Book Reviews From The Bookbag
The Bookbag
Hello from The Bookbag, a book review site, featuring books from all the many walks of literary life - fiction, biography, crime, cookery and anything else that takes our fancy. At Bookbag Towers the bookbag sits at the side of the desk. It's the bag we take to the library and the bookshop. Sometimes it holds the latest releases, but at other times there'll be old favourites, books for the children, books for the home. They're sometimes our own books or books from the local library. They're often books sent to us by publishers and we promise to tell you exactly what we think about them. You might not want to read through a full review, so we'll give you a quick review which summarises what we felt about the book and tells you whether or not we think you should buy or borrow it. There are also lots of author interviews, and all sorts of top tens - all of which you can find on our features page. If you're stuck for something to read, check out the recommendations page.
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HRC: State Secrets and the Rebirth of Hillary Clinton by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes
Hillary Clinton initially came to our attention as First Lady and even then she might have faded into international obscurity had it not been for the way in which she managed to hold her head high during those unfortunate incidents with Bill - well, HRC wasn't involved but I'm sure you know what I'm talking about. Then she re-emerged through the fog of the George W Bush presidency with her bid to gain the Democratic nomination, losing in a hotly contested series of primaries to Barack Obama - and went on to become his Secretary of State. Now the question is whether or not she will make another run for President in 2016. Full review...
The Deadly Seven by Garth Jennings
Most of us do our best to live our lives as polite, sensible, clean human beings. After all, society would soon fall apart if we grabbed whatever we wanted, always said the first thing that came into our heads, and punched anyone who annoyed us. But admit it - deep down, there are moments when you'd just love to bop some irritating twit on the nose, shred your report card and use it as hamster litter, eat a whole box of chocolates in one go, then burp every single verse of The Twelve Days of Christmas, right? Seriously - never? Hmm . . . not sure you're being entirely honest there, pal. Full review...
Down to the Sea in Ships by Horatio Clare
Inspired by a chance read of Moby Dick, the aptly named Horatio Clare applies to be a writer in residence for a shipping company. They accept, and he travels with them on two voyages - one from Felixstowe to Los Angeles, and the other from Antwerp to Montreal. Full review...
Tape by Steven Camden
This treasure of a book is an affectionate tribute to the world of the mixed tape and the human desire to find a fairy tale. It encapsulates universal themes of love, hope and fate while adding a soupcon of magic. Full review...
Best Lowly Worm Book Ever! by Richard Scarry
Since we have worn our copy of Busiest People Ever almost to shreds it was with great delight that we sat down to take a look at this book all about Lowly Worm. Lowly Worm is already a well known character in our house, and so there's something delightful in having a whole book about him! And what a book! This has a little bit of everything in, from the Lowly Worm alphabet right at the start, through counting and what it's like at school, to a delightful chapter all about good manners and on to the never-ending fun of playing 'where's Lowly Worm'. It's possible this will become our new favourite bedtime read! Full review...
A Day at the Fire Station by Richard Scarry
We're big fans of Richard Scarry in our house. Though I have to admit we don't usually read the story and we tend, instead, to just spend our pre-bedtime reading minutes scanning the pages for where the cheese car is, or who has stolen the bananas, or what Mr Frumble has crashed into now! This particular Scarry comes as a small disappointment, then, if that's what you're looking for as it focuses solely on the fire station and the activities of the firemen, but the story (if you bother to read it!) is actually quite good! Full review...
Hamish and the Worldstoppers by Danny Wallace
Something strange is happening to Hamish, or happening around him, or actually, if we're being specific, things are not happening! He is finding that suddenly, in the middle of a perfectly normal day, everything stops except him. So the people around him are frozen, the birds are stuck mid wing-flap, planes hang un-moving in the sky, and Hamish is the only one who can still move around! What is causing these strange pauses, and is there anything Hamish can do about it? Full review...
Oliver and Patch by Claire Freedman and Kate Hindley
Moving house is never easy, especially when you're a child. Oliver has moved from the countryside to the city, and he finds that not only is he having to adapt to his new surroundings, but he's also dealing with terrible loneliness, as he misses all his friends dreadfully. One day, when Oliver can't bear being shut up inside any longer, he ventures out into the big city...will he manage to find a friend? Full review...
The Restoration of Otto Laird by Nigel Packer
The Restoration of Otto Laird is an interesting concept for a story. It pitches an ageing architect against an ageing building that was built early in Otto's career. When Otto makes the trip from Switzerland to London to try and save Marlowe house from demolition, he takes an unwilling journey down his own past. Full review...
1815: Regency Britain in the Year of Waterloo by Stephen Bates
The idea of taking a pivotal year from the past and devoting a whole book to the theme, embracing political, social and military history, is a very interesting one. Stephen Bates did so successfully not long ago with ‘Two Nations: Britain in 1846’, and here he does the same again, taking a step three decades back. Full review...
