Barton Bookshelf

"Not all readers are leaders; but all leaders are readers” | Harry Truman

DECEMBER 2023
Yes, it’s that time of year again – the unleashing on an unsuspecting world of my five fiction and five non-fiction recommendations. I hope they may give you a festive escape into the magic of inky words on pages.

Fiction / Poetry
 
S.A. Cosby | All the Sinners Bleed
This is one of those tough, hard-bitten American thrillers that can prove totally immersive. Investigating the murder of a teacher, the first Black sheriff in the history of Charon County, Titus Crown, must reckon with the ghosts of his own past as well as those of the community.
 
Aoibhin Garrihy | Every Night is Full of Stars
Sometimes – especially when we’re feeling burned out – a collection of life-enhancing poetry is balm for a weary soul. This anthology is just that – uplifting, often unfamiliar, and filled with beautiful words and thoughts.

Barbara Kingsolver | Demon Copperhead
Damon Fields (known as Demon and nicknamed Copperhead for his red hair) is born to a drug-using teenage single mother in a trailer in Lee County, Virginia. Just like his predecessor, Dickens’ David Copperfield, we follow the extraordinary, gritty, compelling twists and turns of his life.
 
Audrey Magee | The Colony
On a remote Atlantic island off Ireland’s west coast, three miles long, its 1979 population now down to double figures, two strangers arrive. And so begins a haunting and disturbing tale of conflict and self-knowledge.

Gervase Phinn | A Wayne in a Manger
A collection of anecdotes by former inspector Gervase Phinn about the primary children he’s encountered across many Christmas season classrooms and assembly halls. It’s a stocking-filler of a book – funny, easy reading, and a charming reminder of the joy of working with children and young people.
 
Non-fiction
 
Elizabeth Day | Friendaholic: Confessions of a Friendship Addict
Everyone talks about and writes about love. This book is a tribute to something that gets less attention – friendship. It’s funny, wise and heart-warming
 
Lucy Easthorpe | When the Dust Settles
Easthorpe is one of the UK’s leading experts on disaster response – from Hillsborough and 9/11 to Grenfell and Covid. This extraordinary book helps us to think differently about what happens after tragic events take place.
 
David Grann | The Wager
The extraordinary 18th century true story of the wreck of ramshackle eighteenth-century British vessel off the coast of Brazil and the claims made by two different groups of survivors … resulting in a nail-biting court martial.
 
Rory Stewart | Politics on the Edge: A Memoir from Within
Spoiler: this is often bleak. But at a time when we have never needed great politicians more, Stewart provides a compelling analysis of why we don’t get them, and how we need to fix our political system.  
 
Wes Streeting | One Boy, Two Bills and a Fry Up
Despite its clunky title, this autobiography by Labour’s shadow health minister is an uplifting story of overcoming a background of eye-watering poverty, thanks to a feisty family, great teachers, and personal drive.

 
SUMMER 2023
Da-dah! Another summer holiday is upon us. So it’s the perfect time to escape into inky words on white screens or pages. Here is my list of the ten fiction and non-fiction books I hope you might enjoy when you get some precious time off. Enjoy!

Fiction

Jackie Kabler | The Vanishing of Class 3B
A brilliant if unnerving thriller to read at top speed. The premise: an entire class and all the staff disappear on the way home from a school day trip.

Claire Keegan | Foster
The deeply moving story of a young girl in rural Ireland sent to stay with foster parents for one brief flourishing summer. Magnificently written.

Bella Mackie | How to Kill Your Family
An Ealing-style comedy in which Londoner Grace Bernard sets out to avenge the death of her mother at the hands of the multimillionaire father whom she suspects of the deed. Darkly hilarious.

