There aren’t enough novels about LONELINESS and GRIEF and the RADICAL JOY OF A PUBLICLY OWNED UNIVERSAL POSTAL SERVICE imo. Thank god for Vigdis Hjorth.
Exactly what you might expect: absurd outfits, mountains of coke, absolutely weapons-grade name dropping. But there’s also a sense of genuine self-examination here – and a ...
M. G. Leonard and Sam Sedgman, illustrated by Elisa Paganelli
Gayle recommends:
Finally someone is giving the people what they want: mysteries, set on trains. M. G. Leonard and Sam Sedgman are writing a whole series of them, beginning with the entertaining ...
The rediscovery of a forgotten Black modernist poet who hung out with the Bright Young Things sends Mathilda on journey involving a mysterious artists’ residency somewhere in ...
I read almost nothing during lockdown, due to being entirely unable to focus on anything for more than five seconds, but Exciting Times was one of the few things that managed ...
Even if, intellectually, you understand all the concepts Layla F. Saad covers in this book – white fragility, cultural appropriation, tokenism… – methodically working ...
A book so delightful I burst into tears on finishing it. Originally published in 1933 and recently rediscovered and reissued by the brilliant Handheld Press, Business as Usual ...
A book about a friendship between two quiet men who like board games and comfortable silences. It is, from the first paragraph, extremely funny (‘Leonard was raised by his ...
Few things have made me feel as hungry as I felt while reading this book. Tiny Moons explores the connections between food, language, inheritance and belonging, and contains a ...
If you read The Iliad and your main thought was "I wish it read a bit more like YA romance," The Song of Achilles is for you. Sexy ancient Greek fan fic FTW.
Happy All the Time is a very rare thing: a novel about fairly contented people, in fairly happy relationships, that nevertheless manages not to be twee or shallow or boring. A ...
This dark, funny, heartbreaking feminist cult classic is a joy to read – even if the fact that so much of it is still relevant after nearly 50 years is kind of depressing. If ...
Not a day goes past that I don't shake a fist at the sky and cry in despair, "When will Claire-Louise Bennett publish something new?!" Until my cries are answered, I'll make do ...
Celebrate his long overdue Oscar nod by treating yourself to With Nails, Richard E. Grant’s glorious, funny, gossipy film diaries. Starting with his first film role in ...
Harriet Vane appears in far too few of Dorothy L. Sayers’s novels, but she does take centre stage in the best, Gaudy Night. The mystery itself – a poison-pen in an Oxford ...
I’ve never been so invested in a romance – even the ones I’ve been personally involved in – as I am in that of Harriet Vane and Lord Peter Wimsey. Strong Poison is ...
Nora Ephron, introduction by Nora Ephron and Delia Ephron
Gayle recommends:
Finally I have something to recommend when people ask for a funny book! Heartburn is properly hilarious, like a 200 page stand up set, except less mean, and with more food.
King Lear transported to contemporary India. A huge, sprawling, ambitious debut novel, that manages to tackle climate change, capitalism, global inequality - while still being ...
I once read this book, cover to cover, by candlelight during a power cut. Not all cookbooks warrant such behaviour, but this one certainly does. Full of musings and stories on ...
A book I wish I'd written myself. Laura Shapiro tells the stories of six women through the food they ate (or didn't, in the case of Helen Gurley Brown). It's filled with ...
Inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement, The Hate U Give pulls no punches in dealing with its difficult subject matter - it's shocking and heartbreaking, and offers no easy ...
Sylvia Townsend Warner, introduction by Claire Harman
Gayle recommends:
Pick up any Sylvia Townsend Warner book and you're in for a treat, but Summer Will Show is a particular favourite. It follows young English aristocrat Sophia Willoughby as she ...
A debut collection that lives up to the promise of its marvellous title. Ranging widely in time and place, these stories can be strange, unsettling or funny - but they're all ...
A beautifully written novel about the quietly disappointing nature of life. Don't let anyone tell you it's the worst Booker winner - they're talking nonsense.
A book about a sex offender who really likes the Eurovision Song Contest. Have I sold it to you yet? Just in case the answer's no: Martin John is also one of the most ...
One of the most finely tuned bits of storytelling you'll ever have the pleasure of reading. Funny, beautifully illustrated, and just dark enough to keep you entertained, even ...
Long out of print, and now available again in this glorious facsimile of the 1966 original, Nairn's London is a funny, angry, stirring tour of London's architecture. Fifty ...
The Dud Avocado is such fun. Sally Jay Gorce is my absolute hero - a fabulous American tumbling in and out of trouble and beds in Paris in the 1950s. Glorious!
