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<metadesc>Book review siteExpert, with books full book reviews from most walks of literary life; fiction, biography, crimenon-fiction, cookery and children's books & self-published books plus author interviews and & top tens.</metadesc><h1 id="mf-title">The Bookbag</h1>Hello from The Bookbag, a site featuring books from all the many walks of literary life - [[:Category:Fiction|fiction]], [[:Category:Biography|biography]], [[:Category:Crime|crime]], [[:Category:Cookery|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 [[:Category:Interviews|author interviews]], and all sorts of [[:Category:Lists|top tens]] - all of which you can find on our [[features]] page. If you're stuck for something to read, check out the [[Book Recommendations|recommendations]] page. We can even direct you to help for [https://www.easywritingservice.com/custom-book-review/ custom book reviews]! Visit [http://www.everychildareader.org www.everychildareader.org] to get free writing tips and [http://www.genecaresearchreports.com www.genecaresearchreports.com] will help you get your paper written for free.

Reviews by readers from all the many walks of literary life. With author interviews, features and top tens. You'll be sure to find something you'll want to read here. Dig in! Find us on [[File:facebook.gif|link=https://www.facebook.com/TheBookbagCoUk|alt=Facebook]] [https://www.facebook.com/TheBookbagCoUk '''Facebook'''], [[File:twitter.gif|link=http://twitter.com/TheBookbag|alt=Follow us on Twitter]] [http://twitter.com/TheBookbag '''Twitter'''], [[File:instagram_classic_logo.png|link=https://www.instagram.com/thebookbag.co.uk/|alt=Follow us on Instagram]] [https://www.instagram.com/thebookbag.co.uk/ '''Instagram'''] and [[File:LinkedIn.png|link=https://www.linkedin.com/in/the-bookbag-1b12a264/|alt=LinkedIn]] There are currently '''{{PAGESINCATEGORY:Reviews}}''' [[:Category:Reviews|reviews ]] at TheBookbag.

==Reviews of the The Best New Books==

 '''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].'''<!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sophie Guerrive1635866847|title=Dinosaur Detective's Search-The Lavender Companion|author=Jessica Dunham and-Find Rescue MissionTerry Barlin Vesci

|genre=Children's Non-FictionLifestyle|summary=This It's strange, the things that make you ''immediately'' feel that this is a horrific worldthe book for you. Monsters leer over all Before I started reading ''The Lavender Companion'', I visited the mountain tops, author's [https://www.pinelavenderfarm.com/ website] and there's a giant octopus in one building picture of a slice of chocolate cake on the homepage. I don't eat cakes and a green giantdesserts - but I wanted that cake viscerally. (There's arms coming through a recipe in the windows of anotherbook, which I'm avoiding with some difficulty!!) Then I started reading the book and everywhere you look someone has lost somethingI was told to make a mess of it. Luckily Notes in the Dinosaur Detective is on hand to helpmargins are sanctioned. Yes, despite his paws looking incredibly ungainly on You get to fold down the controls corners of his flying machine, he is able to visit all eleven zones, and find the five things requested pages. You suspect that smears of him in eachbutter would not be a problem. But can you?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1786030713</amazonuk>I ''loved'' this book already.

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Helen DoeJenny Valentine|title= The First Atlantic Liner: Brunel's Great Western SteamshipUs in the Before and After|rating= 4.5|genre= HistoryTeens|summary= Isambard Kingdom Brunel's enduring seafaring monuments were the Great Britain Elk and Great Eastern. Their forerunner the Great WesternMab are best friends, or more than that even, which paved the way and yet their friendship is now largely forgotten, at last merits a full account once in this booka lifetime connection. Ms Doe admits They meet as children one day on a trip out but unfortunately they don't get each other's contact details at the front that she is not an engineertime. But then chance brings them back together, and as a maritime historian her interests they are more social inseparable. Something has happened though, something terrible and economic than technical. Her aim is to tell the story of the shiptragic, that of the people who travelled on her as crew or passengersand now they must work through their grief, and her influence on subsequent maritime history after an existence of barely two decadestheir friendship, together.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1445667207</amazonuk>1471196585

