Quick look: The many lives of Anne Frank

July 09, 2025 in Bookshelf, Quick looks, Reviews

The structure of this book is very interesting.

Quick look: Hard Rain Falling, by Don Carpenter

July 08, 2025 in Bookshelf, Quick looks, Reviews

The style is plain and simple, and all the more powerful for that.

Quick looks: The Great Exchange: Making the news in early modern Europe

June 23, 2025 in Bookshelf, Quick looks, Reviews

The real history of news is not about a chronology of technological inventions.

Quick look: The Penguin Book of Polish Short Stories

June 18, 2025 in Bookshelf, Quick looks

The stand-out aspect of this collection for me is the way it has been organised into categories, a brave choice I think.

Quick look: The Penguin Book of Bengali Short Stories

June 18, 2025 in Quick looks, Bookshelf

These stories really provide a short glimpse into a culture of which I am almost completely ignorant.

Upcoming book reviews June 2025

June 02, 2025 in Quick looks, Reviews

This is just a very quick heads-up. I’m just about to send off four reviews to Teach Secondary magazine. I will post the reviews here once they’ve been published there (that’s the deal), but here are one-liners to whet your appetite.

Quick looks: The Oxford Book of Caribbean Stories

February 11, 2025 in Bookshelf, Quick looks, Reviews

One of the things I think can add to one’s enjoyment and also improve one’s writing is to read stories from other cultures.

Books added to the TBR heap

August 22, 2024 in Quick looks

This article is an excerpt from a longer one that appeared on my Eclecticism newsletter.

Books I'm reading or about to read

August 12, 2024 in Quick looks, Reviews, Bookshelf

I’ve been sent the following books by publishers, and will review them in due course. Here is some information about them.

Books received

April 03, 2024 in Quick looks

Here are a few of the books I’ve been sent for review recently, covering AI, maps, time travel and language.

Quick looks: Jane Austen; Write, Cut, Rewrite; Handwritten; The Book At War; From Edtech to Pedtech

March 20, 2024 in Bookshelf, Quick looks

Since I read Northanger Abbey when I was in my twenties, I have to say that in the interim it has much improved. Clearly, Jane must have taken a creative writing course or two because it is now much funnier, more cutting and more modern, what with her stepping outside the story to comment on her characters and the novel form itself.

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Quick looks: Triggered Literature PLUS an extract from my new version of Macbeth

February 22, 2024 in Bookshelf, Quick looks, Reviews

A very timely publication. The first section is replete with anecdotes about trigger warnings and similar. Some of these are, in my opinion, ill-informed (such as the charges levelled against Jane Austen) while others are ridiculous (like the rewriting of parts of the Noddy books).

Christmas reading

December 20, 2023 in Bookshelf, Quick looks

Here are a couple of suggestions for your reading pleasure. They are not Christmas books, but big hefty tomes that need a bit of time to wade into.

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Quick look: The Artist's Journey

December 20, 2023 in Bookshelf, Quick looks

Back in April 2023 I reviewed The Writer’s Journey, and this is a companion volume by the same author.

Quick looks: Once Upon A Prime

September 20, 2023 in Quick looks, Reviews

I recently received this book, and I’m enjoying it very much. It looks at the (usually hidden) existence of maths in literary works.

Quick looks: Solutions for Writers

September 15, 2023 in Quick looks, Reviews

This is packed with useful information. I’m especially looking forward to reading the the sections called How to Show Instead of Tell, and Using the Techniques of Fiction to Enhance Nonfiction.

Quick looks: The Notebook

September 13, 2023 in Quick looks, Reviews

This comes out on 2nd November. It has a very readable style, and interestingly the footnotes are in a different font from, and bigger than, the main text.

Quick look: Retroland, by Peter Kemp

September 05, 2023 in Bookshelf, Quick looks, Reviews

This book arrived recently, and I’m very much enjoying reading it. It’s a kind of guided tour or survey of the types of fiction that have appeared in the last fifty years (mainly).