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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Flight by Adam Thorpe
The past is catching up with Bob Winrush. His marriage is over as a result of his inconsiderate arrival home early when weather cancelled one of his jobs as a cargo pilot to find his wife in bed with another man but when an investigative journalist starts to dig into some of the content of Bob's previous cargo trips, his life is quickly placed in grave danger. His problems stemmed from having walked away from a particularly morally dubious trip to transport arms to the Taliban some years ago, although it turns out that his moral line in the sand is somewhat blurred. He has knowingly transported guns and military personnel in his time. He's sort of the aeronautical equivalent of white van man. Full review...
If Dinosaurs Were Alive Today by Dougal Dixon
The book starts with a simple question. How would we cope, how would dinosaurs cope if they had not become extinct and were around today? They're put in context, going back to the beginnings of Planet Earth four and a half billion years ago and working forward to show how life evolved and asking if the skills the dinosaurs developed would allow them to survive today. The four groups of dinosaurs - plant-eaters, meat-eaters, ocean-dwellers and flying reptiles - are then looked at in some detail. Full review...
Charlotte Street by Danny Wallace
In his early books, Danny Wallace was the new Tony Hawks, taking on silly challenges and recounting them in amusing ways. With Charlotte Street, his first entirely fictional work, he seems to be moving into territory inhabited by Mike Gayle, that of bloke-lit. It seems a decent fit, as his book Yes Man had elements of bloke-lit, despite being based on actual events. It may have suffered from a twee ending, but it offered enough to suggest that this is a field Danny Wallace could work well in. Full review...
Everything is Fine (and Other Lies I Tell Myself) by Cathy Brett
Fifteen-year-old Esther Armstrong is having problems at home. Her mum and dad keep arguing, her younger brother is driving her crazy, and she's reduced to writing letters to her older brother about the situation as he's not around. When she finds some letters from a soldier to his girlfriend, she starts trying to find out what happened to them - will she work it out, and also get her own life back on track? Full review...
Carver's Quest by Nick Rennison
The year is 1870 and Adam Carver is at home in his lodgings in London’s Doughty Street when he is interrupted by an unexpected caller. This distraught and enigmatic young woman, Miss Emily Maitland, requests Carver’s help but disappears mysteriously before he can ascertain the details of her predicament. The days and weeks that follow her visit prove to be most eventful, pitching Carver and his assistant Quint into an investigation involving murder, a missing manuscript and a hidden treasure. Full review...
Judith Kerr's Creatures: A Celebration of the Life and Work of Judith Kerr by Judith Kerr
In children's literature there are some authors whom you know are not just reliable, but always impressive. One of those names is Judith Kerr. For decades she's been delighting our children (and grandchildren) but it still came as something of a surprise to discover that she would be ninety in June 2013. To celebrate this, Harper Collins have published Creatures in which Judith tells not just her own story but that of the creatures - the characters in her books and her family - who have contributed to her inspirational life. It is, though, far more than just an autobiography with a marvellous collection of paintings, drawings and memorabilia. Full review...
The Daring Escape of Beatrice and Peabody by Kimblerly Newton Fusco
This is the story of Beatrice (Bee) Hockenberry, the girl with a diamond on her cheek. Orphaned at a young age, Bee lives in the hauling truck of a travelling fair with Pauline who runs the hotdog stand. Daily, she suffers staring, ridicule and worse torments because of the prominent birthmark on her cheek. The story really starts when first Pauline and then Bobby the pig-man, the only people who have ever been kind to her, leave the fair. With no one left to protect her from the show owner who wants to put her in the freakshow booth, she takes her dog Peabody (as much of a stray as she) and Cordelia, the runt from the piglet race and runs away. Taken in by two mysterious old ladies, Bee starts school and embarks on a whole new life which has troubles of its own. Full review...
Traitor's Gate by Michael Ridpath
Oxford-educated Englishman Conrad de Lancey is haunted by the brutality of the Spanish Civil War, his ideals laying in the dust along with the cause for which he fought. Therefore, on a visit to his mother's German homeland, Conrad shies away from involvement in any resistance to the rise of the National Socialist Party. However, he will soon have little choice as tragic events drag him into a world of espionage, brutality and fear, culminating in a conspiracy to kill Hitler himself. Full review...