{{newreview <!-- remove 5/8 -->Frontpage|isbn=1787333175|title=Eye Spy IIYou Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here|author=Tessa BuckleyBenji Waterhouse|rating=45|genre=Confident ReadersPopular Science|summary=Fresh from the success of solving its I was tempted to read ''You Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here'' after enjoying Adam Kay's first case, Eye Spy Investigations book {{amazonurl|isbn=1509858636|title=This is certainly up for another. So twins Alex and Donna jump at the chance Going to investigate Hurt}}, a glorious mixture of insight into the strange things happening at workings of the PrioryNHS, home humour and autobiography. ''You Don't Have to school friend Jimmy Devlinbe Mad... Alex doesn't believe ' promised the same elements but moved from physical problems to mental illness and the work of a psychiatrist. I did wonder whether it was acceptable to be looking for humour in ghosts this setting but the laughter is directed at a situation rather than a person and he it is very keen to persuade Donna that they don't existalways delivered with empathy and understanding.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1788032667</amazonuk>

{{newreview <!-- remove 4/8 -->Frontpage|author= Geoffrey ArnoldMariana Enriquez|title= HuntedA Sunny Place for Shady People|rating= 45|genre= Science FictionShort Stories|summary=Tullia learns about survival in the bush when she Mariana Enriquez writes horror that is taken hostage and later saves a youth's life during a hunt. Adopted into a Bushman family and the tribedisturbingly real, achieving this uncanny familiarity by basing her paranormal plots on gritty realities: her presence stirs disparate feelings amongst the young men and women, a mixture settings include an abandoned field full of awe, desiredisused refrigerators due to an urban planning mishap, fear an overcrowded homeless shelter and hate. Living a very different life, Qwelby, Tullia's twin, is deeply shocked by the violence on Earthcrime-ridden neighbourhood where safety meetings are routine - all within Argentina. As he is rescued by his four best friends from the Pit The circumstances of Despair, he experiences his first feelings for Tamina, a girl he has known for years. Feelings which become much stronger for another girl he tries to help during a violent attack from his own world as he and Tullia seek to restore their telepathic link. Forming a connection with the twins during the attack, the girl, Xaala, is charged by her master with monitoring their attempts to mentally reconnect – and to prevent them. Xaala is torn between her mixed feelings for characters are so plausible that the twins and obeying her orders. Meanwhile, on the planet Vertazia and in secret, Quelby's family and friends build what they hope will be the first ever inter-dimensional transport. On supernatural or otherworldly horror which seeps into these spaces adopts a short test run, the village where he is staying is discovered. When Quelby finds out he is being watched, he flees from the village..similarly tangible texture.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1785891855</amazonuk>1803511230

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Ed McDonald Onyi Nwabineli|title= Blackwing: The Raven's Mark Book OneAllow Me to Introduce Myself|rating= 4.5|genre= Fantasy General Fiction|summary= Perfect Anuri spent her childhood on display to the world, thanks to her step-mother Ophelia's increasingly popular presence on social media, where she posted every step of Anuri's childhood for fans of Scott Lynchsponsorships and influencer deals and, Joe Abercrombie and Mark Lawrencebasically, this dark adventure monetary gain. Now Anuri is gripping in her twenties and bloody; it she is a twisted story that spins a web of deceitslowly trying to regain her confidence and to get her life back, suing her step-mother to take down the content about her. Nothing Anuri is as it seemsbattling alcoholism, failing to start her PhD, as ageless powers manipulate undergoing therapy and secretly abusing people online and control receiving money from them for doing so. Most importantly, she is desperately worried about her little sister, who is the lives new focus of the charactersOphelia's online empire. The world is a staging ground Can she save her sister, all leading to one dramatic confrontation that has been a century in and perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the making.same time?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>147322201X</amazonuk>0861546873

