May 26, 2022 Elektra by Jennifer Saint Review by Annabel The current vogue for feminist retellings of stories from Greek and Roman myths and legends is showing no signs of slowing…
May 24, 2022 Tell Me an Ending by Jo Harkin Reviewed by Harriet ‘What if you didn’t have to live with your worst memories?’, asks the cover of this debut novel. Anyone who’s seen…
May 24, 2022 The Palace Papers by Tina Brown Review by Elaine Simpson-Long I recently reviewed a biography of the Queen by Robert Hardman (reviewed here) which I described as an “admirable book”…
May 19, 2022 Dear Little Corpses by Nicola Upson Reviewed by Harriet It’s the first of September 1939. Hitler has invaded Poland, and though Britain is not yet at war with Germany, there…
May 19, 2022 America Over the Water by Shirley Collins Review by Annabel Shirley Collins is widely regarded as one of the most influential British folk singers of our times. Often singing alongside her…
May 17, 2022 Traitor in the Ice by K.J. Maitland Review by Julie Barham This book is a powerful, sometimes brutal historical novel set in the winter of 1607, when life seemed frozen by…
May 17, 2022 Lean Fall Stand by Jon McGregor Review by David Hebblethwaite If Jon McGregor’s name is on the front of a book, I want to read it – it’s as simple…
May 12, 2022 Maternal Mental Health Awareness Month: Birth Notes by Jessica Cornwell & After the Storm by Emma Jane Unsworth Reviewed by Rebecca Foster May is Maternal Mental Health Awareness Month and so the perfect time to consider two memoirs of postnatal depression, one…
May 12, 2022 Garden Physic by Sylvia Legris Review by Anna Hollingsworth Imagine all the life crawling in the undergrowth of a garden. In Garden Physic, Sylvia Legris digs it all up…
May 10, 2022 Homelands: The History of a Friendship by Chitra Ramaswamy Review by David Hebblethwaite In 2011, journalist Chitra Ramaswamy was sent to interview Henry and Ingrid Wuga, a Jewish couple who had fled Nazi…
May 5, 2022 Even the Darkest Night, by Javier Cercas Translated by Anne Mclean Review by Michael Eaude Javier Cercas rose to literary fame two decades ago with Soldiers of Salamis (2001), a novel…
May 3, 2022 Ephemeron by Fiona Benson Review by Anna Hollingsworth On the cover of Fiona Benson’s Ephemeron, there is a butterfly trapped in a spider’s web. It’s a melancholy image,…
May 3, 2022 These Days by Lucy Caldwell Reviewed by Harriet ‘two sisters, four nights, one city’ is the subtitle of this riveting new novel by Lucy Caldwell. I don’t think I’ve…
April 28, 2022 Mischief Acts by Zoe Gilbert Review by Annabel At this early stage of the year, it may be a bit forward of me to suggest that I may have…
April 28, 2022 In the Margins by Elena Ferrante Translated by Ann Goldstein Review by Anna Hollingsworth There’s something fascinating about writers writing about, well, writing and reading. I care more about writers’…
April 26, 2022 Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus Review by Annabel Sometimes the hype is true, and a publisher’s lead-title for the season really is worth the advance praise heaped on it….
April 26, 2022 Strange Journey by Maud Cairnes Reviewed by Harriet This is a body-swap novel – one of the first ever to be published. It’s very entertaining but also quite thought…
April 21, 2022 This Woman’s Work: Essays on Music, edited by Sinéad Gleeson and Kim Gordon Review by Liz Dexter This is a collection of writing by women about music, mainly about women in music, put together by visual artist,…
April 21, 2022 Queen of Our Times: The Life of Elizabeth II, by Robert Hardman Review by Elaine Simpson-Long There have been so many books written about ‘Her Maj’ and, I daresay, there will be more in the future,…
April 19, 2022 The Poisonous Solicitor, by Stephen Bates Review by Basil Ransome-Davies Back when I aspired to write crime fiction but realised I was a lousy plotter, I used to buy used…
April 19, 2022 The Rabbit Factor by Antti Tuomainen Translated from the Finnish by David Hackston Review by Annabel I’m always interested in adding new Nordic authors to my reading list, which is…
April 14, 2022 The Lives of the Saints by Sebastian Barry Reviewed by Harriet Anyone who knows me or reads my reviews will know that I’m a great admirer of Sebastian Barry. I’ve reviewed three…
April 14, 2022 The Gift of a Radio by Justin Webb Review by Annabel The TV news came on and a lugubrious looking chap in a light-coloured suit with a deep, plummy voice said something…
April 12, 2022 Brainspotting: Adventures in Neurology by A. J. Lees Reviewed by Annabel Dr Andrew Lees is a neurology professor at the National Hospital in London the first English hospital dedicated exclusively to treating…
April 12, 2022 Henry ‘Chips’ Channon: The Diaries 1938-1943 – Volume 2, edited by Simon Heffer Review by Elaine Simpson-Long The second volume of these diaries was delivered by my postman, who was visibly having difficulty handing it over as…
