Book Reviews
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Book ReviewsThe Four Marys: A Quartet of Contemporary Folk Tales by Jean Rafferty
Mary Magdalene and her namesake, the Mother of God - whores and virgins, those cruel binary stereotypes. Jean Rafferty shows all those vivid hues in between in this quartet of contemporary Scottish folk tales Read more »| 05 Jun 2014 -
Book Reviews
For Faughie's Sake by Laura Marney
Glaswegian Trixie returns in this brilliant sequel to No Wonder I Take A Drink, sick of the mud, midges and cliques of Highland village Inverfaughie. In... Read more »| 05 Jun 2014 -
Book ReviewsLetters of James Agee to Father Flye by James Agee
In one of the later letters of celebrated writer James Agee to his lifelong confidant Father Flye, Agee mentions Montaigne's essay on his near-perfect, myth-... Read more »| 03 Jun 2014 -
Book ReviewsThe Dead Beat by Doug Johnstone
Martha Fluke has just been assigned to the 'dead beat' – the obituaries desk of an Edinburgh newspaper in decline, and her dead father's former pl... Read more »| 02 Jun 2014 -
Book ReviewsThe Last Tiger by Tony Black
The premise at least is intriguing: a family relocates from Lithuania to Tasmania in 1910. The father is a shepherd, but he’s adept at hunting Tasmania... Read more »| 02 Jun 2014 -
Book Reviews
The Wherewithal by Philip Schultz
Henryk Wyrzykowski, 'Head Clerk of Closed Files' at a San Francisco welfare office, is translating his mother's diaries while evading the Vietnam War. An acc... Read more »| 07 May 2014
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Book Reviews
The Quick by Laura Owen
Lauren Owen’s debut novel is an enjoyable and sometimes gripping read, set against the Gothic backdrop of Victorian England. The story begins at a... Read more »| 05 May 2014 -
Book Reviews
Caught by Lisa Moore
Lisa Moore turns the law on its head, inviting us to empathise with David Sanely, a criminal on the loose. Her novel Caught is an elaborate cat and mouse cha... Read more »| 05 May 2014 -
Book Reviews
Lexicon by Max Barry
Great sci-fi has often traded on the genre’s potential for making abstract ideas real: Philip K Dick made the question of ‘what makes us human?&r... Read more »| 02 May 2014 -
Book Reviews
Sally Heathcote: Suffragette by Mary M. Talbot, Kate Charlesworth and Bryan Talbot
The latest venture from Costa Award-winning scholar and graphic novelist duo Mary and Bryan Talbot, Sally Heathcote: Suffragette is a fast-paced romp through... Read more »| 01 May 2014 -
Book Reviews
Who is Tom Ditto? by Danny Wallace
What did Danny Wallace’s Shortlist paymasters think of his swipe here at damagingly aspirational men’s mags?It’s one attempt of many to ske... Read more »| 01 May 2014 -
Book ReviewsLeaving the Sea by Ben Marcus
The human condition is too grand and vague, so Ben Marcus writes about the human disease instead. Many of the characters in these short stories are sick, or ... Read more »| 01 May 2014 -
Book Reviews
Five Came Back by Mark Harris
According to Mark Harris, Frank Capra once made Oscar nominees stand on the stage together before he announced the winner. The five film directors that ... Read more »| 29 Apr 2014 -
Book Reviews
Other People’s Countries: A Journey into Memory by Patrick McGuinness
Far removed from the current trend in celebrity biographies, Patrick McGuinness’ memoir is an unusual and striking foray into the past. The book is a collection of Proustian pieces, varying in length from a paragraph to a few pages Read more »| 02 Apr 2014 -
Book Reviews
Gutter 10
Scotland’s leading literary magazine has marked its fifth birthday with a new layout, another fine selection of new Scottish writing, and an interview with Alan Bissett Read more »| 02 Apr 2014