Compass Points

Friday, 15 June 2018

Compass Points 264

Who’s ever wondered why most business books are written by men? Well, if you and your bookshop are bored of the same old macho willy-waving, then this is a highly refreshing list in the Independent of ten that are written by women. It includes two titles from a publisher we’ve recently been delighted to welcome to Team Compass; Practical Inspiration Publishing. This is the home of books that mean business: from management to marketing, parenting to leadership, HR to outdoor skills, internationally recognized authorities share their expertise. Strip Naked and Re-Dress With Happiness by Maria Hocking (£10.99, pb, 978 1910056448) is an emotional and thought-provoking title about how to survive and thrive though adversity; whether you’re in the boardroom or just facing going out alone. Maria shares her emotional journey of battling alopecia, amongst other health challenges, and how these shaped her outlook but also her future career. The Invisible Revolution by Nicola Huelin (£14.99, pb, 978 1910056615) shows the reader how they can join the empowered mumpreneurs and build a business they love. From finding your vision and personal values to marketing and persistence, it covers multiple important aspect of the business world. The list also includes the recent Hay House title Purpose: Find Your Truth and Embrace Your Calling by Jessica Huie (£12.99, pb, 978 1788170567). In it, Jessica documents her journey from teen mum struggling to make ends meet, to an extremely successful entrepreneur who advised the prime minister and worked with every celebrity around. Estelle, no less, said of this title “Once you read her story you are left feeling refreshed, rebuilt and ready to take on the world.”

Thanks Estelle, let’s have a bit of your uplifting music right now!

While we’re on the subject of inspirational women; it’s Feminist Book Fortnight from Saturday 16th June to Saturday 30th June. In celebration of Vote 100 (the hundredth anniversary of some women in the UK getting the vote) a group of radical and independent bookshops is launching this fabulous celebration of feminist books, when some of our very favourite indies around the country will be highlighting the diversity of feminist books with displays of books and events. You can find out all about it here.

Lots of publicity coming up for the wonderful Elsewhere Home (pb, £8.99, 978 1846592119) by Leila Aboulela which is published by Saqi on 2 July including interviews and extracts in the Herald, a feature in Woman’s Way, radio interviews on the BBC World Service and lots of appearances at festivals. It’s been longlisted for the People’s Book Prize which you can find out more about – and vote for – here.

Here’s a highly topical book coming from Pluto in September. Talking to North Korea: Ending the Nuclear Standoff (pb, £14.99, 9780745337852) is by Glyn Ford and is a very controversial take on one of the most terrifying political situations of the twenty-first century. Glyn has visited North Korea over 40 times and has worked with the regime’s leadership as MEP. He has been highly in demand recently – he’s very knowledgeable and opinionated and has just done a couple of slots on Talk Radio, one with Eamonn Holmes and one with James Whale. You can hear his views on the Trump / Kim summit on this terrific five-minute video promoting his book on YouTube here. Talking to North Korea challenges the media myths which paint it as a rogue state run by a mad leader, myths which are used Glyn believes by Western governments to support a military strike against the country. What if, instead of forcing regime change, the West listened to what the regime actually wanted?

Punch and Judy Politics? I’ll say! Who saw the extraordinary scenes at PMQ’s this week? What perfect timing for Ayesha Hazarika and Tom Hamilton’s book which launches next week. The authors have been much demand with their comments all across the media! Ayesha and Tom spent five years preparing Ed Miliband for the weekly joust, living through the highs and lows, the drama, the tension and the black humour of the political front line. With their unique knowledge plus personal recollections from key players from both sides, including Tony Blair, David Cameron, William Hague, Ed Miliband, George Osborne, Vince Cable, Harriet Harman and Neil Kinnock, this insightful and often hilarious book takes you behind the scenes of some of the biggest PMQs moments. Punch and Judy Politics: An Insiders' Guide to Prime Minister's Questions (£20, hb, 978 1785901843) is published by Biteback.

