Spydus Search Results - Recently reviewed titles

Winkle : the extraordinary life of Britain's greatest pilot / Paul Beaver.

The extraordinary life story of Captain Eric 'Winkle' Brown - aviator, record-breaker, and Britain's greatest pilot.
Author: Beaver, Paul, 1953-
Published: UK : Michael Joseph, 2023.
xxviii, 515 pages, 24 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (black and white, and colour), maps (black and white) ; 24 cm
Average rating: (1 review)

Princes Risborough Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult non fiction - B BRO BEA - Onloan - Due: 15 Dec 2023 - 95100000411409

The last remains / Elly Griffiths.

When builders renovating a café in King's Lynn find a human skeleton behind a wall, they call for DCI Harry Nelson and Dr Ruth Galloway, Head of Archaeology at the nearby University of North Norfolk. The bones are identified as the remains of Emily Pickering, a young archaeology student who went missing in the 1990s. Emily attended a course run by her Cambridge tutor. Suspicion falls on him and also on another course member - Ruth's friend Cathbad, who is still frail following his near death from Covid. Just when the team seem to be making progress, Cathbad disappears. The race is on - first to find Cathbad and then to exonerate him.
Author: Griffiths, Elly
Published: London : Quercus, 2023.
357 pages ; 25 cm.
Dr Ruth Galloway mysteries
Average rating: (4 reviews)

29 copies

Emily Wilde's encyclopaedia of faeries / Heather Fawcett.

Emily Wilde is good at many things: she is the foremost expert on the study of faeries. She is a genius scholar and a meticulous researcher who is writing the world's first encylopaedia of faerie lore. But Emily Wilde is not good at people. She could never make small talk at a party - much less get invited to one. Emily prefers the company of her books, her dog Shadow, and the Fair Folk. So when she arrives in the hardscrabble village of Hrafnsvik, Emily has no intention of befriending the gruff townsfolk. Nor does she care to spend time with another new arrival: her dashing and insufferably handsome academic rival Wendell Bambleby, who manages to charm the townsfolk, get in the middle of her research, and utterly confound and frustrate Emily.
Author: Fawcett, Heather (Heather M.)
Published: London : Orbit, 2023.
315 pages ; 25 cm
Average rating: (2 reviews)

Princes Risborough Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - FAN - Available - 95100000402324

My father's house / Joseph O'Connor.

September 1943: German forces occupy Rome. SS officer Paul Hauptmann rules with terror. The war's outcome is far from certain. An Irish priest, Hugh O'Flaherty, dedicates himself to helping those escaping from the Nazis. His home is Vatican City, the world's smallest state, a neutral, independent country within Rome where the occupiers hold no sway. Here Hugh brings together an unlikely band of friends to hide the vulnerable under the noses of the enemy. But Hauptmann's net begins closing in on the Escape Line and the need for a terrifyingly audacious mission grows critical. By Christmastime, it's too late to turn back.
Author: O'Connor, Joseph, 1963-
Published: London : Harvill Secker, 2023.
277 pages : map (black and white) ; 24 cm
Average rating: (1 review)
4 reserves

Beacon Villages Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - Reservation awaiting collection (Set: 23 Nov 2023) - 95100000400962
Beaconsfield Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - Onloan - Due: 05 Dec 2023 - 95100000399484
Bourne End Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - Onloan - Due: 02 Dec 2023 - 95100000399498
Chalfont St Giles Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: adult fiction - Onloan - Due: 06 Dec 2023 - 95100000371208
Chalfont St Peter Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: adult fiction - Adult fiction - In-transit from High Wycombe Library to Great Missenden Community Library (Set: 29 Nov 2023) - 95100000274357
Haddenham Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - Onloan - Due: 19 Dec 2023 - 95100000400999
Long Crendon Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: adult fiction - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 08 Feb 2023) - 95100000276260
Marlow Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - Onloan - Due: 15 Dec 2023 - 95100000399514

What's for dinner? : fuss-free family food in 30 minutes / Sarah Rossi.

