The Tin Princess by Philip Pullman

It is 1882 Sally Goldberg is away to America with her new husband leaving young Jim Taylor, consulting detective, to take the helm in the fourth Sally Lockhart mystery.

In pursuit of a lost girl Jim finds a princess: Adelaide was last seen escaping from the fire that killed Sally's love Frederick.  Now she's engaged to be married to Prince Rudolf, Crown Prince of the tiny kingdom of Razkavia and there are plenty of forces arraigned against her.  Jim finds himself assigned as her protector as they travel with Razkavian exile and interpreter Becky Winter to the country, bordered and threatened by Austria and Germany who both have their eyes on the prize of Razkavia's tin mines.  Murder, skulduggery, high politics and the transformation of a cockney prostitute to a Crown Princess makes for a hell of a ride of a story, entertaining and ultimately heart warming.

The Book of Dead Days by Marcus Sedgwick

Two children, Boy, nameless servant and Willow, assistant to singer Madame Beauchance. A magician and alchemist named Valerian using Boy and infernal powers to create illusions for his act at the Great Theatre.

It is the Dead Days, those oddly quiet days between Christmas and New Year. And a terrible drama plays out in the City, a great sprawling decaying metropolis gripped in winter, once magnificent and powerful, now rotting and impoverished.

Valerian was always unpredicatable, carrying out his mysterious experiments in the rambling ruin of the Yellow House. But now he is becoming increasingly volatile as New Year and his deadline for an infernal pact runs out. Boy and Willow are drawn into a breakneck adventure trying to find a mysterious book that will let the slippery Valerian once more cheat his fate but at a terrible price.

Sedgwick's writing is fast paced but also evocative and haunting, you feel the cold of the City seep into your bones as you're borne away on his adventure.

Gossip from the Forest: The Tangled Roots of our Forests and Fairytales by Sarah Maitland

This is a difficult book to review because it has many many good points but there are areas where I feel a little uncomfortable with what Maitland has written.

Maitland breaks her book down into 12 chapters, visiting 12 forests one a month from March through to February.  Some are familiar names, like the Forest of Dean, the New Forest and Keilder Forest, others like Airyolland Wood and The Purgatory Wood are more obscure.  In her writings on these forests Maitland writes beautifully and eloquently on the history of each woodland and her experience within them, also reflecting on the way that the histories of the woods and that of fairytales are intertwined.

Between each chapter she gives us a fairytale but written from a new and thought provoking perspective, for instance, we hear from Hansel as he and Gretel have grown to adulthood and his thoughts on their experiences in the forest, from the woodcutter of Red Riding Hood and his reasons for becoming a recluse.  Last of all Maitland gives us an appropriately bewitching poetic history of the woodlands of Britain in the dreams of Briar Rose.

There is so much of interest in what Maitland has to say but there are things missing and she does at times repeat herself.  For instance, the focus appears to be on the Grimm canon of fairy tales, when she speaks of the Seven Swans fairytale she does not mention Hans Christian Andersen's similar The Twelve Swans and how the two relate.  However, these are small complaints, this is a book from which I learned much and was charmed by, a book that sends me straight back out to the woods.

What Could Possibly Go Wrong (Almost Naked Animals) by Sarah Courtauld

If you have watched Citv's Almost Naked Animals you'll have some idea of what to expect - anarchy, destruction and hysterical antics.  Howie is the hotel manager of the Banana Cabana (a mad dog), Octo the blue octopus receptionist, Bunny the much put upon Hotel Activities Director, Sloth the bellhop and Narwhal the singer.  All are Almost Naked except for swimwear.  The story begins with Howie surfing down the hotel lobby stairs on a washing machine, and goes full throttle from there.

It's a slight but colourful 57 pages in full colour, with a page of funky stickers at the back.  Warning, may induce sniggering, don't expect morals or uplifting narrative, just animals in pants...

Doctor Who: The Devil in the Smoke by Justin Richards (audio)

Victorian London, its snowing and two boys are futilely sweeping snow from the workhouse yard.  They give up and build a snowman, but then it begins to bleed.  They flee and one runs into the arms of a strange troll like man who takes him to meet Madame Vastra, the fabled Lizard Woman of Paternoster Row. 

But these monsters are the good guys and in fact it is one of the great and good of Victorian society that is bringing death to the streets.  As in all great Dr Who adventures there is alien involvement and impending doom for mankind.

A really entertaining spin off from 'The Snowmen' Dr Who episode, featuring the Siluran Madame Vastra who first appeared in 'A Good Man Goes to War' and the Sontaran Strax who is simply hilarious.

Nikolai Dante: The Romanov Dynasty by Robbie Morrison and Simon Fraser

Nikolai Dante first appeared in 2000AD.  It's the future and the Russian Revolution never happened.  In 2666 AD Nikolai Dante, son of a pirate, swashbuckler, rogue, seducer, swordsman, thief, vagabond is in Imperial prison.  Pardoned in return for completion of a misson he finds his heritage fighting alongside Jena, daughter of the Tsar.  On board a downed Romanov (rival family to the Tsar) spaceship he comes across a strange weapons crest which merges with him, granting supernatural powers and revealing his mysterious origins.  Great fun, well scripted and drawn

Far Rockaway by Charlie Fletcher

Cat Manno is in trouble.  Whilst sulking during a pre Christmas visit to her grandfather in New York with her parents she has stepped off the pavement and been hit by a fire engine.  Saved by her grandfather but suffering terrible head injuries she fights for survival.  As her body wanders the edges of life in operation theatres and intensive care inside her skull she is fighting for survival in high adventures inside the classic stories her grandfather read to her: Last of the Mohicans, Kidnapped!, Treasure Island.  A wonderful book about the magic that exists within stories but also a gripping pacy adventure.