The Dead Lake by Hamid Ismailov

How do you tell the story of a remote injustice to a jaded world? You could make a documentary, or interview the survivors and write a 15,000-word magazine exposé. You could petition the authorities to commission an official enquiry, and…

We Need New Names by NoViolet Bulawayo

This is a book of two halves. The first half is set in an unnamed African country that bears more than a passing resemblance to Zimbabwe, and the second half is set in the USA. Narrating both halves is Darling,…

Rutherford Park by Elizabeth Cooke

Do you ever get the feeling that you’re not the target audience for a particular book? The cover of this one set my alarm bells ringing with its references to Downton Abbey and Catherine Cookson and Edwardian English country houses.…

Dog and Butterfly

Tolstoy famously wrote that “All happy families are alike”, but John Philip Riffice’s novel Dog and Butterfly proves that all good rules also have their exceptions. It’s a novel about a family that is, in general, very happy. The love between…