Remembering Anita
By Thomas Otto Eighteen years ago, as an American with an inexplicable, but deep-seated Anglophilia, I picked up Anita Brookner’s novel A Friend from England (1987) based on the title alone. I’m…
Spotlight on Young Adult Fiction – Spring 2016
Selected by Jenny and Memory In each issue of Shiny New Books, Jenny and Memory highlight the most exciting young adult novels of the season. This spring, they’re perhaps a leetle bit…
An Interview with Professor Janet Todd
Questions by Victoria and Harriet Throughout her long and illustrious academic career, Janet Todd has been a pioneer in women’s writing, recovering lost and neglected authors. She has written biographies…
Five Fascinating Facts about… Vita Sackville-West
Compiled by Simon Vita Sackville-West is probably best remembered today as the inamorata of Virginia Woolf or the garden designer behind Sissinghurst. Less remembered, on the whole, are her novels –…
Make Room For Me: Organising a Literary Conference
Written by Noreen Masud ‘The times will just have to enlarge themselves to make room for me, won’t they, and for everybody else.’ (Stevie Smith, in interview with Peter Orr)…
Spotlight on Publishers: Dean Street Press
Q & A with Rupert Heath Will you tell me a little about the genesis of Dean Street Press? What prompted you to start the business? I’ve spent the past fifteen…
Reading Manchester
By Rob Spence After the recent Budget, the Treasury published a document outlining the government’s plans for regional spending. In among the references to particular cities and regions was a…
The Last of the Bowmans and Black Humour by J Paul Henderson
As he stops off at Shiny New Books on his book tour, we asked J Paul Henderson, author of The Last of the Bowmans (reviewed here), to explore where the black humour comes from…
What Reading Makes of Us – The Power of Stories to Shape our Realities: An Essay.
By Mark Thornton (This is an adaptation of a talk I gave to sixth formers at Abingdon School last year.) This is my tenth year of being an independent bookseller –…
Brooklyn: From Book to Film
By Diana Cheng When Alex Garland was writing the screenplay for Never Let Me Go, the book author Kazuo Ishiguro told him: ‘Your only duty is to write a really good…
Spotlight on Young Adult Fiction – early 2016
By Memory and Jenny From music to murder, from a hospital ward to Haworth Parsonage, Jenny and Memory highlight the most exciting young adult novels of the season in the…
The Shiny Poetry Competition – Runners Up
After our announcement yesterday of the winning poem in our competition, we are delighted to share the runners-up with you today. We’re sorry we can’t offer any prizes for our…
The Shiny Poetry Competition – Our Winner!
Introduced by Chair of the Judges, Rob Spence The inaugural Shiny Poetry Competition, on the theme, naturally enough, of ‘Reading’, attracted a small, but high-quality group of poems. The range…
What Independent Theatre Taught me About Fiction Writing by Alexander Yates, author of The Winter Place.
There is a famous (and sometimes overused) piece of advice that writers like to give each other. It comes from Chekhov, in the form of a quote: “If in the…
Bloody Scotland Crime-writing Festival, Stirling, 11-13 September 2015
Report by Linda Boa After arriving somewhat later than planned in Stirling, all I wanted to do was find the lovely guesthouse I was staying in and catch some sleep….
Q&A with Laila Lalami
Questions by Helen Skinner 1. The Moor’s Account is narrated by the Moroccan slave, Mustafa al-Zamori, also known as Estebanico. What made you decide to write the novel from Estebanico’s point of…
Shiny Book Club – Lila by Marilynne Robinson
Introduced by Harriet It’s time for the third round of The Shiny Book Club – we’re posting the questions now, and the discussion will start in our Extra Shiny issue…
Five Fascinating Facts about… Richmal Crompton
Written by Simon The author of the much loved William books, about a well-meaning but disastrous young boy, also wrote over thirty books for adults, some of which have now…
Reading Israel
Written by Danielle Simpson When was the last time you read a book by an Israeli author? Yes, I thought so. If you had asked me that question just over…
Five Fascinating Facts about … Margaret Atwood
By Shoshi Ish-Horowicz 1. She had an unconventional childhood with her family, spending every spring and summer in the northern Canadian wilderness; Atwood didn’t start full time school until the…
Reading Liverpool
Compiled by Beth Townsend Novels set in places I recognise are a special kind of thing. There is nothing I enjoy more than reading about a place and going, hang…
Upcoming Books to Films
By Diana Cheng Autumn ushers in major film festivals, a springboard to the Awards Season. The following is a list of new movie adaptations, a few of which have just…
Interview with Pushkin Vertigo series cover designer Jamie Keenan
Questions by Victoria I’ve been looking at book covers you’ve designed and it’s an incredibly impressive range. How did you start working with books – was that always a goal…
An Interview with Joanne Limburg
By Victoria What I absolutely loved about A Want of Kindness was the voice you’ve managed to create. It was so brilliantly of the 17th century without ever losing clarity or…