Book news, reviews and recommendations
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 »
While I’d read none of the titles previewed in April’s first instalment, three are tried and tested in the second batch beginning with the first. I’ve long been a fan of Percival Everett so jumped at the chance to read James, a reimagining of Mark Twain’s American classic, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Everett’s novel turns
Books to Look Out For in April 2024: Part Two Read More »
June’s first batch of new fiction began with a much trumpeted novel with a literary theme as does the second. Lots of pre-publication brouhaha for Francesca Reece’s Voyeur which sees a young woman who’s left London for Paris, delighted when she gets a job as a writer’s assistant. Leah’s enthusiasm proves infectious, inspiring Michael to
Books to Look Out For in June 2021: Part Two Read More »
I’ve read three of the paperbacks that have caught my eye for January, one of which is Jim Powell’s Things We Nearly Knew, a slice of American small town life seen through the eyes of an unnamed bartender. I’d enjoyed Powell’s second novel, Trading Futures, a few years back, admiring its narrator’s waspishly funny inner
Paperbacks to Look Out for in January 2019: Part One Read More »
Whereas there was no contest for my first June selection’s lead title, two novels jostle for that position in the second. Tim Winton wins by a whisker with The Shepherd’s Hut. Jaxie Clackton has long since put home behind him when a dramatic event leaves him with nothing, catapulting him into a journey across the
Books to Look Out for in June 2018: Part Two Read More »
At the beginning of 2014 I wrote one of those posts that I thought was just for my own satisfaction but which generated some interesting discussion. It was called ‘the first book of the year’ and it covered a decade of reading, all neatly recorded in a notebook that I still keep. I know we’re
The Last Book of the Year Read More »
I’ve admired Rupert Thomson’s work for some time. His novels are never predictable, always exploring unexpected terrain from the advertising world, satirized in Soft!, to the Medici court in Secrecy‘s seventeenth century Florence. The last one’s my particular favourite. Famously, Davie Bowie’s is The Insult which appeared as one of his 100 Must-Read Books of
Katherine Carlyle by Rupert Thomson: A sense of belonging Read More »
Well, knock me down with a feather! I would never have expected to be posting a two-part November hardback preview. Often it’s a rather dull publishing month but here it is: part one of two starting off with a new Jonathan Coe. I’m treating this one with caution as after many years of Coe fandom
Books to Look Out For in November 2015: Part 1 Read More »