Discover More Reads
Discover more reads about different people in different circumstances and from all around the world.
African Continent
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Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie | Set in Nigeria during the 1960s, this novel contains three main characters who get swept up in the violence during these turbulent years. It is about Africa, about the end of colonialism, about class and race, and the ways in which love can complicate these things. | Chimamanda's official site [https://www.chimamanda.com/welcome/] |
| The Book of Memory by Petina Gappah | "The story you have asked me to tell begins not with the ignominious ugliness of Lloyd's death but on a long-ago day in April when the sun seared my blistered face and I was nine years old and my father and mother sold me to a strange man. I say my father and my mother, but really it was just my mother". Memory, the narrator of 'The Book of Memory', is an albino woman languishing in Chikurubi Maximum Security Prison in Harare, Zimbabwe, where she has been convicted of murder. As part of her appeal her lawyer insists that she write down what happened as she remembers it. The death penalty is a mandatory sentence for murder, and Memory is, both literally and metaphorically, writing for her life. |
BBC World Book Club discussion of The book of memory [http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3csyx6h] |
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Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe | Things Fall Apart tells the story of Okonkwo, an important man in the Igbo tribe in the days when white men were first on the scene. Okonkwo becomes exiled from his tribe, as a result of his pride and his fears, with tragic consequences. |
Goodreads: Things Fall Apart [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/37781.Things_Fall_Apart] British Council: Chinua Achebe [https://literature.britishcouncil.org/writer/chinua-achebe] |
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Infinite Riches by Ben Okri | Azaro is a spirit-child who has decided to live in the land of the living. Two dangerous spirits are trying to reclaim him as he lives through turbulent times in Nigeria whilst the country prepares for independence. |
Ben Okri's website [https://benokri.co.uk/books/infinite-riches/] Goodreads: Infinite Riches [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/101095.Infinite_Riches] |
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Crossbones by Nuruddin Farah | A dozen years after his last visit, Jeebleh returns to his beloved Mogadiscio to see old friends. He is accompanied by his son-in-law, Malik, a journalist intent on covering the region's ongoing turmoil. |
Book details on Penguin Random House website [http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/309653/crossbones-by-nuruddin-farah/9780143122531/readers-guide/] Goodreads: Crossbones [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11157352-crossbones] |
| The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind by William Kamkwamba | When William Kamkwamba was just 14 years old his parents told him that he must leave school and come and work on the family farm as they could no longer afford the $80 a year tuition fees. This is the story of his refusal to give up on learning and reading. |
TED Talk: William Kamkwamba [https://www.ted.com/speakers/william_kamkwamba] |
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The Memory of Love by Aminatta Forna | Adrian Lockheart is a psychologist escaping his life in England. Arriving in Freetown in the wake of civil war, he struggles with the heat and with the secrets the country hides. The Memory of Love is a tale of ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances, addressing the indelible effects of the past on our lives. |
The Memory of Love discussion on BBC4 Bookclub [https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00081wx] |
For further inspiration discover past winners and shortlisted titles from the Caine Prize for African Writing: Caine Prize website [https://www.caineprize.com]
Black Lives Matter
| Book cover | Book title and author | Book introduction | Websites for more information |
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To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee | Through the young eyes of Scout and Jem Finch, Harper Lee explores with exuberant humour the irrationality of adult attitudes to race and class in the Deep South of the thirties. The conscience of a town steeped in prejudice, violence and hypocrisy is pricked by the stamina of one man's struggle for justice. But the weight of history will only tolerate so much. To Kill a Mockingbird is a coming-of-age story, an anti-racist novel, a historical drama of the Great Depression and a sublime example of the Southern writing tradition |
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Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire by Akala Natives is not available in e-format due to restriction rights of the publisher |
From the first time he was stopped and searched as a child, to the day he realised his mum was white, to his first encounters with racist teachers - race and class have shaped Akala's life and outlook. In this book he takes his own experiences and widens them out to look at the social, historical, and political factors that have left us where we are today. Covering everything from the police, education, and identity to politics, sexual objectification and the far right, 'Natives' will speak directly to British denial and squeamishness when it comes to confronting issues of race and class that are at the heart of the legacy of Britain's racialised empire. |
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Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race by Reni Eddo-Lodge |
In February 2014, Reni Eddo-Lodge wrote about her frustration with the way discussions of race and racism in Britain were constantly being led by those who weren't affected by it. She posted the piece on her blog, and gave it the title: 'Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People about Race'. Her powerful, passionate words hit a nerve. The post went viral, and comments flooded in from others desperate to speak up about their own, similar experiences. Galvanised by this response, she decided to dig into the source of these feelings; this clear hunger for an open discussion. The result is a searing, illuminating, absolutely necessary exploration of what it is to be a person of colour in Britain today. |
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The Good Immigrant edited by Nikesh Shukla |
We're told that we live in a multicultural melting pot - that we're post-racial. Yet, studies show that throughout the UK, people from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) groups are much more likely to live in poverty than white British people (Institute of Race Relations). It's a hard time to be an immigrant, or the child of one, or even the grandchild of one. 'The Good Immigrant' brings together twenty emerging British BAME writers, poets, journalists, and artists to confront this issue. In these essays about race and immigration, they paint a picture of what it means to be 'other' in a country that wants you, doesn't want you, doesn't accept you, needs you for its equality monitoring forms and would prefer you if you won a major reality show competition. |
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White Fragility: Why it’s so Hard for White People to Talk About Racism by Robin DiAngelo |
Anger. Fear. Guilt. Denial. Silence. These are the ways in which ordinary white people react when it is pointed out to them that they have done or said something that has - unintentionally - caused racial offence or hurt. After, all, a racist is the worst thing a person can be, right? But these reactions only serve to silence people of colour, who cannot give honest feedback to 'liberal' white people lest they provoke a dangerous emotional reaction. Robin DiAngelo coined the term 'White Fragility' in 2011 to describe this process and is here to show us how it serves to uphold the system of white supremacy. |
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People Like Us by Hashi Mohamed |
Hashi Mohamed came to Britain aged nine, a refugee from the Somali civil war. He attended some of Britain's worst schools and was raised exclusively on state benefits. Yet today he is a successful barrister, with an Oxford degree and a CV that includes appearances on the BBC. In People Like Us, Hashi explores what his own experience can tell us about social mobility in Britain today. Far from showing that anything is possible, he concludes his story is far from typical: our country is still riven with deep divisions that block children from deprived backgrounds from accessing the advantages that are handed to others from birth. |
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Black Lives Matter - further reading
| Book cover | Book title and author | Book introduction | Websites for more information |
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Diversify by June Sarpong |
How do we set aside race, colour, creed, class, age, religion, sexual orientation, physicality and all of our perceived differences? Is it truly possible to live without prejudice? And why should we want to? |
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How To Be An Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi |
In this rousing and deeply empathetic book, Ibram X. Kendi, founding director of the Antiracism Research and Policy Center, shows that when it comes to racism, neutrality is not an option: until we become part of the solution, we can only be part of the problem. |
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Don’t Touch My Hair by Emma Dabiri |
This book is about why black hair matters and how it can be viewed as a blueprint for decolonisation. Over a series of wry, informed essays, Emma Dabiri takes us from pre-colonial Africa, through the Harlem Renaissance, Black Power and on to today's Natural Hair Movement, the Cultural Appropriation Wars and beyond. We look everything from hair capitalists like Madam C.J. Walker in the early 1900s to the rise of Shea Moisture today, from women's solidarity and friendship to 'black people time', forgotten African scholars and the dubious provenance of Kim Kardashian's braids. |