Lorrie Moore | I am Homeless if this is Not My Home
The Guardian describes Lorrie Moore as “the poet laureate of hospitals”. Finn sits with his beloved but dying brother Max. What follows is an amazing meditation on life and death

Graeme Simsion | The Rosie Effect
Forty-one-year-old geneticist Don Tillman is living in New York City with his new wife Rosie. On paper, they're completely incompatible. A quirky, laugh-out-loud sequel to The Rosie Project (which you don’t need to have read to enjoy this).

Non-fiction

Keenan Cody | Grace: President Obama and the Battle for America
This is my book of the year. Imagine being President Obama’s speechwriter and then dealing with an extraordinary set of events – which demand you to write the speech of your career.

Emma Gannon | The Success Myth: Letting Go of Having It All
I’m not usually a fan of books like this. But here in such fraught times, there’s something reassuring and cathartic about a book which exhorts us to regain our perspective on what actually matters

Ann Patchett | These Precious Days
A lovely, life-enhancing collection of essays by a veteran American writer: she reminds us of what matters in life … and what doesn’t.

Anthony Seldon and Raymond Newall | Johnson at 10
An extraordinary, if depressing, account of the moral vacuum that was Boris Johnson. It’s eye-wateringly entertaining and simultaneously chilling.

Polly Toynbee | An Uneasy Inheritance: My Family and Other Radicals
A beautifully written account by this left-wing journalist coming to terms with the family who defined her. It’s a superbly entertaining meditation on class and social mobility.
 

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DECEMBER 2022
Here’s your Christmas collection. I usually aim to balance fiction and non-fiction choices. But this year I’m thinking we need to lose ourselves in stories, so there’s just a bit more fiction than non-fiction in this year’s list. Let me know what you think.

Fiction

Belinda Bauer | Snap
A genuinely unnerving thriller that begins with eleven-year-old Jack and his two sisters sit in their broken-down car, waiting for their mother to come back and rescue them.

Jonathan Coe | Bournville
An entertaining retrospective over the twentieth century through the eyes of Mary, a chocolate-lover who lives through the events that defined so many of us

Alan Garner | Treacle Walker
The story of Joe, liberated by reading and gaining self-confidence through the mysterious Treacle Walker, a rag and bone man

Cecily Gayford (ed) | Murder in the Falling Snow
Grab a glass of mulled wine, and hunker down for some classic short stories involving murder and intrigue

Claire Keegan | Small Things Like These
My novel of the year – a desperately poignant insight into Ireland’s ‘Magdalene laundries’ where an estimated 30,000 women were incarcerated between the 18th and 20th centuries. It’s brief, beautiful, and compelling

Elif Shafak | 10 Minutes, 38 Seconds in this Strange World
An amazing, disturbing novel - the story of a woman’s dying moments as she reflects on her own life and the people around her

Non-fiction

Sally Hayden | My Fourth Time, We Drowned
Quite extraordinary journalism. Forget all those cheap, lazy accounts about migrants heading to the UK – Hayden joins them, tells their stories, and it’s bleakly riveting and utterly heartbreaking

Sam Knight | The Premonitions Bureau: A True Story
A fascinating account of a premonitions bureau established to explore premonitions – ordinary people who felt major things were about to happen – and were often right

Henry Marsh | And Finally
A characteristically beautiful, reflective book from a surgeon who is now a patient. Written with utterly poignant self-awareness and deep humanity.

Nicholas Orme | Going to Church in Medieval England
The title tells you everything – this is a fascinating, elegant deeply-researched insight into another age


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SUMMER 2022
You’ve made it! After another relentless year, you’ve arrived at something of a summer break. And what better way to unwind than to lose yourself via inky words on page or screen into other people’s worlds? Here are ten of the books I’ve most enjoyed over the past year. Enjoy a well-deserved holiday.

Fiction

Bonnie Garmus | Lessons in Chemistry
A sassy, opinionated heroine who becomes a national mouthpiece for women’s empowerment in 1950s America with her cookery show, Supper at Six. It’s my book of the year – perfect for the remotest beach or staycation.

