(Early) birthday dinner: seared flat iron steak with hash browns, roasted cherry tomatoes and a fried egg, and Basque cheesecake with fresh berries. #food #cooking 🍽️🍜

L: the heretic pharaoh Akhenaten worshipping the sun-god Aten (artisans of Amarna, c. 1346-1332 BC) R: cats worshipping a cat/sun head (@poorlycatdraw.bsky.social, 2026)

“Gods need worship, and mortals need stories.” Retellings of Greek myths need to be less accurate—just look at Jennifer Saint's THIS IMMORTAL HEART. Read my review to learn what works (and doesn't) about it: buff.ly/CyCCOza 📚💙 #booksky #bookreview #romance #mythology

Cheese! Art! Gods! Click here to read about: • the paradox of myth retellings in Jennifer Saint's THIS IMMORTAL HEART • Gérôme's elaborately meta paintings • Candy-striped cheese buns 📚💙🍽️🍜 #booksky #bookreview #art #food #cooking #RecipeOfTheDay #romance

We've got a trailer for THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2! If you're excited to see it, click here to read about why the first movie is so enduring. ...that's all. #filmsky 📽️

If anyone's curious how my next book review is coming along, I’ve suddenly begun singing Roland Barthes’ name to the tune of the “Galileo” section in “Bohemian Rhapsody”. 📚💙 #booksky

And if W.B. Yeats had done that, it would still be less insane than everything he wrote in A VISION.

Philip Glass boycotting the Kennedy Center Philip Glass boycotting the Kennedy Center Philip Glass boycotting the Kennedy Center Philip Glass Philip Glass Philip Glass Philip Glass Philip Glass boycotting the Kennedy Center

Are any Great American Novel candidates set entirely outside America? THE SUN ALSO RISES and THE PORTRAIT OF A LADY, where the US only appears in flashbacks, probably come closest… 📚💙 #booksky

Auschwitz was at the end of a process. We must remember that it did not start from gas chambers. This hatred gradually developed: from ideas, words, stereotypes & prejudice through legal exclusion, dehumanization & escalating violence... to systematic and industrial murder. Auschwitz took time.

“Never get between a woman and her happily ever after.” It's a romance with a meta twist. Read about Amy Lea's THE BODYGUARD AFFAIR and how it questions centuries-old ideas about the genre: buff.ly/ggXTAUb 📚💙 #booksky #bookreview #romance #romcom

"Would Gustave Flaubert like HEATED RIVALRY?" My newsletter asks all the important questions. It's got: • the metafictional themes of Amy Lea's THE BODYGUARD AFFAIR • Tom Thomson's nature paintings • reinvented rice pudding 📚💙🍽️🍜 #booksky #bookreview #art #food #cooking #RecipeOfTheDay #romance

Overheard at the @londonreviewbookshop.co.uk: "I've never read WAR AND PEACE." "I've read it four times." 📚💙 #booksky

Jan Rombouts the Elder’s painting of Simon Magus (L) bears an uncanny resemblance to Lumpawaroo the Wookiee (R) from THE STAR WARS HOLIDAY SPECIAL. #art #StarWars

28 YEARS LATER: THE BONE TEMPLE (dir. Nia DaCosta)

“Art is the forgotten fifth pillar of health.” Art is good for you—here's the scientific proof. Read about Daisy Fancourt's ART CURE and how art can benefit your body and mind in my review: buff.ly/lnVgwD0 📚💙 #booksky #bookreview #health #art #science

Boost your mood on Blue Monday! Let my newsletter inspire you with: • The science behind art's health benefits in Daisy Fancourt's ART CURE • Franz Marc's dazzling paintings • An easy, colourful recipe for salmon 📚💙🍽️🍜 #booksky #bookreview #art #food #cooking #RecipeOfTheDay #health #science

In which a photographer quite rudely interrupts Larry the Cat's stroll.

Not the hero we deserve, but the one we need.

On Christmas eve, Santa Krasznahorkai leaves his workshop in Hungary and delivers postmodern musings on absurdist, dystopian themes to readers worldwide. (sighted at @londonreviewbookshop.co.uk) 📚💙 #booksky

Ah, the joys of British English.

AI is such a boon for literature: without it, I wouldn't have heard of the great author Edgalan Poe, also known as The EDGART. 📚💙 #booksky

2026 is the UK's National Year of Reading: if you're on #booksky, take a moment to nominate a few books you love to #ThePleasureList! 📚💙

A man who heroically tackled and disarmed one of the Bondi Beach gunmen has been unmasked. The hero has been named as 43-year-old Ahmed al Ahmed, a Sydney local who owns a fruit shop in Sutherland. www.news.com.au/national/nsw...

There's lots to take note of in this piece, but I want to single out "Espressos for the eyes" as the most apt and inspired description of Marshall's work I've read.

