Autobiography: writers Books

Book SynopsisIn 1993, writer and democracy activist Hwang Sok-yong was sentenced to five years in the Seoul Detention Center upon his return to South Korea from North Korea, the country he had fled with his family as a child at the start of the Korean War. Already a dissident writer well-known for his part in the democracy movement of the 1980s, Hwang's imprisonment forced him to consider the many prisons to which he was subject-of thought, of writing, of Cold War nations, of the heart. In this capacious memoir, Hwang's life is set against the volatile political backdrop of modern Korea, a country subject to colonialism, Cold War division, a devastating war, decades of authoritarian dictatorships, a mass democratic uprising, and a still-lingering, painful division between North and South. The Prisoner moves between Hwang's imprisonment and scenes from his life-as a boy in Pyongyang and Seoul, as a young activist protesting South Korea's military dictatorships, as a soldier in the Vietnam War, as a dissident writer first traveling abroad-and in so doing, braids his extraordinary life into the dramatic revolutions and transformations of Korean society during the twentieth century.Trade ReviewHwang Sok-yong is one of the most read Korean writers in his country, and best known abroad. An activist for democracy and reconciliation with the North, in his books he melds his political fights with the Korean cultural imagination. * Le Monde *Reality, fiction and fantasy mix closely, giving his writing unparalleled power. Hwang Sok-yong's empathy for his heroes is always accompanied by a fierce rage against the powerful. * Le Monde Diplomatique *A powerful yet modest and profound meditation on personal responsibility and what a fulfilled life might mean... Yet At Dusk never trips over into nostalgia or sentimentality. Hwang's writing is laced with the hard-won wisdom of a man with plenty left to say. * The Guardian * The Prisoner is also a literary tour de force. Written in the lyrical, elegant style, with powerful acuity and razor-sharp wit that are hallmarks of Sok-Yong's work, it coaxes the reader to savour images, memorable events, and poignant details while also demanding a comprehensive ethical commitment to freedom, justice, and a moral universe."}" data-sheets-userformat="{"2":12993,"3":{"1":0},"9":0,"10":0,"12":0,"15":"Verdana","16":9}" style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: Verdana;">This sweeping, epic account is not just a memoir but rather a knowledgeable, sensitive and informed insight into Korea and its neighbours, as well as a complex, nuanced examination of the Cold War, its geopolitical consequences and its human cost. Hwang Sok-yong moves effortlessly between the personal and the political, and the geopolitical, and like his novels, his concerns are both compassionately individual and passionately global. The Prisoner is also a literary tour de force. Written in the lyrical, elegant style, with powerful acuity and razor-sharp wit that are hallmarks of Sok-Yong's work, it coaxes the reader to savour images, memorable events, and poignant details while also demanding a comprehensive ethical commitment to freedom, justice, and a moral universe. -- Sunny SinghHwang Sok-Yong's photographic memory yields vitally important historic testimonies: to the trials of his imprisonment, to life in South as well as North Korea under unchecked power, to the dynamism, humanity, persistence and resilience of artists alone and together against injustice. The Prisoner is an invaluable document, a thorough and eye-opening sweep of the past. Translators Anton Hur and Sora Kim-Russell have done a remarkable job of conveying the political and emotional nuances of language in their source material, and we as grateful readers are all the better for it. -- Khairani BarokkaHwang Sok-yong is Korea's leading political novelist. His new book, The Prisoner, is every bit as riveting and deeply informed is anything he has written. The author has a political sensibility that illuminates a number of important episodes in Korea's recent political history, with one trenchant observation after another about both the North and the South. His harrowing experience as a political prisoner under the South Korean dictatorship leaves an indelible black mark on a regime that the United States supported for 40 years, and that Hwang courageously fought every day of his life until the dictatorship finally collapsed. -- Bruce Cumings, historian at the University of Chicago, and the author of the Korean WarEpic in its scope ... a passionate, detailed memoir. -- Kristine Morris * Foreword Reviews *Page-turning ... By offering the reader a holistic view of his literal and metaphorical imprisonment, Hwang poignantly illustrates what it means to be exiled by politics, geography, language, and emotional ties. -- Thúy Ðinh * NPR Books *Cinematic, riveting, elegiac ... The Prisoner expands Hwang's literary scope, uniting his life experience with the compassionate realism of his later works. * NPR Books *A fascinating account of a life lived for art and campaigns for freedom and justice -- Mark Rappolt * ArtReview *Despite having had not so much as a pen to keep a diary, Hwang recalls the techniques he employed and adaptations he made to endure [the] psychological privations and physical discomforts [of prison] in a remarkably high degree of detail. -- Colin Marshall * Los Angeles Review of Books *

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Book SynopsisPolitics, religion, culture, travel, science and technology, family life: nothing escaped the eye and pen of Samuel Langhorne Clemens, better known as Mark Twain, nineteenth-century America's most famous writer and a legend in his own lifetime. Though chiefly known today for his classic novels of childhood, Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, and for his short stories, he produced even more nonfiction of an impressive quality.Twain lived a life as exciting as his fiction, and in his Autobiography we find him running wild, like the heroes of his novels, in the countryside around his childhood home in Missouri and navigating the treacherous waters of the Mississippi River as a trained steamboat pilot, while his letters show him travelling thousands of miles over the United States on hectic lecture tours (he was a great showman, raconteur and performer of his own works), hobnobbing with princes and presidents and being lionized in the capitals of Europe.His trademark wit, candour, sarcasm and irrepressible humour shine through on every page of this selection, but here too, beyond the entertainer, we discover in his speeches and essays the social and moral issues - slavery, imperialism - which concerned him, and meet the private man behind that towering public figure, whose long marriage never lost its romance, but who bore the sorrow of losing two of his three daughters while still in their twenties. A sometimes moving, sometimes hilarious and always riveting read.

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Book SynopsisTo Aran, I recounts the adventurous journey of a young Welshman, who abandons a promising career and relationships to fulfill his dream of living on Inis Mór, blending farce, poetry, and social observation in a story of personal discovery and ambition.

