Melania Trump book donation rejected by school librarian

Massachusetts librarian turns down the first lady’s offer of Dr Seuss books, saying they should go to less privileged communities

A school librarian has declared that she would not like a selection of Dr Seuss classics here, there or anywhere, after refusing books donated by Melania Trump.

Trump had sent a collection of 10 Seuss books, including The Cat in the Hat and Green Eggs and Ham, to schools across the country to mark National Read a Book Day. One school in each state, identified by the US department of education as having achieved high standards of excellence, received a package along with a letter signed by the first lady telling pupils that “the key to achieving your dreams begins with learning to read”.

Many people are unaware that Dr Seuss’s illustrations are steeped in racist propaganda and harmful stereotypes

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Stephen King's It scares off The Exorcist to become highest-grossing horror ever

The adaptation of King’s demonic clown story crosses $500m mark at the global box office as studio fast-tracks sequel

Stephen King’s It has broken the 44-year record set by The Exorcist to become the highest-grossing horror film of all time.

Warner Bros announced Thursday that the film, an adaptation of King’s novel about a child-devouring clown, had crossed the $500m (£399m) mark at the global box office, besting the $441m total made by The Exorcist. It had already set the record for a horror film in 17 territories, including the US, the UK and Australia.

Related: It review – a feast of scary Stephen King, plus the haunted kitchen sink

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The Growing Season by Helen Sedgwick review – if pregnancy were shared between the sexes …

Women are released from the agonies and inconveniences of biology in this compelling what-if about the female body, technology and power

The most obvious sign that The Growing Season takes place in an alternate reality is the pouches. In our world, reproductive technology has remained stubbornly reliant on female bodies to carry foetuses to term. In Helen Sedgwick’s speculative fiction, all that changed sometime in the 1970s, when pioneering Holly Bhattacharya and her husband Will became parents to the first child born from a prosthetic womb – the pouch.

By the 2016 present of the novel, the pouch is ubiquitous, promoted and administered by a company called FullLife. In her plush dynastic home, Holly, now 76, awaits the pouch-assisted birth of her first great-grandchild. Meanwhile in a run-down office, the last reserve of anti-pouch activism surrenders, as middle-aged Eva, who inherited the cause from her mother Avigail, shuts up shop for good. FullLife has won: the pouch is what people want.

The pouch means that gay couples and single parents can have children exactly like straight couples

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Marcel Proust paid for reviews praising his work to go into newspapers

Novelist paid for flattering reviews of Swann’s Way to go on front pages of French newspapers, as revealed in letters to be auctioned by Sotheby’s

The French writer Marcel Proust paid for glowing reviews of the first volume of his “Remembrance of Things Past” to be put into newspapers, letters by the great author reveal.

The novelist wrote the notices himself and sent them to be typed up by his publisher “so there is no trace of my handwriting” to distance himself “absolutely from the money that will change hands”.

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MI6 boss: George Smiley a better role model for agents than James Bond

Sir Alex Younger, known in agency circles as C, says 007’s ‘brash antics’ give a misleading portrayal of life in the service

John Le Carre’s fictional spymaster George Smiley is a far better role model for agents than James Bond, whose “brash antics” and maverick behaviour give a misleading portrayal of life in the service, according to the chief of MI6.

Sir Alex Younger, also known in agency circles as C, was responding to an article about spies in the Economist in which he said he was determined to single out the merits of what he considered to be appropriate characters in fiction.

Related: Bond and Smiley should be retired: it's time for working-class spy fiction

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Mad Men restaurant and Hunger Games bakery to open in Times Square

Lionsgate has announced a new indoor entertainment center to launch in New York in 2019 with a range of attractions inspired by its films and TV shows

Lionsgate has announced a new indoor entertainment center that will bring themed attractions to Times Square in 2019.

Related: A Hunger Games theme park? Why not The Human Centipede, too?

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'Sexists need not apply': publisher refuses to look at manuscripts addressed to 'Dear sirs'

Women behind Irish independent Tramp Press say they will no longer consider submissions from authors who assume they are men, or list only male influences

“Sexists need not apply” to the “dreaded women” who run Tramp Press, say the trail-blazing Irish independent publisher, which has announced it is closing its doors to “overtly sexist” submissions from writers who address them as “Dear Sirs”, or list only male influences.