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The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander |
Once in a great while a book comes along that radically changes our understanding of a crucial political issue and helps to fuel a social movement. The New Jim Crow is such a book. Lawyer and activist Michelle Alexander offers a stunning account of the rebirth of a caste-like system in the United States, one that has resulted in millions of African Americans locked behind bars and then relegated to a permanent second-class status, denied the very rights supposedly won in the Civil Rights movement. Challenging the notion that the election of Barack Obama signalled a new era of colourblindness in the United States, The New Jim Crow reveals how racial discrimination was not ended but merely redesigned. By targeting black men through the War on Drugs and decimating communities of colour, the American criminal justice system functions as a contemporary system of racial control, relegating millions to a permanent second-class status even as it formally adheres to the principle of colourblindness. |
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They Can’t Kill Us All by Wesley Lowery |
In over a year of on-the-ground reportage, Washington Post writer Wesley Lowery travelled across the US to uncover life inside the most heavily policed, if otherwise neglected, corners of America today. |
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Sister Outsider by Audre Lorde |
The woman's place of power within each of us is neither white nor surface; it is dark, it is ancient, and it is deep. The revolutionary writings of Audre Lorde gave voice to those 'outside the circle of this society's definition of acceptable women'. Uncompromising, angry and yet full of hope, this collection of her essential prose - essays, speeches, letters, interviews - explores race, sexuality, poetry, friendship, the erotic, and the need for female solidarity, and includes her landmark piece 'The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master's House'. |
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White Girls by Hilton Als |
'Also has a serious claim to be regarded as the next James Baldwin' Observer |
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I'm Still Here by Austin Channing Brown |
In a time when nearly all institutions (schools, churches, universities, businesses) claim to value "diversity" in their mission statements, I'm Still Here is a powerful account of how and why our actions so often fall short of our words. Austin writes in breathtaking detail about her journey to self-worth and the pitfalls that kill our attempts at racial justice, in stories that bear witness to the complexity of America's social fabric--from Black Cleveland neighbourhoods to private schools in the middle-class suburbs, from prison walls to the boardrooms at majority-white organisations. |
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Brit(ish) by Afua Hirsch |
You're British. Your parents are British. You were raised in Britain. Your partner, your children and most of your friends are British. So why do people keep asking you where you are from? 'Brit(ish)' is about a search for identity. It is about the everyday racism that plagues British society. It is about our awkward, troubled relationship with our history. It is about why liberal attempts to be 'colour-blind' have caused more problems than they have solved. It is about why we continue to avoid talking about race. |
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Black and British: A Forgotten History by David Olusoga |
David Olusoga's Black and British is a rich and revealing exploration of the extraordinarily long relationship between the British Isles and the people of Africa. Drawing on new genetic and genealogical research, original records, expert testimony and contemporary interviews, Black and British reaches back to Roman Britain, the medieval imagination and Shakespeare's Othello. Unflinching, confronting taboos and revealing hitherto unknown scandals, Olusoga describes how black and white Britons have been intimately entwined for centuries. |
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Sulwe by Lupita Nyong’o and Vashti Harrison - for ages 4+ |
Sulwe's skin is the colour of midnight. She's darker than everyone in her family, and everyone at school. All she wants is to be beautiful and bright, like her mother and sister. Then a magical journey through the night sky opens her eyes and changes everything. In this stunning debut picture book, Lupita Nyong'o creates a whimsical and heartwarming story to inspire children to see their own unique beauty. |
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Daddy do my hair: Kechi’s Hair Goes Every Which Way by Tola Okogwu and Naomi Wright – for ages 4+ |
Who will win in the epic battle between dad and hair ? Kechi’s hair is big, thick and loud - and that's just the way she likes it. Mummy’s away and it's up to Daddy to get Kechi and her hair ready for school. There's just one problem - he's never done it before. Fun and hilarity ensue as Daddy tries to tame Kechi’s's swirly-springy, fluffy-puffy, squishy-squashy, candyfloss curls. |
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High Rise Mystery by Sharna Jackson – for ages 9+ |
The detective duo everyone is dying to meet. Summer in London is hot, the hottest on record, and there's been a murder in THE TRI: the high-rise home to resident know-it-alls, Nik and Norva. Who better to solve the case? Armed with curiosity, home-turf knowledge and unlimited time - until the end of the summer holidays anyway. |
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The Faraway Truth by Janae Marks – for ages 9+ |
Zoe Washington never met her father, who was sent to prison right before she was born. When she receives a letter from him on her twelfth birthday, it's a huge surprise. Zoe's mum always told her that Marcus was a liar, a monster, but he sounds nice. Zoe starts to investigate the crime - and the deeper she digs, the more she doubts the conviction. Is her father innocent? Or is he a liar? Zoe is determined to find out. |
Janae Marks talk about one of her other fantastic books From the Desk of Zoe Washington [https://youtu.be/6S42sB9B3tU] |
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The Crossover by Kwame Alexander - for ages 11+ |
Twelve-year-old Josh and his twin Jordan have basketball in their blood. They're kings of the court, star players for their school team. Their father used to be a champion player and they each want nothing more than to follow in his footsteps. Both on and off the court, there is conflict and hardship which will test Josh's bond with his brother. |
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A Jigsaw of Fire and Stars by Yaba Badoe – for ages 13+ |
A powerful, haunting, contemporary debut that steps seamlessly from the horrors of people-trafficking to the magic of African folklore, by an award-winning Ghanaian-British filmmaker. Sante was a baby when she was washed ashore in a sea-chest laden with treasure. It seems she is the sole survivor of the tragic sinking of a ship carrying migrants and refugees. Her people. Fourteen years on she's a member of Mama Rose's unique and dazzling circus. But, from their watery grave, the unquiet dead are calling Sante to avenge them. |
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Fantastic Fiction in Translation
To celebrate the Positive Images Festival, we have put together a list of thirteen fantastic titles of translated fiction. There are links to interviews, reviews and promotions and some of the titles have been listed for the International Man Booker Prize. The rising popularity in translated fiction shows we remain a country keen to look and learn beyond our shores.
| Book cover | Book title and author | Book introduction | Websites for more information |
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Killing Commendatore by Haruki Murakami (translated from Japanese) |
The much-anticipated new novel from the internationally acclaimed, bestselling author of 1Q84 and Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage, Killing Commendatore is an epic tour de force of love and loneliness, war and art - as well as a loving homage to The Great Gatsby - and a stunning work of imagination from one of our greatest writers. |
Murakami's official website [https://www.harukimurakami.com/]
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The Chestnut Man by Soren Sveistrup (translated from Danish) |
On a blistery autumn morning Rosa Hartung returns to her job as Minister for Social Affairs, a year after the dramatic disappearance of her 12-year-old daughter. Linus Berger, a mentally disturbed young man, confessed to her killing, but claims he can't remember where he buried her dismembered corpse. That same day Rosa returns to Parliament, a young mother is found murdered at her home in the suburbs of Copenhagen - she's been tortured, and one hand has been cut off. Detectives Thulin and Hess, sent to investigate the crime, arrive to find a figure made of chestnut hanging from a nearby playhouse. When yet another woman is murdered, and another chestnut figure is found, Thulin and Hess begin to suspect that there's a connection between the previously closed Hartung case and the new recent victims. |
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The Absolution by Yrsa Sigurdardottir (translated from Icelandic) |
The police found out about the crime the way everyone does: on Snapchat. The video shows the terrified victim begging for forgiveness. When her body is found, it is marked with a number 2. Detective Huldar joins the investigation, bringing child psychologist Freyja on board to help question the murdered teenager's friends. Soon, they uncover that Stella was far from the angel people claim - but, even so, who could have hated her enough to kill? Then another teenager goes missing, and more clips are sent. Freyja and Huldar can agree on two things at least: the truth is far from simple. And the killer is not done yet.
