Let me begin by saying that the cover of this novel is perfect. Juliet, with her eyes closed: she could be anywhere, but in assembling an understanding of the world around her, images from her time in Nicaragua serve as a foundation. And the vivid imagery: the combination of photographs
It's legendary now, that Madeleine L'Engle's classic novel was rejected by numerous publishers and eventually even its agent handed the book back to its author. It was "too different", different because it credited young readers with being able to grapple with the concept of evil, and because it
Nathacha Appanah's The Last Brother Translator Geoffrey Strachan (French) Graywolf Press, 2011 A Graywolf Press publication, a contender for The Tournament of Books, with a gorgeous and haunting cover image: all excellent reasons for picking up a copy of The Last Brother without reading a single word. And then you meet
We want that "paradoxical search for familiarity combined with strangeness; want more of the same – but with a difference," says Victor Watson in Reading Series Fiction. Watson's book considers series written for children, but it still applies, doesn't it? There's nothing like reading a series. Robert Kirkman's The Walking
Striking cover, no? Alice Sebold's novel was longlisted for the Orange Prize in 2003, the year that Valerie Martin's Property won the prize. A friend of mine was so excited about The Lovely Bones, that she bought it as soon as it was available in paperback, and I've
