The Death of Arthurian Legend?

Arthurian legend has experienced something of a renaissance in recent years. Clive Owen and Keira Knightley starred in King Arthur in 2004, the BBC premiered its popular series Merlin in 2008 and there is the upcoming American series of Camelot, starring Joseph Fiennes due to air this year. But these modern retellings are a world [...]

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The Man Who Made Lists by Joshua Kendall

We’ve all got one, sitting on our desks or on a shelf. Mine is a battered paperback, with a lurid red cover, propped next to cans of guinea pig treats (for Dora, my piglet). I’m speaking of Roget’s Thesaurus, of course, a tool that is even more helpful than a dictionary when writing something. But [...]

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Coming up on Vulpes Libris

Well, we’re not doing brilliantly with our resolution to reduce the number of postings on Vulpes Libris. Once again we have a full week. Hurray. King Arthur, Cuba, Alice in Wonderland (ballet version), pimps, prostitutes and a thesaurus. Just an average week on Vulpes Libris then… Monday 7th: Jackie tries to find a synonym for [...]

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The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver

Review by Jamie Mollart Many readers will know Kingsolver from her 1998 award winning best seller The Poisonwood Bible. The fact that The Lacuna took 10 years to complete and publish imbues it with a certain level of expectation. And surely no book is worth waiting 10 years for? Well, nearly. The main character, Harrison [...]

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In Praise of Beachcomber (J B Morton)

It has been a long, grey winter, and I’ve been in great need of some of my favourite vintage humour. Nostalgia is my thing, mainly for the surreally funny columns of the newspapers I grew up with. Tastes change, and there seems to be no place for the Peter Simples and Beachcombers now. Their trademark [...]

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Thursday Soapbox: J. David Simons on writing historical fiction and minimizing the research

Article by J. David Simons, author of The Liberation of Celia Kahn and The Credit Draper. I have written two works of historical fiction – The Credit Draper and The Liberation of Celia Kahn – both set in the early part of the 20th century. With both books, people have approached me and commented on [...]

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Vivaldi and the Number 3 by Ron Butlin: from delight to disillusionment in 200 pages

In these playful vignettes, Ron Butlin looks at the lives of the great composers and philosophers from unusual but always entertaining angles. Vivaldi’s creative block is freed with God’s gift of the number 3; Mozart struggles for financial independence by becoming Salzburg’s first private eye; Haydn’s publicity benefits from an appearance on the Jerry Springer [...]

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Mennonite in a Little Black Dress by Rhoda Janzen

A while ago, I was procrastinating on work by reading the Guardian’s Life and Style section.  This was a bad case of procrastination, and I hope my supervisor does not read this review, because I had an incredibly urgent deadline on and there are about a thousand things I would rather read than the Guardian’s [...]

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