I’m a huge fan of Fran Hill’s writing and was thrilled when Lucy at Legend Press sent me a copy of Fran’s new book Home Bird. I’m incredibly grateful to her.

You’ll find my reviews of Fran’s Cuckoo in the Nest here and of Miss What Does Incomprehensible Mean? here. I also interviewed Fran here.

Home Bird is published by Legend Press on 20th March 2025 and is available for purchase here.

Home Bird

1979. Jackie Chadwick is 17 and living in a supported bedsit. She’s still close to her foster parents and friends with (aka unofficial minder for) Amanda, their irresponsible daughter, but she’s enjoying her independence – until a fire leaves her temporarily homeless. Jackie’s dad, widower and recovering alcoholic Dave, has just been released from prison and sees this as his chance to make amends. He offers her his spare room – but can their relationship survive him going back on the booze and the arrival of his gin-loving lady friend and her errant son? As things go from bad to worse, Jackie has to decide how many chances you give someone who keeps letting you down.

Bittersweet and funny, Home Bird draws on Fran Hill’s own experiences as a teenager in foster care.

My Review of Home Bird

17 year old Jackie Chadwick’s dad is fresh out of prison. 

Sometimes with a book review, I just want to say, ‘Buy this book.’ Home Bird is one such story. It’s wonderful. Having previously met the fabulous Jackie, Amanda et al in Cuckoo in the Nest, I’d urge readers to read that book before Home Bird. Not because you need any prior knowledge of Jackie, as this story works flawlessly as a stand alone, but because, once you’ve read Home Bird, you’ll feel devastated not to have met Jackie sooner! 

I’m not quite sure how she does it, but Fran Hill is as able to convey meaning equally as well through what she doesn’t write, as through the words she allows into the page. Her prose is simply glorious. It’s imbued with every emotion conceivable and impacts the reader right in the heart, even when they are laughing aloud at Jackie’s wry, self-preserving, dark humour. It’s the direct speech that conveys meaning and emotion so perfectly. But it’s not just brevity and pared back prose that is so effective. Some of the description of inanimate objects is so astute it takes the reader’s breath away. I found myself reading Home Bird with admiration and envy of the author’s craft because it felt totally perfect.

On the surface, the narrative plot seems prosaic. A teenage girl navigates her way through relationships with her less than perfect father, her previous foster family and her friends. So too do many other teenage girls. But this apparent simplicity belies the stunning insight into human nature, the heart rending and uplifting moments that everyday life throws at Jackie and the true understanding of social care, its efforts and its inadequacies. Heather does her best by Jackie, as do her school’s Nursey B and teacher Mrs Collingworth, but Fran Hill lays bare the challenges faced by young people experiencing social care and she does so with such humanity that it’s impossible not to feel touched to the soul by her writing. I could not have loved Jackie more. She’s the same age as I was in 1979 and reading about her life made me want to climb into the book and become her closest friend. She’s an outstanding character.

I found all the characters quite wonderful. Dave’s spiral back into drink is so realistic as he gravitates towards Doreen, that Jackie finds herself once more a ‘cuckoo in the nest’ in her own home. This gives a sense of the inevitability of life and a feeling of doom even when there’s considerable humour in the telling.

The depiction of 1979 in Home Bird is phenomenal. References to school, food, television, magazines and music all create an authentic and nostalgic tapestry of setting and era so that the reader is totally transported. This is a story written by someone who knows. Someone who understands. Someone who cares.

As a result, Home Bird is the most brilliant read. It made me laugh aloud and it made me cry. It cemented in my mind that Fran Hill is a writer of exceptional talent who understands human frailty completely and who can convey her characters in an intense, yet humorous, distilled fashion so that we comprehend their very essence and they break our hearts along the way. In case you didn’t realise, I absolutely loved this Home Bird. Don’t miss it.

About Fran Hill

Fran Hill is an author and retired English teacher living in Warwickshire, England. Her debut full-length novel Cuckoo in the Nest, was published by Legend Press in April 2023. Its follow-up Home Bird is due out in March 2025. Fran’s funny teacher-memoir Miss, What Does Incomprehensible Mean? was published in May 2020 by SPCK Publishing.

Fran is a member of the Society of Authors and the Association of Christian Writers and was selected for the prestigious Room 204 emerging writers’ programme run by Writing West Midlands in 2016-17.

For more information, visit Fran’s website, find her on Facebook or follow Fran on Twitter @franhill123 and Instagram.

My enormous thanks to Jo Hardacre for sending me a surprise copy of the children’s book Meet the Mubbles by Liz Pichon. I’m delighted better to share my review today.

Meet the Mubbles is published by Macmillan children’s books on 13th March 2025 and is available for purchare through the links here.

