Just in time before the end of the month and the official start of summer, here are five books—mostly UK debuts, a couple somewhat farther afield—that will keep you reading while waiting for good weather. GUNK, Saba Sams Bloomsbury Circus, pp. 240 Set mostly around a grimy student club in Brighton—Gunk, the debut novel by…
Born in 1947 in a small Piedmont village, Giuseppe Penone might be Italy’s most important contemporary artist working today. A key member of the Arte Povera movement, Penone started out with a group of young Italian artists spearheaded by curator and critic Germano Celant who in the late 1960s sought to critique consumerism and industrialism…
Easter is one of those times where even people who don’t usually have time to read feel like it is time to relax and spend a few hours in the company of a book. Here are five suggestions to keep those hours fun and, more often than not, more than a little weird. VANISHING WORLD,…
Believe it or not, this marks the first year anniversary of this column. I hope you had as much fun reading it as I did writing it. But enough of that. Here are five more for you. THE LIFE, OLD AGE, AND DEATH OF A WORKING-CLASS WOMAN, Didier Eribon Allen Lane, pp. 256 Eribon is…
Here’s a selection which this month leans heavily on politics and non-fiction. At a time when it seems there’s little about which to feel hopeful, there remains a lot for us to consider. BLACK UTOPIANS: VISIONS OF HOPE AND RESISTANCE IN AMERICA, Aaron Robertson Chatto & Windus, pp. 400 Black Utopians is the first full-length…
January is the moment of New Year resolutions. “I will hit the gym and scroll less, I will stop binge TV shows and read more,” I tell myself … Let’s see, I suppose. We can but try. With that, here’s a quite eclectic selection of the best books published in the last month to help…
December is one of those downtimes in terms of new releases. Everyone’s attention is focused on presents, and the best books of the year are the ones which tend to get a big boost (for our own list of the standouts in 2024, see here). But this doesn’t mean one can’t find gems if they…
Drafting a reading list is one of those exercises that always come tinged with some regrets. For every book that you decide on including, there are two or three that with the privilege of hindsight you feel should have been afforded the same sort of consideration. Here then are some of my highlights of the…