Book news, reviews and recommendations
I’m beginning with the only one I’ve read from this second instalment of April paperbacks. Narrated by the self-deprecating Rocky, Catherine Newman’s Sandwich spans a week in the holiday let she and her husband have rented for almost twenty years. They and their grown-up children cram themselves into the tiny cottage, joined later by Rocky’s […]
Paperbacks to Look Out For in April 2025: Part Two Read More »
This second instalment of July’s fiction is a very mixed bag beginning with the second novel from an author whose debut couldn’t be more different. As the title suggests Paddy Crewe’s True Love is a love story but far from what you might call a romance. Keely and Finn are two damaged young people who
Books to Look Out For in July 2024: Part Two Read More »
Despite being fortunate to live in a beautiful city, H and I felt in need of a change of scene and were lucky enough to snap up a cheap deal in an aparthotel in spitting distance of the Tower of London. Our first outing was a walk from St Katherine Docks along the canal to
Seven Days in London and Two Half-books plus the Memory of Another Read More »
Hard as it may seem to credit, it’s already nearly time for the announcement of The Women’s Prize for Fiction longlist: Wednesday, 10th March is the date to add to your jam-packed diary. Only novels written by women in English published between April 1st 2020 and March 31st 2021 qualify. Over the past few years
My Wishlist for the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2021 Read More »
The second part of March’s paperback goodies starts with three books I’ve already read, two of which were favourites from last year, beginning with Eley Williams’ The Liar’s Dictionary in which a young woman, interning for the publisher of an unfinished encyclopaedic dictionary, fields the threatening phone calls made to its office with monotonous regularity.
Paperbacks to Look Out For in March 2021: Part Two Read More »
Summer saw a return to more serious reading after spring’s escapism, perhaps because we were experiencing a little respite from the pandemic in the UK. Coincidentally, both June choices overlapped in terms of their unusual theme, exploring the repercussions of nuclear fission. The first was Stuart Evers’ The Blind Light, a little daunting in its
Books of the Year 2020: Part Three 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 – From Rodham to Spider Read More »
I remember Eley Williams’ collection of short stories, Attrib, being garlanded with praise from all sorts of people whose opinions I trust back in 2017 when it was published. I’ve no idea why I didn’t get around to reading it, being well over my short story aversion by then, particularly as its themes seem to
The Liar’s Dictionary by Eley Williams: ’The action of telling lies in an artful way’ Read More »
Another year, another Booker Prize longlist in the offing although this year has been far from normal both in the book world and beyond with titles bouncing around the publishing schedules like tennis balls thanks to the pandemic. I’d half expected a postponement of the longlist announcement but the Booker brigade seem to be sticking
My 2020 Booker Wish List Read More »
Unlike the first, this second instalment of July’s preview begins with a book by a lesser known author, Robbie Arnott’s The Rain Heron, which I’ve already read. Set some time after a military coup against the backdrop of a world beset by weather extremes, Arnott’s beautifully expressed novel explores themes of love, redemption and hope
Books to Look Out For in July 2020: Part Two Read More »