==General fiction==
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{{newreview
|author=Dori Ostermiller
|title=Outside the Ordinary World
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Although not keen on the title (a little clunky) I did feel that this was going to be a book I'd enjoy. Ostermiller has some fulsome praise for this debut novel including from the author [[:Category:Diane Chamberlain|Diane Chamberlain]]. And after reading the back cover blurb I can sense a similarity which is fine by me. (I thoroughly enjoyed all of Chamberlain's books). Would I enjoy this book as much?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>077830468X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|summary=''In The Sea There Are Crocoiles'' is based on a true story about a young boy left by his mother to fend for himself. As if that wasn't difficult enough, he's stranded in Pakistan while the rest of his family are in war-ravaged Afghanistan. It's a collaboration between Afghan Enaiatollah and his Italian translator, Fabio - this book is already a big hit with Italian readers (it says so on the back cover blurb). Enaiatollah eventually claimed political asylum in Italy.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857560085</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|title=Forgetting Zoe
|author=Ray Robinson
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=''Forgetting Zoe'' opens with Thurman, one of the two main characters. We see that his home life is dreadful - with a violent and cruel father and a mother who is weak. And as an only child (to rather elderly parents) Thurman hears his father's violence directed at his mother. Their home is out of the way and in an isolated spot, so really the three of them form a very unhappy threesome indeed. The reader is left in no doubt as to the nature of the father with lines such as, ''As a form of punishment Father would press one of his hands down on top of Thurman's head so forcefully that Thurman's legs would buckle... that blood would trickle down his forehead...''
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>009953763X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|title=The Poison Tree
|author=Erin Kelly
|rating=5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Karen is ending her university years and has her future mapped out. But then she meets Biba, who opens doors to a world she's never seen before, and to the type of intense friendship that she's never experienced either. As Karen embarks on this friendship, she collects all kinds of new experiences along the way. At the start of that summer, she could never have predicted just how indelible the mark left by the friendship would turn out to be.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444701053</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Clare Jacob
|title=Ophelia in Pieces
|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 herself. She even decided that she would wear the red dress which Patrick liked. But when she got home Patrick and their son, Alex, were eating ice creams. He didn't seem in the least interested in dinner and then admitted that he was having an affair. Ophelia threw him out – and then began the long haul of trying to be a decent single parent in a job where the hours were long and the money uncertain.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907595147</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Elliott Hall
|title=The Children's Crusade
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=We back-track several years to get the low-down and history on Felix. It's interesting, very interesting. He's like some sort of American 007 but not all of his plans have been successful. Some have back-fired and he has the scars to prove it. In fact although in his prime years, Felix could be healthier and is forced to take regular medication. And throughout the story Hall tells us why that is. Chapter Two, which sees Felix in Nevada opens with the no-nonsense line ''I came to Las Vegas to kill a man.'' But who? And why? We get the answers all in Hall's good time.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848540752</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=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=Cathy Glass
|title=Run, Mummy, Run
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Aisha is a young, beautiful and successful woman who has worked hard to get where she is. But there is one thing missing in her life: a man. Still living with her parents at the age of thirty and inexperienced when it comes to men, Aisha wonders if she will ever find a husband. But then she spots an ad in the paper and plucking up all her courage and determination, she decides to reply. This could be her only chance at love and she doesn't want to waste it.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007299281</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Blake Morrison
|title=The Last Weekend
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The book opens in the sunny month of June when the invitation is given, via telephone, from Ollie and Daisy to Ian and Emily. Or Em as she's called throughout - there's a lovely explanation of why Ian insists on shortening his wife's name. And even with this generous and seemingly innocent phone call, all hell seems to break loose as Ian decides to de-cipher the call. Did they mean this? Did they really mean that? And lots of undercurrents and negative feelings start to bubble up.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>009954234X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Nicholas Hogg
|title=The Hummingbird and the Bear
|rating=3.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Sam Taylor seems to have a charmed life – a City job that brings him wealth and prestige, a wonderful fiancée and a lovely London home. But all this can't compensate for a childhood that contained great sorrow; he is haunted by a sense of being somehow incomplete. When a chance encounter at a wedding brings a new woman into this life, he begins to hope that he has found everything he really needs.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184901647X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Lisa Jewell
|title=The Making of Us
|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 the same sperm donor. Some have known of their heritage for a while, others are just finding out, but none of them knew the other two existed. Until now. At the same time, their donor father's life is slipping away. His last wish is to know of the impact his 'noble' act may have had, the legacy it is leaving on the world. And in this information age it's not that hard to trace your roots, unless, that is, you're searching for people who don't want to be found.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846055741</amazonuk>
}}