Meet the Mubbles

A FABULOUS, all singing, all dancing book of JOY!

Meet the Mubbles is the first in a hilarious brand-new, full colour graphic novel series perfect for young readers from Liz Pichon, creator of the global phenomenon Tom Gates series. Filled with colourful characters, boundless fun and lots of adventures this series is a guaranteed hit for kids!

Welcome to the Isle of Smile where everyone, including the Wibbles of Wobble Mountain, the singing Earworms and the one-eyed Drib Drabs, lives in perfect harmony – most of the time! But when the Clouds of Joy BUMP together to make a wonky rainbow it means one thing: someone or something is coming to VISIT. Who could it be?

Time spent with The Mubbles on the Isle of Smile makes everything better – you’ll see.

Featuring a QR code that will take you to a website full of extra content including arts and crafts and many fun songs from The Mubbles world and The Isle of Smile. Join our ever growing community – with over 88,000 subscribers already!

My Review of Meet the Mubbles

A strange ball arrives.

As usual with children’s books, I think it’s worth commenting on the physical attributes and Meet the Muggles is excellent. The hard back copy I have is a perfect size for young hands and has a solid and robust cover that feels high quality and which will withstand rough treatment in schools and libraries as well as in the home. 

I do have one small niggle to get out of the way as I prefer not to have upper case letters used for emphasis in the middle of sentences in books for young children. I would rather see emboldened text, because I feel it’s a good idea to model the kind of writing we’d like emergent writers to produce. That said, other elements are perfect for teaching writing, with a clear distinction between direct speech and thought through the shapes they are contained in, for example. 

That aside, I thought Meet the Mubbles was terrific as it is utterly bonkers and huge fun. The illustrations are fabulous, being a perfect style for the target age group and so engaging in their vibrancy. There’s so much to see that Meet the Mubbles can be returned to time and again without young readers ever discovering everything in the pictures. Adults too will love the book, partly through the hilarious thought bubbles and partly through the illustrations. Anyone reading this who hates sprouts will appreciate the section containing stuorps! 

There’s a magical quality in the story that children will adore, from wonky rainbows through a slug of knowledge, to singing and being fabulous. In fact, being fabulous is at the heart of the book, encouraging children to be as bright and vibrant as they can as they work together like the Mubbles – or in some cases, not like the Mubbles, as events don’t always work out as expected, injecting real fun and humour.

With the QR code and a website to go alongside the book, this is a truly interactive reading experience. However, it doesn’t matter if children only have access to the book, because there are lots of moments when they can participate, from shouting aloud and singing, to answering Auntie Mubble’s questions. I loved this aspect as it enables young readers to make predictions and develop their cognitive skills.

I think Meet the Mubbles is a fantastic book to ignite a joy of reading in young children. It’s quirky, colourful and funny. It uses super imagination. Above all else it shows that it doesn’t matter what size, shape or colour you are, you can still be fabulous. 

About Liz Pichon

Liz Pichon is one of the UK’s best-loved and bestselling creators of children’s books, including Tom Gates and The Mubbles. The Tom Gates series won the Roald Dahl Funny Prize, the Blue Peter Book Award for Best Story and the younger fiction category of the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize.

For further information, visit Liz’s website, find her on Facebook and follow Liz on Twitter/X @lizpichon and Instagram.

Lovely Apple Gidley always seems to have a new book out just when I’m in the middle of some personal crisis and can’t manage to fit in reading and reviewing for her. So it is with Finding Serenissma! However, I’m delighted to welcome Apple to Linda’s Book Bag with a guest post to celebrate today’s publication of Finding Serenissima.

Apple has previously featured here on the blog and I’m delighted to welcome her back with a super post considering those of us not in the first flush of youth. Before that, though, let’s find out about Finding Serenissima.

Published today 11th March 2025 by Vine Leaves Press, Finding Serenissima is available for purchase in all the usual places including directly from the publisher here.

Finding Serenissima

With the help of a feisty hotel owner, an attractive water-taxi driver, and a gondola full of Italians who call Venice home, Amelia, a widowed Australian, begins her search for serenity. As the island city works its magic, she comes to realize her life has been overshadowed by her famous American husband, Leo, well before his decline into Alzheimer’s.

As Amelia navigates Venice’s winding canals and its language, she gracefully confronts the joys and challenges of aging, discovering that love and laughter can come at any stage of life. Balancing long-distance parenting and familial obligations, she redefines what it means to live fully as an older woman, all while the magical city slowly helps her reclaim her identity.

Finding Serenissima is a heartwarming tale of second chances, exploring the complexities of long marriage, independence, and rediscovering love in the most unexpected places.

