SUMMER ROUND-UP by Adèle, Celia and Linda

Adèle, Celia and Linda give their latest recommendations.

Linda's choices:

Rough Patch by Kathy Slack is a memoir of breakdown and recovery. We're accustomed to the idea that being outside in natural surroundings is beneficial to our wellbeing; in Kathy's case the cure came, specifically, through vegetable growing. Severe depression led to the abandonment of a demanding but unrewarding career in advertising and a retreat to her Cotswolds home. She frequently acknowledges her privilege - loving husband, beautiful house, 'enough money not to worry about money' - yet none of these assets provided a defence against debilitating depression. Dismissing the 'woo' of abstract concepts like gratitude and blessings, she felt her recovery begin with the scattering of seeds, their germination and the resulting harvest. 'I've been unable to do virtually anything for myself ... And here I am now, with a lettuce of my very own.' An engaging read, written with warmth and humour - and there are recipes, too, based on what the garden produces.

Still - a mindful practice for photographers by Paul Sanders is the next book I read, which as it happens is also by an author who held a high-profile job (photography editor for The Times) before experiencing breakdown and recovery. For Paul Sanders, salvation came through photography - and from a particular kind of photography, focusing not so much on the technical side as on the mindfulness of looking, seeing and appreciating. Beautifully produced, Still is illustrated throughout, mainly in black and white but occasionally in colour, with images which will encourage you to go out with your camera, not to 'snap' or 'capture' but to see which images offer themselves to you. Reviewer Graeme Fife has written a fuller appreciation of this book, which will appear soon.

The Angel of St Piran by John Ironmonger: When does ‘conservation’ mask animal exploitation? That question is at the heart of this thrilling novel, set in Tanzania. Young researcher Angel, who lives among wild chimpanzees on a forested island, must fight for the animals’ survival and her own against an organisation that provides wealthy hunters with opportunities to kill. Many of us, revolted by images of hunters posing proudly with their victims, are familiar with the argument that controlled ‘trophy hunting’ can benefit wild animal populations and habitats. There’s no doubting which side John Ironmonger is on; readers will be rooting for Angel and her chimpanzee companions against the pitiless invaders as the situation becomes ever more dangerous. Partly inspired by the work of the great Jane Goodall, the novel explores animal communication and how much we can learn from wild creatures when we’re willing to listen. This was my introduction to an author with a thorough knowledge and passionate feeling for animal issues; I’m now eager to read his earlier novel, The Wager and the Bear. (Note: The Angel of St Piran will be published in September - I read an advance proof.)

Celia's choices:

Keeping The World Away by Margaret Forster: I recently went to a wonderful Gwen John Exhibition at Cardiff Museum and Art Gallery. I was with my Book Club and we were celebrating thirty years of reading and meeting. The book choice was Margaret Forster’s Keeping The World Away. The novel is based on a depiction of a corner of Gwen John’s attic room in Paris. The painting is small, like much of Gwen John’s work and very simple, the light coming through a window onto a plain wooden table which holds a bunch of primroses. The only hint of a human presence is an empty wicker chair, a discarded coat and a parasol but the paintings speak volumes about the woman who painted it.
Gwen John painted several versions of this scene, all slightly different. The novel begins with the artist herself and her life in Paris. She gifts one of these paintings, unsigned, to a friend. The friend loses it, something she regrets for the rest of her life. The painting is restless. Lost, stolen, mislaid, sold, finally bequeathed, it passes from one woman to another. Each woman falls under the painting’s indefinable spell and finds something that speaks to her own need for calm, quiet, solace, a life of one’s own. Forster weaves their very different stories into a complex narrative that spans much of the twentieth century. Ultimately, the novel is a love letter to a painter and her painting. I really admired the novel and it was a very special experience to have it fresh in my mind as I stood in front of A Corner of the Artist’s Room in Paris.

Is A River Alive? by Robert Macfarlane: The answer to the question posed by the title of Robert Macfarlane’s book is an unequivocal Yes, they are very much alive, should have Rights like other living beings and should be protected as, ultimately, all life depends on them. He takes us with him on three expeditions to rivers in very different parts of the world. The Cloud-forest of Ecuador, a unique environment with astonishing biodiversity, where the rivers are threatened by god mining. Southern India where the rivers are already horribly polluted and dying and the Magpie River in North-eastern Quebec, a magnificent, wild river threatened by damming to produce hydroelectricity. In each place he links up with activists, often Native people, to whom the rivers are alive, have always been alive and who are fighting to save them and all the life that depends on them. Macfarlane is a writer who combines the vivid excitement of the best travel writing with a wide and erudite knowledge of the natural world. His writing is passionately felt, very radical but also profoundly philosophical and deeply spiritual. He brings the book home, literally, to a fragile wellspring in the chalk lands near his home, which is threatened on all sides by building development and he finds hope in its ability to flow anew. He reminds us of our own reverence for rivers and water, remembered in the names of our rivers, the Severn, the Thames and the Dee.

Purple Citrus & Sweet Perfume by Silvena Rowe: like Adèle, I love a cookery book. So much so, that my latest novel. Miss Graham's Cold War Cookbook (later re-titled Miss Graham's War), has a cookery book at the heart of the narrative (the clue is in the original title). I first saw Purple Citrus & Sweet Perfume in my local artisanal baker and coffee shop. I couldn't resist the beautiful cover or the equally beautiful title. I immediately picked it up and was entranced by page after page of fascinating Eastern Mediterranean recipes and lovely illustrations. Part cookery, part history, part travelogue, part memoir, it's my favourite kind of cookery book. Silvena Rowe is of Bulgarian Turkish heritage and her book explores the culinary legacy of the Ottoman Empire which extended from Hungary to the Persian Gulf, into Egypt and North Africa. The Ottomans controlled the Spice Road, their vast empire encompassed many different peoples and their culinary traditions. Silvena Rowe focuses for the main part on the Eastern Mediterranean. Through her recipes, she takes us from Istanbul to Syria, Jordan, the Lebanon, into the Balkans and across to Damascus. She follows in the footsteps of the great Ottoman chefs, who came from every corner of the Empire and gives a modern twist to their recipes. Her book is a celebration of one of the great cuisines of the world.     

