books
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John Crace delves deep into the actor’s life story to condense it to a heartfelt 850 words
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Your neighbours beheaded, the terror of the religious police: in this extract from a new book, a Syrian activist, interviewed below, records the horror in his city
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Could this young Dutchman, hailed as a visionary, galvanise the left with his radical plan for a borderless future in which we are all paid for working less?
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The author of Stay With Me on child-free marriage, how sickle cell disease affects life in Nigeria and how she got started
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Book of the day Irresistible: Why We Can’t Stop Checking, Scrolling, Clicking and Watching
Gavin FrancisA fascinating study by Adam Alter explains why many of us find our smartphones and computers so addictive -
Make America great again. Take back control... From politics to culture, we have been gripped by a wave of nostalgia. Mohsin Hamid calls on storytellers to look ahead with hope
news
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Donald Trump’s presidency has already left its mark on the English language, according to lexicographers monitoring the most popular new vocabulary
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Stories are a key support for each person’s identity, so it’s vital we defend those going unheard and unread – or leave a void to be filled by the far right
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For youngsters realising they don’t fit expected gender roles, books from Winnie-the-Pooh to His Dark Materials have long provided overt and covert help
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books in 2017
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Jane Austen’s bicentenary, Arundhati Roy’s first novel in 20 years, and unpublished F Scott Fitzgerald ... the literary year ahead
regulars
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PodcastPodcastReclaiming history with Yaa Gyasi and Chibundu Onuzo - books podcastThe authors of two buzzy new novels, Homegoing and Welcome to Lagos, explore ancient and modern stories of west Africa
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Reading groupReading groupAngela Carter webchat – your questions answered by biographer Edmund GordonGordon spent five years writing his acclaimed biography of Carter and joined us to answer your questions about Carter’s thoughts on feminism, ‘modern’ fairytales and which authors she thought were bores...
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The first book interviewThe first book interviewAlice Broadway: 'I guess it's inevitable that I became a bit death-obsessed'Ink’s heroine loses faith in a culture where people’s histories are etched on their skin – reflecting its author’s own disaffection from evangelical Christianity
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Book of the dayBook of the dayIrresistible: Why We Can’t Stop Checking, Scrolling, Clicking and Watching – reviewA fascinating study by Adam Alter explains why many of us find our smartphones and computers so addictive
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Shannon Leone Fowler and Clover Stroud have both produced compelling, heart-rending memoirs about their responses to the death of a loved one
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History Reformation Divided: Catholics, Protestants and the Conversion of England by Eamon Duffy
Ian ThomsonA superb collection of essays reveal the bloody theological tussles of the 16th century in all their nuance
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A vivid collective biography of a group of 19th-century freethinkers is crammed with hopeful visions from the past
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Society The Raqqa Diaries by Samer – brutal and powerful
Robin Yassin-KassabReports smuggled out of Isis-occupied Syria detail the horrors faced by a desperate population -
Nothing actually ‘goes viral’, and consumers are both conservative and curious, argues this engaging cultural study
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Paperback of the week The Dedalus Book of Gin by Richard Barnett
Nicholas LezardNicholas Lezard’s paperback of the week: an entertaining look at the drink’s history – complete with ‘Hogarth-rating’ tasting notes
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Fiction Swimming Lessons by Claire Fuller – in at the deep end
Hannah BeckermanThe follow-up to Fuller’s celebrated debut novel dives skilfully into delicate family dynamics and mysterious disappearances -
Real-life historical figures are among the jailbreakers, prig-nappers and bawds in this vivid portrait of 1720s London
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A brilliant, genre-bending French bestseller uses the story of the early church as a parable for the author’s own life
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Short stories Whatever Happened to Interracial Love? by Kathleen Collins – black power and pathos
Colin GrantWritten during the 1960s and 70s, these posthumously published stories from the civil rights activist and film-maker seem startlingly prescient -
A gay Slovakian heroine makes a new life in rural England in this quirky debut novel
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There are shades of Jeanette Winterson and Ian McEwan in this atmospheric follow-up to The Girl in the Red Coat
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New York’s East Village is the setting for this brilliantly kaleidoscopic story about the city’s haves and have‑nots, both brought together and torn apart by an epidemic
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Protesting chickens, a mischievous bear, hunt the ballerinas and a Swedish horror story
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When we read to a child we are also reading to ourselves – and, in our increasingly polarised society, small choices make a big difference
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Young adult Another Brooklyn by Jacqueline Woodson – dreams and danger on the streets of New York
Bernardine EvaristoAn allusive, less-is-more approach works beautifully in this coming-of-age novel
people
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AL Kennedy celebrates a craftsman who viewed his work as a lifelong apprenticeship
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Susan Hill on starting her career during her O-levels, Twitter and completing her 59th book
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The Chinese-American author discusses her breakdown and facing up to the trauma of her past
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With Tom Hanks announcing a collection of typewriter-themed short stories, which other stars have tried and failed to become bestselling authors?
A selection of our favourite literary content from around the world
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The Little Library CaféThe Little Library CaféFood in books: pig cheeks from Fingersmith by Sarah WatersUnctuous and tender, pig cheeks are less popular now as a cut than past times. Kate Young brings them back in style, to celebrate a meal from Sarah Waters’s Victorian novel
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Interview with a Bookstore by Literary HubInterview with a Bookstore by Literary HubInterview with a Bookstore: Blue Willow Bookshop in HoustonCelebrating 20 years since owner Valerie took over, Blue Willow Bookshop is equally split between adults and children’s books, and staffed with knowledgable booksellers who can do anything - including fixing vacuum cleaners
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pictures, video & audio
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The authors of two buzzy new novels, Homegoing and Welcome to Lagos, explore ancient and modern stories of west Africa
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The Pulitzer prize-winning novelist looks back on a modern classic at a Guardian book club event
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In the week Sebastian Barry picked up his second Costa book of the year award, he joins us in the studio to read from and discuss Days Without End
you may have missed
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The first short stories smuggled out of North Korea represent a unique challenge for their translator, Deborah Smith
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In hospital in 1972, Paula Keogh fell in love with the poet Michael Dransfield. In her new memoir she captures the voice of her illness and the man she loved
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A new exhibition charts the changing place of electricity in our lives, our homes and in literature
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The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, her debut novel of desolate southern lives, made McCullers an instant star – something she never fully recovered from
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40 years of 2000AD Looking back on the future of comic books