Books

Jeremy Black recommends three history books that have been neglected by literary reviewers

In his coverage of Northern Ireland in this memoir, Kevin Myers was unflinchingly critical of British ineptitude

Frederic Raphael reveals how Paul Cartledge makes the case for a central historical role for Oedipus’s home town

In the West we’ve yet to make the acknowledgment that overwork can be deadly, says Katrina Gulliver

There is a lesson here for those who prefer to sharpen their knives on the whetstone of grievance

The relationship between J.M. Barrie and the real life Peter Pan was fatherly, friendly and perhaps something else

Andrew Roberts says that in these diaries, Channon takes snobbery to a truly pathological level

Lisa Hilton asks whether Twitter mobs should be able to police the imagination of novelists and playwrights

Christopher Bray thinks Roth’s “novelist’s autobiography” is one of his most fizzing examinations of the stories that construct our various selves

Christopher Silvester reveals how this biography of Robert Maxwell is a skilfully constructed page-turner