Clever Commuter: Puzzles, Tests and Problems to Solve on Your Journey by Dr Gareth Moore
The week before I reviewed this book I saw a newspaper article that said that so-called brain-training apps are a waste of time, that they merely replace what we should be doing anyway to keep our grey cells active (multi-tasking, observing, REAL LIFE etc). This is the puzzle book version of a brain training app, and so with all those electronic titles on the market it already had opposition, even before that news came in. But let's face it – who on earth would risk the science being wrong on this occasion? Surely this kind of book should be an inherently essential purchase? Full review...
Eat. Nourish. Glow.: 10 easy steps for losing weight, looking younger and feeling healthier by Amelia Freer
Amelia Freer had struggled with her own health for a while and it reached a stage where she was waking up feeling tired and groggy, relying on ten cups a day of sugary tea to perk her up and her food was mainly processed convenience foods. At the time she was working as a PA to Prince Charles and loved the job but her busy life meant that she made automatic food choices without consideration of what they were doing to her health. It wasn't until she went to see a nutritionist that she realised what she had been doing and made the decision not only to change her diet, but to train to be a nutritionist. The result is a busy practice - and this book. Full review...
The Test Book: 64 Tools to Lead You to Success by Mikael Krogerus and Roman Tschappeler
The title of the book intrigued me: The Test Book and the offer of sixty four tools which would lead me to success. I'm happy with where my life is but it struck me that only a fool doesn't see room for improvement - and besides, it's a slim book, ideal for popping into a bag or pocket for those waiting room moments. It was only the reputation of the authors - and the value of their earlier books - which made me realise that this wasn't going to be a light-hearted series of 'tests' such as those favoured by some magazines and newspapers. For the most part these are serious, well-established tests used by professionals. Full review...
Digital Inferno by Paul Levy
You know how it goes. You have a pressing job that requires your immediate attention, but decide to treat yourself to a five minute tea break surfing the internet. One link leads to another and before you know it, your short tea break has swallowed up a whole hour. Or maybe you are at an important meeting and you feel the phone vibrate in your pocket, signalling an incoming text. Is it rude to check your messages when your full attention should really be elsewhere? If you feel that meaningful communication with the family has been replaced with a glut of hastily-typed x's, LOLs and emoticons, this book may be just what you need. Digital Inferno aims to help its readers reclaim their place in the digital world and gain mastery over all of those pieces of tech that seem to demand so much of us. Full review...
The Making of Home by Judith Flanders
In 1900 a young girl in a strange land told the people around her that she had decided she no longer wanted to live in their lovely country, but would much rather return to the ‘dry, grey’ place she had come from, because there was ‘no place like home’. The girl was Dorothy, while the people around her were the citizens of Oz – and, yes, it was all fiction, the creation of author L. Frank Baum. Nevertheless he had put into words something which many people deeply felt but had not yet expressed. Full review...
The Bookshop Book by Jen Campbell
I love a good bookshop. The smell, the feel of an old bookshop, and the wonderful feeling when you chance upon a book that appeals to you. They may be a dying breed in some places, but Jen Campbell has written a fantastic book that celebrates the bookshop and those who love them. Full review...
How to Predict the Unpredictable: The Art of Outsmarting Almost Everyone by William Poundstone
William Poundstone believes that we are all in the business of predicting, whether it be something as minor as playing rock, paper, scissors to pay a bar bill though to anticipating how the housing or stock markets are going to move. Now, I'm not particularly competitive - if whatever it is means that much to someone else then I'd rather let them have it - so this book didn't appeal to me on the basis of doing better than someone else, but I was interested in how it might be possible to predict what is going to happen. So, care to predict how it stacked up? Full review...
Who Do You Think You Are?: The Genealogy Handbook by Dan Waddell
The celebrity genealogy programme Who Do You Think You Are? celebrates its 10th anniversary this year. The makers, Wall to Wall Media, were fortunate enough to ride the ripple of family tree fascination, helping to turn it into the hobbyist tidal wave that remains today. For those not familiar with the format, each episode allows us to accompany a household name as they discover secrets, scandals and surprises about an ancestor or two. Thus we aren't only entertained; we're encouraged to delve into our own pasts, BBC TV publications acting as tutor and motivator via this handy little reference guide. Full review...
Home Sweet Anywhere: How We Sold Our House, Created a New Life, and Saw the World by Lynne Martin
Lynne and Tim Martin had known each other decades ago but when we meet them they've only been married for a short time. There's just one thing though - they're not ready to settle down, despite the fact that they're what might be called 'upper middle aged'. Their roots are in the US - both have adult children there and the Martins have a house in California - but they want to travel and not just as tourists. They want to see the world as the locals see it and to experience what it's like to live there. Lynne describes them as not being wealthy, but they decide to sell their home, invest the money and become 'home-free'. Full review...
