132,902
edits
Changes
Book Reviews From The Bookbag (view source)
Revision as of 08:50, 31 October 2024
, Yesterday at 08:50no edit summary
<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 book review 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 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.
There are currently '''{{PAGESINCATEGORY: Reviews}}'''Read [[:Category:New Reviews|new reviews by genre]]at TheBookbag. '''<br>
Want to find out more [[About Us|about us]]? __NOTOC__ ==The Best New Books== '''Read [[:Category:New Reviews|new reviews by category]]. '''<br> '''Read [[:Category:Features|the latest features]].'''<!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Alistair McGuinnessFyodor Dostoyevsky|title=Half a World Away: Surviving White Nights|rating=5|genre=Short Stories|summary=As always in Dostoyevsky, the Move to character work is sublime. One is never left wondering what a Land Down Undercharacter is thinking or feeling because Dostoyevsky lays bare their innermost dispositions and temperaments with remarkable clarity.|isbn=0241619785}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0008385068|title=The Midnight Feast|author=Lucy Foley
|rating=4.5
|genre=Thrillers
|summary=A university professor is randomly killed by a thunderbolt after posting a package of history texts to journalist Jake WolseyIt's midsummer on the Dorset coast and guests gather at The Manor. Was his death really that random? It's their opening weekend and splendid celebrations are promised. Jake doesn't have long to ponder that before heIt's off to Turkey with archaeologist Florence Chung to investigate the ancient religion of the Etruscansall headed up by Francesca Meadows. HeThe Manor was her ancestral home and she's not the only one interested; MI6 are tailing him converted it into an impressive retreat for a reason even the agents concerned don't knowwealthy and famous. As history starts to reveal its secrets Her husband, Owen, was the architect and connects with names centuries after work is still ongoing on parts of the Etruscans died, Jake site. The heat is oppressive and Florence realise this is amongst the guests are enemies as much a fight for their lives well as friends. Old scores are going to be settled and it won't be long before a body is for knowledgefound.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0715649930</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Simon ScarrowJames Baldwin|title=Hearts of StoneGiovanni's Room|rating=34.5|genre=Historical Literary Fiction|summary=Wars are often written about and ''Giovanni's Room'' follows the further back you go the more unreal they feelnarrator David, an American man living in Paris, as he navigates his torturous affair with Giovanni, an Italian bartender he meets in a gay bar. The description of a Roman Soldier being killed seems While David is engaged to have little impact on our lives todayHella, butwho is travelling in Spain, what about Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam? How far must one go back before we feel detached the real tension in the novel arises not from events? World War Two ended 70 years ago, his infidelity but it still ripples through to todayfrom the deeper conflict within himself. There are stories still to be told from this time, but they must be written well It is David's crippling shame and sensitivelydenial of his sexuality that ultimately dooms his relationship with Giovanni.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0755380223</amazonuk>0141186356
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=John Dougherty and David Tazzyman (illustrator)|title=Stinkbomb and KetchupAshley Hickson-Face and the Bees of Stupidity|rating=5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=We've been here before. The lovely children whose name is in the title of all these books – handy when they make time to try and check if they're in this one or not – are woken up in a ridiculous way by a blackbird making his usual cameo. The Army of Great Kerfuffle is asleep – all single cat of it. The King is wearing a badge that allows him to pretend to not be the King – this time he's thinking of keeping bees, although he has four animals that go 'quack' in a hive instead. Oh yeah, and the evil badgers are in prison having been naughty. But they will never follow the pattern and be evil and naughty and break out in order to be eviller and more naughty, will they?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0192742736</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Julian Sedgwick|title=Ghosts of Shanghai|rating=4|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Shanghai, 1926. The city is heavily divided between the natural, national areas, and the enclaves of the foreigners – Russian, French, American, British. Several of the younger international youths have formed the Ghost Society gang, after the principal character, Ruby, found another divide cleaving Shanghai in two – that between the living and the dead, the 'real world' and the Otherworld. Her brother dead, she seemed to become the conduit for a poltergeist in her apartment, and recently the gang have even managed to lock a spirit into a bottle and cast it down a well. But the gang is immediately falling apart – the lad she loves, Charlie, and his sister are diverting themselves from, or have been warned off, any further such activity. Rose knows she has to find the source of the problem – and cross any untold divides in her city to find the truth…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444923900</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Guillermo del Toro, Daniel Kraus and Sean MurrayLovence|title=TrollhuntersWild East
