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A Romantic Escape | Summer Reading from Slightly Foxed

A Romantic Escape | Summer Reading from Slightly Foxed

Greetings from Hoxton Square, where you find us scaling the shelves (via library steps) to bring you books of romantic escape this summer. Eric Newby’s spine-tingling story set in Italy’s Apennines is the tip of the iceberg when it comes to our compulsively readable series of classic memoirs. Please read on for a selection of Slightly Foxed Editions, Plain Foxed Editions and pocket paperbacks, all beautifully produced and just the right size to hold in the hand. More important still, they’re wonderful reads – hitherto forgotten memoirs that bring alive a particular moment, that allow you into someone else’s world and make you feel you have actually known the writer. You’ll also find links to tempting bundles and offers to ensure your reading pile is at its peak.
Written on the Hoof | Hermione Ranfurly, To War with Whitaker

Written on the Hoof | Hermione Ranfurly, To War with Whitaker

Greetings from Slightly Foxed, where we’ve been browsing our bookshelves and roaming far and wide – from London to Cairo, Jerusalem, Baghdad and many more places besides – through the pages of To War with Whitaker, the remarkable wartime diaries of Hermione, Countess of Ranfurly. We’re down to our final binders’ parcels of this popular Slightly Foxed Edition, so if you’re tempted to add this book to your collection, now’s the moment.
Not So Bad, Really | From the Slightly Foxed archives

Not So Bad, Really | From the Slightly Foxed archives

‘Barbara Pym’s novels are easily dismissed as interesting but marginal. But, as I came to realize, they are full of wit, balance, sly observation and a cheering sense of the ridiculous.’ Frances Donnelly, Slightly Foxed Issue 11 Greetings from Hoxton Square, where doses of wit and cheer are always welcome, especially when prescribed through the pages of good books. Many of you may have already listened to the latest episode of the Slightly Foxed podcast, all about Barbara Pym and other excellent women writers under or above the radar. If you have yet to tune in, we recommend carving out an hour for some lively bookish conversation and suggestions for your reading list. For another perspective on Pym, we’re sharing Frances Donnelly’s piece from SF Issue 11, in which a reluctant reader discovers social commentary, a keen eye for the ridiculous and enjoyable bad behaviour at the church jumble sale on revisiting Excellent Women. We do hope you’ll enjoy  it.
As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning | Laurie Lee

As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning | Laurie Lee

When Laurie Lee set out on foot from his home in the Gloucestershire village of Slad one midsummer morning in 1935 he was 19 and off to see the world with only his violin for company. So began a year of wandering that eventually took him from the north to the south of Spain, a country in which life had barely changed since the Middle Ages but which was now on the brink of a bitter civil war. The adventure that began as a romantic dream ended somewhat ignominiously, but it inspired Lee to produce this brilliant and darkly haunting account of a vanished Spain.
Celebrating Dervla Murphy | From the Slightly Foxed archives

Celebrating Dervla Murphy | From the Slightly Foxed archives

Greetings from a red-hot Hoxton Square, where we’ve been celebrating and remembering the adventurous spirit and prolific travel writing of Dervla Murphy, the author and explorer who famously journeyed alone from her native Ireland to India on a bicycle, armed with little more than a pistol, a notebook and a compass. Dervla died peacefully, aged 90, at her home in Lismore on 22 May 2022. Her good friend Hilary Bradt, of Bradt Travel Guides, said: ‘Dervla was a traveller who wrote, rather than a writer who travelled.’ Yet what a writer Dervla was. Her first book, Full Tilt: Ireland to India with a Bicycle, was published in 1965, and more than twenty other titles have followed. Not to mention several articles for Slightly Foxed. It was a pleasure to work with her, and a greater pleasure still to have been informed and entertained by her insights on people and places, bicycling and beer.
Over to Candleford & Candleford Green | From the Slightly Foxed bookshelves

