Hunger and Thirst: My New Novel Coming in February 2026

February 14, 2025February 17, 2025 / Claire Fuller / 10 Comments

Delighted, excited and terrified… My sixth novel, Hunger and Thirst will be published by Fig Tree (Penguin) in February 2026 in the UK and Commonwealth, Tin House in the US, and Bond Street Books (Doubleday) in Canada.

“Ursula, a renowned, reclusive sculptor find the past she has been running from catching up with her when a documentary-maker begins to dig into the unsolved disappearance of someone Ursula knew back in the 1980s. Set in and around a local art school and steeped in the atmosphere of the horror films Ursula watches, it’s a compelling and chilling story of loneliness and possession, of the dangerous line between wanting and needing and of how far a person will go to belong.”

It’s been great fun rewatching all my favourite horror films from the 1970s and 80s, and drawing on my memories from that time, when I was an art student studying sculpture and living in what was essentially a squat. Ghost stories and horror novels were the first books I read as a teenager, and it’s been interesting (and difficult) to see whether I can write something a little bit scary.

Hidden Gem Book Recommendations for Avid Readers

February 10, 2025February 3, 2025 / Claire Fuller / 1 Comment

Read This: Books under the Radar is a weekly post written by a guest author – often a friend of mine, someone I’ve met on my writerly travels, or an author I admire – who recommends three books they think deserve more recognition. If you’re interested in buying any of the books, please click on the covers and give these hidden gems some love. You can see the full list of books which have been selected, as well as the author’s latest book on Bookshop.org, where you can have a browse and buy any that take your fancy. Happy reading!

Read This: Tamsin Hope Thomson

Read This: Books Under the Radar will be coming to an end in a couple of months, and I had every Monday scheduled with a different author apart from one slot, so I asked my newsletter subscribers whether any of them would like to be a guest and I would pick a name out of a hat, and Tamsin Hope Thomson won. (Sign up here, if you’re interested.) And weirdly two of her choices would absolutely be contenders for my own list, which means we must have very similar tastes and I must read her third recommendation. Here’s what she has to say about herself:

Tamsin Hope Thomson is a gardening writer and editor and has written on all kinds of topics from Snowdrop societies to Mary Berry’s veg patch. She grew up in Scotland and now lives in Sussex with her husband and two children. Tamsin is currently editing her first novel, very slowly, and has started a substack for book recommendations.

You can find her on: https://tamsinht.substack.com/

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Essential Reads: 3 Must-Read Underrated Books selected by Chloe Lane

February 3, 2025January 20, 2025 / Claire Fuller / 5 Comments

Read This: Chloe Lane

I read Chloe’s debut novel The Swimmers back in 2022, and it made my and my husband’s top books of the year. I also loved her second novel, Arms and Legs, and I’m really looking forward to what she writes next. Here’s what she has to say about herself:

Chloe Lane earned her MFA in fiction at the University of Florida. She is also a graduate of the International Institute of Modern Letters at Victoria University of Wellington and the founding editor of Hue+Cry Press. Her first novel, The Swimmers, was longlisted for the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction at the NZ Book Awards. Her second novel, Arms & Legs, is out now. She lives and teaches in Gainesville, Florida.

You can find her on:
Instagram @cv_lane

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Top 3 Overlooked Novels to Discover Today

January 27, 2025January 10, 2025 / Claire Fuller / 1 Comment

Read This: Books under the Radar is a weekly post, usually written by a guest author – often a friend of mine, someone I’ve met on my writerly travels, or an author I admire – who recommends three books they think deserve more recognition. But for a second time I’m inviting on a favourite book blogger of mine – someone whose taste in books I appreciate and follow: Sally Hughes, aka @salboreads on Instagram. If you’re interested in buying any of the books featured, please click on the covers and give these hidden gems some love. You can see the full list of books which have been selected on Bookshop.org, where you can have a browse and buy any that take your fancy. Happy reading!

Read This: Sally Hughes

Sally and I have never met in real life but we’ve followed each other for a while on Instagram and I always love her recommendations. Perhaps one day we’ll get to exchange book recommendations over a coffee. Here’s what she has to say about herself:

I am a librarian and teacher, currently volunteering at my local public library. I run the Children’s Classics Club on Instagram which is a virtual group celebrating the joy of children’s fiction. I have been book blogging as Salboreads for about 4 years. I read many genres from classics to thrillers. I have introduced two hashtags to bookstagram – Mindful Monday and Children’s Book Sunday. I have a beautiful, but crazy flat-coated retriever called Pippin who is well known by my followers and takes up the time when I am not reading! I have selected three books which I have absolutely loved and which also reflect something of the nature of my reading.

www.instagram.com/salboreads

Read on to find out which three books Sally recommends.

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Discover Underrated Books by Carole Burns

January 20, 2025January 8, 2025 / Claire Fuller / 2 Comments

Read This: Carole Burns

Carole was Head of Creative Writing on the MA I did, way back in 2011. She was only there a year before she left, but I remember being inspired and in awe – here was a real-life published author, telling me how it was done. Since then we’ve stayed in touch, she’s even come to my writing group on a couple of occasions and it’s always wonderful to get a sneak preview of what she’s writing. Here’s what she has to say about herself:

Carole Burns is an award-winning American writer and journalist living in the U.K. The Same Country, her debut novel, named by Wales Arts Review as one of the Best Welsh Fiction Books of 2023, was described by the writer Gish Jen as “unearthing long-buried truths that remain the truths of America.” A freelancer for the Washington Post and LitHub, Burns was the winner of Ploughshares’ Zacharis Award for The Missing Woman and Other Stories. Her book, Off the Page: Writers Talk About Beginnings, Endings, and Everything in Between, features interviews with forty-three writers including Jhumpa Lahiri and Colm Tóibín. She is Associate Professor at the University of Southampton and lives in Cardiff.