The small press announced the change to its submission guidelines on social media. “We at Tramp experience sexism in lots of ways all the time, being dreaded women,” wrote Sarah Davis-Goff and Lisa Coen. “One really annoying way we experience it is when authors send us their manuscripts and do one or both of the following: 1. Addressing us as ‘Dear Sirs’ and 2. Sending us a cover letter in which they declare they do not read books by women.”

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OUP responds to Biff, Chip and Kipper book 'cottaging' controversy

Publisher says its books ‘are created with utmost thought and consideration’, after Twitter user highlights apparently dubious scene

Oxford University Press has moved to reassure parents that its books “are created with the utmost thought and consideration” following a social media storm over an apparent cottaging scene in a Biff, Chip and Kipper title.

Earlier this week, Twitter user Ed Brody highlighted the “somewhat dubious scenes spotted in the background of a friend’s 4yo’s school book”. The first image tweeted by Brody, from one of the Oxford Reading Tree’s Biff, Chip and Kipper titles, shows a group of men at the back of the picture discussing something by a bush. The second shows an old woman looking behind the bush and reacting in shock to what she sees.

Somewhat dubious scenes spotted in the background of a friend's 4yo's school book http://pic.twitter.com/opF9ogsQwO

I noticed this as a kid in 'Where's Waldo' http://pic.twitter.com/uDFs27ZL0f

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Appeal launched to collect poetry in endangered languages

Marking the UK’s National Poetry Day, an international call for readers to submit poems that could be lost to future generations has gone out

From Assyrian to Irish Gaelic, the National Poetry Library is launching a major new project to collect the poetry of thousands of languages in danger of dying out, and preserve them for future generations.

According to Unesco, of the 7,000 languages spoken in the world more than half are endangered, with one dying every two weeks. For the library, Chris McCabe said: “By the end of the century, Unesco estimates that half of our languages will be lost, and when languages go, their poetry goes too.”

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Isobelle Carmody on Daniel Findlay's 'novel of revelation'

The acclaimed fantasy author dives into the apocalyptic world of Findlay’s ambitious first novel, Year of the Orphan

I have always been fascinated by apocalyptic visions, as a writer and as a reader.

I wrote my first novel, set after an apocalypse, at 14. I wanted to find out if I could believe that humans would evolve morally and ethically after an ultimate lesson. But, at its most profound level, the novel expressed and explored my confusion and grief at my father’s death and the drunk driver who killed him. The fictional apocalypse I imagined is effectively my father’s death. What could be more like an apocalypse for a child, after all, than the death of a beloved parent?

Related: Toni Jordan on her favourite new writer: ‘You should be reading Briohny Doyle’

Related: The big book about small town Australia that travelled the world

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Natalie Portman in first trailer of Alex Garland's sci-fi thriller Annihilation

Portman plays a biologist looking for answers to her husband’s strange condition in the hotly-anticipated new film from the Ex Machina director

The first footage from Annihilation, the new thriller from Ex Machina director Alex Garland, has hit the internet. Starring Natalie Portman, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Oscar Isaac, Annihilation is adapted from the award-winning novel by Jeff VanderMeer about a biologist who embarks on a research expedition after her husband returns from a similar one in a bizarrely altered state.

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Naomi Klein: Trump's like the fatberg – horrible, noxious, hard to dislodge

• Author tells Labour conference Trump is political equivalent of fatberg
• Mass of fat and sanitary products found earlier this month one of biggest ever

The author and journalist Naomi Klein has likened Donald Trump to a “fatberg”, a congealed lump of fat and sanitary products that causes dangerous blockages in sewers.

Related: 'Total monster': fatberg blocks London sewage system

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Book of Mormon sets new record for most expensive manuscript ever sold

Founding text of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints returned to followers of Joseph Smith for $35m

The printer’s manuscript of the Book of Mormon has been sold to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) for $35m (£26m), setting what is believed to be a new record for the most expensive manuscript ever sold.

Related: Dissatisfied liberal Mormons find refuge in the Community of Christ

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Kingsman: The Golden Circle spies an opportunity at the UK box office – and grabs It

Matthew Vaughn’s spy caper sequel opens bigger than a string of 2017 summer blockbusters; while Stephen King horror drops into second place

The reviews may have been mixed, but producer-director-writer Matthew Vaughn once again demonstrates his savvy populist instinct. The darkly comic spy adventure opens in the UK with £6.2m, with Wednesday and Thursday previews taking that tally to a five-day £8.53m. This compares with a £3.56m debut for 2015’s Kingsman: The Secret Service, or £4.24m including previews.

