General fiction
A Dead Hand: A Crime in Calcutta by Paul Theroux
Set in India, familiar territory for Theroux, A Dead Hand tells the story of a travel writer suffering from writer's block (also known as 'dead hand') until a chance letter from an American ex-pat, the mysterious Mrs Unger, relating a story of a mystery of a dead body in a hotel leads him to release his creativity in very unexpected ways. The story is more about obsession and infatuation than it is about the mystery itself as the narrator falls under Mrs Unger's Tantric charms. But does she have more to hide than she's letting on? Full review...
The Wild Things by Dave Eggers
Meet Max. When I say he sometimes gets the wrong end of the stick about adults, or dislikes his mother's new boyfriend, or gets a bit feisty when he feels the need for revenge, I am certainly understating the facts. He is a bit of a rascal to say the least. But all that might change when he finds himself travelling to a strange land of roisterous animals, and ends up installed as their king. Full review...
Tell No One by Harlan Coben
I've been meaning to get around to reading some or all of Harlan Coben's work, because if the reviews are to be believed and you are a fan of the 'Bloody Knife /Blunt Instrument' thriller, the man is quite simply not capable of turning out a duff novel. But you know how it is, what with one thing and another and a bulging pile of books to be read and reviewed, I just somehow hadn't managed to give him my full attention. Until now. Full review...
Another Kind of Loving by Sylvie Nickels
Mike Hennessy was a journalist whose speciality was the war-torn parts of the world and October 1992 found him in Sarajevo visiting a children's home to get a story. The orphanage was on the right side of town – away from the main barrage – but it had few other advantages. There was no heat and little food or water, but it was here that he found Jasminka, part Serb, part Bosniak and eleven or twelve years old. In a phone call to his wife Mike suggested that perhaps Jasminka could come and stay with them for a while. Full review...
The Triangle by rashbre
Brian's trip to the art gallery was a treat, courtesy of a private ticket from a friend and the white room was much better than the last gallery he'd visited. It was, though, to be his last such visit as he was silently knifed by a professional hit man. His friends were stunned, not just at his death, but at the way in which it had come about. What could Brian have been doing to attract that sort of attention? Jake had given him the ticket and it dawned on him that he had been the target rather than Brian. Some recent events clicked into place… Full review...
An Imitation of Life by Laura Solomon
We are introduced to the baby girl, Celia with a detailed, blow-by-blow account of her dreadful physical condition, from her unusual eyes, her even more unusual teeth, her lumpy body and the ever-growing hump on her shoulder. Forget the Elephant Man, here we have elephant baby. Everything is stacked against her. She is abandoned by her mother, her father is unknown. And as if all that wasn't enough to make you weep, she is unceremoniously dumped on a doorstep - to die. But she doesn't. She lives. And what an extra-ordinary life Laura Solomon has mapped out for her. Full review...
A Place of Safety by Tamsin Reeves
There are lots of reasons to take in a lodger for your spare room, but for Martha one of the best is to get one up on her recently departed scoundrel of an ex-husband. And it's not like her financial situation is looking too rosy since he left her for another woman – a woman who is also pregnant with his child. The fact that her lodger is a He, and that he's a Foreigner (and from Afghanistan, no less) is just the icing on the cake. Colin's going to be furious, and Martha can't wait. Full review...
The Comfort of Saturdays (Isabel Dalhousie 5) by Alexander McCall Smith
As always with Alexander McCall Smith, this fifth book in the Sunday Philosophy series benefits from being read in sequence with the previous titles. One of the beautiful aspects of his writing is that his characters develop slowly, gently, over the series so although you could probably dive in here and get a fair idea of his style you really should start at the beginning to thoroughly enjoy the pleasure of an AMS read. In this episode Isabel is busy taking care of her son, Charlie, looking after her niece Cat's delicatessen, editing the review and struggling with her own personal fears over her relationship with Jamie. And she wouldn't be Isabel if she didn't, somehow, get entangled in someone else's problems, someone else's life, and here she finds herself trapped into investigating the case of a doctor whose career has been ruined. Full review...
