Where to start with: Muriel Spark From an extraordinary debut inspired by a real-life breakdown to a creepy masterpiece, here’s a guide to the Scottish novelist’s works

@drjamesbailey.bsky.social 📚
www.theguardian.com/books/2026/a...

What I Learned From Making a Documentary About My Grandmother Beryl Bainbridge There was a story in our family growing up that every one of our relatives had died at the age of 71. Like many of the stories that my grandmother, the acclaimed British novelist Dame Beryl Bainbri…

What making a documentary about his grandmother, Beryl Bainbridge, taught Charlie Russell.

‘There is one story we never tell’: will old family photos bring joy to my ailing mother – or remind us of dark secrets? As Alzheimer’s tightens its grip, we have started making our way through the hundreds of albums in my childhood home. But some are too painful to revisit

Beautifully written piece by @stephenkelman.bsky.social
www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...

The Emmett Till Interpretive Center has purchased and protected the barn near Drew, MS, where Emmett Till was brutally beaten and murdered. It will be preserved not merely as a structure, but as sacred ground. Read our open letter here: www.emmett-till.org/barn

Legal challenge to Palestine Action ban can go ahead, court rules Judges reject Home Office attempt to block judicial review of group’s proscription under Terrorism Act

Starts November 25th @gardencourtlaw.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

The Covid Inquiry finds that if Boris Johnson had called the first lockdown even one week earlier then it could have saved at least 20,000 lives.

Here's a quick reminder of what Johnson was actually doing during those weeks

Did you read his latest contribution to today’s Times? He should stick to ping pong 🏓

Commemorating the Battle of Cable Street on October 4th 1936, when the people of London’s East End stood against Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists. And remembering why we should all be Antifa.

Classics with added Yorkshire class: tributes to Tony Harrison Harrison’s poetry and plays made an electrifying connection with readers and audiences through his use of Leeds dialect, and his ear for rhyme. Writers remember his greatness

www.theguardian.com/books/2025/s...

Sounds like one of those posh international schools, or the French Lycée in Kentish Town 🤷🏻‍♀️

Still true:
*Britain is a success story
*Most of its cities are doing astonishingly well
*Multiculturalism is popular
*Mass immigration has not led to social disintegration
*Nostalgia is increasingly weird
*Britain is incredibly safe
*Levels of social cohesion are high
Don't let them gaslight you.

Alan Parker’s 1989 film Mississippi Burning was my introduction to this terrible, terrible story.

Not only that, Boris stuck him in the House of Lords 😠

A Group of Poor Clares (Claire’s?) from the Siena exhibition at the @nationalgallery — a fresco fragment by Ambrogio Lorenzetti, painted around 1340. Discovered under whitewash in 1855.

Grouped by subject (ie. fiction, art, poetry, biography, etc) & then by author (but not alphabetical)📚

Ah, the perils of #NextDoor 😬

I just heard & then saw my first one (north London) this morning!! Hooray! 🙌🏼

I love the sound of this course! Great literature sources too 📚

He never fails to remind us what a failure at business he was … 14 bankruptcies? 🤨

On Monday our instagram account was hacked and then deleted. We received a ransom note to recover it; obviously we couldn't and wouldn't pay, and therefore lost thousands of followers. Meta support was useless. But we're BACK with a new account: @littletollerbooks. Can you follow us there and share?

Blimey 😳

No, no sheds 😕 but will keep my eye out.

I know this cat! She sometimes comes in my garden — & left one of those colours behind!! I’ll look out for her

We should really ask Canada if they'll let us be their 11th province.

Bizarre, given his heart failure & dementia.

Blimey! Who said that??

Sounds exactly like the economic leadership of a man with six bankruptcies to his name 🫠

✍🏻📚✍🏻📚✍🏻
Writers’ retreat
May 24th - 31st 2025
Time to actually WRITE plus
optional workshops, one-to-one support, peaceful surroundings, great food & company — a week of creative focus & inspiration in the beautiful Alpujarra region of southern Spain.
www.writersretreats.org

Musk says DOGE ‘restored’ Ebola prevention effort. Officials say that’s not true. USAID’s initiatives to fight Ebola and other diseases have been gutted, current and former agency officials said.

Every news outlet reporting Elon Musk's comment about accidentally canceling Ebola prevention efforts and quickly restoring them should also say they haven't been restored, they're still canceled, the outbreak-fighting teams are dismantled, the money is gone

www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

😕