Fiction for Over Fifty

A Guest Post by Apple Gidley

Who cares about fiction representing more mature women as the leading lady? Perhaps a good proportion of the eleven or so million women aged over 55 might, and that’s just in the UK. Too often older women feel invisible, sidetracked, bypassed and, based on a survey by BookBrowse, that would appear to be a mistake. Of more than 3,600 people questioned, the average age of women in book clubs is over 45, that’s a lot of readers who shouldn’t be dismissed or forgotten.

No wonder, then, the huge success of novelists like Elizabeth Strout and her 2008 book, Olive Kitteridge; or Rachel Joyce’s Miss Benson’s Beetle. Both depict strong mature women. Women want books that speak to the real universal issues they might face, like in Kate Morton’s The Secret Keeper; or Elizabeth Gilbert’s memoir, Eat, Pray, Love.

Conflict resolution is something many have learned from childhood. Watch a little girl telling teddy not to lord it over rabbit. Or a teenager giving comfort to a friend’s heartbreak. The trials become greater at university—perhaps a lecherous tutor, or amorous jock—then workplace inequities as men are promoted over female colleagues, and sometimes above their abilities.

As we ladies-of-a-certain-age continue to age, we want to read of others who have overcome whatever has tried to stop us in our tracks. Not just those who have made it to the top of their chosen tree, but about strong women leading ordinary lives who don’t always get the recognition they deserve. How satisfying lives can be led without children; or how each stage of children’s lives are juggled and navigated. Perhaps how any, or all, of the three ‘d’s—divorce, dementia, death—are managed, and how clambering out of the hole that sense of abandonment has opened can lead not only to survival but adjustment and, as the pain eases, gives access to maybe a different, yet still fulfilling life. 

Amelia Paignton, in Finding Serenissima, is such a woman.…

 Exhaustion prickled Amelia like scalding water as she stood under the shower and washed off the travel grime. Wrapping a towel around her chest, she stepped over to the window and looked out at the people sauntering along the canal. Snatches of Italian drifted up, adding to her disorientation, her sense of displacement. Untethered.

         “Well, that’s what you wanted.” Her words jarred loud in the calm of the room. “But Italy? You don’t speak the language. You don’t know anyone.” She could almost hear the words coming from Leo’s mouth, see the petulant tilt of his lips.

         She shook her head, and clutching the towel, replied. “No, Leo, I don’t, but I can learn. And Leo, who was it that had to make a life for us while you painted? I can do this.” The threat of tears dispersed as anger replaced rootlessness. Swapping the towel for a sarong, she lay down on the bed. Sleep. That would help. But not too long.

         The ping of the phone alarm woke Amelia and, prizing her eyes open, it took her a moment to remember her surroundings.

         “Oh, my God, I’m in Italy!” Laughter followed her pronouncement. Shadows playing a different dance to earlier in the day told her hours had passed. And the grumble in her tummy. She had to go out. Take the plunge. And her dictionary.

         Pulling on a pair of jeans,she tucked a green shirt into the waistband, then stuck her feet into ankle boots. A slash of eyeliner and mascara, a jacket and scarf, and she felt ready.

         “I can do this.” She repeated her new mantra.

 This desire for strong female protagonists, of any age, can extend to non fiction. We want to learn of women who have led remarkable lives. Women like, Elżbieta Zawacka, the Polish WWII resistance fighter whose life is documented in Clare Mulley’s latest book, Agent Zo. Or Bloody Brilliant Women by Cathy Newman, described as “a fresh, opinionated history of all the brilliant women you should have learned about in school but didn’t.”

As a teenager, the travels of Mary Kingsley and Dervla Murphy enthralled me. I was lucky, I was already seeing the world, but their words made me want to see more and, sometimes, I’d wish I had been born into an earlier time, so I could join them in their adventures. Although I doubt I’d have had the courage to pack my bags and go, certainly not solo, as did Gertrude Bell who mapped, physically and metaphysically, the Middle East. She was far better described as the Queen of the Desert rather than, as some suggested, the female equivalent of Lawrence of Arabia.

When I read, I want characters, real and imagined, to inspire me. Characters like Janet Pimm, the seventy-year old, in Helen Paris’s The Invisible Women’s Club to remind me that 50, 60, 70, 80 are all just a numbers—particularly on the days when I glance in a mirror and wonder who is that older woman looking out at me.               

When I write, strong women slip onto the pages. Not consciously created. They just appear. Perhaps, somewhere in my subconscious, I want my granddaughters, when they are old enough to read my books, to recognise their own potential, their strength, even when things don’t go according to plan. Or my grandson to respect the line of strong women on both sides of his family.

And sometimes it is a reminder that women need women. Rather as Amelia, in Finding Serenissima, comes to rely, both for friendship and guidance, on the older determined hotelier, whose words will not be brooked and who says with regal bearing, “I am Bria Valentina Scutari”.

