132,689
edits
Changes
From TheBookbag
Jump to navigationJump to searchno edit summary
'''Read [[Forthcoming Publications|reviews of books about to be published]].
{{Frontpage
|author=Andrew SharpJenny Lecoat|title=The Chef, the Bird and the BlessingBeyond Summerland
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary= Chef Mlantushi - Mozzy to his employer - is, in his mind, Jean lives on Jersey with her mother where they are celebrating the head chef end of the occupation. During the war, Jean's father was arrested for listening to a safari business catering to VIP guests in an unnamed African country. Mozzy is earnest banned radio and dedicated to his task soldiers took him away one night, leaving Jean and he puts all her mother waiting for years for news of himself into creating fine cuisine dishes for him. As the British finally free the Channel islands from the Nazis, and the guests at BOD-W safaris but his dream war is to become the head chef finally over, their hopes rise that they will finally learn what became of a restaurant in London or a big American cityhim. Even to win But will the truth come as a Michelin star. He is thwarted in this ambition by his bossrelief, Mr Bin (Ben to you and me) or will it raise further questions around what else happened during the war? Who was the informer who incurs Mozzy's disapproval for his scruffy ways, his uninterest in his guests and - shock, horror - his allowing of bush animals into told the Nazis about the radio? And what other secrets have been kept throughout the house.occupation?|isbn=B09926MK8H1846976537
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Alex Foulkes1529428289|title=Rules for VampiresA Grave in the Woods (A Bruno, Chief of Police Novel)|author=Martin Walker|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary= Eleonore Von Motteberg (or 'Leo' Because of various property transactions, people were searching for short) is a Vampire. She drinks blood, she sleeps during the daygrave but when they found it, and she can Grimwalk (turning into a flock it came with three sets of bats bones. They dated back to travel around, although not all of them remember World War II and it fell to come back). Pretty cool stuff. NowBruno, on the night Chief of her hundredth birthnightPolice for St Denis, she has to go out discover the identities of the bodies and hunt her first humanestablish whether or not a crime had been committed. However, instead she ends up killing two humans by accident and burning down an orphanage. Oops! And As if this isn't enough to make things worseworry about, the ghosts of one of the orphans and the evil master of the orphanage come back to haunt herDordogne River - normally tranquil - is flowing at record levels. So, It's not only does Leo just the local autumn rains that have to team up with caused the friendly ghost Minna problem: various dams upstream on another river have had to stop release water and St Denis faces the ghost possibility of the Orphanmaster before he becomes unstoppably powerful, she has to do it all while hiding it from her familya devastating flood. Did I mention vampires and ghosts hate each other? Yeah, there's a reason why there are rules for vampires…|isbn=147119955X
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Tori Bovalino152919640X|title=The Devil Makes ThreeSuspect|author=Rob Rinder
|rating=4.5
|genre=TeensCrime|summary= Working all summer in her boarding schoolThe nation's favourite daytime TV presenter, Jessica Holby, was murdered live on television and it seems that there's only one suspect. He's library is the last thing Tess Matheson wants to do — especially when she gets a request for over a hundred books celebrity chef Sebastian Brooks and his contract stated that she has he must not serve anything containing miso to deliver herself. What makes it worse is the man who requested the books: Mr BirchJessica Holby. The boarding school She's headmaster, seriously allergic and a man Tess hatescarries an EpiPen in case of emergencies. As Everything seemed as normal - as normal as they can be in a petty act of revenge for making her find busy, live television studio - and deliver such Brooks served a large request, Tess sticks post-it notes on each of the books, scribbled with the ugliest insults she can think of. They're never meant ragout to reach him, of courseHolby. Her plan is EpiPen was nowhere to get her anger out like this, be found and then take them all off before delivering themshe was dead within minutes. No harm done… Or it would be, if someone hadn't delivered them for her It was soon clear that this was no accident.|isbn=1789098130
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn= B09BG8V3Q60008385068|title= Who Needs Nappies? Not Me! (Everybody Potties!)The Midnight Feast|author= Justine Avery and Seema AmjadLucy Foley
|rating=4.5
