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The Costa Book Awards shortlist 2018
The Costa Book Awards honour some of the most outstanding books of the year written by authors based in the UK and Ireland. There are five categories – First Novel, Novel, Biography, Poetry and Children’s Book – with one of the five winners chosen as Book of the Year.
Dominic Paul, Managing Director of Costa said: ‘There’s genuinely something for everyone in our shortlists this year: books which will make you laugh and books which will make you cry; books…
What we're reading: Curtis Sittenfeld, Karl Ove Knausgaard & Lisa Hanawalt
Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films and TV shows we’re watching, and the music we’re listening to.
Paul Goodman is reading Inadvertent by Karl Ove Knausgaard (translated by Ingvild Burkey)
I took another break from the new Murakami to read Karl Ove Knausgaard’s contribution to the Windham-Campbell Why I Write series, Inadvertent. With characteristic suspicion and microscopic analysis he addresses his ‘reasons’ for writing one by one, asking how legitimate it…
Living in Hope wins the 2018 Most Underrated Book Award
Living in Hope by the late Frank Byrne with Frances Coughlan and Gerard Waterford has been named the winner of year’s Most Underrated Book Award (MUBA).
A child of the Stolen Generation, Frank was moved from place to place after being taken from his mother, a Gooniyandi woman from Christmas Creek. Living in Hope is a record of his enduring determination from childhood through to adolescence, dotted with moments of joy within the overwhelmingly harsh and unjust era of the…
Our 2018 Christmas Gift Guide: What to buy for hard-to-buy-for adults
Over the next few weeks, we’ll be compiling a host of gift guides to help you with your Christmas shopping. Here is a list of suggestions for the tricky people in your life..
An ageing relative…
Spitfire by David Fairhead and Ant Palmer tells the story of the most famous fighter aircraft ever made, combining breathtaking aerial footage with rare digitally re-mastered archive film from the 1940s.
In Books That Saved My Life, Michael McGirr invites a reflection on…
Our 2018 Christmas Gift Guide: What to buy for hard-to-buy-for children
Over the next few weeks, we’ll be compiling a host of gift guides to help you with your Christmas shopping. Here is a list of suggestions for the tricky young people in your life.
THEY DON’T LIKE READING
Kids who won’t read
Hilda and the Hidden People – Based on the Hilda series of graphic novels and backed up by the new Netflix series, this novelisation sees Hilda encounter trolls and elves, and fight against a move to the city…
Literary prize winners to read over the holidays
Looking for good summer reading recommendations? Here are 20 literary prize winners of the past year!
Tracker by Alexis Wright
Winner of the Stella Prize 2018
Tracker is a collective memoir of the charismatic Aboriginal leader, political thinker and entrepreneur Tracker Tilmouth, who died in Darwin in 2015 at the age of 62. The book is as much a testament to the powerful role played by storytelling in contemporary Aboriginal life as it is to the legacy of an extraordinary…
Our 2018 Christmas Gift Guide: What to buy your siblings (and other relatives)
Over the next few weeks, we’ll be compiling a host of gift guides to help you with your Christmas shopping.
If they want summer reading recommendations…
The Incendiaries by R.O. Kwon is a darkly glittering read. A young Korean American woman at an elite American university is drawn into acts of domestic terrorism by a cult with ties to North Korea.
Melissa Lucashenko delivers a whip-smart, funny and engaging family epic in her latest novel, Too Much Lip. This…
Meet the bookseller with Gabrielle Williams
Gabrielle Williams has worked at Readings for the past six years where she juggles dual roles as a bookseller at Malvern shop, and as the Grants Officer for the Readings Foundation. She is also an award-winning author of young adult novels, most recently including the funny and heartfelt My Life as a Hashtag. Here, she shares some of her favourite recent reads and some advice on how customers can support the work of the Readings Foundation.
What is your…
Our 2018 Christmas Gift Guide: What to buy your significant other
Over the next few weeks, we’ll be compiling a host of gift guides to help you with your Christmas shopping.
If they love to entertain…
The Noma Guide to Fermentation shares secrets from the famed Denmark restaurant’s fermentation lab. David Zilber, who runs the lab, and Noma chef and owner René Redzepi have collated 100 recipes, all with the home chef in mind and featuring step-by-step instructions and lots of photographs.
For the chef who loves to experiment, Lateral Cooking…
Our children's & YA top 10 bestsellers of the week
The Ice Monster by David Walliams & Tony Ross
All the Ways to be Smart by Allison Colpoys & Davina Bell
Wundersmith: The Calling of Morrigan Crow (Nevermoor Book 2) by Jessica Townsend
The Meltdown (Diary of a Wimpy Kid Book 13) by Jeff Kinney
Lenny’s Book of Everything by Karen Foxlee
Tales from the Inner City by Shaun Tan
Night Walk by Alison Binks
Tricky’s Bad Day by Alison Lester
A Winter’s Promise (The Mirror Visitor…
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