Tag: Non Fiction

By Jack Parlett Paperback, £10.99 Fire Island is a thin barrier island off the southern shore of Long Island, New York, known for its private beaches, posh family-oriented communities, and, increasingly since the second half of the 20th century, its queer party scene. In this excellent blend of history, cultural commentary, and memoir, Jack Parlett…

By Cheryl Strayed Paperback, £10.99 In March 2010, Cheryl Strayed took over the Dear Sugar advice column, to great success. Two years later, her memoir Wild became an international sensation. The following year, she published Tiny Beautiful Things, this delightful selection of her best Dear Sugar pieces. Almost a decade later, her advice remains reassuring…

Naomi and Natalie Evans Paperback, £10.99 The Mixed-Race Experience is a great point of entry into many of the questions concerning growing up and existing as a mixed-race person in the UK and in the Western world in general. It tackles themes from adoption and parenthood to hair and growing up in small towns, through…

It is rare when a book of interviews strikes a balance between informative and conversational, but this one nails it. Ezra Woodger chats with eight transmasculine people of different ages, races, and backgrounds. Main topics discussed include changing views on masculinity, approaches to transition, paths to self-expression, and the importance of an accepting community. The…

What is it like to be a marine scientist and conservationist in the time of the climate emergency and the increase in species becoming extinct?  How do you keep going? Spring Tides is a well written combination of natural history and memoir that helps answer this question. “My energy comes from looking down into clear…

A Norwegian woman inherits a tiny cabin in a remote location.  There’s no running water, but there is a river.  There’s no electricity, but there is a woodburning stove.  And there’s no toilet, but there is Siri Helle’s determination to make a loo in a hut, with her own two hands. Don’t be put off…

This autobiography of an outstanding civil rights lawyer, who has specialised in inquests, doubles as an incisive and detailed account of many of the most important human rights cases of the last 30 years.  Thomas always puts the people involved at the heart of his account.  I felt that the book, while being candid about…

The editors of Welsh Plural have gathered some of the most interesting and relevant writers from Wales to consider what Welsh identity means today.  This is anything but niche: for anyone thinking about what identity, belonging and borders mean or could come to mean, this is helpful.  It is no surprise that this anthology has…

The Madhouse at the End of the Earth is an engrossing account of a journey to Antarctica in 1897.  One thing after another goes wrong for the crew of the Belgian whaling ship the Belgica, and they get stranded for the whole of the winter darkness, their ship frozen in a sea of ice. Among…

The pocket-sized London’s Hidden Walks series is well researched and handy.  The latest addition, subtitled Every Street Has a Story to Tell, is a genial and inspiring guide to some hidden London treasures. Who knew that the Spanish Civil War memorial was right next to Fulham Palace?  Or that the cabman’s shelter in Pimlico, a…

I read Islands of Abandonment in hardback during one of the lockdowns last year.  I was transported to wildly different newly-wild places around the world, even as I couldn’t stir much from home: a former military base on a Scottish island; an abandoned agricultural institute in the Tanzanian mountains; the drowned homes and fields of…

Did you know that Fortnum and Mason’s was started by one of Queen Anne’s footmen, who had a side business flogging off used candle wax from the queen’s household?  Or that the wooden flooring in Liberty’s department store is from a nineteenth century warship?  These are the kind of excellent nuggets that feature alongside engaging…

London in the Snow is not only about the humans.  There are elephants with shovels, camels looking a bit chilly, and pigeons making the best of it.  This charming small hardback photo book has a good range of black and white images from the 1900s to the 1960s, and they are not just the usual…

Ice, snow, owls: sold. Naturalist and PhD student Slaght goes to Primorye in remotest Russia in 2006 to research and protect the world’s largest owl, the Blakiston’s fish owl (see excellent pictures in Helen Macdonald’s rave review, here).  Slaght describes it: “Backlit by the hazy gray of a winter sky, it seemed almost too big…

You must be careful when reading this book.  You might end up with a shopping list that suddenly includes good vodka, Valtellina cheese, and bushels of fresh tomatoes.  I read it on a Sunday afternoon, snacking enjoyably throughout, and had a deeply relaxing time. Tucci is just as funny, smart and interesting in Taste as…

This new graphic novel and memoir charts historian Rebecca Hall’s search for women rebel slave leaders in archives in the UK and US.  It is gripping, moving, and compelling. Formerly a social justice lawyer, Hall’s work starts in New York in 1999, and Hugo Martínez’s illustrations show the slaving past literally reflected in the city…

I did not expect to laugh out loud while reading a proper scholarly history of the index.  But I did, several times. And I now know that the little pointing hand in the margin is a manicule: ? (see also here). I did not realise that an index might be more than a handy tool.  In…

Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were executed in the United States for treason in 1953.  A married couple, and the parents of two young children, their case became a cause célèbre as a miscarriage of justice, a cultural reference point, and a symbol of US domestic attitudes during the Cold War.  Amid all of this, the…