Shouting at the Window
A man takes a train journey between two (unnamed) cities. Haynes - we only ever get to know his surname - is on the margins of society: a petty criminal, living from day-to-day, who has had to flee from his usual territory to somewhere more secure...
On the Carousel
On the Carousel is the story of a young man’s journey through the decade – against the background of Thatcherism and Madonna and Cabbage Patch Dolls – as he enjoys the benefits of success, but then starts to re-assess his values and priorities...
Latest from the Blog
Gabriel’s Moon by William Boyd (2024)
10th February 2026 In August 1960, Gabriel Dax – an ambitious 30-year old travel writer – is in Léopoldville in the newly independent republic of the Congo. Through a friend from university who is now a Minister in the government, he secures an interview with the charismatic Prime Minister, Patrice Lumumba. Gabriel learns that Lumumba…
A Scrooge Mystery by Andreina Cordani (2025)
18th January 2026 It is a few days before Christmas in 1844, nearly a full year on from the events of Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol. The enlightened Ebenezer Scrooge – now a reformed character and an enthusiastic supporter of the festival – is paying one of his occasional visits to the local graveyard for…
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Alexander Solzhenitsyn (1962)
24th December 2025 It is a day in January 1951. The prisoner (or zek) is awakened by the five o’clock reveille sounded – by the blows of a hammer on a length of rail hanging up near the staff quarters – for those in his freezing barrack hut. “The clanging ceased, but everything outside still…
JR Alexander 