There are some great looking books being released in April that it has been hard to choose just ten.
Life with my puppy is still very lively but I very much hope to find time to get stuck into these little beauties.
The Shadow Key by Susan Stokes-Chapman
There's something mysterious about the village of Penhelyg. Will unlocking its truth bring light or darkness?
Meirionydd, 1783. Dr Henry Talbot has been dismissed from his post in London. The only job he can find is in Wales where he can't speak the language, belief in myth and magic is rife, and the villagers treat him with suspicion. When Henry discovers his predecessor died under mysterious circumstances, he is determined to find answers.
Linette Tresilian has always suspected something is not quite right in the village, but it is through Henry's investigations that a truth comes to light that will bind hers and Henry's destinies together in ways neither thought possible.
Pathways by Katie Ward
Cara is a dedicated neuroscientist with a research post at Cambridge. Heather is her almost-stepdaughter, drifting towards the end of school, trying to picture a future that fits her. Paul is Cara's partner and Heather's father - and when he suddenly disappears with no explanation, these two very different women, legally and biologically unrelated, need to figure out their place in each other's life.
Set in Cambridge and Las Vegas, each city in its way as artificial as the other, Pathways is about connections forged and connections failed, and how people struggle to understand themselves and each other. A novel of both the heart and the head, it is perceptive, wry and unexpectedly moving, a love story of deep originality and intelligence.
The Little Penguin Bookshop by Joanna Toye
Books can change lives, even in wartime. . .
When World War II breaks out, Carrie Anderson sets up a bookstall at her local train station in the hope of providing a sense of escapism for travellers, troops and evacuees.
Driven by an entrepreneurial spirit and armed with a colourful array of Penguin paperbacks, Carrie’s business soon booms. And when she gifts a book to a dashing officer, an act of kindness becomes the beginning of Carrie’s very own love story.
But as war rages on, and Mike is posted abroad, Carrie’s world is turned upside-down.
With the help of her station community, and the power of her paperbacks, can Carrie find the strength to battle through?
Sweetness in the Skin by Ishi Robinson
For Pumkin Patterson, family is complicated.
There’s her mother Paulette, who ignores her. There’s her beloved Auntie Sophie, who her mother resents. And there’s her grandmother, who has always played favourites. Whenever tensions rise, Pumkin retreats to the kitchen - creating the Jamaican bread puddings and coconut drops that have always given her comfort.
When Sophie moves to France for work, she vows to send for her niece in one year’s time. But in order to follow her aunt, Pumkin has a mountain to climb. Starting with the question of how she’ll manage to escape her mother, and make enough money to get to Marseille.
Inspired by her skills in the kitchen, Pumkin turns to her community in the hope that she can sell enough sweet treats to bake her way out. But when her school and her mother discover her plan, everything she’s worked so hard for may slip through her fingers . . .
A Single Act of Kindness by Samantha Tonge
Tilda has done everything she can to make her life neat, protected, tidy. No longer the girl who was scared of everything, whose family pushed her away, who hit rock bottom. Now she runs her life – as she does her successful business – with the utmost organization. As long as she keeps everyone at arm’s length, she will be fine. She will be safe.
But then a chance encounter with a man who’s fallen on hard times changes everything. Milo needs a break, and self-contained Tilda surprises herself by deciding she should help him. Just for a while. A few days at the most.
Maybe all he needs is someone to organize him, to help him clean up his act? She is sure she knows how to kick-start Milo into turning his life around.
What Tilda doesn’t know is that – with this single act of kindness – it might actually be her own life that’s about to change forever…
The Library Thief by Kuchenga Shenje
The library is under lock and key. But its secrets can't be contained.
After he brought her home from Jamaica as a baby, Florence's father had her hair hot-combed to make her look like the other girls. But as a young woman, Florence is not so easy to tame - and when she brings scandal to his door, the bookbinder throws her onto the streets of Manchester.
Intercepting her father's latest commission, Florence talks her way into the remote, forbidding Rose Hall to restore its collection of rare books. Lord Francis Belfield's library is old and full of secrets - but none so intriguing as the whispers about his late wife.
Then one night, the library is broken into. Strangely, all the priceless tomes remain untouched. Florence is puzzled, until she discovers a half-burned book in the fireplace. She realises with horror that someone has found and set fire to the secret diary of Lord Belfield's wife - which may hold the clue to her fate . . .
Hard Times for the East End Library Girls by Patricia McBride
As the war reaches London, they’ll band together…
War strikes close to home for chief librarian Cordelia when her flat is bombed, and her beloved Robert is called up and sent abroad. Fortunately, her colleagues Mavis and Jane can help see her through hard times.
The three friends find purpose in making the Silvertown library a friendly sanctuary for their deprived and devastated community. But sinister forces, from callous bureaucrats to crafty criminals, still lurk among the stacks. Worse, Jane’s soldier husband is injured and suffers both physically and mentally.
With so many struggles Cordelia and her friends might need more than books to survive war's shadow. Can they find light in the darkness?
Red Runs the Witch's Thread by Victoria Williamson
Paisley, Scotland, 1697. Thirty-five people accused of witchcraft. Seven condemned to death. Six strangled and burned at the stake. All accused by eleven-year-old Christian Shaw.
Bargarran House, 1722. Christian Shaw returns home, spending every waking hour perfecting the thread bleaching process that will revive her family’s fortune. If only she can make it white enough, perhaps her past sins will be purified too.
But dark forces are at work. As the twenty-fifth anniversary of the witch burnings approaches, ravens circle Bargarran House, their wild cries stirring memories and triggering visions.
As Christian’s mind begins to unravel, her states of delusion threaten the safety of all those who cross her path. In the end she must make a terrible choice: her mind or her soul? Poverty and madness, or a devil’s bargain for the bleaching process that will make her the most successful businesswoman Paisley has ever seen?
Her fate hangs by a thread. Which will she choose?
Widows on the Wine Path by Julia Jarman
Viv, Janet and Zelda know all about facing the wobbly first year of becoming a widow as their friendship was forged when they ran away from the same dreary support group. Forming instead the much more lively widows' wine club – The Muscateers – they welcome new member Libby with open arms.
Libby feels lost without Jim, her husband of more than thirty years, but the warmth, friendship and fun the women wrap her up in inspires her to begin to look to the future. When a solo trip to the theatre brings a blast from the past back into her life, things are looking up.
But as cravat-wearing, smooth-talking Monty Charles sweeps Libby off her feet, the women of the Muscateers smell a rat. They know only too well that the first year of widowhood is prime for making mistakes, and they’re determined to protect their friend. And as Monty soon finds out to his cost, never underestimate a Widow on the Wine Path…
A Beginner's Guide to Breaking and Entering by Andrew Hunter Murray
Property might be theft. But the housing market is murder.
My name is Al. I live in wealthy people's second homes while their real owners are away.
I don’t rob them, I don’t damage anything… I’m more an unofficial house-sitter than an actual criminal.
Life is good.
Or it was - until last night, when my friends and I broke into the wrong place, on the wrong day, and someone wound up dead.
And now … now we’re in a great deal of trouble.