Adèle's choices:

Wolves Eat Dogs  by Martin Cruz Smith: does anyone remember a wonderful thriller called Gorky Park? It was published in 1981 and was a huge hit. In it, we were introduced to a Moscow detective called Arkady Renko. I loved it, but somehow never kept up with  the other books in the 11 book series. I watched the movie in 1983 and enjoyed that too  but not as much as the book. 

I was persuaded to download Wolves Eat Dogs by one of those 99p Kindle offers from Amazon. (An aside: I think these offers are a Public Good for readers in these straitened times and I've since downloaded four more.) So I'm working my way through the Renko novels but this one is particularly fascinating. It's set in the Black Zone around Chernobyl and the town of Pripyat and is absolutely gripping, terrifying and full of extraordinary characters. The shadow of the accident hangs like a dark cloud over everything. It's haunting and beautifully written. Arkady is a wonderful creation and I think new readers will enjoy reading about him. I also loved the running gag about how 'Chernobyl' is actually  pronounced  'Chornobyl' in Ukrainian ... of course it's still in Ukraine now and that's a worrying fact in the present circumstances. 

More Home Cooking: A writer returns to the kitchen by Laurie Colvin: I have a thing about Laurie Colvin. This time last year in our round up, I wrote about a novel of hers called A Big Storm Knocked it Over.

This year, I'm writing about this non-fiction book. There's also, obviously, a book called Home Cooking and that's terrific too, but I've read this one most recently.

Laurie Colwin died much too young  and is not nearly well enough known. These days, we're all  used to Substack, in which writers can  reach readers and speak to them directly about their chosen subject. In Colwin's case, we're invited itno her house and more particularly her kitchen. We get glimpses into her daily life and share recipes grouped not chronologically nor alphabetically but by category. These seem totally random. How about American Corn, followed by Jam Anxiety, followed by Three Chocolate Cakes? 

Each new subject gives us recipes embedded in a kind of short story that allows us delighful glimpses into her life. I can't think of a book I own that's more comforting and life enhancing. It arouses many emotions in me, not least a great sadness that she didn't live long enough to write more books. 

I am Pilgrim  by Terry Hayes: at the very end of June, I travelled from Northern Italy to London by train. I needed, therefore, à la Gwendolyn in The Importance of Being Earnest, "something sensational" to read. This novel has been on my Kindle for many years but I had, I confess, forgotten all about it. That happens with a Kindle when you don't see the spines of books on your shelves.  It had been recommended by someone in one of the round ups of Holiday Reading choices in the newspapers. 

And what a good choice I made! It's far too long and probably could have had several large chunks cut out of it to some advantage but goodness me, what a hair-raising ride! Breathless, and thrilling and proceeding a a breakneck speed, it nevertheless has time to develop characters in impressive depth.  Pilgrim is our hero, fighting for Good against a terribly evil enemy and you root for him the whole way. It's a souped-up spy thriller, really, and that's not my usual kind of book, but it's so brilliantly done and takes you to such fascinating parts of the world along the way that you give yourself up quite happily to the thrill of the narrative. I’d recommend reading it on Kindle if possible … at over 600 pages long, the paperback version will add a lot of weight to your tote bag or suitcase.

Happy summer reading to all!

BOOKS OF THE YEAR Part 3: chosen by our contributors

Here's the final part of our roundup and our chance to thank our reviewers for their generous contributions throughout the year. We couldn't do this without you! Thanks too to all our followers. We hope everyone's found something here - or maybe several titles - to add to your reading pile for 2026.

John Newman chooses something old and something new: My reconnection with the work of Rosemary Sutcliff continued this year and I was really thrilled to find a second hand hardback edition of Knight’s Fee complete with Charles Keeping illustrations. I f could not recall reading of how Randal, an abandoned kennel boy overcomes adversity to become a knight. Sutcliff brilliantly uses his rise to explore how the Saxon and Norman population find a common enemy in the French and those attempting to usurp the throne at the end of the eleventh century.

Sometimes picking up a proof copy can lead to a major reading experience. Such is the case with Solvej Balle’s On the Calculation of Volume. The story of how an antiquarian book dealer awakes continuously on the 18th November and how she attempts to adapt is told a day at a time. I'm now up to Volume 3 of a planned septology and I can’t stop recommending them.

John Newman is an independent booksellers at Newham Books. 

Penny Dolan chooses A Voice in the Night by Simon Mason, the fourth in his excellent ‘DI Wilkins’ crime series: Two murders, set in a rather unlovely Oxford: the stabbing of a security guard and a mysterious death-by-drowning of a retired academic.

DCS Wainwright, the ruthless new Superintendent at Thames Valley Police, wants both murders solved. She also wants one of two officers out of the service. Will it be handsome, black, college-educated DI Raymond Wilkins? Or his ‘past partner’: trailer-trash, trackie-bottomed, single-parent DI Ryan Wilkins, who must have ‘no responsibility’, yet somehow fixes on essential facts?

Though each Wilkins goes their own way in sorting out the mystery, they also face painful responsibilities in their own lives. A Voice in the Night, with its compelling heart, makes my Book of the Year 2025, though I must add that the three earlier DI Wilkins novels are worth reading first.

