book review how i live now

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How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff - review

Elisabeth is a fifteen year-old girl who prefers to be called Daisy. Because of an emerging war her parents send her from New York to England. There she lives with her four cousins, three boys and a girl, and her aunt, all of whom she has never met before. They live on a beautiful country farm with dogs, chicken, goats and cows.

A whole new world for Daisy, who is used to the busy streets of New York. Because of her work, Daisy's aunt soon has to leave for Oslo, Norway, and the kids have to take care of themselves. The farm becomes a sort of paradise for the children. Only the eldest goes to school and the other three, together with their cousin, enjoy their independent life without any adults telling them what to do. During this time Daisy falls in love with her cousin Edmond. They have a very passionate relationship and share a strong common bond.

But this happy life doesn't last long. The world is in crisis. A new world war has started. Nobody knows who the enemy really is or what the motives are. There are terrorist attacks all over the planet, bombs explode in cities, water supplies are poisoned and the United Kingdom is being occupied by an unknown enemy. At first Daisy and her cousins are unconcerned about the war. It simply seems like a distant event without any major consequences for them.

But that soon changes, and they find themselves in the middle of it. Daisy's aunt is stranded in Oslo, as all the airports are closed, so the children are still left alone. Finally the army arrives at their doorstep and the children are sent away. Daisy and her youngest cousin, Piper, are sent West, whereas the others, including Daisy's lover, Edmond, are brought to a place in the East. The beautiful life alone on the farm is over and Daisy faces a whole new challenge trying to survive war and the resulting starvation, and finding Edmond again.

Meg Rosoff has written an impressive novel about war, survival and teenage love. The story is told from the point of view of Daisy, the smart and courageous protagonist. The way in which the story is told and the fact that not much is said about who the enemy is, or why this Third World War has started, really puts the focus on the victims of the conflict and the struggles they face because of it.

How I Live Now definitely has elements of an adventure story, but it deals more with the thoughts and feelings of its characters. It is a very engaging book and makes you think differently about what war and death do to the people who are surrounded by them.

The book has been adapted for the screen. The film was directed by Kevin Macdonald and stars Saoirse Ronan as Daisy. It was released on 18 October 2013.

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HOW I LIVE NOW

by Meg Rosoff ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 24, 2004

An epilogue, set six years after the conclusion, while war still lingers, ends Daisy’s story on a bittersweet, hopeful note.

Manhattanite Daisy, 15, moves to London to stay with an aunt and cousins she’s never met.

Without preamble or fanfare, an unidentified enemy attacks and war ensues. Her aunt is abroad on a peace mission, meaning that Daisy and her three cousins, with whom she forges a remarkable relationship, must survive almost entirely on their own. This is a very relatable contemporary story, told in honest, raw first-person and filled with humor, love, pathos, and carnage. War, as it will, changes these young people irrevocably, not necessarily for the worse. They and readers know that no one will ever be the same. The story of Daisy and her three exceptional cousins, one of whom becomes her first lover, offers a keen perspective on human courage and resilience.

Pub Date: Aug. 24, 2004

ISBN: 0-385-74677-6

Page Count: 160

Publisher: Wendy Lamb/Random

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2004

TEENS & YOUNG ADULT FAMILY | TEENS & YOUNG ADULT FICTION

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BOOK REVIEW

by Meg Rosoff

by Meg Rosoff ; illustrated by Grace Easton

IF ONLY I HAD TOLD HER

by Laura Nowlin ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 6, 2024

A heavy read about the harsh realities of tragedy and their effects on those left behind.

In this companion novel to 2013’s If He Had Been With Me , three characters tell their sides of the story.

Finn’s narrative starts three days before his death. He explores the progress of his unrequited love for best friend Autumn up until the day he finally expresses his feelings. Finn’s story ends with his tragic death, which leaves his close friends devastated, unmoored, and uncertain how to go on. Jack’s section follows, offering a heartbreaking look at what it’s like to live with grief. Jack works to overcome the anger he feels toward Sylvie, the girlfriend Finn was breaking up with when he died, and Autumn, the girl he was preparing to build his life around (but whom Jack believed wasn’t good enough for Finn). But when Jack sees how Autumn’s grief matches his own, it changes their understanding of one another. Autumn’s chapters trace her life without Finn as readers follow her struggles with mental health and balancing love and loss. Those who have read the earlier book will better connect with and feel for these characters, particularly since they’ll have a more well-rounded impression of Finn. The pain and anger is well written, and the novel highlights the most troublesome aspects of young adulthood: overconfidence sprinkled with heavy insecurities, fear-fueled decisions, bad communication, and brash judgments. Characters are cued white.

Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024

ISBN: 9781728276229

Page Count: 416

Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire

Review Posted Online: Jan. 5, 2024

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2024

TEENS & YOUNG ADULT SOCIAL THEMES | TEENS & YOUNG ADULT FICTION | TEENS & YOUNG ADULT ROMANCE

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by Laura Nowlin

INDIVISIBLE

by Daniel Aleman ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 4, 2021

An ode to the children of migrants who have been taken away.

A Mexican American boy takes on heavy responsibilities when his family is torn apart.

Mateo’s life is turned upside down the day U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents show up unsuccessfully seeking his Pa at his New York City bodega. The Garcias live in fear until the day both parents are picked up; his Pa is taken to jail and his Ma to a detention center. The adults around Mateo offer support to him and his 7-year-old sister, Sophie, however, he knows he is now responsible for caring for her and the bodega as well as trying to survive junior year—that is, if he wants to fulfill his dream to enter the drama program at the Tisch School of the Arts and become an actor. Mateo’s relationships with his friends Kimmie and Adam (a potential love interest) also suffer repercussions as he keeps his situation a secret. Kimmie is half Korean (her other half is unspecified) and Adam is Italian American; Mateo feels disconnected from them, less American, and with worries they can’t understand. He talks himself out of choosing a safer course of action, a decision that deepens the story. Mateo’s self-awareness and inner monologue at times make him seem older than 16, and, with significant turmoil in the main plot, some side elements feel underdeveloped. Aleman’s narrative joins the ranks of heart-wrenching stories of migrant families who have been separated.

Pub Date: May 4, 2021

ISBN: 978-0-7595-5605-8

Page Count: 400

Publisher: Little, Brown

Review Posted Online: Feb. 22, 2021

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2021

TEENS & YOUNG ADULT FICTION | TEENS & YOUNG ADULT FAMILY | TEENS & YOUNG ADULT SOCIAL THEMES

More by Daniel Aleman

by Daniel Aleman

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Reviews of How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff

Summary | Excerpt | Reviews | Read-Alikes | Genres & Themes | Author Bio

How I Live Now

by Meg Rosoff

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Book summary.

'Rarely does a writer come up with a first novel so assured, so powerful and engaging that you can be pretty sure that you will want to read everything this author is capable of writing'.

"EVERY WAR HAS turning points and every person too." Fifteen-year-old Daisy is sent from Manhattan to England to visit her aunt and cousins she’s never met: three boys near her age, and their little sister. Her aunt goes away on business soon after Daisy arrives. The next day bombs go off as London is attacked and occupied by an unnamed enemy. As power fails, and systems fail, the farm becomes more isolated. Despite the war, it’s a kind of Eden, with no adults in charge and no rules, a place where Daisy’s uncanny bond with her cousins grows into something rare and extraordinary. But the war is everywhere, and Daisy and her cousins must lead each other into a world that is unknown in the scariest, most elemental way. A riveting and astonishing story.