|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
|summary=West Coast USA Written in the 1960sverse, and the city this is wracked Ronny's story, a young black fourteen year old boy from Hackney who suddenly has to move to Norwich and wrecked by start at a slew of missing children reportsmostly white school. The parents with their new anguishesmove is initiated by Ronny's mum who is worried for Ronny's safety after a tragic event, and so Ronny finds himself trying to settle in a new rules against playing out after darktown, have no idea of the horrors in their vicinity – literally under their feet lies a city of trollsnew school, guilty and keep himself out of snatching the childrentrouble. Last He listens to gomusic constantly, Jack Sturgessand has always dreamed of being a rapper. Cue the modern era But now, in this new school, his teacher encourages him to be part of a poetry writing workshop group and Jack's younger, now grown-up brother Jimslowly, and Jim Jr live a sheltered life in Ronny begins to see the most barricaded connections between rap and secure home imaginablepoetry, and Jim Jr's life is as exciting as you'd expect. Unfortunately, however, the trolls are about to make a return to their nastiest power of ways – creativity and their intentions are a lot more surprising than Jim Jr could ever predict…crafting your words.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1471405192</amazonuk>0241645441
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Anita Davison1635866847|title= Murder on the MinneapolisThe Lavender Companion|author=Jessica Dunham and Terry Barlin Vesci|rating= 4.5|genre=Crime (Historical)Lifestyle|summary=Governess Flora Maguire It's strange, the things that make you ''immediately'' feel that this is sailing from New York to England on the SS Minneapolisbook for you. Before I started reading ''The Lavender Companion'', entrusted with I visited the task author's [https://www.pinelavenderfarm.com/ website] and there's a picture of returning her teenage charge, Eddie back home to boarding schoola slice of chocolate cake on the homepage. I don't eat cakes and desserts - but I wanted that cake viscerally. Unfortunately for Flora, (There's a recipe in the ship is first-class onlybook, so she spends which I'm avoiding with some difficulty!!) Then I started reading the first night aboard stowed away book and I was told to make a mess of it. Notes in her cabin, acutely aware of her lower social statusthe margins are sanctioned. Her intention You get to stay out of fold down the limelight is thwarted when, during a solitary stroll along the deck, she discovers a dead body at the bottom corners of the companionwaypages. The ship staff hastily conclude You suspect that this is smears of butter would not be a tragic accident, but Flora has other ideas and decides to conduct her own investigationproblem. Is there a murderer aboard ship? And if so, is Flora making herself a prime target by poking her nose into other people I ''loved''s affairs?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1910208264</amazonuk>this book already.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Eve ChaseJenny Valentine|title= Black Rabbit HallUs in the Before and After|rating= 5|genre= General FictionTeens|summary=At Black Rabbit HallElk and Mab are best friends, time goes ''syrupy slow''. None of the clocks work properlyor more than that even, but an hour at Black Rabbit their friendship is said to last twice as long a once in a lifetime connection. They meet as children one day on a London one, and you trip out but unfortunately they don't get a quarter of each other's contact details at the things donetime. Every holiday But then chance brings them back together, and they are inseparable. Something has happened though, something terrible and tragic, the Alton family swap the hustle and bustle of London life for this secluded Cornish retreatnow they must work through their grief, a place that is theirs and theirs alonetheir friendship, together.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0718182979</amazonuk>1471196585
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Jo Walton1787333175|title= The Just CityYou Don't Have to be Mad to Work Here|author=Benji Waterhouse|rating= 3.5|genre= Dystopian FictionPopular Science|summary=Urged on by her brother ApolloI 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}}, goddess Pallas Athene founds a glorious mixture of insight into the Just City workings of Atlantis – a city based on Plato’s republicthe NHS, humour and autobiography. ''You Don't Have to be Mad... Filling it with an assortments of adults collected '' promised the same elements but moved from throughout time, as well as ten thousand ten year olds, (one physical problems to mental illness and the work of whom is a disguised Apollo)psychiatrist. Whilst the city flourishes, the arrival of Socrates may prove I did wonder whether it was acceptable to be a fly looking for humour in this setting but the ointment…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1472150767</amazonuk>laughter is directed at a situation rather than a person and it is always delivered with empathy and understanding.