Mary Hoffman: My fiction-reading has involved a lot of re-reads. I discovered Elly Griffiths’ wonderful Ruth Galloway series of detective novels in June and have read all fifteen and am now re-reading them. The first is The Crossing Places and I heartily recommend them. The heroine is middle-aged, not slim and fashionable, but is a forensic archaeologist. Yet Ruth Galloway is not short of male admirers.

I’ve also been re-reading my way through my extensive Anne Tyler collection and am six books in so far. I got the latest Jackson Brodie novel by Kate Atkinson at Christmas last year – Murder at the Sign of the Rook (Doubleday), so of course I then had to re-read all the others. And I belong to a book group which also sometimes supplies titles I know already, including my own choice, The Leopard (Collins and Harvill Press) by Giuseppe Tommasi di Lampedusa, partly inspired by the recent Netflix series, which played fast and loose with the plot but was beautifully cast and filmed. It was first published in Italy in 1958 and the English translation two years later, both after the author’s death. I must have first read it in sixth form; anyway, I seem always to have known it and it remains one of my favourite books. 

Other favourite re-reads of the years have been Hilary Mantel’s The Mirror and the Light, which I enjoyed much more second time round and Irène Nemirovsky’s Suite Française, which ditto. Our last book club title of the Year is Pip Williams’ The Dictionary of Lost Words and it is a corker.  It may be hard to write a page-turner about a (fictional) girl helping to compile the OED, but Williams has done it. Happy reading!

Mark Davies has also chosen The Dictionary of Lost Words: Set largely in Oxford, the novel is structured to track the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries through the life of the first-person character, Esme. As the daughter of one of the editors, Esme's awareness of the significance of words begins as a small child. As a adult, she is employed at the Dictionary, and determines to try to include 'lost' words of a more feminine derivation, having realised that the Dictionary was a male-dominated domain: the editors and compilers were men, the majority of cited sources were written by men, and most of the researchers were men. By retrieving otherwise ignored or mislaid words, and by talking to working class women, Esme collects the basis of her own small alternative 'Lost Words' dictionary. This feminist theme is interwoven with the simultaneous activities of the suffragette movement and the nursing of soldiers injured in the First World War, making the book both engaging, thought-provoking, and educational.

Mark Davies is an Oxford local historian, public speaker and guide. His latest publications are A Jericho Scrapbook: Inside an Oxford Community Saved from Destruction and Jericho - a Celebration.

Jane Dalton: My pick is The Glass Hotel by Emily St John Mandel. Ostensibly a warning of the devastation wreaked by ponzi schemes, this strange and haunting novel carries an undercurrent of a world in which women pay the price for men’s crimes and selfishness.

Chief among them is Vincent, who at school was straight-As pupil but whose talents go unrecognised. Without a career, she becomes a fake trophy wife to the "super-rich" Jonathan Alkaitis, while her half-brother Paul plagiarises her video work. He squanders his college education funded by his mother, whereas Vincent is haunted by the loss of her own beloved mother.

The many different shifts in time, perspective and tenses - present and past, including Paul justifying his actions to a therapist in later years - make for a read that’s as unsettling as offensive messages written on a hotel window - a key plot point.At the end, I had to return to the start to better relish the nuances and detail of the rich narrative in context.

Jane Dalton is a journalist for the Independent. Her first novel is currently out on submission to publishers. 

Leslie Wilson's choice is When I Was, by Miranda Miller. What struck me about this novel was the vulnerability of people trying to be adults, and somehow never managing it; the deeply insecure parents are imprisoned by their class and difficult background, trying to negotiate the world without enough tools to do so, at least not enough to fool other adults that they know what they're doing, and aren't we all like that at times? The four children are also struggling through their lives, particularly the youngest, an observant, sometimes truculent little girl who loves her parents in spite of their failings. The family relationships ring absolutely true.

There are passages of wonderful comedy, particularly the abortive excursion to Brighton in a hire car, which turns out a disaster, particularly for the car. There's  also deep and devastating sadness. Engaging, perceptive and compassionate, this is a novel that’s hard to put down.

Leslie Wilson’s latest novel is The War’s Not Over Yet.

Jane Rogers chooses Juice by Tim Winton: I love Winton’s work but I’d read enough utterly depressing cli-fi dystopias to feel reluctant about starting this. Juice is set in a lawless, scorched, barren Australia 200 years in the future – how could it not be grim? But Winton is a compelling writer. His narrator spins his tale to save his own life, at the hands of a lone killer who holds him, and the child he is trying to protect, captive. There are layers and layers of suspense, not just about the narrator but about his mother, wife, and child, and about the violent climate justice organisation both he and his captor have worked for (the chief targets are heirs to Big Oil). Winton is brilliant at raising complex moral issues; blame, revenge, honesty, and love. The astonishing humanity of the story makes it much much more than the recital of bleakness I was fearing. And his introduction of honourable AI in the final third of the novel raises questions which continue to haunt me.

Jane Rogers' latest publication is a short story collection, Fire-Ready.

Becky Jones: The book I loved most this year was The Wedding People by Alison Espach. It was the first book for a long time that hooked me on the very first page. Phoebe, a divorced academic, arrives at the Cornwall Inn to find she is the only guest who is not there for the elaborate week-long wedding of Lila and Gary. When the bride realises, she is furious – this depressed stranger could ruin her meticulously planned celebrations. As things pan out, however, Phoebe becomes important to her in ways neither of them could have imagined.

What I loved about this book was the writing – sometimes I find myself aware of the craft of writing which can sometimes detract from the enjoyment as a reader. But with this book, I could admire the writing whilst laughing and crying and being fully absorbed in the story. The premise was perfect – a week-long wedding in a hotel. It was a stage set for drama, full of surprises with wonderful, fully formed characters and sparkling, funny dialogue. But what I loved most was the way themes of loneliness, depression, grief and being different were treated with such humour. An uplifting read.

Becky Jones' first novel, Searching for Amy, was published this year.