My name is Elizabeth but no one’s ever called me that. My father took one look at me when I was born and must have thought I had the face of someone dignified and sad like an old-fashioned queen or a dead person, but what I turned out like is plain, not much there to notice. Even my life so far has been plain. More Daisy than Elizabeth from the word go. But the summer I went to England to stay with my cousins everything changed. Part of that was because of the war, which supposedly changed lots of things, but I can’t remember much about life before the war anyway so it doesn’t count in my book, which this is. Mostly everything changed because of Edmond. And so here’s what happened.

I’m coming off this plane, and I’ll tell you why that is later, and landing at London airport and I’m looking around for a middle-aged kind of woman who I’ve seen in pictures who’s my Aunt Penn. The photographs are out of date, but she...

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Michael Printz Award 2005

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Daisy's voice is totally authentic and the story gripped and just wouldn't let go. More than any recent book, How I Live Now brought home how easily a country could be brought to its knees by a small invading force. As Daisy explains, 'when I heard how it happened I was pretty impressed by the cleverness of the guys who planned it, who as far as I understood basically waited for most of the British Army to be lured into crises on the other side of the world and then waltzed in and cut off all the transportation and communication sand stuff so basically they were defending Britain against its own returning armed forces rather than attacking.' Most poignant of all is a long postscript written by Daisy six years after the war, I have reread these particular chapters a number of times already and will likely return to them again.

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Book Review: How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff

Title: How I Live Now

Author: Meg Rosoff

Genre: YA/ Dystopian

Publisher: Wendy Lamb Books (US)/ Puffin (UK) Publication Date: April 2006 / June 2010 (UK – re edition) Paperback: 194 pages

“Every war has turning points and every person too.” Fifteen-year-old Daisy is sent from Manhattan to England to visit her aunt and cousins she’s never met: three boys near her age, and their little sister. Her aunt goes away on business soon after Daisy arrives. The next day bombs go off as London is attacked and occupied by an unnamed enemy. As power fails, and systems fail, the farm becomes more isolated. Despite the war, it’s a kind of Eden, with no adults in charge and no rules, a place where Daisy’s uncanny bond with her cousins grows into something rare and extraordinary. But the war is everywhere, and Daisy and her cousins must lead each other into a world that is unknown in the scariest, most elemental way.

Stand alone or series: Stand alone.

How did I get this book: Bought.

Why did I read this book: It has been on our radar for a long, long time.

I had been waiting to read How I Live Now for a long time now, especially after reading reviews by some of my favourites bloggers (and by a few newspapers too, but who cares about those? I trust my favourite bloggers so much more. Angie even NAMED her adorable child after a character in this book) and finally the time came with YAAM.

It’s not hard to pinpoint what makes How I Live Now such a compelling read: its evocative, atmospheric narrative with its lack of both punctuation and dialogue speech marks and the non-stop-I-can’t-breathe-must-keep-reading pacing more than anything else are what kept me turning the pages voraciously. How I Live Now is not flawless but it is SO beautiful it hurts.

Daisy is our protagonist and narrator. A 15 year old New Yorker who has been sent by her father to live with her late mother’s relatives in England. Daisy recounts her life in England with her weirdly magical cousins, from the idyllic first days gallivanting in the countryside, without adult supervision after her aunt goes on a trip to Oslo, to falling in love with her cousin Edmond. The narrative progresses with the ensuing chaos after England is invaded, the War starts and the cousins are evacuated and separated; the high point is Daisy’s relentless strive for survival alongside her youngest cousin Piper and her attempts to reunite with Edmond.

Once How I Live Now starts, I found it difficult to put it down. Part of this reaction comes from its nonstop narrative. I think the best way to describe is: it reads as though Daisy took a deep breath one day and decided to tell me, the reader, how she lived in those days in England and didn’t stop until she was done. The result is a rapport between the reader and Daisy that is hard to break because the narrative is inviting and intimate.

I also find that is almost impossible to separate plot and character when it comes to this book. I think that both plot and narrative ARE essentially Daisy. And Daisy is, and consequently the narrative as well, self-absorbed and unreliable but also: funny, resilient, compassionate, and spirited. She is a doer and a survivor and among cousins that are almost mythical creatures (they have weird abilities like being able to talk to animals and communicate silently), she is also almost the most REAL one too. She is a force , a propelling force.

I think this quote summarises everything that Daisy is:

“I don’t get nearly enough credit in life for the things I manage not to say. Of course in order to survive, Piper and I needed to have a plan, and I was the one who was going to have to make it because Piper’s job was to be a Mystical Creature and mine was to get things done here on earth which was just how the cards were dealt and there was no point thinking of it any other way. Our major plan, which we didn’t even have to discuss, was to get back together with Edmond and Isaac and Osbert by hook or by crook. So far, I was pretty hazy in the details.”

Does she do it? You will have to read to find out. But know this, the second part of the book is starkly different from the first part and it is heartbreaking and heart-warming and the final lines of the novel are incredible.

There is also an aura of mystery surrounding the story because Daisy is a certain type of unreliable narrator – one who is self-absorbed and won’t look further than its own nose, at least to begin with. And this presents a twofold result.

On one hand I felt utterly frustrated by this. And this is a very personal reaction to the story itself and how Daisy reacts to what is happening around her. A war is looming in the horizon, their country is invaded, the only adult they can count on is gone and yet Daisy doesn’t seem to be asking a lot of questions. Because of that, I couldn’t tell you WHO invaded England, WHEN or WHY. The story also has a certain “old days” feeling – the kids are homeschooled, they live off the farm but it is in fact some point in the near future . There are mentions of emails and mobiles and so I found it hard to believe that these kids would be so naïve and so insulated as to not ask simple questions, especially at their age. Daisy starts a sexual relationship with Edmond and although I have zero problems with the fact that they are cousins, and I actually loved their connection and love story, I do have a problem with how she never thought of contraception (I kept waiting for her to get pregnant).

So this is on the one hand. On the other hand, the fact that the narrative is so destitute of certain realistic details it allows for the story to be stripped down to its bare essentials, to what is crucial: the people and how they survive in times of war. Because of that, the pesky details don’t really matter because all you need to know is how Daisy lived then and how she lives now. And what she has to do to get from one point to another. And THAT my friends is a story worth reading.

Notable Quotes/Parts:

