Could you defend someone you knew was guilty? Perhaps it would depend what they were guilty of, or what mitigating circumstances there were, or on your own experiences of England’s legal system. Perhaps it would depend on more pragmatic considerations. Could you defend them in return for money, status and the prospect of job security? […]
Unreliable narrators fascinate me and other people’s psychological states intrigue me. So it’s not surprising that when I spotted ‘Confessions of a Sociopath’ it went straight onto my wish list. What’s it about? M.E. Thomas is (apparently) a successful American law professor writing about her sociopathy under a pseudonym. Originally, she founded a blog – […]
Secrets. Everyone has at least one. But would yours destroy your marriage? In an instance of pure serendipity, this month’s book group choice was one I had recently placed on my wish list, so I was glad to get the opportunity to try-before-you-buy. What’s it about? Cecilia finds a letter that isn’t meant to be […]
Comedies are tricky things. Jokes or conceits that I find simply dull, you may find hilarious – or offensive. I remember loathing ‘A short history of tractors in Ukrainan’ despite it being universally feted as a ‘jolly romp’ and I found that ‘Then we came to the End’ – supposedly a satire of modern office-life […]
Miserable winter weather always leads me to crank up the heating, feel guilty about it and read a book about sustainable living. Recently I re-read ‘Enough’, which could be described as a critique of our cluttered lifestyles from an evolutionary psychologist perspective. What’s it about? John Naish, lifestyle writer for The Times, argues that over human […]
It would be easy to dismiss this book as largely fearmongering, given the attention-seeking title. However, it’s much better than that. What’s it about? A few years ago, Sue Palmer, literacy expert, stepped aside from her day-to-day professional activities and began to examine a range of cultural factors that were having a growing impact on […]
Recently, I read ‘The Family’, a story which the blurb claims will ‘hook you in from the very first page, and keep you there til the very last’. Unfortunately, I found the opposite to be true: during the month I had this book, I found myself reading almost anything else, and it was a real […]
My teetering TBR pile and haphazard reading choices mean I always seem to reach the ‘must-read-book-of-the-year’ just after everyone else has finished reading and talking about it. Gillian Flynn’s third novel, ‘Gone Girl’, is a case in point: hyped as THE thriller of 2013, I found myself reading it as we slipped into 2014. So […]
I was pleased to receive this during my pregnancy as, at a mere 144 pages, it made the whole idea of having a child seem a lot more manageable. I’ve seen longer instruction manuals for putting furniture together. What’s it about? The basics of babycare. Jay starts from a position of absolute ignorance, similar to […]
It seems it may no longer be possible to be “well-read”, although much depends on how you define the term. Once, a reader who had read Shakespeare, Milton and works by a few of their contemporaries could claim to be well-read. Now, there are so many new books published each month that it sometimes feels […]