The Conversations by Olivia Fane
I need no encouragement to start talking. Leave me alone with someone and I will find something to talk to them about, in whatever language. I’ve dated people I’ve met by talking to them on aeroplanes, hablaring español with them in evening classes, chatting to them online. I’ve made friends at the gym, on the shop floor, during a day’s IT system training, people I still keep in touch with. So you might think the last thing I need is a book of conversation starters, and yet in a way that’s what this is. Full review...
Flowerpot Farm: A First Gardening Activity Book by Lorraine Harrison
With the demand for us to eat seemingly more fruit and vegetables every day, the world of grow-your-own is back. Why buy from the supermarket when you can release the kids into the garden to graze like cattle? However, before you do this, perhaps you should pick up a book like ‘Flowerpot Farm’ by Lorraine Harrison and Faye Bradley which will show them how to create their own fruit, veg and flower garden no matter how small a space they have to work with. Full review...
He Texted: The Ultimate Guide to Decoding Guys by Lisa Winning and Carrie Henderson-McDermott
This book, despite the title, is about more than texting. It is about the whole digital world and how guys and gals interact within it (Companies’ House stalkerage aside). From how long to wait to text back, to how to respond to friend requests and what to do with the power when you’re unleashed on his Facebook wall, this book promises to provide hilarious and essential advice on how to navigate the perplexing world that is trouser-shaped. Full review...
The Bluffer's Guide to Etiquette (Bluffer's Guides) by William Hanson
If you ask people what they fear most in any social situation most will tell you that it's not knowing how to behave. They'll be fine about the basics, but it's those little niceties - how to introduce yourself, what to ask for as an aperitif, how to address someone, for instance which can suddenly reveal you as a parvenu. William Hanson gives us a quick trip through the essentials in a book which is very readable and - in places - hilariously funny. Full review...
A Little Piece of England: A tale of self-sufficiency by John Jackson
Here at Bookbag we're great fans of John Jackson. We loved his Tales for Great Grandchildren and Brahma Dreaming: Legends from Hindu Mythology so it was something of a treat to meet the author on his own ground, so to speak. Originally published as A Bucket of Nuts and a Herring Net: The Birth of a Spare-Time Farm this is actually Jackson's first book and thirty-five years later we're delighted that it's been republished in hardback complete with the original black-and-white illustrations by Val Biro. Full review...
Mastermind: How to Think Like Sherlock Holmes by Maria Konnikova
Psychologist Maria Konnikova seems to have rather ambitious aims regarding her new book, Mastermind . She plans to teach her readers how to think like Sherlock Holmes. Anyone who has read the adventures of the world’s most famous detective will have no doubt marvelled at his uncanny powers of analysis and observation. Can a book really unlock the power of the mind and turn average-Joe into a master of deduction? Full review...
Decisive: How to Make Better Decisions in Life and Work by Chip Heath and Dan Heath
I don't have a problem with making decisions, probably because I've always tended to the view that it's better to make a decision and get on with life than haver and waste time in limbo. With a few notable exceptions it's served me well, but when Decisive appeared on my desk it struck me that there could be advantages to improving the quality of the decisions too. The Heath brothers have a good history of collaborating on such subjects and delivering books which open the mind. Full review...
The Examined Life: How We Lose and Find Ourselves by Stephen Grosz
I usually review fiction. For that reason alone, I knew that reviewing this particular book would be a challenge. I was attracted to it for many reasons; I thought it would give me a window into many situations of which I know little or nothing. Full review...
Change One Thing by Sue Hadfield
On the face of it the principle is simple: just change one thing for a better life. Of course it's not that simple. Working on the basis that the longest journey starts with a single step Sue Hadfield looks at the disillusionment which is a by-product of our work-driven life and guides us towards the steps we'll need to take to pull ourselves out of what's not so much a rut as a pit of despair on occasions. Changing one thing is just the beginning, but as she points out, it can be what's needed to kick-start the whole process - to a better way of our current life or a whole new life. Full review...
How to Win: The Argument, the Pitch, the Job, the Race by Dr Rob Yeung
Looking for a sure-fire way to intimidate the competition during a job interview? Just sit in the waiting room perusing the oh, so subtly titled How to Win, with the book tilted at the optimum angle to allow everyone to see the bold heading on the cover. Of course, if more than one candidate is reading the same book, difficulties may ensue... Full review...
The Mistress Contract by She and He
'Women feel a reluctance to talk about those things which should be mysterious.' Well, not all of them. This line – and I won't say who says it – is a quote from a large audio archive of the thoughts of a most unusual couple. College friends, they split apart then got back together, and ended up having an affair. Until she decided to formalise it in a momentary flash of, well, something, saying she would cede all to his every sexual and housework wishes if he would cater for her financially and with a place to live. Nowhere did that small contract say that they would open up themselves to public scrutiny with recordings of their conversations, over a restaurant table or in bed or a car having a tete-a-tete, but they soon did – and these small pages are the resulting book. Full review...
