After vanquishing Voldemort, JK Rowling takes on a new dark and dangerous force - the parish council of Pagford. Rebecca Rouillard reviews The Casual Vacancy.

Fiona Melrose offers her thoughts on the latest novel from Andre Brink, the challenging yet beautiful Philida.

Katherine Vik reviews Tan Twan Eng's Booker shortlisted novel The Garden of Evening Mists.

Book review of The Guard, by Flemish Writer Peter Terrin, which, having originally been published in 2009, won the 2010 European Literary Prize. It is the first of Terrin's books to be translated into English.

"All I can do is turn a phrase until it catches the light," writes Clive James in the epilogue to May Week Was In June. Kate McLoughlin explains why the book means so much to her in a new series of Staff Picks.

Alan Baban reviews Junot Diaz's latest book This is how you lose her.

Amy Bird explores secret worlds in Jonathan Lee's Joy and Kitty Aldridge's A Trick I Learned from Dead Men.

'First, I’ll tell about the robbery our parents committed. Then about the murders, which happened later'... Fiona Melrose reviews Richard Ford's Canada.