Over to Candleford & Candleford Green | From the Slightly Foxed bookshelves

In Over to Candleford, the sequel to Lark Rise (SFE No. 58), life begins to open out for Flora – or Laura as she calls her lightly fictionalized childhood self – when she goes to visit her father’s relations in the local market town. She makes particular friends with her uncle Tom, a liberal thinker and respected craftsman, who shares with her his love of books and his talent for attracting interesting and often eccentric people. Back at home and now in her teens, Laura is restless and undecided about her future, until news comes of a vacancy for an assistant at the Post Office in a nearby village. Candleford Green is an enchanting picture of Laura’s new life in this colourful community and of Dorcas Lane, her redoubtable – and unforgettable – employer. Over to Candleford and Candleford Green are published together as a single Slightly Foxed Edition and we do hope you enjoy reading them.
‘Each page is an utter delight’ | From the Slightly Foxed bookshelves

‘Each page is an utter delight’ | From the Slightly Foxed bookshelves

Greetings from Slightly Foxed. With Father’s Day on the horizon we thought some of you may appreciate a few gift ideas for the father figures in your lives. All items can be sent off to the recipient, or to you to hand over in person, in good time for Sunday 19 June. And if you’re worried about delivery times, you can also choose to have an instant gift card sent to you to print out at home or sent straight to the recipient by email. We’re offering free gift wrap for all orders of £10 or more when you quote the promotional code GIFTWRAP at the checkout or over the phone. SF HQ is, as ever, well-stocked with handsome gift cards, reams of brown paper and our understated cream ribbon in anticipation.
‘Perfect literary hedonism’ | New this Summer from Slightly Foxed

‘Perfect literary hedonism’ | New this Summer from Slightly Foxed

‘Every single word is a delight. I am gluttonous when it comes to this magazine. It is perfect literary hedonism.’ Notis, via Goodreads Greetings, dear readers. We’re delighted to report that the new Summer issue of Slightly Foxed (No. 74) has now left the printing press at Smith Settle and will start to drop through letterboxes in the UK very soon and elsewhere over the next few weeks. It ranges far and wide in the usual eclectic manner: Olivia Potts masters the art of French cooking with Julia Child • Justin Marozzi heads for the Hindu Kush • Sue Gee goes boating with Mole and Ratty • Rachel Cooke enjoys Alison Lurie’s academic affairs • William Palmer follows Norman Lewis to Spain • Alexandra Harris picks up a Pevsner, and much more besides . . . With it, as usual, you’ll find a copy of our latest Readers’ Catalogue, listing new books, our backlist, recommended seasonal reading and a selection of offers and bundles. We hope it will provide plenty of recommendations for reading off the beaten track this summer.
Food without Shame | From the Slightly Foxed archives

Food without Shame | From the Slightly Foxed archives

‘Food is life, and Laurie Colwin served hers up with jokes and trivia, delightful diversions and strange segues’ Greetings from Hoxton Square, where we’re busy preparing a feast of good reading for the summer quarter: the new issue of Slightly Foxed magazine will be rolling off the presses next week, as well as the latest limited-edition memoir, Over to Candleford & Candleford Green by Flora Thompson. To fortify readers meantime, we have selected a delicious morsel from the archives to share with you this weekend. We were delighted to learn that Olivia Potts was shortlisted for the Fortum & Mason Food and Drink Awards 2022 for her food writing in Slightly Foxed, so we’re serving up her piece on Laurie Colwin, the original ‘writer in the kitchen’.
Another Self | From the Slightly Foxed bookshelves

Another Self | From the Slightly Foxed bookshelves

James Lees-Milne wrote that he ‘always felt an outsider in every circle’. It was this, combined with his eye for detail and highly developed sense of the ridiculous, that made him such a wonderful comic writer. John Betjeman compared the impact of Another Self to that of Evelyn Waugh’s Decline and Fall. We’re delighted to announce that this classic memoir will be available to readers once more, published on 1 June in a Plain Foxed Edition. These sturdy little books, bound in duck-egg blue cloth, come in the same neat pocket format as the original Slightly Foxed Editions. Please do go forth and place your order now.
Z is for Zola, Émile | From the Slightly Foxed archives

