My first Substack of the year goes the full Nigel Slater. I wrote about surviving the culinary delights of the 1970s in About a Boyhood. Read it for free here

Tremendously proud to be one of the judges for the 2025 REPUBLIC OF CONSCIOUSNESS PRIZE. Here's the 10-strong longlist. An impossible choice, and so many books narrowly missed inclusion. But it represents some of the best of what small presses are currently publishing. More details here

Some post-Xmas reading from me: a last Substack for 2024. Aide-Mémoires: The Art of Not Forgetting. Read it for free here

I enjoyed writing about Sarah Manguso's coruscating novel, Liars, for Review 31's Books of the Year 2024. Read here

Here's my review of Duets, Scratch Books' collection of thrilling, unsettling, ambitious co-written short stories, in the Guardian

I wrote about the Booker Prize, Samantha Harvey's triumphant 2024 win, as well as The Bee Sting, Prophet Song and pain and pleasure-principle novels. Read The Wrong Paul on Substack for free here

I reviewed Andrew Miller's excellent new novel The Land in Winter, set during the Big Freeze of 1962-3, in the TLS