Scarlett Thomas talks about her process for writing a Worldquake book…
“In the heart of the Green Belt nothing seemed to move. Stranded in the past, it wrestled with the present, and hated the future. And there I was, stuck with it.”
“If everybody lived a life like mine, there would be no need for novels”
“Eerie, engrossing … The author skilfully sifts through the secrets harboured in homes and haunting the heart … The tension between concealing and revealing utterly grips”
Anita Sethi
The Observer
“Joan of Arc and Christine de Pizan are reimagined in a post-apocalyptic dystopia, in this compellingly ambitious examination of gender, semiotics and warfare … The narrative mode is to show through dramatic, often moving scenes, and then to tell, reflecting on them analytically. This disjunction can be jarring, but it’s knowingly done, because the book’s style is itself a theme”
Lara Feigel
The Guardian
“ALAN Parks is an amiable bear of a man who these days spends his time wandering around Glasgow thinking up ways to murder people. No, don’t worry. His criminal activities are purely fictional. Parks is that not-so-rare thing these days, a Scottish crime writer. His first novel Bloody January is out now”
Teddy Jamieson
The Herald
“When I started writing Bloody January I wanted to write about Glasgow and I wanted to write a book about the different kind of people who lived there in the early seventies. A crime story seemed to be the best way to explore the different levels of society, from homeless people living on the streets to the landed Gentry in their huge houses in the country … So I ended up writing a ‘Tartan Noir’. Definition seems to be pretty broad but mostly they are novels set in Scotland containing some element of crime in the plot. Here are five of my favourites”
Alan Parks
Dead Good
“Daniel H Pink’s engaging book reveals the best times of day to make optimum decisions … It is intriguing stuff written with a light, assured touch by Pink, an expert on motivation and management who is at pains to stress that modern science shows that scheduling and careful timing of our daily routines is crucial to our wellbeing”
Robin McKie
The Guardian
“All the words that follow are my yearning to make some sense out of the American darkness that disconnects colored fathers from sons, a darkness in which sons and fathers lose track of one another.”
“You might think you know about Father Christmas. And I'm sure you do know some things. You probably know about the Toy Workshop and the reindeer. But the thing you probably don't know about is me...”
“When the waves faded out on the far side of the stream, Kenn felt the great silence that lay upon the world and stood in the midst of it trembling like a hunted hare.”
“When Apollo was born, Brian and Lillian thought they'd reached the end of their story but they'd been wrong. The wildness had only begun.”
You can get these free Christmas-themed teaching resources for children aged 7–9! Make an amazing Christmas display for your classroom, or learn about Queen Victoria and more.
You can get these free Christmas-themed teaching resources for children aged 7–9! Make an amazing Christmas display for your classroom, or learn about Queen Victoria and more.
You can get these free Christmas-themed teaching resources for children aged 7–9! Make an amazing Christmas display for your classroom, or learn about Queen Victoria and more.
