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[[Category:General Fiction|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|General Fiction]]==General fiction==__NOTOC__{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Haley Tanner1739526910|title=Vaclav and Lena|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Vaclav and Lena are both children of Russian immigrants, growing up in Brooklyn. Vaclav dreams of becoming a fantastic magician, with his friend Lena as his assistant, and as children they practise their routine together, making lists of the things theyWhere I'll need, the costumes they will wear and the tricks they will perform. Vaclav is confident and happy, but Lena is quiet, withdrawn and struggles with speaking English. Yet Vaclav believes, always, that they are destined to be together. Even when Lena disappears one day and is gone from his life for many years still he hopes that, somehow, he will find her again.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0434020443</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewve Not Been Lost|author=Jon Blake|title=69ers: A Novel About the 1969 Isle of Wight Festival of MusicGlen Sibley|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=In the summer of 1969''One year after a suicide attempt blows apart musician Brian O’Malley's life, as Thunderclap Newman proclaimed he arrives in their one and only musical claim an unfamiliar Devon town to famerecover. Living with an unexpected housemate at his former manager’s holiday home, there was something in the airhe dreams of reconnecting with everything he has lost. The alternative generation were talking about the recent Woodstock Festival But as those tentative plans falter, he becomes swept up in America, and eagerly looking forward to what promised to be a similar gathering, albeit on a smaller scale, at the Isle local world of Wight at the end of Augustunlikely friendships, where Bob Dylan was headliningmobile discos and surprising romantic possibilities.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1908105658</amazonuk>''
}}
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Ashdown won the Observer Best Debut Novels of the Year Jean lives on Jersey with her book [[Glasshopper by Isabel Ashdown|Glasshopper]], an excerpt mother where they are celebrating the end of which is given at the back of this bookoccupation. I decided During the war, Jean's father was arrested for listening to read it first a banned radio and soldiers took him away one night, leaving Jean and I must say that I immediately warmed to Ashown's style her mother waiting for years for news of writinghim. She seems to have a knack for down-to-earth language especially with teenagers As the British finally free the Channel islands from the Nazis, and young peoplethe war is finally over, their hopes rise that they will finally learn what became of him. SoBut will the truth come as a relief, I or will it raise further questions around what else happened during the war? Who was really looking forward to this book but I was also conscious of the fact that it had a lot to live up to. informer who told the Nazis about the radio? Will she be able to deliverAnd what other secrets have been kept throughout the occupation?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0956251552</amazonuk>1846976537
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Gabrielle DonnellyOnyi Nwabineli|title=The Little Women LettersAllow Me to Introduce Myself|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=I read Anuri spent her childhood on display to the back cover blurb with delight and couldnworld, thanks to her step-mother Ophelia's increasingly popular presence on social media, where she posted every step of Anuri't help but applaud Donnelly s childhood for sponsorships and influencer deals and, basically, monetary gain. Now Anuri is in her twenties and she is slowly trying to regain her confidence and to get her life back, suing her step-mother to take down the content about her ingenuity. I loved the book ''Little Women'' when I read it many years ago Anuri is battling alcoholism, failing to start her PhD, undergoing therapy and secretly abusing people online and television adaptations keep it fresh receiving money from them for new generationsdoing so. SoMost importantly, before Ishe is desperately worried about her little sister, who is the new focus of Ophelia'd even turned to chapter one, I was loving this books online empire. But will it live up to my lofty expectationsCan she save her sister, and perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the same time?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0718156587</amazonuk>0861546873
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Caitlin Davies1529153298|title=The Ghost List of Lily PainterSuspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey