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The Reunion by Guillaume Musso (translated from French) |
French Riviera, Winter 1992. On a freezing night, as her high school campus is engulfed by a snowstorm, 19-year-old Vinca Rockwell runs away with Alexis, her philosophy teacher. No one will ever see them again. French Riviera, Spring 2017. Formerly inseparable, Thomas, Maxime and Fanny - Vinca's best friends - have not spoken in twenty-five years. But when they receive an invitation to their school's anniversary reunion, they know they must go back one final time. Because there is a body buried in that building - and they're the ones who put it there. |
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Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata (translated from Japanese) |
Keiko has never really fitted in. At school and university people find her odd and her family worries she'll never be normal. To appease them, Keiko takes a job at a newly opened convenience store. Here, she finds peace and purpose in the simple, daily tasks and routine interactions. She is, she comes to understand, happiest as a convenience store worker. But in Keiko's social circle it just won't do for an unmarried woman to spend all her time stacking shelves and re-ordering green tea. |
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The Librarian of Auschwitz by Antonio Iturbe (translated from Spanish) |
Available in e-book. Fourteen-year-old Dita is one of the many imprisoned by the Nazis at Auschwitz. Taken, along with her mother and father, from the Terezin ghetto in Prague, Dita is adjusting to the constant terror that is life in the camp. When Jewish leader Freddy Hirsch asks Dita to take charge of the eight precious volumes the prisoners have managed to smuggle past the guards, she agrees. And so Dita becomes the secret librarian of Auschwitz,responsible for the safekeeping of the small collection of titles, as well as the 'living books' - prisoners of Auschwitz who know certain books so well, they too can be borrowed' to educate the children in the camp. But books are extremely dangerous. They make people think. And nowhere are they more dangerous than in Block 31 of Auschwitz, the children's block, where the slightest transgression can result in execution, no matter how young the transgressor. |
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Zuleikha by Guzel Yakhina (translated from Russian) |
In a small Tatar village, a woman named Zuleikha watches as her husband is murdered by communists. Zuleikha herself is sent into exile, enduring a horrendous train journey to a remote spot on the Angara River in Siberia. Conditions in the camp are tough, and many of her group do not survive the first difficult winter. As she gets to know her companions - including a rather dotty doctor, an artist who paints on the sly, and Ignatov, her husband's killer - Zuleikha begins to build a new life that is far removed from the one she left behind. |
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By Night the Mountain Burns by Juan Tomás Ávila Laurel (translated from Spanish) |
Shortlisted for the 2015 Independent Foreign Fiction Prize. By Night The Mountain Burns recounts the narrator’s childhood on a remote island off the West African coast, living with his mysterious grandfather, several mothers and no fathers. We learn of a dark chapter in the island’s history: a bush fire destroys the crops, then hundreds perish in a cholera outbreak. |
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The Discomfort of Evening by Marieke Lucas Rijneveld (translated from Dutch) |
Jas lives with her devout farming family in the rural Netherlands. One winter's day, her older brother joins an ice skating trip; resentful at being left alone, she makes a perverse plea to God; he never returns. As grief overwhelms the farm, Jas succumbs to a vortex of increasingly disturbing fantasies, watching her family disintegrate into a darkness that threatens to derail them all. |
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Tyll by Daniel Kehlmann (translated from German) |
He's a trickster, a player, a jester. His handshake's like a pact with the devil, his smile like a crack in the clouds; he's watching you now and he's gone when you turn. Tyll Ulenspiegel is here! In a village like every other village in Germany, a scrawny boy balances on a rope between two trees. He's practising. He practises by the mill, by the blacksmiths; he practises in the forest at night, where the Cold Woman whispers and goblins roam. When he comes out, he will never be the same. Tyll will escape the ordinary villages. In the mines he will defy death. On the battlefield he will run faster than cannonballs. In the courts he will trick the heads of state. As a travelling entertainer, his journey will take him across the land and into the heart of a never-ending war. |
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Serotonin by Michel Houellebecq (translated from French) |
Dissatisfied and discontent, Florent-Claude Labrouste begrudgingly works as an engineer for the Ministry of Agriculture, and is in a self-imposed dysfunctional relationship with a younger woman. When he discovers her ongoing infidelity, he decides to abandon his life in Paris and return to the Normandy countryside of his youth. There he contemplates lost loves and past happiness as he struggles to embed himself in a world that no longer holds any joy for him. His only relief comes in the form of a pill - white, oval, small. Captorix is a new brand of anti-depressant, recently released for public consumption, which works by altering the brain's release of serotonin. With social unrest intensifying around him, and his own depression deepening, Florent-Claude turns to this new medication in the hope that he will find something to live for. |
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Tram 83 by Fiston Mwanza Mujila (translated from French) |
Lucien, a professional writer, fleeing the exactions and the censorship, finds refuge in the city thanks to Requiem, a friend. Requiem lives mainly on theft and on swindle while Lucien only thinks of writing and living honestly. Around them gravitate gangsters and young girls, retired or runaway men, profit-seeking tourists and federal agents of a non-existent state. 'Tram 83' plunges the reader into the atmosphere of a gold rush as cynical as it is comic and colourfully exotic. |
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Disoriental by Negar Djavadi (translated from French) |
Kimia Sadr fled Iran at the age of 10 in the company of her mother and sisters to join her father in France. Now 25 and facing the future she has built for herself as well as the prospect of a new generation, Kimia is inundated by her own memories and the stories of her ancestors, which come to her in unstoppable, uncontainable waves. In the waiting room of a Parisian fertility clinic, generations of flamboyant Sadrs return to her, including her formidable great-grandfather Montazemolmolk, with his harem of 52 wives. |
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A Good Day For Climbing Trees by Jaco Jacobs Translator: Kobus Geldenhuys (from Afrikaans) | Sometimes, in the blink of an eye, you do something that changes your life forever. Like climbing into a tree with a strange girl. Marnus is tired of feeling invisible, living in the shadow of his two brothers. His older brother is good at breaking swimming records and girls' hearts. His younger brother is already a crafty entrepreneur who has tricked him into doing the dishes all summer. But when a girl called Leila ends up on their doorstep one morning asking him to sign a petition, it's the start of an unexpected adventure. And finally, Marnus gets the chance to be noticed. |
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Great British Crime â our âdeadâ good books for 2020
As the nights draw in, the days get shorter and the leaves begin to fall, why not check out our top crime reads to keep you company on those long dark nights?
From Manchester to Cambridge, Wales to Northern Ireland, British crime writers have found inspiration up and down the country in both the rolling green countryside and the rough, tough streets of the capital city. So if you’re looking for a good book to help immerse yourself in different locations in good ol’ Blighty, then you need look no further.
With these gripping crime and thriller reads you can pay a visit to Brighton with Dorothy Koomson, explore the darker side of Yorkshire with Tim Weaver and escape to Wales with Claire Douglas!
| Book cover | Book title and author | Book introduction | Websites for more information |
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The Brighton Mermaid by Dorothy Koomson ] |
Brighton Beach, 1993 Teenagers Nell and Jude find the body of a young woman and when no one comes to claim her, she becomes known as the Brighton Mermaid. Nell is still struggling to move on when, three weeks later, Jude disappears. Twenty-five years on, Nell is forced to quit her job to find out who the Brighton Mermaid really was – and what happened to her best friend that summer. But as Nell edges closer to the truth, dangerous things start to happen. Someone seems to be watching her every move, and soon she starts to wonder who in her life she can actually trust… |
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Wild Fire by Ann Cleeves e-book and e-audiobook |
Shetland: Welcoming. Wild. Remote. Drawn in by the reputation of the islands, a new English family move to the area, eager to give their autistic son a better life. But when a young nanny’s body is found hanging in the barn of their home, rumours of her affair with the husband begin to spread like wild fire. With suspicion raining down on the family, DI Jimmy Perez is called in to investigate. For him it will mean returning to the islands of his on-off lover and boss Willow Reeves, who will run the case. Perez is already facing the most disturbing investigation of his career, when Willow drops a bombshell that will change his life forever. Is he ready for what is to come? |
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No One Home by Tim Weaver e-book |
