PAUL DONOVAN is chilled by the contemporary resonance of Harper Lee’s coming of age tale amidst racism and white supremacy in this excellent production
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History made real in vivid portrait of girl breaking chains of working-class exploitation
GEOFF BOTTOMS recommends the unashamedly light-hearted escapism on offer in this stage version of the 1963 film
Full of mysterious religious references and radical sound design, the Scottish duo’s new offering is candidate for album of the year, suggests SIMON DUFF
MARY CONWAY revels in a powerful reminder that human lives are not defined by physical perfection
PAUL DONOVAN recommends the fine performances in this account of the pre-war meeting between the US president and the British king
TECLYN AROD relishes an intimate celebration of jazz improvisation that mixes local and national musicians
Martha’s Story: The Girl Who Broke Her Chains by Tony Barnsley (Grosvenor House, £6.99)
ON HER 11th birthday Martha Wood receives paper and pens as a present and, from that moment on, keeps a diary about her life as the daughter of a chain-making family at the beginning of the 20th century.
Author Tony Barnsley has chosen this fictional diary form to provide us with a vivid picture of life in a working-class household in the Black Country at the time. It was an area renowned for its metal-working factories and notorious for the way families were exploited by the chain-making companies. Often most of them, including wives and daughters, would be involved in the back-breaking work of chain-making in their own homes and backyards for appallingly low wages.
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