Book news, reviews and recommendations
This is an unusual one for me as it’s been published for a few months now, but I enjoyed Douglas Bruton’s With or Without Angels so much that I was more than happy to accept his offer of a review copy. Hope Never Knew Horizon weaves together three reimagined stories: the exhibiting of the Wexford […]
Hope Never Knew Horizon by Douglas Bruton: ‘Just breathe’ Read More »
I was pitched Paddy Crewe’s True Love because of my liking for Donal Ryan. Ever sceptical of such comparisons, I checked out Goodreads to find two Ryan mentions then twigged that Crewe was the author of My Name is Yip which has been sitting on my TBR shelves for a while. It seemed a safe
True Love by Paddy Crewe: Love and healing Read More »
There’s a marriage theme running through the first part of August’s preview, not happy ones but those don’t tend to make for interesting fiction. I enjoyed Charlotte Mendelson’s The Exhibitionist so was delighted when Wife popped through my letterbox. Zoe and her supremely egotistical wife, Penny, have two daughters and a complicated set of co-parents,
Books to Look Out For in August 2024: Part One 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 – Kairos to The Night Guest 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. Tobias Hill’s Underground is an unusual one for me. It’s a thriller, not a genre I read much
Blasts from the Past: Underground by Tobias Hill (1999) Read More »
Perhaps because I’m in one, I’m attracted to fiction about long relationships which are as different from each other as the couples involved. I included a post in my Five Books I’ve Read series and could probably write several more on the theme. Acclaimed Swedish writer Moa Herngren’s The Divorce explores the end of a
The Divorce by Moa Herngren (transl. Alice Menzies): Two sides of the story Read More »
Part two of July’s paperback preview kicks off with two superb novels from Irish writers, both favourites from last year. Sheila Armstrong’s Falling Animals spans a year in which the authorities try to trace the identity of a corpse found on an Irish beach within sight of the shipwreck that caught fire a while ago,
Paperbacks to Look Out For in July 2024: Part Two Read More »
So many readers whose opinions I trust enjoyed Catherine Newman’s We All Want Impossible Things that I snapped up Sandwich which came with a feelgood billing and a Cape Cod setting, one of which I was sorely in need of after thinking too much about the state of the world, the other I find irresistible
Sandwich by Catherine Newman: Learning to let go Read More »
I was in two minds about reading Tom Lamont’s debut, Going Home. The synopsis made me think it might wander off into mawkishly sentimental territory but Lamont appeared on the Observer’s ’10 Best New Novelists of 2024’ list alongside Leo Vardiashvili whose Hard By a Great Forest I’d very much enjoyed so I decided to
Going Home by Tom Lamont: We are family Read More »
This first, disappointingly thin, instalment of July paperbacks begins with one I’ve already read. C. Pam Zhang’s Land of Milk and Honey is a slice of dystopian fiction in which a chef recalls her year in an Italian mountain top restaurant sufficiently elevated to lift it above the smog that enveloped the world. While everyone
Paperbacks to Look Out For in July 2024: Part One Read More »
I’ve been reading Anna Quindlen’s quietly perceptive novels for years, wondering if she might get the Elizabeth Strout style recognition she deserves here in the UK. It didn’t happen with either Still Life with Breadcrumbs or Alternate Side but perhaps it will with After Annie which spans the year after Annie Brown’s death, following her
After Annie by Anna Quindlen: ‘There’s no right or wrong way to grieve’ Read More »