Maggie O’Farrell | After You’d Gone
A tale of a troubled family relationship, escape into love, and what happens next. A study in grief, but utterly beautiful and compelling

Laurent Binet | HHhH
The amazing, twisting story of a real-life attempt in 1942 to assassinate Reinhard Heydrich, chief of the Nazi secret service. It’s told with in a jaunty, often laugh-out-loud-style, and gives a fascinating glimpse into an unfamiliar episode in history

Susie Steiner | Missing, Presumed
For fans of crime fiction, here’s the story of a missing young woman, the desperation of her family, and the pressure on DS Manon Bradshaw and her team to get to the truth

Maggie Shipstead | Great Circle
The inspiring tale of Marian Graves who lives a life driven by her hunger for adventure. Here’s an uplifting, fast-paced tale for your holiday

Non-Fiction

Caitlin Moran | How to be a Woman
A bawdy, feisty, endlessly entertaining memoir by one of our greatest newspaper columnists

Malcolm Gladwell | The Bomber Mafia
Gladwell is the supreme teller of stories, and this exploration of the British approach to bombing (flatten cities and undermine the morale of the population) versus the early American approach (use bombs strategically to close cities down) is genuinely and starkly fascinating

James Plunkett | End State: Nine Ways Society is Broken and How we Fix It
A clever, persuasive book reflecting on society as it is now, with some big ideas on how we can reinvent it. A welcome dose of optimism

Julie Summers | When the Children Came Home
I read this as the first Covid lockdown began in 2020. It’s a vivid account of the evacuees of World War II told through their diaries and recollections. Those children – like the Covid generation – showed resilience and optimism

Brian Groom | Northerners: A History
A cheerful and wide-ranging tribute to the people of the north, charting their history from Neolithic times onwards

APRIL 2022
Never has there seemed more need to be able to escape through inky words into other worlds seen through other people’s eyes. Here’s my spring selection of five fiction and five non-fiction texts. I hope you enjoy some or all of them.

Fiction/Poetry

Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz | The Passenger
A fascinating historical curiosity, and fast-paced thriller: it’s November 1938 in Berlin, and Jewish businessman Otto Silbermann begins a journey to try to escape the brewing violence of the Nazi regime, beginning on the terrible evening of Kristalnacht

Amanda Gorman | Poems: Call Us What We Carry
Gorman wowed us with her poetry performance at the presidential inauguration of Joe Biden. This collection of her poetry is full of her memorable phrases and rich insights

Elizabeth Strout | Oh William!
The story of Lucy Barton, a successful writer, who reconnects unexpectedly with her ex-husband William, leading to a beautiful, affectionate tale of imperfect but enduring love

Jean Rhys | Wide Sargasso Sea
Written in 1966, this is a brilliant, disturbing prequel to Jane Eyre, recounting the story of Antoinette Cosway, the Creole heiress who married Mr. Rochester – only to be ripped away from her Jamaican homeland to end up as the abandoned ‘madwoman in the attic’ of Charlotte Brontë's novel

Anne Tyler | Breathing Lessons
In east coast America, Maggie Moran is en route to attend the funeral of a good friend. Unexpectedly, her journey turns into a day in the life of a fiftysomething couple, told with Tyler’s characteristic warmth and charm

Non-Fiction

Gavin Barwell | Chief of Staff: Notes from Downing Street
This is for political junkies. Barwell was Theresa May’s Chief of Staff at Number 10 throughout her tumultuous, Brexit-dominated stint as prime minister. It has fascinating insights into the inner workings of politics in an already fading different era

Rutger Bregman | Humankind: A Hopeful History
Here’s a book for our times – a kind of history of the human race with lots of much-needed and optimistic reminders about the instinctive goodness of most of our fellow inhabitants of Planet Earth

Elizabeth Day | How to Fail: Everything I’ve Learned from Things Going Wrong
This entertaining book uses interviews with successful people (such as David Baddiel, Mishal Husain, Phoebe Waller-Bridge) about their moments of failure, and applies them to the ups and downs of Day’s own life. It’s eminently readable and ultimately uplifting

Anna Keay | The Restless Republic: Britain Without a Crown
This is a detailed history of the decade from 1649 when Britain was engulfed by revolution. The author tells the story by focusing on some key personalities: Anna Trapnel whose godly visions transfixed the nation; Marchamont Nedham, brilliant propagandist of the fledgling newspaper industry; William Petty, the audacious scientist who mapped Ireland. It’s a book that transports us to the people of a different time and place.

