Book Reviews From 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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Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi and Sara Fanelli
Pinocchio, as you all know, is a little wooden puppet, who wants to be a real boy. He's very badly behaved, and always getting into trouble. Will he listen to the advice of Gepetto, the cricket or the fairy? Will he become real? What's it like if he doesn't break into a Disney song every two minutes? Full review...
The Terrible Plop by Ursula Dubosarsky and Andrew Joyner
The rabbits are sitting by the lake, munching on cake and carrots. An apple falls in, with a terrible plop, and they scamper off scared. All the other animals join in the stampede and get as far away as they can from the terrible plop. Bear is far too big and grumpy to be scared, so he gets the littlest rabbit to show him just where the scariness lies... Full review...
The Comet's Child by John Ward
Teenage Fin is rescued from his remote forest home by Ragg, the first man he has ever encountered. Having such a sheltered childhood has equipped Fin with the speech and education of a nobleman's son but little idea about the real world. Other than relying on his instincts and resourcefulness, Fin has no way of knowing who to trust, or where he is bound as he leaves home with Ragg. Full review...
Mr Shivers by Robert Jackson Bennett
Marcus Connelly, a quiet, reserved and private man, has recently joined the mass of humanity travelling west in search of work. It's the Midwest in the 1930s and the Great Depression is in full swing. The dustbowl is a desperate place and there's none more desperate than Connelly. But Connelly doesn't need a job and he has a wife and a home. Connelly isn't missing prosperity; he's missing his daughter, and he's in search of the man who killed her. Full review...
Captured by Neil Cross
Kenny is dying - brain cancer is hitting him just as he's barely turning forty. As a result he compiles a short list of rights to wrong, and people to create closure with. One, his ex-wife, might not be easy, two concern a misguided sense of a guilt of old. The fourth turns out to be a missing woman. The journey he takes in that redemptive exercise is not for the squeamish. Full review...
The World of Business: From Valuable Brands and Games Directors Play to Bail-Outs and Bad Boys by The Economist
For years I've been a great fan of The Economist's Pocket World in Figures series with all the unbiased statistics which the average person could want. I was just a little nervous when I opened The World of Business – just in case it was going to be a disappointment – but I needn't have worried. Full review...
Dork Diaries by Rachel Renee Russell
I do like a blurb to be accurate. So when I saw the back cover of this book state the obvious to me, "Diary of a Wimpy Kid for girls!", I could rest assured. I didn't relax fully, however, for I'd read the blue one of those and found it a bit feeble, and the yellow one and found it a bit fabulous, so I couldn't guarantee any feminine, pink variant would be worth my time. Full review...
My Story, My Life: Val Doonican - The Complete Autobiography by Val Doonican
In the 1960s, if Harold Wilson was the personification of politics and the Beatles the collective icon of youth culture, Val Doonican was similarly at the very apex of light entertainment. He may no longer have such a high profile – but he's outlasted them both. Over four decades he has refused to bow to passing fads and fashions, remained true to himself, and in the process he has never really put a foot wrong. As he says towards the end, 'When you find out what it is you do best, and what the public wants from you, then stick with it, and do it as well as you can.' With the possible exception of his contemporary and long-time professional and personal friend Rolf Harris, it's difficult to think of another person in showbiz who comes across as more genuinely likeable, and more a genuine case of 'what you see is what you get'. Full review...
The Boat to Redemption by Su Tong
Ku Dongliang and his father, Ku Wenxuan, are forced to live on a barge on the river following Ku Wenxuan's fall from grace. Originally believed to be the son of a revolutionary martyr, it is eventually proved that Mr Ku was not so - as a result, his position in society takes a nose-dive. Dongliang suffers as a result of this, finding it hard to make friends within the barge community and on shore. Then an orphaned girl moves onto the barges and finds a place in Dongliang's apparently cold heart. Will she be able to take him out of himself? Or will she, too, turn her back on him? Full review...
The Merry Misogynist by Colin Cotterill
Dr Siri Paiboun is now married to Madame Daeng and despite the fact that they have a combined age of going on for a hundred and forty they're behaving like the newly-weds they are. Even being the reluctant coroner for the Republic of Laos can't dampen Siri's enthusiasm for life. Well, it can't until he makes the gruesome discovery that a man is wooing and wedding girls in various parts of the country and then murdering them on honeymoon and binding their bodies to trees. What he does to his victims leaves the morgue staff sickened. There's a determination to find the man responsible and bring him to justice. Full review...
