If you're new here, why not subscribe to our email updates or follow us on Facebook? You can also add us to your Google Reader. Thanks for visiting! I picked up Susan Hills'A Change for the Better from the shelves of the Little Library, a literary free-for-all thanks to which Ive stumbled across all manner of elderly, fusty little books. The sorts...

I purchased Lydia Millets'My Happy Life'some years ago on the strength of her book'Oh Pure and Radiant Heart, which I remember being a tremendous read. I wonder now whether Id feel the same way upon embarking on a re-read, as Im deeply ambivalent about'My Happy Life,'a book thats so painfully, mawkishly self-conscious that...

(Contains spoilers, but the narrative of this book is circular, so its difficult to discuss without them) And the frontier in here? the North American had asked, tapping her forehead. And the frontier in here? General Arroyo had responded, touching his heart. Theres one frontier we only dare to cross at...

Upon the hill above the kirk at moon rise she did stand To tend her sheep that Samhain eve, with rowan staff in hand. And where shes been and what shes seen, no living soul may know And when shes come back home, she will be changed oh! I picked up Sharyn McCrumbs'The Songcatcher'several years ago when on holiday in...

There are many kinds of bad novels. There are those that are simply bad for me, those that are deliciously terrible, and those that are merely dull and purposeless, warranting a why bother? response. But perhaps the very worst of these is the novel that is disappointing, the novel that has that potential to be so brilliant, but simply is not. Anne...

We hover on the edge of what used to be said, caught up, as we used to be caught in the histories we made up for Rosina and Mandy. They were always changing. That was the best thing about the dolls. If the storyline didnt work out, we could always erase their pasts Increasingly as a reader Im drawn to unreliable narrators and...