Difference between revisions of "Book Reviews From The Bookbag"
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| + | |title=The Faithful Executioner: Life and Death in the Sixteenth Century | ||
| + | |author=Joel F Harrington | ||
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| + | |summary=Frantz Schmidt, the official executioner and torturer in Nuremberg, the Albert Pierrepoint of his day, entered his terrible profession by accident. In 1553, shortly before he was born, the Margrave of Brandenburg-Kulmbach had three gunsmiths arrested after they were found guilty of plotting to kill him. Invoking a local custom, he called on a random bystander to execute them, and his choice fell on Heinrich Schmidt to carry out the sentence. If he disobeyed, he and the two men standing next to him would also be summarily hanged. Having thus been made to carry out one execution, Schmidt and his family were ostracised by all respectable citizens in their home town of Nuremberg and banned from all public buildings. He therefore had no choice but to take it up as a lifelong career. | ||
| + | |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099572664</amazonuk> | ||
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|summary=Tyrannosaurus Rex is the scariest dinosaur around. He can pull whole trees out of the ground, crush boulders with his bare claws and chase away the other dinosaurs with his mighty roar! Everything changes one night when he finds an abandoned egg in a cave. A baby dinosaur pops out and decides that T.Rex is his ''Dadda''. | |summary=Tyrannosaurus Rex is the scariest dinosaur around. He can pull whole trees out of the ground, crush boulders with his bare claws and chase away the other dinosaurs with his mighty roar! Everything changes one night when he finds an abandoned egg in a cave. A baby dinosaur pops out and decides that T.Rex is his ''Dadda''. | ||
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Revision as of 08:45, 4 May 2014
The Bookbag
Hello from The Bookbag, a book review site, featuring books from all the many walks of literary life - fiction, biography, crime, 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 author interviews, and all sorts of top tens - all of which you can find on our features page. If you're stuck for something to read, check out the recommendations page.
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The Faithful Executioner: Life and Death in the Sixteenth Century by Joel F Harrington
Frantz Schmidt, the official executioner and torturer in Nuremberg, the Albert Pierrepoint of his day, entered his terrible profession by accident. In 1553, shortly before he was born, the Margrave of Brandenburg-Kulmbach had three gunsmiths arrested after they were found guilty of plotting to kill him. Invoking a local custom, he called on a random bystander to execute them, and his choice fell on Heinrich Schmidt to carry out the sentence. If he disobeyed, he and the two men standing next to him would also be summarily hanged. Having thus been made to carry out one execution, Schmidt and his family were ostracised by all respectable citizens in their home town of Nuremberg and banned from all public buildings. He therefore had no choice but to take it up as a lifelong career. Full review...
The Geography of You and Me by Jennifer E Smith
Lucy has lived in the same building in New York for all of her sixteen years. Owen's just moved in to the basement apartment, son of the building's new super. They've seen each other around, but they've never actually met. When a city-wide blackout hits New York, Lucy and Owen happen to be stuck in the same elevator. As they get talking, they make an unlikely connection that will travel with them around America and across continents. But how can you pursue first love when the geography is always against you? Full review...
The Story of the World Cup by Richard Brassey
Look at the calendar and you will see that it is a year ending in an even number, what does this mean? To a host of football fans it means a summer free from boredom as an International Tournament will fill the void that the Premier League has left. For non-football fans it's more excuses for people to watch a pigskin be knocked around. Be you young or old, football can get in your blood and you want to know more. For the younger fan, there are worse places to start their obsession than the World Cup and getting to know more about the esteemed tournament in Richard Brassey’s 'The Story of the World Cup'. Full review...
Seventeen Coffins by Philip Caveney
Poor Tom! He's barely recovered from his time-slip journey to plague-ridden seventeenth century Edinburgh when he's off again, this time to the nineteenth century. Just like on his first journey he's lost and friendless, and in deadly peril – but somehow, he ends up once again employed to feed the pigs. It seems some things never change. Full review...
Bhalla Strand by Sarah Maine
1910: A renowned artist brings his young bride to his childhood home of Bhalla House, an imposing estate on a remote Hebridean island. The grand residence was built at the expense of the local community, many of whom were evicted from their homes and crofts in order to create this rich man’s playground. Tensions run deep and the division between rich and poor seems impossible to bridge. Full review...
The Rev Diaries by Reverend Adam Smallbone
Adam Smallbone wasn’t always a vicar. He used to work for the Bristol Housing Department, enabling his father-in-law to tell everyone he worked 'in property'. From there, his initial calling was to a rural church in Suffolk which did nothing to prepare him for this, his current London inner city parish. Indeed, he's not prepared for Adoha (the Nigerian parishioner with 19 grandchildren and 'the bottom of God') or Colin, the homeless alcoholic who has adopted Adam and his wife Alex (Mrs Vicarage to Colin). But then Alex also has a lot to get used to; after all, she didn't actually marry a vicar. Full review...
