It’s a classic for a reason – profoundly good, unexpectedly funny and unforgettable. If you were unfortunate enough not to encounter it in your early teens, read it now. But whatever you do, don’t read the appalling Go Set a Watchman afterwards. That book should never have been published. It makes me so mad I […]
Top Five Courtroom Dramas
Quick Sand by Malin Persson Giolito
A good rule of thumb is that if a publisher bothers to translate a Swedish crime novel into English, it’s usually a winner. That is certainly the case with Quick Sand. It’s so good it makes me salivate. There are six people in the classroom in the opening sequence: eighteen year old Maja Norberg is […]
Anatomy of a Scandal by Sarah Vaughan
Wow, this one is so good and so relevant. Holly returns home to Liverpool in 1993 after a term at Oxford, where she was raped. She tells only one friend about the rape, and feels a failure “for being unable to communicate something so crucial-the fact she did not want her body to be invaded […]
Apple Tree Yard by Louise Doughty
Geneticist Yvonne Carmichael is in her early fifties. She is good at what she does and competent and sensible in every part of her life. So much so that her affair with Mark Costley, who she presumes is a spy, takes her almost by surprise. She’s a little obsessive about this guy, although it is difficult to see why as he does […]
Midwives by Chris Bohjalian
Midwives is a rich and satisfying read- my second taste of Chris Bohjalian, after the excellent The Guest Room. Sibyl Danforth is a warm, sensible midwife assisting women at home births in Vermont in 1981. One homebirth goes horribly wrong and, unable to get the patient to hospital, Sibyl ends up performing what she believes is […]