Editor's Choice, The BooksellerA mix of memoir and narrative non-fiction, White Spines is a book about Nicholas Royle's passion for Picador's fiction and non-fiction publishing from the 1970s to the end of the 1990s. It explores the bookshops and charity shops, the books themselves, and the way a unique collection grew and became a literary obsession. Above all a love song to books, writers and writing.

Season Highlight, Spring/Summer 2026 — The BooksellerFinders, Keepers tells the stories that hide between the lines of the second-hand books that fill the shelves of charity shops and second-hand bookshops up and down the country. The author collects books. He collects books that contain bookmarks in the form of maps – he will read the book while walking the streets depicted on the map, provided he doesn't have to get on a plane to get there. He collects books give...

La normalità nasconde sempre qualcosa di inaspettato. Nelle pieghe del quotidiano si celano briciole di inquietudine, di più o meno velata morbosità, di più o meno evidente disturbo. Difficile notarle, a meno che non ci si soffermi a osservarle. In questi quindici racconti, sullo sfondo di una Londra legata spesso all'arte, alla letteratura, al cinema, si dipanano le storie di personaggi al confine tra luce e ombra, tra l'ordinario e lo straordinario, tra il reale e il surreale; personaggi...

'Shadow Lines very much celebrates the world of books' —TelegraphNicholas Royle's love of second-hand books and the 'inclusions' he finds inside them, their presence betrayed by 'shadow lines', is about making connections. Someone has scribbled a number in a book? He'll text or call. An old address? He'll return the book to where it used to live. Follow him as he walks between bookshops, reading as he goes, on the hunt for treasure, for ways to make us feel...

Facing the disarray and disorientation around his father's death, a man contends with the strange and haunting power of the house his parents once lived in.He sets about the mundane yet exhausting process of sorting through the remnants of his father's life -- clearing away years of accumulated objects, unearthing forgotten memories and the haunted realms of everyday life. At the same time, he embarks on an eccentric side-project. And as he grows increasingly obsessed with this new project...

'A tender and graceful study of parents and children, and a finely judged and measured attempt to capture the flitting, quicksilver shapes of what we keep and what we lose: the touch, the tone, the gaze of the past as it fades. It is a moving and beautifully achieved memoir, and a testament to the writer's skill and generosity of spirit.' —Hilary MantelBefore the devastating 'loss of her marbles', Mrs Royle, a nurse by profession, is a marvellously no-nonsense char...

Silas and Ethel Woodlock retire to spend their twilight years by the sea, only to find themselves traumatised by herring gulls. London journalist Stephen Osmer writes a provocative essay about two people called Nicholas Royle, one a novelist, the other a literary critic. Whether Royle, the literary critic, is having an affair with the beautiful Lily Lynch, and has stolen and published Silas Woodlock's short story, 'Gulls', becomes a race to the death for at least one of the authors. Playfu...

Paul Kinder, a novelist with one forgotten book to his name, teaches creative writing in a university in the north-west of England.Either he's researching his second, breakthrough novel, or he's killing time having sex in cars.Either eternal life exists, or it doesn't.Either you'll laugh, or you'll cry.Or maybe both.

The Reunion" is based on actual events," reveals the author, "but the story only really came into focus for me when I was invited to contribute to Ellen Datlow's Poe anthology. Poe is brilliant. I was at a conference recently where a teacher revealed that she had read Poe's 'The Black Cat' to a lecture theatre full of schoolchildren. She switched off all the lights and used a torch to read by. A number of parents lodged complaints, which she took as a measure of the event's succes...

In this one-of-a-kind book, novelist and academic Nicholas Royle brings together two remarkably different creative figures: Enid Blyton and David Bowie. His exploration of their lives and work delves deeply into questions about the value of art, music and literature, as well as the role of universities in society.Blending elements of memoir and cultural commentary, Royle creates a tender and often hilarious portrait of family life during the pandemic, weaving it together with musin...

Shakespeare's legacy is all around us - in our books and our films, in our politics and in our everyday speech. With his words he has formed our world, and his influence has been greater than that of any other writer. So what makes Shakespeare's plays so powerful? Taking a single word from each of the seven most influential plays, Nicholas Royle opens up the delights and complexities of Shakespeare's language for the reader, teaching us to discover his work anew.

There are few figures more important in literary and critical theory than Jacques Derrida. Whether lauded or condemned, his writing has had far-reaching ramifications, and his work on deconstruction cannot be ignored. This volume introduces students of literature and cultural studies to Derrida's enormously influential texts, covering such topics as:*deconstruction, text and difference*literature and freedom*law, justice and the 'democracy to come'*drugs, secret...