I read Archer’s Goon as a child. I don’t know what it was about it that made me pick it up. Maybe it was just the word ‘Goon’ in the title. Maybe it was the fascinating picture of the Goon himself on the front cover. At first glance he …

Tower of Destruction, by Keith Martin, is a fairly late entry in the long-running Fighting Fantasy series of solo gamebooks, having first been published in 1991 and coming in at number 46 in the original Puffin sequence. It is not one I would consider a classic, and nor does …

Thanks to Andrew Lloyd Weber, Gaston Leroux’s Phantom of the Opera has gained a huge following throughout the years. However, extensive detail about the elusive Erik, also known as the Phantom or the Opera Ghost is relatively unknown - That was until Susan Kay’s groundbreaking novel Phantom arrived!
Phantom begins …

Originally intended as a teen read, Kristen D. Randle’s “The Only Alien on the Planet” is a moving, powerful, and insightful look into the long term effects of child abuse.
Ginny Christiansen is new in town, having recently moved from the warm, western United States to the eastern half of …

If you’re familiar with Louis Theroux than you’ll no doubt love this book. For a start, it doesn’t only continue on his trademark style, but it marries together countless themes and his many interview subjects together in one enjoyable read that manages to retain the vibes of his documentaries.
A …

When Santa Fell to Earth is definitely something different from Cornelia Funke. While you still have her signature style, as well as the magical elements (rooms that are bigger on the inside than the outside, that kind of thing). The setting, however, is actually earth society (with a sort …

As the name implies, Bewdley Books is a bookshop in the Worcestershire town of Bewdley. I always consider it admirable when a local concern manages to keep going in the face of the pincer attack from the large booksellers (such as Waterstone’s and WH Smith) on the one hand …

Few years ago, when I was pregnant my second child, I bought this book for my first daughter. She was almost two at that time, and I need to tell her about the baby that will come very soon.
We already spoke about it but then when I saw Dora …

“Greg Hildebrandt’s Book of Three-Dimensional Dragons” is a wonderful book. I have had mine since I was in the second grade through college and have never grown tired of it. I think what made the book so great is that it is a pop up
book and brings …

Like Father, Like Son (by Robert Scott)
This book had my emotions running from one end of the spectrum to the other – it started with deep sympathy and then progressed to profound disgust and horror. The father, Thomas Soria Sr, had a damaging childhood, suffering mental and physical …

There are a large number of books of games listings and programming tips for Sinclair ZX81 enthusiasts, and as such they are mostly fairly easy to get hold of even for those who are part of the computing hobby scene today. However, many ZX81 books in particular do suffer …

Anne of Avonlea is the second book of Lucy Maud Montgomery’s popular series of Anne books, about the irrepressible and high spirited Anne Shirley.
Anne of Avonlea moves at a slightly slower pace than the first book, Anne of Green Gables, which took us through Anne’s childhood. Now Anne is …

The Brown Recluse is a short story by Davis Grubb. It appears in the anthology Shadows Three which was edited by Charles Grant. The anthology is a horror themed one but this particular story is more of a mystery than a horror story. The story revolves …

King Arthur and his Knights is part of the English Picture Readers series, published some time ago by Oxford University Press. Although the style used in Ronald Stober’s retelling of the legends is a little bit outdated nowadays, especially for a children’s book, it is still a good enough …

Havana Noir is a collection of short stories set in Cuba. My favorite story in the collection is called The Last Passenger. This is a very suspenseful story about a serial killer who terrorizes the city. He kills women throughout the city and the authorities have …

This is an old-fashioned crime story by Simon Brett, with a protagonist similar to Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple. However Mrs Melita Pargeter was a more flamboyant lady, rich and vocal. Furthermore she had inherited not only wealth from her dead husband, but his professional skills, …

The full title of this book is “Practical Programs for the BBC Computer and Acorn Atom”, which I would imagine makes it pretty clear that this is a work which will be of interest mostly to those like me who take an interest in classic computers. Given the ever …

The title of this book - “Extinction: Bad Genes or Bad Luck?” - makes the work sound as though it is going to be a rather straightforward look at how the dinosaurs were wiped out - and, indeed, the painting of a snarling dino on the otherwise dramatically black …

My daughter once again brought home a book from the school library to read (in between chapters of the book we are reading together). This time around, it was a book called Little Critter’s These Are My Pets.
The book was OK. But I sometimes wonder if the schools think …

Evolution from Space is a classic work of popular science, and although its conclusions - that life on Earth originated far out in the universe, and was brought here by cometary impacts and so on - have never won widespread acceptance, that does not make the book any less …

Math Appeal by Greg Tang is a fun book for elementary school aged kids (probably ones who are working on multiplication and grouping). The poems are clever and the illustrations, by Harry Briggs, are friendly, colourful, and obviously math filled. The book feels lighthearted, fresh, and modern.
I enjoyed the …

Darian Spenser was raised in a world of social correctness, manners and cotillions. Her mother’s plans certainly did not include Darian’s college sweetheart, Davis Chancellor. Yet, it would be Davis, who nurtures and releases Darian’s inner vixen. Darian learns there’s more to life than where to place and how to …

I avoided watching the movie Precious until I read that book that the movie was based on, Push by Sapphire, because I generally enjoy books more than the movies. As well, having heard about, read about and seen information about the content of the movie, I did not think …

In Country is a book written by Bobbie Ann Mason. I found this book at a going out of business sale for $2. The summary caught my attention. I’m glad I got this for $2, because if I had paid any more for it, it would have been a …

