Feature: Fox in the City

As a precursor to Rosy’s report on the Great Blogging Debate this Saturday, we thought newcomers to Vulpes Libris might find “Fox in the City” interesting.  Two years after it originally appeared, it remains one of our most-read features ever … (Originally published on the 2nd of February, 2008.) ~~~o~~~ FOX IN THE CITY – [...]

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Poetry Week: John Donne, The Reformed Soul

I studied the poetry of John Donne for A Level, and loved it: how could a seventeen year old not love a poet who writes about sex as Heaven and Hell, and berates and begs his God with the fury of a lover? Who argues his girl into bed, and talks his way into his deity’s heart, [...]

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Jean Rhys – Good Morning Midnight

Fiction shares much with its narrative siblings drama, film, epic, myth and non-fiction, but what makes it unique is that it can let us into someone’s mind, and into more than one person’s at that. If you want to point out that so, too, can memoir, the crossover genre which uses the techniques of fiction to write autobiography, [...]

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A Secret Alchemy by Emma Darwin

Whenever one of the Bookfoxes has a novel published, we are naturally all eager to jump straight in, see what it’s all about and have a good natter. However, no matter how much you like the author, there’s no guarantee you’ll like the book, so when three of the Bookfoxes decided to read A Secret [...]

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Coming Attractions: Richard III Week.

The Colours of the Chameleon. I can add colours to the chameleon, Change shapes with Proteus for advantages, And set the murd’rous Machiavel to school. Henry VI, Pt 3. Act III, Scene 2. Richard the Third, King of England, is a man standing in the shadows. Five hundred and twenty-three years ago, he went down [...]

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Celebrating Antonia Forest: the grown-up children’s author

Perhaps it was inevitable that Antonia Forest should go out of fashion for a while. When you were born in 1915, put life on hold for war work, have your first novel published in 1948, and take the rest of a long life to write eight books about the same family, two books about their [...]

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Thursday Soapbox: Emma Darwin On Why Literary Fiction is Worth It

As a counterpoint to Clare Sudbery’s piece last week “In Praise of Popular Culture”, on the Soapbox this week we have the author of “The Mathematics of Love” and soon-to-be-released “A Secret Alchemy”, Bookfox Emma Darwin, putting the case for literary fiction. Truffling Out the Riches by Emma Darwin So, which way up is your [...]

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Interview with Emma Darwin

The Mathematics of Love, by Emma Darwin (published by Headline Review) has had terrific print and blogosphere reviews and since the author just happens to be a Bookfox, Lisa and Leena set to work with their best Paxman-esque questions. For Emma’s thoughts on historical fiction, sex and transgression, read on… For Jackie’s Vulpes Libris review [...]

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Feature: Fox in the City

FOX IN THE CITY – LITERARY CUB, LISA GLASS, TALKS TO SOME ELDERS AND BETTERS Book Bloggers: The Saviour of Small Publishers? The End of Decent Criticism? Or Unpaid Cheerleaders? As this article goes to press, the fox den is in crisis. What kind of blog are we? Are we merely promotional cheerleaders? Are we [...]

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Bookweek Round-up

NEWS AL Kennedy wins 2007 Costa Book of the Year Award With 5 votes to in-effect runner-up Catherine O’Flynn’s 3. Read the Guardian coverage here. “Kennedy’s writing has always slipped the leash of expectation, leaving gender stereotypes far behind. She’s un-pigeon-hole-able because inimitable.” Join in the debate at Guardian blogs here. Fear that Nabokov’s may [...]

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