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When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead

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When You Reach Me

11-13 years

Welcome re-release of ingenious prize-winning time travel mystery

‘Our apartment door was unlocked when I got home from school that Friday, which was strange.’ Nothing appears to have been stolen from 12-year-old Miranda’s home but she subsequently discovers a cryptic note, informing her that someone she loves is in mortal danger. In order to avoid catastrophe, Miranda must turn detective cum scientist and challenge her own received notions of the nature of time. A 2010 Newbery medal winner, When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead is an inventive time travel mystery set in 1970’s New York, ideal for canny young sleuths in search of an invigorating read.

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A Dance to the Music of Time by Anthony Powell

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A Dance to the Music of Time

An extraordinary literary marathon

A Dance to the Music of Time by Anthony Powell is a 12-volume sequence of novels that has been lauded as one of the greatest works of 20th century English literature. The books start in the late 1920s and take us up to the 1960s, feature a huge cast of characters and offer a remarkable vision of changing social history, a deftly sustained narrative, some wonderfully memorable characters and a stark vision of the impact that time wreaks on our lives.

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10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World by Elif Shafak

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10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World

A beautiful and campaigning novel short-listed for the Booker Prize 2019

Tequila Leila, a Turkish prostitute in her 40s, lies murdered in a rubbish bin. Her brain, for the first ten minutes and thirty-eight seconds after her death is still working – remembering, sensing, calling up memories and sensations from her life. 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World by Elif Shafak tells not just the story of one woman’s life through these disjointed recollections but conjures a beautiful but unsettling portrait of Istanbul and its shifting population.

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The Witches of St. Petersburg by Imogen Edward-Jones

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The Witches of St. Petersburg

Intriguing tale of black magic, forgotten Russian princesses and Rasputin

Russia is divided and trouble is brewing. Revolution is bubbling angrily beneath the surface. The poor are starving and desperate, yet in the Imperial court of Tsar Nicolas II the aristocracy live a life of senseless decadence and wanton excess. Two mysterious sisters burst into the Romanov Court. Princesses Anastasia and Militza arrive from the tiny impoverished backwater of Montenegro and, thanks to their socially aspirational father the ‘Goat King’, are married off to wealthy Russian aristocrats. The Witches of St. Petersburg by Imogen Edwards-Jones is ideal beach reading: gripping, entertaining and gossipy.

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Our Souls At Night

A tender, contemplative novel about a late life relationship

This is the first book I have read by Kent Haruf, and it won’t be the last. It’s one of those tender, contemplative books in which nothing much happens but through which you feel your life has been immeasurably enhanced.

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The Children's Bach by Helen Garner

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The Children’s Bach

Domesticity and desire in suburban Melbourne

The splendid W&N Essentials series is a carefully curated collection of books considered to have stood the test of time, and been adored by their first readers. The Children’s Bach by Helen Garner is one of its brightest stars, a spare and fearless novel, highly acclaimed in the author’s native Australia in 1984, but curiously, only now feeling the love in the U.K. Set in suburban Melbourne in the early 1980’s, it’s the story of Dexter and Athena Fox and some blast-from-the past visitors, whose presence causes the Fox’s cosy domesticity to unravel into fantasy, escapism, and moral dilemma.

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Dead-End Memories by Banana Yoshimoto

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Dead-End Stories

Short stories to gladden the heart

An offbeat and lovely addition to the world of short story collections, Dead-End Stories by Banana Yoshimoto is, in essence, a tribute to hope, light, and resilience. The women in each of her five stories experience episodes of emotional pain or trauma, from the extremes of abuse and murder, to the heartbreak inflicted by an inconstant lover. In Yoshimoto’s tender hands, ultimately these events will not be allowed to warp and embitter, as each character is set on a path towards acknowledgement of life’s random cruelties and a final blessing of solace and clarity.

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Long Island Compromise by Taffy Brodesser-Akner

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Long Island Compromise

Screamingly funny satire on wealth and privilege

When Carl Fletcher, styrofoam factory owner and one of Long Island’s richer residents, is kidnapped from his driveway one morning, life changes forever for the Fletcher family. Carl is returned unhurt, at least physically, in exchange for a large pile of cash placed on a baggage carousel at La Guardia airport, but the kidnapping still reverberates decades later. His three children have turned out deeply dysfunctional, each in their own way. Long Island Compromise by Taffy Brodesser-Akner is an extremely funny satire and deep dive into privilege, Jewish identity and a spot-on comment on how we live now.

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Top Ten Summer Classics

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Top Ten Summer Classics

Is there anything better than a summery read to get you into a sunny mood? Or a summery novel to read on your holiday?  To get you into the spirit, we have chosen our top ten summer classics.

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Doppler by Erlend Loe

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Doppler

A tent, an elk, and an existential crisis

Doppler is sick of his nice life with his nice wife and nice children. Sick of toeing the line and being a passive consumer in Oslo society, chasing money in a city bloated with oil wealth. Also, his father is dead and it hurts. A bump on the head from a cycling accident prompts an epiphany, and in a clever, satirical skewering of modern life, Doppler by Erlend Loe chronicles Doppler’s desertion of his family, in exchange for a tent in the Norwegian forest, where he will take up contemplation of modern existence in the devoted company of a very small elk.

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