Ella Harold, editor at Fig Tree, has acquired UK and Commonwealth rights to Family Friends, the third novel by writer and journalist Chloë Ashby, from Emma Finn at C&W. Fig Tree will publish the novel as a lead hardback in summer 2026 👇 thebookseller.com/rights/chloe-a…

SECOND SELF but make it French 🇫🇷 My author copies of REPENTIRS have arrived, a week ahead of publication day (13th March) and on World Book Day! Translated by Anouk Neuhoff and published by Alice Déon and the dream team at LA TABLE RONDE ❤️

I'll be at Bàrd Books on 25th March talking all things writing and art with Sinéad Gleeson (NOT HERE) and Rosie Beaumont-Thomas of Feminist Book Society. Join us! wearebardbooks.co.uk/the-feminist-b…

The dangers of dating Picasso ❤️💔 For @TheTimesBooks I reviewed Sue Roe’s Hidden Portraits, a group biography of the six women who loved Picasso: Fernande Olivier, Olga Khokhlova, Marie-Thérèse Walter, Dora Maar, Françoise Gilot and Jacqueline Roque. thetimes.com/culture/books/…

My family were very confused about my sudden interest in the fibre-optic cables that carry information around the world on the ocean floor – until I told them about TWIST, Colum McCann’s latest, out now from Bloomsbury Books UK. My review for The Spectator spectator.co.uk/article/deep-m…

Not every artist who skyrockets to fame makes it all the way into space…. I interviewed Amoako Boafo ahead of his first U.K. solo show at Gagosian for The Guardian theguardian.com/artanddesign/2…

I reviewed (and loved) Madeleine Watts’ second novel, Elegy, Southwest, which is thoughtful and quietly compelling, and conjures the familiar sense of steadily trundling towards disaster…. In this week’s The Spectator spectator.co.uk/article/the-ro…

It’s remarkable, really, the web Katie Kitamura can spin around a scene as simple as a woman meeting a man for lunch. My review of the author’s confounding and quietly intense fifth novel is in this week’s The Spectator spectator.co.uk/article/the-mo…

“Gunk is a warm, often funny novel about an unconventional partnership — imagine Ratty and Mole if they had a baby together in 21st-century Brighton.” Laura Hackett – keeping everything crossed the second half of this sentence makes it onto the paperback thetimes.com/culture/books/…

charmed to learn that in early modern french texts on childbirth & churching, the placenta is often called a “gâteau”

If you ask me, there’s nobody painting modern motherhood quite like Caroline Walker. We chatted ahead of her new show at The Hepworth Wakefield, which focuses on the constellation of mostly female workers providing support during childbirth and early-years care theguardian.com/artanddesign/2…

Niki de Saint Phalle and Jean Tinguely reunite! My review for Guardian culture theguardian.com/artanddesign/2…

another day, another press release

I reviewed Judith Mackrell’s long and lively joint biography of Gwen and Augustus John for Times Culture thetimes.com/culture/books/…

I wrote about James Delbourgo's history of collecting (and my childhood Beanie Baby stash) for Times Culture thetimes.com/culture/books/…

The case of the disappearing Amédée Ozenfant! Or, my latest for Times Culture thetimes.com/culture/books/…