Dead Men's Dust by Matt Hilton
Joe Hunter helps people. That's what he does. He's been around the block and to say that he has learned a trick or two along the way might be something of an understatement. No-one really knows much about Joe Hunter and certainly his past is not something that many would be brave enough to poke around in. Full review...
This Little World by Imogen Parker
I haven't read the first two books in the trilogy but that didn't spoil my enjoyment of This Little World. They all stand alone as individual novels in their own right. Those readers who have already enjoyed the first two books will know most of the characters and will be keen to find out - what happens next. Full review...
Angels of Destruction by Keith Donohue
In an opening chapter reminiscent of Cathy's ghostly appearance at the window in Wuthering Heights, widowed Margaret Quinn opens her front door in the middle of a wintry night to a half-frozen, waif-like child, Norah, who appears to have arrived out of nowhere. Lonely and withdrawn in the wake of her daughter Erica's disappearance many years earlier, Margaret takes in apparently-orphaned Norah, passing her off as her granddaughter. But Norah is no ordinary child… Full review...
The Alchemaster's Apprentice by Walter Moers
Meet Echo the Crat. He is a rare example of his species, which is a cat that can speak every language known. His life among the miserable, permanently ill citizens of Malaisea is not great, which is why, when the strange scientist from the castle that looms over everyone and everything offers him a month of entertaining gluttony before he kills Echo, as opposed to three days' starving penury on the streets, the offer is accepted. Full review...
The Crying Tree by Naseem Rakha
Irene Stanley had lived in Illinois all her life, on a farm which had been in her family for generations and where the boundary of the property was the Mississippi river. She had friends, family and her church in the area and it came as a shock when Nate came home one day and said that he was considering taking a job as a Deputy Sheriff in Oregon (that's pronounced Organ – only tourists say Or-ee-gon). It wasn't long before they and their children, Shep and Bliss, made the long overland journey to their new home. Shep was a quiet boy, a talented musician but against his mother's expectations he settled into his new life well. Irene wasn't totally convinced, but accepted that life wasn't too bad for the family. That all changed when she was called home from work to find that Shep had been murdered. Full review...
The Virtuous Saint by Johan Minto
Dr Marcus Hoag has been searching for the lost Regula Monachorum of St Benedict for the last thirty five years and the fruits of his research are recorded in a notebook which he carries with him. He's been searching for clues in stained glass windows in churches and cathedrals and the discovery of two previously unknown windows at his old university, St Peter's in New York, sets him on a journey to England. Full review...
Rosie: Note to Self by Claire Connor and G P Taylor
In the first of a five book deal Claire Connor, writing in partnership with GP Taylor, brings us a modern romance based loosely on the story of Ruth from the Bible. This is total chick-lit, and from the first few pages I thought it was just going to be a very light, funny romance story. However, the story quickly takes a depressing turn and the rest of the book is as much an exploration of grief as it is a romance novel. Full review...
Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger
When Elspeth Noblin dies of Leukemia, she leaves behind a strange bequest that will have dramatic and tragic consequences. She leaves her London flat and all the trappings of her life to the 'mirror' twins of her own twin sister who currently live outside Chicago. This is news to the twins who didn't even know that they had an aunt. The only condition of her legacy is that the twins, Julia and Valentina, have to live in the flat, which is adjacent to Highgate Cemetery, for a year before they can sell it. It is clear from the outset that Elspeth has secrets about her relationship with her twin sister Edie, which she is keen to keep hidden from the twins, but when it turns out that Elspeth hasn't quite left the apartment after her death, things get a whole lot messier for everyone. Full review...
Dark Echo by F G Cottam
In Rouen in September 1917, a French detachment are guarding the Cathedral. Guarding it and using it as a barracks and still doing their best to treat it as a house of God. After all, you cannot make a fortress out of a place designed to be welcoming.
One night the fog descends, thick and eerie, and reminiscent of the gas attacks in the trenches. Full review...
An Irish Country Village by Patrick Taylor
Dr Barry Laverty is working for the older, and somewhat irascible Dr Fingal O'Reilly, in the fictional Ulster village of Ballybucklebo. They, their housekeeper Mrs Kinkaid, and the residents of the village were introduced in the book An Irish Country Doctor, which I haven't read, so it took me a few chapters to get into this novel. Full review...
