Every Brilliant Thing by Duncan Macmillan

Every Brilliant Thing by Duncan MacmillanYou're six years old. Mum's in hospital. Dad says she's 'done something stupid'. She finds it hard to be happy. So you start to make a list of everything that's brilliant about the world. Everything that's worth living for. 1. Ice Cream 2. Kung Fu Movies 3. Burning Things 4. Laughing so hard you shoot milk out your nose 5. Construction cranes 6. Me You leave it on her pillow. You know she's read it because she's corrected your spelling. Soon, the list

In poem after poem

where her crucial decisions and dissents are still making history

' More messages followed from more refugees

finely textured and achingly beautiful

and baroque stylist' Margaret Atwood

He is good at doing all sorts of paranormal things

RACHEL**'Fleet-footed

she is assumed a slave

and Annie Ernaux's The Years

and complemented by Maria Nilsson's captivating drawings

underappreciated landscape'The Old Ways confirms Macfarlane's reputation as one of the most eloquent and observant of contemporary writers about nature' Scotland on SundayFollowing the tracks

abolitionism and feminism stand shoulder-to-shoulder in fighting a common cause: the end of the carceral state