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<metadesc>Book review siteExpert, with books full book reviews from most walks of literary life; fiction, biographynon-fiction, crime, cookery and children's books & self-published books plus author interviews and & top tens.</metadesc><h1 id="mf-title">The Bookbag</h1>Hello from The Bookbag, a site featuring books from all the many walks of literary life - [[:Category:Fiction|fiction]], [[:Category:Biography|biography]], [[:Category:Crime|crime]], [[:Category:Cookery|cookery]] and anything else that takes our fancy. At Bookbag Towers the bookbag sits at the side of the desk. It's the bag we take to the library, the charity shop and the bookshop. Sometimes it holds the latest releases, but at other times there'll be old favourites, books for the children, books for the home. They're sometimes our own books or books from the local library. They're often books sent to us by publishers and we promise to tell you exactly what we think about them. You might not want to read through a full review, so we'll give you a quick review which summarises what we felt about the book and tells you whether or not we think you should buy or borrow it. There are also lots of [[:Category:Interviews|author interviews]], and all sorts of [[:Category:Lists|top tens]] - all of which you can find on our [[features]] page. If you're stuck for something to read, check out the [[Book Recommendations|recommendations]] page.

Reviews by readers from all the many walks of literary life. With author interviews, features and top tens. You'll be sure to find something you'll want to read here. Dig in! Find us on [[File:facebook.gif|link=https://www.facebook.com/TheBookbagCoUk|alt=Facebook]] [https://www.facebook.com/TheBookbagCoUk '''Facebook'''], [[File:twitter.gif|link=http://twitter.com/TheBookbag|alt=Follow us on Twitter]] [http://twitter.com/TheBookbag '''Twitter'''], [[File:instagram_classic_logo.png|link=https://www.instagram.com/thebookbag.co.uk/|alt=Follow us on Instagram]] [https://www.instagram.com/thebookbag.co.uk/ '''Instagram'''] and [[File:LinkedIn.png|link=https://www.linkedin.com/in/the-bookbag-1b12a264/|alt=LinkedIn]] There are currently '''{{PAGESINCATEGORY:Reviews}}''' [[:Category:Reviews|reviews ]] at TheBookbag.

==Reviews of the The Best New Books==

'''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].''' <!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->

|isbn=147117316X0008385068|title=Guilty Not GuiltyThe Midnight Feast|author=Felix FrancisLucy Foley

|summary=It's midsummer on the Dorset coast and guests gather at The Manor. It's their opening weekend and splendid celebrations are promised. It's all headed up by Francesca Meadows. The Manor was her ancestral home and she's converted it into an impressive retreat for the wealthy and famous. Her husband, Owen, was the architect and work is still ongoing on parts of the site. The Honourable William Herbert Millgate Gordonheat is oppressive and amongst the guests are enemies as well as friends. Old scores are going to be settled and it won't be long before a body is found.}}{{Frontpage|author=Ashley Hickson-Russell (Bill Russell Lovence|title=Wild East|rating=4.5|genre=Teens|summary=Written in verse, this is Ronny's story, a young black fourteen year old boy from Hackney who suddenly has to move to those Norwich and start at a mostly white school. The move is initiated by Ronny's mum who knew him well) was acting as is worried for Ronny's safety after a tragic event, and so Ronny finds himself trying to settle in a new town, a volunteer steward at Warwick Racecourse when he was told new school, and keep himself out of the violent death trouble. He listens to music constantly, and has always dreamed of his much-loved wifebeing a rapper. It would get worse though: But now, in this new school, his teacher encourages him to be part of a poetry writing workshop group and, slowly, Ronny begins to see the connections between rap and poetry, and the successful insurance actuary would be accused power of killing her creativity and crafting your words.|isbn=0241645441}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1635866847|title=The Lavender Companion|author=Jessica Dunham and hounded by Terry Barlin Vesci|rating=4.5|genre=Lifestyle|summary=It's strange, the things that make you ''immediately'' feel that this is the mediabook for you. Then Before I started reading ''The Lavender Companion'', I visited the author's [https://www.pinelavenderfarm.com/ website] and there's a picture of a slice of chocolate cake on the homepage. he would lose his job I don't eat cakes and his homedesserts - but I wanted that cake viscerally. His best friends would turn against him(There's a recipe in the book, as they came which I'm avoiding with some difficulty!!) Then I started reading the book and I was told to believe him guilty make a mess of it. Notes in the murdermargins are sanctioned. Yet there was no really compelling evidence You get to fold down the corners of pages. You suspect that he was guiltysmears of butter would not be a problem. I ''loved'' this book already.