|rating=5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=When Annie Sweet buys a home with her It's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly...) She's not what's worrying Miv's family, she feels inexplicably bonded to it from first sightthough. Women have been disappearing. As life brings unwelcome changes for her Well, they've been murdered, she decides but to uncover the history of her house to provide a distraction and to understand her feelings about her homehave 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091937035</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Diane Chamberlain|title=The Midwife Miv's Confession|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=I feel upset because she's overheard that I've barely finished a Chamberlain review when up pops another of her books - such seems father wants to be proliferation. The story opens with move the build-up to the death of middle-aged midwife, Noellefamily 'Down South'. Her friendsWhen you're from Yorkshire, all Down South is a little younger than herself and with families of their ownfrightening, foreign place, are busy getting on with their daily livesbest avoided. But someone - suddenly - remembers they havenFor Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and she't heard from Noelle for some daysll do anything to prevent that. ItShe's unusual as this group of chatty friends are forever phoning, texting not worried about the dangers or popping round to each otherthat her Mum's housesstopped talking - to anyone.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0778304663</amazonuk>
}}
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The authorWe tend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, but she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, Stefan Merrill BlockNew York, is writing about members of his own family in December 1923 and only moved to Athens when she was thirteen. Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 'Callas'The Storm at to make it more manageable in the Door''States. The story opens at the end, if you When she was back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get my drift. We see appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the elderly grandmother Katherine in Nazi occupation by a bit of a spot, wondering whether to open mother who mercilessly exploited her and then read a bunch of papers. These papers (these red-hot papers) are the words and thoughts made no secret of her husband Frederick from his time in a mental institution. If she opens thempreference for her elder sister, then it will be opening a veritable can of wormsJackie. Does she or doesn't she?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571269591</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview|title=A Conspiracy Of FriendsFrontpage
|author=Alexander McCall Smith
|title=The Perfect Passion Company
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=SoThe Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, here we are again back with our friends run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the online apps in Corduroy Mansions in thisproviding a more personal, their third booktailored service. I found ''A Conspiracy Of Friends'' Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and look after the business, as Ness is planning to take a little slow trip to Canada to start get away for a while. Katie is coming out of a break up witha bad boyfriend, and I worried that perhaps I had tired of so jumps at the characterschance to come home to Edinburgh. And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, but a few chapters later the pace picked up thanks to 44 Scotland Street and once again I was thoroughly entertained by the quirky Isabel Dalhousie novels, but with some new characterswho quickly begin to charm. Katie has no experience in running a business, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, interesting thoughts and ideas.there's always her very helpful (and rather handsome) neighbour, William, to lend a hand…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846971829</amazonuk>1846976596
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=In The Sea There Are CrocodilesDean Koontz|authortitle=Fabio GedaThe Bad Weather Friend|rating=4.5|genre=General FictionParanormal|summary=''In The Sea There Are Crocoiles'' Benny is based on having a true story about a young boy left by terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and his mother to fend for himselfhouse gets trashed. As if that wasn't difficult enoughOh, and someone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to his home, heand it's stranded in Pakistan while possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the rest of thing that has trashed his family are in war-ravaged Afghanistanhouse! The thing is, Benny is the very last person to deserve all this bad luck. It's He is a collaboration between Afghan Enaiatollah and nice person. A really nice person. So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to his Italian translatorhouse is a new friend, a bad weather friend called Spike, Fabio - this book who has been sent to help him since Benny is already clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a big hit with Italian readers good person. Spike is going to take care of Benny, and will certainly take care of Benny's enemies, if he, Benny, and Harper (it says so on the back cover blurba waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure). Enaiatollah eventually claimed political asylum in Italycan figure out who exactly they are.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857560085</amazonuk>1662500491
