Today in Bookish and Literary History, November 5

1740 A Treatise of Human Nature (Vol3) by David Hume (UK)


1936 French writer Andre Gide criticizes the Soviet regime in his "Return from the U. S. S. R" after his visit to the Soviet Union


2020 Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan (Ireland) (My Review) ⭐⭐⭐⭐

It is 1985, in an Irish town. During the weeks leading up to Christmas, Bill Furlong, a coal and timber merchant, faces into his busiest season. As he does the rounds, he feels the past rising up to meet him ― and encounters the complicit silences of a people controlled by the Church.

  • Winner of The Orwell Prize
  • Winner of The Kerry Group Irish Novel Of The Year Award
  • Shortlisted For The Booker Prize
  • Shortlisted for The Rathbones Folio Prize
  • Shortlisted The Irish Novel Of The Year At The Dalkey Literary Awards


2020 Where Snow Angels Go by Maggie O'Farrell (UK)

Have you ever woken up suddenly, in the middle of the night, without knowing why? Best-selling and award-winning master storyteller Maggie O'Farrell weaves an extraordinary and compelling modern fairy tale about the bravery of a little girl and the miracle of a snowy day.


2024 The Man in the Banana Trees by Marguerite Sheffer

The stories in The Man in the Banana Trees take place in the past, present, and future—from the American Gulf South to the orbit around Jupiter. We meet teachers and students, ghosts and aliens. An ice cream consultant in the year 2036 predicts a devastating flavor trend and a disgruntled New England waiter investigates a mysterious tanker crash. Although wildly varied in setting, length, and genre, a thread of the fantastic unites these stories, as characters struggle to understand that thing lurking at the edge of their perception: something sinister, or maybe—miraculous.

  • Finalist for the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Short Story Collection 2025


2024 Flint Kill Creek: Stories of Mystery and Suspense by Joyce Carol Oates

A new collection of stories by one of America’s greatest writers


2025 Other Death: Ellipsis by Ferenc Barnás

A lecturer’s descent into psychological chaos unfolds against the turbulent backdrop of 1990s Budapest.


2025 Her Forgotten Hours by Lily Graham (South Africa)

The Germans shot down her plane. She couldn’t remember who she was. But she knew she had to save him.



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