![Brevity Brevity](https://bookanista.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Last_Pilot_feature-290x290.jpg)
Brevity
Benjamin Johncock’s debut novel The Last Pilot is a gritty tale about a US Air Force test pilot who is set to become one of the world’s first astronauts until a crisis in his young family forces him to face the earthbound challenges of fatherhood. His taut, spare prose has been compared with Raymond Carver,...
![Capturing the silence Capturing the silence](https://bookanista.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/Hush_feature-290x290.jpg)
Capturing the silence
I never deliberately set out to write a silent character. I know it sounds like a writerly cliché – “they just walked into my head like that”, and so on – but in Lily’s case it’s completely true. That’s just the way she was, and it never seemed particularly unusual to me. So when I...
![The mindful writer The mindful writer](https://bookanista.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Dark_Aemilia_slider-290x290.jpg)
The mindful writer
So you want to be a writer? According to popular mythology, all you need to do is hole up for a weekend or three, drink copious amounts of coffee and/or smoke a lot of cigarettes and put pen to paper. Words of genius will instantly pour out of you. After that comes The Auction, which...
![Double English Double English](https://bookanista.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Longest_Fight_feature-290x290.jpg)
Double English
I was a slow learner; my primary school English teacher told me so and I almost believed her. She put me in remedial classes. I was taken off to another room away from the other children; but the support assistant let me sit and write stories, (I still have one of them, ‘Mrs Brambles’). After...
![A drink or two A drink or two](https://bookanista.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Phenakistoscope_480-290x290.gif)
A drink or two
Jack slipped under the counter and closed the door to the bar; propped behind it was a picture of Churchill, glass cracked, and in front beer-crates lined the wall leading straight to Georgie. Her buttocks strained against the seam of her skirt as she bent over and counted bottles. Jack tiptoed forward – one slap...
![Human terrain Human terrain](https://bookanista.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Emily_Bullock_290-290x290.jpg)
Human terrain
A latecomer slides into the middle row. “War Studies?” he asks the brunette next to him. She nods. I tell the students to put away their texts. “History isn’t in those books,” I say. “Where is it then?” the latecomer asks. A girl in the front runs a finger over her iPhone. “Bomb in Pakistan...