David Breakell has chosen The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov, translated by Hugh Aplin: Written in the era of Stalin's show trials, this political satire cum fantasy horror was finally published only when the author - and Stalin himself - were both long dead. In a surreal Moscow where most of the humane, moral characters are to be found in a mental institution, Bulgakov skewers Soviet society with prose which is, at turns, darkly comic and terrifying. For me, its most compelling aspect is the 'novel within a novel': the eponymous Master is struggling to complete his manuscript, a historical novel which reimagines a single day - the day of Christ's crucifixion - from the point of view of Pontius Pilate. In the hours after Christ's death, Pilate tries, unsuccessfully, to alleviate his sense of guilt. Sprinkled through the text of the main narrative, these chapters provide a brilliant counterpoint to its satirical message. But also perhaps hope for the Master and Margarita.

David Breakell's first novel is The Alchemist of Genoa - read a Q&A with David next Monday.

The choice of Alison Layland is Audrey Magee's The Colony: There’s something about islands, and I realised recently that I've visited quite a few in my reading this year, all of them as exciting and intriguing an experience as a real-life trip across the sea currents.

In The Colony, the inhabitants of a small island off the coast of Ireland are visited by an English artist and a French linguist, who battle one another for the soul of the island’s people and their language, to the bewilderment of the islanders themselves. In a microcosm of colonialism, their desires and actions have profound consequences. This is a beautifully written, engaging read with brilliant characterisation and dialogue, and so much between the lines.

Other excellent island-based novels I’ve read this year are: Little Great Island by Kate Woodworth; Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy; Muckle Flugga  by Michael Pedersen; Island by Jane Rogers. Maybe I’ve been drawn to island-set novels recently as my novel, After the Clearances, is largely set on the fictional island of Ynys Hudol, inspired by Bardsey off the north-west coast of Wales.

Alison Layland's latest publication is After the Clearances.

Nick Manns recommends Forbidden Notebook by Alba de Céspedes: In Rome, one Sunday in November 1950, Valeria Cossati walks into a tobacconist’s and asks the shopkeeper for cigarettes and a child’s exercise book. The shopkeeper says it’s forbidden to sell non-tobacco products on a Sunday. With sudden urgency (‘I need it’), Cossati persuades him to break the law, and with the notebook hidden beneath her coat, walks into the street, past a watching policeman.

‘I need it’ marks the point when de Céspedes’ character steps beyond the role of compliant housewife and selfless mother and speaks for herself. The ‘forbidden notebook’ – her diary of domestic events – becomes a document of resistance: reports from a strange country.

Written five years after the fall of Italian fascism; 18 months after the publication of The Second Sex, Valeria Cossati walks towards our own time. She says, ‘This is what I saw; this is what I worked out.’

Nick Manns has written four novels for young adults and is the founder-director of Dyslexia Lifeline.  

Paul Dowswell couldn't decide on just one, so chose three! Firstly, A Village in the Third Reich. Julia Boyd, who also wrote the fascinating Travellers in the Third Reich about tourism in Hitler’s Germany, excels in this captivating account of the Nazi-era lives of the people of Oberstdorf in the Bavarian Alps. Not a good bedtime read for anyone worried about the state of the world; It gave me nightmares.

Secondly, Long Island by Colm Toibin. I loved Brooklyn, both film and book, so was keen to catch up with Eilis Lacey, Tony Fiorello and Jim Farrell. We’re now in the 1970s and all is not well. Toibin writes so well about the longings and disappointments of his characters and leaves us on a cliff edge. I eagerly await the third instalment.

Lastly, Abbey Road. David Hepworth is a music journalist with a keen eye for the sort of ‘fancy that’ information my fellow music trainspotters love. He's also a successful publisher with a keen understanding of the £££ that oils the wheels of art. This book is a highly readable history of the famous London studio and, simultaneously, the history of recorded sound.

Paul Dowswell's latest title is Aliens: the Chequered History of Britain's Wartime Refugees

From our own Adèle Geras: Andrew Michael Hurley’s Saltwash is a book that lingers in your mind long after you finish reading it. It’s not as frightening as some of his others (try Starveacre for the most terrifying last paragraph I’ve read in years) but it does have what Hurley has always excelled at: an atmosphere that settles around you as you read like drizzle in an out of season seaside town. This is exactly what Saltwash is. I’m very partial to such settings. A man goes to meet a friend in the oddest seaside hotel you’ve ever visited. The friend isn’t there at first but turns up later. There’s a big party on that night, as it happens, and many strange guests are ready to attend. I shan’t say another word! Merry Christmas to all WR readers.

Adele Geras' latest novel, under the pseudonym Hope Adams, is Dangerous Women.

Linda Sargent's choice is What you are looking for is in the Library by Michiko Aoyama, translated by Alison Watts: a Japanese bestseller and it’s easy to see why. The story unfolds as we follow the interlinking lives of five characters from a range of ages and backgrounds, but all are at some kind of turning point in their life. They arrive at a community centre/library and are directed to the librarian Sayuri Komachi, who has an uncanny, almost magical, gift for deep empathy and she directs them to seemingly unlikely books that turn out to be exactly what they need. All the while she makes tiny felt gifts and all five of the characters in this story are given one, which is also significant in their progress too. I especially liked Masao’s crab which ends up on his daughter’s bag and is a pathway to their greater connection too. It is a book about community, connection, listening and kindness. Perfect for these somewhat overwhelming times in the world and emphasising the necessary treasure provided by libraries and librarians. I loved it.

Linda Sargent's most recent publication is Tosh's Island.

Jon Appleton chooses The Light of Day by Christopher Stephens and Louise Radnofsky, a compelling addition to the canon of queer British history.

