Fiction in translation: The strange workings of myth and history, a work of limpid beauty set in the Bosnian countryside, and more
New books from China, Spain, South Korea, Croatia, Italy and Peru
Books in brief: A history of plaster; Einstein for the general reader; influencers’ literary antecedents
Collected Poems by Gerard Fanning: Elliptical, at times cryptic works built on mood and atmosphere
Women’s Prize for Fiction winner on The Safekeep, being intersex and her childhood in Israel
Poem of the Week: Us
My Name is Emilia del Valle: A lighthearted and comical late-Victorian adventure
A Family Matter by Claire Lynch: Serviceable, highly readable but a bit preachy
Timothy O’Grady: ‘You feel miserable most of the time when you’re writing’
SHORT STORIES
Book Club
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POETRY
Claire Adam on childhood summers in Ireland: ‘My grandmother from Skibbereen lived to 108’
By Martin Doyle
Artists, Siblings, Visionaries: The lives and loves of Gwen and Augustus John by Judith Mackrell - pithy, incisive and fascinating
By Jessica Traynor
Perfect Storm by Thane Gustafson: A thorough study of the use and abuse of sanctions on Russia, and what could happen next
By Conor O’Clery
Europe without Borders: a detailed history of the Schengen system - Skilful account of a tense balancing of freedoms
By Paul Gillespie
Saraswati by Gurnaik Johal: A novel of immense range that deserves a very wide readership
By Naoise Dolan
Crime fiction: Megan Abbott, Elmore Leonard, Luke Beirne, Paul Vidich, Karin Slaughter and K Anis Ahmed
By Elizabeth Mannion and Brian Cliff
‘I wanted to do something radical’: Wendy Erskine on her debut novel, which deals with class, rape and parenting
By Martin Doyle
Albion by Anna Hope: Shades of Brideshead in this fine novel about inherited wealth and difficult family dynamics
By John Boyne
Daughters of the Bamboo Grove by Barbara Demick: Chilling insight into the birth of modern China
By Jessica Traynor
Heading to the Fleadh: Festival, cultural revival and Irish traditional music, 1951-1969 – Professing the power of ‘festival time’
By Siobhán Long
