132,741
edits
Changes
From TheBookbag
Jump to navigationJump to searchno edit summary
'''Read [[Forthcoming Publications|reviews of books about to be published]].
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Peter Papathanasiou1009473085|title=The Stoning|rating=3.5|genre=Thrillers|summary=In a town sleazy enough to make sh*tholes elsewhere look glamorous in comparison, a teacher has been transported across town at night in a shopping trolley, and she's been taped to a tree and she's had rocks bowled at her as if she were the world's tallest cricket stumps. When she's discovered by the town gossip everyone, including the local cops, are quite confident the culprit has come from the immigrant detention centre the place is reluctantly home to. An arson attack on that shows the feeling – and it's only fair, is the general opinion, for the occupants are often setting their own fires in protest at their conditions. Cue the arrival of George Manolis, a higher rank from the city, to sort everything out. Because such an aggrieved, insular community is really going to welcome a GreekConservative Effect 2010 -heritaged city boy laying down the law...|isbn=1529416973}}{{Frontpage|isbn=B08Z8BMZ7H|title=The Mystery of Healing2024|author=A P McGrath|rating=4|genre=Crime Anthony Seldon and Tom Egerton (HistoricalEditors)|summary=We meet Solon in Pergamon in the second century of the common era and he's the physician on duty at the munus - the games put on for the amusement of the populace. The remuneration isn't high but the work gives the doctor a feeling of virtue and hones his skills: Solon ''wants'' the warriors to live. It's quite a spectacle: the magistri are the charge hands and when we first see them, they're sprinkling gold dust onto the lions' manes to make them look more impressive. The sagitarii are the archers and the beastiarii are the condemned criminals who are going to fight for their lives with the wild animals. Today, it's the crocodiles.}}{{Frontpage|author=Kate DiCamillo and Sophie Blackall|title=The Beatryce Prophecy
|rating=5
|genre=Confident ReadersPolitics and Society|summary=Sometimes it's simpler to explain a book by describing what it ''isn't''Stories have joy and surprises in themthat applies to ''The Conservative Effect: 2010-2024 - 14 Wasted Years?'', we are told here. And none more so than in this wondrous If you're looking for an easy read which will deliver the inside storyabout what ''really'' happened on certain occasions, which feels an instant classic with then this isn't the freshness and the agelessness it has in equal proportionbook for you. We start with a group of monks If that's what you're looking for, the Order of the Chronicles of SorrowingI don't think Anthony Seldon's book, and the demonic goat that loves nothing more than upending{{amazonurl|isbn=B0BH7SKG2S|title=Johnson at 10}}, trampling on can be bettered for those tumultuous years. It's a compelling read and biting the poor Brothersshould be compulsory for anyone who thinks Johnson should return to politics. ''The Conservative Effect'' is an entirely different beast. Things change drastically when It's the beast takes seventh book in a totally maternal approach to series which looks at the impact a homeless girl, one who government has survived some trauma that has blocked her past from her memorymade and co-editor Sir Anthony Seldon regards this as the most important. Elsewhere sits This book follows the well-established format: a King series of experts from various fields review the state of the nation when the coalition took over in his castle2010, desperate to find the girl, for it is prophesied changes that a young child can unseat occurred and the throne and cause great changesituation in 2024. Who foretold that revolution but the Order of the Chronicles of Sorrowing? But how can a simple, amnesiac lass ever prove a threat to anyone?|isbn=1529500893
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=B09FFJF8YSMax Boucherat|title=You Can't Wear Panties! (No More Nappies!)|author=Justine Avery and Kate Zhoidik|rating=3.5|genre=For Sharing|summary=''For the big, grownup girls out there, the potty masters in training, "You Can't Wear Panties!" is a cry (the big-girl kind!) The Last Life of toilet triumph and persevering panty pride.'' And so it is! This latest book from Justine Avery celebrates a little girl's final goodbye to nappies and pull-ups and graduation to "proper" pants by following her around as she proudly explains to her dog, her cat, her stuffed rabbit and her baby sibling that ''she'' can wear super-duper proper pants, while they cannot. Neither can the flowers, nor the fish, nor the birds. Boy's certainly can't. She's a big girl now and she wants everyone to know it!}} {{Frontpage|author=Nick Lake and Emily Gravett|title=Locked Out LilyLori Mills