Roger Butler was the first British man to publicly admit his homosexuality, lighting a touchpaper at a time (1960) when society condemned ‘inversion’, before sexual acts between consenting men were legalised. Christopher Stephens was a young Oxford student who became the older man’s friend and was gifted, upon Roger’s death, an episodic letter which revealed not only the unrequited longing Roger had for him (about which he knew) but the man’s extraordinary life as a private citizen turned activist during the early years of gay liberation. Extracts are interspersed with Christopher’s reflections on the friendship, on his own story, on the tricky matter of offering the right levels of affection and admiration to those we revere – not just in their lifetime but after they’ve died. It’s a compelling mix and part of the reason it’s my book of the year is that just a few streets away from where Christopher visited Roger in East Oxford, I made visits to my own friend and hero, writer Jan Mark, and since her death I have grappled with many of the questions Christopher confronts.

Jon Appleton is editor of the gab, which celebrates 20th century children’s literature: lettersfromrobin.com/the-gab

And finally ... a great note to finish on, with good advice for all of us! Venkatesh Swamy recommends Slow Down and Be Here Now, by Laura Brand, illustrated by Freya Hartas. These are times where the normal is rush, rush, rush. One keeps lurching from crisis to crisis and leaps from opportunity to perceived opportunity. For many, life has become one merry-go-round with no stop button. There have been days when I feel that I have been shot out of a cannon. Here’s a book for those moments. 

Slow Down and Be Here Now is a book that immediately needs to be introduced into children’s lives (maybe adults too). As are other titles in the Slow Down series. Written by Laura Brand and illustrated by Freya Hartas, it starts off with a simple tip - Be Here Now! 

Each of the short 46 chapters is fascinating and some of my favourites are: Watch a Duck Coat its Feathers, See a Grasshopper Jump, Watch a Family of Hermit Crabs Move House. And if I get the time, I will do just that. 

The book’s premise? When it is almost impossible to find joy, feel peace or follow curiosity, there are ways you can look after yourself, calm your body and mind, and being immersed in nature is just one of them. All you need do to see them is slow down.

Venkatesh Swami is the proprietor, with Swati Roy, of Eureka! Bookstore in New Delhi.

We'll be back to normal next week. Follow us for a great reading recommendation every Monday!

SUMMER ROUND-UP by Adèle, Celia and Linda

Adèle Geras, Celia Rees and Linda Newbery are the hosts of Writers Review. Here we each share two books that have impressed us recently and one or more titles we're planning to read next. 

Linda's choices:

In The Lost Rainforests of Britain, Guy Shrubsole has almost single-handedly raised public awareness of the temperate rainforests we have in Britain – often in damp microclimates where a deep gorge creates the right conditions of moistness and protection from wind. He’s an engaging writer and the book ranges widely, recounting expeditions with his partner or friends to remote places in Wales or the West Country, describing in detail the species found in these ecosystems, and exploring references in poetry and folklore. We justifiably criticise other countries for destroying their rainforests, but Shrubsole points out that we're largely unaware of how much of our own has been lost. His campaign has resulted in government acknowledgment of these precious habitats and a commitment to protecting and restoring them. 

I went straight on to Guy Shrubsole's more recent The Lie of the Land (clever title) - an angrier but equally informative book that looks at who owns land in Britain (the wealthiest 1% owns 50% of it), what they do with it, and how they deny access to the rest of us. You won't be surprised to hear that Guy Shrubsole was a leading figure in the successful challenge to Dartmoor landowner Alexander Darwall when he attempted to ban wild camping. Shrubsole is outraged about the (mis)management of huge areas of moorland for grouse shooting, which includes practices such as burning moorland and the illegal slaughter of birds of prey, foxes and anything classed as 'vermin' which might reduce grouse numbers - all this subsidised by taxpayers. The mass release of pheasants each year, again in the interests of the shooting minority, receives equal condemnation - in what other circumstance would the widespread release of a non-native species into the countryside be considered acceptable, at a time when bird flu is rife and we're all aware of the risks of another pandemic? As recent parliamentary debates have shown, it's down to the lobbying power of those with vested interests in shooting estates. More optimistically, Shrubsole looks at instances of communal purchase of land for the benefit of all and for nature restoration. 

As for the books I'm looking forward to, I'm treating myself to a re-reading of Judith Allnatt's touching and beautifully-written The Poet's Wife, which tells the story of poet John Clare's descent into madness from the point of view of Patty, his wife. I first read this ten or more years ago and am now delighted to see it reissued in our own imprint, Writers Review Publishing. With wonderful evocations of the Northamptonshire countryside and rural life, it begins with Patty's deep concern when her husband John, who's walked eighty miles from a lunatic asylum in Epping Forest, appears to believe that he's still married to his first love, Mary. How will Patty cope, as his behaviour becomes increasingly delusional?

I'm also tempted by Anna Hope's Albion, having been captivated by the abridged version as Radio 4's Book of the Week. With a funeral, a will, a privileged family, a big country house, complex relationships and a big surprise sprung on the gathered relatives, it has elements in common with my own novel, which Celia's kindly chosen below. Here, no spoilers, but the revelation brought by outsider Clara shocks the family out of its smugness and leaves them with a difficult dilemma to face.  

And I can't omit to mention that I'm currently in thrall to Barbara Kingsolver's Demon Copperhead. It's been sitting on my reading pile for some time but now that I've started, I can't wait to get back to it - a marvellous and moving novel whether or not you're familiar with David Copperfield, which it cleverly shadows.