|genre=For SharingThrillers|summary= It's midsummer on the Dorset coast and guests gather at The Manor. It'Who Needs Nappies? Not Me!s their opening weekend and splendid celebrations are promised. It's all headed up by Francesca Meadows. The Manor was her ancestral home and she' s converted it into an impressive retreat for the wealthy and famous. Her husband, Owen, was the architect and work is still ongoing on parts of the latest release in site. The heat is oppressive and amongst the ''Everybody Potties!'' series from Justine Averyguests are enemies as well as friends. This series of fun picture books aims Old scores are going to take the pain out of potty training children be settled and replace it with some fun. Itwon's t be long before a worthy aim, as any frustrated parent will tell you. body is found.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=B098FFFBH9Ashley Hickson-Lovence|title=Snowcub|author=Graham FulbrightWild East
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary FictionTeens|summary=Fourteen-Written in verse, this is Ronny's story, a young black fourteen year-old Rachel boy from Hackney who suddenly has to move to Norwich and start at a mostly white school. The move is initiated by Ronny's mum who is her schoolworried for Ronny's animal rights project leader and she safety after a tragic event, and her friend are producing a competition entry so Ronny finds himself trying to highlight the way settle in which human beings exploit the animal world. She gets a great deal of support from her family: father Pip Harrisonnew town, a lecturer at Imperial Collegenew school, Londonand keep himself out of trouble. He listens to music constantly, mother Kate and her twin, Nickhas always dreamed of being a rapper. Kate runs the family businessBut now, in this new school, his teacher encourages him to be part of a toy shop called Cornucopia in Putneypoetry writing workshop group and, slowly, Ronny begins to see the connections between rap and poetry, which is where we'll meet Rachel's main (if unsuspected) source and the power of information: five soft toyscreativity and crafting your words.|isbn=0241645441
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn= Angharad Walker1635866847|title= The Ash HouseLavender Companion|author=Jessica Dunham and Terry Barlin Vesci|rating= 4.5|genre= Confident ReadersLifestyle|summary= A new boy arrives at The Ash House. He doesnIt't know his names strange, or why he the things that make you ''immediately'' feel that this is there but he is used to the systembook for you. Before I started reading ''The Lavender Companion'', used to different places and different facesI visited the author's [https://www.pinelavenderfarm. He meets Dom who names him Sol com/ website] and sets out to teach him the rules there's a picture of The Ash House. These rules centre on a variety slice of Nicenesses set out by chocolate cake on the absent Headmasterhomepage. All children must remember their Niceness I don't eat cakes and complete their choresdesserts - but I wanted that cake viscerally. (There's a recipe in the book, working as which I'm avoiding with some difficulty!!) Then I started reading the book and I was told to make a hive mess of it. Notes in the smouldering shadows of The Ash Housemargins are sanctioned. But soon their easy peace is shattered by You get to fold down the arrival corners of the Doctorpages. By the end You suspect that smears of the story, lives will butter would not be changed forever and The Ash House will never be the same againa problem. I ''loved'' this book already.|isbn=1912626977
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Yancey WilliamsRob Keeley|title=Crosshairs of the DevilChildish Spirits: 10th anniversary special edition|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Award-winning crime writer Eddie Jablonski is getting on in years and, despite his strenuous objections and thanks to his daughter, finds himself living - or imprisoned, from Eddie's point of view - in room 315 of the Garden of Eden nursing home, with only a trusty nursing aide, Jenkins, for palatable company. Nothing is going to keep Eddie from his stock-in-trade of writing though, so here, for his readers, are his wanderings through his life's work.|isbn=0986031658}} {{Frontpage|author=Philip Reeve|title=Utterly Dark and the Face of the Deep|rating=5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=In a wordAround here, richwe're big fans of children's author Rob Keeley. There is certainly an abundance He's a ball of riches in this story set on a peculiar island called Wildsea, British but way west, beyond the Scillies. There are troll people on ithappy positivity, and sea-witcheshe understands children, and legends of the Dark family that has to keep watch he writes for magical islands their pleasure and their monster approaching from even further westenjoyment, where no ship dare sailnot to lecture or hector. The current Darks are the Watcher, Andrewe, who has to keep notes ''Childish Spirits'' series is one of activity from the Hidden Lands, his brother Will who lives in London with too much science in his head to worry about such local yokel superstitions, and Andrewegreatest achievements. It's foundling daughtera sequence of ghost stories centring on Ellie, a stalwart young girl who washed up out of can cope with anything the sea one day eleven years ago. But when Andrewe Dark drowns himselfspirit world throws at her, and Edward, both his sullen brother a spoiled lordling and his curious ward are thrust into the world of protecting their island, like it or not.first spirit Ellie encounters|isbn=17884523721783064617