We want to read about them. Those friendships that transcend age, distance, and occasionally, the men in their lives! Who would argue that eleven million women are wrong?

****

Certainly not me Apple! Thanks so much for this fabulous guest post – and for representing those of us who still feel we have a place in the world!

About Apple Gidley

Apple Gidley has lived all over the world. Her roles have been varied – editor, intercultural trainer for multinational corporations, British Honorary Consul to Equatorial Guinea, amongst others. She started writing in 2010. 

You can find out more about Apple on her website and by finding her on Facebook or following her on Instagram and  Twitter/X @ExpatApple.

It’s my absolute pleasure to welcome Kim Smejkal to the blog today to stay in with me and to tell me all about her latest young adult novel. My huge thanks to Vicki Berwick at Pushkin Press for putting us in touch with one another.

Let’s see what Kim had to say:

Staying in with Kim Smejkal

Welcome to Linda’s Book Bag, Kim and thank you for agreeing to stay in with me.

Tell me, which of your books have you brought along to share this evening and why have you chosen it?

The Dandelion Riots is my latest young adult fantasy and I brought it because it holds a special place in my heart. I’ve always loved classic fairy tales—full of curses, evil sorceresses, and the magic of true love’s kiss—but I wanted The Dandelion Riots to be fresh, exciting, and unexpected. I had a lot of funflipping familiar tropes upside-down!

That sounds great. What can we expect from an evening in with The Dandelion Riots?

The Dandelion Riots is about forming community and fighting back against injustice and hate. 

That sounds like something we could do with in the real world Kim, never mind fantasy fiction!

In this world, some girls are cursed at birth by powerful witches as preemptive punishment for future misdeeds. These cursed girls are the dregs of society: shunned, feared, and often hunted.

That doesn’t sound fair at all. Do they deserve the curse?

They are frightening and dangerous, it’s true! But they’re born innocent, and then they’re vilified. They become the scapegoat so everyone spends time fighting against them instead of the true villains…

Interesting. Tell me more about the curses.

As an aside, crafting the various “flavours” of curses was one of my favourite parts about writing this book! The curses can take many forms, and some examples include transforming food into dust, ruling armies of cockroaches, bringing plague and pestilence, and, in some cases, unintentional murder.

And what about your protagonist?

The main character, Drinn, is a naïve and kind-hearted girl who’s been hidden away her entire life for a very good reason: her curse is the most powerful of them all. When Drinn discovers the nature of her curse, she is stunned: “The destruction I was destined to cause was unfathomable.”

So her life seems inevitable – is that how it pans out for her?

Despite what everyone tells her, Drinn refuses to accept this fate. Instead, she rallies other cursed girls to her side and vows to fight back against both the witches who cursed them, and the world that hates them.

These girls sound like great role models.

The Dandelion Riots celebrates the strength of girls, friendship, compassion, and community. These girls show us that there is power in the riot, there is hope in the fight.

I think The Dandelion Riots sounds very pertinent to today’s society. How is the book being received?

We’ve gotten some encouraging feedback from early readers that the messages in The Dandelion Riots are resonating. One bookseller had this to say: “This story rockets along and is full of amazing characters that all make an impression, bringing surprises at every turn. An empowering story of people sticking together no matter the odds, even when everything appears broken. I loved every word.”

That’s brilliant. You must be thrilled.  And what else have you brought along and why have you brought it?

I brought along a bouquet of fresh, spring dandelions for you! (I bet you’ve never received weeds before…)

Er… I’m not so sure about that! But why dandelions?

Dandelions are important in the book for a number of reasons. First of all, our main character, Drinn, lives with an unfortunate side-effect from her curse: dandelions sprout out of her neck when she’s anxious. They tangle in her hair, scar the nape of her neck, and make it quite difficult to hide the fact that she’s cursed.

That explains the cover image – it fits perfectly.

The cursed girls adopt the dandelion as their symbol. It’s a persistent weed, able to grow and thrive in neglected soil and abandoned spaces. Many people hate them and spend a lot of time and effort trying to get rid of them.

I confess I have tried to eliminate them from my lawn. Maybe I need a rethink…

But the dandelion is also one of the first flowers to bloom in spring: a beautiful sunshine-yellow. You can eat the greens, make wine or tea or jelly (dandelion jelly doesn’t just look like sunshine, it tastes like sunshine too!) And when the blooms are spent, we blow on the seed heads and make wishes, sending them off on new adventures.

I’m definitely seeing them differently now.

I really hope you like your dandelion bouquet, and hopefully you’ll look at the yellow flowers and serrated green leaves and see beauty instead of nuisance!

I will indeed Kin. Thank you so much for staying in with me to chat about The Dandelion Riots. I’m delighted to have a copy waiting for me on my TBR. I think you should make us a dandelion tea and I‘ll give readers a few more details about the book.