Yorkshire Nine neighbours gather for a dinner party. But by the next morning, they had disappeared without a trace. No bodies. No evidence. No clues. Two and a half years later, it remains a mystery. Desperate for answers, the families of the missing turn to investigator David Raker. How did an entire village vanish overnight?/p> And is he looking for nine missing people, or nine dead bodies? |
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Spare Room by Dreda Say Mitchell e-book |
Beautiful double room to let to single person. |
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A Spot of Folly by Ruth Rendell e-book and e-audiobook |
Ruth Rendell was an acknowledged master of psychological suspense: these are ten (and a quarter) of her most chillingly compelling short stories, collected here together for the first time. In these tales, a businessman boasts about cheating on his wife, only to find the tables turned. A beautiful country rectory reverberates to the echo of a historical murder. A compulsive liar acts on impulse, only to be lead inexorably to disaster. And a wealthy man finds there is more to his wife's kidnapping than meets the eye. Atmospheric, gripping and never predictable, this is Ruth Rendell at her inimitable best. |
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Open Grave by A.M. Peacock e-book |
In the British city of Newcastle, a pair of bodies leads a police detective into a dark place… DCI Jack Lambert is no stranger to inner demons, having struggled with his own since the admission about his sexuality. But when two bodies are discovered entwined in an open grave, Lambert must put his personal worries aside and work the case. Then, when a local thug turns up dead on the banks of the River Tyne, the DCI’s criminal past comes back to haunt him. Meanwhile, a local celebrity singer claims that she is being stalked. Could there be a link to the killings? As the bodies start to pile up, Lambert and his colleagues realize the motive lies in the past and the killer is taunting them—but they may not be able to catch the murderer before one of their own ends up in an open grave. |
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The 39 Steps by John Buchan e-book and e-audiobook |
London Recently returned from South Africa, adventurer Richard Hannay is bored with life, but after a chance encounter with an American who informs him of an assassination plot and is then promptly murdered in Hannay's London flat, he becomes the obvious suspect and is forced to go on the run. He heads north to his native Scotland, fleeing the police and his enemies. Hannay must keep his wits about him if he is to warn the government before all is too late. |
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The Crossing Places by Elly Griffiths e-audiobook |
Norfolk Winner of the 2016 CWA Dagger in the Library award. A child's bones are discovered on the windswept Norfolk marshes. Believing them to be ancient, the police call in Dr Ruth Galloway, forensic archaeologist. But this is no prehistoric grave. It seems a cold missing person case has now become a murder investigation. A must-read for all crime fiction fans, particularly readers of Val McDermid and Ann Cleeves. |
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The Catch by T.M. Logan e-book and e-audiobook |
She says he's perfect. I know he's lying . . . |
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The Monogram Murders by Sophie Hannah e-book |
London The new Hercule Poirot novel – another brilliant murder mystery that can only be solved by the eponymous Belgian detective and his ‘little grey cells’. Hercule Poirot's quiet supper in a London coffee house is interrupted when a young woman confides to him that she is about to be murdered. She is terrified, but begs Poirot not to find and punish her killer. Once she is dead, she insists, justice will have been done. Later that night, Poirot learns that three guests at the fashionable Bloxham Hotel have been murdered, a cufflink placed in each one’s mouth. Could there be a connection with the frightened woman? While Poirot struggles to put together the bizarre pieces of the puzzle, the murderer prepares another hotel bedroom for a fourth victim… |
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Darkness Rising by A.A. Dhand e-book (Quick Read) |
Bradford Detective Inspector Harry Virdee has a lot on his plate. His team is facing government cuts, tensions are building between Bradford’s two rival drugs gangs and his wife Saima is due to give birth any day now. So when bodies start turning up in the old industrial district, the pressure is on to get the case wrapped up as quickly as possible, or risk a full-scale gang war. But the man behind the murders is ruthless and pushy. And things are getting personal. Harry must think fast and bend the rules if he wants to keep his city, and his family, safe . . . |
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Case Histories by Kate Atkinson e-book and e-audiobook |
Cambridge Cambridge is sweltering, during an unusually hot summer. To Jackson Brodie, former police inspector turned private investigator, the world consists of one accounting sheet - Lost on the left, Found on the right - and the two never seem to balance. Surrounded by death, intrigue and misfortune, his own life haunted by a family tragedy, Jackson attempts to unravel three disparate case histories and begins to realise that in spite of apparent diversity, everything is connected... |
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A Place of Execution by Val McDermid e-book |
Peak District In the Peak District village of Scardale, thirteen-year-old girls didn’t just run away. So when Alison Carter vanished in the winter of ’63, everyone knew it was a murder. Catherine Heathcote remembers the case well. A child herself when Alison vanished, decades on she still recalls the sense of fear as parents kept their children close, terrified of strangers. Now a journalist, she persuades DI George Bennett to speak of the hunt for Alison, the tantalizing leads and harrowing dead ends. But when a fresh lead emerges, Bennett tries to stop the story – plunging Catherine into a world of buried secrets and revelations. |
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The Sleepwalker by Joseph Knox e-book |
Manchester ‘He said he didn’t remember killing them…’As a series of rolling blackouts plunge the city into darkness, Detective Aidan Waits sits on an abandoned hospital ward, watching a mass murderer slowly die. Transferred from his usual night shift duties and onto protective custody, he has just one job… To extract the location of Martin Wick’s final victim before the notorious mass murderer passes away. Wick has spent over a decade in prison, in near-total silence, having confessed to an unspeakable crime that shocked the nation and earned him the nickname of The Sleepwalker. But when a daring premeditated attack leaves one police officer dead and another one fighting for his life, Wick’s whispered last words will send Waits on a journey into the heart of darkness…Manipulated by a reticent psychopath from his past, and under investigation from his new partner, Detective Constable Naomi Black, Waits realises too late that a remorseless contract killer is at work. Can Aidan Waits solve his last case before fleeing justice? |
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Do Not Disturb by Claire Douglas e-book |
Wales After what happened in London, Kirsty needs a fresh start with her family. But then their first guest arrives. Why has she chosen now to walk back into Kirsty's life? |
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Rain Dogs by Adrian McKinty e-book |
Northern Ireland It's just the same things over and again for Sean Duffy. Riot duty. Heartbreak. Cases he can solve but never get to court. But what detective gets two locked room mysteries in one career? |
Reality bites: sharp edged fiction
| Book cover | Book title and author | Book introduction | Websites for more information |
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The Quiet at the End of the World by Lauren James |
How far would you go to save those you love? Lowrie and Shen are the youngest people on the planet after a virus caused global infertility. Closeted in a pocket of London and doted upon by a small, ageing community, the pair spend their days mudlarking and looking for treasure - until a secret is uncovered that threatens not only their family but humanity's entire existence. Now Lowrie and Shen face an impossible choice: in the quiet at the end of the world, they must decide what to sacrifice to save the whole human race. |
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Meat Market by Juno Dawson |
Jana Novak's history sounds like a classic model cliche: tall and gangly, she's uncomfortable with her androgynous looks until she's unexpectedly scouted and catapulted to superstardom. But the fashion industry is as grimy as it is glamorous. And there are unexpected predators at every turn. Jana is an ordinary girl from a south London estate, lifted to unimaginable heights. But the further you rise, the more devastating your fall. |
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On the Come Up by Angie Thomas |
'On The Come Up' is the second novel from Angie Thomas, number one New York Times bestselling author of 'The Hate U Give'. Here, she returns to the world of Garden Heights in a story about an aspiring teen rapper and what happens when you get everything you thought you wanted. |
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The Burning by Laura Bates |
Fire is like a rumour. You might think you've extinguished it but one creeping, red tendril, one single wisp of smoke is enough to let it leap back into life again. Especially if someone is watching, waiting to fan the flames. New school. Tick. New town. Tick. New surname. Tick. Social media profiles? Erased. There's nothing to trace Anna back to her old life. Nothing to link her to the 'incident'. At least that's what she thinks - until the whispers start up again. As time begins to run out on her secrets, Anna finds herself irresistibly drawn to the tale of Maggie, a local girl accused of witchcraft centuries earlier. A girl whose story has terrifying parallels to Anna's own. |