Juggling daily life and eating well can feel impossible, especially after a busy day - finding time to think about mealtimes can feel like just another chore. But this book will do the hard work for you - and restore peaceful dinner times amid the chaos of family life! With 100 recipes and ten weekly meal plans plus shopping lists for absolutely everything you need, this book will take the pain out of planning and be your solution to those daily dinner dilemmas.
Author: Rossi, Sarah
Published: London : Harper Thorsons, 2023.
224 pages ; 26 cm
Average rating: (1 review)

Aylesbury Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult non fiction - 641.5 ROS - Onloan - Due: 20 Dec 2023 - 95100000404340

A tidy ending / Joanna Cannon.

Meet Linda. Linda lives a nice, normal life, on a nice, normal street with Terry, her perfectly ordinary husband. Linda's not like everyone else, she keeps herself to herself. But she's good at solving puzzles and there are times she sees things other people might have overlooked. Because nothing on Cavendish Avenue is quite as it seems. People have started to go missing in the neighbourhood and Linda will soon discover that some secrets can't stay buried forever.
Author: Cannon, Joanna (Psychiatrist)
Published: London : The Borough Press, 2023.
415 pages ; 20 cm
Average rating: (2 reviews)

Aylesbury Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Available - 95100000404457
Chalfont St Peter Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: adult fiction - Adult fiction - Available - 95100000278881
Flackwell Heath Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Available - 95100000414883
Hazlemere Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Onloan - Due: 19 Dec 2023 - 95100000404385

The Earth transformed : an untold history / Peter Frankopan.

Most people can name the influential leaders and major battles of the past. Few can name the most destructive storms, the worst winters, the most devastating droughts. In this book, historian Peter Frankopan reconnects us with our ancestors who, like us, worshipped, exploited and conserved the natural environment - and draws salutary conclusions about what the future may bring.
Author: Frankopan, Peter
Published: London : Bloomsbury Publishing, 2023.
xxv, 695 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (black and white, and colour), maps (black and white) ; 25 cm
Average rating: (1 review)
2 reserves

Chalfont St Peter Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult non fiction - 363.3409 FRA - Reservation awaiting collection (Set: 01 Dec 2023) - 95100000405093
Marlow Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult non fiction - 363.3409 FRA - Reservation awaiting collection (Set: 24 Nov 2023) - 95100000404787

Fatal legacy / Lindsey Davis.

An unpaid bar bill leads Flavia Albia to her most bitter and complex case yet. Decades earlier Appius Tranquillus Surus wrote his will: it freed his slaves and bequeathed his businesses to them. He left an orchard to the Prisci, a family he was friendly with, on the condition that his freedmen could still take its harvest. The convoluted arrangement has led to a feud between the two families, each of which has its own internal strife. Endless claims and counterclaims lead to violence and even death. Lawyers have given up in exasperation but the case limps on. The original will has disappeared, along with a falsified codicil - and might there be another one? But could there be a solution? Two youngsters from each side of the divide, Gaius Venuleius and Cosca Sabatina, have fallen in love, which could unite the feuding families. There is only one problem: were Sabatina's grandmpther and father really liberated in the Surus will? If not, the stigma of slavery will stop the marriage and the dispute will rage on forever. Reconciliation seems impossible, but Albia will try. Her investigation must cut through decades of secrets, arguments, lies and violence to reach a startling truth.
Author: Davis, Lindsey
Published: London : Hodder & Stoughton, 2023.
xii, 394 pages : illustrations (black and white), map (black and white) ; 24 cm.
Flavia Albia series
Average rating: (1 review)

Beaconsfield Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - CRI - Onloan - Due: 16 Dec 2023 - 95100000404929
Burnham Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - CRI - Available - 95100000404853
Chesham Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - CRI - Onloan - Due: 16 Dec 2023 - 95100000404763
Farnham Common Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: adult fiction - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 21 Apr 2023) - 95100000377211
Great Missenden Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - CRI - Available - 95100000404885
Hazlemere Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - CRI - Onloan - Due: 09 Dec 2023 - 95100000405145

Frogs : what do frogs, toads, and tadpoles get up to all day? / Itzue W. Caviedes-Solis, Henry Rancourt.

