|summary=In 1908, Henry Ford's Model T hadn't yet brought cars to the masses. The pioneers of the world of automobiles were experimenting and discovering just what the car could do, by driving right round the world. Except they didn't want to be pioneers. One of the competitors, Antonio Scarfoglio, put it so perfectly when he said 'We had set out to perpetuate an act of splendid folly, not to open up a new way for men. We wished to be madmen, not pioneers.' Isn't that about the best quote you've ever read?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0810994895</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=P J Reece
|title=Roxy
|rating=3.5
|genre=Teens
|summary=Maddie was at Aunt Gretchen's funeral when she got the phone call to tell her that her father was in a coma and likely to die. This might sound like a double whammy but Maddie's father had deserted her soon after her birth (during which her mother died) and she was brought up by Aunt Gretchen, who never missed an opportunity to point out that she was an unwanted burden.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1896580017</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Richard North Patterson
|title=The Spire
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary=When student Mark Darrow discovers the body of a black fellow student, Angela Hall, at the foot of the spire in the centre of the college he attends, he little suspects that his best friend will be charged with the murder. Now, sixteen years later, Darrow is back, at the invitation of his mentor and now college provost, Lionel Farr, to become president of the college in order to rebuild its reputation after a case of embezzlement has left the college in a precarious position (conveniently, Darrow has become an ace financial fraud lawyer in the intervening years). As Darrow digs into what happened with the college finances, he also begins to look afresh at the trial of his friend and questions if he really was guilty as charged. He also finds time to start an emerging relationship with the provost's troubled, but beautiful, daughter. Is the real killer still at large and are the two crimes connected?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230705650</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Pseudonymous Bosch
|title=This Book is Not Good for You
|rating=3.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Cass is not having the best of time when it comes to secrets. It's all very well being involved in a top-secret society, designed to keep the secret of the most secretive secret ever, but those pesky people called adults are keeping things from her as well - namely, her very origins. Can Max-Ernest and she wade through their junk store base and find the box she was delivered in? Can they survive the mysterious clown school they end up visiting? And can they keep a mystical tuning fork from falling into the wrong hands?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1409506312</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Russell Kirkpatrick
|title=Beyond the Wall of Time (Broken Man)
|rating=4
|genre=Fantasy
|summary=A couple of aspects have summed up Russell Kirkpatrick's ''Broken Man'' trilogy for me so far. There has been a fascinating story with some wonderful character building that has made it highly enjoyable. There have also been some of the most detailed maps I have ever seen in a fantasy series, offering more variation than I've seen in maps before and actually adding detail to some parts of the story, not merely acting as a guide. I was expecting more of the same from the final part, ''Beyond the Wall of Time'' and very much looking forward to it.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1841496715</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=David Hosp
|title=Among Thieves
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
|summary=In 1990, some valuable paintings were stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner museum in Boston in the United States. The police investigation failed to find them and many felt they were lost forever. But soon the paintings and their whereabouts would be impacting on many people's lives…
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230707238</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=David Shields
|title=Reality Hunger: A Manifesto
|rating=5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary='The Novel is Dead' is not really what a novelist wants to read first on picking up a new book – but I persevered with Shields' manifesto and I'm glad I did. This is a thought-provoking wake-up call that any artist, writer or book-lover will enjoy.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>024114499X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author= Ian Rankin and Werther Dell'Edera
|title=Dark Entries
|rating=4
|genre=Graphic Novels
|summary=The producers of Dark Entries, the latest hit reality TV show, are worried. Yes the six housemates are there, present and correct, and are ready to be scared witless en route to the one way out, and the brilliant prize that might await them somewhere in the merry-go-round of horror that is their new home. They are already being scared witless, by phantoms - but that's nothing to do with the TV producers.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848563426</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Betty G Birney
|title=Holidays According to Humphrey
|rating=5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Humphrey the hamster is worried. Everywhere he turns his little pink ears he hears noises about the school being closed. How can he survive without all his adoring fans in room 26, and what is life like for a classroom pet without a classroom? Luckily, this is only the summer holiday he is misunderstanding, and what do you know - he will soon be meeting familiar faces, not at school, but at summer camp.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571250904</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Keith Mansfield
|title=Johnny Mackintosh: Star Blaze
|rating=5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Before I get into the review of this book, I'd like to suggest that if you haven't read Keith Mansfield's first Johnny Mackintosh book, [[Johnny Mackintosh and the Spirit of London by Keith Mansfield|The Spirit of London]], you go off and read the review of that first and then go and read the book itself. It's a fantastic read. But because this is a sequel, there are obviously going to be some SPOILERS ahead.
