Difference between revisions of "Book Reviews From The Bookbag"

The smallest member of the Crumb family, Fum, has gone missing. Where on earth can he be? The rest of the Crumbs (a family of giants) search high and low for little Fum, enlisting the help of various fairy tale friends along the way. Full review...

Little Monster's Day Out with Dad by Nick Sharratt and Pippa Goodhart

Before leaving the house it is always important that you check the traffic online. What is the point in leaving now if you are going to be stuck in a traffic jam all the way? Little Monster's Father could have done this, but is learning the hard way. Thankfully, this is a world in which even the mundane can be fun and there are lots of friends to find; even when you are stuck in back to back traffic on the Monster M25. Full review...

The Island that Disappeared by Tom Feiling

History

'The Island that Disappeared' tells the history of the, largely now forgotten, island of Providence in the Caribbean. It is a fascinating and compelling account of what might have been but ultimately is the story of greed, ambition and human nature. In 1630 on board the Seaflower, a sister ship to the Mayflower, a small group of English puritans sailed to the island to establish a new colony. They were convinced in their belief that the British Empire would rise in the Central America and not in New England. The hopes that they carried was soon destroyed by failing crops, quarrels and rebellions and many turned to piracy and the plundering of Spanish treasure ships. Within ten years, the Spanish retaliated and invaded the island, wiping the colony out. Providence became a footnote of history until it was resettled over a hundred years later. The book tells the island's story from its early puritan beginnings to the present and through its telling it provides a fascinating microcosm of the world we live in today. Full review...

Countless by Karen Gregory

Hedda is 20 weeks pregnant. It was a one-night stand, so there's no father on the scene. She's 17. She's in the grip of an eating disorder and has been for years. Her best friend recently died. She's living in a grotty flat because her relationship with her parents has broken down. I think we can all agree that the situation is dire. Full review...

The Boy, the Bird and the Coffin Maker by Matilda Woods

Alberto is a carpenter, the very best in the town of Allora. But after the plague sweeps through the town, taking many of the citizens and Alberto's wife and children, he turns his skills away from furniture and toys to making coffins. Wrapped in sadness, and waiting only for the plague to come and claim his life too, Alberto lives alone, keeping company with the dead who are delivered to his house to await their coffin. One day, however, he realises that he must have a living visitor, as food starts to go missing. He begins to leave scraps of food, to try and discover who his mystery thief is… Full review...

The Pearl Thief by Elizabeth Wein

Julie Beaufort-Stuart - Lady Julia to you and me, if you please - has just returned to Strathfearn. It's 1938 and her grandfather, the Earl of Strathfearn, has recently died, leaving a mountain of debt behind him. The family's ancestral home has been sold to meet the debt and the death duties and will soon become a school. But, as the contents of the estate and its treasures are catalogued and renovations are underway, there is time for Julie and her family to spend the summer making their goodbyes - to home and landscape and to friends, including the McEwans, a family of Highlands Travellers, loved by the family but hated by the authorities. Full review...

The Fallen Children by David Owen

Life is tough on the Midwich Estate. Kids living there don't have much hope in the future. They're already judged by their poverty, their religion, their race. Carving out a prosperous future from this inauspicious place seems like a pipe dream. But, in their various ways, Siobhan, Keisha, Maida and Morris are all trying - whether that means making plans to get out, or developing strategies to cope with life as it has been dealt. Full review...

Strange Magic: An Essex Witch Museum Mystery (Essex Witches Mystery 1) by Syd Moore

Paranormal

Rosie Strange doesn't believe in ghosts or witches or magic. No, not at all. It's no surprise therefore when she inherits the ramshackle Essex Witch Museum, her first thought is to take the money and run. Still, the museum exerts a curious pull over Rosie. There's the eccentric academic who bustles in to demand she help in a hunt for old bones, those of the notorious Ursula Cadence, a witch long since put to death. And there's curator Sam Stone, a man about whom Rosie can't decide if he's tiresomely annoying or extremely captivating. It all adds up to looking like her plans to sell the museum might need to be delayed, just for a while. Finding herself and Sam embroiled in a most peculiar centuries-old mystery, Rosie is quickly expelled from her comfort zone, where to her horror, the secrets of the past come with their own real, and all too present, danger as a strange magic threatens to envelop them all. Full review...

