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{{newreview
|author=Gabrielle Donnelly
|title=The Little Women Letters
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=I read the back cover blurb with delight and couldn't help but applaud Donnelly for her ingenuity. I loved the book ''Little Women'' when I read it many years ago and television adaptations keep it fresh for new generations. So, before I'd even turned to chapter one, I was loving this book. But will it live up to my lofty expectations?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0718156587</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|summary=A man whose nickname is Mole (and it suits him just perfectly) is released from prison. He's described as your average Joe Public, your man in the street so normal in every way that no one would look twice at him. And that's the point. He's clever and resourceful enough to blend into any crowd and in any situation. Now that he's served his time behind bars, has he become a reformed man? Is he going to opt for a lawful way of life from now on? You'd perhaps think so, wouldn't you?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904738737</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Duncan Hamilton
|title=The Unreliable Life of Harry the Valet: The Great Victorian Jewel Thief
|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
|summary=The story of Harry the Valet may not be particularly familiar to modern readers, but he was something of a celebrity in the Victorian age. He achieved notoriety by stealing thousands of pounds worth of jewels from the Dowager Duchess of Sutherland - much to the delight of many people who disliked the lady, which appears to have been pretty much everyone who ever met her. Having pulled off this audacious theft, Harry seemed to be invincible - but he was brought down by his love for a Gaiety Girl, and ended up facing a trial which the papers fell over themselves to report on.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846058139</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Alain Mabanckou
|title=Memoirs of a Porcupine
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=The protagonist of this novel is an ordinary Congolese porcupine until Papa Kibandi performs an ancient ritual involving a hallucinogenic cocktail called ''mayamvumbi'', and transforms him into his son's harmful double. The insecure younger Kibandi becomes more and more embittered as his life goes on, and sends his porcupine to 'eat' anybody he feels the least bit threatened by, a process whereby that person's life essence is sucked out, killing them instantly. Over one hundred victims later and following his master's death at the hands of a vengeful baby, our narrator retires to the hollow of a baobab tree where he writes this confessional.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846687675</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Jeanne Willis and Tony Ross
|title=The Nanny Goat's Kid
|rating=4
|genre=For Sharing
|summary=Nanny Goat really wanted a kid – more than anything else in the world, but it wasn't possible. Her sisters told her kids weren't all they were cracked up to be and she should be grateful. Eventually she decided that she would adopt a kid. Now, we all noticed that the kid didn't really look like a kid at all. In fact he looks suspiciously like a tiger and as Nanny Goat struggled to bring him up the differences became more and more obvious. Matters came to a head when Nanny Goat's sisters' kids went missing and the sisters blamed Nanny Goat's kid. Nanny goat might not have given birth to the kid but she still saw him as her child and when the sisters said that he should leave the herd she decided to go with him.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849390789</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Joy Cowley and Gavin Bishop
|title=Just One More
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=What happened when a dragon moved into the town's library? Or when Cowgirl Katie's horse went shopping and rode on the escalator? This fun collection of short stories is unusual, odd and very entertaining!
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1877467677</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Chris Van Allsburg
|title=Queen of the Falls
|rating=4.5
|genre=Children's Non-Fiction
|summary=Annie Edson Taylor was sixty-two years old and a widow. She didn't have very much money saved and she was worried about her future - until she had an inspiration. She would have a barrel made - a very stout and water-tight barrel - and she would be the first person to brave the thundering waters of Niagra Falls in this barrel. Chris Van Allsburgh tells us her story from the moment of inspiration right through to the times after the epic trip, but in truth the words are simpy there to eleborate on his wonderful drawings. They're so good that you could be forgiven for thinking that they're black and white photographs on occasions.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849392722</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Michaela Morgan and Katherine Lodge
|title=Kitty Kool's Beauty School
|rating=3.5
|genre=For Sharing
|summary=Kitty Kool has a new beauty school, and she's very excited about her opening day. However, when her makeovers for a grumpy crocodile, messy rabbit and spider don't go quite as they expected she worries that perhaps her beauty school isn't as fabulous as she'd first thought!
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340989920</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Sue Moorcroft
|title=Love and Freedom
|rating=4.5
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=Honor Sontag left her home in the States and came to the UK. Her career had hit a sticky patch but she was determined to take a four-month break in Brighton to think things over and get herself back together again. She needed a job that would help to supplement the money she had - and she definitely didn't want anything 'heavy'. The other thing that she didn't want was any sort of romantic entanglement. She's not even that tempted by the brother of her landlady, who's good looking, but his sister can't stop commenting about how irregularly he works although someone else mentions that he's on the buses. Not much of a starter there then.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906931666</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Sharon Rentta
|title=A Day with the Animal Doctors
|rating=5
|genre=For Sharing
|summary=It is going to be a very busy day for the animal doctors. There's a snake that needs unknotting, a leopard who has lost his spots and the inevitable dog who has swallowed an alarm clock. But today is going to be an important day for Terence too as he's going to be a doctor – just like his Mummy, who is a doctor every day. Terence packs his first aid kit (some VERY useful toys in there!) and off he goes to the hospital with Mummy.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1407116444</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Quintin Jardine
|title=Grievous Angel
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary=I recently read (and reviewed) Jardine's [[The Loner by Quintin Jardine|The Loner]] and found it an engaging work of fiction, so I was looking forward to dipping into my first ''Bob Skinner Mystery.'' I think the front cover alone may very well tempt readers with its attention-grabbing graphics which shouts out 'read me'.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755356934</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Richard Holmes
|title=Churchill's Bunker: The Secret Headquarters at the Heart of Britain's Victory
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=Nowadays, when there is a security threat it seems to be mandatory to whisk the leader and other important personages off to a secret location deep inside a mountain or in a distant forest, but Churchill fought his war – our war – from a series of basement rooms right in the heart of London and within sight of Buckingham Palace and the Houses of Parliament. The Cabinet War Rooms didn't have their own air supply, were infested with vermin and lacked proper toilet facilities, but they were Churchill's choice. He spent a few nights down in the CWR but usually lived in the No 10 Annex upstairs – throughout the worst of the bombing.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846682312</amazonuk>
}}