Can Anybody Help Me? by Sinead Crowley
Yvonne and Gerry are proud new parents. However, as they've only recently moved to Gerry's native Dublin, Yvonne mourns the lack of a support network. This all changes when she turns to Mammynet, a web-based online forum and chat room for new and soon-to-be mums. It works too - Yvonne quickly makes a local online friend but then the friend disappears without warning. Meanwhile Garda Sergeant Claire Boyle is investigating the murder of a young woman. There may be a connection but will Claire discover it before the killer strikes again? Full review...
Kicking A Ball by Allan Ahlberg
There is a boy who likes kicking a ball. It’s the best thing of all for him, and there’s nothing he’d rather be doing, nowhere he’d rather be. We see his bedroom and this has some football albums in, and a football table, but his interest is definitely with playing rather than being on the side lines. There are other ball sports too, of course, but he’s not into tennis or volleyball or golf or cricket or hockey or netball or playing catch with a child in a wheelchair (nice touch). No, kicking a ball is where it’s at. Full review...
Macavity,the Mystery Cat by T S Eliot and Arthur Robins
There’s nothing my little boy likes more than to sit down with a tome of good poetry. Currently he is reading T.S. Eliot. Well, that’s what I will be telling them down at playgroup anyway. No need to add that it’s not ‘The Wasteland’. The poem in this volume is actually just one from ‘Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats’ and features the inimitable scoundrel of the title, Macavity. Full review...
The Forever Watch by David Ramirez
Great science fiction is made up of many parts, but three things are vital for it to become a classic; world building, story and character. If one of these three elements is slightly below the others, a great novel can be punished. In ‘The Forever Watch’ by Daniel Ramirez we have a fantastic world in the form of the spaceship Noah, a great character in the form of Hana, but does the story quite match up to the rest? Full review...
Riot by Sarah Mussi
It is 2018 and Britain is still in recession. Years of austerity have devastated the country. Banks are going under. Unemployment is rising. The cost of welfare is soaring. Prisons are overflowing. And the population is still rising. Something has to give. The solution? Forced sterilisation of all school-leavers without a secured place in higher education or a guarantee of employment. The programme has started with prisoners but the legislation to roll it out across the population is about to go through parliament. Unsurprisingly, there is a growing popular protest against it. Full review...
Charlie Merrick's Misfits in Fouls, Friends, and Football by Dave Cousins
The world, we are told, loves a trier, and Charlie Merrick is one of the world's biggest. His only hobby and only skill is in football, but his intent is never matched by his actual talent – a statement that stretches to most of his team-mates. With several under-12s league games under their belt and with no points to their name, Charlie must try his hardest to get the squad working as a team, which is hard considering what he has to put up with, and even harder when he makes some very unfortunate decisions… Full review...
The Girl Who Was Saturday Night by Heather O’Neill
The time: the 1995; the place: Quebec. The Tremblay family have espoused the cause of Quebeçois separation from English-speaking Canada for many years. Etienne Tremblay has been a prominent, political folk singer throughout the childhood of Nouschka, his daughter, and her identical twin brother, Nicolas. The young children themselves appeared on stage frequently and have been brought up much in the public eye. Their father is almost always absent from their life as he feeds his selfishness on public adoration. Their mother only existed for them as a name in a hit song about a one night stand. They were cared for by Loulou, a loving grandfather lacking any influence over their behaviour. Full review...
Tease by Amanda Maciel
Emma Putnam killed herself and it was all Sara's fault. If Sara and her other mean girl friends hadn't hounded and bullied Emma to the ends of the world, Emma would still be alive. And so now it's Sara's turn to be ostracised - by her old friends, by the community in which she lives, and even by the media. Full review...
The Queen's Hat by Steve Antony
A naughty gust of wind comes along and blows the Queen’s hat right off her head. Her Majesty simply cannot be seen bare headed, and so she follows it in hot pursuit. Full review...
The Bubble-Wrap Boy by Phil Earle
Tiny Charlie Han is an outsider at school, whose only friend is Sinus, a fellow outcast. At home, he suffers from an overbearing mother and a quiet father who won't stand up to her. But Charlie believes that everyone's good at something, and when he finds a special talent for skateboarding, it might be the start of something special - if his mum's constant need to keep him safe doesn't get in his way. Full review...
The Farmer's Away! Baa! Neigh! by Anne Vittur Kennedy
Flobba dob. Eh-oh. Or should I just stop the words completely and communicate with a swanee whistle? From the Flowerpot Men to the Teletubbies via the Clangers, the substitution of ‘real’ words with made up language and sounds has always been controversial. So I’ll level with you straight away and spoil the ‘surprise’ of The Farmer’s Away! Baa! Neigh! by revealing that, bar the title, there are no proper words in this book. When this book is described as being told in the animals’ own words it means quite literally that. Barks. Hisses. Neighs. Cheeps. And lots of them. For 32 pages. Full review...