The Lost Art of Gratitude by Alexander McCall Smith
I should say to begin with that it would probably be tricky to leap into reading this series with this latest book. This is the sixth book in the Sunday Philosophy Club series and returns us to the life of Isabel Dalhousie, our gentle philosophising heroine. She is still living with her partner, Jamie, and her son Charlie, editing her philosophy journal, and of course interfering in the lives of others. Her niece, Cat, has another dodgy boyfriend, this time a tightrope walker... Her 'enemy', Christopher Dove, is causing more friction and somehow, at a toddler's birthday party, Isabel simply can't help herself and finds herself embroiled in the woes of a previous foe, Minty Auchterlonie. Full review...
The Complete Novellas by Agnes Owens
Who is Agnes Owens? A Scottish author who portrays working class life from the nineteen forties and fifties. Now an octogenarian, apparently Agnes Owens started writing at the age of 58. Here are five previously published stories collected into one new edition, a companion volume to her short stories, published in 2008. I don't think you'll be disappointed. Full review...
The Good Bride Guide by Matt Dunn
As he approaches a milestone birthday, Ben begins to think back on his old relationships. While none of them seemed right at the time, he's not quite sure that the other option – his current single status – is really any better. With a good friend about to enter into an arranged marriage, Ben has the by this point predictable yet wacky idea that he needs the same thing – a nice young woman hand-picked for him by his parents. After all, who knows him better than they do? Full review...
Bait by Nick Brownlee
Jake Moore was in the Flying Squad but a bullet put paid to his career and ten years later he's running a game-fishing business on the Kenyan coast. Times are hard and there's every chance that the business will fold unless he and his partner, Harry, can find the money to pay their bills. Some strange things are happening in the game fishing business too – one of their number has died in a mysterious explosion on his boat and the body of a man who shouldn't have been aboard has been washed up on the shore. Full review...
Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon
The close of the '60s, the dawn of the '70s. San Francisco. Some people say the most influential people are Nixon and his cronies. Some people say they're Charlie Manson and his cronies. Some people call the smog surrounding everyone in the Bay Area air pollution, others a drug haze. Doc, the sole proprietor of LSD Investigations, is approached by different people, requesting two jobs of him, which both point to the same bigwig property developer. One of these is from his ex, now with said mogul, another is from a man whose prime interest immediately dies. How will this escalate into a manic mystery, hitting on mysterious yachts taking odd journeys, missing people, Nixon, dead people coming back to life, unusual retreats, and a host more? Full review...
Stairway to Hell by Charlie Williams
This is looking like a bad night for Rick Suntan, club singer. He's merely trying to put some Doctor Who into his Cliff Richard renditions (don't ask), when he gets bottled off the stage. Oh, and sacked. Oh, and his girlfriend changes the locks on him. Oh, and he gets shot. From this mess of a life comes an even more unusual thread, courtesy of his small-scale manager. Is the latter, we feel, some Mephisto to Rick's Faust - or just a saddened alcoholic? Neither, in fact - he's a messenger, with the news that Rick is actually David Bowie's soul, inverted into the body of a nonentity. Courtesy of Jimmy Page. Full review...
Black Friday by Alex Kava
There is no reason to be suspicious of the college kids wandering around Mall of America on the busiest shopping day of the year. They look just like everyone else. But in fact these kids are actually up to serious mischief: they think the jamming devices they are carrying in their identical red backpacks will disrupt the greedy capitalist stores' computer systems, causing delays and a big dip in sales. The truth is, if they had been aware that said identical red backpacks were actually stuffed with enough explosives to knock the Earth off its axis and that in fact, a remote control device would turn them each into suicide bombers, perhaps they would not have got out of bed that day? Full review...
Vanished by Joseph Finder
In the wake of a ferocious attack, Lauren Heller finds herself in a hospital bed, groggy from 24 hours of oblivion. Her head is bandaged and throbbing and her husband, Roger, is not only missing – he has vanished without a trace.