A gripping story set over 24 hours where readers will come face-to-face with the most amazing frogs and toads in the world.
Author: Caviedes-Solis, Itzue Wendolin
Published: London : Neon Squid, [2023]
Published: ©2023
48 pages : illustrations (colour) ; 27 cm.
Day in the life
Average rating: (1 review)

Hazlemere Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Children's non fiction - J597.815 CAV - Available - 95100000406487
High Wycombe Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Children's non fiction - J597.815 CAV - Available - 95100000406742

Just another missing person / Gillian McAllister.

Olivia, 22 years old. No history of running away. Last seen on CCTV, entering a dead-end alley. And not coming back out again. Missing for one day and counting. Julia is the detective heading up the case. She knows what to expect. A desperate family, a ticking clock, and long hours away from her daughter. But Julia has no idea how close to home it's going to get. Because her family's safety depends on one thing, Julia must not find out what happened to Olivia - and must frame somebody else for her murder. What would you do?
Author: McAllister, Gillian
Published: UK : Michael Joseph, 2023.
398 pages ; 24 cm
Average rating: (1 review)
4 reserves

12 copies

Murder before evensong / The Reverend Richard Coles.

Canon Daniel Clement is Rector of Champton. He has been there for eight years, arriving at the invitation of the patron and landowner, Bernard, Baron de Floures, of Champton House. Daniel's previous post was curate at a smart central London parish, where he got to know the de Floures family through his brother Theo, an up-and-coming actor and socialite. Audrey Clement, his widowed mother, lives with him at the Rectory on the estate. He has two dachshunds, Cosmo and Hilda. The story begins with Daniel announcing from the pulpit a plan to install a lavatory in church. This is long overdue, he thinks and so does Bernard de Floures, but the announcement goes down badly with the parish. Firm opposition comes from Mrs Harper and Mrs Dollinger of the Flower Guild, who are habitual opposers of change. There is opposition too from others who do not like the the thought of matters lavatorial in church.
Author: Coles, Richard, 1962-
Published: London : Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2023.
371 pages : map (black and white) ; 20 cm.
Canon Clement mystery
Average rating: (1 review)
1 reserve

Aylesbury Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Onloan - Due: 22 Dec 2023 - 95100000404366
Bourne End Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - In-transit from Bourne End Community Library to High Wycombe Library (Set: 01 Dec 2023) - 95100000404288
Chalfont St Giles Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: adult fiction - Onloan - Due: 22 Dec 2023 - 95100000371401
Chesham Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Available - 95100000404155
Farnham Common Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: adult fiction - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 27 Sep 2023) - 95100000377176
Great Missenden Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Onloan - Due: 22 Dec 2023 - 95100000409005
Marlow Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Available - 95100000404170
Princes Risborough Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Onloan - Due: 15 Dec 2023 - 95100000404193

Fourth wing / Rebecca Yarros.

Welcome to the brutal and elite world of Basgiath War College, where everyone has an agenda, and every night could be your last. Twenty-year-old Violet Sorrengail was supposed to enter the Scribe Quadrant, living a quiet life among books and history. Now, the commanding general - also known as her tough-as-talons mother - has ordered Violet to join the hundreds of candidates striving to become the elite of Navarre: dragon riders. But when you're smaller than everyone else and your body is brittle, death is only a heartbeat away - because dragons don't bond to 'fragile' humans. They incinerate them. With fewer dragons willing to bond than cadets, most would kill Violet to better their own chances of success. The rest would kill her just for being her mother's daughter - like Xaden Riorson, the most powerful and ruthless wingleader in the Riders Quadrant.
Author: Yarros, Rebecca
Published: London : Piatkus, 2023.
512 pages : map (black and white) ; 24 cm
Average rating: (4 reviews)
10 reserves

Buckingham Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - Onloan - Due: 22 Dec 2023 - 95100000413126
Chalfont St Giles Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - FAN - Onloan - Due: 16 Dec 2023 - 95100000415065
Chesham Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - In-transit from Chesham Library to Buckingham Library (Set: 27 Nov 2023) - 95100000417259
High Wycombe Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - Onloan - Due: 10 Dec 2023 - 95100000417207
Long Crendon Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: adult fiction - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 02 Aug 2023) - 95100000276332
Wendover Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 05 Sep 2023) - 148404561

The Medici murders / David Hewson.

