The Bookcase

Never mind book of the week, The Buried Giant will quite possibly scare off competition to be my book of the year. A decade after Kazuo Ishiguro's last novel Never Let Me Go left me and millions of others in tears, he's returned to the same impeccable form with a story that's just as tender, thought-provoking and moving.

The Booker Prize winning author of The Remains Of The Day has been far from idle in the last 10 years, publishing a volume of short stories, Nocturnes, in 2009 and seeing Never Let Me Go safely onto the big screen in 2010, but The Buried Giant had a false start and was scrapped after his wife deemed it not up to scratch. What we have now is perhaps all the better for being allowed to steep in his subconscious for so long.

His previous novels have mostly been set in a recognisable past, with the exceptions of the dreamlike and critic-dividing The Unconsoled and Never Let Me Go, an alternate reality in which cloned children were bred to be organ donors. Here, Ishiguro mines the mythical realm of post-Arthurian Britain - a land where ogres, pixies and knights errant all roam. It's a plucky genre departure that fits naturally with his other-wordly style of storytelling, where ellipses are king and the reader is left to fill in the gaps using their own imagination. It's part quest narrative and part love story.

Axl and Beatrice are an elderly couple, living in an underground warren of dwellings on the edge of a bog. One morning, they decide to go on a journey to visit their son, even though they can't remember where he lives or why he's not now with them. A mist has descended over the country which is robbing the native Britons of their memories and it emanates from the breath of a she-dragon called Querig.

On their travels, they meet a Saxon warrior called Wistan, who is tasked with slaying the dragon and the elderly Sir Gawain, one of Arthur's knights, who hasn't yet managed the same feat. The country for now is at peace, but tensions are bubbling not far beneath the surface.

As with all of Ishiguro's writing, it's a deceptively simple tale, supported by carefully wrought dialogue which drip-feeds morsels about each character's murky past as they gradually remember moments. But it ponders the universal theme of forgetting, as a couple and as a nation - should certain memories stay forgotten? And are happy memories the oil that keeps love burning strong over a lifetime? - which will stay with you long after you've closed the book, lump firmly in throat.

The film rights have already been acquired and the author is anxious his book's dealt with gently and not pigeon-holed as merely 'fantasy' - but with the upwelling of praise for The Buried Giant, surely Ishiguro has nothing to fear and another spot on the Booker Prize shortlist is a matter of course.

9/10

(Review by Kate Whiting)

FICTION

The Fishermen by Chigozie Obioma is published in hardback by One, priced £14.99 (ebook £4.19). Available now

Chigozie Obioma's novel follows the disintegrating fortunes of a middle-class family, the Agwus, in 1990s Nigeria. Trouble starts when the bookish, ambitious Mr Agwu is posted away from Akura, the town where he and his wife have been raising their children, to take up a banking position in the riskier north. In his absence, the older boys run wild on the forbidden edge of a local river - and an ancient, less rational Africa asserts itself. One by one, the children fall victim to a malign prophecy, uttered by a terrifying madman who has appeared in their Christian lives like an emissary of the devil - or maybe of the previous era's animistic religion, which has never quite gone away. Obioma does a terrific job of portraying his birth country as a place of warmth, chaos, love, stink and ever-present brutality - though at times you'll need a strong stomach to read it.

9/10

(Review by Liz Ryan)

Second Life by SJ Watson is published in by Doubleday, priced £14.99 (ebook £1.88). Available now

How do you follow a debut like Before I Go To Sleep, which has sold more than four million copies and been made into a movie starring Colin Firth and Nicole Kidman? Well, SJ Watson may have set himself a high standard with his thriller about a woman with catastrophic amnesia, but he has come up trumps again with his second novel. Once again, his story centres on a woman, Julia, a photographer and former alcoholic who has a secure, comfortable life with her kindly surgeon husband and adopted teenage son, really her sister's child. But then her sister is brutally murdered and Julia discovers that she was using dating sites to meet men for sex. Julia throws herself into her sister's online dating world in the hope of drawing out the killer, but is soon dabbling in some sexual experimentation of her own. With plenty of surprising twists and turns, exposing the darker side of human nature, SJ Watson writes convincingly in the first person as a woman who replaces alcohol with a different type of addiction. Taut, tight and terrific, I hope they make the film soon.

