The Perfect Nine: The Epic of Gikuyu and Mumbi

With gorgeous pictures by a host of top illustrators, KIND is an inspiring picture book about the many ways children can be kind, from sharing their toys and games to making those from other countries feel welcome. Fifty pence from the sale of each printed copy goes to Three Peas, a charity which gives help to refugees from war-torn countries.

Moving, intimate, and beautifully written, The Beekeeper of Aleppo is a book for our times: a novel that at once reminds us that the most peaceful and ordinary lives can be utterly upended in unimaginable ways and brings a journey in faraway lands close to home, never to be forgotten.

Recommended by Noelle Cobden (Communities Programme Director)

In Poor, his first poetry collection, Caleb Femi gives the reader a snapshot of growing up Black, male and poor on a North Peckham housing estate.

Part speaking truth to power, part love letter to his home Femi described the collection as ‘an ode to a troubled yet enchanted world, and the Black boys raised in it’.

Recommended by Nick Barley (Festival Director)

Ever since he burst onto the Irish writing scene over a decade ago, Kevin Barry has entranced readers with his laconic humour, his amiable characters and his impeccable ability to tell stories. In recent years he’s been getting better and better, with his glorious recent novel Night Boat To Tangier earning him a place on the 2019 Booker longlist.

One year on, Barry returns to his beloved short story form with That Old Country Music, a collection based on some oddly delicious (and sometimes deliciously odd) characters from County Sligo on the Atlantic coast of Ireland. Each and every one of these stories is irresistibly readable, vividly conjuring mental images of lives and landscapes in such high resolution, you could project them on an Imax screen.