book reviews and features
Elinor Cleghorn: Unwell Women review – misunderstanding and misdiagnosis![]()
I’m one of the women in the pages of Elinor Cleghorn’s new history of the female body, Unwell Women: A Journey Through Medicine and Myth in a Man-Made World. I’ve dealt with strange... Read more... |
Ed Miliband: Go Big - How to Fix Our World review - reasons to hope![]()
Almost alone among my friends, I liked and admired Ed Miliband, renewing my on-off relationship with the Labour... Read more... |
Nichola Raihani: The Social Instinct review - the habits of co-operation![]()
An army on the move must be as disturbing as it is, on occasion, inspiring. In E.L. Doctorow’s startlingly good civil war novel The March, General Sherman’s column proceeds inexorably... Read more... |
Kylie Whitehead: Absorbed review - boundary-blurry, darkly funny debut![]()
Absorbed meets Allison at the end of her relationship with Owen. They are at a New Year's Eve party when she realises that their 10-year partnership has wound down. So far, so normal. But... Read more... |
Rosie Wilby: The Breakup Monologues review - do breakups make us stronger, better people?![]()
According to Rosie Wilby, “breaking up and staying together are simply two sides of the same coin. They are a flick of a switch apart, separated only by one fleeting moment of madness, or perhaps... Read more... |
Natasha Brown: Assembly review - turning personal crisis into perfect criticism![]()
School assembly: one of the many great traditions to be upended by the pandemic. According to this... Read more... |
Esther Freud: I Couldn't Love You More review - the alternative history of a pregnancy![]()
The glamorous unreliability of Esther Freud’s father, Lucian Freud, is an inescapable force in her... Read more... |
Music books to end lockdown: Sam Lee, Hawkwind, Dylan, Richard Thompson, and the Electric Muses![]()
It won’t be long now before concert halls and back rooms, arts centres and festival grounds fill with people again, and... Read more... |
Sam Riviere: Dead Souls review – whip-smart literary satire with a techno tinge![]()
In 1992 Martin Amis published a story, “Career Move”, in which the writers of sensational screenplays with titles like Decimator and Offensive from Qasar 13 read their work to... Read more... |
Lucy Caldwell: Intimacies review - exploring the empty spaces![]()
In the first short story of Lucy Caldwell’s collection Intimacies, “Like This”, one of the worst possible things that could ever happen to a parent occurs. On the spur of a stressful... Read more... |
Pages
Subscribe to theartsdesk.com
Thank you for continuing to read our work on theartsdesk.com. For unlimited access to every article in its entirety, including our archive of more than 15,000 pieces, we're asking for £5 per month or £40 per year. We feel it's a very good deal, and hope you do too.
To take a subscription now simply click here.
And if you're looking for that extra gift for a friend or family member, why not treat them to a theartsdesk.com gift subscription?
The future of Arts Journalism
You can stop theartsdesk.com closing!
We urgently need financing to survive. Our fundraising drive has thus far raised £33,000 but we need to reach £100,000 or we will be forced to close. Please contribute here: https://gofund.me/c3f6033d
And if you can forward this information to anyone who might assist, we’d be grateful.
latest in today

It all started on 09/09/09. That memorable date, September 9 2009, marked the debut of theartsdesk.com.
It followed some...

A traditional Korean house has appeared at Tate Modern....

Wagner’s universe, in the second of his Ring operas which brings semi-humans on board to challenge the gods, matches exaltation and misery, terror...

Does it spark joy? Yes, definitely...and maybe we music critics should ask the Marie Kondo question more often. London-based vocalist/lyricist...

The makers of The Extraordinary Miss Flower are billing it as a “performance film”, a subspecies of the concert-movie...

Purporting to be a documentary about John Lennon in the 1970s, Borrowed Time is no such thing....

PUP’s Who Will Look After The Dogs? is a raw and emotionally charged album that captures the band’s chaotic spirit while showing clear...

It's both brave and bracing to welcome new voices to the West End, but sometimes one wonders if such exposure necessarily works to the benefit of...

“Sandra” is one of my favourite tracks from my album Between The Moon and the Milkman which was released last year. While living in...

On the eve of recording an album at Real World Studios, guitarist Adrian Utley and the American trumpet player Eddie Henderson brought their “...