The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas

Garden Heights is a neighbourhood notorious for all the wrong reasons: poverty, drugs, shootings, it ticks all the ghetto stereotypes. It's also the place that sixteen-year-old Starr Carter calls home. Even if most people there only know her as 'Big Mav's daughter who works in the store', Garden Heights is where she was born and raised. It's where she can be herself and not care about what people think or how people expect her to act - a freedom that isn't afforded to her at the posh suburban high school where she is one of just a handful of black students. However, Garden Heights is also where her childhood friend was shot in a drive-by. And now, it's the place where Starr witnesses the devastating, fatal shooting of her unarmed friend, Khalil. At the hands of a police officer. It's an event whose repercussions will irrevocably change her life, and the lives of everyone around her. Full review...

The Song of the Stork by Stephan Collishaw

Literary Fiction

Stephan Collishaw has achieved a rare feat – a novel set amidst the horrors of Nazi tyranny that does not shy away from human suffering, but does not drown in it either. Full review...

None So Blind by Alis Hawkins

Crime (Historical)

When a body is accidentally uncovered nearby in 1850, Harry Probert-Lloyd the London barrister has recently returned to his father's house in West Wales due to deteriorating sight. That means Harry is on hand to press for justice, since he knows whose remains they must be. Unfortunately he's up against a few formidable opponents from the past, not least the Rebecca rioters, members of an illegal group from a few years earlier, and officially it looks like justice might not be on the cards. With the assistance of a local clerk, John Davies, Harry takes up the investigation himself, but it seems like both of them know more than they are willing to admit. Will the outcome be worth stirring up all those secrets for? Full review...

The Stars are Fire by Anita Shreve

General Fiction

Meet Grace. She's not exactly trapped in a loveless marriage, but something like it. She has no real way away from the kitchen sink, and two very young children to care for while her husband is a civil engineer. Her mother-in-law hates her, but she has a great relationship with a girlfriend neighbour – except said friend Rosie has a wondrous love life, while Grace's experience with sex is getting worse and worse. Things deteriorate when Grace's husband, Gene, loses his mother, and retreats from intimacy even further. The small community around Grace – and an endless rain shower – are closing in around her. But what would happen to her and those she cares for if a real disaster were to occur? Full review...

A Story Like the Wind by Gill Lewis and Jo Weaver

A small group of people huddle together in a tiny boat in a large sea. Strangers to each other but united by a common experience. They have each lost everything and yet each has a dream of seeking and finding refuge. They each have hope. A small hope. Full review...

Masquerade (Micah Grey Trilogy) by Laura Lam

It's been a remarkable journey for our young protagonist. It wasn't long ago that Micah Grey was still living the life of Iphigenia Laurus, daughter of a noble family, trapped in a gilded cage forever hiding her true self. Since running away, Micah has managed to reinvent himself, first as a circus acrobat, and then as a magician's apprentice. Along the way he's discovered love and friendships that have helped keep him afloat, even as betrayal and tragedy seem ready to strike at every turn. But there's only so long he can keep running. His powers are growing, the Chimaera are returning, and Ellada is about to reach a violent tipping point. Full review...

The Six Wives & Many Mistresses of Henry VIII: The Women's Stories by Amy Licence

Biography

According to popular wisdom, Henry VIII had six wives and only two mistresses. The former statement is correct, but the latter only tells part of the story. Even while he was married to his first wife, Catherine of Aragon, there were many more ladies in his life. Full review...

Pure & Simple: A Natural Food Way of Life by Pascale Naessens

Cookery

The idea of being able to eat what you want without putting on weight seems impossible. If you can do it without counting calories then it seems almost incredible, but that's what Pascale Naessens is offering us in Pure & Simple: A Natural Food Way of Life. There is, of course a catch to this, but it's just one simple rule: do not eat concentrated carbohydrates with concentrated protein in the same meal. You can eat everything but not together. It's the science of food combining presented in a very attractive hardback book, complete with recipes and excellent photography. Full review...

Cinnamon by Neil Gaiman and Divya Srinivasan

First written in 1995, Cinnamon has hitherto existed as a short story on Neil Gaiman's website or as part of an audiobook collection. Now, it's out as a picture book for us all to share. The story follows Cinnamon, a princess in a small hot country, where everything is very old. Cinnamon was born with pearls for eyes. This means that she is very beautiful but also blind. And Cinnamon won't speak. Her parents, the rajah and rani, offer rich rewards for anyone who can persuade their daughter to talk. People come and go but nobody is successful. Until, one day, a tiger comes... Full review...

