It was an absolute honour to chat with Elif Shafak for the @royalliteraryfund.bsky.social podcast. Full of insight and fun, I hope! @annmorgan.bsky.social @orendabooks.bsky.social open.spotify.com/episode/3a98...

Really exciting book news out of Norway. And while the article focusses on the sealskin binding, I'm even more excited by the fact that these neumes are not square, which suggests a date well before 1200.

Delighted to receive a copy of this from @translatingwomen.bsky.social, who wrote the introduction. Latin American writers have consistently written some of the boldest, most challenging and illuminating accounts of female experience I’ve encountered. #booksky #feminism #translation

Does anyone know if any of the work of Petr Šabach has been translated into English? #booksky

‘A person is a star that does not fall alone. Who knows where the echo will reverberate when we leave this earth? Perhaps someone will rise from our ashes in another time and realise they have been burned by the flame of our fall.’ ayearofreadingtheworld.com/2025/10/30/b...

I live in a small town on the south coast of the UK and there is someone publishing world-class Kurdish literature a few minutes’ walk from my house. I give you my latest Book of the month ayearofreadingtheworld.com/2025/10/30/b... #booksky

Book of the month: Bachtyar Ali I'm very fortunate to receive messages from readers and writers around the world telling me about books I might like to read. Many of the titles I've featured on this blog are the result of conversations with people in parts of the planet from which we English…

I am published by a genuine unicorn of an independent publisher - the wonderful, carbon-neutral, inclusive and thoroughly humane @renardpress.com. Today, they posted this. Please buy a book if you can

Think I'm prouder of this than any of my own books: the collection translated for me from São Tomé and Príncipe back in 2012 is finally published in English ayearofreadingtheworld.com/2025/10/22/n...

News: São Tomé and Príncipe collection published after 13 years Perhaps the most extraordinary thing that happened during my 2012 quest to read a book from every country (and there were many extraordinary things) involved the small African island nation of São Tomé and Príncipe. Of the 11 or so…

Is anyone else starting to find hardbacks a bit last century? I'm beginning to find the sight of them oddly quaint...

GOOD PEOPLE OF GLASGOW! I am thrilled to be appearing at this year's Aye Write festival on Sunday 9th November at 6pm. I'll be chatting to terrific writer Adam Oyebanji and all round legend Ann Landmann - come and find us and spread the word! tinyurl.com/yc56dfe8 @orendabooks.bsky.social

Obviously disappointed to have been pipped to the post for the Nobel yet again, but this lovely write-up of RELEARNING TO READ BY @carosanderson.bsky.social is a powerful consolation carosanderson.substack.com/p/what-to-re...

Arrived at my desk this morning to find this. Just the encouragement I needed today! #parentsky

On Sunday, I'll be on stage at the Cheltenham Literature Festival reacting to the announcement of the new Nobel Literature laureate. Who do you think it's going to be? #booksky

Lately, I’ve sent RELEARNING TO READ to Armenia, India, Bhutan, the US, France, Italy, Eritrea and the UAE. These days, sending parcels internationally involves lengthy paperwork. So today I gave copies to Penny and Kate at my local post office to thank them for helping me get my book out there.

Absolutely bowled over by this piece in today's Culture Newsletter from @prospectmagazine.co.uk. What a generous, insightful and powerful review. Thank you! www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/culture/the-...

RELEARNING TO READ is published to today. My dad died while I was writing it. He was planning to travel in retirement but never got to. I've dedicated the book to his memory; it makes me smile that as it sets off around the world, he goes with it. ayearofreadingtheworld.com/2025/10/01/p...

Publication day: Relearning to Read It's out! My fourth book, Relearning to Read: Adventures in Not-Knowing officially hits the shelves today. It's available worldwide in English and can be ordered through all the usual channels and bookshops, as well as directly through my publisher's website.…

Delighted to wish @annmorgan.bsky.social a happy #publicationday! A book about leaning into uncertainty to see the richness in lit from across the globe, in three slightly different covers, with a foreword by @lucycaldwell.bsky.social that will leave you beaming. 😁 renardpress.com/books/relear...

Whoop! We have SOLD OUT of the special numbered editions of RELEARNING TO READ and it's not even published yet! But don't despair, the paperback is available and comes in three slightly different covers. If you order one, it's a lucky dip. Or order three to be safe... renardpress.com/books/relear...

Book of the month: Ning Ken One of the lovely things about this project is the interactions I've had through it with writers around the world. The Chinese literary master Ning Ken is a great example. After I gave a quote to support Thomas Moran's English translation of Tibetan Sky, I received a…

Give away! Tell me about a book you gave or received for a chance to win a beautiful essay collection featuring many well-known writers' reflections on childhood reading (shipped anywhere in the world) ayearofreadingtheworld.com/2025/09/18/g...

Sure - it was the Oxford English Dictionary, which is what I also have on my desk.