Enter Roger's brother Nick Heller, the pre-eminent investigator at Stoddard Associates with a cv that includes a spell as ex-Army Special Forces. Nick is a man who does not take orders from anyone and a man for whom family is of the ultimate importance. As Stoddard's finest, most inventive and successful operator, Nick Heller is used to getting results but this time, the case is personal. Full review...
Let Them Come Through by Neil Forsyth
Nick Santini spent most of his childhood conning the drunken patrons of his father's bar out of their beer money and spending it on cider. With patchy schooling, an abusive father and no real talents beyond his ability to lie, career choices for Nick were few and far between, so when a friend gives him some money to break free, Nick spends it on an office in Soviet Street, hires a secretary, and advertises his services as a medium. Full review...
The Dying Light by Henry Porter
We're a little way into the future: the Prime Minister followed two whom you might recognise. The first was so dangerously casual that members of cabinet only realised what decisions had been taken when they read the papers the next day. His successor was prone to childish tantrums. The Olympics are spoken of in the past tense and John Temple's government is well-established under his seemingly calm leadership. It hasn't been without its glitches though. Full review...
The Cry of the Sloth by Sam Savage
Meet Andrew Whittaker. In some untold time of recent American history, he is forced through a failed marriage and an artistic temperament at odds with so many other people, to let properties to tenants he does not like, for $120 a month. The lodgers might not like the state of the buildings - ceilings falling through and so on - but that's another matter. He would much prefer to be left alone in front of his little Olivetti typewriter and create art. He runs a literary journal, of a kind, called "Soap", which no-one likes, no-one reads (and often, with dodgy, cheap printing, no-one could physically read it anyway), and which makes him poorer in time, money and spirit. Full review...
Incendiary by Chris Cleave
When the Book Reviewing Gods first suggested I re-read this book (the first time they have asked such a repeat of me) I felt like writing them a letter. But soon any draft I might have made would have referred not so much to the duplicated experience, but the joys of rediscovered depths, characters lost and found again, and a plot to be experienced once more. Full review...
Jerusalem by Patrick Neate
With cricket's so-called Barmy Army and their murderously boorish renditions of Jerusalem, the rise of the BNP and the renewed media focus on immigration, the question of British national identity has rarely been more in the spotlight. Patrick Neate's timely new novel Jerusalem, the third in a loosely fitting trilogy, tackles the spiky issues of identity, race and the impact of colonialism in this entertaining yet in some ways frustrating book. Full review...
Family Album by Penelope Lively
Family Albumis the sixteenth novel Penelope Lively has written for adults. As the title suggests, it is a series of snapshots, episodes from the life of an upper middle class family. Charles, the father, is a writer who, it seems, never wanted marriage and children and who spends the majority of his time hidden away in his study, working on his next book. His wife, Alison, was the original 1960s Earth Mother whose whole life revolved around having and bringing up children. The children have all, unfortunately for Alison, now grown up. And then there's Ingrid, the Scandinavian au pair, still there after all these years. One wonders why. Full review...
When I Found You by Catherine Ryan Hyde
Lost and insecure, you found me, you found me...
It's 1960, and on the morning when Nathan McCann sets off on a pre-dawn duck hunting trip, he hasn't the faintest inkling that the day will turn out to be anything other than ordinary. He just wants to enjoy being out in the crisp autumn air with Sadie, his loyal retriever, and maybe bring home a few birds for dinner. But this is no normal day, and before he even gets to the lake, Nathan's life changes forever with the discovery of a newborn baby, barely alive having been abandoned in the woods. A few days later as he reluctantly relinquishes control of the boy to its maternal grandmother, he asks the woman to promise him one thing: that at some point in the future, when she feels the time is right, she will facilitate a meeting between the two, finder and the found. Time passes and life moves on, but years later the two do cross paths again, with rather unexpected consequences. Full review...
No More Mulberries by Mary Smith
Miriam was not been her name at birth – she was Margaret then – and she hadn't always lived in Afghanistan. The streets of Edinburgh were more familiar to her, but as we meet Miriam in the outlying village of Sang-i-Sia in July 1995 you could be forgiven for thinking that she had always lived there, as she coped with what western eyes would see as primitive conditions to feed and care for her family and act as midwife to the village women. Miriam abides by the Muslim way of life and seems content with her life, until you peel away a layer. Dr Iqbal was not her first husband and nor was he the love of her life. When Miriam was given the opportunity to attend a teaching camp as a translator she decides to go, despite knowing that it is against her husband's wishes. Full review...