Dedicated to...: The Forgotten Friendships, Hidden Stories and Lost Loves found in Second-hand Books by W B Gooderham
I have found many strange and unusual things in second-hand bookshops. I have done one or two strange and unusual things in them as well, but that's a different story. Twice now I have managed to find a second-hand book, completely signed and dedicated by the author, yet discarded by the recipient, and have been able to present the author with the edition at hand and get it re-dedicated. (If I'm not mistaken, the discarders were a neighbouring babysitter, and a teacher of the author's children.) I'll admit that's rarefied, however, and on the whole the scribble you find in second-hand books is from the person who bought it, and gave it as a gift, not the person who wrote it. But even so, the dedication of the donor can be immensely fascinating and open to all kinds of interpretation, as these examples show perfectly clear. Full review...
A Piece of Danish Happiness by Sharmi Albrechtsen
Sharmi Albrechtsen was a true Hindu-American princess. Obsessed with shoes and handbags and designer labels, she saw status and wealth as the only route to happiness. But she wasn't happy enough, no matter how much designer gear she owned. And it wasn't until 1997, when she married her second husband, a Dane, and relocated to Denmark, that she began to wonder if it was something lacking in herself, rather than her possessions, that was at the root of her problems. Full review...
Couture Prairie And Flea Market Treasures by Rachel Ashwell
Shabby Chic has always appealed to me: it fits neatly with my views on recycling, upcycling and generally refusing to replace anything which still looks good and has life left in it. Rachel Ashwell takes this to a whole new level, but her most glorious moment must have been when - on her regular yearly visit to the flea markets of Round Top in Texas - she decided on a whim to buy The Outpost at Cedar Creek and she turned this into The Prairie, a group of buildings which would house her retail store and a B&B which exhibited some of her most treasured finds. As she said herself, her cowboy boots, jeans and love of poetry in country music had come home. Full review...
Very British Problems: Making Life Awkward for Ourselves, One Rainy Day at a Time by Rob Temple
Are you compelled to apologise multiple times a day – even when you are not at fault, or even to inanimate objects? Would you subject yourself to great inconvenience rather than confront someone who is sitting in your reserved seat on a train? Have you been known to commit desperate acts in the search for your next cup of tea? If so, you may be suffering from Very British Problems. Full review...
How to Keep Calm and Carry On by Daniel Freeman and Jason Freeman
Heart pounding, rapid breathing, dry mouth and sweaty palms are just some of the unpleasant symptoms associated with anxiety. Anxiety affects us all at one time or another in our lives and occurs in varying degrees of severity. For example, a little nervousness is par for the course when a performer steps on stage in front of a huge crowd, but on the other end of the spectrum, conditions such as OCD and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder can leave sufferers paralysed with fear. Full review...
Hospice Voices: Lessons for Living at the End of Life by Eric Lindner
Hospice Voices tells the stories of the last days of some fascinating people while it follows author Eric Lindner through his journey as a hospice volunteer and a crisis in his own daughter's health. Full review...
High Sobriety: My Year Without Booze by Jill Stark
On the first of January 2011 Jill Stark woke up with the hangover from Hell. She was no stranger to them: at thirty five she'd been binge drinking for more than twenty years and was in the dubious position of being the health reporter who wrote herself off at weekends. And by 'wrote herself off' I mean being seriously drunk on a very regular basis, having consumed vast quantities of alcohol and having regularly put herself in danger of serious illness, unwanted pregnancy and assault. But on that first day in January Stark decided that she was going to do something about it and the initial decision was that she would spend three months on the wagon. Full review...
The Sex Diaries by Arianne Cohen
As far as ‘doing what it says on the tin’ goes, this book is a good one. It’s the diaries, plural, from people, plural, talking about their sex lives. But it’s not just the doing of the deed and the sowing of the seed, it’s also all the stuff that goes with being in a relationship or not being in one. The daydreams. The texts. The efforts made to secure a hook-up, if there’s not one waiting for you at home. Full review...
Out of Office: Work Where You Like and Achieve More by Chris Ward
'Imbibe coffee and become imbued with an entrepreneurial spirit' would be an apt summary of the gist of 'Out of Office' by Chris Ward. If you choose to read the book, be prepared to receive inspiration rather than practical instruction on how to build an empire, if anything. This is not to discredit the book; it is attractively designed, full of fundraising event photos and company founder portraits, motivational quotes and brief enthusiastic testimonies of the interviewees featured. But in terms of content, it doesn’t offer substantial advice on how to make that leap from the office cubicle – a context quite heavily vilified by Ward – to the existence of the creatively liberated mover and shaker. 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...
Pigs in Clover: Or How I Accidentally Fell in Love with the Good Life by Simon Dawson
Simon Dawson really had no intention of leading a life of self-sufficiency - he accidentally fell into the beginnings of it at a New Year's Eve party which was a little too noisy for him to be completely certain what it was he was agreeing to. But even then there was no need for it to go too far. After all, this man's heart was in London and he was an estate agent - a member of the profession whose place at the top of the opprobrium ladder was only made wobbly after a serious PR campaign on behalf of journalists and politicians. But his wife was determined that she couldn't stand being a property solicitor any longer and so they sold their flat in London and rented a property on Exmoor and Simon began a weekly commute - weekends in Devon and most of the week in London. Full review...