A look at the latest releases, plus what's new in paperback.

By Sophie Herdman


Empress Dowager CIXI: The Concubine Who Launched Modern China by Jung Chang is published in hardback by Jonathan Cape, priced £20 (ebook £11.39). Available now.

Chinese-born British writer Jung Chang has a record for radical biographies having previously released the head-turning tome Mao: The Unknown Story in 2005. Now she turns her attention to one of Mao's villainised predecessors, Dowager Empress Cixi.

A great deal of negative attention has been given to the woman who revolutionised the Chinese court in the 19th century in order to take power of the country, but in her latest work Chang seeks to change the record and give an original analysis of the Empress based on recently released documents from the stateswoman's court.

Cixi, a Manchu-clan member's daughter, was selected as a concubine for Emperor Xianfeng in 1851. After his death ten years later, their son - the Emperor's only surviving boy - became the assumed heir, however his role would be held by a board of Regents until he was of reasonable age.

Due to her education and prior knowledge of the court, Cixi had foresight of China's future under the rule of the Regents, which was widely accepted as a doomed strategy. For this reason, and with the help of Princes and her fellow Dowager Empress, Cixi staged a coup and instated herself as ruler of China.

Popular opinion has seen Cixi's character described as that of a desperate villain whose rule drove China into corruption and anarchy. In stark contrast, Chang's biography shows Cixi as a thoughtful, decisive leader who pushed China into the modern world, abolished the cruel practise of feet-binding, and opened relations with the West.

Chang's writing is sympathetic towards the Empress without being biased, and gives a fresh insight into the political career of one of the world's most influential leaders. In addition she manages to inform the reader without overbearing with heavy detail.

This is one of the most engaging and informed political biographies I has ever read, and is sure to make waves around the world.

8/10

(Review by Holly McKenzie)


New fiction

A Tap on the Window by Linwood Barclay is published in hardback by Orion Books, priced £16.99 (ebook £8.49). Available October 10.

A Tap on the Window is the latest thriller from Canadian author Linwood Barclay. Driving home one dark rainy night, private investigator Cal Weaver is flagged down by a teenage girl in need of a lift. Originally reluctant, he agrees when she reveals that she knew his recently deceased son.

It doesn't take long though for Cal to realise something is amiss with the situation, and when his passenger darts out of the car just as abruptly as she entered, he worries for her safety.

The detective in him can't let the matter rest, and the following day when Cal makes a gruesome discovery.

Although enjoyable, this book requires some perseverance. You need to have faith that the best-selling author will deliver the intrigue expected because it's almost the midway point before the real mystery develops.

Once the plot picks up though, it's hard to put the book down and the misdirection, twists and turns don't disappoint.

6/10

(Review by Stephanie Murray)


Odysseus: The Oath by Valerio Massimo Manfredi is published in hardback by Macmillan, priced £16.99 (ebook £7.47). Available now.

Ancient Greek myths have fascinated and entertained millions over the centuries, and the best stories never get old. That seems to be the thinking of Italian writer and archaeologist Manfredi, who has based his 16th novel on Homer's epic poems The Iliad and The Odyssey.

This first instalment tells the story through the eyes of Odysseus himself, recounted in flashback up to the fall of Troy.

It is an excellent device as his childhood knits together the timeline and geography of many different myths: Odysseus's father sailed with Jason on the Argo, and Hercules makes an appearance as well as Achilles.

But Manfredi is not afraid to embellish - Odysseus' cantankerous grandfather is rumoured to be a werewolf, while there was apparently one man able to resist Helen's beauty - and the translation from Italian is conversational and enjoyable.

The sequel, covering the wily hero's 10-year journey home, should be a treat.

9/10

(Review by Natalie Bowen)


Worst. Person. Ever. by Douglas Coupland is published in hardback by William Heinemann, priced £16.99 (ebook £9.49). Available now.

When Douglas Coupland's Generation X: Tales For An Accelerated Culture was released in 1991, it both popularised the phrase of its title - Americans reaching adulthood in the late 1980s - and gave birth to the term McJob.

It's difficult to imagine Worst. Person. Ever, the Canadian's fourteenth novel, having similar cultural impact.

It tells the story of Raymond Gunt, a TV cameraman and one of the most unlikable characters you'll find in the whole post-modern genre.

He lands a job on a reality survival programme on a remote Pacific island, although it takes him half the book to get there, and by the time he has arrived, amid endless plane travel, anaphylactic shocks and more swearing than a whole frigate full of drunken sailors, it's impossible to care what happens to the wearing Gunt at all, so utterly charmless and lacking redeeming features as he is.

