Books

It’s been eight years since Dan Brown published Origin, the fifth novel in his best-selling Robert Langdon series. The novels about the Harvard symbologist, especially 2003’s The Da Vinci Code, have proven to be widely popular, selling over 120 million copies worldwide. Tom Hanks starred as Langdon in three movies …

Irvine Welsh has been revealed as one of the special guests at the world’s most prestigious celebration of crime writing this summer. The Trainspotting author joins the likes of Lee and Andrew Child, Val McDermid, Kate Atkinson and Mark Billingham at the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival, supported by …

Slow Horses creator Mick Herron has been honoured with the highest accolade in crime writing – the Crime Writers’ Association (CWA) Diamond Dagger. The prestigious award recognises authors whose careers have been marked by sustained excellence, and who have made a significant contribution to the genre. Newcastle-born Herron, 61, who …

Luke Arnold, centre, as Martin Scarsden in hit BBC adaptation of Chris Hammer’s Scrublands against b (Image: BBC / Easy Tiger / Getty / AP) Being a political consultant is a high-risk job. Careers can be short and brutal. But former journalist Chris Hammer might just hold the record for …

Andrew Scott played the brilliant, evil Jim Moriarty in the BBC’s 2010 series Sherlock (Image: BBC / Hartswood Films /Colin Hutton) Was there ever a greater description of a fictional villain than the “Napoleon of crime”, as Sherlock Holmes brands his arch-rival Professor James Moriarty? “He is the organiser of …

The dawn of a new year often brings with it the tradition of setting resolutions, be it hitting the gym, picking up a new hobby or kicking an unhealthy habit. A common resolution is to reduce screen time and increase reading hours. However, despite starting the year with high hopes, …

Award-winning actor Ralph Ineson stars as a jail inmate who finds solace and redemption through reading in a short film highlighting the work of a charity that helps prisoners find joy in books. Ineson, best known for playing Finchy in The Office alongside Ricky Gervais, appears as ‘Declan’, who joins …

By inputting the amount of time you spend browsing content on your phone, a new online tool reveals what novels you could have read in the time you spend aimlessly scrolling. It includes literary works like Dracula, Dune, and It. While other featured titles include Richard Osman’s Thursday Murder Club, …

Conservationists Gerald and Lee Durrell with lemurs at Jersey Zoo in 1987 (Image: Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust.) The legendary naturalist Gerald Durrell once noted that “so-called human progress proceeds at the speed of an Exocet missile, whereas conservation proceeds at the pace of a donkey and cart”. Yet, according to …

The last time George RR Martin published a novel in his A Song of Ice and Fire series was in 2011 when Game of Thrones was debuting on HBO. Since then, the 76-year-old has continued to work on the penultimate book, The Winds of Winter, which still doesn’t have a …