Our latest reviews
Snapper by Brian Kimberling
Snapper is the story of Nathan, philosophy graduate turned songbird researcher, and his life in southern Indiana. The book is structured like a series of personal essays. Nathan’s tales about the birds and people in his life are witty and…
The China Factory by Mary Costello
Much of the pleasure of some books is the opportunity to travel to another part of the world, and to feel and breathe with the locals. Mary Costello’s collection of stories, The China Factory, takes us on just such…
A Delicate Truth by John le Carré
For more than five decades, John le Carré has been the revered master of the British spy novel, and his latest work, A Delicate Truth, is no exception. While the edginess of earlier classics, such as Tinker Tailor Soldier…
Cry Blue Murder by Kim Kane & Marion Roberts
Being a big fan of Kim Kane’s book Pip: The Story of Olive and Marion Roberts’ Sunny Side Up, I was more than a little excited about this first collaborative venture for older readers. But nothing could have prepared…
Dark Horse by Honey Brown
Don’t be led astray by her sweet name – Honey Brown can write a mean psychological thriller. Last year, I adored her highly original After the Darkness, and this year Dark Horse has come along to keep you unnerved…
In the Memorial Room by Janet Frame
Given that the history of posthumous publishing has not always ended happily, one might be excused from feeling a sense of trepidation as they approach the latest release by New Zealand writer Janet Frame. Yet, according to a brief note…
The Last of the Vostyachs by Diego Marani
In 1942 Hitler paid the Finnish leader Marshal Mannerheim a surprise visit for his 75th birthday, leaving the national hero reticent and embarrassed. One wonders what Diego Marani’s fictional acolyte of Finnish patriotism in The Last of the Vostyachs…
Let’s Explore Diabetes With Owls by David Sedaris
For his ninth book, humorist David Sedaris has pooled together stories as diverse and obscure as the collection’s title: Let’s Explore Diabetes With Owls.
In his signature conversational style, Sedaris meanders quite literally all over the place – from…
Bone Ash Sky by Katerina Cosgrove
In the first few pages of Katerina Cosgrove’s Bone Ash Sky, Anoush Pakradounian, an Armenian-Turkish American journalist, arrives in Beirut to report on a tribunal. Her father, a member of the Christian Phalangist militia, is being tried in absentia…
Elemental by Amanda Curtin
In her final years, Meggie Tulloch writes her life story as a gift to her granddaughter. From her childhood in rural Scotland at the start of the twentieth century to her youth in fisheries gutting herring and her emigration to…
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