What is it like to judge the world’s most prestigious book prize? How do judges manage to read 150 submissions in a matter of months? And how do publishers update the winning book jacket so swiftly? In the first episode of our new series, Ask Penguin, we delve into the world of literary prizes with […]

Discover the work of the late Albanian author Ismail Kadare, a giant of European literature, with this guide to his must-read novels.

I thought I heard birds that morning time just before the morning light, after I shot up scared of men so white they were blue. I’d been having dreams of blue men with blue breath, and the sound of birds was the slow squeaking of wheels, the rolling of mountain howitzers approaching our camp at […]