Andrea Dworkin’s dispatches from the sex wars
In her 1981 treatise, Dworkin called porn “the orchestrated destruction of women’s bodies and souls”. Forty years later, has sex-positive…
ByBook reviews
Read all the latest book reviews from the New Statesman and discover the best novels, non-fiction, essays and biographies. If you’re looking for something more specific, explore our sections dedicated to politics books and history books.
Britain’s small boats obsession
Overcrowded dinghies used for desperate, dangerous crossings have become totemic in our toxic immigration conversation.
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Solvej Balle’s day without end
In this Danish novel, a woman stuck in a repeating time loop is forced to consider the very fundamentals of…
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How the world stopped Hitler
The Second World War was not just won on the battlefield, but in seemingly marginal regions from Ireland to Iraq.
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The sounds that shape us
Alice Vincent’s Hark asks why gender, age and parenthood change the way we listen.
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The road that built England
The country’s elusive identity resides not in a National Trust garden, but on the thundering dual carriageway of the A1.
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Who are the white working class?
A deeply reported survey of a much-mythologised slice of Britain reveals a heterogeneous, complex demographic.
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From Omar El Akkad to Laura Spinney: new books reviewed in short
Also featuring Open, Heaven by Seán Hewitt and Mythica by Emily Hauser.
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Joan Didion without her style
The writer’s posthumous therapy journal is raw and unvarnished – the most direct book she never wrote.
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Joe Dunthorne’s lessons in chemistry
The novelist thought his great-grandfather’s memoir would be a story to be proud of. He found something else.
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Fear and loathing in Liverpool
Why a “left-wing city” can still host a race riot.
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The best books of 2025 so far
From urgent new fiction to the inside story of Keir Starmer’s Labour, the New Statesman picks the season’s essential reading.
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Samuel Beckett’s art of reduction
In The Unnamable, the writer’s prose was stripped to the bone – and the bone itself boiled white.
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The best children’s books for Easter
From hidden jewels to good eggs, children will be delighted by these funny, moving stories.
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Katie Kitamura’s study of social dynamics
The novelist coolly examines how we interact with each other in a deeply unsettling story of reversals and doubles.
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Jensen Huang: the man who powers AI
The entrepreneur’s microchip company Nvidia has fuelled a tech revolution, but his success is built on failure and suffering.
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Inside the ugly world of Facebook
In Careless People, former employee Sarah Wynn-Williams reveals the callousness at the heart of the company.
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The dark side of the Moomins
Tove Jansson’s beloved stories, which turn 80 this year, are not cute: they are angry tales of apocalypse and breakdown.
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Capitalism (Taylor’s Version)
Swift is a self-made billionaire and the most profitable live musician in history. What can her ascendance teach us?
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The glory and grime of boxing
In The Last Bell: Life, Death and Boxing, Donald McRae deftly captures the sport’s ugliness and exhilaration.
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