Related: Kingsman: The Golden Circle – did the shock tactics go too far? Discuss with spoilers

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Charlie and the Chocolate Factory began as 'anti-racist novel', claims academic

Roald Dahl’s early draft portrayed Charlie as a black boy who gets trapped in a chocolate mould, which researcher says was an image of stifling prejudice

An early draft of Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory not only starred a black version of Charlie Bucket, it saw the character trapped in a life-size chocolate mould of a boy as a “metaphor for racial stereotype”, according to research by an American academic.

Dahl’s widow, Liccy Dahl, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme last week of how her husband had wanted Charlie to be “a little black boy”. His biographer, Donald Sturrock, added that the idea had been rejected by Dahl’s agent, but no further details were provided about the discarded storyline.

Related: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory hero 'was originally black'

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Australian writers urge yes vote in same-sex marriage survey

An open letter signed by more than 100 authors including JM Coetzee, David Malouf and Helen Garner encourages support for ‘equality and social reform’

More than 100 prominent Australian authors including JM Coetzee, David Malouf and Helen Garner have put their names to an open letter urging Australians to vote yes in the same-sex marriage postal survey, in what they called “the interest of fairness, equality and social reform”.

Peter Rose, editor of Australian Book Review, contacted a host of names from Australia’s arts community following the high court’s decision earlier this month to allow the federal government’s postal vote to go ahead. With voting now well under way – and a decisive lead currently held by the yes side, according to a Guardian Essential poll – the literary journal has published the letter to its readers, signed by names including actor and writer Magda Szubanski, ballet dancer and author of Mao’s Last Dancer Li Cunxin, and the authors Geraldine Brooks, Michelle de Kretser, Kate Grenville and Christos Tsiolkas.

Related: 'It brings a tear to my eye': the labours of love battling the vitriol of the marriage campaign

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Sleeping Beauties by Stephen & Owen King review – King Sr’s return to form

The master of horror collaborates with his son on this epic, colourful story of global pandemic, and shows a youthful vigour not seen in years

The Aurora virus is a pandemic that drops on the world like some fairytale enchantment. It seals the women inside fibrous cocoons and leaves the men in a state of bull-headed disarray. There are riots outside the White House; an apocalyptic gang war in the streets of Chicago. Meanwhile, in Dooling, West Virginia, the battle of the sexes boils down to a joust between Clinton Norcross, a harried prison psychiatrist, and Evie Black, a supernatural girl drifter, incarcerated for the murder of a pair of crystal meth cookers. The clock is ticking, the end is nigh, and yet these two remain locked in their Mars-versus-Venus dispute. “We could go on like this for ever,” Evie sighs in her cell. “He said, she said. The oldest story in the universe.”

While the entertaining Sleeping Beauties – written by Stephen King in tandem with his novelist son, Owen – doesn’t quite last for ever, its allegorical drama extends across 736 pages. It’s a bulging, colourful epic; a super-sized happy meal, liberally salted with supporting characters and garnished with splashes of arterial ketchup. These women are sleeping but they must not be disturbed. Tear off the cocoon and the females awaken as zombies, or possibly as angels of vengeance, and immediately start murdering their husbands and sons. Evie – whom the Kings refer to as “the black angel” – clearly regards this response as a kind of cosmic payback. It may even be that she is pulling the strings from afar.

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Why I put Dad in old socks for his funeral | Brief letters

Jasper Johns’ Flag | Predictive power of The Space Merchants | Reasons to read Proust | Dress-down corpses | The best sort of meeting

Though Adrian Searle is correct to say that Jasper Johns’ Flag is not a painting of a flag, it is less of a flag than he suggests (Flagging up conundrum of a complicated painter, 20 September). Johns’ brilliant work, which raises many important questions about art, is no more a flag than Constable’s Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows is the Wiltshire countryside. It is perhaps more helpful to think of representational paintings as being from things rather than of things.
David Ainley
Matlock, Derbyshire

