her birthday cake. She can't resist tasting the cake, and at first it is delicious: 'Warm citrus-baked batter lightness enfolded by cool deep dark swirled sugar'. But then she has 'the sensation of shrinking, of upset, tasting a distance I somehow knew was connected to my mother'.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>009953827X</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewDetached|author=Guillaume Musso|title=Where Would I Be Without You?Deborah Stone
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=I love the cover, which I think angles this book firmly towards women. With that old Beach Boys hit from the Sixties as the title, it encapsulates everything you need to know when choosing this book. It's not really crime fiction'Bill and Amanda are living in a semi-detached house, stuck in that it lacks a whodunnit aspect in favour depressing rut of following the protagonistsboredom and disappointment, a French cop when Terry and a Scottish master criminalFiona – glamorous, through a romantic entanglement successful and into the jaws of deathvery much in love – move in next door. The interest is in which of the two men will gain command of Despite their different outlooks on life, the couples befriend each other – and who life appears to improve for both pairs. But all is really driving the action – when both not what it seems, and their attentions increasingly interconnected relationships are focused on the same girlfated for tragedy.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906040346</amazonuk>''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mischa HillerShalini Boland|title=Shake OffThe Silent Bride|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=''Shake Off'' Alice and Seth are a match made in heaven. He is the latest from the pen of Mischa Hellereverything she has been searching for; handsome, accomplished, clever, a student of the John Le Carre universe where the Spies had to Come In From The Coldfunny; total and utter husband-material. Set She is all he could possibly want in the 80s against a backdrop of daggers and cloakswife; beautiful, successful, wests confident… and easts so the inevitable proposal is eagerly accepted by Alice and defectors the wedding is planned and double agentsset. When the much-anticipated day arrives, Heller's protagonistAlice is walked down the aisle by her father, Michel Khoury, hooked on pain killers beaming with pride and posing excitement as a studentshe surveys the congregation – their friends assembled to celebrate this joyful day and when Seth turns to face his approaching bride, Alice's world implodes because she has been tasked with absolutely no idea who the man at the unlikely mission of scouting altar is, who is waiting for a Cambridge location in which her to host secret talks between those Palestinians and Israelis who seek a 'secular democratic state for Jews, Christians and Muslims'become his wife.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846590884</amazonuk>1662507089
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sarah Winman1787636003|title=When God Was A RabbitThe Girls of Summer|author=Katie Bishop|rating=45
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=When God Was a Rabbit is a book It was the summer when Rachel Evans turned eighteen that tugs at she and Caroline went backpacking around Greece and arrived on the emotions island. Rachel wasn't exactly innocent but she was, perhaps, naive, so when thirty-four-year-old Alistair Wright started to take an interest in a sweet but uncompromising wayher, she was flattered rather than wary. It's in no way was quite a RomCom but if you are a fan while before he made any sort of physical approach to her and by that genre of filmtime she was obsessed by him. Alistair worked for Henry Taylor, I would suggest that you might too enjoy this book as it shares many of looking after his interests on the island and in particular in the traits if not bar where all the storyline. The analogy to a movie is apposite too as first time author Sarah Winman's 'day job' is as an actor - she has appeared recently in Holby City, for examplegirls either worked or partied.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755379284</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Sam MeekingsAmanda Craig|title=The Book of CrowsThree Graces|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Having lived in China for a substantial period Few styles of contemporary fiction interest me like the state-of-the-nation novel. There's something so utterly compelling about any writer who can catch hold of the atmosphere of timethe day and capture it, Sam Meekings has clearly soaked up a great deal crafting an image of the culture; something he has already put to great effect country as it stands in his first book, [[Under Fishbone Clouds by Sam Meekings|Under Fishbone Clouds]]one particular moment. In The Book To say that Amanda Craig is skilled at doing this would be embarrassingly inadequate: she's practically synonymous with the genre of Crows, his third book, he continues to show his talent as contemporary social fiction at this point. She has such a non-Chinese raconteur gift for weaving the ongoing issues of the day into the lives of Chinese culture, but goes one step further by telling her characters in a story way that spans several periods of Chinese historyfeels natural and lived-in, thereby giving the reader a glimpse into different never making them ciphers for social commentary but instead fully realised people's lives, grappling with issues far larger than themselves. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846971721</amazonuk>140871468X