Gaia Warriors by Nicola Davies
The best way to read this book is to treat it like a magazine: flip the pages and dip in. I can guarantee that you will find something to catch your eye. Fashion addicts could start on page 136 Dressing for the climate, foodies may prefer page 124 Rock-star food. The array of different typefaces and page colours make the book very easy to browse, and the author excels at explaining difficult concepts in a straightforward way. So certain sections in it could be considered not just as for older children or teen readers, but as an informative read for adults as well. Full review...
The Steep Approach to Garbadale by Iain Banks
It took me a while to realise that Iain Banks is, most of all, a teller of tales - I would call him a story-teller had this term not became a compliment-cum-invective usually reserved for the Jeffrey Archers and Dan Browns of the modern publishing world. This ability to tell stories - not to plot as much as to weave a yarn - combines with a penchant for creating appealing contexts for Banks' narratives to unfold in (this gets magnificently realised in the world building of his Iain M. Banks alter-ego) and populating them with memorable, larger than life but usually short of caricature, characters. Full review...
The Stone Crown by Malcolm Walker
Neither Emlyn nor Maxine feel completely at home in Yeaveburgh - yet they both have roots there. Emlyn's come back to the town in which he was born because his mother and sister, archaeologists, are working on a dig nearby. His father is in a care home, having suffered a nervous breakdown. Maxine returned to the town to live with her grandmother after her mother died of a heroin overdose. Emlyn is quiet and shy, a bit geeky, and lonely. Maxine is lonely too, but she'd never admit it. She's too spiky and defensive. They both feel like outsiders, and yet they both have a nagging sense that they are where they were meant to be. Full review...
Mirror Mischief (Oli and Skipjack's Tales of Trouble) by Ceci Jenkinson
Sid from the pizza shop is on holiday in Africa and she's sent presents to her two best customers, Oli Biggles and Skipjack Haynes. Oli's present is a mirror and it's not just any mirror as it seems to have magical powers. It was perhaps unfortunate that Vernon Surd, the mean maths teacher who punishes anyone who can't do fractions and Slugger Stubbins, the school bully should be the ones at the wrong end of the magical powers but it seemed quite appropriate that the first should be transformed into a vulture and the second into a blue-faced baboon. Full review...
When the Duke Returns by Eloisa James
When the Duke Returns, the newest volume in the 'Desperate Duchesses' series, continues the regency celebrity romp saga where Duchess by Night left off.
The focus, this time, is on Isidore, the Duchess of Conway: hot-headed, hot-blooded and Italian to boot, she was married by proxy at the age of sixteen and is still a virgin seven years later. Isidore's cunning plot to entice back the husband she has never seen from his travels in Asia and Africa works perfectly and Simeon, His Grace Duke of Conway is now back in England, ready to claim his estate and, as Isidore presumes, ready to claim his beautiful wife. Full review...
Sons, Servants and Statesmen: The Men in Queen Victoria's Life by John Van der Kiste
Like the first Elizabeth more books than are strictly necessary have been written about Queen Victoria, but John Van der Kiste has taken the unusual step of using the men in her life to illuminate some dark corners which might other wise have remained unexplored. Of course the most famous man in her life, husband and Prince Consort Albert isn't 'son, servant or statesman' as promised by the title of the book, but he established a trend. Victoria, often regarded as a difficult woman to please, would always have a man in her life who would, to a greater or lesser extent, dominate her. Full review...
Escape to Provence by Maureen Emerson
In the 1920s two women, one American, one British, settled in the south of France, both for different reasons. Elisabeth Starr had left her home in Philadelphia after an unhappy childhood and the death, possibly suicide, of her fiancé, a nephew of the American President. Drawn to Paris, 'the chosen European city for the sophisticated and well-heeled of the New World', she worked as a nurse during the Great War, then moved to Provence where she made her home in an ancient stone house, the Castello, and took French citizenship. Winifred (Peggy) Fortescue was the wife of the Royal Librarian at Windsor, who retired in 1926 with a knighthood and became a renowned (though hardly successful in financial terms) military historian. After the fall of the pound, it was hard for them to make ends meet in England, and they were drawn to find a property in Provence partly by the lifestyle, partly by a favourable exchange rate. Full review...
Beyond Reason by Keith Colquhoun
Beyond Reason is a deceptively complex novel - a black comedy about the conflicts within religion. The main focus of the plot, Edward Bunyan, is a radical within the Church of England who is trying to take religion in a new (and rather amusing) direction in order to get the public interested in it again. Bunyan claims to have a direct link with God as well as spiritual powers, such as being able to levitate and read minds, which leave his colleague and old college friend, Reverend Ralph 'Marmy' Marmaduke, unsure about both his friendship with Bunyan and his own religious beliefs. Full review...