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Book Synopsis**WINNER of the 2019 PEN Ackerley Prize**'A major literary talent . . . speaks about the power and powerlessness that young women are subject to in a wholly fresh, clear-eyed way . . . you'll find it hard to come away from The Terrible without a stab of recognition in your chest' Stylist 'You may not run away from the thing that you arebecause it comes and comes and comes as sure as you breathe.'This is the story of Yrsa Daley-Ward, and all the things that happened - 'even the Terrible Things (and God, there were Terrible Things)'. It's about her childhood in the north-west of England with her beautiful, careworn mother and her little brother who sees things written in the stars. It's also about growing up and discovering the power and fear of sexuality, about pitch grey days of pills and powder: going under, losing yourself, and finding your voice. 'Yrsa's work is like holding the truth in your hands' Florence WelchTrade ReviewElegant, daring, profound - confirms her abundant talent as a writer -- Arifa Akbar * Observer *Beautiful and harrowing . . . Daley-Ward writes with disarming honesty * Vogue *A major literary talent . . . speaks about the power and powerlessness that young women are subject to in a wholly fresh, clear-eyed way . . . you'll find it hard to come away from The Terrible without a stab of recognition in your chest * Stylist *Daley-Ward explores the connection between raw emotion and the mechanics of language with more wildness and tenacity than ever * Dazed *A rare combination of literary brilliance, originality of voice and a narrative that commands you to keep going until you've reached the last page . . . her prose is invigorating, razor-sharp and moves at the speed of light . . . Yrsa Daley-Ward is an explosive new talent and this book should not be missed -- Anna van Praagh * Evening Standard *The Terrible's raw yet lilting prose draws the reader in at once. Unpredictable shifts in form and structure - from prose to poetry and script - are refreshingly disorientating. This is both a defiant book and a defiantly inventive one. -- Patricia Yaker Ekall * The Times Literary Supplement *Daley-Ward is a stylish writer, as well as an unusual voice . . . she has a knack for distilling wild emotions into precise imagery, for selecting insightful impressions. -- Francesca Angelini * Sunday Times *Daley-Ward's beautiful prose wrapped its hands around my neck - I found myself doing stupid things like walking through New York at rush hour with my nose buried in her book. -- Jamal Jordan * The New York Times *The Terrible is a lyrical piece of writing that oscillates between prose and poetry . . . Daley-Ward's lines land like dandelion spores, these weightless things that are somehow simultaneously profound -- Una Mullally * Irish Times Magazine *Daley-Ward has cooked a broth of dizzying emotions and touching moments down to a nuanced and taut account . . . there are so many flourishes of imagination and pathos here, that it's impossible not to get caught up in the torrential pace of the narrative . . .the result is one of the year's genuine must reads * Irish Independent *Daley-Ward combines beautifully crafted and deeply personal verse with impressive prose, bending the form of the memoir into her own genre -- Alexander Holmes * Metro *Daley-Ward is twenty-nine years old, but the events of her life more than justify the publication of this unflinching chronicle. -- Patricia Yaker Ekall * The Times Literary Supplement *Daley-Ward is twenty-nine years old, but the events of her life more than justify the publication of this unflinching chronicle. -- Patricia Yaker Ekall * The Times Literary Supplement *

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Book SynopsisOn the day that A. M. Homes was born in 1961, she was given up for adoption. Her birth parents were a twenty-two year old woman and an older married man with whom she was having an affair. Thirty years later, out of the blue, Homes was contacted by a lawyer on behalf of her birth mother, and they began to correspond; her biological father contacted her soon after. These two individuals and their effect on the adult Homes are strange and unexpected, and the story spirals into something utterly raw and hilarious, heartbreaking and absurd. Along the way, Homes describes the clash between her childhood fantasies of her birth parents and the disappointing reality. She writes about the experience of experiencing biological resemblance for the first time (in 'My Father's Ass') and the addictiveness of the genealogical research she embarks on. She reflects on the significance of DNA testing and having two mothers and two fathers and unearths profound truths about her family and herself. Finally, she writes movingly about her own baby daughter and the way she has recently helped to mend Homes' fractured life.Trade ReviewA compelling, devastating and furiously good book written with an honesty that few of us would risk -- Zadie SmithVeracious words on the complexity and ambiguity of the fractured life of an adopted child. Celebratory and shattering, it will leave you asking yourself, adopted or not, who am I? -- Jamie Lee Curtis

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Book SynopsisWhen he turned sixty-five, the playwright Simon Gray began to keep a diary: not a careful honing of the day's events with a view to posterity but an account of his thoughts as he had them, honestly, turbulently, digressively expressed. The Smoking Diaries was the result, in which one of Britain's most beloved and original writers reflected on a life filled with cigarettes (continuing), alcohol (stopped), several triumphs and many more disasters, shame, adultery, friendship and love. Few diarists have been as frank about themselves, and even fewer as entertaining.

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Book Synopsis'During the Tang dynasty, the Chinese artist Wu Tao-tzu was one day standing looking at a mural he had just completed. Suddenly, he clapped his hands and the temple gate opened. He went into his work and the gates closed behind him.' Thus begins Sven Lindqvist's profound meditation on art and its relationship with life, first published in 1967, and a classic in his home country - it has never been out of print. As a young man, Sven Lindqvist was fascinated by the myth of Wu Tao-tzu, and by the possibility of entering a work of art and making it a way of life. He was drawn to artists and writers who shared this vision, especially Hermann Hesse, in his novel Glass Bead Game. Partly inspired by Hesse's work, Lindqvist lived in China for two years, learning classical calligraphy from a master teacher. There he was drawn deeper into the idea of a life of artistic perfectionism and retreat from the world. But when he left China for India and then Afghanistan, and saw the grotesque effects of poverty and extreme inequality, Lindqvist suffered a crisis of confidence and started to question his ideas about complete immersion in art at the expense of a proper engagement with life. The Myth of Wu Tao-tzu takes us on a fascinating journey through a young man's moral awakening and his grappling with profound questions of aesthetics. It contains the bracing moral anger, and poetic, intensely atmospheric travel writing Lindqvist's readers have come to love.

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Book SynopsisIn 1995, Adam Gopnik, his wife, and their infant son left the familiar comforts and hassles of New York for the urbane glamour of Paris. Charmed by the beauties of the city, Gopnik set out to experience for himself the spirit and romance that has so captivated American writers throughout the twentieth century. In the grand tradition of Stein and Hemingway, Gopnik planned to walk the paths of the Tuilleries, to enjoy philosophical discussion in cafes - in short, to lead the fabled life of an American in Paris. Of course, there was also the matter of raising a child and carrying on with everyday, not-so-fabled life.Trade ReviewA conscientious, scrupulously savvy American husband and father meets contemporary France, and fireworks result, lighting up not just the Eiffel Tower - John Updike * John Updike *The finest book on France in recent years - Alain de Botton, New York Times Book Review * New York Times *

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Book SynopsisUnder the pressure of his boss, the intransigent Riviere, the airmail pilot Fabien attempts a perilous flight during a heavy night-time thunderstorm in Argentina. As conditions get worse and the radio communication with Fabien becomes increasingly difficult, Riviere begins to question his uncompromising methods, and his distress turns to guilt when the pilot's wife comes to find him in search of answers. Based on Saint-Exupery's own experiences as a commercial pilot, Night Flight is a haunting and lyrical examination of duty, destiny and the individual, as well as an authentic and tragic portrayal of the intrepid early days of human air travel.Trade ReviewWhat gives this book an authentic and inimitable flavour is the personal confrontation with a recurrent peril... Quite aside from its literary merits, which I much admire, this book is valuable as a document; and it is the unusual combination of these two qualities which makes Night Flight so exceptionally important. -- Andre Gide

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Book SynopsisFirst published in 1973, Haste Ye Back is a lively and intimate portrayal of Aberlour Orphanage in Banffshire, where Dorothy K. Haynes (19181987) spent four formative years in her childhood. Best known as a writer of gothic and supernatural fiction, here Haynes's vivid imagination brings to life the residents, caretakers and stories of the institution that irrevocably shaped her.In this new edition, the complete text of Haste Ye Back is reprinted alongside additional material by Haynes: three previously unpublished reminiscences on Aberlour Orphanage, and The Head', the winner of the 1947 Tom-Gallon Trust Award and a fine example of the author's haunting short fiction. Opening with a fresh and considered look at Haynes's life and work, this volume re-introduces a long-neglected writer of striking originality.