I had a bit of a chuckle at this A-Z of Author Events on Secret Bookseller’s blog. A is for Authors, B is for Books – yep I think we’re all in agreement so far. How about K is for Knobhead and N is for Narcotics…

What is a “lost” women’s classic? How unappreciated does something have to be before you consider it lost? Also, lost to whom? In a recent article on Top Ten Lost Women’s Classics in the Guardian, which you can read here Nuala O’Faolain’s Are you Somebody? (£7.99, pb, 978 1848406858) was listed as one of the “books, you’ll realise, that your library was lost without.” New Island reissued it this year in an anniversary edition to mark ten years since the author’s death. The Guardian said of Nuala’s writing that she was “someone witty and female who would not only call a spade a spade but acknowledge the blade, the handle the funny way it sticks out of the earth” and this book is as Roddy Doyle said “an extraordinary, powerful memoir. It is beautifully written, with an honesty that is both sensitive and stark.”

Great to see Kalwant Bhopal launching her book White Privilege: The Myth of a Post-racial Society (£15.59, pb, 978 1447335979) at The Centre for Research in Race and Education in Birmingham this week. Despite claims that we now live in a post-racial society, Kalwant examines how race continues to disadvantage those from black and minority ethnic backgrounds, shifting from overt to covert racism. She also shows how certain types of whiteness is privileged, whilst other white identities, Gypsies and Travellers for example, remain marginalised and disadvantaged in society. Drawing on topical debates around education, employment, class and poverty, this important book examines the impact of race on wider issues of difference in society. It’s published by Policy Press.

Martina Evans’ Now We Can Talk Openly About Men (pb, £9.99, 978 1784105785) is the Observer’s Poetry Book of the Month – with an enthusiastic review saying “I loved everything about this book … there is a garrulous humanity and humour in Evans’s writing.” You can read the whole feature – which includes an extract, here. Now We Can Talk Openly about Men is a pair of dramatic monologues, snapshots of the lives of two women in 1920s Ireland. The first, Kitty Donovan, is a dressmaker in the time of the Irish War of Independence. The second, Babe Cronin, is set in 1924, shortly after the Irish Civil War. Kitty is a dressmaker with a taste for laudanum. Babe is a stenographer who has fallen in love with a young revolutionary. Through their separate, overlapping stories, Evans colours an era and a culture seldom voiced in verse. It has just been published by Carcanet.

In 1919 Sigmund Freud published an essay The Theory of the Uncanny that delved deep into the tradition of horror writing and claimed to understand its darkest tricks. In the spirit of this great experiment, back in 2007, fourteen leading authors were challenged to write fresh fictional interpretations of what the uncanny might mean in the 21st century; updating Freud’s famous checklist of what gives us the creeps. Possum, one of the stories from this award-winning collection has now been turned into a film, which is premiering on the 25th June at the Edinburgh International Film Festival. Directed by its author Matthew Holness and starring Sean Harris, who is on magnificently twisted form as Philip, a troubled children’s puppeteer who is forced to face up to his wicked stepfather (Alun Armstrong) and the dark and surreal secrets that have tortured him his entire life. Comma are publishing a new edition of The New Uncanny (£9.99, pb, 978 1905583188) that Time Out called “a masterclass in understated creepiness.” I LOVE the new cover! It’s available to order now.

As the #MeToo movement spreads across the creative industries, writers are facing increasingly draconian attempts by publishers to police their behaviour, calling into question centuries old assumptions about the desirability – or even the possibility in today’s networked world – of separating writers’ lives from their work. So begins a very thought provoking article in the Guardian here about the return of ‘morality clauses’ in US publishing contracts. Are writers entitled to hold offensive opinions? How about sexual misconduct? And should their behaviour influence our opinion of their work?

Author Andy Hedgecock wrote a brilliant article recently for The Morning Star about the real-life people that inspired his short story Trying Lydia in Comma’s anthology Protest: Stories of Resistance. He found that researching a Luddite rising in Nottinghamshire revealed state collusion which offered many insights into the present. You can read the whole piece here.

