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Andrew O’Hagan's Picks

I am truly captivated by Namanlagh, this debut poetry collection after ten years from the renowned Tom Paulin. A tone-perfect reflection on sickness and healing, companionship & authorship, conflict & forgotten pasts, this work is an absolute cracker. One finds subtle nods toward Derek Mahon and Seamus Heaney, while numerous verses are filled with the feeling of late style and lingering matters.

Autobiographies by politicians are usually terrible, frequently screeds of self-justification & retaliation, however Nicola Sturgeon’s Frankly redefines the rules. She is a proper writer, for a start, who skillfully consort with self-doubt, ambivalence, remorse, affection and compassion, adaptability, and numerous of the things which truly define humanity. I eagerly anticipate what she writes next.

I discovered a new writer – new to me, though cherished by Norwegians for years. He is the deceased Dag Solstad , I devoured his book Shyness and Dignity over two sessions. It tells the tale of a literature teacher with a quarter-century career that suddenly breaks down as he attempts to handle a malfunctioning parasol. He is having a breakdown and the novel traces it with insightful, unfussy manner, producing a work of beauty.

I want to provide additional homemade treats to my friends. Soon, I’m going to host a brunch gathering from my dining table covered with homemade croissants, tattie scones, sourdough bread & mad cakes. I’m hoping to receive guidance in this quest by Helen Goh’s Baking and the Meaning of Life.

Penny's Choice

Climate Capitalism: Winning the Global Race to Zero Emissions from Akshat Rathi came out last year. Every section details an achievement in the capitalist transition away from the fossil fuel economy to renewable energy & climate solutions, highlighting people who have made a huge difference. There is abundant detail and information I was unaware of before, despite my thorough research around the subject.

Although some issues spark debate, such as carbon capture and storage – plus Bill Gates has proved to be not quite the climate solutions man than is claimed within the text, with his fossil fuel investments – on the whole, the progress outlined give great hope. They demonstrate how some nations collaborated in tandem with private enterprise , are already moving toward the right direction, as innovative tools is developing apace. The technical details are superb, as well. I was unaware the way photovoltaic cells worked, for instance.

Patricia Lockwood's Favorites

Elaine Kraf’s Find Him! is being reissued in November, making it an ideal moment to read it, alternatively revisit her luminous, paisley-printed The Princess of 72nd Street.

Down Below from Leonora Carrington stands as a landmark. It’s not the exact blueprint of my newest book, Will There Ever Be Another You, but I recall perusing it outdoors during the pandemic and thinking: this is exactly what’s occurring to me. Also, it contains the nearest depiction you can get to a diagram the divine anatomy.

A significant release – Airless Spaces from Shulamith Firestone was originally published in 1998, a decade following the author’s schizophrenia diagnosis & withdrawal from society. She stood as a towering figure, already somewhat remote for activists in my age group, however these sketches, that explore her hospitalisations, feel immediate, intimate, defiant.

Another Reader's Perspective

Andrew Miller’s The Land in Winter offers a subtle & quiet complex narrative. The story unfolds during the harsh cold of the early sixties and traces the experiences of two pairs residing opposite each other in the countryside in the West Country. Confined by their environment, the main characters – Eric and Irene, Rita & Bill – grapple with their past and current lives, moving toward an unravelling. This is an exquisitely penned novel that reaffirms Miller among Britain’s most talented authors of the human condition.