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Book SynopsisPart memoir, part biography, part book about creative writing and what really makes a novel, and also a brave book about failure, This Is Not A Book About Charles Darwin is unique and compelling.

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Book SynopsisPreviously unpublished work from the acclaimed author of several great classics, detailing the last years of her life.

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Book SynopsisFrom the author of Mrs Engels and The Sisters Mao, an intimate family memoir about filial love and its limits, separation, and loss. Gavin is spending the quarantine with his eighty-year-old mother, whose mind is slowly slipping away. He has returned home to care for her and to write a novel. But all he can write about is her. In this frank and revealing memoir, he unspools an intimate story of his upbringing and early adulthood: feeling out of place as a child, homophobic bullying at school, his brother’s mental illness and drug addiction, his father’s sudden death, his own devastating diagnosis, his struggles and triumphs as a writer, and above all, his relationship with his mother. Her brightness shines a light over his childhood, but her betrayal of his teenage self leads to years of resentment and disconnection. Now, he must find a way to reconcile with her, before it is too late.Trade Review‘Flayingly authentic and sensationally compelling … one of the best books of the year.’ -- Anthony Cummins * The Observer *‘Cells is a raw, throbbing thing; the literary equivalent of an open wound, but one that’s been cauterised by a highly skilled surgeon … one of the very best, most authentic, beautiful, and brutal depictions of a deep and abiding, albeit imperfect love between a son and his mother, not to mention the story of the making of an acutely talented writer.’ -- Lucy Scholes * The Telegraph *‘Raw and deeply affecting.’ -- Fiona Buckley * The Guardian *‘Fantastic.’ -- Seán Hewitt * Sunday Independent *‘Already established as a leading voice in Irish literature as a novelist, Gavin McCrea’s first foray into memoir, Cells, allows him to pour his literary prowess into a heart stopping excavation of the self … An antidote to shame that this country sorely desires, Cells will heighten the capacity for empathy in all who read it. Not least of all, empathy for the self.’ -- Helen Cullen * The Irish Times *‘Remarkable’ -- Andrew McMillan‘McCrea lays himself bare.’ -- Sophie Grenham * The Sunday Times *‘A brave, raw, visceral memoir told with such acuity, insight, and compassion, I could barely put it down. Gavin McCrea’s unflinching mapping of his family’s struggles, his own journey towards individuation and self-realisation, as well as his deep, conflicted love for his mother, is beautifully rendered, painful, and real. A stunning, memorable read.’ -- Lisa Harding, author of Bright Burning Things‘McCrea’s emotionally intelligent dissection of personal relationships ensures that this is no squalid misery memoir.’ -- Houman Barekat * TLS *‘While a deeply personal book, Cells represents an important comment on modern Ireland.’ -- Luke Warde * Sunday Independent *‘Cells is a compulsive tidal force of a book: detailed, vulnerable, and brave, it pulled me in swiftly and held me to the very end.’ -- Seán Hewitt, author of All Down Darkness Wide‘This is a book that brims with stored-up pain — and with a very particular kind of courage. For all its dark and sometimes brutal honesty, what the reader is going to remember here is the way that McCrea’s prose fights on through his hurt to bring home pages that seem lit from within by love and beauty. A memoir that is as rewarding as it is undoubtedly challenging.’ -- Neil Bartlett, author of Ready To Catch Him Should He Fall and Address Book‘Reading Cells, I was struck by McCrea’s generosity in interrogating personal histories as they relate to wider familial and social systems. Contemplating devotion and loss with revolutionary sensitivity, what results is a stunning work of emotion-mapping. Cells is a dazzling exploration of nuance; pondering the formative threads that piece together the self, sewing a new lineage of interconnectedness towards acceptance.’ -- Peter Scalpello, author of Limbic‘A life recollected in vivid scenes, Cells is both brutal and tender in its depiction of the relationships that shape a self. Leading the reader through moments of darkness and of luminosity alike, this is a work of intellect and eloquence, but also a work of great heart. I was deeply moved as I read, and so grateful that this book found its way to me.’ -- Doireann Ní Ghríofa, author of A Ghost in the Throat‘McCrea is one of Ireland’s best contemporary authors.’ -- Sara Baume * Irish Examiner *‘Using the fine brushstrokes of his relationship with his mother, Gavin McCrea creates a remarkable self-portrait which becomes, then, a portrait of our times. This memoir will comfortably sit alongside other great Irish memoirs of recent decades, not least the work of Nuala O’Faolain, Hugo Hamilton, and John McGahern. This is a brave book, beautifully written, fearless, vulnerable, self-aware, honest, and not without moments of intimate levity. McCrea is prepared to express his rage at how the world has unfurled around him, but he does so with delicacy and love and a daring sense of invention.’ -- Colum McCann, author of Apeirogon‘Honest, moving, raw, and unsparing this memoir makes you think and feel. With Cells, Gavin McCrea has established himself as one of Ireland’s finest writers.’ -- Paul McVeigh, author of The Good Son‘An unflinching memoir about interiority, in multiple senses of the word, and the ways in which shame and trauma inflect the spaces of our material lives. Gavin McCrea’s writing is attentive and deeply intelligent; it teems with the life of its subject, refrains from glumness or easy answers, and all with an elegance that makes Cells a captivating read.’ -- Jack Parlett, author of Fire Island‘Gavin McCrea has written a succession of cells that open up a world of wonder. As smart as it is witty, this memoir grips in a journey that will make the reader feel, understand, and, on top of that, marvel at the cost of love and the things people need do to survive.’ -- Gillian Slovo, author of Every Secret Thing‘Gavin McCrea’s wonderful memoir Cells is aptly named. His writing gets under the skin and drills through the bone and into the marrow of what pain and joy it is to be a mother and to be that very particular mother’s child.’ -- Tish Delaney, author of The Saint of Lost Things‘Raw, courageous, and heartfelt … a brutal, tender book, and one which merits reading with all the same attention and care with which it is written.’ * Totally Dublin *‘He writes beautifully.’ -- Orna Mulcahy * The Gloss *‘A riveting, deeply considered memoir … as with the best memoirs (Nuala O’Faolain’s Are You Somebody? is one touchstone) McCrea uses his own life as a springboard to discuss wider Irish society … From the wonderful prologue that will instantly hook readers, to the many surprising twists introduced without fanfare throughout the book, Cells is an excavation of the past by a writer who knows exactly what he’s doing.’ -- Sarah Gilmartin * The Irish Times *‘A writer of enormous talent and courage, Gavin McCrea’s Cells is the kind of book you can’t put down ... The kind of book you’ll never forget, the kind of book you’ll press on other readers so you can discuss it together.’ -- Caitriona Lally, author of Eggshells‘A visceral and searching memoir where the author displays seemingly inexhaustible strength in revealing his vulnerability.’ -- Brendan Daly * The Sunday Business Post *‘In its ungarnished prose and loud inner voice, Cells stitches raw memories with new meanings to craft a brilliant composite of a son’s unexamined relationship with his mother. The memoir pairs McCrea’s unspoken shame with his private sanctums to show how it’s these cells — physical or fantastical — where we sometimes finally find the words to speak.’ -- Nathan Smith * The Saturday Paper *‘[Q]uite fearlessly, McCrae lays it all bare … [Cells is] brave; brilliantly written; almost unbearably raw and frank; but also tender and sweet.’ -- Peta Stavelli * NZ Booklovers *‘In this exceptional memoir, McCrea (Mrs. Engels) unflinchingly untangles his family’s history and its effects on his adult self … a powerful and complicated reckoning with the ghosts of family dysfunction. This one isn’t easy to shake.’ -- Publishers Weekly, starred review‘A harrowing but ultimately very rewarding read.’ -- Martín Von Hildebrand * The Sunday Business Post *Praise for The Sisters Mao: ‘McCrea’s portrait of Jiang Qing is a masterpiece of characterisation: at once monstrous and pitiable. The Sisters Mao is dazzlingly clever and original.’ -- Antonia Senior * The Times *Praise for The Sisters Mao: ‘The Sisters Mao is a spectacular novel, utterly enthralling and insightful; every voice is penetrating, dazzling. In spite of the setting, it is full of relevance for these times; it manages to be both historically authentic and thrillingly contemporary. Gavin is a writer of extraordinary talent, and I cannot think of a kind of reader who I would not recommend this novel to.’ -- Sara Baume, author of Spill Simmer Falter WitherPraise for The Sisters Mao: ‘McCrea has conducted exceptionally deep research to conjure up nuanced, authentic portrayals of the worlds of the book — but the text carries his knowledge lightly, supporting rather than dominating the story. The Sisters Mao is the best sort of historical fiction; one that illuminates the contemporary moment with great insight. Profoundly brilliant, it will no doubt be a huge contender on the literary awards circuit, but also one that is pushed feverishly from reader to reader with excitement.’ -- Helen Cullen * The Irish Times *Praise for Mrs Engels: ‘[Gavin McCrea] deserves praise for his command of voice in Mrs Engels … This is the best kind of historical fiction — oozing period detail, set in a milieu populated by famous figures and events about which much is known, but seen through the eyes of a central character who, due to her illiteracy, left no ready access to her experience in the form of letters or diary entries: a rich and accomplished first novel.’ -- Lucy Scholes * The Independent *

