Category Archives: review

HG Wells, The Door in the Wall, and MR James, Canon Alberic’s Scrap-Book

Posted on February 18, 2011 by Charles Lambert

These days, I tend to organise books alphabetically and by genre, which probably makes me sound more anal than I really am (most other things I just throw on the floor). But when I was a youngish teenager, I loved … Continue reading →

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Niall Griffiths, The Dreams of Max and Ronnie, and Gwyneth Lewis, The Meat Tree

Posted on February 9, 2011 by Charles Lambert

Some years ago, Canongate began to publish a series of re-workings of the world’s great myths. It was a good idea, and it’s produced some interesting and surprising works, among them Dream Angus by Alexander McCall Smith, a startlingly resonant … Continue reading →

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Clare Dudman: 98 Reasons for Being

Posted on January 26, 2011 by Charles Lambert

Last September, I was invited to take part in a book-lovers’ week in Catalonia, as one of four guest authors. (And if you think you’d enjoy a week in a manor house in a beautiful part of northern Spain, eating … Continue reading →

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Kazuo Ishiguro: Never Let Me Go

Posted on January 22, 2011 by Charles Lambert

It seems a bit churlish to follow my last, fairly negative review with another one – although Ishiguro‘s work generally and this novel in particular have been sufficiently praised by enough people for one small dissenting voice not to matter that much … Continue reading →

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Nicholas Mosley: The Hesperides Tree

Posted on January 2, 2011 by Charles Lambert

I first came across Nicholas Mosley‘s work when I read Hopeful Monsters some years ago. I was deeply impressed by the book, not only by its range of intellectual reference, which includes politics, biology, genetics and physics (cue walk-on part for … Continue reading →

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Damon Galgut: The Good Doctor

Posted on December 28, 2010 by Charles Lambert

The Man Booker Prize is a mixed blessing. Certainly, from the point of view of someone who writes novels, the publication of the long list is one of those little disappointments that enliven, and embitter, the literary year, providing – … Continue reading →

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Top ten books written by women about gay men

Posted on December 2, 2010 by Charles Lambert

Some of the best books to have been written about the male gay experience in the past hundred years have been written by women. Here are ten of my favourites. (And it would be considerably more difficult to find ten … Continue reading →

Posted in gay, review, top ten | 10 Comments

Top ten books set in Rome

Posted on November 26, 2010 by Charles Lambert

Book Depository used to have a weekly post called Tuesday Top Ten. I thought it would be fun (and useful) to pick out my top ten books set in Rome. Unfortunately, Book Depository decided to discontinue their Tuesday Top Ten, … Continue reading →

Posted in book depository, henry james, italy, pasolini, review, rome, shakespeare | 10 Comments

Keith Ridgway, Horses

Posted on November 20, 2010 by Charles Lambert

No, not the Patti Smith début album, much as I love it, but a long story by the Irish writer Keith Ridgway, unknown to me until a few weeks ago, when I read a typically perceptive review by John Self of a … Continue reading →

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Sing Sorrow Sorrow

Posted on November 13, 2010 by Charles Lambert

My earliest holiday memories are of Wales, of a caravan behind the dunes of Abersoch, of wind lifting the sand and throwing it, stingingly, against my goosebumped legs. During the night, the same wind would rock the caravan. I was … Continue reading →

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