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Lily isWe meet Lori on the first evening she's got the house to herself – no neighbour to pop in, babysitter poorly, mother at work, just an avidly rule-breaking eleven year old, or wason her lonesome. What could possibly go wrong? Snuggled in a blanket fort, or she has been, very illone main intention, and that is to give her parents relief she's been told log on to stay with her grandma for Voxminer, the world-building, critter-collecting game that is a few days. The parents need the relief as Lilyhit in Lori's baby sibling is just about to be born – a child Lily swears she hates already and wants nothing to do withworld. But first Lori has a tiny inkling that this stormy night doesn't find herself entirely on tracking back home for word of her parents (own, and her plush toy so then she can sleep) finds something even more spooky. For the server she finds stony-eyed simulacra of and her parents, bestie and the babe-in-arms, already installed. These devilish interlopers need to nobody else should be ousted able to get the family back intactenter shows signs of tampering. When malevolent eyes spark up on her phone screen, even if it's not the family Lily wants – and all she has to help her safe place in the task are some talking animals game has been doctored – Crowwell, Mole, Mouse and Snake.where is a girl to turn?|isbn=14711948330008666482
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Greg James and Chris SmithJenny Lecoat|title=The Great Dream RobberyBeyond Summerland|rating=54|genre=Confident ReadersGeneral Fiction|summary=MayaJean lives on Jersey with her mother where they are celebrating the end of the occupation. During the war, Jean's father is was arrested for listening to a professor who invented an amazing dream machinebanned radio and soldiers took him away one night, leaving Jean and her mother waiting for years for news of him. But something went wrong As the British finally free the Channel islands from the Nazis, and now he can't wake up. Or at leastthe war is finally over, their hopes rise that's they will finally learn what Maya has been toldbecame of him. In a rather strange dream one night Maya makes But will the truth come as a new friendrelief, and discovers that 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 only way to save her dad may be by being asleep. Cue one madcap action adventure story where dreams and reality collide...really...and there's everything from llamas and bananas, dream machines made from hairdresser cast-offs, to a talking cat called Bin Bag!occupation?|isbn=024147051X1846976537
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=18004644951529428289|title= 100 Ways A Grave in 100 Days to Teach Your Baby Maths: Support All Areas the Woods (A Bruno, Chief of Your Baby’s Development by Nurturing a Love of MathsPolice Novel)|author=Emma SmithMartin Walker|rating=4.5|genre=Children's Non-FictionCrime|summary=''Babies seem to be born with an amazing number sense: understanding shapes in Because of various property transactions, people were searching for the wombgrave but when they found it, being aware it came with three sets of quantities at seven hours oldbones. They dated back to World War II and it fell to Bruno, assessing probability at six months oldthe Chief of Police for St Denis, to discover the identities of the bodies and comprehending addition and subtraction at nine months oldestablish whether or not a crime had been committed.'' Did you know As if this? I didnisn't! How enough to worry about: ''Maths ability on entry to school , the Dordogne River - normally tranquil - is a strong predictor of later achievement, double that of literacy skillsflowing at record levels. It'' I didn't know this either! I think most parents are aware s not just the local autumn rains that giving your children a good start in literacy - reading stories, teaching pen grips, singing rhymes - gives children a solid foundation when they start school. But do we think have caused the problem: various dams upstream on another river have had to release water and St Denis faces the same way about maths, beyond counting? I don't think we do, in part because so many of us are afraid of maths. But why are we? Most possibility of us use maths in daily life without realising and it follows that giving our children a similar pre-school grounding will be just as beneficialdevastating flood.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1529379385152919640X|title=The Madness of Crowds (Chief Inspector Gamache)Suspect|author=Louise PennyRob Rinder
|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=In the Canadian village of Three PinesThe nation's favourite daytime TV presenter, Jessica Holby, wewas murdered live on television and it seems that there're post-pandemic: the scars are still there but life is starting to get back to normals only one suspect. The villagers are beginning He's celebrity chef Sebastian Brooks and his contract stated that he must not serve anything containing miso to return to the Bistro and the AubergeJessica Holby. They're visiting each otherShe's homes seriously allergic and having friends carries an EpiPen in case of emergencies. Everything seemed as normal - as normal as they can be in a busy, live television studio - and relatives Brooks served a ragout to stayHolby. A young Sudanese woman who has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize is one such visitor Her EpiPen was nowhere to be found and she was dead within minutes. It was soon proves clear that not all saints are necessarily pleasant people to be around - a bit like Vincent Gilbert, known in the village as the Asshole Saintthis was no accident.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn= B09F4CTKJR0008385068|title= Flights for FreedomThe Midnight Feast|author= Steven BurgauerLucy Foley