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The Places I've Cried in Public by Holly Bourne |
Amelie loved Reese. And she thought he loved her. But she's starting to realise love isn't supposed to hurt like this. So now she's retracing their story and untangling what happened by revisiting all the places he made her cry. Because if she works out what went wrong, perhaps she can finally learn to get over him. |
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The Black Flamingo by Dean Atta |
A boy comes to terms with his identity as a mixed-race gay teen - then at university he finds his wings as a drag artist, The Black Flamingo. A bold story about the power of embracing your uniqueness. Sometimes, we need to take charge, to stand up wearing pink feathers - to show ourselves to the world in bold colour. 'I masquerade in makeup and feathers and I am applauded.' |
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Patron Saints of Nothing by Randy Ribay |
When Jay Reguero hears of his cousin Jun’s death, everything changes. Although years have passed since they were last in contact, the stories about Jun just don’t fit with the boy Jay knew. Hoping to uncover the truth, Jay travels to Jun’s home in the Philippines - but the shocking realities of life there lead to even more questions. Can Jay find the answers he seeks? |
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Two Can Keep a Secret by Karen M. McManus |
Ellery's never been to Echo Ridge, but she's heard all about it. It's where her aunt went missing at age sixteen, never to return. Where a Homecoming Queen's murder five years ago made national news. And where Ellery now has to live with a grandmother she barely knows, after her failed-actress mother lands in rehab. No one knows what happened to either girl, and Ellery's family is still haunted by their loss. Malcolm grew up in the shadow of the Homecoming Queen's death. His older brother was the prime suspect and left Echo Ridge in disgrace. His mother's remarriage vaulted her and Malcolm into Echo Ridge's upper crust, but their new status grows shaky when mysterious threats around town hint that a killer plans to strike again. No one has forgotten Malcolm's brother - and nobody trusts him when he suddenly returns to town. |
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Bearmouth by Liz Hyder |
Newt has been working in Bearmouth mine from a very young age. There is a routine and acceptance to all that happens - that is, until Devlin arrives. Newt fears any unrest will bring heightened oppression from the Master and his overseers, and simply isn't prepared for any more hardship. Life is hard enough, and there isn't any choice about that. Or is there? |
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Yes No Maybe So by Becky Albertalli and Aisha Saeed |
Jamie Goldberg is cool with volunteering for his local state candidate - as long as he’s behind the scenes. There’s no way he’d ever knock on doors to ask people for their votes, until he meets Maya. Maya Rehman’s having the worst Ramadan ever. Her best friend is too busy to hang out, her summer trip is cancelled, her parents are separating and now her mother thinks the solution to her problems is political canvassing - with some awkward guy she hardly knows ... Going door to door isn’t exactly glamorous, but maybe it’s not the worst thing in the world. After all, the polls are getting closer - and so are Maya and Jamie. Mastering local activism is one thing. Navigating the cross-cultural crush of the century is another thing entirely. |
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Eight Pieces of Silva by Patrice Lawrence |
Becks is into girls but didn't come out because she was never in. She lives with her mum, stepdad and 18-year-old Silva, her stepdad's daughter. Becks and Silva are opposites, but bond over their mutual obsession with K-pop. When Becks' mum and stepdad go on honeymoon to Japan, Becks and Silva are left alone. Except, Silva disappears. Becks ventures into the forbidden territory of Silva's room and finds the first of eight clues that help her discover her sister's secret life. Meanwhile, Silva is on a journey. A journey to make someone love her. He says he doesn't, but he's just joking. All she has to do is persuade him otherwise. |
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Noughts + Crosses by Malorie Blackman |
Sephy is a Cross: dark-skinned and beautiful, she lives a life of privilege and power. But she's lonely, and burns with injustice at the world she sees around her. Callum is a nought: pale-skinned and poor, he's considered to be less than nothing - a blanker, there to serve Crosses - but he dreams of a better life. They've been friends since they were children, and they both know that's as far as it can ever go. Noughts and Crosses are fated to be bitter enemies - love is out of the question. Then - in spite of a world that is fiercely against them - these star-crossed lovers choose each other. But this is love story that will lead both of them into terrible danger - and which will have shocking repercussions for generations to come. |
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Wonder by R.J. Palacio |
My name is August. I won't describe what I look like. Whatever you're thinking, it's probably worse.' Auggie wants to be an ordinary 10-year-old. He does ordinary things - eating ice cream, playing on his Xbox. He feels ordinary - inside. But ordinary kids don't make other ordinary kids run away screaming in playgrounds. Ordinary kids aren't stared at wherever they go. Born with a terrible facial abnormality, Auggie has been home-schooled by his parents his whole life. Now, for the first time, he's being sent to a real school. All he wants is to be accepted. But can he convince his new classmates that he's just like them, underneath it all? |
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Windrush day
| Book cover | Book title and author | Book introduction | Websites for more information |
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The Windrush Betrayal by Amelia Gentleman |
Paulette Wilson had always assumed she was British. She had spent most of her life in London working as a cook; she even worked in the House of Commons' canteen. How could someone who had lived in England since being a primary school pupil suddenly be classified as an illegal immigrant? It was only through Amelia Gentleman's tenacious investigative and campaigning journalism that it emerged that thousands were in Paulette's position. What united them was that they had all arrived in the UK from the Commonwealth as children in the 1950s and 1960s. In 'The Windrush Betrayal', Gentleman tells the story of the scandal and exposes deeply disturbing truths about modern Britain. |
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Homecoming by Colin Grant |
When Colin Grant was growing up in Luton in the 1960s, he learned not to ask his Jamaican parents why they had emigrated to Britain. 'We're here because we're here', his father would say, 'You have some place else to go?'. But now, seventy years after the arrival of ships such as the Windrush, this generation of pioneers are ready to tell their stories. 'Homecoming' draws on over a hundred first-hand interviews, archival recordings and memoirs by the women and men who came to Britain from the West Indies between the late 1940s and the early 1960s. |
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Familiar Stranger by Stuart Hall |
Stuart Hall grew up in a middle-class family in 1930s Jamaica, still then a British colony. He found himself caught between two worlds: the stiflingly respectable middle class in Kingston, who, in their habits and ambitions, measured themselves against the white planter elite; and working-class and peasant Jamaica, neglected and grindingly poor, though rich in culture, music and history. But as colonial rule was challenged, things began to change in Kingston and across the world. When, in 1951, a scholarship took him across the Atlantic to Oxford University, Hall encountered other Caribbean writers and thinkers, from Sam Selvon and George Lamming to V.S. Naipaul. He also forged friendships with the likes of Raymond Williams and E.P. Thompson, with whom he worked in the formidable political movement, the New Left. |
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Windrush Songs by James Berry |
Contains poems which aim to give voice to the people who came on the first ships from the Caribbean, whose journeys held strange echoes of earlier sea voyages which brought ancestors from Africa to the slave plantations. This book explores different reasons his fellow travellers had for leaving the Caribbean when they rushed to get on the boat. |
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This Lovely City by Louise Hare |
The drinks are flowing. The music is playing. But the party can't last. With the Blitz over and London reeling from war, jazz musician Lawrie Matthews has answered England's call for help. Fresh off the Empire Windrush, he's taken a tiny room in south London lodgings, and has fallen in love with the girl next door. Touring Soho's music halls by night, pacing the streets as a postman by day, Lawrie has poured his heart into his new home - and it's alive with possibility. Until, one morning, he makes a terrible discovery. As the local community rallies, fingers of blame are pointed at those who had recently been welcomed with open arms. And, before long, the newest arrivals become the prime suspects in a tragedy which threatens to tear the city apart. |
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Small Island by Andrea Levy |
Returning to England after the war Gilbert Joseph is treated very differently now that he is no longer in an RAF uniform. Joined by his wife Hortense, he rekindles a friendship with Queenie who takes in Jamaican lodgers. Can their dreams of a better life in England overcome the prejudice they face? |
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The Lonely Londoners by Sam Selvon |