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Erling KaggeJenny Valentine|title=Walking: One Step At A TimeUs in the Before and After
|rating=5
|genre= LifestyleTeens|summary= Those who have read my reviews before will know that how much I loved a book is evidenced by the number of pages with corners turnedElk and Mab are best friends, so let me start this one with an apology to the Norfolk Library Service: sorry! I forgot it was your book not mine. In my defence, I will say or more than that as a reader of this type of book there is something connective about noting where prior readers were inspired (provided it is subtle – I'll allow creased cornerseven, but not scribbles – for the latter we must buy our own copy – which I am about to do as soon as I have finished telling you why). Erligg Kagge their friendship is a Norwegian explorer who has walked to the South Pole, the North Pole and the summit of Everest. He knows once in a thing or two about walkinglifetime connection. However, this isn't They meet as children one day on a travelogue about any of those epic journeys, it is instead a thoughtful exploration of what it means to walk. It is a plenitude of unnumbered essays about walking. There is no 'contents' page and I haventrip out but unfortunately they don't counted. In small format paperback, get each essay is only a few pages longother's contact details at the time. Perhaps But thenchance brings them back together, better thought of as a meditation rather than an essay.|isbn=0241357705}}{{Frontpage|author=Ian Mark and Louis Ghibault|title=Monster Hunting For Beginners|rating=4they are inseparable.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Meet Jack. Now Jack knows very little about being fearless and nimble Something has happened though, something terrible and quick, for he's a slight boytragic, and although he wants for danger and peril and interesting things his dad refuses to let him out of his sight. That's because Jack's mother knew all about monstersnow they must work through their grief, and look what happened to her – she died. Luckily or unluckily then, depending on your point of view, a giant ogre will threaten his aunt when Jack's father also goes AWOL, Jack will fluke the ogre's death, a dwarfish wizard-type will make him an apprentice monster huntertheir friendship, and he'll be given a book that tells him all he needs to know about the perils he always wanted closer contact with. The book's name? ''Monster Hunting for Beginners''..together.|isbn=07555019421471196585
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Keith GrayKieran Larwood and Joe Todd-Stanton|title=The ClimbersDungeon Runners: Hero Trial
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Sully is the best tree climber in the villageMeet Kit. He has what's known amongst Like most of the kids as 'reach'. But what happens when a new kid shows up people in town? A new kidhis world, called Nottinghamit seems, who clambers up some he is an avid fan of Dungeon Running – the hardest trees with ease? Suddenly Sully is worried that his status is being threatenedsport where a team of warrior, mage and not only thathealer enter specially prepared, century-old, magical mazes, that his chance and race to name the finalexit, unnamed perhaps bothering with the treasure or the big tree in bad and the points they grant you along the way. Unfortunately for Kit, the only thing he's seen of the park by being latest race on the first inn TV equivalent is that one team has been retired, eaten, and a new trio of questors is needed. Possibly very unfortunately indeed for Kit, he has taken to conquer it, might be snatched the goading from the token bully of his handsworld and stumbled into declaring he'll enter as a team. How can Sully stop Nottingham? And will it cost him his best friend What chance does this friendless, or maybe even all of his friendsmuscle-free-zone have in actually managing that, and how could he possibly hope to do sosucceed?|isbn=17811299911839945184
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Emma CarrollSaima Mir|title=The Week at World's EndVengeance|rating=43.5|genre=Confident ReadersThrillers|summary=First, I was instantly intrigued by the premise of this novel – an organised crime syndicate in the titlenorth of England run by a Muslim woman. WeThe fact that it was the second in a series I hadn're in Worldt read didn't stop me – I's End Close, ve jumped midway into a mediocre set of houses, where Stevie few series before (Vie to her friendson page and screen) finds fun only with the family dog and with the boy over the road. But we could also it needn't be at Worlda hindrance if it's End, because something taking a great chunk of the fun away is the fact good enough. And that the Cuban Missile Crisis is kicking off. The Soviet boats are getting blockaded as America tries to reduce the risk of nuclear missiles offshore, and not much else is able to make the news. That said, Vie has news of her own – Anna, wasn't a secretive young woman hiding in their coal shedproblem here. Anna has, in no short time, taken a strong interest in the American airforce base behind the Close, said she'd locate something she wanted and leave, failed Vengeance swiftly brings you up to leavespeed, and implied her life was at riskI never felt lost. But surely this bit of intrigue has got nothing to do with what the Cold War is doing miles away?|isbn=05713644380861541561