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Caroline LawrenceMariana Enriquez|title= The Case of the Bogus DetectiveA Sunny Place for Shady People|rating= 5|genre= Confident ReadersShort Stories|summary= Howdy folks! Welcome to Virginia CityMariana Enriquez writes horror that is disturbingly real, bustling and busy home achieving this uncanny familiarity by basing her paranormal plots on gritty realities: her settings include an abandoned field full of disused refrigerators due to prospectors, dancing girlsan urban planning mishap, lawyers, gamblers an overcrowded homeless shelter and newspapermen. It's 1862, and our twelvea crime-yearridden neighbourhood where safety meetings are routine -old pal Pinky is continuing the quest to become a successful detective and eventually join Uncle Allan in the famous Pinkerton Detective Agency in Chicagoall within Argentina. But for the moment there's The circumstances of her characters are so much crime right here in Nevada, thanks to plausible that the untold wealth being found daily in the nearby silver mines, that Pinky and financial partner Ping are soon busy day and night, chasing desperados, solving crimes and righting all manner of wrongssupernatural or otherworldly horror which seeps into these spaces adopts a similarly tangible texture.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1444010336</amazonuk>1803511230
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Marissa MeyerOnyi Nwabineli|title= Fairest: The Lunar Chronicles: Levana's StoryAllow Me to Introduce Myself|rating= 4.5|genre= TeensGeneral Fiction|summary= Meyer’s dedication 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 this prequel her twenties and she is slowly trying to The Lunar Chronicles is regain her confidence and to get her fanslife back, The Lunarticssuing her step-mother to take down the content about her. This book Anuri is especially for voracious readers who have devoured Cinderbattling alcoholism, failing to start her PhD, Scarlet undergoing therapy and Cress secretly abusing people online and are receiving money from them for doing so. Most importantly, she is desperately awaiting Winterworried about her little sister, though it works as a standalone too. According to who is the publisher’s note Queen Levana is a ruler who uses her glamour to gain powernew focus of Ophelia's online empire. But long before Can she crossed paths with Cindersave her sister, Scarlet and Cress, Levana lived a very different story- a story that has never been told… until now.perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the same time?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1250069661</amazonuk>0861546873
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=David LoadesChadwick|title=The Seymours Headload of Wolf Hall: A Tudor Family StoryNapalm|rating= 4.5|genre= HistoryThrillers|summary= In medieval times Wolf Hall or Wolfhall (or even Wulfhall), the long-since-demolished family seat It's September 1973 in WiltshireHicks, was the home California. Hicks is a Mojave desert town of a few thousand people with its nearest neighbours of the Seymour familyLA and Las Vegas both a significant drive away. Not much happens in Hicks. Their greatest triumph, followed by A silver mine and a speedy decline and falldefence contractor are the main local employers but otherwise, was part there's not much of Tudor history, note other than dive bars and Joshua trees. Life is thus the focus of this bookquiet, until....|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1445634953</amazonuk>B0D321VJ76
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Ali SparkesTom Percival|title=Car-JackedThe Wrong Shoes
|rating=5
|genre=Confident Readers |summary=A boy genius who speaks Mandarin 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 Latin 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 criminal who’s just robbed cash-in-hand job on a bank building site and stolen a car: it’s had an unusual pairing butaccident. Throw into that mix the fact that his mum and dad are separated, it turns outand Will's life seems bleak in every direction. And yet, he still has a perfect teamtiny amount of hope. ‘‘Car-Jacked’’ leads us through He is good at art, and clings to the twists and turns moments of 12-year old Jack’s adventure joy when his parents’ car he is hi-jacked with Jack still insidedrawing, that feel like a light at the end of a long, dark tunnel.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>019273346X</amazonuk>1398527122
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Kim HyunSylvie Cathrall|title=Best FriendsA Letter to the Luminous Deep|rating=3.5|genre=For SharingScience Fiction|summary=Teaching your young child new words is one of the wonders of parenthood, but once you have grown tired of teaching them mildly rude words, what is next? Thankfully, like with most thing in modern living, there is There are few greater joys than a book which lives up to help you that a compelling premise. And this is full one of popular and useful phrases to use in everyday situationsthem. I mean who else is going to teach you to say Pardon Me, if you have an accident?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1447277309</amazonuk>0356522776