Star Wars: Return of the Jedi Junior Novel (Star Wars Junior Novel 3) by Ryder Windham

Spirituality and Religion

We open here with the Rebellion in disarray, and our heroes separated. Obviously they need to rescue the ones imprisoned, liaise with the ones acting as secret agents, and get back to what they do best. For the Empire are doing the same – they are building another Death Star – a new, bigger, quicker one without a piddly little hole in it that just happens to allow the goodies the chance to destroy it at the first attempt. Oh, and our main hero, Luke, still has the matter of who he should count as a family member to settle… Yes, this is the third film made in the Star Wars universe, in a handy form for the eager junior novelisation reader. Full review...

Lift-the-Flap and Colour: Ocean by Alice Bowsher

Children's Non-Fiction

When you think about it, it's quite startling that oceans cover most of our planet and they're home to nearly half of all species, apart from humans. We don't know a lot about the oceans either - less than 5% of the area has been explored, but it is an area of outstanding beauty. With Alice Bowsher's Lift-the-Flap and Colour: Ocean children as young as two have the opportunity to do a little exploration and to colour their own pictures. The flaps are a stroke of genius: when we look at the sea we see little more than the movement of the water, but how different it would be if you could see a little of what is going on underneath. Full review...

A Biblical Theology Behind Music, Praise, and Worship by Dr Mark Pearce

Music used in religions and worship itself goes back to the beginning of humankind. In this book musician and theological academic Dr Mark Pearce explores its Biblical history in a Christian context as well as providing tips and suggestions for those involved in worship in the present day. Full review...

The Diamond of Drury Lane by Julia Golding

Set in 18th Century London, this historical thriller captures all the rawness of life in the grimy city. A young girl, Cat, who was orphaned at birth, is taken under the wing of a kind benefactor, Mr Sheridan, who found her abandoned on the steps of his theatre. The Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, is an exciting place to grow up, and Cat becomes a well-loved member of the staff behind the scenes. While running errands in the theatre, she dreams of being a famous writer herself one day. Before her dream is realised though, Cat has an important role to play in solving a mystery - the mystery of a diamond hidden in the Theatre Royal itself. Full review...

The Age of Olympus (Duncan Forrester Mystery 2) by Gavin Scott

Crime (Historical)

Whilst part of an SOE mission to kidnap a German commander in Greece during the war, Duncan Forrester came across an ancient Cretan stone, which he hoped could lead to the deciphering of Linear B. The war is now officially over (although a lot of people are still fighting it, mentally if not physically) and Forrester has returned to Athens with his lover, Sophie Amfeldt-Laurvig, intent on getting the necessary permissions to go to Crete and retrieve the stone. It was whilst they were in Athens that Forrester was the unwitting witness to the poisoning of a Greek poet and where he found himself pursued by a man wearing a mask. Strange as all this might seem, Forrester is convinced that the poet was not the intended victim: it should have been a general who has been approached to lead ELAS, the military arm of the Greek communists. He's the sort of charismatic man who could sway a lot of people to follow him adn that would mean certain war. Full review...

Can I Join Your Club? by John Kelly and Steph Laberis

Duck just wants to join a club. Any club would be fine, but he would really like to be a part of something, so he tries the Lion Club, and the Snake Club, and even Club Elephant, but it seems like duck won't ever fit in anywhere… Full review...

Ethics for a Full World or, Can Animal-Lovers Save the World? by Tormod V Burkey

Animals and Wildlife

Burkey argues that man's current practices are outside the realms of nature. He is no longer part of the ecosystem, but instead exists above it through his dominating ways. He is himself distanced even further by advancement in technologies, industry, money and all the pollution that comes with them. The natural world, Burkey argues, no longer exists for man because he has altered it by such things. Indeed, global warming has caused climate change, which, if it continues, will make the world unrecognisable. For the world to become fuller, for it to be a world that seeks to provide for the needs of every living thing, then it needs to change. Full review...

Tibs the Post Office Cat by Joyce Dunbar and Claire Fletcher