NATURE Rewild Yourself by Simon Barnes (Simon & Schuster £8.99, 208 pp) How do you fancy sitting on a damp patch of ground for hours on end, not moving a muscle, unable even to scratch your nose when it itches? It may sound like a form of torture, but for Simon Barnes this ‘bottomless sit’, … Read more
WHAT BOOK would author and illustrator Tony Ross take to a desert island? Tony, a resolute royalist, is halfway through Elizabeth II by Nicholas Davies He would take The Kenneth Williams Diaries by Russell Davies to a desert island The illustrator was first turned on to reading by his Rupert books He could not summon up any … Read more
FAMILY House of music by Kadiatu Kanneh-Mason (Oneworld £18.00, 320 pp) When Dr Kadiatu Kanneh-Mason opens the bathroom door at her family home in Nottingham, she smiles at the pockmarked linoleum which gives the impression ‘a lively woodpecker has been at work’. The line of dents leads to the toilet seat where her third child, … Read more
CHILDREN’S By Sally Morris for the Daily Mail Published: 22:01 BST, 27 August 2020 | Updated: 22:01 BST, 27 August 2020 VOYAGE OF THE SPARROWHAWK by Natasha Farrant (Faber £7.99, 368 pp) VOYAGE OF THE SPARROWHAWK by Natasha Farrant (Faber £7.99, 368 pp) It’s 1919 and Nathan, the kindly owner of the Sparrowhawk barge who, … Read more
BOOK OF THE WEEK Fatherhood by Charlie Gilmour (Weidenfeld £15.99, 288 pp) Featherhood, it would be tempting to say, is where Helen Macdonald’s H Is For Hawk meets Gerald Durrell’s My Family And Other Animals. But Charlie Gilmour’s memoir is so original and ingeniously wrought, it stands on its own as a book to which … Read more
MEMOIR NOT THE TYPE by Camilla Thurlow (John Blake £16.99, 288 pp) Camilla Thurlow was not exactly your average Love Island contestant when she appeared on the reality dating show in 2017. She was not, like many islanders, a personal trainer, sexy scaffolder or nebulous influencer. Thurlow’s job was far more dangerous: explosive ordinance disposal … Read more
SOCIETY Sealand by Dylan Taylor-Lehman (Icon £16.99, 320 pp) Sealand, ‘the true story of the world’s most stubborn micronation’ — a micronation being defined as ‘an invented country within the territory of an established nation, whose boundaries go unrecognised on the world stage’ — is a celebration of British eccentricity. The hero is Roy Bates, … Read more
What makes an Olympic champion: New book explores the common attributes of elite athletes – from being a younger sibling to loving the ‘agony’ of training Annie Vernon won two world championships and an Olympic silver for rowing She explores what makes elite athletes elite in a fascinating new book Author points out skills are … Read more
A librarian has revealed they did rearrange books behind Boris Johnson during a speech to form a covert message, but the message wasn’t intended for him. Eagle-eyed social media users claimed the librarian at the school in Leicestershire, where the Prime Minister made a speech yesterday, may have deliberately placed books such as ‘The Twits’ … Read more
Words to wash away your worries: Paul Anthony Jones uses ‘linguistic remedies’ to offer reassurance and hope in the face of all the ghastly feelings that enshroud us day after day By Marcus Berkmann for the Daily Mail Published: 22:01 BST, 20 August 2020 | Updated: 22:05 BST, 20 August 2020 The Cabinet Of Calm … Read more