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kevin Brooks1786482126|title=The Snake Trap: Travis Delaney Investigates Janus Stone (Dr Ruth Galloway)|author=Elly Griffiths|rating=4.5|genre=TeensCrime|summary=Teen private investigator Travis Delaney is still looking for Builders were demolishing an old house in Norwich - the people who killed his parents. He needs more than anything site was going to find out why hold seventy-five 'luxury' apartments - when they died. And, fresh from a narrow escape from death at discovered the hands bones of a criminal mastermindchild beneath a doorway. There was no skull. Was this a ritual killing or murder? Inevitably, Travis now suspects that thereDr Ruth Galloway finds herself working with DCI Harry Nelson. It's a traitor in the camp. This third installment in the ''Travis Delaneydifficult as Ruth knows, but Nelson doesn'' series has a barnstorming opening. Travis is abducted by terrorists and held captive alongside Winstont, the security officer gone bad who Travis suspects that she is the person guilty of pregnant with his father's death. Travis has child as a lot result of questionsthe one night they spent together some three months ago. But Her condition will he get any answers? And can he get himself out be obvious before long, not least because Ruth is prone to sudden bouts of this horribly dangerous situation?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1447238982</amazonuk>sickness.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Melvin BurgessJoan Didion|title=Lady: My Life as a BitchThe Year of Magical Thinking|rating=4.5|genre=TeensAutobiography|summary=Sandra This book is a naughty kid. Fed up with the pressure of exams, a lovely but slightly boring boyfriend and an overbearing mother, sheJoan Didion's gone a bit wild. She's thrown over heartbreaking autobiographical account of the boring boyfriend and the worthy best friend, done pretty badly at grief she endured following her GSCEs, and is running with some exciting but unreliable new pals. Shehusband's done sudden death. Books that shed light on taboo topics like death are such a bit of shoplifting beautiful and slept with a few boys, and caused her mother a good few hairnecessary resource to help people feel less alone. Didion unpicks unpleasant feelings surrounding death like self-tearing moments. On this particular daypity, she's getting off with Wayne denial and cheesing off Michelle, delusion and just generally being rebelliousmakes them utterly normal, when she runs slap bang into lends them a homeless alcoholic man, causing him human face to spill his can of Special Brew. The homeless guy is furious and chases her and Sandra is furious too, because he's ruining her day and HOW DARE HE? And then, everything changes for Sandra. The homeless guy has changed her into a dog. Yep. You heard. A dogwear.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1783443030</amazonuk>0007216858
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Karma Wilson and Jane Chapman0008551324|title=Bear CountsThe Devil You Know (D S Max Craigie)|author=Neil Lancaster|rating=4.5|genre=For SharingCrime|summary=If a bear approaches you 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 woods police where the body of a missing person is buried and asks you who was responsible for help countingher death. This person, he promises, the only numbers you is someone big and it will need to be aware of are worth the steps you take pegging it in the opposite directionpolice doing what he wants. Thankfully, And what he wants is to be transferred to an open prison to serve the bear remainder of this story is a friendly creature and he hangs out mostly with his woodland pals sentence and not terrified humansto get an early parole date. Can he help us count Not much to ask, is it? The new Deputy Police Constable doesn't think so and she's even prepared to five before do the terror grips us?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1471125459</amazonuk>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.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Michelle Miller1739526910|title=The UnderwritingWhere I've Not Been Lost|author=Glen Sibley|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary= Todd Kent is young, rich, stupidly handsome, and well on his way to the top of Wall Street. When ''One year after a new dating app called “Hook” decides to go publicsuicide attempt blows apart musician Brian O’Malley's life, Todd is handpicked by Hook’s eccentric founder he arrives in an unfamiliar Devon town to lead the project teamrecover. Taking brainy analyst NehaLiving with an unexpected housemate at his former manager’s holiday home, spoilt party-boy Beau, and old flame Tara Taylor he dreams of reconnecting with him – the team find themselves thrust into the hectic circumstances of a $14 Billion dealeverything he has lost. As Silicon Valley and Wall Street clashBut as those tentative plans falter, the death he becomes swept up in a local world of a young girl will find the team at odds with each other – unlikely friendships, mobile discos and spinning wildly out of controlsurprising romantic possibilities. