Saturday, 3 January 2026
Friday, 2 January 2026
The Old Fire by Elisa Shua Dusapin
About the book: Octave says it couldn’t have been easy for Véra, growing up with a sister as brilliant as me.
In the wake of her father’s death, Agathe leaves New York and returns to her childhood home in the French countryside, after fifteen years away. She and her sister Véra have not seen each other in all that time apart.
Now, they must empty their home before it is knocked down. Véra stopped speaking when she was six, and as the pair clean and sift through a lifetime’s worth of belongings, old memories and resentments surface.
Tender, melancholic and evocative, The Old Fire is an exploration of time and memory, of family and belonging, of the unsaid and the unanswered. It is also a graceful and profound exploration of how loss and grief can live alongside life and abundance.
The Old Fire is out on 29 January 2026.
The Old Fire is translated from the French by Aneesa Abbas Higgins.
About the author: Elisa Shua Dusapin was born in France in 1992 to a French father and a South Korean mother and grew up in Paris, Seoul, and Porrentruy, a town in the Swiss canton of Jura. She studied at the Swiss Literature Institute in Biel and presented her debut novel, Hiver à Sokcho [Winter in Sokcho, 2020], in 2016. The jury of the Robert Walser Prize, which she was awarded in 2016, declared the novel "a small masterpiece". The English translation received the prestigious US National Book Award in the Translated Literature category in 2021.
Elisa Shua Dusapin’s second novel, Les Billes du Pachinko [The Pachinko Parlour, 2022], was awarded a Swiss Literature Award in 2019.
Her most recent publication, Vladivostok Circus [2020], like its two predecessors, highlights a unique set of relationships. Le Figaro declared that "each of her words contains a world…The author’s style is as beautiful as the relationships she describes. She remains true to herself and allows cultures and continents to embrace each other in a poetic way. A sublime spectacle".
The author lives near Porrentruy, Switzerland.
About the translator: Aneesa Abbas Higgins is an award-winning translator. She has been translating literary works from French for the past ten years. Before becoming a translator, she taught French for many years. Just six years after publishing her first translation, Aneesa Abbas Higgins won the 2021 National Book Award for Translated Literature for Elisa Shua Dusapin’s Winter in Sokcho. In addition to winning the National Book Award in 2021, her work was named the winner of the Scott Moncrieff Prize (A Girl Called Eel by Ali Zamir) in 2020, and was twice shortlisted for that same award. Her published translations include works by Nina Bouraoui, Tahar Ben Jelloun, François Garde and Vénus Khoury-Ghata. Her translations have also appeared in Words Without Borders and Asymptote. She lives in London.
For a full list of Aneesa Abbas Higgins' translations, please see https://free99656.wordpress.com/
Blank Canvas by Grace Murray
About the book: 2026 is shaping up to be a big year for book releases. Introducing the first book in 2026, an outstanding new voice in literary fiction: a sensual, sharp, and utterly compelling campus novel about grief, reinvention, and the ripple effects of telling lies.
If I ever woke up with an ungodly dread - that I could change it all now, turn around, and confess - I ignored it. I had never been good, and there was no point in trying now.
On a small liberal arts campus in upstate New York, Charlotte begins her final year with a lie. Her father died over the summer, she says. Heart attack. Very sudden.
Charlotte had never been close with her classmates but as she repeats her tale, their expressions soften into kindness. And so she learns there are things worth lying for: attention, affection, and, as she embarks on a relationship with fellow student Katarina, even love. All she needs to do is keep control of the threads that hold her lie - and her life - together.
But six thousand miles away, alone in the grey two-up-two-down Staffordshire terrace she grew up in, her father is very much alive, watching television and drinking beer. Charlotte has always kept difficult truths at arm’s length, but his resolve to visit his distant daughter might just be the one thing she can’t control.
Blank Canvas will be released on 15 January 2026.
About the author: Grace Murray was born in 2003 and grew up in Norwich. She has recently graduated from Edinburgh University, where she read English Literature and found time to write between her studies and two part-time jobs. Her short fiction has been published in The London Magazine.
In writing Blank Canvas, Grace set out to explore themes of Catholic guilt and queer identity, clashing moral codes and lies, and the opportunity for reinvention presented by moving between countries and settings. Blank Canvas was written over the course of a year as part of WriteNow, Penguin Random House’s flagship mentorship scheme for emerging talent. Grace Murray won one of nine places on the scheme on the exceptional strength of her writing, selected from a pool of over 1,300 applicants.
Rating: 4/5
Thursday, 1 January 2026
Sunday, 28 December 2025
Compassion In The Court by Frank Caprio
About the book: Judge Frank Caprio, “the Nicest Judge in the World,” brings to the page the same wisdom and spirit of decency that millions of fans have come to treasure.
In his four-time Emmy-nominated show Caught in Providence, Judge Frank Caprio’s courtroom became a worldwide beacon of compassionate justice - and an unforgettable watch for millions of fans.