At Waterloo Station, hopeful new arrivals from the West Indies step off the boat train, ready to start afresh in 1950s London. There, homesick Moses Aloetta, who has already lived in the city for years, meets Henry 'Sir Galahad' Oliver and shows him the ropes. In this strange, cold and foggy city where the natives can be less than friendly at the sight of a black face, has Galahad met his Waterloo? But the irrepressible newcomer cannot be cast down. He and all the other lonely new Londoners - from shiftless Cap to Tolroy, whose family has descended on him from Jamaica - must try to create a new life for themselves. As pessimistic 'old veteran' Moses watches their attempts, they gradually learn to survive and come to love the heady excitements of London. |
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Voices of the Windrush Generation by David Matthews |
With over 20 first-hand accounts from men, women, and children of Windrush, this work sheds light on the true impact of one of the most disastrous and damaging scandals in recent memory, and gives a platform to those most affected - those whose voices have yet to be truly heard. Their stories provide intimate, personal and moving perspective on what it means to be black in Britain today, and the heartache the 'hostile environment policy' our government has created has meant for those who have called this country home for half a century and more. |
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Mother Country edited by Charlie Brinkhurst-Cuff |
Britain was known as the Mother Country: a home away from home; a place that you would be welcomed with open arms; a land where you were free to build a new life. 70 years on, this remarkable book explores the reality of the Windrush experience. It is an honest, eye-opening, funny, moving and ultimately inspiring celebration of the lives of both ordinary and extraordinary people. |
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Books that help children stay safe, calm, connected and hopeful
Tell us what you think of the books on this list and suggest great books you would like to share: contact us libraries247@coventry.gov.uk [mailto:libraries247@coventry.gov.uk]
Why We Stay Home [https://www.coventry.gov.uk/downloads/file/34539/why_we_stay_home] by Samantha Harris and Devon Scott
Staying Home [https://www.coventry.gov.uk/downloads/file/34540/staying_home] by Sally Nicholls and Viviane Schwarz
My Hero is You [https://www.coventry.gov.uk/downloads/file/34541/my_hero_is_you] by Helen Patuck
Coronavirus [https://www.coventry.gov.uk/downloads/file/34542/coronavirus] by Elizabeth Jenner, Kate Wilson and Nia Roberts
Beating the Virus [https://www.coventry.gov.uk/downloads/file/34543/beating_the_virus] illustrated by Lucy Bergonzi
Welsh stories
| Book cover | Book title and author | Book introduction | Websites for more information |
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Broken Ghost by Niall Griffiths |
A Welsh community is drawn together and blown apart by a strange vision in the mountains: the huge spectre of a woman floating over a ridge. The people who live here in these mountains already have their own demons - drink, drugs, domestic violence, psychoses - but each character has a different experience of this strange apparition, a different reaction, and for some it will change everything. Is it a collective hallucination? A meteorological phenomenon? Whatever it is, they all saw something, early one morning on the shores of a mountain lake, something that will awaken in them powers and passions and, perhaps, a possibility of healing these broken people in a broken country. |
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Never Greener by Ruth Jones |
Available in e-book Ruth Jones makes her debut with a witty and wise story of life's second chances and the dangers of taking them. With her trademark warmth, humanity and heart, she shows us the dangers of looking for something better, and forgetting that the best might not be in our past or yet to come - but right where we are now. |
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The Infinite by Patience Agbabi |
Available in e-audiobook We fight crime across time. Leaplings, children born on the 29th of February, are very rare. Rarer still are Leaplings with The Gift - the ability to leap through time. Elle has The Gift, but she's never used it. Until now. On her 12th birthday, Elle and her best friend Big Ben travel to the Time Squad Centre in 2048. Elle has received a mysterious warning from the future. Other Leaplings are disappearing in time - and not everyone at the centre can be trusted. Soon Elle's adventure becomes more than a race through time. It's a race against time. She must fight to save the world as she knows it - before it ceases to exist. |
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The Paying Guests by Sarah Waters |
There came the splash of water and the rub of heels as Mrs Barber stepped into the tub. After that there was a silence, broken only by the occasional echoey plink of drips from the tap. Frances had been picturing her lodgers in purely mercenary terms - as something like two great waddling shillings. But this, she thought, was what it really meant to have paying guests: this odd, unintimate proximity, this rather peeled-back moment, where the only thing between herself and a naked Mrs Barber was a few feet of kitchen and a thin scullery door. An image sprang into her head: that round flesh, crimsoning in the heat. |
An interview with Sarah Waters, author of The Paying Guests [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gduzWfGxnE] |
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The Welsh Girl by Peter Ho Davies |
This novel traces a perilous wartime romance as it explores the bonds of love and duty that hold us to family, country, and ultimately, our fellow man. |
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Thinking Again by Jan Morris |
Available in e-book Necrophilia is not one of my failings, but I do like graveyards and memorial stones and such... Following the publication In My Mind's Eye, her acclaimed first volume of diaries, a Radio 4 Book of the Week in 2018, Jan Morris continued to write her daily musings. From her home in the North West of Wales, the author of classics such as Venice and Trieste cast her eye over modern life in all its stupidity and glory. From her daily thousand paces to the ongoing troubles of Brexit, from her enduring love for America to the wonders of the natural world, and from the vagaries and ailments of old age to the beauty of youth, she once again displays her determined belief in embracing life and creativity - all kindness and marmalade. |
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Last Tango in Aberystwyth by Malcolm Pryce |
Available in e-book To Dean Morgan who taught at the Faculty of Undertaking, it was just a place to get course materials. But both worlds collide when the Dean checks into the notorious bed and breakfast ghetto and mistakenly receives a suitcase intended for a ruthless druid assassin. Soon he is running for his life, lost in a dark labyrinth of druid speakeasies and toffee apple dens, where every spinning wheel tells the story of a broken heart, and where the Dean's own heart is hopelessly in thrall to a porn star known as Judy Juice. |
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Resistance by Owen Sheers |
In an imagined alternative 1944, Sarah Lewis, a 26-year-old farmer's wife, wakes to find her husband has gone. She is not alone, as all the other women in the Welsh border valley of Olchon wake to discover their husbands have also disappeared. |
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The Man from St Petersburg by Ken Follett |
Available in e-book and e-audiobook The Man From St Petersburg is a dark tale of family secrets and political consequences. Ken Follett's masterful storytelling brings to life the danger of a world on the brink of war. It is just before the outbreak of World War I and Britain must enlist the aid of Russia. Czar Nicholas's nephew is to visit London for secret naval talks with Lord Walden, who has lived in Russia and has a Russian wife, Lydia. But there are other people who are interested in the arrival of Prince Alexei: the Waldens' only daughter, Charlotte - willful, idealistic, and with an awakening social conscience; Basil Thompson, head of the Special Branch; and, above all, Feliks Kschessinky, the ruthless Russian anarchist. No one could have foretold that Lydia should recognize Feliks, or that she might put her own daughter's life at risk for his sake. As the secret negotiations progress, the destinies of these characters become ineluctably enmeshed. And as Europe prepares for the catastrophe of war, the final private tragedy which will shatter the complacency of the Waldens is acted out. |
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According to YES by Dawn French |
The Foreign Land of the Very Wealthy - otherwise known as Manhattan's Upper East Side - has its own rigid code of behaviour. So when an unconventional thirty-eight-year-old primary school teacher from England bounces into their inflexible lives with a secret sorrow and a heart as big as the city, nobody realises she hasn't read the rule book. And for the Wilder-Bingham family, whose lives begin to unravel thread by thread, the consequences are explosive. |
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Do Not Disturb by Claire Douglas |
Could your dream home be your worst nightmare? After what happened in London, Kirsty needs a fresh start with her family. And running a guesthouse in the Welsh mountains sounds idyllic. But then their first guest arrives. Selena is the last person Kirsty wants to see. It's seventeen years since she tore everything apart. Why has she chosen now to walk back into Kirsty's life? Is Selena running from something too? Or is there an even darker reason for her visit? Because Kirsty knows that once you invite trouble into your home, it can be murder getting rid of it. |
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Twelve of the best books set in Wales [https://www.panmacmillan.com/blogs/literary/books-in-wales-cymru-poetry-landscape].