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Rachel Simon152915118X|title=The Story of Beautiful Girl|rating=3.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=The book begins with widow Martha, an ex-teacher in her seventies living alone in her farmhouse in the Pennsylvanian countryside. Martha's life is filled with loneliness, a phone that never rings, and she rarely sees other people. But all that is set to change one rainy night in 1968 when Lynnie and Homan knock on Martha's door. Lynnie and Homan have escaped from The School for the Incurable and Feebleminded, a harsh institution where people with disabilities are kept away from the rest of the world. Martha takes the couple in and soon discovers that Lynnie is carrying a new born baby. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>184809339X</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewPineapple Street|author=Henry Sutton|title=Get Me Out Of HereJenny Jackson
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Hapless (and you could also say hopeless) Matt ''Pineapple Street'' is fed up with his rather sad the story of three women: Sasha, Darley and unexciting lifeGeorgiana. So, at every opportunity he wants Darley and George are sisters and Sasha is married to spice it up a bittheir brother Cord. But does this strategy work? WeThey're barely pages Stocktons, only Sasha isn't a Stockton by birth so she isn't readily accepted into the book when we see that Matt is an out-and-out snobtribe. He knows all The problem's exacerbated when the designer labels for the best clothesclan matriarch, Tilda, asks Cord and Sasha if they'd like to move into the best shoes (handmadePineapple Street property. Tilda and Chip have renovated and downsized to another property, natch)a street or so away, the best champagne label ... I think you may get my drift herewhich they own. ThatThey won's finet need any of the furniture from Pineapple Street, so Sasha and Cord can move straight in. As long as you can pay for this high lifeNominally, whatthey had a choice but that wasn's t the problem? reality. Well, MattDarley and Georgiana start to call Sasha 's problem is cash - or the distinct lack of itgold digger'. He She's down on his financial luck at the minute living in ''their'' family home. They use it so often that they abbreviate itto 'the GD's time to try another angle ...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099535629</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Joolz DenbyEmily Critchley|title=The Curious Mystery of Miss Lydia Larkin and the Widow MarvellOne Puzzling Afternoon
|rating=4
|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=I was 84 year old Edie has lived in the same small town for almost her whole life, but now she is facing a bit surprised by this book when it arrivedmove as her son wants to move to another house and bring Edie to live with his family, as Edie is starting to lose her memory. Joolz Denby However, Edie is a punk poettormented by the memory of her childhood friend, and has written four noir crime novelsLucy, including Billie Morganwho went missing over 60 years ago, longlisted and the worry that there was a secret she was keeping for Lucy that somehow might be the Orange Prizething that reveals the truth of what happened all that time ago. This quirky little novella with a long title features a large black cat and recipes at After 'seeing' Lucy in the high street, just as she was the last time she saw her, she starts to find pockets of memories coming backto her. And yet as she remembers the past, she is forgetting more and more in her day to day life. Has Joolz really written a cosy Will she uncover the truth about Lucy's disappearance before her move, and before her memories are gone forever?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0956778607</amazonuk>1804181250
}}
{{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''
Told from a retrospective view, a young woman unravels the year-long relationship that once defined her. Overlaid with later wisdom, the narrator relives the affair with a man twenty years her senior from its inception – the summer after finishing university – to its sorrowful end the summer after. Set against the backdrop of an isolated Australian coastal town ''Thirst for Salt'' details the 24-year-old narrator's deepening relationship with her older lover, depicting its all-consuming nature, how it changed her perspective on both romantic and familial relationships and how it altered her irrevocably.|isbn=0861546490}}{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Robert Dinsdale0008506337|title=Three MilesThe Garnett Girls|author=Georgina Moore|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Captain Abraham Matthews is so desperate to catch the villainous Albie Crowe The love affair between Margo Garnett and poet Richard O'Leary was all-consuming, apparently on both sides. Margo was just sixteen when they fell in love. Richard was twenty-one and bring the youngster to justice described by Margo's mother as 'an older man'. Her parents worried that some people Richard's influence would say he was obsessedtake her away from what they felt she could achieve - going to Oxford and having a glittering career. After six months, Matthews has finally tracked down his prey In the event, they eloped and captures him just three miles Richard took her away from the police stationIsle of Wight. But with Albie's boys trying Margo did go to Oxford and went on to rescue himbecome a well-respected journalist. The couple had three children: Rachel, other men without Abraham's moral compass more interested Imogen and Sasha. Life was lived in vengeance than justiceLondon and holidays were spent at Sandcove, and the Luftwaffe dropping bombs family home on Leeds, this is set to be the longest three miles of either Isle of their lives.Wight. Even then the doubts about Richard's drinking were never far from Margo's mind: ''she would never be able to leave him in charge''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>057126025X</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kim Edwards1914585402|title=The Lake of DreamsDashboard Elvis is Dead|author=David F Ross