Christina Patterson | Outside, the Sky is Blue
Patterson is one of my favourite newspaper columnists. This book tells her story – from the sudden death of her brother which leads to her having to clear his house, unearthing pictures and documents about him and her family. It’s ultimately a joyful, deeply personal memoir
 
DECEMBER 2021
There’s never been a holiday when we’ve each needed more time to recuperate, and to lose ourselves in other worlds via inky words on paper or screens. So here are my five fiction and five non-fiction suggestions to entertain, unnerve, provoke, inform, and help you to escape for a while. Have a good break.

Fiction

Jane Harper | The Survivors
A dark and disturbing thriller that begins with a body found on the beach in a small coastal town

Robert Harris | Munich
A dazzling account of Neville Chamberlain’s high-stakes 1938 meeting with Hitler

Maggie O’Farrell | The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox
As a young girl, Esme Lennox is taken from her family home and committed to a mental asylum: this is her story

Lionel Shriver | The Mandibles
A compelling, chilling account of what happens when a nation’s finances implode and the impact on one family

Catriona Ward | The Last House on Needless Street
Another thriller: here is the story of a serial killer. A stolen child. Revenge. Death. And an ordinary house at the end of an ordinary street

Non-Fiction

Oliver Burkeman | Four Thousand Weeks
On average, we each have four thousand weeks on the planet: here’s an uplifting account of how to use them wisely

Hannah Fry | Hello World: How to be Human in the Age of the Machine
A stunning and ultimately reassuring book about how to navigate our way as humans through a complicated world

Clare Jackson | Devil Land
A rich, detailed history of the UK during a time of endless crises, 1588-1688. It’s full of breathtaking intrigue

John Preston | Fall: The Mystery of Robert Maxwell
A fascinating and entertaining account of a former giant of the publishing industry

Jon Yates | Fractured
A superb dose of optimism about how we take our fractured society and begin to rebuild it


SUMMER 2021
You made it! Welcome to some kind of summer break. Here’s my list of reading recommendations to escape into from one of the most challenging years of our lives. I’ve chosen some of the books that have most challenged, entertained and sometimes unnerved me over the past few months.

Geoff Barton

Non-fiction

Jennifer Lucy Allan | The Foghorn’s Lament
Who’d have thought we needed a history of foghorns -  the science, their impact on local people, their legacy? A quirky and exquisitely written social history.

Jessica Bruder | Nomadland
A sad but illuminating insight into people in USA who spend their lives travelling from job to job and living in battered mobile homes.

Richard Coles | The Madness of Grief
A funny, poignant and brilliantly written account of life during and after the death of Richard Coles’ partner.

Hadley Freeman | House of Glass
From a shoebox of photographs found at the back of her grandmother’s wardrobe, Hadley Freeman traces the remarkable secrets of her Jewish family

Johan Norberg | Open: How Collaboration & Curiosity Shaped Humankind
A fascinating, optimistic account of how the human instinct to help one another creates our success as a species

Melanie Reid | The World I fell Out Of
A tough but ultimately inspiring account of how journalist Melanie Reid comes to terms with being paralysed from the neck down following a horse-riding accident

Fiction and Poetry

Brian Bilston | Alexa, What is There to Know About Love?
Bilston is the poet of the internet – funny but powerful poems about the confusing world we inhabit

Matt Haig | The Midnight Library
An uplifting story of regret, hope and forgiveness - and a library that houses second chances. A magnificent and optimistic tale

Liz Moore | Long Bright River
In a Philadelphia neighbourhood rocked by a drugs epidemic, two once-inseparable sisters find themselves at odds. A dark, clever and beautifully written thriller

Rebecca Wait | Our Fathers
A disturbing account of how the guilt of surviving murder shapes the decisions and lifestyle of Tom, now returning home to a remote Scottish Island.
 