From 1985, when he first took the bench, to when he stepped down in 2023, Judge Caprio dispensed true compassion to a continuous flow of regular people in his municipal traffic court in Providence, Rhode Island. His courtroom was a place where defendants were treated with dignity, and where the deserving were given a break - not a pass or get-out-of-jail-free card, but the chance to right their lives and care for their families.
In Compassion in the Court, Judge Caprio shares transformative stories and lessons from his life and courtroom, including:
- Wisdom he gained from his immigrant parents
- Stories shared by individuals of all ages who appeared in court
- How he developed the ability to tell when someone is not telling the truth
- The power of growing up with someone who believed in him - and how he has tried to provide the same for everyone who appeared before him
- How a person’s worth is not measured by the mistakes they make, but by their ability to learn from those mistakes
Judge Caprio’s memories will challenge readers to become somebody - to value their past and their family, to confront their realities, and to believe that, through respect, compassion, and understanding, they can succeed.
Compassion in the Court: Life-Changing Stories from America's Nicest Judge (2025) will touch your heart, uplift your spirit, and renew your faith in others and in yourself.
About the author: Judge Frank Caprio became an unexpected television and internet superstar while in his eighties! Judge Caprio and his three-time Emmy-nominated television show, Caught in Providence, has amassed over 20 million followers across social media, and his videos have accrued billions of views. His compassionate temperament - unique for a judge - has earned him the title “the nicest judge in the world.” A beloved Rhode Island–based judge and attorney, Judge Frank Caprio is from humble beginnings. His parents were immigrants from Italy who through hard work, devotion to family, and love of their new country and community forged a new life in America. Their sense of responsibility and commitment to service and education was firmly instilled in each of their three sons. Today, Judge Caprio has inspired the world and become the face of compassionate justice.
St Vincent Ferrer of the Order of Friar Preachers: His Life, Spiritual Teaching And Practical Devotions by Andrew Pradel
About the book: St Vincent Ferrer of the Order of Friar Preachers: His Life, Spiritual Teaching And Practical Devotions (1863) is another important book written over 100 years ago with information, prayers and devotions of St Vincent Ferrer by the Reverend Father Andrew Pradel of the same order. It is translated from the French by the Reverend Father T A Dixon, Ord Praed.
Padre Candido Amantini: Rome's Exorcist by Antonio Coluccia and Andrea Maniglia
About the booklet: Padre Candido Amantini: Rome's Exorcist (2016) is an English translation of a brief biography of Servant of God Father Candido Amantini, CP, a Passionist priest, exorcist, and beloved spiritual father. He lived from 1914-1992 and received people at the Church of the Scala Santa (Holy Staircase) in Rome, Italy. He was the teacher of Fr Gabriele Amorth. Padre Candido is loved by many people. Every day, at the Scala Santa in Rome, his 'friends' come to pray for his intercession by his tomb. His cause for beatification and canonization has been opened. All proceeds from the sale of this publication go directly to printing and distribution of prayer cards and other materials about Padre Candido Amantini CP. Neither the translators nor the Society of the Holy Face of Jesus benefit financially from the sale of this book.
This text was translated by Dr Anna Pecoraro and Father Francis Piro. It is printed in English by the Society of the Holy Face of Jesus on the anniversary of Padre Candido Amantini's passing into eternal life on 22 September 2016.
Tuesday, 23 December 2025
Saturday, 20 December 2025
Treatise On The Spiritual Life by Saint Vincent Ferrer
About the book: The saintly author begins by detaching the soul from all things and from itself by means of poverty, silence and the practice of self-renunciation. Thus he would have us attain to purity of heart. And this purity leads us to divine union, which is the end of the whole spiritual life. Having established these great principles, he then applies them to the principal actions of Christian and religious life.
Considering these actions one by one, he indicates, together with the interior dispositions which should animate them, some exterior practices aimed at sanctifying them. It is, as it were, a road mapped out for us towards perfection. But along this road dangers are to be encountered; he points them out to us: discouragement will overtake us; he forestalls it by proposing fourteen most efficacious motives for stimulating our generosity in the service of God.
This classic includes the following chapters:
1. On Poverty
2. On Silence
3. On Purity of Heart
4. Perfection Through the Help of a Director
5. On Obedience
6. On Regulating the Body
7. Rules in Regard to Drink
8. Rules to be Observed at Table
9. Persevering in Sobriety and Abstinence
10. Rules of Sleep, Watching, Study, and Choir
11. On Preaching
12. Remedies Against Certain Spiritual Temptations
13. Remedies Against False Revelations
14. Motives to Excite Us to Perfection
15. Elucidation and Application of Motives
16. How to Escape the Devil
17. Dispositions in Regard to Our Neighbour
18. On Perfection
19. Instruction on Various Subjects
Treatise on the Spiritual Life was originally published in 1944.
About the author: Saint Vincent Ferrer, OP, (1350-1419) was a Valencian Dominican friar who gained acclaim as a preacher, missionary and logician.
Wednesday, 17 December 2025
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