8/10

(Review by Hannah Stephenson)

The Tusk That Did The Damage by Tania James is published in hardback by Harvill Secker, priced £12.99 (ebook £6.02). Available now

'Elephants never forget' is the aphorism driving Tania James' latest novel, an exploration of poaching in Southern India. Three separate coming-of-age stories interweave, told through the eyes of a local teenager, an American documentary filmmaker and an elephant known as the Gravedigger. Brought face to face with the realities of the ivory trade, each realises that the world is far more nuanced and corrupt than the cosseted experiences of their youth had prepared them for. Yet despite this growing understanding, they are powerless to resist, and their worlds' coincide in a tragic climax that has seemed inevitable from the first page. At its heart, this is a pessimistic tale that derives little hope from attempts at conservation. Human weakness and the imperatives of money and revenge, it suggests, will make us forever powerless to repair our fraught relationship with the natural world.

6/10

(Review by Adam Weymouth)

A Killing Winter by Tom Callaghan is published by Quercus, priced £18.99 (ebook £7.49). Available now

Depressed detectives solving grisly crimes in far-flung foreign lands are nothing new, but Tom Callaghan's debut novel adds a new dimension and a new country - Kyrgyzstan - to the list of usual suspects. Callaghan portrays the former Soviet state in central Asia as a bleak, wintry, world condemned to wallow in corruption and violence. His hero, detective Akyl Borubaev, finds himself caught in the middle when a crazed killer strikes and claims the daughter of one of the country's most powerful men as his first victim. The plot has twists aplenty and the location makes a change from the endless list of Mediterranean and Scandinavian thrillers piling up on the shelves, but some readers will be put off by the bloodthirsty violence and unrelenting gloom of life behind the old iron curtain.

6/10

(Review by Rob Dex)

Summer At Little Beach Street Bakery by Jenny Colgan is published in paperback, priced £7.99 (ebook £2.99). Available now

A charming sequel to Little Beach Street Bakery, Jenny Colgan's latest tale about the life of the likeable Polly Waterford is an enjoyable - if slightly predictable - read. Set in the picturesque Cornish village of Mount Polbearne, Polly's bakery (of course she's a baker) faces closure when its owner, the miserable Mrs Manse, passes away. With the help of her hunky American husband, Huckle, and her pet puffin, the rather Disney-esque Neil, Polly needs to save the bakery by avoiding the wrath of late Mrs Manse's misanthropic sister. Colgan's warm writing tone and eye for detail sets this light read apart from others of a similar genre. While Polly's constant self-deprecation and her happy-go-lucky cheeriness does become slightly grating, the plot remains convincing and the enchanting village and its gossiping inhabitants are sharply and humorously described throughout. An easy yet pleasant read, Summer At Little Beach Street Bakery is as delightful as its name suggests.

7/10

(Review by Kate Samuelson)

Ivy Lane by Cathy Bramley is published in paperback by Corgi, priced £6.99 (ebook £3.66). Available now

The lines between the online library and physical books are blurring even further thanks in part to digital bestseller Cathy Bramley. Ivy Lane was originally released as four seasonal novellas. Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter have now been bound into one single novel. Tilly has recently arrived in Kingsfield, Derbyshire. Recently heartbroken, the part-time teacher attempts to build a new life, hoping to lose herself working on her allotment at Ivy Lane. Instead what she finds is a hotchpotch of gardeners opening their arms to welcome her. The final drops of Tilly's attempts for a quiet life disappear when a TV documentary film crew arrive on site. This is a fabulously light-hearted romance perfect for the beach and upcoming spring evenings. The characters all feel like people you would expect to find on a British allotment, from the committee members to the novice gardeners whose fingers are more black than green.

8/10

(Review by Rachel Howdle)

NON-FICTION

Girl In A Band by Kim Gordon is published in trade paperback by Faber & Faber, priced £14.99 (£5.99). Available now

As a co-founder of influential no wave band Sonic Youth, Kim Gordon is used to the spotlight. But despite being in the public eye since the Eighties when the group formed, the bassist, artist and clothes designer has remained a rather private figure, often keeping schtum on her personal life. So it comes as pleasant surprise to find out more about the prominent musician in her autobiography Girl In A Band, not least because after 27 years of marriage, she split up with Thurston Moore, the band's singer and guitarist. Kicking off with the band's final shows in South America, Gordon sheds light onto the pain she felt uniting on stage with her estranged husband, whose affair caused their split. It's credit to Gordon that instead of waging war on Moore, she maintains a dignified stance on the hurt she suffered. But while she doesn't muddy Moore's name, she is upfront about the awkward atmosphere during those last gigs. Later, passages on a fallout with Courtney Love (Gordon produced Love's first album with Hole) and her impressions of late Nirvana singer Kurt Cobain will keep grunge fans happy. Girl In A Band is a colourful read, which is sensitively managed and puts Gordon rightly at centre stage.