Andrew Liddle’s new biography Ruth Davidson: And The Resurgence Of The Scottish Tories (hb, £18.99, 978 1785901744) continues to gain attention, particularly, north of the border of course with a variety of news pieces in The Times, Daily Record, Scotsman, The National and Herald Scotland and this review in The Times. A lesbian, kick-boxing former Territorial Army reservist, Davidson has broken the mould of both Tory and Scottish politics and has been touted as a future Prime Minister. This first biography of one of Britain’s rising political stars examines how Davidson rejuvenated the toxic Tory brand and asks what the future holds both in Scotland and beyond for this extraordinary young politician. With Scottish politics in flux following the hard-fought independence referendum and Britain s imminent departure from the EU, Davidson’s profile will only become more prominent as she heads up the official opposition. It’s published by Biteback.

John Erik Fossum and Hans-Petter Graver, authors of Squaring the Circle on Brexit: Could the Norway Model Work? (978 1 447348122, pb, £ 12.99) have published an interesting blog post here for the LSE Politics and Policy website – all great timing, with Brexit debates more in the news than ever! It’s published by Policy Press.

The William Roache book Life and Soul: How to Live a Long and Healthy Life (hb, £18.99, 978-1781809778) is published by Hay House next week and there’s loads of publicity – he is going to be EVERYWHERE! Just for starters that includes Loose Women –15th June, BBC Breakfast – 20th June, RTE TV – 22nd June and Granada TV News – 20th June. He will be speaking on the following radio shows: BBC Radio 2 Steve Wright – 19th June, BBC Radio 5 – date tbc, BBC Radio Manchester – 20th June, Newstalk Pat Kenny Show – 22nd June and will be featured in the Daily Mirror – 10th/11th June, Daily Mail – w/c 12th June, Sunday Express, the Sunday Mirror, Daily Mail Weekend, OK! – w/c 12th June and the Radio Times w/c 12th June. And there’s likely to be more!

There was a great review of Banthology (£9.99, pb, 978 1910974360) in World Literature Today saying "The stories, while cohesive, are not so similar that reading them feels monotonous. Rather, utilising uniquely different styles, each author manages to capture and fully develop a different perspective on the same overarching themes of immigration and xenophobia." You can read that here.

It’s Pride Month and of course Jessica Kingsley are fully committed to publishing pioneering books on LGBT issues for all readers. From children's storybooks, through to memoirs and practical guides for practitioners, there's something for everyone. To celebrate #Pride2018 in your bookshops check out their full range of titles here.

Always good to finish with some music – and in the absence of an official England World Cup offering, what do we have to entertain us? First up is this unofficial remix – Rasputin Rebooted from Ricky Wilson and Freddie Flintoff. No, I’m not joking. OK then how about this, Live it Up, the official FIFA video by Nicky Jam feat. Will Smith and Era Istrefi. Hmm. Or you could try Colors from Jason Derulo which is the Coca-Cola World Cup anthem. No? Not really feeling it? Never mind, this little ditty from CBeebies is trending rapidly – and something tells me it could yet be the hit of the summer…

That’s all for now folks! More next week!

This weekly blog is written for the UK book trade. If you would like to order any of the titles mentioned, then please talk to your Compass Sales Manager, or call the Compass office on 020 8326 5696. Every Friday an e-newsletter containing highlights from the blog is sent out to over 700 booksellers – and if you’d like to receive this then please contact nuala@compass-ips.london

Friday, 8 June 2018

Compass Points 263

This week, Team Compass have been at our sales conference, hearing about all the fabulous books that our wonderful publishers are bringing out between September 2018 and February 2019. We can’t wait to tell you more about them in the coming months – there are some real crackers!

There have been some lovely reviews for the Books of Tbilisi (978 1910974315), Riga (978-1910974384) – and the newest in the series – Havana (978 1910974018). STORGY said: "The Book of Tbilisi deserves every piece of praise it gets. It deals with raw emotion, real struggles, and introduces characters who leap from the page and exist outside of the stories they were created for." You can read the whole review here. Selcouth Station said of The Book of Riga: "I think that the concept of this book, short stories rooted in the same place, works so well because of the nature of short stories. I’ve been shown glimpses of Riga through the lens of several characters and their perspective creators. I went into reading this book with high expectations, weary because of how that usually leads to disappointment. However, when I finished the last pages of The Book of Riga I breathed that familiar sigh of content, pleased." That’s here. Bookmunch called it a "quirky and varied" collection here. The forthcoming Book of Havana was including in Culture Trip's Book Editor's 11 Books You Really Should Be reading for June; that's here and The Independent Literary Fiction Blog, said: “It’s a collection that’s saturated with the sights and smells of Havana, that will lead you through the backstreets to show you the reality of the city in all its glory and squalor. It’s hard to imagine wanting anything more from a collection of this type.” They are all published by Comma.

