Bookcase

Hal and Mickey are founders of the Encyclopaedists of Capital Hill, a tongue-in-cheek arts collective which puts on pop-up exhibitions largely as a means of picking up women. Their cosy boho slacker lifestyle is disrupted when, instead of moving to Boston together to college as planned, Mickey's National Guard unit is called to serve in Iraq.

The narrative then splits in two, with despatches from Iraq - the most powerful sections, detailing the compromises and cruelties of life as an agent of the occupation in the beleaguered Green Zone - alternating with scenes of Hal failing to get on at college, and gradually dropping out. While Hal is struggling with literary theory and grad envy, his pal is witnessing comrades being blown up.

There are girls in all this too, notably the free-spirited Mani, who makes up a triangle of sorts with the pair, the development of which provides some momentum for the plot. Hal and Mickey also take it in turns to update a Wikipedia page about their lives as a way of extending their arts project.

All in all, this is an easy and often compelling read, if at times it feels a little meandering and lacking in narrative drive and balance. I could have done without the Wikipedia pages though - cryptic, ponderous and oddly infrequent, these inserts promise innovation but deliver only obfuscation.

8/10 (Review by Dan Brotzel) FICTION The Followers by Rebecca Wait is published in hardback by Picador, price £12.99 (ebook £7.59). Available now If you're looking for a summer read with brains, this is the perfect book. Following on from a successful debut novel, The View On The Way Down, The Followers is once again a story predominantly about family - and here, about a child, Judith, observing the actions of a parent, yet being helpless to stop them. Alternating between the present, where an adult Judith endures awkward meetings with her inmate mother, and 'before', depicting Judith's childhood, the story of Stephanie's imprisonment is unravelled cunningly and satisfyingly: after meeting the charismatic Nathaniel in the cafe where she works, single mother Stephanie is recruited to a simple life, moving with Judith to a remote farmhouse as part of a tiny community of which Nathaniel is the leader. However, inevitably, tensions rise within the tight-knit group, climaxing in a disturbing act of violence that explains the present. A deftly written, compelling, and utterly accessible novel.

8/10 (Review by Emma Herdman) The Slaughter Man by Tony Parsons is published in hardback by Century, priced £12.99 (ebook £6.17). Available now It's New Year's Eve in London and while most people are out celebrating, a wealthy couple and two of their children are murdered in their home. The unusual murder weapon - a gun used for stunning cattle before they're slaughtered - points to a killer nicknamed the Slaughter Man who, 30 years ago, dispatched his girlfriend's father and brothers in the same way. He's out of prison now, but dying of cancer. Could he really be responsible? Is there a copy-cat killer on the loose? Or is someone trying to frame him? DC Max Wolfe is on the case. Unlike most fictional detectives, he's not a dysfunctional cliche, which is refreshing. Parsons deftly weaves together the various plot strands and, for the most part, the story is fast-paced and gripping, but his compulsion to explain every piece of police jargon and every acronym is stilted and clumsy and impedes the narrative.

8/10 (Review by Catherine Small) World Gone By by Dennis Lehane is published in hardback by Little, Brown, priced £16.99 (ebook £6.49). Available now American crime writer Dennis Lehane's latest novel concludes a trilogy spanning the years from the end of the First World War to the start of the second. Policeman's son Joe Coughlin has risen in the world of organised crime, but things are changing and he looks set for a fall as his past catches up with him. His story is the heart of the book, but it is fleshed out with a memorable supporting cast drawn from high ranking-politicians, lowlife criminals and the world inbetween. The plot moves from Florida to Cuba and back again at a fair pace but this is no thoughtless thriller as the author recreates a lost era with great skill and brings his often unlikeable characters to life. Lehane, whose bestsellers Mystic River and Shutter Island have already been adapted for the big screen, has produced an American epic that begs to be made into a film.

7/10 (Review by Robert Dex) The Saffron Trail by Rosanna Ley is published in paperback by Quercus, priced £7.99 (ebook 99p). Available now Nell is a disillusioned chef living in Cornwall. Her mother is dead, and the legacy she leaves behind - a family history of growing saffron and a mystery surrounding the identity of her father - leaves Nell feeling lost. But then her husband buys her a cooking course in Marrakech. There Nell is drawn to Amy, a photographer, who is by contrast headstrong and independent, but who is also searching for answers. Through their shared adventures, they discover their family stories are inextricably linked. Rosanna Ley spends much of her time running writing retreats in fabulous locations in Spain and Italy. Her passion for travel is evident here. The Saffron Trail is exotic, romantic and poignant, and although the loose ends are a little bit too neatly tied up by the end - it's a satisfying piece of escapism. The colours, smells and chaos of Morocco jump off the page. It makes me long to visit the place.

7/10 (Review by Rachel Farrow) The Mountain Can Wait by Sarah Leipciger is published in hardback by Tinder Press, priced £16.99 (ebook £4.35). Available now Canadian-born Sarah Leipciger lives in London these days, but you can't help but wonder how well she fits in. Each page of The Mountain Can Wait is shot through with the bush of her homeland; the prose as rugged as its characters. Tom Berry is the boss of a tree-planting outfit, a man capable of turning his hand to anything, but less competent as a father. When his son, Curtis, flees the scene of a hit-and-run, Tom sets out to find him before the police do, a final chance to repair their broken relationship. Despite the novel's explosive start, it never quite gets going, bogged down by flashbacks and memories and dreams, and the vivid, naturalistic descriptions are not enough to breathe it back to life. That said, it is an original and complex debut, and Leipciger's will be an interesting voice to watch.