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=Forgetting ZoeKatherine Howe|authortitle=Ray RobinsonA True Account|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=''Forgetting Zoe'' opens Hannah Masury is living in Boston, having been sent to live with Thurmana family who run an inn, one of the two main charactersand being made to work there from a young age. We see that his home life When she hears there is dreadful - with to be a violent hanging of some pirates in the town, she decides to go and cruel father watch. Enthralled and horrified in equal measure, Hannah finds herself embroiled in a mother who is weak. And as an only child (to rather elderly parents) Thurman hears his fatheryoung boy's violence directed death at his motherthe hands of two vicious pirates. Their home is out of the way She hides away, so that they don't find and kill her too, and in an isolated spotthen to escape them completely she runs away to sea, so really dressing as a boy and joining the three of them form notorious Ned Low's pirate ship as a very unhappy threesome indeedcabin boy. The reader is left She soon finds herself in no doubt as to the nature thick of the father with lines such asthings when there is a mutiny on board, ''As a form and from there we are caught up in her rip roaring tale of punishment Father would press one of his hands down life on top of Thurman's head so forcefully that Thurman's legs would buckle... that blood would trickle down his forehead..the ocean waves.''|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>009953763X</amazonuk>0861547438
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1471180158|title=The Poison TreeMaybe Tomorrow|author=Erin KellyPenny Parkes|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Karen is ending her university years and has her future mapped out. But then she meets BibaJamie Matson works in an upper-class grocery store, for a man who opens doors to 's a control freak with all the subtlety of a world shehalf brick. Jamie's never seen beforeson, Bo, 'has his problems'. He's asthmatic and to the type of intense friendship more you read, the more you'll suspect that shehe's never experienced either. As Karen embarks on this friendship, she collects all kinds of new experiences along the wayautistic spectrum. At the start of that summer, Sometimes Jamie needs to take time off at short notice - she could never have predicted just how indelible 's a frequent flier in the mark left by local A&E and sometimes Bo's not fit enough to go to school. Missed shifts or the friendship would turn out need to beaway on time to pick Bo up from school are occasions when Jamie can be controlled and put in the wrong. It was going to come to a head.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444701053</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Clare JacobB0CKD1L5JL|title=Ophelia in PiecesRadio Free Olympia|author=Jeffrey Dunn
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Barrister Ophelia Dormandy had been working hard – well, overworking – for the last six months and on the eve of her thirty-ninth birthday she decided that she would go home early and cook a decent meal for her husband and herselfPetr is an orphan. She even decided that she would wear Rescued by the red dress which Patrick liked. But when she got home Patrick strange, reclusive Bear, he is brought up far from bustling cities and their son, Alexbusy human society, were eating ice creams. He didn't seem in the least interested in dinner and then admitted that he was having an affairforests of Washington's Olympic Peninsula. Ophelia threw him out – After Bear dies and then began the long haul of trying to be a decent single parent brief sojourn in human company, and armed with only a job where pirate radio transmitter, Petr goes on a journey through the hours were long forest, broadcasting the strange, wild and the money uncertainrarely heard voices he encounters.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907595147</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Elliott HallSarah Marsh|title=The Children's CrusadeA Sign of Her Own|rating=43.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=We back-track several years to get the low-down and history on Felix. It's interestingAfter a bout of scarlet fever as a child, very interestingEllen Lark loses her hearing. He's like some sort Suddenly plunged into a world of American 007 but not all of his plans have been successfulsilence, everything about her life changes. Some have back-fired and he has Living in a time when the scars to prove it. In fact although in his prime yearsuse of sign language was seen as something only savages do, Felix could be healthier and Ellen is forced sent to take regular medication. And throughout the story Hall tells us why that a school where she istaught to lip read, but physically restrained from signing. Chapter TwoFrom here, which sees Felix she ends up in Nevada opens with another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the no-nonsense line ''I came to Las Vegas to kill deaf and using a mansystem called Visible Speech.'' But who? And why? We get At the answers all same time, Bell is working on other inventions and ideas, and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in Hall's good timea complicated tangle of espionage.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1848540752</amazonuk>1035401614
