'Alderton is Nora Ephron for the millennial generation' Elizabeth Day 'With courageous honesty , Alderton documents the highs and the lows - the sex , the drugs , the nightmare landlords , the heartaches and the humiliations . Deeply funny, sometimes shocking, and admirably open-hearted and optimistic' Daily Telegraph 'A sensitive, astute and funny account of growing up millennial' Observer 'The book we will thrust into our friends' hands . . . that will help heal a broken heart. Alderton's wise words can resonate with women of all ages. She feels like a best friend and your older sister all rolled into one and her pages wrap around you like a warm hug ' Evening Standard 'I loved its truth, self awareness, humour and most of all, its heart-spilling generosity ' Sophie Dahl 'Steeped in furiously funny accounts of one-night stands, ill-advised late-night taxi journeys up the M1, grubby flat-shares and the beauty of female friendships, as Alderton joyfully booze-cruises her way through her twenties ' Metro 'Alderton proves a razor-sharp observer of the shifting dynamics of long term female friendship' Mail on Sunday 'It's so full of life and laughs - I gobbled up this book. Alderton has built something beautiful and true out of many fragments of daftness ' Amy Liptrot
'Unmissable . Like chancing upon an oasis, you want to drink it slowly... Subtle, unpredictable, surprising' Guardian Things I Don't Want to Know is the first in Deborah Levy's essential three-part 'Living Autobiography' on writing and womanhood. Taking George Orwell's famous essay, 'Why I Write', as a jumping-off point, Deborah Levy offers her own indispensable reflections of the writing life. With wit, clarity and calm brilliance, she considers how the writer must stake claim to that contested territory as a young woman and shape it to her need. Things I Don't Want to Know is a work of dazzling insight and deep psychological succour, from one of our most vital contemporary writers. 'Superb sharpness and originality of imagination. An inspiring work of writing' Marina Warner
From the twice-Man Booker Prize-shortlisted author of Hot Milk and Swimming Home : Dazzling, essential, entirely unlike anything else -- a memoir on modern womanhood, rejecting oppressive social expectations and turning instead towards a thrilling, transformative freedom What does it mean to be free - as an artist, a woman, a mother or daughter? And what is the price of that freedom? In this dazzling memoir, Deborah Levy confronts the essential questions of modern womanhood with humour, pragmatism, and profoundly resonant wisdom. Reflecting on the period when she wrote the Man Booker Prize-shortlisted Hot Milk - when her mother was dying, her daughters were leaving home, her marriage was coming to an end - she is characteristically eloquent on the social expectations and surreal realities of daily life. And expanding far beyond these bounds, she describes a uniquely frank, wise and thrilling manifesto for female experience: embracing the exhilarating terror of freedom, seeking to understand what that freedom could mean and how it might feel.
From internationally renowned writer and Booker Prize winner Salman Rushdie, a searing, deeply personal account of enduring - and surviving - an attempt on his life thirty years after the fatwa that was ordered against him
Speaking out for the first time, and in unforgettable detail, about the traumatic events of August 12, 2022, Salman Rushdie answers violence with art, and reminds us of the power of words to make sense of the unthinkable. Knife is a gripping, intimate, and ultimately life-affirming meditation on life, loss, love, art - and finding the strength to stand up again.
Three bicycles. Seven ghosts. A crumbling apartment block on the hill. Fame. Tenderness. The statue of Peter Pan. Silk. Melancholy. The banana tree. A Pandemic. A love story.''br>br>br>From one of the great thinkers and writers of our time, comes the highly anticipated final instalment in Deborah Levy''s critically acclaimed ''Living Autobiography''br>br>br>''I can''t think of any writer aside from Virginia Woolf who writes better about what it is to be a woman'' Observer on The Cost of Livingbr>br>br>Following the international critical acclaim of The Cost of Living, this final volume of Deborah Levy''s ''Living Autobiography'' is an exhilarating, thought-provoking and boldly intimate meditation on home and the spectres that haunt it.br>br>br>''I began to wonder what myself and all unwritten and unseen women would possess in their property portfolios at the end of their lives. Literally, her physical property and possessions, and then everything else she valued, though it might not be valued by society. What might she claim, own, discard and bequeath? Or is she the real estate, owned by patriarchy? In this sense, Real Estate is a tricky business. We rent it and buy it, sell and inherit it - but we must also knock it down.'' br>br>br>''Wise, subtle and ironic, Levy''s every sentence is a masterpiece of clarity and poise... A brilliant writer'' Daily Telegraph on The Cost of Livingbr>br>br>''Extraordinary and beautiful, suffused with wit and razor-sharp insights'' Financial Times on The Cost of Living>
From one of America's iconic writers, a portrait of a marriage and a life -- in good times and bad -- that will speak to anyone who has ever loved a husband or wife or child. A stunning book of electric honesty and passion.