My name is Elizabeth but no one’s ever called me that. My father took one look at me when I was born and must have thought I had the face of someone dignified and sad like an old fashioned queen or a dead person, but what I turned out like is plain, not much there to notice. Even my life so far has been plain. More Daisy than Elizabeth from the word go. But the summer I went to England to stay with my cousins everything changed. Part of that was because of the war, which supposedly changed lots of things, but I can’t remember much about life before the war anyway so it doesn’t count in my book, which this is. Mostly everything changed because of Edmond. And so here’s what happened. **** I’m coming off this plane, and I’ll tell you why that is later, and landing at London airport and I’m looking around for a middle-aged kind of woman who I’ve seen in pictures who’s my Aunt Penn. The photographs are out of date, but she looked like the type who would wear a big necklace and flat shoes, and maybe some kind of narrow dress in black or gray. But I’m just guessing since the pictures only ever showed her face. Anyway, I’m looking and looking and everyone’s leaving and there’s no signal on my phone and I’m thinking Oh Great, I’m going to be abandoned at the airport so that’s two countries they don’t want me in, when I notice everyone’s gone except this kid who comes up to me and says You must be Daisy. And when I look relieved he does too and says I’m Edmond. Hello Edmond, I said, nice to meet you, and I look at him hard to try to get a feel for what my new life with my cousins might be like. Now let me tell you what he looks like before I forget because it’s not exactly what you’d expect from your average fourteen-year-old what with the CIGARETTE and hair that looked like he cut it himself with a hatchet in the dead of night, but aside from that he’s exactly like some kind of mutt, you know the ones you see at the dog shelter who are kind of hopeful and sweet and put their nose straight into your hand when they meet you with a certain kind of dignity and you know from that second that you’re going to take him home? Well that’s him. Only he took me home. I’ll take your bag, he said, and even though he’s about half a mile shorter than me and has arms about as thick as a dog leg, he grabs my bag, and I grab it back and say Where’s your mom, is she in the car? And he smiles and takes a drag on his cigarette, which even though I know smoking kills and all that, I think is a little bit cool, but maybe all the kids in England smoke cigarettes? I don’t say anything in case it’s a well known fact that the smoking age in England is something like twelve and by making a big thing about it I’ll end up looking like an idiot when I’ve barely been here five minutes. Anyway, he says Mum couldn’t come to the airport cause she’s working and it’s not worth anyone’s life to interrupt her while she’s working, and everyone else seemed to be somewhere else, so I drove here myself. I looked at him funny then. You drove here yourself? You DROVE HERE yourself? Yeah well and I’M the Duchess of Panama’s Private Secretary.

Verdict: Even though I was slightly frustrated with the not-knowing, I fully appreciated the book for what it is: an engrossing, beautiful story of survival and love.

Rating: Ana: 8 – Excellent

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Ana Grilo is a Brazilian who moved to the UK because of the weather. No, seriously. She works with translations in RL and hopes one day The Book Smugglers will be her day job. When she’s not here at The Book Smugglers, she is hogging our Twitter feed.

15 Comments

I LOVED this book, so I’m really glad to see it getting a review here. The only other book by Rosoff I’ve gotten around to is What I Was, which is also very good but even more character-driven. (By which I mean almost nothing happens for most of it, but you won’t care.)

Karen Mahoney

Oh, I LOVED this book! I read it when it first came out in hardback over here & I just sunk into the voice and let it carry me away. Beautiful.

I fully agree with you, though, that there is a frustrating element of not knowing the Where, When, How, Who, Why? of the war, etc. But it just doesn’t matter – not with the bigger picture.

This is one of my favourite books, and I can’t believe I haven’t talked to you about it more! 🙂

Anne M Leone

I love How I Live Now, too, though I had many of the same frustrations reading it as you did. Meg Rosoff is a very daring, admirable writer who has taken lots of risks with her books. Some pay off more than others, but I love the thought that goes into each one. Her recent Bride’s Farewell is amazing.

Oh, I really enjoyed this one, too! Definitely a different, compelling read, and one I couldn’t read fast enough. I stayed up until the middle of the night to find out what happened to Daisy. One of my favorite dystopian reads ever.

Mrs. DeRaps

Nice review. I loved the book, though I was a tad grossed-out by the cousin thing. But, I guess that they didn’t grow up together, so it’s okay. Thanks for reviewing this awesome book.

Tahlia Newland

Looks like this one’s going on my TBR list. I wonder about the lack of speech marks though. I saw another book like that and I found it a bit ocnfusing. That won’t stop me reading it though. I love books that are as moving as this one sounds – I call it the M-factor and it sounds like this one has heaps of it.

I did a post on the M-factor you might like http://publishersearch.wordpress.com/2010/07/31/what-makes-good-fantasy-novels-great-part-1/

Rosoff is a fantastic writer. Just In Case stuck with me for days afterwards. I’m dying to get my hands on her latest one when it comes out in paperback.

Book Review: There is no Dog by Meg Rosoff | The Book Smugglers

[…] did I read this book: I read and loved How I Live Now by this author and kept meaning to read other books from her. When I was offered a copy of There is […]

I need to know what for character every person in this book has, cuz I’m doing a presentation about this book on thursdayyy 😕

i need a paragraph saying why these books are good because i am doing a presentation about it. plzzzzzzzzzzzzz

i hate the book -__-

I loved this book so much. I read it in one day and I’ve read it thousands of times since. At first it was quite annoying and I wasn’t used to the fact that there wasn’t speech marks for any dialogue and I found it hard to separate speech from Daisy’s thoughts. However, I managed to get it. Sometimes I thought parts were too rushed but in a way that showed you Daisy’s character if you understand what I mean. Part two was my favourite I have to say. I cried throughout the whole of it and suspect I’ll be reading just that section of that book over and over for the rest of my life. I hated the ending but at the same time I loved it. I was glad it wasn’t what I was expecting, which was a soppy happy ever after. Which at times I love but now, after reading it, I’m glad isn’t in the book. It’s a clever ending and it doesn’t tell you everything and leaves some parts a mystery that you have to figure out yourself. I suppose it’s sort of a happy ending but it’s not the whole romantic, back together with your true love and a happy family sort of happy. I won’t spoil it all though. You will only like this book if you can put the time into it and have patience. If you can’t really be bothered with it and don’t put your mind to it, you’ll find it boring. If you don’t give up on it, it will be a fantastic read. -N

I need 10 quotes from this book with explanations please

i love this book too. But can anyone tell me why is this book a dystopian story, i can’t find the one who has power or other things related to dystopia…

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REVIEW: How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff

Dear Ms. Rosoff,

Here I am regardless, writing this open letter mainly to say that I think the folks who hand out these prizes were on to something, and readers with a taste for young adult fiction with a touch of romance, or who like their dystopias served up with a scoop of wry humor on the side, might enjoy this book as much as I did.

Whether How I Live Now takes place in an alternate present or in the very near future isn’t clear, but it doesn’t matter, because the world it is set in feels so familiar that when things start to go wrong they’re disturbingly convincing. The book begins when Daisy, its fifteen year old American narrator, arrives in England. Daisy tells her story in long sentences and a wry tone.

Anyway, I'm looking and looking and everyone's leaving and there's no signal on my phone and I'm thinking Oh great, I'm going to be abandoned at the airport so that's two countries they don't want me in, when I notice everyone's gone except this kid who comes up to me and says You must be Daisy. And when I look relieved he does too and says I'm Edmond.

Daisy’s voice takes a little taking used to, but it wasn’t long before I was caught up in her story. Daisy and her “wicked stepmother” Davina don’t get along, and now that Davina is pregnant, Daisy’s father has sent Daisy to live with her maternal aunt and her cousins. The cousins are nine year old Piper, fourteen year old twins Edmond and Isaac, and sixteen year old Osbert.

Daisy’s relationship with her dad is clearly complicated (she starves herself partly because it forces her father to spend his money on psychiatrists), but the cousins and her aunt Pen welcome Daisy so warmly that she feels wanted for the first time in her life. The family lives in big country house with dogs and chickens and ducks and goats, some of which are pets and some of which are there for decoration. To Daisy, who has lived in Manhattan all her life, the place seems exotic and strange, but in a good way.

There’s a wasp in the ointment, however, and that is the fact that everyone expects war to break out soon. Daisy and the other kids see this mostly as a lark, but Daisy’s aunt Pen is a diplomat, and takes it very seriously. Shortly after Daisy’s arrival, Pen leaves for Oslo, where a last ditch attempt at diplomacy is to be made. But while she is away, London is attacked, England’s borders are closed, and the kids are left on their own.

