Fantasy

One of the main reasons I liked this book was because it was self contained - it was not the beginning of a trilogy! It was also, and more importantly, a really well told and unusual story.

Rayne's mother is a Spell Breather and Rayne is expected to follow in her footsteps but she isn't much good at it. However, it is the breathing of spells that keeps her village safe and when Rayne's clumsiness breaks her mother's spell book she unwittingly releases a plague of monsters and an incredible adventure begins.

Before she was Wonder Woman, she was Diana - Princess of the Amazons. But in her attempts to prove herself to the mighty Amazonian warriors Diana may have doomed the whole world!

This is more than an origin story for one of my favourite superheroes - this an adventure about figuring out what to fight for and how to define your own future.

MC/GroveAc

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After twelve year old Stephanie inherits her uncle's house she discovers that the horror writer did not die of the natural causes everyone assumes. His friend Skulduggery takes her on an adventure in a different world where everyone has magical gifts that they use for good or evil. Skulduggery is a skeleton; he has already died at the hands of the evil overlords - fine in the fantasy world but a bit odd in the real world.

Stephanie begins to develop her own magic skills as she and Skulduggery make their way through this fantastical world in search of the mitre. A fight between good and evil with humour.

Suitable 10+

CM/StP/2/6/20

The Widdershin sisters, Betty, Fliss and Charlie have a pretty hard and grim life working in their Grandmother's Inn. However, when Betty turns 13 she finds out her family's misfortunes are due to an ancient curse.

With the help of three magical objects she sets out, with her sisters, to rectify past wrongs and break the spell.

This is the first book featuring the Widdershin sisters, however, it is a stand alone book which I really liked. There's a definite conclusion and very satisfying ending. Having said that, I really loved the sisters and am looking forward to reading about their next adventure!

Almost every night is party night at Marinka's house, unfortunately all the guests are dead. Marinka's grandmother is Baba Yaga, who guides spirits between this world and the next.

Marinka's destiny seems to be to follow in her grandmother's footstep but Marinka dearly wishes for a different destiny and a normal life with friends.

To make matters even more difficult their house has chicken legs and moves from place to place without any warning!

Although this sounds like a very strange book, don't be put off, it is a great story beautifully told.

It is 1922 and from her home in a small flat in London, Lil Kaye is eagerly following the newspaper reports of the search for a long lost Egyptian Pharaoh's tomb.

Things take an unexpected turn when one of eminent Egyptologists goes missing - only leaving behind his feet! Around the same time Lil's grandfather becomes ill and the plot thickens when a mysterious package arrives for him from non other that the missing Egyptologist!

This is the beginning of a wonderfully exciting adventure that sees Lil, an ordinary girl, managing to get from London to Egypt in order to try and solve the mystery.

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Years ago I tried reading Terry Pratchett's books for grown ups and I couldn't get into them. However, one of my friends encouraged me to to try this, the first book in his Tiffany Aching series which was written for children. I loved it and can't wait to read the others.

Tiffany is 9 years old. The book starts with her finding out she is a witch. Hot on the heels of this discovery her little brother is kidnapped and Tiffany has to find her way into a different world to rescue him. She also discovers that being a witch isn't so much about magic as it is about using your brains! And who are the Wee Free Men? Well they are the Nac Mac Feegle a band of pictsies, yes pictsies NOT pixies. They are tiny blue men who are fierce, wild and incredibly funny and their mission is to help Tiffany throughout her adventure, whether she wants them to or not!

After reading The Wee Free Men, I was hooked and went on to read the remaining four books in the Tiffany Aching series. A Hatful of Sky follows Tiffany as she leaves home to learn more about being a witch. In Wintersmith, Tiffany can't hold back from joining in a dance which leads to the King of Winter having a bit of a crush on her! Tiffany is quite a bit older (sixteen) in I Shall Wear Midnight and she has a particularly challenging foe to defeat. The final book, The Shepherd's Crown, was the last book Terry Pratchett wrote before he died. In the afterword Rob Wilkins states there would have been changes to the book if Terry Pratchett had lived longer. And it does have a slightly, 'not the final version feel to it'. Having said that, I still enjoyed it and I relished being back in the company of characters I had grown to know and love from the preceding books.

This novel is 'a reimagining of Hansel and Gretel'. Ansel and Gretchen find themselves at a cottage on their way to the coast and the owner takes them in. She is a sweetmaker and needs help to prepare for the chocolate festival.

Ansel falls in love with her but she is not what she seems. Girls disappear every time she holds the chocolate festival and she is connected to the werewolves in the wood. Gretel and Samuel shoot them to stop the werewolves taking the girls but there are too many of them coming to abduct the eighteen year old girls at the festival. Something so sweet can become deadly

Suitable age 12+

CM/StP/6/7/20