Find her at:
http://www.caroleburns.com
Instagram @writercaroleburns
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/carole.burns.73

Read on to find out which three books Carole recommends.

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Ten Years of a Photo a Day

January 18, 2025January 17, 2025 / Claire Fuller / 9 Comments

At the end of 2024, my husband, Tim and I had taken a photo every day for the previous ten years. Every day we take at least one picture – if we take more than one, we decide on the most interesting – and upload it to my computer. Throughout the year, Tim lays each picture out into a book format via Blurb, and at the end of the year we get a single book printed. 365 pictures per year; ten books. Here are two pages from each of the ten books.

Ten years of friends and family, kids growing up and leaving home, holidays, chores, dinners, and work, parties, book events, Alan the cat, literary heroes, and my hair going from red to grey. What Tim and I have learnt that is no matter how beautiful the sunset or the field of flowers, it is people we want to look back at – those who are still around, and those who have gone.

These ten years also include moving house and the pandemic. They include an online book launch for my fourth novel, Unsettled Ground, since all bookshops and public spaces were closed. Ironically, this is one of my favourite pictures from all ten books. At the end of the launch we asked everyone to turn on their cameras, and we got an image: all those lovely faces from right across the world, celebrating with us.

Thanks to all our friends and family (and sometimes strangers) for being so tolerant to us saying, ‘Time for a photo of the day!’ Here’s to another ten years.

Three Must-Read Books by Cherie Jones

January 13, 2025January 20, 2025 / Claire Fuller / 4 Comments

Read This: Cherie Jones

I read Cherie’s debut when it was shortlisted for the Women’s Prize, and we met at the event in London when my novel, Unsettled Ground was also shortlisted, and when the winner was announced – which wasn’t either of our books. I loved How The One-Armed Sister Sweeps her House – it gave me such a different perspective on Barbados. Here’s what she has to say about herself:

Cherie Jones is a Barbadian author whose first novel ‘How the One-Armed Sister Sweeps Her House’ was shortlisted for the Women’s Prize and translated into French and German. Cherie is working on her second novel.

You can find her on:
Instagram @cheriejoneswrites and Facebook @cheriejoneswrites

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Creative Collaborations: Flash Fiction Inspired by Burnham

January 9, 2025January 9, 2025 / Claire Fuller / 6 Comments

Last year I was delighted to be invited by Buckinghamshire Culture to get involved in their Village Stories project. As well as commissioning a photographer and a choreographer to take photographs of the people from three Buckinghamshire villages, three writers were asked to work with the villagers on writing projects. I was given the village of Burnham, near Slough, and during a week in September 2024, I delivered three flash fiction workshops to community groups, and one open session in Burnham Library.

I took photographs of the village and handed these out as inspiration for the pieces of writing that were created by Slough Writers (a group which meets in Burnham), Men in Sheds, Burnham Grammar, and the library session. And I was amazed and delighted by the pieces which were produced.

In addition, I was commissioned to write two pieces of flash fiction – also inspired by the photos I took, and these, together with the villages photos and the work by the other writers were produced in a booklet.

In November we had a celebratory evening in Burnham where the village photographs – inspired by Bruegel, were unveiled, and several people who had attended my flash fiction workshops came along and were brave enough to read out their pieces.

It was a wonderful project to be a part of.

If you’re interested in me collaborating with anything similar, please get in touch.

Hidden Gem Book Recommendations from Cate Baum

January 6, 2025January 8, 2025 / Claire Fuller / 3 Comments

Read This: Cate Baum

Cate Baum and I met a few times in person when I mentored her for her first (unpublished) novel which she wrote on her Creative Writing MA course – and I loved it. Land of Hope is the novel that got her an agent and a publishing deal (which I’m very much looking forward to) it will be published in May 2025, and is available to pre-order now. Here’s what she has to say about herself:

Cate Baum was born in Cambridge to a magician and a big band singer. She grew up in the East Anglian countryside, spending summers roaming the wilds of the UK. She attended UCLA to study Screenwriting, and then City University, London, gaining a Masters with Distinction in Creative Writing. There, she was mentored by Claire Fuller (The Memory of Animals), Clare Allan (Poppy Shakespeare) and Jonathan Myerson (Nuremberg). She now lives in Spain. Her debut novel, Land of Hope, will be published in 2025.

Find her on Instagram @catebaumwriter

Read on to find out which three books Cate recommends.

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Discover Lesser-Known Books Recommended by Leena Norms

December 30, 2024January 8, 2025 / Claire Fuller / 2 Comments

Read This: Leena Norms

A while ago I read Leena’s poetry collection, Bargain-Bin Rom Com, and this is what I wrote about it: funny, smart, sad, and wise. And book-ended by the two most perfect poems (that’s in no way to say the ones in the middle aren’t brilliant too), but I love how I can hear Leena’s voice in them both, saying it’s ok, you don’t need to read this, and then by the end, it’s ok, you can go now. Actually I would have been happy to stay much longer. I was lucky enough to meet her in person when she came on the Arvon Editing Fiction and Non-fiction course I taught (and am teaching again in January 2025), and now her next book has just been published: Half-Arse Human – How to Live Better without Burning Out. Here’s what she has to say about herself:

Leena has spent almost a decade and a half forming communities online, creating video essays about books, eco-conscious style and how we can all participate in ‘positive panic’ about the climate crisis. Her first poetry collection, Bargain-Bin Rom Com and her ‘slap-dash self help’ essay collection, Half-Arse Human, was published this month by John Murray.

Find Leena here on Instagram.

Read on to find out which three books Leena recommends.

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