==Literary fiction==
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{{newreview
|author=Nicola Barker
|title=Burley Cross Postbox Theft
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=When a bag of twenty seven undelivered letters was recovered from behind a hairdresser's in Skipton it fell to two local policemen to investigate what would become known as Burley Cross Post Box Theft, for it was in the village of Burley Cross, just before Christmas, that the Post Box was forced open and the mail stolen. P C Roger Topping, of the Ilkley force, took over the case from his old school friend Sargeant Laurence Everill without any great hope of success, but the village was in turmoil and something had to be done.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007355009</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Per Petterson
|summary=The two central characters are (and we've come across it many times before) a psychiatrist (in this case Kirsch) and his patient (known as the Einstein Girl) and hence the novel's title. The case of this girl is intriguing, not least because both doctor and patient had accidentally met prior to her admission to hospital. Kirsch appears immediately smitten - which may be a problem. He's already spoken for. In a nutshell, the Einstein Girl has lost her memory. Kirsch finds more and more of his professional time given over to her recovery, back to mental well-being. It becomes a long and complicated journey, for both of them.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099535793</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=David Mitchell
|title=The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary='The belly craves food, the tongue craves water, the heart craves love, and the mind craves stories.'
This is the book to satisfy that last craving. It is rich in stories from the graphic opening chapter to the poignant closing lines. Everyone has a tale to tell and even minor characters are fleshed out with histories that amuse, horrify or enthral. Their stories made me think about how sometimes what at the time seems to be an insignificant choice can define the course of a life. Here the characters’ choices unleash a cascade of consequences.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340921560</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Michelle Lovric
|title=The Book of Human Skin
|rating=5
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=''Ye can't take the slither out ovva snake.''
So says Gianni, valet in a wealthy eighteenth century Venetian household. The master, a merchant, divides his time between Italy and Peru, where he deals in silver. But the merchant isn't the serpent - his son Minguillo is. On the night an earthquake ripped through Peru and deposited fanatical nun Sor Loreta at the convent in Arequipa, Minguillo was born - a serpent in his family's midst. His own mother couldn't bear to nurse him and his father went into denial, making more and more frequent trips to a South American home free of sociopathic progeny.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140880588X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Elif Shafak
|title=The Forty Rules of Love
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=This is a sixth novel from best-selling Turkish author, Elif Shafak. Set in twelfth century Anatolia, two famous characters from Islamic history meet in a gorgeously real world. A delicate contemporary US love story is wrapped around the rich, meaty historical fiction. Don't be misled by the dodgy-sounding title!
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670918733</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Rebecca Goldstein
|title=36 Arguments for the Existence of God: A Work of Fiction
|rating=2
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary='Atheist with a Soul' Cass Seltzer has achieved sudden celebrity thanks to his new bestselling book. This has led to a job offer from Harvard, and he waits for his girlfriend to return, while thinking back on past experiences. Most of these experiences involved his old mentor Professor Klapper, an ex-lover, Roz Margolis, and a six year old genius mathematician Azarya. The characters frustrate and amuse in roughly equal measure, while the plot meanders towards a sort-of-conclusion as Cass debates the existence of God with Nobel laureate Felix Fidley.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848871538</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Lorrie Moore
|title=A Gate At The Stairs
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Bass-playing, 20 year-old Tassie Keltjin is studying an eclectic range of subjects (Geology, British Literature, Sufism, Soundtracks to War Movies and Wine Tasting) in post 9/11 USA when she lands a job as a child minder for chef, Sarah Bink who is adopting an African-American baby. A Gate at the Stairs is at times a very funny and at others a sad reflection of growing up in modern America.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>057119530X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Eleanor Catton
|title=The Rehearsal
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=If you are the type of person who wants their novels to start at the beginning, build character and plot before coming to a satisfying 'they all lived happily ever after' ending, then avoid this book at all costs. You will hate it. But I cannot remember when I last enjoyed a first time novel as much as this one. It is ambitious, daring and complex, and yet it works beautifully.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847081398</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Barbara Kingsolver
|title=The Lacuna
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Ten years ago, Barbara Kingsolver's [[The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver|Poisonwood Bible]] revealed the grim politics in the Congo. The Lacuna has a similarly political theme, this time turning her focus on Mexico and the USA in the 1940s and 1950s.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>057125263X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=David Eagleman
|title=Sum: Tales from the Afterlives
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=For some reason I find myself unable to start this review. So I'll mention this book starts with the end, and see where we go from there. Of course, that's the key – this book does just that – starts with the end of our human life here on Earth (or wherever you happen to be reading this) and posits forty possibilities of what happens thereafter, in the hereafter. It's not so much 'Five People You Meet in Heaven' as 'Forty Heavens you Might Meet People In'.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847674283</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=M J Hyland
|title=This Is How
|rating=4
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Things weren't going too badly for Patrick Oxtoby. He's intelligent and did well at school. Then his Gran died. He started getting pains in his shoulder and things rapidly went downhill from there. He drops out of university to become a mechanic. By the time we meet him as a 23-year-old, he's become a loner who cannot communicate his feelings and who cannot seem to fit himself into society. Now his fiancee has left him (and you can see her point) and he finds himself in a seaside boarding house in an unnamed English town, hoping to start a new life. Then, one night he commits an act of violence (you can see it coming) and his life goes from bad to awful.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184767383X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=John Buchan
|title=Sick Heart River
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=This was a surprise for me. It’s rare for a book to come to my attention from the reviewing gods that’s a rerelease of a 1930s novel, and one that surfaced a couple of years ago now. But when it strikes me as startlingly Conradian, updated for the times, and perfectly able to stand alongside one of literature’s greats, then it’s just a sign those reviewing gods are on the ball.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184697030X</amazonuk>
}}