|isbnauthor=1908745819Jenny Valentine|title=Surfacing|author=Kathleen JamieUs in the Before and After

|genre=HistoryTeens|summary=Sometimes when people suggest Elk and Mab are best friends, or more than that you read even, their friendship is a once in a certain book, they tell you ''this lifetime connection. They meet as children one has your name day on ita trip out but unfortunately they don't get each other's contact details at the time. Mostly we take But then chance brings them at their wordback together, and they are inseparable. Something has happened though, or notsomething terrible and tragic, but rarely do we ask them why and now they thought somust work through their grief, unless it turns out that we didn't like the book. That's a rare experience. People who are sensitive to hearing a book calling your nameand their friendship, rarely get it wrongtogether. In this case I was told why|isbn=1471196585}}{{Frontpage|author=Kieran Larwood and Joe Todd-Stanton|title=Dungeon Runners: Hero Trial|rating=4|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Meet Kit. The blurb speaks Like most of the author considering ''people in his world, it seems, he is an olderavid fan of Dungeon Running – the sport where a team of warrior, mage and healer enter specially prepared, century-old, magical mazes, and race to the exit, less tethered sense of herselfperhaps bothering with the treasure or the big bad and the points they grant you along the way.'' Older. Less tethered. ThatUnfortunately for Kit, the only thing he's not seen of the latest race on the inn TV equivalent is that one team has been retired, eaten, and a bad description new trio of where I amquestors is needed. Add Possibly very unfortunately indeed for Kit, he has taken to that my love the goading from the token bully of the natural his worldand stumbled into declaring he'll enter as a team. What chance does this friendless, of those aspects of the poetic and lyrical muscle-free-zone have in actually managing that are about style not form, and substance most how could he possibly hope to succeed?|isbn=1839945184}}{{Frontpage|author=Saima Mir|title=Vengeance|rating=3.5|genre=Thrillers|summary= I was instantly intrigued by the premise of this novel – an organised crime syndicate in the north of all, about connectionEngland run by a Muslim woman. Of course this book had my name The fact that it was the second in a series I hadn't read didn't stop me – I've jumped midway into a few series before (on page and screen) and it needn't be a hindrance if it's good enough. It was written for meAnd that wasn't a problem here. It would have found its way Vengeance swiftly brings you up to me eventually. speed, and I am pleased to have it fall onto my path so quicklynever felt lost.|isbn=0861541561

{{Frontpage|author=Stuart Douglas|title=Lowe and Le Breton Mysteries - Death at the Dress Rehearsal|rating=3.5|genre=Crime|summary=During location filming for his 1970's sitcom 'Floggit and Leggit', leading man Edward Lowe stumbles across the dead body of a woman on the edge of a reservoir. The police seem happy to assign it as an accidental death, but something about the whole thing bothers Lowe, and he enlists the help of a fellow actor, John Le Breton to help him investigate matters further. They travel across the country during their days off filming, uncovering more possible murders and, seemingly, a link to death during the Second World War. But is there really a link between the deaths? And will they manage to uncover who is responsible before more people lose their lives?|isbn=1803368209}}{{Frontpage|isbn=B0CYV674G2|title=Swanton Morley (John Tanner)|author=David Blake|rating=3.5|genre=Crime|summary=It seemed like an open-and-shut case. A man, covered in mud and blood - and carrying a knife, comes into the police station shouting that he hasn't killed the man. A body at the bottom of a freshly dug grave at Swanton Morley church - he's been stabbed to death. DCI John Tanner is just back from his honeymoon, which coincided with the birth of his daughter Samantha. You would think he'd be grateful for an easy answer but the words 'perverse' and 'John Tanner' were made for each other. He's sleep-deprived to the point of falling asleep at work but he's determined to keep going - probably because he can't get any sleep at home.