Lynda La Plante wrote the three Widows series for TV: great characters, blistering dialogue, terrific pace. She followed that up with Prime Suspect, which matched the same high quality over seven series. Both of them featured women as the protagonists, and that added a wonderful new perspective to the crime stories. So when I found …
Beetle Queen
I was never scared of beetles when I was little, but I certainly never saw them as beautiful. Or interesting. But that’s what MG Leonard makes them in this, the follow-up to Beetle Boy. I’m not the first person to say that reading these books makes you want to start collecting beetles – in all …
Keeping On Keeping On
I love Alan Bennett’s writing, even when – in many of his plays – I’m not really sure what he’s getting at. His prose is elegant. His dialogue is witty. He has an eye for the odd little occurrences of daily that make me think I must be walking around with my eyes shut. The …
Great Britain’s Great War
A friend of mine used to make documentaries for television. Part of the process included research with academic histories: books full of footnotes, quotes from those involved, facts and figures galore. He didn't mind; he rather liked it. It would have sent me looking for the nearest high window to throw myself through. Jeremy Paxman's …
