March 24, 2020 Fandango and Other Stories by Alexander Grin Translated by Bryan Karetnyk Reviewed by Karen Langley Recent years have seen a wave of wonderful new translations of ‘lost’ Russian authors of the…
March 19, 2020 The Ruins by Mat Osman Reviewed by Annabel I am an absolute sucker for any novel with a bit of rock’n’roll in it, and two of my favourite reads…
March 12, 2020 Winter in Sokcho by Elisa Shua Dusapin Translated by Aneesa Abbas Higgins Review by David Hebblethwaite Winter in Sokcho is a first in several senses: the debut novel by French-Korean writer…
March 3, 2020 Miss Austen by Gill Hornby Reviewed by Anna Hollingsworth There’s a point in Miss Austen where I felt that my sins had been found out. Cassandra, Jane Austen’s now…
February 25, 2020 Three Hours by Rosamund Lupton Review by Annabel Anyone who works in a school these days will be familiar with ‘lockdown’ procedures, with code reds being the ones you…
February 20, 2020 Snow, Dog, Foot by Claudio Morandini Translated by J. Ockenden Reviewed by Rebecca Foster Who could resist the title of this Italian bestseller? A black comedy about a hermit in…
February 13, 2020 Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line by Deepa Anappara Review by Laura Tisdall Jai is nine years old and lives with his family in the slums of New Delhi. He loves watching reality…
January 21, 2020 American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins Review by Anna Hollingsworth Let’s face it: anything involving human tragedies, poverty, despair, abuse and crime offers a wealth of material for a novelist…
January 21, 2020 Happy Ever After by C. C. MacDonald Review by Basil Ransome-Davies Adultery. It crops up everywhere. Few grown-up pastimes are as popular as disobeying the sixth Commandment. Where would novels, plays…
December 12, 2019 Meet Me at the Museum by Anne Youngson Review by Annabel This short novel told in letters took me pleasantly by surprise. Within pages I was hooked, and I read it in…
December 10, 2019 The Honjin Murders by Seishi Yokomizo Translated by Louise Heal Kawai Reviewed by Harriet This delightful reprint from Pushkin Press is widely viewed as one of Japan’s greatest murder mysteries….
November 28, 2019 Sorry for the Dead by Nicola Upson Reviewed by Harriet Here at Shiny we are great admirers of Nicola Upson’s books – her most recent novel, Stanley and Elsie, was reviewed…
November 26, 2019 The Pursuit of William Abbey by Claire North Review by David Harris A new book by Claire North is always a very special event in my reading calendar, and William Abbey didn’t disappoint. In…
November 26, 2019 Blackberry & Wild Rose by Sonia Velton Review by Helen Skinner It’s 1768 and Sara Kemp has just arrived in Spitalfields, the London parish which has become home to a thriving…
November 21, 2019 The Measure of a Man by Marco Malvaldi Review by Terence Jagger I was intrigued to see this novel on my doormat: Malvaldi is better known (to me at least) as a…
November 21, 2019 Lake Like a Mirror by Ho Sok Fong Translated by Natascha Bruce Review by David Hebblethwaite Ho Sok Fong is a Malaysian writer whose short stories have won a number of awards. Lake…
November 19, 2019 Your Duck is My Duck by Deborah Eisenberg Review by Terence Jagger This, in spite of its slightly silly sounding title, is an interesting and slightly mysterious collection of six short stories….
November 12, 2019 Wakenhyrst by Michelle Paver Review by Annabel I read and really enjoyed Paver’s first two adult novels, both ghost stories. The first, Dark Matter was located in the Arctic, which was…
November 7, 2019 Akin by Emma Donoghue Reviewed by Harriet Back in 2010 I read Emma Donoghue’s best selling, prize winning Room. I admired it but I can’t say I enjoyed…
November 5, 2019 Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo Review by Liz Dexter Amma is a playwright and director who’s moved from the fringes to the mainstream (or has it moved to her?)….
October 31, 2019 Olive, Again by Elizabeth Strout Reviewed by Harriet I’ve reviewed two of Elizabeth Strout’s novels on Shiny [here] and [here] and both were brilliant. But possibly my favourite up…
October 31, 2019 Find Me by André Aciman Review by Anna Hollingsworth There are two kinds of novels to which I don’t want to see a sequel. There are, of course, the…
October 15, 2019 Inheritance by Jenny Eclair Review by Laura Marriott “Beginnings, middles and ends; Peggy, Serena, Natasha and Bel. This is the room that binds them, this is how consequences…
October 10, 2019 Heaven, My Home by Attica Locke Review by Gill Davies This powerful and engrossing novel continues a series of crime novels in which Attica Locke uses plot and suspense to…
October 8, 2019 The Dutch House by Ann Patchett Reviewed by Harriet Ann Patchett believes in goodness, arguably a most unfashionable belief in today’s world. In the bookstore she runs, there’s a sign:…
