I have been reading cozy mysteries since I was 8 years old. That’s over fifty years now, and I love, love, love them. Partly it’s the history: the setting and era so different from my own, and partly it’s the mystery element, I love to try to get to the answer before the sleuth, so that I can nod sagely and say, ‘I thought so.’ It’s also about people going through tough times, and seeing how those times can make or break them. I relate so much to their struggles with everyday life, and trying to fit an investigation around romance or vice versa, often during wartime.
The strengths of Wentworth’s books lie in the portrayal of the era, and in the characters who are forced to find their way through unfamiliar and difficult circumstances. They are not all wealthy, they are not all high-born, and we watch them as they try to adapt to wartime conditions and deprivations.
Wentworth’s mysteries are fascinating, clever, with the protagonist Miss Silver, a spinster who is a professional ‘private enquiry agent’. The Listening Eye, I feel, contains some of the most acute observations of human nature, and this makes the characters just seem so relatable. Wentworth books are ‘clean’ mysteries with a strong thread of romance, little gore, no bad language, or sexy shenanigans.
No one would ever have guessed that Paulina Paine was deaf, and that her ability to lip-read was astonishing. So the two men who met one day during the showing of a new art exhibition did not realise until too late that the middle-aged tweedy figure sitting out of earshot could understand every word they said. And it had been no ordinary conversation. In fact, Paulina was so shaken by its implications that she went to see Miss Silver straight away.
As the violence escalates, Miss Silver finds herself at a very tense house party where all the guests are…
I love comedy, showbusiness, mystery and fantasy stories, and sport—and these varied interests have resulted in me writing in various genres as both a journalist and author. My books have all been thoroughly researched and that has helped my crime thrillers receive glowing endorsements from best-selling writer Peter James in the case of Triple Tease and national newspaper journalist Stuart Pink in the case of Stitch Up! - Killer or Victim? My other books have also received excellent endorsements and reviews—fantasy adventure Secret Potion and Laughs and Tears Galore – Short Stories and Poems With Twists, written jointly with my wife Heather Flood, best known for her children's books.
Alex: The Man Behind The Legend is the latest biography of Sir Alex Ferguson—the most decorated manager in British football history.
I was fascinated to learn how livid Fergie was when his choice as his successor at Manchester United, David Moyes, was sacked after only 10 months; and his opinions of the reigns at Old Trafford of Louis van Gaal, Jose Mourinho, and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.
"For anyone wanting to know what makes Fergie tick..." — Eamonn Holmes.
BEFORE, DURING AND AFTER MANCHESTER UNITED ALEX is the most up-to-date biography of Sir Alex Ferguson—the most decorated manager in British football history.
Find out how he recovered from his brain surgery in 2018.
Why he appointed David Moyes as his successor.
How livid he was when Moyes was sacked ten months later.
What he thought of Louis van Gaal’s tenure as Manchester United manager. What he thought of Jose Mourinho’s reign. And just how big a role he played in the appointment of Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.
Like just about everyone, I was taught in childhood that we should think of others and help others. But then we start to hear different messages: “it’s naïve to think you can make the world a better place,” “you’re better off trying to help yourself—don’t waste your time with misguided attempts to help others,” "it’s sanctimonious to be a do-gooder,” and on and on it goes. The fact is, we can help to make the world a better place (without being sanctimonious). And we all should. We can volunteer, donate to good causes, eat less meat (or no meat at all), fly and drive less (or not at all!). And, as these authors have shown, the books we write can also make a real contribution.
Gaskell wrote this novel at a time when workers and their families in Britain’s industrial cities labored under intolerable conditions, and it was all too common for their suffering “to pass unregarded by all but the sufferers,” as Gaskell puts it in her preface. Her aim in writing the novel was to bring their plight to the attention of those better off—and to engender sympathy for their plight in the hearts and minds of readers. In the first half of the novel, she succeeds completely; it would be impossible for any reader to remain unmoved while reading of the lives of the Wilson family and the Barton family. The second half of the novel succeeds less fully, but the first half remains as powerful a piece of writing as I have ever read.
Mary Barton first appeared in 1848, and has since become one of the best known novels on the 'condition of England,' part of a nineteenth-century British trend to understand the enormous cultural, economic and social changes wrought by industrialization. Gaskell's work had great importance to the labour and reform movements, and it influenced writers such as Charles Dickens, Thomas Carlyle and Charlotte Bronte.
