The Borrowed Boy – Deborah Klée

I raced through this novel in one sitting, so desperate was I to find out what happens to Danek, the 'borrowed boy', in Klée's story. Angie Winkle, aging and alone, knows she has cancer and probably doesn't have long to live. Her life has been unsatisfactory and she has decided to revisit an old seaside …

The Wave – Virginia Moffatt

'Perhaps I am wrong, but I have weighed the odds, and finding them so stacked against me, I have made my choice. If this is the remaining time allotted to me, I will spend it doing what I want. The sun is shining, the surf is up. It's a perfect day for the beach ... …

Re-Navigation by Sue Parritt #BlogTour

A gloomy seascape is of little consequence to Julia, as a ferry transports her to an isolated Welsh island to undertake a Spiritual Development course. Soon, Julia finds herself surrounded by new friends and questions. As relationships deepen, so does Julia’s feeling that something crucial is missing from her life. As passion ignites and deep-buried …

Charlie Laidlaw’s The Space Between Time

As in his previous novel, The Things We Learn When We're Dead, Charlie Laidlaw has taken on both the intensely personal and big sweeping ideas about time and space, examining what it is to be human, and situating his narrator’s existence in North Berwick within a much wider cosmic scale. I very much enjoyed The …

Gordon Kerr’s The Partisan Heart #BlogTour

Following his wife’s tragic death, Michael Keats’ grief is compounded by the discovery that she had been having an affair. This revelation leads Michael to Italy, his wife’s home country, where he becomes embroiled in tensions which date back to the 1940s. The violence and loyalties of the past reverberate down the years, and Michael …

What’s Left Unsaid – Deborah Stone

Deborah Stone’s novel begins with Joe telling us, from beyond the grave it quickly transpires, that he and his wife, Annie, have much to regret, that they hid the truth at many points in their lives. The consequences of what has been left unsaid are played out in this story, often to devastating effect. Annie …

Helen Matthews’ Lies Behind the Ruin #BlogTour

I’d thoroughly enjoyed Helen Matthews’ first novel, Leaving the Village, which focused on human trafficking, and her new novel is just as fascinating. Following a fatal accident at her husband’s firm, for which he is held responsible, Emma and Paul Willshire attempt to begin a new life in France with their daughter Mollie. This is …

Chris Brookmyre’s Fallen Angel #BlogTour #review

I love a book which starts with a murder - it establishes the genre swiftly and we all know where we stand. The dead man is unnamed – we’ll get confirmation of his identity halfway through the novel – and the plotting is superb from the outset. Brookmyre is a talented crime writer, setting up …

Sally Nicholls’ Things a Bright Girl Can do

This is my second read from this year’s Carnegie Shortlist, and it is a far more complex novel than I had anticipated from the cover. Taking its title from a 1914 book, 301 Things a Bright Girl Can Do, Nicholls gives us three bright girls who each become a part of the struggle for female …

Kwame Alexander’s Rebound

Shortlisted for this year's CILIP Carnegie Medal Shortlist,  this coming-of-age novel, set in the summer of 1988, introduces us to Charlie Bell. He’s lost his dad, he doesn’t have the right trainers, and he’s full of the usual insecurities of adolescence. And yet he also has an excellent sense of humour and makes for a …