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jeff Brown and Rob BiddulphDavid Chadwick|title=Flat StanleyHeadload of Napalm

|genre=Emerging ReadersThrillers|summary=It''Stanley was four feet talls September 1973 in Hicks, about California. Hicks is a Mojave desert town of a few thousand people with its nearest neighbours of LA and Las Vegas both a significant drive away. Not much happens in Hicks. A silver mine and a foot widedefence contractor are the main local employers but otherwise, there's not much of note other than dive bars and half an inch thickJoshua trees. Life is quiet, until....'' |isbn= B0D321VJ76}}{{Frontpage|author=Tom Percival|title=The Wrong Shoes|rating=5|genre=Confident ReadersYes, there|summary=Will's proof that this life is difficult, in a multitude of ways. He is bullied because he has 'the original text wrong shoes', he has the wrong shoes because his dad can't work and doesn't have enough money for even the most basic of this classic childrenthings like food, and his dad can's book – t work because he lost his job at least it's not been updated to metricthe college, was working a cash-in-hand job on a building site and had an accident. So while Throw into that mix the illustrations fact that his mum and dad are newseparated, we get the real dealand Will's life seems bleak in every direction. And yet, with the young Stanley squished one nighthe still has a tiny amount of hope. He is good at art, and clings to such an extent the moments of joy when he can limbo under shut doorsis drawing, that feel like a light at the end of a long, get airmailed dark tunnel.|isbn=1398527122}}{{Frontpage|author=Sylvie Cathrall|title=A Letter to America the Luminous Deep|rating=5|genre=Science Fiction|summary= There are few greater joys than a book which lives up to visit relatives, become a kite for his younger brother to play with, and morecompelling premise. But then you don't need to update perfectionAnd this is one of them.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1405288108</amazonuk>0356522776

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kate Ellis1786482126|title=The Mermaid's Scream Janus Stone (Wesley PetersonDr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths|rating=4.5

|summary=In 1884 a wealthy young woman became infatuated with Builders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the man who ran a travelling puppet show. Wesite was going to hold seventy-five 'luxury'll follow apartments - when they discovered the story bones of John Lipton's courtship through excerpts from his journala child beneath a doorway. In August 2016 Zac Wilkinson There was writing the biography of the reclusive novelist Wynn Stanilandno skull. Was this a ritual killing or murder? Inevitably, Dr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. It's not easy work difficult as Staniland isnRuth knows, but Nelson doesn't inclined to give more away than he has to and , that she is unwilling to discuss pregnant with his child as a result of the one thing which the public will want to know about: his wife's suicide which seemed to follow a scene from his most famous booknight they spent together some three months ago. Wilkinson Her condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is doing his best prone to drum up interest in the forthcoming book: he does talks at local libraries which are well attended and he was seemingly on his way to one sudden bouts of these talks when he disappearedsickness.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0349413118</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Naoki Higashida and David MitchellJoan Didion|title=Fall Down Seven Times, Get Up Eight: A Young Man's Voice From the Silence The Year of AutismMagical Thinking|rating= 4.5|genre= ReferenceAutobiography|summary=Naoki Higashida was only 13 years old when he wrote the international best-seller This book is Joan Didion''The Reason I Jump.'' The book was popular because it gave a rare glimpse into the workings s heartbreaking autobiographical account of the autistic mind, as told from the unique perspective of a teenager with non-verbal autismgrief she endured following her husband's sudden death. Naoki communicates by using an alphabet grid, or by tracing letters Books that shed light on the palm of taboo topics like death are such a transcriberbeautiful and necessary resource to help people feel less alone. Despite this slow Didion unpicks unpleasant feelings surrounding death like self-pity, denial and laborious method of writingdelusion and makes them utterly normal, he has published several books in his native Japan, and manages lends them a human face to give public presentations to raise awareness of his condition. ''Fall Down 7 Times Get up 8'' reintroduces us to Naoki as a young adult in his 20s and explains how his perspectives on life have changed since writing his first bookwear.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1444799088</amazonuk>0007216858

