tue 21/10/2025

book reviews and features

theartsdesk Q&A: Anna Bogutskaya on her new book about the past decade of horror cinema

Harry Thorfinn-

You may have heard the phrase “elevated horror” being used to describe horror films that lean more toward arthouse cinema, favouring tension and psychological turmoil over jump-...

Read more...

Olga Tokarczuk: The Empusium review - paranoid prose

Issy Brooks-Ward

In his first of a series of meditations on the sickness that was consuming him, John Donne reflected...

Read more...

Stevie Smith: Not Waving But Drowning review - riding the wave

Jack Barron

Last year, Wendy Cope’s poem, "The Orange", went viral on TikTok. I’m not totally certain how a poem goes viral, but it did – and there’s nothing we can do about it.

In fact, Faber &...

Read more...

Ellen McWilliams: Resting Places - On Wounds, War and the Irish Revolution review - finding art in the inarticulable

Issy Brooks-Ward

How do you give voice to a history that is intimate to your own in one sense, whilst being the story of others whom you never knew? This is a...

Read more...

Claire Messud: This Strange Eventful History review - home is where the heart was

India Lewis

Claire Messud’s This Strange Eventful History is personal: a novel, that is, strangely inflected by autobiography, a history that is...

Read more...

Paul Alexander: Bitter Crop - The Heartache and Triumph of Billie Holiday's Last Year review - setting the record straight

John Carvill

It’s often said that nobody mythologised Billie Holiday like Billie Holiday. I’m not so sure.

In this fine, clear-eyed...

Read more...

Kelly Clancy: Playing with Reality - How Games Shape Our World review - how far games go back

Jon Turney

For a couple of decades, the free video game America’s Army was a powerful recruitment aid for the US military. More than a shoot-em-up, players might find themselves dressing virtual...

Read more...

Hugo Rifkind: Rabbits review - 31 wild parties and a funeral

Bernard Hughes

In some ways I’m an appropriate person to review Hugo Rifkind’s new novel Rabbits, a coming-of-age comedy set in the early...

Read more...

Extract: Pariah Genius by Iain Sinclair

Iain Sinclair

Iain Sinclair is a writer, film-maker, and psychogeographer extraordinaire. He began his career in the poetic avant-garde of the Sixties and Seventies, alongisde the likes of Ed Dorn and J. H....

Read more...

Jonn Elledge: A History of the World in 47 Borders review - a view from the boundaries

Bernard Hughes

In A History of the World in 47 Borders, Jonn Elledge takes an ostensibly dry subject – how maps and boundaries have shaped our world – and makes from it a diverting and informative read...

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 £49,000 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

'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages... ...
Bryony Kimmings, Soho Theatre Walthamstow review - captivati...

Bryony Kimmings’ new show – her first in five years – was created to celebrate the opening of Soho Walthamstow, the previously...

Blu-ray: Le Quai des Brumes

From its opening scene, Le Quai des Brumes (Port of Shadows,1938) feels like a reverie, a period of sustained waiting, during...

The Perfect Neighbor, Netflix review - Florida found-footage...

Another day, another shooting: this is Florida, USA, where the "Stand Your...

La bohème, Opera North review - still young at 32

Phyllida Lloyd’s production of La Bohème for Opera North is...

Shibe, LSO, Adès, Barbican review - gaudy and glorious new m...

Many orchestral concerts leaven two or three established classics with something new or unusual. The LSO reversed that formula...

Frankenstein review - the Prometheus of the charnel house

Guillermo del Toro strains every sinew to bring his dream film to life, steeping it in religious symbolism and the history of art, cannily...

Solar Eyes, Hare & Hounds, Birmingham review - local lad...

Their new album may have been born out of a deep dive into Quentin Tarantino’s cinematic reimagining of the post-Manson killings’ atmosphere of...

The Free Association launch review - strong start for improv...

It’s always good to welcome the opening of a new arts venue, and sadly it doesn’t happen too often in the current economic climate. But...

newsletter

Get a weekly digest of our critical highlights in your inbox each Thursday!

Simply enter your email address in the box below

View previous newsletters