In Love and War by Alex Preston
By Victoria Best It is 1937 and disgraced Cambridge student, Esmond Lowndes – caught in bed with another boy by the Master of Emmanuel College, no less – is being…
The Eds Discuss: Book Covers
By the Shiny New Books Editors Never mind the old saw, ‘Don’t judge a book by its cover’, how important IS cover design, bearing in mind the recent issues over…
The Scatter Here is Too Great by Bilal Tanweer
Reviewed by Denise Kong If, as I do, you use Yahoo Mail, it’s impossible to log in without being enticed into clicking on some lurid headline about an outrageous wrong…
Reading Scotland
Selected by Victoria Best You’d think everything there is to say about Scotland has been said in the media over the past couple of months. But there’s been a suspicious…
Questions for Laurie Graham
Interview by Victoria Best First of all, I have to say that Annabel, my co-editor, and I are both enormous fans of your books. [Laurie: THANK YOU, THANK YOU!!!!!] We’ve both been…
The Grand Duchess of Nowhere by Laurie Graham
Reviewed by Victoria Best Laurie Graham is one of those authors who never seem to get the attention and acknowledgement they deserve. Her novels are engrossing and clever and so,…
The Confabulist by Steven Galloway
Reviewed by Annabel Gaskell. Interest in the great magician and escapologist Harry Houdini seems to be undergoing a revival lately. Christopher Sandford wrote a book about the feud between Houdini…
Colliding Worlds by Arthur I Miller
Reviewed by Peter Hobson One of the most enjoyable work-related things I have done in recent years was to collaborate with the British artist Jayne Wilton for a year after…
Stone Mattress by Margaret Atwood
Reviewed by Victoria Best Oh Margaret Atwood, you are so funny and so clever and so full of novelistic wiles! She may be 74 but no author could be less…
Jeeves and the Wedding Bells by Sebastian Faulks
Reviewed by Ali Hope Recently out in paperback is the latest offering from Sebastian Faulks, a novel which resurrects P. G. Wodehouse’s characters of Bertie Wooster and his valet Jeeves….
Ammonites and Leaping Fish: A Life in Time by Penelope Lively
Paperback review by Denise Kong Ammonites and Leaping Fish: A Life in Time is an intelligent, illuminating and thoughtful memoir, which left me wanting its author, Penelope Lively, to be my…
The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy by Rachel Joyce
Reviewed by Ali Hope The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy is the much anticipated companion novel to The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry. This novel has a parallel narrative, rather than…
Hild by Nicola Griffith
Reviewed by Helen That night she dreamt Fursey was talking to Hereswith. It’s what women do: weave the web, pull the strings, herd into the corner. It’s their only power. Then she…
As Green as Grass by Emma Smith
Paperback review by Simon Thomas Emma Smith, who wrote novels, short stories, and children’s books throughout the second half of the 20th century, has had a resurgence of fame in her…
Station Eleven by Emily St John Mandel
Reviewed by Annabel Gaskell This book may have shocking pink endpapers, but between them is the most elegant novel of speculative fiction that I’ve read in a long time –…
Angelica’s Smile by Andrea Camilleri
Translated by Stephen Sartarelli Reviewed by Elaine Simpson-Long I discovered the Inspector Montalbano books by Camilleri some six or seven years ago and at first wasn’t sure I liked them…
When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomed by Bradley Greenburg
Reviewed by Victoria Best One of the best experiences in reviewing books is when a book for which you have no particular expectations turns out to be both engrossing and…
To Come Back Increased: Hild by Nicola Griffith
Written by Nicola Griffith For me a good novel is one that draws me in and puts me right there, right then, with the characters: I walk where they walk,…
Nick Rennison talks about the Victorians…
By Nick Rennison What is it about us and the Victorians? Here we are in 2014, in a world of smart phones, Twitter and Facebook, and yet, everywhere you look…
Tigerman by Nick Harkaway
Reviewed by Annabel Gaskell At the time of writing, I have the pleasure of telling you that Tigerman, with its stunning cover artwork, is the best novel I’ve read this year. My…
Travels with Epicurus by Daniel Klein
Reviewed by Victoria Best Cultural theorist Giorgio Agamben has some very interesting things to say on the topic of old age – the subject of Daniel Klein’s gentle, ruminative trundle…
The Day of the Dead by Maurizio de Giovanni
Translated by Antony Shugaar Reviewed by Falaise On a miserable morning in 1930, a small, undernourished child is found dead at the foot of the Tondo di Capodimonte steps in Naples,…
Glow by Ned Beauman
Reviewed by Simon Thomas When you’ve established yourself as a (Booker longlisted) quirky historical novelist – if such a title can be given to an author whose first two novels…
Eyrie by Tim Winton
Reviewed by Kim Forrester If you’ve ever spoken your mind, or stood up for something you believe in when it might have been easier — and safer — to keep…