Out with the old: is neoliberalism really dying?
Despite our age of economic crisis, populism and pandemic, we may be living in the ruins of the neoliberal order…
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.
Bob Stanley’s pre-history of pop breathes life into a lost musical era
In Let’s Do It, the musician and journalist reveals how ragtime, jazz, blues and swing still shape today’s popular culture.
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Reviewed in Short: New books from Ramon Pacheco Pardo, Preti Taneja, Leo Damrosch and Hanna Bervoets
Shrimp to Whale by Pacheco Pardo, Aftermath by Taneja, Adventurer by Damrosch and We Had To Remove This Post by…
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Ottessa Moshfegh and the tedium of depravity
The American author’s new novel of medieval brutality aims for the Marquis de Sade but ends up closer to Shrek.
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What Antony Beevor gets wrong about Russia
The historian’s new book Russia: Revolution and Civil War 1917-1921 fails to understand that brutality is powered by ideas.
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Reviewed in Short: New books by Rupal Patel and Jack Meaning, Melvyn Bragg, Laura Bates and Paddy Crewe
Can’t We Just Print More Money? by Patel and Meaning, Back in the Day by Bragg, Fix the System, Not…
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The secret world of Mick Herron
How the author of Slow Horses and Bad Actors became the foremost living spy novelist in the English language.
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Reflections of the elusive Jean Rhys
The novelist wrote four dark, slyly autobiographical novels – then vanished for 25 years. A new biography hopes to separate…
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Desperate Remedies: A new work charts the cruel and often gruesome history of mental health treatments
The sociologist Andrew Scull acknowledges that contemporary psychiatry is more rigorous – but is it more effective?
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Reviewed in short: New books from Robert Samuels and Toluse Olorunnipa, Hannah White, Viola Davis and JL Heilbron
His Name is George Floyd by Samuels and Olorunnipa, Held in Contempt by White, Finding Me by Davis and The…
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How nostalgia fuels the culture wars
In her new book Rule, Nostalgia, Hannah Rose Woods explores how illusory and contested golden ages have haunted Britain since…
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From bullied to billionaire – the inevitable triumph of Elon Musk
In a new biography, the Tesla and SpaceX CEO is portrayed as a troubled visionary who views success as a…
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How “dead-end work” reinforces the gender pay gap
Linda Babcock and Laurie Weingart, authors of The No Club, reflect on why women are often given “non-promotable tasks”.
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Zero: Jeremy Hunt’s book on the NHS is well intentioned – but misses 90 per cent of the story
Candid on short-staffing and underfunding, ministerial memoir Zero omits the healthcare that happens in the community.
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Jarvis Cocker’s book Good Pop, Bad Pop reveals the sentimental side he hid in the Nineties
Taking us through the contents of his attic, the Pulp frontman shows there was always more to him than ironic…
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Reviewed in Short: New titles from Kris Manjapra, Karolina Ramqvist and Emilie Pine
Black Ghost of Empire by Manjapra, Bear Woman by Ramqvist, Deep Deception by Alison, Belinda, Helen Steel, Lisa and Naomi,…
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The myth of the white male scientific genius – and why its time is up
Darwin and Newton acknowledged their debt to other cultures. Why don’t we?
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Who is to blame for 30 years of climate change inertia?
Two new books trace the history of global inaction over the climate emergency, and seek to identify the culprits.
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The joyless rise of Anna Wintour
Amy Odell’s new account of the iron-fisted Vogue editor’s ascent struggles to find the human being behind the shades.
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The two genres of Trump book
A memoir by Kellyanne Conway is the latest in a now-established trend. What are we doing with all these revelations?
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