For readers of Maggie Nelson and Leslie Jamison, a poignant, universal story of the forces that shape girls, and of an America where women are rarely free to define themselves.
In her dazzling new book, critically acclaimed author Melissa Febos examines the narratives women are told about what it means to be a girl and the realities of growing up female in a world that prioritizes the feelings, perceptions, and power of men at girls'' expense.
Febos was eleven when her body began to change, and almost overnight, the way people spoke to, looked at, and treated her changed with it. As she grew, she defined herself based on these perceptions and by the romantic relationships she threw herself into headlong. But in her thirties, Febos began to question the stories she''d been told about herself and the habits and defenses she''d developed over years of trying to meet others'' expectations. The values she and so many other women had learned in girlhood did not prioritize their personal safety, happiness, or freedom, and she set out to reframe those values and beliefs.
Blending investigative reporting, memoir, and scholarship, Febos charts how she and others like her have reimagined relationships and made room for the anger, hurt, and grief women have long been taught to deny.
Fierce and breathtaking, written with Febos'' characteristic lyricism and searing insights, Girlhood is an anthem for women, a powerful exploration of the forces that seek to confine them, and a searing study of the transitions into and away from girlhood on a lifelong journey of discovery.>
THE NO. 1 BESTSELLERbr>br>BRITISH BOOK AWARDS, NON-FICTION BOOK OF THE YEARbr>br>THE SUNDAY TIMES, MEMOIR OF THE YEARbr>br>BOOKS OF THE YEAR: THE TIMES, OBSERVER, GUARDIAN, EVENING STANDARDbr>br>Now in paperback featuring a new introduction by Michelle Obama, a letter from the author to her younger self, and a book club guide with 20 discussion questions and a 5-question Q&A, the intimate, powerful, and inspiring memoir by the former First Lady of the United Statesbr>br>In her memoir, a work of deep reflection and mesmerizing storytelling, Michelle Obama invites readers into her world, chronicling the experiences that have shaped her -- from her childhood on the South Side of Chicago to her years as an executive balancing the demands of motherhood and work, to her time spent at the world''s most famous address. With unerring honesty and lively wit, she describes her triumphs and her disappointments, both public and private, telling her full story as she has lived it -- in her own words and on her own terms.br>br>Warm, wise, and revelatory, Becoming is the deeply personal reckoning of a woman of soul and substance who has steadily defied expectations -- and whose story inspires us to do the same.>
A Guardian Book of the Year Maggie Nelson is one of the most electrifying writers at work in America today, among the sharpest and most supple thinkers of her generation - Olivia Laing Bluets winds its way through depression, divinity, alcohol, and desire, visiting along the way with famous blue figures, including Joni Mitchell, Billie Holiday, Yves Klein, Leonard Cohen and Andy Warhol. While its narrator sets out to construct a sort of ''pillow book'' about her lifelong obsession with the colour blue, she ends up facing down both the painful end of an affair and the grievous injury of a dear friend. The combination produces a raw, cerebral work devoted to the inextricability of pleasure and pain, and to the question of what role, if any, aesthetic beauty can play in times of great heartache or grief. Much like Roland Barthes''s A Lover''s Discourse , Bluets has passed between lovers in the ecstasy of new love, and been pressed into the hands of the heartbroken. Visceral, learned, and acutely lucid, Bluets is a slim feat of literary innovation and grace, never before published in the UK.
THE BESTSELLING SEQUEL TO THE HIT KOREAN THERAPY MEMOIR TRANSLATED BY INTERNATIONAL BOOKER SHORTLISTEE ANTON HUR Baek Sehee''s struggle to recover from dysthymia continues, and the inner conflict she experienced during the healing period became more complex. I Want to Die but I Still Want to Eat Tteokbokki is a record of what life is truly like with persistent mild depression.
