The Secret Agent – Elisabeth Hobbes

Elisabeth Hobbes is charting new territory here, and the result is superb. A seasoned writer of Medieval and Victorian historical romances for Harlequin, she is now striking out with a new publisher, One More Chapter, and she's jumped forward into the heady and terrifying world of occupied France. Sylvie, or Sylvia, as the more restrained …

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At the Pond; Swimming at the Hampstead Ladies’ Pond (Daunt Books)

Land-locked in a Lock-down (and probably kidding myself I’m brave enough anyway), this is the book I needed to read this week. It is such a joyous collection about the impact of swimming outdoors – and about the body – that I’m going to be pushing it at friends at every opportunity. And next time …

This Mournable Body – Tsitsi Dangarembga #BookerPrize

This is undoubtedly a powerful novel, the conclusion to a trilogy which captures women's experiences in Zimbabwe in the final decades of the Twentieth Century, as political tensions bubble away, and the violent upheavals of the past two decades are still very much in the consciousness of the characters. But I struggled with it, largely …

The Lost Spells – Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris

This little book is becoming something of a talisman for me – I’ve taken to carrying it around and dipping into it when I need a moment to just stop. I really love The Lost Words, but that’s a book to pour over at the kitchen table with others. The much smaller Lost Spells feels …