Feel good books celebrating resilient women
| Book cover | Book title and author | Book introduction | Websites for more information |
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Feminists Don’t Wear Pink and Other Lies by Scarlett Curtis |
A collection of writing from extraordinary women, from Hollywood actresses to teenage activists, each telling the story of their personal relationship with feminism, this book explores what it means to be a woman from every point of view. Often funny, sometimes surprising, and always inspiring, this book aims to bridge the gap between the feminist hashtag and the scholarly text by giving women the space to explain how they actually feel about feminism. This book contains strong language and some adult content. |
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The Truths we Hold: an American Journey by Kamala Harris |
From Vice President Kamala Harris, one of America's most inspiring political leaders, a book about the core truths that unite us, and the long struggle to discern what those truths are and how best to act upon them, in her own life and across the life of our country. |
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Women and Leadership by Julia Gillard and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala |
Women make up less than 10 per cent of national leaders, and behind this lies a pattern of unequal access to power. In conversation with some of the world's most powerful and interesting women, Women and Leadership explores gender bias and asks why there aren't more women in leadership roles? Using current research as a starting point, Gillard and Okonjo-Iweala form questions and hypotheses, then test them on the lived experiences of women leaders such as Jacinda Ardern, Hillary Clinton, Christine Lagarde, Michelle Bachelet and Theresa May. |
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Dr Wangari Maathai Plants a Forest: Rebel Girls |
From the world of Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls comes a historical novel based on the life of Dr. Wangari Maathai, the Nobel Peace Prize-winning activist and environmentalist from Kenya. Then Wangari grows up and goes away to school, and things start changing at home. Farmers chop down the trees. Landslides bury the stream. The soil becomes overworked and dry, and nothing will grow. People go hungry. After all her studies, Dr. Wangari Maathai realizes there is a simple solution to these problems: plant a forest full of trees. |
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The Book of Awesome Women by Becca Anderson |
Rebels, trailblazers, and visionaries who shaped our history...and our future! |
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Skint Estate: notes from the poverty line by Cash Carraway |
Cash Carraway is a single mum living in temporary accommodation. She's been moved around the system since she left home at 16. She's also been called a stain on society. And she's caught in a poverty trap. 'Skint Estate' is the hard-hitting debut memoir about impoverishment, loneliness and violence - set against a grim landscape of sink estates, police cells, refuges and peepshows. Told frankly, but with a swaggerous eye roll and a smirk, Cash delves into the reality of family estrangement, mental illness, alcoholism and domestic violence in working-class Britain today. |
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Somebody I Used to Know by Wendy Mitchell |
In this phenomenal memoir - the first of its kind - Wendy grapples with questions most of us have never had to consider. What do you value when loss of memory reframes what you have, how you have lived and what you stand to lose? What happens when you can no longer recognise your own daughters or even, on the foggiest of days, yourself? Philosophical, intensely personal and ultimately hopeful, "Somebody I Used to Know" gets to the very heart of what it means to be human. It is both a heartrending tribute to the woman Wendy used to be and a brave affirmation of the woman dementia has seen her become. |
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Call me Red: a Shepherd’s Journey by Hannah Jackson |
In this uplifting and inspirational memoir, Hannah shares how she broke the stereotypes of her 'townie' beginnings, took risks and faced up to the challenges of being a young woman in a male-dominated industry, and followed her heart to become the Red Shepherdess. But behind the beautiful landscape, talented sheepdogs and eye-catching red hair was a steep learning curve. The physically and mentally demanding conditions she faced as she chased her dreams to build her own Cumbrian farm taught Hannah the values that hold true, including community, leadership, patience and resilience. | None |
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On This Day She: putting women back in history, one day at a time by Tania Hershman, Ailsa Holland, and Jo Bell |
From Beyoncé to Doria Shafik, Queen Elizabeth I to Lillian Bilocca, On This Day She sets out to redress this imbalance and give voice to both those already deemed female icons, alongside others whom the history books have failed to include: the good, the bad and everything in between - this is a record of human existence at its most authentic. |
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Fears to Fierce by Brita Fernandez Schmidt |
Brita Fernandez Schmidt has spent 25 years championing women's rights across the world, nurturing her own fierce and inspiring others to do the same. Through a combination of guidance, storytelling and practical tools, her rallying call in Fears to Fierce will inspire you to realise your purpose and potential, ignite your fierce and create the life you have been dreaming of. |
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She Speaks: women speeches that changed the world from Pankhurst to Thunberg – Yvette Cooper |
Looking at lists of the greatest speeches of all time, you might think that powerful oratory is the preserve of men. But the truth is very different - countless brave and bold women have used their voices to inspire change, transform lives and radically alter history. |
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Wuhan Diary: dispatches from a quarantined city by Fang Fang |
A fascinating eyewitness account of events as they unfold, Wuhan Diary captures the challenges of daily life and the changing moods and emotions of being quarantined without reliable information. Fang Fang finds solace in small domestic comforts and is inspired by the courage of friends, health professionals and volunteers, as well as the resilience and perseverance of Wuhan's nine million residents.
But, by claiming the writer´s duty to record she also speaks out against social injustice, abuse of power, and other problems which impeded the response to the epidemic and gets herself embroiled in online controversies because of it. |
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How to be a Heroine by Samantha Ellis |
On a pilgrimage to 'Wuthering Heights' with her best friend, Samantha Ellis found herself arguing about which heroine she liked best: Jane Eyre or Cathy Earnshaw. She was all for wild, free, passionate Cathy, but her friend found Cathy, a snob who betrays Heathcliff for Edgar - while Jane makes her own way. And that's when she realised that she'd been trying to be Cathy when she should have been trying to be Jane. So, she decided to look again at all the heroines she'd loved through her life, from her earliest obsessions with the Little Mermaid and Anne of Green Gables; and then on to Scarlett O'Hara, Sylvia Plath, the Dolls (of the Valley); and later Riders, Buffy, Flora Poste from 'Cold Comfort Farm' and many, many more. |
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Irish stories and Irish authors
| Book cover | Book title and author | Book introduction | Websites for more information |
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The Green Road by Anne Enright | The children of Rosaleen Madigan leave the west of Ireland for lives they never could have imagined in Dublin, New York and various third-world towns. In her early old age their difficult, wonderful mother announces that she's decided to sell the house and divide the proceeds. Her adult children come back for one last Christmas, with the feeling that their childhoods are being erased, their personal history bought and sold. |
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Don’t Touch my Hair by Emma Dabiri |
Available in e-book and e-audiobook
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Rory and Ita by Roddy Doyle |
Available in e-book
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The Pull of the Stars by Emma Donoghue |
Available in e-book
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Dracula by Bram Stoker |
Available in e-audiobook
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Normal People by Sally Rooney |
Available in e-book
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Brooklyn by Colm Toibin | In a small town in the south-east of Ireland in the 1950s, Eilis Lacey is among many of her generation who cannot find work at home. So when she is offered a job in America, she leaves her family to start a new life in Brooklyn. | |
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Postscript by Cecelia Ahern |
Available in e-book
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A Week in Winter by Maeve Binchy |
Available in e-audiobook
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The Wych Elm by Tana French |
Available in e-book
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The Heart’s Invisible Furies by John Boyne |
Cyril Avery is not a real Avery - or at least that's what his adoptive parents tell him. And he never will be. But if he isn't a real Avery, then who is he? Born out of wedlock to a teenage girl |
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Our Little Cruelties by Liz Nugent |
Available in e-book
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Books about England and the English
All the books are available to read for free online [http://www.coventry.gov.uk/ebooks] and in libraries [http://www.coventry.gov.uk/librarycatalogue].
Tell us what you think of the books on this list and suggest great books you would like to share: contact us libraries247@coventry.gov.uk [mailto:libraries247@coventry.gov.uk]
| Book Cover | Book Title and Author | Book Introduction | Websites for More Information |
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This Green and Pleasant Land by Ayisha Malik |
Available in e-book and e-audiobook Accountant Bilal Hasham and his journalist wife Mariam plod along contentedly in the sleepy, chocolate box English village they've lived in for ten years. Then Bilal is summoned to his mother's bedside in Birmingham. Mrs Sakeena Hasham knows she is not long for this world. She has a final request. Instead of whispering her prayers in her dying moments, she instructs her son: you must go home to your village, and you must build a Mosque. Mariam is horrified. The villagers are outraged. How can a grieving Bilal choose between honouring his beloved mum's last wish and preserving everything held dear in the village he calls home? But it turns out home means different things to different people. |
Ayisha talks about the book [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSB2T4FpnqA] |
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The Time Travellers Guide to Elizabethan England by Ian Mortimer |
We think of Queen Elizabeth I as 'Gloriana': the most powerful English woman in history. But what was it actually like to live in Elizabethan England? If you could travel to the past and walk the streets of London in the 1590s, where would you stay? What would you eat? What would you wear? |
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Who Owns England? by Guy Shrubsole |
