August 31, 2017 The End of the Web by George Sims Reviewed by Harriet No, the title doesn’t refer to a predicted end of the internet. This is a 1976 novel, written before such things…
August 31, 2017 Separation by Sally Emerson Reviewed by Harriet I have to admit I’d never heard of Sally Emerson before the publishers offered me a couple of their recent reprints….
August 29, 2017 Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee Review by Gill Davies I am going to review two novels by Min Jin Lee (the other one is Patchinko – see here). This…
August 29, 2017 Patchinko by Min Jin Lee Review by Gill Davies Patchinko is a very different novel from Min Jin Lee’s earlier Free Food for Millionaires, which I reviewed here. It…
August 24, 2017 The Bestseller Code by Jodie Archer and Matthew L. Jocker Reviewed by Annabel Imagine that you train a computer to read and analyse books, input a mix of hundreds and ask it to predict…
August 24, 2017 The Story of Classic Crime in 100 Books by Martin Edwards Reviewed by Harriet Here at Shiny we love our classic crime, and we have been delighted to review a number of excellent novels that…
August 22, 2017 Long Road from Jarrow: A Journey Through Britain Then and Now by Stuart Maconie Review by Liz Dexter This entertaining and thought-provoking book is both a state-of-the-nation essay and an exercise in historical research and re-enactment and Maconie,…
August 22, 2017 The Sixteen Trees of the Somme by Lars Mytting Translated by Paul Russell Garrett Reviewed by Harriet For me my mother was a scent, she was a warmth. A leg I clung to….
August 17, 2017 The Music Shop by Rachel Joyce Review by Annabel This certainly is the year for novels about popular music, of the vinyl persuasion and the power of picking just the…
August 17, 2017 What it Means When a Man Falls from the Sky by Lesley Nneka Arimah Reviewed by Rebecca Foster Born in the UK, raised largely in Nigeria, and now resident in Minneapolis, USA – Africa and the West are…
August 15, 2017 Rapture by Iliazd Translated by Thomas J. Kitson Reviewed by Karen Langley The early 20th century was a time of great change and upheaval; it produced wars…
August 15, 2017 The Children of Jocasta by Natalie Haynes Reviewed by Annabel Natalie Haynes may be most familiar to you as a journalist and broadcaster, popping up on various shows and with her…
August 10, 2017 A Secret Sisterhood by Emily Midorikawa and Emma Claire Sweeney Reviewed by Harriet The subtitle of this book is ‘The hidden friendships of Austen, Brontë, Eliot and Woolf’, which sounds very promising. I’ll start…
August 10, 2017 The Zoo by Christopher Wilson Reviewed by Basil Ransome Davies Christopher Wilson’s new novel takes us back in time while signalling contemporary concerns. It recalls the Cold War epoch,…
August 8, 2017 Listening In by Jenny Eclair Review by Laura Marriott Listening In is a collection of 24 short stories from comedian and writer Jenny Eclair. Her last literary outing was the…
August 8, 2017 Can You Hear Me? by Elena Varvello Translated by Alex Valente Review by Annabel Can you hear me? is no ordinary psychological thriller – to pigeonhole it into that sub-genre would…
August 3, 2017 Five Fascinating Facts about… Anthony Burgess Compiled by Annabel Researching Burgess for this article, I found so many nuggets, I could easily have compiled a list of fifty facts –…
August 3, 2017 Anthony Burgess Centenary – a Reading List By Rob Spence Anthony Burgess, whose centenary is celebrated this year, remarked ruefully on more than one occasion that he produced as many novels…
August 1, 2017 Questions for Louise Welsh about Plague Times Trilogy Questions by Annabel Annabel: When you began writing these books, had you already planned a trilogy? Had you ever thought that A Lovely Way to Burn could…
August 1, 2017 No Dominion by Louise Welsh Reviewed by Annabel No Dominion is the concluding part of Louise Welsh’s Plague Times Trilogy – a dystopian tale of a pandemic and its…
