Saskia

Clare Wilson’s debut novel The Long Staff is the first book in the Staff Wielder series about the adventures of thirteen-year-old Tom MacKay. Published by Olida Publishing as children’s fiction with a Scottish flavour, it is a magical adventure book touching upon Scotland’s oral and written storytelling heritage. While visiting [more...]

After attending Lin Anderson’s book launch of The Reborn, I was excited to read her seventh crime novel featuring Rhona MacLeod, a forensic scientist based in Glasgow. Anderson promised a fast-paced story full of elaborate forensic detail and certainly did not fail to deliver a cracking read. The Reborn will [more...]

Andrew Raymond Drennan’s outstanding and thought-provoking second novel follows the story of teenage girl Maggie, who lives on a drug-blighted council estate. She finds a friend in Bertrand, an elderly man who lost his childhood love in the war. When Maggie’s sister is run over and killed by a car, [more...]

C. J. Sansom’s continued success of the Shardlake series is undeniably linked to his flawless ability to describe medieval London and its streets, smells and atmosphere in great detail, through the eyes of non-conformist Serjant Shardlake. Heartstone is the fifth novel in the series in which the good-natured hunchback lawyer [more...]

Janis MacKay’s second Magnus Fin book for five to eight-year-olds is just as imaginative, but more fast-paced than its predecessor Magnus Fin and the Ocean Quest, for which MacKay won the Kelpies Prize 2009. When Fin discovers that his initials have been scratched onto a big rock in the sea, [more...]

The Long Song is a vibrant, fictitious ‘autobiographical’ novel that visits the darkest corners of the slave trade in Jamaica with a bagful of wit and wry humour. July, the story’s main narrator, describes the ridiculous habits and brutalities of the colonial invaders at Amity, while telling her own life [more...]

Steven Amsterdam’s debut novel narrates the post-apocalyptic life of a relentless young man throughout his 30 years of despair, search for love, and survival. Each chapter unfolds chronologically, but with several year gaps, and therefore this novel allows itself to be read as an anthology of short stories – a [more...]

The Floating Man is a collection of short poems which, unlike some poetry, is an accessible piece of art and shouldn’t fail to attract a wide audience. Its language is unpretentious and topics such as the natural world, history and music are a familiar starting point to enjoy these short thought-provoking [more...]

Room is a heart-breaking story on a kidnap and sexual abuse victim who undergoes her ordeal while bearing and raising a child in a small fortified garden shed. As a reader you experience Ma’s imprisonment through her son’s eyes (Jack), who eventually escapes by using a wonderfully simplistic and cleverly written memory game: “Dead, [more...]