EASTER 2021
If ever there was a time when we needed to escape into inky words on paper or screens, it’s now. So here are my Easter reading recommendations. I hope you enjoy them.

Fiction

Nickolas Butler | Little Faith
A story about how family loyalties are put under pressure by wider questions of faith

Andrew O’Hagan | Mayflies
A wonderful story of a 1980s friendship, nostalgia, and how we confront a darker future

Sarah Moss | Summerwater
The haunting story of one grim day on a Scottish holiday chalet park told through the eyes of different residents

Kashuo Ishiguro | Klara and the Sun
A breathtaking depiction of a world in which ‘artificial friends’ support children stranded at home, exploring our understanding in the age of robots of what it is to be truly human

Maggie O’Farrell | Hamnet
The beautifully-told depiction of Anne Hathaway and her daily life, in which her famous husband William Shakespeare is a shadowy, unnamed figure

Non-Fiction

Julia Summers | When the Children Came Home  
Amid so much Covid talk of a ‘lost generation’, here’s an authentic account of the WWII evacuees and their generally positive experience of what they gained from educational disruption

The Secret Barrister
A bleak but compelling insight into a profession doing their best to support society’s most vulnerable citizens

John Higgs | Stranger than We Can Imagine: Making Sense of the Twentieth Century
A brilliant, funny, and cleverly erudite account of how we can understand the twentieth century

Selina Todd | Snakes and Ladders: The Great British Social Mobility Myth  
A quietly angry polemic that dismantles many myths about social mobility through the ages, showing us how we go to here

Rosamond Young | The Secret Life of Cows
A wise and charming account of the quirky psychology of cows. That’s all you need to know.

DECEMBER 2020
As we always remind ourselves, ‘Not all readers are leaders; but all leaders are readers’ (Harry Truman). This year, more perhaps than any other, we need some books to escape into. Here’s my collection of fiction, non-fiction and poetry which I hope you’ll enjoy during a Christmas break unlike any previous ones.

William Boyd | Trio
Three interwoven but secret lives set in the swinging sixties: in his new novel, William Boyd is as funny and tender as ever

Elly Griffiths | The Ghost Fields
For fans of grisly thrillers, Elly Griffiths’ latest is as beautifully plotted, atmospheric and utterly readable

Isabel Hardman | Why We Get the Wrong Politicians
A fascinating, gritty account of why our social structures make it so difficult nowadays to have effective political leaders

Noreena Hertz | The Lonely Century
A book about the world we’ve created, with so much deep-rooted fragmentation and isolation, with ideas of how to rebuild a sense of community

Penelope Lively | How It All Began
It begins with an act of violence and then, with characteristic skill, Penelope Lively weaves a brilliant thread of interconnected relationships across unexpected lives

Derek Mahon | New Selected Poems
Until lockdown, I didn’t really know the late Derek Mahon’s poetry. Then I read ‘Everything is going to be all right’ and was smitten by the beguiling simplicity and reassuring optimism of his work

Patrick Ness | A Monster Calls
A heartbreaking, heartwarming children’s book about a boy dealing with his mother’s cancer diagnosis

Barack Obama | A Promised Land
Part one of Obama’s memoir is beautifully upbeat, elegantly written and a reflective exploration of what leadership is

Michael Pye | The Edge of the World: How the North Sea Made Us
A fascinating social history of the UK’s island status, how the ocean has defined and shaped who we are

James Suzman | Work: A History of How We Spend Our Time
An anthropologist’s fascinating account of how fire, farming and our move to towns and cities reshaped the human experience of life
 
AUTUMN 2020
As you hurtle (I hope) into half-term, you need to escape. Here’s my bookshelf of suggested texts designed to help.

