Reviews
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An African History of Africa by Zeinab Badawi review – an insider’s take
The journalist and broadcaster offers a refreshing corrective to narratives imposed on the continent by others Simukai Chigudu The Guardian…
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On the Right to Resist! Then and Now
The book Postcards to Hitler: A German Jew’s Defiance in a Time of Terror tells the story of my grandfather Benno Neuburger…
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Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar review – an antihero in search of meaning
In Martyr!, the debut novel by Iranian-American poet Kaveh Akbar, a troubled young man is searching for a reason to…
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Final Verdict by Tobias Buck review – the weight of collective guilt
Reporting on the trial of a former SS camp guard, the author learns that his own grandfather was an early…
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How the World Made the West by Josephine Quinn review – rethinking ‘civilisation’
Like the railway and the telegraph, western civilisation was invented in the 19th century. Steven Poole The Guardian It had…
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Cold Crematorium: Reporting from the Land of Auschwitz by József Debreczeni review – hell on earth in poised prose
In King Lear, confronted with the figure of his cruelly blinded father, Edgar wonders whether matters are as bad as they imaginably…
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This Might Not Be It review – NHS office politics through the looking-glass
Personalities and generations clash in Sophia Chetin-Leuner’s claustrophobic play about a mental health unit under strain Arifa Akbar The Guardian…
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The Truce review: deep dive on Democrats’ dynamics and divisions
Joe Biden is more unpopular than Donald Trump. Lloyd Green The Guardian The Democrats’ upstairs-downstairs coalition frays, riven by the Israel-Gaza war,…
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Not the End of the World by Hannah Ritchie review – an optimist’s guide to the climate crisis
But is there something missing? Bibi van der Zee The Guardian Data scientist Hannah Ritchie has written a good-hearted, generous book that…
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The End of Enlightenment by Richard Whatmore review – a warning from 18th-century Britain
Britain, thought Thomas Paine, needed to be destroyed. Its monarchy must be toppled, its empire broken up and the mercantile…
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Kibogo by Scholastique Mukasonga review – crisis in colonial Rwanda
“Kamanzi, our sub-chief, came to take away our children.” Aminatta Forna The Guardian So begins a trail of misfortune that…
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A cosmic ocean of shame: Jesmyn Ward’s Let Us Descend confronts a history beyond the ken of storytelling
Are there subjects so immense in historical scope and in depths of human suffering that a form engineered to tackle…
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A Death in Malta by Paul Caruana Galizia review – courage under fire
Journalism. John Simpson The Guardian So is outing hapless celebrities over their sex lives, or researching long-form pieces about the…
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Wifedom by Anna Funder review – a brilliant reckoning with George Orwell to change the way you read
Blending forensic research, fiction, life writing and criticism, Funder upends the legacy of literary triumph to reveal the woman behind…
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Breathe review – Sadiq Khan’s climate emergency manifesto is a breath of fresh air
Sadiq Khan’s first book is ostensibly structured as a self-help title in the vein of, say, Stephen Covey’s 7 Habits of…
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‘The Last Animal’ is a bright-eyed meditation on what animates us
Even more profoundly, why is a family? Jason Heller npr Entire wings of the literary canon have confronted these questions, usually…
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