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Book Synopsis“Has the page-turning quality of a thriller.” —NPR “Strange and wonderful…A book for our times.” —The New York Times Book Review “Propulsive…mesmerizing…breathtaking.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review) This unforgettable memoir traces the ramifications of a series of lies that threaten to derail the author’s life—exploring the line between fact and fiction, reality and conspiracy.In To Name the Bigger Lie, Sarah Viren “has pulled off a magic trick of fantastic proportion” (The Washington Post), telling the story of an all-too-real investigation into her personal and professional life that she expands into a profound exploration of the nature of truth. The memoir begins as Viren is researching what she believes will be a book about her high school philosophy teacher, a charismatic instructor who taught her an

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Book Synopsis''Both extremely funny and deeply sad, The Writing School examines how and why we tell our own stories. It''s beautifully written and structured, compelling, wise and fabulously readable'' Lissa Evans''The Writing School is an extraordinary book. It is funny, exhilarating, heart-breaking and passionate. Its delicate pulsing themes are held like a bird in the writer''s confident, gentle hand'' Katharine Norbury''Life, with its unexpected troughs and highs, the disciplines of teaching a creative writing course and the shadow of a family tragedy provide the focus for a memoir that brims with humour, honesty and intelligence. The Writing School taught me a lot'' Elizabeth BuchanA creative writing course is a chance for reinvention. When author Miranda France sets off to teach at a residential writing school in a remote valley, she expects to meet a group of aspiring writers with the usual mix of hope and unrealised ambitTrade ReviewFascinating, hugely entertaining, instructive in the best sense. I always thought that writing could not be taught, only reading, but this book made me reconsider. I read it in one sitting -- Alberto ManguelBoth extremely funny and deeply sad, The Writing School examines how and why we tell our own stories. It's beautifully written and structured, compelling, wise and fabulously readable -- Lissa Evans'Intellectually riveting but also slyly funny and, out-of-nowhere, heartbreaking. What an achievement. I loved every word of it' * Nathan Filer *The Writing School is an extraordinary book. It is funny, exhilarating, heart-breaking and passionate. Its delicate pulsing themes are held like a bird in the writer's confident, gentle hand. Miranda France has created a brilliant, ephemeral eulogy for her beloved brother and a luminous gift for her reader -- Katharine Norbury, author of The Fish Ladder

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Book SynopsisWith such varied correspondents as T. S. Eliot, Stephen Spender and Anthony Powell, for nearly forty years George Orwell wrote and received the letters that are now collected together in A Life in Letters, edited with an introduction by Peter Davison in Penguin Modern Classics.Personal as well as political, Orwell''s letters offer a fascinating window into the mind of a phenomenal man. We are privy to snatched glimpses of his family life: his son Richard''s developing teeth, the death of his wife Eileen, and his own illness. Candid portraits of Barcelona during the Spanish Civil War, his opinions on bayonets, and on the chaining of German prisoners display his magnificent talent as a political writer, and letters to friends and his publisher provide a unique insight into the development and publication of some of the most important novels in the English language. A Life in Letters features previously unpublished material, including letters which shed new light on a love that would haunt him for his whole life, as well as revealing the inspiration for some of his most famous characters. Presented for the first time in a dedicated volume, this selection of Orwell''s letters is an indispensible companion to his diaries.''Arguably the most influential writer thrown up by the West in the twentieth century ... the real Orwell - whoever he is - continues to take shape''The TimesTrade ReviewArouses your warmest sympathy * Daily Mail *A Life in Letters contains nearly everything a reader new to Orwell needs to know about him -- DJ Taylor * New Statesman *'Mr Davison's new edition of the letters is compelling...unlike a conventional biography, the character of the subject comes through undiluted.' * Sunday Telegraph *'This is the authentic Orwell voice: wonderfully clear and fresh and forthright' * Mail on Sunday *'the best single-volume selection we could hope for' * Sunday Times *'Orwell: A Life in Letters should take its place beside the five major biographies ... as an indepsensible resource for understanding George Orwell and his times.' * John Rodden *

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Book SynopsisNawal El Saadawi was born in a village outside Cairo, Egypt, in 1931. A trained medical doctor, she wrote landmark works on the oppression of Arab women including Woman at Point Zero (1973), God Dies by the Nile (1976) and The Hidden Face of Eve (1977). After being imprisoned by Anwar Sadat's government for criticising the regime, she founded the Arab Women's Solidarity Association in 1982, before being forced into exile in later life due to death threats by religious extremists. She returned to Egypt in 1996, running for president in 2005 until government persecution forced her to withdraw. Saadawi died in Egypt in 2021.

