Which character from a book has stayed with you the longest?

Readers—in person, on social media and in the blogging world—often ask which book has moved me the most. Many have over the years, but there's one that has stayed with me since I read it in my late teens—Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant by Anne Tyler.

It wasn't the novel so much as one character: Ezra Tull. I really felt for him.

Film Review: Obsession and 9 novels with similar themes

I swore off horror films after watching The Exorcist as a teenager at a cousin’s place more than four decades ago. It scared the pants off me. What made it worse was returning home alone on the dark and rainy night. That resolution didn’t last very long. Over the years, I have watched horror films now and then, more out of morbid curiosity than any real liking for the genre. In my defence, I haven’t read too many horror novels, though William Peter Blatty's The Exorcist, on which the film was based, remains one of the best-known books in the genre. I haven't read it either.

Which brings me to Obsession, one of the most talked-about psychological horror films of 2026.

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New Fiction: Books about books, libraries and bookshops

There seems to be no shortage of novels about books, libraries, and bookshops. There is a growing audience for what might be called “books about books,” or bibliophilic fiction, as it’s also known. I have seen more films and television shows revolving around books and literary culture than I have read novels in this genre.

Below are only a few such books that caught my attention, though I haven't read any of them. There are many others in this ever-growing bookish genre—some I have read about, some of which are now on my TBR, and many I still have to discover.

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