In the beginning they are glad to be free of parental supervision. Being on their own is exciting, and even the war is thrilling since it doesn’t yet touch them. Osbert dreams of spying on the enemy, a country whose identity is at first unknown and later unnamed.

Daisy and Edmond have another reason to be happy with the present state of affairs. It’s very nearly love at first sight for them, despite the fact that they are first cousins. At first they try to resist their feelings, but eventually they give in to them. They are, as Daisy puts it, starved for each other, and the absence of adults makes it possible for them to try to satisfy their endless hunger.

But this idyll can’t and doesn’t last long. First the countryside is quarantined due to a rumored outbreak of smallpox, and then British soldiers commandeer the house, recruit Osbert, and send Daisy and Piper west, to live with a military family. Both girls are miserable at being separated from their family, and Daisy promises Piper that she will reunite them with Edmond and Isaac. But she will have to ensure her own survival and Piper’s first.

How I Live Now starts out intriguing and gets better from there. Some readers might be squicked out by the fact that Edmond and Daisy are cousins. I was a little bit discomfited at first, but their love scenes took place behind closed doors, and as the book progressed I saw that their love was one of the things that kept them whole in an unstable world with jagged edges, and I came to appreciate how much it meant to them, and to want them to be reunited.

Although the book gets quite dark, Daisy’s wry commentary got me laughing out loud in the midst of moments that might otherwise have been grim. What unfolds during the war is at times surreal, but Daisy is so grounded in reality that the book remains believable even when elements of the fantastical are introduced. You weave together threads from several genres to create a beautiful fabric of a book, something new and not quite like anything I’ve read before, though I was reminded a bit of Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower .

The only reason this book won’t get a straight A from me is that a time transition near the end felt abrupt and choppy, and for a little while there were too many unanswered questions that Daisy knew and could have supplied the answers to circling in my head and distracting me. One in particular I still wonder about. Was Piper left completely alone before Isaac returned? But the fact that it niggles at me shows how involved and I became in this wonderful tale. I laughed, I cried, I turned page after page, and was left thinking about how our world has changed since September 11th, and how we live now. A-.

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Janine Ballard loves well-paced, character-driven novels in romance, fantasy, YA, and the occasional outlier genre. Examples include novels by Ilona Andrews, Mary Balogh, Aster Glenn Gray, Helen Hoang, Piper Huguley, Lisa Kleypas, Jeannie Lin, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Naomi Novik, Nalini Singh, and Megan Whalen Turner. Janine also writes fiction. Her critique partners are Sherry Thomas and Meredith Duran. Her erotic short story, “Kiss of Life,” appears in the Berkley anthology AGONY/ECSTASY under the pen name Lily Daniels. You can email Janine at janineballard at gmail dot com or find her on Twitter @janine_ballard.

Yay, this is available as a ebook.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this book, Keishon.

I study literature and for a long time, this was the first book to cause me true pleasure. It’s beautiful. I am twenty-three now, and I was struck by the fact that being in love for the first time exactly felt like as it is depicted in this book.

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How I Live Now Hardcover – July 31, 2004

• Print length 192 pages
• Language English
• Publisher Gardners Books
• Publication date July 31, 2004
• Dimensions 5.43 x 0.94 x 8.58 inches
• ISBN-10 0141380756
• ISBN-13 978-0141380759
• See all details

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com review.

Rosoff's writing style is both brilliant and frustrating. Her descriptions are wonderful, as is her ability to portray the emotions of her characters. However, her long sentences and total lack of punctuation for dialogue can be exhausting. Her narrative is deeply engaging and yet a bit unbelievable. The end of the book is dramatic, but too sudden. The book has a raw, unfinished feel about it, yet that somehow adds to the experience of reading it. (Age 14 and over) -- John McLay

Product details

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Gardners Books (July 31, 2004)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 192 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0141380756
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0141380759
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 10.6 ounces
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.43 x 0.94 x 8.58 inches

About the author

Meg Rosoff was born in Boston, educated at Harvard and St Martin’s College of Art, and worked in New York City for ten years before moving to London permanently in 1989. She worked in publishing, politics, PR and advertising until 2004, when she wrote her first novel, How I Live Now, which won the Guardian Children’s fiction prize (UK), Michael L Printz prize (US), the Die Zeit children’s book of the year (Germany) and was shortlisted for the Orange first novel award. Her second novel, Just in Case, won the 2007 Carnegie Medal. Meg’s latest book is The Bride’s Farewell. She lives in London with her husband, daughter and two very hairy dogs.

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The Plucky Irish Heroine of ‘Brooklyn’ Is Back — and in Crisis

Now a suburban married mother, Eilis Lacey finds herself in a quandary in “Long Island,” Colm Tóibín’s sequel to his much-admired novel.

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By A.O. Scott

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LONG ISLAND, by Colm Tóibín

In the early 1950s, Eilis Lacey, a fictional character, said goodbye to Enniscorthy, the real town in County Wexford, Ireland, where her creator, the novelist Colm Tóibín, would be born a few years later. She crossed the Atlantic, making her way to Brooklyn and into “ Brooklyn ,” Tóibín’s near-perfect 2009 novel about her emigration.

Eilis was often lonely, but she was hardly alone. In the 1950s, Ireland lost more than 15 percent of its population to emigration; 50,000 of those who left made their way to America. But Eilis wasn’t a statistic or a symbol: She was a soul — a witty, observant, sometimes anxious young woman finding her way and her place in the world. (Both her caution and her boldness were superbly captured by Saoirse Ronan in John Crowley’s film adaptation .)

Where would Eilis go from Brooklyn? The obvious answer, supplied in the title of Tóibín’s new novel, “Long Island,” was foreshadowed in the earlier book. On one of their dates, Tony Fiorello, a Bensonhurst plumber and Eilis’s eventual husband, tells her about his plan to start a construction business with his brothers out on the island, with a cluster of houses where the whole extended Fiorello family will live.

As “Long Island” gets underway, that plan has long since come to pass. It’s the mid-1970s, and Eilis has taken part in another large-scale demographic movement, the exodus from the cities to the suburbs. She lives with Tony and their two teenage children near a bevy of in-laws.

The voyage to America, encouraged by her older sister, Rose, and enabled by a helpful priest, wasn’t entirely Eilis’s idea. Neither was the relocation to Long Island — that was Tony’s dream. But Eilis is hardly passive. She is an interesting and vivid character because she manages to make her destiny her choice. She may be constrained, in Lindenhurst as in Enniscorthy, by social norms and family expectations, but in her own mind, and in the eyes of sympathetic readers, she is free.

In the opening pages of “Long Island,” fate deals her a wild card. Or rather, Tony does. A stranger shows up at Eilis’s door to inform her that his wife is pregnant and that Tony, who had done some repairs for the family, is the father.

“If anyone thinks I am keeping an Italian plumber’s brat in my house and have my own children believe that it came into the world as decently as they did, they can have another think,” he tells her. Because he is Irish, Eilis takes him at his word. And perhaps because she is Irish, she is equally adamant. “The baby will not pass the threshold,” she tells her mother-in-law, who clearly has something else in mind.

Tony’s transgression, and his family’s response to it, underscores Eilis’s alienation from the large Italian American family she has married into. With her marriage in limbo, she decides to return to Enniscorthy for the first time in more than 20 years. Her children, Larry and Rosella — who have had “no real interest in Enniscorthy, or even Ireland” — will join her for part of the summer.

