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Books of Note

Conversations On Kindness by Bernadette Russell

I had no idea what I was letting myself in for. I’m not sure if I’d known what was coming, I would have started it so impulsively. We live in a world where the leader of a major political party (I had to check this was actually true, as I’ve been ill and was concerned I’d had a fever dream where I’d imagined she was a senior politician) describes diversity initiatives as a “poison” , and the presumptive leader of the “free world” (apologies for the liberal use of parentheses, but I’m struggling to overcome deep skepticism about the cultural and political structures which we tend to take for granted and feel powerless to alter for the benefit of us all – i.e. those whose labour is exploited by capital [ more on this later ]) can call the teaching staff at Harvard “woke” and blame the first tragic air disaster in more than 20 years on disabled staff at air traffic control . These are facts, I checked! It’s worth interjecting at this point with a quick definition of woke, as expresse...

The Name Of The Rose by Umberto Eco

Dancing In The Dark: My Struggle Volume 4 by Karl Ove Knausgaard

Universal Harvester by John Darnielle

The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton

The Black Prince by Adam Roberts (adapted from an original script by Anthony Burgess)

Mother Tongue by Bill Bryson

To Say Nothing Of The Dog by Connie Willis

Tree Of Smoke by Denis Johnson

Ray Of The Star by Laird Hunt

The Wild Places by Robert MacFarlane

High-Rise by J.G. Ballard

Borne by Jeff VanderMeer

The City of Mirrors by Justin Cronin

The Elephant by Sławomir Mrożek

Augustus Carp, Esq., By Himself: Being the Autobiography of a Really Good Man, by Henry Howarth Bashford

Veins by Drew