Stephanie Butland’s third novel, Lost for Words, is set in a secondhand bookshop in the walled city of York, two of my favourite places to wander around. And while the bookshop on the cover may look quirky and cute at first glance, there are shadows lurking inside it. Much like its main character Loveday. Loveday Cardew prefers books to people….
There’s an insistent pull to the rhythm of its opening pages that drew me into Guy Gunaratne’s debut In Our Mad and Furious City, a novel which gives voice to “London’s scowling youth” and “those of us who had an elsewhere in our blood.” For Selvon, Ardan and Yusuf, growing up under the towers of Stones Estate, summer means what…
Helena is driving home from the lake with her youngest daughter when a report comes on the radio that she never hoped to hear. Now in order to protect everything she has, she needs to return to a place she thought she’d long left behind her. You’d recognise my mother’s name if I told it to you. You’d wonder, briefly,…
As soon as I read her opening description of a murmuration, I knew that I was going to enjoy Katy Mahood’s debut novel, Entanglement. It’s the first of many such arresting images in this novel about those ‘moments’ we share with complete strangers. On a hot October day in a London park, Stella sits in her red wedding dress opposite…
Bridget Collins’ The Binding is one book you’ll lust after for your collection with its beautifully finished dust jacket and intricately designed book boards, holding within them the promise that this young man’s story is no ordinary apprentice’s tale. Imagine you could erase your grief. Imagine you could forget your pain. Imagine you could hide a secret. Forever. Emmett Farmer…
I had a hankering to read Sonia Velton’s debut novel Blackberry & Wild Rose for its stunning cover alone before I knew anything more about the story. But what a world I found wrapped up in that oh so very beautiful dust jacket. WHEN ESTHER THOREL, the wife of a Huguenot silk-weaver, rescues Sara Kemp from a brothel she thinks…
Hame is a book I happened upon thanks to the publisher Vintage tweeting about it on St Andrew’s Day last year. The Scottish island setting and a literary trail in search of a mysterious poet really appealed to me and it seems only fitting to post my review of it on St Andrew’s Day, one year on. Here’s what it’s about: Hame,…
Lucy Ayrton’s One More Chance is one of four books helping to launch Little, Brown imprint Dialogue Books this year. It’s an imprint dedicated to introducing wider diversity and more inclusivity by giving a voice to those often overlooked by mainstream publishing. And here, that voice belongs to a young mother in Holloway prison. Dani hasn’t had an easy life. She’s made…
Despite its title, Rebecca John’s The Haunting of Henry Twist isn’t a ghost story in the traditional sense but it does have an ethereal feel to it, and is likely to haunt you long after finishing it. London, 1926: Henry Twist’s heavily pregnant wife leaves home to meet a friend. On the way, she is hit by a bus and killed,…
I’m welcoming author Evonne Wareham to the Nut Press today to talk about her most recent release, Summer in San Remo, which I reviewed here. You can also win a signed copy below. What three words would you use to describe Summer in San Remo? Sunny, flirty, enigmatic. Summer in San Remo is a departure from your previous books which…