7/10

(Review by Keeley Bolger)

Breadline Britain: The Rise Of Mass Poverty by Stewart Lansley and Joanna Mack is published in paperback by Oneworld Publications, priced £9.99 (ebook £6.64). Available now

When Stewart Lansley and Joanna Mack wrote the pioneering Poor Britain in 1985 - a response to the first 'Breadline Britain' survey of 1983 - they probably hoped it would lead to a rise in living conditions for those whose plight they documented. They certainly didn't imagine how much worse things would have become. Drawing on three decades of statistics from the Breadline Britain surveys, the authors use eye-opening numbers to illustrate the alarming fact that nearly one in three Brits currently live in poverty... three and a half million adults go hungry so they can feed their children; one in five children is in a house that is cold and damp; and one in 10 lacks warm clothes. Nothing less than a damning indictment of authority, the book paints a picture of a system, which - rather than releasing people from poverty - has entrapped many in lives of deprivation. It makes for some seriously uncomfortable reading - as it should.

7/10

(Review by Sarah Warwick)

CHILDREN'S BOOK OF THE WEEK

Violet And The Hidden Treasure by Harriet Whitehorn is published in hardback by Simon And Schuster, priced £8.99 (ebook £5.49). Available March 26

Harriet Whitehorn's debut, Violet And The Pearl Of The Orient won glowing reviews when it was published last summer and has been shortlisted for the Waterstone's Children's Book Prize, so all eyes are on the follow-up. Tree-climbing, poker-playing Violet Remy-Robinson lives with her jewellery designer mum and architect dad in a flat in London, with their cat Pudding. Her godmother, wildlife photographer Celeste, takes her to India in the Christmas holidays to trek through the jungle and help out at an orphanage, where they're unexpectedly invited to the Maharajah's New Year's Eve party. There she meets the Maharani - not a woman, but a cockatoo, who the Maharajah has tasked with deciding who will inherit his fortune when he dies. No sooner than Violet's home again, than the Maharajah's manservant Rajesh appears with the Maharani, explaining that his master has passed and asking Violet to keep her safe from kidnappers. The Maharajah's niece Angel is angry about his bizarre will and is soon on the scene, employing dirty tactics to get her hands on the bird, who holds the key to the hidden treasure. It's an engaging flight of fancy, a quirky caper that will prove compulsive reading to the 'midders' of the story, girls over seven, who won't be concerned about convincing plot points. Kudos to Whitehorn for inventing such a colourful cast of characters, who are beautifully brought to life by Becka Moor's illustrations.

7/10

(Review by Kate Whiting)

BESTSELLERS FOR WEEK ENDING MARCH 1

HARDBACKS

1. Mightier Than the Sword: The Clifton Chronicles, Jeffrey Archer

2. The Girl on the Train, Paula Hawkins

3. Deliciously Ella: Awesome Ingredients, Incredible Food That You and You, Ella Woodward

4. The Butterfly Club, Jacqueline Wilson

5. Love, Tanya, Tanya Bur

6. Girl Online, Zoe Sugg

7. Not Quite Nice, Celia Imrie

8. The Long Haul: (Book 9): Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Jeff Kinney

9. Shop Girl, Mary Portas

10. All That Glitters: Geek Girl, Holly Smale

(Compiled by Waterstones)

PAPERBACKS

1. H is for Hawk, Helen Macdonald

2. Demon Dentist, David Walliams

3. Nora Webster, Colm Toibin

4. The Miniaturist, Jessie Burton

5. Elizabeth is Missing, Emma Healey

6. An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth, Chris Hadfield

7. The Rosie Effect, Graeme Simsion

8. The Great Comic Relief Bake Off: 14 Simple Recipes to Bake for Red Nose Day

9. Arsenic for Tea: A Wells and Wong Mystery, Robin Stevens

10. Enchanted Forest: An Inky Quest and Colouring Book, Johanna Basford

(Compiled by Waterstones)

EBOOKS

1. Silent Scream, Angela Marsons

2. Personal, Lee Child

3. The Girl on the Train, Paula Hawkins

4. Elizabeth is Missing, Emma Healey

5. The Black Echo, Michael Connelly

6. The State We're In, Adele Parks

7. Closer Than You Think, Karen Rose

8. Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn

9. Sleepyhead,Mark Billingham

10. The Little Shop of Hopes and Dreams, Fiona Harper