Venice, 1548, Lorenzino de Medici, himself a murderer and a man few will miss, is assassinated by two hired killers. Today, Marmaduke Godolphin, British tv historian and a man even fewer will miss, is stabbed by a stiletto blade on the exact same spot, his body dropping the canal. Can the story of the first murder explain the attack on Godolphin? The Carabinieri certainly think so. They recruit retired archivist Arnold Clover to unpick the mystery and to help solve the case. But the conspiracy against Godolphin runs deeper than anyone imagined.
Author: Hewson, David, 1953-
Published: Edinburgh : Canongate, 2023.
284 pages ; 20 cm
Average rating: (1 review)

Amersham Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Onloan - Due: 15 Dec 2023 - 95100000407525
Aylesbury Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Available - 95100000407365
Buckingham Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Available - 95100000407230
Buckingham Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Available - 95100000407767
Hazlemere Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Available - 95100000407507
Marlow Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Onloan - Due: 12 Dec 2023 - 95100000407626
Princes Risborough Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - CRI - Available - 95100000407399

The trial / Rob Rinder.

When hero policeman Grant Cliveden dies from a poisoning in the Old Bailey, it threatens to shake the country to its core. The evidence points to one man. Jimmy Knight has been convicted of multiple offences before and defending him will be no easy task. Not least because this is trainee barrister Adam Green's first case. But it will quickly become clear that Jimmy Knight is not the only person in Cliveden's past with an axe to grind. The only thing that's certain is that this is a trial which will push Adam - and the justice system itself - to the limit.
Author: Rinder, Robert, 1978-
Published: London : Century, 2023.
359 pages ; 24 cm
Average rating: (2 reviews)
1 reserve

13 copies

A song of me & you / Mike Gayle.

Helen and Ben parted as heartbroken 18-year-olds and went their very separate ways. Twenty years later, mother-of-two-teenagers Helen is still in Manchester, a part-time primary teacher, stunned by the behaviour of her love-rat husband. In an old T-shirt and scruffy jeans, she feels at the lowest point in her life. And suddenly, impossibly, Ben is standing on her doorstep. Tired maybe, lonely even, but clearly still the world-famous, LA-based multi-millionaire rockstar he has become. Can you ever go back? For Helen and Ben, so much has happened in the years between. But just to sit in the kitchen for a while and talk - that would be nice. Before the world comes crashing in.
Author: Gayle, Mike
Published: London : Hodder & Stoughton, 2023.
346 pages ; 24 cm
Average rating: (1 review)

Aylesbury Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - In-transit from Gerrards Cross Community Library to Aylesbury Library (Set: 30 Nov 2023) - 95100000412165
Buckingham Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - Onloan - Due: 12 Dec 2023 - 95100000413064
Chalfont St Giles Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: adult fiction - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 16 Aug 2023) - 95100000371468
Chalfont St Peter Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: adult fiction - Adult fiction - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 25 Aug 2023) - 95100000274488
Farnham Common Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: adult fiction - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 06 Aug 2023) - 95100000377178
Hazlemere Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - Onloan - Due: 12 Dec 2023 - 95100000413030
High Wycombe Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - Onloan - Due: 20 Dec 2023 - 95100000412234
Long Crendon Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - Available - 95100000413985
Lt. Chalfont Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: adult fiction - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 29 Jul 2023) - Onloan - Due: 12 Dec 2023 - 95100000279155
Winslow Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - Onloan - Due: 09 Dec 2023 - 95100000412661

Everyone here is lying / Shari Lapena.

William Wooler is a family man, on the surface. But he's been having an affair, an affair that ended horribly this afternoon at a motel up the road. So when he returns to his house, devastated and angry, to find his difficult nine-year-old daughter Avery unexpectedly home from school, William loses his temper. Hours later, Avery's family declare her missing. Suddenly Stanhope doesn't feel so safe. And William isn't the only one on his street who's hiding a lie. As witnesses come forward with information that may or may not be true, Avery's neighbours become increasingly unhinged. Who took Avery Wooler? Nothing will prepare you for the truth.
Author: Lapena, Shari, 1960-
Published: London : Bantam, 2023.
323 pages ; 25 cm
Average rating: (2 reviews)

18 copies

A game of lies / Clare Mackintosh.