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Caz Frear0008551324|title= Sweet Little LiesThe Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster|rating= 4.5|genre= ThrillersCrime|summary= In 1998 a girl called Maryanne disappears in IrelandIt's unusual for anyone from the Hardie family to approach the police. Neither side likes or has any respect for the other. In 2017 a woman called Alice But Davie Hardie is found dead struggling in London. In both cases, Detective Constable Cat Kinsella is coincidentally close by, but sheprison and he's more worried by prepared to tell the fact police where the body of a missing person is buried and who was responsible for her father death. This person, he promises, is toosomeone big and it will be worth the police doing what he wants. And what he cannot wants is to be trustedtransferred to an open prison to serve the remainder of his sentence and to get an early parole date.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785763350</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Mayim Bialik|title= Girling Up|rating= 4.5|genre= Children Not much to ask, is it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and she's Noneven prepared to do the other thing that Hardie demanded -Fiction|summary= Aimed at teenagers, this book focuses on growing up as a girl, or ''Girling up'' if you will, make certain that DS Max Craigie and anyone who works with him is kept well away from what it means to transition from school girl to grown up, via that hideous detour of teenage years's happening.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0399548602</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Philippa Pearce and Cate James1739526910|title=The Ghost in AnnieWhere I's Room (Little Gems)ve Not Been Lost|author=Glen Sibley

|genre=Dyslexia FriendlyGeneral Fiction|summary=Emma is on ''One year after a family holiday in an older relativesuicide attempt blows apart musician Brian O’Malley's seaside cottagelife, where she is he arrives in an unfamiliar Devon town to sleep in the room in the atticrecover. Her brother has passed on what Living with an unexpected housemate at his former manager’s holiday home, he says dreams of reconnecting with everything he has overheard – that it is hauntedlost. But even with the mementos of the person that once lived there all around heras those tentative plans falter, and with he becomes swept up in a strange feeling local world of being watchedunlikely friendships, even with the stormy winds knocking tree limbs on to the window – Emma can sleep through it allmobile discos and surprising romantic possibilities. But that's not to say things will forever be that way…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781126852</amazonuk>'

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=0008405026|title=Svetlana Alexievich, Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky A Stranger in the Family (translatorsMaeve Kerrigan 11)|titleauthor=The Unwomanly Face of WarJane Casey

|genre=HistoryCrime|summary=It''War''s sixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. She was never found and the investigation ground to a halt. Now, says Svetlana Alexievichher mother, ''is first of all murderHelena, and then hard workher father are dead in their bed. And then simply ordinary life: singing Initially, falling in love, putting your hair in curlers…it looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but there''. This extraordinary book is a collection s something about the positioning of first-hand accounts by Russian fighting women in the Second World Warbodies that makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and her boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. A million women joined Russian military forces What looked as soldiers of all ranks, medics, pilots, drivers, snipers, cryptographers. Most were very young, little more than girls of 18 or 19. They were passionate about defending their homeland and often extremely keen though it was going to join up, returning again be an open-and again to recruitment offices until someone could be persuaded to take them-shut case is now a complex double murder. Their ambition was to help their brothers, fathers, husbands to fight Kerrigan is convinced that the terrible invader. They were trained and sent to the frontexplanation lies in Rosalie's disappearance: others (such as Derwent's boss, where they were greeted at first with disappointment and disgust by fighting men, who had hoped for reinforcements of able-bodied men. The women had to prove themselvesUna Burt) are less convinced.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141983523</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Alison Jay1529077745|title= Alison Jay's ABCThe Dark Wives (D I Vera Stanhope)|author=Ann Cleeves|rating= 4.5|genre= For SharingCrime|summary= At first glanceA man walking his dog in the early morning discovered the body of a man in the park near Rosebank, this is a beautiful but fairly standard alphabet book: care home for troubled teens. The dead man was Josh - one letter per page with a nice big picture of an apple or the care workers who was due to work a panda front and centre shift the night before but who had never turned up. D I Vera Stanhope is called in to investigate the murder - after allbut her only clue is the disappearance of one of the residents, fourteen-year-old Chloe Spencer. Some people believe that Chloe was responsible for the ABC format death but Vera thinks this is pretty restrictive, isnunlikely as the girl't s diary makes it? And truth be told, clear that's all most small people will see first time round. But look a little closer . she adored Josh. She knows that she has to find Chloe to discover what happened to Josh. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1787410196</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Anna Kovecses1399613073|title=Opposite ThingsMoral Injuries|author=Christie Watson

