Difference between revisions of "Book Reviews From The Bookbag"

Read Me Like A Book is both a coming-of-age and a coming-out story.

Ash feels as though everything is a mess. Her parents aren't getting on and Ash is terrified they're going to split up. She's struggling to keep up her relationships with her friends. She trying to decide whether or not to lose her virginity - and how exactly she even feels about the boy she might lose it with. She's falling behind in her grades at school and half of her is a rebellious teen who couldn't care less about it, while the other half is panicking that she might not get into university.

And if all that wasn't enough, Ash is struck by a bolt from the blue when she develops an almighty crush on Miss Murray, her English teacher... Full review...

The Last Bookaneer by Matthew Pearl

Crime (Historical)

Bookaneer Fergins makes a decent living in 19th century London. However his business acquaintance Davenport has a plan to aid his prosperity. Hot literary property Robert Louis Stevenson is dying on Upolo, a Samoan island, having just written his final potential masterpiece. Therefore all Davenport has to do is to steal it, bringing it back to publishing glory and self-aggrandisement. The only problems are that the enabling legal loophole is about to close and he's not the only one with his eye on that particular prize. And Fergins? He's going too, whether he wants to or not. Full review...

The Economist Style Guide: 11th Edition

If you don't write what you mean, how will people know what you mean? Full review...

Gorgeous Colouring Book for Grown-Ups

So, when I mentioned on Facebook that I had a nice new grown-up colouring book to review, I discovered a secret little group of friends who all confessed (instantly and with glee) that they have succumbed to the new relaxation craze of grown-up colouring! They had tales of how tricky it was to stay inside of the lines, how long one picture could take, and how relaxing the whole thing is. I dug out my old tin of pencils, and settled down to give it a try. Full review...

Best Friends’ Bakery: Birthdays and Biscuits by Linda Chapman and Kate Hindley

In this, the fourth story in the Best Friends’ Bakery series, Hannah is recovering from her sadness at being thrown off the Junior Baker show on TV. Fortunately there’s plenty going on in her town and at her mum’s bakery to keep her busy. There’s a new beauty shop opening to bake for, a doggy rescue centre in trouble, and a new girl who seems intent on stopping anyone from befriending her. How will Hannah get on with these new challenges in her life? Full review...

Generation Z: Their Voices, Their Lives by Chloe Combi

Politics and Society

Generation Z, for anyone like me who didn’t know, is made up of those young people born between 1995 and 2001. It is one of the central contentions of Chloe Combi’s book 'Generation Z: Their voices, Their Lives' that these young people’s lives are unlike anyone else’s in British history. From the radical technological innovation which produced the internet and smart phones to multiculturalism, life for these children and teenagers is characterised by so much that was not experienced by their parents and grandparents. In 'Generation Z', then, Combi offers some glimpses into the worlds of young people today, in what she wishes to be 'a conversation starter between teenagers and adults'. Full review...

Alienated by Melissa Landers

Two years ago, aliens made contact. Now, Cara Sweeney has been chosen to host Aelyx, a L'eihr exchange student. The first exchange student. Cara gets a free ride to any college she chooses out of the deal, some excellent material for her blog, and a chance to be a part of history, helping in her own way to form an alliance between the two races. Full review...

Invaded by Melissa Landers

To save the alliance between Humans and the L'eihr, and save the planet from the deadly algae blooms that threaten to destroy all life, Cara and Aeylx have to persuade the L'eihr that Humans and L'eihr can peacefully co-exist. Full review...

Eagles at War by Ben Kane

War, what is it good for? Looking at the ever buoyant historic fiction genre it would appear that war is great for selling books. This is especially the case with the Romans; there are more books about Ancient Roman battles than there were mad Caesars. One of the leading names in the historic fiction genre is Ben Kane and when he releases the first book in a new series fans of the genre take notice, but would they be right to do so? Full review...

The Eye of Winter’s Fury by Michael J Ward

Fantasy

The Cold North awaits you…War is coming to Valeron, where an ill and ineffectual king is beset on all sides by the scheming of ambitious men. His youngest son, Prince Arran is sent on a fool’s errand, with the real threat waiting to be revealed. Your are Prince Arran. The ghost prince, a sickly boy who haunts the palace library. As danger threatens, you must finally prove yourself. Will you defy fate and become a great hero of legend? You decide in this epic fantasy adventure. The cold north awaits you…are you ready for the challenge? Full review...

