ANGUS REID, ANDY HEDGECOCK and MARIA DUARTE review On The Sea, A Useful Ghost, Brunello: The Gracious Visionary, and Pinocchio Unstrung
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Bach to the future
PAUL SIMON recommends a novel with subtle variations on the impact of the Holocaust, then and now
RON JACOBS enjoys a great tale, told by a US communist, of the lives of working-class New Yorkers
BRENT CUTLER searches a new history of contemporary Iran for an understanding of the Islamic Republic, finding both interesting detail and glaring omissions
MARIA DUARTE recommends the true story of the remarkable woman who sued Donald Trump for sexual assault not once, but twice
KENNY MacASKILL is disappointed by a polemical, rather than factual, account of the Lone Star State and its political path since the civil war
PAUL DONOVAN is fascinated by the lives of Charles and Mary Bagot, and the insight this biography shines on the morals of pre-Victorian society
GORDON PARSONS appreciates fine performances and a feel for ambiguity, but misses the music of the dialogue
J SS Bach
by Martin Goodman
(Wrecking Ball Press, £14)
J SS Bach starts tragically and, seemingly, tangentially.
It is 1962 and Katja Birchendorf rescues her pregnant daughter Uwe from her squalid flat in Sydney. But Uwe has a death wish, having discovered earlier that her late father Dieter was the adjutant at a concentration camp and is so physically weak that she dies giving birth to daughter Rosa.
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