• Amy Fleming’s article on lab-grown meat and fish (Is ‘Frankenfish’ the start of a food revolution?, G2, 21 September) illustrates once again the predictive power of Pohl and Kornbluth’s 1953 SF novel The Space Merchants. They called the non-animal meat plant “Chicken Little”. Their main prediction, of corporations ruling the world, becomes more accurate each year.
John Wilson
London

Related: Jonathan Franzen: 'The book that had the greatest influence on my writing? CS Lewis's Narnia'

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Banned Books Week: 'In 2017, censorship comes from an outraged public'

As right-to-read celebration begins, campaigners says authors must resist pressure from ‘online mob’ to avoid controversial topics like sex and race

In the 17th century, William Prynne’s cheeks were branded with the letters SL, standing for “seditious libeler” after he published pamphlets critical of Anglican clergymen. Such punishments are long gone in the UK and US, but as this year’s Banned Books Week gets under way, the chief executive of Index on Censorship has warned that the “anger of the mob” online has spawned a new, modern kind of censorship – particularly when it comes to young readers.

“There is a really worrying trend of popular pressure forcing children’s books off shelves,” said Jodie Ginsberg of the campaign group, which is part of a coalition of UK organisations staging events, panels and discussions to mark the annual celebration of the right to read.

Related: The real censorship in children's books: smiling slaves is just the half of it

Almost all of the challenged books are flagged because of sexual content... the only exception is Bill Cosby

Related: My trans picture book was challenged – but the answer to hate speech is more speech

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Is Tintin a girl? Philosopher says his theory was 'fake news'

After media fuss, Vincent Cespede says playful suggestion that Hergé’s boy detective was a young girl was merely ‘rethinking from another point of view’

A French philosopher, who made headlines worldwide last week after writing that he believed the boy detective Tintin was actually a girl, has said that it was a thought experiment and that the media ran it despite being told it was fake news.

“For his creator, Tintin [had] always been a young girl. An androgynous redhead with blue eyes, and probably asexual,” wrote Vincent Cespedes on Facebook last week. “Hergé would still be sniggering to find that 30 years after his death and 80 years after the first appearance of Tintin in the Land of the Soviets, the whole world still believed that his ‘tomboy’ – as he called the character in front of the few friends who were in on the joke – is well and truly a real boy.”

Related: Tintin: Hergé's masterpiece – in pictures

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Michael Ondaatje opens archive to reveal his writing methods

Author’s papers, acquired by the Harry Ransom Center in Texas, include a photograph that formed the basis of one of the scenes in The English Patient

An image of a drunken Oxford party that Michael Ondaatje clipped from a magazine and stuck into a notebook would, years later, inspire a scene in The English Patient, according to the novelist’s archives, which have just been acquired by the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin.

Ondaatje, in an interview with the Center’s director Stephen Ennis, said he writes around four drafts of a book by hand before moving it on to a typewriter or computer and then “reworking it, printing it out, rewriting it by hand”.

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Annie Proulx wins high honour for writing on 'the beauty of rural America'

The Shipping News author joins previous winners of the National Book Foundation’s award such as Toni Morrison, Elmore Leonard and Norman Mailer

The Shipping News author Annie Proulx has been named as the latest recipient of one of the highest honours in US fiction, the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, and praised for her “deep reverence for the beauty and complexities of rural America”.

The medal, which recognises “a lifetime of literary achievement”, has been awarded to authors including Elmore Leonard, Norman Mailer, Toni Morrison and Judy Blume. Authors are put forward for the $10,000 (£7,300) honour by US literary experts, with the National Book Foundation’s board of directors making the final choice. Chair David Steinberger said that Proulx’s work was “widely loved and uniquely significant”, and that “her commitment to crafting compassionate, honest stories has left an indelible mark on literature and created a powerful and enduring legacy”.

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The Good Immigrant's editor plans new journal and agency for writers of colour

Nikesh Shukla and literary agent Julia Kingford have launched Kickstarter appeal to fund The Good Journal, with further plans for an affiliated agency

After selling more than 50,000 copies and being named the British public’s favourite book of 2016, the success of anthology The Good Immigrant has prompted the launch of a new literary journal to showcase British writers of colour.

