There’s a tradition in drama for the ‘lower classes’ to dish the dirt on the tiddly posh. Plays, especially social comedies, often start with a pair of servants discussing what naughty things their superiors are up to. ‘Upstairs, Downstairs’ does something similar. In the 1970s, when I was growing up, this was a drama series…
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Smugge by name, smug by nature, Isabella is debut-novellist Ruth Leigh’s unpalatable influencer character, who discovers she has a well-hidden heart of gold. In The diary of Isabella M Smugge, you are hard-pushed to like ‘Issy’ much, what with her constant #hashtagging, (im)perfect family set creation and incessant people-judging. Moving from London to the country…
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This is an exceptional novel by British-Turkish writer Elif Shafak and earned a well-deserved place in the Booker Prize shortlist in 2019. I alternated between wanting to hide behind a cushion at the brutal descriptions of abuse, shouting at the injustices of the lives described, punching the air in support of Leila and her friends…
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Fifty Words for Snow by Nancy Campbell is a beautiful, rather poetic book, which I thought rather fitting as one of the first things to share with you. Nancy leads us on a fascinating journey around 50 countries and cultures, all of which have their own word for snow. You’d think a book about a…
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