The Dandelion Riots

A breathtaking queer fantasy in which girls are cursed at birth with terrible powers.

She believed I was meek and unassuming, because for sixteen years, that was all I’d ever been…

Cursed at birth, 16-year-old Drinn has been kept away from everyone – moved from house to house to ensure that she never finds love. But this year, she has decided to break free.  

Fleeing, Drinn finds herself in Oblison, surrounded by others just like her – cursed girls whose lives are dangerous and wild. They vow to free themselves once and for all. But rebellion is dangerous, and if Drinn finds love before the curse can be broken, a terrible fate could befall them all…

The Dandelion Riots is out in the UK on March 13, 2025 from Pushkin Press, and in Canada and the US on September 30, 2025. You can pre-order The Dandelion Riots through the Pushkin website, from Bookshop.org, Waterstones and Amazon.

About Kim Smejkal

Kim Smejkal writes fantasy for young adults and not-so-young adults, always with a touch of magic. Her books include The Dandelion Riots, Ink in the Blood, and Curse of the Divine. When she’s not writing, she’s often lost in the woods, wandering a beach, or puttering around in her garden, and she currently lives on Vancouver Island in Canada with her family and anxious dog, Pigeon.

 For further information about Kim, visit her website or find her on Instagram and Threads. 

I always find it exciting to be in at the start of a book’s life and so it gives me enormous pleasure to help reveal the details for The Woman in Ward 9 by Naomi Williams, especially as this is a book in one of my favourite genres – psychological thrillers. 

Let’s find out more:

The Woman In Ward 9 will be published by Headline on 17th July 2025 and is available for pre-order through the publisher links here.

The Woman in Ward 9

Victim. Witness. Killer?

Laura is found covered in blood that is not her own. With no memory of what happened, she is admitted to a high security psychiatric facility.

With no body and no other witnesses, it is down to psychologist Emma to gain Laura’s trust and understand her disturbed mind.

Beneath Laura’s stories of an idyllic life and a boyfriend almost too good to be true, Emma begins to unravel a darker truth. But as she listens to Laura’s story, she begins to draw chilling parallels between her patient’s life and her own. The man Laura describes sounds uncannily similar to Emma’s own husband…

Is she entering the mind of a victim, a witness – or a killer?

With tension you could cut with a knife and twists that will have your head spinning, The Woman In Ward 9 is sure to keep you reading late into the night.

****

Doesn’t that sound fabulous? I can’t wait to get my hands on a copy.

About Naomi Williams

Naomi Williams started her career teaching English and Drama, and when she had a family, combined all three to write novels about family drama. Originally from Yorkshire, she now lives in a London suburb with her husband and two teenage daughters, so expects there’s plenty more drama to come.

Also writing as Lisa Timoney and Kate Storey, you can find out more by visiting Naomi’s website, finding her on Facebook and Instagram or following her on Bluesky and Twitter/X @LTimoneyWrites.

My grateful thanks to Annie West for sending me a copy of her graphic novel The Late Night Writers Club. I don’t think I’ve reviewed a graphic novel for adults on Linda’s Book Bag before and it’s my pleasure to share my review today. 

The Late Night Writers Club is available for purchase in all the usual places as well as directly from the publisher, New Island, here. 

The Late Night Writers Club

In rich and abundant illustrations, Annie West tells a rowdy story of artistic struggle, ego and unexpected kindness. You will never look at the Irish Literary Canon in the same way again.

A talented but annoying Debut Author, suffering from writer’s block and mysterious headaches, ghosted by his girlfriend and on his last chance with his bartender job, takes refuge in the National Library of Ireland, hoping for some last-minute inspiration within those hallowed walls.

Tortured by literary inadequacy and disappointed love, can he somehow absorb the famous modesty of Yeats, the wit of Edgeworth, the charm of Binchy, the wisdom of Heaney? But a weird twist of fate or perhaps a guiding hand reveals all is not what it seems in the library after dark, and The Author soon discovers: be careful what you wish for.

My Review of The Late Night Writers Club

An aspiring debut writer is suffering writer’s block and his girlfriend (amongst others!) is ghosting him.

The Late Night Writers Club is, if I’m totally honest, completely insane and I absolutely loved it! I read it through rapidly, simply enjoying the surface story. There are jokes, puns and quotations that are incredibly funny and the speech between the various author members of the Late Night Writers Club in the library is packed with witticism. I found myself snorting aloud on occasion. I loved the concept that the protagonist is highly irritating and really not the protagonist at all as he is outshone and out talked by the famous ghosts.

