My bad picture of a good picture of Leonora Carrington by Kati Horna that I meant to share from an exhibition that closed a couple of weeks ago

Details here! amheath.com/hilary-mante... #emergingwriters

Spent 3 hours of my birthday watching Magnolia in the cinema. As brilliant and monumental as when it first blew my mind open 25 years ago though with different feelings about some characters. I've said before but until I saw Magnolia I didn't know cinema was an artform. Can't wait for new PTA

Reminder that my new poetry collection (my SEVENTH because I apparently cannot take a hint) is available from Picador www.panmacmillan.com/authors/luke...

Five alarm fire. Goodbye Jimmy Kimmel, @karenattiah.bsky.social — and press freedom. Follow @rbreich.bsky.social if you don’t already to see how all this works. observer.co.uk/news/opinion...

This is worth a listen. It's fair on the govt and offers constructive hope because it doesn't talk the horror of a Reform victory into being, as I keep hearing others do, and explains how Labour can earn people's votes... And really great to see Andy Beckett in the lrb

I wrote about Jung Chang's Fly, Wild Swans which succeeds as a memoir sequel and companion to the books that made her name: inews.co.uk/culture/wild...

Read and heard a couple of pieces today about how tough things are for landlords. They didn't even mention that their passive incomes corrode their souls and mean that in pretty much every good story ever told they would be on the side of evil

I wrote about Jung Chang's Fly, Wild Swans which succeeds as a memoir sequel and companion to the books that made her name: inews.co.uk/culture/wild...

"When we use generative AI, we consent to the appropriation of our intellectual property by data scrapers. We stuff the pockets of oligarchs with even more money. We hand over our autonomy, at the very moment of emerging American fascism."

It's physically unsafe for people like me to go into the centre of our home city this Saturday on account of the colour of our skin. Most politicians are either failing to stand up to this or actively contributing to the situation. We don't owe any of those politicians our votes. Not one of them.

Euston station clogged up with "patriots" stinking of lager and piss. The dregs of every town within an hour of London by the looks of it. Real 9am Wetherspoons types. V nasty indeed. Must be the ones Yvette Cooper is down with

A simple but important way to support Palestinian writers is to read their work. A helpful list is in the link below but please do explore @arablit.bsky.social more widely as well as publishers like @commapress.bsky.social

Could we please stop pretending that the flags being hung from streetlamps or painted on roundabouts are innocent expressions of patriotic pride? This is the far right marking out its territory. It uses these flags to intimidate its traditional victims and opponents. 🧵1/3

Wincing at details of a choppy 20s then lol at "Torn". From v good Joy is My Middle Name by Sasha Debevec-McKenney via @fitzcarraldoeds.bsky.social

I'll read anything Pankaj Mishra publishes but this dismissal ignores that the reason to read said DFW essay is the minutiae of his observations, the comic details from the campaign - staff falling asleep standing up on the bus for eg - and the "indecisiveness" is part of what makes it memorable

‘What is happening has been clearly announced by the Israeli government: the eradication of Gaza City, of the north of Gaza. The displacement once again of a population that has been expelled multiple times with nowhere to go.’ @selmadabbagh.bsky.social on the blog: www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2025/se...

This December 152 of John Berryman's previously unpublished Dream Songs will appear in the volume 'Only Sing'. You can read about it in this fascinating piece by the book's editor www.theparisreview.org/blog/2025/09...

Good to see Helen Garner's Collected Diaries longlisted for the non-fiction prize. Here's the interview I did with Garner last year when her books were about to come in the UK: www.ft.com/content/2f37...

Last night I left London and went all the way to Luton to see Ryan Davis & The Roadhouse Band at the @thebearclubluton.bsky.social. They were amazing and deserve to be massive after new album "New Threats from the Soul" so I feel v lucky to have seen a band that great in such an intimate space

Always knew being tall was a disadvantage

Interesting piece on the men of the Booker long list. I appreciated the rooting of comparison to Coetzee’s Disgrace (I love comparative lit as my wayfinder)- and wonder if Raymond William’s Border Country/ Loyalties would be illuminating read alongside…

I wrote about silent men, violent men, singing men and more in novels by Szalay, Markovits, Wood et al on the 2025 @thebookerprizes.com longlist: thebookerprizes.com/the-booker-l...