|genre=For SharingThrillers|summary=Rearing Olivia, Laura and Anjali met on the first day of medical school and their friendship would keep them inseparable for a quarter of a child century. Olivia is ruthlessly ambitious, which is not a competition, but have bonus when you aim to be a conversation with cardiothoracic surgeon. Laura is a certain type of parent perfectionist and they won't agreea trauma doctor. Their child can speak four languagesAnjali is the free spirit of the group and she becomes a GP. Their child wrote their When we first sonnet meet them they're at the age of threea drug and alcohol-fuelled party and it's going to end in tragedy. Their child can be seen wistfully looking into We don't know who suffered the middle distance just wanting to play on tragedy or the bouncy castleconsequences. For me, I am happy, if my child is happy; Twenty-five years later there will be an eerily similar event that doing sums, or eating play-dohwill impact the three friends. However, even with a relaxed attitude to educating your kidThis time, it can be fun to learn a little, especially when a book is as fun as Little Mouse's ''Opposite Things''their teenage children who are involved.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1786030381</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Michael Morpurgo and Shoo Rayner0241636604|title= Mudpuddle FarmThe Trading Game: Hee-Haw HoorayA Confession|author=Gary Stevenson|rating= 4.5|genre= Emerging ReadersAutobiography|summary=Two collected stories from Mudpuddle Farm series – If you were to bring up an image of a city banker in your mind, you''Nowt re unlikely to Worry About'' think of someone like Gary Stevenson. A hoodie and ''Ticketyjeans replaces the pin-Boo''. How will stripe suit and his background is the animals react when the sky goes strange East End, where he was familiar with violence, poverty and horrifying noises abound? Changes are afoot that could mark injustice. There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to the end London School of Mudpuddle farm; or Economics. Stevenson is it just bright - extremely bright - and he has a facility with numbers which most of us can only envy. He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to be stupid. It was his ability at what was, essentially, a new beginning?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0008241988</amazonuk>card game which got him an internship with Citibank. Eventually, this turned into permanent employment as a trader.

{{newreview <!-- remove 1/8 -->Frontpage|author=Stephan SantiagoLeanne Egan|title=Returning HomeLover Birds|rating=34.5|genre=Spirituality and ReligionTeens|summary=[[:Category:Stephan Santiago|Stephan Santiago]] has experienced life in a way When new girl, Isabel, moves to Lou's hometown of Liverpool from London Lou immediately feels Isabel's disdain for everything around her. A misunderstanding between them leaves them hating each other, but Lou feels her pulse racing every time she looks at Isabel or speaks with her, and that's led him to believe wedefinitely because Isabel makes her feel so cross, isn're all on a soul journey back home – that place we inhabited before we were born. t it? This book Because Lou is straight, isn't she? Even though none of her relationships with boys have gone very well so far, and she's never had a guide as good kiss with any of them? So she just finds herself watching Isabel, and wanting to how we can optimise this journey for ourselveshang out with her because fighting with her is fun, those around us and our children.she definitely just hates Isabel, doesn't she?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1504305272</amazonuk>000862657X

{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1009473085|title=The Conservative Effect 2010 - 2024|author=Julia BlackburnAnthony Seldon and Tom Egerton (Editors)|rating=5|genre=Politics and Society|summary=Sometimes it's simpler to explain a book by describing what it ''isn't'' and that applies to ''The Conservative Effect: 2010-2024 - 14 Wasted Years?''. If you're looking for an easy read which will deliver the inside story about what ''really'' happened on certain occasions, then this isn't the book for you. If that's what you're looking for, I don't think Anthony Seldon's book, {{amazonurl|isbn=B0BH7SKG2S|title=ThreadsJohnson at 10}}, can be bettered for those tumultuous years. It's a compelling read and should be compulsory for anyone who thinks Johnson should return to politics. ''The Conservative Effect'' is an entirely different beast. It's the seventh book in a series which looks at the impact a government has made and co-editor Sir Anthony Seldon regards this as the most important. This book follows the well-established format: a series of experts from various fields review the state of the nation when the coalition took over in 2010, the changes that occurred and the situation in 2024.}}{{Frontpage|author=Max Boucherat|title=The Delicate Last Life of John CraskeLori Mills

