First look
We teamed up with HarperCollins to give readers a chance to tell us what they thought of new titles, before they were released
All aboard!
When David McKie and his family moved to Leeds as wartime refugees, it was the city's old green buses that came to mean home to him. Here, in an extract from his new book, he explains why the humble bus is such a cornerstone of British culture.
Review by Charlotte Buxton
Amy Tan's book is an insightful, poignant critique of the complexities of understanding different cultures.
Review by Sarah Taylor
"I would strongly recommend this book both to Amy Tan fans and those who have never encountered her before ... "
Review of Saving Fish From Drowning by Deidre Laffan
"The story lacks the nuances and emotional resonances of earlier works ... However, fans will recognize Tan at her best in the supernatural elements of the novel."
Review of Saving Fish From Drowning by Sandra McDonald
Few of the characters have any real life to them; they are just types for the author to manipulate to make neat but unsatisfying points.
Review of Saving Fish From Drowning by Michael Shakespeare
"The story crumbles under the weight of faux-philosophical meanderings and Tan's scattergun approach to attacking personal bugbears. Alas, her insights are never quite as insightful as you'd hope, her targets never as worthy."
Review of Saving Fish From Drowning by Rosie Scourti
"Despite a large cast of characters, Tan holds the plot together and inspires the reader to keep turning the page to find out what happens next, although at times the turn of events is improbable to say the least ... "
Review of Saving Fish From Drowning by Anthony O'Keefe
"Admirers of Amy Tan are likely to come away from Saving Fish From Drowning wanting to re-read, say, The Joy Luck Club - if only to remind themselves that she can do better."
Review by JC Phillips
This is a rather romantic book. It's partly a cultural history of mankind's various interpretations of the solar system, and partly a brisk journey through the discoveries and breakthroughs which establish the current analyses of each planet's orbit, physical make-up and possible origins. We also get the sun and the moon thrown in for good measure.
Review of The Planets by Peter Lawton
Review of The Planets by Bryan Flynn
Review of The Planets by Hannah Bayes
Review of The Planets by Aqsa Malik
Review of The Planets by Terrie McCann
Review of The Planets by Rhydian James
Review of The Planets by Emma McDonald
Review of The Planets by Nuzhat Jabinh
Review of Specimen Days by Sian Hughes
The slide from literary novel to pulp fiction is all too complete.
Review of Specimen Days by Nicholas Hillier
It would be better for Specimen Days to be sold as three separate novellas
Review of Specimen Days by Chris Murray
Specimen Days is an ambitious novel in three parts, each set in a different time-period. Michael Cunningham chooses Walt Whitman as his cohesive agent, binding the narratives with his characters' preoccupation with Leaves of Grass. Although the sections differ greatly from each other - the historical account, the thriller, the science-fiction story - the characters all seek something inherent in all that lives. They move towards a self-realisation that is proposed to them by Whitman's work. This commonality is underlined, perhaps too heavily, by Cunningham's use of the same set of characters, superficially altered, in each section.
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