Part memoir, part self-help book, the intimacy and power of this book led it to become a bestseller in South Korea and Indonesia.>
One of bell hooks'' foundational works introduced to the UK for the first time.
''With the emotion of poetry, the narrative of a novel, and the truth of experience, bell hooks weaves a girlhood memoir you won''t be able to put down-or forget. Bone Black takes us into the cave of self-creation.'' Gloria Steinem
Stitching together the threads of her girlhood memories, bell hooks shows us one strong-spirited child''s journey toward becoming the pioneering writer we know. Along the way, hooks sheds light on the vulnerability of children, the special unfurling of female creativity and the imbalance of a society that confers marriage''s joys upon men and its silences on women.
In a world where daughters and fathers are strangers under the same roof, and crying children are often given something to cry about, hooks uncovers the solace to be found in solitude, the comfort to be had in the good company of books.
Bone Black allows us to bear witness to the awakening of a legendary author''s awareness that writing is her most vital breath.
THE PHENOMENAL KOREAN BESTSELLER TRANSLATED BY INTERNATIONAL BOOKER SHORTLISTEE ANTON HUR ''Will strike a chord with anyone who feels that their public life is at odds with how they really feel inside.'' Red PSYCHIATRIST: So how can I help you?
ME: I don''t know, I''m - what''s the word - depressed? Do I have to go into detail?
Baek Sehee is a successful young social media director at a publishing house when she begins seeing a psychiatrist about her - what to call it? - depression? She feels persistently low, anxious, endlessly self-doubting, but also highly judgemental of others. She hides her feelings well at work and with friends; adept at performing the calmness, even ease, her lifestyle demands. The effort is exhausting, overwhelming, and keeps her from forming deep relationships. This can''t be normal.
But if she''s so hopeless, why can she always summon a desire for her favourite street food, the hot, spicy rice cake, tteokbokki? Is this just what life is like?
Recording her dialogues with her psychiatrist over a 12-week period, Baek begins to disentangle the feedback loops, knee-jerk reactions and harmful behaviours that keep her locked in a cycle of self-abuse. Part memoir, part self-help book, I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki is a book to keep close and to reach for in times of darkness.>
It was one of the most searing images of the twentieth century: two young boys, two princes, walking behind their mother''s coffin as the world watched in sorrow - and horror. As Diana, Princess of Wales, was laid to rest, billions wondered what the princes must be thinking and feeling - and how their lives would play out from that point on. For Harry, this is that story at last. With its raw, unflinching honesty, Spare is a landmark publication full of insight, revelation, self-examination, and hard-won wisdom about the eternal power of love over grief. Prince Harry wishes to support British charities with donations from his proceeds from Spare . The Duke of Sussex has donated $1,500,000 to Sentebale, an organisation he founded with Prince Seeiso in their mothers'' legacies, which supports vulnerable children and young people in Lesotho and Botswana affected by HIV/AIDS. Prince Harry will also donate to the non-profit organisation WellChild in the amount of £300,000. WellChild, which he has been Royal patron of for fifteen years, makes it possible for children and young people with complex health needs to be cared for at home instead of hospital, wherever possible.
THE NO. 2 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From the indie rockstar Japanese Breakfast, an unflinching, powerful, deeply moving memoir about growing up mixed-race, Korean food, losing her Korean mother, and forging her own identity. In this exquisite story of family, food, grief, and endurance, Michelle Zauner proves herself far more than a dazzling singer, songwriter, and guitarist. With humour and heart, she tells of growing up the only Asian-American kid at her school in Eugene, Oregon; of struggling with her mother''s particular, high expectations of her; of a painful adolescence; of treasured months spent in her grandmother''s tiny apartment in Seoul, where she and her mother would bond, late at night, over heaping plates of food. As she grew up, moving to the east coast for college, finding work in the restaurant industry, performing gigs with her fledgling band - and meeting the man who would become her husband - her Koreanness began to feel ever more distant, even as she found the life she wanted to live. It was her mother''s diagnosis of terminal pancreatic cancer, when Michelle was twenty-five, that forced a reckoning with her identity and brought her to reclaim the gifts of taste, language, and history her mother had given her. Vivacious and plainspoken, lyrical and honest, Michelle Zauner''s voice is as radiantly alive on the page as it is onstage. Rich with intimate anecdotes that will resonate widely, Crying in H Mart is a book to cherish, share, and reread.