|genre=BiographyConfident Readers|summary=John Craske was a fisherman, from a family of fishermen, who became too ill to go to sea. He was born in Sheringham We meet Lori on the north Norfolk coast in 1881 and would eventually die in first evening she's got the Norwich hospital house to herself – no neighbour to pop in 1943 after a life which could have been defined by ill health. There were various explanations for what ailed him, what caused him to sink into a stupourbabysitter poorly, sometimes for years mother at a time and he was work, just an avidly rule-breaking eleven year old, on occasions described as 'an imbecile'her lonesome. But John had What could possibly go wrong? Snuggled in a natural artistic talentblanket fort, she has one main intention, albeit and that his work had is to be done log on to Voxminer, the available surfaces world-building, critter-collecting game that is a hit in his homeLori's world. Chair seats, window sillsBut first Lori has a tiny inkling that this stormy night doesn't find herself entirely on her own, and then she finds something even more spooky. For the backs of doors all carried his wonderful pictures server she and her bestie and nobody else should be able to enter shows signs of the seatampering. Then he moved When malevolent eyes spark up on to embroideryher phone screen, producing wonderful pictures of and her safe place in the Norfolk coast - andgame has been doctored – well, most famously, of the evacuation at Dunkirk.where is a girl to turn?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099582198</amazonuk>0008666482

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= M J TjiaFyodor Dostoyevsky|title= She Be DamnedWhite Nights|rating= 45|genre= Crime (Historical) Short Stories|summary= London, 1863: prostitutes As always in the Waterloo area are turning up deadDostoyevsky, their sexual organs mutilated and removed. When another girl goes missing, fears grow that the killer may have claimed their latest victimcharacter work is sublime. The police are at One is never left wondering what a loss character is thinking or feeling because Dostoyevsky lays bare their innermost dispositions and so it falls to courtesan and professional detective, Heloise Chancey, to investigate. With the assistance of her trusty Chinese maid, Amah Li Leen, Heloise inches closer to the truth. But when Amah is implicated in the brutal plot, Heloise must reconsider whom she can trust, before the killer strikes againtemperaments with remarkable clarity.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>178507931X</amazonuk>0241619785

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Sarah Powell0008385068|title= Search and Find: Pride & Prejudice: A Jane Austen Search and Find BookThe Midnight Feast|author=Lucy Foley|rating= 4.5|genre= Emerging ReadersThrillers|summary= Search It's midsummer on the Dorset coast and find books are usually aimed guests gather at childrenThe Manor. They It's their opening weekend and splendid celebrations are a good bit of fun, but they are also a good study tool for adult readers alikepromised. It's all headed up by Francesca Meadows. Jane Austen is a fantastic novelist, but The Manor was her style of writing can be daunting ancestral home and she's converted it into an impressive retreat for those not used to such heavy prose. It is very easy to become lost in the myriad of dialogue, characters wealthy and eventsfamous. I find a good plot summary helps when approaching her works Her husband, Owen, this was especially so in the case architect and work is still ongoing on parts of the perplexing site. The heat is oppressive and amongst the guests are enemies as well as friends. Old scores are going to be settled and it won't be long-winded Emmabefore a body is found. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1783708271</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Patrice LawrenceJames Baldwin|title=Indigo DonutGiovanni's Room|rating=4.5|genre=TeensLiterary Fiction |summary=''In BaileyGiovanni's opinionRoom'' follows the narrator David, Indigo didn't look like she needed an American man living in Paris, as he navigates his torturous affair with Giovanni, an Italian bartender he meets in a herogay bar. One by oneWhile David is engaged to Hella, she looked Monawho is travelling in Spain, Saskia, Betti and Kay the real tension in the eye. Then she gave them novel arises not from his infidelity but from the finger: slow motiondeeper conflict within himself. Headphones on again, she sauntered off towards the science wing. Hell. That was... She was...'' ThatIt is David's Indigo for you! Indigo is seventeen. And on her umpteenth school. Pitt Academy is a last chance for Indigo crippling shame and her foster mother Keeley is anxious that she makes it there. But it's not easy for Indigo - her reputation for kicking off always precedes her. And that's the least denial of it - because someone always finds out about her past: his sexuality that ''she'' is the tiny little girl who was found by the body after her father killed her motherultimately dooms his relationship with Giovanni.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1444927183</amazonuk>0141186356

