Glorious colours riotously abound in Monique Roffey's first novel: 'deep purples, maroons, reds and oranges'. It is set in a delicatessen cum cafe in Shepherd's Bush, London where large, ungainly August Chalmin presides over culinary riches.
READ MORE

This fine novel grows out of the tension between order and chaos. Civil war brings chaos to previously orderly lands, and maps bring order and a finite structure to an endlessly disordered world. Yet seeking perfect order in life can itself bring a sort of chaos. These tensions play out in the lives of two sisters, refugees from a country destroyed by war.
READ MORE

I inhale. Realign my chair, which slides a little too easily under me. I do have one niggling concern (there are several but this is the one that comes to mind): while I will go on feeling as transparent as air, what I'm about to put in writing will show itself in a dense hue, one that might even shock me. —With these thoughts we are introduced to Jen, now known as Monty, who goes on to simply and honestly recount the changes that have occurred in her life.
READ MORE

The Skin of the Sky follows the life of Lorenzo de Tena, one of Mexico's most celebrated astronomers. His childhood bond with his doting mother is shattered by her early death, leaving him to be raised by an apathetic father. His mother's …
READ MORE

How does one escape? From what one does one need to escape? Why? Ana Menéndez's new collection of interlinked tales is all about escape artists, starting with the author herself. Each tale is attributed to a concocted author, for whom Menéndez has supplied an appropriately imaginative biographical note, including one for herself: "Ana Menéndez is the pseudonym of an imaginary writer and translator, invented, if not to lend coherence to this collection, at least to offer it the pretense of contemporary relevance."
READ MORE