Fiction

Fredrik Backman | A Man Called Ove
These days, we’re all grumpy. Follow the quirky story of Ove, and feel some redemption

Bridget Collins | The Binding
A strange, evocative tale of how books might define who people are in the real world

Guinevere Glasfurd | The Year Without Summer
In 1815 in Indonesia, Mount Tambora erupts and much of the world experiences no summer. This novel tells that story.

RJ Palacio | Wonder
A simply joyful novel that celebrates the wonder of human beings, whatever they may look like. It is, indeed, a wonder.

John Steinbeck | Of Mice and Men
Until a few years ago, every student would have read this book for their GCSE English exam. Quite right too. It’s a simple, mesmerising text that holds a mirror up to who we are. If you've never read it, now's the time.

Non-fiction and poetry

Deborah Alma | The Emergency Poet
During the past 6 months, we’ve seen a craving for wise words. Here’s one of my favourite, life-affirming poetry anthologies.

Kate Clanchy | Some Kids I taught and what they taught me
A life-enhancing celebration of being a teacher. It brims with classroom joy.

Melinda Gates | The Moment of Life
An inspirational and ego-free account of Melinda Gates’ manifesto to create a more equal world.

David Goodhart | Head Hand Heart
From the author of the brilliant ‘Road to Somewhere’, here’s another powerful manifesto for why our society needs to recognise knowledge and skills beyond the narrowly academic.

Simon Heffer | Staring at God
A magisterial account of the home front in World War I - the politics and the people amid a world in crisis.
SUMMER 2020
Rarely have we craved a break so much. And escaping into good books has never felt so important. So here, once again, is my annual list of recommendations for the beach or, more likely, your garden. I hope you’ll find something here to transport you from these strange times.

Fiction

Nickolas Butler | Shotgun Lovesongs
A schmaltzy but entertaining account of four male schoolfriends and how their lives in a small Midwest town develop and unravel

Katerina Diamond | The Teacher
Recommended by Mrs B. If you like dark thrillers (and she does), brace yourself for one that’s not for the faint-hearted

Robert Harris | The Second Sleep
Harris is the expert in thoughtful thrillers, this one linking the dark ages to our own times of anxiety and the ever-present threat of social collapse

Delia Owens | Where the Crawdads Sing
One of those life-affirming novels that are perfect for a holiday read

Anne Tyler | Redhead by the Side of the Road
A wonderful, evocative portrait of Micah Mortimer, a middle-aged man whose life appears to have stalled

Non-Fiction

Pragya Agarwal | Sway: The Science of Unconscious Bias
An unexpectedly personal look by a behavioural scientist at the unconscious influences that affect our everyday decisions, including racism and bias against women

Craig Brown | One Two Three Four: The Beatles in Time
An entertaining, affectionate, anecdotal biography of the Fab Four

Thomas L. Friedman | Thank You for Being Late
From economics to climate change to changing technology, Friedman reassuringly and optimistically guides us through an era of bewildering change

David Kynaston | Austerity Britain
A magnificent, detailed, nuanced portrait of a country emerging from the crisis of World War II

Jonathan Sacks | Morality
This is deep thinking conveyed with the lightest of touches – a book in dark times to help us navigate our way through to hope in humanity.


EASTER 2020
There’s probably not been a time in our lives when many of us have needed toe space into a good book. Here’s my latest list of five fiction and five non-fiction texts. Thanks to my good friend, ASCL member, and voracious thriller reader, Helen Neal, for the first three suggestions here - they are very dark thrillers.

All of the choices will transport you to different worlds. I hope you enjoy them.

Fiction

Liz Lawler | Don’t Wake Up
Alex Taylor wakes up tied to an operating table. The man who stands over her isn’t a doctor …

Carla Kovach | The Next Girl
You thought he’d come to save you. You were wrong.