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=J Robert LennonB0BC3YTCMR|title=CastleGood Girls Die|author=Ayura Ayira
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=In the late winter of 2006 Erich Loesch returns to Gerrysburg, NY (Pop 2310 and falling) and buys six hundred or so acres of undeveloped land on the edge of the county''This story is not for everyone. ''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Rachel Genn1472263936|title=The CureFigurine|author=Victoria Hislop|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=We get the background on Eugene early on It was in 1968 that Helena McCloud made her first trip to Greece. She was alone: her mother, Greek by birth, had left the story; family home and refused to return, but Mary and Hamish (Helena's parents) felt that it would be a troubled childhood with an alcoholic father who was often not at homepity if Helena grew up without knowing her grandparents or understanding her Greek heritage. Instead he was working on a building site Her trip to the family apartment in London and drinking away much up-market Kolonaki would be the first of his wagesseveral annual visits. His wife She grew to love her grandmother and children didnthe family't appear to benefit much s maid, Dina, but was wary - and frightened - either financially or emotionallyof her grandfather, retired general Stamatis Papagiannis. Eugene still bears plenty He was proud of invisible scars from that time his close connections to the Junta and now grown up, would like expected his family to carve out uphold his own path and thinks a fresh start would be a good ideavalues but saw no reason to accommodate them. Although itHis prejudices included Helena's not altogether a fresh start as he chooses to work on the same construction site as his red hair and green eyes - inherited from her father and even lives in the same lodgings in the East End's Scottish ancestors. Is this his own unique way of exorcising some ghosts?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184901583X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Cathy GlassDean Koontz|title=RunAfter Death|rating=3|genre=General Fiction|summary= Michael Mace, Head of Security, at a top secret biological research facility, is among 55 people who die when a virus is released in a bio-hazard accident. Finding himself in a makeshift mortuary, covered in plastic, he has a sense that something very, Mummyvery bad has happened to him – and only him – as he sits up and looks around at the shrouded bodies of his dead friends and former colleagues. As he recovers his senses, Runhe realises that there is something different about him; he can ''feel'' everything. ''Everything''. Michael isn't ''Michael'' anymore.|isbn=1662500467}} {{Frontpage|isbn=B0BVDC2VWH|title=The Grave Listeners|author=William Frank
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Aisha The village is a young, beautiful isolated and successful woman who has worked hard to get where she ispoor. But there is one thing missing in her life: It's surrounded by a manWitching Forest. Still living with her parents at And the age villagers subsist largely by farming Uphegia plants - its bread-like fruit provides nutrition and its blossom provides herbal medicines. The black wood of thirty the forest provides heat and inexperienced when it comes to menwarmth, roofs on homes, and even gallows, Aisha wonders if she will ever find a husbandneeded. But then she spots The fear of being buried alive is an ad existential superstition in the paper village and plucking up all her courage and determinationthat is the reason Volushka, a drunken, self-indulgent, she decides to reply. This could be her only chance at love and she doesn't want to waste itlazy lout of a man is tolerated.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007299281</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Blake MorrisonB0BYF82CXT|title=The Last WeekendSemi-Detached|author=Deborah Stone
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The book opens ''Bill and Amanda are living in a semi-detached house, stuck in the sunny month a depressing rut of June boredom and disappointment, when Terry and Fiona – glamorous, successful and very much in love – move in next door. Despite their different outlooks on life, the invitation couples befriend each other and life appears to improve for both pairs. But all is givennot what it seems, via telephone, from Ollie and Daisy to Ian their increasingly interconnected relationships are fated for tragedy.''}}{{Frontpage|author=Shalini Boland|title=The Silent Bride|rating=3|genre=General Fiction|summary= Alice and EmilySeth are a match made in heaven. Or Em as He is everything she's called throughout has been searching for; handsome, accomplished, clever, funny; total and utter husband- there's material. She is all he could possibly want in a lovely explanation of why Ian insists on shortening his wife's name; beautiful, successful, confident… and so the inevitable proposal is eagerly accepted by Alice and the wedding is planned and set. And even When the much-anticipated day arrives, Alice is walked down the aisle by her father, beaming with this generous pride and seemingly innocent phone call, all hell seems to break loose excitement as Ian decides she surveys the congregation – their friends assembled to de-cipher the call. Did they mean celebrate this? Did they really mean that? And lots of undercurrents joyful day and negative feelings start when Seth turns to face his approaching bride, Alice's world implodes because she has absolutely no idea who the man at the altar is, who is waiting for her to bubble upbecome his wife.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>009954234X</amazonuk>1662507089