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1922182974</amazonuk>''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Mike Brooks0008405026|title=Dark RunA Stranger in the Family (Maeve Kerrigan 11)|author=Jane Casey|rating=45|genre=Science Fiction Crime|summary=For any sane person Space is not 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 place you would want to gohalt. Yes Now, there is the great unknownher mother, Helena, planets to visit and the potential to meet alien lifeher father are dead in their bed. Initially, it looks like a straightforward murder/suicide but all that sits between you and there's something about the endless void is a few inches positioning of metal – no thank you. To make things even worse, the future of space travel also appears to have pirates, terrorism bodies that makes DS Maeve Kerrigan and petty bureaucracyher boss DI Josh Derwent suspicious. I think I will stick What looked as though it was going to getting my astronautbe an open-and-based thrills vicariously through shut case is now a complex double murder. Kerrigan is convinced that the medium of the novelexplanation lies in Rosalie's disappearance: others (such as Derwent's boss, Una Burt) are less convinced.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091956641</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Simon Dawson1529077745|title=The Sty's the Limit: When Middle Age Gets MuckyDark Wives (D I Vera Stanhope)|author=Ann Cleeves
|rating=4.5
|genre=LifestyleCrime|summary=Simon Dawson has met something he cannot beatA man walking his dog in the early morning discovered the body of a man in the park near Rosebank, a care home for troubled teens. He can't come The dead man was Josh - one of the care workers who was due to terms with it eitherwork a shift the night before but who had never turned up. It's D I Vera Stanhope is called Getting Older: not in to investigate the 'getting older' which we all do day by day, murder - but that moment when you realise that you've moved on to an entirely different stage in your life - and no her only clue is the disappearance of one actually asked you if you wanted to go on of the journeyresidents, fourteen-year-old Chloe Spencer. For Simon it's Middle Age Some people believe that's taken him by surprise: bits of Chloe was responsible for the body have stopped working death but Vera thinks this is unlikely as they ought to and hethe girl's realised diary makes it clear that she adored Josh. She knows that if he's going she has to find Chloe to look in the mirror, bare-chested, then he shouldn't do it when he's standing next discover what happened to a fit teenage boyJosh.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1409160858</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Cynthia Harrod-Eagles1399613073|title=Keep the Home Fires Burning: War at Home, 1915Moral Injuries|author=Christie Watson|rating=4.5|genre=Historical FictionThrillers|summary= As Olivia, Laura and Anjali met on the calendar page turns 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 1915 Jack Hunter be a cardiothoracic surgeon. Laura is fighting the fronta perfectionist and a trauma doctor. The same goes for Charles Wroughton, leaving his new fiancée Diana to face his aristocratic family (including dreadful Rupert) aloneAnjali is the free spirit of the group and she becomes a GP. The countryWhen we first meet them they're at a drug and alcohol-fuelled party and it's men are going off in greater numbers as enlistment fever begins to build and women are being brought end in to do mentragedy. We don's jobst know who suffered the tragedy or the consequences. (Yes, really!) Diana's sister Sadie continues to train horses to Twenty-five years later there will be sent to an eerily similar event that will impact the French front, making her feel as if she's doing something usefulthree friends. There are also other benefits to the job, seeing more of local vet John Courcy for instance, although their relationship is purely professional… yesThis time, really! Not everything is focused on France though; thereit's talk of opening up a new front further east on the Turkish coast at a place called Gallipolitheir teenage children who are involved.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0751556297</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Joan Aiken and Quentin Blake0241636604|title=Arabel’s RavenThe Trading Game: A Confession|author=Gary Stevenson
|rating=4.5
|genre=For SharingAutobiography|summary=It’s been manyIf you were to bring up an image of a city banker in your mind, many years since I first met Arabel you're unlikely to think of someone like Gary Stevenson. A hoodie and her pet ravenjeans replaces the pin-stripe suit and his background is the East End, Mortimerwhere he was familiar with violence, whilst watching Jackanory on children’s televisionpoverty and injustice. Bernard Cribbins used There was no posh public school on his CV - but he had been to read the stories, London School of Economics. Stevenson is bright - extremely bright - and they became firm favourites he has a facility with numbers which most of mineus can only envy. Here I am returning He also realised that most rich people expect poor people to the first book in the seriesbe stupid. It was his ability at what was, wellessentially, just a handful of years latercard game which got him an internship with Citibank. Eventually, and the story has lost none of its charmthis turned into permanent employment as a trader.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847806910</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Kim Kane and Sara ActonLeanne Egan|title=Unexpected Crocodile|rating=4|genre=For Sharing|summary=It’s always a worry when a large animal comes to tea. Here we find our characters inviting in a crocodile, who just happens to have dropped by to join Peggy and her family as they entertain the Dawson’s for a barbecue. Why has the crocodile come? And more importantly, will he ever leave?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1760111732</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Lucy Tapper and Steve Wilson|title=Horace and Hattiepillar (Hedgehugs)Lover Birds