So, done that have you?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849161267</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Chinua Achebe
|title=The Education of a British-Protected Child
|rating=4.5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=This book is a collection of autobiographical essays by Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe, whose best known work is the novel Things Fall Apart, published in 1958. Topics covered include Nigerian, Biafran and Igbo history and culture, African literature and the legacy of colonialism in his country and the rest of Africa. Some of the essays are taken from guest lectures at universities around the world and conference papers, and others are written for this book, particularly many of the more personal pieces about Achebe's family.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846142598</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Norman Russell
|title=The Calton Papers
|rating=3.5
|genre=Crime (Historical)
|summary=Philip Garamond had had an abiding interest in botany since his teens and when we first meet him he's on his way to Sotheby's intent on making a bid for the Calton Papers. Sir George Calton's papers include an unpublished account of Darwin's explorations on the Beagle, some letters and a geographical survey of the British Isles. Garamond's ambition had always been to own a botanical garden on Madeira, but he lacked the funds and the Calton Papers seemed to be as close as he would get to owning something special.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709089546</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Nancy Holder and Debbie Viguie
|title=Legacy and Spellbound (Wicked)
|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
|summary=Holly Cathers has returned, and this time, she's more powerful than ever. The war between the House of Cahors witches and House of Deveraux warlocks still rages on, and only one side will eventually triumph.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184738689X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Kees van Deemter
|title=Not Exactly - In Praise Of Vagueness
|rating=3.5
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=How warm is a warm day? Or rather, given the weather at the moment, how chilly is a chilly day? Is it better to know I want a small helping of peas, or to know that I want 82 peas? There are times when vagueness is more useful than being specific. Kees van Deemter makes this point, sharing many examples from a number of fields, including maths, philosophy, linguistics and AI.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0199545901</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Chris Wormell
|title=One Smart Fish
|rating=5
|genre=For Sharing
|summary=Many, many, many years ago, the ocean was full of amazing fish. The most amazing fish was a boring-looking silver fish, who was smarter than all the others. He played chess (against himself), drew pictures and performed plays. One day, he decided to see what life was like on land, so he invented feet and went for a walk. Yep, you've guessed it: it's a picture book about evolution.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224083546</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Stevie Davies
|title=Into Suez
|rating=4.5
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=We are introduced to the main characters Ailsa and Joe Roberts and their young daughter, Nia. Joe is a down-to-earth Welshman who's been posted to Egypt with the RAF. They are making a new and exciting life for themselves amidst the heat and poverty of the Middle East. Ailsa is English, rather headstrong and clever. Her parents said she'd 'the brain of a boy.' There are two strands to the novel which interweave throughout: the 1950s which see the early married life of Joe and Ailsa and then there's the post-invasion of Iraq period when the grown-up Nia returns to Egypt to lay some ghosts, as it were.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906998000</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Norah Vincent
|title=Voluntary Madness: My Year Lost and Found in the Loony Bin
|rating=3.5
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary=''Voluntary Madness'' is journalist Norah Vincent's account of her visits to three mental health facilities in America. The first is an urban, public hospital that houses mainly homeless, psychotic patients, many of whom are addicted to drugs. In this hospital, the doctors are overworked and jaded and medication is always the answer. Soon, the author finds that her latent depression (which led her to do the book in the first place) is returning. The process of being institutionalised breaks her sense of self-worth down astonishingly fast. Indeed, she suggests that it is the lack of autonomy in institutional life, even for those patients who voluntarily commit themselves, that makes it so hard for them to rebuild independent lives when they finally leave the institution.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099513439</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Neal Shusterman
|title=Everwild
|rating=5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Neal Shusterman continues his part zany adventure, part philosophical enquiry, and part coming-of-age story that began with Everlost in this follow-up that is perhaps even better than its predecessor.
Everlost is a kind of limbo and home to children - Afterlights - who have died, but somehow missed the tunnel and the light - wherever and whatever the light actually is. Adults never make it there, but significant or much-loved objects and buildings sometimes do. Mary Hightower, for instance, is so-called because she took up residence in New York in the Twin Towers. Mary thinks Everlost is a wonderful place and she "saves" the Afterlights she finds by giving them repetitive but addictive tasks to fill eternity.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847387322</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Gabriel Weston
|title=Direct Red
|rating=5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=Few people have the ability to convey the minutiae of their profession in ways which engage the reader, answer your unspoken questions and talk in such a way that you're neither patronised nor overburdened with jargon. Gabriel Weston is one such – and ''Direct Red'' held me as though I was hypnotised for several hours. She's a surgeon and we're pulled into the intricacies of her world without the need to don mask and gown.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099520699</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=David Baldacci
|title=True Blue
|rating=4.5
|genre=Crime
|summary=Jamie Meldon, ex-criminal-defence attorney, now in private practice, leaves his office very late one night. He's met by the FBI. Very shortly afterwards Jamie Meldon is dead in a dumpster.
Mace Perry is working out, trying to stay fit, trying to stay sane, trying to stay alive long enough to get out jail in a couple of days' time. Perry was a cop. Under-cover, maverick and darn good at her job. Until she ended up stoned on meth, busted for robbery, convicted and sent down.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230706134</amazonuk>
}}