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Nicholas Hogg1787636003|title=The Hummingbird and the BearGirls of Summer|author=Katie Bishop|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Sam Taylor seems to have a charmed life – a City job It was the summer when Rachel Evans turned eighteen that brings him wealth she and prestige, a wonderful fiancée Caroline went backpacking around Greece and a lovely London homearrived on the island. But all this can Rachel wasn't compensate for exactly innocent but she was, perhaps, naive, so when thirty-four-year-old Alistair Wright started to take an interest in her, she was flattered rather than wary. It was quite a childhood while before he made any sort of physical approach to her and by that contained great sorrow; he is haunted time she was obsessed by a sense of being somehow incompletehim. When a chance encounter at a wedding brings a new woman into this life Alistair worked for Henry Taylor, he begins to hope that he has found everything he really needslooking after his interests on the island and in particular in the bar where all the girls either worked or partied.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184901647X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Lisa JewellAmanda Craig|title=The Making of UsThree Graces
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Lydia, Robyn and Dean are three completely different people with only one thing in common. According to an online donor registry, they were all fathered by Few styles of contemporary fiction interest me like the same sperm donor. Some have known state-of their heritage for a while, others are just finding out, but none of them knew -the other two existed-nation novel. Until now. At the same time, their donor fatherThere's life is slipping away. His last wish is to know something so utterly compelling about any writer who can catch hold of the atmosphere of the impact his 'noble' act may have hadday and capture it, crafting an image of the legacy country as it stands in one particular moment. To say that Amanda Craig is leaving on skilled at doing this would be embarrassingly inadequate: she's practically synonymous with the worldgenre of contemporary social fiction at this point. And She has such a gift for weaving the ongoing issues of the day into the lives of her characters in this information age it's not a way that hard to trace your rootsfeels natural and lived-in, unless, that is, you're searching never making them ciphers for social commentary but instead fully realised people who don't want to be found, grappling with issues far larger than themselves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846055741</amazonuk>140871468X
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jenn Ashworth152915118X|title=Cold Light|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=''Cold Light'' is the story of three teenage girls who become involved in a predatory adult world. As the story opens we're looking back on what happened from a decade later and we know that one of the girls, Chloë, died in a Valentine's Day suicide pact. The town council has finally decided on a memorial to Chloë – it's to be a summerhouse at the side of the pond where she drowned, although it's difficult to understand quite why anyone would want to sit there. The ground-breaking ceremony is being televised when it becomes obvious that something has gone terribly wrong. But Lola, our narrator, knows that they've found a body. She also knows who it is.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444721445</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewPineapple Street|author=Kristina McMorris|title=Letters From HomeJenny Jackson|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Liz Stephens accompanies a couple ''Pineapple Street'' is the story of friends three women: Sasha, Darley and Georgiana. Darley and George are sisters and Sasha is married to a GI social occasiontheir brother Cord. SheThey's content and already 'spoken forre Stocktons, only Sasha isn' t a Stockton by birth so she wouldnisn't normally be here where essentially most people are foot-loose and fancy-freereadily accepted into the tribe. But sheThe problem's promised her good friend Betty exacerbated when the clan matriarch, Tilda, asks Cord and Sasha if they'd like to come alongmove into the Pineapple Street property. As the evening progresses with lots of singing Tilda and Chip have renovated and dancingdownsized to another property, things become both interesting and just a little dangerousstreet or so away, which they own. But for whom? Who are we talking about here? Liz bumps into one They won't need any of the many GIs present. His name's Morgan. An instant spark is there - or furniture from Pineapple Street, so someone believesSasha and Cord can move straight in. But Nominally, they both end had a choice but that wasn't the evening on a less-than-satisfactory notereality. Liz returns Darley and Georgiana start to her life with her soon-call Sasha 'the gold digger'. She's living in ''their'' family home. They use it so often that they abbreviate it to-be-fiance and Morgan goes off to war'the GD'.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847562418</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Steve HelyEmily Critchley|title=How I Became a Famous NovelistOne Puzzling Afternoon