However, it was the second reading that made me realise just what a fabulous book this is. Of course, some of the literary greats like Shakespeare, James Joyce and Oscar Wilde are instantly recognisable, but other references such as those folk from Greek myths are less familiar so that not only is The Late Night Writers Club thoroughly entertaining, it’s educational and so intelligently constructed. 

But best of all is the absolute, scalpel sharp, insight into writing and the publishing industry, from (quite literally here) ghost writing, through social media spats to professional rivalry. There’s writer’s block and procrastination. There’s consideration of who might be the best writer, eponymous branding and author book signings. What makes the book so engaging is the fact that every aspect is recognisable and relatable to anyone who has ever considered writing as a profession. 

My third reading of The Late Night Writers Club was to peruse the fantastic illustrations in more detail. I can’t begin to imagine the time and effort this book must have taken. I thought the colour palette of rich browns, greens and reds gave a traditional feel in keeping with the historical characters we encounter. But beyond that there is so much more to uncover. Take a look at the library curator’s name badge, for example, or the person advertising get togethers for shy people in one of the newspapers or the political jokes… I could continue, but you’ll need to read the book to discover them for yourself and I’m sure there’s even more for me to find on subsequent readings. 

Utterly bonkers, witty and fabulously illustrated, The Late Night Writers Club is a universally appealing book that every reader and every established or aspiring writer will relate to wholeheartedly. I thoroughly, thoroughly enjoyed it. 

About Annie West

Annie West is an award-winning illustrator and writer who has had two authored books published and illustrated dozens more. Annie has exhibited her Yeats in Love series to much acclaim and her work has been acquired by admirers such as President Michael D. Higgins, Neil Jordan, Seamus Heaney and the United States Embassy. 

Born in 1961, Annie graduated from Dun Laoghaire College of Art & Design (IADT) in 1979 with a Diploma in Design for Communications. She began working in the Design Department at RTÉ  and Tyne Tees Television and various independent TV productions for Channel Four. This was followed by a decade working in the Art Department on feature films in Ireland, Britain and America. Around 1991 Annie left the Film & TV industry to concentrate on illustrating and cartooning full time. 

She specialises in highly detailed pen and ink drawings with the emphasis on detail. She is particular and punctual, and can work to extremely tight deadlines.

Annie has won a number of Awards: The Alfred Beit Award in 1993 & 1994, The NCEA Patent Practicioners’ Award 1994, and the Illustrators’ Guild Best Book Illustration Award 2003 & 2004.

A selection of Annie’s work was recently added to the National Library of Ireland’s permanent Cartoon & Illustration Archive.

For further information, visit Annie’s website and follow her on Twitter/X @anniewestdotcom . You’ll also find Annie on Bluesky and Instagram.

My huge thanks to A.P. Durston for sending me a copy of his children’s book The Land Of No Food in return for an honest review. Married to a Welshman, how could I resist that cover! I’m delighted to share my review today.

The Land Of No Food was published by Austin Macauley on 13th September 2024 and is available for purchase here. 

The Land Of No Food

Prince Durst, the leader of his tribe in Wales, is a troubled man. The Welsh dragons, the food of his nation, are becoming extinct. He can’t let his people starve, but what will he do? He will need to travel to far off shores to find a land of food.

Setting sail in his ship he voyages far, far away and discovers the land of Zitan, ruled by a Queen tormented by dragons!

Helping the Queen with her troublesome pests she rewards the Prince for his help and bravery.

The Prince can now return home to his people with the answer to all his worries and problems!

My Review of The Land Of No Food

A tale of dragons and bravery!

Before my review proper, and in the interests of complete honesty, I’m going to mention a couple of small elements that I’d have liked done differently in this story so that it models perfection for emergent writers: the use of ‘fewer and fewer’ instead of ‘less and less’, and fewer upper case letters in ordinary sentences, albeit that they are used for emphasis. That said, this is my former literacy consultant head speaking and both aspects could be fabulous teaching points in school settings. Young readers are not going to notice!

The Land Of No Food is actually a smashing story and it’s so good to read something with Wales at its heart. Here we have a sense of tradition that draws on the myth of dragons, of bravery and of quest. It’s also thought-provoking for children to consider where their food comes from making The Land Of No Food informative as well as entertaining. There’s a real sense of community and family at its heart too.

I thought the direct references and asides to the children reading the story were inspired because they enhance engagement. The question about the number of dragon illustrations on the page, for example, is super for increasing early numeracy too as well as for drawing children into the narrative. 

Speaking of illustrations, those in The Land Of No Food are wonderful, with vibrant colours. They are well balanced to the white space and text, and featuring a style just perfect for the target audience. As well as strengthening young children’s observational skills, there’s real fun to be had in spotting what Prince Durst’s dog is doing too! 

