Winter's Bone posted on 02 Jul 2017

My God. If you think that Cormac McCarthy is a brutally hard read and his world is a vision of bleak nihilism, try Daniel Woodrell's 'Winter's Bone'.

The Last Picture Show posted on 01 Jul 2017

Guest reviewer, Alun Severn comes belatedly to a novel of 'underlying sophistication' that has plenty to say about the human condition.

The Friends of the National Libraries posted on 29 Jun 2017

Guest contributor, Linda Hart, asks if you ever wondered why so much of our literary heritage has ended up abroad and what we can do about it.

Toast: the story of a boy’s hunger posted on 28 Jun 2017

It’s unlikely that you’ll find many references on this website to the literary output of celebrity chefs........

Bradford Literature Festival 2017 posted on 26 Jun 2017

Bradford Literature Festival

A Boy At The Hogarth Press posted on 25 Jun 2017

In 1928 public schoolboy, Richard Kennedy left Marlborough school at the age of 16 with no qualifications...

London Radical Bookfair 2017 posted on 23 Jun 2017

The joys of sharing books with older readers posted on 22 Jun 2017

As an ex teacher I always enjoy doing one of our ' Wild Things and Gold Rings' events with children in playgroups, nurseries and schools.

Colette at the table: M F K Fisher posted on 21 Jun 2017

Guest writer, Alun Severn reviews the career of a writer he thinks is a 'strange, unrepeatable cross between Colette and Hemingway'.

The Uses of Literacy posted on 20 Jun 2017

A recent article in The New Statesman reminded me that it was time to revisit some of Richard Hoggart’s 1957 classic