15 Of The Best Books To Read This Season
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In Ordinary Time by Carmel McMahon
In 1993, aged 20, Carmel McMahon left Ireland for New York, carrying $500, two suitcases and a ton of unseen baggage. It took years – and a bitter struggle with alcohol addiction – to unpick the intricate traumas of her past and present. Candid yet lyrical, In Ordinary Time mines the ways that trauma reverberates through time and through individual lives, drawing connections to the events and rhythms of Ireland's long Celtic, early Christian and Catholic history. From tragically lost siblings to the broader social scars of the Famine and the Magdalene Laundries, McMahon sketches the evolution of a consciousness from her conservative 1970s upbringing to 1990s New York, and back to the much-changed Ireland of today.
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Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton
Birnam Wood is a gripping psychological thriller from the Booker prize-winning author of The Luminaries. Five years ago, Mira Bunting founded a guerrilla gardening group: Birnam Wood. An undeclared, unregulated, sometimes-criminal, sometimes-philanthropic gathering of friends, this activist collective plants crops wherever no one will notice – on the sides of roads, in forgotten parks and neglected backyards. For years, the group has struggled to break even. Then, Mira stumbles on an answer, a way to finally set the group up for the long term: a landslide has closed the Korowai Pass, cutting off the town of Thorndike. Natural disaster has created an opportunity, a sizable farm seemingly abandoned. But Mira is not the only one interested in Thorndike. Robert Lemoine, an enigmatic American billionaire, has snatched it up to build his end-times bunker – or so he tells Mira when he catches her on the property. Intrigued by Mira, Birnam Wood and their entrepreneurial spirit, he suggests they work his land. But can they trust him? And, as their ideals and ideologies are tested, can they trust each other?
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Quartet: How Four Women Changed the Musical World by Leah Broad
This new book chronicles the lives, loves, adventures and trailblazing musical careers of four extraordinary women. Ethel Smyth (b.1858) was famed for her operas and was a trailblazing queer Victorian composer who was a larger-than-life socialite, intrepid traveller and committed Suffragette. Rebecca Clarke (b.1886) was a talented violist and Pre-Raphaelite beauty, who was one of the first women ever hired by a professional orchestra. Dorothy Howell (b.1898) was a prodigy who shot to fame at the 1919 Proms. And Doreen Carwithen (b.1922) was one of Britain's first woman film composers, who scored Elizabeth II's coronation film. In their time, these women were celebrities. They composed some of the century's most popular music and pioneered creative careers; but today, they are ghostly presences, surviving only as muses and footnotes to male contemporaries like Elgar, Vaughan Williams and Britten. Debut biographer Leah Broad's group biography resurrects these forgotten voices, recounting lives of rebellion, heart break and ambition, and celebrating their musical masterpieces.
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Cursed Bread by Sophie Mackintosh
Elodie is the baker's wife. A plain, unremarkable woman, ignored by her husband and underestimated by her neighbours, she burns with the secret desire to be extraordinary. One day a charismatic new couple appear in town – the ambassador and his sharp-toothed wife, Violet – and Elodie quickly falls under their spell. All summer she stalks them through the streets: inviting herself into their home, eavesdropping on their coded conversations, longing to be part of their world. Meanwhile, beneath the tranquil surface of daily life, strange things are happening. Six horses are found dead in a field, laid out neatly on the ground like an offering. Widows see their lost husbands walking up the moonlit river, coming back to claim them. A teenage boy throws himself into the bonfire at the midsummer feast. A dark intoxication is spreading through the town and, when Elodie finally understands her role in it, it will be too late to stop.
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Two Sisters by Blake Morrison
Blake Morrison has lost a sister and a half-sister in recent years. Both are the subjects of this remarkable and heart-breaking memoir, along with a forensic examination of sibling relationships in history and literature. Blake's sister Gill struggled with alcoholism for a large part of her life and her shocking death is the starting point for Two Sisters. Blake returns to their childhood to search for the origins of her later difficulties and, in doing so, unearths the story behind his half-sister, Josie. As he unravels these narratives, Blake deals movingly with the guilt and shame that will be familiar to every person who has struggled with addiction in their family. He is unflinching in doing so, and the result is a book which provides testament to that common struggle, as well as acknowledging the complex, hidden forces on which all our lives are based.