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Bethan WoollvinB0DGDJRHYD|title=RapunzelNowhere Man|author=Deborah Stone

|genre=For SharingGeneral Fiction|summary=Ah RapunzelIn a quiet suburban house, Patrick is making his final plans. A meticulous man, he makes sure of every preparation, down to the last detail. Some last reflections, how well we all know about her long golden hair and her difficult-then he says goodbye to-escape tower! Here, howeverhis wife, the story is told with a twistworld, because there is no handsome Prince who comes riding by to save Rapunzel from and his life. It's horribly sad. At work in her incarceration. Noshop, instead we see Rapunzel his wife Diana is smart enough to figure fending off yet another phone call about her own way outageing and ailing mother, defeating the witch, and going on to who needs extricating from yet another accident. It will be a successful witch-hunting careerwhile before Diana realises what Patrick has done.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1509842675</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Catherine Barr and Hanako ClulowVirginie Despentes|title=10 Reasons to Love an ElephantKing Kong Theory

|genre=Children's Non-FictionAutobiography |summary=Ten reasons to love an elephant, eh? Well, personally, I've never needed ten reasons as they've always been my favourite large animal, the gentle giants of Africa King Kong Theory'' is a hard-hitting memoir and Indiafeminist manifesto, but it was good which can be seen as a call to find out more about themarms for women in a phallocentric society broken at its core. Perhaps the most surprising fact which I discovered was that they live Originally written in herds headed by their ''grandmothers''. Female elephants and their calves stay together and French, the oldest female elephant book is the one a collection of essays in charge which Virginie Despentes explores her experiences as she knows where a woman through the complex prism of her varied life: from rape to find food and water - sex work and she knows her herdpornography. She remembers about people tooThough these discussions are intertwined, their placement within the book can feel somewhat disjointed, a reflection of their original form as independent essays.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>184780943X</amazonuk>191309734X

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Andrew LaceyJames Baldwin|title= The English Civil War in 100 FactsGiovanni's Room|rating= 4.5|genre= HistoryLiterary Fiction |summary= The '100 Facts' series is now sufficiently well-established Giovanni's Room'' follows the narrator David, an American man living in Paris, as he navigates his torturous affair with Giovanni, an Italian bartender he meets in a guarantee of useful introductory historiesgay bar. This latest additionWhile David is engaged to Hella, who is travelling in Spain, recounting the struggle between King real tension in the novel arises not from his infidelity but from the deeper conflict within himself. It is David's crippling shame and Parliament, is no exceptiondenial of his sexuality that ultimately dooms his relationship with Giovanni.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1445649950</amazonuk>0141186356

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Peter CottrillAshley Hickson-Lovence|title= Terrible True Tales from the Tower of LondonWild East|rating= 4.5|genre= Children's Non-FictionTeens|summary=The history of the infamous Tower of London Written in verse, this is full of gore and death. Its rich history dates back Ronny's story, a young black fourteen year old boy from Hackney who suddenly has to move to the eleventh century Norwich and since then it has played host to many famous figures, many of them ill-fated prisonersstart at a mostly white school. The history of the Tower move is told within this bookinitiated by Ronny's pages, only this time itmum who is worried for Ronny's told by the ravens that live theresafety after a tragic event, and so Ronny finds himself trying to settle in a new town, a new school, and keep himself out of trouble. They are the Tower's guardians who reside there permanently due He listens to an ancient legend that all music constantly, and has always dreamed of London will fall should they being a rapper. But now, in this new school, his teacher encourages him to be removedpart of a poetry writing workshop group and, slowly, Ronny begins to see the connections between rap and poetry, and after centuries of watching over the Tower they have their own version power of history to tellcreativity and crafting your words.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1406376884</amazonuk>0241645441

