What We're Reading – October 2019

Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine EvaristoSince studying Lara as a student, I have been a fan of Bernardine Evaristo’s work, and am delighted to see her win the Booker Prize this year. Girl, Woman, Other follows the lives of twelve black characters with different backgrounds and experiences, most of whom identify as female, living in London. I’ve enjoyed getting to know them through my reading and seeing how their lives are linked or overlap in different ways. What I found particularly interesting about this book is how each character responds in their own way to the universal questions of self and identity, particularly the tensions between personal, public and political gender discourse and the effect it has on the relationships the characters have with others. This feels like a very important book, and a must-read if you’re interested in what’s happening in UK fiction today.Rachel Stevens, Director LiteratureCommon People - An Anthology of Working-class Writers (ed Kit de Waal). An exceptional collection of essays, poems, memoir and short stories celebrating working-class life, culture and literature. There are many highlights, but I especially recommend Lisa McInnery’s essay ‘Working Class: An Escape Manual’, which considers how working-class writers and artists are co-opted into other identities when they achieve success. Debut author Adam Sharp’s ‘Play’, a memoir of his relationship with a substance-addicted father, is poignant and deftly handled - he’s a writer to... Continue reading at 'British Council global'

[ British Council global | 2019-10-30 09:49:28 UTC ]

Other news stories related to: "What We're Reading – October 2019"


Macmillan scoops Snowden memoir in global deal

Pan Macmillan has scooped NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden’s "incredible" memoir as part of a global deal by Macmillan Publishers. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2019-08-01 17:23:10 UTC ]
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Edward Snowden’s Memoir Is Coming in September

The National Security Agency whistle-blower has written a book exploring his role in mass surveillance and the “crisis of conscience” that led to his actions. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2019-08-01 17:09:52 UTC ]
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Edward Snowden’s memoir will be published in September.

Metropolitan Books, an imprint of Macmillan, will release a memoir by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden titled Permanent Record in September, the publisher announced Thursday. The project has been cloaked in secrecy for the last year; the Associated Press reported Thursday that the book was... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2019-08-01 16:03:07 UTC ]
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Edward Snowden memoir to reveal whistleblower’s secrets

In Permanent Record, the former spy will recount how his mass surveillance work eventually led him to make the biggest leak in historyAfter multiple books and films about his decision to leak the biggest cache of top-secret documents in history, whistleblower Edward Snowden is set to tell his... Continue reading at The Guardian

[ The Guardian | 2019-08-01 13:09:01 UTC ]
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Macmillan Announces Acquisition and Pub Date of Snowden Memoir

'Permanent Record,' a memoir by former CIA agent Edward Snowden, will be published globally by Macmillan on September 17. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2019-08-01 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Pan Mac snaps up British Superbike star Shane 'Shakey' Byrne's memoir in three-publisher auction

Pan Macmillan has snapped up the autobiography of Shane "Shakey" Byrne, the most successful British Superbike Championship rider in history, in a three-publisher auction. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2019-08-01 00:46:31 UTC ]
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50 Years of Literary Activism: The WLT Readers’ Poll, by The Editors of WLT

Lit Lists The Editors of WLT Earlier this summer, the editors of WLT invited more than two dozen writers to nominate one book, published since 1969, that most influenced their extraliterary commitments, along with a brief statement explaining their... Continue reading at World Literature Today

[ World Literature Today | 2019-07-31 20:17:00 UTC ]
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There’s a newly translated John Steinbeck story about a chef and his cat.

Long before funny cat content flooded every single corner of the internet, John Steinbeck, legendary dog person, was writing it for Le Figaro, proving once again that France gets all the good stuff before we do. Steinbeck wrote “The Amiable Fleas,” or “Les puces sympathiques,” in 1954 for Le... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2019-07-31 15:44:48 UTC ]
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Review: Susan Straight's new memoir amplifies stories of strong women who survive and thrive

Susan Straight's new memoir, "In the Country of Women," depicts the tough, trauma-burdened women who have populated her life. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times

[ Los Angeles Times | 2019-07-30 19:40:36 UTC ]
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4th Estate snaps up Bernie Marsden's memoir

HarperCollins imprint 4th Estate will publish Whitesnake musician Bernie Marsden's memoir in November 2019.  Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2019-07-30 07:38:39 UTC ]
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Sheen returns to narrate new Philip Pullman audiobook

Michael Sheen, who narrated the first volume of Philip Pullman’s The Book of Dust series, will return to the studio to narrate volume two, The Secret Commonwealth. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2019-07-29 23:25:29 UTC ]
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Queues outside Edinburgh indie as The Portobello Bookshop opens doors

Edinburgh's latest indie The Portobello Bookshop has opened its doors to the public, with customers queuing to get in on its first day of trading.  Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2019-07-29 21:32:06 UTC ]
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Is this the oldest debut author in history?

Sarah Yerkes didn’t begin writing until she was in her 90s, but last month, at the age of 101, she released her first collection of poems, Days of Blue and Flame. A graduate of Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design and a 74-year resident of Washington D.C., Yerkes had decades-long... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2019-07-29 16:21:29 UTC ]
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Women Rewriting the Rules of Reporting in the Arab World

In “Our Women on the Ground,” an anthology edited by the Lebanese-British journalist Zahra Hankir, 19 female journalists recount their experiences. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2019-07-29 15:37:53 UTC ]
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Scarlett Curtis to curate mental health anthology

Scarlett Curtis, the writer and activist behind Feminists Don't Wear Pink (and other lies), is curating a second anthology for Penguin about mental health. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2019-07-29 13:46:30 UTC ]
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Side by Side: On Bettijane Sills’s “Broadway, Balanchine, & Beyond: A Memoir” and Marianne Preger-Simon’s “Dancing with Merce Cunningham”

TWO RECENT TITLES from the University Press of Florida make for a remarkably successful pairing: one focuses on the “golden years” of George Balanchine’s New York City Ballet through the memoir lens of former soloist Bettijane Sills, while the other offers, through a series of impressionistic... Continue reading at Los Angeles Review of Books

[ Los Angeles Review of Books | 2019-07-28 17:00:03 UTC ]
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Movies Aren’t Telling Love Stories Anymore. So The New York Times Brought Them to Amazon

The romance genre has all but disappeared from films, so now several cable and streaming outlets have claimed it for themselves. The latest to jump on board is Amazon Prime Video. The streaming service will soon air Modern Love, a new anthology series debuting Oct. 18 that features eight... Continue reading at AdWeek

[ AdWeek | 2019-07-28 00:59:10 UTC ]
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The Best Short Stories about Christmas Everyone Should Read

The best Christmas stories This is a somewhat unseasonal post for us, appearing in July as it is. But we’ve recently turned our thoughts towards Christmas literature for a whole host of reasons, so thought we’d offer ten of the greatest short stories about Christmas. These are stories set around […] Continue reading at Interesting Literature

[ Interesting Literature | 2019-07-27 14:00:59 UTC ]
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Why the ‘Orange Is the New Black’ Author Went Back to Prison

Piper Kerman, whose experiences and memoir inspired the Netflix prison dramedy, now works with inmates in correctional facilities. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2019-07-26 10:00:07 UTC ]
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Why the ‘Orange Is the New Black’ Author Went Back to Prison

Piper Kerman, whose experiences and memoir inspired the Netflix prison dramedy, now works with inmates in correctional facilities. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2019-07-26 10:00:06 UTC ]
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