Dead Jealous by Sharon Jones
Poppy is a rationalist. Her sweatshirt says so: GOD IS DEAD, it proclaims. She's been swearing blind she wouldn't attend her mother and stepfather's handfasting ceremony at the annual pagan festival. It's all stuff and nonsense. But then her best friend - and secret love - Michael goes and gets a girlfriend and jealousy gets the better of Poppy. Suddenly, the festival and the handfasting seem much more inviting. Once there, Poppy meets a strange girl at the shores of Scariswater Lake. When Beth turns up dead, Poppy is sure she has been murdered. And the police don't seem to care, putting it down as an accident. Full review...
Life on a Plate: The Autobiography by Gregg Wallace
I remember the early days of Masterchef when members of the public practiced certain dishes until they couldn't get them wrong and then presented them to be judged. Once it got past the point where you could be reasonably certain that there wouldn't be a major disaster with no food on the table it all got rather boring and finally faded. It had a reincarnation though, largely fronted by chef John Torode and greengrocer Gregg Wallace. Gone are the days when people said Greengrocer? as though they were referring to some lower life form and it's generally acknowledged that Wallace is a good anchor (and better as he's grown in confidence) and that he has a great palate. But where did he come from? Full review...
Stung by Bethany Wiggins
Fiona wakes up confused and disoriented. She's in her bedroom but her bedroom has never looked like this. It's filthy. And abandoned. Where is her family? And how has she come to have a strange tattoo on her hand? Full review...
To Catch a Rabbit by Helen Cadbury
Sean Denton's grandmother always said that his smile was his biggest asset. He wasn't overburdened with other qualifications. Being a Police Community Support Officer was OK for him but he was out of his depth when two young lads took him to the body of a young woman at a disused catering caravan. He was even more confused when when no one seemed that worried about who she was or what had happened - and deciding to look into it himself wasn't the cleverest thing he'd ever done. Full review...
Straight Flush by Ben Mezrich
Ben Mezrich's latest book tells the story of six college kids - frat brothers from the University of Montana - who built up AbsolutePoker.com, one of the world's largest poker sites - only for it to come crashing down as the legality of online poker became more and more of an issue, with the Department of Justice getting involved. We find out in the first chapter, as one of the six prepares to return to the USA from Central America to face prosecution, that things have gone horribly wrong. Just how horribly wrong, we have to wait to find out... Full review...
Fragments by Dan Wells
I didn't have much hope for this book - the middle book in a series tends to be filler, and as Partials was so brilliant, I though it was going to be hard to top. I was very wrong. This book is mind-blowing. Full review...
The Wall by Marlen Haushofer
One morning our protagonist awakens to a world in which she appears to be the sole living human inhabitant. A mysterious transparent wall has been erected around a large area in the Austrian mountains where our narrator has been holidaying, a wall that is unbreakable and through which she can see that the world outside has come to a complete standstill. Our narrator is faced with living in total isolation and forced to learn how to survive. Full review...
The Dance Of The Seagull (Inspector Montalbano Mysteries) by Andrea Camilleri
Montalbano was about to go on holiday with his girlfriend Livia and it was quite an event as they hadn't seen each other for three months. As he sat on his verandah Montalbano saw the death throes of a seagull - it was almost a macabre dance - and he couldn't get what happened out of his mind, convinced that it was an ill omen. When he picked Livia up at the airport he told her that he had to go into the office but that he would be home quickly. He meant it too. The first problem began when Fazio's wife rang to say that he hadn't arrived home since going out to meet Montalbano the night before. The second problem was that there had been no arrangement to meet the previous evening. In the context of what would happen that night the fact that Montalbano completely forgot about Livia was no more than a small blip. Full review...
Don't You Dare by Sharky and George
Older readers like myself may recognise a great many of Sharky and George's ideas from our own childhood games, in the days when children's games usually did take place outdoors. Most of us will have played games like torch tag (which is enemy spotlight in this book), cops and robbers, boxes with a pen and paper, made drip sand castles, skimmed a stone or built a dam in childhood. So you might ask - why do need a book to teach us games we already know how to play? The sad fact is, most of these games are rapidly being forgotten. I rarely see children other than my own play any type of tag or hide and seek games. Full review...
