==Literary fiction==
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{{newreview
|author=John O'Connell
|title=The Baskerville Legacy: A Novel
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=
1900, and a man on a ship coming back from the Boer War to edit the Daily Express meets one of his heroes in the form of Arthur Conan Doyle. With similar experiences and interests yet different enough to bounce off each other they take up the idea of collaborating on a plot. When they do fix on time to do so, it leads to literary prospects, which lead to a week's research together on Dartmoor, which leads to ''The Hound of the Baskervilles''. But perhaps in a way that only one of them intended.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907595465</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Kenzaburo Oe
|summary=Alan Hollinghurst's Booker-nominated and long-awaited 'The Stranger's Child' is without doubt, as one might expect from this writer, beautifully written. Almost every page offers something to smile about either in terms of the comments of his characters or, more often, the wry descriptions that the author offers. The structure of the book is episodic, split into five parts covering pre-World War One, the 1920s, the 1960s, the 1980s and finally the early 2000s. It offers a thoughtful and well observed picture of changes in society and culture over this period and in particular of attitudes to homosexual relationships, although admittedly Hollinghurst's subjects tend to fall into a narrow band of well educated, artistic and often aristocratic members of society. Writers, poets and artists are the subject matter rather than the man on the street. His male characters are invariably homosexual while his females mostly either remain unmarried or have dysfunctional marriages.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330483242</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Lisa See
|title=Dreams of Joy
|rating=4.5
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=It's the late 1950s, and America's teenagers (the very idea a brand new concept) are beginning to live the all-American dream. For some of them however it isn't all 'Happy Days' diners and rock'n'roll. For the second generation Chinese immigrants there's an alternative: back 'home' there's a brave new world being forged, a world where 'we'd work in the fields and sing songs. We'd do exercises in the park. We'd help clean the neighbourhood and share meals. We wouldn't be poor and we wouldn't be rich. We'd all be equal.'
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408822296</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Christine Dwyer Hickey
|title=The Cold Eye of Heaven
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=I reviewed Hickey's [[Last Train From Liguria by Christine Dwyer Hickey| Last Train From Liguria]] so was keen to see if I'd enjoy this book too. The front cover says that Farley ''unravels the warp and weft of his life'' which is a great phrase - wish I'd though of it. Hickey lives in Dublin so I'm kind of expecting good characterization (as the book's location is Dublin) and a nice line in put-me-down wit. But will I get it? Time to find out ...
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857890301</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Leon Jenner
|title=Bricks
|rating=3
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Let me start on a positive: this slim volume is exquisitely presented and has a lovely 'traditional' feel about it. Very covetable for book lovers. The front cover is also a bit of a paradox - what with the workmanlike one-word title ''Bricks'' and the almost mystical/biblical-esque graphics. Will this all help to draw the reader in, well, I'm not too sure.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444706284</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=David Almond
|title=The True Tale of the Monster Billy Dean
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=''This tale is told by 1 that died at birth by 1 that came into the world in days of endles war & at the moment of disaster... I am not cleva, so forgiv my folts and my mistayks. I am Billy Dean. This is the truth. This is my tale.''
The Monster Billy Dean tells the story of Billy, a boy born into the dystopia of a war-torn town and the product of an illicit liaison between a young woman and her priest. His birth coincided with an apocalyptic bombing and his parents have hidden him away from the ruins and the catastrophe in a single room, both out of shame and in the belief that his coming into the world and surviving at such a violent moment signifies a sacred future.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670919055</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Andrew Kaufman
|title=The Tiny Wife
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=It all begins with a bank robbery. Only this isn't your typical sort of bank robbery since the robber demands not money but instead each person in the bank must give him the item of most sentimental value that they have with them. These range from photographs and a key through to a calculator...and on taking these items he says he is also taking fifty percent of their souls, and it is up to the victims to find the way to get their souls back, or to die trying.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007429258</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Yvvette Edwards
|title=A Cupboard Full of Coats
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=''He just knocked, that was all, knocked and the front door and waited, like the fourteen years since I'd killed my mother hadn't happened...''
Jinx is cold and she knows it. She cleans obsessively - a largely pointless task, since there is little mess to clean since her husband and young son, tired of her frigidity, moved out. She cooks beautifully balanced meals that look aesthetic on the plate. But her food offers sustenance, not comfort. In fact, Jinx feels most at home amongst the dead people she works with as a funeral home cosmetologist.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1851688382</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Claudie Gallay
|title=The Breakers
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=The book is in the first person, told by a woman who is a relative newcomer to this tiny village, no more than a cluster of homes and a few basic amenities. The story opens in the lead-up to a horrendous storm. The narrator has seen nothing like it before and is both afraid and excited. The locals take it all in their stride. They're a hardy bunch of disparate individuals and we get to know more them, one by one, as the story develops.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906694710</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Susan Hill
|title=The Woman in Black
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Arthur Kipps is a young solicitor working in a fog-bound London and soon to be married. All looks rosy for Arthur until one day he is called into his boss' office where he is tasked with the affairs of the deceased recluse Alice Drablow. Alice Drablow had lived in the melancholy village of Crythin Gifford in an isolated house on the remote Eel Marsh, a house only accessible by a strange causeway when the tide is out. It is here Arthur must travel to firstly represent his firm at her funeral and then to sift through Mrs Drablow's house to ensure all her legal paperwork is in order.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846685621</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Julian Barnes
|title=The Sense of an Ending
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary='The Sense of an Ending' is almost more of a novella - it's a slim volume but exquisitely written, as you might expect from Julian Barnes. It starts off describing the relationships between four friends at school, narrated by one of the friends, Tony Webster, but quickly it becomes clear that this is written many years later. Barnes has long been a terrific observer of the English middle classes and his style invariably contains satire and dry humour. And this being Barnes, this school clique is intellectual in interest, as the narrator recalls English and History teachers and student philosophising.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224094157</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Adam Levin
|title=The Instructions
|rating=2.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Now, I know that size isn't everything, but the first thing that strikes you about 'The Instructions' is that it is a brick of a book. It comes in at a wrist-challenging 1030 pages that almost encourages me to invest in an e-reader. It's also hugely ambitious for a first time writer not least that the book's action takes place over just a few days and the narrator is a ten year old child. While it starts encouragingly, it too rapidly becomes repetitive and dull and I found it a slog to get through. There are some great passages but these get too easily lost in this huge tome.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857861360</amazonuk>
}}
