Out of the Darkness: The Germans 1942-2022 – by Frank Trentmann
Review by Liz Dexter Over the course of the last eighty years, Germany has gone through a remarkable moral and material regeneration. The two have pulled the country in opposite…
The Sequel by Jean Hanff Korelitz
Reviewed by Harriet Sequels can be very enticing when the initial book has done well. Readers want to know what happens to a character they’ve connected with. So says a…
Lady Living Alone by Norah Lofts
Reviewed by Harriet In the year 1932, Miss Penelope Shadow published a book which instantly became a best seller. It was her fourth book and not, in her opinion, markedly…
Karla’s Choice by Nick Harkaway
Review by Annabel When it was announced that Nick Harkaway, one of the lateJohn Le Carré’s sons, was going to write another Smiley novel, I rubbed my hands with glee….
Mammoth by Eva Baltasar
Translated by Julia Sanches Review by Michael Eaude Ice and Fire Mammoth is the third novel in Eva Baltasar’s big-selling trilogy, each featuring young women in search of love with…
Small Things Like These: from Novella to Screen
A film review by Arti Here’s an interesting fact: Claire Keegan’s books Foster (2010) and Small Things Like These (2020), both have 128 pages. While short as standalone books, both novellas exemplify Keegan’s style…
Midnight in Vienna – Jane Thynne
Reviewed by Elaine Simpson-Long Several years ago I was sent a copy of Black Roses by this author, the first in her Clara Vine series. Clara is an Anglo-German actress…
The Unfinished Harauld Hughes by Richard Ayoade
Review by Annabel Underneath the comic, often socially awkward, character exterior of Richard Ayoade lives a real intellectual and talented writer, who puts on a clever act to fool us…
Dickens: The Funny Bits, compiled by R.J. Cruikshank
Review by Karen Langley Victorian novelist Charles Dickens is an iconic figure; known for his chunky novels, filled with vivid characters, social commentary and campaigning, he’s also occasionally dismissed because…
Death at the Sign of the Rook by Kate Atkinson
Reviewed by Harriet He had spent a good two weeks being sensible and mature, and then he bought a Land Rover Defender instead. It was a rugged, blokey kind of…
This Volcanic Isle: The Violent Processes that Forged the British Landscape, by Robert Muir-Wood
Review by Liz Dexter We now realize that throughout the past 66 million years, this land has been far from quiescent. It has been split by magma-filled cracks, wracked by…
Dear Dickhead by Virginie Despentes
Translated by Frank Wynne Review by Annabel I would never have predicted that Virginie Despentes, creator/director of the 2000 rape-revenge novel and film Baise-moi, author of the superb ‘State of…
Tell Me Everything by Elizabeth Strout
Reviewed by Harriet I discovered the wonderful Elizabeth Strout back in 2017, when I reviewed My Name is Lucy Barton for Shiny. Since then I’ve reviewed another four of her…
Birds, Beasts and Bedlam: Turning My Farm into an Ark for Lost Species by Ben Gow
Review by Liz Dexter If you wish to bludgeon badgers or beavers or remove peregrine falcons and hen harrier chicks from their nests, a way can be found. If you…
Gabriel’s Moon by William Boyd
Reviewed by Harriet William Boyd’s latest novel has been almost overwhelmingly greeted with admiration and praise. ‘A Spy Story to rival Restless’ is the Guardian’s headline, harking back to Boyd’s…
Material: The Art of Handcrafting Beautiful Objects in a Digital Age by Nick Kary
Review by Frances Spurrier Kary starts his book by saying that he wants to help understand the relationship we all have fashioning our lives within the material structure of the…
Portrait of the Art Dealer as a Young Man: New York in the Sixties, by Michael Findlay
Review by Annabel My fascination with the 1960s (the decade in which I was a child), will never die. Add in the world of art and a New York setting…
Book to Screen: In Development, 2024 and Beyond
By Arti After looking at forthcoming releases in my last post, we turn to books that are being adapted and are currently in development or in production. James (2024) by Percival Everett…
Rare Singles by Benjamin Myers
Review by Annabel Myers is one of those British authors who writes something totally different every time he puts pen to paper, with the exception that almost all of his…
The Watermark by Sam Mills
Reviewed by Harriet Sam Mills is not a prolific writer, but her books are well worth waiting for. In 2012 she published The Quiddity of Will Self, which she described…
The Ghost Lake by Wendy Pratt
Review by Peter Reason Ghost Lake is a paleolithic, extinct lake that lies between the Yorkshire Wolds and Scarborough. In prehistoric times it was a real lake, the centre of…
Loving Sylvia Plath: A Reclamation by Emily van Duyne
Written by Victoria Best There’s a lot going on in Emily van Duyne’s intriguingly hybrid work on Sylvia Plath, a book that has its feet in scholarship and its head…
Warsaw Tales, selected and translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones
Review by Rob Spence The only time I have been in Warsaw was in 1988, before the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the subsequent collapse of the Soviet Union. …
Books into Film: Fall 2024
By Arti The annual film festival season kicks off in late August, and come September, there are arrays of new offerings on streaming platforms. I haven’t done actual research, but…