December 16, 2020 I Don’t Want to Go to the Taj Mahal: Stories of a Birmingham Boy by Charlie Hill Review by Eleanor Updegraff It can be difficult to get other people interested in your life. Many authors have tried, many have failed –…
December 10, 2020 The Fragments of My Father by Sam Mills Reviewed by Harriet Sam Mills’ ‘memoir of madness, love, and being a carer’ starts on a Friday night in early 2016. Sam’s father has been…
December 9, 2020 Sylvia Pankhurst: Natural Born Rebel, by Rachel Holmes Reviewed by Rob Spence I recently watched the Ethiopia episode of Afua Hirsch’s excellent series African Renaissance, in which I was startled to see…
November 12, 2020 Michael Tippett, The Biography by Oliver Soden Reviewed by Peter Hobson This is a very long, extensively referenced account of the life and music of Michael Tippett, a composer who is…
September 21, 2020 Journey through a Tragicomic Century: The Absurd Life of Hasso Grabner by Francis Nenik Translated by Katy Derbyshire Reviewed by Eleanor Updegraff This September sees the launch of V&Q Books, a brand-new publishing imprint with the mission of…
September 17, 2020 Horse Crazy: The Story of a Woman and a World in Love with an Animal by Sarah Maslin Nir Review by Liz Dexter Sarah Maslin Nir is a staff reporter for the New York Times who, by her own admission, has sought out…
August 4, 2020 Memorial Drive: A Daughter’s Memoir by Natasha Trethewey Reviewed by Rebecca Foster Natasha Trethewey is an English professor and former U.S. Poet Laureate familiar to me from Native Guard (2006), her third…
July 30, 2020 Grayson Perry by Jacky Klein & Grayson Perry Reviewed by Liz Dexter This sumptuous book, that has a lot of content, in terms of both text and image, is a real treat…
July 28, 2020 Three Wainwright Prize Nominees: Books by Patrick Barkham, Patrick Laurie & Jini Reddy Reviewed by Rebecca Foster The Wainwright Prize longlists for writing on UK nature and global conservation themes were announced in early June and will…
July 2, 2020 Diary of a Young Naturalist by Dara McAnulty Reviewed by Rebecca Foster When the Wainwright Prize longlists (for writing on UK nature and global conservation themes) were announced in early June, Dara…
June 23, 2020 I Remember by Georges Perec Introduced, Translated, Annotated, Edited and Indexed by Philip Terry and David Bellos Reviewed by Karen Langley Regular readers of Shiny New Books may recall…
June 16, 2020 James and Nora: A Portrait of a Marriage by Edna O’Brien Review by Rob Spence Last year, Weidenfeld and Nicholson reissued Edna O’Brien’s 1999 biography of Joyce, an entertainingly idiosyncratic volume, which is reviewed here….
May 21, 2020 Well-kept Secrets: The Story of William Wordsworth by Andrew Wordsworth Reviewed by Harriet As I’m sure you’ve noticed, this year marks the 250th anniversary of the birth of Wordsworth, one of England’s most celebrated…
May 19, 2020 Diary Of A Foreigner In Paris, by Curzio Malaparte Translated by Stephen Twilley Reviewed by Basil Ransome-Davies An adjective frequently applied to Curzio Malaparte is ‘colourful’. To the Cambridge dictionary it means ‘vivid,…
March 17, 2020 James Joyce by Edna O’Brien Review by Rob Spence Edna O’Brien’s position as one of the most significant modern Irish writers is undisputed, and here, in this reissue of…
February 13, 2020 Veronica by Veronica Lake Reviewed by Harriet I wonder how many people today have even heard of Veronica Lake. There was a time, though a relatively brief one,…
October 29, 2019 Home Work by Julie Andrews with Emma Walton Hamilton Review by Annabel Julie Andrews’s first volume of memoir, Home, told us of her childhood, growing up during the war, and…
October 15, 2019 Gloucester Crescent by William Miller Review by Annabel Nestled between Primrose Hill and Camden Town in NW1, it’s hard to believe that Gloucester Crescent (and Regents Park Terrace which…
October 10, 2019 Surfacing by Kathleen Jamie Review by Peter Reason Kathleen Jamie is primarily known as a poet, but her prose writing is eagerly anticipated and widely acclaimed. Surfacing is…
October 1, 2019 Confessions of a Bookseller by Shaun Bythell Review by Simon As the cover of Confessions of a Bookseller tells us, Bythell is an international bestseller. A couple of years ago, The…
September 17, 2019 Rough Magic: Riding the World’s Wildest Horse Race by Lara Prior-Palmer Review by Liz Dexter Lara is by her own account a bit scatter-brained. She’s been described as away with the fairies, didn’t see the…
July 30, 2019 This Really Isn’t About You by Jean Hannah Edelstein Review by Max Dunbar There’s a common British anecdote that goes: ‘We had some American friends here on holiday, and on the third day…
May 21, 2019 The Way Home: Tales from a life without technology by Mark Boyle Reviewed by Rebecca Foster It’s common practice nowadays, when publicizing a book review published in an online venue, to tag the author on social…
May 9, 2019 Little Boy by Lawrence Ferlinghetti Review by Karen Langley American poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti is perhaps more regularly acknowledged nowadays for his pivotal role in pioneering the Beat Generation; from…
May 7, 2019 So Much Longing in So Little Space: The Art of Edvard Munch by Karl Ove Knausgaard Translated by Ingvild Burkey Reviewed by Jean Morris This is a book for fans of Karl Ove Knausgaard who also love the work of…
