Picture Books Picture books are booming. Each month seems to bring to the bookshop shelves more startling illustration, imaginative stories and deadpan comic creations. What follows is a glance ahead at some of the most interesting-looking picture book titles… where... Continue Reading →
On the Tenth Day of Christmas, we post our annual look ahead to the exciting new books coming out in 2020. Some of these we've peeked inside the pages of, others are a whisper on the wind of publishing schedules... Continue Reading →
In 2019 I continued to alternate reading Childrens/YA fiction with “proper grown up books” partly as an act of gentle escapism and partly as my “research” for illustration projects and the pipe dream of one day adding my own work... Continue Reading →
Some of Gill's favourite reads encountered in 2019... Richard Ford, Between Them (Bloomsbury) Determined to preserve two lives that might otherwise have gone unnoticed, Richard Ford’s tender memoir of his parents doesn’t shy away from the difficulties they encountered by having... Continue Reading →
I’m incredibly lucky to be able to read books for a living, whether that’s through academic work, bookselling, reviewing, or as amazingly happened this year, book prize judging. Overlapping with my own reading habits, this year I’ve reviewed 89 books... Continue Reading →
This month marks the centenary of Sam Read, one hundred years since the death of the bookshop’s founder. He had run a bookshop in Grasmere since 1887, and it seemed fitting to write a piece about his history in the... Continue Reading →
It’s all about flapjack and water. These are my two key takeaways from this year’s London Book Fair. This isn’t a new publishing trend, but instead the essentials needed to survive a couple of days in the hangar space of... Continue Reading →
The third and final part of our look ahead at some exciting Children’s titles due out in 2019. Here we tackle a few of the highlights in 9+ and YA books. Aged 9+ January Ross Welford, The Dog Who Saved... Continue Reading →
The second part of this year’s children’s titles preview provided some useful challenges. Where do we draw the line between the huge age-range a picture book could satisfy, with what we call chapter books and then the start of middle-grade... Continue Reading →
Sam Read's Books Blog 