Interview with crime thriller writer Katherine Howell

Today we have the privilege of bringing you an interview with bestselling crime thriller writer Katherine Howell. Her latest novel, Cold Justice, is out in paperback now. Regular readers of this site might remember that I recently reviewed Cold Justice for Vulpes Libris, and that review can be found here. Lisa: Welcome, Katherine, and thanks [...]

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Civilization: the West and the Rest by Niall Ferguson

I’ve come over all “killer app” today and recorded my review of Niall Ferguson’s Civilization in podcast form.  If you’d rather stick with the written word, click here for a transcript. Allen Lane, hardback, 402 pp.  ISBN: 978-1846142734 Civilization is also available in audio and Kindle e-book form.

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Soapbox:Why Do Animals Always Die in Childrens Books?

After reading fellow Book Fox RosyB’s essay on the books of her childhood, I began thinking of mine. Having similar interests, we each read animal books, but I noticed something about many of the ones I read: most of the time, the animals died. Why was that? Why did so many of the novels, often [...]

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Coming Up: Week of the 29th August 2011

It’s sure to be a controversial week on VL this week with Jackie tub-thumping on the soapbox about animals in kids books and  Kirsty’s much anticipated (by me!) piece on Niall Ferguson’s Civilization. Please do join us in some sparky debate in the comments and let us know your views on everything we cover. We [...]

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How to Write (Good) Bad Children, by Emma Barnes

Apologies – due to illness, we are unable to bring you the poetry interview – which will be posted in due course so keep an eye out. Stepping into the breach, RosyB’s sister, Emma Barnes, has kindly allowed us to post this article, originally written for the ABBA blog (An Awfully Big Blog Adventure). Emma [...]

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Shades of Grey by Jasper Fforde

In his Thursday Next series, Jasper Fforde sets out his stall as a writer of comic fantasy with a vision of an alternative Britain. That series is set in a time frame reasonably contemporaneously with our own. Shades of Grey presents another alternative Britain, this time with a distinctly darker edge. The world we see [...]

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The Pirate’s Daughter by Margaret Cezair-Thompson

I’ve always enjoyed Errol Flynn films. There’s nothing like a rainy Saturday, a plate of hot buttered crumpets and Captain Blood on the telly. But beyond that I knew very little of Errol Flynn and while this book is fictional, there are elements that are entirely correct. Flynn really did end up in Jamaica in [...]

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The Amish mysteries of P. L. Gaus

Amish is trendy, not as trendy as vampires, but still quite popular. Beverly Lewis and others have made a rather good living writing about the Plain People. A less well known author of this topic is Paul L. Gaus, who still lives in Ohio, my home state. I’m not sure why he uses his initials, [...]

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Coming Up This Week

It’s late summer and the Foxes are feeling sluggish in the heat, but we still have a few offerings this week featuring suitably summery subjects, such as Amish farmers and pirates with  a surprise on Thursday and a mystery poet on Friday. But surprises are good anytime of year, aren’t they? * * * * [...]

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T S Eliot Summer School 2011

Report by David Boyd. We’ve recently returned from a week in London. “SO BLOODY WHAT?!” you might rightly cry, dear reader, but please bear with me a little longer for some possibly pertinent and salient Vulpes Libris content, because this was a very special, literary, week.  It was, in fact, the 2011  T S Eliot [...]

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