BloodMining by Laura Wilkinson – a story of mothers in crisis

Megan Evens appears to have it all: brains, beauty, a successful career as a foreign correspondent. But deep down she is lonely and rootless. Pregnant, craving love but unable to trust after the destructive affair with her baby’s father, she returns to the security of her birthplace in Wales. When Megan’s son is later diagnosed [...]

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Trotsky: past, present… future? An interview with Tariq Ali

(Originally published: 3rd September 2010) Today’s guest contributor, Tariq Ali, is a writer, activist and political commentator. A leading figure of the Trotskyist movement in the sixties and seventies, Ali’s engagement with Trotsky goes far beyond party politics. I met up with him at the Edinburgh Book Festival, where he was presenting his new novel [...]

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This Week on Vulpes Libris …

We don’t generally blow our own trumpet, but last week, in the wee small hours of Friday morning, Vulpes Libris clocked up 1,000,000 page views.  Even allowing for the fact that a small but not insubstantial proportion of those were: (a)  Small children looking for photographs of bunnies, (b)  Pre-adolescents SHOUTING AT EACH OTHER about [...]

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Hergé: The Man Who Created Tintin – by Pierre Assouline, translated by Charles Ruas

Review by Jay Benedict. “Assouline gets behind the genial public mask to take full measure of Herge’s life and art and the fascinating ways in which the two intertwine. Neither sugarcoating nor sensationalizing his subject, he meticulously probes such controversial issues as Herge’s support for Belgian imperialism in the Congo and his alleged collaboration with [...]

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Cocktails for Three by Madeleine Wickham: a disappointingly light concoction

Three great friends, smart and successful, meet for cocktails and gossip once a month. Roxanne: glamorous, self-confident, with a secret lover – will he ever leave his wife and marry her? Maggie: capable and high-achieving – will she take motherhood in her stride? Candice – honest, decent, or so she believes – how will she cope [...]

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The War According to Castro: La victoria estratégica/La contraofensiva estratégica

In the summer of 2010, a longstanding question was finally resolved. Fidel Castro had then been living in seclusion for almost four years, since the acute intestinal illness which struck him in August 2006 effectively ended his political career (although power was not officially transferred to his brother Raúl until 2008). During those years, various [...]

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To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf

Hundreds of pages have been written about this book, so I shall not add to it with a scholarly analysis. No, what I want to do is share my reading experience with you. A rediscovery as it were. A recent selection for my monthly book discussion group, it was my third time reading this classic, [...]

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Coming Up…

Well, it doesn’t get more eclectic than this – what a perfect representation of the madness of Vulpes Libris, with classics, chicklit, Castro and Tin-Tin all in the same week. Monday Jackie has an eye-opening experience rereading Virginia Woolf’s To The Lighthouse. Wednesday Kirsty reviews the memoirs that marked Fidel Castro’s reappearance in the public [...]

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Shakespeare Week: Measuring up Measure for Measure

Measure for Measure is one of my favourite plays. I have seen it a number of times, studied it at University and it has long held a place of affection in my heart. A play about justice, the limits of the law and mercy, there are many ways of interpreting the text: human frailty versus [...]

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The Great Night by Chris Adrian

The Great Night is one of those books I’m impossibly grateful to have found. A modern reworking of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, it is conceptually daring, stylistically exciting and presents a view of humanity that is stark and powerful and unlike anything I’ve read before. It is Midsummer’s Eve in San Francisco’s Buena Vista [...]

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