Lerner's fiendishly clever second novel is about a writer who has just received an enormous advance for his second novel. The excitement of this sum is dwarfed by other pressures: strange we... read more
Travel memories - some imagined, such as a performance of 'Hamlet' off the African coast, in 1607 - from the amiable author of A Pike in the Basement: Tales of a Hungry Traveller.
With Chartists, Diggers and Levellers among her cast, the revered Green MP for Brighton offers an inclusive account of Englishness that differs radically from that purveyed by the Right.
A gardener's control is illusory - thanks to a myriad of other - "often argumentative" - organisms that have their own ideas about how things should be run.
An awe-inspiring epic about a young Dutch microbiologist whose research takes her on a deep dive into sea and space. These journeys raise profound questions about the origin of life, our pla... read more
A novel (Tatting, 1957) in which a just-married young couple go to Cornwall where the inhabitants are definitely odd, and a group of short stories about the complexities of love and sex (Man... read more
Majorelle (1886-1962) was a French painter who travelled widely in Italy and Egypt before settling in Morocco in 1917; he became well-known as an Orientalist painter (with shades of Edward H... read more
Published under the auspices of the Burlington Magazine, this is a series of 17 essays on aspects of the history of fine art conservation (from the conservation of the 'Ghent Altarpiece' to ... read more
Matar's photographs at sites of lethal police violence in the US and her fastidious research make for a quietly devastating critique. The formality of her images and the directness of her g... read more
Charming and gentle tale about a mouse who sets off down the river in his red rowing boat to visit a friend; the journey takes a day and night. Flaps reveal the deeply cosy dwellings of the ... read more
The remarkable diplomatic mission (Harriman for the US, Archibald Clark Kerr for Britain) that braced Stalin against the Germans and brought him into WW2 as an ally.
A lavish book on this Georgian artist who lived c.1866-1918 and influenced Georgian and Russian avant-gardists and Modernists. Large format, many illustrations.
VM was the author of The Map of Knowledge, a compelling account of the survival of the ancient classics in the Muslim world, and their re-emergence in the West. Now she turns her attention t... read more
A mysterious painting leads a young boy to investigate the fate of one soldier on the Normandy beaches. By the author of War Horse and much else. Ages 7-11.
The only woman to reach London from Warsaw during WW2, she was later parachuted back into Poland where she was deeply involved in the Uprising; she then disappeared into the Soviet prison sy... read more
Powerful debut novel set in a coastal Irish town, where women must navigate their emotional lives among hard, manipulative men. Fine characterisation and atmosphere.