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Showing posts with label Newbooks Magazine. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Newbooks Magazine. Show all posts
31 May 2014
Newbooks is a magazine for book lovers and reading groups, published in the UK bi-monthly.
Can I first say that I am in not affiliated to the magazine, but love not only reading books, but also read about books / authors / what's new / what are others reading etc. I'm a subscriber to this magazine. Apart from author interviews and book reviews, the magazine usually offers some of the books they reviewed for free to the readers (you will need to pay P&P though which is £3 per book).
Books which are reviewed in the magazine and which you can order for free (pay £3 P&P per book)
Every review always also features an extract from the book
(Please note: I have not read yet any of the books below and the synopsises and some other extracts have been in part taken from my copy of Newbooks magazine.)
1. We need New Names by NoViolet Bulawayo
Darling and her friends live in a shanty called Paradise, which of course is no such thing. It isn't all bad, though. There's mischief and adventure, games of Find bin Laden, stealing guavas, singing Lady Gaga at the tops of their voices.
They dream of the paradises of America, Dubai, Europe, where Madonna and Barack Obama and David Beckham live. For Darling, that dream will come true. But , like the thousands of people all over the world trying to forge new lives far from home, Darling finds this new paradise brings its own set of challenges - for her and also for those she's left behind.
2. Butterflies in November by Audur Ava Olafsdottir
From the author:
'Butterflies in November is the story of a woman at a crossroads in her life deciding to go on a road trip around her island - taking her summer holiday in November. She is dumped twice the same day, by both her husband and her lover, and than wins the lottery twice. [sic] it is a love story, but not an ordinary one, since there is one woman and three men, plus a deaf-mute child my heroine is temporary taking care of.'
3. The Book of You by Claire Kendal
Psychological thriller. Following a hazily remembered one night stand, Clarissa is being stalked by her creepy colleague, Rafe. A call to undertake jury service seems to provide the perfect opportunity to escape Rafe's unwanted attentions. As the trial unfolds, however, Clarissa sees disturbing parallels between herself and the victim.
4. Arms Wide Open by Tom Winter
Story of non-identical twins Jack and Meredith, yearning for the father they never knew. Their mother is succumbing to early-onset dementia, a rare and hereditary form of the disease. Over a period of days and weeks, Jack and Meredith are forced to ponder both the past and the future: their memories of their mother, their hopes of finding their father and the fear of what's in their bloodline.
5. Lost and Found by Tom Winter
Acc to the author he 'seeks to treat difficult subjects with humour'
Amazon: Meet Albert and Carol, two lost souls, brought together through a series of unforgettable letters.
Extract:
'Carol wants a disease. Nothing deadly, and nothing crippling. She doesn't aspire to disabled parking, for instance, despite its obvious advantages.'
Other books featured in the magazine (some with extracts)
- The Bookshop that floated away by Sarah Henshaw
- The Road to Reckoning by Robert Lautner
- City of Lies by Ramita Navai
Crime Supplement:
- The Deliverane of Evil by Roberto Costantini
- The First Rule of Survival by Paul Mendelson
- Letters to my Daughter's Killer by Cath Staincliffe
- Precious Thinn by Colette Mcbeth
- If I should Die by Matthew Frank
- Eeny Meeny by MJ Arlidge
- After the Silence by Jake Woodhouse
- Sara Sheridan talks about her Mirabelle Bevan Series
- The Good Priest by Gillian Galbriath
- Run by Greg Olsen (+ author Q+A with Greg Olsen)
- Death in Pont-Aven by Jean-Luc Bannalec
The Book Lover's Companion - What to read next (formerly the Book Club Bible) - looks like a must buy to me. This book covers over a hundred books, with 'each title having suggestion discussion points to stimulate debate. '
Other features
- interview with author Alexander McCall Smith
- the life work of Australian novelist Alex Miller - an introduction to the author, his books and a closer look at his latex novel, Coal Creek
- an introduction to four translation publishers - Alma Books, Pushkin Press, Hesperus Press and MacLehose Press
- The Directory - selection of titles recently published or about to be published (Now that is one of my favourite parts of the mag )
15 March 2014
Newbooks is a magazine for book lovers and reading groups, published in the UK bi-monthly.
Can I first say that I am in no way affiliated to the magazine, but love not only reading books, but also read about books / authors / what's new / what are others reading etc. I'm a subscriber to this magazine. Apart from author interviews and book reviews, the magazine usually offers some of the books they reviewed for free to the readers (you will need to pay P&P though which is £3 per book).
I've had issue #80 March/April 2014 for a couple of weeks now and read it whilst sitting in Starbucks when my family went shopping. Perfect.
