Mr Campion’s Farewell by Mike Ripley
Reviewed by Harriet Devine I think I was about eleven when my mother, responding to my cry that I had nothing to read, gave me a copy of Margery Allingham’s Sweet…
In the Light of What We Know by Zia Haider Rahman
Reviewed by Victoria Best Many years ago, when I was teaching literature at Cambridge University, my good friend Kathryn and I used to laugh together about a certain category of…
Expo 58 by Jonathan Coe
Reviewed by Annabel Gaskell The Festival of Britain back in 1951 and subsequent World Expos were before my time but I am finding that the 1950s are an attractive era…
Wilfred and Eileen by Jonathan Smith
Reviewed by Rachel Fenn Wilfred and Eileen, one of Persephone’s new books for the Spring, is also one of their most modern, having been first published in the 1970s. It…
A Bright Moon for Fools by Jasper Gibson
Reviewed by Annabel Gaskell Harry Christmas strode out of Caracas airport with little more than a wallet full of stolen money and the dried-up brain of a long-haul drinker. Beyond…
The Lie by Helen Dunmore
Reviewed by Susan Osborne. If you spend any time at all perusing reviews, on the internet or otherwise, you can’t have failed to notice the plethora of novels about the…
Everything Beautiful Began After by Simon Van Booy
Reviewed by Victoria Best Several years ago, I read a short story collection by an author whose name was buzzing around the blogosphere as a talent to watch. The book…
Murder Underground and Death on the Cherwell by Mavis Doriel Hay
Reviewed by Harriet Devine Mavis Doriel Hay (1894-1979) wrote only three crime novels, all published in the 1930s. They slipped completely under the radar until the British Library decided to…
The Quick by Lauren Owen
Reviewed by Sakura Gooneratne The Quick by Lauren Owen burst into the literary scene earlier this year with fantastic reviews in major broadsheets and literary blogs, no mean feat for a…
Meeting the English by Kate Clanchy
Reviewed by Annabel Gaskell Kate Clanchy’s first novel is a perfect summer read: it’s laugh-out-loud funny, has pathos in all the right places, a sweet young hero and an inbuilt…
Gossip by Beth Gutcheon
Reviewed by Annabel Gaskell When this novel was published, I couldn’t resist the allure of the cover in an oversized paperback format with French flaps. Luckily the novel inside is…
A trio of Maigret novels by Georges Simenon
Reviewed by Lizzy Siddal Let me start this article with a confession. In my pre-blog years, I once read a Maigret novel. I didn’t like it much. I found it…
Mistress Masham’s Repose by T. H. White
Reviewed by Jodie Robson “It was a glorious day in June – for that matter it was the Glorious First of June – and the sun was resounding on the…
We Were Liars by E. Lockhart (YA)
Reviewed by Bookgazing E. Lockhart’s We Were Liars is a small book crammed to the brim with narrative experiment and investigation. Its story begins with sharp lines arranged in a whip crack…
And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini
Reviewed by Karen Heenan-Davies Expectations ran high in the run-up to the publication of Khaled Hosseini’s latest novel And the Mountains Echoed. Could he emulate the success of The Kite Runner and A Thousand…
Beatrice and Benedick by Marina Fiorato
Reviewed by Annabel Gaskell In tackling on one of Shakespeare’s most popular pairings in her latest novel, Marina Fiorato is taking a big risk. The sparring partners who…
During the Reign of the Queen of Persia by Joan Chase
Reviewed by Danielle Simpson Quite often the best reading experiences I have, or at least the most memorable ones, are stories that are in some way challenging or difficult. This…
We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler
Reviewed by Simon Thomas When we did a piece on the Booker longlist recently, I cheerfully said that I hadn’t read any of them – as always seems to be the case,…
After Me Comes the Flood by Sarah Perry
Reviewed by Victoria Best John Cole is an antiquarian bookseller who has grown tired of his life and tired of his self. One long, hot summer, towards the end of…
The Dance of Love by Angela Young
Reviewed by Simon Thomas In the first issue of Shiny New Books we had a lovely piece by Angela Young about the genesis of her novel The Dance of Love. We were thus…
All the Birds, Singing by Evie Wyld
Reviewed by David Hebblethwaite She may only be on her second novel, but Evie Wyld is already gathering considerable acclaim. Her debut, 2009’s After the Fire, a Still Small Voice,…
The Blue Room by Hanne Ørstavik
Translated by Deborah Dawkin Reviewed by Hayley Anderton I read the press release for The Blue Room (published in Norwegian in 1999, and now published by Periene Press in a translation by…
All My Puny Sorrows by Miriam Toews
Review by Victoria Best At the funeral service of an aunt who has died unexpectedly, our narrator, Yolandi, notices a toddler creep up to the urn on the dias and…
City of Endless Night by Milo M. Hastings
Reviewed by Simon Thomas My heart would normally sink at any blurb which began ‘The year is 2151.’ I am perfectly willing to concede that the fault is with me…