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1787333175|title=You Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here|author=Benji Waterhouse|rating=5|genre=Popular Science|summary=I was tempted to read ''You Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here'' after enjoying Adam Kay's first book {{amazonurl|isbn=1509858636|title=This is Going to Hurt}}, a glorious mixture of insight into the workings of the NHS, humour and autobiography. ''You Don't Have to be Mad...'' promised the same elements but moved from physical problems to mental illness and the work of a psychiatrist. I did wonder whether it was acceptable to be looking for humour in this setting but the laughter is directed at a situation rather than a person and it is always delivered with empathy and understanding. }}{{Frontpage|author=Onyi Nwabineli|title=Allow Me to Introduce Myself|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Anuri spent her childhood on display to the world, thanks to her step-mother Ophelia's increasingly popular presence on social media, where she posted every step of Anuri's childhood for sponsorships and influencer deals and, basically, monetary gain. Now Anuri is in her twenties and she is slowly trying to regain her confidence and to get her life back, suing her step-mother to take down the content about her. Anuri is battling alcoholism, failing to start her PhD, undergoing therapy and secretly abusing people online and receiving money from them for doing so. Most importantly, she is desperately worried about her little sister, who is the new focus of Ophelia's online empire. Can she save her sister, and perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the same time?|isbn=0861546873}}{{Frontpage|author=David Chadwick|title=Headload of Napalm|rating=4.5|genre=Thrillers|summary= It's September 1973 in Hicks, California. Hicks is a Mojave desert town of a few thousand people with its nearest neighbours of LA and Las Vegas both a significant drive away. Not much happens in Hicks. A silver mine and a defence contractor are the main local employers but otherwise, there's not much of note other than dive bars and Joshua trees. Life is quiet, until....|isbn= B0D321VJ76}}{{Frontpage|author=Tom Percival|title=The Wrong Shoes|rating=5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Will's life is difficult, in a multitude of ways. He is bullied because he has 'the wrong shoes', he has the wrong shoes because his dad can't work and doesn't have enough money for even the most basic of things like food, and his dad can't work because he lost his job at the college, was working a cash-in-hand job on a building site and had an accident. Throw into that mix the fact that his mum and dad are separated, and Will's life seems bleak in every direction. And yet, he still has a tiny amount of hope. He is good at art, and clings to the moments of joy when he is drawing, that feel like a light at the end of a long, dark tunnel.|isbn=1398527122}}{{Frontpage|author=Sylvie Cathrall|title=A Letter to the Luminous Deep|rating=5|genre=Science Fiction|summary= There are few greater joys than a book which lives up to a compelling premise. And this is one of them.|isbn= 0356522776}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0008517061|title=Death in a Lonely Place|author=Stig Abell|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary= Former Metropolitan Police detective, Jake Johnson, has settled into his rustic life at Little Sky. There’s perhaps a little uncertainty about the future of his life with his vet girlfriend, Livia and her daughter Diana, as moving in together would mean a lot of compromise: does Jake give up his off-grid and relaxing life to move in with Livia or does Livia move to Little Sky despite her reservations about whether or not this is the future she wants for herself and her daughter? For the moment they’re enjoying life in the present and putting the future on the back burner.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1786482126|title=The Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths|rating=4.5|genre=Crime|summary=Builders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the site was going to hold seventy-five 'luxury' apartments - when they discovered the bones of a child beneath a doorway. There was no skull. Was this a ritual killing or murder? Inevitably, Dr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. It's difficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn't, that she is pregnant with his child as a result of the one night they spent together some three months ago. Her condition will be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is prone to sudden bouts of sickness.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0008551324|title=The Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster|rating=4.5|genre=Crime|summary=It's unusual for anyone from the Hardie family to approach the police. Neither side likes or has any respect for the other. But Davie Hardie is struggling in prison and he's prepared to tell the police where the body of a missing person is buried and who was responsible for her death. This person, he promises, is someone big and it will be worth the police doing what he wants. And what he wants is to be transferred to an open prison to serve the remainder of his sentence and to get an early parole date. Not much to ask, is it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and she's even prepared to do the other thing that Hardie demanded - make certain that DS Max Craigie and anyone who works with him is kept well away from what's happening.