Small Elephant's Bath Time by Tatyana Feeney
Water is the funnest, and Small Elephant knows it. But the one time he’s not the biggest fan of aqua is when it’s bath time. Ewww. Bor-ring. He will do anything to avoid having to get into the tub and Mummy has to take drastic measures. Full review...
Robot Girl by Malorie Blackman
Claire is excited and she's nagging her mother to tell her what her father has been doing in his laboratory, but her mother is no wiser than she is and tells Claire that she will simply have to wait until her father is ready to show her what he's been doing. He's a famous inventor and Claire knows that whatever it is will be exciting. For now all she can do is to tell her pen friend - and be patient. Full review...
The Complex Chemistry of Loss by Ian Walthew
Deep in rural France James Kerr was admitted to a psychiatric clinic. His mental problems were deep and intractable. Superficially he seemed never to have got over the sudden death of his mother and sister when he was a child and after their death his relationship with his father had deteriorated because his father refused to speak of their loss. There were additional factors too: Kerr had spent some time in Afghanistan in a secret capacity. In fact much of his life since he went to university had involved putting up a front, but doing something else in the background. Full review...
Blown Away by Rob Biddulph
If you thought penguins didn’t fly, think again. Penguin Blue is up in the sky but it’s not what you might think – thanks to a fun kite and a cheeky gust of wind, he’s soaring up, up and away from the home, and as his friends try to help they get pulled up and away too. Uh oh. Where will the wind take these South Pole creatures? The answer, in this amazingly fun book, is to a lush, tropical island. It’s full of friendly creatures and wondrous green foliage like none they’ve ever seen before. But it’s rather hot and far from home. Full review...
Lost and Found by Brooke Davis
Millie Bird keeps a notebook. She writes in it all of the Dead Things that she sees. Her Very First Dead Thing was her dog Rambo. Then there were other things a spider, a Bird… but then there was number 28. The twenty-eighth dead thing than Millie Bird noticed was her Dad. Full review...
Wild Thing Goes Camping by Emma Barnes
Wild Thing is truly wild, keeping worms in her grandma's handbag, building dens in muddy holes in the garden, or setting up camps, complete with sticks ready for a fire, in her big sister's bedroom! She's the sort of child who sends her parents grey in their twenties! Poor Kate, her older sister, is stuck being the sensible one in the family, trying to keep an eye on Wild Thing and help her dad out (her mum died when Wild Thing was very little), and the strain of always being sensible and reliable begins to show and Kate starts to think maybe she'd like to be wild too! Full review...
The Butterfly Club by Jacqueline Wilson
Tina is a triplet but you'd never know it. Sisters Maddie and Phil are much bigger, much livelier and much louder than sickly little Tina, who had a heart problem when she was born and spent months in an incubator. She's never caught them up. Her health is still delicate too, so Tina doesn't play rough games and is forbidden from most sport at school. At this rate, she'll never catch up with Phil and Maddie. But Tina doesn't mind too much. She's protected at school by her sisters and coddled at home by her mother. Life, despite its smallness, is pretty sweet for Tina... Full review...
The Queen's Orang-Utan by David Walliams and Tony Ross
The Queen felt trapped in the palace with all those stuffed animals which she has been given on foreign tours. There are mountains of them and every night she would dream of escaping. When her birthday drew near the family dutifully asked her what she would like as a present. The Prince was thinking of a gold, diamond encrusted stairlift whilst the Duke was considering a great big bottle of brandy. The Royal Baby had some decorated thimbles in mind, but the Queen became just a little snappish as she explained that what she really wanted was 'One's own orang-utan'. And she didn't mean a stuffed one, either. Full review...
Creepy Caves (Elf Girl and Raven Boy) by Marcus Sedgwick and Pete Williamson (illustrator)
We've come a long way together, Elf Girl, Raven Boy and I. I wasn't there quite at the start of their adventures, but jumped on at a suitably early stage, and met up with them a bit here and there since. It was obvious from the start, when all six alliterative titles were announced, that the final battle would be the pair – and his rat called Rat – battling the Goblin King. But there was little clue to just how frolicsome the action would be, nor what ungainly band of friends (and enemies) would combine with them for this, the final episode. Full review...
Love From Pooh (Winnie the Pooh) by A A Milne
For a small book, a small review – this is a quite delightful little thing, about which not a lot can be said. It is a gift book pure and simple, much in the way that Pooh Bear was a little simple at times (Pooh… thought how wonderful it would be to have a Real Brain which could tell you things). With it comes a simple blurb, and almost instructions that it is for giving, and there is a space for a loving dedication at the beginning, which is again only apt, as it is all about love. Love of honey, love in friendship, love of all various kinds, but just love. It can't help but make you most warm-hearted. Full review...