|rating=4.5
|genre=Historical FictionThrillers|summary=It's midsummer on the later stages of World War I Dorset coast and guests gather at The Manor. It's their opening weekend and the United States has just entered the conflictsplendid celebrations are promised. Petrol Petronus is a young American who has signed It's all headed up by Francesca Meadows. The Manor was her ancestral home and joined she's converted it into an impressive retreat for the 17 Aero Squadronwealthy and famous. This company Her husband, Owen, was the first US Aero Squadron to be trained in Canada, architect and work is still ongoing on parts of the site. The heat is oppressive and amongst the first guests are enemies as well as friends. Old scores are going to be attached to the RAF settled and the first to it won't be sent into the skies to fight the Germans in active combat. But long before that can happen, Petrol has to master flying the notoriously difficult but majestic Sopwith Camela body is found.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=183885410XAshley Hickson-Lovence|title=The Dark Remains|author=William McIlvanney and Ian RankinWild East|rating=34.5|genre=CrimeTeens|summary=Bobby Carter was Written in verse, this is Ronny's story, a lawyer young black fourteen year old boy from Hackney who suddenly has to move to Norwich and consigliere to one of the major crime families in nineteen seventies Glasgowstart at a mostly white school. DC Jack Laidlaw The move is on the CID team charged with the investigation. I say initiated by Ronny's mum who is worried for Ronny'on the team'' but Laidlaw never really seems s safety after a tragic event, and so Ronny finds himself trying to be settle in a new town, a part new school, and keep himself out of ittrouble. He does listens to music constantly, and has always dreamed of being a rapper. But now, in this new school, his own thingteacher encourages him to be part of a poetry writing workshop group and, slowly, Ronny begins to see the connections between rap and poetry, goes his own way and ''The Dark Remains'' uncovers the truth power of why Bobby Carter's body was found behind one of Glasgow's seedier pubscreativity and crafting your words.|isbn=0241645441
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=19424102551635866847|title=Tokyo Zangyo (Detective Hiroshi)The Lavender Companion|author=Michael PronkoJessica Dunham and Terry Barlin Vesci
|rating=4.5
|genre=CrimeLifestyle|summary=It's strange, the things that make you ''immediately''Zangyofeel that this is the book for you. Before I started reading ''The Lavender Companion'', I visited the author's [https://www.pinelavenderfarm.com/ website] and there's a picture of a slice of chocolate cake on the homepage. I don't eat cakes and desserts - but I wanted that cake viscerally. (There's a recipe in the book, which I'm avoiding with some difficulty!!) Then I started reading the book and I was told to make a mess of it. Notes in the margins are sanctioned. You get to fold down the corners of pages. You suspect that smears of butter would not be a problem. I ''loved'' this book already.}}{{Frontpage|author=Rob Keeley|title=Childish Spirits: overtime work10th anniversary special edition|rating=4|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Around here, often unpaidwe're big fans of children's author Rob Keeley. He's a ball of happy positivity, he understands children, and he writes for their pleasure and enjoyment, not to lecture or hector.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=0241425425Jenny Valentine|title=The Man Who Died Twice|author=Richard OsmanUs in the Before and After|rating=4.5|genre=CrimeTeens|summary=Elizabeth Best was Elk and Mab are best friends, or more than that even, their friendship is a little surprised when she received the letteronce in a lifetime connection. It came from They meet as children one day on a man whose body she had helped to pull from the Thames and who had never existed trip out but then this is unfortunately they don't get each other's contact details at the sort of conundrum which retired spies have to deal with on a regular basistime. When she visits the sender of the letter (he's moved into the Cooper's Chase Retirement Village) it comes as no surprise that it's someone with whom she has a long professional history - But then chance brings them back together, and who used to be her husbandthey are inseparable. He's made a bad mistake - Something has happened though, something to do with a mask being removed within the range of a CCTV camera on a raidterrible and tragic, a missing twenty-million pounds in diamonds and a few death threats. He's now in hiding with a young woman called Pollythey must work through their grief, and their friendship, who's his MI5 handler as well as being an incompetent waitresstogether.|isbn=1471196585
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Andrew SharpKieran Larwood and Joe Todd-Stanton|title=The Chef, the Bird and the BlessingDungeon Runners: Hero Trial
|rating=4
