Books

March is a great month for book lovers (Image: Fotografía de eLuVe via Getty Images) This article contains affiliate links, we will receive a commission on any sales we generate from it. Learn more Between suggestions from friends, relatives and colleagues and the countless reviews accessible on TikTok, Instagram and Goodreads, deciding what to read next can prove more challenging than it appears. However, if you're seeking something new, you're lucky, as March brims with thrilling fresh releases from cherished authors including Tayari Jones and Liz Tomforde, alongside numerous highly-anticipated debuts.From fantasy and romance to literary fiction and thrillers, here are some of the best books coming out this month. For more book recommendations, reviews and news, you can subscribe to o...

Traitors star Harriet Tyce photographed exclusively for the Express (Image: Jonathan Buckmaster / Daily Express)She set the “cat amongst the pigeons” in an explosive Traitors showdown that became one of the most watched TV moments of the year, before daring fellow contestants to vote her off Claudia Winkleman’s hit gameshow – which they duly did. Now she’s publishing her devilishly twisty new courtroom drama, which taps into themes of falsehood, deception and, most fittingly, the perils of sitting in judgement upon others.But criminal defence barrister turned bestselling author turned standout Traitors star Harriet Tyce creases up at suggestions she planned it all. In fact, she insists, it’s been a “bonkers” series of happy accidents coupled with her growing confidence as a writer havin...

The violent protests in Tehran, Iran, last month almost overtook David's McCloskey's new book, The Persian (Image: Middle East Images /AFP via Getty)Former CIA analyst turned bestselling spy writer David McCloskey is either cursed or blessed to live in interesting times. Arriving in London this month to promote his gripping new novel, The Persian, featuring the “shadow war” between Israel and Iran, there was a moment when it looked like the latter’s brutal theocratic government might be on the verge of collapse following severe anti-regime demonstrations.Such real-world intrusions into fiction are nothing new for the 40-year-old writer and podcast host whose second novel, 2023’s Moscow X, featuring a deep-cover plot to destabilise the Kremlin, was almost upended firstly by the Ukraine i...

Your Kindle reading experience could be seriously enhanced (Stock Image) (Image: Getty)If you’re a Kindle reader, you may want to listen up. A woman has shared that you may not be getting the full experience from your e-reader, so there may be some settings that you want to change.Liv Charette demanded: “If you’ve recently got a Kindle, I’m going to need you to change these three settings immediately."There are so many different ways that you can enhance your reading experience on a Kindle, but she wanted to focus on these three first. They are:1. Turn the clock onLiv said: “First, turn on the clock. I don’t know about you, but I like to know what time it is. For some reason, Kindles always come with the clock off."If you’d rather just not know what time it is, and just get totally lost...

For edge of your seat excitement, look no further. Our critics reveal four of the best new books this spring

House of the Dragon is set 200 years before Game of Thrones and A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms 100 years prior to the War of the Five Kings.Now, a third prequel has been announced by A Song of Ice and Fire writer George RR Martin, but this one won’t be on TV.Set just a decade before Game of Thrones, The Mad King is the first official stage production set in Westeros.Adapted by Duncan MacMillan, the new play covers the Great Tourney at Harrenhal that led to Robert Baratheon’s Rebellion, when King Aerys II Targaryen was slaughtered and deposed, ending his family’s 300 year reign on the Iron Throne.The pivotal event features Jon Snow’s parents Prince Rhaegar Targaryen and Lynn Stark, plus Eddard Stark, who is executed early on in Game of Thrones.Reacting to the news on his blog, Martin wro...

The Housemaid is finally available to stream on Amazon Prime via a purchase option after hitting the big screen in December, and fans are thrilled. The hit thriller was originally written in 2019, but wasn't published until 2022 after pushbacks that it was "too dark". It ultimately became the start of something huge for author Freida McFadden when it became a best-seller, prompting multiple sequels and a lot of additional thrillers after that. Speaking as someone who has read quite a lot of Freida's thrillers now, I feel like I can weigh in on what I think some of her best books are, some that are perhaps even better than The Housemaid. Granted, I loved the second in the book series, but I'm going to make some suggestions completely separate to the series, but it goes without saying tha...

Dominic Sandbrook and Tabby Syrett, his co-presenter on the new podcast Book Club (Image: Courtesy Goalhanger Productions)Described by a recent interviewer as “middle-aged, balding and bespectacled… a picture of ordinariness”, Dominic Sandbrook makes an unlikely superstar. But if there was a Top of the Pops for podcasters, the 51-year-old would be a fixture. Having made his name in a series of well-received post-war histories of Britain with a side-line in perceptive newspaper columns, five years ago he pivoted to the spoken word – launching The Rest is History podcast with fellow archive diver Tom Holland. And the rest, as they say, really is history.From the Fall of the Aztecs and History’s Greatest Monkeys, to Jack the Ripper and General George Custer – of whom a single episode spawn...

Our great island nation has led way in everything from the Industrial Revolution to the Suffragettes (Image: Getty)Are we about to see yet another shift in the ever-changing relationship between the nations that make up Britain and Ireland? These isles – encompassing England, Scotland, the Irish Republic, Northern Ireland and Wales, along with the Isle of Man and bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey – have been a work in progress since the first humans set foot on them at least 900,000 years ago.Their history has been a kaleidoscope of overlapping and conflicting identities, as I write about in my new book, These Isles: A People’s History of England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales. There is little agreement even on what they are called. A common term is the British Isles, though that is widel...

Kathleen Harriman, with father Averell, were in London at height of the Blitz (Image: Getty)Kathleen Harriman jumped at the chance to accompany her father on his wartime mission to London. A wealthy American tycoon, Averell Harriman was US president Franklin Roosevelt’s special envoy to Britain.“Ave” arrived in March 1941 and 23-year-old Kathy a couple of months later. Averell’s job was to expedite the supply of American aid to embattled Britain – material vital to the country’s survival against a Nazi war machine that had already defeated France and conquered continental Europe.Kathy acted as Ave’s hostess, but her day job was as war correspondent for the US-based International News Service. Her father’s political connections gave her an easy entrée to elite social, political and milit...