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0008405026|title=A Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Jane Casey|rating=5|genre=Crime|summary=It's sixteen years since nine-year-old Rosalie Marshall disappeared from her bed one summer night. She was never found and the investigation ground to a halt. Now, her mother, Helena, and her father are dead in their bed. Initially, it looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but there's something about the positioning of the bodies that makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and her boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. What looked as though it was going to be an open-and-shut case is now a complex double murder. Kerrigan is convinced that the explanation lies in Rosalie's disappearance: others (such as Derwent's boss, Una Burt) are less convinced.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0571379877|title=The Kellerby Code|author=Jonny Sweet|rating=3.5|genre=Crime|summary=Edward Jevons is a working-class young man, obsessed with his upper-classfriends, Robert and Stanza. Robert's a theatre director. He's also self-obsessed, demanding, handsome and entitled and uses Edward to run errands for him. Edward has been in love with Stanza since their university days - and he's drunkenly confided how he feels to Robert. Most men in Robert's position would stay away from Stanza or tell Edward that a relationship had begun between them but he's not like most men: Edward is left to stumble upon the two of them kissing in a dark passageway.}}{{Frontpage|author=Jo Callaghan|title=Leave No Trace|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary=When a man is found crucified on the top of a hill in Nuneaton, DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to the case alongside her sidekick, the AI detective Lock. It's their first live case together, having previously been very successful with several cold cases. But when there is a second body found crucified a few days later, Kat is suddenly struggling with a potential serial killer and a very high profile case that draws a lot of unwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. Will they be able to solve the case in time, or will Kat find herself taken off the case and, potentially, out of a career?|isbn=139851120X}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1399613073|title=Moral Injuries|author=Christie Watson|rating=4.5|genre=Thrillers|summary=Olivia, Laura and Anjali met on the first day of medical school and their friendship would keep them inseparable for a quarter of a century. Olivia is ruthlessly ambitious, which is a bonus when you aim to be a cardiothoracic surgeon. Laura is a perfectionist and a trauma doctor. Anjali is the free spirit of the group and she becomes a GP. When we first meet them they're at a drug and alcohol-fuelled party and it's going to end in tragedy. We don't know who suffered the tragedy or the consequences. Twenty-"wikitable" cellpaddingfive years later there will be an eerily similar event that will impact the three friends. This time, it's their teenage children who are involved.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0241636604|title=The Trading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson|rating=4.5|genre=Autobiography|summary=If you were to bring up an image of a city banker in your mind, you're unlikely to think of someone like Gary Stevenson. A hoodie and jeans replaces the pin-stripe suit and his background is the East End, where he was familiar with violence, poverty and injustice. There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to the London School of Economics. Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and he has a facility with numbers which most of us can only envy. He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to be stupid. It was his ability at what was, essentially, a card game which got him an internship with Citibank. Eventually, this turned into permanent employment as a trader.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1035021803|title=The Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder|author=C L Miller|rating=3.5|genre=Crime|summary=It's twenty years since Freya Lockwood has been back to the English country village where she grew up. She's back now because of a request for help from her beloved aunt, Carole. Freya's former mentor and Carole's close friend, Arthur Crockleford, is dead and the circumstances seem suspicious, to say the least. Arthur was the reason why Freya had not been back to the village: Arthur, she feels, let her down badly. Even though they were in business together as antique hunters, she has not felt able to be near the man or pursue the profession she loved. After the split, she worked in a cafe, met and married James (on the rebound from the love of her life, who was murdered) and Freya and James have now divorced.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=AllTomorrowsFutureCover|title=All Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)|rating=5|genre=Science Fiction|summary="15" ''Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to come.''