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The I reviewed David F Ross's book opens with [[There's Only One Danny Garvey by David F Ross|There's Only One Danny Garvey]] a lovely couple of years back and intriguing sentence - 'My name is Lucy Jarrett remember being absolutely floored by how powerful and before I knew about the girl in the window ... I found myself living in a village near the sea in Japan.' Who could fail to be drawn into a story after reading that, I thoughtaffecting it was. I It was hooked immediately. Edwards gives us a fleeting taste of life in Japangripping, particularly the importance (almost reverence) of nature and gardensemotionally wounding read, public and private. This sets the tone for the novel which is captivating and interesting, but put together beautifully, unhurriedrereading my review of it my main takeaway was that I might not have lavished enough praise on it.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0142428396</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Nikesh ShuklaLucy Ashe|title=Coconut UnlimitedClara and Olivia
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=It The year is the early 19901933. The place? Sadler's Wells. Ballerinas Clara and AmitOlivia are sisters, Anand and Nishant are three young Asian boys in an all white private school. As such they are considered massively uncool by default. Too bad then that their Asian peers in the North London Gujarati enclave known as Harrow think that they are a bunch of stuck up toffs. Soft. Weak. No street cred whatsoevertwins no less. Worst of all they are labelled as 'Coconuts' (brown Identical on the outsidebut not, we learn, white on the inside). ThereAnd not on stage, either. Because there's only one thing for it - start a hip-hop bandlot that builds a dancer. The fact Some things that can be taught or learnt – discipline, attention to detail – and some things, that ''je ne sais quoi'', that they don't have any songscome from the classroom. A stage presence, talent or initially any idea what hip-hop actually sounds like isn't really a problem. As everyone knowscharm, forming a band makes you 'pretty cool' joie de vivre''. The difference between a hard-worker, and after that the girls simply fall at your feeta star.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0704372045</amazonuk>0861544080
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Elizabeth HaynesHeather Fawcett|title=Into The Darkest Corner|rating=4.5|genre=Crime|summary=The book didn't actually look that appealing. The cover is on the sepia side of dull. I didn't know the authorEmily Wilde's name and the title didn't really grab me. When I started reading we were straight into the transcript of a court case in which it seemed that a police officer was being questioned in court about his relationship with a woman. He was accused Encyclopaedia of being violent to her, but it seemed that the boot was really on the other foot. Then we were into a story – or even two stories – with two time lines some four years apart. Within ten minutes I couldn't put it down.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0956251579</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Ben Pastor|title=LumenFaeries
|rating=4
|genre=Crime (Historical)General Fiction|summary=CracowEmily Wilde is an expert academic scholar on faerie lore, Polandand she has travelled extensively, October 1939: The Germans have recently occupied Poland and are seeking researched meticulously, to establish their authority. Captain Martin Bora write her life's work, the very first encyclopaedia of the Wehrmacht (the German army) has just arrived in the city from the battlefield to take up a posting to Intelligencefaeries. His boss asks Bora to drive him to a convent every day Whilst she is brilliant at research and speaking to see the renowned Abbessfaeries, rumoured to have mystic and healing powersshe is not so good with people. A few days later, though So when she finds herself far, she is found shot dead far North in the grounds small village of her convent. Bora Hrafvsnik, having somehow offended the village matriarch, she is asked not sure what she has done, nor how to investigate redeem herself and report put her final investigations for her book backon the right track. He proceeds to investigate who shot Enter Wendell Bambleby, her dashingly handsome and whyinsufferable rival who arrives unexpectedly, but as his investigation continuesall charm and delight, there are more questions for Bora and the readermuch to Emily's frustration. Where But why is he here? What does this case fit in he want? And what exactly is going on with the priorities of the occupying forcesfaerie folk around Hravsnik?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1904738664</amazonuk>0356519120
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jake Wallis Simons1398515388|title=The English German GirlBoy and the Dog|author=Seishu Hase and Alison Watts (translator)
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=When First of all, it began it wasn't pleasantwas the earthquake, deep in the ocean floor, which created the tsunami and this, in turn, but there was hope that it would get bettercaused the nuclear meltdown. Rosa's father, Otto The result was a doctor complete and she lived with him, her mother, Ingautter devastation. The deaths were uncountable, elder brother Heinrich and younger sister Hedi in a pleasant flat in Berlinthe loss of livelihoods was widespread. The turn fact that many pets were separated from their owners came far down the list of opinion against Jews was slow – an antipriorities but -Jewish pin handed to Rosa as she went shopping, friends who felt that they couldn't remain such obvious friends – certainly for six months after the time being – and tsunami - Kazumasa Nakagaki discovered a dog outside a change of employment for Ottoconvenience store. It was better for He wasn't a dog person but the patients if they didnconvenience store owner't have contact with him, even if s comment that he was a good doctorwould call Public Health prompted Kazumasa to open his car door and Tamon the dog jumped in.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846971764</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Nathacha AppanahChristopher Bowden|title=The Last Brother|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Raj and his two beloved brothers live on a Mauritian sugar plantation. World War II rages far away and close too, but Raj is blissfully unaware of anything beyond his immediate surroundings. Life is poor and hard and Raj's father takes out the privations of his life on his sons and his wife - drunken beatings are a regular occurrence. But his mother is loving and kind, and skilled at healing, and his brothers are constant playmates. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849164010</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Tom Bale|title=Terror's ReachMr Magenta
