The bestselling thriller writer known as Freida McFadden has revealed her real identity, ending years of speculation about the author behind a string of hugely popular novels. McFadden, whose books include bestseller... Read more »
At the Café Royal in Regent Street in 1944 three intelligence officers bent over their plates while Europe held its breath. Outside, London braced for D-day. Inside, Graham Greene announced that he... Read more »
British novelist Gwendoline Riley is among eight writers set to receive $175,000 (£130,000) each in recognition of their life’s work. Australian playwright S Shakthidharan, known as Shakthi, is also among those selected... Read more »
Jan Morris had two stipulations before she would agree to sit for a painting for the National Portrait Gallery in London. Ibsen, her Norwegian forest cat, should feature. And so should one... Read more »
The dark hull of a shipwreck, beached and rotting on the sand, provides the powerful symbolism in award-winning poet and author Susannah Dickey’s third novel Into the Wreck. Five members of a... Read more »
In the opening pages of The Palm House, London is enveloped in a dust storm blown up from the Sahara. As old friends Laura and Putnam meet for a drink in a... Read more »
Every day I meet strangers who share intimate details with me. It’s called reading. In a newspaper piece a former sex addict recalls her need for BDSM (“when a sexual partner hurt... Read more »
My earliest reading memoryThe headteacher in my village primary school used to recount terrifying Cumbrian ghost tales to the class, which I’m sure was formative. I can also still hear my mum sing-songing rhymes; “Oranges... Read more »
Goyle, Chert, Mire by Jean Sprackland (Jonathan Cape, £13)The 45 unrhymed sonnets in Sprackland’s sixth collection coalesce into three spellbinding interwoven sequences. Set in the Blackdown Hills, a remote stretch between Somerset... Read more »