"While Rooney wants to make it clear that these characters are made by a complex process of personal and structural factors, the characterisation of these effects comes across as largely typical liberal nihilism: evident contemporary issues are discussed but focus by and large as background. Brexit, climate change, culture wars and fame form a seemingly endless indulgent discourse with no real direction or purpose. Instead, there seems to be an obsession with providing binary opposites within her characters, which comes across as a litany of cliché. Felix is both bad because he watches hardcore pornography but is good in the fact that he likes and gets along well with dogs. Eileen presents her vulnerabilities through the online-stalking of her ‘sad boy’ ex-boyfriend, her tiny apartment, and meagre salary, while Simon can promise his traditional Catholicism, do-gooder job in the Irish government. Alice’s sexual voyeurism is linked to her financial position in allowing Felix to come to Rome with her expenses paid. Felix’s working-class cliché borders on the offensive, or serious ignorance at best, presenting a character who has to literally defend his intelligence: “I can read by the way… I’m not great at reading, but I can read. And I don’t think you really care anyway.” When these minor power-plays slowly unfold and catalyse at the end of the novel, involving a major confrontation between Alice and Eileen, a knocked-over chair, and a wine glass smashed on the kitchen floor, we’re left wondering what the entire point of these relationships was in the first place."
"Of all the books that explore the question of how and why we learn, I find that Frank Herbert’s Dune offers an unsettling, prescient answer to this question."
'Upon sitting down to write this article, the immense prospect of narrowing down my entire life's reading experience to five books suddenly seemed to stare at me, chasm-like. Life does not always present itself to us in such neat sequences.'
'What makes a great writer?
Practice, of course, and undoubtedly that unique spark called talent or inspiration. But as every writer, great or otherwise, knows, the whole business of writing is built on reading.'
'There’s something magical about running your fingers across a shelf, gazing over each stack and meandering through a cavern full of works of literature.'
When browsing the shelves of a bookshop, what I am most drawn to is art. I hunt for the brightest colour, the most striking typography, a good-looking image with which to decorate my bedside table. Book covers can use their beauty to their advantage, or even as a form of rebellion.
'Ramadan is a highlight of the Islamic calendar and involves a month of self-reflection and improvement as well as abstinence from food and water. Gaining knowledge is hugely celebrated within Islam, and with more time on my hands not eating or drinking, this spiritual month is the perfect opportunity to learn something new.'
As Valentine's Day looms, it's not hard to find examples of romantic love. But literature celebrates the expanse of human emotion, so our books editors have picked out two moving illustrations of the other forms love takes.
My pandemic summer was spent staring at a computer, but these were a startlingly productive and educational few months and, as with most exciting things in my unexciting life, it starts with a blank page.
