Culture

Ed Waugh’s one-woman show about Blyth Spartans goal machine Bella Reay tours the north east and Cumbria in March 2027, with a cameo from Alan Shearer.

Books From Below wants to be more than a shop. It plans to be a hub for talks, reading groups and organising, funded by supporters rather than investors.

The Tenementals’ new single tells the story of the Calton weavers, shot dead by troops in 1787. It backs a campaign to strip army officers of their civic honours and restore the weavers’ neglected graves.

From Attlee to Corbyn via Blair's “double shuffle”, Izzy Conn’s podcast series is sharper and better resourced than most left media can afford. Clive Hedges finds a lot to admire, along with a Westminster-shaped blind spot or two.

Andrew Hedges reviews a new book, published this week, that doubles as a portrait of his own County Durham and argues that the left must learn from Thatcher’s success at ‘subject formation’ if it wants to build one of its own.

Richard Rose’s The Disruption of the British Party System offers a dispassionate, data-driven guide to a fractured political landscape, but its refusal to ask why things are breaking down is also its biggest limitation.

A new book uses declassified FBI files and a son’s own research to expose Washington’s decades-long campaign against Puerto Rican independence and the man at its centre.

A forensic new book by Daniel Trilling traces how Britain’s political establishment normalised the far right and asks whether it’s too late to reverse course.

With the football World Cup starting next week, Andy Walsh has a very timely review of a new book that reveals the dark underbelly of the beautiful game as it hits the headlines around the globe.