|rating=4
|genre=General FictionCrime|summary=With an uncompromising title like 'How I Became 84 year old Edie has lived in the same small town for almost her whole life, but now she is facing a Famous Novelist'move as her son wants to move to another house and bring Edie to live with his family, this clearly isn't intended as Edie is starting to be a subtle booklose her memory. So I can hardly complain when However, Edie is tormented by the memory of her childhood friend, Lucy, who went missing over 60 years ago, and the worry that there was a cynical look at secret she was keeping for Lucy that somehow might be the thing that reveals the writing industry swings raw punches truth of what happened all that time ago. After 'seeing' Lucy in every direction. It the high street, just isn't my sort as she was the last time she saw her, she starts to find pockets of humourmemories coming back to her. And yet as she remembers the past, but equally, if you rave she is forgetting more and more in her day to day life. Will she uncover the truth about Lucy'The Office' you will likely enjoy this book far more than I have done.s disappearance before her move, and before her memories are gone forever?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1849015724</amazonuk>1804181250
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Madelaine Lucas
|title=Thirst for Salt
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary= ''Love, I'd read, was supposed to be a light and weightless feeling, but I had always longed for gravity''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Anna Quindlen0008506337|title=Every Last OneThe Garnett Girls|author=Georgina Moore
|rating=5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Mary Beth Latham is contemplating The love affair between Margo Garnett and poet Richard O'Leary was all-consuming, apparently on both sides. Margo was just sixteen when they fell in love. Richard was twenty-one and described by Margo's mother as 'an older man'. Her parents worried that Richard's influence would take her averageaway from what they felt she could achieve - going to Oxford and having a glittering career. In the event, ordinary life where every day is more they eloped and Richard took her away from the Isle of less the sameWight. Would things be better if life were more exciting, varied, newsworthy? Is that a legitimate thing Margo did go to hope for? They say Oxford and went on to be careful what you wish forbecome a well-respected journalist. The couple had three children: Rachel, Imogen and Mary Beth Sasha. Life was lived in London and holidays were spent at Sandcove, the family home on the Isle of Wight. Even then the doubts about Richard's drinking were never comes right out and says this is what far from Margo's mind: ''she wants, but there are hints would never be able to this effectleave him in charge''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099537966</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kim Newman1914585402|title=Anno Dracula|rating=3.5|genre=Horror|summary=The story begins in London. It Dashboard Elvis is 1888 and Queen Victoria is on the throne. She has recently remarried, taking as her husband the infamous vampire Count Dracula. Dracula's influence is all around London as more and more of its citizens turn willingly to vampirism, whilst others resist its temptations. A distinct sense of social and political unrest is in the air as factions speak out against the race of vampires, somehow spurred on by the serial killer at large. Known at first as the Silver Knife, but later as Jack the Ripper, this killer targets young vampire women in Whitechapel, prostitutes who have recently turned to vampirism, known as new-borns. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857680838</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Alexander Baron|title=There's No Home|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=It's the year 1943 and Sicily has been invaded (along with other parts of Europe). The menfolk have gone (will they return?) and the women, children and old people left behind are a sorry sight. Impoverished, ragged and with barely enough food to eat. A British company of soldiers rolls into town ... and everything changes. The men are foot-sore, exhausted and dirty. They are also glassy-eyed with the horrors of war. And as if that were not enough, the Sicilian sun beats down on them mercilessly. But there's some good news - they're here to rest and recuperate for a while.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0956308600</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewDead|author=Raj Kumar|title=SharafDavid F Ross