6/10 (Review by Adam Weymouth) NON-FICTION Gut: The Inside Story Of Our Body's Most Underrated Organ by Giulia Enders is published in paperback by Scribe, priced £14.99 (ebook £7.19)). Available now Australian scientists Barry Marshall and Robin Warren identified the stomach ulcer-causing bacteria Helicobacter Pylori in 1982, but it took a decade of campaigning to break down the medical orthodoxy that brainwashed GPs into prescribing an outdated cure. Giulia Enders, who is studying for a medical doctorate at the Institute of Microbiology in Frankfurt, was shocked by how few of the latest discoveries about the digestive system were finding their way out of obscure conference papers and into public awareness. This fabulous little book changes all that. Enders takes us on an empowering journey from cake hole to toilet bowl, explaining via a series of ingenious metaphors how our tummies actually work, and why they sometimes go wrong. As well as a plethora of practical health advice, she holds out real hope that one day the try-it-and-see approach to many psychological and autoimmune disorders will be replaced by effective gut-based treatments.

9/10 (Review by Liz Ryan) Speed Kings by Andy Bull is published in hardback by Bantam Press, priced £17.99 (ebook £9.99). Available now Andy Bull, senior sportswriter for The Guardian, makes his literary debut with an account of the incredible real-life tale of the 1932 Winter Olympics and four extraordinary adventurers who won bobsled gold. And what incredible lives they did lead: heavyweight boxer Eddie Eagen already had a summer Olympic gold to his name; the mysterious Clifford Grey, whose identity caused confusion until very recently; driver Billy Fiske, who had a natural talent for speed and flew in the Battle of Britain; and brakeman Jay O'Brien, a rouge and charmer who was claimed to have married women at gunpoint. To say more would ruin the surprises on offer as this story goes way beyond the sport in which the four competed, capturing a world where speed was king and pre-war life was crazy.

8/10 (Review by Chris Gray) Dancing With The Enemy: My Family's Holocaust Secret by Paul Glaser is published in paperback by OneWorld, priced £12.99. Available now Raised as Roman Catholic, Paul Glaser is shocked to discover a suitcase with his name on it during a visit to Auschwitz and he starts to uncover his father's Jewish roots and learns about the story of his estranged Aunt Rosie during World War II. A strong, cunning and resourceful woman, Rosie defied convention and toured Western Europe teaching ballroom dancing. When the Nazis seized power, she was betrayed by both her ex-husband and lover and sent to a number of concentration camps, including Auschwitz, where she was punished by working at the gas chambers. Of the 1,200 people who arrived with her, only eight survived. Pieced together from Rosie's own diaries, letters, archive material and stories from family friends, this book depicts an individual who is fearless, passionate and unconventional. This is not an easy read and there are slightly jarring interludes from the author, breaking up Rosie's own story, but this book is compelling, riveting and another achingly human insight into the tragedy of the Holocaust.

7/10 (Review by Georgina Rodgers) CHILDREN'S BOOK OF THE WEEK The Porridge Of Knowledge by Archie Kimpton, illustrated by Kate Hindley, is published in paperback by Hot Key Books, priced £5.99 (ebook £3.99). Available now We all know porridge is good for us, but imagine if a bowl of it could give you unlimited knowledge? Author Archie Kimpton uses his second children's book The Porridge Of Knowledge to explore the idea of breakfast as truly magical brain food. Schoolgirl Milk lives in a rather boring town called Slopp-on-Sea with her Grandad. Grandad has a rather strange habit of wandering off and getting lost or doing silly things like wiping his nose on their cat! But one day he comes back with a book called The Porridge Of Knowledge. Milk finds a bizarre recipe in the back of it so her and her friend Jarvis the chef decide to make it. The powers of the porridge are supernatural and could change Milk's life and the town of Slopp-on-Sea forever! This book was ridiculously funny! The effect the porridge had was hilarious. There were lots sections and happenings that made me laugh out loud as they were extremely weird. This book also showed that porridge can be a great source of magic and mystery. It was funny and inventive. Also great illustrations by Kate Hindley!

8/10 (Review by Noah Sanders, aged 10) BESTSELLERS FOR WEEK ENDING MAY 23 HARDBACKS 1. The Girl On The Train, Paula Hawkins 2. Ardennes 1944: Hitler's Last Gamble, Anthony Beevor 3. Yes! No (Maybe...): Tom Gates, Liz Pichon 4. Mary Berry's Absolute Favourites 5. You Are Dead, Peter James 6. A God In Ruins, Kate Atkinson 7. All I Know Now: Wonderings And Reflections On Growing Up Gracefully, Carrie Hope Fletcher 8. The Scarlet Gospels, Clive Barker 9. The Shepherd's Life: A Tale Of The Lake District, James Rebanks 10. Minecraft Blockopedia (Compiled by Waterstones) PAPERBACKS 1. Us, David Nicholls 2. The Woman Who Stole My Life, Marian Keyes 3. Sapiens: A Brief History Of Humankind, Yuval Noah Harari 4. Kolymsky Heights, Lionel Davidson 5. All The Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr 6. Perfidia, James Ellroy 7. Darkmouth, Shane Hegarty 8. The Good Life, Martina Cole 9. The Children Act, Ian McEwan 10. Secret Garden: An Inky Quest and Colouring Book, Johanna Basford (Compiled by Waterstones) EBOOKS 1. The Lie by C.L. Taylor 2. The Girl On The Train by Paula Hawkins 3. The Throwaway Children by Diney Costeloe 4. Here Come The Girls by Milly Johnson 5. Silent Scream by Angela Marsons 6. I Let You Go by Clare Mackintosh 7. Gray Justice (A Tom Gray Novel Book 1) by Alan McDermott 8. Game Of Scones by Samantha Tonge 9. Us by David Nicholls 10. Doesn't Everyone Have a Secret? by Sue Shepherd (Compiled by amazon.co.uk)