The plot of Mary Barton concerns the poverty and desperation of England's industrial workers. Fundamentally, however, it revolves around Mary's personal conflicts. She is already divided between an affection for an industrialist's son, Henry Carson, and for…
I'm an anarcho-feminist who has a special interest in magic; I consider it my guilty pleasure. I write dark and gritty stories that delve into gender, trauma, and mental illness, yet discover hope and freedom in the pit of darkness. I'm best known as a horror writer, but it’s more accurate to say that I create dark-fantasy and speculative fiction. My themes reflect the darkness which feels ubiquitous in the world, especially now in this age of extremes and pandemics, but I always search for the glimmer of light, the flame of hope that we can make a better future. I've always been fascinated by the Goth aesthetic and enchanted by post-punk threnodies.
It is set in the late 19th early 20th century in Manchester, England. A time of suffragists and a blossoming underground queer culture, both of which were violently opposed by state and police. Set in this time, place and atmosphere is the story of Edie and Gnome. The first chapter shows them in perfect, natural harmony with each other. As Edie grows up, her intersex nature (given a gloriously magical bent by Garland) is repressed and made a cause of shame via their mother’s abuse. Without full expression and acceptance, Edie/Gnome's relationship becomes destructive and toxic. The Night Brother is a journey of acceptance and balance woven into a wider narrative about feminine roles in society and the struggle to transcend them.
It is a delight to follow Garland’s beautiful prose both as it delves into the violent and gritty aspects of Victorian Manchester and when it soars into fantastical…
'Echoes of Angela Carter's more fantastical fiction reverberate through this exuberant tale of a hermaphrodite Jekyll and Hyde figure...enjoyably energetic' SUNDAY TIMES
Late nineteenth-century Manchester is a city of charms and dangers - the perfect playground for young siblings, Edie and Gnome. But as they grow up, they grow apart, and while Gnome revels in the night-time, Edie wakes each morning, exhausted and uneasy, with only a dim memory of the dark hours.
Convinced she deserves more than this half-life, she tries to break free from Gnome and forge her own future. But Gnome is always right behind, somehow seeming…
Having readOnce in a House on Fire about
twenty years ago, I was recently drawn back to the book by the memory of a beautifully
told story of trauma and quiet triumph, and it was no less compelling the
second time around.
As the author’s memoir of growing up in a poor family
in Manchester in the 1970s and 80s—dominated by not one but two violently abusive stepfathers—it
is powerfully and disconcertingly raw and honest, leaving the reader aghast and
willing the youthful author to make her escape.
Set in 1970s Manchester, ONCE IN A HOUSE ON FIRE tells the harrowing true story of three sisters and their mother, from the point of view of the eldest sister Andrea. They are a close-knit, loving family but are forced to battle with poverty, depression, and terrifying abuse at the hands of two stepfathers. Andrea, a sensitive and highly observant child, witnesses and suffers unbearable cruelty yet refuses to give into despair. Ultimately this is an empowering account of survival and hope, as Andrea forges a future beyond the violent world of home.
I am a mathematician, based at Oxford University, following up the ideas of the Nobel prizewinner Roger Penrose on fundamental physics. But I am best known for writing a biography of Alan Turing, the founder of computer science. I did this at a time when he was almost unknown to the public, long before computers invaded popular culture. And it meant giving a serious account of two kinds of secret history: the codebreaking of the Second World War and the life of an unapologetic gay man. Since then I have also created a supporting website. When I was drawn to find out about Alan Turing, it was not only because he was a mathematician. I seized the chance to bring together many themes from science, history, and human life. This broad approach is reflected in my recommendations. I am choosing books that hint at the great scope of themes related to Turing’s life and work.
My first pick is the one most directly about Alan Turing himself. After 1950 his attention turned mainly to his new theory of mathematical biology, but his death in 1954 left most of this work unpublished. His ideas were 20 or more years ahead of their time and few people could assess them. Jonathan Swinton is a leading expert in this field, and has been studying Turing’s manuscripts for 30 years. But his book has a much broader range: he adds so much on the culture of Manchester and its region, with a particular focus on women both as protagonists and observers. He has also illustrated his story with a wealth of pictures.
Manchester is proud of Alan Turing but does it deserve to be? Dr Jonathan Swinton explores the complexity of the city that Alan Turing encountered in 1948. He goes well beyond Turing as a mathematician, to cover wire-women, Wittgenstein and the daisy. This is a richly illustrated account of lives lived - and one life ended tragically early - in a post-war Manchester busy creating the computer. This is a book about the people one might have met in Turing s Manchester. It records the patronage of older men, triumphant from the successful prosecution of a scientific war, who could…
I’d thought I was writing a novel about someone putting a life back together after everything fell apart but, when I’d finished, readers told me I’d written a book about vivid, authentic friendships. It was a welcome surprise. From Charles Dickens to Sylvia Plath, nuanced characters have always interested me and so, when writing, I set myself the task of believable dialogue and interactions which readers can relate to like it’s their own friends sitting around a table; laughing, crying, or bickering. When a life falls apart it’s often friendships that are tested to breaking but then become stronger as a result.
