The End of Vandalism by Tom Drury
Reviewed by Annabel Tom Drury is the author of a trio of exquisite observational dramas following the everyday life of the inhabitants of Grouse County, Iowa, a location which epitomises…
A Game for all the Family by Sophie Hannah
Reviewed by Harriet My name is Justine Merrison and I do Nothing. With a capital N. Not a single thing. When I tell people I enjoy crime novels, they often…
Kauthar by Meike Ziervogel
Reviewed by Annabel Many of you will recognise Meike Ziervogel as the founder of Peirene Press; we’ve reviewed several of their novella length books in Shiny New Books (here and here for example)….
Q&A with Kathleen Benner Duble about Madame Tussaud’s Apprentice
Questions by Jenny Your fascination with Madame Tussaud is obvious. What led to your decision not to set the book from her perspective, but rather from the perspective of an invented street…
Suspense with Style: The Novels of Mary Stewart
Written by Lory Widmer Hess “The whole affair began so very quietly.” With the first line of her first novel, Mary Stewart already proclaimed herself a sublimely intelligent storyteller, saying…
Interview with David Bradley, winner of the NHE Essay Prize 2015
Ingrid Wassenaar met up with David Bradley, winner of the second Notting Hill Editions Essay Prize for his essay ‘A Eulogy for Nigger’ for a conversation. Tell me your story! Well, what…
An extract from the NHE Essay Prize winner
From ‘A Eulogy for Nigger’ by David Bradley DETROIT. Hundreds of onlookers cheered . . . as the National Association for the Advancement of … People put to rest a…
The Meursault Investigation by Kamel Daoud
Translated by John Cullen Reviewed by Victoria In a bar in Oran, Algeria, a lone man sits drinking. He draws his companion – the reader – into his strange and…
Madame Tussaud’s Apprentice by Kathleen Benner Duble (YA)
Reviewed by Jenny As Kathleen Benner Duble remarks in her author’s note (always my favorite part of any historical novel), Marie (‘Manon’) Tussaud had a fascinating life. Her mother was…
On Writing Places I’ve Never Been To by Hugo Wilcken
As a teenager, I’d spend hours on my own wandering the stacks of Sydney’s State Library. Its vast, airy reading room mimics those of libraries I later used in London…
The Eds Discuss: The Books & Author Package
Although there always have been superstar authors, for everyone else, gone are the days when you could write a book and leave it to your publisher to sell it for…
The Reflection by Hugo Wilcken
Reviewed by Annabel In this review, I could just make a list of the all the great noir novels and movies and their authors that went through my mind as…
Till Kingdom Come by Andrej Nikolaidis
Translated from the Montenegrin by Will Firth Reviewed by Chelsea McGill Strange things are happening to our narrator, a local newspaper reporter living in the seaside town of Ulcinj, Montenegro…
Two Years Eight Months & Twenty-Eight Nights by Salman Rushdie
Reviewed by Annabel Before you ask – yes, that does make 1001 nights. Rushdie’s new novel may have its roots in the ancient tales but it is also a thoroughly modern story…
Grief Is the Thing with Feathers by Max Porter
Reviewed by Rebecca Foster Hope is the thing with feathersThat perches in the soul,And sings the tune without the words,And never stops at all It may seem perverse to reinterpret…
Undermajordomo Minor by Patrick De Witt
Reviewed by Susan Osborne Undermajordomo Minor is Patrick deWitt’s third novel. His second, The Sisters Brothers, was a darkly comic western set in mid-nineteenth century Oregon which followed the careers of two…
The House in Smyrna by Tatiana Salem Levy
Translated by Alison Entrekin Reviewed by Tony Malone Tatiana Salem Levy was one of the writers featured in Granta’s Best Young Brazilian Novelists list a couple of years back, and her debut…
The Ecliptic by Benjamin Wood
Reviewed by Rebecca Foster Portmantle is a mysterious artists’ retreat centre on the Turkish island of Heybeliada. Its rules are strict: acceptance is at the recommendation of a sponsor, and…
Great Sexpectations by Non Pratt
Non is the author of two YA novels, the latest of which, Remix, is reviewed in our fiction section here. She recently took part in a panel discussion at the Young Adult Literature…
The Looking Glass House by Vanessa Tait
Reviewed by Esther Brazil “Some children have a most disagreeable way of getting grown-up: I hope you won’t do anything of that sort before we meet again.” So wrote Lewis…
The Chimes by Anna Smaill
Reviewed by Eric Karl Anderson I’ve read a couple of fascinating dystopian novels recently: Station Eleven and Not Forgetting the Whale. Both use a dark forecast of the future to say something meaningful…
The Watchmaker of Filigree Street by Natasha Pulley
Reviewed by Annabel Hats off to Bloomsbury on the lovely design of this wonderful novel. You can’t see here, but there is a cut-out of the watch dial, and all around…
The Seed Collectors by Scarlett Thomas
Reviewed by David Harris This book is very different from Thomas’s last, Our Tragic Universe. We see events from several viewpoints, mostly members of the rambling Gardener family: Fleur, her lover…
Tender by Belinda McKeon
Reviewed by Alice Farrant Tender by Belinda McKeon is a literary tour-de-force. A frighteningly addictive tumble down the rabbit hole of obsessive love and friendship in late-90s Ireland. Catherine is 18,…