Today is a sneaky early launch for my book #RelearningtoRead, published by @renardpress.com with a wonderful introduction by Lucy Caldwell. The official paperback publication date is 1 October but today fifty of these limited-edition copies, signed and hand-numbered by me, tumble into the world.

Dear Will Dady from @renardpress.com drove more than two hours yesterday to bring hot-off-the-press copies of my new book #RelearningtoRead to my house for me to sign. This has to be my favourite thing a publisher has ever done for me.

Book of the month: Nauja Lynge ayearofreadingtheworld.com/2025/08/29/b...

Thirteen years ago, I declared this man the writer I would most like to meet. Now I’m in Greenland with him. The world is full of so much darkness. We human beings do terrible things to one another. But there are also moments like this #anafricaningreenland #greenland

Think I've got everything. #Greenland here I come!

Delighted to be back literary exploring at #CheltLitFest (10-19 October 2025). Events include reimagining travel writing in the age of migration, reacting to the Nobel prize announcement and a special workshop to launch RELEARNING TO READ www.cheltenhamfestivals.org/whats-on

I'm not sure it was ever quite a library of Alexandria (I remember how awful chatrooms were) but I'm pretty sure it wouldn't be possible to do a project like a year of reading the world on the internet now.

Seeking a good book on the history of the Nobel prizes, particularly the Nobel prize for literature. Has anyone got any recommendations? #BookRecommendations

It'll be my first night in Nuuk in just over a week's time, so it seems fitting to prepare by reading this (tr. Anna Halager). #anfricaningreenland #witmonth

'You can’t help noticing how literary the collective consciousness of everyone in this book seems to be.' Yes, interesting. I enjoyed this book, but found myself thinking I couldn't help noticing how Western the perspective of everyone in it seems to be, despite the team being international.

The Republic of Consciousness Prize for small press fiction has a new sponsor and a new name. The Queen Mary Small press Fiction Prize. I'm excited to be judging it alongside @stuhennigan.bsky.social & @susannacrossman.bsky.social therepublicofconsciousness.substack.com/p/new-name-a...

Trying to read some Greenlandic/Inuit writing before I travel to #Greenland next month. Any recommendations? #AnnandanafricaninGreenland

Book of the month: M.G. Sanchez ayearofreadingtheworld.com/2025/07/28/b...

Whoop! Big thanks to @waterstones.bsky.social for picking #RelearningtoRead for this pre-order promotion. Order through their website, using code SUMMER25, and get 25% off until end of July.

‘What can I say, Juan? There are things embedded in my past that no man should have to talk about in the first-person possessive.’ From Diary of a Victorian Colonial and other Tales by M. G. Sanchez #Gibraltar

‘These scoundrels… [should be forced to] apologise. And while they’re doing that there has to be a visible blob of marmite on their clothing.’ Costa-winning poet Jonathan Edwards has a mischievous suggestion for handling rejection in the new #rlfcollected podcast.rlf.org.uk/488-jonathan...

My younger daughter, who is two, enjoys watching Bluey and Peppa Pig. But she calls them Bingo and George. For her, the shows are about the younger siblings. This is why representation and diversity of voices matter: we look for ourselves in stories.

you have to feel the language in your bones. the language is not a part of you, you are a part of the language, a wave in its ocean

So the #education secretary has announced that 2026 will be the UK’s National Year of Reading. If only there were a book coming out this October about putting the joy and curiosity back into #reading 🤔 (Still got a couple of ARCs if you’d like to see one)

What is the future of English studies? ayearofreadingtheworld.com/2025/07/07/w...

Book of the month: Tahir Hamut Izgil ayearofreadingtheworld.com/2025/06/30/b...

Went to see Guns N’ Roses at Wembley last night. My first big stadium gig at the ripe old age of 43. This morning I keep reflecting on the resonance of those lines from Civil War: You can’t trust freedom when it’s not in your hands/ When everybody’s fighting for the promised land.

Wow, would you look at this? A visitor to my blog has created an interactive map showing the titles rated highest on Goodreads for each country. Extraordinary. (Apparently ATONEMENT tops the bill for the UK) bookrecommendationgenerator.com/world-book-m...

Such an honour to have Tessa Hadley as a guest on #rlfcollected. I particularly love what she says about her early struggles to write - so inspiring for all of us who have battled to realise the work we feel compelled to make podcast.rlf.org.uk/486-tessa-ha...

Honoured to have an essay in this collection, published today in the UK, alongside work by such household names as Michael Morpurgo, Madeleine Thien, William Boyd and Nikesh Shukla. Many of my most powerful exchanges with book lovers around the world have involved messages from young people.

Thanks so much to @annmorgan.bsky.social for this proof copy of Relearning to Read, a book that offers insights into how we can reset our reading to engage more fully with literature that may be unfamiliar to us. Ann is the author of Reading the World, her project to read a book from every country.