"I'd like to mix in nonsense/ While there's time left/ Before it ends." Endings - personal, American, global - are everywhere in this collection. It's extremely poignant in places but always great fun too

Mariam Dagga, a journalist killed yesterday by the IDF left behind two sets of instructions: that her colleagues not cry at her funeral, and asked her 11-year-old son to make her proud. Murdering journalists. Bombing hospitals. Causing a manmade famine. Slaughtering children. This horror has to end.

I reviewed Greyhound by @joannapocock.bsky.social for this week's @ftweekend.com. Much of what the author witnesses on her journey across the US is bleak but there are profound moments of grace and I didn't want the ride to end www.ft.com/content/2089...

I reviewed Greyhound by @joannapocock.bsky.social for this week's @ftweekend.com. Much of what the author witnesses on her journey across the US is bleak but there are profound moments of grace and I didn't want the ride to end www.ft.com/content/2089...

Tonight, Tonight www.foyles.co.uk/events/saman...

If you want to know how a society sleep-walks into fascism you need only put on the World at One. Relentless, disgraceful pandering to fascist thugs by media and politicians who would rather criminalise people who want to stop genocide. Terrifying

Tomorrow night, Foyles Charing Cross Road, 7pm. "Good and Evil and Other Stories" is strange and stunning. Be there

It’s a bubble and when it pops things are going to get very ugly. The US has gone all in on gen AI. There’s not much else going on. fortune.com/2025/08/18/m...

Saw Materialists. Quite liked it. Made me feel good about being tall

www.ft.com/content/2089... Thank you @maxjliu.bsky.social and the @financialtimes.com for this generous review of GREYHOUND.

I spoke to critic Wiebke Huester about being assaulted by an male artist - and reflected on some of the perils of being a female critic. Thanks Katherine Butler for commissioning this piece: www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Excited to say I'll be asking Samanta Schweblin ('Fever Dream', 'Little Eyes' et al) about her new collection 'Good and Evil and Other Stories' at Foyles, Charing Cross Road next Friday 22 August. Come down! www.foyles.co.uk/events/saman...

I love this novel. It is calm, mature and profound. It left me bereft. The quote on the back is me in a review of You Don't Have to Live Like This from 10 years ago. I hope the answer is "not anymore"

Good review. "We don’t have to accept nonsense sold to us about AI: we can ridicule it as a thinking public, and resist its implementation through our strength as organised workers." tribunemag.co.uk/2025/08/ai-i...

Anas al-Sharif and his fallen colleagues are heroes. Israel clearly and deliberately kills journalists—over two hundred in less than two years, more than died in WWII and the wars in Viet Nam, Iraq, and Afghanistan combined.

BREAKING: One of the most important and prominent reporters on the ground in Gaza has been Anas Al Sharif. He - and several other Al Jazeera journalists - have just been assassinated by Israelis forces whilst in their press tent in central Gaza. Speechless.

Barely an hour ago, Palestinian journalist Anas Al-Sharif warned us all: “If this madness doesn’t end, Gaza will be reduced to ruins, its people’s voices silenced, their faces erased — and history will remember you as silent witnesses to a genocide you chose not to stop.” Israel just killed him.

Over 400 writers, publishers and booksellers — including figures across the literary world — have signed an open letter warning that a proposed ban on protest group Palestine Action represents a serious threat to free expression and civil liberties. @theguardian.com

My review of Pan by Michael Clune is in this week's @ftweekend.com www.ft.com/content/af7c...

Lucy Sparrow's "Bourdon Street Chippy" (a felt fish and chip shop installation) at Lyndsey Ingram gallery is a joy

My review of Pan by Michael Clune is in this week's @ftweekend.com www.ft.com/content/af7c...

A debut novel by a critic about the mysteries of consciousness and being a teenager in the 90s that is extremely fun and quotable. Naturally I loved Pan by Michael Clune... My review for @ftweekend.com: www.ft.com/content/af7c...

I’m very happy the Booker longlist is now public and I can once again actually talk to people about great books I’ve read recently thebookerprizes.com/the-booker-l...

Went to see this documentary - in which six former-inmates of Holloway Prison return there before its demolition - after reading this excellent review. Powerful, important work, recommended: www.ft.com/content/3fd8...

Presenting the #BookerPrize2025 longlist. Find out more about the books and authors that make up this year's Booker Dozen: thebookerprizes.com/bp2025