Helen Phifer | Dark House
A shadowy figure in the dark was dragging something heavy behind them. Lizzy pulled the covers over her head, then realised what was being dragged...

Penelope Lively | Consequences
I’ve mentioned this before. It’s simply a beautiful - just beautiful - novel set over three generations.

Colm Tóibín | Brooklyn
The film was good; the novel is magnificent - the story of a life that begins in Ireland, then through emigration moves to Brooklyn. The Observer named it as one of the top 10 historical novels.

Non-Fiction

Francesca Segal | Mother Ship
Memoir of having premature twins - the staff, the other people, the wards. Compelling and uplifting.

Graham Swift | Here We Are
A wonderful account via shifting narrative voices of the three main members of a musical hall and magic act. It has a beautifully elegant ending. Heartbreaking.

Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff | The Coddling of the American Mind
A brilliant polemic on how parenting, schools and especially universities are leaving us emotionally weakened and socially atomised

Hillary Clinton | What Happened?
A candid and often darkly funny account of her presidential campaign
 
Doris Kearns Goodwin | Leadership
Lessons from the Presidents Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Lyndon B. Johnson for Turbulent Times
CHRISTMAS 2019
For your Christmas 2019 holiday reading, I’m suggesting ten titles that have entertained, disturbed, provoked and moved me. Once that well-earned break arrives, curl up with a good book.

Fiction

William Boyd | Waiting for Sunrise
Regular readers will know how highly I rate William Boyd. This is a sophisticated thriller that begins in an evocative twentieth century Vienna and then takes us on a thrilling adveture

Michelle Paver | Wakenhyrst
A gothic horror story, set in Suffolk – ideal (if unnerving) fireside reading

Maggie O’Farrell | When First I Held Your Hand
A story of two couples, and the cleverly emerging connections between their separate lives

Elizabeth Stroud | Olive Kitteridge
My book of the year – a compelling, detailed story of a community and a marriage shaken to its core

Oscar Wilde | The Selfish Giant
A nineteenth century short story for children, brimming with an optimism we adults currently crave. Find a picture book version to read to a child – but read it yourself first, with a box of tissues at the ready

Non-Fiction

Malcolm Gladwell | Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know About People We Don’t Know
Gladwell is always thought-provoking and entertaining. This new book explores why we shouldn’t trust our instinctive views of other people

Lemn Sissay | My Name is Why
An extraordinary true story of a child loved, then rejected, then finding his true self. He’s now Chancellor of Manchester University. Sissay will join us at conference on March 2020 to tell his tale

David Wallace-Wells | The Uninhabitable Earth
A book that moves us from the rhetoric of climate catastrophe to the scientific realities. Spoiler: it’s even worse than we realised

Laura Cumming | On Chapel Sands: My mother and other missing persons
It begins with a kidnapping from a Lincolnshire beach: a most extraordinary and beautifully written memoir

Sabrina Cohen-Hatton | The Heat of the Moment: Life and Death Decision-Making from a Firefighter
This life story moved me deeply – from homeless child to PhD student to chief fire officer. She writes with such passion and a powerful moral conviction. She’ll join us at ASCL Conference 2020.

SUMMER 2019
‘Not all readers are leaders, but all leaders are readers,’ said US President Harry Truman. Once again, here are ten suggestions for your holiday - a mix of fiction and non-fiction titles, none of them about education, and each of them compelling in a different way. Enjoy!
Geoff Barton

Fiction

Ian McEwan | Machines Like Us
McEwan’s novels are always thought-provoking as well as entertaining. This one is fascinating for its chilling exploration of how the lines between humans and robots may one day blur. It’s especially enjoyable for its depiction of an alternative 1980s, in which Britain has just lost the Falklands War.

Gerladine McCaughrean | Where The World Ends
We are in a golden age of writing for teenagers and young adults: here’s a novel that delivers an unusual story with great clarity and style. Quill and his friends arrive once again on a remote island to hunt birds. But this particular summer, 1727, no one arrives to take them home. McCaughrean’s novel charts what happens next.