Stranded in the Welsh mountains, seven reality show contestants have no idea what they've signed up for. Each of these strangers has a secret. If another player can guess the truth, they won't just be eliminated - they'll be exposed live on air. The stakes are higher than they'd ever imagined, and they're trapped. The disappearance of a contestant wasn't supposed to be part of the drama. Detective Ffion Morgan has to put aside what she's watched on screen, and find out who these people really are - knowing she can't trust any of them. And when a murderer strikes, Ffion knows every one of her suspects has an alibi - and a secret worth killing for.
Author: Mackintosh, Clare
Published: London : Sphere, 2023.
374 pages : map (black and white) ; 25 cm.
DC Ffion Morgan
Average rating: (2 reviews)
9 reserves

19 copies

The queue / Alexandra Heminsley.

Three strangers. Ten miles. One life-changing day. 'The Queue' tells the unforgettable story of three strangers, 19-year-old Abbie, 40-year-old Mike and 69-year-old Suzie, who meet in Southwark Park on 17th September 2022 on a day that will change their lives forever. Over the next 24 hours, alongside 250,000 others, friendships are formed, celebrities are spotted and rom-com dreams are ignited. As the unlikely trio wind along the Thames, edging ever closer to Westminster and the Queen, it's clear that they have unknowingly become a part of history - and that when they finally leave the queue their worlds will never be the same again.
Author: Heminsley, Alexandra, 1976-
Published: London : Orion, 2023.
276 pages ; 20 cm
Average rating: (1 review)

Aylesbury Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - Onloan - Due: 16 Dec 2023 - 95100000415783
Flackwell Heath Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - Available - 95100000416850
Princes Risborough Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - Available - 95100000415846

Tom Lake / Ann Patchett.

In the spring of 2020, Lara's three daughters return to the family's orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew. Tom Lake is a meditation on youthful love, married love, and the lives parents have led before their children were born. Both hopeful and elegiac, it explores what it means to be happy even when the world is falling apart. As in all of her novels, Ann Patchett combines compelling narrative artistry with piercing insights into family dynamics.
Author: Patchett, Ann
Published: London : Bloomsbury Publishing, 2023.
309 pages ; 25 cm
Average rating: (1 review)
16 reserves

14 copies

The Borgia portrait / David Hewson.

Lizzie Hawker recruits Arnold Clover to look into the disappearance of her mother, an Italian countess, and a priceless painting of Lucrezia Borgia. When a body is discovered in a crypt, secret clues to the portraits location are unearthed. The search for the lost Borgia quickly becomes a race through Venice, with potentially deadly consequences.
Author: Hewson, David, 1953-
Published: Edinburgh : Severn House, 2023.
278 pages ; 23 cm.
Venetian mysteries
Average rating: (2 reviews)

Great Missenden Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - CRI - Onloan - Due: 19 Dec 2023 - 95100000412924
Hazlemere Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - CRI - Onloan - Due: 19 Dec 2023 - 95100000413160

Normal rules don't apply : short stories / Kate Atkinson.

In this collection we meet a queen who makes a bargain she cannot keep; a secretary who watches over the life she has just left; and a man whose luck changes when a horse speaks to him. Witty and wise, with subtle connections between the stories, 'Normal Rules Don't Apply' is a startling , and funny feast for the imagination. In Kate Atkinson's world nothing is over until 'the talking dog speaks'.
Author: Atkinson, Kate
Published: London : Doubleday, 2023.
vii, 223 pages ; 24 cm
Average rating: (1 review)
2 reserves

13 copies

Johnny Thunders : in cold blood : the official biography / Nina Antonia.

Johnny Thunders was a guitarist with the punk band the New York Dolls. This book tells the story of his life, from their first recordings in the early 1970's, his new band formed in 1975, the Heartbreakers, and his death in 1991.
Author: Antonia, Nina
Revised and updated edition. / foreword by Mike Scott.
Published: London : Jawbone Press, 2023.
288 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm
Average rating: (1 review)

Marlow Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult non fiction - B THU ANT - Available - 95100000414249

Absolutely and forever / Rose Tremain.

