Galleries: Artist Anna King

Painter Robert Kelsey is a past president of Paisley Art Institute and a real champion of fellow artists and their work. For this new exhibition for Thompson’s Aldeburgh in Suffolk, Kelsey has returned to a theme of exploring the graphic elements of driftwood on the shore from his early days as an artist. Robert Kelsey, Thompson’s Aldeburgh, 175 High Street, Aldeburgh, Suffolk, IP15 5AN, www.thompsonsgallery.co.uk, 01728 453 743, Mon-Fri, 10am-5pm, Sat, 10am-5pm, Sun, 11am-5pm.Opens today. Opens today. Runs until Aug 31.

industry. As we drove around last week, forests of non-native spruce – some felled, some not – would regularly hove into view.

As King says: “Although we often think of any trees as being ‘natural’, when it comes to non-native forestry plantations, there is no doubt that this land has been as industrialised as any quarry or built environment.”

There is an almost post-apocalyptic feel to devastated tracts of nature on our hillsides and King’s paintings of trees reminded me of the way in which you see a ghostly imprint in your mind’s eye when you get an eye-test. “That’s exactly

OLIVE

Emma Gannon

HarperCollins, priced £14.99

(ebook £6.99)

I was hooked straight away by the topics writer and broadcaster Emma Gannon covers in her first foray into fiction; particularly, how it’s still a ‘taboo’ for a woman to say she doesn’t want children. The story follows the eponymous character and her three best friends, Isla, Cecily and Bea. Moving between their 20s and present-day – as they navigate their early 30s – we see how their lives have taken very different paths. Gannon’s characters feel comfortingly familiar, and their various struggles many women will be able to identify with. I loved the exploration of how messy friendships can get, and how much warmth, empathy, and understanding Gannon displays throughout. My only criticism would be some plot developments felt a little rushed, the writing a little hurried. However, it was enjoyable and I devoured it in one weekend says it all.

GEORGIA HUMPHRIES

THE HUNGOVER GAMES Sophie Heawood

Jonathan Cape £14.99

(ebook £9.99)

Unexpectedly pregnant in Los Angeles, where she has been living in a bubble as a celebrity journalist, Sophie Heawood returns to the UK to have the baby. What follows next is a frank memoir about shedding one’s old life to nurture another, trying to date and hold down a freelance career while bringing up a newborn, with a few big-name interviews thrown in along the way. The brutal precision in which she describes prolonged singledom is so accurate it leaves the reader winded; the love for her daughter, sublime. This is in turns gorgeous, unflinching, tender, sad, affirming and cackle-worthy. You don’t need to be a mother for the razorsharp observations chronicled here to ring true.

JEMMA CREW