Blog
Wednesday Cover Story: Sneek peek of Over a Hot Stove
24 July, 2013
I spent many happy hours as a child sitting with my family watching Upstairs, Downstairs, and now am counting the weeks until Downton Abbey returns to our TV screens again. And here in the A&B office we’re equally excited about the upcoming release of Over a Hot Stove, by Flo Wadlow – a delightful memoir […]
The Boy, the bandwagon and the bets…
23 July, 2013
Kate finally popped! So the third in line to the throne is a boy. And we wait with baited breath for a name. I wonder if there’s one already chosen or if they’re trying to decide from a few shortlisted names. We can scoff and imagine they’ll call him something like Bartholomew, but I think […]
You wait ages and then three queens come along at once…
22 July, 2013
Have you been watching The White Queen? After what I thought was a good start (Janet McTeer gets thumbs up from me and not just for her Princess Leia hair-do, though that helps) I’ve found that later episodes have dragged a little. Mostly because characters are having to carry the weight of exposition, and keep […]
Take a break from technology this weekend
19 July, 2013
Earlier this week I spent a few lovely (and luckily sunny!) days camping in Pembrokeshire. We camped at Lleithyr Farm, a brilliant site and a truly secluded countryside spot; my only complaint might have been the occasionally noisy sheep! Although I of course took my smartphone along with me (who can be separated from theirs […]
Do you really know who wrote that book you’re reading?
18 July, 2013
In an attempt to write without the pressure of Harry Potter hype, it was revealed this week that JK Rowling had published a crime novel under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith. The result being that reviewers had – in contrast to her previous venture into adult literature The Casual Vacancy – unwittingly judged the book on […]
Wednesday Cover Story: The Morganville font strikes again
17 July, 2013
Last year we spotted the Gothic font used on our brilliant Morganville Vampire covers on the signage for Sweet Revenge – a cupcake store in Kingston. Now I’ve spotted it in South Wimbledon, this time on the signage for a tattoo parlour, Collector’s Ink. A tattoo parlour certainly fits in with a Morganville-esque theme. Tattoos […]
Bringing Down a Giant
16 July, 2013
Last week I read an article title that made me feel a little smug. Young book-buyers ‘put off Amazon’. A survey from the Booksellers Association showed that over 70% of 16 – 24 year olds said recent revelations about internet-only booksellers’ tax affairs made them less likely to shop for books online, as did 59.5% […]
First time for everything
15 July, 2013
My name is Lesley and until last week I had never been to London Zoo. There, I said it, but I made up for this shocking discrepancy by going along to one of the Zoo Lates last Friday night. Checking out the giraffes and gorillas (the silverback had poses that wouldn’t have looked out of […]
Speaking through the pages…
12 July, 2013
The current book occupying my bag by day and bedside table by night is David Mitchell’s much-acclaimed Cloud Atlas, and reading it made me think about the often crucial element of narrative voice. I must admit that I wasn’t hooked on the book at first, because the initial voice was quite dry, dull and didn’t […]
Short on time? Turn to short stories
11 July, 2013
As a newcomer to the somewhat daunting world of the early morning London commute, I am impressed by the people who, undeterred by the uncomfortably close mass of armpits and elbows, continue to be absorbed in their books whilst standing in a cramped tube carriage. Having managed to get on the wrong train once already, […]
Wednesday Cover Story: How good is that book spine?
10 July, 2013
Yesterday I attended the Bookseller’s Marketing & Publicity Conference which featured a wide range of interesting speakers covering topics from creative campaigns, discoverability, the Amazon algorithm, Facebook and Goodreads, and more. Steve Bohme, from Bowker discussed market research and revealed rather suprisingly that customers, when browsing in a bookshop, primarily browse books on shelves (as […]
Past, Present or Future?
9 July, 2013
A new title has slipped into our Autumn schedule called Over a Hot Stove – the memoir of Flo Wadlow who was a kitchen maid in some of England great houses such as Blickling Hall and Hatfield House. There seems to be a trend for all things nostalgic with the BBC’s Downton Abbey and Aprons […]
Dying to read that book now…
8 July, 2013
These days there are so many entertainment options out there; hundreds of video channels; streaming movies; computer games; social media, the list goes on. It might seem that books and reading are hard pressed to compete, though I think our industry is in pretty good health. However, the Madrid Book Publishers Association have launched an […]
Friday Fun: Test your bookworm IQ…
5 July, 2013
This year, Virago books celebrate forty years of championing women writers. To celebrate, author Sarah Waters has concocted a little quiz for us book lovers. Click here to see her list of forty quotes from some of Virago’s classics, each one referring to a number between one and forty. I wonder how long she spent […]
May I suggest a June Thomson novel, Sharapova?
4 July, 2013
In this week’s Stylist, tennis star Maria Sharapova reveals that she loves Sherlock Holmes films and books. So, I have a mind to send her copies of June Thomson‘s brilliant pastiches including Holmes & Watson, The Secret Notebook of Sherlock Holmes, The Secret Archives of Sherlock Holmes, and The Secret Journal of Sherlock Holmes. Now […]
Wednesday Cover Story: Little Children becomes an A&B Classic
3 July, 2013
One of the first A&B books I worked on when I joined the company was Little Children, by Tom Perrotta, and it remains one of my favourite reads. The trade paperback got rave reviews, the mass market paperback became a Top 10 Bestseller, the novel then hit the big screen in a film starring Kate […]
Music, not War, comes to Val D’Orcia
2 July, 2013
We never need a reason to talk about one of our most beloved books, the famous memoir War in Val D’Orcia, by Iris Origo which we so proudly publish. This incredibly moving and honest diary was written in secret and recounts a year in the life of writer Iris Origo as she hid orphans and […]
The Love Lettering Project
1 July, 2013
London is filled with wonderful things, one of which is its huge variety of creative and original art projects. I came across The Love Lettering Project today, created by Lindsay Zier-Vogel, it’s a community arts engagement project that brings love letters to strangers in the form of an anonymous love letter to the city you […]
Plan for the weekend: book shopping!
28 June, 2013
What do you have planned for this weekend? Watching Wimbledon? Walking the dog? Catching up on some shut-eye? Well, add this to your diary: this Saturday is the launch of Independent Booksellers Week. So, why not pop along to your local indie, or seach here if you’re not sure where they are, and pick up […]
Rediscover the magic of the fairy tale . . .
27 June, 2013
Did you know that this week is National Bookstart Week? This means that thousands of free events will be taking place for preschool children and their families, in the hopes of getting some young ‘uns hooked on books! And to mark the start of this celebration, which this year has a fairy-tale theme, five of […]
Wednesday Cover Story: It All Begins with a Letter
26 June, 2013
I recently discovered something extremely gorgeous, expensive and what I have no need for at all. Which means I must have them. Yes, plural. I am talking about these: These are the Penguin Drop Caps – a series of twenty-six collectible hardcover editions of fine works of literature, each featuring on its cover a specially […]
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