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Time Travelling With A Hamster - Ross Welford

Description A truly original debut novel from an extraordinarily talented new voice in children’s books. Laugh, cry and wonder at this race-against-time story of a boy who travels back to 1984 to prevent a go-kart accident, and save his father’s life… “My dad died twice. Once when he was thirty nine and again four years later when he was twelve. The first time had nothing to do with me. The second time definitely did, but I would never even have been there if it hadn’t been for his ‘time machine’…” When Al Chaudhury discovers his late dad’s time machine, he finds that going back to the 1980s requires daring and imagination. It also requires lies, theft, burglary. Review This is a young adult novel which I requested from Netgalley because I love time travel novels. I wasn't disappointed, it is probably one of the best time travel novels I have read (and I have read a lot). The book is very good at "explaining" time travel which isn't always the case in a novel...

The Good Retirement Guide 2017

Description Whether it is a relaxing, action-packed or financially rewarding retirement you are looking for, this is the book for you. In retirement, personal ambitions can be realized and new experiences enjoyed. Yet with so much to consider, people are often unsure how best to plan for their future and the scope for concern and confusion is even greater with changing retirement ages and pension rules. The Good Retirement Guide  offers clear and concise suggestions on a broad range of retirement-related subjects. The Guide includes information on: Pensions/ Tax / Investment / Starting your own business / Leisure activities / Paid work / Voluntary work / How to avoid being scammed / Health / Holidays / Looking after elderly parents / Wills Revised and updated, the 2017 edition is packed with hundreds of useful suggestions and helpful websites to browse. This is an indispensable book that you will refer to again and again. Review I was expecting this book to be full ...

The Twenty Three - Linwood Barclay

Dexcription Everything has been leading to this. It's the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend, May 23rd, and the small town of Promise Falls, New York, has found itself in the midst of a full-blown catastrophe. Hundreds of people are going to the hospital with similar flu-like symptoms—and dozens have died. Investigators quickly zero in on the water supply. But the question for many, including private investigator Cal Weaver, remains: Who would benefit from a mass poisoning of this town? Meanwhile, Detective Barry Duckworth is faced with another problem. A college student has been murdered, and he's seen the killer's handiwork before—in the unsolved homicides of two other women in town. Suddenly, all the strange things that have happened in the last month start to add up… Bloody mannequins found in car “23” of an abandoned Ferris wheel…a fiery, out-of-control bus with “23” on the back, that same number on the hoodie of a man accused of assault… The motive for harmin...

The Second Chance Shoe Shop - Marcie Steele

Description All  Riley Flynn  wants is to meet someone who makes her happy. But attracting the right kind of man is not easy, and with her heart still hurting from her last break-up, Riley believes she’ll never find love again.  A year ago,  Sadie Stewart’s  whole world was shattered when her husband, Ross, died. She has struggled to keep herself together for the sake of their young daughter, but with the anniversary of his death approaching, Sadie finds herself overwhelmed by grief.  Sadie and Riley work at Chandlers shoe shop, in the charming town of Hedworth. But when Chandlers is threatened with closure, the friends are confronted with the loss of not only their jobs, but also their support network - the glue that holds them together when they are close to breaking.  As they put together a plan to save their beloved shop, Sadie realises that she might just be learning to live again. Could it be that new beginnings are just round the corner? The ...

A Dictionary Of Mutual Understanding - Jackie Copleton

Description Amaterasu Takahashi has spent her life grieving for her daughter Yuko and grandson Hideo, who were victims of the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki in 1945. Now a widow living in America, she believes that one man was responsible for her loss; a local doctor who caused an irreparable rift between mother and daughter. When a man claiming to be Hideo arrives on her doorstep, she is forced to revisit the past; the hurt and humiliation of her early life, the intoxication of a first romance and the realisation that if she had loved her daughter in a different way, she might still be alive today. Review The story begins with 50 year old Hideo arriving at his grandmother's (Amaterasu) house claiming to be her grandson. The novel then travels back and forth in time as Amaterasu relives the previous years and how she came to be in America. Amaterasu reads letters and a journal to take the reader with her back over those years. Some of which is news to Amaterasu and ver...

The One In A Million Boy - Monica Wood

Description The story of your life never starts at the beginning. Don't they teach you anything at school? So says 104-year-old Ona to the 11-year-old boy who's been sent to help her out every Saturday morning. As he refills the bird feeders and tidies the garden shed, Ona tells him about her long life, from first love to second chances. Soon she's confessing secrets she has kept hidden for decades. One Saturday, he doesn't show up. Ona starts to think he's not so special after all, but then his father Quinn arrives on her doorstep, determined to finish his son's good deed. The boy's mother is not so far behind. Ona is set to discover that even at her age the world can surprise you, and that sometimes sharing a loss is the only way to find yourself again. Review This really is a remarkable book I totally forgot I was reading a story - how Monica Wood ever came up with this story line is just amazing to me. The back story to Ona, who is now 1...

A Field Guide To Reality - Joanna Kavenna

Description Eliade Jencks knows the only reason people call at midnight is to tell you someone has died. Professor Solete was one of her few friends. Perhaps her only friend. But his friends don't think much of her - a vague, scruffy waitress, impatient with philosophical onanism at parties. Naturally, they're horrified to find out that Solete has left her his Field Guide to Reality. The Guide has taken on legendary proportions among the celebrated minds of Oxford. The work of a lifetime, it purportedly advances Solete's great philosophical Theory of Everything and even defines the very nature of reality. A big, important book. Only, they can't find it. So, baffled, grieving, and slightly annoyed, Eliade sets out on a quest for the missing manuscript, and falls down a rabbit-hole of metaphysical possibility. From a psychotropic tea party to the Priests of the Quantum Realm, she trips her way through Solete's wonderland reality and, without quite meaning to...