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Cara BlackAlba de Cespedes |title= Murder in Saint-GermainForbidden Notebook|rating= 4|genre= CrimeLiterary Fiction|summary=Who is Aimee Leduc? I have to be honest This Italian work of feminist fiction holds an air of suspense and say that though this novel may be seventeenth in series tension from the best-selling Cara Blackmoment our protagonist, it is in fact my first outing with the deft Parisienne detective. And soValeria Cossati, if I'm honest, I wasn't sure what to expect. How does a character with so many investigations under purchases her belt retain the gusto we've come to expect from all good literary detectives? Moreoverforbidden notebook, how does an author with so well established a character as Aimee Leduc keep her interesting enough for those of us coming late to and learns about herself in the party? After reading ''Murder in Saint-Germain'' I would suggest that Black manages it quite easilymost intimate and revealing ways.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1616957700</amazonuk>1782278222

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Pierre Lemaitre Ottessa Moshfegh|title=My Year of Rest and Frank Wynne (translator)Relaxation|rating=3|genre=Literary Fiction|titlesummary=Three Days At best, this novel is a scathing critique of modern society and reveals the fragility of human relationships; at worst, it is the cynical, predictable and slightly trite tale of an unlikeable protagonist. This unlikely heroine, a Lifeslim, attractive and newly orphaned girl in her twenties is disillusioned with the world, but resolves not to lose sleep over it: in fact, her solution lies in her hibernation.|isbn=1784707422}}{{Frontpage|author=Jo Callaghan|title=Leave No Trace

|summary=Christmas week, 1999, and Antoine hasn't got When a man is found crucified on the best of situations. Some of his friends have parted company with him because top of the new-fangled Playstation, which his mother refuses to let him waste his time on. He's built a treehouse all by himselfhill in Nuneaton, and decided it was solely DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to woo the girl next door that he lovescase alongside her sidekick, but she's rejected it. And his best company, the dog from the other house next door, was injured in a hit and run, and shot to be put out of its miseryAI detective Lock. In the process of angrily demolishing the treehouse, heIt's visited by his their first live case together, having previously been very friendly and adorable neighbour, the dog's six-year-old ownersuccessful with several cold cases. But when there is a second body found crucified a few days later, and Antoine's swung some of the wood at him – and killed him Kat is suddenly struggling with one fell a potential serial killer and a very foul sweephigh profile case that draws a lot of unwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. As Will they be able to solve the title suggestscase in time, there or will be a very tense few days and nights while Kat find herself taken off the guilt amasses with the lad – case and/or a lifetime , potentially, out of living on a knife-edge, where any false move could lead to him being found out…career?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>085705662X</amazonuk>139851120X

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Hendrik Groen and Hester Velmans (translator)B0DB64PYV5|title= The Secret Diary of Hendrik Groen, 83¼ years OldWhite Rose|author=Dave Baines|rating= 4.5|genre= General Dystopian Fiction|summary= As the old adage goesIn 2033, to walk a mile in someone elsesuperstorm known as the White Rose devastates the Northern Hemisphere. And it's shoes is to gain some understanding of what it is to be that person. Admittedly, Hendrik Groen isn't much up for long walks any more, but he does acquire not a swish mobility scooter to zoom around in; one could say storm that we get to zoom a mile in Groen's shoesgathers, and ohwreaks havoc, what fun shoes he wears!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405924004</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Cathy Scott-Clark and Adrian Levy|title= The Exile|rating= 4|genre= Politics and Society|summary= An account of the fate of Al Qaeda and the Bin Laden family since the events of 9/11, ''The Exile'' plunges into the murky waters of international terrorism, espionage and politicsthen dissipates. Detailed and meticulousInstead, it hovers across half the book tackles the subject from all anglesEarth with its octopus-like tentacles, providing a panoramic view of the subject not giving up and acting to enlighten and inform the readernever going away.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408858762</amazonuk>