Literary Calendar

Essie Fox, Samantha Ellis, Ben Johncock, Anna Whitwham will be reading from their upcoming books at Drink, Shop, Do in Kings Cross. Essie Fox is the author of gothic Victorian novels The Goddess And The Thief, Elijah’s Mermaid, and The Somnambulist, all published by Orion. Samantha Ellis is the author of How To Be A Heroine - read the review roundup here. Ben Johncock is the author of Burning, Blue. Anna Whitwham is the author of Boxer Handsome. Drink, Shop, Do are a&hellip

‘I am drawn to people who seem to have been born defeated,’ Penelope Fitzgerald once wrote. She considered herself one of these, and despite great early promise lived much of her life in drudgery and near destitution. Then, in her late 50s, she began to write. Over the next two decades, she not only published three biographies, but nine brief and brilliant novels, four of which were shortlisted for the Booker, Offshore winning it. At 80, Fitzgerald found fame both&hellip

Margaret Atwood began writing poetry in high school, and the most thrilling moment of her writing career was the publication of her first poem: ‘I mean, all the other things that have happened since then were a thrill, but that was the biggest.’ She has gone on to publish 19 collections of poetry, as well as 14 novels – including The Handmaid’s Tale, The Blind Assassin and MaddAddam, published last summer. Organised and methodical in writing fiction, she writes poetry ‘in a state of&hellip

Brighton, summer 1940. Fear of invasion brings unspoken desires to the surface as a middle-class English family anxiously awaits news. Geoffrey falls in love with a prostitute he suspects is a Jew; Evelyn is attracted to a ‘degenerate’ German-Jewish painter held in an internment camp.  An exploration of chaos and xenophobia in an ordinary town, Unexploded was long-listed for the 2013 Man Booker Prize. Read all reviews for Unexploded. Book tickets/more information

In a small village, in a kitchen, a man announces to his wife that he is leaving, embarking on a journey in search of their dead son. The “Walking Man” paces in ever-widening circles around the town. One after another, all manner of townsfolk fall into step with him – the Net Mender, the Midwife, the Elderly Maths Teacher, even the Duke – each enduring his or her own loss. Israel’s celebrated author David Grossman is back at Jewish Book&hellip