Book news, reviews and recommendations
I snapped up Brandon Taylor’s new novel as soon as it appeared on NetGalley having very much enjoyed The Late Americans. Minor Black Figures spans a Manhattan summer following Wyeth, a black artist, and his relationship with Keating who he meets one night in a bar after visiting the opening of the latest glitzy identity […]
Minor Black Figures by Brandon Taylor: Art for art’s sake Read More »
March’s snapshot includes a Swedish short story collection from a writer whose novels I’ve enjoyed, a piece of non-fiction in which the author is absent, and a novel largely set in 1990s New York. The short story collection I’m reading is Sara Stridberg’s beautifully expressed Hunter in Huskvarna. Her writing is often lyrical, vividly summoning
A Snapshot of My Reading #13 Read More »
April’s first batch of paperbacks includes three of my books of last year beginning with one from a favourite author. Robert Seethaler‘s The Café with No Name opens in 1960s Vienna against a backdrop of a social change as the city picks itself up after the war. It follows Robert Simon, an orphan and market
Paperbacks to Look Out For in April 2026: Part One Read More »
I’d not read either of Kiran Millwood Hargrave’s previous novels, drawn to Almost Life by the blurb’s comparison with David Nicholls’s One Day half expecting to be disappointed. Spanning thirty-five years, it follows Laure and Erica who meet one summer morning in 1978 on the steps of Sacré Coeur when Erica smiles at Laure after
Almost Life by Kiran Millwood Hargrave: ‘There is nothing we could not do together’ Read More »
Those of you with long memories might recall M. L. Stedman’s debut, The Light Between Oceans, published in the UK back in 2012. I loved it which made me keen to read her new one, A Far-flung Life. Largely set in the 1950s and ‘60s on a sheep station in Western Australia, it follows the
We’re in New York for the first three titles in April’s second preview, Ireland for the last three and Iceland for one in the middle. Jay McInerney’s See You on the Other Side is the fourth and final instalment of the series which spans four decades in the lives of New York golden couple, Russell
Books to Look Out For in April 2026: Part Two Read More »
Six Degrees of Separation is a meme hosted by Kate over at Books Are My Favourite and Best. It works like this: each month a book is chosen as a starting point and linked to six others to form a chain. A book doesn’t need to be connected to all the titles on the list,
Six Degrees of Separation – Wuthering Heights to The Sound of One Hand Clapping Read More »
This is the latest in a series of occasional posts featuring books I read years ago about which I was wildly enthusiastic at the time, wanting to press a copy in as many hands as I could. I read anything I could get my hands on by Barbara Trapido back in the ‘90s. She’s one
Blasts from the Past: The Travelling Hornplayer by Barbara Trapido (1998) Read More »
I’d not come across Stephanie Sy-Quia before a proof of A Private Man turned up. She’s an award-wining poet which predisposed me towards reading it. Like many debut novelists, Sy-Quia draws on her family history and, as the granddaughter of a Catholic priest, hers is a fascinating one. A Private Man tells the story of
A Private Man by Stephanie Sy-Quia: ‘There are many different ways to have an affair.’ Read More »
The first instalment of April’s preview begins with two I’ve already read. Divided into three parts, Ben Lerner’s Transcription follows an unnamed narrator who knocks his phone into a filled washbasin while preparing to interview his mentor, the father of Max, his best friend. Setting off fretfully to Thomas’s house, he finds him disconcertingly altered.
Books to Look Out For in April 2026: Part One Read More »
I dithered over Debra Curtis’s Laws of Love and Logic which sounded from the blurb as if it might be a straightforward tragic love story. There was also a worrying degree of brouhaha around it but I decided to take the plunge. Spanning three decades, beginning in the 1976, Curtis’s debut follows Lily, the elder
Laws of Love and Logic by Debra Curtis: ‘Guilt is both long and cruel’ Read More »