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Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics.Orlando had become a woman there is no denying it. But in every other respect, Orlando remained precisely as he had been. The change of sex, though it altered their future, did nothing whatever to alter their identity.'Boisterous and defiant, Virginia Woolf's queer classic subverts restraints of genre, time and gender. Traversing the complexities of human emotion and society's obsession with conformity, the wild adventures of Woolf's gender fluid hero begin in Elizabethan England and end in 1928 yet Orlando ages just 36 years.A satirical romp that spans over three hundred years of history, Woolf's fantastical biography was decades ahead of its time.Trade Review‘Undoubtedly one of the most singular novels of our era’Jorge Luis Borges

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Book SynopsisPeeling the Onion is a searingly honest account of Grass'' modest upbringing in Danzig, his time as a boy soldier fighting the Russians, and the writing of his masterpiece, The Tin Drum, in Paris.It is a remarkable autobiography and, without question, one of Günter Grass'' finest works.By the Nobel Prize-winning author of The Tin Drum.Trade ReviewAn exquisitely constructed narrative... Peeling the Onion is a genuine masterpiece * Independent on Sunday *A memoir of rare literary beauty * New Yorker *As a writer, his influence still looms large, and Peeling the Onion is a reminder why. It has that same imaginative accuracy that made The Tin Drum a bestseller * The Times *An ingenious but treacherous text that glides constantly between past and present, first and third person, memory and imagination * Evening Standard *This subtle and expertly written book is really a memoir about forgetting -- Sebastian Faulks * Sunday Times *

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Book SynopsisAmerica''s greatest living crime writer gives us a raw, brutally candid memoir-as high intensity and as riveting as any of his novels-about his obsessive search for atonement in women.The year was 1958.Jean Hilliker had divorced her fast-buck hustler husband and resurrected her maiden name.Her son, James, was ten years old.He hated and lusted for his mother and summoned her dead. She was murdered three months later.The Hilliker Curse is a predator''s confession, a treatise on guilt and the power of malediction, and above all a cri de cœur. Ellroy unsparingly describes his shattered childhood, his delinquent teens, his writing life, his love affairs and marriages, his nervous breakdown and the beginning of a relationship with an extraordinary woman who may just be the long-sought Her. A layered narrative of time and place, emotion and insight, sexuality and spiritual quest, The Hilliker Curse is a brilliant, soul-baring revelation oTrade ReviewA remarkable memoir ... Hugely enjoyable * The Economist *We turn the pages gripped with a rubbernecker's fascination ... It is ugly, beautiful, reprehensible and moving. In other words, a hard book to forget * Irish Times *High-octane ... A breathless piece of writing ... When it comes to pinning down the most startling possible word collision, Ellroy's acrobatic pizzazz is beyond doubt ... This is literary knife-throwing at its most exhilarating and dangerous -- Julie Myerson * Guardian *A painfully honest book, written in Ellroy's usual blunt, breathless but often starkly beautiful prose ... a marvellous read, sly, self-mocking and filled with troubling insight * Time Out *James Ellroy's crime novels have been much acclaimed for their dark plots, tough prose and generally bleak view of the world. Now that he's brought those same qualities to bear on a history of his relationships with women, the result, inevitably, is not for the faint-hearted ... Ellroy writes with such swagger and certainty that it's hard not to be swept along. He also - let's face it - has quite a tale to tell * Daily Mail *

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Book SynopsisBeginning in 1956 with the publication of A Legacy, Sybille Bedford has narrated - in fiction and non-fiction - what has been by turns her sensuous, harrowing, altogether remarkable life. In this magnificent memoir, she moves from Berlin during the Great War to the artists'' set on the Côte d''Azur of the 1920s, through lovers, mentors, seducers and friends, and from genteel yet shabby poverty to relative comfort in London''s Chelsea. Whether evoking the simple sumptuousness of a home-cooked meal or tracing the heart-rending outline of an intimate betrayal, she offers spellbinding reflections on how history imprints itself on private lives.

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Book SynopsisEdward Gibbon was one of the world''s greatest historians and a towering figure of his age. When he died in 1794 he left behind the unfinished drafts of his Memoirs, which were posthumously edited by his friend Lord Sheffield, and remain an astonishing portrait of a rich, full life. Recounting Gibbon''s sickly childhood in London, his disappointment with an Oxford ''steeped in port and prejudice'', his successful years in Lausanne, his first and only love affair and the monolithic achievement of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, he distils his genius for history into a remarkable gift for autobiography. Candid and detailed, these writings are filled with warmth and intellectual passion.

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Book SynopsisA House Unlocked is Booker Prize winning author Penelope Lively''s classic memoir.The only child of divorced parents, Penelope Lively was often sent to stay at her grandparents'' country house Golsoncott. Years later, as the house was sold out of the family, she began to piece together the lives of those she knew fifty years before.In a needlework sampler, she sees her grandmother and the wartime children that she sheltered under her roof in 1940. Potted meat jars remind her of the ritual of doing the flowers for church. The smell of the harness room brings her Aunt Rachel - avant-garde artist, fervent horserider - vividly back to life.In A House Unlocked, Penelope Lively delves into the domestic past of her former home, and tells of her own youth and the contrasts between life today and the way they lived then.''Wonderful. Lively is brilliant and original . . . Every page of this book captures your attention'' Daily Trade ReviewWonderful. Lively is brilliant and original . . . Every page of this book captures your attention * Daily Mail *Remarkable, richly enjoyable ... a captivating memoir -- Helen Dunmore * The Times *Engaging, curious, compelling, remarkable ... Any time spent with Penelope Lively is a joy * Observer *An ingenious memoir. The enchantment lies in its personal narrative: the portrait of a family and its progress through the twentieth century * Literary Review *

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Book Synopsis''Extremely funny'' Sunday Telegraph _____________________________A poet is a rock star without the sex''n''drugs, or the rock''n''roll. But that never stopped Simon Armitage dreaming, and in Gig, he explores how music and the muse intertwine in work and in life. Crammed with stories, anecdotes, jokes, absurdities, the odd informal homily, pitfalls and pratfalls (not all the author''s own), Yorkshire life and death, Gig is about the dream and reality of what you are, and what you might have been._____________________________''One of our most entertaining authors'' Independent''Very, very funny'' GQ''Witty, terrific, stupendously funny'' Daily Telegraph Trade ReviewI read this book in one sitting. It moved me to tears, to shouts of laughter, and made me look at even the most mundane things in a different way * Sunday Times *Extremely funny, brilliant * Sunday Telegraph *Engaging, eccentric, hilarious, incredibly good company. A wonderwall of moments and memories . . . one of our most entertaining authors * Independent *Very, very funny . . . the kind of book you'll want to press on your friends * GQ *Witty, terrific, stupendously funny * Daily Telegraph *Warm, funny . . . wonderfully accurate and evocative . . . we close the book wanting more * Times Literary Supplement *Pitch perfect * Financial Times *Funny, perceptive, thought-provoking. Armitage has a poet's eye for the poignant detail and the bigger theme * Scotsman *