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Kiran Millwood Hargrave and Tom de FrestonStuart Douglas|title=Julia Lowe and Le Breton Mysteries - Death at the SharkDress Rehearsal|rating=43.5|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=Julia, our pre-teen heroineDuring location filming for his 1970's sitcom 'Floggit and Leggit', has been packed off with her parents and their cat from leading man Edward Lowe stumbles across the family home in SW England to be lighthousekeepers for dead body of a summer, in woman on the far NE edge of the Scottish islandsa reservoir. Here be VikingsThe police seem happy to assign it as an accidental death, but something about the whole thing bothers Lowe, that kind and he enlists the help of Scottish islanda fellow actor, John Le Breton to help him investigate matters further. Dad is going to be automating They travel across the lanterncountry during their days off filming, uncovering more possible murders and, which is his specialist thingseemingly, while mum will be leaving her career in algae behind a link to hunt death during the elusive Greenland sharkSecond World War. But is there really a link between the deaths? And Julia, well, she will be homesick and alone – until she suddenly finds company one night.they manage to uncover who is responsible before more people lose their lives?|isbn=15101077891803368209
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Freya SampsonB0CYV674G2|title=The Last LibrarySwanton Morley (John Tanner)|author=David Blake|rating=43.5|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=I am always a little nervous to start a story about a library, since I am a librarianIt seemed like an open-and-shut case. I always grit my teeth slightly at the thought of the incoming cardigan-wearingA man, hair covered in a bun, catmud and blood -owning, glasses on a chain stereotypes! In this story, the main character, June, does put her hair in a bun, and she does own carrying a cat (called Alan Bennett)knife, and she has barely any friends and spends her evenings eating comes into the same Chinese takeaway meal once a week whilst reading books alone! But I didnpolice station shouting that he hasn't immediately throw killed the book out of the window, because I found I was interested in June, and why she lived as she didman. Her mum used to be a librarian A body at the village library, but when she got sick, June gave up on going to University and stayed at home to take care bottom of her mum, as well as taking on a job as library assistant freshly dug grave at the local librarySwanton Morley church - he's been stabbed to death. And even though her mum sadly died some years ago, she DCI John Tanner is still working therejust back from his honeymoon, still eating her mumwhich coincided with the birth of his daughter Samantha. You would think he'd be grateful for an easy answer but the words 'perverse's favourite takeaway meal, and still reading her mum'John Tanner' were made for each other. He's old books. June is stuck, sleep-deprived to the point of falling asleep at work but little does she know, everything in her life is about the changehe's determined to keep going - probably because he can't get any sleep at home.|isbn=183877369X
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=00083709821787333175|title=Rock Paper ScissorsYou Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here|author=Alice FeeneyBenji Waterhouse|rating=4.5|genre=ThrillersPopular Science|summary=Amelia Wright is forty-two and it I was the staff raffle at Battersea Dogs Home that gave her a weekend away in a converted chapel in Scotland. Her husband, Adam, isntempted to read ''You Don't so keen on the idea. Like Amelia, he knows that their marriage has been under strain: heHave to be Mad to Work Here'' after enjoying Adam Kay's first book {{amazonurl|isbn=1509858636|title=This is Going to Hurt}}, a screenwriter glorious mixture of insight into the workings of the NHS, humour and heautobiography. 's never shy of making it clear to Amelia that he'd prefer to spend time with the novels heYou Don's hoping t Have to adapt than with herbe Mad... Amelia's annoyed that he never enquires about how her day has been - ' promised the same elements but moved from physical problems to mental illness and working with the dogs, many work of whom have been abused, is never easya psychiatrist. Still - she's won the weekend away, even if I did wonder whether it does mean driving was acceptable to be looking for eight hours humour in her 1978 Morris Minor Traveller this setting but the laughter is directed at a situation rather than a person and it is always delivered with Adam beside her in the passenger seat - empathy and then doing the same thing to come back a couple of days laterunderstanding.
