Completely Kafka by Nicolas Mahler
Translated by Alexander Booth Review by Karen Langley 2024 is the centenary of the death of author Franz Kafka and the year has seen a flurry of interest focusing on…
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Shiny New Books
The House of Silence by Edith Nesbit
Reviewed by Harriet Here at Shiny, I’m proud to say, we have now covered every aspect of Edith Nesbit’s wonderful fiction writing. Best known to most people as a writer…
Queen Victoria and her Prime Ministers – a personal history, by Anne Somerset
Reviewed by Elaine Simpson-Long Queen Elizabeth II had fifteen prime ministers during her reign. Queen Victoria had fourteen. The weekly meetings between Queen Elizabeth and her prime minister were one…
Deep Water: The World in the Ocean, by James Bradley
Review by Peter Reason James Bradley, the Australian novelist and essayist, chooses an apt epigraph from Arthur C. Clarke for his book: ‘How inappropriate to call this planet “Earth”, when…
The Book Forger by Joseph Hone
Reviewed by Harriet ‘Thomas James Wise (1859-1937) was a bibliophile and thief’, says Wikipedia. He was indeed. As Joseph Hone puts it in this fascinating exploration of ‘the most sensational…
You Don’t Have to be Mad to Work Here by Benji Waterhouse
Reviewed by Liz Dexter This book is also about me and about why anyone in the right mind would choose to be a psychiatrist. I hope that it serves as…
An African History of Africa: From the Dawn of Civilisation to Independence by Zeinab Badawi
Reviewed by Liz Dexter I would like to say to the non-African reader of this book that I hope I have demonstrated that Africa has a history, that it is…
One Man in his Time: A Memoir, by N.M. Borodin
Review by Karen Langley Nicholas Borodin (as he is billed here) is something of a man of mystery, at least for the English speaking reader. Apart from his memoir, One…
Thunderclap: A memoir of art and life & sudden death, by Laura Cumming
I am a very critical reader; there are not many books that I unreservedly admire. So it is notable that when I finished reading Thunderclap, I closed the covers, turned…
And Time Was No More: Essential Stories and Memories, by Teffi
Edited and annotated by Robert Chandler Review by Karen Langley The last decade or so has seen a resurgence of interest in Russian émigré writing with a host of forgotten…
Close to Death by Anthony Horowitz
Reviewed by Harriet ‘Anyone who has read the four books I have written about my adventures with ex-Detective Inspector Daniel Hawthorne, may be surprised by this one. Where is Hawthorne?…
The Time of Cherries by Montserrat Roig
Translated by Julia Sanches Review by Michael Eaude Lemons and Cherries Most reviews I write are of Catalan fiction translated to English. I often wonder whether my commitment to learning…
Reviewer’s Choice – Birthright by Charles Lambert
Review by Rob Spence Birthright. The word smacks of entitlement, doesn’t it? The idea of being privileged because of the status of your parents. There’s plenty of entitlement on show…
Blue Remembered Hills by Rosemary Sutcliff
Reviewed by Harriet Who remembers reading The Eagle of the Ninth? First published in 1954, when Sutcliff was 34, it is set in Roman Britain and tells the story of…
Shiny Prize Season – Falling Animals by Sheila Armstrong – The Ondaatje Prize shortlist
Review by Annabel 2024 marks the twentieth anniversary of the ‘Ondaatje Prize’, awarded by the Royal Society of Literature for a distinguished work of fiction, non-fiction or poetry, evoking the…
Rural Hours – The Country Lives of Virginia Woolf, Sylvia Townsend Warner and Rosamond Lehmann by Harriet Baker
Reviewed by Gill Davies In the summer of 1917 Virginia Woolf was living at Asheham, a house near Lewes in Sussex. She was 35 and hadn’t written anything for two…
Anthony Burgess, The Devil Prefers Mozart: On Music and Musicians 1962 – 1993, edited by Paul Phillips
Review by Rob Spence Anthony Burgess was, of course, one of the most significant novelists of the second half of the twentieth century, publishing over thirty novels, (a centenary reading…
Secret Voices: A Year of Women’s Diaries, edited by Sarah Gristwood
Reviewed by Harriet I have set myself many tasks for the year – I wonder how many will be accomplished? A Novel called Middlemarch, a long poem on Timoleon, and…
Power and Glory: Elizabeth II and the Rebirth of Royalty, by Alexander Larman
Review by Elaine Simpson-Long When Alexander Larman wrote The Crown in Crisis: Countdown to the Abdication about Edward VIII, he had no idea that it would be the beginning of…
Shiny Prize Season – Ordinary Human Failings by Megan Nolan – Women’s Prize for Fiction
Review by Annabel I enjoyed Nolan’s debut, Acts of Desperation, published in 2022, which was shortlisted for the Sunday Times Young Author Award. It is a fine example of the now…
Head North by Andy Burnham and Steve Rotherham
Review by Rob Spence When Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced in October last year that the multi-billion pound rail infrastructure programme HS2 would not, after all, be completed, leaving Manchester…
Orbital by Samantha Harvey
Review by Annabel One thing I know: this sublime novella will be featuring in my books of the year for 2024. Samantha Harvey’s Orbital is a beautifully written love letter,…
Shiny Prize Season – Bright Fear by Mary Jean Chan – Dylan Thomas Prize shortlist & Jhalak Prize longlist
Reviewed by Rebecca Foster I knew from the Costa Award-winning debut collection Flèche (2019) that Mary Jean Chan writes exquisite poems of love and longing. Their follow-up, Bright Fear, has…
Barbara Comyns: A Savage Innocence, by Avril Horner
Reviewed by Harriet In the back of my mind I was always sure that wonderful things were waiting for me, but I’d got to get through a lot of horrors…