“When London first hosted the Olympics, in 1948, alongside boxing and canoeing there was also competitive poetry. By 2012 there were no medals for literature, but a fringe event called Poetry Parnassus invited poets from every Olympic nation to read in London. In a spirit of woolly equality there were no prizes on offer, but if there were, Austria’s representative – the brilliant Evelyn Schlag – might well have won. This week Schlag finally got the medal she deserved, one of three gongs awarded at the Hay Festival (the others went to Margaret Atwood and Jackie Morris). Much acclaimed as a novelist and poet on the continent, if Schlag is still little read in Britain then All Under One Roof (£12.99, pb, 978 1784102241), which is out on 28 June from Carcanet deserves to change that. Witty, tender, occasionally baffling, often sexy, it's a small gem to look forward to.” This was the start of a major article in the Telegraph, who have featured All Under One Roof as their Poetry Book of the Month. Subscribers can read the full article here.

If you weren’t at the Hay Festival – but wish you had been, then you could do a lot worse than listen here to the special Guardian Hay Podcast and discover which novel knocked Midnight’s Children out of the running for the Golden Booker, which is marking 50 years of the UK’s top literary award. You can also hear poet Tishani Doshi gives an impassioned response to the problem of violence against women in India and neurologist Sarah-Jayne Blakemore explains why we should take teenagers more seriously.

Darker With the Lights On by David Hayden (978 0995705296, pb, £9.99) is now up for two awards – it’s longlisted for the Edgehill Short Story Prize and shortlisted for the inaugural London Magazine Collyer Bristow Prize for Debut Fiction. The Guardian said “Once in a blue moon, a book comes along that really is like nothing you’ve ever read before. The 20 stories in this debut collection from David Hayden are strange, uncomfortable fables of memory, metamorphosis, time, disassociation and death: hard to fathom, but impossible to ignore; twisty and riddling, yet with a blunt impact that reverberates long after the final page.” It’s just been published in paperback by Little Island Press and as Eimear McBride said: “Why it's taken this long for his first collection to be published is beyond me but I, along with anyone with even the vaguest interest in looking at modernism anew, will be queuing up for a copy."

Following last weekend’s offering in the Mail on Sunday (which was in turn a focus of The Andrew Marr Show’s paper review), part two of the serial for Geoffrey Robertson QC’s new book, Rather His Own Man: In Court with Tyrants, Tarts and Troublemakers (£25, hb, 978 1785903977) is due to run this weekend. Hailed as the “exception’ to the ‘rarely memorable’ world of legal memoirs”, according to Lord Pannick QC who reviewed the book in The Times, this is “a legal autobiography that entertains, informs and inspires.” Linking in with the many columns in the wake of the BBC’s A Very English Scandal, Geoffrey wrote about his experiences defending the New Statesman in the aftermath of the Jeremy Thorpe case in The Guardian. He is also due to be featured as the subject of next weekend’s News Review profile in the Sunday Times, alongside a review in the books pages, and further reviews expected in the Daily Telegraph, Times Literary Supplement, Literary Review and Law Society Gazette.

"My story is reaching readers who then create their own experience of it. Each reader interprets and reacts emotionally to characters and events in the book and no reading experience is ever exactly the same" says Tracey Warr whose superb Conquest series is published by Impress. Daughter of the Last King (978 1907605819, £8.99) and The Drowned Court (£8.99, 978 1911293088), recount the story of a Welsh noblewoman caught up in the struggle between the Welsh and the Normans in the 12th century and is a highly readable weave of researched history and imagined stories.

Refugee Tales (£9.99, pb, 978-1910974230) was featured on Clare Balding's Ramblings programme on Radio 4 this week; she was walking in Surrey with a group of asylum seekers who are former detainees of the Gatwick Immigration Removal Centres. You can listen to the programme here.