Sue Hubbard | Rainsongs
A lyrical, haunting account of Martha Cassidy, staying at her cottage in western Ireland and trying to come to terms with the death of her husband, before getting drawn into local disputes in a community she isn’t part of.

Chris Hammer | Scrublands
In an obscure country town, a priest suddenly opens fire on the congregation: if you’re a fan of crime thrillers, here’s one of those dark, breathless thrillers that provide essential escapism for holidays.

Anne Griffin | When All is Said
84-year-old Maurice Hannington sits at a bar in an Irish town and offers up five toasts. Collectively, they reveal the people and events of his colourful life. This is a beautiful, poignant novel, recommended to me by an assistant in Waterstone’s. It has resonated ever since.

Non-fiction

Juliet Blaxfield | The Easternmost House
Blaxfield lives in a farmhouse on edge of the Suffolk coast, one of England’s most easterly points. And the land it is on is falling relentlessly into the sea. She uses this stark context to reflect on the seasons and the rhythms of life. A gentle and quietly moving read.

James O’Brien | How to be Right
Radio talkshow host James O’Brien takes various themes - political correctness, LGBT issues, Trump, Brexit - and uses his many telephone encounters with the public to explore how easily people create their own versions of the truth. It’s feisty in style, but makes serious points with a lightness of touch.

Robert MacFarlane | Underworld
MacFarlane writes in a mesmerising way about his journeys beneath the earth - under forests, into caves, and through hypnotically strange antechambers deep below the streets of Paris. It’s a haunting depiction of the unfamiliar worlds beneath our feet.

Emily Maitlis | Airhead
BBC2’s ‘Newsnight’ has been revitalised this year since Emily Maitlis became its main presenter. In this book she explores the on-screen encounters she has had with politicians and others, filling in the backstory in an entertaining, often waspish way.

David Goodhart | The Road to Somewhere
This is the book that has most influenced me over the past year - a compelling account of polarised attitudes in the UK. Goodhart’s analysis compares the Anywheres - people like us who leave home, go to university, see ourselves as global citizens - and the Somewheres - rooted in communities and values that they frequently see criticised and denigrated. Essential reading.

 
EASTER 2019
Holidays are a time to escape, to reflect, to nourish our minds and souls. And as we always remind ourselves: “Not all readers are leaders but all leaders are readers” (Harry Truman). So here’s my list of fiction, non-fiction and poetry that you might enjoy over immersing yourself in over the Easter break

Fiction

Sally Rooney | Normal People
The shifting relationship between two young people from different backgrounds, told chiefly through dialogue. It’s warm, funny and (be warned) racy

Jonathan Coe | Middle England
A laugh-out-loud funny account of middle-aged life, though please note: it mentions Brexit

Sue Townsend | Adrian Mole: The Prostrate Years
Moving back to Leicester has reacquainted me with the great comic author, Sue Townsend. Adrian is a national treasure

Max Porter | Grief is the Thing with Feathers
A haunting, heart-wrenching meditation on love, loss and living

Ellie Griffiths | The Crossing Places
For fans of crime fiction, here’s a writer who sets compelling stories in the haunting landscapes of Norfolk

Non-fiction

Jennifer Palmieri | Dear Madam President
An elegantly written, and inspiring, reflection addressed to a future female US President.

Michael Jago | Rab Butler: The Best Prime Minister We Never Had?
Some 75 years on from Butler’s 1944 Education Act, a biography that shows us what politicians can achieve in adversity

Michael Barber | How to Run A Government
A wonderfully optimistic reminder of things governments can do to make life better

Darren McGarvey | Poverty Safari
A stark personal account of an upbringing steeped in poverty

Mary Oliver | Devotions: Collected Poems
Inspiring, sustaining poetry to rejuvenate you for the term ahead