1 hour ago Katabasis by RF Kuang review – a descent into the hellscape of academia

The bestselling author’s sixth novel is far from perfect, but this journey into the underworld is delivered with heretical gleeThe more academia has broken your heart, the more you’ll love RF Kuang’s new novel. Katabasis knows the slow grind of postgrad precarity: the endless grant grubbing and essay marking; the thesis chapters drafted, redrafted and quietly ignored by a supervisor who can’t be bothered to read – let alone reply to – an email. Living semester to semester, pay shrinking, workload metastasising, cannon fodder in a departmental forever war. Katabasis knows how it feels to spend your best thinking years doing grunt work to further someone else’s ideas, clinging to the bottom rung of a ladder you will never be allowed to climb: less an ivory tower than a pyramid scheme.Academia is a hellscape; Katabasis just makes it literal. The American author’s sixth novel is an infernal twist on the campus farce: David Lodge with demons. Kuang’s previous book, 2023’s Yello...

Politics

11 h. ago Next manuscript by Amitav Ghosh to be kept sealed for 89 years

The Indian author is the next Future Library writer, set to submit a secret work to be locked in a library until 2114The next manuscript by Indian writer Amitav Ghosh will not be read for 89 years, as he becomes the 12th author to contribute to the Future Library project.Ghosh joins Margaret Atwood, Han Kang, Ocean Vuong and other prominent authors who have written secret manuscripts, which are locked away until 2114. Continue reading...

Politics

12 h. ago 'I glamped at Boomtown 2025 and realised I've done festivals wrong my whole life'

Boomtown 2025 was one for the history books but this year a huge change to our camping experience has permanently altered how we rave for the rest of our lives...

Politics

23 h. ago The Magician of Tiger Castle by Louis Sachar review – whimsical fantasy in a kingdom long, long ago

In this first adult novel from the acclaimed children’s author, an immortal magician returns to tell the story of a royal court where he cast his spells some 500 years beforeThe American author Louis Sachar’s most celebrated book, 1998’s YA novel Holes, was a huge word-of-mouth success on both sides of the Atlantic. Its short, punchy chapters tell the story of plump, hapless Stanley Yelnats, sent to a summer camp for wayward boys, where a terrifying Warden has peculiar ideas about character reformation. The 5ft-deep holes the boys are required to dig turn out to have a surprising purpose. Shifts of time, register and perspective render a simple premise mesmerisingly intricate. It has peril, love, crime, wickedness, redemption and friendship in, well, spades.A quarter of a century later, Sachar has written his first supposedly adult novel, in which many of the same ingredients reappear. A man “dressed like a typical American tourist”, but with an odd habit of storing cake crumbs in t...

Politics

25 h. ago Chasing the Dark by Ben Machell review – the original ghostbuster

An entrancing biography of Tony Cornell, who displayed a scientist’s commitment to impartiality as he investigated the paranormalMy first and only experience with a Ouija board occurred when I was 11, at a friend’s house. It was good, spooky fun until it wasn’t. I recall movement and the start of a message before we recoiled from the board. Later that evening, I learned that my grandfather had died. While I realise now that a boy with a terminally ill relative and a lurid imagination was not the most reliable witness, I remember wanting to believe that I’d had a brush with the uncanny.When Times journalist Ben Machell’s dying grandmother bequeathed him a crystal ball, he began idly searching for mediums and happened across the work of a man named Tony Cornell. Between 1952 and 2004, Cornell worked (unpaid and to the detriment of two marriages) for the Society for Psychical Research (SPR). Weeding out deception and delusion from accounts of paranormal activity to find out w...

Politics

27 h. ago ‘Trump is a horror story, isn’t he?’ Stephen King on villains, dark secrets and dreams

One of the world’s most successful authors answers readers’ questions on his sources of inspiration, the colour of fear, knowing when to quit – and why manual labour is invaluable for writersI once entered a short story competition in the Guardian, judged by you, but failed. Is it simply a case of trying until something sticks? Or is accepting a lack of talent a relief over chasing an impossible dream? EvolAnthWell, it’s not necessarily a lack of talent. I think everybody has talent, but you have to hone it. The more you do it, the more you like it. And when you have talent, you want to do it, you know? You signed my copy of Christine with the words “Keep on screaming for vengeance” because I was wearing a Judas Priest badge. Is music still important to you? RobFramptonYeah, music is still important to me. I’ve moved on from Judas Priest because I couldn’t get the rights to use the lyrics from You’ve Got Another Thing Comin’ for my [2008] novel, Duma Key. So I’ve moved on to Rancid,...