"Human rights experts now believe El Fasher is likely to be the worst war crime of the Sudanese civil war, which is already characterised by mass atrocities and ethnic cleansing."

Prepare for Christmas with artichokes and adultery! From an exciting upcoming novel to two of history's most famous cheaters, there's all sorts of excitement in my last newsletter of 2025: wsluk.substack.com/p/to-kiss-an... 📚💙🍽️🍜 #booksky #bookreview #art #food #cooking #RecipeOfTheDay

My recipe for artichoke with a blood orange mayonnaise is a delicious and unusual appetiser, perfect for entertaining guests at Christmas. Click below to learn how it's made. #RecipeOfTheDay #food #recipe #cooking 🍽️🍜

Get some hump day inspiration: click below to read about an adulterous couple who inspired artists from Rodin to Rossetti. #art

I'm genuinely excited to see more people read Sophie Mackintosh's PERMANENCE when it comes out next year. Read my review of her novel below. 📚💙 #booksky #bookreview

What should you give the book-lover in your life for Christmas? Click below to learn about my favourite reads of 2025 and more! 📚💙🍽️🍜 #booksky #bookreview #art #food #cooking #RecipeOfTheDay

For anyone who read the article and was curious, here's Academy president Cheryl Boone Isaacs calling cinematographer Dick Pope "Dick Poop":

FUN LITERATURE FACT: the name "Dostoevsky" translates to "two Toevskys". 📚💙 #booksky

“In the city there was time for all of this, and more. Time for the ordinary, to which we normally give little value…” You should get excited for Sophie Mackintosh's upcoming novel PERMANENCE. To learn why, read my review of this subtle, moving book: buff.ly/HnFa6bW 📚💙 #booksky #bookreview

Prepare for Christmas with artichokes and adultery in my newsletter, featuring: • Sophie Mackintosh's philosophical and beautiful novel PERMANENCE • paintings of two iconic adulterers • the joy of artichokes! 📚💙🍽️🍜 #booksky #bookreview #art #food #cooking #RecipeOfTheDay

A modern classic.

An otherwise excellent cookbook I’ve just read kept referring to sauces as a "viscous halo", which is a remarkably strange phrase for describing food, but an excellent name for a prog-rock band.

ICYMI: Click here to travel back to the 1930s with a thrilling mystery, an underrated artist, and Victorian-era breakfast, all in my newsletter: buff.ly/vdb7QYs 📚💙🍽️🍜 #booksky #bookreview #art #food #cooking #RecipeOfTheDay #history

Just awoke from a nightmare about walking round a darkened, desolate book fair, in case anyone's curious how my job search in publishing is going.

This is a genuinely laudable goal (see below for a quick, cheap bean recipe I love) and deserves all the publicity it can get...but could they not have given the campaign *literally any other name*?

My #RecipeOfTheDay, an easy one-pan kedgeree, is something I make all the time. Click below to learn the recipe for this simple and spicy main course. #food #recipe #cooking 🍽️🍜

Contemplate the cool subtlety of Dod Procter's portraits in this retrospective of her deeply underrated artwork, which combines realism with an icy elegance. #art

Christmas at Thornleigh Hall means balls, betrayal, and bloodshed in Emily Critchley's THE UNDOING OF VIOLET CLAYBOURNE, now available in paperback. Click below for my review of this wintry mystery novel! 📚💙 #booksky #bookreview

Perk up your hump day with a thrilling mystery novel, an underrated painter, and Victorian-style breakfast! 📚💙🍽️🍜 #booksky #bookreview #art #food #cooking #RecipeOfTheDay

Tired: DIE HARD (1988) is a Christmas movie Wired: FAUST (1926) is a Christmas movie 📽️ #filmsky

Great culture can save lives. Literally. Amazing letter in today’s @thetimes.com about Tom Stoppard

A chilling mystery about nasty rich people, Emily Critchley's THE UNDOING OF VIOLET CLAYBOURNE (now out in paperback) will thrill you during a chilly winter night. Read my review here (and subscribe!): buff.ly/vdb7QYs 📚💙 #booksky #bookreview

Take a trip back to the 1930s in today's newsletter, featuring: • Emily Critchley's wintry mystery THE UNDOING OF VIOLENT CLAYBOURNE • Dod Procter's icily beautiful portraits • my reinvention of a Victorian dish! 📚💙🍽️🍜 #booksky #bookreview #art #food #cooking #RecipeOfTheDay

Channelling my inner early modern peasant with one of the best winter meals I’ve ever made. #food #recipe #cooking 🍽️🍜

ICYMI: Roman mummies, boozy desserts, and an awful book are featured in my newsletter. Click below (and subscribe) to laugh along at ridiculous quotes, or be inspired by beautiful art! Read it here: buff.ly/z7caBMB 📚💙🍽️🍜 #booksky #bookreview #art #food #cooking #RecipeOfTheDay #history