'''Read [[Features|new features]].'''
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{{newreview
|author=Fiona Dunbar
|title=Divine Freaks
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Unless you really love science, Mr Wesley's Biology lessons can occasionally seem a little dull. Still, a spot of boredom might have been better, in Kitty Slade's opinion, than the mean grey-faced man who turned up, began to dissect a rat, then just as suddenly disappeared again. Leaving her, of course, to explain to her mystified teacher just why she had leapt from her seat, shoved him aside and lunged at thin air. The rest of the class didn't mind: watching Kitty dash about the room screaming was way more fun than anything Mr Wesley could do. Things got a little heated after that, however, and Kitty stormed out of school, convinced she was losing her mind.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408309289</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Emily Giffin
|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>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Sally Gardner
|title=Cinderella
|rating=4.5
|genre=For Sharing
|summary=Most little girls must surely know the story of Cinderella by heart. My little girl likes nothing better than putting on her princess dress and parading around the house talking about pumpkins and lost shoes. This version of the familiar story is written specifically for early readers and manages to capture the magic of this wonderful fairy tale. I once got to be Cinderella, in my very last year at school before I left for University (surely just on the verge of being too old!) It is a wonderful, magical story and I never get tired of hearing it and it is, fortunately, my daughter's favourite too so we both sat down eagerly to try out this new retelling by Sally Gardner.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444002414</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Alain Mabanckou
|title=Broken Glass
|rating=3.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=In the Congolese bar of Credit Gone West, the owner Stubborn Snail wants a record of the lives of those who drink there. The man he chooses to write it? Disgraced schoolteacher Broken Glass, who fills up a notebook with the stories of the bar’s patrons – or at least their versions of those tales.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184668675X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Helen Simpson
|title=In-Flight Entertainment
|rating=5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=I am always thrilled to see that Helen Simpson has brought out a new book. I am a big fan of her crisp, funny, observant short stories. So I picked up 'In Flight Entertainment' with some anticipation. I was not disappointed.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099546124</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Alan Gibbons
|title=An Act of Love
|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
|summary=Chris and Imran were childhood friends. Blood brothers. They swore it when they played together in the wilderness behind the estate where they lived. But not any more. The riots put paid to that. 9/11 put paid to that. Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan put paid to that. Ten years on, Chris is a veteran of Afghanistan, waiting to receive a medal from the country for which he lost a leg. Imran is angry and rebellious, flirting with extremism. Terrorism has wrecked their friendship and sent them in different directions. And now, terrorism is threatening to end their very lives...
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444002287</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Darren Shan
|title=Ocean of Blood (The Saga of Larten Crepsley)
|rating=4
|genre=Teens
|summary=In book two of this prequel series about the beloved orange-haired vampire from Darren Shan's Cirque du Freak series, we find Larten Crepsley and his friend Wester Flack finally free of the restrictions and privations imposed upon them by their master, Seba Nile. The young vampires have joined the Cubs, and are wandering the world enjoying all the "pleasures" human life can give them - wine, women, song, and a ringside seat at as many bloody wars as they could shake a stick at (plus a good supply of fresh blood in the aftermath of battle).
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007315880</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Tim Butcher
|title=Chasing the Devil: On Foot Through Africa's Killing Fields
|rating=4.5
|genre=Travel
|summary=Tim Butcher's day job from 1990 to 2009 was "journalist".
I wonder what today's school-kids imagine when they say they want to be a journalist… do they envisage writing about science, or economics, or celebrities, or do they see themselves as television reporters standing in flak jackets doing the obligatory piece-to-camera in the latest war zone? Do they even read newspapers any more? Do they realise that there are still also people out there in those war zones, without the glamour flak-jacket, just (if they're lucky) the ordinary pock-marked one, that they prefer not to wear because it's way too hot? People who still ply the classic trade of actually writing what they see and trusting that they can do it well enough for the words to stand alone without the sound effects, without (quite often) any pictures, to make it "real"?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099532069</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Martin Pugh
|title=Speak for Britain!: A New History of the Labour Party
|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=Since the Labour Representation Committee came into existence in February 1900, the party in Britain which it spawned has had a chequered and often contrary existence. Ironically, as Pugh demonstrates, while it may have been formed to represent the workers, it never became a fully working class party. James Keir Hardie may have been a genuine socialist, but some of the senior figures who followed were recruited from middle and upper-class Conservative backgrounds.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099520788</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Gennifer Choldenko
|title=No Passengers Beyond This Point
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=India is fourteen and, like many teenagers, doesn't see much outside her own narrow sphere of interest. She's spiky and defensive and reacts to any setbacks with anger and aggression, usually turned against her family. But inside, like many teenagers, she's rather lonely and lost. Finn is twelve and not as good at basketball as he'd like. He's not as popular as he'd like either. But he is honest and loyal, and he longs for a chance to prove it. Mouse is six and a bit of an oddity. She has an imaginary friend and a brain the size of a planet. This doesn't always make her easy to get along with.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408815729</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Jackie French and Bruce Whatley
|title=Queen Victoria's Knickers
|rating=4
|genre=For Sharing
|summary=A message from the palace has arrived! It's from Queen Victoria, and as mum reads it she cries out 'The Queen wants my knickers!' Queen Victoria, ruler of the British Empire, has riches galore, but she has no knickers, so the dressmaker's family set about making her some.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007418310</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Kristina McMorris
|title=Letters From Home
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Liz Stephens accompanies a couple of friends to a GI social occasion. She's content and already 'spoken for' so she wouldn't normally be here where essentially most people are foot-loose and fancy-free. But she's promised her good friend Betty to come along. As the evening progresses with lots of singing and dancing, things become both interesting and just a little dangerous. But for whom? Who are we talking about here? Liz bumps into one of the many GIs present. His name's Morgan. An instant spark is there - or so someone believes. But they both end the evening on a less-than-satisfactory note. Liz returns to her life with her soon-to-be-fiance and Morgan goes off to war.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847562418</amazonuk>
}}