|genre=General FictionConfident Readers|summary= Chef Mlantushi - Mozzy to Meet Kit. Like most of the people in his employer - isworld, in his mindit seems, he is an avid fan of Dungeon Running – the head chef sport where a team of a safari business catering to VIP guests in an unnamed African country. Mozzy is earnest warrior, mage and healer enter specially prepared, century-old, magical mazes, and dedicated race to his task the exit, perhaps bothering with the treasure or the big bad and the points they grant you along the way. Unfortunately for Kit, the only thing he puts all 's seen of himself into creating fine cuisine dishes for the guests at BOD-W safaris but his dream latest race on the 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 become the head chef goading from the token bully of his world and stumbled into declaring he'll enter as a restaurant in London or a big American city. Even to win a Michelin starteam. He is thwarted in What chance does this ambition by his bossfriendless, Mr Bin (Ben to you and me) who incurs Mozzy's disapproval for his scruffy waysmuscle-free-zone have in actually managing that, his uninterest in his guests and - shock, horror - his allowing of bush animals into the house.how could he possibly hope to succeed?|isbn=B09926MK8H1839945184
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Alex FoulkesSaima Mir|title=Rules for VampiresVengeance|rating=43.5|genre=Confident ReadersThrillers|summary= Eleonore Von Motteberg (or 'Leo' for short) is I was instantly intrigued by the premise of this novel – an organised crime syndicate in the north of England run by a VampireMuslim woman. She drinks blood, she sleeps during The fact that it was the day, and she can Grimwalk (turning second in a series I hadn't read didn't stop me – I've jumped midway into a flock of bats to travel around, although not all of them remember to come back). Pretty cool stuff. Now, few series before (on the night of her hundredth birthnight, she has to go out page and hunt her first human. However, instead she ends up killing two humans by accident screen) and burning down an orphanageit needn't be a hindrance if it's good enough. Oops! And to make things worse, the ghosts of one of the orphans and the evil master of the orphanage come back to haunt herthat wasn't a problem here. So, not only does Leo have to team Vengeance swiftly brings you up with the friendly ghost Minna to stop the ghost of the Orphanmaster before he becomes unstoppably powerfulspeed, she has to do it all while hiding it from her familyand I never felt lost. Did I mention vampires and ghosts hate each other? Yeah, there's a reason why there are rules for vampires…|isbn=147119955X0861541561
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Tori BovalinoStuart Douglas|title=The Devil Makes ThreeLowe and Le Breton Mysteries - Death at the Dress Rehearsal|rating=43.5|genre=TeensCrime|summary= Working all summer in her boarding schoolDuring location filming for his 1970's library is sitcom 'Floggit and Leggit', leading man Edward Lowe stumbles across the last thing Tess Matheson wants to do — especially when she gets dead body of a request for over woman on the edge of a hundred books that she has reservoir. The police seem happy to deliver herself. What makes assign it worse is as an accidental death, but something about the man who requested the books: Mr Birch. The boarding school's headmasterwhole thing bothers Lowe, and he enlists the help of a man Tess hatesfellow actor, John Le Breton to help him investigate matters further. As a petty act of revenge for making her find They travel across the country during their days off filming, uncovering more possible murders and deliver such a large request, Tess sticks post-it notes on each of the booksseemingly, scribbled with a link to death during the ugliest insults she can think ofSecond World War. They're never meant But is there really a link between the deaths? And will they manage to reach him, of course. Her plan uncover who is to get her anger out like this, and then take them all off responsible before delivering them. No harm done… Or it would be, if someone hadn't delivered them for her.more people lose their lives?|isbn=17890981301803368209
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn= B09BG8V3Q6B0CYV674G2|title= Who Needs Nappies? Not Me! Swanton Morley (Everybody Potties!John Tanner)|author= Justine Avery and Seema AmjadDavid Blake|rating=43.5|genre=For SharingCrime|summary= It seemed like an open-and-shut case. A man, covered in mud and blood - and carrying a knife, comes into the police station shouting that he hasn't killed the man. A body at the bottom of a freshly dug grave at Swanton Morley church - he'Who Needs Nappies? Not Me!'' s been stabbed to death. DCI John Tanner is just back from his honeymoon, which coincided with the latest release in birth of his daughter Samantha. You would think he'd be grateful for an easy answer but the words 'perverse'Everybody Potties!and 'John Tanner' series from Justine Averywere made for each other. This series of fun picture books aims He's sleep-deprived to take the pain out point of potty training children and replace it with some fun. Itfalling asleep at work but he's a worthy aim, as determined to keep going - probably because he can't get any frustrated parent will tell you. sleep at home.
