Ark Angel by Anthony Horowitz

The Blurb On The Back:

He's back.

Alex Rider is in hospital and determined to put his spying days behind him - but the reluctant teenage superspy is forced into action once again when a group of deadly eco-terrorists breaks in.

Suddenly Alex finds himself in the middle of a war that seems to be somehow connected to Ark Angel, a revolutionary space hotel. This time he will have to push himself to the very limits - and beyond.

( The Review (Cut For Spoilers): )

The Verdict:

See my reviews of the previous Alex Rider books because very little has changed. Horowitz has said that the series will stop when Rider reaches 15 and he'll get a happy ending. I hope there's enough steam left in the series for that.

Dead Run by P. J. Tracy

The Blurb On The Back:

It should have been a simple journey: three friends driving cross-country towards Green Bay, Wisconsin.

Then Grace, Annie and Sharon break down ... Deep in the northern woods, far from civilisation.

Just how far becomes clear when the women stumble into Four Corners: a dead town hiding a deadly secret. It's a secret people have already died for; and the terror is far from over. Because there are people who will stop at nothing to prevent the truth - and its witnesses - from ever leaving ...

( The Review (Cut For Spoilers): )

The Verdict:

Not what I'd expect from such a talented pair of writers as P. J. Tracy. Very disappointing and easily skipped for fans of The Monkeewrench Crew.

Labyrinth by Kate Mosse

The Blurb On The Back:

July 1209: in Carcassonne a seventeeen-year old girl is given a mysterious book by her father which he claims contains the secret of the true Grail. Although Alais cannot understand the strange words and symbols hidden within, she knows that her destiny lies in keeping the secret of the labyrinth safe ...

July 2005: Alice Tanner discovers two skeletons in a forgotten cave in the French Pyrenees. Puzzled by the labyrinth symbol carved in the rock, she realises she's disturbed something that was meant to remain hidden. Somehow, a link to a horrific past - her past - has been revealed.

( The Review (Cut For Spoilers): )

The Verdict:

To paraphrase the review: it was a chore to have to continue through all 694 pages of leaden, plodding, sub-par Mary-Sue fiction and I blame Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code for opening the door to this kind of pseudo-literary dross. If you like well-written, engaging and well-paced fiction, avoid this book like the plague.

Small Island by Andrea Levy

The Blurb On The Back:

It is 1948, and England is recovering from a war. But at 21 Nevern Street, London, the conflict has only just begun.

Queenie Bligh's neighbours do not approve when she agrees to take in Jamaican lodgers, but with her husband, Bernard, not back from the war, what else can she do?

Gilbert Joseph was one of the several thousand Jamaican men whojoined the RAF to fight against Hitler. Returning to England as a civilian he finds himself treated very differently. Gilbert's wife Hortense, too, had longed to leave Jamaica and start a better life in England. But when she joins him she is shocked to find London shabby, decrepit, and far from the city of her dreams. Even Gilbert is not the man she thought he was.

Small Island explores a point in England's past when the country began to change. In this delicately wrought and profoundly moving novel, Andrea Levy handles the weighty themes of empire, prejudice, war and love, with a superb lightness of touch and generosity of spirit.

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The Verdict:

Absorbing and moving, definitely worth a read and especially if you want to see ethnic characters written in a sensitive and credible way.