Sarah Moorhouse

Glamour and intrigue: The Silver Book, by Olivia Laing, reviewed

From our UK edition

Olivia Laing has had a productive couple of years. The Silver Book arrives hot on the heels of The Garden Against Time, a memoir-cum-environmentalist treatise published in 2024. It is a novel of stunning imaginative power that was apparently written in just three months. Set in 1975, during the making of two great works of

The fragility of the modern city reflects humanity’s vulnerability

From our UK edition

As I reached the final pages of the German writer Gregor Hens’s essayistic travelogue The City and the World, news of the blackout across Spain and Portugal snatched my attention. Madrid and Lisbon were at a standstill. Images of gridlocked round-abouts and commuters rushing out of pitch-dark subway tunnels plunged me into a fatalistic mood.

The need to feel seen: Perfection, by Vincenzo Latronico, reviewed

From our UK edition

I probably won’t be the only one to say this of Vincenzo Latronico’s Perfection: it made me feel seen, and not in a good way. The novel takes aim at aspects of modern life, from social media to remote working and interior design trends, that aren’t obvious subjects for serious literary attention. Latronico, a philosopher