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=B098FFFBH91787333175|title=SnowcubYou Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here|author=Graham FulbrightBenji Waterhouse|rating=4.5|genre=Literary FictionPopular Science|summary=Fourteen-year-old Rachel is her schoolI was tempted to read ''You Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here'' after enjoying Adam Kay's animal rights project leader and she and her friend are producing first book {{amazonurl|isbn=1509858636|title=This is Going to Hurt}}, a competition entry to highlight glorious mixture of insight into the way in which human beings exploit workings of the animal worldNHS, humour and autobiography. She gets a great deal ''You Don't Have to be Mad...'' promised the same elements but moved from physical problems to mental illness and the work of support from her family: father Pip Harrison, a lecturer at Imperial College, London, mother Kate and her twin, Nickpsychiatrist. Kate runs I did wonder whether it was acceptable to be looking for humour in this setting but the family business, laughter is directed at a situation rather than a toy shop called Cornucopia in Putney, which person and it is where we'll meet Rachel's main (if unsuspected) source of information: five soft toysalways delivered with empathy and understanding.
}}
{{Frontpage
|author= Angharad WalkerOnyi Nwabineli|title= The Ash HouseAllow Me to Introduce Myself|rating= 4.5|genre= Confident ReadersGeneral Fiction|summary= A new boy arrives at The Ash House. He doesnAnuri spent her childhood on display to the world, thanks to her step-mother Ophelia't know his names increasingly popular presence on social media, or why he where she posted every step of Anuri's childhood for sponsorships and influencer deals and, basically, monetary gain. Now Anuri is there but he in her twenties and she is used slowly trying to regain her confidence and to get her life back, suing her step-mother to take down the systemcontent about her. Anuri is battling alcoholism, used failing to different places start her PhD, undergoing therapy and different faces. He meets Dom who names him Sol secretly abusing people online and sets out to teach him the rules of The Ash Housereceiving money from them for doing so. These rules centre on a variety of Nicenesses set out by the absent Headmaster. All children must remember their Niceness and complete their chores Most importantly, she is desperately worried about her little sister, working as a hive in the smouldering shadows of The Ash House. But soon their easy peace who is shattered by the arrival new focus of the DoctorOphelia's online empire. By the end of the story Can she save her sister, lives will be changed forever and The Ash House will never be perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the same again.time?|isbn=19126269770861546873
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Yancey WilliamsDavid Chadwick|title=Crosshairs Headload of the DevilNapalm
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary FictionThrillers|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 EddieIt's point of view - September 1973 in room 315 Hicks, California. Hicks is a Mojave desert town of the Garden a few thousand people with its nearest neighbours of Eden nursing home, with only LA and Las Vegas both a trusty nursing aide, Jenkins, for palatable companysignificant drive away. Nothing is going to keep Eddie from his stock-Not much happens in-trade of writing thoughHicks. A silver mine and a defence contractor are the main local employers but otherwise, so here, for his readers, are his wanderings through his lifethere's worknot much of note other than dive bars and Joshua trees. Life is quiet, until....|isbn=0986031658B0D321VJ76}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Philip ReeveTom Percival|title=Utterly Dark and the Face of the DeepThe Wrong Shoes
|rating=5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=In Will's life is difficult, in a word, richmultitude of ways. There He is certainly an abundance of riches in this story set on a peculiar island called Wildseabullied because he has 'the wrong shoes', British but way west, beyond he has the Scillies. There are troll people on it, wrong shoes because his dad can't work and sea-witches, and legends of the Dark family that has to keep watch doesn't have enough money for magical islands and their monster approaching from even further west, where no ship dare sail. The current Darks are the Watchermost basic of things like food, Andrewe, who has to keep notes of activity from and his dad can't work because he lost his job at the Hidden Landscollege, his brother Will who lives in London with too much science was working a cash-in -hand job on a building site and had an accident. Throw into that mix the fact that his head to worry about such local yokel superstitionsmum and dad are separated, and AndreweWill's foundling daughterlife seems bleak in every direction. And yet, who washed up out he still has a tiny amount of the sea one day eleven years agohope. But when Andrewe Dark drowns himself He is good at art, both his sullen brother and his curious ward are thrust into clings to the world moments of protecting their islandjoy when he is drawing, that feel like it or nota light at the end of a long, dark tunnel.|isbn=17884523721398527122
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Erling KaggeSylvie Cathrall|title=Walking: One Step At A TimeLetter to the Luminous Deep