It's Men’s Health Week 11-17 June, and there’s lots of publicity linked to this for Dave Chawner’s witty and practical memoir Weight Expectations: One Man’s Recovery from Anorexia (£9.99, pb, 978 1785923586). The Telegraph Men Channel has You Don't Look Anorexic – a written feature from Dave on how anorexia is not always physically obvious, and how he used his anorexia as a coping mechanism to combat his anxiety. The Independent is running an interview with Dave about the book, his experience of anorexia and the misconceptions that surround men and mental health/eating disorders. And the Sun will have an interview with Dave about his anorexia and anxiety. It’s published by Jessica Kingsley on 21 June.

A really interesting piece here by Anthony Burgess, on LitHub where he asks “If A Clockwork Orange Can Corrupt, Why Not Shakespeare and the Bible?” It is taken from a new compilation of unpublished and uncollected material which has just been published by Carcanet. The Ink Trade: Selected Journalism 1961-1993 (pb, £19.99, 978-1784103927) is a selection of reviews and articles which are provocative, informative, entertaining, savage and extravagant. Burgess’ journalism has fallen somewhat into neglect in recent years, but his writing – as this article proves – is always very readable and was often crucial in establishing new writers, new tastes and trends. There’s a super review of it in the Manchester Review of Books here.

And if you haven’t seen or read A Clockwork Orange then do watch this one-minute trailer – it gives you a very good idea of just how extraordinarily powerful and provocative a writer Anthony Burgess was.

Tis the season for a large glass of something cold or warm (depending on whether you’re more of a Crocodile Dundee or a John Major type of drinker), and The Pocket Guide to Beer (£7.99, pb, 978 1780274898) which was launched this week by Birlinn will point your tastebuds in the direction of something new. This handy, fun and informative guide to beer takes the reader on a journey using the BeerTubeMap, a unique flavour map that links beers by flavour and style. It comprehensively shows how beer styles from around the world relate to each other and includes both traditional and new wave beers, along with some practical tips on keeping up with the ever-changing world of beer! The no nonsense, un-geeky style makes it a great starter guide for beer newbies whilst providing inspiration for more seasoned drinkers. It’s by bar manager Joe Dick and industry expert Nikki Welch.

I LOVE it when publishers and authors create little films to promote their books! Have a watch of this dramatic video trailer for Drugs To Forget (pb, £8.99, 978-1910453513) a new thriller by Martin Granger just published by Red Door. CrimeTime Magazine said “If you hanker for fast-moving adventure novels look no further. Clearly Mr Granger is a name to watch” and this suspenseful race against bio-terror, where a foreign chemical agent is found on British soil sounds great!

That’s all for now folks! More next week!

Friday, 1 June 2018

Compass Points 262

Who has seen this AMAZING trailer for the new Queen biopic Bohemian Rhapsody – coming out in October? I must say I think the remix of the Queen music in this trailer is absolutely superb. And talking of perfect timing (almost like they planned it!) this film will coincide with the new edition of Queen in 3D (978 1999667429, £30, hb) Following the huge success of the slipcased deluxe first edition last autumn; those clever folk at the London Stereoscopic Company are now bringing us a “Lite” edition — the same content and quality, but now with a compact viewer, sunk into the back board of the book which will make Brian May’s vivid words and pictures available to millions more of Queen fans at a lower price. This new edition contains all the words and the 300 pictures from the original, it’s 208 pages, 325x240 mm with a “lite” OWL 3-D viewer included and it’s out in October. Bohemian Rhapsody is going to be HUGE – and so is this new edition methinks!

Today's millionaire footballers can thank the Premier League, Pay TV and a bloke called George, says Jon Henderson author of When Footballers were Skint: A Journey in Search of the Soul of Football (£20, hb, 978 1785903847) which has just been published by Biteback. He’s written a great article about it which you can read here saying “I wrote the book for two reasons. First, before it was too late, to capture the reminiscences of the country’s leading professionals who really were hard up, living on a meagre and strictly enforced maximum wage regardless of their status, while subject to a punitive ‘slavery’ rule. And, secondly, to give perspective to the surreal changes that have taken place since, both to players’ lives and the character of the crowds who watch them.”