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40 h. ago The best holidays to book for September 2025, from mountainous Montenegro to Sardinian beach breaks

Whether seeking a European walking holiday, Sardinian beach escape or a South African safari, plan ahead for a warm getaway after the schools reopen

Politics

46 h. ago ‘Looming over the city like gods’: the men who changed New York for better and worse

Jonathan Mahler’s new book looks back at the tumultuous period between 1986 and 1990 when figures such as Trump, Koch and Giuliani forever affected the cityJonathan Mahler didn’t plan to publish his new book about New York City from 1986 to 1990, tumultuous years culminating in a historic mayoral election, amid a similarly dramatic campaign for city hall. But he’s not unhappy to do so.The Gods of New York tells how the Democrat Ed Koch sought a fourth term as mayor but by election year, 1989, was widely seen as an “incumbent plagued by scandal, just like Eric Adams now”, Mahler said. Continue reading...

Politics

47 h. ago The Benson Diary by AC Benson review – musings of an Edwardian elitist

At four million words he beats Pepys, but the daily jottings of a judgmental don fail to transcend his rather stuffy millieuAC Benson is remembered today, if at all, for having edited three volumes of Queen Victoria’s letters and for writing Land of Hope and Glory to accompany Elgar’s first Pomp and Circumstance march – though, like Elgar, he came to dislike the vainglorious imperial sentiments that the words express – “vulgar stuff and not my manner at all”. Born in 1862, he began his working life as a school master at Eton, before moving on in 1904 to Magdalene College, Cambridge, where he was first a fellow and then master.Notably, he left voluminous diaries – over four million words, filling 180 bound volumes – four times the length of the diaries of Samuel Pepys, who had been an undergraduate at Magdalene. Benson was well connected and knew most of the political and literary elite of late Victorian and Edwardian Britain, so one might have expected him to offer a similarly ...

Events

51 h. ago Take away our language and we will forget who we are: Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o and the language of conquest

The late Kenyan novelist and activist believed erasing language was the most lasting weapon of oppression. Here, Aminatta Forna recalls the man and introduces his essay on decolonisationIn the 1930s, it was common for British missionaries to change the names of African school pupils to biblical names. The change wasn’t “just for school” – it was intended to be for ever. So Ngũgĩ became James and my father, Mohamed, became Moses. While many students retained their new names throughout their lives, Ngũgĩ and my father changed theirs back, though you can still find early editions of Ngũgĩ’s first book, Weep Not, Child, under the name of “James Ngugi”. With the novel, Ngũgĩ established himself as a writer and later, by reclaiming his Kikuyu identity as an activist, began a process of decolonisation that he would explore in one of his most famous nonfiction works, Decolonising the Mind (1986), which challenged the dominance of European languages in African education and literature. Ngũgĩ...

Politics

62 h. ago ‘Once again, the west turns away’: a new book recounts the fall and rise of the Taliban

Esteemed foreign correspondent Jon Lee Anderson’s new book offers a full accounting of life in Afghanistan from before 9/11 to nowJon Lee Anderson is “not done with Afghanistan”, despite having reported on it for more than 40 years, through invasions, occupations, the rise and fall of the Taliban and two great power retreats.“I always want to go back,” said the New Yorker staff writer. “It gets into your skin. Afghanistan is an incredible place, an incredible society. It’s always like time travel to me, and I knew people there that are larger than life. They stay with you I may return shortly.” Continue reading...

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65 h. ago Which books will Nationals English pupils read 2025? The Scottish texts teachers can choose

Scotland’s school reading list recently got a bit of a refresh 📚

Politics

2 d. ago Tiny Bookshop review – a truly cosy escape made with readers in mind

PC; Neoludic GamesReal titles from Shakespeare to John Green line the shelves of your seaside shop in a rhythmic, mellow management simulator worth relaxing intoIt is a rare thing in my experience that a resource management simulator, set in a retail or service environment, can strike the precise tone and pace that manages to evoke both interest and relaxation. As a player who previously worked as a bookseller, and currently is a novelist, I am poised to be extremely stressed out by a game set in a mobile bookshop. However, Tiny Bookshop is crafted with such care and balance that I found myself losing hours to the gentle pace and tiny puzzles and sheer escapism of the world it presents.The setup is simple, and one that is common to many games in the post Stardew Valley era of “cosy” games. You throw in your old life and open a shop selling tiny things you are passionate about to a bustling little community full of interesting characters who you progressively develop relationships wi...