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Doug JohnstoneOnyi Nwabineli|title=The Great Silence|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary=For those who, like me, haven't come across the Skelfs before, I'll risk a quick synopsis of who's who – although Johnstone does a good job of bringing the backstory in without being heavy handed about it. Skelf isn't some fantastic creature, though it sounds as though it ought to be, it is merely the surname of a family of undertakers. Undertakers and private investigators. Dorothy is the matriarch – Californian by birth and instinct, she married a scot and ended up helping to run the Edinburgh undertaking firm that had been in the family for generations. Recently widowed and now involved with a black Swedish police officer. Swedish by nationality. Scottish police. Daughter Jenny, 46, is haunted by her still-living husband – a violent escaped prisoner. And grand-daughter is about Allow Me to graduate with a first-class physics degree and join the academic staff next term.|isbn=1913193837}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1901514978|title=There's a Problem With Dad|author=Carlos AlbaIntroduce Myself
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Life is different for George Lovelace and he canAnuri spent her childhood on display to the world, thanks to her step-mother Ophelia't really understand why. Hes increasingly popular presence on social media, where she posted every step of Anuri's always done everything he ought to: steady worker, husband childhood for sponsorships and father - influencer deals and a father who was always there for school plays and sports days, basically, monetary gain. So why Now Anuri is he never quite in tune with those around him? Why does he upset people? Why her twenties and she is someone with such a ''good'' mind unable slowly trying to progress at work or regain her confidence and to relate get her life back, suing her step-mother to his colleagues? take down the content about her. Why does he make Anuri is battling alcoholism, failing to start her PhD, undergoing therapy and secretly abusing people online and receiving money from them for doing so many breath-taking gaffes? . It's almost become a cliche these days to suggest that someone who Most importantly, she is a desperately worried about her little different sister, who is 'on the spectrum', but George Lovelace has all the symptoms new focus of AspergerOphelia's Syndrome: high-functioning autismonline empire. Can she save her sister, and perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the same time?|isbn=0861546873
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Louise CandlishDavid Chadwick|title=The HeightsHeadload of Napalm
|rating=4.5
|genre=Thrillers
|summary=Ellen doesn't expect to see Kieran that day. SheIt's on siteSeptember 1973 in Hicks, visiting California. Hicks is a client for Mojave desert town of a lighting consultation when she spies him few thousand people with its nearest neighbours of LA and Las Vegas both a significant drive away. Not much happens in Hicks. A silver mine and a building across defence contractor are the way. There are lots of thingsmain local employers but otherwise, lots there's not much of people, you might see when you look out across London, but this isn't one Ellen expected that day or in fact any note other daythan dive bars and Joshua trees. Why? Because Kieran has been dead for over two yearsLife is quiet, and Ellen knows this for a fact, because she had a hand in his murderuntil....|isbn=1471183483B0D321VJ76
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=0008421714Tom Percival|title=Mrs March|author=Virginia FeitoThe Wrong Shoes|rating=4.5|genre=Literary FictionConfident Readers|summary=The problem began just after the publication of George MarchWill's most successful novel to datelife is difficult, in a multitude of ways. Everyone but Mrs March (we know her first name only on He is bullied because he has 'the last page) seemed to either be reading it or had already done so. Every day Mrs March went to the local patisserie to buy olive bread but on that particular morningwrong shoes', Patricia asked, as she was wrapping he has the bread, wrong shoes because his dad can't work and doesn'but isnt have enough money for even the most basic of things like food, and his dad can't this work because he lost his job at the first time he's based college, was working a character cash-in-hand job on you?'' a building site and had an accident. She mentioned Throw into that mix the fact that Johannahis mum and dad are separated, the principal character had 'her mannerisms'and Will's life seems bleak in every direction. And yet, he still has a tiny amount of hope. Perhaps this would not have matteredHe is good at art, except for and clings to the fact moments of joy when he is drawing, that Johanna is feel like a light at the whore end of Nantes - ''a weak, plain, detestable, patheticlong, unloved, unloveable wretchdark tunnel.''|isbn=1398527122
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=John BoyneSylvie Cathrall|title=The Echo ChamberA Letter to the Luminous Deep
|rating=5
|genre=General Science Fiction|summary=Meet George Cleverley. He is self-defined as "one of the There are few television personalities over the age of fifty without greater joys than a criminal record". He starts this book a bit worried when his mistress tells him she's carrying his child, but then his author wife is getting her kicks with the Ukrainian partner "Strictly Come Dancing" paired her with. They have three children, who are a sad-sack with absolutely no social skills whatsoever, a girl who hangs around with a virtue-signalling, keyboard warrior "wokester" who wants which lives up to save the world's homeless with out-of-date food, and a fit young lad doing the gay hustle thing. Add in a few other characters – therapists, lawyers, random transgender types – that all have two very different connections to his life, and you have something that suggests an almost farcical approach to the modern worldcompelling premise. What suggests the farcical approach even more, however, is the fact And this is bloody funnyone of them.|isbn=08575262190356522776
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=02419890940008517061|title=The Perfect LifeDeath in a Lonely Place|author=Nuala EllwoodStig Abell
|rating=4
|genre=ThrillersCrime|summary=In August 2018 we meet a young woman called Imogen and she's viewing a house in Goring-on-Thames and telling the estate agent about her three childrenFormer Metropolitan Police detective, LavenderJake Johnson, Freddie and Barclayhas settled into his rustic life at Little Sky. The boys are There’s perhaps a bit little uncertainty about the future of his life with his vet girlfriend, Livia and her daughter Diana, as moving in together would mean a handful which lot of compromise: does Jake give up his off-grid and relaxing life to move in with Livia or does Livia move to Little Sky despite her reservations about whether or not this is why the future she's making this trip on wants for herself and her own. daughter? The house would be perfect for them. It's For the same month but now we're moment they’re enjoying life in Wimbledon the present and we encounter putting the future on the same young woman, only this time she's job hunting and living in her sister, Georgie's, spare room, where she's been since she broke up with her boyfriend, Connorback burner.
