'''Read [[Features|new features]].'''
__NOTOC__
{{newreview
|title=Oomph! (Preston Pig)
|author=Colin McNaughton
|rating=3
|genre=For Sharing
|summary=Preston Pig is a charming and somewhat lucky character who features in quite a few of Colin McNaughton's picture books. In ''Oomph!'', Preston and his family go to the seaside for their holiday where he makes a new little friend called Max. They have great fun together all week but are blissfully unaware that there is someone a bit sinister lurking in the background. With this book, as well as reading the words, make sure that you pay close attention to the illustrations where there is a slightly different story being told.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849392617</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|summary=The history of science is filled with many miraculous discoveries. ...It's also filled with exploding trousers, self-experimentation, a coachman's leg that becomes a museum piece and gas-powered radios. ''Farmer Buckley's Exploding Trousers'' regales us with fifty odd events on the way to scientific discovery. Part popular science book, part trivia, each article is a treat to read, either as a fun-sized nugget, or when reading from cover to cover.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846685087</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=J Robert Lennon
|title=Castle
|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.
Loesch grew up in Gerrysburg, but he's been away a long time. The place hasn't changed much except through long, slow decline. There are vacant lots where he remembers homes, businesses, amenities. There are one or two people who remember him, or remember his family. They remember what happened to the family, or heard about what happened to him afterwards.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1555975593</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Felix J Palma
|title=The Map of Time
|rating=5
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=Like a lot of readers I cannot resist a book with an immediate hook that draws you into the story quickly and in a seemingly effortless fashion. From the very first page of 'The Map of Time' Felix Palma had me firmly in his grasp and continued to hold me there for the entirety of the novel. Not once did I become bored or distracted as I relished every word, page and chapter of this remarkable book.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007344120</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Karen Blixen
|title=Out Of Africa
|rating=5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=It's more than a quarter of a century since I first saw the film ''Out of Africa'' and it's one of the few that have stayed with me over the intervening years. It wasn't just the story, but the personality of Karen Blixen and the wonderful landscape of the Ngong Hills, south of Nairobi, in Kenya's Rift Valley. I remember looking for this book at the time, but being unable to find it, so the opportunity to read it now was too good to miss.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241951437</amazonuk>
}}
{{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
|title=Something Borrowed
|rating=4
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=Rachel Miller and Darcy Rhone had been friends forever. Rachel was the older by just four months, but it was Darcy who sailed through life getting everything that she wanted. Rachel might have reached her teens first, got her driving licence first and then gone on to become an attorney, but on the eve on Rachel's thirtieth birthday Darcy is the one who is having a whale of a time, with her glamorous PR job and ''very'' presentable fiancé. Rachel is very obviously still single – and then an ill-considered birthday fling puts everything in jeopardy and – to cap it all - she begins to realise that her friendship with Darcy might not have been all she thought.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099557746</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Sara Wheeler
|title=Access All Areas: Selected Writings 1990-2010
|rating=5
|genre=Travel
|summary=This is a great book to acquire if your general knowledge of historical adventurers is as haphazard as mine. Somewhere along the line, I'd missed out on Scott and Shackleton, and it's very satisfying indeed to fill those gaps from such a reliable informant. One brisk section, for example, managed to encapsulate both Antartica's history and further outlook, along with sufficient atmospheric detail to ensure we mortals understood just what it feels like to sleep in Scott's hut during a wintry gale.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224090712</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Farahad Zama
|title=The Wedding Wallah
|rating=4.5
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=Finishing 'The Wedding Wallah' is like leaving India at the end of a short holiday with myriad impressions of foreignness. I'll remember the crowds of Mumbai, the smells of cooking in small rooms, the colours and textures of saris, the dangerous forest. This may not be the greatest literature published this year – not even the finest romantic fiction – but the sheer novelty of the Indian world portrayed makes it five stars for enjoyment in my book. I imagined Farahad Zama as a female writer beavering away in rural India. Turns out I was wrong: the author is a male investment banker in London with two books previously published in this series. Oops.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0349122687</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Tony Ross
|title=Little Princess: I Want A Party!
