A Theatre For Dreamers by Polly Samson
Reviewed by Rebecca Foster Tired of lockdown, hankering to see new places, and in desperate need of some sun: that describes most of us at this point. New in paperback,…
A Virtual Image by Rosalind Brackenbury
Reviewed by Helen Parry Until Michael Walmer reissued her first novel, A Day to Remember to Forget, I had never heard of Rosalind Brackenbury. She seems to be scandalously obscure…
There’s No Story There – Wartime Writing, 1944-1945 by Inez Holden
Reviewed by Hayley Anderton This is one of two recent releases from Handheld Press that cover aspects of wartime experience – in this case life in a huge munitions factory…
The Immortals of Tehran by Ali Araghi
Reviewed by Anna Hollingsworth Who hasn’t thought of poets as semi-mythical, Byron-like figures, with access to otherworldly visions? The truth is, most of the time poetry takes as much drafting…
Diary of a Film by Niven Govinden
Reviewed by Annabel Diary of a Film follows a few days in the life of an auteur film director who is in Italy with his two lead actors to promote…
King of Rabbits by Karla Neblett
Reviewed by Anna Hollingsworth Imagine a teenager who skips school, smokes, drinks and disappears from his girlfriend on a regular basis; a young man adrift whose main interests are vandalizing…
A History of What Comes Next by Sylvain Neuvel
Reviewed by Max Dunbar The Age of Acceleration In 2019, the Unherd website carried an article by Gerard DeGroot, about the Chang’e 4 moon landing. ‘Whenever something big happens in space,…
Where Stands a Wingèd Sentry by Margaret Kennedy
Reviewed by Harriet If you’ve heard of, or read, Margaret Kennedy at all, it’s likely to be her 1924 novel The Constant Nymph. Written when she was 28, it made…
Miss Benson’s Beetle by Rachel Joyce
Reviewed by Heavenali Miss Benson’s Beetle is Rachel Joyce’s latest novel – now published in paperback. Women are at the heart of this wonderful story – and we see the…
The Passenger by Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz
Translated by Philip Boehm Reviewed by Gill Davies This is an important republication of a novel which first appeared eighty years ago under a pen name and in translation as…
The Decagon House Murders by Yukito Ayatsuji
Translated by Ho-Ling Wong Reviewed by Terence Jagger This is a very unusual book, and I initially disliked its artificiality – extreme, even by the standards of sealed room murder…
The Galaxy, and the Ground Within by Becky Chambers
Reviewed by Annabel With The Galaxy, and the Ground Within, Becky Chambers brings her Wayfarers series to a close. The quartet began in 2015 with The Long Way to a…
Mrs Death Misses Death by Salena Godden
Reviewed by Anna Hollingsworth After a year of daily Covid death reports, death really wasn’t something I wanted to hear any more of, let alone read a whole book about…
Bestiary by K-Ming Chang
Reviewed by Anna Hollingsworth “At a loss for words”, “in awe” and “confused but thrilled” are all phrases that I could use to describe my feelings when I reached the…
Cathedral by Ben Hopkins
Reviewed by Terence Jagger The cathedral, and the difficulties building it, both physical, financial, and aesthetic, dominate the early parts of the book, and brood over the whole story, so…
Tang: A Shetland Story by J.J. Haldane Burgess
Reviewed by Hayley Anderton Northus is a new project from Michael Walmer (who’s own reprint series will be familiar to many readers here) and the Shetland born, currently Edinburgh based,…
The Disciple by Michael Mallon
Reviewed by Annabel A novel about the increasingly toxic relationship between an old art historian and his young acolyte set in Florence was always going to be a book I…
Havana Year Zero by Karla Suárez
Translated by Christina MacSweeney Reviewed by Pete Freeth Havana Year Zero is a delightfully unusual detective story from Karla Suárez and translated into English by Christina MacSweeney. Set in the…
Hotel Cartagena by Simone Buchholz
Translated by Rachel Ward Reviewed by Annabel I’ve come late to German ‘Queen of Krimi’ Simone Buchholz’s novels. Hotel Cartagena is the ninth of her books featuring the Hamburg-based State…
The Ice by John Kåre Raake
Translated by Adam King Reviewed by Gill Davies John Kåre Rake is a successful Norwegian screen writer and this is his first novel. It’s a mysterious thriller that uses its…
Who Was Changed and Who Was Dead by Barbara Comyns
Reviewed by Harriet Barbara Comyns seems to be enjoying a well-deserved renaissance at the moment. In addition to this one, just published by Daunt Books (with more to come later…
A Long Way From Douala by Max Lobe
Translated by Ros Schwartz Reviewed by Annabel I have a personal goal to increase diversity in my reading and am glad to have discovered the indie publisher HopeRoad. Founded in…
House With No Doors by Jeff Noon
Reviewed by Annabel Having been a fan of Jeff Noon’s cult spec fiction novels set in an alternate Manchester, I was surprised and delighted when his book Slow Motion Ghosts,…
How We Are Translated by Jessica Gaitán Johannesson
Reviewed by Anna Hollingsworth When an author is described as having a ”fresh voice”, I usually dismiss the description with a shrug; the attribute is repeated so often that it’s…