A Hard Death by Jonathan Hayes
I haven't read Jonathan Hayes' bestseller 'Precious Blood' so I was a fresh reader, so to speak. His writing biography on the inside cover of the book is impressive. My expectations were high. All the ingredients are in place for a good thriller. The location is The Everglades in Florida. Brooding, enigmatic, awe-inspiring and where we all seem to expect crocodiles to rear their heads out of the swampy waters every five minutes. Full review...
Curse of the Pogo Stick by Colin Cotterill
Dr Siri Paiboun usually managed to control his reactions in front of Judge Haeng, but occasionally he forgot himself and was more insolent than usual. This time the Laos national coroner (reluctant), communist (even more reluctantly) and shaman finds himself on a road trip with the judge and the Justice Department. Nurse Dtui (pregnant and married, although not in the usual order of events) is left to run the morgue along with Mr Geung, who might, or might not be a help, but probably not in the way that you might expect. As if that wasn't enough Nurse Dtui discovers a booby-trapped corpse, there's a geriatric hit-person on the loose and Siri is kidnapped. Full review...
More Than Just A Wedding by Nia Pritchard
If you like novels in which little happens as the story strolls towards its happy ending, then Nia Pritchard's sequel to 'More Than Just a Hairdresser' may suit you. If the Liverpudlian vernacular and setting pushes your buttons, then maybe you'll enjoy its light-hearted picture of Scouse life. My mother-in-law will probably love it. I'm sorry to say that it wasn't my cup of tea at all. Full review...
Ghostgirl by Tonya Hurley
Charlotte Usher is desperate to be popular. She has spent the entire summer break transforming herself to try and fit in with the 'in' crowd all in an attempt to try and attract the attention of Damen, a popular and handsome jock. Yet even after all her hard work she still remains invisible at best, despised at worst. Finally, in a moment of tragic bad luck, Charlotte chokes on a gummy bear, alone in a classroom, and dies. This isn't the end of the story however, it's actually just the beginning, because Charlotte isn't going to let the little inconvenience of being dead get in her way... Full review...
Crocodile Tears (Alex Rider) by Anthony Horowitz
Fans of Anthony Horowitz' Alex Rider series have had a two-year wait for this installment of our young hero's escapades and they are not going to be disappointed. He's fourteen year old now and not only is he being targeted by a hitman, he's also being pursued by a journalist who wants to tell the nation all about the fact that MI6 are using one of his tender years to do their dirty work. The trouble is that he can't be positive that it was a sniper that caused the car he was in to skid off a Scottish road and land at the bottom of a Loch. And MI6 don't seem all that bothered about the journalist, unless, that is, Alex might be willing to find some simple information from a GM crop research centre, in which case they might be able to have a quiet word with the gentleman. Full review...
Bad Penny Blues by Cathi Unsworth
Step into the seedy underbelly of London on the cusp of the Swinging Sixties. 'Bad Penny Blues' is the story of the hunt for a brutal serial killer targeting prostitutes in the west of the city, at the time a melting pot of immigrants from the Caribbean and Ireland, bohemian artists and media types, and even peers. Carnaby Street was just becoming the fashion centre of London and a new decade promised exciting possibilities. Full review...
The Wings of Wrath (The Magister Trilogy) by Celia Friedman
The first part of Celia Friedman's Magister trilogy was a wonderfully dark piece of fantasy. It contained some beasts you wouldn't be surprised to come across in a horror novel and stretched the idea of magic being a draining power to an interesting place psychologically. The second part, Wings of Wrath is more of a straight fantasy novel, lacking some of the horror elements that made the first part such a draw for me, but it's still a very good read. Full review...
The Lighthouse by Bernard P Morgan and Rikin Parekh
Bob the lighthouse keeper tries to warn the village of Quark that there's a big storm on the way. They don't listen to him, so Bob just sets about making preparations anyway. When the storm comes, the villagers are in a lot of trouble, but thankfully Bob is on hand to save the day. Full review...
The Secret Symbol: The Original Masonic Documents Behind Dan Brown's Latest Bestseller by Peter Blackstock
Pop Quiz. What links Scott of the Antarctic, Jim Davidson, Churchill, and Rabbie Burns? Where and when might you come a cropper trying to spell Boaz, but starting with the B? And what has three stages - unless it's thirty-three, or even ten by the York system? Full review...
Contact by Jonathan Buckley
Dominic Pattison's life began to veer off course badly on a Tuesday in May. It's a fairly banal Tuesday. The kind of Tuesday that Dominic probably experiences quite frequently. He feels the need to tell us about it.
In detail.
And, sadly, not in a particularly engaging style. Full review...