The Americanisms seem odd for a character who is meant to be a Londoner too, while, the supposed satire of disposable modern culture and dumbed-down media feels obvious, out-of-date, and from a writer normally as on-the-money as Coupland, oddly toothless.

5/10

(Review by Andy Welch)


Bellman and Black by Diane Setterfield is published in hardback by Orion Books, priced £14.99 (ebook £7.49). Available October 10.

The long-awaited follow up to Setterfield's debut The Thirteenth Tale takes the form of a gothic ghost story.

We meet William Bellman, the young son of an abandoned single mother and grandson of a mill owner. As his uncle takes him under his wing, he learns how the mill works, and finds himself a natural. But his life is not easy.

People around him die, and he attends multiple funerals; at each one William sees a mysterious man. It is only in his most desperate moment that he is able to speak to him, and so a deal is struck that will haunt William the rest of his life.

A novel light on story and strong on writing, it doesn't have all the meat of The Thirteenth Tale, but is nevertheless a book that lingers after the last page is turned.

6/10

(Review by Emma Herdman)


Non fiction

Running: The Autobiography by Ronnie O'Sullivan is published in hardback by Orion Books, priced £18.99 (ebook £9.49). Available October 10. REVIEW EMBARGOED UNTIL PUBLICATION DATE.

In Ronnie O'Sullivan's candid first book he spoke of how a troubled home life - both parents in prison, one for murder - had contributed to him going down a path of drink, drugs and depression, all while ruling the snooker world.

In this more grown-up life account, Running, he talks at length of how running itself has helped him banish those demons. In fact, this book is arguably more about running than snooker as he passionately tells of how the sport has saved him.

But while running may have solved some of his problems, he admits to having sprinted away from others, charting the breakdown of his relationship and a long and expensive battle for access to his children.

Intertwined with that is the release from prison of his father after 18 years, and his life as a snooker player which has reached new levels of brilliance after he won a fifth world title despite taking a full year off (during which he worked as a free-hand on a farm!).

Running is a chaotic race through O'Sullivan's life, but this does little to dethrone him as the people's champion - it simply adds further to his legend.

8/10

(Review by Wayne Gardiner)


Great Britain's Great War by Jeremy Paxman is published in hardback by Viking, priced £25 (ebook £12.99). Available now.

With the centenary of the outbreak of World War I fast approaching, historians will be looking to the archives for fresh takes on the tragedy.

Despite being better known for his television presenting, Paxman is more than up to the challenge, having previously tackled such weighty subjects as The English, The Political Animal and Empire.

Scouring an encyclopaedic bibliography for forgotten wisdom about the war, he presents a balanced and intelligent analysis - not just of the Western Front, which is so often the focus for books on the conflict, but of the British at home as well. Rationing, popular support for the war, and other little-known facets of the conflict are brought out in this engaging, if sobering book.

His take on the Great War is particularly interesting when considering the circumstances of the war's outbreak. Famous for asking pointed questions, here Paxman asks, and answers, another one: In the light of what it meant to be British 100 years ago, was this war really inevitable?

8/10

(Review by Sarah Warwick)


Darling Monster by Diana Cooper - The Letters of Lady Diana Cooper to her son John Julius Norwich 1939-1952 is published in hardback by Chatto and Windus, priced £25 (ebook £12.99). Available now.

These missives from a famous British upper-class beauty, to her adored only child, are full of valuable social history and hilariously waspish gossip.

Lady Diana Cooper (1892-1986) and her husband Duff, who was a leading Tory politician and top-level diplomat, were married from 1919 until his death in 1954. Their son, John Julius Norwich, to whom the letters were written, is himself a distinguished author of historical books and has added his own comments and explanations to these pages.

Diana showed a remarkable tolerance of her husband's philandering and sometimes became a personal friend of his current mistress. Although the Coopers were posh and comfortably off, they were not wealthy by the standards of their associates and the steps that she took to save money are, at times, both amusing and surprising.

Duff and his wife made dangerous journeys abroad during the war, because of his work, but wherever she was, she always wrote back to her young son in boarding school.

The picture she paints of upper-class life in London during the 1940-41 Blitz is an eye-opener, and the best part of a fascinating and very readable book.

8/10

(Review by Anthony Looch)


David and Goliath by Malcolm Gladwell is published in hardback by Allen Lane, priced £16.99 (ebook £9.99). Available now.

Malcolm Gladwell, journalist and author of best-selling books such as Blink and The Tipping Point, returns with yet another book examining how we think and act as a society.

This time, Gladwell is scrutinising the David and Goliath legend - where a lowly shepherd carrying just a sling conquers a fully-armoured giant in battle. The author asks the question: Why do underdogs succeed more often than they should?

What follows is a collection of stories where a disadvantage has turned out to be an advantage, and an advantage has turned out to be a disadvantage.

