The Librarian by Mikhail Elizarov
Translated by Andrew Bromfield Reviewed by Karen Langley We all believe in the transformative power of literature; however, what would happen if books really did change us in dramatic ways, bringing strength…
Translated by Andrew Bromfield Reviewed by Karen Langley We all believe in the transformative power of literature; however, what would happen if books really did change us in dramatic ways, bringing strength…
Translated from the French by Roland Glasser and Louise Rogers Lalaurie. Reviewed by Jean Morris The year is 1649 or thereabouts. In a verdant Swiss valley, a tall, bearded old…
Reviewed by Max Dunbar There’s an episode of the classic US prison show Oz where a new governor brings back the death penalty and sentences Jefferson Keane, a gangster serving life, as the…
Reviewed by Victoria In 2013, Alice Munro was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature, to put on the mantlepiece alongside her 2009 Man Booker International award, the National Book Critics…
Reviewed by Helen Parry It is 1872 and Max Duncker, handsome, young and irresponsible, is blessed with a not-too-onerous role in the publishing company he shares with his elder brother…
Reviewed by Victoria Moses Sweetland is an ornery, tough-skinned, self-sufficient, stubborn old man and he’s also a remarkably tenacious and vital force of life in Michael Crummey’s Robinson Crusoe-esque novel….
Reviewed by Victoria If I ever get to meet Matt Haig, the first thing I would like to do, now I’ve read his book, is give him a hug. I’m…
Reviewed by Hayley Anderton No matter how many classics I read it never fails to surprise me how little people, or even society, seem to change. The realism of The Whirlpool reminded…
Reviewed by Harriet I was strong and he was not so it was me went to war to defend the Republic. I stepped across the border out of Indiana into…
Reviewed by Bookgazing Holly Black is one of the reigning queens of modern gothic. Her novel The Coldest Girl in Coldtown presented an original, nightmarish vampire world that mixed garish tourist stops,…
Reviewed by Stefanie Hollmichel I first read Orlando by Virginia Woolf many years ago. Fresh in love with Woolf’s writing and having just learned about her romance with Vita Sackville-West, I read…
Reviewed by Judith Wilson I began reading Weathering whilst staying on a Cornish estuary within sight of the sea, on a cold, damp day. This was fortuitous as the book is set…
Reviewed by Rebecca Foster Ann Morgan is a freelance writer for the Guardian, among other publications, and also part of a dedicated tribe of book bloggers. She spent 2011 on a…
Reviewed by Kate Gardner This novel (novella really – even bulked out with short stories, an introduction and a preface it’s still barely 200 pages) explores childhood, and specifically that…
Reviewed by Annabel After the success of her memoir Bedsit Disco Queen (which I reviewed here) in which she told us how she joined a band and had a brilliant…
Reviewed by Gill Davies This is a very enjoyable novel, in the American crime genre but with lots of other things going on too. It has a lively style, some…
Reviewed by Victoria Writing a family memoir can be a tricky business in these days of ever more sensitively judgemental readers. There’s a subset who disapproves of anything that smacks…
Reviewed by Victoria In this outstanding work of cinema history, Mark Harris follows the fortunes of five big name Hollywood directors who enlisted in the wake of Pearl Harbour to…
Reviewed by Simon I have a definite weakness for spoof etiquette guides and the like – such as Bed Manners, reviewed in the third issue of Shiny New Books – and…
Reviewed by Lyn Baines In an Afterword to this new edition of George Sanders’ memoir, his niece, Ulla Watson, describes him as the opposite to the cads and bounders he played…
Reviewed by Annabel Subtitled ‘Wonderings and Reflections on Growing Up Gracefully’, All I Know Now is part memoir, part advice guide for teens, by one of the big stars of vlogging. Carrie…
Translated from Finnish by Emily Jeremiah and Fleur Jeremiah Reviewed by Kate Gardner I’ll warn you from the start: this is not the book to read if you’re feeling a…
Interview by Victoria V: There’s been a spate of social media bullying cases in the news these past few years; was there any one particular event that sparked the idea…
Reviewed by Victoria Some of the most powerful stories about children and adolescents are the ones, like Lord of the Flies, that send chills down your spine. Make the children high…