Sometime in the fourteenth century (during the time of Julian the anchorite), Norwich was overcome by a great plague of beetles. The beetles, which are especially common in the flat, damp lands of East Anglia, are larger in this part of the world. An ordinary deathwatch beetle grows up to a half inch in length, but here East Anglian deathwatches have been known to reach near two inches. And these beetles threatened to devour the city, which was then mostly made of wood. All was nearly lost, it is said, and would have been entirely, were it not for a woman named Meg Utting. She had ever been st ..read more

With The Silent Killer, acclaimed author Trevor Wood introduces a new series of gripping Newcastle-set police procedurals. Seasoned detective DCI Jack Parker is battling early-onset Alzheimer’s as he races against time to solve a string of revenge killings – while seeking to conceal his diagnosis from both family and colleagues. THIS HIGH-STAKES CRIME NOVEL begins with a devastating car crash that lands Jack in hospital and claims the life of his trusted partner, Laura Kemp. In the aftermath, Jack receives the life-altering diagnosis that he carries the dementia gene. This revelation sets the ..read more

Lights, camera, action! The 68th BFI London Film Festival is set to dazzle audiences for twelve days in October. From Steve McQueen’s Blitz to French auteur-provocateur François Ozon’s latest, to animated marvel Flow, the festival promises a cinematic feast spanning genres, generations, original features and literary adaptations in a rich tapestry of storytelling, showcasing celebrated superstars and emerging talents across the world. Opening night Kicking off with a bang, the Opening Night Gala on Wednesday 9 October features the world premiere of Steve McQueen’s Blitz with an ensemble cast l ..read more

Writing has always been my thing. Back when I was a crime reporter in the US, picking my way across murder scenes and figuring out how to get blood out of my shoes, I was there because I wanted to write. And when I worked in communications for the British government, trying to persuade spies to talk to the public, I was there to write. Now as an author of espionage fiction, I write about a spy named Emma Makepeace, a globe-trotting British agent who works for an organisation so secret it doesn’t even have a name. This merges crime and politics, and allows me to pull all of my previous experien ..read more

A ‘frontier’ is a place where one society meets another. A place of risk and encounter, where one wilderness sees itself change into something ever wilder. The historic American West might be the archetype of this idea of a frontier; the most famous of belts between the known and unknown where opportunity, change, exploration and exploitation coexist beyond sightlines. And so, it might define others we know. My book The Muslim Cowboy, a Middle Eastern Western about an Iraqi man entranced by old Western movies, who dresses in double denim and roams a lawless landscape in search of his own Weste ..read more

What is The Centre? In this clever and fun novel by debut novelist Ayesha Manazir Siddiqi, the protagonist Anisa is bored in her career as a translator. But all that changes when she meets new boyfriend Adam, who introduces her to a place that can change her life and bring the success that she craves. It’s an isolated, invitation-only programme that promises fluency in any language in just ten days. But at what cost? The book explores themes ranging from race, identity and cultural appropriation to secrecy and unfettered ambition, and goes from the comic to the very dark. It’s very much a page ..read more

The colorful history of the Western passport does not account entirely for passportism against Third World countries. For the crucial piece of subtext missing in this history, we have to read between the lines. In the nineteenth century, the British had made it a common practice to move around indentured labor between their colonies. However, when its colonized people started using their status as Commonwealth subjects to move around of their own free will, the British government realized the dangers posed by this open-door policy. In her brilliant book Indian Migration and Empire: A Colonial ..read more

Set over the course of a sunny November day in suburban Delaware in the late 1950s, Jessica Anthony’s The Most dissects the hopes, uncertainties and secret desires of a married couple whose life hasn’t quite panned out as they’d hoped. Handsome people-pleaser Virgil Beckett drifted into a job as an insurance agent, but is ill-equipped to drive home expected sales, while his wife Kathleen, once a prospective champion tennis player, is reduced to an unfulfilling role as a home-maker and mum of two. On this particular Sunday, as news is breaking about the Russian launch of Sputnik 2 with doo ..read more

Ariel dragged himself out of bed and went to the kitchen. He wanted to sleep some more, but couldn’t. Books and newspapers were scattered everywhere in the living room. He had to tidy up. It took seven steps to get to the little kitchen. He opened the big silver refrigerator and stood there perplexed, as if he’d forgotten that he came to drink water. He took a bite out of a red apple that sat on one of the shelves. He had brushed his teeth before going to sleep, but the sour taste of wine from the night before lingered. Maybe the apple will change that. He should take a shower, he thought, as ..read more

Over the past five decades I have researched proverbs, art, myths and other verbal genres that magnify the differences between men and women. These sources – many of which are thousands of years old – shed light on our conversations around gender today. For the most part, our myths are mainly concerned with justifying, or establishing, a patriarchal, hierarchical order. However, other genres, such as proverbs, art and folklore, struggle to address the precarious gender balance of power in society. Comparing the cultural legacies of widely different people from around the globe, I discovered si ..read more