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Book SynopsisTim Lott''s parents, Jack and Jean, met at the Empire Snooker Hall, Ealing, in 1951, in a world that to him now seems ''as strange as China''. In this extraordinarily moving exploration of his parents'' lives, his mother''s inexplicable suicide in her late fifties and his own bouts of depression, Tim Lott conjures up the pebble-dashed home of his childhood and the rapidly changing landscape of postwar suburban England. It is a story of grief, loss and dislocation, yet also of the power of memory and the bonds of family love.Trade Review'The Scent of Dried Roses touches a nerve no other English memoir has found; it does so in a way that seems not only affecting, but somehow important' - Sebastian Faulks 'This is a moving, insightful, important book. It works as a personal story, as an analysis of the unknowable horrors of suicide and as a history of a changing Britain' - William Hague 'In its slow and careful way, it unfolds a certain topography of melancholia, and the map Lott makes of his troubles mixes the intricate streets he has walked in all his life with some pretty intricate places in his own mind and heart. We are left with a resounding lament for small England ... The book's recreation of a suburban world, its flashing-back and forward in real time, its compilation of whispers and roars and half-remembered truths, its reliance on the intimacies of interior monologue, are bound to make some people think of fiction' - Andrew O'Hagan 'Brilliant. I don't remember reading any text which is so personal, so particular and near the bone and yet which is so utterly without self-regard' - Hilary Mantel 'Outstanding ! tracing his parents' marriage, Lott conveys, with a brilliant, almost Orwellian command of social and historical nuance, what England looked and felt like, decade by decade, from 1930 to 1989 ! it is a story told with courage, candour and astonishing command of detail' Blake Morrison

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Book SynopsisEdward John Trelawny (1792-1881) was one of the most curious figures of the English Romantic Movement, and spent his long life travelling extensively as a naval officer, biographer and adventurer. After a brief education, Trelawny was assigned as a volunteer in the Royal Navy by the age of thirteen, and led an unaccomplished naval career until his resignation at nineteen. He met Shelley and Byron in Italy in 1822, where he became fascinated, almost hypnotized, by the two poets. His Records of Shelley, Byron and the Author, written after both their deaths, is the end-product of this strange obsession. An incorrigible romancer, Trelawny had three marriages - the second of which was to Tersitza, sister of the Greek warlord Odysseus Androutsos, whose cause he had joined and whose mountain fortress he looked after when Odysseus was arrested. He died after a fall at the age of eighty-eight, in England, and his ashes were buried in Rome in a plot adjacent to Shelley's grave.

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Book SynopsisKeats's letters are 'the most notable and most important ever written by any English poet' (T. S. Eliot). This new edition revises and updates Robert Gittings's selection and includes 170 letters, a new introduction and notes, list of correspondents and full index

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Book Synopsis''Wonderfully entertaining, hilarious. Contains the distilled wisdom of some of the greatest writers who ever lived'' Allison Pearson, Sunday TelegraphWhat should I do with my life? What if my love is not returned? Why do bad things happen? The answers to some of life''s biggest questions are found not in trite self-help manuals but in the tough-love lessons explored in Russian literature. Here, Viv Groskop delves into the novels of history''s deepest thinkers to discover enduring truths about how we should live.Whether you''re new to the Russian classics or returning to old favourites, The Anna Karenina Fix will help salve your heartache by exploring the torments of a host of famous and infamous literary heroes and heroines. Think of it like this: they have suffered so that you don''t have to . . .''Enchanting. Groskop falls in love with the literature, her impressive knowledge of which she conveTrade ReviewWonderfully entertaining, hilarious. Contains the distilled wisdom of some of the greatest writers who ever lived. Explored with dancing wit, affection and brilliance, this is a passionate, hilarious, joyful love letter to Russian literature. * Allison Pearson, Sunday Telegraph *Enchanting. Groskop falls in love with the literature, her impressive knowledge of which she conveys with a charmingly breezy tone * Observer *A beguiling tasting menu of some of the finest reading experiences of my life. Witty, likeable, and lighthearted, Viv Groskop invites us to embrace the work of these august Russian dead souls as belonging to us all * Lionel Shriver *Groskop has a knack of giving you just enough biography of the author, just enough tantalising kiss-and-tell detail from the works . . . A delightful primer and companion to all the authors you are ashamed to admit you haven't read * The Times *What does Tolstoy have in common with Oprah Winfrey? What can Chekhov teach us about body image? In The Anna Karenina Fix, comedian Viv Groskop shows us how to use Russian literature as self-help, with hilarious and eye-opening results * Good Housekeeping *A wry literary memoir examining what we can learn from the great Russian novelists * Stylist *Funny and only second best to reading the stuff itself * Sara Wheeler, The Spectator *A highly knowledgeable jaunt through 150 years of literature * Observer *

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Book SynopsisWith a new introduction by JESMYN WARD''Warm, witty, imaginative . . . A rich and winning book'' NEW YORKER ''Devilishly funny and academically solid: delicious mixture'' MAYA ANGELOU''One of the greatest writers of our time'' TONI MORRISONFirst published in 1942 at the height of her popularity, Dust Tracks on a Road is Zora Neale Hurston''s candid, exuberant account of her rise from childhood poverty in the rural South to a prominent place among the leading artists and intellectuals of the Harlem Renaissance. As compelling as her acclaimed fiction, Hurston''s literary self-portrait offers a revealing, often audacious glimpse into the life - public and private - of an extraordinary artist, anthropologist, chronicler and champion of the black experience in America. Full of the wit and wisdom of a proud, spirited woman who started off low and climbed high: ''I have been in Sorrow''s kitchen and lickeTrade ReviewWarm, witty, imaginative . . . A rich and winning book * New Yorker *Told in gutsy language . . . Her story is an encouraging and enjoyable one for any member of the human race * New York Review of Books *One of the greatest writers of our timeZora Neale Hurston was a knockout in her life, a wonderful writer and a fabulous person. Devilishly funny and academically solid: delicious mixtureA different kind of a book, absorbing, human, entertaining, with occasional strong flavor * Kirkus Reviews *

