The Thursday Murder Club: everything is eclipsed by the cakes in this sanitised Netflix adaptation

By Andrew Dix, Senior Lecturer in American Literature and Film, Loughborough University

In his essay Decline of the English Murder, the writer George Orwell evokes the pleasure to be had in reading about killing. After a good meal (including pudding), you are in the mood to read: “the sofa cushions are soft underneath you, the fire is well alight, the air is warm.” And what is it, in “these blissful circumstances”, that you want to read about? “Naturally,” says Orwell, “a murder”.

Substitute Orwell’s fires for contemporary radiators, and he might be describing the millions of readers…

Read complete article

~	80 years since the end of World War II, a dangerous legacy lingers in the Pacific

~	It’s OK for people to cry at work. Here’s how you can respond as a colleague or manager

~	Ageing Australians are waiting too long for home care packages. Here’s why

~	My cat needs to be contained indoors – how do I make sure it stays happy?

~	It was lonely during WII. Those at home and away coped through letters

~	Low expectations and thwarted desires: Geoff Dyer’s memoir of a working-class childhood

~	Indonesia: Authorities must investigate eight deaths following violent crackdown on protests

~	Research shows English children’s wellbeing drops when they start secondary school – here’s why

~	ChatGPT only talks in clichés – here’s why that’s a threat to human creativity

~	Four reasons why the UK lags behind its rivals on productivity