|rating=5
|genre= LifestyleScience Fiction|summary= Those who have read my reviews before will know that how much I loved There are few greater joys than a book is evidenced by the number of pages with corners turned, so let me start this one with an apology which lives up to the Norfolk Library Service: sorry! I forgot it was your book not minea compelling premise. In my defence, I will say that as a reader of And this type is one of book there is something connective about noting where prior readers were inspired (provided it is subtle – I'll allow creased corners, 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)them.|isbn= 0356522776}}{{FrontpageErligg Kagge is |isbn=0008517061|title=Death in a Norwegian explorer who Lonely Place|author=Stig Abell|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary= Former Metropolitan Police detective, Jake Johnson, has walked to the South Pole, the North Pole and the summit of Everestsettled into his rustic life at Little Sky. He knows There’s perhaps a thing or two little uncertainty about walking. Howeverthe future of his life with his vet girlfriend, this isn't a travelogue about any of those epic journeysLivia and her daughter Diana, it is instead as moving in together would mean a thoughtful exploration lot of what it means compromise: does Jake give up his off-grid and relaxing life to walk. It is a plenitude of unnumbered essays move in with Livia or does Livia move to Little Sky despite her reservations about walking. There whether or not this is no 'contents' page the future she wants for herself and her daughter? For the moment they’re enjoying life in the present and I haven't countedputting the future on the back burner. In small format paperback, each essay is only a few pages long. Perhaps then, better thought of as a meditation rather than an essay.|isbn=0241357705
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Ian Mark and Louis Ghibault1786482126|title=Monster Hunting For BeginnersThe Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=Meet Jack. Now Jack knows very little about being fearless and nimble and quick, for heBuilders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the site was going to hold seventy-five 'luxury's apartments - when they discovered the bones of a child beneath a slight boy, and although he wants for danger and peril and interesting things his dad refuses to let him out of his sightdoorway. That's because Jack's mother knew all about monsters, and look what happened to her – she died There was no skull. Luckily Was this a ritual killing or unluckily thenmurder? Inevitably, depending on your point of view, a giant ogre will threaten his aunt when JackDr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. It's father also goes AWOLdifficult as Ruth knows, Jack will fluke the ogrebut Nelson doesn's deatht, that she is pregnant with his child as a dwarfish wizard-type result of the one night they spent together some three months ago. Her condition will make him an apprentice monster hunterbe obvious before long, and he'll be given a book that tells him all he needs not least because Ruth is prone to know about the perils he always wanted closer contact with. The book's name? ''Monster Hunting for Beginners''sudden bouts of sickness...|isbn=0755501942
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Keith Gray0008551324|title=The ClimbersDevil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster|rating=4.5|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=Sully is It's unusual for anyone from the best tree climber in Hardie family to approach the villagepolice. He Neither side likes or has what's known amongst any respect for the kids as 'reach'other. But what happens when a new kid shows up Davie Hardie is struggling in town? A new kid, called Nottingham, who clambers up some prison and he's prepared to tell the police where the body of the hardest trees with ease? Suddenly Sully a missing person is worried that his status is being threatened, buried and not only thatwho was responsible for her death. This person, that his chance to name the finalhe promises, unnamed is someone big tree in and it will be worth the park by being the first police doing what he wants. And what he wants is to conquer it, might be snatched from transferred to an open prison to serve the remainder of his handssentence and to get an early parole date. How can Sully stop Nottingham Not much to ask, is it? And will it cost him his best friend, or maybe The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and she's even all of his friends, prepared to do so?|isbn=1781129991the 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=Emma Carroll0008405026|title=The Week at World's EndA Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Jane Casey|rating=45|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=First, the title. We're in WorldIt's End Close, 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 mediocre set of houseshalt. Now, where Stevie (Vie to her friends) finds fun only with the family dog mother, Helena, and with the boy over the roadher father are dead in their bed. But we could also be at World Initially, it looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but there's End, because something taking a great chunk about the positioning of the fun away is the fact bodies that the Cuban Missile Crisis is kicking offmakes DS Maeve Kerrigan and her boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. The Soviet boats are getting blockaded What looked as America tries though it was going to reduce the risk of nuclear missiles offshore, be an open-and not much else -shut case is able to make the news. That said, Vie has news of her own – Anna, now a secretive young woman hiding in their coal shedcomplex double murder. Anna has, Kerrigan is convinced that the explanation lies in no short time, taken a strong interest in the American airforce base behind the Close, said sheRosalie's disappearance: others (such as Derwent'd locate something she wanted and leaves boss, failed to leave, and implied her life was at riskUna Burt) are less convinced. But surely this bit of intrigue has got nothing to do with what the Cold War is doing miles away?|isbn=0571364438