Celia's choices:

I have been reading…

The Dutch House by Ann Patchett. The house of the title is in Elk Park, a prosperous suburb of Pennsylvania. It is A large mansion, built in the 1920s, with a glass frontage ‘as big as storefront windows’. The use of glass in the design makes it possible to see right through it, which cannot be said of the characters who come to live there. The house is more than a setting – it is a powerful and enduring presence in the novel with a deep and lasting effect on those who inhabit it. The characters change. The house does not. It is named, not for the design, but for the Van Hoebeeks, the originally owners. It is acquired in 1946 by Cyril Conroy, a real estate developer, who buys it and moves in with his wife and two children, Danny and Maeve. He leaves the contents intact including a library of Dutch books no-one can read and large portraits of the Van Hoebeeks. Nothing about the house changes. It is as if his family have no impact on it. The house affects them, however. The mother loathes it and leaves house, husband and children. Cyril quickly installs a young widow, Andrea, with two children of her own. Danny and Maeve are pushed out, underlining the book’s fairy tale quality. Told over five generations, Pratchett continually plays on fairy tale elements and archetypes: rags to riches, absent fathers, neglectful mothers, abandoned children, wicked stepmothers, faithful retainers but it is done with such skill and delivered with such laconic, casual insouciance by narrator, Danny, that it all seems completely natural.

Our own Linda Newbery also has an iconic house, Wildings, and more importantly an iconic and beautiful garden in her novel The One True Thing. The garden is created by Bridget, a renowned gardener, who is married to Anthony who owns the house. There are two narrators, Bridget herself and her daughter, Jane. With echoes of E.M Forster’s Howard’s End and Dickens' Bleak House, the novel revolves around a death and a quirky will which leaves the future of house (and garden) in doubt. Her mother having pre-deceased her father, daughter Jane is doubly bereaved. The garden and the idyllic rural surroundings are so beautifully described that the reader begins to feel the imminent loss as acutely as Jane does. She is forced to confront not only the threat to her home, but a complex set of revelations that strike at her core beliefs about her family. The skilfully handled dual narrative gradually reveals the lies, evasions and emotional complexities of the past, leading to a resolution where past and present can be reconciled.

Having recently read The Dalai Lama’s Cat by David Michie, I'm now looking forward to The Claw of Attraction by the same author. Plucked as a tiny, dying kitten from the streets of New Delhi by His Holiness The Dalai Llama (who just happens to be passing - not coincidence {obv.} but karma), the eponymous heroine re-counts her life as HHC: His Holiness's Cat. Her day to day encounters and challenges, from the temptations offered by over generous food providers (she is, after all, the Dalai Lama’s Cat) to the sudden arrival of a dog, an abandoned Lhasa Apso, serve as lessons in timeless Buddhist wisdom, compassion and the way to true contentment. As a cat owner and therefore lover, I found The Dalai Lama’s Cat utterly charming and deceptively wise. It would work for dog lovers, too. Don’t like animals? What’s wrong with you?

Adèle's choices:

This year, I have discovered a writer I'd never heard of before and I really want to introduce her to readers of this blog. Her name is Laurie Colwin and she died in 1992 at the age of 46. She was mainly known as a short story writer and especially a food writer during her lifetime but her novels are wonderful and deserve the attention of anyone who is interested in the texture of life and relationships, food and houses, animals and children .... I'm highlighting her last novel, which was published posthumously in 1993. It's called A Big Storm Knocked it Over and it's about a woman preparing for her own wedding, while also working at a publishing house where she is the editor in charge of illustrations in adult books. Her run ins with recaltricant writers who will not listen to her excellent advice, her beautifully depicted dealings with her fiancé and her friends and the toings and froings with regard to the wedding...everything takes you straight in, and you're part of the proceedings which are described with grace, humour and attention to detail. She's comparable to Anne Tyler in her ability to absorb you into what's happening on the page, seemingly without any effort. Her writing, sentence to sentence, is elegant and considered and engaging. Here is a tiny example, picked at random: "The enormous manuscript of In the Polar Regions by Hugh Oswald-Murphy, had been placed on Jane Louise's desk three times and taken back three times by Erna Hendershot. Then, just as Jane Louise felt she had a grip on what this thing should look like, Erna would appear in a tearing rush and inform her that the author had added to it or taken something away, or that most likely it had been pushed off the spring list or that he had decided that some Eskimo artist would do little line cuts to be scattered throughout, and furthermore that his photographs -still to come- would have to be keyed in.

I really loved this book and have also read Home Cooking and More Home Cooking which are superb and also contain recipes in plenty. She's a writer to take to your heart.

If you’ve not come across the four police procedural novels of Simon Mason (The Wilkins and Wilkins books) then I urge you to find them and read them in the right order. I don’t think nearly enough readers have discovered them and they’re very good indeed.

Even fewer readers will know about the Finder novellas. These are short, spare books in which a man, who calls himself The Finder, turns up in a place (in the case of The Woman Who Laughed it’s a rather drab suburb of Sheffield) and sets about finding someone who has disappeared. In Sheffield, a young sex worker who was murdered some time ago is seen on a bus…. Then she disappears again…. The Finder begins to follow threads which lead into many strange places.

He always takes a novel with him when he travels. In this book, it’s Persuasion by Jane Austen. His reflections on the novel add to this reader’s pleasure.

My advice? Read Simon Mason!

Two books I’m looking forward to:

I’ve just downloaded Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake. His name seems to suit the subject very well. It’s about fungi which have complicated networks of communication and which behave in all kinds of very fascinating ways. I love books that open up a whole new world and I am looking forward greatly to learning much more about mushrooms than the fact that they’re delicious when they’re not poisonous.

And I’m about to start on a new novel by Stephen King. It’s called Never Flinch and is a follow up to a terrific and very gory thriller starring the private detective Holly Gibney. That’s called Holly. This story involves a murderer who embarks on a plan to kill 12 innocent people, to avenge the death of a prisoner who has just been stabbed to death in gaol…. but who was falsely imprisoned for a crime he didn’t commit.

One thing is sure: never a dull moment in a King book, and this one looks terrific!

Happy reading and have a great summer….