<!-- Adele Parks -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:0008284660I've heard it said that 'technology' is what happens after you're eighteen.jpg|link=http://www Well, I must confess that there have been more than a few decades of technology in my lifetime.amazon.co.uk/dp/0008284660/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag I've kept up reasonably well with what's advantageous to me but I'm left with the feeling that it's all getting away from me. Some of it is -21]]  | style="verticalfrankly -align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[Lies Lies Lies by Adele Parks]]=== [[image:4quite frightening.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]] Simon Barnes had his first taste of beer in 1976 when he was just six years old. Over Of course, I could research the possibilities and the years it would become a habit probabilities and then a need. By 2016 and with a wife and child of his own he was a functioning alcoholic - a fact known by everybody except Simonend up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who knows what they're talking about or the latest conspiracy theorist. He's concentrating on wanting another child to complete his family. His wife, Daisy, isn't worried. They took a long time to conceive Millie, I needed people I knew I could trust and who's perfect could deliver information in every a way, so why tempt fate? Simon's not inclined to let matters rest though and it's at a fertility clinic that he receives the news that will change all their lives: he's sterileI could understand. [[Lies Lies Lies by Adele Parks|Full Review]]}}{{Frontpage<!-- Peter Lynas and Charlie Roberts -->|author=Sunny Singh|-title=Hotel Arcadia| stylerating="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"3.5|genre=Thrillers [[image:099334030X.jpg|linksummary=http://www.amazonThe Hotel Arcadia is a luxury hotel in an unnamed city that has suddenly been violently taken over by a terrorist group.co Hiding from the terrorists who are rampaging through, killing everyone on site, there is Sam, a wartime photographer and Abhi, the hotel manager.uk/dp/099334030X/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[Can You Draw As Abhi continues to try to care remotely for the Dragosaur? by Peter Lynas and Charlie Roberts]]=== [[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Crafts|Crafts]]residents who are still alive in the hotel, [[:Category:Emerging Readers|Emerging Readers]] You're going he forms a bond with Sam who refuses to get a hint be cowed by events, and keeps on venturing out of her room to try to capture what this book's about very quicklyhappened through her photography. When you see Although they only ever talk over the title pagephone, you'll find out what the book's called their friendship grows as Abhi tries to help her keep safe and that it's been written they both wait to see if they will be rescued before they are discovered by Peter Lynas. Then we move on to who has done the illustration - and there's a gapterrorists. ''You'' are going to put your name there. It's ''your'' responsibility to provide the pictures for this book about one |isbn=086154742X}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1529153298|title=The List of the largest creatures ever to roam the earthSuspicious Things|author=Jennie Godfrey|rating=5|genre=General Fiction|summary=It's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly... ) ThereShe's not what's worrying Miv's some help availablefamily, though. Women have been disappearing. Well, they've been murdered, but your name is on the title page - and you to have work to do! [[Can You Draw the Dragosaur? by Peter Lynas and Charlie Roberts|Full Review]] <!-- Abercrombie -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:0575095865'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening.jpg|link=http://www.amazon Miv's upset because she's overheard that her father wants to move the family 'Down South'.co.uk/dp/0575095865/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]] | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[A Little Hatred by Joe Abercrombie]]===When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a frightening, foreign place, best avoided. [[image:5starFor Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and she'll do anything to prevent that.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Fantasy|Fantasy]] The chimneys of industry rise over Adua and She's not worried about the world seethes with new opportunities. But old scores run deep as ever. On the blooddangers or that her Mum's stopped talking -soaked borders of Angland, Leo dan Brock struggles to win fame on the battlefield, and defeat the marauding armies of Stour Nightfall. He hopes for help from the crown. But King Jezal's son, the feckless Prince Orso, is a man who specialises in disappointments. Savine dan Glokta - socialite, investor, and daughter of the most feared man in the Union - plans to claw anyone.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1398524085|title=Has Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?|author=Nicci French|rating=5|genre=Crime|summary=Charlotte Salter was expected at her way to the top of the slag-heap of society by any means necessaryhusband's fiftieth birthday party but never turned up. But the slums boil over with a rage that Her children, sons Niall, Paul and Ollie and her daughter, Etty. are all the money in the world cannot controlworried but - strangely - her husband, Alec, is not. The age of the machine dawns Shortly afterwards, but Etty and Greg, find the age body of magic refuses to die. With the help of the mad hillwoman Isern-i-PhailGreg's father, Rikke struggles to control the blessingDuncan Ackerley, or the curse, of in the Long Eyeriver. Glimpsing It was an easy assumption for the future is one thing, but with police to make that Duncan had murdered Charlie and then committed suicide when he couldn't stand the guiding hand of the First of the Magi still pulling the strings, changing it will be quite another guilt. The Salter children are not convinced but there's little else they can do but get on with their lives and wonder about what really happened. .