And to take yourself right back to the times “before the silly money came in.” this highly nostalgic ten-minute film is well worth a watch – magnificent stuff!

I’m delighted to say that Carcanet are shortlisted thrice for this year’s Forward Prizes! Best Collection includes Venus as a Bear by Vahni Capildeo (£8.99, pb, 978 178410554 9), Best First Collection includes Shrines of Upper Austria by Phoebe Power (£9.99, pb, 978 1784105341) and Best Single Poem includes And Death Demands a Labor by Sumita Chakraborty (published in PNR 237). The Forward Prizes for Poetry are Britain’s most coveted poetry prizes: celebrating the best new poetry published in the British Isles and honouring both established and emerging writers. They will be awarded on 18 September 2018 at the Southbank Centre, London. You can find more details about the shortlists here.

A great piece here in the Guardian from Kogan Page author Charles Arthur where he tells us how GDPR is “the data detox we’ve been waiting for” – and also includes a good plug for his new books Cyber Wars (£14.99, pb, 978 0749482008). He writes: “researching my new book, Cyber Wars, which looks at various hacking incidents, I was stunned to discover that TalkTalk was fined more for bad customer service than it was for allowing the theft of the personal and bank details of thousands of people by a cyber attacker.”

And for some of the funniest GDPR memes and tweets have a look here!

Lots of publicity expected in the like of the Newcastle Journal, Herald, Northern Echo etc as well as the specialist military and archaeology media for Lost Lives New Voices: Unlocking the Stories of the Scottish Soldiers from the Battle of Dunbar 1650 (pb, £20, 978 1785708473). This is an absolutely fascinating book – with special appeal of course for bookshops in Scotland, Durham and Northern England – it’s just been published by Oxbow. Using the latest scientific techniques as well as archaeological and historical evidence, it reconstructs with vivid accuracy the stories of the Scottish soldiers who were in Durham cathedral and castle in the fateful autumn of 1650. Of the prisoners who survived their ordeal after Dunbar, new evidence has emerged taking us across the Atlantic where the soldiers began new lives on the frontiers of New England working in ironworks, sawmills, farming and fishing and adapting to the vast forested landscapes which they named ‘Scotland’ and ‘Unity’, after the vessel they had sailed in. None returned to the country of their birth.

There was a wonderful review of Ironopolis (hb, £11.9, 978 1912109142) in the Morning Star this week calling it “the most accomplished working-class novel of the last few years. By any measure, Ironopolis is an extraordinary novel. Glen James Brown’s debut work is breathtaking in its ambition and delivery.” You can read the whole piece here . Ironopolis has just been published by Parthian and everyone at Compass who has read this one says it is terrific –I urge you to order it!

Anxiety and depression – the stigma around admitting we need help is vanishing fast – and there’s a terrific blog piece here by Michael Maitland who talks honestly about how “feeling stressed and trying to be ‘a man’ about it; i.e. bottling it all up” negatively impacted his mental health. His book (written with his father Iain) Out of the Madhouse (pb, £12.99, 978 1785923517) has just been published by Jessica Kingsley and combines personal insights, humour and practical tips, with essential support for anyone experiencing a depression-related issue. It confronts the shocking bleakness of mental illness head on but is also profoundly moving and beautifully written, with loads of excellent advice for family and friends.

Ooh – I am loving this display for Red Door from Kenilworth Books in Warwickshire who say “Small publishers are a thriving, powerful force in the British book industry; and yet rarely do we see their news supported by industry or cultural media. We’re creating displays to introduce these extraordinary companies to our customers. Meet @RedDoorBooks #PublishingRevolution” What a great idea – beautifully executed!

A number of the Comma Palestinian authors have been in the news recently, being interviewed and asked to write opinion pieces on the current tensions. Rawan Yaghi was on Newsnight and wrote a piece for Mondoweiss which you can read here. His writing will be included in Palestine + 100: Stories From a Century after the Catastrophe (pb, £9.99, 978 1910974445) an anthology coming from Comma in 2019. Atef Abu Saif, editor of The Book of Gaza (£9.99, pb, 978 1905583645) and author of The Drone Eats With Me (£9.99. pb, 978 1905583713) was interviewed on Sky News, the Guardian and also The New York Times.