Soulprint by Megan Miranda
Alina Chase lives in a future America obsessed by soulprinting. Scientific advances have enabled the tracking of the soul by markers carried in spinal fluid. Reincarnation is now an established fact and the government maintains a database of all past lives. People without heirs can even make wills leaving their worldly goods to the person in whom their soul is reincarnated. But the discovery has led to problems and the problems have led to Alina's containment. Full review...
The Diary of Lena Mukhina: A Girl's Life in the Siege of Leningrad by Lena Mukhina and Amanda Love Darragh (translator)
If life as a girl of school-leaving age is hard enough, think about it when you're stuck in a great city under a horrendous siege. Lena Mukhina's diary only covers half the 800-odd days the nightmare in Leningrad lasted, but so palpably singular were the circumstances that it feels like one is given the clearest insight into what it was like, courtesy of these pages. I've been there and never felt the ghost of the siege in the modern St Petersburg, anything like (for example) the ruination of Warsaw had lived on. But a dreadful time this was. At the peak times of Nazi oppression and aerial bombing, the city lost 2 or 3 residents' lives every minute of the day on average. The city was desperate for fuel, and food – and this is a place where it can – and does here – snow in June. Without giving too much of the diet away, it's notable that later on Lena dreams of having a menagerie of small animals to live with – but no dogs or cats. Full review...
My Heart and Other Black Holes by Jasmine Warga
Aysel lives in the middle of nowhere. She’s smart but not popular, so high school’s not much fun, and her part-time job, cold calling the town’s residents on behalf of various customers, is far from satisfying. It’s understandable that she’s not a very happy girl. She’s not the preppy cheerleader or the honour roll student who sidelines as class president. She’s nobody, really. But she’s nobody with a dark secret. She wants to take her own life, and she’s making plans to make this happen. Full review...
Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard
Mare is a Red - a race kept in lives of poverty and servitude by the Silvers, a race with wealth and mutant powers that allow them to live lives of luxury. Learning to survive amongst the slum like conditions that the Reds inhabit, Mare is swiftly thrown into the world of the Silvers - one that proves to be more dangerous than she had ever imagined, with treachery, plots and deadly games lurking round every corner. Full review...
Tips From Widows by Jan Robinson
I'm not a widow and I secretly hope that I never will be, but I picked up Tips From Widows when a close friend (who is supporting someone who knows that becoming a widow is frighteningly close) mentioned the need to plan what to do. The death of a husband must be devastating, even terrifying, but as next of kin you have certain responsibilities and there are some things which you must do. Who better to give advice than other women who have experienced what must be the worst thing that life can throw at them? Full review...
Impulse by Dave Bara
In space, no one can hear you squirm and this is no bad thing if you happen to be Lt. Peter Cochrane, newly out of the Navy Academy he is put straight on the front line and is prone to as many mistakes as he is heroics. Cochrane has no choice, the son of an Admiral; he is deemed the best choice to seek out an ancient enemy that has destroyed a starship full of Navy Officers. When you are only one of a few Officers left standing, you do what you can; even if this does involve blowing stuff up and falling in love. Full review...
If I Fall, If I Die by Michael Christie
It probably tells you a lot about the atmosphere of this book that for the whole time I was reading it, I thought the title was If I Fall, I Die. That missing second If is probably at the crux of the whole tale. Full review...
Blackout (Urban Outlaws) by Peter Jay Black
Fans of thrillers will be the first to admit that character development is not always the first priority in their favourite books. In fact, in some series heroes change less than The Simpsons, even after dozens of adventures. So, finding a story which has heart-pounding drama, well-drawn characters and even – believe it or not – a few scenes which would melt the hardest heart makes this excellent series a must-read. Full review...
Rugby Academy: Surface to Air by Tom Palmer
We first met Rory in Combat Zone when circumstances forced him to go to Broadlands Boarding School when both his parents were posted abroad by the RAF. It wasn't his choice - I mean they played rugby rather than his beloved football - but it wasn't long before he discovered that not only did he enjoy rugby, he was rather good at it. It was also something of a relief to be at a school where there were other boys in a similar situation to himself. By the time that we meet Rory again time has moved on and he's on his way to Toulon to play in an international schools rugby tournament. Full review...
Influx by Daniel Suarez
We are told to never judge a book by its cover and that certainly includes any quotes that should adorn the front. Since his debut novel, all the Daniel Suarez books I have read had a quote suggesting that he was the legitimate heir to Michael Crichton. To compare your work with one of the best techno thriller writers of all time is never going to be easy and time after time, Suarez fell short. That is until Influx, a book that finally puts Suarez in the same illustrious company as Crichton. Full review...
