![]() | The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
Buy new: £3.95 / Used from: £1.96 Original and creepy take on the Holocaust.
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![]() | Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
Buy new: £8.49 / Used from: £7.95 A welcome antidote to Philippa Gregory's bodice rippers; Mantel's Tudor England is a more vivid place altogether.
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![]() | The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson
Buy new: £3.95 / Used from: £3.45 Sassy Scandinavian crime novel with a social message. Better than its prequel.
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![]() | Devil May Care (James Bond) by Sebastian Faulks
Buy new: £4.61 / Used from: £0.01 A Bond "homage" that reminds you why no one reads Fleming any more.
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![]() | The Einstein Girl by Philip Sington
Buy new: £9.06 / Used from: £3.08 Dark, thought-provoking and powerful mystery about an Einstein family secret. Beautifully done.
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![]() | Gone Tomorrow by Lee Child
Buy used from: £9.90 Child reprises and recycles in this, his 13th Jack Reacher novel. The flogged horse isn't dead, perhaps. But it's definitely resting.
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![]() | The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga
Buy new: £3.80 / Used from: £0.73 The lively but improbably confession of a Bombay murderer with ambitions to rise.
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![]() | The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
Buy new: £9.46 / Used from: £5.81 More gothic shenanigans from the auther of The Shadow of the Wind. Doesn't take itself too seriously, and falls a bit flat when it does.
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![]() | The History of Love by Nicole Krauss
Buy new: £6.36 / Used from: £0.01 Charming tale, wittily told in a New York/magic realism kind-of-way.
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![]() | Breaking Dawn (Twilight Saga) by Stephenie Meyer
Buy new: £7.46 / Used from: £6.50 Latest, last and longest in this hugely successful romantic/vampirical saga. We live in strange times, is all I can say.
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![]() | The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne
Buy new: £3.49 / Used from: £0.88 Spare but affecting story of children growing up during the Holocaust period.
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![]() | The Luminous Life of Lilly Aphrodite by Beatrice Colin
Buy new: £4.74 / Used from: £0.01 Lively if slightly over-long yarn of movie-makers in Weimar Germany. A rich period piece.
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![]() | Sashenka by Simon Sebag Montefiore
Buy used from: £0.79 Seriously hyped historical yarn that takes far too long to get going.
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![]() | The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher: or the Murder at Road Hill House by Kate Summerscale
Buy new: £4.27 / Used from: £0.01 Don't read this as a whodunnit. It's an intelligent and revealing look at Victorian society, revealed through the prism of a seminal murder investigation.
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![]() | Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky
Buy new: £4.76 / Used from: £0.01 Astute, tragic unfinished novel.
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![]() | The Interpretation of Murder by Jed Rubenfeld
Buy new: £5.01 / Used from: £0.01 Engaging but drawn-out historical detective yarn.
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![]() | The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún by J R R Tolkien
Buy new: £9.92 / Used from: £2.99 Really only suitable for Middle Earth fanatics who should probably get out more.
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![]() | The Believers by Zoë Heller
Buy new: £3.85 / Used from: £0.01 New York is full of hypocritical and nasty people. Heller draws them with ruthless efficiency. But her plot has no emotional centre and little in the way of drive.
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![]() | The Shadow Of The Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
Buy new: £3.99 / Used from: £0.01 Convoluted, OTT and slightly silly mystery redeemed by humour and occasional panache. But no masterpiece.
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![]() | The Return by Victoria Hislop
Buy new: £4.76 / Used from: £0.01 Pretty ropy mix of salsa nonsense with a Spanish civil war plot. Dull writing makes it all seem rather tired.
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![]() | The Road by Cormac McCarthy
Buy new: £2.95 / Used from: £2.70 Miserable subject; oddly uplifting story. Not too long either, which makes a pleasant change.
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![]() | The Children's Book by A.S. Byatt
Buy new: £8.49 / Used from: £11.28 Top class historical saga about children's writing 100 years ago.
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![]() | Me Cheeta: The Autobiography by James Lever
Buy new: £4.48 / Used from: £2.80 Rollicking showbiz 'memoire' about apes and the Hollywood of yesteryear.
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![]() | What Was Lost by Catherine O'Flynn
Buy used from: £0.01 Droll look at growing up in the 1980s. Distinctive.
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![]() | The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown
Buy new: £9.00 / Used from: £9.50 The publishers worldwide have been waiting seven years for this. Whether their patience has been rewarded remains to be seen. For readers, at least, the precedents are not good.
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