Jane Garvey will be taking part in the Stratford Literary Festival on 12 November.
We Didn’t Mean to Go to Sea by Arthur Ransome (1940)
I’ve no idea why I loved this book so much, but I know I did. It’s one of the Swallows and Amazons series, and involves an accidental trip to Belgium. I found it absolutely hair-raising – I’m not exactly intrepid myself so it probably petrified me.
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Red Fox £7.99; The Week Bookshop £5.99
Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell (1933)
I have a very clear memory of reading this in the toilet at a party when I was a teenager. I went through a phase of reading everything George Orwell had ever written. I used to find enjoying myself quite difficult, I think, and imagine old George was probably the same.
Penguin £9.99; The Week Bookshop £7.99
Frost in May by Antonia White (1933)
This is a 1930s novel reissued by Virago in the late 1970s, and another teenage favourite of mine. I wasn’t a Catholic, but I was absolutely intrigued by the descriptions of a convent education. It’s a feminist classic in any number of ways but I’m not sure I knew it at the time.
Virago £8.99; The Week Bookshop £7.99
Noughts and Crosses by Malorie Blackman (2001)
This series of books by Malorie Blackman turned my eldest daughter into a reader. She picked up the first one on a family holiday and barely spoke for three days; she was so engrossed. I’ve loved reading all my life: I grew up with my maternal grandmother, lost in Catherine Cookson.
Penguin £7.99; The Week Bookshop £5.99
Brave Bitsy and the Bear by Angela McAllister and Tiphanie Beeke (2004)
Some books my children liked when they were young were, to say the least, somewhat wearing. But this is a sweet story of a toy rabbit abandoned in a forest and rescued by a passing bear. It has a happy ending, thank goodness.
Out of print
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5 capitulating cartoons about the Democrat's shutdown surrenderCartoons Artists take on Democrat's folding, flag-waving, and more
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How are these Epstein files so damaging to Trump?TODAY'S BIG QUESTION As Republicans and Democrats release dueling tranches of Epstein-related documents, the White House finds itself caught in a mess partially of its own making
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Margaret Atwood’s memoir, intergenerational trauma and the fight to make spousal rape a crime: Welcome to November booksThe Week Recommends This month's new releases include ‘Book of Lives: A Memoir of Sorts’ by Margaret Atwood, ‘Cursed Daughters’ by Oyinkan Braithwaite and 'Without Consent' by Sarah Weinman
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Train Dreams pulses with ‘awards season gravitas’The Week Recommends Felicity Jones and Joel Edgerton star in this meditative period piece about a working man in a vanished America
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Middleland: Rory Stewart’s essay collection is a ‘triumph’The Week Recommends The Rest is Politics co-host compiles his fortnightly columns written during his time as an MP
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‘Paper Girl: A Memoir of Home and Family in a Fractured America’ and ‘Unabridged: The Thrill of (and Threat to) the Modern Dictionary’feature The culture divide in small-town Ohio and how the internet usurped dictionaries
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6 homes with fall foliagefeature An autumnal orange Craftsman, a renovated Greek Revival church and an estate with an orchard
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Bugonia: ‘deranged, extreme and explosively enjoyable’Talking Point Yorgos Lanthimos’ film stars Emma Stone as a CEO who is kidnapped and accused of being an alien
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The Revolutionists: a ‘superb and monumental’ bookThe Week Recommends Jason Burke ‘epic’ account of the plane hijackings and kidnappings carried out by extremists in the 1970s
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Film reviews: ‘Bugonia,’ ‘The Mastermind’ and ‘Nouvelle Vague’feature A kidnapped CEO might only appear to be human, an amateurish art heist goes sideways, and Jean-Luc Godard’s ‘Breathless’ gets a lively homage
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Book reviews: ‘Against the Machine: On the Unmaking of Humanity’ and ‘Nobody’s Girl: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice’feature An examination of humanity in the face of “the Machine” and a posthumous memoir from one of Jeffrey Epstein’s victims, who recently died by suicide
