Review by Liz Dexter “Having been lost in the Great Fire and again to the Blitz, Christ Church has now arguably been lost again, figuratively, to London’s neoliberal appetites.”(p. 35)…
Review by Liz Dexter While I come at this topic through the lens of my own experience, I share this journey because I believe anyone can learn and benefit from…
Review by Rob Spence Belles-Lettres is a term you rarely hear nowadays, but once upon a time, it was quite common, as a description for those literary items that defied…
Review by Annabel I’m becoming addicted to the Melville House ‘Futures’ series – see my reviews of Fraud, Gardens, Energy and Trust. The series comprises short non-fiction, extended essays to…
Review by Annabel Oscar de Muriel is Mexican, but based in the UK, where he came to finish his PhD. He’s a chemist and violinist as well an established author,…
Reviewed by Harriet Loneliness does not come from having no people about one, but from not being able to communicate the things that seem important to oneself, or from holding…
Review by Karen Langley Denis Johnson was a prolific American author, producing during his writing life nine novels, one novella, two books of short stories, three collections of poetry, two…
Review by Annabel Being a 1960-born baby, I was a t(w)eenager all through the 1970s, from start to finish. The decade encompassed my whole time at senior school and my…
Translated from Catalan by Peter Bush Review by Michael Eaude In 1940s and 1950s Spain, young people rarely heard their parents explain anything about the 1936-39 Civil War. The war…
Reviewed by Liz Dexter The countryside belongs to everyone. (Michael Morpurgo, Foreword) This interesting volume by the renowned and doughty nature and countryside publisher Little Toller Books brings together essays,…
Reviewed by Harriet I’m a great admirer of Anthony Horowitz’s crime novels, especially the two series which are so brilliantly metafictonal. One is the Sue Ryland series, starting with Magpie…
A short review by Annabel We don’t often review children’s books at Shiny, but when Lonely Planet sent me the latest in their ‘Kid’s Guide’ series after we’d reviewed some…
Reviewed by Harriet Just out in paperback, Lucy Steeds’ debut novel was greeted with much praise when published at the beginning of last year, and was selected by Waterstones as…
Review by Annabel Les Fugitives is a small indie press that initially specialised in French translations, of both literary fiction and nonfiction (see here). Lately, they’ve widened their scope to…
Review by Liz Dexter Then there was Dungeness itself. True to its contrary nature, slack water came around the headland a couple of hours either side of the peak or…
Compiled by Annabel We haven’t done one of our archive reading lists for a couple of years, but what better occasion to celebrate belatedly than Sir David Attenborough reaching his…
Translated by Kate McNaughton Review by Karen Langley Nobel-prize winner Herta Muller is a Romanian-German novelist, poet and essayist who’s known for work which captures the experience of living under…
Review by Peter Reason Melissa Harrison combines duties as novelist and nature writer. Her nature writing often takes a narrative form, and her novels pay greater respect to the contribution…
Translated by Bryan Karetnyk Review by Karen Langley When faced with a totalitarian regime and a disintegrating world, how should the writer or artist respond? In many cases they turn…
Review by Annabel I was always going to pick up this book – galactic cats on the cover! A must-read: luckily, the contents were also brilliantly quirky. Somehow I’ve never…
Review by Annabel I’ve reviewed three of Melville House’s ‘Futures’ series previously for Shiny, (Gardens, Energy and Trust). They are punchy little flapped paperbacks of under 200 pages, each written…
Review by Rob Spence We don’t celebrate the linguistic diversity of these isles anything like enough. Just think of the rich heritage of Welsh, Gaelic, Irish, Manx, Scots, Cornish, Norn…
Reviewed by Harriet ‘That woman is a hyena in petticoats’ I wonder how many people would have guessed from the title and the cover clip from a portrait who the…
Review by Annabel This is only the second book by TJR that I’ve read, Daisy Jones & the Six being the first. While Daisy is unique in style, being written as documentary…