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In Memoriam by Alice Winn
This debut novel from Alice Winn is a gripping, heart-shattering story of love between two soldiers in WWI. It's 1914 and talk of war feels far away to Henry Gaunt, Sidney Ellwood and the rest of their classmates, safely ensconced in their idyllic boarding school in the English countryside. At 17, they're too young to enlist and, anyway, Gaunt is fighting his own private battle: an all-consuming infatuation with his best friend, Ellwood – all the while not having a clue that Ellwood is in love with him. When Gaunt's German mother asks him to enlist as an officer in the British army to protect the family from anti-German attacks, Gaunt signs up immediately, relieved to escape his overwhelming feelings for Ellwood. The front is horrific, of course, and though Gaunt tries to dissuade Ellwood from joining him on the battlefield, Ellwood soon rushes to join him, spurred on by his love of Greek heroes and romantic poetry. Before long, their classmates have followed suit. Once in the trenches, Ellwood and Gaunt find fleeting moments of solace in one another, but their friends are all dying right in front of them and, at any moment, they could be next. An epic tale of both the devastating tragedies of war and the forbidden romance that blooms in its grip, In Memoriam is a truly impressive first novel.
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Old Babes In The Wood by Margaret Atwood
This is an epic collection of 15 stories from Margaret Atwood, the internationally acclaimed, award-winning author of The Handmaid's Tale and The Testaments. Atwood is celebrated as one of the most gifted storytellers in the world and these stories explore a huge range of experiences, from two best friends disagreeing about their shared past, to the right way to stop someone from choking; from a daughter determining if her mother really is a witch, to what to do with inherited relics such as WWII parade swords. They feature beloved cats, a confused snail, George Orwell, philosopher-astronomer-mathematician Hypatia of Alexandria, a cabal of elderly female academics and an alien tasked with retelling human fairy tales. At the heart of the collection is a striking sequence that follows a married couple as they travel the road together, exploring the moments big and small that make up a long life of love – and what comes after.
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Paradise Now by William Middleton
Karl Lagerfeld, Chanel's iconic creative director for 35 years, was a cultural figure like no other. Larger than life, Lagerfeld was legendary not only for reinventing Chanel but also for his idiosyncratic personal style and captivating life, which featured a cast of the world's most famous, fabulous and fascinating people. Not least his cat, Choupette, who herself became a fashion icon. Journalist and author William Middleton spent years working in Paris for Women's Wear Daily, W and Harper's Bazaar. During his time there, he interviewed and socialised with Lagerfeld, coming to see a side the elusive designer kept private from the world. In this entertaining book, Middleton takes us inside the most exclusive rooms in the fashion industry, behind the catwalk, and into a world of brilliantly talented artists, stylish socialites and some of the most unforgettable figures of fashion's inner circle for the past four decades.
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Milk by Alice Kinsella
Alice Kinsella was in her mid-20s when she became pregnant with her first child, newly engaged and about to embark on a life in an unfamiliar town on the west coast of Ireland. After her baby arrived, Alice's world began to expand and contract in ways she could never have imagined. With her body struggling to recover, darker intrusions ran through the days and nights of new motherhood. For the first time, she considered the experiences of her mother, her grandmother and the generations of women who came before them. She asked herself questions. How does this country treat its mothers? What does it mean to be forever tethered? Forever in love? Set against the backdrop of a seemingly changed Ireland, Alice draws readers her own map of motherhood, a crucial reflection spanning nine months of pregnancy and the first nine months of her child's life. Intimate, warm, startlingly vivid and gentle, this is both a delicate reflection on a moment of gigantic change in body and mind, and a powerful, often painful confrontation of the politics of a country deeply unsure about its women.
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Why Women Grow by Alice Vincent
Women have always gardened, but the stories have been buried with their work. Gardener and writer Alice Vincent is on a quest to change that – and to understand what encourages women to go out, work the soil, plant seeds and nurture them, even when so many other responsibilities sit upon their shoulders. Why Women Grow is a much-needed exploration of why women turn to the earth, as gardeners, growers and custodians. This book emerged from a deeply rooted desire to share the stories of women who are silenced and overlooked. In doing so, Alice fosters connections with gardeners that unfurl into a tender exploration of women's lives, their gardens and what the ground has offered them, with conversations spanning creation and loss, celebration and grief, power, protest, identity and renaissance. Want more? Check out Alice’s new podcast of the same name.