The Glass Bird Girl by Esme Kerr
Edie is a new student at Knight’s Haddon boarding school – but not just any new student. Planted there by her uncle, who can fix anything, she’s been given a mission – to investigate the problems his client’s daughter, Russian princess Anastasia is having. But what seems like it’ll be a straightforward case of schoolgirl bullying is actually much more complicated, and dangerous. Full review...
How to be Well Read: A guide to 500 great novels and a handful of literary curiosities by John Sutherland
Being well read is rather like having good manners: it's something that we all aspire to but there's always a nagging doubt that there's something lacking in what we've achieved. That is, of course, why a book with the title How to be Well Read pulled me in so successfully with its promise of being a guide to five hundred great novels and a handful of literary curiosities. Was I going to find that ultimate list of books which I would have to read to ensure that I could think of myself as well read? No - I was going to find something far more useful and interesting. Full review...
The Abduction by Jonathan Holt
The teenage daughter of a US Army Major is kidnapped when off basecamp at a Venetian nightclub. She is abducted by a masked team during the carnevale celebrations, when people not wearing masks are more conspicuous than those whose identities are hidden. Everything about the abduction seems perfectly orchestrated leaving very little in the way of clues apart from the very fact that it is carried out with such military precision. Full review...
Waterfire Saga: Deep Blue by Jennifer Donnelly
Four thousand years after Orfeo defected as one of the six magical leaders of Atlantis, created the most evil of monsters, and the island sank below the sea, Serafina is preparing for a ceremony that will confirm her as the heir to a Mer realm. Sera will sing a songspell to her people and become betrothed to the prince of another Mer realm. But Sera is plagued by a strange dream, in which witches of Mer legend warn her of terrible danger to come. And when her friend Neela arrives for the occasion, she confesses that she has had the same dream. Full review...
Red Shadow by Paul Dowswell
It's Moscow in 1940. Misha's life transformed when his father was offered a job in the Kremlin by his old revolutionary comrade, Stalin. Misha's life is easier in many ways than those of his peers - he lives in a spacious and comfortable flat, and he has plenty of good food to eat.
But Russia is at war - currently allied to Hitler's Germany but about to be betrayed by them. And Stalin is both paranoid and unstable - this is the time of the purges and nobody is safe from denunciation. Full review...
Judges by Andrea Camilleri, Carlo Lucarelli and Giancarlo De Cataldo
I'll confess that it was the name of Andrea Camilleri which brought me to this book. I'm a long-time fan of his Inspector Montalbano series and a recent reading of a spin-off novella had proved to me that the concise nature of his full-length novels was no fluke. In Judges we had another novella - worth buying for its own sake - and the bonus of two more stories from better-than-decent Italian authors. All that was needed was a glass of wine and a comfortable chair. Did the book live up to expectation? Full review...
The Devonshires: The Story of a Family and a Nation by Roy Hattersley
According to the back of this book, ‘the story of the Devonshires is the story of Britain’. That’s an extravagant claim, but it contains more than a germ of truth. Certainly one would be hard-pushed to find an aristocratic, non-royal British family who has more consistently been central to our history since medieval times, as this detailed chronicle demonstrates. From the dissolution of the monasteries under Henry VIII presided over in part by Sir William Cavendish, father of the first Earl, to the big business that their ancestral home Chatsworth House in Derbyshire has now become, the somewhat inaccurately geographically-named Devonshires have often been, or helped to, contribute to, part of the fabric of Britain’s past and present. Full review...
Eric the Boy Who Lost His Gravity by Jenni Desmond
Everyone gets angry sometimes. Maybe all it takes is someone queue-jumping, or in the case of my toddler, all it takes is the wrong colour cup, or someone playing with the one toy in the world that he wants right at that moment! The challenge for children growing up (and for adults too sometimes!) is how to deal with that anger. This story is about what happens when a little boy called Eric gets angry. Full review...
How to Catch a Star by Oliver Jeffers
The boy makes various attempts to catch his star. He spends most of the day waiting for a star to appear, and when one finally does he tries climbing a tree, or dragging his father's lifebelt to lasso the star down. Each attempt, however, fails. Finally, down by the shore, he sees a star that has fallen into the sea. He walks along the beach, hoping that the star will wash up on the sand and, finally, it does! They boy and the star walk away together, hand in hand. Full review...
Those Magnificent Sheep In Their Flying Machine by Peter Bently and David Roberts
The sheep on the hillside live a pretty sedate lifestyle, grazing on green grass day after day. One morning they hear a mighty ZOOM overhead and go to check out where the noise is coming from. To their delight, they see rows of aeroplanes lined up in the field below, ready for a race. The inquisitive sheep decide to hop inside a big yellow aeroplane and before they know it, they have accidentally pressed the start button and are flying high above the hills! Full review...
Rex by Simon James
Tyrannosaurus Rex is the scariest dinosaur around. He can pull whole trees out of the ground, crush boulders with his bare claws and chase away the other dinosaurs with his mighty roar! Everything changes one night when he finds an abandoned egg in a cave. A baby dinosaur pops out and decides that T.Rex is his Dadda. Full review...
