Likely best known for The Dark Room, a debut which was both Man Booker listed and adapted for film, Rachel Seiffert may be a young writer, but already her achievements are remarkable. The Walk Home, her fourth novel, is set in Glasgow, a city the writer knows well. Specifically, the narrative is sited largely in Read More
I Am China is possibly Xiaolu Guo’s most ambitious work to date, combining the struggles of communication which she explored in A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers with the snapshot, cinematic style of her 20 Fragments of a Ravenous Youth. Much like that latter work, this novel is composed of an intricate collage of artefacts, Read More
In her career to date, Cusk has been loved and loathed in equal measure, as much for her forthright opinions as the quality of her writing. Outline is her eleventh work and, read in the light of her controversial memoirs about motherhood and divorce, blurs the boundaries between fiction and non-fiction. With a female novelist Read More
All art is political: Writings on performative art is a collection of interviews and essays on artists whose art lies less in the artwork itself and more in the context in which these artworks are placed. The first interview, with Keith Rowe and Mayo Thompson, suffers from the fact that two artists are interviewed. As Read More
“Love is a spark Lost in the dark Too soon Too soon…” – Speak Low Darkness. Two bass notes. A broken piano chord. Brightening lights slowly reveal a car with two occupants pulling towards an armed checkpoint. After requesting the passport of the woman driving, the guard demands to see the face of the Read More
Sara Taylor’s debut novel draws the reader into a harsh and deeply connected world. In a group of small islands off the coast of Virginia, a small community of outsiders has struggled to survive against all odds, not only for their own sake but for the continuation of their family lines. Interlinking familial connections act Read More
The Way Home is Millicent Graham’s second poetry collection following her debut work The Damp in Things, also published by Peepal Tree Press, in June 2009. Although these collections are Graham’s only solo publications, her work has been published in a number of anthologies, the most recent of which being Yonder Awa (comprising of Scottish Read More
I plant a handstand on the edge of human existence tempting mythical beasts to call my bluff, make a scapegoat out of me, or at the very least a media sensation. (‘Let Me Bring You to the Brink’) From the jacket inwards, Priscila Uppal, a Canadian of South Asian descent, fires her mantra for this Read More
Harry D’armour, private eye to the supernatural has been chosen as a witness. A mad Cenobite, a Priest of Hell known as Pinhead wants Harry to write his Gospel, to chronicle the Cenobite’s challenge for the throne of Hell. Pinhead will not take no for an answer and convinces Harry the only way he knows Read More
Imagine you are interrogating water coercing the hydrogen and oxygen to give up their bonds, give up each other. New York-based poet Philip Fried’s Interrogating Water can be read as an intense critique of the ethics of modern day American warfare, tackling themes of political ambivalence, military torture, weapons and those who wield those forces. Read More