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The Garnett Girls by Georgina Moore
This debut is a powerful tale of sisterhood and home. Margo and Richard's love affair was the stuff legends are made of – forbidden, passionate, all encompassing but, ultimately, doomed. When Richard walked out, Margo shut herself away from the world, leaving her three daughters, Rachel, Imogen and Sasha, to run wild. Having finally put the past behind her, charismatic Margo holds court in her cottage on the Isle of Wight, refusing to ever speak of Richard. But her silence is keeping each of the Garnett girls from finding true happiness. The eldest, Rachel, is desperate to return to London, but is held hostage by responsibility for Sandcove, their beloved but crumbling family home. Imogen, the dreamy middle child, feels the pressure to marry her kind, considerate fiancé, even when her life takes an unexpected turn. And wild Sasha, trapped between her increasingly alienated family and her controlling husband, has unearthed the secret behind Richard's departure – and when she reveals it, the effects are devastating.
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The Witches of Vardo by Anya Bergman
Norway in 1662 is a dangerous time to be a woman, when even dancing can lead to accusations of witchcraft. After recently widowed Zigri's affair with a local merchant is discovered, she is sent to the fortress at Vardo to be tried as a witch. Zigri's daughter Ingeborg sets off into the wilderness to try to bring her mother back home. Accompanying her on this quest is Maren – herself the daughter of a witch – whose wild nature and unconquerable spirit gives Ingeborg the courage to venture into the unknown, and to risk everything to save her family. Also captive in the fortress is Anna Rhodius, once the King of Denmark's mistress, who has been sent in disgrace to the island of Vardo. What will she do – and who will she betray – to return to her privileged life at court? In an age weighted against them, these women refuse to be victims. They will have their justice – all they need to do is show their power.
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Old God's Time by Sebastian Barry
Recently retired police officer Tom Kettle is settling into the quiet of his new home, a lean-to annexed to a Victorian castle overlooking the Irish Sea. For months he has barely seen a soul, catching only glimpses of his eccentric landlord and a nervous young mother who has moved in next door. Occasionally, fond memories return, of his family, his beloved wife June and their two children. But when two former colleagues turn up at his door with questions about a decades-old case, one which Tom never quite came to terms with, he finds himself pulled into the darkest currents of his past. A beautiful, haunting novel, in which nothing is quite as it seems, Old God's Time is about what we live through, what we live with and what may survive of us.
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Destination Fabulous by Anna Murphy
From the fashion director of The Times comes a wise, inspiring and invigorating guide to making the most of life as a grown-up woman – from the practical (how to dress your best) to the existential (how to feel your best). At 50, Anna Murphy feels more visible than at any point in her life to date. Her new book is the toolkit you need to embrace your age and celebrate the wisdom and inner beauty that comes with it. It’s not about impossible goals. It’s not about denying the ageing process, nor attempting to erase its signs. It’s not about letting everything go, either. It’s about balance. As for fashion, Anna knows better than anyone that this can be the ultimate route into surfacing the true you. She shares all her tricks for finding your way to a wardrobe that will transform not just the way you look but the way you feel. And she shares the highlights of her conversations over the years with super-stylish agers such as Iris Apfel and Miuccia Prada.
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A Fortunate Woman by Polly Morland
A Fortunate Woman is a compelling, thoughtful and insightful look at the life and work of a country doctor. Polly Morland was clearing her late mother's house when she found a battered paperback behind the family bookshelf. Opening it, she was astonished to see an old photograph of the remote, wooded valley in which she lives. The book was A Fortunate Man, John Berger's classic account of a country doctor working in the same valley more than half a century earlier. This chance discovery led Morland to the remarkable doctor who serves that valley community today, a woman whose own medical vocation was inspired by reading the very same book as a teenager. Revisiting Berger's story after half a century of seismic change, both in our society and in the ways in which medicine is practised, A Fortunate Woman sheds light on what it means to be a doctor in today's complex and challenging world.
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