Books Interviews
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Tom Rob Smith
Evening Standard
18 August 2008
From soaps to the Booker.
Behind the scenes, in cosy private members' clubs and gossipy Soho restaurants, publishing has always been a bitchy, cut-throat business. But it's still unusual for publishers openly to tear a strip off authors signed to other houses. no matter how bitter the rivalries, few are prepared to shatter the veneer of gentlemanly behaviour by picking a fight in public.
That is why the overt criticism of Tom Rob Smith's thriller, Child 44, by Canongate publisher Jamie Byng caused such a sharp intake of breath across the literary world last month. Byng has always been forthright but this was an angry and highly personal intervention. his complaint? The inclusion of Child 44, published by Simon & Schuster, on the recently announced 12-strong Man Booker Prize longlist, and the absence of a Canongate book called The Spare Room, by Helen Garner. In two separate posts on the Booker website, Byng explicitly questioned the decisions of the judging panel (chaired by Michael Portillo): "I cannot respect a judging committee that decides to pick a book like Child 44, a fairly well written and well-paced thriller that is no more than that, over novels as exceptional as Helen Garner's The Spare Room or Ross Raisin's God's Own Country... ," he wrote. He then rubbed it in the next day: "... the credibility of the panel is completely undermined by its decision to include a book like Child 44 ... The idea that this novel could be determined to be a finer piece of fiction than The Spare Room is, I think, ludicrous. And many other people feel this." ...
Francis Wyndham
The Observer
17 August 2008
'It was a monologue, but it was a monologue that I wanted to hear'
Friend and confidant of Bruce Chatwin, Jean Rhys, VS Naipaul and Bruce Chatwin, Francis Wyndham has moved in English literature's most exalted circles. Now, as his own deliciously precise and funny writings are being republished, he talks to Rachel Cooke about his meetings with remarkable men and women
Louis de Bernières
Sunday Times
17 August 2008
At home with Louis de Bernières.
Although he lives in an idyllic Suffolk rectory, the author of Captain Corelli's Madonlin prefers to write in his shed
Colin Thubron
Sunday Times
17 August 2008
Best of Times, Worst of Times: Colin Thubron.
Colin Thubron, 69, travel writer and novelist, began his career writing about the Middle East. He looks back on the accident that turned his world upside down — and really put his work on the map
Wendy Holden
The Guardian
15 August 2008
My life in shopping: Wendy Holden, novelist.
What Holly Golightly felt about Tiffany's, I feel about John Lewis in Sheffield. Nothing nasty can happen to you there'
Jane Fallon
The Guardian
15 August 2008
Chick lit with an edge.
Jane Fallon left her job as a TV producer to write novels she calls 'chick noir'. Her latest features a lying, deluded husband who, she tells Patrick Barkham, bears no resemblance to her partner, Ricky Gervais.
Gaynor Arnold
The Guardian
13 August 2008
Family affairs.
With her first published novel - based on her literary hero Charles Dickens - in line for this year's Man Booker prize, the social worker Gaynor Arnold tells Chris Arnot why the two professions complement each other so well
Clive James
Daily Telegraph
13 August 2008
Edinburgh Festival 2008: return to the Fringe.
After 40 years, Clive James is back in the city of his first triumph. He talks to Dominic Cavendish
Chuck Palahniuk
The Independent
12 August 2008
Chuck Palahniuk's: the reluctant showman
His novels are so extreme they make readers faint. But really he's just a shy romantic, he tells Geoffrey Macnab
Raymond Briggs
The Observer
11 August 2008
Big kid, 'old git' and still in the rudest of health
His Snowman and Bogeyman are loved by millions - but Raymond Briggs's more sober work is now being rediscovered. As we launch our graphic story prize, Rachel Cooke talks to him about his life and art
Candace Bushnell
Sunday Times
10 August 2008
Candace Bushnell on her new TV series Lipstick Jungle.
Sitting at Candace Bushnell’s knee and hearing her tell her stories feels like tugging on a thread that leads all the way back to Arthurian legend. In one tale, a black knight — of course — will slay the youthful king if he cannot answer one simple question: what is it that women want? Arthur has a year to find the answer, and it takes about that long to find a woman wise enough to tell him. She then gets to marry Sir Gawain. For grappling with the same tortured question, Bushnell gets an apartment in New York’s hip Greenwich Village, a few million dollars and a cute former ballet dancer to live happily ever after with. Who says fairy tales don’t come true?
Ed Husain
Sunday Times
10 August 2008
Best of Times, Worst of Times: Ed Husain.
Ed Husain, 33, is the author of the controversial book The Islamist, an account of how he embraced extremist Islamism when he was 16. He is married to Faye and they have a one-year-old daughter, Camilla
Ruth Rendell
Sunday Telegraph
9 August 2008
Ruth Rendell: a tough case to crack.
Ruth Rendell thinks self-analysis can be dangerous for a writer. But she delights in casting her novelist's eye over everything else - including the subject of her latest thriller, 'adventure sex'. Nigel Farndale takes notes.
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