Marianne Clifford, teenage daughter of a peppery army colonel and his vain wife, Lal, falls helplessly and absolutely for Simon Hurst, 18, whose cleverness and physical beauty suggest that he will go forward into a successful and monied future, helped on by doting parents. But fate intervenes. Simon's plans are blown off course, and Marianne is forced to bury her dreams of a future together. Narrating her own story, characterising herself as ignorant and unworthy, Marianne's telling use of irony and smart thinking gradually suggest to us that she has underestimated her own worth. We begin to believe that - in the end, supported by her courageous Scottish friend, Petronella - she will find the life she never stops craving. But what we can't envisage is that beneath his blithe exterior, Simon Hurst has been nursing a secret which will alter everything.
Author: Tremain, Rose
Published: London : Chatto & Windus, 2023.
180 pages ; 23 cm
Average rating: (2 reviews)
31 reserves

15 copies

The secret of the blood-red key / David Farr ; illustrated by Kristina Kister.

Rachel and Robert have defeated the tyrant Malstain and become the heroes of Krasnia, but all is not how it should be. Robert is swept away with his new friends, leaving Rachel alone to take care of her ailing father, who's lost without their beloved mother. From nowhere, a boy appears knowing the secrets of the hidden blood-red key. For the key is a way into the Hinterland - and Rachel must promise that, as a new key keeper, she will answer when it calls. When a young girl, Elsa Spiegel, is illegally smuggled into the Hinterland, Rachel has no choice but to use her key to save Elsa. But her fate is linked to Krasnia, and Rachel must battle to save her home as she knows it.
Author: Farr, David, 1969-
Published: London : Usborne, 2023.
334 pages : illustrations (black and white) ; 22 cm.
Stolen dreams adventure
Average rating: (1 review)
1 reserve

Aylesbury Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Children's fiction - Onloan - Due: 09 Dec 2023 - 95100000417211
Chalfont St Peter Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: children's fiction - Junior fiction - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 03 Nov 2023) - 95100000373638
High Wycombe Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Children's fiction - Onloan - Due: 16 Dec 2023 - 95100000417267

The last devil to die / Richard Osman.

You'd think you would be allowed to relax over Christmas, but not in the world of the Thursday Murder Club. On Boxing Day, a dangerous package is smuggled across the English coast. When it goes missing, chaos is unleashed. The body count starts to rise - including someone close to the Thursday Murder Club - as our gang face an impossible search and their most deadly opponents yet. With the clock ticking down and a killer heading to Cooper's Chase, has their luck finally run out? And who will be 'the last devil to die'?
Author: Osman, Richard, 1970-
Published: UK : Viking, 2023.
421 pages ; 24 cm
Average rating: (2 reviews)
170 reserves

41 copies

Impossible creatures / Katherine Rundell ; illustrated by Tomislav Tomić.

Christopher is visiting his reclusive grandfather when he sees an avalanche of mythical creatures come tearing down the hill. This is how he learns that his grandfather is the guardian of one of the ways between the non-magical world and the Archipelago, a cluster of magical islands where the creatures we tell of in myth live and breed and thrive alongside humans. They have been protected from being discovered for thousands of years; now, terrifyingly, the protection has worn thin, and creatures are breaking through. Then Mal appears in Christopher's world. She is in possession of a flying coat, is being pursued by a killer and is herself in pursuit of a baby griffin. Mal, Christopher and the griffin embark on an urgent quest across the wild splendour of the Archipelago, where sphinxes hold secrets and centaurs do murder, to find the truth - with unimaginable consequences for both their worlds.
Author: Rundell, Katherine
Published: London : Bloomsbury Children's Books, 2023.
325 pages : illustrations (black and white), maps (black and white, and colour) ; 23 cm
Average rating: (1 review)
10 reserves

Aylesbury Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Children's fiction - Reservation awaiting collection (Set: 01 Dec 2023) - 95100000417133
Beaconsfield Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Children's fiction - Onloan - Due: 01 Dec 2023 - 95100000416639
Buckingham Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Children's fiction - Reservation awaiting collection (Set: 17 Nov 2023) - 95100000417647
Chalfont St Giles Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Children's fiction - Onloan - Due: 15 Dec 2023 - 95100000419229
Chalfont St Peter Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: children's fiction - Junior fiction - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 04 Oct 2023) - 95100000373599
Haddenham Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: children's fiction - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 19 Sep 2023) - Onloan - Due: 02 Dec 2023 - 95100000374155
Hazlemere Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Children's fiction - Onloan - Due: 11 Dec 2023 - 95100000417476
Lt. Chalfont Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: children's fiction - Junior fiction - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 16 Sep 2023) - 95100000279282

The drift / C.J. Tudor.

