Author Archives: drewsmith28

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About drewsmith28

Words, words, words...

Portrait of an Oyster by Andreas Ammer (Greystone)

Posted on September 1, 2025 by drewsmith28

Andreas Ammer might have benefited from reading my own Oyster a Gastronomic history before embarking on his operatic ode to the world’s oldest and most iconic shellfish. He does, I admit, show a masterly, gynaecological, Germanic interest in the sex … Continue reading →

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Seascraper by Benjamin Wood (Penguin/Viking)

Posted on August 29, 2025 by drewsmith28

“Thomas Flett relies upon the ebb tide for a living, but he knows the end is nigh” THE flap quotes the Sunday Times as saying that Benjamin Wood is ‘Britain’s answer to Donna Tart’. Except he writes better and Seascape … Continue reading →

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I Regret Almost Everything by Keith McNally (Simon & Schuster)

Posted on August 2, 2025 by drewsmith28

“In early August 2018, I tried to commit suicide.” IN a pompous review the Guardian suggested this memoir would have benefited from a bit of editing. That would have been a mistake. The beauty here is the raw courage to … Continue reading →

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Broken Shore by Peter Temple (Quercus)

Posted on June 24, 2025 by drewsmith28

“Cashin walked around the hill, into the wind from the sea. It was cold, late autumn…” THIS small town crime drama is so ingrained in the Australian outback that it is a bit of a surprise to discover that Peter … Continue reading →

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Wild Thing by Sue Pridaux (Faber)

Posted on June 4, 2025 by drewsmith28

“Shortly after his first birthday, Paul Gaugin was bundled aboard a ship called The Albert, to sail some 12,000 miles from the French port of Le Havre to Peru.” The Peru link above is not insignificant. This book was sparked … Continue reading →

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An Island of Suspects by Jean-Luc Bannalec (Minotaur)

Posted on June 4, 2025 by drewsmith28

“Commissaire Georges Dupin had made a new friend.” The first few pages dispel any notion that this investigation will just be another cosy crime. It is literature. It is blue. The sea, the sky, the Bretons even have their own … Continue reading →

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A Life in Fifty Books by Anthony Cheetham (Head of Zeus)

Posted on June 4, 2025 by drewsmith28

I am not inclined usually to fall for this kind of congratulatory memoir. But this is Anthony Cheetham, publisher extraordinaire. He has brought many books to market down the years from Frank Herbet’s Dune to Michael Connelly’s Bosch detective series. … Continue reading →

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The Fraud by Zadie Smith

Posted on October 10, 2024 by drewsmith28

The trigger for this exhilarating romp through literary Victoriana was a sale at the auction house of Sotheby’s. A first edition of Charles Dickens’ Christmas Carol sold for a record sum. The inscription was to a Mrs Touchet. Meet Eliza. … Continue reading →

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Death in Pont Aven by Jean-Luc Bannalec

Posted on October 7, 2024 by drewsmith28

THE light first drew artists to the north west of France. Most famously it was Gauguin and his portraits of girls in clogs and costumes, one of many.  Pont Aven, a sleepy one church town on a creek was where … Continue reading →

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Regenesis by George Monbiot (Allen Lane)

Posted on April 6, 2023 by drewsmith28

“It’s a wonderful place for an orchard, but a terrible place for growing fruit.” LIKE all good horror stories we start out slowly, the John Carpenter cruise around the suburban neighbourhood, albeit in this case we are digging in George’s … Continue reading →

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