Ian McEwan has forged his own genre – crisply realist surfaces mixed with sudden excursions into the darkest corridors of the mind. In Lessons, the central character reveals a writerly consciousness.
Major plot points explode like hand grenades in Adrianne Howell’s Hydra, which is ‘never dull’, but implausible. And Alice Nelson’s Faithless, about love and literature, operates in a rarefied world.
Nights of Plague is set on a fictional island in the early 20th century. Is it an allegory of empire’s fall; a contemplation on corruption and East-West tension or a reflection on pandemic life?
In a series of discussions with journalist Sean O'Hagan, we meet an older, reflective theologically-probing musician, drawn to the Christian qualities of mercy, atonement and forgiveness.
Clive Hamilton’s memoir of 40 years in activism is most of all a narrative of ideas in action. He argues for the power of provocation – and against the left, the right and China.
Douglas Rushkoff’s Survival of the Richest is less about tech billionaires and their ‘bonkers’ escape plans than it is an entertaining primer on the various ills of late capitalism.
Elizabeth Strout’s novel Oh William! has been shortlisted for the Booker Prize. Her follow up book takes us inside the head of a small, loving, anxious, slightly neurotic person during lockdown.
A new book explores how birds have adapted to our cities - from nesting in skyscrapers to snatching food - reflecting on the beauty and wildness they bring to urban landscapes.
From partying in California to activism in Australia, Grace Tame refuses to be defined by past traumatic events. The voice of her memoir, writes Camilla Nelson, is irrepressible.
Peggy Frew’s masterful control of Wildflowers, her fourth novel – about three sisters, once close, now estranged – promises not to engulf readers in the sorrow it must expose. Debra Adelaide reviews.
Joyce Carol Oates saw Blonde, her epic novel interrogating the legend of Marilyn Monroe, as ‘my Moby Dick’. Mel Campbell celebrates Oates’ achievement, in the lead-up to the Netflix adaptation.
Does a journalist’s gender matter if their job is to speak truth to power? It shouldn’t but until recently did. A new book, Through Her Eyes, tells the stories of our women foreign correspondents.
Siang Lu’s debut novel suggests whitewashing Asians for the screen is profitable. ‘People pay to see foreignness repackaged as stereotypes – and thus rendered virtually invisible.’