Sunday, 31 August 2025

Why men read less than women — And how to change it

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It remains a sad truth universally acknowledged that women read more books than men. Twenty years ago, Ian McEwan remarked that ‘when women ...
Friday, 29 August 2025

When cosy meets cathartic: the revival of WWII family sagas

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There is something quietly astonishing about returning to a decades-old series and finding it not only still relevant, but newly resonant. T...
Wednesday, 27 August 2025

Beyond genre: experimental and alt-lit’s bold new directions

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Genres are meant to be helpful. They signpost where to look on the shelves in bookshops and libraries, offering a comforting sense of what t...
Monday, 25 August 2025

Eco-fiction and cli-fi: why climate-centred narratives are more crucial than ever

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Not long ago, a story about climate disaster might have been shelved neatly in the realm of science fiction. Now, it reads like realism with...
Thursday, 21 August 2025

The quiet power of slow books

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Some novels refuse to be hurried. They ask for patience, not because they’re difficult, but because they move differently. You don’t tear th...
Tuesday, 19 August 2025

Why we keep coming back to the same books over and over

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There are books I’ve read two or three times, and picked up more times. Not out of duty, but from a pull I can’t quite explain.  They’re not...
Saturday, 16 August 2025

Why the Literary western endures — and what’s driving Lonesome Dove’s TikTok resurgence

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There’s something quietly electric about  Lonesome Dove’s return in the BookTok universe: the dust-swept epics and tender, layered characte...
Thursday, 14 August 2025

Reading for Joy: How to escape a reading slump and embrace comfort in 2025

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It happens quietly. It has happened to me. The pile of unread books grows taller, the will to open one grows thinner, and suddenly reading—t...
Tuesday, 12 August 2025

How to write like Joan Didion

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What makes a Joan Didion sentence unmistakable? It’s not only the vocabulary or the rhythm. It’s the control. The precise needlepoint balanc...

Experimental & Alt-Lit movements — When internet culture writes fiction

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If you’ve ever found yourself falling down a rabbit hole of Tumblr confessions, TikTok poetry, or a Reddit thread that reads like a novella,...
Monday, 11 August 2025

Climate fiction and Neurodivergent narratives — The rise of conscious storytelling

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Something’s shifting in the novels. The stories feel sharper somehow, as if they know they’re not just here to entertain. They’re here to nu...
Thursday, 7 August 2025

Is fan fiction the new slush pile? What editors are really looking for

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There was a time when fan fiction lived in the shadows, tucked into forums, buried in tags, dismissed as derivative, and looked down upon. I...
Wednesday, 6 August 2025

Joan Didion’s packing list and the illusion of preparedness

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It’s the holiday season. You’re packing for your trip. There is no better time to revisit this: two skirts. Two jerseys. A bottle of bourbon...
Sunday, 3 August 2025

How long before AI writes a Bestseller? A Literary Thought Experiment

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How long before AI writes a New York Times bestseller? It’s a question that lingers like a subplot, unresolved, faintly unsettling, impossib...

Emily Henry and the craft of commercial fiction

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It’s not just that Emily Henry writes bestsellers. It’s that she writes the kind of commercial fiction people want to reread, smart, emotion...
Saturday, 2 August 2025

Four debuts that disturb and dazzle: New voices to read now

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There is nothing better when it comes to books than discovering a favourite new writer, and this summer has seen the arrival of several stri...
Friday, 1 August 2025

Hidden Pages: Graham Greene and the joy of literary discoveries

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I love a literary discovery like the newly found short story by Graham Greene, Reading at Night. It adds an intriguing footnote to a major l...

Dua Lipa and Helen Garner: When pop culture meets literary depth

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Dua Lipa’s book club selection of This House of Grief brought Helen Garner’s work into the mainstream spotlight and sparked an unexpected li...
Wednesday, 30 July 2025

Publishers and platforms: How Substack, AI & email newsletters are redefining fiction in 2025

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In 2025, a quiet transformation is reshaping literary publishing. Authors are increasingly bypassing traditional deals to connect directly w...

The Booker Prize 2025: Subtle power and global resonance

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This year's Booker Prize longlist pulses with quiet intensity. From the return of Kiran Desai after a 19-year silence to Maria Reva'...