Shirley jackson

Wednesday

Sarah Ditum

Urban gothic: I Want to Go Home, But I’m Already There, by Roisin Lanigan, reviewed

A horror story in three words: London property market. That’s the starting point for Roisin Lanigan’s brilliantly creepy debut novel, set in the sheer hell of being a young renter. Because once you’ve run the gamut of carbon monoxide-leaking boilers, coked-up estate agents, absentee landlords and frosty housemates (and been gouged in rental costs for the privilege), maybe a haunting isn’t a deal-breaker. The main character, Aine, is adrift in her twenties with a vaguely online job and a prescription for unspecified mental health issues. She’s also pathologically passive: she ends up in London because Laura, her best friend from university, asks to flatshare and Aine can’t think of anything

Thursday

Deborah Ross

You won’t be able to look away: Shirley reviewed

This week, two electrifying performances in two excellent films rather than two mediocre performances in the one mediocre film — see: Rebecca — so things are looking up. Firstly, Mogul Mowgli, starring Riz Ahmed, directed by Bassam Tariq and co-written by the pair. Ahmed plays Zed, a British-Pakistani rapper who has lived in New York for two years and is on the brink of stardom when he returns home to his family in London. It’s intended as a brief visit but then he is struck down by an autoimmune disease that is never named but is something like multiple sclerosis. The point is, I think, even his body doesn’t recognise