[[A Little Hatred by Joe Abercrombie|Full Review]]}}{{Frontpage<!-- Peter Lynas and Clare Lindley -->|isbn=1035906708|-title=Diva| styleauthor="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|Daisy Goodwin[[image:0993340334.jpg|linkrating=http://www4.amazon.co.uk/dp/0993340334/ref5|genre=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]] General Fiction| stylesummary="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[Bunny by Peter Lynas and Clare Lindley]]=== [[image:4starWe tend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, but she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, New York, in December 1923 and only moved to Athens when she was thirteen.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:For Sharing|For Sharing]] You might have seen Bunny on Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 'Callas' to make it more manageable in the beach where he livedStates. Like many beaches it When she was full of sand back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the Nazi occupation by a mother who mercilessly exploited her and Bunny didn't like sand, not least because it got between his toes and ''scratched''made no secret of her preference for her elder sister, Jackie. What he really liked was juicy green grass. All the other rabbits lived on the top of the cliff, where Bunny could see a lot of tasty-looking grass. But the cliff was very high. [[Bunny by Peter Lynas and Clare Lindley}}{{Frontpage|Full Review]]author=Christopher Edge|title=Black Hole Cinema Club<!-- Thomas Knauer -->|-| style|rating="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|4[[image:1635860334.jpg|linkgenre=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1635860334/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]] Confident Readers| stylesummary="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[Why We Quilt by Thomas Knauer]]=== [[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Crafts|Crafts]] ILucas and his friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, a place that has the nickname of 'The Black Hole'. All big movie fans, they've often wondered about the story that patchwork quilting began as a way for women (and myth would have it that it was always women) re looking forward to make an extra blanket out lots of material which would otherwise go to waste. exciting films, and many, many snacks! This undoubtedly ''did'' happen but when you think However, as the movie starts, they very quickly realise that something about itthis new film format is very different, you need and they are swept up into an awful lot of material to make a quilt and the time could have been better spent if all that was required was beddingadventure they couldn't even imagine. Like Thomas Knauer I've come But as they lurch from one film genre to the conclusion that it began as an art next, can they figure out what on earth is going on? Will they ever get back to the cinema, and has largely continued down that same road with fluctuations in popularity over the years. [[Why We Quilt by Thomas Knauer|Full Review]] <!-- Nicci French -->to their real lives?|-| styleisbn="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|1839942738[[image:1471179230.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1471179230/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[The Lying Room by Nicci French]]=== [[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Crime|Crime]], [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]] When we meet Neve Connolly it's pretty obvious that she has something to hide. She crept into the house after midnight, carefully putting her clothes into the washing machine and she can't wait to get husband Fletcher and children Mabel, Connor and Rory off on their various ways the next morning when she gets a text telling her to come to the flat. He has a few hours to spare and can't wait to see her. Only, when she gets to the flat she finds Saul Stevenson, her boss and lover, dead on the floor. The hammer that's been used on his brain is at his side. [[The Lying Room by Nicci French|Full Review]] <!-- Peter Lynas and Charlie Roberts -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:0993340342.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0993340342/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[Madeleine Goes to the Moon by Peter Lynas and Charlie Roberts]]=== [[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:For Sharing|For Sharing]] Madeleine is a very lucky girl: in her room she has all a girl could ask for in the way of toys, books, games and dollies. She's a very lucky girl in another way too: she has imagination and everything in her room can be used to take her on adventures. She spends all day there: Dad thinks that she likes to be alone, but Madeleine's not alone on all the trips she takes. We'll find out that yesterday she was told to tidy her room, but instead of doing that she went to the moon. [[Madeleine Goes to the Moon by Peter Lynas and Charlie Roberts|Full Review]] <!-- Ann Patchett -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:1526614960.