We Need New Names by NoViolet Bulawayo
This powerful narrative bears witness to the experience of economic migrants. Not just black Africans coming from Zimbabwe, like NoViolet Bulawayo, but more generally, those several generations of hardy, resourceful immigrants driven to the USA in search of a better future. Such people leave behind less courageous family members, but not their emotions towards those they have loved or their nation of birth. Full review...
My Life in Black and White by Kim Izzo
My Life in Black and White starts off in a police station in England. The film noir theme that permeates the novel begins immediately. Clara Bishop is dressed in a gold evening gown, and treats the police officer who is interviewing her just as a femme fatale would. This girl has sass. But when she begins to recount her tale, it is clear this is a new development. The old Clara describes her life as something from a screwball comedy, not a film noir. How does a screenwriter-slash-gossip-columnist from LA end up being interviewed about an assault in England? Full review...
Pray for the Dying: A Bob Skinner Mystery by Quintin Jardine
Chief Constable Bob Skinner is in a very difficult situation. His race to prevent a murder didn't quite work out and he's now outside the theatre where what he dreaded has happened. There's carnage outside too: the killers have shot two policemen, one fatally and Skinner himself is responsible for the death of one of the killers. The other was killed by a member of the Security Services, but he'll need to be quietly airbrushed out of the record. Before long Skinner finds himself having to take on a role which he has always said that he would never want. And that's besides investigating whether or not the victim was the intended target and who was behind the operation because it's obvious that this was a professional hit. Full review...
Kurt Vonnegut: Letters by Kurt Vonnegut and Dan Wakefield
Kurt Vonnegut: Letters is a fascinating tome of personal correspondences between one of the greats in American literature and the several individuals and institutions whose paths he’d crossed. Written from the early forties up until 2007, the year of Vonnegut's untimely death, these letters enable readers to understand the workings of the mind behind classics such as Slaughterhouse-Five and Cat's Cradle. Full review...
Crime of Privilege by Walter Walker
In March 1996 George Becket was a guest at a party in the Cape Cod home of Senator Gregory, patriarch of America's most loved and influential family. Outwardly everything looked wholesome and fun as the Senator did an impromptu song and dance act with his sister but in the library George was present when Jamie Gregory and Peter Gregory Martin raped a young woman who was too drunk to either assent or protest. It was only George's intervention which prevented the assault becoming more violent. But for the young woman, Kendrick Powell, the rape was devastating and before long she was dead. She too was the child of an influential and wealthy family. But the Gregory clan sticks together and no action was taken against Jamie or Peter and it was the senator's influence which secured George Becket a post in the Cape Cod DA's office. It might seem that the matter was closed - but the Powell family were determined that George would suffer for not having spoken out against the Gregory family. Full review...
Deer Island by Neil Ansell
Neil Ansell volunteered in the 1980s to work for an organization that provided support for the homeless. These homeless were the people other shelters would reject for various reasons (drink, drugs, etc.) but the group Neil worked for were a little different to most similar charities. Due to this Neil experienced some of the worst case scenarios of being down and out in London, and along the way befriended many interesting but ultimately ill-fated people. To escape and recover from a life full of brief friendships, poverty and untimely death Neil travelled to the Isle of Jura off the West coast of Scotland. Jura came to be a special place for him and of all places in the world it was the one most in his heart. Deer Island is Neil’s account of his life in the 1980s and his discovery of Jura; it is, in effect, his love song to the island that has been his sanctuary. Full review...
Chaplin and Company by Mave Fellowes
In 'Chaplin & Company', Mave Fellowes takes a quirky look at life on London's canal boats. Yet, while her story is full of eccentric characters, not least the main human character of Odeline Milk, who moves to the boat that shares the title of the book after her mother passes away to pursue her dream of becoming a mime artist in the more culturally enlightened big city after a lonely life in provincial Arundel, the book is delightfully free of sentimentality. I say the main human character, because this is also the story of a boat with a remarkable history of owners, and also a story of the strange life on the canal which somehow exists beneath the city through which it flows. Full review...
