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The Shock Doctrineby Naomi Klein (2007)In this urgent examination of free-market fundamentalism, Klein argues – with acc...
21/11/2021

The Shock Doctrine
by Naomi Klein (2007)
In this urgent examination of free-market fundamentalism, Klein argues – with accompanying reportage – that the social breakdowns witnessed during decades of neoliberal economic policies are not accidental, but in fact integral to the functioning of the free market, which relies on disaster and human suffering to function.

The Roadby Cormac McCarthy (2006)A father and his young son, “each the other’s world entire”, trawl across the ruins of ...
21/11/2021

The Road
by Cormac McCarthy (2006)
A father and his young son, “each the other’s world entire”, trawl across the ruins of post-apocalyptic America in this terrifying but tender story told with biblical conviction. The slide into savagery as civilisation collapses is harrowing material, but McCarthy’s metaphysical efforts to imagine a cold dark universe where the light of humanity is winking out are what make the novel such a powerful ecological warning.

The Correctionsby Jonathan Franzen (2001)The members of one ordinarily unhappy American family struggle to adjust to the...
21/11/2021

The Corrections
by Jonathan Franzen (2001)
The members of one ordinarily unhappy American family struggle to adjust to the shifting axes of their worlds over the final decades of the 20th century. Franzen’s move into realism reaped huge literary rewards: exploring both domestic and national conflict, this family saga is clever, funny and outrageously readable.

The Sixth Extinctionby Elizabeth Kolbert (2014)The science journalist examines with clarity and memorable detail the cur...
21/11/2021

The Sixth Extinction
by Elizabeth Kolbert (2014)
The science journalist examines with clarity and memorable detail the current crisis of plant and animal loss caused by human civilisation (over the past half billion years, there have been five mass extinctions on Earth; we are causing another). Kolbert considers both ecosystems – the Great Barrier Reef, the Amazon rainforest – and the lives of some extinct and soon-to-be extinct creatures including the Sumatran rhino and “the most beautiful bird in the world”, the black-faced honeycreeper of Maui.

Fingersmithby Sarah Waters (2002)Moving from the underworld dens of Victorian London to the boudoirs of country house go...
21/11/2021

Fingersmith
by Sarah Waters (2002)
Moving from the underworld dens of Victorian London to the boudoirs of country house gothic, and hingeing on the seduction of an heiress, Waters’s third novel is a drippingly atmospheric thriller, a smart study of innocence and experience, and a sensuous le***an love story – with a plot twist to make the reader gasp.

Nickel and Dimedby Barbara Ehrenreich (2001)In this modern classic of reportage, Ehrenreich chronicled her attempts to l...
21/11/2021

Nickel and Dimed
by Barbara Ehrenreich (2001)
In this modern classic of reportage, Ehrenreich chronicled her attempts to live on the minimum wage in three American states. Working first as a waitress, then a cleaner and a nursing home aide, she still struggled to survive, and the stories of her co-workers are shocking. The US economy as she experienced it is full of routine humiliation, with demands as high as the rewards are low. Two decades on, this still reads like urgent news.

The Plot Against Americaby Philip Roth (2004)What if aviator Charles Lindbergh, who once called Hi**er “a great man”, ha...
21/11/2021

The Plot Against America
by Philip Roth (2004)

What if aviator Charles Lindbergh, who once called Hi**er “a great man”, had won the US presidency in a landslide victory and signed a treaty with N**i Germany? Paranoid yet plausible, Roth’s alternative-world novel is only more relevant in the age of Trump.

The Amber Spyglassby Philip Pullman (2000)Children’s fiction came of age when the final part of Pullman’s His Dark Mater...
18/11/2021

The Amber Spyglass
by Philip Pullman (2000)
Children’s fiction came of age when the final part of Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy became the first book for younger readers to win the Whitbread book of the year award. Pullman has brought imaginative fire and storytelling bravado to the weightiest of subjects: religion, free will, totalitarian structures and the human drive to learn, rebel and grow. Here Asriel’s struggle against the Authority reaches its climax, Lyra and Will journey to the Land of the Dead, and Mary investigates the mysterious elementary particles that lend their name to his current trilogy: The Book of Dust. The Hollywood-fuelled commercial success achieved by JK Rowling may have eluded Pullman so far, but his sophisticated reworking of Paradise Lost helped adult readers throw off any embarrassment at enjoying fiction written for children – and publishing has never looked back.

Austerlitzby WG Sebald (2001), translated by Anthea Bell (2001)AdvertisementSebald died in a car crash in 2001, but his ...
18/11/2021

Austerlitz
by WG Sebald (2001), translated by Anthea Bell (2001)
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Sebald died in a car crash in 2001, but his genre-defying mix of fact and fiction, keen sense of the moral weight of history and interleaving of inner and outer journeys have had a huge influence on the contemporary literary landscape. His final work, the typically allusive life story of one man, charts the Jewish disapora and lost 20th century with heartbreaking power.

Never Let Me Goby Kazuo Ishiguro (2005)From his 1989 Booker winner The Remains of the Day to 2015’s The Buried Giant, No...
18/11/2021

Never Let Me Go
by Kazuo Ishiguro (2005)
From his 1989 Booker winner The Remains of the Day to 2015’s The Buried Giant, Nobel laureate Ishiguro writes profound, puzzling allegories about history, nationalism and the individual’s place in a world that is always beyond our understanding. His sixth novel, a love triangle set among human clones in an alternative 1990s England, brings exquisite understatement to its exploration of mortality, loss and what it means to be human

The Siegeby Helen Dunmore (2001)The Levin family battle against starvation in this novel set during the German siege of ...
13/11/2021

The Siege
by Helen Dunmore (2001)
The Levin family battle against starvation in this novel set during the German siege of Leningrad. Anna digs tank traps and dodges patrols as she scavenges for wood, but the hand of history is hard to escape.

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