'''Read [[Features|new features]].'''
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{{newreview
|author=Carol Thompson
|title=Snug!
|rating=4
|genre=For Sharing
|summary=What makes you feel snug? Tucked up like a bug in a rug? Being as snug as a mole in his underground hole? This story looks at all different ways that make us feel cosy and warm.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846433738</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Neil Griffiths and Vicki Leigh
|summary=Princess Annie is Sleeping Beauty's younger sister. Her sister, Gwendolyn, was given various magical gifts at her birth making her graceful and beautiful, but then a bad fairy created the spell that Gwendolyn would prick her finger on a spinning wheel before she turned 16 and sleep for one hundred years. So far, so familiar. All of the upset over Gwendolyn's christening led to the King and Queen being very scared when their second daughter, Annabelle, was born. They invited only one fairy along and asked her advice. She cast a spell on Princess Annie that made her impervious to all magic. Although this seemed like a good idea it means that none of her family like to be too near her because her spell tends to affect their own magical enchantments, making them less beautiful, more wrinkled and aged. Annie does her best to please her parents and to try and protect her sister, but in the end the wicked fairy's magic spell comes true and Gwendolyn and everyone in the castle falls asleep. Everyone, that is, except for Annie...
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408807572</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Meira Chand
|title=A Different Sky
|rating=4
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=We meet the first of the three main characters - Chinese Mei Lan on a trip with her devoted minder-nursemaid into town. The sights and smells intrigue the young girl as they are a far cry from her comfortable home and its surroundings. Rather than appreciating all that space and the beautiful objects in the family home, Mei Lan feels lonely (she's an only child) and even hemmed in. But perhaps she'll change as she grows up.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099546248</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=David Almond
|title=My Name Is Mina
|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
|summary=We first Mina in Skellig. A homeschooled, William Blake-loving, slightly precious child, she arrived in Michael's life with not a little whiff of the culture shock about her. Now, we can find out what really makes Mina tick as we read through her journal. Mina is full of contradictions. She likes to be different, individual, but she doesn't like being a misfit. She wants friends but she doesn't know how to make them or to keep them. She is both reflective and impulsive.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340997265</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=C J Box
|title=Out Of Range
|rating=3
|genre=Crime
|summary=Will Jensen, a Wyoming Game Warden of many years standing, had long held the respect of the townsfolk of Jackson. Recently though he seemed to have been going off the rails. Not turning up for work on time; a couple of DUIs; his wife upped and left. Then one day he cooks himself 14lb of meat. No vegetables. And slowly eats his way through it, washed down with whiskey, before he goes to fetch his .44 magnum from the pick-up.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848878044</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Christos Tsiolkas
|title=Loaded
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Ari is just nineteen, of Greek descent but living in Melbourne with his family. He's gay, unemployed and not in education. He wants to get away from the traditional Greek life of his parents and their friends but has no idea how to do it. He falls back on the only life that he knows: clubs, parties, anonymous sex, a cocktail of drugs and alcohol. But will even this be enough to dull the pain? Told vividly in the first person and sexually explicit it's a short book – a novella – which grabs you and has no intention of letting you go until it spits you out at the other end.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099757710</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Gregg Olsen
|title=Empty Coffin: Envy
|rating=3
|genre=Teens
|summary=A small town is stunned by the death of a young girl, Katelyn, and although the death is attributed to an accident, there are some who believe that suicide and homicide shouldn't be ruled out just yet. Although twins Hayley and Taylor Ryan weren't close to the girl at the time of her death, they used to be good friends and a combination of guilt and curiosity leads them to investigate the death and its true cause. They may just be teenagers, but combine the fact that they have a father who is a true crime author, with the mysterious supernatural abilities they share, the twins are more than well-equipped to discover the truth behind the death; however, they find themselves digging up more than they bargained for when tragic history, and revelations from the past begin to reveal themselves.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1402789572</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Gabrielle Donnelly
|title=The Little Women Letters
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=I read the back cover blurb with delight and couldn't help but applaud Donnelly for her ingenuity. I loved the book ''Little Women'' when I read it many years ago and television adaptations keep it fresh for new generations. So, before I'd even turned to chapter one, I was loving this book. But will it live up to my lofty expectations?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0718156587</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Elen Caldecott
|title=Operation Eiffel Tower
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Jack, Ruby, Lauren and Billy live in a seaside town. Jack helps out at the crazy golf course and he's got a mean shot or two up his sleeve. Lauren likes boys, ''Teen Thing'' magazine and looking down her nose at her younger siblings. Ruby's world revolves around winning a teddy on the grab-a-bear machine in the amusement arcade. Billy is just a baby so he doesn't do very much if it doesn't involve cuddling Teddy Volvo.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408805731</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Ciaran O Murchadha
|title=The Great Famine: Ireland's Agony 1845-1852
|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=In August 1845, reports began to circulate of the destruction of growing potatoes in the south of England, killed by a mysterious and so far unknown plant disease. As yet, the scientific aspects of what was given the name of 'blight' were not fully recognised, let alone understood. At the end of the month, small instances of failure in the potato crop in Ireland were reported, but there seemed to be no cause for alarm until the main crop was dug out in October. Only then did it become apparent that an 'awful plague' had appeared in several areas, with decomposing vegetables producing a strong, foul stench that assailed the nostrils of cultivators and passers-by alike.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847252176</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Caitlin Davies
|title=The Ghost of Lily Painter
|rating=5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=When Annie Sweet buys a home with her family, she feels inexplicably bonded to it from first sight. As life brings unwelcome changes for her, she decides to uncover the history of her house to provide a distraction and to understand her feelings about her home.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091937035</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Mary Hoffman
|title=David
|rating=4
|genre=Teens
|summary=It's 1501 and Gabriele is in Florence without a penny to his name. As a greenhorn country boy, he managed to get himself robbed almost as soon as he arrived in the city. But he does have one big advantage: a renowned sculptor as a step-brother. Gabriele hopes this will be enough to find him work, but little does he dream that he will soon find himself the model for one of the world's greatest pieces of art - Michelangelo's David. Or that he'll become intimately embroiled in the deadly rivalries and politics of the city. As the statue of David is slowly created, Gabriele will have to walk the line between the republican faction and those supporting the return of the Medicis without being exposed by either. It won't be easy...
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408800527</amazonuk>
}}
