Books: The illusion of control
S.J. Watson’s ambitious follow-up to his best-seller Before I Go To Sleep delves into the murky world of cybersex, he tells Stephen Jewell.
S.J. Watson’s ambitious follow-up to his best-seller Before I Go To Sleep delves into the murky world of cybersex, he tells Stephen Jewell.
Untangling the dramas of a seemingly normal family makes for an authentic read.
Roddy Doyle’s new novel, aimed at people with poor literacy, is inspired by a death in his own family, the Booker winner tells Arifa Akbar.
To begin a novel with a character who is dead from the very first page is a risk.
Kiwi author’s first novel explores fantasy and memories set to a compelling tune.
I would rather read Kelly Link than breathe. Writing about her is another thing again. I do not know why her new book is called Get In Trouble.
Debut novel combines writer’s love of music with her love of words, writes Rebecca Barry Hill.
New Zealand-born Peter Walker has been living in Britain for nearly 30 years now. He's made a considerable reputation as an author there, under as many as six nom-de-plumes, writing well over 100 books.
A novel is a place where past and present versions of one person can co-exist, and in his fifth novel Andrew O'Hagan movingly explores the way the "flotsam" of a life can rise to the surface as old age and memory go about their strange and poignant work.
To modern eyes, the little wagon in a Berlin museum looks like a model of an old horse-drawn cart. Solidly made, about as big as a baby's cot, it is in fact a handcart, to be pulled by people, not animals.
Plaudits to the publisher for their tactile, trim presentation of this small-is-beautiful novella. And to the Australian author herself for a rewarding — and riddling — little read.
What is normal? And what if you don't fit in with society's idea of it? Those are the issues raised by US author Amy Hatvany's thoughtful and compelling new novel
Christchurch crime writer Paul Cleave, whose books have sold more than half a million copies, has no qualms killing people on the page. But now online piracy is killing him, he tells Linda Herrick.
Lucy Wood’s first novel is a magic realist ghost story set in Devon. Lucy Popescu went there to meet her.
"Tell you what", write the editors of this excellent collection, is a phrase that promises "a revelation, a shift, a new truth".
Jodi Picoult has written 23 novels, eight of them No 1 bestsellers. Just don’t call her work ‘women’s fiction’, says Bryony Gordon.
When a computer virus hacks into the Australian prison system in 2010, it also infects the American corporations that licensed the software.
The quintessential guide book for the scene of New Zealand's most significant war effort covers everything you need to know about the Gallipoli Peninsula.
Mussolini hated pasta and Hitler, famously a vegetarian, liked to eat baby pigeons. A new book tells us what tyrants liked for tea. John Walsh reports.
Linda Herrick delves into four new cookbooks that transport the palate around the globe.
With the national carrier entering its 75th year, here's a wee stocking-filler for the sky-gawping plane nerd in your life.
With a new novel out, and a potential film finally on the horizon, Patricia Cornwell tells Judith Woods how Dr Kay Scarpetta was held hostage by Hollywood.
Neil Gaiman’s latest fantasy is an attempt to restore to fairy tales some of the danger the Grimm brothers removed. Gaby Wood reports.
"Short stories don't sell," is the current mantra of publishers everywhere, as a way of refusing to look at proffered manuscripts in case they love them and are sorely tempted.
Some Luck is the first volume of Pulitzer Prize-winner Jane Smiley’s trilogy set in the Iowa badlands. Boyd Tonkin reports.