Criminal Capital: How the Finance Industry Facilitates Crime by Stephen Platt

Business and Finance

It used to be estate agents we reviled the most, but they've now achieved relative respectability. MPs briefly took the top spot, but for many years now the list has been topped by bankers following the 2008 financial crisis, when huge taxpayer-funded financial bailouts were required to keep the world's financial system afloat. Most people will think that we've heard the worst of what has been going on, but Stephen Platt believes that excessive risk taking and mis-selling might well be just a minor part of what is still happening in the industry and that government attempts to counter the problems are misguided and unlikely to be effective. Full review...

Itchcraft by Simon Mayo

Third book in the Itch sequence about the audacious, intrepid teen obsessed with collecting elements from the Periodic Table to the detriment of his own life. Electrifying, explosive, punchy and action packed tour de force sizzling with surprising shocks. Full review...

Goodnight Already by Jory John and Benji Davies

For Sharing

If you list all of my favourite things you may be surprised what one of my top choices is – sleep. Lovely, blessed sleepy sleep. There is nothing quite like the feeling of waking up at the usual time, only to roll over and go back to Slumberville as there is no work today. If you wake me up too early, I have been described as looking somewhat like a grumpy bear, but what do you expect if you try to stop someone who is hibernating? Will you learn the lesson of this little duck who would not let a sleeping bear lie? Full review...

The House At The End Of Hope Street by Menna Van Praag

General Fiction

Alba Ashby is a wallflower of a girl; studious, bookish and excruciatingly shy, so when tragedy wields its ponderous bolt, she is less able than most to adjust to life as she now knows it. In one of her midnight walks around historical Cambridge, she finds herself at the door to Number 11 Hope Street. It is house that she has never before seen; quirky and turreted with a wild garden and grandly Victorian in hue and Alba is enchanted by it. So she does something that she would never normally do, in a million years. She knocks on the door. Full review...

The Throwaway Children by Diney Costeloe

They seemed like a perfect little family unit: Mavis and her two young daughters, Rita and Rosie. But widowed Mavis needed a man in her life and violent bully Jimmy was only too happy to enjoy the perks of such a relationship, even if it meant putting up with her troublesome children. When Mavis finds herself pregnant with Jimmy's baby, he agrees to marry her on one condition: the girls have to go. Distraught Mavis chooses her man over her children, setting in motion a tragic chain of events that leads to the girls being sent to an orphanage thousands of miles away in Australia. “The Throwaway Children” follows the lives of Rita and Rosie as they struggle to make sense of this new, unfamiliar world. Full review...

At The Water's Edge by Sara Gruen

General Fiction

An indiscretion at a party causes Ellis Hyde's parents to disown him, coming, as it does, hot on the heels of his father not understanding why Ellis has been turned down for war service. To prove he's not a coward, Ellis, his new wife Maddie and best friend Hank leave the US for Scotland. He's determined they will succeed where Ellis' father failed years before: they will find the Loch Ness monster. Maddie isn't as convinced but then she also thinks she knows Ellis. She and the locals at the inn where they're stranded by the global conflict will discover a lot more about him, and indeed themselves. Full review...

The Lady of Misrule by Suzannah Dunn

Elizabeth Tilney volunteers to accompany Lady Jane Grey to the Tower of London. Elizabeth would be attendant to the young deposed Protestant queen while Jane's husband Guildford Dudley is kept in an adjacent tower. Her feelings for him are less than devotional whereas he still feels a responsibility towards her, mixed with his fear and anger at what has gone before and what may lie ahead. However Jane is treated well by the new Queen Mary despite the difference in the new and old queens' faiths. Does Jane have anything to fear? Spending her time with Jane and as a messenger to Guildford, Elizabeth hopes not but she hears rumours... Full review...

William Shakespeare's The Phantom of Menace by Ian Doescher

Humour

Join us, good gentles, for a merry reimagining of `Star Wars Episode 1' as only Shakespeare could have written it. 'Tis a true Shakespearean drama, filled with sword fights, soliloquies and doomed romance…all in glorious iambic pentameter and coupled with gorgeous illustrations. Hold on to your midichlorians: The plays the thing, wherein you'll catch the rise of Anakin! Full review...

A War of Flowers by Jane Thynne

Crime (Historical)

A War of Flowers is the third of Jane Thynne's thoroughly researched and beautifully written novels of Nazi Berlin from the female point of view. Reading them is an immersive experience; the joy of the book is in location, description, comment. The action does not rush but the ending expertly pulls plot strings together and has a wow factor that will leave the reader eager for more. Full review...