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Darren Shan1786482126|title=Archibald Lox and the Slides of Bon Repell: Archibald Lox series, Volume 2, book 2 of 3The Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=So. Having done Builders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the impossible and unpicked the lock site was going to the Forgotten Crypt, from which the Departed communicate with the Merge, Archie now has hold seventy-five 'luxury'grop'' to think aboutapartments - when they discovered the bones of a child beneath a doorway. There was no skull. But before that Was this a ritual killing or murder? Inevitably, soireesDr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. Soirees! Archie, much to Inez It's amusementdifficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn't even know what , that she is pregnant with his child as a result of the one of those night they spent together some three months ago. Her condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is. But he manages prone to come through the fancy party unscathed, even after an uncomfortable encounter with Kurtis, whose fledgling romance with Inez was crushed in the first volume sudden bouts of this seriessickness. |isbn=B093J9TF73
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=B07GZ81J7C0008551324|title=When Fred the Snake Got Squished and MendedThe Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Peter CottonNeil Lancaster
|rating=4.5
|genre=For SharingCrime|summary=Meet FredIt's unusual for anyone from the Hardie family to approach the police. Well, actually, you're going to be meeting Fred-Fred Neither side likes or has any respect for reasons which will become all too obvious very quicklythe other. But IDavie Hardie is struggling in prison and he'm getting ahead s prepared to tell the police where the body of myself: I'd better tell you a bit more about Fred. Fred missing person is a snake buried and even those of us who have a phobia about snakes are going to warm to himwas responsible for her death. He arrived as a present in a box with holes so that This person, he could breathe promises, is someone big and immediately became part of it will be worth the family, to the extent that they would take Fred out with them when they went out for a walkpolice doing what he wants. And that was where what he wants is to be transferred to an open prison to serve the problem startedremainder of his sentence and to get an early parole date. Fred didnNot much to ask, is it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't have any road sense. Or brakesthink so and she's even prepared to do the other thing that Hardie demanded - make certain that DS Max Craigie and anyone who works with him is kept well away from what's happening.
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn= Justine Avery and Naday Meldova0008405026|title= Everybody Pees! A Stranger in the Family (Everybody Potties!Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Jane Casey|rating=45|genre=For SharingCrime|summary= Can potty training ever be joyous? It often isn'ts sixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. She was never found and the investigation ground to a halt. Now, her mother, Helena, as any parent will tell youand her father are dead in their bed. But really Initially, why shouldnit looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but there't it be? We all have to learn s something about our bodily functions just the positioning of the bodies that makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and her boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. What looked as we have though it was going to learn about everything else when we are smallbe an open-and-shut case is now a complex double murder. Why shouldn Kerrigan is convinced that the explanation lies in Rosalie't potty training be as much fun s disappearance: others (such asDerwent's boss, say, learning about why the sun and the moon take turns in the sky? |isbn= B098BJZYHHUna Burt) are less convinced.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=17876344930571379877|title=All Her FaultThe Kellerby Code|author=Andrea MaraJonny Sweet|rating=43.5|genre=ThrillersCrime|summary=It had seemed like one of those serendipitous events which sometimes happenEdward Jevons is a working-class young man, obsessed with his upper-class friends, Robert and Stanza. Marissa Irvine had been hoping that the opportunity would arise for her son, Milo, to go on Robert's a play datetheatre director. She was concerned that he didnHe't have any friends at his new schools also self-obsessed, demanding, handsome and entitled and uses Edward to run errands for him. Milo would go home from Kerryglen National School Edward has been in an affluent Dublin suburb love with his classmate Jacob Stanza since their university days - and Marissa would pick him up from 14 Tudor Grove a little laterhe's drunkenly confided how he feels to Robert. What could be better? Only, when Marissa arrived at the house, expecting to meet JacobMost men in Robert's mother, Jenny, the door was answered by Esther, who didn't know Jenny position would stay away from Stanza or Jacob. The phone number she'd been given for Jenny was not recognised. Milo tell Edward that a relationship had disappeared. And so had Jennybegun between them but he's nannynot like most men: Edward is left to stumble upon the two of them kissing in a dark passageway.