Available in e-audiobook Who owns England? Behind this simple question lies this country's oldest and darkest secret. This is the history of how England's elite came to own our land - from aristocrats and the church to businessmen and corporations - and an inspiring manifesto for how we can take control back. |
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Middlemarch by George Eliot |
Available in e-book and e-audiobook Dorothea is bright, beautiful and rebellious. Lydgate is the ambitious new doctor in town. Both of them long to make a positive difference in the world. But their stories do not proceed as expected and both they, and the other inhabitants of Middlemarch, must struggle to reconcile themselves to their fates and find their places in the world. Middlemarch contains all of life: the rich and the poor, the conventional and the radical, literature and science, politics and romance, but above all it gives us a vision of what lies within the human heart, the roar on the other side of silence. |
George Eliot Fellowship [https://www.georgeeliot.org/] |
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Adventures on the High Teas by Stuart Maconie |
Everyone talks about Middle England. Sometimes they mean something bad and sometimes they mean something good. But just where and what is Middle England? Stuart Maconie didn't know either, so he packed his Thermos and sandwiches and set off to find out. |
Stuart Maconie reads from his book [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwPNU4Z2IuA] |
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Three Great English Victories by Bernard Cornwell |
Available in e-book Harlequin 1342. The English, led by Edward III, are laying waste to the French countryside. The archers, the common men, are England’s secret weapon. The French know them as Harlequins. Thomas Hookton is one of these archers. But he is also on a personal mission: to avenge his father’s death and retrieve a stolen relic. Thomas begins a quest that will lead him to finally where the two armies face each other at Crecy. 1356 The Hundred Years War rages on and the bloodiest battles are yet to be fought. Across France, towns stand alert to danger. The English army is invading again and the French are hunting them down. Thomas of Hookton, an English archer, is under orders to seek out a lost sword, said to grant certain victory. As the outnumbered English army becomes trapped near the town of Poitiers, Thomas, his men and his sworn enemies will meet in one great and bloody battle. Azincourt Azincourt, fought on 25 October 1415, on St Crispin's Day, is one of the best known battles of all time. This is the breathtaking story of this momentous battle and its aftermath. From the varying viewpoints of nobles, peasants, archers, and horsemen, Azincourt skilfully brings to life the hours of relentless fighting, the desperation of an army crippled by disease and the exceptional bravery of the English soldiers. |
Bernard Cornwell website [http://www.bernardcornwell.net/] |
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Refugee Boy by Benjamin Zephaniah |
Available in e-book Life is not safe for Alem. His father is Ethiopian, his mother Eritrean. Their countries are at war, and Alem is welcome in neither place. |
The Guardian book review [https://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-site/2015/nov/23/refugee-boy-benjamin-zephaniah-review] |
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The Grim Smile of the Five Towns by Arnold Bennett |
Available in e-book British author Arnold Bennett returns to his native stomping grounds -- the Potteries district of England's West Midlands region -- with this collection of insightful, darkly witty stories about the denizens of the fictionalized "Five Towns." From love gone wrong to mischief and misadventure, these sharply drawn tales run the gamut. |
Arnold Bennett society [https://www.arnoldbennettsociety.org.uk/] |
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Middle England by Jonathan Coe |
Available in e-audiobook Set in the Midlands and London over the last eight years, Jonathan Coe follows a brilliantly vivid cast of characters through a time of immense change and disruption in Britain. There are the early married years of Sophie and Ian who disagree about the future of Britain and, possibly, the future of their relationship; Sophie's grandfather whose final act is to send a postal vote for the European referendum; Doug, the political commentator, whose young daughter despairs of his lack of political nous and Doug's Remaining Tory politician partner who is savaged by the crazed trolls of Twitter. And within all these lives is the story of England itself: a story of nostalgia and irony; of friendship and rage, humour and intense bewilderment. |
Jonathan Coe talks about his book [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hMN1tsMy9xI] |
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The Five by Hallie Rubenhold |
Available in e-book and e-audiobook Polly, Annie, Elizabeth, Catherine and Mary-Jane are famous for the same thing, though they never met. They came from Fleet Street, Knightsbridge, Wolverhampton, Sweden and Wales. They wrote ballads, ran coffee houses, lived on country estates, they breathed ink-dust from printing presses and escaped people-traffickers. |
Hallie tells us about her book [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-IAn0rLqKQ] Review by the Guardian [https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/feb/13/the-five-by-hallie-rubenhold-review-the-untold-lives-of-the-rippers-victims] |
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Mother Tongue by Bill Bryson |
Available in e-book With dazzling wit and astonishing insight, Bill Bryson—the acclaimed author of The Lost Continent—brilliantly explores the remarkable history, eccentricities, resilience and sheer fun of the English language. From the first descent of the larynx into the throat (why you can talk but your dog can't), to the fine lost art of swearing, Bryson tells the fascinating, often uproarious story of an inadequate, second-rate tongue of peasants that developed into one of the world's largest growth industries. |
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British Science Week
Join us in celebrating British Science Week
Get involved at www.britishscienceweek.org [http://www.britishscienceweek.org]
This year’s theme is Growth
All the books are available to read for free online [http://www.coventry.gov.uk/ebooks] and in libraries [http://www.coventry.gov.uk/librarycatalogue].
Tell us what you think of the books on this list and suggest great books you would like to share: contact us libraries247@coventry.gov.uk [mailto:libraries247@coventry.gov.uk]
Check out these great titles
Adult booklist
- A Life on Our Planet by David Attenborough
- Human Universe by Brian Cox and Andrew Cohen
- Storm in a Teacup: The Physics of Everyday Life by Dr Helen Czerski
- Vaxxers by Sarah Gilbert
- Heart: A History by Sandeep Jauhar
- The Gene by Siddhartha Mukherjee
- What if?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions by Randall Munroe
- To Be a Machine by Mark O’Connell
- Superior: The Return of Race Science by Angela Saini
- Headstrong by Rachel Swaby
Children's booklist
- Agents of the Wild series of books by Jennifer Bell and Alice V Lickens
- Once Upon a Star: a Poetic Journey Through Space by James Carter
- Grow: Secrets of Our DNA by Nicola Davies
- Agent Asha: Mission Shark Bytes by Sophie Deen
- Space Oddity by Christopher Edge
- The Plesiosaur’s Neck by Jonathan Emmett and Dr Adam Smith
- Lightning Mary by Anthea Simmons
- Nano: the Spectacular Science of the Very (Very) Small by Jess Wade
Green book list for children and young adults
| Book cover | Book title and author | Book introduction | Websites for more information |
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Last Tree in the City by Peter Carnavas |
For ages 3+ Edward's city is a place of concrete and cars, a world without colour. Every day, Edward takes himself to a part of the city that is not like the city at all - the last tree in the city. He is happy there, until one day, the tree is gone. Edward (and his duck) eventually figure out a unique way to make the city more beautiful than it ever was before. |
Listen to the story [https://youtu.be/FsP12TaNxXY]. |
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Cyril the Lonely Cloud by Tim Hopgood |
For ages 3+ This beautiful and poignant story of a cloud called Cyril conveys positive messages about the life and colour that water brings to our world. |
Watch Tim drawing Frankie from one of his other stories [https://youtu.be/xOGPB1rzX90]. |
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The Wonders of Nature by Ben Hoare, Angela Rizza and Daniel Long |
For ages 7+ This compendium of amazing animals, plants, rocks and minerals, and microorganisms will wow children and many adults, too. With 100 remarkable items from the natural world, from orchids to opals and lichens to lizards, everyone will find something to be captivated by. |
Find out more about illustrator Angela Rizza in her studio [https://youtu.be/yifI0KQSp4w]. |
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Hope Jones Saves the World by Josh Lacey |
For ages 7+ Hope Jones' New Year's resolution is to give up plastic, and she's inspiring others to do the same with her website hopejonessavestheworld.com. When she realises her local supermarket seems to stock more unnecessary plastic than food, she makes it her mission to do something about it. She may be just one ten-year-old with a homemade banner, but with enough determination, maybe Hope Jones really can save the world. |
Listen to Josh read from one of his other Hope Jones books [https://youtu.be/sER6DR-IwuM]. |
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Greta’s Story by Valentina Camerini |
For ages 9+ Greta Thunberg is the Swedish schoolgirl who dared to stand up to global inaction on climate change. What began as one girl's personal plea for environmental responsibility has now become a worldwide movement, with millions of followers also demanding changes to the ways in which we exploit our planet's natural resources. This book shares Greta's life-affirming story, showing how we can all join her and help to change the world. |
Find out more about how Greta became famous [https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/47467038]. |
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October, October by Katya Balen | .
For ages 9+ October and her dad live in the woods. They know the trees and the rocks and the lake and stars like best friends. They live in the woods and they are wild. And that's the way it is. Until the year October turns eleven. That's the year October rescues a baby owl. It's the year Dad falls out of the biggest tree in their woods. The year the woman who calls herself October's mother comes back. The year everything changes. This book is a feast for the senses, filled with the woodsmoke smell of crisp autumn mornings and the sound of wellies squelching in river mud. And, as October fights to find the space to be wild in the whirling chaos of the world beyond the woods, it is also a feast for the soul. |
Hear Katya talk about her books [https://youtu.be/nzk_LIxemOs]. |
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Green Rising by Lauren James |
For young adults Gabrielle is a climate-change activist who shoots to fame when she becomes the first teenager to display a supernatural ability to grow plants from her skin. Hester is the millionaire daughter of an oil tycoon and the face of the family business. Theo comes from a long line of fishermen, but his parents are struggling to make ends meet. On the face of it, the three have very little in common. Yet when Hester and Theo join Gabrielle and legions of other teenagers around the world in developing the strange new 'Greenfingers' power, it becomes clear that to use their ability for good, they'll need to learn to work together. |
See Lauren talk about Green Rising [https://youtu.be/JZrx9YpguxU]. |