The subtitle of this book is “A Study of Bird Parasites”, and the cover of my 1961 Grey Arrow paperback edition is a plain green studded with microscopic (and otherwise) black and white drawings of some of these creatures. You might think from looking at it that it would …

The Penguin Atlas of Medieval History is one of that exalted band of reference books that I dip into time and time again for the simple pleasure of reading it. It has been through several editions since it first came out in the 1970s, but has not departed very …

Free Fall by Robert Crais is more like a movie than a book. The style and events are more of cinematic nature. Free Fall can not be seen as the best work from Robert Crais but it has some good elements like the way the difficulties in life are …

If a Tree Falls at Lunch Period by Gennifer Choldenko is actually a great book for middle school aged kids. I found the story complex enough to enjoy myself, while simple enough that younger readers can understand the themes. (Sort of a something for everyone kind of situation). If …

This was a sweet story and makes you want to believe that there really are nights in shinning armor out there to protect the ones they love from all danger that comes their way. I would rate this book as a must read for everyone that is a …

I felt that this was a really good book and very much a page turner. It had plenty of suspense and lots of romance mixed in. If you like reading books with drama and definite chemistry between the two main characters, then I suggest you pick this …

This book is from Steeple Hill’s Love Inspired collection which means that it is a romance book but has a religious theme to it. God and his love for us are mentioned in various spots of the book, so if that sort of thing bothers you, this might …

I recently bought “The Stinky Cheese Man” for a children’s literature class, but I first read it in elementary school. The book is full of wackily illustrated fractured fairy tales, which give a new and strange perspective to the classics. The book is illustrated by Lane Smith and won …

The Graeme Hick Benefit Year 1999 commemorative book is, to be perfectly honest, not something that anyone other than a die-hard cricket fan would be likely to be all that interested in reading, and in truth its truly avid readership is probably confined to supporters of Worcestershire County Cricket …

The Piltdown Men (first published in 1972, then re-released in revised form as “The Piltdown Mystery” in 1988) is a book which deals with one of the most famous scientific frauds of all time, and one in which I have always had a great interest, the announcement in 1912 …

Ray Bradbury is a very talented and famous science fiction writer. He came out with an anthology called “A Medicine For Melancholy” a number of years ago. One story in it is “The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit.” This story revolves around several Latino workers in the city who want …

Little Bee is a novel that kept me hooked to the book right from its page one. The way he narrates this beautiful story is something that rocks. The novel unfolds in a very fresh approach and is told from perspectives of two ladies from different ethnicities. Their lives …

Anne of Green Gables is a classic Canadian children’s novel by Lucy Maud Montgomery. As the first of the series, this particular book starts with Anne as a sweet, eager child and moves her rather quickly through the remainder of her childhood into adolescence. (The book ends with Anne …

I received this book as a birthday present last year from a well meaning friend who knows I like to make my own beaded jewelry.
Now, it should be said I don’t buy a lot of books on making beaded jewelry for myself. I consider myself a pretty creative …

This book was very well written and I have to say i enjoyed it. I love historical fiction and I think this one was very well done. The story is about the love affair between Anne Boelyn and King Henry but what was different about this is …

Play With Us is the very first book (labelled as book 1a) in the classic Ladybird Key Words Reading Scheme, which for many years was extremely popular in both schools and homes in the United Kingdom. It was first published as long ago as 1964, but continued to be …

I received an autographed copy of “Kat Von D: High Voltage Tattoo” for my birthday last year, and have really enjoyed looking through it. I have never sat and read the entire book cover to cover, as it isn’t designed that way. This book has tons of …

Once again this is another stylized work of fiction from Conn Igulden. This book essentially deals with Julius Ceasar when he was growing up and how he got to discover Gaius Marius and his introduction to military life.
What really made this book appealing was that it was once …

I am a big fan of Conn Igulden and I have read a lot of the books he has written. The lords of the bow was the last one I read from him and I have to say that it was hard to put that book down once I …

I am in the martials arts for quite some time now and I would like to add my tuppence worth to Matt Furey’s book about how to get rock hard abs. First of all let me tell you folks that this is utterly overpriced. I own another one of …

This is an amazing book if you want to change your bad habits for good. We are all so busy trying to make changes from the outside, when really success has to come from within. All of the things we do are based off of the habits that we …

This novel starts with promise, you learn much about the characters very early. Susan Jagger is suffering from agoraphobia, fear of open spaces, causing her to have intense panic attacks. Her friend Martie Rhodes helps her with her phobia and Susan attends a psychiatrist named Dr. Ahriman, who happens …

Authors: George Papajohn, Eric Zorn, and Joel Kaplan
It is indeed difficult to feel sorry for the murderer or her family in this story. I would rather reserve my sympathies for the innocent victims who were killed or injured, and those who had been hounded by the murderer’s acts …

Branded by the recently defunct and still much missed British computer magazine “Personal Computer World”, the title of this book - 35 Programs fof the Dragon 32 - is about as straightforwardly literal as it gets. Dr Tim Langdell - this is not, to be absolutely honest, a name …

This is a YA book where the main protagonists are 16-year-old Ethan and 15-year-old Lena. Ethan is a normal mortal while Lena is a caster (otherwise known as witch) with incredible powers. Their love is doomed by a curse on Lena’s family incurred a hundred years ago by one …

I used to be a fan of Nicholas Sparks. The Notebook is perhaps his greatest achievement as a writer to date. It was superbly written that grew popular to almost all hopeless romantics around the world. But sadly, I think Nicholas Sparks failed to follow through. I noticed that …