Leïla Slimani’s second novel won the Prix Goncourt and became the most read book in France in 2016. Now translated by Sam Taylor, it is being marketed as this year’s Gone Girl.
Myriam and Paul are blissfully happy after the birth of their first child, but shortly afterwards “the clocklike perfection of the family mechanism jammed”. When Myriam, who is of North African descent, visits a childcare agency, she is assumed to be a prospective employee.
Imogen Hermes Gowar's historical romp, The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock was only published a fortnight ago but is already riding high in the bestseller list.
I'll be talking about the book with Imogen at Waterstones Gower Street on Monday 5th March. Over a glass of wine, we'll also discuss the irresistible appeal of historical romps. Drinks are served from 6.30pm. Tickets available via the link below. All tickets, hallelujah, include wine.
Before Imogen Hermes Gowar was a writer, she worked at visitor services for the British Museum. There she came across a rare and hideous artefact, a mummified monkey stitched to the tail of a fish. Fascinated, she plunged into the story that became her first novel, The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock. Thanks to a feckless captain, Jonah Hancock -- a merchant -- loses a ship but finds himself apparently in possession of a mermaid. Gowar wickedly evokes the brothels and coffee shops of Georgian London, abuzz with talk of this extraordinary creature. he impeccable period detail is brought to life by the sheer joy of Gowar’s prose in this bawdy, witty tale. And she has particular fun with Angelica Neal, a spoilt, spirited and highly accomplished courtesan.
Like most people, I will eat any doughnut offered to me: a Greggs jam doughnut; a Krispy Kreme chocolate dreamcake or even a yuzu and matcha vegan number from Crosstown. The absolute acme of doughnut perfection, however, are Bread Ahead doughnuts.
Originally made by baker Justin Gellatly for St. John restaurant, he’s now Head Baker at Bread Ahead where they sell 5000 of these beauties a week. Even if you’ve never tried one, you’ve probably seen pictures of them on Instagram.
The narrator of Megan Hunter’s moving first novel envisages for herself “a water birth, with whale music, and hypnotism, and perhaps even an orgasm”. The reality is, of course, different and she leaves hospital “barely intact”. The change wrought in her by new motherhood is echoed by a change in the world around her: a flood is threatening to engulf England, making the narrator, her partner and their new baby refugees. The claustrophobia of life with a newborn is intensified by the apocalyptic drama unfolding around them. Retreating to the rural home of her partner’s parents, the narrator refers to the “tiny cabin that has become our world”.
I had read Slipstream (2002), the novelist Elizabeth Jane Howard’s brilliant – and apparently candid – memoir by the time I interviewed her in November 2013. It was less than two months before she died. I wondered what else there was to ask her: she had laid bare her disastrous first marriage to Peter Scott, son of the Antarctic explorer; her affair with Cecil Day-Lewis, whilst he was married to one of her closest friends; her acrimonious divorce from her third husband, fellow writer Kingsley Amis, and so much more.