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Book SynopsisA memoir about home and belonging, from the author of I KNOW WHY THE CAGED BIRD SINGS''A brilliant writer, a fierce friend and a truly phenomenal woman'' BARACK OBAMAMaya Angelou''s seven volumes of autobiography, beginning with I KNOW WHY THE CAGED BIRD SINGS, are a testament to the talents and resilience of this extraordinary writer. Though she fiercely loves the world, as a black woman, she also knows its cruelty. Angelou has known discrimination and extreme poverty, but also hope, joy, achievement and celebration. In the fifth volume, Maya Angelou emigrates to Ghana only to discover that ''you can''t go home again'', but she comes to a new awareness of love and friendship, civil rights and slavery - and the myth of mother Africa.''She moved through the world with unshakeable calm, confidence and a fierce grace . . . She will always be the rainbow in my clouds'' OPRAH WINFREY''She was important in so ma

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Book SynopsisChester Himes and John A Williams met in 1961, as Himes was on the cusp of transcontinental celebrity and Williams, sixteen years his junior, was just beginning his writing career. This is a collection of correspondence between these two friends, presenting nearly three decades worth of letters about their lives and loves.Trade Review"Reading these letters, one is delighted to be in the company of two friends who truly like each other. One also feels the passionate excitement and richness of their intellect and creativity, their anger and joy. But most of all one learns what it is like in the 20th century to be an African-American writer in America and Europe." - Clarence Major, professor of English at the University of California-Davis and author of Dirty Bird Blues"

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Book SynopsisA dynamic selection of Linton Kwesi Johnson's most powerful prose writings, brought together for the first time.Trade ReviewLinton Kwesi Johnson brought the aural poetry of Jamaican speech to 'H'england' and captured it in verse. He contributed a sharp and still relevant analysis of class dynamics to our literature. Oh, and he also made music from words. Thank you, Linton! -- Zadie SmithAn outstanding collection which speaks to the extraordinary achievement of the voice of my generation. Like all great artists, Linton Kwesi Johnson wasn't called - he simply arrived. For his time, and for the ages. -- Caryl PhillipsLKJ provided the soundtrack to my youth but these writings are more than nostalgic. Written with humility and generosity, this mosaic of wise, urgent and moving pieces document an important time in British Caribbean history, the emergence of our music, our culture, our heroes and our political history. I loved it. -- Kit de WaalFlecked with passion; taut and reasoned . . . The grace and power of LKJ's writing are as necessary as ever. * The Observer *Linton Kwesi Johnson is not just a master of the language but of its various forms: lyric, poetry and prose. Incisive, engaging, fearless, it is as much of a joy to read him as it is to hear him. -- Gary YoungeOne of the greatest living poets of the counterculture . . . Braids together the themes of his life. * The Guardian *An opportunity to understand Johnson as a thinker as well as a cultural critic . . . every word is chosen with care. * TLS *A scandalously overdue volume. -- Paul GilroyExtraorindary . . . If you want to know about the life, politics and history behind Linton Kwesi Johnson's poetry and music, you need this book. * Wire *Sheds light not only on LKJ's creative process but also his life story. * Financial Times *A welcome collation of Linton Kwesi Johnson's writings, which provide a thorough understanding of his commitment to poetry, music and justice. I found the book inspirational - and was gladdened to eavesdrop on formative exchanges from the author's childhood and grateful to investigate avenues of culture, which were new to me. I put down Time Come singing the tune of the boon of community. -- John HegleyA brilliant and welcome collection of musings from the fertile mind of one of the world's great waymaking poets, philosophers and activists. -- Lorna GoodisonIt doesn't matter how familiar you might be with LKJ's poetry, in Time Come the essays and writings frame the verse; they give a context which places the verse squarely within the culture and observations that produced it. This is a genuinely deep dive into the mind of one of Britain's most important poets. -- Lloyd BradleyGathers the real-life reportage roots of the dub poetry that makes LKJ our Bard of the Front Line, wherever it may be. His insights unite Black and diverse Britain, the Afro-Diaspora and those who dig it. Spare and deliberate, his dead-on prose critiques several decades of music, poetry, theatre and literature . . . LKJ also chronicles the social and political progress of post-colonial Black Britons, building a culture and spaces of their own. Engagingly, he shares his personal artistic development, deftly guiding arts aspirants. A work of consistent commitment and courage. -- Vivien GoldmanOnce again we are playing catch up with the writing of Linton Kwesi Johnson. From speeches to reviews, reggae to political commentary, Linton always has an insightful perspective . . . something to teach, something to tell, something to rebel against. A book to be savoured and re read, spending time with Kwesi Johnson, one of our greatest living poets, is always a privilege. -- Derek OwusuIn Time Come, we learn how the sonic explosion in LKJ’s writing and performances is rooted in his earliest impulses to question, learn, experiment and create . . . His thoughtful prose shows what an enduring legacy looks like, a tribute to his own fortitude but also to the people and forces that have shaped his trajectory and sensibility. -- Olive SeniorWe journey through this selection of prose with Linton Kwesi Johnson's upbringing and landscape weaved within. Time Come is a necessary book from a writer who continues to inspire generations of Black voices. LKJ: a reggae poet on the mic, a craftsman on the page, and a legacy in our hearts. -- Yomi SodeWith this collected prose, we as readers are privy to over four decades of learning, listening and doing. Like all deep teachers, LKJ is patient, generous, profound and direct. This is a precious collection, a bold and incisive counterweight to some of the most important poetry written about the black experience in the UK and beyond. Essential reading. -- Anthony JosephFrom rebel music to praisesongs for the ancestors, LKJ’s vibrant prose traverses the broad terrain of Black British culture and beyond . . . LKJ’s prose, like his poetry, is a dread beat of resistance against systemic racism, affirming the capacity of Caribbean migrants to turn trauma into sustaining art. -- Carolyn CooperA brilliant culmination of a life's worth of work. * Caribbean Today *

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Book Synopsis______________ Paris may well be White's pearl, but he is in fact the real pearl ... This wonderfully eccentric, conversational and personalised cultural history contains the essence of Edmund White Entertaining and wry, White is worldly-wise and wise' - Eileen Battersby, Irish Times Edmund White writing about his Paris years, with walk-on parts for Catherine Deneuve, Yves Saint-Laurent and other assorted members of the French glitterati? That'd be Inside a Pearl' Scotsman We are lucky to have him still publishing diverting, affectionate and full of tips' - London Evening Standard______________ A literary treat of a memoir, covering Edmund White''s years among the cultural and intellectual elite of 1980s ParisEdmund White was forty-three years old when he moved to Paris in 1983. He spoke no French and knew just two people in the entire city, but soon discovered the anxieties and pleasures of mastering a new cultuTrade ReviewParis may well be White’s pearl, but he is in fact the real pearl ... This wonderfully eccentric, conversational and personalised cultural history contains the essence of Edmund White … Entertaining and wry, White is worldly-wise and wise * Eileen Battersby, Irish Times *Edmund White writing about his Paris years, with walk-on parts for Catherine Deneuve, Yves Saint-Laurent and other assorted members of the French glitterati? That’d be Inside a Pearl * Scotsman *There is at once something artfully canny and beguilingly innocent about Inside a Pearl … You want to hold on to him, will him to live more, live longer and write about more years * Independent *We are lucky to have him still publishing … diverting, affectionate as well as bitchy, and full of tips * London Evening Standard *In the end, this dazzling memoir isn’t just a love song to a city – a city “so calm” it is “like living inside a pearl” – but profoundly moving elegy to a friend * Sunday Times *