Twerp by Mark Goldblatt
Julian Twerski did something bad. So bad, that it got him suspended from school. When he returns, his English teacher asks him to write a journal about it, in exchange for getting out of doing a report on Shakespeare. Julian reluctantly accepts - but would rather be writing about sending love letters for a friend, blowing up fireworks, or pretty much anything else except telling Mr Selkirk about what he wants to hear. Full review...
Drummer Girl by Bridget Tyler
Lucy is really pleased when Harper McKenzie decides to start talking to her again and suggests forming a band. From then, life gets increasingly wonderful as they recruit three other girls, enter a talent show, and make it to the finals. Parties, fame, and success await - until everything comes crashing down. What went wrong? Full review...
Black Skies by Arnaldur Indridason
Detective Sigurdur Oli has worked himself into a difficult situation. It would be easy to ask why he did what he did. Easier still to say that he's doing the job he wanted to do, but a school reunion left him over-awed by the success of some of his contemporaries and when one of them asked for his help in sorting out a small matter it was a way of demonstrating his position to be able to say that he would help. A friend of his friend was being blackmailed over some photographs taken at a wife-swapping party and Sigurdur Oli agreed to have a word with the blackmailers and retrieve the photographs. It should have been simple - but when he arrived at their home the woman had just been brutally attacked and Sigurdur Oli only just avoided the same fate. He should have come clean about exactly what he was doing there. He didn't. Full review...
Into The Valley of Death by A L Berridge
Master Harry-sahib saunters up the path of the family bungalow in some unnamed Indian 'British town', puzzled to see the pathway choked with weeds, surprised by the absence of servants and disgusted by the swarming ants. There is worse inside. His father, the colonel, is dead on the floor. 'The money was gone, obviously, but it would take more than that to make a devoted soldier to blow his brains out. What had it done to him, this army he'd given his whole life to?'
What indeed? 'Into the Valley of Death' isn't the novel that will tell us. Full review...
The Religion by Tim Willocks
To the Maltese and Sicilians, Mattias Tannhauser is a successfully blooded infantry captain. To Ottoman Turks he's Ibrahim the Red, having been kidnapped from Hungary and raised as a Muslim. Dual nationality comes in handy once he's met the beautiful Contessa Carla de la Penantier and is commissioned to find and return her 12 year old bastard son. As always with these missions there's a catch. The boy (whom Carla hasn't seen since the day of his birth) is rumoured to be on Malta, an island currently being threatened by 30,000 Turks and defended by a tenth of that number, even if you count the Knights Hospitaller. The Turks call themselves the Hounds of Hell, the Knights are known as the Religion, but it's immaterial to Mattias. He just needs to find the lad and get out alive. Full review...
Impulse: Why We Do What We Do Without Knowing Why We Do It by Dr David Lewis
How many times have we asked ourselves the question:
Why did I do that?
Most of the time, the question is a response to a sudden inexplicable impulse or urge on our part. That extra helping of chocolate cake, that flirtation with the guy in the office, or that must-have item in the supermarket trolley may all be causes for regret once our rational brain kicks in. But why is it that we humans are often slaves to our base instinct? Full review...
The Norm Chronicles: Stories and numbers about danger by Michael Blastland and David Spiegelhalter
I'd like you to meet Norm. He's an absolutely average kind of guy, thirty one years old, 5'9”, a touch over thirteen stone and he works a thirty-nine hour week with the occasional treat of a bar of milk chocolate. Oh, and he's ambivalent about Marmite - couldn't care one way or the other - can take it or leave it. In The Norm Chronicles we hear the story of his life and the lives of his friends Prudence (the name tells you what you need to know) and Kelvin, who's a dare-devil, hard-living kind of guy. It's the story of the hazards they face - some real and some imagined - in every aspect of their lives. And along with these stories are the real facts about the reality of the risks they take. Full review...
NOS-4R2 by Joe Hill
Vic McQueen has a talent for finding things. Her little Raleigh bicycle can take her over a seemingly demolished bridge near her home and takes her to places where lost items have come out. Over the years, she has built up stories in her head as to how she found these items, but as she gets older, she becomes more and more unable to find herself. One day, she takes her bridge to a place where she finds Charles Talent Manx III, a man who has a similar talent, but uses it to take children out of the world, rather than bringing lost things back into it. Full review...