Readers of “Brooklyn” will recall that Eilis’s previous trip home came in the wake of Rose’s death. If you’re just joining her, Tóibín offers a succinct recap of that visit:

That summer, in Enniscorthy, Eilis had a romance with Jim Farrell. No one … knew that she was, by that time, married to Tony. They had got married in Brooklyn. Eilis had wanted to tell her mother as soon as she arrived home, but it was too hard because it meant that, no matter what, she would have to go back to America. So she told no one, no one at all. And then, at summer’s end, she had abruptly left, just as Jim was making it clear that he wanted to marry her.

This loose end turns into the warp and woof of “Long Island.” Jim, who never married and never got over Eilis, manages a pub he inherited from his parents. He has been carrying on a discreet affair with Nancy, who had been Eilis’s best friend and who is now a widow running a chip shop in town. Jim and Nancy take pains to avoid the inquisitive eyes and judgmental tongues of their neighbors, but once Eilis shows up no secrets are safe.

Eilis herself, with her rented car and her Americanized attitudes, attracts envious, curious, suspicious scrutiny, including from her own mother. Meanwhile, her renewed connection with Jim and Nancy, coming on the heels of her marital crisis back home, sends her and the novel into a swirl of complicated feelings and difficult choices.

“Long Island” is both a sequel to “Brooklyn” and a companion to “ Nora Webster ,” Tóibín’s 2014 novel — his masterpiece, in my opinion — about another Enniscorthy woman’s struggle for autonomy. Eilis’s mother makes an appearance in that novel, which is set in the late 1960s and early ’70s. While events in the wider world are mentioned in all three books — the Troubles in Northern Ireland, the war in Vietnam — these are not historical novels in the usual sense. Tóibín’s interest is in the finer grain of individual perception.

He brings us close enough to Eilis, and to Nora, to see what and how they think, but not so close as to invade their privacy or compromise their dignity. In an autobiographical essay, Tóibín applied James Merrill’s description of Elizabeth Bishop to his own mother, who gave “a lifelong impersonation of an ordinary woman.” Nora and Eilis are drawn in similar terms, their ordinary experiences of migration, marriage and motherhood filtered through an intense and meticulously observed inner life. What holds the reader’s eye, in “Brooklyn” and “Nora Webster,” are not the external movements of a plot but the intimacy and accuracy of the portrait.

“Long Island” is a busier book than its predecessors, more exciting in some ways but in others less satisfying. There is more plot — more incidents and coincidences, more twists and revelations — and less Eilis. Her point of view alternates with Jim’s and Nancy’s, which heightens the drama but also feels like something of a betrayal. Like the busybodies of Enniscorthy, we are preoccupied with what Eilis will do next — no spoilers here — and less attentive to who she is. This exquisitely drawn, idiosyncratic soul turns out to be just another character in a novel after all.

LONG ISLAND | By Colm Tóibín | Scribner | 294 pp. | $28

A.O. Scott is a critic at large for The Times’s Book Review, writing about literature and ideas. He joined The Times in 2000 and was a film critic until early 2023. More about A.O. Scott

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Tell us, Tom Selleck: Who are you, really?

The 79-year-old actor opens up — kind of — in his memoir, “You Never Know.”

Unlike Ben Franklin, who arrived in Philadelphia after a long journey by foot and boat, with enough money to buy three puffy rolls, Tom Selleck entered Los Angeles in the family car, dad at the wheel, ready to settle down in Sherman Oaks, a short drive from Hollywood.

Though Franklin is not mentioned in Selleck’s memoir, “ You Never Know ,” his work ethic and didacticism are widely evident. Another great American is also present: Huck Finn. By combining Franklin’s homiletic pronouncements with Huck’s folksy immediacy of voice, Selleck, along with co-writer Ellis Henican, has created an easygoing, talky American memoir.

And why not? Sturdy as Mount Rushmore, athletic and eminently likable, Selleck exudes traditional American masculine traits; he’s the very embodiment of the strong, silent type. But silence can be a hazard when it comes to writing a memoir, which after all is a genre of self-reflection, confession and exposure.

Known for his privacy, Selleck has written a what book instead of a why book, a chronology of doing , as he writes about his life. As he says late in the book, “Feelings are hard to describe.” So readers can decide if they’re satisfied with a résumé — a running of the credits, if you will.

I like Tom Selleck, and while waiting for the book to arrive, I watched a lot of his movies and shows. Though I find the memoir disappointing, it will make a great audiobook, and I wonder if that’s what he had in mind, letting his easygoing voice tell a story that is soothing because he keeps it on the surface.

A quick list of some doings: student at USC, where a drama professor referred him to a Hollywood agent; acting classes to improve his “instrument”; joined California Army National Guard in 1967; appeared on “The Dating Game”; TV commercials; print ads; B movies, then better ones; survived the Hollywood cattle calls until he was chosen for a new TV show titled “Magnum, P.I.” By now it’s 1980, and Selleck is 35. He’s paid his dues and lived up to his principle of “Don’t know where I’m goin’, but there’s no use bein’ late.” Hi, Huck.

This Hollywood education exposes a ruthless industry that both tests and forms Selleck’s values. He sums up his success by quoting Calvin Coolidge: “Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence,” a very Franklinesque aphorism. But, despite Selleck’s persistence, he wrestles with the “critic on my shoulder,” that voice that says you’re not good enough. Soon, though, another phrase — a mantra, really — takes its place: “Tom, you’re good enough.”

The book gives us a lot of doing and name-dropping. We may learn about the risqué incident when Carol Burnett had her legs around Selleck’s neck, and his photo shoot with a naked Barbara Parkins, but we learn nothing about his love life — according to my research outside the book, he’s been involved with more than three famous actresses — and little about his first marriage. He dilutes his inward thoughts with vague phrasing such as “I kinda knew,” “I don’t know why … well, actually, yes, I do know why,” or “I sit here, pen in hand, trying to explain my emotions … I can’t.”

Such coy deflections and elisions try our patience and may leave some of us wondering why he wrote a memoir if he can’t express feelings. Instead, we get clichés like “In the film business, work is waiting for you every day, and you owe it your commitment every day” and repetitions of the line he uses in his TV commercials for reverse mortgages: “This isn’t my first rodeo.” In his memoir, does Selleck have difficulty separating himself from the characters he depicts? He’s selling himself to his readers, and we’ll buy it because we like him and he’s a good actor, but cliché and evasion erode intimacy .

Ten chapters detail the creation and success of “Magnum, P.I.,” and we learn much about television production and its grueling deadlines, and that actors chew ice before doing a scene so their breath won’t show up on camera. We also learn how loyal and dedicated Selleck is to his crew, those folks who make our favorite shows possible. During the last season of “Magnum,” Selleck asked his network to give his hard-working team of seven years a bonus; the studio refused. So Selleck arranged to have his own bonus docked and gave $1,000 to each crew member. Commendable.

“Magnum” is firmly part of what scholar Susan Jeffords calls the “remasculinization of America,” a post-Vietnam cultural shift that, through films and popular culture, reinvigorated hypermasculine images and traditional male values. “Magnum” featured a Vietnam veteran, an ex-Navy SEAL, who relocates to Hawaii and becomes a private investigator. He became a character millions of men admire and emulate. But Selleck says little about his longest-lived iteration of American masculinity, Frank Reagan of the TV hit “Blue Bloods,” now in its 14th and final season. A lifelong Republican, Selleck, I’m sure, enjoys playing a character who has the same last name as a president he admires.

