The musician, famed for her "folktronica" sound, picks her favourite books. She is one of the judges of the International Booker Prize 2025, the winner of which is due to be announced on Tuesday.
Self-Portrait
In this mysterious yet clear-eyed memoir, the artist tells her life through the painting of loved ones, immortalising shared time with a graceful generosity. I found this book in the Aldeburgh bookshop, and Paul's writing, like her painting, conjured the landscape beneath my feet.
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A Life's Work
Rachel Cusk, 2001
This was one of the first books that opened the door to shitting on the hallowed ground of being a mother. It tore through me, a conversation that I needed to have with myself but wasn't prepared for. Its true weight is in how Cusk describes the guilt inherent in trying to be both a loving mother and an artist.
All Fours
Miranda July, 2024
I am calling this novel one of my favourite Miranda July films, as everything she writes translates into technicolour, and her dialogue is properly funny. "All Fours" often hides behind seeming off the cuff, but it is unfathomably deep, a work of heartbreaking genius.
This is Not a Pity Memoir
Abi Morgan, 2022
The first book to inform me of the Holocaust, it was the start of a lifelong education that continues to this day, inspiring some of my own most famous novels. It remains one of the most upsetting but important narratives ever committed to print. Essential reading.
Swann's Way
Marcel Proust, 1913
I started listening to "Swann's Way" before the 2020 lockdown. As I lay awake in a world as still as I've ever known it, the sensory nature of Proust's writing calmed me and carried me gently through uncertain nights. Some of the hypnagogic state of that time is recorded into "Weather Alive", the record I ended up making.
Titles in print are available from The Week Bookshop
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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
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The dazzling coral gardens of Raja AmpatThe Week Recommends Region of Indonesia is home to perhaps the planet’s most photogenic archipelago
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Salted caramel and chocolate tart recipeThe Week Recommends Delicious dessert can be made with any biscuits you fancy
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6 trailside homes for hikersFeature Featuring a roof deck with skyline views in California and a home with access to private trails in Montana