Cuckoo Song by Frances Hardinge

Marketed as a twisted fairy tale, Cuckoo Song is so much more. Hardinge’s lyrical style sets it apart from other fantasy reads. Such phrases as she was weeping spider silk lend it a melody all of its own. At the story’s heart is the sense of wanting to belong and connect with others. It revolves around Piers Crescent’s daughter Triss who wakes up after an accident to find that her world has changed. She doesn’t feel that she is herself and starts to exhibit extremely peculiar behaviour. She is ravenous and inexplicably binge eats. For some reason her little sister Pen appears to hate her, scissors act strangely around her and her parents are anxious for her to remain ill and cosseted. She has memories from the time before she nearly drowned but she can’t visualise the actual incident. Full review...

This is not a Love Story by Keren David

This is a perfect holiday read – but that doesn't mean you need to be on holiday to read it. This Is Not A Love Story will waft you away from your bed or your fireside or your tube train seat and relocate you to Amsterdam. Full review...

Daddy's Sandwich by Pip Jones and Laura Hughes

For Sharing

One day, a little girl decides to make her daddy a sandwich. It starts out well, with two slices of bread, but things soon slip and slide from there into culinary chaos as she searches through the house for all of his favourite things, like biscuits dunked in tea, and his favourite slippers, and even the remote control! Full review...

The Lie Tree by Frances Hardinge

Fans of Frances Hardinge will be familiar with the eerie, unreal atmosphere of her books. Mysteries lurk in the shadows, perplexing and sometimes menacing her characters, and the strange and the banal jostle each other for space on the page. A world both familiar and outlandish is offered to us, where once again a fallible but endearing heroine battles forces which threaten to overwhelm her at every turn. Full review...

Demolition Dad by Phil Earle and Sara Ogilvie

Jake's dad is a wrestler. Nobody knows however, because Jake's dad also insists that Jake keeps it a secret, so that no one realises that come the weekend he leaves behind the demolition sites that he works on, puts on his spandex suit and enters the ring as 'Demolition Man'! But Jake is so proud of his dad that his alter ego can't remain a secret for long, and he sets about trying to change his dad's life through the world of wrestling. Full review...

Notebooks of a Middle-School Princess by Meg Cabot

The author of the hugely successful Princess Diaries has written a brand-new series for younger girls, telling the story of awkward middle-school student Olivia Grace. She discovers that her father is actually the Prince of Genovia, making her...a princess! Not everyone responds well to the news, however, and poor Olivia is soon thrown into a world of jealous bullies, intrusive paparazzi, disgruntled relatives and a whole new family she never knew existed. Full review...

The Mountain Can Wait by Sarah Leipciger

General Fiction

Tom Berry is a quiet man - one who lives for and in nature, spending a half of his year running a small team in remote, isolated forests. The other half he spends tending to his family - a small group whom he brought up almost single handedly, following the departure of his wife. A good, determined man, we learn of Tom's life running forestry teams in remote wilderness, before an accident forces Tom to leave his routine and seek out his son - and both become troubled by the events of the accident, as well as ghosts of the past that may cause more pain than either man had anticipated. Full review...

Lottery Boy by Michael Byrne

Twelve year old Bully and his mongrel dog, Jack, have been living rough for almost six months – ever since Bully's mum died. The future holds no hope until, quite by accident, he finds the lottery ticket he purchased for his mum hidden inside the last birthday card she gave him. He checks the numbers and discovers he's won the jackpot. But there's only days left before the ticket expires and Bully's not old enough to claim the money. To make matters worse, word of his winning ticket has got out and every unsavoury character on the streets is now after him. Full review...

Panther by David Owen

Things have gone woefully wrong for Derrick. He's binge eating and his weight has spiralled. He's fallen out with his best friend. The girl he likes doesn't like him. He's in trouble at school. And if it weren't for his sister Charlotte, none of this shiznit would be happening. If Charlotte wasn't depressed, if she hadn't tried to... well, you know... everything would be fine, just like it used to be. Full review...

The Case of the Exploding Brains by Rachel Hamilton

You'd think, with one parent in prison and the other one hardly ever moving from the sofa, that middle school student Noelle Hawkins would have far too many problems on her hands already to start worrying about the occasional little explosion at the Science Museum. After all, that's the kind of thing that's bound to happen in a place littered with heaps of seriously wacky inventions, right? Full review...

The Fifth Heart by Dan Simmons

On a rainy night in March 1893 Henry James stands on a Paris bridge, about to end it all. Next to him sidles Sherlock Holmes, about to do the same. Instead of jumping, Holmes drags James off for a drink and decides that they will go to America to solve a 17-year-old murder case. The supposed victim, socialite Clover Adams, is believed to have committed suicide but that doesn't deter Sherlock. He's off, Henry James is going with him and that's that! Full review...

The It Girl by Katy Birchall