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Kiran Millwood Hargrave and Tom de Freston0571379877|title=Julia and the SharkThe Kellerby Code|author=Jonny Sweet|rating=43.5|genre=Confident ReadersCrime|summary=JuliaEdward Jevons is a working-class young man, obsessed with his upper-class friends, our preRobert and Stanza. Robert's a theatre director. He's also self-teen heroineobsessed, demanding, handsome and entitled and uses Edward to run errands for him. Edward has been packed off in love with her parents Stanza since their university days - and their cat from the family home in SW England he's drunkenly confided how he feels to be lighthousekeepers for a summer, in the far NE of the Scottish islandsRobert. Here be Vikings, Most men in Robert's position would stay away from Stanza or tell Edward that kind of Scottish island. Dad a relationship had begun between them but he's not like most men: Edward is going left to be automating stumble upon the lantern, which is his specialist thing, while mum will be leaving her career two of them kissing in algae behind to hunt the elusive Greenland sharka dark passageway. And Julia, well, she will be homesick and alone – until she suddenly finds company one night.|isbn=1510107789
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Freya SampsonJo Callaghan|title=The Last LibraryLeave No Trace
|rating=4
|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=I am always When a little nervous to start man is found crucified on the top of a story about a libraryhill in Nuneaton, since I am a librarian. I always grit my teeth slightly at DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to the thought of case alongside her sidekick, the incoming cardigan-wearingAI detective Lock. It's their first live case together, hair in having previously been very successful with several cold cases. But when there is a bun, cat-owning, glasses on second body found crucified a chain stereotypes! In this storyfew days later, the main character, June, does put her hair in Kat is suddenly struggling with a bun, potential serial killer and she does own a cat (called Alan Bennett), and she has barely any friends and spends her evenings eating the same Chinese takeaway meal once very high profile case that draws a week whilst reading books alone! But I didn't immediately throw the book out lot of unwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. Will they be able to solve the window, because I found I was interested case in Junetime, or will Kat find herself taken off the case and why she lived as she did. Her mum used to be a librarian at the village library, but when she got sickpotentially, June gave up on going to University and stayed at home to take care out of her mum, as well as taking on a job as library assistant at the local library. And even though her mum sadly died some years ago, she is still working there, still eating her mum's favourite takeaway meal, and still reading her mum's old books. June is stuck, but little does she know, everything in her life is about the change.career?|isbn=183877369X139851120X
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=00083709821399613073|title=Rock Paper ScissorsMoral Injuries|author=Alice FeeneyChristie Watson
|rating=4.5
|genre=Thrillers
|summary=Amelia Wright is forty-two Olivia, Laura and it was Anjali met on the staff raffle at Battersea Dogs Home that gave her first day of medical school and their friendship would keep them inseparable for a weekend away in quarter of a converted chapel in Scotlandcentury. Her husbandOlivia is ruthlessly ambitious, Adam, isn't so keen on which is a bonus when you aim to be a cardiothoracic surgeon. Laura is a perfectionist and a trauma doctor. Anjali is the free spirit of the ideagroup and she becomes a GP. Like Amelia, he knows that their marriage has been under strain: heWhen we first meet them they's re at a screenwriter drug and alcohol-fuelled party and he's never shy of making it clear to Amelia that he'd prefer to spend time with the novels he's hoping going to adapt than with herend in tragedy. AmeliaWe don's annoyed that he never enquires about how her day has been - and working with t know who suffered the tragedy or the dogs, many of whom have been abused, is never easyconsequences. Still Twenty- she's won five years later there will be an eerily similar event that will impact the weekend awaythree friends. This time, even if it does mean driving for eight hours in her 1978 Morris Minor Traveller with Adam beside her in the passenger seat - and then doing the same thing to come back a couple of days later's their teenage children who are involved.