There’s a wide range of vocabulary in The Land Of No Food so that the story would be a useful tool for literacy work in school settings. Unfamiliar vocabulary is embedded in context ensuring that emergent and independent young readers can understand meaning well and is best suited to children aged 6+. 

These positive educational aspects aside, at its heart The Land Of No Food is an interesting, entertaining and exciting tale for young readers. It provides a story packed with adventure, action and peril; features that draw children into a love of reading and that’s the most important thing of all. Children will thoroughly enjoy it.

About A.P. Durston

Alan Paul Durston lives with his wife Erica and son Jack in the shadow of the 13th Century castle in Caerphilly in South Wales, near his daughter Lucy and grandchildren Jacob and Scarlet.

He lived and worked in Hamburg, Germany for 10 years where the idea for The Land of No Food was conceived.

Not only an author, Alan plays guitar and is also a songwriter being influenced by life, events and history.

I can’t remember when I last wrote a review of a book that is from my book group. Partly, that’s because I haven’t enjoyed a few and I don’t write negative reviews, and partly because life has got the better of me and like last month, not only did I not finish the book, but I didn’t even start it. 

Having reviewed Matt Haig’s Reasons to Stay Alive here, when I realised our March book group read was his famous The Midnight Library I simply had to read it straight away before time runs away from me again. 

The Midnight Library was published by Canongate Books on 13th August 2020 and is available for purchase here.

The Midnight Library

Between life and death there is a library.

When Nora Seed finds herself in the Midnight Library, she has a chance to make things right. Up until now, her life has been full of misery and regret. She feels she has let everyone down, including herself. But things are about to change.

The books in the Midnight Library enable Nora to live as if she had done things differently. With the help of an old friend, she can now undo every one of her regrets as she tries to work out her perfect life. But things aren’t always what she imagined they’d be, and soon her choices place the library and herself in extreme danger.

Before time runs out, she must answer the ultimate question: what is the best way to live?

My Review of The Midnight Library 

Nora Seed has decided it is time to die.

The Midnight Library is a book that might require some readers willingly to suspend their disbelief, and that might perhaps be triggering for some suffering from poor mental health, but I found it completely engaging, moving and absorbing. In addition, I felt that the narrative could simply be enjoyed as a diverting story without the need to engage with the deeper meanings of the book. The various lives Nora lives are entertaining in their own right and the people she meets along the way are interesting and varied. As The Midnight Library is written in an accessible style it works well as a story for young adults and older readers alike. 

However, those more profound elements are what makes The Midnight Library so affecting. It’s filled with the delicate balance between regret and potential, between life and death, and between living for ourselves or living for others – or for what we perceive to be their expectations for us. The range of emotion is so wide that any, and every, reader can find an aspect that resonates with them. Ultimately, having taken both Nora and the reader through the full gamut of emotions from fear to despair, joy to contentment, Matt Haig provides a sense of hope that is authentic and uplifting. Indeed, there are real moments of humour to be found in a story about someone who wants to die which enhance and balance the darker elements.

I loved meeting Nora in all her manifestations in this kind of literary string theory. She really is the personification of a seed of doubt. Through Nora’s experiences Matt Haig is completely convincing in portraying the potential of ‘what if?’ in our lives. In The Midnight Library Nora is given the opportunity to see who, and what, she has the potential to be in other situations. She’s equivocal and flawed and that’s what makes her so fascinating. She’s a real Everywoman.

Whilst I very much enjoyed The Midnight Library as a simple narrative, I appreciated it all the more for its humanity, its helpfulness to, and appreciation of, others in real life feeling like Nora does, and for Matt Haig’s wise and sensitive understanding of who we are as people. I think The Midnight Library might be just the book to save someone in severe difficulty – and what could be better than that?

About Matt Haig

Matt Haig is the internationally bestselling author of the novels The Midnight Library, How to Stop Time, The Humans, The Radleys, children’s novel A Boy Called Christmas, and memoir Reasons to Stay Alive. His The Life Impossible, was published in summer 2024. His work has been translated into over fifty languages.

You can follow Matt on Twitter @matthaig1. Visit his website for further information and find him on Facebook and Instagram.

I am absolutely thrilled to help reveal the cover of Georgina Moore’s brand new novel River of Stars. I adored Georgina’s first book, The Garnett Girls which I reviewed here, so I’m delighted to have River of Stars waiting for me on my 2025 TBR.

Let’s find out more about River of Stars:

River of Stars

Steeped in bohemia and music legend, Walnut Tree Island is home to a thriving community of artists and musicians. It is where teenager Mary Star once caught the eye of a rock star about to hit the big time, only to be left with a new baby and a broken heart.

Years later, Mary lives on the houseboat where she raised her daughter and her granddaughter, Jo. But now one of the island’s prodigal sons has returned. Oliver Greenwood has inherited Walnut Tree and changes are coming.