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Book SynopsisA revealing, honest and often comic coming-of-age story about growing up in 1970s Britain on the boundaries of race''Full of charm'' GUARDIAN''An account of what being British means'' i''Captures a country in transition ... You can''t fail to be moved'' THE TIMESKamal Ahmed''s childhood was very British' in every way except for the fact that he was brown. Half English, half Sudanese, he was raised at a time when being mixed-race meant being told to go home, even when you were born just down the road.This is his account of an upbringing of cricket and bucket-and-spade holidays, Angel Delight and the BBC - British to the core, yet always feeling foreign in the only home he had ever known. ''Ahmed grew up as a mixed-race kid in west London in the seventies, and his book charts the progress (sometimes slow and now without a few setbacks along the way) that our country has made on race issues since then. Brilliant'' Rohan SilvaTrade ReviewSparky, accessible and stimulating * Observer *Full of charm. Will no doubt deepen the conversation on race and identity in Britain * Guardian *Compelling. Ahmed writes evocatively of his almost cloyingly British upbringing: life in the suburbs: bucket-and-spade hols, cricket and card games with (white) Granddad. And yet, as Ahmed observes, he has always felt a little alien in his homeland. It is clear that Ahmed has done his homework – spoken to an enormous number of people, read endless studies. The book is a valuable addition to a growing body of work on what it means to be mixed race in modern Britain * Sunday Times *Ahmed draws on his experiences as a half-English, half-Sudanese child in 70s London for an account of what being British means * 50 Top Reads for Autumn, i-paper *Captures a country in transition. Even allowing for the lofty vantage point [Ahmed] looks back from as economics editor of the BBC, his story has a touch of the everyman about it. Ahmed recounts all this with elegance and wry humour. You can’t fail to be moved * The Times *Excellent. Ahmed grew up as a mixed-race kid in west London in the Seventies, and his book charts the progress (sometimes slow and not without a few setbacks along the way) that our country has made on race issues since then. Brilliant -- Rohan Silva * Evening Standard *[An] intimate memoir ... Ahmed uses his parents' individual and joint personal stories to pan outward into the broader histories of their countries, continents, and the evolution of ideas about race and citizenship ... Read[s] like an engaging novel ... Although emotionally similar to Dreams from my Father by Barack Obama and stylistically similar to Born a Crime by Trevor Noah, The Life and Times of a Very British Man is deeper in its complexity and broader in scope than those other two titles * Media Diversified *[Ahmed] writes movingly … With personal anecdotes and political analysis, it’s a thoughtfully written and thought-provoking book about race and identity in the Britain he passionately believes in * Choice Magazine *

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Book Synopsis''A compelling memoir. Absorbing and graced with a deceptive lightness of touch, [Hanging with the Elephant] is clever and brilliantly pieced together. Harding writes like an angel'' Sunday TimesFrom the No.1 bestselling author of Staring at Lakes, Talking to Strangers and On Tuesdays I''m A Buddhist''In public or on stage, it''s different. I''m fine. I have no bother talking to three hundred people, and sharing my feelings. But when I''m in a room on a one-to-one basis, I get lost. I can never find the right word. Except for that phrase - hold me.''Michael Harding''s wife has departed for a six-week trip, and he has been left alone in their home in Leitrim. Faced with the realities of caring for himself for the first time since his illness two years before, Harding endeavours to tame the ''elephant'' - an Asian metaphor for the unruly mind. As he does, he finds himself finally coming to terms with the death

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Book SynopsisA father reflects on the rich life of his son, who died suddenly at twenty-six after living with schizophrenia. On the morning of Boxing Day 2009, the poet Fraser Sutherland and his wife found their son, Malcolm, dead in his bedroom in their house. He was twenty-six and had died from a seizure of unknown cause. Malcolm had been living with schizophrenia since the age of seventeen.Fraser's respectful narration of Malcolm's life his happiness as well as his sufferings, his heroic efforts to calm his troubled mind, his readings, his writings, his experiments with religious thought is a master writer's attempt to give shape and dignity to his son's life, to memorialize it as more than an illness. And in writing about his son's life, Fraser creates his own self-effacing memoir the memoir of a parent's resilience through years of stressful care.Fraser Sutherland, one of Canada's finest poetry critics and essayists, died shortly after completing this boTrade ReviewPart elegy, part existential howl, The Book of Malcolm is an investigation of a beloved child's life, of the moods and registers of his mental illness, and of the sometimes harrowing family moments. * from the Foreword by Carmine Starnino *The Book of Malcolm makes the mundane moments of family and of lived, shared experience shine beautifully. That Sutherland loved his son, and that family is a complicated blessing, are made achingly clear. * Winnipeg Free Press *

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Book Synopsis'I thought if I was going to die I should write some things down'Kirsty Everett was going to be an Olympic gymnast. But as she made plans to win gold, life, as it does, laughed at the goal she'd set. Aged nine, she was diagnosed with leukaemia and spent the next two and a half years in treatment and attending the funerals of children she met in the cancer ward. At the age of sixteen, Kirsty's cancer returned. Faced with a devastating prognosis, she threw herself into as much as she could - friends, school, drama, sport, even a life-writing course with Patti Miller. As she said, 'I thought if I was going to die I should write some things down.'Against the odds, Kirsty survived. She never achieved gold at the Olympics, but she learned a lot about people, attitudes and resilience. This is a book about growing up different when you want to be the same; sparking hostility where there should be support; and how love can be tested to its utmost. It's wise and unflinching and hopeful, and you

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Book Synopsis''Like all good diarists Paling''s musings are funny, tender and uncensored'' Sunday Times6 April 2007Writing income for the year so far: minus 300''I feel that this might just be the year in which something happens. Then again it might not. But hope drives all writers on.''It''s unlikely that you''ll know Chris Paling''s face or have heard his name. This is his diary of trying to make a living as a writer, through the typical career trajectory of what is deemed a ''mid-list novelist''. Publishing rule 6: there is no such thing as a ''low-list'' novelist.In renumeration terms, writing is a career that often ends in disappointment and despair, and occasionally disgrace. Paling artfully explores what compels him and so many others to write - the battling joys and agonies of when that compulsion beds itself in one''s psyche, and a day without writing is a day wasted. A fascinating insight Trade ReviewLike all good diarists Paling's musings are funny, tender and uncensored -- Jackie Annesley * Sunday Times *Funny and revealing . . . everyone who is convinced they have a book in them should read [this book] -- Neil Armstrong * Mail on Sunday *A Very Nice Rejection Letter is a completely authentic account of what it's like to be merely reasonably good -- Thomas W Hodgkinson * Literary Review *Splendidly entertaining * The Chap *

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