Sicilian Sunset by Jessica Porter
Sarah Livingstone's jewellery business was struggling but she was still annoyed when her father called James Ross for help. Sarah and James had had a relationship some ten years earlier and Sarah really didn't want to work with him, particularly after her marriage. Most people thought that her husband's death in a plane crash had been the cruel end to a good marriage. Only a few knew that he had been about to leave her to live with another woman. It's left Sarah very reluctant to get involved with any man. Full review...
Daisy: The Lives and Loves of the Countess of Warwick by Sushila Anand
Born Daisy Maynard in 1861, the Countess of Warwick lived a colourful life by any standards. She was notoriously promiscuous, a spendthrift who did not hesitate to try and provoke a royal scandal to shore up her parlous finances, and although she relished her lifestyle to the full, she spent several years fighting wholeheartedly for the pioneer socialists in Britain. Full review...
The Littlest Detective in London by Suzy Brownlee
The Littlest Detective in London is the first in this series of children's books by Suzy Brownlee and will soon be followed by the continuing story of Clementine Cordelia Bird's exploits in Paris. The books are aimed at young girls, aged between around eight and fourteen.
Clemmy (as she is known) is nine years old, but looks younger, due to her being rather small. However, she makes up for this by being brave and inventive. We learn early on that her mother disappeared in mysterious circumstances and the books have the underlying theme of Clemmy trying to find her mum again. Full review...
Guilt Trip: From Fear to Guilt on the Green Bandwagon by Alex Hesz and Bambos Neophytou
Did you know that Horlicks, that great sleep aid, is sold in India as a start-the-day energy boost? Not another concoction under the same brand, but the Exact Same Product. Full review...
Tempted (House of Night) by P C and Kristin Cast
Last time we left Zoey, she'd just banished Kalona, an ancient fallen immortal, from the Tulsa House of Night, along with evil High Priestess Neferet. Stevie Rae's Red Fledglings were regaining their humanity, but Stark, second ever Red Vampire, was badly injured. Her official boyfriend was Erik, but she's re-Imprinted with Human, Heath, and Stark had pledged a Warrior's Oath to her. Full review...
Emily and the Big Bad Bunyip by Jackie French and Bruce Whatley
The author-illustrator partnership that created the 'Diary of a Wombat', Pete the Sheep and 'Josephine Wants to Dance' bring all their Aussie characters together in a Christmas book with a Antipodean twist. Full review...
The Group by Mary McCarthy
'Given the attention paid to relations between the sexes, it would be tempting to call The Group a forerunner of today's chick lit. It's not.'
So writes Candace Bushnell, the writer behind the TV series Sex and the City, in the introduction to this new Virago Modern Classics edition of The Group by Mary McCarthy. First published in 1963, this novel is about the lives of a group of young women after leaving college in 1933, including careers, relationships, sex, babies, parents, and money. Full review...
My Dead Body (Joe Pitt Casebook) by Charlie Huston
Joe Pitt's New York is one riddled with Vampyres, infected by a Vyrus that makes them drink blood and die in the sun. It is also a wasteland of lawless tribes of Vampyres, gang warfare carving up Manhattan into territories, each with their own leaders, specialist workers, fighters, animosities. As we start book five, Joe's New York is actually a subterranean one, as he hides from everyone in the sewers and tunnels, until the enterprise of a top dog character flushes him out, and tells Pitt to find his daughter - a messianic poster girl for the future of the city. Full review...
My Father's Places: A portrait of childhood by Dylan Thomas' daughter by Aeronwy Thomas
Aeronwy Thomas was six years old when she and her family came to settle after a nomadic existence at Laugharne, on the Welsh coast, in 1949. Dylan used to broadcast regularly on the BBC, and while he continued to travel to London regularly for the purpose (as well as to carouse with friends in his old haunts), somewhere off the beaten track was a more suitable working environment. Full review...
The Church Mouse by Graham Oakley
Arthur the church mouse lives in peace with Sampson the meek church cat, but he gets lonely from time to time. He hits on a great idea: he'll invite all the other mice of the town to come and live with them. The parson agrees, as long as they agree to do a few odd jobs around the place. Then one day, a burglar breaks in and there's no-one around to stop him but Arthur, Sampson and the mice... Full review...
Bangers and Mash by Keith Hern
Keith Hern found a small lump in his neck and when the results of the tests came through he tried to put the appointment off as he had something more pressing to do, but the doctor was insistent. He knew then that he had cancer. The lump in his neck was, in fact, a secondary tumour with the primary being in the back of his tongue. But for the secondary tumour the discovery of the primary might have been too late for successful treatment. Keith takes us through the discovery of his cancer, his reactions to the diagnosis, his treatment and the titular meal of bangers and mash – the first solid food which he had attempted for some time. Full review...
