The author of Original Sins, an account of addiction and shame, on his book’s impact on his evangelical parents, reading the Patrick Melrose series while waiting for drug dealers, and how looking middle class saved him from arrestMatt Rowland Hill, 38, is the author of Original Sins, about growing up as the son of a baptist minister before falling into a decade-long addiction to heroin while studying at Oxford. Out in paperback, it was longlisted for last year’s Baillie Gifford prize for nonfiction while being praised by Geoff Dyer for its “novelistic virtues of vivid scene-making, fully realised characterisation and psychological subtlety”. Hill and I sat in a park near his home in east London.I might have read this as a novel had it not been subtitled “a memoir”.The subtitle wasn’t my choice: I was open to it being published as fiction if my publisher had wanted that. I approached it like a novel, thinking about point of view and how I’d produce moments of irony and humour, which maybe liberated me to write with an emotional distance that paradoxically allowed me to be more honest. Nothing is fabricated. I did go to psychiatric units. I was a heroin addict for all that time. I used my imagination to make vivid the bits of dialogue or details about what we were wearing, although it’s surprising how detailed your recollections are once you dig in; what my father told my mother on that car ride to Guernsey – “If you died tonight, I’d dance on your grave” – was scored into... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2023-04-29 17:00:41 UTC ]
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Comedian Rosie Jones has added another string to her bow by authoring a children’s book series—the sort of titles she says she needed as a child Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-09-24 00:06:18 UTC ]
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Meghan, Duchess of Sussex has written a children's book for Penguin Random House called The Bench, about the “special bond between father and son as seen through a mother’s eyes”. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-05-04 02:52:11 UTC ]
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Independent publisher Joffe Books is partnering with author Dorothy Koomson and literary agent Susan Yearwood to launch a writing prize for unagented crime writers of colour. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-04-30 23:20:48 UTC ]
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Ex-vice-president is first of Trump circle to snag lucrative dealSimon & Schuster to pay $3-4m for two booksMike Pence has signed a two-book deal for his memoir that is reported to be worth millions of dollars, making him one of the first of former president Donald Trump’s inner circle to... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2021-04-07 22:02:58 UTC ]
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Unless you’re a disgraced politician, trying to get a book published can be difficult, nerve-wracking, soul-denting work. If you’re anything like me, though, it really helps to hear that rejection is the rule in the publishing industry, rather than the exception. When my novel was out on... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2021-03-10 17:04:17 UTC ]
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Chatto & Windus has signed a new two-book deal with The Language of Kindness author Christie Watson, including a joint project with her 16-year-old daughter Bella Egberongbe. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-02-22 16:24:18 UTC ]
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Michael Lewis has written a “stunning” book on a group of people who predicted the coronavirus pandemic, to be rushed out by Allen Lane. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-01-28 20:37:13 UTC ]
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Vaseem Khan was reading about the history of Mumbai as part of research for his successful Baby Ganesh Agency series—which stars the newly retired Inspector Chopra and the elephant he inherits on his last day of work—when he came across a fact that made him sit up. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-01-28 16:04:12 UTC ]
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This year's Branford Boase Award, the lengthiest longlist in the award's history, sees last year's winning editor Sarah Odedina in the running again, with her author Kereen Getten. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-01-27 17:51:51 UTC ]
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As a trans person, I spent most of my life with my head in a book imagining other lives, other bodies, and other histories. In some ways, my memoir is an amalgamation of all the books that kept me curious, kept me thinking it was worth it to keep going. Sometimes it was to dream […] Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2021-01-26 09:48:49 UTC ]
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Brayden Harrington, 13, who spoke at the Democratic National Convention, will write a picture book, “Brayden Speaks Up,” HarperCollins announced. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2021-01-21 11:55:52 UTC ]
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Grigory Rodchenkov has won this year's William Hill Sports Book of the Year award for his memoir The Rodchenkov Affair: How I Brought Down Putin’s Secret Doping Empire (W H Allen). Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-12-03 21:02:42 UTC ]
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Indies Pitch Publishing and Floodlit Dreams are among the publishers featuring on this year's five-strong William Hill Sports Book of the Year shortlist. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-10-27 03:30:12 UTC ]
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An interview with a book critic who's read more than 150 titles about the Trump era. Continue reading at Slate
[ Slate | 2020-10-22 22:15:00 UTC ]
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London bookshop Heywood Hill has launched a competition to provide one book-lover with a free book every month for life. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-10-19 13:58:51 UTC ]
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Richard Osman, whose first novel The Thursday Murder Club this week becomes the fastest selling adult crime debut since records began, has signed a deal with Viking for two more books in the series. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-09-07 19:31:57 UTC ]
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This is definitely a clickbait title because I don’t really know the answer. In contemplating Nadim Shamma-Sourgen’s recently announced book deal with Walker Books (who will publish a collection of his “astonishing” poetry next summer) I have spent the last 15 minutes of my life cycling through... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2020-07-22 15:38:53 UTC ]
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Princeton Architectural Press will publish Sean and Karin Hepburn Ferrer's Little Audrey's Daydream, about actress Audrey Hepburn. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-07-07 02:24:58 UTC ]
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Ann Cleeves has written a short story based on indie store Forum Books in Northumberland, which even features manager Helen Stanton as a character. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-06-22 05:26:33 UTC ]
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When libraries around the US began closing their doors due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Internet Archive (IA) responded by creating a “National Emergency Library,” a collection of 1.4 million books from its free e-book repository Open Library. Pu... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2020-06-01 19:33:58 UTC ]
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