Q&A: Adèle Geras interviews Judith Allnatt about THE POET'S WIFE

 

"I wondered what it must have been like for Patty to deal with John absconding from an asylum not to return home to her and their seven children but to find his ‘other wife’, Mary Joyce."

Judith Allnatt discusses her newly-reissued novel with Writers Review's Adèle Geras.

Adèle: When did you first come across the work of John Clare? His absence from what’s generally taught in schools has always rather surprised me.

Judith: I’ve always loved both nature and poetry and as a youngster I read some of John Clare’s keenly observed poems about the natural world. One particularly stuck in my mind about a hedgehog collecting crab apples by rolling on them until they stuck to its spines and could be taken back to its nest. I was charmed by the picture of a ‘hedgepig’ trundling along and looking like a head of hair in curlers!

Years later, as a writer living in Northamptonshire, Clare’s native county, I was involved in an arts project that took me into Northampton Library to research local literary figures. I started by reading the journal John Clare wrote about his eighty-mile walk home from an asylum in Essex in which he survived on a diet of ‘grass and tobacco’. Reading his letters from a later period, when he was a long-term patient at Northampton General Lunatic Asylum moved me. Through his own words you could trace his heart-breaking mental decline.

Sometimes he thought himself to be Admiral Nelson or Byron or a boxer called Jack Randall. I became interested in him not just as a marvellous poet and naturalist but as a man. When I found out that John was obsessed with his childhood sweetheart, Mary Joyce, and believed himself to be twice married, to both his real wife, Patty, and to Mary, I knew that here lay the tinder for a novel. I wondered what it must have been like for Patty to deal with John absconding from an asylum not to return home to her and their seven children but to find his ‘other wife’, Mary Joyce.

Adèle: How well do you know Clare’s part of the world? Are you a native? If not, what drew you to this landscape, or perhaps it’s only through the poems that you met it…

Judith: I’ve lived in Northamptonshire for almost forty years but at the opposite end of the county to John Clare’s native village of Helpston, so it was a joy to explore an area that was new to me. As I drove towards Helpston for the first time, I remember performing the usual visual gymnastics of the historical writer to sweep away all evidence of modernity: cars, tarmac, bungalows, pylons and railway crossings. What was left was a blonde landscape of cut hay and pale, stone walls reminding me of John Clare’s description of wandering in such a scene before harvest ‘in the mealy light of waking day’.

The village evidences the esteem in which John Clare is held. The tiny cottage that once housed his family of eleven is restored and partnered by a museum. On a Victorian monument, his poems are carved in stone and in the churchyard on his birthday a living memorial surrounds his grave: a spread of Midsummer Cushions, squares of turf studded with flowers, placed there by local school children.

Over many trips, I also visited Northborough, on the edge of the fens, where the family later moved and where the copses and gentle slopes give way to the flat horizon and huge skies that John Clare found alien and unsympathetic. He longed for his old home and this homesickness perhaps contributed to his illness. From wandering knee deep in grass to find the family’s graves to visiting the mansion, Burghley House, where Clare worked as a gardener, I loved collecting all the little details I needed to build a convincing nineteenth century world.

Adèle: I’m very curious about the novel’s publishing history. What sort of publicity etc did you get? Was the book reviewed etc etc?

Judith: The book was favourably reviewed in The Times Literary Supplement, The Daily Mail and The Times, where Kate Saunders referred to it as ‘affecting and beautifully written.’ It was Book of the Month for Choice magazine and was shortlisted for the East Midlands Book Award. I was also delighted to have comments from writers whom I admire. Clare Morrall called it ‘A fascinating, compelling book written with subtlety and a delicate touch’ and ‘a tender family portrait’ and Charles Palliser said ‘This book is superb’, which is of course just what a writer hopes to hear!

As well as several bookshop launches, the novel also had a wonderful launch at the John Clare museum. There I had the opportunity to do a reading in the cottage itself, standing in the very place where Clare would have written some of his poems on old sugar bags and any scrap of paper he could find, and where Patty would have arrived as a new bride full of hope and excitement about their marriage.

Adèle: Following on from this, can you say anything about the new cover? It has quite a different feel to it … how did you choose it? Did you choose the first one?

Judith: Originally, when Random House published the book, I had only a minor input into the cover design. Having the book republished through Writers Review Publishing offered an opportunity for autonomy in its presentation. I collaborated with a designer who freelances for the mainstream publishers to produce a cover that is more contemporary in style and that includes more elements drawn from nature, to reflect the rural world in which the Clare family lived. This was important to me as I feel that John Clare’s love of his environment and the desire to protect it, and his awareness of the natural world and the place that Man has within it, have struck a chord with us now. Connections are being made between the depredations of enclosure and modern spoliation on a grander scale and John Clare’s words have found new resonance.

The kissing figures in silhouette are intended to emphasise Patty and John’s romance but as a touch of foreshadowing a wedding ring hangs, caught on a twig, as if lost or thrown away.

Adèle: What I always want to know from writers is the nitty gritty! Where do you work? Are you a plotter? Do you write on a laptop? Do you have stationery quirks? And so on…

Judith: My methods are quite ‘old school’! I always write the first draft by hand and do the main edit when putting it on to the computer later. I use big ‘Pukka Pad’ notebooks and write on alternate lines so I have room to insert changes. I write on the right hand side of the pad and make all kinds of notes on the left hand page – spider diagrams; sometimes even drawings that help me imagine a scene or decide the characters’ positions and attitudes within it. I have a very broad plan before I start but it might be no more than knowing the beginning, a climactic scene and the ending. I always have a picture in my head of the last scene and this acts as a kind of guiding light for the novel, the point I’m aiming towards even though at the start I may have little idea how I’ll get from A to B.