Politics

2 d. ago The Adversary by Michael Crummey review – dark humour and depravity at the edge of the Earth

This prize-winning take on a biblical tale set in 1800s Newfoundland is grim, but has energy, empathy – and a wickedly colourful way with wordsSeveral years have passed since Michael Crummey’s last novel The Innocents was published in the UK in 2020. A pandemic has since occurred and, appropriately perhaps, The Adversary begins on a dark note of contagion. “There was a killing sickness on the shore that winter and the only services at the church were funerals,” runs the opening line, setting the tone for a book that plumbs the depths of depravity but – thanks to its energy, and its ripe and adventurous language – never loses a black sense of humour. Having now won the 30th annual Dublin Literary award, worth €100,000, The Adversary is proof that Crummey is beginning to garner the accolades he deserves beyond his native Canada.Crummey hails from Newfoundland; all six of his novels are set there. He understands the power of lashing sea, scouring wind, an eked-out existence far from wh...

Politics

3 d. ago Best Betting Sites: Top 10 Online Bookmakers for August 2025

Our tipster, sports journalist and betting content producer Chris Wilson reviews UK betting sites and picks out his favourites

Politics

3 d. ago Alexandrian Sphinx by Peter Jeffreys and Gregory Jusdanis review – the mysterious life of Constantine Cavafy

The enigmatic queer poet admired by EM Forster and Jackie Onassis takes centre stage in this unconventional biographyThe second floor of 10 Rue Lepsius, tucked away in the old Greek quarter of Alexandria above a brothel, was, for three decades, the literary focal point of the city. Entering the apartment, out of the Mediterranean sun, visitors would need a minute to adjust to the dimness, gradually perceiving faded curtains and heavy furniture, every surface covered with antiques and whimsical objects. There was no electricity, only candlelight. The host, proffering morsels of bread and cheese from the shadows, was an older man with “enigmatic eyes” beneath round spectacles – the poet Constantine Cavafy.What kind of person might be discerned amid the gloom? This is what Peter Jeffreys and Gregory Jusdanis set out to discover in their deeply researched and engaging biography, the first for 50 years. They brilliantly recreate his world – two chapters about Alexandria are especially go...

Politics

3 d. ago Claims Freddie Mercury had secret daughter divides fans and friends

Woman claiming the late singer is her father speaks out after some of his inner circle cast doubt ahead of new bookHis performances defined an era, and his life story has been dissected in tell-all books as well as on the big screen.But now further revelations may open up an unknown chapter in the life of Freddie Mercury. Continue reading...

Events

3 d. ago Claim Freddie Mercury had secret daughter divides fans and friends

Woman claiming the late singer is her father speaks out after some of his inner circle cast doubt ahead of new bookHis performances defined an era, and his life story has been dissected in tell-all books as well as on the big screen.But now further revelations may open up an unknown chapter in the life of Freddie Mercury. Continue reading...

Events

4 d. ago Peter Carey on Ned Kelly: ‘Did no one see what I saw, that our famous bushranger was a raging poet?’

Twenty-five years after his award-winning book was published, the Australian author revisits True History of the Kelly GangHow very weird to return to this old manuscript, the scene of so much doubt and anguish, not to say obsession.I was a baby when the seed was planted, three years out of school, two years since my devastating failure in the first year of a science degree. I had drifted into advertising where the gods determined I would fall among novelists and playwrights who would lead me to a place I could never have imagined.Sign up for a weekly email featuring our best readsI cant help it if Im young still can I its a wonder Im not an old shrivelled hag before my time living with him so cold never embracing me except sometimes when hes asleep the wrong end of me not knowing I suppose who he has any man thatd kiss a womans bottom. Continue reading...

Transport

4 d. ago ‘I’m carrying survivor’s guilt’: Raymond Antrobus on growing up deaf

The poet reflects on his heritage, his new life as a father in Margate – and why his memoir is a call to armsWhen Raymond Antrobus was a child, he writes in his new book, The Quiet Ear, his father would call him “white” when he was drunk, and “black” when he was sober. “White” was meant as an insult, the author explains over tea in his flat in Margate, where a pile of toys indicate the recent presence of his own young son. In his cruellest moments, it was a way for Antrobus’s black father, who died in 2014, to say “I don’t understand you. I don’t love you. You don’t understand my pain.”Antrobus, 38, is calm and reflective when he talks about this. As a deaf person who relies on hearing aids and lip-reading to communicate, he says he has long had to “make sense of myself for other people”. Continue reading...

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