Hannah awakens to carnage, all mangled metal and shattered glass. Evacuated from a secluded boarding school during a snowstorm, her coach careered off the road, trapping her with a handful of survivors. Meg awakens to a gentle rocking. She's in a cable car stranded high above snowy mountains, with five strangers and no memory of how they got on board. Carter is gazing out of the window of an isolated ski chalet that he and his companions call home. As their generator begins to waver in the storm, the threat of something lurking in the chalet's depths looms larger. Outside, the storm rages. Inside each group, a killer lurks. But who? And will anyone make it out alive?
Author: Tudor, C. J.
Published: UK : Penguin Books, 2023.
407 pages ; 20 cm
Average rating: (1 review)
1 reserve

Aylesbury Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - Onloan - Due: 12 Dec 2023 - 95100000419383
High Wycombe Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - Onloan - Due: 14 Dec 2023 - 95100000419551
Lt. Chalfont Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Donation: adult fiction - This item cannot be reserved (Set: 26 Nov 2023) - 95100000377524
Marlow Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - Available - 95100000419506
Princes Risborough Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: paperback - Reservation awaiting collection (Set: 21 Nov 2023) - 95100000419669

Hercule Poirot's silent night : the new Hercule Poirot mystery / Sophie Hannah.

It's 19 December 1931. Hercule Poirot and Inspector Edward Catchpool are called to investigate the murder of a man in the apparent safe haven of a Norfolk hospital ward. Catchpool's mother, the irrepressible Cynthia, insists that Poirot stays in a crumbling mansion by the coast, so that they can all be together for the festive period while Poirot solves the case. Cynthia's friend Arnold is soon to be admitted to that same hospital and his wife is convinced he will be the killer's next victim, though she refuses to explain why. Poirot has less than a week to solve the crime and prevent more murders, if he is to escape from this nightmare scenario and get home in time for Christmas. Meanwhile, someone else - someone utterly ruthless - also has ideas about what ought to happen to Hercule Poirot.
Author: Hannah, Sophie, 1971-
Published: London : HarperCollinsPublishers, 2023.
xi, 360 pages ; 24 cm
Average rating: (1 review)
5 reserves

14 copies

No brainer / by Jeff Kinney.

Up until now, middle school hasn't exactly been a joyride for Greg Heffley. So when the town threatens to close the crumbling building, he's not too broken up about it. But when Greg realises this means he's going to be sent to a different school than his best friend, Rowley Jefferson, he changes his tune. Can Greg and his classmates save their school before it's shuttered for good? Or is this the start of a whole new chapter for Greg?
Author: Kinney, Jeff
Published: London : Puffin, 2023.
217 pages : illustrations (black and white) ; 21 cm.
Diary of a wimpy kid
Average rating: (1 review)
24 reserves

12 copies

Making it so : a memoir / Patrick Stewart.

From his acclaimed stage triumphs to his legendary onscreen work in the 'Star Trek' and 'X-Men' franchises, Sir Patrick Stewart has captivated audiences around the world and across multiple generations with his indelible command of stage and screen. Now, he presents his long-awaited memoir, 'Making It So', a revealing portrait of an artist whose astonishing life - from his humble beginnings in Yorkshire, England to the heights of Hollywood and worldwide acclaim - proves a story as exuberant, definitive, and enduring as the author himself.
Author: Stewart, Patrick, 1940-
Published: London : Gallery Books UK, 2023.
x, 469 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (black and white, and colour) ; 25 cm
Average rating: (1 review)
3 reserves

Beaconsfield Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - B STE STE - Onloan - Due: 21 Dec 2023 - 95100000420199
Farnham Common Community Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - B STE STE - Onloan - Due: 09 Jan 2024 - 95100000420305
Hazlemere Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult fiction: hardback - B STE STE - Onloan - Due: 14 Dec 2023 - 95100000420144
Princes Risborough Library - (Buckinghamshire libraries) - Adult non fiction - B STE STE - Onloan - Due: 20 Dec 2023 - 95100000418124