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Claire NorthJo Callaghan|title=Notes from the Burning AgeLeave No Trace
|rating=4
|genre=Science FictionCrime|summary=At its core ''Notes From the Burning Age'' by Claire North When a man is a spy thriller, with as many double crosses, interrogations and night time escapes as Le Carre or Fleming. However, as with found crucified on the best novels, it wears many masks and its most affecting one is that top of a new and timely genrehill in Nuneaton, cli-fiDCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to the case alongside her sidekick, or climate change fictionthe AI detective Lock. North It's novel tells of a world devastated by climate change where humans have been forced to start anew and their first live alongside nature without any of the modern and corrupting "luxuries" (read: fossil fuelscase together, weapons of mass destruction, intensive farming)having previously been very successful with several cold cases. There But when there is a growing unhappiness second body found crucified a few days later, Kat is suddenly struggling with this limiting worlda potential serial killer and a very high profile case that draws a lot of unwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. Will they be able to solve the case in time, or will Kat find herself taken off the case and one group, the Brotherhoodpotentially, aims to master these processes no matter the cost to the Earth.out of a career?|isbn=0356514757139851120X
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Eva Bjorg Aegisdottir and Victoria Cribb (translator)1399613073|title=Girls Who LieMoral Injuries|author=Christie Watson|rating=34.5
|genre=Thrillers
|summary=You might be forgiven for thinking that all Olivia, Laura and Anjali met on the dark corners first day of Iceland have featured in medical school and their noirish thrillers and crime books before nowfriendship would keep them inseparable for a quarter of a century. You think, seeing on the map that we're set in AkranesOlivia is ruthlessly ambitious, and finding it's only twenty kilometres from the capital city, that this author which is clutching at the few final straws lefta bonus when you aim to be a cardiothoracic surgeon. However just because the book aims for the usual small-town feel, it's not just in Akranes that our interests lie. Six months ago Laura is a woman failed to turn up for her date evening, perfectionist and was never seen againa trauma doctor. This left a teenaged girl not at all disappointed that she could now live permanently with Anjali is the couple who had given her foster care before her mother had asked for free spirit of the girl back, group and she becomes a couple of delighted adoptersGP. But it left our three detectives When we first meet them they're at a quandary – mobile phone use was at a high level until drug and alcohol-fuelled party and it stopped all of a sudden, in one place, the woman's car was found miles away going to end in a second place, and now, after six months, the body has been discovered, in a third, even more remote placetragedy. Meanwhile, this narrative is interrupted by a confessional monologue from a mother We don't know who found herself with heavy post-natal depression, and very little maternal feeling in her bodysuffered the tragedy or the consequences. Is the assumption Twenty-five years later there will be an eerily similar event that is so easy for will impact the reader to make the right one?|isbn=191319373Xthree friends. This time, it's their teenage children who are involved.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=B0925KS87N0241636604|title=Dead ManThe Trading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson|rating=4.5|genre=Autobiography|summary=If you were to bring up an image of a city banker in your mind, you're unlikely to think of someone like Gary Stevenson. A hoodie and jeans replaces the pin-stripe suit and his background is the East End, where he was familiar with violence, poverty and injustice. There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to the London School of Economics. Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and he has a facility with numbers which most of us can only envy. He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to be stupid. It was his ability at what was, essentially, a card game which got him an internship with Citibank. Eventually, this turned into permanent employment as a trader.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1035021803|title=The Antique Hunter's Grave (DS Max Craigie)Guide to Murder|author=Neil LancasterC L Miller|rating=43.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=Tam Hardie had It's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been determined back to find the grave - and it took some finding - in an overgrown old cemeteryEnglish country village where she grew up. It was She's back now because of a strange thing request for Scotlandhelp from her beloved aunt, Carole. Freya's premier criminal former mentor and Carole's close friend, Arthur Crockleford, is dead and the circumstances seem suspicious, to do, but Tam say the least. Arthur was getting old and there were things he wanted the reason why Freya had not been back to dothe village: Arthur, she feels, let her down badly. OnlyEven though they were in business together as antique hunters, his family didn't hear from him again after he'd said that he'd found she has not felt able to be near the grave - man or pursue the one which said that it shouldn't be opened - and his three sons began to worryprofession she loved. Tam JuniorAfter the split, Frankie she worked in a cafe, met and Dave wouldn't normally go to married James (on the rebound from the police but they weren't certain where their father had been love of her life, who was murdered) and Freya and they were worriedJames have now divorced.