It was one of the images of the twentieth century: two boys, walking behind their mother, Princess Diana''s, coffin. Billions wondered what the princes must be feeling - and how their lives would play out from that point on.
For Harry, this is that story at last.
Before then, Prince Harry was known as the happy-go-lucky Spare to the more serious Heir. But grief changed everything.
At twenty-one, he joined the Army but was soon more lost than ever, suffering from post-traumatic stress and crippling panic attacks. Above all, he couldn''t find true love.
Then he met Meghan. The world was swept away by the couple''s romance and wedding. But in the face of sustained press intrusion, Harry saw no other way to protect his wife and children than to flee his mother country. Over the centuries, leaving the Royal Family was an act few had dared. The last to try had been his mother. .
Written with raw, unflinching honesty, Spare is full of insight, revelation and hard-won wisdom about the eternal power of love over grief.
With the acute insight that distinguishes all great writers, from her singular experience Westover has crafted a universal coming-of-age story that gets to the heart of what an education is and what it offers: the perspective to see one's life through new eyes, and the will to change it.
A personal and powerful essay on loss from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, the bestselling author of Americanah and Half of a Yellow Sun .
''Grief is a cruel kind of education. You learn how ungentle mourning can be, how full of anger. You learn how glib condolences can feel. You learn how much grief is about language, the failure of language and the grasping for language'' On 10 June 2020, the scholar James Nwoye Adichie died suddenly in Nigeria.
In this tender and powerful essay, expanded from the original New Yorker text, his daughter, a self-confessed daddy''s girl, remembers her beloved father. Notes on Grief is at once a tribute to a long life of grace and wisdom, the story of a daughter''s fierce love for a parent, and a revealing examination of the layers of loss and the nature of grief.
Joan Didion''s hugely influential collection of essays which defines, for many, the America which rose from the ashes of the Sixties. We tell ourselves stories in order to live. The princess is caged in the consulate. The man with the candy will lead the children into the sea. In this now legendary journey into the hinterland of the American psyche, Didion searches for stories as the Sixties implode. She waits for Jim Morrison to show up, visits the Black Panthers in prison, parties with Janis Joplin and buys dresses with Charles Manson''s girls. She and her reader emerge, cauterized, from this devastating tour of that age of self discovery into the harsh light of the morning after.
Twelve early pieces never before collected that offer an illuminating glimpse into the mind and process of Joan Didion.
Mostly drawn from the earliest part of her astonishing five-decade career, the wide-ranging pieces in this collection include Didion writing about a Gamblers Anonymous meeting, a visit to San Simeon, and a reunion of WWII veterans in Las Vegas, and about topics ranging from Nancy Reagan to Robert Mapplethorpe to Martha Stewart.
Here are subjects Didion has long written about - the press, politics, California robber baronsac, women, the act of writing, and her own self-doubt. Each piece is classic Didion: incisive and, in new light, stunningly prescient.
Angela Y. Davis is a political activist, scholar, author, and speaker. She is an outspoken advocate for the oppressed and exploited, writing on Black liberation, prison abolition, the intersections of race, gender, and class, and international solidarity with Palestine. She is the author of several books, including Women, Race, and Class and Are Prisons Obsolete? She is the subject of the acclaimed documentary Free Angela and All Political Prisoners and is Distinguished Professor Emerita at the University of California, Santa Cruz.>
Joan Didion''s savage masterpiece, which, since first publication in 1968, has been acknowledged as an unparalleled report on the state of America during the upheaval of the Sixties Revolution. We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. We forget the loves and the betrayals alike, forget what we whispered and what we screamed, forget who we were In her non-fiction work, Joan Didion not only describes the subject at hand - her younger self loving and leaving New York, the murderous housewife, the little girl trailing the rock group, the millionaire bunkered in his mansion - but also offers a broader vision of the world, one that is both terrifying and tender, ominous and uniquely her own.
