Last weekend of the Ilkley Literature Festival still holds some treats in store:
Tom Lott’s 1970s-set novel, The Last Summer of the Water Strider, takes the life of the 17-year-old son of Ray a shoe shop worker, whose coming-of-age is drastically changed by the arrival of his Crazy Uncle Henry. The young man and his peer set off for adventures in his riverboat on the West Country.
Caroline Criado-Perez is a freelance journalist. broadcaster and feminist campaigner. Her first book, Do It Like A Woman looks at the worldwide phenomenon of women reinventing what it means to be female in a misogynistic patriarchal cultural hegemony. She introduces us to ground-breaking women whether it be crossing the Atlantic alone or an Iranian journo who dares to uncover her hair.
Jonathan Dimbleby highlights the importance of The Battle of the Atlantic in WWII when German U-boats threatened to sever the maritime artery between the Allies. He also describes the horror of life on those perilous seas.
C. Beaton reveals some of the secrets of the next Agatha Raisin novel, Dishing the Dirt. It includes the love triangle of therapist Jill Davant, the protagonist and her husband. This escalates to a full blown murder enquiry with Agatha having to prove her innocence, despite a strong motive.
The Festival closes with an intriguing look at cross-period portraits that are the object of Simon Schama’s Face of Britain focusing on the themes of Power, Love, Fame, Self and People, he asks what makes a successful portrait and what this tells us about the individual and collective psyche of the time.