Reading

“Chocolate Nations” by Orla Ryan

This is a comprehensive view of the chocolate industry, following the chain from African farmers to European consumers and explaining exactly why the cocoa farmers receive just 4% of the price of the average UK bar of milk chocolate.  It’s…
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“Incendiary” by Chris Cleave

A well-written, poignant look at terrorism, both cause and effect. [Warning: spoilers further down, don’t read on if you don’t want to know the ending] The effect comes first – a British woman suffers the loss of her husband and…
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“Lux the Poet” by Martin Millar

I thought I would like this book more than I did. It’s a comedy set in the Brixton Riots of the early 1980s, set around the adventures of a narcissistic poet called Lux. In a wonderfully creative mix of storylines,…
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My non-review of the best books of 2010

So all the newspapers have been publishing their end-of-year roundups. Some even started back in November. Here’s why I won’t be doing my own little roundup of the best books of 2010. Basically, it’s because I haven’t read very many…
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“Crow” by Ted Hughes

I rarely read poetry, but I enjoyed this strange little book by Ted Hughes. It’s full of dark imagery, violence and unexpected humour. The poems read like myths of the origins of the world, except that at the middle of…
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