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=WeChristopher Bowden're on the south coast of England in the middle s latest novel is a patient untangling of a hot summer in a very upmarket enclaveseemingly ordinary woman's life, not dissimilar to Sandbanks, along the coast a bitcarried out by her nephew after she has died. The locals are going about their business, about their daily lives aunt who always provided a safe harbour and Bale obligingly introduces them a little bit of indulgence to us one by one and also gives us an idea of their respective backgrounds, their family members and even some of the house designs ' ... each home a young nephew had had a private jetty' for example.. New money is also apparent along with ostentatious taste. What's also apparent is much more interesting life than that trouble's afoot. Big timenephew Stephen had ever realised and it seems to him an obligation to find it all out.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1848090765</amazonuk>B0B6Z9VJDW
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Daphne KalotayJennifer Mason|title=Russian WinterPartitions of Unity
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The novel's structure goes back and forth from the past to the present day. The book opens with NinaHere at Bookbag Towers, now elderlywe first met Elizabeth Cromwell, dominatrix and unintentional detective in pain [[Preposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery by Jennifer Mason|Preposterous]], when she investigated and in unravelled a wheelchair: waiting to die basicallyseries of disappearances. And even although sheIn ''Partitions of Unity''s lived an interesting life, now all she has for company is sets her mind to solving a daily home-helpmurder. I was struck straight away by how prickly Nina is and I could feel all those emotions seething underneath the surface. So the question is - why has she decided to sell some of her exquisite jewellery. Is it to help pay the bills? Or some other reason? We find out by degrees.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099553244</amazonuk>B09LQR9FRF
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Scott MarianiWill Carver|title=The Lost RelicDaves Next Door
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Ben Hope went to Italy Five strangers come together in one moment as a suicide bomber prepares to visit a former SAS comrade and offer him a job, but he's got marriage and happiness – and Ben's trade is far from the front of his mind. It's whilst he's driving away that Ben nearly runs down a small boy and unwittingly walks into a deadly heist which will see the boy and his mother – and many others – brutally murdered. It's only the beginning for Ben though as he find himself fleeing for detonate his life and accused of murder. When the state needs to act people – even heroes – are disposable.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847561977</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Diane Janes|title=Why Don't You Come For Me?|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Over a decade ago Jo's daughter was abducted from in front of a shop whilst she and her husband were on holiday. The pushchair was found vest on a cliff edge but there was no trace of Lauren, even on the beach belowLondon tube line. Occasionally Jo receives postcards with an old picture of her daughter on the front simply saying that the writer still has Lauren. The policeAs their fates overlap, the people who know what happened believe the cards to be a hoax. Jo believes differently. She also realises that as she has moved house and remarried and the story has faded from press attention someone is going to a great deal of trouble to keep track of her.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849011257</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=G S Mattu|title=Sons and Fascination|rating=3|genre=General Fiction|summary=This book concentrates on emotions. Take an impressionable young man, add told in a chance (?) encounter with an attractive older woman and then stand well back as the fireworks explode and as familybackwards order, friends and colleagues get sucked in leading up to their deepening relationship. I must say I'm not keen on the title (a little pretentious for a work of fiction in my opinion and more suited to poetry) and even when it was ever so gently explained later on in the book (twice) I still didn't warm to it. All in all, not off to the greatest of startsfateful moment. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1907756000</amazonuk>1914585186}} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Philip WildingJennifer Mason|title=Cross Country Murder SongPreposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The novel opens ''A struggling poetry zine, a mom-and-pop mobile diner in the Northern California redwoods, a 400-meter hurdler who just missed the 2004 Olympics, a women's track coach with a yen for bullwhips, a billionaire with a state-of-the -art S&M dungeon, a man serving a life sentence in Alabama, an enigmatic signature, K(unnameds, x) central character in , on a therapy session in downtown New York. The air is charged and tension is present, big-time. This is one troubled human being. And of coursecheap oil painting, childhood issues and experiences are dominant an erotic art dealer in this question and answer sessionGeorgia. We soon find out that this individual has secrets in his basement. It all becomes too much, he packs a bag and hits the road and so the story starts proper.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099539934</amazonuk>}}''
}}
