Philip Womack
Man of Mystery
Jonathan Barnes’s new book is a labyrinthine literary thriller that cleverly plays with ideas of authorship and text, while satirising our obsession with money and celebrity. With the rise of the internet and e-books, the terrifying question arises: can a text be stable? Would we notice if, say, Orwell were edited, subtly, year on year, until the text became something entirely different? What if it weren’t a human editing the texts, but something else entirely? And what if those edits had an actual effect upon reality itself?
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'Has the printed book finally outlived its span?' asks @AdamCSDouglas. 'If so, how long can the rare book trade continue? And how much longer can we keep flying in fat-bellied jets to gather in some foreign land to exhibit our wares?'
https://literaryreview.co.uk/how-long-can-we-keep-doing-this
'The capital is revealed as a frightening, roiling place of disease and debauchery, the heads of traitors displayed on spikes, the sky leaden with fumes and fog.'
@MirandaFrance1 on Maggie O'Farrell's new plague-era novel, 'Hamnet'.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/love-in-the-time-of-plague-2
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https://literaryreview.co.uk/on-deaf-ears
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