Features

Our intrepid volunteer Nicola highlights some fun and interesting picture books that will appeal to both young children and their parents! With 10,000 new children’s books published each year, it can feel overwhelming knowing where to start when you want to buy new books for your children or school. Understandably, people often return to old favourites and well-known names. At The Bookery, we are always here to help with this dilemma and this month we have selected six of the … Read more

Kev McCready is a writer, born in Liverpool but now living in Devon. Always with his nose in a book and a cuppa brewing. A fanatical reader since the age of five, Kev has a collection of bookmarks as esoteric as his bookshelves… Iain Banks occupies a peculiar place in literature. His contemporary novels have a dark, oxymoronic moral coating of sex, violence and morality. There is a very manichiestic sense of what is what is right and wrong; but … Read more

A fascinating selection hand-picked by our Work Experience teen: Amelie! “This is a selection of our favourite young adult books that focus of growing up and exploring the world around us. They are about teenagers from all walks of life and range from fantasy to real life, and are guaranteed to be gripping reads!” Aristotle and Dante Discover The Secrets Of The Universe by Benjamin Alire Saenez Aristotle is 14 when he when he meets Dante, a scrawny boy who … Read more

Annette Shaw is a freelance journalist with 30 years of experience, and has a regular column in Devon Life, sharing her pick of brilliant books with Devon connections. With her reputation for championing books and authors around the county, we’re delighted to have the opportunity to showcase her reviews here. Breakpoint by T. Orr Munro Set in Devon. Tick. Author lives on site so to speak. Tick. Unsettlingly creepy. Most definitely. And the cover has that air of seaside scenic allure … Read more

Kev McCready is a writer, born in Liverpool but now living in Devon. Always with his nose in a book and a cuppa brewing. A fanatical reader since the age of five, Kev has a collection of bookmarks as esoteric as his bookshelves… I met Anne Enright at a book signing in Liverpool. She’s all business, polite but friendly. There is also that impish, playful side to her, smiling wryly as she signed my book that my girlfriend at the … Read more

Cathie – head of our schools team – shares her top picks for adventurous readers… Here are our favourite adventure books from the last few years! From time travelling with a hamster to surviving in the jungle, there is sure to be something to catch your imagination. We think these are books that you won’t be able to put down and are perfect holiday reads. Darwin’s Dragons – Lindsay Galvin A book with a difference. It’s based on fact: the … Read more

Our superb volunteer Belinda explores the world of verse novels and makes some recommendations… I have to confess to a slight sinking feeling when I picked up my first verse novel, One by Sarah Crossan.  I was interested in the story line but was sceptical about the verse format.  How could the details and subtleties of the story be conveyed when the word count was so much lower than a novel written in prose?  How wrong I was!  The sparseness … Read more

We’re rooting out some great but less well-known small publishers and finding out what makes them tick. This month’s small press is Old Street Publishing – founded in 2006, Old Street is an independent British publisher of fiction and non-fiction who might be recognisable from their excellent ‘Shortest History’ series. Ben Yarde-Buller kindly gave us some of his time to fill us in with all things Old Street: Q: What is Old Street Publishing’s origin story? I wish we had … Read more

Fantastic Bookshops! I love the personalised nature of the shops I’ve visited here in Devon, they’re really working with their local communities and schools to make sure everyone has the books that are right for them. And it’s such a rush, seeing my own handwriting right on the shop front of The Bookery in Crediton, where I helped them with their new branding and lettering. I’m thrilled to be their new Patron and hope I can give them a boost! … Read more

Annette Shaw is a freelance journalist with 30 years of experience, and has a regular column in Devon Life, sharing her pick of brilliant books with Devon connections.With her reputation for championing books and authors around the county, we’re delighted to have the opportunity to showcase her reviews here.   Tea At The Palace By Carolyn Robb No doubt Devon will have many events to celebrate the Platinum Jubilee and one we can all be involved in is a local street … Read more