The Infinities by John Banville
Adam is being watched over by a god. No, not that Adam - this one is a young man, in his twenties, staring out the window at the midsummer's dawn breaking, in his old family home, where his father - Adam senior - lies comatose, dying from a stroke. And not that god, either - this is Hermes, who will be our narrator as the family (Adam's wife, mother, younger sister) wake up to the new day, and have cause to remember other times. We'll see also that Zeus, too, is one of the household gods - and is still doing his old, randy, visitation tricks. Full review...
The Bradshaw Variations by Rachel Cusk
This book is both very odd and very interesting in equal measure, because it manages to fill thirty two chapters without much of a plot and yet is still an engaging read. Admittedly, there are various little snippets of information that pad it out, and small events that are written up, but for the most part there is nothing you'd call an actual storyline per se. Full review...
Many and Many a Year Ago by Selcuk Altun
Kemal is going places, and quickly - he has powered through a career in the airforce, with the help of an F-16. He also thinks his love of western classical music had something to do with it. But an accident leaves him with a juddery hand, depressive thoughts, and a major set-back in his life. Just by chance, at this time, an acquaintance decides he should give Kemal a nice large flat, and a healthy pension, should he retire. So he does. Full review...
The Unwanted by Brett Battles
Jonathan Quinn is 'The Cleaner' – not someone you employ at minimum wage and hope they'll turn up again next week, but a man who takes charge of the problems which other people leave behind. This usually means bodies. In this third book in The Cleaner series Quinn is on a mission to Ireland – and he never should have believed that he was going there purely as an observer, because we have four bodies before we're many pages into the book. Before long he's on his way to Africa in search of a UN aide worker who has disappeared, along with the child she's protecting. Full review...
Shame on You by Clara Salaman
Thirteen-year-old Caroline Stern loves hanging out with her friends, has a reputation as the class clown, and is in love with Mr. Steinberg, her Greek teacher. Sounds like an average London teenager, right? Not quite. Full review...
Ravens by George Dawes Green
Shaw and Romeo are two friends, moving across country for a new life, when they stumble upon Nowheresville, GA, and find that one family has just had the only winning lottery ticket for a $318million jackpot. The family involved is very average - slightly ineffectual father, mother who gets geared up for the weekly lottery and descends into a gin fug as a result, girl stuck on Facebook, boy glued to a PSP or something. There are enough gaps within the family for the pair of guys to break in between them, and have them under threat for half the winnings. Full review...
Even by Andrew Grant
Sibling rivalry can be either a wonderful or a horrible thing. It can cause massive arguments, or it can inspire a sibling to stretch themselves and achieve more than they might usually have done. With this debut novel from Andrew Grant, who is the brother of Lee Child, author of the successful Jack Reacher series. Full review...
Burn by Nick Brownlee
Inspector Daniel Jouma was hoping that calm had returned to Mombasa the problems start mounting up again. A nun has gone missing in mysterious circumstances and the local priest doesn't seem all that worried. After a meal with his friend Jake Moore a respected member of the local community falls to his death almost at their feet – but how he had got into the fort ion the first place? Jake hasn't got it any easier either. Kenya's most ruthless and dangerous developer wants to sweep away the local village and build a five-star hotel in its place. To top it all a paid assassin has accepted some local contracts and the FBI are in pursuit. Full review...
Songs of Triumphant Love by Jessica Duchen
Glaswegian opera star Terri Ivory spends her life travelling the world when she's not at home in her ivory tower in London. Recovering from a potentially life-changing surgery as the book begins, Terri draws on those around her to see her through. Though divorced a long time now, she is surrounded by enough good people that she doesn't feel lonely. There's daughter Julie, about to start at university though she should possibly be choosing a life more choral than Cambridge. There's her intriguing man-friend Teo, wounded by war but perhaps damaged more by an unrequited love. Sue, Julie's boyfriend's mother, comes from a background that could not be more different, but still finds a place in Terri's life and in her heart. Full review...