• The Day That Went Missing is a heart-rending story as intensely personal as any tragedy and as universal as loss. It is about how we make sense of what is gone. Most of all, it is an unforgettable act of recovery for a brother.

    Jun 16,
  • The Day That Went Missing is a heart-rending story as intensely personal as any tragedy and as universal as loss. It is about how we make sense of what is gone. Most of all, it is an unforgettable act of recovery for a brother.

    Feb 22,
  • The Manchester Deansgate Waterstones is always a fantastic place to read, and many years ago I was half of a double-bill with the great Robert Stone. His novel Damascus Gate was published in the UK at about the same time, in 1998, as my novel Damascus. His book is set in Jerusalem and mine has nothing to do with the Middle East. He was a revered American novelist and I ... I was not. It seems fairly certain that someone in the shop had mixed up one Damascus with another, and we ended up in the same shop in Manchester on the same midweek night. Everyone was very polite and pretended it wasn't a mistake, including Robert Stone, who drank the Deansgate whiskey and grumbled wise sayings

    May 30,
  • "Curious is a festival like no other. Taking place each July in the breathtaking grounds of Pylewell Park, it is dreamy, eccentric, fun and ultimately, irresistible." More about the festival across the website but the amazing line-up of writers is here.

    May 30,
  • This piece was commissioned by the ILS as part of the 'Crossing Borders' series. To Live Outside the Law You Must be Honest An April bank holiday Monday, and I plan to go across the border somewhere in the south-west of England. I don’t know the exact place, but between Newbury and Bath the Kennet and Avon canal stretches fifty-odd miles over the English countryside. My border point will be the 60 foot narrowboat Eve, which has a continuous cruising licence, meaning that every fortnight it has to move. My friend Drusilla Marland, who lives on Eve, is hard to pin down... Read full text here.

    May 30,
  • This is a fantastic festival, and probably the only event for book-lovers where you can see Roman legionnaires riding on a Sherman tank. I'll be talking about the research for The Day That Went Missing, and how family history also counts as History. More details here.

    May 30,
  • “If you wish to converse with me,” said Voltaire, “define your terms.” A definition of terms is the boring, necessary foundation to any philosophical debate, and is equally relevant to appreciating this book. In the title the publishers have chosen to pick out “win” in Knowing the Score, but David Papineau, a professor of the philosophy of science, isn’t offering a new and unlikely marginal gain in the quest for sporting victory. Nor is his book an ambitious attempt to mesh the universal cogs of theoretical philosophy and sport..." This book review was in the Times on April 22 and the full text is available here, possibly behind the paywall unless you never look at the Times, in which case you

    May 03,