liberal Virginia Evans: ‘I loved books about things that can’t exist’The Women’s prize-shortlisted novelist on taking inspiration from John Steinbeck, Joan Didion and Jhumpa Lahiri, and weeping through Little Women in her 30s3 months agobooks
liberal From racy riders to romantic rivals: Jilly Cooper’s best booksThe second series of Rivals has put the bestselling author’s brand of saucy jollity back on screen, but what is her bonkbuster nonpareil?3 months agobooks
liberal Children and teens roundupA bunny who loves to bake, illustrated poems about amazing animals and a YA verse novel of dancefloor salvation3 months agobooks
liberal The Guardian view on Middlemarch: the greatest novel in the English languageGeorge Eliot’s masterpiece of provincial life still has much to teach us about sympathy and tolerance3 months agobooks
liberal John of John by Douglas Stuart reviewThe Booker winner’s epic tale of gay love and loneliness in the Hebrides charts an uneasy homecoming against a backdrop of repression4 months agobooks
liberal The best recent science fiction, fantasy and horrorThe Republic of Memory by Mahmud El Sayed; The Rainshadow Orphans by Naomi Ishiguro; No Ghosts by Max Lury; Palaces of the Crow by Ray Nayler; Moon Over Brendle by Jeff Noon4 months agobooks
liberal Lily King: ‘I couldn’t get past the first 20 pages of Pride and Prejudice’The Women’s prize-shortlisted author on being obsessed with Judy Blume, hating Jane Austen at first, and the joys of Tove Jansson4 months agobooks
liberal The Tragedy of the TradwifeCaro Claire Burke on her best-selling novel, Yesteryear, and the retrograde fantasy that inspired it.4 months agobooks
liberal What Am I, a Deer? by Polly Barton reviewThe feverish interiority of a young woman abroad is captured with offbeat wit and disarming candour in the first novel from the translator of Butter4 months agobooks
liberal Katie Kitamura: ‘Almost every writer changes my mindThe American author on the magic of Yasunari Kawabata, the hidden layers of Henry James and coming late to the genius of Muriel Spark4 months agobooks
liberal What we’re reading: writers and readers on the books they enjoyed in AprilLuke Kennard, Sophie Ratcliffe and Guardian readers discuss the titles they have read over the last month. Join the conversation in the comments4 months agobooks
liberal Joe Dunthorne: ‘Growing up in Swansea, I developed an allergy to Dylan Thomas’The author on feeling Thomas Hardy’s pain, being duped by Donna Tartt and how reading his sister’s copy of Trainspotting made him want to write4 months agobooks
