Latest FromBook Reviews
![Bertie forced me to cheer up](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Bertie forced me to cheer up
Normally gloomy Sebastian Faulks is enjoying the abuse he’s had for daring to write a pastiche of his boyhood hero, P.G. Wodehouse. Sarah Rainey reports.
![Book review: Catastrophe: Europe Goes to War 1914](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Book review: Catastrophe: Europe Goes to War 1914
Like one of Field Marshal Haig's family whiskies, Max Hastings is a dram that steadily improves with age.
![Book review: Birds of New Zealand: A Photographic Guide](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Book review: Birds of New Zealand: A Photographic Guide
It's almost a tradition for birders to complain about their field guides: a particular variation of plumage.
![Horror: How to respond](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Horror: How to respond
When Elizabeth Knox started writing her new novel, Wake, she wanted to take on the challenge of inspiring fear. But, she writes, that evolved into confronting the real-life things that terrified her.
![Bringing a circle to an end](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Bringing a circle to an end
Canadian writer Margaret Atwood tells Stephen Jewell how one novel became three.
![Book review: Goat Mountain](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Book review: Goat Mountain
David Vann's fourth novel is the story of one weekend in 1978 when three men and a boy go hunting in Northern California.
![Worse things happen in real life](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Worse things happen in real life
Australian crime writer Garry Disher tells Linda Herrick why he likes to make his readers wait.
!['I'll never look at power the same way'](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
'I'll never look at power the same way'
The new thriller from Robert Harris has as its hero one of history’s great whistleblowers. It’s a story with plenty of modern parallels, he tells Jon Stock.
![In honour of a toad](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
In honour of a toad
Although often abusive in nature, the literary work of Fr Rolfe is worth remembering, writes David Hill.
![Travel book review: <I>NZ Cycle Trails</I>](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Travel book review: <I>NZ Cycle Trails</I>
There's a lot about New Zealand that makes it a pretty dreadful place to ride a bike.
![Always look on the bright side](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Always look on the bright side
Bill Bryson tells Stephen Jewell he is drawn to American subjects in his writing.
![Book review: Tracing a civilisation](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Book review: Tracing a civilisation
Simon Schama's beginning is Egypt. But it is not the beginning of patriarchs and prophets.
![Book review: Becalmed in a time of great change](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Book review: Becalmed in a time of great change
British writer Margaret Drabble is beloved by generations of readers, especially women.
![Book review: Doctor Sleep](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Book review: Doctor Sleep
Bring me all the Stephen King novels in the land. Yes, all of them. I know, I know. I'll build a new bookcase. I'll buy a bigger house.
!['It's good to be slightly crazy'](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
'It's good to be slightly crazy'
Norwegian crime writer Jo Nesbo talks to Jake Kerridge about his latest Harry Hole novel and his fascination with what makes ordinary people do evil things.
![Book review: We Need New Names](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Book review: We Need New Names
NoViolet Bulawayo was born in Zimbabwe, a year after the country gained independence from British rule.
![Book review: The Signature Of All Things](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Book review: The Signature Of All Things
From the author of Eat, Pray, Love comes a remarkable new novel - a total deviation from Elizabeth Gilbert's 2006 bestseller, although just as likely to become a chart-topper.
![Book review: Snake Bite](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Book review: Snake Bite
Since the novel Puberty Blues first scandalised the complacent Australian middle classes in 1979, there have been a couple of updates.
![Book review: The Young Desire It](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Book review: The Young Desire It
As a coming-of-age story, this first novel by a young Australian writer would alarm those who leaped to condemn Ted Dawe's Into The River, which recently won this country's Young Adult Fiction award.
![Lucky break](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Lucky break
Talent and hard work are important but chance plays a big part, economist Tim Harford tells David Larsen.