Brilliant piece of journalism by Joan Didion Queen always delivers with razor-sharp, economical writing where every word lands.

In this piece, she recounts two harrowing weeks she and her husband John Dunne spent in El Salvador, capturing the culture of terror, the eeriness, and the constant sense of dread. The piece is filled with graphic, horrific imagery, including stories of body dumps, casual violence, and a country teetering on collapse. Didion admits several times how her own fear often kept her from probing too deeply. 

Ultimately, she delivers a sharp critique of U.S. foreign policy, exposing the arrogance of officials obsessed with appearances while chaos reigned around them.

A scattered memoir that took me almost a year to finish and only made me wish Terry had handed the pen to his mother. 

I came to this memoir hoping for personal, behind-the-scenes insight into Éamon de Valera's life from his son, but left feeling underwhelmed. 

While the writing is fine and there are moments of genuine interest, the book suffers from scattered chronology and all too frequent digressions. Terry de Valera often starts an intriguing anecdote about his father or another key figure from Irish history, only to veer off into unrelated side stories about distant Spanish or American relatives or minor acquaintances. 

Without a doubt, the extracts included from the diary of Sinéad DeValera –wife to Éamon and mother to Terry– were the strongest parts of the book. Her practicality and determination truly balanced her husband’s eccentricities and political savvy, adding a dimension to the De Valera story I hadn’t previously considered.

Hollywood's Eve is a biography of Eve Babitz that knowingly blurs the line between subject and writer. Normally, I am not a fan of biographers inserting themselves into the story, but it works here. 

Lili Anolik’s deep affection for Babitz and her work is obvious, and though this makes for an unabashedly subjective portrait, Anolik is very upfront about it.

The first half mythologises Babitz’s heyday as Los Angeles' ultimate it-girl: sex, drugs, rock and roll, famous lovers, and the iconic naked chess photo. Yet even within the glamour, Babitz remains a carefully crafted mystery. The second half shifts its focus to her complicated family relationships, addictions, eccentricities, and political turn towards the far right in later life. 

Overall, Babitz does not come across as especially likeable, either as a young woman or as she grows older, but that feels entirely the point. Anolik makes space for the idea that women do not need to be likeable or palatable to be interesting.

The only real flaw is the book’s persistent and rather unnecessary comparisons between Babitz and Joan Didion. To me, it felt like pitting two women against one another, with Anolik’s clear preference for Babitz occasionally grating. 

In the end, Hollywood's Eve made me want to revisit Babitz’s writing. My first reading of Slow Days, Fast Company left me unsure, but after this, I am tempted to give it another try.

The Enemy Within by Robert F. Kennedy is one of the best books I’ve read so far this year. It offers an in-depth, highly readable account of the Senate committee hearings into organised crime’s infiltration of American trade unions during the 1950s. The exploration of Jimmy Hoffa and the Teamsters is particularly fascinating. Hoffa comes alive on the page, a figure of bravado and slippery deflections, oddly reminiscent of certain contemporary political figures in the US (wink-wink, nudge-nudge)

If you’ve watched The Irishman, this serves as the perfect companion piece, offering a rich background on Hoffa, the Teamsters, and their Mafia connections. One of the book’s unexpected pleasures is Bobby Kennedy’s hilariously petty remarks about individuals such as Roy Cohn and others with whom he had infamous rivalries. If you’ve read other books on the Kennedys, these moments are oddly iconic!

The book also provides valuable insight into how complex investigations come together, with lawyers, investigators, accountants, and law enforcement all playing their part. It sheds light on the early formation of relationships between the Kennedy Brothers and unions such as the UAW. These ties would go on to quietly influence future campaigns. 

Additionally, it’s fascinating to see how the committee became increasingly politicised as the presidential election approached, with Republicans seeking to discredit pro-Democrat unions as figures like Goldwater and McGovern emerged on the scene.

Altogether, it’s a layered, sharp, and revealing read that brilliantly captures both the public spectacle and private rivalries of the era. 

So, so good!

Liar’s Poker is the second Michael Lewis book I’ve read, and while I liked it a lot, it didn’t hit quite as hard as The Big Short. 

Overall, it’s a super interesting, darkly humorous look into the hyper-masculine, frat-like culture of Wall Street in the 1980s, particularly inside Salomon Brothers before Warren Buffett’s era. Lewis, fresh from college, gives sharp, entertaining insight into the firm’s ruthless interview and hazing process. It’s a wild, ridiculous, and revealing read that makes total sense of how things went so wrong in the years that followed.

This was recommended to me by a college lecturer after finishing a finance module called 'Risk Management and Derivative Markets', and it’s been a brilliant read. 

The Big Short by Michael Lewis offers a fascinating, sometimes darkly funny look at the 2008 financial crash. It follows people like Michael Burry, Steve Eisman, and Vinny Daniels — outsiders who spotted the looming collapse while everyone else missed it. 

Lewis does a great job making complicated financial concepts like credit default swaps and subprime mortgages clear and engaging. It’s a sharp, insightful book that’s both educational and surprisingly entertaining. A must-read if you're interested in finance, risk, or how markets can fail so spectacularly. It really was such a wild time.