It’s book review time and Tom is looking towards Henley’s famous Literary Festival, so he’s highlighted a few authors appearing at the festival. A reminder that if you’re keen to turn the pages of one of Tom’s four recommended reads, pop into Bell Bookshop in Bell Street. If they don’t have it in stock they will source it for you. That’s proper independent bookshop service for you.

By Tom Ryan

As readers of Experience Henley know better than most, live events are coming back to the town in a big way, so for this month’s books round-up I wanted to highlight just a few of the hundreds of authors heading to Henley Literary Festival this autumn.

Having appeared at the festival previously with both his adult and YA fiction, Nikesh Shukla returns on October 2 joining Candice Brathwaite and Leah Boleto. This time the Good Immigrant editor will be discussing Brown Baby, which for me is undoubtedly one of the best books of 2021. Addressed to his daughters, this beautifully told memoir explores his journey as both parent and child and takes on huge subjects including body image, identity and feminism in a compelling and honest manner (chapter titles ‘How can we talk about personal and civic responsibility and still be joyful and boundless’ and ‘How do I talk to you about my mum, especially when I need my mum?’ give you a sense of how brilliantly he pulls off these challenges). 

National Poetry Day once again coincides with the festival and this year (October 7) Brian Bilston makes a rare appearance at the Baillie Gifford Marquee at Phyllis Court, equivalent to having Santa Claus pop round yours for Christmas Day lunch! Twitter’s unofficial poet laureate, Brian shifts seamlessly from the moving and thought-provoking to the laugh-out-loud hilarious, often within the same poems (“There’s a supermarket where once the library had been/I’ve been reading the Dahl in ‘Indian cuisine’/No golden tickets, giants, or witches, of course/just chickpeas and lentils in a creamy spiced sauce”), in his latest collection Alexa, what is there to know about love? From pasta and penguins to Google and geopolitics this terrific writer covers a lot of ground in a short, special book. As well as sharing some readings he will be in conversation with Insatiable author Daisy Buchanan. 

Poetry also plays a part in The Rapping Princess, published this month for younger readers. After the success of My Hairwriter Hannah Lee and illustrator Allen Fatimaharan are back with a rhyming picture book about daring to be different (“Being a princess is a tough job for someone so small/It’s even harder when you have a problem you can’t solve at all/You see, every princess in the kingdom could sing/Yet Shiloh’s voice could do no such thing”). A fresh and funny fairytale with fantastic drawings on every page, this was a real treat and the award-winning duo journey to Henley Town Hall on 2 October. 

Inspired by her hit podcast, Alonement sees journalist Francesca Specter take on an issue which affects us all – that of spending time alone, whether that is all too rare, a part of daily life or somewhere in between  – and, with her specific and open-minded approach, has produced an extremely engaging book, mixing memoir, research and advice. She’ll be joining fellow podcasters Alex Holmes and Clemmie Telford on 3 October.

If you are interested in reading any of these books, please do ask at a local bookshop if they stock it before purchasing online – Support Local

In between reading books and being an uncle to six, Tom Ryan works in events and communications with – amongst others – Henley Literary Festival, Jewish Book Week, Reading Fringe Festival and Henley Santa’s Grotto. He is on Instagram as @henleyonthomas and Twitter as @atomryan.