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Emily CritchleyAllTomorrowsFutureCover|title=The Tiny Gestures of Small FlowersAll Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)|rating=35|genre=General Science Fiction|summary= The Tiny Gestures ''Opening up new ways of Small Flowers had all thinking about the hallmarks shape of something goodthings to come. '' I was intrigued by the plot've heard it said that 'technology' is what happens after you're eighteen. Well, liked I must confess that there have been more than a few decades of technology in my lifetime. I've kept up reasonably well with what's advantageous to me but I'm left with the design feeling that it's all getting away from me. Some of it is - frankly - quite frightening. Of course, I could research the book, possibilities and thought the authorprobabilities and end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who knows what they's work sounded interestingre talking about or the latest conspiracy theorist. From the outset it all looked incredibly promising I needed people I knew I could trust and who could deliver information in a way I could understand. So what on earth went wrong here?|isbn= 1911427091}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Sarah LanganSunny Singh|title=Good NeighboursHotel Arcadia|rating=43.5|genre=Thrillers|summary= If you're of The Hotel Arcadia is a certain vintage, it's hard to read the words ''Good Neighbours'' without adding luxury hotel in an unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a sing-song ''that's when Good Neighbours…become…good friends''terrorist group. Maple Street Hiding from the terrorists who are rampaging through, killing everyone on site, there is no Ramsay StreetSam, thougha wartime photographer and Abhi, Arlo and Gertie live a world apart from the Melbourne suburbshotel manager. They're one of 18 households on As Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the crescent, quite new arrivals having moved residents who are still alive in a year earlier. They're not quite like all the other families (hotel, he's an ex rocker, she's forms a former beauty queen) but they've made some friends and their kids have settled inbond with Sam who refuses to be cowed by events, and itkeeps on venturing out of her room to try to capture what's all going okhappened through her photography. Until it isn't. One hot Although they only ever talk over the phone, clammy, sticky, sweaty summer, a sinkhole opens up in the park across the way. It's a revolting mess of dirt their friendship grows as Abhi tries to help her keep safe and chaos, but for they both wait to see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by the residents of Maple Street, the worst is yet to cometerrorists.|isbn=1789098211086154742X
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Lisa Thompson1529153298|title=The Small List of Suspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey
|rating=5
|genre=Confident ReadersGeneral Fiction|summary=Although Anna has friends at schoolIt's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, she feels like she never really fits inhonestly... Her ) She's not what's worrying Miv's family don, though. Women have been disappearing. Well, they've been murdered, but to have 'disappeared' doesn't have enough money to let her do after school activities, and sound quite so frightening. Miv's upset because she feels like 's overheard that her life at home is boring in comparison father wants to theirsmove the family 'Down South'. When a new girl joins her classyou're from Yorkshire, Anna Down South is asked to partner hera frightening, but things are complicated because the new girlforeign place, Ellie, is unwell and so can't attend school in personbest avoided. Instead For Miv, she joins in with the class by using a robot. Can Anna overcome the challenge of making friends with someone through a robotmove would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and is she even interesting enough 'll do anything to be a good friend prevent that. She's not worried about the dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to Ellie?|isbn=1781129649anyone.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=00083503881398524085|title=We Need to Talk About MoneyHas Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Otegha UwagbaNicci French
|rating=5
|genre=Politics and SocietyCrime|summary=Charlotte Salter was expected at her husband''To be a dark-skinned Black woman is to be seen as less desirables fiftieth birthday party but never turned up. Her children, less hireablesons Niall, less intelligent Paul and ultimately less valuable than my light-skinned counterparts...'' ''We Need to Talk About Money'' by Otegha Uwagba ''0.7% of English Literature GCSE students in England study a book by a writer of colour while only 7% study a book by a woman.'' ''The Bookseller'' 29 June 2021 Otegha Uwagba came to the UK from Kenya when she was five years old. Her sisters were seven Ollie and nineher daughter, Etty. It was are all worried but - strangely - her mother who came firsthusband, with her father joining them laterAlec, is not. The family was hard-workingShortly afterwards, principled Etty and determined that their children would have Greg, find the best education possible. There was always a painful awareness body of money although this did not translate into a shortage of anything: it was simply carefully harvestedGreg's father, Duncan Ackerley, in the river. When Otegha It was ten an easy assumption for the family acquired a carpolice to make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when he couldn't stand the guilt. For Otegha, education meant a scholarship to a private school in London The Salter children are not convinced but there's little else they can do but get on with their lives and then a place at New College, Oxfordwonder about what really happened.
}}
