For novelist and critic Gabriel Josipovici, the contemporary novel in English is profoundly disappointing - a poor relation of its groundbreaking Modernist forebears. This book asks why.

From one of the country's most eminent reviewers and academics, a delightfully sceptical and devastatingly intelligent assessment of the true value of art.

'No one else casts such a shrewd and gimlet eye on contemporary life.' - William Boyd Comic, dark and insightful, What Happened? is Hanif Kureishi's new collection of essays and fiction.

An engaging, thought-provoking, and polemical volume on what makes American literature what it is today.

In What Is the Grass keeps company with Whitman and his mutable, landmark work, Leaves of Grass, tracing the resonances between his own experience and the legendary poet's life and work. What is it, then, between us? Whitman asks.

In this inspiring love letter to reading and the life-changing power of literature, 35 writers share their all-time favourite books

Bracing honesty, rare insight and hilarious revelations from internationally bestselling author of LADY IN WAITING as she shares everything she's learned from her extraordinary and unexpected life.

From the author of the magnificent, award-winning novels GILEAD, HOME and LILA comes this wonderful, heart-warming collection of essays about reading.

Should you finish every book you start? How has your family influenced the way you read? What is literary style? How is the Nobel Prize like the World Cup? This collection of provocative pieces tells what readers want from books and how to look at the literature we encounter in a new light.

A mix of memoir and narrative non-fiction, White Spines is a book about Nicholas Royle's passion for Picador's fiction publishing from the 1970s to the end of the 1990s.

A spirited and essential companion to Orwell and his works, covering all the novels and major essays

Acclaimed critic John Sutherland gets his teeth into the literary puzzles of the greatest-ever Gothic novel

Acclaimed critic John Sutherland gets his teeth into the literary puzzles of the greatest-ever Gothic novel

Presents essays by leading short-story writers on their favorite American short stories and why they like them. It will send readers to the library or bookstore to read - or re-read - the stories selected.

In Why I Write, Orwell describes his journey to becoming a writer, and his movement from writing poems to short stories to the works we remember him for. Why I Write is a unique opportunity to look into Orwell's mind, and it grants the reader an entirely different vantage point from which to consider the rest of the great writers' oeuvre.

From the Booker-shortlisted author of Umbrella, a world-girdling collection of writings inspired by a life lived in and for literature.

Beginning with an essay on the attributes that define a classic, this collection provides the author's criticism.

Written by a leading academic and broadcaster and drawing on interviews with readers, writers, reading groups, bookshop owners, librarians, and figures from literary publishing, reviewing, and festivals, this accessible volume offers an overview of the contemporary scene of women's novel-reading.

Written by a leading academic and broadcaster and drawing on interviews with readers, writers, reading groups, bookshop owners, librarians, and figures from literary publishing, reviewing, and festivals, this accessible volume offers an overview of the contemporary scene of women's novel-reading.