There have been some superb US reviews for Because We Are Bad: OCD and a Girl Lost in Thought (£7.99, pb, 978 0993040740) by Lily Bailey. Slate.com said “Bailey tells her story with impressive frankness and eloquence…expressive, droll, and evocative. Though the book is rife with her harrowing experiences... its overall effect is that of a late-night diner catch-up with a lovable friend.” and the Washington Post called it “remarkable… vivid… I hope this book finds a wide readership." It is also getting five-star acclaim on Amazon – don’t let them get all the sales – this one should be in your shops right next to Bryony Gordon’s latest bestseller which I see everywhere! It’s published by Canbury Press.

Some great publicity is planned for Elsewhere, Home (pb, £8.99, 978 1846592119) a new collection from prize-winning author Leila Aboulela. These intimate stories of longing and exile by one of our finest contemporary writers have just been published by Saqi and from the heat of Khartoum at the height of summer to the wintery streets of London, from the concrete high rises in the Gulf to the blustery coast in Aberdeen, they vividly evoke the overlapping worlds of Africa, Britain and the Middle East. So far, interviews are confirmed with the Herald, Sunday Herald, BBC World Service, and BBC Africa; and Leila will be appearing at the following events: Africa Writes Festival (29 June), Daunts Marylebone (3 July), London Migration Museum (4 July) Edinburgh International Book Festival (Aug), Aberdeen Unbound: Booked! Festival (24 Aug) and the Marlborough Book Festival (September). Rachel Cusk writing in the Telegraph said “Leila Aboulela is the kind of writer from whom British people need to hear” and with this publicity – they absolutely will be!

Are you the person who seeks out the liquorice sweeties in the box – or the one who avoids it at all costs? Whatever your personal preference, liquorice’s popularity is on the rise again – and is so much more than confectionery; its sophisticated herbal taste makes it a marvellous culinary ingredient as well. In Liquorice: A Cookbook (£10, 978 0754833659) by Carol Wilson you'll discover a liquorice cheesecake, choc chip muffins with liquorice buttercream, glazed liquorice roast pork, and all kinds of marinades, sweets, drinks and preserves, as well as a guide to liquorice around the world and its fascinating history. Perfectly timed for the famous Pontefract Liquorice Festival in July (who knew?) this is published by Lorenz in June.

This week the BBC revealed the existence of secret networks of badger baiters who kill the protected species for fun. An ex-soldier went undercover to expose the gang, who used hunting dogs to ‘dig out’ badgers as well as going lamping — shining bright lights that attract animals and then clubbing them to death. You can read his report here. Badgered to Death: The People and Politics of the Badger Cull (pb, £8.99, 978 0993040757) by Dominic Dyer delves into this centuries old persecution. With numbers of badgers, foxes and hedgehogs falling sharply, Dominic argues that the animal should not be killed in its thousands as a result of a government cull to control TB. The badger cull brings out high passions in people, as witnessed by the actor Brian Blessed’s expletive-laden rant against farmers while dressed as a tudor king!. Badgered to Death is an impassioned polemic, but reads like a thriller, and is essential reading for anyone with an interest in wildlife and the environment in general. It’s been highly praised and is published by Canbury Press.

If you’re a book reviewer or blogger as well as a bookseller and would like to review the latest in the Book of the City series The Book of Havana (pb, £11.99, 978 1910974018), or Sean O'Brien's (whose writing the FT called “strange, creepy, often brilliant”) supernatural short story collection, Quartier Perdu (£8.99, pb, 978 1905583706); then those lovely folk at Comma Press can send you a copy! Get in touch at commapublications@yahoo.co.uk

Let’s end with some music. What do Katy Perry’s Firework, Art Garfunkel’s Bright Eyes and Elton John’s Goodbye Yellow Brick Road have in common? They’ve all been inspired by books of course – click here to see forty such songs – I absolutely LOVE this list from the Scottish Book Trust!

That’s all for now folks! More next week!