Books which are reviewed in the magazine and which you can order for free (pay £3 P&P per book)
Every review always also features an extract from the book
(Please note: I have not read yet any of the books below and the synopsises and some other extracts have been in part taken from my copy of Newbooks magazine.)
1. I am Pilgrim by Terry Hayes
A spy thriller featuring an ex-intelligence agent who is hiding from the people he used to work with. He starts to help one of his friend, an NYCD cop, to investigate a seemingly perfect murder and the investigation leads them to discover a plot of mass terrorism.
2. The Girl from Station X by Elisa Segrave
Tagline: My mother's unknown life. Non-fiction.
The author outlines her difficult relationship with her mother until her death from alcoholism and Alzheimers. However, after her death, Elisa discovers her mother's diaries and discovers part of her mother's life she never knew anything about. As a young woman, she had been a young and wealthy socialite and than during WW2 she started to work with Bomber Command and tan at Bletchley Park.
3. Sweet Dreams, Little One by Massimo Gramellini
'Early in the morning of New Year's Eve, nine-year old Massimo wakes up to the sound of his father crying out and discovers that his mother has gone. Life will never the the same. He grows up without love, but longing for it.'
A story of loss and bereavement and trying to overcome the death of his mother.
4. That Part Was True by Deborah McKinlay
'When Eve Petworth writes to Jackson Cooper to praise a scene in one of his books, they discover a mutual love of cookery and food. As their letters criss-cross the ocean that lies between them, friendship and than romance blossoms. An escapist read about food, friendship and falling in love from afar.'
I always love stories involving writers :)
5. The Wild Girl by Kate Forsyth
An interesting spin here on the Grimm's fairy stories.
No, not another one who takes a fairy tale and puts it in modern days, but this one tells the story of Dortchen Wild who was a neighbour of Wilhem Grimm and was indeed one of the people who told Wilhelm many of the stories which the brothers wrote down and collected. Apparently, Hansel and Gretel, The Frog King, Rumpelstiltskin and The Elves and The Shoemaker are all Dortchen's stories. And, like a true romance story (and true!), Wilhelm and Dortchen fall in love and get married. Well, I never knew that!
6. The Son-in-Law by Charity Norman
'This story starts with the death of Zoe Scott. We know immediately how she died, if not why. What happens next is seen through the eyes of her mother, her young daughter and the husband who killed her. '
That certainly sound like a powerful story and one to mark for myself.
7. After the Fall by Charity Norman
'The story about a family who emigrate to New Zealand only to meet disaster. How did a five-year old boy come to fall off a balcony? Martha knowns exactly what happened that night but she isn't telling us. She is a dishonest narrator, or at least a cagey one.'
There was lots of buzz about this book but I haven't read it yet. Time to put it on my TBR pile!
8. Road Ends by Mary Lawson
The story of a family, set in Canada in Northern Ontario. The story is told with there POV's - Tom, an aeronautical engineer who witnesses the suicide of his friend a, Edward who is Tom's father and Megan, his sister. The family is dysfunctional and all have their own problems and issues to deal with.
9. Crow Lake by Mary Lawson
Another story by Mary Lawson which again, is set in Canada in Northern Ontario. The narrator of this story is 26 year old Kate who grew up in a small, time-forgotten town. She loses her parents aged 7 in a motorbike accident which leaves her and her siblings orphaned. the story of her childhood is intertwined with her life now and slowly more is revealed about the incident 20 years ago in that incident when the siblings lost their parents.
10. A Mother's Shame by Rosie Goodwin
The story of 2 woman - Maria and Isabella. In 1957, Maria is working in a local mental asylum where she will meet Isabelle who is the daughter of an rich family. But Isabelle is not insane. She has been put in the asylum by her family as an unmarried woman who has to hide away in shame.
11. Home Front Girls by Rosie Goodwin
This book is set during World War 2 and it's aftermath. The story of 3 girls during the war and the men they loved, hardship, love and hope.
Other features
- Interview with Irma Kurtz, agony aunt
- Q&A with Joanne Harris
- reading group discussions on The Ruby Slippers by Keir Alexander
- World Book Night
- Bonzo's War by Clare Campbell (a book about animals/pets during war time)
- My favourite writing spot
- chat with Hilary Bonner and Robert Lautner
- The Directory - selection of titles recently published or about to be published (Now that is one of my favourite parts of the mag obviously)
Other books featured in the magazine
- The French Promise bye Fiona McIntos
- Bonzo's War by Clare Campbell (a book about animals/pets during war time)
- Transcendence by Rene Denfeld (about a prisoner on death row)
2 February 2014
Can I first say that I am in no way affiliated to the magazine, but love not only reading books, but also read about books / authors / what's new / what are others reading etc. I'm a subscriber to this magazine. Apart from author interviews and book reviews, the magazine usually offers some of the books they reviewed for free to the readers (you will need to pay P&P though which is £3 per book).