Reagan is an aging patriarch who wields his masculinity both as the NYPD police commissioner and as a father who sits at the head of the table during family Sunday dinners. Selleck does not share what it’s like playing this older man who covers up his body with an overcoat and a cowl-neck sweater. Instead, we’re told the business details of “Blue Bloods,” not its personal impact on its star.

Selleck is completely silent about the nine “Jesse Stone” TV movies he made beginning in 2005. Stone, a cop, does open up, revealing both the whats and the whys of his character, especially in the exchanges between him and his male therapist. Selleck is also at his sexiest, lounging in bed, the famous chin doubling as he reaches for his reading glasses. How does a masculine icon age? Selleck doesn’t say.

Closing on a pastoral note in the epilogue, the 79-year-old actor walks around his ranch and checks the water tanks he needs for his avocado crop while reminiscing about the stories he’s just told us and the ones he’s keeping to himself. In the book’s penultimate sentence he writes, “I am the steward of those stories, the same way I am steward of my land.” Unsurprisingly, Selleck fails to mention his allegedly improper transfer of over 1 million gallons of water onto “my land” in 2015.

It’s hard to separate the dancer from the dance, the mustache from the man, but not impossible. Memoir is supposed to puncture the facade of performance, or at least try to. Perhaps Selleck will trust his audience enough to write a more intimate sequel. He’s been speaking to us for a long while now, and I’m sure he has more to say.

Sibbie O’Sullivan, a former teacher in the Honors College at the University of Maryland, is the author of “My Private Lennon: Explorations From a Fan Who Never Screamed.”

Tom Selleck

You Never Know

By Tom Selleck with Ellis Henican

Dey Street. 352 pp. $29.99

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Amazon Cracks Down After Kristi Noem’s Book Is Flooded With Mean Reviews

Goodreads has also suspended feedback for the now infamous memoir.

Dan Ladden-Hall

News Correspondent

John Lamparski/Getty Images

Kristi Noem has spent the past few weeks fighting a firestorm of criticism about the contents of her new book—the one in which she boasts about murdering her pet dog , Cricket, in a gravel pit, discusses botching the execution of a goat, and dishes details on a dubious meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un .

So she’ll probably be somewhat relieved that Amazon appears to have imposed a limit on reviews for No Going Back: The Truth on What’s Wrong With Politics and How We Move America Forward , which was published Tuesday.

The online retail giant said it had “noticed unusual reviewing activity” on the book and therefore restricted the reviews, which are now completely invisible on the memoir’s page as of Wednesday morning.

“We want Amazon customers to shop with confidence knowing that the reviews they see are authentic and trustworthy,” an Amazon spokesperson said in a statement to The Daily Beast. “If we notice unusual reviewing activity, we will occasionally limit reviews to verified purchases only.”

Reports about what was being said before the restriction came into force, however, will be difficult reading for the South Dakota governor.

Goodreads, the Amazon subsidiary where bookworms share their literary recommendations and reviews, has similarly imposed “temporary limitations on submitting ratings and reviews” of Noem’s book. “This may be because we’ve detected unusual behavior that doesn’t follow our review guidelines,” an explanatory note reads when attempting to add a review as of Wednesday morning.

One Amazon review captured by MeidasTouch before the feedback disappeared was titled “Filled with lies, and violence against animals.” “She shot her puppy in the head,” the reviewer grumbled. “Enough said.”

Another one-star review under the heading “My cat loved this book” said: “He says Cricket was asking for it.” Other negative reviews appear to have consisted entirely of poop emojis, while RawStory said one person called the work “grift for VP at its best” and advised shoppers to “save a tree” by not buying the book.

Not that the book appears to have done anything to burnish Noem’s chances for being chosen by Donald Trump to become his running mate. Several GOP sources previously told The Daily Beast that the memoir had not gone down well in Trumpworld, with one putting her chances of winning the veepstakes at “less than zero now.”

For her own part, Noem has remained bullish in increasingly heated interviews when asked about the book, evading giving a straight answer about the veracity of its anecdote about meeting Kim Jong Un (which, according to the book’s publisher , is being removed from new editions of the print edition and scrubbed “as soon as technically possible on the audio and ebook” versions) and insisting that her choice to kill Cricket was illustrative of her willingness to make hard decisions.

Noem’s patience appeared to completely snap during one interview with Fox Business Network host Stuart Varney on Tuesday morning when he asked her if she’d discussed her dog-killing in conversations with Trump.

“Enough, Stuart,” Noem raged. “This interview is ridiculous, what you are doing right now. You need to stop.”

Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast  here .

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Israel-Hamas war

Trump's hush money trial

Stormy Daniels wraps up testimony in Trump hush money trial

By CNN's Kara Scannell, Lauren Del Valle and Jeremy Herb in the courthouse

Defense attorney is now asking Daniels about how she got to Trump's hotel

Trump attorney Necheles is now moving on to questions about whether Stormy Daniels walked to the hotel or took a car.

"The details of your story keep changing, right?" Necheles asks.

"No," Daniels says. She testifies she took a car from a tattoo shop to Trump's hotel, and says "I don’t know how a car was called."

Defense zeroes in on whether Trump and Daniels dined together as it tries to highlight an inconsistency

We've heard a lot about dinner — namely, whether it was eaten or not when Trump and Stormy Daniels met — as Trump attorney Susan Necheles zeroes in on what she argues is an inconsistency in Daniels' story.

"So you're saying, when you said, 'We had dinner,' you didn’t mean that, right?" Necheles asks.

Daniels has repeatedly argued that saying the two met to "have dinner" doesn't necessarily mean they ate.

Necheles again presses Daniels about dinner.

"Yes, like I said it was dinner time in the room," Daniels says.

Daniels has further testified, appearing exasperated, that when she goes to someone's house "for dinner," it doesn't necessarily mean you have to eat.

The defense says Stormy Daniels benefitted from the story’s publicity. Here’s her latest testimony

From CNN's Christina Zdanowicz

Trump attorney Susan Necheles has hammered Stormy Daniels in cross-examination to establish some of the ways the porn star gained publicity and money from her story going public.

Here are the highlights:

Denying the relationship: In a January 2018 statement, Daniels denied a sexual encounter with Trump. Later that same month, Daniels put out a second statement denying the relationship, but she said she did not release it after she signed it. Daniels says was pushed to sign the statement by Michael Cohen via Keith Davidson, adding, "I never spoke to Michael Cohen directly."

Going public about sex with Trump: Necheles asked Daniels if she eventually wanted to publicly announce she had sex with Trump.

"No. Nobody would ever want to publicly say that. I wanted to publicly defend myself," Daniels testified.

She benefitted from the publicity : Necheles asked a series of questions to establish examples of how Daniels benefitted from the story. A 60 Minutes interview and appearances on CNN and The View brought Daniels publicity, Necheles said. Daniels argued her then-lawyer Michael Avenatti arranged her appearances, but she said "he took everything else for himself. Daniels also negotiated a $800,000 book contract.

More ways she benefitted : Necheles continued to drill down on how Daniels "capitalized" on the moment after coming forward with her story. Here’s what Necheles outlined:

• Daniels did a strip club tour, called 'Make America Horny Again."
• Daniels appeared on "The Surreal Life” reality show.
• She received $100,000 from the documentary.

Necheles presses Daniels on her 2018 interview with Anderson Cooper

Trump attorney Susan Necheles is now pressing Stormy Daniels about her 2018 interview with Anderson Cooper.

