Interviews

A labour of love

16 June 2013

AS a boy growing up in the 1950s, Peter Stothard was not interested in collecting cigarette cards or trainspotting.
Finding a sliver of heroism in children who kill

15 June 2013

At the heart of Neil Mackay's debut novel is the question: why can't we be more ready to understand what makes certain children kill?
Elizabeth Strout keeps coming back to the Maine event

9 June 2013

One of the few New Yorker cartoons ever to make me laugh featured a sullen teenager sitting in her bedroom writing to her parents, "Dear Mom and Dad, Thank you for giving me a happy childhood – and for ruining my chances of becoming a best-selling novelist."

Rose Tremain puts history in the past

8 June 2013

This week, Rose Tremain was installed as chancellor of the University of East Anglia, the first woman to hold the post in the university's 50-year history.
What if feels like to: tour with Nirvana

8 June 2013

Andy Bollen – freelance comedy writer
Barbara Kingsolver's flight of fancy for the real world

1 June 2013

Barbara Kingsolver recently filed a book review for the New York Times.
Investigating the murder behind The Great Gatsby

25 May 2013

If only she had had the prescience to seek out a bookmaker in 2009, Sarah Churchwell jokes, recalling the moment she told her literary agent she had started to research a book about F Scott Fitzgerald, because "I think we're due a Fitzgerald renaissance".
Alice Thompson discovers island life

12 May 2013

Enter Alice Thompson's house and you descend a winding staircase to emerge into light.

Comment & Debate

Claims children can't cope with a whole book are insulting

15 June 2013

I listened to the radio with astonishment earlier this week as a teacher told a Today presenter that, contrary to what cynics like to think, children studying English in England and Wales do indeed have "whole books" on the syllabus.
Whether island or hut, the retreats of writers are many and varied

8 June 2013

When I read that Alexander McCall Smith had bought a small chain of islands off Coll, I looked them up online.
Literary magazines: culturally essential but financial suicide

1 June 2013

As often happens when I'm away from home, the flat has been "tidied" by my fellow incumbent.

Reimagining Flodden, 500 years on

25 May 2013

Signposts near the Border south of Coldstream point to the site, their crossed swords the tourist equivalent of a skull and crossbones.
How writers make their way around the block

18 May 2013

Gore Vidal's writing routine was simple: "First coffee, then a bowel movement, then the Muse joins me." Not for him the agonies of staring at a blank page and wondering how to fill it.
Dismal diagnosis can give a life impetus

4 May 2013

Reading Robert Peston's description of typing up his wife's last book, shortly after her death, the words blurred on the page.
National festivals sing the praises of all things literary

27 April 2013

It's hard to think back to a time when book festivals were as unheard of as mobile phones or laptops.
Sparkle of children's classic is lost in author's later work

20 April 2013

I read an old novel recently, which has left me wishing I had chosen something else.

Iain Banks: The Quarry (Little Brown, £18.99) Reviewed by Rosemary Goring

16 June 2013

So much has been written about Iain Banks in the week since his death, one wonders what there is to add.
Paul Morley: The North (And Almost Everything In It) (Bloomsbury)

15 June 2013

For Scots, the conversation over identity has become a habit, a fair facsimile of second nature.
Courtney Collins: The Burial (Allen & Unwin)

15 June 2013

Courtney Collins is an unashamed fan of Southern Gothic literature, and that sensibility has clearly been a decisive influence on the way she portrays her native land of Australia in the 1920s.

Gerard Stembridge: The Effect Of her (Old Street Publishing)

9 June 2013

Gerard Stembridge writes novels and screenplays and is a theatre and film director.
Paperbacks

9 June 2013

Monster by Dave Zeltserman (Duckworth Overlook, £7.99)
Iain Macwhirter: Road To Referendum (Cargo)

8 June 2013

This book by the distinguished journalist Iain Macwhirter is designed to accompany an STV series on the background to the referendum of 2014.
Jonathan Jones: The Love Of The Artists - Art And Passion In The Renaissance

2 June 2013

The title comes from Vasari's 1550 Lives Of The Sculptors, Architects And Painters From Cimabue To Our Own Time, better known in English as The Lives Of The Artists and still the best book about art and artists ever written.
John Le Carre: A Delicate Truth (Viking)

2 June 2013

ALONE among contemporary novelists John le Carre has the ability to bridge the gap between superior literary fiction and bestseller pap.