'''Read [[Features|new features]].'''
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{{newreview
|author=Terry Deary
|title=Put Out The Light
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=In 1940, Billy and Sally Thomas are living in Sheffield, a city which is well aware that German bombs will almost surely find their way there sooner or later. As the air raid sirens blare out, they help friendly Warden Crane to make sure the blackout is kept up - but when they find that people are having money stolen while they're in the shelters, they try to solve the crime. Meanwhile, in Germany, Manfred and Hansl are determined to do their bit for the war effort by getting into the bomb factory and writing an English soldier's name on a bomb. Then they meet Polish youngster Irena and become quickly embroiled in a frantic escape attempt. By December, the two sets of children will both have been thrust into the thick of the action, and we get a finale that's truly explosive – in more ways than one!
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408130548</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Sophie McKenzie
|summary=I'm relatively new to the fantasy genre and it really is true - you should never judge the book by its genre (my quote). Having read a previous fantasy trilogy (more of that later) I was looking forward to reading this book which has a similar lay-out and publishing format.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0356500101</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Catriona Hoy and Cassia Thomas
|title=George and Ghost
|rating=4
|genre=For Sharing
|summary=George and his friend are inseparable, but George isn't sure he believes in Ghost any more. He asks Ghost to prove he is real by weighing himself, having his photo taken and showing he takes up space. But the scales don't move, Ghost can't be seen in the picture and the water in the bucket doesn't spill when Ghost stands in it. Ghost can't be real. Or can he?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340988851</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Tom Campbell
|title=Fold
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Five men in Reading circulate their monthly poker evenings around their respective houses. None of them like all the others, none of them seem to completely like the game, but they're more-or-less happy with the habit. It's the way the five different personalities approach the evenings that we are concerned with, and enjoy principally, especially when the poorest player, Nick, decides to clash with his polar opposite, Doug. And what might happen if a non-playing character were to enter things, and make them even feistier?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408807602</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Rebecca Stead
|title=When You Reach Me
|rating=5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Miranda has quite a bit going on in her life. Since her best friend Sal was punched on the street for no reason, he's been distant, shutting Miranda out of his life. This loss leaves Miranda somewhat adrift, as she and Sal have been inseparable since they were at day care together. So she strikes up a friendship with Annemarie, but that involves coming between Annemarie and the stuck-up Julia. And then Colin joins the group, which adds yet more complications - Miranda likes Colin, but she's worried he might like Annemarie.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849392129</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Chester Himes
|title=If He Hollers Let Him Go
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=If He Hollers Let Him Go, first published in 1945, is written from the perspective of Robert Jones, an African-American working in the defence shipyards in California. The book is full of anger about racial inequalities and Himes pulls no punches in his depiction of the life of a young black man in a white world. It must have been shocking at the time of publication, but how does it stand up in today's more racially integrated world?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846687381</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Ulf Stark
|title=Fruitloops and Dipsticks
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Simone is not happy. Her mother, a flaky artist with a peculiar sartorial bent, has forgotten her daughter's twelfth birthday and Simone has had to make her own cake. And that's only the beginning. They've also had to move away from school and friends to a house outside town. Hmph. The house belongs to Ingvar, Simone's mother's nerdy and hypochondriac new boyfriend. He's a pain. In the confusion of the move, Kilroy, Simone's beloved dog, has been left behind. Nobody can find him. And as if all this weren't enough, Grandpa has run away from the care home and turned up at the door, wearing high-heeled boots and not a lot else.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1877467588</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Lindsay Reade
|title=Mr Manchester and the Factory Girl: The Story of Tony and Lindsay Wilson
|rating=4
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Mr Manchester, as Tony Wilson came to be known, could have been the next John Humphrys. Instead he ended up becoming the next Malcolm McLaren – or, perhaps, a far less successful version of Richard Branson. After graduating from Cambridge University with a degree in English he became a trainee news reporter for ITN, and for much of his life he worked as an anchorman for regional evening news programmes. Yet he is less remembered for this than for his championship of alternative music and punk rock, founding of Factory Records and involvement with the Hacienda Club. Although he loved the Beatles and folk music in general, he disliked much of the contemporary music scene until he saw the Sex Pistols live in the summer of 1976.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0859654567</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Jane Casey
|title=The Burning
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary=The book opens with a bunch of young women enjoying a drink-fuelled night out in the capital. And as often happens, there's always one absolutely paralytic - with drastic consequences. Casey gives her readers a sharp taste of danger early on as we accompany the unfortunate Kelly on a terrifying taxi ride. The media is stirring up a right old frenzy and calling this local serial killer ''The Burning Man''. And yes, it's a suitably horrible title and we hear it time and time again throughout the book.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091936004</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Polly Samson
|title=Perfect Lives
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=The eleven short stories in Perfect Lives are about a group of people living in an English seaside town. Each story of challenged relationships, devastating discoveries and objects and people with a history is carefully and beautifully crafted, stands alone and works well in its own right, but the connections between all the stories offer an extra, fascinating dimension. Each story made me want to look at the others again to understand how they all connect, to piece together the different bits of people's lives in each story. This format also offers an opportunity to see some of the characters from several different perspectives, and perhaps make the short stories more satisfying to those who are dissatisfied by their brevity, as some of the same characters reappear, so offering some of the advantages of the novel while staying in the short story form. There are four stories told in the first person by an unnamed woman who is married with two young sons, and then one of her sons has a story of his own (Ivan Knows). There are a variety of narrative viewpoints – women, men, a little boy, a teenage girl, first and third person.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1860499929</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Charles Ellingworth
|title=Silent Night
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=The front cover describes this book as 'astonishing' and has 'the mark of a classic.' We're introduced to one of the two female characters, Mimi: a young, German woman. It's 1944 in Eastern Germany and if I say that things are grim, I'm sure you'll appreciate that it is an understatement. Mimi is obviously an intelligent and curious individual and she's certainly not happy to be living in the back-of-beyond. But then again, things could be ten times worse for her. She could be living in Berlin picking through the rubble. Out of the blue, she encounters a man - a French national, as it happens and things change dramatically. We learn that along with his fellow countrymen, Mimi's husband is absent, not at home. So when she acknowledges her attraction for another man - and someone who is not German at that, she seems exhilarated, shocked and perhaps just a little repelled, all at the same time.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0704372126</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Sam Kean
|title=The Disappearing Spoon
|rating=4.5
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=If the disappearing spoon of the title doesn't pique your interest, the subtitle is bound to get your juices flowing: ''and Other True Tales of Madness, Love and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements''. As far as popular science books goes, it's got all the umm... right elements (sorry, sorry, sorry). We're taken on a tour through the periodic table, hearing exciting tales of scientific discovery and marvel.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857520261</amazonuk>
}}