The latest issue 79 January/Februar 2014 dropped trough my letter box last weekend and this is what you will find in the magazine:
Interview with Val McDermaid
The Best-selling UK crime author talks about her career, her
books, her characters
Some
things I picked out which I found particularly interesting:
Look
out for:
- · She talks about Agatha Christie and how one particular story was found in scattered in several of Christie’s notebooks which she carried with her (made me smile, because I almost always carry several notebooks with me J
- · Violence in Crime Fiction which she calls ‘pornography of violence’
- · Her contacts in the police / forensics who assist her
Books which are reviewed in the magazine and which you can
order for free (pay £3 P&P per book)
Every review always also features an extract from the book
Please note: I have not read yet any of the books below)
1.
Barracuda by Christos Tsiolkas 
Tsolkias is the Greek/Australia author who came to fame with
his story ‘The Slap’ published in 2008. This is the new offering of this
author. It tells the story of Daniel Kelly, a talented young swimmer who
struggles to cope with the pressures of the sport.
2.
Longbourn by Jo Baker 
This book takes a spin on Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice (and Downtown Abbey), cleverly telling the
story of the servants / maids in the Bennett’s household. I’m usually not a fan
of period drama, but the writing sound really good and the extract had me
hooked already with the story of housemaid Polly musing about the Bennett’s
dirty laundry (literally) and the powerful descriptions of their hard work.
3.
When Mr Dog Bites by Brian
Conaghan 
A YA novel about a sixteen year old boy with Tourette’s
syndrome, has been compared to Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in Nighttime . The author himself
has Tourette’s so I think this will be really authentic. 4. Flight Behaviour by Barbara Kingsolver
A novel about climate change, possible environmental
diseaster, ‘exploring escape versus reason, catastrophe versus denial.’ I love
this kind of stories, and a large amount of research must have gone into it. 5. The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd
Here the author took the historical figure of Sarah Grimke,
the American abolitionist, writer and suffragist who lived in the 1800’s and
told the (imagined) story of her house-slave, Hetty. Slavery, racism, America’s
deep South. From the extract, I loved the way that Hetty’s language is brought
across: “I was shrewd like mauma.” Well worth putting on the TBR pile.
6.
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue
Monk Kidd 
Again, the author goes back to her memories of Georgia in
the 1950’s and 1960’s, the racism, Rosa Park’s, Ku Klux Klan, Martin Luther
King. 7. Labor Day by Joyce Maynard
I read about this somewhere else (can’t remember now where),
and it is a soon-to-be-a-movie novel. The story unfolds on a Labour Day weekend
what Adele, a divorcee, takes her son to a supermarket where they come across a
man in blood soaked clothing who asks them to help him and he is a murder. And
astonishingly, Adele does take him home. The story is told from the point of
the 13 year old son if I understand the feature right. Sound like a book I
would enjoy me says!
Other books featured in the magazine:
·
Unfaithfully
Yours by Nigel Williams 
A
woman writes a letter to a private detective, asking for her husband to be
investigated. Stories of marriages
unravelling, told through a series of letters
·
Hearts of Darkness by Paul Lawrence
Hearts of Darkness by Paul Lawrence
London
in the 1700’s, the plague. Harry Lytle works for the intelligence service to
return a traitor. Interesting mix – London, the plague and intelligence
service.
·
The Buy Side by Turney Duff
The Buy Side by Turney Duff
Non-fiction.
Wall Street Trader exposes the after-hours of sex and drugs. Very current with
the recent Leonardo De Caprio movie Wall Street in the cinemas at the moment
covering the same sort of topic and I think people will be interested in it. I
did watch the movie tbw and thought it was very good. (well, it helps that I do
love De Caprio)
Debut novels who are being introduced
· Writers Block
by Judith Flanders
· The Ruby
Slippers by Keir Alexander
· The Amber
Fury by Nathalie Haynes
· The
Undertaking by Audrey Magee
· The Boy that
Never Was by Karen Perry
· The Lie of
You by Jane Lythell
· Custard Tarts
and Broken Hearts by Mary Gibson
· The Mangle
Street Murders by M.R.C Kasasian
And finally, there are other
features to discover, i.e an interview with musician Mike Rutherford (of
Genesis) and the section I always read religiously is The Directory which features a selection of titles recently
published or about to the published in the next 6 weeks or so.
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