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Month: June 2021

June 29, 2021

A Stinging Delight by David Storey

Reviewed by Harriet Back in 2004 I had the great pleasure of meeting David Storey – rugby player, painter, novelist, poet, playwright and filmmaker…

June 29, 2021

The Wolf Den by Elodie Harper

Review by Lory Widmer-Hess Ancient Greece and Rome, which formed the foundation of so much in our Western civilization, have been getting a revisionist…

June 24, 2021

Hidden Spring: A Journey to the Source of Consciousness, by Mark Solms

Review by Terence Jagger This is a fascinating book, one I bought after hearing the author give an inspiring presentation to the Royal Institution….

June 24, 2021

Burning Man: The Ascent of D.H. Lawrence by Frances Wilson

Reviewed by Harriet I always feel as if I stood naked for the fire of Almighty God to go through me….I often think of…

June 22, 2021

Rodham by Curtis Sittenfeld

Paperback review by Rebecca Foster Curtis Sittenfeld’s sixth novel, a work of alternative history narrated entirely by Hillary Rodham and covering the years between…

June 22, 2021

The Feast by Margaret Kennedy

Reviewed by Harriet Margaret Kennedy has appeared a few times before on Shiny: two of her novels in 2014 [here] and [here] and more…

June 17, 2021

Barcelona Dreaming, by Rupert Thomson

Review by Basil Ramsome-Davies Rupert Thomson has been around for quite a while, a prolific and much respected author; this is the first book…

June 17, 2021

Miss Browne’s Friend by F M Mayor

Reviewed by Harriet Born in 1872, Flora Macdonald Mayor was the daughter of an Anglican clergyman and classics professor. Perhaps surprisingly, given her background,…

June 16, 2021

Five Fascinating Facts About… Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf

Compiled by Annabel The Royal Society of Literature is celebrating ‘Dalloway Day‘ today – a Wednesday in the middle of June – when Virginia…

June 15, 2021

Things Remembered and Things Forgotten by Kyoko Nakajima

Translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori and Ian MacDonald Review by Anna Hollingsworth In the short story The Last Obon, Satsuki is mistaken for the…

June 15, 2021

Rabbits by Terry Miles

Review by Annabel As I sat down to start reading this book, a tweet pinged on my phone and I glanced over – someone…

June 10, 2021

Our Lady of the Nile by Scholastique Mukasonga

Translated by Melanie Mauthner Review by Dorian Stuber The title of Scholastique Mukasonga’s Our Lady of the Nile refers to both a statue of…

June 10, 2021

At Night All Blood is Black by David Diop

Translated by Anna Moschovakis Review by Tony Malone David Diop’s At Night All Blood Is Black  takes the reader back to the battlefields of…

June 8, 2021

On Time and Water by Andri Snær Magnason

Translated by Lytton Smith Review by Peter Reason This book focuses on two things that are changing beyond recognition in this era of rapid…

June 8, 2021

Painting Time by Maylis de Kerangal

Translated by Jessica Moore Reviewed by Annabel Maylis de Kerangal is a novelist whose primary focus is not the characters that people her books,…

June 7, 2021

Burning the Books: A History of Knowledge Under Attack by Richard Ovenden

Review by Liz Dexter  The processes of selection, acquisition and cataloguing, as well as of disposal and retention, are never neutral acts. They are…

June 7, 2021

Dostoevsky in Love: An Intimate Life by Alex Christofi

Review by Karen Langley It could be argued that much fiction is in a sense autobiographical, and one man who certainly poured his life…

June 4, 2021

Monica Jones, Philip Larkin and Me by John Sutherland

Review by Karen Langley Monica Jones, the subject of a new biography by John Sutherland, is a fascinating figure who, up until now, has…

June 4, 2021

Fifty Sounds by Polly Barton

Reviewed by Anna Hollingsworth Why country X? Why language Y? Anyone who has lived abroad or taken up a foreign language will be familiar…

June 3, 2021

Civilisations by Laurent Binet

Translated by Sam Taylor Review by Max Dunbar Reviewers of fiction, trying to make sense of Laurent Binet’s Civilisations, have reached for video game metaphors….

June 3, 2021

Inventory of a Life Mislaid: An Unreliable Memoir, by Marina Warner

Review by Helen Parry In spring 1944 the English officer Esmond Warner attended a party in Bari hosted by a widow, Signora Terzulli, and…

June 1, 2021

The Muse by Nell Dunn

Review by Annabel There is a particular sub-genre of memoir that almost goes into biography but fundamentally remains a memoir. I’m talking about memoirs…

June 1, 2021

The Nightingale: Notes on a songbird, by Sam Lee

Review by Peter Reason Sam Lee is a renowned song collector, interpreter, and singer of folk songs from Britain and Ireland; he has an…

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