During the interview, Cooper asks Daniels if they went out for dinner. She says no. He asks if they had dinner in the room. She says yes. Daniels says it was dinner time but they didn't eat dinner.

"We did not have any food. I did not eat any food. I maintain that in every interview. That has not changed," Daniels says. "When you said to Anderson Cooper you didn’t really mean you had dinner, you meant something else?" Necheles asks. "We had dinner time in the room," Daniels said.

"Your words don’t mean what they say, do they?" Necheles asks. Judge Juan Merchan then sustained an objection.

Daniels says she went to dinner with Trump but never got food

Trump attorney Susan Necheles asks whether she made "a big deal" about not getting dinner when going to Donald Trump's hotel room.

Necheles is reading a few different interview accounts from over the the years, including Daniels telling Jimmy Kimmel she was "very food-motivated," so she stayed in the hotel room because she was holding out for dinner.

Necheles then asks whether Daniels said the opposite in her 2011 InTouch interview .

"I never said we ate," Daniels says. Necheles is now bringing up the article for Daniels to review.

Daniels defends herself: "My story's the same."

"I've maintained that I didn't see any food," Daniels. "It was dinner but we never got food."

"All of these interviews I would have talked about the food," Daniels adds.

As Trump attorney picks apart article, Daniels argues it was meant to be "short and frivolous"

Trump lawyer Susan Necheles is focusing repeatedly on Stormy Daniels' comments for a 2011 article in the gossip magazine InTouch about a dinner with Trump.

Daniels has pushed back as Necheles tries to highlight potential discrepancies in her story, saying the article wasn't meant to be a perfect record of events.

"This is an entertainment magazine. This is short and frivolous. It's an abbreviated, entertaining version of the events," Daniels says of the interview.

Necheles asks if Daniels was telling the truth in her 2011 interview.

"It is minus some details," Daniels responds.

Judge tells Trump attorney to give Daniels enough time to answer questions

Judge Juan Merchan just told Trump lawyer Susan Necheles to give Stormy Daniels time to answer each question.

The two are going back and forth so quickly they're stepping on each other's sentences.

Necheles has been pressing Daniels, and Daniels often pushes back on the attorney's account of events.

Daniels is questioned about how she was asked out to dinner with Trump

Stormy Daniels is now being asked about how Donald Trump's bodyguard Keith Schiller asked her to have dinner with Trump.

Defense attorney Susan Necheles asks, "(That's a) totally different story than you told in 2011, isn't it?"

Necheles asks her to confirm she told InTouch magazine that Trump personally asked her to dinner. Daniels says on the stand that she doesn't remember saying.

Daniels says, "I didn’t specify. I left out the names of all the other people not to get them involved."

In that interview, Daniels said at the time that "he came to talk to me and asked me for my number and I gave it to him."

Daniels also told the magazine in 2011 that he said, "I want to come talk to you later."

Here's a court sketch of Stormy Daniels from CNN anchor Jake Tapper

CNN anchor Jake Tapper is in court during Stormy Daniels' testimony in the hush money trial.

Tapper drew the following sketch of Daniels.

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Money latest: Mortgage rates could go lower than expected, BoE hints; 'era of cheap food over,' says supermarket boss

The Bank of England has hinted a base rate cut is coming, and it's "not ruled out in June". Read all today's personal finance and consumer news - and listen to the latest Ian King Business Podcast below.

Thursday 9 May 2024 23:09, UK

• Interest Rates
• Interest rate held at 5.25% | June rate cut 'not ruled out but not fait accompli' - BoE | Cuts may take interest rate 'lower than currently priced into market'
• Supermarket boss declares end of the 'cheap food era'
• Gordon Ramsay to open new restaurants on London skyscraper

Essential reads

• Ed Conway on interest rates : Waiting game almost over - but Bank needs to be bold to jump US
• 10 cheapest popular destinations in Europe - and how costs compare
• The top-paying savings account on the market right now
• Iconic tea brand enlists Top Boy star for £12m ad to revive fortunes - but poll suggests Britons prefer rival
• Cheap Eats : Chef at Tom Kerridge pub picks Buckinghamshire spot
• Listen to the Daily above and  tap here to follow wherever you get your podcasts

Looking for some longer Money reads for your evening/commute/lunch break?

Here's four from the last few months you might like...

Should you offer kids cash rewards for good grades? The psychologist's view

As exam season gets under way, some parents are putting hundreds of pounds aside to reward their children if they achieve certain grades. 

While some parents lambasted the idea as "absolute potatoes", others told Sky News they saw their children's focus increase after offering up to £250 for the top results.

We also spoke to teachers and a psychologist...

What can I do if flexible working request declined?

Every Monday we put your financial dilemmas or consumer disputes to industry experts. A few weeks ago Sky News reader AJ2024 asked...

"While on maternity leave my employer rejected my flexible work request and told me to pick from four new shift patterns or take redundancy if they didn't suit me. All new shifts were full working hours. No support as a new mother and ruined my last few precious weeks. What are my rights?"

We got an employment lawyer to answer...

'£2,000 landed in my account' - The people who say they're manifesting riches

Money blogger Jess Sharp spoke to people who swear they've made money from manifestation - before finding herself meditating under a tree to see if she could get in on the action...

The world of dark tourism - what is it, is it ethical, and where can you go?

Interest in a phenomenon known as "dark tourism" has been steadily rising in recent years - but what is it?

To find out, we spoke with tourism academic  Dr Hayley Stainton  and renowned dark tourist and author Dr Peter Hohenhaus, who runs a  dark tourism website ...

Fraud is "rife" on second hand marketplaces including Depop, Shpock and Preloved, according to a new survey by Which?.

The consumer magazine/website found that, of 1,300 buyers, 32% had been scammed on a second hand marketplace in the two years to January.

The most common ruse involved consumers receiving incorrect goods or nothing at all, while others were delivered an empty package or fake goods.

57% of those surveyed said they had experienced a scam on Depop.

This compares with 53% for Shpock and 51% for Preloved and Nextdoor. 

Amazon Marketplace came in at 35%, while for Gumtree and eBay the figures were both 29%. 

The number for Facebook and Vinted was 24% and 22%, respectively.

Rocio Concha, Which? director of policy and advocacy, said the survey’s findings were "worrying". 

"It's important that people properly check the seller's reviews and profile," she said, adding that marketplaces need to have proper checks in place and ensure that scam profiles are removed quickly.

Depop told the Guardian it offered protection for buyers and sellers and was investing in new technology. 

"We strongly encourage consumers who are buying and selling anywhere online never to share personal information with other users, to be very wary about following links to other sites, and to report any suspicious behaviour via in-app reporting systems."

Sky News has reached out to the other companies mentioned.

You may remember our coverage here a few weeks back on the proliferation of scams targeting Taylor Swift fans hoping to buy tickets to see one of her current run of shows across Europe...

The Shake It Off star will hold a series of concerts in the UK as she continues her Eras tour, with the first taking place in Edinburgh on 7 June.

But the artist's megastardom has seen a huge demand for tickets, which were not cheap even before they sold out within minutes - with prices ranging from £58.65 - £194.75.

Resale prices from legitimate websites have been in the region of £700 each - with some fans reported to have spent well in excess of that to see their hero.

However, such is her popularity among an army of mostly young female devotees that the market has become a target for people seeking to exploit the widespread desperation for tickets.

As reported here, a spate of attempts had seen Facebook users' accounts hacked by scammers, who would then create seemingly genuine posts in groups on the site that the users were members of.