|rating=4.5
|genre=For SharingTeens|summary=Horace and Hattie are best friends. They like to do everything that they can togetherWhen new girl, from playing hide and seekIsabel, moves to looking Lou's hometown of Liverpool from London Lou immediately feels Isabel's disdain for the first star of the nighteverything around her. One day when they’re out togetherA misunderstanding between them leaves them hating each other, but Lou feels her pulse racing every time she looks at Isabel or speaks with her, they find something small and round that's definitely because Isabel makes her feel so cross, isn't it? Because Lou is straight, isn't she? Even though none of her relationships with boys have gone very well so far, and smooth handing on the bottom she's never had a good kiss with any of a leaf. them? Whatever could it beSo she just finds herself watching Isabel, and wanting to hang out with her because fighting with her is fun, and she definitely just hates Isabel, doesn't she?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>184886163X</amazonuk>000862657X
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Anthony Quinn1009473085|title= Curtain CallThe Conservative Effect 2010 - 2024|ratingauthor= 4.5|genre= Crime Anthony Seldon and Tom Egerton (HistoricalEditors)|summary= London, 1936. Nina Land is a West End actress, and she is spending her afternoon in a hotel room with a married man. When she spots the face of the man the newspapers have named “The Tie-Pin Killer”, she faces a huge dilemma – will she report the man to the police, and risk her career and the reputation of her lover? Or will she stay quiet, and risk the lives of innocent girls?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099593238</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Alena Graedon|title= The Word Exchange|rating= 3.5|genre= General FictionPolitics and Society|summary=Welcome Sometimes it's simpler to the world of the explain a book by describing what it ''Memeisn't'; the next-generation mobile device. Imagine technology so sophisticated ' and that it could anticipate your needs as soon as they come into your mind. Need applies to get home''The Conservative Effect: 2010-2024 - 14 Wasted Years? Your Meme will hail a cab''. Feeling unwell? The Meme has If you're looking for an app for that. Negative thoughts? The Meme easy read which will intercede deliver the inside story about what ''really'' happened on your behalf to call family and friends or even 911, if needed. Yescertain occasions, then this isn't the Meme is a truly indispensable aid that has revolutionised the way that humans communicatebook for you. Critics say If that it's destroying human language and verbal interactionwhat you're looking for, but I don't worry: the Meme has an app think Anthony Seldon's book, {{amazonurl|isbn=B0BH7SKG2S|title=Johnson at 10}}, can be bettered for that toothose tumultuous years. If you are lost It's a compelling read and should be compulsory for words, the anyone who thinks Johnson should return to politics. ''The Conservative Effect'Word Exchange'is an entirely different beast. It' will supply you with s the seventh book in a series which looks at the impact a government has made and co-editor Sir Anthony Seldon regards this as the word you requiremost important. For This book follows the well-established format: a small fee series of experts from various fields review the state of course..the nation when the coalition took over in 2010, the changes that occurred and the situation in 2024.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780225628</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mick Manning and Brita GranstromMax Boucherat|title=William Shakespeare: Scenes from the life The Last Life of the world’s greatest writerLori Mills
|rating=4.5
|genre= Children's Non-FictionConfident Readers|summary= Sumptuously and appealingly illustratedWe meet Lori on the first evening she's got the house to herself – no neighbour to pop in, babysitter poorly, mother at work, just an avidly rule-breaking eleven year old, on her lonesome. What could possibly go wrong? Snuggled in a blanket fort, she has one main intention, this imaginative and innovative approach that is to the life of William Shakespeare uses quirky comic strip style speech bubbles while also paying tribute log on to some of his most famous plays. Occasionally losing focus in Voxminer, the order of scenes from his lifeworld-building, which critter-collecting game that is why it’s not quite a 5 star reviewhit in Lori's world. But first Lori has a tiny inkling that this stormy night doesn't find herself entirely on her own, it is still an entertaining and insightful introduction then she finds something even more spooky. For the server she and her bestie and nobody else should be able to the bard enter shows signs of Stratford upon Avontampering. This book includes maps When malevolent eyes spark up on her phone screen, a bibliographyand her safe place in the game has been doctored – well, where is a glossary and quotations from the bard’s plays.girl to turn?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1847803458</amazonuk>0008666482
