by David Attenborough A Review There can be few people around the world who have not heard of David Attenborough. He has been involved in nature broadcasting for around seventy of his ninety-four* years. During this time, he has probably seen more of the planet than anyone else alive today. This book, A Life on …
Category: Book Review
The Stolen Sisters
by Louise Jensen ‘That was when she saw a glint of silver. A sharp point pressed against her neck. Instantly the bottom fell out of her world, her body slackened. She had to stay alive for her sisters.’The Stolen Sisters (2020) is the sixth of Louise Jensen’s psychological thrillers. It follows the same structure that …
Jane Eyre meets Wuthering Heights
Mrs England by Stacey Halls A Review '.... Mr England was in high spirits. He'd played two songs on the upright piano and now sat on the stool smoking. Cigar cuttings littered the carpet. His mood was infectious; the children cheered and ran about, and Charley clapped on the rug.' Stacey Halls's first novel The …
Tomb of Sand
by Geetanjali Shree translated from the Hindi by Daisy Rockwell ‘What is a border? It’s something that surrounds an existence, it is a person’s perimeter. No matter how large, no matter how small.’ Tomb of Sand, which won this year’s International Booker Prize, is about borders - and about crows. Crows, I hear some readers …
Strange Affair at a Lighthouse
The Lamplighters by Emma Stonex Review 'So ghostly in the cold sunlightIt seemed, that we were struck the whileWith wonder all too dread for words.And, as into the tiny creekWe stole beneath the hanging crag,We saw three queer, black, ugly birds—Too big, by far, in my belief,For guillemot or shag—Like seamen sitting bolt-uprightUpon a half-tide …
The Heart of the Robot
Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro A Review 'Josie came hurrying to me. She put her arms round me and held me. When I gazed over the child's head, I saw Manager smiling happily and the Mother, her face drawn and serious, looking down to search in her shoulder bag.' Klara, the eponymous narrator …
BILLY BOY
Caught Between the Orange and the Green by Joyce Milne D'Auria ‘Maggie’s eye fixed on the boy. She smiled and felt drawn to the cot’s side. The child had red-gold hair down to his collar and piercing blue eyes. He raised his arms to be picked up ....’ Billy Boy is an historical coming-of-age novel …
Cold Comfort Farm
by Stella Gibbons 'You told them you were mad. You had been mad since you saw something nasty in the woodshed.' Aunt Ada Doom is in her eighties. She hasn’t left the farm for twenty years. Indeed, she only comes out of her room once a year to do ‘the Counting’ – a kind of …
STORYLAND
A New Mythology of Britain by Amy Jeffs 'Arthur had a sister called Anna. She married the pagan King Loth of Lothian. Their sons' names were Gawain and Mordred. They had a daughter too, whose name was Teneu. As soon as they were old enough, the boys had migrated south to fight for Arthur. Teneu …
Emma Revisited
'Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her.' It has long been the opinion of at least some authorities on the English novel …
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