Book news, reviews and recommendations
Earlier in the year I reviewed Business as Usual, published by Handheld Press based just a few miles from where I live. It was a little outside my usual reading territory – Handheld specialise in reissuing largely forgotten books by women – but I loved it: a welcome piece of escapism during the height of …
Several times recently I’ve enjoyed novels I might have otherwise dismissed thanks to a puff from authors whose own work I particularly enjoy. In the case of Jessica Anthony’s Enter the Aardvark it was the ‘fresh, witty and smart’ comment from one of my all time favourites, Kate Atkinson, that sealed the deal. Without it, …
Enter the Aardvark by Jessica Anthony: A winning combination of taxidermy and politics Read More »
Timur Vermes is clearly not a man to shy away from controversy. His sharp, very funny satire, Look Who’s Back, nailed the internet’s potential for political manipulation with admirable, if unsettling, prescience when Hitler wakes up with a bad headache in 2011 and quickly becomes a YouTube star. The Hungry and the Fat takes on …
It’s been well over four years since Scarlett Thomas’ The Seed Collectors was published. Since then she’s produced three children’s books. I’d been eyeing the schedules hoping for another adult novel, wondering if her writing career had taken a permanent turn when Oligarchy turned up. This short, biting novel should please Thomas fans with its …
Oligarchy by Scarlett Thomas: Sharp, funny and very, very dark Read More »
I’m sharing the last stop on The Capital‘s blog tour with Reader Dad. I’m not one for blog tours – this may well be both my first and last – but I couldn’t say no to this one. If you’ve been reading this blog for the last couple of years, you’ll be in no doubt …
The Capital by Robert Menasse (transl. Jamie Bulloch): Better in than out Read More »
I’ve been a keen fan of Patrick deWitt’s fiction since reading his darkly comic ripping yarn, The Sisters Brothers. His last novel, Undermajordomo Minor, was entirely different having more than a touch of the Gothic fairy tale about it. French Exit takes yet another turn with its caustic caricature of the wealthy upper classes, taking …
French Exit by Patrick deWitt: Squewering the rich Read More »
Catherine Lacey’s second novel arrived with a press release mentioning Margaret Atwood. I tend to ignore these bits of paper until I’ve finished the book, preferring to read it with an open mind. A few chapters in, however, Atwood’s was the name that popped into my head. Not such a cheeky comparison after all for …
The Answers by Catherine Lacey: Love, whatever that Is Read More »
I first spotted The Nix back in September last year on our riding the Central European railways holiday. It was sitting on a table in the English bookshop wing of Dussmann’s in Berlin, too chunky to justify including in the luggage that had to be hefted on and off the train. It looked right up …
The Nix by Nathan Hill: Nothing ventured, nothing gained Read More »
Way back in the mid-‘90s, Jonathan Coe published What a Carve Up!, a wickedly funny satire on Thatcherism in which the Winshaw family had their fingers in a multitude of nasty pies. I was in bookselling at the time and my Penguin rep and good friend, A, gave me a proof, praising it to the …
Number 11 by Jonathan Coe: The Winshaws are back… Read More »
Sloane Crosley has published two collections of essays including one with the wonderfully peevish title I Was Told There’d be Cake, or at least it sounds peevish to me which may tell you something about how I feel about cake and broken promises. The Clasp is her first novel, a classic comedy of manners in …
The Clasp by Sloane Crosley: Growing up is hard to do Read More »
Adolf Hitler wakes up with a dreadful headache. He’s a little bemused to find himself lying in what seems to be a wasteland. He picks himself up and makes his way to a news kiosk where he’s astonished to find that it’s August 30th 2011. He’s at a loss to know what’s happened but the …