From the very first page, Jo’s voice feels like a warm hand held out across the table. She welcomes readers into her “Carers’ Day Out” with exclamation marks of joy and sincerity — not the polished punctuation of publishing convention, but the spontaneous rhythm of someone who has lived what she writes. Her enthusiasm, sincerity, and gratitude radiate through every line: “All you need is the desire to feel closer to your loved ones…and the willingness to have a go!” It’s not the voice of a theorist; it’s the voice of a daughter who has learned, through heartbreak and hope, what care really means.

A story could take you anywhere… and in Where Are We Going and Are We Nearly There Yet?, Paul Hodson invites us on a journey without a map — a wide-ranging, deeply humane reflection on what it means to be human in a world that feels simultaneously ancient and new. The title sounds almost whimsical, the question of an impatient child in the back seat, but it is also a cry from civilisation itself: have we made progress, and if so, towards what?

A story could take you anywhere — and in Sandra Jackson-Trench’s The Secret Adventure Machine, “anywhere” means quite literally anywhere. One minute you’re an eight-year-old boy in suburban Birmingham, clutching your new MadTab 2.0 tablet; the next, you’re chasing villains through New York, dodging spies in Beijing, and discovering that imagination might be the most powerful technology of all.

Dystopian fiction has long fascinated readers with its ability to reflect the cracks in our own societies through exaggerated, often terrifying, futures. In Utopia?, R.A. Rowlingson takes up this challenge with remarkable assurance, offering not merely another bleak vision of tomorrow but a layered narrative that combines political intrigue, social critique, and deeply human storytelling.

Patrick Tooban has achieved something rare: a historical novel that feels at once grand in scope and intimate in detail, scholarly in grounding yet poetic in telling. The Oak and the Eagles is not just a story about a forgotten figure of Celtic history — it is an invitation to step into a world where oak and eagle, prophecy and memory, flesh and spirit, are woven into the fabric of life. Readers who accept that invitation may well find themselves lingering by the fire, listening for the echoes of Calgach’s tale long after the book is closed.

No Free Speech for Hate is a work of conviction, scholarship, and humanity. It is bold without being strident, rigorous without being dry, and urgent without being alarmist. In the current climate—where words have never carried more weight, and where democracies everywhere are being tested—it feels like essential reading.

Jack Landon, a thirteen-year-old Goth with a knack for getting into trouble, is sarcastic, stubborn, vulnerable, and instantly sympathetic – the kind of protagonist you root for even when he makes questionable decisions. His life is turned upside down when he finds himself pursued by a mysterious man, stunned by a robot, and whisked into a completely unfamiliar reality. Here he meets Dorothy, a so-called Guardian Angel who is equal parts wise, chaotic, and hilarious. She offers Jack biscuits, sweets, and tambourines as if these are the essentials for surviving both adolescence and interdimensional crises.

Chris Bulteel‘s life has been somewhat exceptional. Alongside a career in catering that lasted 30 years, he also became Mayor of two different towns and gained the extremely rare accolade of Sheriff in one of them. But arguably most remarkable, is his career in the care sector, where through a great deal of hard work he reached a senior position before humbly retiring.