From The Girl on the Train to Gone Girl, badass women rule in today’s blockbusters. Author Kate Mosse picks her favourite justified sinnersThis year has been, in fiction at least, the year of the wild woman. Novels driven by vengeful, unreliable female narrators and psychopathically flawed protagonists have topped the bestseller charts – Paula Hawkins’ The Girl on the Train, Renée Knight’s Disclaimer, Lisbeth Salander in The Girl in the Spider’s Web, following in the footsteps of Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl. Complicated, flawed, delusional, violent, transgressive and out of control, these are women seeking retribution and taking matters into their own hands. Mad, bad or misunderstood, they are satisfying to read about and satisfying to write. So where do such characters come from? One of the most commonly asked questions at any literary event is how a character comes to life. Is character the keystone, the first component of a novel? Or is it an idea that first whets the author’s appetite? A period or an object? Or imagination, pure and simple? We give different answers, of course, because we each have our own technique. Besides, the various inspirations for a new book often happen near-as-dammit simultaneously and unconsciously, with lots of conflicting ideas rushing forward at the same time. Continue reading... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2015-10-20 00:00:00 UTC ]
Lack of copyright has filled a nation of very keen readers with multiple versions of foreign books – doing artistic as well as financial damage to writersIf JD Salinger could see what was on the shelves in Iranian bookshops, he would turn in his grave. The Inverted Forest, a 1947 novella that he... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2017-06-23 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Paula Hawkins’s ‘Into the Water’ remained on top of the iBooks bestseller list last week, with Nora Roberts’s latest, ‘Come Sundown,’ at #2. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2017-06-08 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Readers keep Paula Hawkins's 'Into the Water' swimming along at the top of the iBooks bestseller list, while Margaret Atwood's 'The Handmaid's Tale' drops to #5. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2017-05-31 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Even bestsellers like J K Rowling and Paula Hawkins can’t escape the shadow of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle from beyond the grave. Kiera O’Brien reports. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2017-05-31 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Margaret Atwood’s 1985 novel rockets to number one on Amazon after Channel 4 begins airing series starring Elisabeth MossThe Handmaid’s Tale, the 1985 novel by Margaret Atwood envisaging a hellish dystopia where the US is ruled by an ultra-far-right regime that treats women as chattels, has... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2017-05-29 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Paula Hawkins is treading water in the Weekly E-Ranking top 20, with Into the Water holding the top spot for the second week running. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2017-05-27 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Paula Hawkins’ Into the Water (Doubleday) has held the UK Official Top 50 number one spot for a second week running, according to Nielsen BookScan’s Total Consumer Market. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2017-05-17 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Readers dove head-first back into Paula Hawkins's world, with 'Into the Water' heading the latest iBooks bestseller list. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2017-05-11 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Donald Trump loves Reasons to Vote Democrat, a volume of white space that follows a number of liberal spoofs with the same content. I prefer less vacant jokesIt’s a product worthy of Reggie Perrin’s Grot shop – the store opened to sell tat in David Nobbs’s magnificent satire of modern life: a... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2017-04-18 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Less than 24 hours after the announcement that Philip Pullman is to release a new epic fantasy series entitled The Book of Dust, the first volume has shot to number one in Amazon's bestseller charts. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2017-02-16 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Paula Hawkins' novel The Girl on the Train was borrowed from libraries 200 times a day in 2015/16. Continue reading at BBC News
[ BBC News | 2017-02-03 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The LibScan top 20 may be the only year-end chart not to be conquered by Paula Hawkins, with male-authored crime fiction dominating the list. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2017-01-30 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The top three ebooks in the seven days to 7th January held firm from the list covering the previous week, with Paula Hawkins’ The Girl on the Train steaming into its 16th week at the top; Lee Child’s Night School chalking up a fifth week in the runner-up position; and Jeffrey Archer’s This was a... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2017-01-24 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Books by Paula Hawkins, Bill O'Reilly, and J.K. Rowling topped the 2016 bestseller charts for adult fiction and nonfiction, and for children's books. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2017-01-20 00:00:00 UTC ]
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After a four-week break, Paula Hawkins' The Girl on the Train (Transworld) has steamed back into the Weekly E-Ranking top spot, for a 13th non-consecutive week. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2016-12-16 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Lee Child completes a hat-trick of number ones across formats in this week’s charts pages, although Paula Hawkins may yet overtake him before 2016 is out. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2016-12-12 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Paula Hawkins has penned a “dark and moving” second psychological suspense novel for Doubleday called Into The Water, set for release next May. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2016-11-30 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Riverhead Books has acquired U.S. rights to 'Into the Water,' the next novel from Paula Hawkins, whose 'The Girl on the Train' has sold more than 6 million copies in the U.S. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2016-11-29 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Titles from Kate Atkinson, Paula Hawkins and Kazuo Ishiguro are among the 23 British novels longlisted for the €100,000 (£85,407.66) International Dublin Literary award 2017. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2016-11-23 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The author of Silicon Valley satire I Hate the Internet on the evils of social media, and how novelists have failed to tackle itWhen the novel I Hate the Internet came out in the US earlier this year, it had every likelihood of sinking without trace. It was self-published, it was by a young... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2016-11-20 00:00:00 UTC ]
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