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=With its subtitle "Forbidden love in the kingdom of faith and honour", I expected something entirely different from reviewed David F Ross's book [[There'Sharafs Only One Danny Garvey by David F Ross|There'' to what s Only One Danny Garvey]] a couple of years back and remember being absolutely floored by how powerful and affecting it deliveredwas. For the second time in as many weeks I had misjudged It was a book bygripping, if not its cover exactlyemotionally wounding read, certainly by its setting and its blurb.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905802331</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Mark Watson|title=Eleven|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=The book's title has been well thought out. Xavier Ireland, the rereading my review of it my main character has the number ''Eleven'' if you take his initials as Roman numbers (XI) and there are eleven individuals who are involved in this chain reaction of events. When takeaway was that I read the blurb might not have lavished enough praise on the back cover, what caught my eye above all else was the line 'whether the choices we don't make affect us just as powerfully as those we do.' And of course, when we take no action about something in our lives, it's a form of action in effect.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184983136X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mavis CheekLucy Ashe|title=The Lovers of Pound HillClara and Olivia
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Archaeologist Molly Bonner had something about herThe year is 1933. She definitely wasnThe place? Sadler't dressed for the country when she arrived in Lufferton Boney s Wells. Ballerinas Clara and she'd captured the heart of one young man before she'd even walked down the streetOlivia are sisters, twins no less. She captured another when she offered money to work Identical on the Gnome of Pound Hill, outside but Miles Whittington was ruled by his wallet and he was keen to make money out of the Gnome. The Gnomenot, you seewe learn, was what might euphemistically be called 'well endowed' and Miles had visions of charging visitors to make use of on theinside. And not on stage, er, fertility riteseither. One thing was certain – none of the villagers of Lufferton Boney would be the same by the time that Molly Bonner (not only an archaeologist but also the archaeologistBecause there's granddaughter) had finished her worka lot that builds a dancer.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091931665</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Alan Warner|title=The Stars in the Bright Sky|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=In 1999Some things that can be taught or learnt – discipline, Alan Warner introduced us attention to a wonderful set of characters in detail – and some things, that ''je ne sais quoi''The Sopranos, that don' when a school choir t come from the classroom. A stage presence, a backwater town in Scotland went on charm, a trip to the big city. Much debauchery ensued. 'The Stars in the Bright Sky' once again reunites most of the original gang and there is no need to have read the first book to pick up on the diverse charactersjoie de vivre''. Now thoughThe difference between a hard-worker, they've grown up (or at least got older!) and are gathered at Gatwick Airport to set off on a girls' holidaystar.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>009946182X</amazonuk>0861544080
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Geraint AndersonHeather Fawcett|title=Just BusinessEmily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The inside cover blurb tells us that the author himself Emily Wilde is an expert academic scholar on faerie lore, and she has worked in the square mile in Londontravelled extensively, and researched meticulously, so presumably heto write her life'll have s work, the very first-hand experience in the world encyclopaedia of financefaeries. The book Whilst she is bang up-brilliant at research and speaking to-datefaeries, she is not so good with people. So when she finds herself far, as it mentions far North in the first whiff small village of Hrafvsnik, having somehow offended the sub-prime disaster which seemed village matriarch, she is not sure what she has done, nor how to start redeem herself and put her final investigations for her book back on the whole collapse of the (up till then) safe right track. Enter Wendell Bambleby, her dashingly handsome and insufferable rival who arrives unexpectedly, all charm and often extremely well-paid banking sectordelight, much to Emily's frustration. But why is he here? What does he want? And what exactly is going on with the faerie folk around Hravsnik?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0755381726</amazonuk>0356519120
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Linda Gillard1398515388|title=House of SilenceThe Boy and the Dog|author=Seishu Hase and Alison Watts (translator)
