This series is an adaptation of something I saw on Twitter – people were posting 26 books in 26 days, each title beginning with a different letter of the alphabet. However, I’m planning on taking around 26 months to get to Z. Each month I’ll post a newish book I’ve enjoyed, plus a children’s book and an older book.

This month, after a bit of a delay due to one thing and another, it’s the S books:

Your best friend dies. All because of you. How do you go on?

Layla is struggling to come to terms with the death of her best friend, Danni, at a student party almost a year ago. Perhaps she never will – because only Layla knows the truth about what happened that night.

Danni’s parents, Melody and Reece, invite Layla for weekend visits to their Sussex farmhouse home, and she’s happy to accept – until Melody’s increasing dependence on her sends out warning signals. Although she knows it’s time to break away, for all their sakes, Layla’s guilt over Danni’s death has her returning, time and again.

When Layla meets Morgan, the connection between them is unmistakable. But until she confronts the past, she can’t face the future, let alone allow herself to fall in love.

There is only one way out: Layla must confess her secret to Danni’s parents. But can she risk breaking their hearts all over again? And will Morgan still love her, once he discovers the kind of person she really is?

It’s the hardest decision. And time is running out…

This is lovely, insightful book – who doesn’t remember being that age, coming to terms with being an adult, trying to make sense of what the world throws at you. It isn’t easy, and like most kids, Layla doesn’t always get it right. A great read from Deirdre Palmer.

Set on Guernsey and the Channel Islands

The seven scamps have built up something of a reputation for themselves. From Madelaine, who was seventeen and therefore might have been supposed to know better, down to Tim, who was five and a handful, they were up to every mischievous trick imaginable.

It was hardly surprising they were involved in escapades with boats, ghostly midnight adventures on Lihou Island, and heroic rescues on the storm-girt island cliffs.

Elinor M. Brent-Dyer, of “Chalet School” fame, has added to her thousands of admirers with this fine book, the fourth in the La Rochelle series.

I was a huge fan of the Chalet School books when I was in my teens, and when I’d read them all I went on to collect the La Rochelle series too – some of the characters in these books return later as parents of Chalet School pupils. My copies are all aged and worn used hardbacks, but I have all seven.

If you’re a Sister, there’s no such thing as a mistake

Sister can cope with any crisis you can imagine. Everyone knows that – patients, doctors and nurses all believe it.

Today, Helen Davies dons that blue uniform for the first time. She’s proud, excited – and scared. Twenty-eight patients will be in her care. Can she handle it?

Because being a Sister isn’t just a job like any other…

This book is set in the eighties, when I was a young physiotherapist. The author has “drawn on eighteen years’ experience in nursing”, and every word in the book rings true.

Next time, it’s the ‘T’ books!
(And I’ll just mention that The Attic Room is 99p on kindle in Amazon’s UK Twelve Days of Christmas Sale…)