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1526614960/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[The Dutch House by Ann Patchett]]=== [[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Literary Fiction|Literary Fiction]] When we first meet Danny and his elder sister, Maeve Conroy, they're both living at The Dutch House with their parents and under the gaze of the portraits of the former owners whose oil paintings still hang on the walls. It's a strange family dynamic: Cyril Conroy is distant and the closest Danny seems to come to him is when he goes out with him on a Saturday collecting rents from properties the family owns. Elna Conroy is loving, but absent increasingly often until the point comes when the children are told that she will not be returning. In other circumstances this might have affected Maeve and Danny deeply, but their primary relationship is with each other. It's a bond which only death will break. [[The Dutch House by Ann Patchett|Full Review]] <!-- Peter Lynas and Andy S Gray -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:0993340350.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0993340350/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[The Very Rude Toytoise by Peter Lynas and Andy S Gray]]=== [[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:For Sharing|For Sharing]] It was one of those blissful days in the forest. Mrs Rabbit was collecting carrots because she wanted to make a cake. Mrs Blue Bird was gathering twigs to build a nest. Mrs Spider was busily spinning a web to catch juicy flies. Mrs Squirrel was piling up acorns. And Mr Bear sat comfortably in a chair, fishing for lunch. What could be better? And then... [[The Very Rude Toytoise by Peter Lynas and Andy S Gray|Full Review]] <!-- Peter Lynas and Rosie Alabaster -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:0993340318.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0993340318/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[Recipe for Making a Snowman by Peter Lynas and Rosie Alabaster]]=== [[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:For Sharing|For Sharing]] Who knew it? You can even get a recipe book which tells you how to make a snowman - and there's no cooking involved! Mum, Dad and the two children are absolutely meticulous though: they're going to get everything right, even down to doing some mining to get the coal for the eyes, searching through the bits 'n bobs jar for buttons for the snowman's coat and picking out the perfect piece of headgear. There's quite a choice available, but the family decide on the bobble hat, presumably to keep the snowman warm. The moth-eaten pair of mittens simply won't do and a pair with purple and pink stripes are chosen. [[Recipe for Making a Snowman by Peter Lynas and Rosie Alabaster|Full Review]] <!-- Melanie Martin -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:1789016304.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1789016304/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[War and Love: A family's testament of anguish, endurance and devotion in occupied Amsterdam by Melanie Martin]]=== [[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:History|History]], [[:Category:Biography|Biography]] Melanie Martin read about what happened to Dutch Jews in occupied Amsterdam during World War II and was entranced by what she discovered, particularly in ''The Diary of Ann Frank'' but then realised that her own family's stories were equally fascinating. A hundred and seven thousand Jews were deported from the city during the war years, but only five thousand survived and Martin could not understand how this could be allowed to happen in a country with liberal values who were resistant to German occupation. Most people believed that the occupation could never happen: even those who thought that the Germans might reach the city were convinced that they would soon be pushed back, that the Amsterdammers would never allow what happened to escalate in the way that it did, but initial protests melted away as the organisers became more circumspect. It's an atrocity on a vast scale, but made up of tens of thousands of individual tragedies. [[War and Love: A family's testament of anguish, endurance and devotion in occupied Amsterdam by Melanie Martin|Full Review]] <!-- Sedgwick -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:1788542347.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1788542347/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[Snowflake, AZ by Marcus Sedgwick]]=== [[image:3.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Literary Fiction|Literary Fiction]] This is a deep, interesting read unlike any book I've read in quite some time. The novel's story follows a young man named Ash in the process of joining a community of sick people in the curiously named town of Snowflake, Arizona. These people are sick, but it's not a sickness you've heard of. Instead, they're environmentally ill – affected by household chemicals and fabrics, pesticides, static electricity, and radiation – and their only ''cure'' is to stay in the town away from the real world. Though it's about a real place, the people in it are fictional. It really is a place apart, quite literally cut off from the outside world – people are even required to decontaminate themselves thoroughly before becoming fully integrated. [[Snowflake, AZ by Marcus Sedgwick|Full Review]] <!-- Moyer -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:178747920X.