Glee star Chris Colfer has signed a book deal.

When I have a spare half hour to browse in my local independent bookshop, it's usually a combination of the cover and the title that tempts me to pick up something new.

Read extracts from the new book by Lesley Elliott, detailing the life and death of daughter Sophie, killed in a frenzied attack...

With a new cookbook out, one half of Two Fat Ladies, Clarissa Dickson Wright, is happy.

Despite the glowing book-jacket recommendations from writers much loftier than me, I started out disliking Elizabeth Day's début novel, Scissors Paper Stone.

Geraldine Brooks ‘talks’ to the ghosts of the past. Bron Sibree reports.

One of the most interesting things about reading a historical novel is working out what period detailing preoccupies the novelist and is used as a means of anchoring it to its era.

Never mind its unappealing cover, this debut kids' novel is bound to enchant adults, too.

It's hard to think of a recent debut novel as original and ambitious in its premise - or as successful in its execution - as S.J. Watson's Before I Go to Sleep.

David Hartnell has recently released his autobiography, Memoirs Of A Gossip Columnist (Penguin, $45).

There seems to be a trend for long titles with meanings that remain obscure until you've read a decent chunk of the book.

Commonplace books are literary scrapbooks - "salads of many herbs" as one compiler put it. They are eclectic, idiosyncratic repositories of bits and pieces that have taken a person's fancy.

Edna O'Brien turned 80 last year. The energy and immediacy of these 11 stories makes that hard to believe.

Filming began in Bougainville today for Mr Pip, the movie based on the novel by New Zealander Lloyd Jones.

Monica Ali's new novel is unconvincing but entertaining. Where would Princess Diana be now if she faked her death?

The opening of Jane Harris' second novel gives little indication of how dark it will become.

Jeanette Aplin lives with her husband on remote D'Urville Island in the Marlborough Sounds, and has recently written about raising kune kune pigs there in The Price of Bacon (Cape Catley).

Anne and David Norman will have their work cut out in turning the Whitcoulls and Borders book retailing chains around.

A good cookbook can open up a world of possibilities for a passionate foodie - and can document their culinary history.