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The Agony and Ecstasy of Escape

Will Boast

Will Boast on how Bernini's Apollo and Daphne helped him write his latest novel

Best Book of 2011: Kingdom Animalia

Nell Boeschenstein

‘As the title suggests, this is a book about the family of animals, the family of man, and the family of family.’

A Few Words about Fake Breasts

Nell Boeschenstein

‘You repeat this over and over. You pinch your nipples harder. Then harder and harder still. You twist them. You dare them to say Mercy. You stare into your own eyes that are watching you from the mirror.’

A Summer of Japanese Literature

Dan Bradley

From manga to crime fiction, contemporary literature to Nobel-Prize-winning classics, here are ten works of Japanese literature worth spending your summer on

Best Book of 2009: William Vollmann’s Imperial

Sam Byers

Sam Byers on why William Vollmann’s Imperial is the best book of 2009

Karl Kraus and Veza

Elias Canetti

‘It was natural that the rumors about both these people should reach me at the same time; they came from the same source, from which everything new for me came at that time.’

Best Book of 1919: The Years Between by Rudyard Kipling

Robert Chandler

Robert Chandler on why The Years Between by Rudyard Kipling is the best book of 1919

The Farmer’s Son

John Connell

‘I’m twenty-nine and I’ve never delivered a calf myself. But that’s all about to change’

On Coyotes

Diane Cook

‘There is something about the presence of coyotes that makes any place feel wilder than it is.’

Greedy Sleep

Bernard Cooper

‘I knew I had a problem when I woke up in a Motel 6 in Fresno.’

The Falconer and the Hawks

Ben Crane

‘A fine balance of precision and coiled unsparing instinct, all contained within a gossamer skein of feather, skin, muscle and bone.’

Best Book of 1953/1994: Trans-Atlantyk

Jennifer Croft

‘The most Polish novel of the twentieth century was written in Argentina and published in France.’

Letter from Zaria

Pwaangulongii Dauod

Memoir by Pwaangulongii Dauod, who writes from Zaria, Nigeria.

Carys Davies | Notes on Craft

Carys Davies

‘All good stories are both resonant and concrete; they live in the mind of the reader and reverberate beyond the pages of the book.’