How are women supposed to behave, discreetly? Are their friendships always a saccharine Hallmark card? Not in this novel. Living loudly, louchely, in chaos, with hedonistic nights out and all-day hangovers, Laura and Tyler are a tight, whip-funny twosome… except one has a wedding on the horizon to a teetotal stable man, and she’s wrestling with whether marriage is a legitimate life milestone anymore. The friendship portrayal here is a messy, clever, and foul-mouthed foray into the moment when inseparable friends face the prospect of their familiar relationship disappearing through the unstoppable forces of adult life. And we’ve all had impossible choices when we haven’t known which loyalties to put first – one’s duty to oneself or to one’s best friend?
“An utterly triumphant ode to female friendship, in all its intense, messy and powerful beauty” from the internationally bestselling author of Grown Ups (Elle).
It is the moment every twenty-something must confront: the time to grow up. Adulthood looms, with all its numbing tranquility and stifling complacency. The end of prolonged adolescence is near.
Laura and Tyler are two women whose twenties have been a blur of overstayed parties, a fondness for drugs that has shifted from cautious experimentation to catholic indulgence, and hangovers that don’t relent until Monday morning. They’ve been best friends, partners in excess, for the last…
Most people don’t realize how deeply ingrained folklore is to our daily lives. Superstitious habits like tossing spilled salt over the shoulder seem silly now, but had grave implications a hundred or more years ago. I love books that draw lines between folklore and reality, that weave tales laced with superstition, especially through the lens of modern issues. Stories like these have always helped me to not only understand myself better, but the world around me. The things people do and say aren’t nearly as important as why. Folklore, like changeling stories, I’ve found, is the key to human understanding.
Little Darlingswas the first book I’d read in a long time that made me feel seen.
When Lauren came home from the hospital after delivering twins only to find her life had not become as picture perfect as she was led to believe, I felt a keen connection. Told with visceral desperation, Lauren’s story is one we can all relate to—a story of self-doubt and a mad scramble for validation.
I'm a shameless people-watcher. There's nothing I like better than sitting in a cafe, or an airport, or on a bus, and observing the people I see (and yes, I admit, eavesdropping on their conversations). What are they wearing and what does it say about them? Who are they with, and what's their relationship? What are they saying to each other - and what are they not saying? So it's not surprising the most important element of a book for me is the characters, and my favourite characters are women who are a little bit different, who don't fit the mould - because you just never know what they'll do.
This one’s a story of obsessive love, with a heroine who is undoubtedly flawed, but who you can’t help cheering on, even when she’s doing very bad things.
You wouldn’t want her to be your brother’s girlfriend, but she’d be hilarious company on a night out. The story is darkly funny, but ultimately uplifting, which I think is a great combination in a book.
Although I’m from New Zealand, Europe has been home for a lot of my adult life, and that has included a lot of time in North Yorkshire. It always seems to me that there’s potential for magic around every corner, in the deep sinkholes and high fells of the Dales, or the cobbled charm of the York Shambles and the loom of the Abbey over Whitby harbour. So I do feel that the fact so many stories are set in London is a waste of so many delightfully different settings, and I make a point of hunting out as many alternatives as I can. I hope you enjoy this selection!
I love finding a new series that hits all my favourite urban fantasy points – smart, funny, peopled with delightfully weird and very uncool characters, andit’s set anywhere in the UK outside London (nothing against London, it’s just fun to read about somewhere different). C.K. McDonnell’s The Stranger Times hits all of these, plus is partly inspired by actual news stories from around the world (some clippings included, and the author’s podcast covers a lot more). This is a pure joy to read, and I’m definitely looking at Manchester a little differently now...
'Wonderfully dark, extremely funny' proclaimed ADAM KAY, author of the No.1 bestselling This is Going to Hurt 'A filmic romp with great characters, a jet-propelled plot, and a winning premise' said the GUARDIAN JASON MANFORD thinks it's 'Hilarious. You'll never look at Manchester the same way again.' The Chronicles of St Mary's series author JODI TAYLOR declared 'I loved this . . . great premise - great story - great characters . . . hugely enjoyable.' And THE TIMES called it 'ripping entertainment from start to finish.'
There are dark forces at work in our world (and in Manchester in…
