The Gilmore Girls’ revival – we’ve all been waiting for it, wanting to revisit Stars Hollow, hang out with our favourite characters (Emily and Paris, for what it’s worth), see who Rory ends up (#TeamJess). Well, I’m here to tell you the wait was not worth it. Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life – made…
Category: Review
Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction 2016 shortlist reviews
The Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction 2016 is awarded this week. Here’s my take on the shortlist. Ruby by Cynthia Bond Synopsis: In small-town Liberty, Ephram Jennings still holds a candle for Ruby Bell, who has returned to home to the demons she has been trying to rid herself of for years. Review: Ruby is…
Book review: Eligible by Curtis Sittenfeld
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a brilliant story told once needs to be retold for a modern audience, and so it is with Jane Austen’s classic Pride and Prejudice, which has been retold by Curtis Sittenfeld as part of The Borough Press’ Austen Project. Moving the action to modern day Cincinnatta, we join…
Book review: Rush Oh! by Shirley Barrett
How entertaining can a novel about a whaling family in a tiny community in Australia be? The answer, I was pleasantly surprised to learn while reading Shirley Barrett’s debut Rush Oh! is very. Mary Davidson, the oldest daughter in a whaling family in New South Wales, chronicles the difficult whaling season of 1908. Drama, misadventure…
Book review: Not Working by Lisa Owens
Many people spend the majority of their waking time working, so you want a job where you’re happy, and challenged, and where you feel like you’re making a difference. But what if your work just isn’t living up to expectations? (If my boss is reading this, I love my job, we’re not talking about me…
Book review: The Unexpected Inheritance of Inspector Chopra by Vaseem Khan
On the day he retires two things happen to Inspector Chopra. The first is that a young man is found dead, his death dismissed as an accident by Chopra’s colleague. The second is a little more unusual – Chopra gets home to find he has inherited a baby elephant from his uncle. And so begins…
Book review: Sofia Khan is Not Obliged by Ayisha Malik
Sofia Khan has had it with men. She thought she’d found the one, but it turned out he wanted her to move in with his parents (sort of, next door but with a hole connecting the two houses) after they got married, so now Sofia has given up. Or she thinks she has – when…
Book review: All the Rage by Courtney Summers
I have struggled and struggled with this review – I started writing it weeks and weeks ago (months actually) and I’ve written and rewritten paragraphs, deleted sentences and whole sections, and given up many a time only to come back a few days or weeks later. Because how do you review such a brilliant and…
Book review: The Year of the Runaways by Sunjeev Sahota
Refugee, migrant – two terms that are very politically charged, but how often do we think about the people behind these words? Sunjeev Sahota’s The Year of the Runaways is fiction, but its subject is something that hits the headlines in the real world with alarming regularity, although with little of the nuance displayed in…
Sarah Shaffi 