April New Reads
Check out our new reads for this April! Each of these books are available for order online!
A Season for Scandal by Laura Wood
When Marigold Bloom finds her family business in trouble a chance encounter with the devastatingly handsome and extremely bad-tempered Oliver Lockhart leads her to the Aviary – a secret agency of women who specialise in blackmailing troublesome men.
Soon, Mari is the agency’s newest recruit, sent to investigate the mysterious return of Oliver’s long lost sister. Forced to masquerade as a newly engaged couple, it is up to Mari and Oliver to determine if there is an imposter in their midst. But what happens when the line between truth and fiction starts to blur? And what do you do when a pretend romance starts to feel all too real?
Island by David Almond
Sixteen-year-old Louise travels with her father to the island of Lindisfarne every year ever since she can remember – it’s the place Louise’s mother loved best of all. The arrival of Hassan from war-torn Syria changes everything.
Louise is restless and yearning for independence, and the fiercely free and self-reliant Hassan fascinates her. He seems to know the island from long ago as if it were his home from birth. Hassan is an acrobat, maybe a sorcerer, possibly a source of great danger. The wild gang of boys who call the island their home want to cast him out. The forces of love, death and hope move Louise and Hassan towards a deeper understanding of themselves and their place in a world that is both cruel and compassionate. Lindisfarne will change their lives forever.
Deadly Little Scandals by Jennifer Lynn Barnes
Reluctant debutante Sawyer Taft joined Southern high society for one reason and one reason alone: to identify and locate her biological father. But the answers Sawyer found during her debutante year only left her with more questions and one potentially life-ruining secret.
When her cousin Lily ropes her into pledging a mysterious, elite, and all-female secret society called the White Gloves, Sawyer soon discovers that someone in the group’s ranks may have the answers she’s looking for.
Things are looking up . . . until Sawyer and the White Gloves make a disturbing discovery near the family’s summer home — and uncover a twisted secret, decades in the making.
Seven Million Sunflowers by Malcolm Duffy
15-year-old Kateryno and her family live in Kharkiv. Their lives are shattered when on February 24th 2022 the Russian army invades. Their apartment block is struck by a missile. After weeks living in their basement, Kateryno, her mother, and brother, decide to leave, joining seven million Ukrainian refugees. They come to England and meet their host family, the Hawkins. But their new beginning brings a whole new set of problems.
Hell Breaks Loose by Derek Landy
Italy, 1703.
As the war with Mevolent rages on, the Dead Men are dispatched to a walled town in the Tuscan hills – not to assassinate the Lord of the Dark Sorcerers, but to save him. A rift has opened to a hellish dimension where a being of devastating power awaits, and only Mevolent is strong enough to seal it and save the world.
A simple mission, then, which turns ever-so-slightly trickier when Skulduggery is presented with the opportunity to finally get revenge on Nefarian Serpine, the man who murdered him and killed his family thirteen years earlier.
Return to the world of Skulduggery Pleasant in a short novel set hundreds of years before Valkyrie Cain is even born, and follow Skulduggery, Ghastly, Shudder, Ravel, Saracen, Dexter and Hopeless as they argue, bicker and battle their way through an army of their most hated enemies in order to save their oldest enemy so they can stop another, brand new, enemy…
And that’s when things get complicated.
Goddess Crown by Shade Lapite
Kalothia has grown up in the shadows of her kingdom, hidden away in the East after her parents were outed as enemies of the king. When assassins attack her home on her sixteenth birthday, she must flee to the king’s court – a beautiful but lethal nest of poison, plots and danger, overseen by an entrenched patriarchy. Can Kalothia navigate this most worldly of places to find her own role? What if she must choose between her country and her heart?
The Invocations by Krystal Sutherland
Five women are dead. The killer leaves no fingerprint, no DNA. Police are utterly stumped.
In a world where only women can use magic and the men who know about it seek to eradicate them, three lonely teenage girls – one cursed, one hunted, one out for revenge – will team up to track down and take out a brutal supernatural killer. At the apartment of the fifth victim, Jude and Zara meet by chance, and there they find a clue that brings their paths crashing together: A strange business card bearing three words. Emer Byrne. Cursewriter.
Beasts of War by Ayana Gray
Once a prisoner to Fedu, the vengeful god of death, Koffi has regained her freedom, but she is far from safe. Fedu will stop at nothing to hunt her down and use her power to decimate the mortal world. Koffi knows when Fedu will strike: during the next Bonding, a once-in-a-lifetime celestial event. To survive, Koffi will have to find powerful new allies quickly, and convince them to help her in the terrible battle to come.
Once a warrior-turned-runaway, Ekon has carved out a new life for himself outside Lkossa, but the shadows of his past still haunt him. Now, alongside unexpected friends, Ekon tries to focus on getting Koffi to the Kusonga Plains before the next Bonding. If he fails, Koffi will be consumed, either by her own dangerous power, or the terrible fate Ekon is doing everything he can to prevent. Ekon devotes himself to protecting Koffi, but the lingering threats from his own past are more urgent than he knows.
As Koffi and Ekon race to the Kusonga Plains–and try to garner the help of Eshōza’s ancient gods along the way–they must face a slew of dangerous beasts old and new. In the end, destiny may unite Koffi and Ekon for the last time–or tear them apart for good.
Little Bang by Kelly McCaughrain
Beneath the New Year’s Eve fireworks, shy science-nerd Mel and slacker songwriter Sid get pregnant on their first date. Any sixteen-year-olds would expect trouble – but this is Northern Ireland 2018, where abortion is still illegal.
Mel’s religious parents insist she must keep the baby, whilst Sid’s feminist mum pushes for a termination. Mel and Sid are determined to do this together, but they soon discover that pregnancy is totally different for boys and girls. When their relationship starts to fall apart under all the pressure, Mel finds herself feeling alone with the impossible dilemma of the Little Bang growing inside her.
Signed Sealed Dead by Cynthia Murphy
True-Crime obsessed Paige, and her family, move across the Atlantic to her father’s eerie hometown, and it’s not long before she uncovers the town’s dark history – a string of unsolved murders and disappearances in the 90s.
And then notes start appearing at their dilapidated old home, about the secrets the house is keeping. The clues lead Paige to a diary concealed in the walls that belonged to one of the missing girls. Could this be the key to solving a quarter-of-a-century mystery, or will this make Paige the next target?!