Jo hasn’t seen Oliver since that glorious, life-changing summer when their idyllic island paradise was shattered. And while the islanders are thrown into a frenzy of speculation over their futures, Oliver’s return has opened the wounds of a love she had thought was lost for ever…

Beautifully written, featuring a cast of magnetic characters, River of Stars is the captivating new novel from Sunday Times bestselling author, Georgina Moore.

****

Doesn’t that sound completely wonderful? Just my kind of read!

River of Stars will be published by HQ on 3rd July 2025 and is available for pre-order here.

About Georgina Moore

Georgina Moore grew up in London and lives on a houseboat on the River Thames with her partner, two children and Bomber, the Border Terrier.   The Garnett Girls is her debut novel and is set on the Isle of Wight, where Georgina and her family have a holiday houseboat called Sturdy. Georgina’s new novel River of Stars is inspired by the legendary Eel Pie Island and its colourful history as a rock and roll haven in the 1960s.

For further information, visit Georgina’s website or follow Georgina on Twitter/X @PublicityBooks or find her on Bluesky and Instagram.

With thanks to Ben Cameron at Cameron Publicity for putting us in touch with one another, it’s my pleasure to welcome Anika Pavel to stay in with me today to tell me all about her fascinating memoir. 

Let’s Find out more:

Staying in with Anika Pavel

Welcome to Linda’s Book Bag Anika and thank you for agreeing to stay in with me. Tell me, which of your books have you brought along to share this evening?

I brought in my autobiography entitled Encounter with the Future.

What can we expect from an evening in with Encounter with the Future?

The book is a collection of autobiographical essays some of which have been published online, in print and nominated for Pushcart Prize.

How exciting. Tell me more. 

“Travel is the university of life” is a quote that rings through the book. With a dictionary in hand, the learning begins at the London airport. After the Soviet Union invades Czechoslovakia and a lonely night at Victoria railway station, life goes on and has to be conquered by hard work and eternal optimism. After all London was at the height of its fabulousness, and being sad was not an option.

How did you counteract that sadness?

Waiting tables whether in a small restaurant or at the London Playboy Club can be hard work or fun, depending on the point of view. Graduating into TV with Two Ronnies, Frankie Howerd, Benny Hill, and movies, with Dick Emery, Confections of the Window, Golden Lady, and even a James Bond movie is a rich reward for all the hard work.

That sounds so exciting.

None the less, there were tense even tragic moments, death of a father, broken heart, and unsavoury and scary chases.

I imagine so.

But, travel did prove to be an education. The joy of the new generation continues in learning, traveling, and loving. As one of the readers put it: “A touching tale of a woman who makes it through the tornados of life and still comes out centred.”

What a brilliant definition Anika. 

What else have you brought along and why have you brought it?

Music; The Beatles mostly although not exclusively. I write while I listen to the music. Many songs are as relevant today as they were when they were written; Give Peace a Chance… is the case in point.

Oh absolutely – more important now than ever I think!

I am an optimist, so I like to be in the company of books that lift my spirits. It saves my energy for the times when I have to swim up the hill, which in the past was quite often. Also, books set in history are a must, learning from past mistakes is all important!

I couldn’t agree more Anika. Thank you so much for staying in with me to chat about Encounter with the Future. It sounds an exciting and intriguing book. Let me give readers a few more details.

Encounter with the Future

Imagine if an 18-year-old girl landed across the iron curtain for the first time…alone.

What if that girl went from being a nanny, to a fashion model, to a playboy bunny, to an actress, and from London to Hong Kong, to the USA in a full and wonderful life encompassing rock n roll, new business ventures, a family and everything in between?

It is not a movie script; this is a real story

Anika Pavel was born Jarmila Kocvarova in communist Czechoslovakia. She bravely ventured across the iron curtain to England for what was intended to be a one-year stay.

As her life transpires, she goes from sleeping in phone booths to a Bond girl in the swinging London of the 1960s and 70s.

These are the stories of her life and the people she has shared it with. People stories. Heartwarming, tender, meaningful and captivating.

In a series of essays, some intimate and small, some touching upon the major historical moments of the twentieth century, Pavel takes us on an unforgettable journey.

Published by Castle on 15th February 2025, Encounter with the Future is available for purchase in all the usual places including here.

About Anika Pavel

Actress, model, essayist and writer, Anika Pavel was born in Czechoslovakia, now Slovakia and currently resides in the United States. After the brutal Soviet invasion of her homeland, rending her emigrant and homeless, she was discovered and became successful model and actress during the swinging 70th London. She managed a seamless transition from James Bond to motherhood. She moved across three continents challenging geopolitical divides. Encounter with the Future reflects this life still in motion.

For further information, visit Anika’s website, or find her on Instagram and Facebook.