Author:Paul Mason,Paul Mason
Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable, audiobook edition of PostCapitalism, written and read by Paul Mason.
'The most important book about our economy and society to be published in my lifetime' Irvine Welsh
From Paul Mason, the award-winning Channel 4 presenter, Postcapitalism is a guide to our era of seismic economic change, and how we can build a more equal society.
Over the past two centuries or so, capitalism has undergone continual change - economic cycles that lurch from boom to bust - and has always emerged transformed and strengthened. Surveying this turbulent history, Paul Mason wonders whether today we are on the brink of a change so big, so profound, that this time capitalism itself, the immensely complex system by which entire societies function, has reached its limits and is changing into something wholly new.
At the heart of this change is information technology: a revolution that, as Mason shows, has the potential to reshape utterly our familiar notions of work, production and value; and to destroy an economy based on markets and private ownership - in fact, he contends, it is already doing so.
In this groundbreaking, Sunday Times top ten book, Mason shows how, from the ashes of the recent financial crisis, we have the chance to create a more socially just and sustainable global economy.
His stories are full of characters poisoned by things left unsaid, or situations misread... an interior state of mind is beautifully translated into memorable yet familiar imagery... a ring of interior psychological veracity.
—— Nicholas Lezard , The GuardianThe most exciting book I have ever read ... a feverish, fascinating novel.
—— Antony Beevor , Sunday TelegraphCalvino was drawn to narratives as pure and potent objects; in this collection, he examines but does not deconstruct them . . . There is the author's trademark ironic distance and careful wit, as well as tinges of surrealism. But, where the mature Calvino found a style that was supremely arch, alien, and spare, his more mimetic stories retain the funk of the human . . . The reader of Last Comes the Raven registers a bloom of social feelings: sympathy, recognition, curiosity
—— New YorkerIt is impossible to understand the soul of Japan without reading Yasunari Kawabata. Snow Country is his greatest hit, a beautiful novel that both reflected and shaped Japanese culture, but The Rainbow - translated into English for the first time - is Kawabata's missing classic. The Rainbow is where modern Japan begins - a nation born again in the shadow of the nuclear mushroom cloud, and in its bitter-sweet tale of two sisters is also the story of a nation struggling to find a way to live in the rubble and ruins. As always with Japan's greatest novelist, his themes - the bonds of family, wounds that will never heal , love that endures and loser boyfriends - are painfully universal. A book for anyone who loves Japan, or great story-telling, or both. Dazzling, brilliant, unmissable.
—— Tony ParsonsKawabata's novels are among the most affecting and original works of our time
—— The New York Times Book ReviewKawabata is a poet of the gentlest shades, of the evanescent, the imperceptible
—— CommonwealHe will continue to glitter, this strange, lonely prospector in the universe of words, well into the next millennium and after, a master in the empire of the imagination
—— IndependentA writer of dizzying ambition and variety, each of his stories is a fresh adventure into the possibilities of fiction
—— GuardianThis set of interweaving short stories is a perfect way to get a more bite-sized read... There's a story in here that everyone can relate to
—— Woman & HomeThe inimitable author of The Handmaid's Tail is spectacular at short stories
—— iAtwood...writes infectiously... page after page proving that...[her] lavish literary talents remain wholly undiminished
—— Reader's Digest[Old Babes in the Wood] showcase[s] Atwood's spiky wit and imagination
—— Sunday ExpressThe 15 stories in this collection from the stellar Margaret Atwood are book-ended by the touching, tender, grief-tinged tales of Tig and Nell
—— Eithne Farry , Daily MailThere are authors we turn to because they can uncannily predict our future; there are authors we need for their skillful diagnosis of our present; and there are authors we love because they can explain our past. And then there are the outliers: those who gift us with timelines other than the one we're stuck in, realities far from home. If anyone has proved, over the course of a long and wildly diverse career, that she can be all four, it's Margaret Atwood . . . Long may she reign
—— New York Times Book ReviewAs affecting as any of Atwood's strongest work
—— WiredIn Old Babes in the Wood, Margaret Atwood delivers her signature sci-fi with a human heart. It is a story collection that teems with playfulness and invention... reminding us of her skill in the short form
—— Emily Watkins , iA highly personal collection
—— Lisa O'Kelly , ObserverThe Tig and Nell stories... are subtle and poignant, written in grief and from the heart
—— The OldieDevastating and thought-provoking in equal measure, you will find yourself thoroughly entertained - and we're sure you'll return to these again and again
—— GlamourAtwood brings her trademark wit and invention to bear on subjects as diverse as a pandemic, cancel culture, female friendship, witchcraft - and cats
—— ObserverOld Babes in the Wood... [is] a clear demonstration of her prevailing skill as a writer
—— Arts DeskAs her short story collection Old Babes in the Wood debuts at the top of the fiction chart, Margaret Atwood can rest assured that she has reached literary legend status. It was one thing for The Handmaid's Tale to make it to No 1, but quite another for stories narrated by snails and aliens to do it
—— The Sunday TimesHer latest collection of short stories... proves once again she's also an impassioned observer of everyday people and their struggles, with a hilarious sense of humour
—— RTE *Book Of The Week*Each [story] is interesting in its own right...Atwood's imagination and mastery of storytelling is evident
—— UK Press Syndication[A] writer who is still so sparky and brilliant in the sudden ways she tips you into despair or delight. Whatever she's up to, I'll take more if it's going
—— Alys Key , SpectatorQuietly devastating
—— Suzi Feay , The TabletAny new publication by the estimable Atwood...is an event and this collection of 15 short stories is no exception
—— Evening StandardBracing, darkly funny and cheerfully unsentimental
—— Guardian, *Summer Reads of 2023*[A] masterclass in writing about the edges of everyday life. This collection of short stories that all link to the Sunshine State captures loneliness, alienation, abandonment and inner resourcefulness in the most creative of tales.
—— Victoria SadlerFantastical tales ... You'll be swept up in a wild hurricane of a ride with this lyrical stories of fury and love, loss and hope.
—— NewsweekEach story is perfectly formed, exquisite, often troubling but there is something so brilliantly humane about her work.
—— Kate Hamer, Wales Art Review