Initially, the posts would suggest the user was seeking to sell tickets - generally four - that were invariably just a few rows from the front of a specific venue for one of Swift's UK shows.

The price suggested in the posts was generally around £180, more expensive than the face value of most tickets, but a fraction of the cost of those being advertised on legitimate resale sites - especially for such desirable seating.

More recent instances indicate the methods being employed by scammers have since evolved and, it appears, become significantly more sophisticated.

In these more recent attempts to defraud so-called Swifties (and in many cases, the parents purchasing the tickets), the posts detail the specific rows and seat numbers.

A further departure from the previous efforts is the scammers no longer including the asking price for the (non-existent) tickets.

Both these changes were evident in one attempt Sky News has become aware of - as was another and decidedly sinister tactic.

In this case, given the number of previous scams that have flooded Facebook, the admin for the group in question first removed the post - correctly assuming it was fraudulent.

But, he told Sky News, he was subsequently sent a photo of what appeared to be the user's passport as a means of verifying her post was genuine.

This development indicates the scammer in question had used some form of photo-editing software to create an image that appeared to be of the user's passport.

"I contacted her to explain that I had deleted her post and removed her account from the group as there are so many scams around, and I could not verify their identity or the validity of the ticket offer," said Trevor Williams, who runs the local community Facebook group in Birmingham.

"Within a few minutes, I received a photo of a passport in this name and an assurance that she was genuine.

"This was enough to change my decision and the post was put it back on the group.

"Most people have no idea of the problems of being an admin on these groups, as you simply cannot win."

How can you protect yourself against these scams?

For those looking to buy resale tickets, the main advice is to simply avoid being tempted into seemingly genuine offers posted on Facebook, unless it is from someone you know and have spoken to directly (and not just over Facebook).

Those looking to sell on their tickets will invariably use the established and legitimate resale sites such as Viagogo or StubHub.

Perhaps the most useful piece of advice is an old one - if it looks too good to be true, it probably is.

In terms of protecting yourself against your account on Facebook (or any social media site) being hacked by scammers, the best measure is to ensure you have enabled two-step or two-factor authentication.

This can be found through the security and privacy settings on your Facebook account, and involves the use of your telephone number or a separate authentication app on your phone whenever someone attempts to log in.

TV chef Gordon Ramsay has announced he will open new restaurants and a cooking academy in one of London's tallest skyscrapers. 

The 60th floor of 22 Bishopsgate will have a 14-seat chef's table experience - run by the team from the chef's three-Michelin-starred Chelsea restaurant, Restaurant Gordon Ramsay.

In addition, Lucky Cat restaurant, a Lucky Cat terrace bar and a Bread Street Kitchen will open on the 59th floor.

Finally, he'll be opening a cooking academy in the building, The Gordon Ramsay Academy. 

Mr Ramsay said: "This is more than just a new opening - it's a significant milestone for our business. 

"We're not only launching the highest culinary experiences in London, but also creating a vibrant culinary hub at the incredible 22 Bishopsgate."

City editor Mark Kleinman   has revealed that high street billionaire Mike Ashley is closing in on a deal to become the new British partner of struggling fashion chain Ted Baker.

He learnt that Frasers Group had emerged as the preferred partner for the chain following the collapse of No Ordinary Designer Label (NODL), Ted Baker's existing UK licensing partner.

It is hoped a deal could be agreed over the coming days - read more on this story here ...

Eating ultra-processed meat is linked to an increased risk of early death.

A Harvard study over 30 years tracked more than 114,000 adults.

The highest risks were linked with the most processed meats such as sausages and ham. 

Regular eaters had a 13% higher chance of dying over the 34 years tracked.

Diets high in sugary and artificially sweetened drinks had a 9% increased risk, the study found.

The used car market increased by 6.5% in the first quarter of the year , with sales of over 1.9 million vehicles, new figures show.

The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) says the total reveals the strongest start to a year since pre-pandemic 2019.

Sales of used hybrids also increased.

That's all from an enlightening news conference in which we heard an interest rate cut in June hadn't been ruled out - and that rates could fall more than markets expect. 

Scroll through to read and watch some of the key moments - meantime, we'll return to general money and consumer news.

We're now hearing the final questions of this news conference. 

The governor of the Bank of England is asked if August is more likely than June to see the Monetary Policy Committee cut interest rates. 

"Nice try to introduce the 'is it June' question again," Andrew Bailey says with a smile.

"We're going meeting by meeting," he adds, stressing that more data [which will be at the MPC's disposal over the coming months] will allow them more visibility and more scope to make a decision."

Our  economics editor Ed Conway  is next to ask the governor a question.

He asks whether increasing government interest in the Bank's workings has any influence on an interest rate cut.

"We [the Monetary Policy Committee] never discuss politics," Andrew Bailey replies. 

"We are an independent central bank, we have a remit and it is our duty to exercise that remit at all times."

"Our remit applies at all times, so it [politics] isn't a consideration."

Asked if inflation dynamics in the UK are different to the US, Andrew Bailey says there is no law that says the US moves first on interest rate cuts and everyone else afterwards.

"There is no law," he says.

"Moreover, we have a remit and target which is related to domestic inflation in the UK.

"We're an open economy so we take the rest of the world into consideration 

"But there is no law to say we can only move once the Federal Reserve (central bank of the US) moves."

There is a feeling among economists that, although the US often leads, the European Central Bank may be the first to move with an early June cut.

This could, it has been suggested, push the UK to cut on 20 June.

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More From Forbes

‘arena breakout infinite’ beta goes live and you can still get in.

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Arena Breakout Infinite looks great, it's just a shame so many can't play yet.

The closed beta for Arena Breakout Infinite is now live with many players who signed up getting the chance to play Tencent’s competitor to Escape From Tarkov . But if you didn’t manage to get access in the first wave of invites there are still a few chances for you to play before the beta ends.

The Arena Breakout Infinite beta is now live on Steam, but you will need a code and to be whitelisted in order to play the beta. If you signed up for the beta on the game’s website you may have been added to the beta, and can use a tool on the website to check. If you have then you can jump in and start playing almost straight away.

There are also some keys for the beta being given out on social media, as well as by some of the streamers playing the game. However, if you manage to get a key this way you need to jump through some hoops to make sure your account is allowed to play, instead of just redeeming the key and getting straight in.

If you haven’t managed to get into the first wave of invites for the beta you can still sign up on the website , with further waves of invites expected to be sent out in the coming days. The beta is scheduled to last for around two weeks, so you will have plenty of time to give it a try. The official website also mentions an upcoming Twitch drops campaign that may be another way to get access.

After some account verification issues I’ve managed to play a bit of Arena Breakout Infinite and my initial reaction is that it is a little disappointing. Movement feels slow and clunky, and the shooting isn’t all that much better, so the moment to moment gameplay isn’t super fun. Hopefully that will improve as I unlock better gear but compared to the seamless Gray Zone Warfare test a few weeks ago, it’s not a great start.

The Best Gaming Mouse That’ll Improve Your Aim

However, Arena Breakout Infinite still looks interesting and could be a competitor to Tarkov . It seems to have more of a focus on loot and the extraction style than Gray Zone Warfare , which will no doubt be welcome news to those who didn’t click with the hottest game on Steam . With Tarkov shooting itself in the foot with the Unheard Edition and then accusing Arena Breakout Infinite of plagiarism , the new game could be in a position to sweep up a lot of disillusioned players, especially if the beta goes well.

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