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Several things about this novel intrigued me. It is about two female journalists First of very different generations. Alsoall, it is set was the earthquake, deep in the recent past – 1997. While newspaper production had been computerisedocean floor, it was just before internet access at home which created the tsunami and work became affordable and accessible to far more people and so became mass mediathis, in turn, and newspapers were almost entirely a print medium – newspaper websites were just around caused the cornernuclear meltdown. Annalena McAfee has an insider's knowledge of the newspaper world as she The result was a journalist for many yearscomplete and utter devastation. The deaths were uncountable, and her career included founding the Guardian's review section in its current formloss of livelihoods was widespread.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846554357</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Megan Abbott|title= The End of Everything|rating=5|genre=Teens|summary=On the surface this book is about fact that many pets were separated from their owners came far down the disappearance list of a thirteenpriorities but -yearsix months after the tsunami -old girlKazumasa Nakagaki discovered a dog outside a convenience store. Her best friend and neighbour Lizzie relates how she searches for clues, how she discovers that He wasn't a local man may be involved, and how Evie and Lizziedog person but the convenience store owner's families struggle comment that he would call Public Health prompted Kazumasa to cope. But look again at the title. What really unfolds here is the story of the effect a single incident has on three families, not two, how that one event came about, open his car door and why nothing will ever be Tamon the same for everyone involved. It is a book which is complex, deep and very, very intensedog jumped in.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330535455</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=C J BoxChristopher Bowden|title=Back of BeyondMr Magenta
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Connolly and [[Tell No One by Harlan Coben|Harlan Coben]], both of whom IChristopher Bowden've read. So, it was off to s latest novel is a pretty good start. The front cover graphics and large print scream out 'thriller'. We get the essence patient untangling of Cody early on. He's a man who likes to do his own thing and doesn't take kindly to orders or red tape. All that red tape is shit, is probably how Cody would describe it in his own colourful and down-to-earth fashion. He looks older than his years. Maybe thatseemingly ordinary woman's down to a messy domestic life and also to the hours he puts in on the job. He lives on his own and , carried out by her nephew after she has a teenage son he doesn't see often enoughdied. Oh, and he smokes like The aunt who always provided a chimney safe harbour and drinks like a fish. In short, he's little bit of indulgence to a mess. But somehow he stumbles through his police work - with young nephew had had a lot of help much more interesting life than that nephew Stephen had ever realised and support from a long-suffering colleagueit seems to him an obligation to find it all out.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1848872984</amazonuk>B0B6Z9VJDW
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Hans Werner Kettenbach and Anthea Bell (Translator)Jennifer Mason|title=The Stronger SexPartitions of Unity
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=After reading the various comments on the back coverHere at Bookbag Towers, I was looking forward to reading this book as I love a story with a psychological element. Young Alex is driven to the home of his latest client; a man called Klofft. The reader soon finds out that Klofft has plenty of baggagewe first met Elizabeth Cromwell, as well as plenty of money. He's elderly dominatrix and very ill and mobility is also an issue for him. Sounintentional detective in [[Preposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery by Jennifer Mason|Preposterous]], while he may have set out to impress others with his large home when she investigated and beautiful things, sadly he seems no longer to be able to enjoy life. His illness confines him to just unravelled a couple series of roomsdisappearances. ItIn ''Partitions of Unity''s apparent that Alex is rather taken with his wife, Cilly Klofft, who is still rather beautiful - for she sets her agemind to solving a murder. The reader assumes she's in her late sixties or early seventies. But what is it they say about age being only a number for some of us? And age plays a big part, a very big part, in this novel.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1904738672</amazonuk>B09LQR9FRF
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Robert Jackson BennettWill Carver|title=The Company ManDaves Next Door
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=''The Times'' says Five strangers come together in one moment as a suicide bomber prepares to detonate his vest on the front cover that Bennett is 'clearly a writer to watch' so I had high hopes for this novelLondon tube line. We meet two of As their fates overlap, the central characters, American policeman Garvey and Englishman Hayes. Garvey's working cv story is straightforward enough - he carries out police worktold in backwards order, some of which is pretty grisly. But what about Hayes? He appears leading up to be all things to all men but at the end of the day well, he's 'The Company Man' which gives the book its title. And so a complex scenario starts to unravel ..fateful moment.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1841497924</amazonuk>1914585186}}