Book news, reviews and recommendations
Back in 2001, I was very taken with a novel called Pages for You. It was a love story, telling of the intense almost visceral affair between seventeen-year-old Flannery and her teacher Anne, ten years her lover’s senior. Since then I’ve read and thoroughly enjoyed Sylvia Brownrigg’s The Delivery Room, a very different novel. When […]
Pages for Her by Sylvia Brownrigg: Flannery and Anne reprised Read More »
I have to confess that these are the first short stories I’ve read by Tove Jansson although I’ve very much enjoyed her novellas, given a new lease of lease of life by the lovely Sort of Books. I’ve harboured a fondness for them since their publicist sent me a copy of The Moomins and the
Letters from Klara by Tove Jansson (transl. Thomas Teal): Short stories to delight in Read More »
It was clear even before I opened Fiona Melrose’s new novel that it was going to be an homage to Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway: it follows a set of disparate characters through a single day as one of them prepares for a party on December 6th, 2013. Just as Woolf’s novel reflected the preoccupations of
Johannesburg by Fiona Melrose: Mrs Dalloway goes to South Africa 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. Way back in my bookselling days I remember being given a proof of Elizabeth Hay’s Garbo Laughs. It
Blasts from the Past: Late Nights on Air by Elizabeth Hay (2007) Read More »
I’m not an avid thriller reader as regular visitors here will know but last year one did find its way onto my books of the year list – Annemarie Neary’s Siren, notable for its sharp, pithy writing and smart psychological insights. Her new novel opens in Goa, a world away from Siren’s Northern Irish setting,
The Orphans by Annemarie Neary: The kids are not alright Read More »
Regular readers of this blog will probably know that I’ll take any opportunity to bang on about Nickolas Butler’s debut Shotgun Lovesongs. I even managed to get it into my first Six Degrees of Separation post. No surprise, then, that The Hearts of Men was one of the books I was looking forward to most
The Hearts of Men by Nickolas Butler: What maketh the man? Read More »
Unusually for us, H and I chose to go back to the same village and even the same hotel for this year’s walking holiday. Adelboden is a sweet little town in the Berner Oberland area of Switzerland. It’s set in a lovely valley with a waterfall at one end so picturesque it looked as if
One Week in the Swiss Alps and Just One Book Read More »
Despite swearing off Man Booker predictions a few years back I can’t seem to keep away although I must emphasize that my track record is pretty dismal so don’t go laying any bets on my suggestions. To be eligible for the prize all books must be published in the UK between October 1st 2016 and
My 2017 Man Booker wish list Read More »
I liked the sound of Ann Leary’s new novel even before I remembered how much I’d enjoyed The Good House. Looking back at my review of that I see that I was after something ‘absorbing but relatively unchallenging’ thanks to the befuddlement of a cold. This time I was engaged in that traditional British summer
The Children by Ann Leary: Happy families Read More »
The Cut is the second in the Peirene Now! series, books commissioned by the publisher’s founder, Mieke Ziervogel, in response to the questions shaping our world. The first was Olumide Popoola and Annie Holmes’ collection, breach, based on the stories they’d gathered in Calais and the now defunct ‘Jungle’ refugee camp just outside the town.
The Cut by Anthony Cartwright: A tale of two countries Read More »
Every now and then a book comes along about which it’s hard not to gush. Victoria’s Redel’s lovely Before Everything fits that bill for me. I was very much attracted by its premise – five women, friends since school, come together when one of them is dying – but I hadn’t expected the bonus of
Before Everything by Victoria Redel: A gorgeous paean of praise to friendship Read More »