The Overflowing Library

This month has been epic reading wise. So many awesome books Books read All that glitters by Holly Smale (4 stars) Better left buried by Emma Haughton (3 stars) Dog Ears by Anne Booth (4 stars) Written in the stars by Ali Harris (4 stars) The Start of me and you by Emery Lord (4 stars) Stealing Parker by Miranda Kenneally (3 stars) The rest of us just live here by Patrick Ness (4 stars) Liberty's Fire by Lydia Syson (4 stars) Being a girl by Hayley Long (5 stars) Demolition Dad by Phil Earle (5 stars) It's all about love by Steve Camden (4 stars) Lorali by Laura Dockrill (5 stars) One by Sarah Crossan (5 stars) Poppy in the Field by Mary Hooper (4 stars) Read me like a book by Liz Kessler (4 stars) House of Windows by Alexia Casale (4 stars) One small act of kindness by Lucy Dillon (4 stars) Book of the Month This month it has to be One by Sarah Crossan. It was an extraordinary read which absolutely blew me away Events attended Early this month I ...

Another month. Another list of books I cannot wait for. Asking for it by Louise O'Neill I know nothing about this book. I want it purely because it is written by Louise. Darkest Night by Will Hill The brave men and women of Department 19 have fought Dracula at every turn, but now Zero Hour has passed and the ancient vampire is at full strength.   Inside Department 19, the Operators are exhausted and fractured. Jamie, Larissa, Matt and Kate are each struggling with their own demons. When the friends need each other most, they are further apart than ever.   Outside the Department, the world reels from the revelation that vampires are real. Violence and paranoia spread around the globe and, when it finally comes, Dracula’s opening move is more vicious than anyone could have imagined.   A final battle looms between the forces of darkness and the last, massed ranks of those who stand against it. A battle that will define the future of humanity. ...

Oakfield by David J Rodgers Monsters lurk in quiet places. Annabella Spaulding has inherited an extraordinary property from her estranged grandfather. A man she hasn’t seen since she was a child. Taking her husband and family there she seeks to heal the painful rifts between them. When owners of a local mine show an unhealthy interest in the property, it becomes worryingly apparent her grandfather may not have died naturally. There is a great secret bound within the house, and digging through the clues to discover the truth they risk tearing down the walls between our reality and a monstrous other.... I stumbled upon this title totally by accident but was immediately drawn to it as it appeared to contain overt Lovecraftian influences, in that regard I certainly wasn’t disappointed.   That said I’m confident that this book would be entirely accessible to you even if you had no grounding in the works of H.P.Lovecraft (1890-1937). Oakfield begins at a gentle...

One Story, Two Narrators Sam Hepburn Until I wrote If You Were Me I had never written a book using dual narratives and it was an interesting challenge, made easier in a way because the two main characters were so very different. Dan Abbott is English, fourteen years old and the only child of a London plumber . He is good hearted but a tiny bit dodgy – he has been known to unlock stolen phones for an older friend. He doesn’t try very hard at school and he has no idea what he wants to do with his life. He has a happy, contented homelife, although things were difficult when he was little and his father did a short prison sentence for selling stolen goods. Aliya is also fourteen but from Afghanistan. Her doctor father was killed in a Taliban bomb explosion and the shock and grief have plunged her mother into a deep depression. She has a younger sister Mina, who is four and an older brother Behrouz who worked as an interpreter for the British troops. Aliya is clever and deter...

My Road to Publication They say that every published writer has at least one book in their bottom drawer. The one that didn't make it. I'm sure that there are exceptions to this, but I'm not one of them! SEED isn't my first book - I've got another one, tucked away. It's one I still have faith in, but it wasn't quite good enough to get onto the shelves.      The great thing about my first book not getting picked up, was that I could write SEED without any expectation on my shoulder. That's definitely how my writing spirit prefers to work. I was free to write Pearl's story and if I didn't do it justice, then I would get on with the next one.      Luckily, though, fate steered me in the direction of Veronique Baxter - an agent at The David Higham Agency. She read the first three chapters 'in one big gulp' and asked to see the rest. I couldn't believe that Veronique might want to take me on - she has incredible auth...

“The human race had every opportunity. We blew it, darling” Take two Cousins from Faction Paradox.   Give them a world – the Earth, for example – and give them the power to change that world’s history as they see fit.   Then stand back and watch what happens…   Just what would happen if a couple of Cousins used our planet as their personal game board?   As they create one alternative reality after another, twisting history and reality into knots, only one outcome is sure: whoever wins, the human race loses. For those who have not heard of it Faction Paradox started life as a spin-off of the BBCs popular science fiction show Doctor Who.   Originally conceived prior to the new series returning to our screens, Faction Paradox has now distanced itself from its origins and continues to be a franchise is its own right.   The premise of the series is that a vast war rages through time and space between two matched powers – The Great Houses (aka Tim...

Seed loves you. Seed will never let you go. Fifteen-year-old Pearl has lived her whole life protected within the small community at Seed, where they worship Nature and idolise their leader, Papa S. When some outsiders arrive, everything changes. Pearl experiences feelings that she never knew existed and begins to realise that there is darkness at the heart of Seed. A darkness from which she must escape, before it's too late. This isn't really a review of Seed. I don't want to review this for fear of spoiling it. I came to this book only knowing that it was about a girl who is part of a cult. I actually think knowing only the very basic premise meant I was surprised all the way through and needed to keep reading to find out what happened next. This book is dark and creepy and with leave you chilled by the end. I found myself getting more and more uncomfortable as the story progressed. This book is a real example of how YA can really take you to that dark p...