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Doug Johnstone0241636604|title=The Great SilenceTrading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson|rating=4.5|genre=CrimeAutobiography|summary=For those who, like me, haven't come across the Skelfs before, I'll risk a quick synopsis If you were to bring up an image of who's who – although Johnstone does a good job of bringing the backstory city banker in without being heavy handed about it. Skelf isnyour mind, you't some fantastic creature, though it sounds as though it ought re unlikely to be, it is merely the surname think of a family of undertakerssomeone like Gary Stevenson. Undertakers A hoodie and private investigators. Dorothy jeans replaces the pin-stripe suit and his background is the matriarch – Californian by birth and instinctEast End, where he was familiar with violence, she married a scot poverty and ended up helping to run the Edinburgh undertaking firm that injustice. There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been in to the family for generationsLondon School of Economics. Recently widowed Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and now involved he has a facility with a black Swedish police officernumbers which most of us can only envy. Swedish by nationality He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to be stupid. Scottish police. Daughter Jenny It was his ability at what was, 46essentially, is haunted by her still-living husband – a violent escaped prisonercard game which got him an internship with Citibank. And grand-daughter is about to graduate with Eventually, this turned into permanent employment as a first-class physics degree and join the academic staff next termtrader.|isbn=1913193837
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=19015149781035021803|title=ThereThe Antique Hunter's a Problem With DadGuide to Murder|author=Carlos AlbaC L Miller|rating=43.5|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=Life is different for George Lovelace and he canIt't really understand whys twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to the English country village where she grew up. HeShe's always done everything he ought to: steady workerback now because of a request for help from her beloved aunt, husband Carole. Freya's former mentor and father - Carole's close friend, Arthur Crockleford, is dead and a father who the circumstances seem suspicious, to say the least. Arthur was always there for school plays and sports daysthe reason why Freya had not been back to the village: Arthur, she feels, let her down badly. So why is he never quite Even though they were in tune with those around him? Why does he upset people? Why is someone with such a ''good'' mind unable business together as antique hunters, she has not felt able to progress at work be near the man or to relate to his colleagues? pursue the profession she loved. Why does he make so many breath-taking gaffes? It's almost become After the split, she worked in a cliche these days to suggest that someone who is a little different is 'cafe, met and married James (on the spectrum', but George Lovelace has all rebound from the symptoms love of Asperger's Syndrome: high-functioning autismher life, who was murdered) and Freya and James have now divorced.
}}
{{Frontpage
|authorisbn=Louise CandlishAllTomorrowsFutureCover|title=The HeightsAll Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)|rating=4.5|genre=ThrillersScience Fiction|summary=Ellen doesn't expect 'Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to see Kieran come.'' I've heard it said that day'technology' is what happens after you're eighteen. She's on site Well, visiting I must confess that there have been more than a client for a lighting consultation when she spies him few decades of technology in a building across my lifetime. I've kept up reasonably well with what's advantageous to me but I'm left with the wayfeeling that it's all getting away from me. There are lots Some of thingsit is - frankly - quite frightening. Of course, lots of people, you might see when you look out across London, but this isnI could research the possibilities and the probabilities and end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who knows what they't one Ellen expected that day re talking about or in fact any other daythe latest conspiracy theorist. Why? Because Kieran has been dead for over two years, I needed people I knew I could trust and Ellen knows this for who could deliver information in a fact, because she had a hand in his murderway I could understand.|isbn=1471183483
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbnauthor=0008421714Sunny Singh|title=Mrs March|author=Virginia FeitoHotel Arcadia|rating=43.5|genre=Literary FictionThrillers |summary=The problem began just after the publication of George March's most successful novel to dateHotel Arcadia is a luxury hotel in an unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a terrorist group. Everyone but Mrs March (we know her first name only Hiding from the terrorists who are rampaging through, killing everyone on site, there is Sam, a wartime photographer and Abhi, the last page) seemed to either be reading it or had already done sohotel manager. Every day Mrs March went As Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the local patisserie to buy olive bread but on that particular morning, Patricia asked, as she was wrapping residents who are still alive in the breadhotel, ''but isn't this the first time he's based forms a character bond with Sam who refuses to be cowed by events, and keeps on you?'' She mentioned that Johanna, the principal character had venturing out of her room to try to capture what's happened through her mannerisms''photography. Perhaps this would not have matteredAlthough they only ever talk over the phone, except for the fact that Johanna is their friendship grows as Abhi tries to help her keep safe and they both wait to see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by the whore of Nantes - ''a weak, plain, detestable, pathetic, unloved, unloveable wretchterrorists.''|isbn=086154742X
}}