Gladwell tells tales of the American civil rights movement, The Troubles in Northern Ireland, children who have lost their parents, and the reverse, parents who have lost their children. He also looks at why smaller classes at school are not always an advantage and why it is sometimes better for an intelligent student to go to a less academically successful university.

The book comes to somewhat of a bumpy conclusion, which is essentially that sometimes a disadvantage can be a good thing, sometimes it can be a bad thing.

Take, for example, dyslexia. Many entrepreneurs are dyslexic, and Gladwell skilfully explains how the difficulty can lead to success, but then again he also notes that the proportion of dyslexics who end up in jail is very high.

Still, Gladwell's ability to uncover captivating tales and his clear writing make this an enjoyable, fascinating and thought-provoking read.

8/10

(Review by Sophie Herdman)


The Great British Year: Wildlife Through The Seasons by Stephen Moss is published in hardback by Quercus, priced £25 (ebook £6.69) Available now.

Forget mugs of lattes, The Great British Year is what coffee tables were made for. This glorious 320-page tome is packed with coloured photographs of the changing seasons in Britain and the wildlife that so enriches it, and coincides with the BBC One wildlife series of the same name.

But this is no fluffy catalogue of cute animals; there are informative passages on how to help familiar creatures like birds during the winter, explanations about our seasons and woodlands, as well as facts about our ecosystem.

Although a lot of complex subjects are introduced and some, like moths and ants, do not seem that riveting at first, leading nature writer Stephen Moss ensures that each area is tackled with the same lively and informative tone as the next.

Consequently, the book could easily be read aloud to a child without becoming too complicated, while maintaining an interest for the adult reading it.

If the text doesn't do it for you, the stunning photography throughout the book is enough to make the most reluctant birder want to pull out their binoculars and unleash their inner Chris Packham.

With so many nature programmes and books devoted to far-flung shores, it's heartening to see just how exciting our home grown wildlife can be.

9/10

(Reviewed by Keeley Bolger)


Children's book of the week

Dragon Loves Penguin by Debi Gliori is published in hardback by Bloomsbury Children's Books, priced £10.99. Available October 10.

Award-winning Debi Gliori returns with yet a beautifully illustrated tale of love, loss and bravery, with Dragon Loves Penguin.

Young penguin Bib asks his mum to read his favourite bedtime story, and so she begins to tell the tale of the dragons who settled in the land where the penguins now live.

As the dragons started to produce eggs, one dragon found herself egg-less, until she found a lone egg which she decided to look after. But this, it turns out, was not a dinosaur egg, it was a penguin egg.

The dragon did not mind and gave her little penguin all the love and attention it could ask for. Little penguin was different to the other dragons, but in the end, this turns out to be a good thing.

As Bib's bedtime story draws to a close, we realise that this tale is close to home.

This is a moving tale of adoption and a touching bedtime read for any little one who feels out of place.

9/10

(Review by Sophie Herdman)


Best-sellers for the week ending October 5

Hardbacks

1 Demon Dentist, David Walliams

2 Eat - The Little Book Of Fast Food, Nigel Slater

3 Doctor Sleep, Stephen King

4 An Officer And A Spy, Robert Harris

5 Solo: A James Bond Novel, William Boyd

6 Diamond: Hetty Feather, Jacqueline Wilson

7 One Summer: America 1927, Bill Bryson

8 Guinness Book Of Records

9 The Pagan Lord, Bernard Cornwell

10 Tom Kerridge: Proper Pub Food, Tom Kerridge

(Compiled by Waterstones)


Paperbacks

1 The Little Coffee Book of Kabul, Deborah Rodriguez

2 A Possible Life, Sebastian Faulks

3 Dominion, C.J Sansom

4 The Fault In Our Stars, John Green

5 The Casual Vacancy, J.K Rowling

6 Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn

7 Instructions For A Heatwave, Maggie O'Farrell

8 How to Betray a Dragon's Hero: How to Train Your Dragon, Cressida Cowell

9 Grimm Tales: For Young And Old, Philip Pullman

10 The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out Of The Window And Disappeared, Jonas Jonasson

(Compiled by Waterstones)


Ebooks

1 The Geneva Trap, Stella Rimington The Cry, Helen FitzGerald

2 The Casual Vacancy, J.K.Rowling

3 Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn

4 My Sister's Keeper, Bill Benners

5 The Husband's Secret, Liane Moriarty

6 Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy, Helen Fielding

7 Carter Reed, Tijan

8 The Bad Mother, Isabelle Grey

9 Backlash, Lynda La Plante

10 The Last Letter from Your Lover, Jojo Moyes

(Compiled by the Kindle store at Amazon.co.uk)