While I do jot down thoughts for a book anywhere, the heavy-duty work gets done at the library where there are no distractions. I usually do a six-hour stint and feel that I need that long to immerse myself properly in the novel’s world. I think of it as letting down a bucket into a deep well to find what’s at the bottom and it takes time to let down that rope.

Adèle: You seem to know a great deal about e.g. 19th century agriculture! Also childrearing…what kind of research did you do?

Judith: I was brought up on the farm of the Agricultural College where my father taught, so the rhythm of planting and harvest and the tending of livestock went on all around me. My dad, a born countryman, would tell me about the ‘old ways’ of farming as well as about modern practices. Later, when writing the book, he directed me to the sources I needed to answer such questions as ‘what are windrows’ and ‘why was a stook left at the field entrance when harvest was gathered in?’ The experience of walking the ground where the novel was to be set, was also invaluable as it gave me ways to describe the social history that I learnt about through reading: rural poverty, the greed of the powerful, the enclosure of the countryside and the passing of a way of life.

Finding out about Patty was the major research challenge; information about her is sparse. From the handful of poems written by John to Patty and from his letters and journal writing we know that she was attractive and ‘artless’ and that the lovers had a common interest in the natural world. We know that she was nineteen when she met John, that her family was above his in the social scale as they had six acres, pigs and a cow, and that her parents had aspirations for her to marry ‘up,’ and had a local shoemaker in mind. I rooted out other sources about the Clare family: paintings, photographs and artefacts handed down through generations. Then, through reading all the biographies, I looked at the events in the Clare family’s life: births and deaths, John’s courtship, his London popularity and his fall from publishing favour, the fragmentation of his personality and his delusion about being twice married. I imagined how each might have affected Patty and how she might have reacted.

Researching the social history provided detail too about the arduous labour of a countrywoman’s everyday life. To eat, you must first dig, sow, and hoe, to bake, you must first glean, thresh and grind, to have clothes on your back; you must first sew, alter or mend. I concluded that Patty must have been a strong woman to manage all this as well as seven living children and an elderly relative and grew very fond of her as I developed her character to reflect her warmth, good sense and grit.

The Poet's Wife is published by Writers Review Publishing

The other two launch titles for Writers Review Publishing are Mary Hoffman's David: the Unauthorised Autobiography and Linda Newbery's The One True Thing.

A VOICE IN THE NIGHT by Simon Mason, reviewed by Adèle Geras

" ... a nuanced rivalry which veers from irritation to anger to wonderfully complicated friendship which neither man would actually describe as such, but which is nevertheless real and touching."

Adèle Geras has written many books for children and young adults and seven novels for adults, the latest of which (under the pseudonym Hope Adams) is Dangerous Women, published by Michael Joseph. She lives in Cambridge.

For anyone who does not know him, Simon Mason is, as well as a wonderful writer, a friend of this blog. He was our special guest recently and we are fans of his work.

On one level, Mason might be said to write quite a traditional sort of crime story. His Wilkins and Wilkins series (I'm calling them that. I haven't seen them described so in newspapers) contains two cops, contrasted in many ways, solving crimes in a particular area. There are the accustomed wisecracks, of course, but in addition this pair share both a surname and initials. They started work on the same day but the differences between them couldn't be greater. Of course, these lead to much comedy along the way but also create a nuanced rivalry which veers from irritation to anger to wonderfully complicated friendship which neither man would actually describe as such, but which is nevertheless real and touching. On the cover of A Voice in the Night, Mick Herron calls them "crime fiction's most entertaining double act in decades" and he's right.

Ray Wilkins is very handsome, Black, sharply dressed and a graduate. Ryan Wilkins is skinny as a rake, wears dreadful clothes (a lime green puffa jacket features in this book) and comes from a decaying estate. His father was abusive. His late wife died of a drug overdose. He's no beauty but has a fine line in repartee and huge charm, at least for me. He's what would definitely be called "poor white trash" in the USA. But he has a superb instinct for people, and can deal with them in a way most other policemen cannot. He lives with his sister, Jade, who works at the Co-op. Most importantly of all, he's father to little Ryan who is easily the most wonderful toddler I can remember in recent fiction. The relationship between father and son is what lifts these novels up out of the general run of crime books. It's movingly described and often provides another dimension to whatever is going on in the police action.

This novel is the fourth in the series. I am a believer in starting series with Book 1, but it's not strictly necessary. What you miss starting with Book 4 is the history: what's gone on between Ryan and his son, between Ryan and Ray, between Ryan and his police chiefs, between the police and a nice assortment of low-life living and committing crime around Oxford. My advice: you ought to buy all four books at once ...

This one is terrific. The body of a linguistics professor is found still dressed in his pyjamas, dripping wet and lying on the lawn in front of a hotel. There's also been a security guard stabbed to death during an armed robbery. On top of all that, there's a new female officer in charge of things at the station and charged with clearing up these matters. DCS Wainwright is much more than she at first appears, and very interesting.

Meanwhile, back home, Jade and little Ryan are threatened by a gang whom Ryan has met before. Michael, the chief young yobbo, is superbly described. Even villains in Mason's book are portrayed in a three-dimensional way.

Just over half way through the book, something happens that was like a sledgehammer to the heart. I'm not saying another word. But be assured, in the end we reach a solution. Mason even manages to pull off that wonderful trick of a surprise as the last thing we read ... a rare event in fiction. I hope lots of people get to know Ray and Ryan before the inevitable TV adaptation, because (and I am not sure why I've left this till the end) one of the glories of these novels is the way they're written. Oxford and the countryside around it come subtly to life and every sentence is elegant and perfectly judged. Mason's prose is not show-offish or mannered but simply elegant and suited in every way to the story he's telling.

A Voice in the Night is published by riverrun.

Simon Mason's feature for our 8th birthday last July: on the crime fiction of Peter Temple.