|rating=5
|genre=For Sharing
|summary=The Little Princes is quite a famous character among young children having starred in many stories as well as her own TV series. In her latest book, 'I Want a Party!', she is set on having a do even though there is nothing to actually celebrate. And of course, if you are familiar with this series of books, you will know that what the little princess wants, she usually gets. Having brushed aside her parents' objections, she sets about writing invitations, preparing party food with the Cook, making party hats with the Prime Minister and planning games with the General.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849392684</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Diane Ackerman
|title=One Hundred Names For Love: A Stroke, a Marriage, and the Language of Healing
|rating=4.5
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary=Diane Ackerman's husband, Paul West, had been in hospital for three weeks with a kidney infection and was just rejoicing in the fact that he was to go home the next day. As Diane watched , Paul suffered a massive stroke. The effects were catastrophic, but worst of all, the man who had been a brilliant wordsmith was robbed of his power of speech and lost his extensive vocabulary. It's eight years since this happened and the intervening years have been a constant battle to improve Paul's speech and restore some joy to his life. There have been ups – and many downs – but despite a brain scan indicating that Paul might well be a vegetable he has since his stroke written books. His vocabulary will never be back to what it was, but it remains impressive and, strangely enough, many of the words which he finds easiest to use are those which he encountered a number of years ago.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>039307241X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Rachel Genn
|title=The Cure
|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=We get the background on Eugene early on in the story; a troubled childhood with an alcoholic father who was often not at home. Instead he was working on a building site in London and drinking away much of his wages. His wife and children didn't appear to benefit much - either financially or emotionally. Eugene still bears plenty of invisible scars from that time and now grown up, would like to carve out his own path and thinks a fresh start would be a good idea. Although it's not altogether a fresh start as he chooses to work on the same construction site as his father and even lives in the same lodgings in the East End. Is this his own unique way of exorcising some ghosts?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184901583X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Paul Addison and Jeremy A Crang
|title=Listening to Britain: Home Intelligence Reports on Britain's Finest Hour, May-September 1940
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=The Home Intelligence Department had been set up by the government to assess home morale by studying immediate reactions to specific events and to find out public opinion on important issues, including pacifism. One reason for this was 'to provide a basis for publicity', that is, to plan propaganda and test its effectiveness. The reports drew on various sources, including Mass Observation, a market research style Wartime Social Survey, staff listening to conversations on the way to work, and visiting pubs and other places where lots of people went and talked to each other.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099548747</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Katy Moran
|title=Dangerous to Know
|rating=5
|genre=Teens
|summary=
Jack and Bethany are in love. But Bethany's mother thinks Jack is a bad influence. He comes from a bad family - a broken home, one brother was a drug dealer, the other smoked too much dope and ended up sectioned - and he just isn't the sort of boy Bethany's mother wants her daughter to spend time with. It's not all snobbery though - Bethany's father is terminally ill and the family has too much on its plate to be thinking of first love affairs. Says Bethany's mother. But not Bethany.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1406317292</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=R J Anderson
|title=Ultraviolet
|rating=4
|genre=Teens
|summary=Alison wakes up to find herself sectioned in a secure psychiatric unit for teenagers. Arriving home with blood on your hands and gibbering endless confessions to having killed a girl who's gone missing will do that. But there isn't any proof and Tori is still missing so both the police and Alison's doctors want to get to the bottom of what happened.
The thing is, Alison herself can't explain what happened.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408312751</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Elyne Mitchell
|title=The Silver Brumby
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=When Bel Bel's foal was born she called him Thowra, which meant 'wind'. Like her he was a creamy, silver brumby. They're the wild horses of Southern Australia and Bel Bel knew that her foal would not have an easy life. As a stallion he would have to fight to keep his own herd of mares and foals but his main enemy would be man. The brumbies were regularly captured and herded away but the creamy, silver brumbies were the biggest prizes of all. 'The Silver Brumby' is Thowra's story as he matures from young foal to adult stallion.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007425201</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Kit Berry
|title=Magus of Stonewylde
|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
|summary=Stonewylde is a mysterious self-contained community that exists in the heart of modern England but operates in isolation from the rest of the world, offering a very alternative lifestyle. Pagan culture is an intrinsic part of Stonewylde, with its various seasonal festivals, unique style of living, and most importantly its reverence of nature. Society in the community is also pretty unorthodox, being based upon an autocracy ruled by the Magus, a figure who is blessed with Earth Magic, during each of the eight seasonal festivals, that gives him the power to run Stonewylde.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0575098821</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Adrian Webster
|title=Polar Bear Pirates and Their Quest to Engage the Sleepwalkers: Motivate Everyday People to Deliver Extraordinary Results
|rating=4
|genre=Business and Finance
|summary=I'd like to introduce you to the polar bear pirates. They're the people who believe in life before death – the people who can deliver extraordinary results despite being just ordinary people like you and me. Well, me anyway. They're the manager who can motivate their staff to achieve those extraordinary results – even if their staff are sleepwalkers who live on planet complacency, amps or vamps. We won't mention the potholers. This is a management book like no other – you're going to laugh, cry just occasionally when you realise that you've been seen through and come away with plenty to think about.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857081276</amazonuk>
}}