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Cornelius MedveiB0DGDJRHYD|title=The Making of Mr BolsoverNowhere Man|author=Deborah Stone
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Meet Andrew Lynch. He's In a graduate civil servantquiet suburban house, then he isn'tPatrick is making his final plans. He's marriedA meticulous man, then he isn't. He's a librarian, then he isn’t. He starts, makes sure of all thingsevery preparation, down to live in a handmade camp in the Sussex countrysidelast detail. Some last reflections, and gets a job writing nature notes for a local magazine – until it's clear then he's shootingsays goodbye to his wife, the world, killing and eating too many of his subjects for his audiencelife. It's tasteshorribly sad. He turns his efforts to writing politicised letters to the local newspaperAt work in her shop, where his nephew wife Diana is fending off yet another phone call about her ageing and ailing mother, who needs extricating from yet another accident. It will be a jobbing hack, which inspires further, more campaigning activitieswhile before Diana realises what Patrick has done. Yes, it seems that Andrew Lynch's path to the top is foretold – but his fate is most definitely anything but natural…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099548690</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Ian McMillanVirginie Despentes|title=Neither Nowt Nor Summat: In search of the meaning of YorkshireKing Kong Theory
|rating=4
|genre=Politics and SocietyAutobiography |summary=Ian McMillan, poet, radio presenter, poet in residence at Barnsley Football Club and professional Yorkshireman, is worried. It has crossed his mind that he might not be ''Yorkshire enoughKing Kong Theory''is a hard-hitting memoir and feminist manifesto, given that his father was not from God's Own County, but was which can be seen as a call to arms for women in a Scot by birthphallocentric society broken at its core. In Originally written in French, the book is a series collection of discursions on essays in which Virginie Despentes explores her experiences as a woman through the subject complex prism of Yorkshire he attempts her varied life: from rape to distil sex work and pornography. Though these discussions are intertwined, their placement within the essence book can feel somewhat disjointed, a reflection of their original form as independent essays.|isbn=191309734X}}{{Frontpage|author=Alba de Cespedes |title=Forbidden Notebook|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=This Italian work of feminist fiction holds an air of suspense and tension from the moment our protagonist, Valeria Cossati, purchases her forbidden notebook, and learns about herself in the county most intimate and to understand what being a Yorkshireman meansrevealing ways. To |isbn=1782278222}}{{Frontpage|author=Ottessa Moshfegh|title=My Year of Rest and Relaxation|rating=3|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=At best, this end we accompany him through towns novel is a scathing critique of modern society and citiesreveals the fragility of human relationships; at worst, it is the Cudworth Probus Clubcynical, Ilkley Moor predictable and elicit contributions from Mad Geoff the barberslightly trite tale of an unlikeable protagonist. This unlikely heroine, a kazoo-playing train guard slim, attractive and four Saddleworth council workers newly orphaned girl in her twenties is disillusioned with the world, but resolves not to lose sleep over it: in fact, her solution lies in search her hibernation.|isbn=1784707422}}{{Frontpage|author=Jo Callaghan|title=Leave No Trace|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary=When a man is found crucified on the top of a mattresshill in Nuneaton, DCS Kat Frank finds herself assigned to the case alongside her sidekick, the AI detective Lock. Amongst othersIt's their first live case together, having previously been very successful with several cold cases. All 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 Yorkshire life is hereunwanted attention to their AI Future Policing project. Including Yorkshire puddings.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?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0091959950</amazonuk>139851120X
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Philip CaveneyB0DB64PYV5|title= One For SorrowThe White Rose|author=Dave Baines|rating= 54|genre= Confident ReadersDystopian Fiction|summary= You'd thinkIn 2033, wouldna superstorm known as the White Rose devastates the Northern Hemisphere. And it't you, s not a storm that Tom Afflick would move heaven and earth to avoid leaving Manchester to go to Edinburgh: on his last two visits there he ended up tumbling into the pastgathers, where he met all manner of scary folk. But parents tend to be pretty determined to get their own way about such thingswreaks havoc, and no way are they going to swallow some mad tale about him being chased by plague doctors and other assorted murderersthen dissipates. SoInstead, off he has to goit hovers across half the Earth with its octopus-like tentacles, not giving up and yes – he's barely set foot in ''Auld Reekie'' when he's time travelling again, in a wondrous mix of drama, real live people and deadly perilnever going away.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905916957</amazonuk>
}}