March 24, 2020 Fandango and Other Stories by Alexander Grin Translated by Bryan Karetnyk Reviewed by Karen Langley Recent years have seen a wave of wonderful new translations of ‘lost’ Russian authors of the…
January 30, 2020 Of Cats and Elfins by Sylvia Townsend Warner Reviewed by Harriet Just over a year ago I reviewed the newly published Handheld Press edition of Sylvia Townsend Warner’s Kingdoms of Elfin, a…
November 21, 2019 Lake Like a Mirror by Ho Sok Fong Translated by Natascha Bruce Review by David Hebblethwaite Ho Sok Fong is a Malaysian writer whose short stories have won a number of awards. Lake…
November 19, 2019 Your Duck is My Duck by Deborah Eisenberg Review by Terence Jagger This, in spite of its slightly silly sounding title, is an interesting and slightly mysterious collection of six short stories….
August 27, 2019 Belfast Stories, edited by Paul McVeigh & Laura Frank Review by Laura Marriott In Donegall Square, in the centre of Belfast, Lisa is working in the Welcome Centre. Tourists flock in searching for…
July 2, 2019 The Quarter by Najib Mahfouz Translated by Roger Allen Review by Anna Hollingsworth On the rare occasions that someone uncovers unpublished work by a deceased writer, publishing takes an…
June 27, 2019 The Cracks in our Armour by Anna Gavalda Translated by Alison Anderson Reviewed by Harriet Way back in the early days of Shiny (issue 5 to be exact) I reviewed Anna Gavalda’s…
June 25, 2019 Barcelona Tales, ed Helen Constantine Translated by Peter Bush Review by Karen Langley If you’re an armchair traveller like I am, the “City Tales” collection of books from Oxford…
June 25, 2019 Lisbon Tales, ed. Helen Constantine Translated by Amanda Hopkinson Review by Karen Langley If you’re an armchair traveller like I am, the “City Tales” collection of books from Oxford…
June 6, 2019 Being Various: New Irish Short Stories, ed. Lucy Caldwell Review by Laura Marriott Ireland is going through a golden age of writing: that has never been more apparent. I wanted to capture something…
March 14, 2019 Picnic in the Storm by Yukiko Motoya Translated by Asa Yoneda Review by Anna Hollingsworth The title of Yukiko Motoya’s short story collection Picnic in the Storm could easily be a…
March 12, 2019 Girl Balancing by Helen Dunmore Review by Harriet It was a great loss to the world of fiction when Helen Dunmore sadly died in 2017. Fortunately for her admirers,…
October 30, 2018 Kingdoms of Elfin by Sylvia Townsend Warner Reviewed by Harriet Do you believe in fairies? Probably at a young age most people would say they did. And together with an idea…
September 27, 2018 I Am Heathcliff – Stories Inspired by Wuthering Heights, curated by Kate Mosse Review by Julie Barham It is never easy to review a collection of short stories, especially one by such a diverse selection of authors…
August 2, 2018 Sentimental Tales by Mikhail Zoshchenko Translated by Boris Dralyuk Review by Karen Langley Russian satirical writing has a rich heritage, stretching all the way back to the time of…
June 5, 2018 The Sing of the Shore, by Lucy Wood Review by Helen Parry I have been a fan of Lucy Wood’s writing since reading her début collection of short stories, Diving Belles, and…
May 24, 2018 Blood on the Tracks: Railway Mysteries, ed. Martin Edwards Reviewed by Karen Langley Golden Age crime, which has had such a revival recently, is renowned for particular tropes and settings; the country house…
April 5, 2018 Moonrise & Lost Mars, ed. Mike Ashley Reviewed by Karen Langley There can’t be many readers of Shiny New Books who aren’t aware of the lovely British Library Crime Classics series:…
December 14, 2017 The Runagates Club by John Buchan Reviewed by Julie Barham This is a splendid book for all those who revel in the scary, the heroic and the unusual. Anyone familiar…
November 2, 2017 Uncommon Type by Tom Hanks Reviewed by Alice Farrant “We can get the Times to write something. Or that nut from the Observer.”“Wait, what… what nut from the Observer?”“Frank…
October 26, 2017 Ornithology by Nicholas Royle Reviewed by Annabel Earlier this year, I reviewed the novel An English Guide to Birdwatching by an author named Nicholas Royle, and I interviewed…
September 19, 2017 Russian Émigré Short Stories from Bunin to Yanovsky, edited by Bryan Karetnyk Reviewed by Karen Langley In the anniversary year of the 1917 Russian Revolution a number of books have been issued which look at that…
August 17, 2017 What it Means When a Man Falls from the Sky by Lesley Nneka Arimah Reviewed by Rebecca Foster Born in the UK, raised largely in Nigeria, and now resident in Minneapolis, USA – Africa and the West are…
August 8, 2017 Listening In by Jenny Eclair Review by Laura Marriott Listening In is a collection of 24 short stories from comedian and writer Jenny Eclair. Her last literary outing was the…
July 4, 2017 DIS MEM BER by Joyce Carol Oates Reviewed by Karen Langley American author Joyce Carol Oates is an astonishingly prolific writer: since the publication of her first book in 1963, she’s…