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/178747920X/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[Brightfall by Jaime Lee Moyer]]=== [[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Fantasy|Fantasy]], [[:Category:Historical Fiction|Historical Fiction]] Robin Hood is gone – denouncing both his former life and his love Marian, and retreating to a monastery – although no-one knows quite what led him to abandon all that he had built. Marion's life since has been relatively quiet - but when her friends start dying, Marion is tasked by Father Tuck to break the curse surrounding them and to save their lives. Setting off with a soldier, a Fey Lord and a sullen Robin Hood, she becomes tangled in a maze of betrayals, complicated relationships, and a vicious struggle for the throne…[[Brightfall by Jaime Lee Moyer|Full Review]] <!-- Hewitt -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:1509896465.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1509896465/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[The Nightjar by Deborah Hewitt]]=== [[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Fantasy|Fantasy]], [[:Category:Literary Fiction|Literary Fiction]] ''The Nightjar'' is an unusual and exciting story. Alice Wyndham lives a normal life in London until she finds a box on her doorstep one morning and her life begins to unravel, fast. From that very moment, her life is flooded with magic, loss, expectation and particularly, betrayal. As everything around her shifts, all that she knows, all that she thinks she knows, must change. Who can she trust? Who must she trust? Who will she trust? More importantly, can she even trust herself? [[The Nightjar by Deborah Hewitt|Full Review]] <!-- McGee -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:0241365953.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0241365953/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[American Royals by Katharine McGee]]=== [[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:General Fiction|General Fiction]] Two and a half centuries ago, America won the Revolutionary War and General George Washington was offered the crown. Today, the House of Washington still sit on the thrown with Princess Beatrice next in line. Beatrice's whole life has been building up to her ruling the United States and the time for her reign is imminent. [[American Royals by Katharine McGee|Full Review]] <!-- Nicola Monaghan -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:0857308025.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07VRSX3SN/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[Dead Flowers (Dr Sian Love) by Nicola Monaghan]]=== [[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Crime|Crime]] It was more than a little bit of a surprise to Dr Sian Love (and the rest of the relatives) when her uncle Bobby left her his home - a former pub called The Loggerheads in the Narrow Marsh area of Nottingham. Then it was a shock when she found two bodies in the cellar before she'd even got settled in - and managed to break a bone in her foot in the course of making the discovery. They'd been there for some time, but who - exactly - were the man and the woman, wrapped in each other's arms? Having spent ten years on the Murder Squad, ending up as a DCI she knows what's going to happen next, but she's not prepared for quite how personal it's all going to get. [[Dead Flowers (Dr Sian Love) by Nicola Monaghan|Full Review]] <!-- Renee Watson -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:1526613689.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1526613689/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[Some Places More Than Others by Renee Watson]]=== [[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]  Amara's twelfth birthday is coming up and she wants nothing more for it than a trip to New York to meet her father's side of the family. But her father hasn't spoken to Amara's grandfather for many years - Amara doesn't know why - and both her parents are resistant to the idea. But Amara is nothing if not persistent and a school family history project provides her with the perfect wedge. Eventually, her parents give in and off she goes... with a secret mission from her mother: to bring her father and Grandpa Earl back together again. [[Some Places More Than Others by Renee Watson|Full Review]] <!-- Graves -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:194927201X.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/194927201X/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]] | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"|===[[Lakes of Mars by Merritt Graves]]=== [[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Science Fiction|Science Fiction]] Aaron Sheridan doesn't want to live anymore. His entire family is dead by his own hand, killed in a shuttle crash. Unable to deal with the guilt, he signs up for the Fleet expecting a fatal deployment to the Rim War, but instead ends up at their most prestigious command school, Corinth Station... [[Lakes of Mars by Merritt Graves|Full Review]] <!-- Ryan -->|-| style="width: 10%; vertical-align: top; text-align: center;"|[[image:191280493X.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/191280493X/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21]]  | style="vertical-align: top; text-align: left;"| ===[[Coming of Age by Danny Ryan]]=== [[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Autobiography|Autobiography]]  ''He began writing novels and poetry at the age of twelve, but it was to take him a further forty-eight years to realise that he wasn’t very good at either. Consistently unpublished for all that time, he remains a shining example of hope over experience...''  ''This a memoir from someone you have never heard of - but will feel like you have.'' [[Coming of Age by Danny Ryan|Full Review]]  <!-- DO NOT REMOVE ANYTHING BELOW THIS LINE -->|}}