Z is for Zola, Émile | From the Slightly Foxed archives

Greetings from Hoxton Square, where we can scarcely believe we’ve come to the end of our alphabetical adventures through the Slightly Foxed archives, arriving at Andrew Wall’s piece on The Ladies’ Paradise by Émile Zola. We do hope you’ll enjoy it. It’s been a joy to delve into back issues and revisit old favourites, from Margery Allingham’s crime fiction to consumer culture with Émile Zola, via Barbara Comyns, Graham Greene, Molly Keane, Marilynne Robinson, Kurt Vonnegut and many more along the way. And we have barely burrowed into the archive of hidden gems: eighteen years’ worth of entertaining and original reading recommendations, good humour and good writing.
A Boy at the Hogarth Press | From the Slightly Foxed bookshelves

A Boy at the Hogarth Press | From the Slightly Foxed bookshelves

There have been many memoirs of life among the Bloomsberries, but none more wickedly frank or funny than Richard Kennedy’s A Boy at the Hogarth Press. In 1926, at the age of 16, Richard Kennedy left school without a single qualification and went to work at Leonard and Virginia Woolf’s Hogarth Press. Though home from home for London’s intellectual élite, the Press’s damp basement at Tavistock Square was anything but elegant, with the legendarily mean LW keeping a close check on everything, including the toilet paper, and frequently exploding when confronted with RK’s latest idiocy. The Woolfs clearly developed a fondness for their apprentice, but when he left several years later LW pronounced him ‘the most frightful idiot he [had] ever had the privilege of meeting in a long career of suffering fools’.
Now that spring has come . . . | Seasonal reading from Slightly Foxed

Now that spring has come . . . | Seasonal reading from Slightly Foxed

Greetings from Hoxton Square, where we’re looking forward to the Easter break next week and the prospect of fresh air, feasting and, most importantly, time to read. Therefore, if you would like to give the gift of good reading to a fellow booklover (or yourself!) in time for the long weekend, we suggest placing your order in the coming days. The office will be closed from 5.30 p.m. Thursday 14 April until 9.30 a.m. on Tuesday 19 April for Easter. However, our online shop will be open all hours as always, so do feel free to order books, invest in a literary bundle, pick up a tote bag, acquire a notebook, stock up on bookplates, renew your subscription – or, indeed, take out a new subscription – while we’re away, and we’ll send out all orders as soon as we’re back at the packing desk.
Inspire a love of reading | Slightly Foxed Cubs

Inspire a love of reading | Slightly Foxed Cubs

Today, 2 April, is both Hans Christian Andersen’s birthday and International Children’s Book Day, which is celebrated each year to inspire a love of reading and to call attention to children’s literature. Not that we need an excuse to do so here at SF HQ, of course. However, we thought it only fitting to shine the spotlight on our series of Slightly Foxed Cubs this weekend. These beautifully produced collectable children’s books strike a nostalgic chord with many older readers and introduce a younger generation to writers whose marvellous books have, unaccountably, been allowed to slip out of print. Bound in coloured cloth, with printed endpapers and original illustrations, the Cubs make ideal presents for the young and young at heart. Whether you wish to escape into nature with BB, venture back to Roman Britain with Rosemary Sutcliff, join up the dots of history with Ronald Welch or begin to build a library for a bookworm by picking a few titles by each author (or collecting the full set at once) we have books, bundles and offers to satisfy all readers and occasions.
Jan Morris | Conundrum | Rescued – a grand love

Jan Morris | Conundrum | Rescued – a grand love

‘Conundrum is the nearest thing Jan has written to an autobiography. But as she herself acknowledges, in a sense all her writing is autobiographical. Her books represent conversations between Jan Morris and the places she is writing about. Her approach is wholly subjective, and it is hardly an exaggeration to say that she has imposed her personality on the entire world. Yet Conundrum is indeed unique among her books.’ Derek Johns in his preface to Slightly Foxed Edition No. 46: Jan Morris, Conundrum

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