The book’s editor, Nikesh Shukla, published the collection of essays on race and immigration after crowdfunding the project with support from big names such as JK Rowling and thousands of pledges from the public. Its success has, said Shukla, been so phenomenal that he and the literary agent Julia Kingsford are now looking to raise £40,000 on Kickstarter to publish a new quarterly, The Good Journal.

Related: The Good Immigrant: why BAME writers are 'done justifying our place at the table'

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Husband's elegy for Jenny Diski wins Forward prize for best single poem

Ian Patterson’s The Plenty of Nothing, begun in the days leading up to her death, shares honours with best collection win for Sinéad Morrissey’s On Balance

Ian Patterson’s elegy for his late wife, the writer Jenny Diski, which he began writing in the days leading up to her death, has won the Forward prize for best single poem.

Related: Jenny Diski obituary

Related: Night Sky with Exit Wounds by Ocean Vuong review – violence, delicacy and timeless imagery

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Zadie Smith says using social media would threaten her writing

Novelist tells interviewer that avoiding Twitter and Instagram protects her ‘right to be wrong’, which would be inhibited by instant public reaction

Zadie Smith has spoken of how staying away from social media gives her “the right to be wrong” without fearing other people’s reactions, saying that if she knew readers’ reactions to her work, she wouldn’t be able to write.

At a live event with the New Yorker writer Jia Tolentino in New York, the British novelist said: “Because I’m not on Twitter, I’m not on Instagram, I’m not on the internet, I never hear people shouting at me.”

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Hillary Clinton's What Happened sells 300,000 copies in first week

Clinton’s memoir and election postmortem has enjoyed the biggest debut for a nonfiction book in five years

Hillary Clinton’s memoir, titled What Happened, had a hugely successful debut, with publisher Simon & Schuster reporting that the book has sold 300,000 copies since its release on 12 September.

Related: What Happened by Hillary Rodham Clinton review – no twinge of remorse

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'A vote for freedom': Jacob Rees-Mogg joins Lionel Shriver and Matt Haig in Brexit anthology

In Goodbye, Europe, a forthcoming collection of essays and stories, the Eurosceptic backbencher says ‘it was bold of the electorate to ignore the experts’

Jacob Rees-Mogg has contributed to a forthcoming literary anthology about Britain’s exit from the European Union, with the Eurosceptic backbencher’s unlikely voice joining those of authors including Ian Rankin, Sarah Perry and Lionel Shriver.

Publisher Orion has gathered 46 contributors for its collection Goodbye, Europe, out on 16 November. A mix of letters, fiction, illustrations and reminiscences, it is described by the publisher as an examination of “the political, emotional, historical, gastronomic and cultural influence of Europe on the United Kingdom”.

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Testosterone Rex triumphs as Royal Society science book of the year

Psychologist Cordelia Fine’s dissection of the myths that sustain assumptions about sexual difference acclaimed by judges as ‘a cracking critique’

A book that rubbishes the idea of “fundamental” differences between men and women has become the 30th winner of the prestigious Royal Society prize for science book of the year.

Related: Testosterone Rex by Cordelia Fine review – the question of men’s and women’s brains

Related: Why Testosterone Rex is extinct | Cordelia Fine

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Snobbish about TV? It is your loss, Benedict Cumberbatch tells actors

Lines are ‘beautifully blurred now between what big- and small-screen is’ says star ahead of Sunday night BBC1 drama

There is now such a blur between film and TV that if any actor remains snobbish about the small-screen medium, “it is their loss”, Benedict Cumberbatch has said.

Cumberbatch was speaking after the first screening of the new BBC1 drama The Child in Time, in which he stars. The one-off drama – an adaptation of Ian McEwan’s 1987 Whitbread award-winning novel – is due to air on Sunday 24 September.

Related: The Current War review – Benedict Cumberbatch transmits medium voltage portrait of Thomas Edison

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‘So many different types of strange’: how Nnedi Okorafor is changing the face of sci-fi

With a Marvel comic under her belt and a novel being adapted for TV by HBO, the Nigerian-American writer is flying the flag for black, female geeks

As the science fiction novelist Nnedi Okorafor takes to the stage at the TEDGlobal conference in Tanzania, she challenges stereotypes before she has said a word. The 43-year-old writer who won the 2016 Hugo award (the Oscars of the sci-fi world) for best novella doesn’t look like much of a geek. Yes, she wears oversized glasses, but Okorafor’s specs are trendy, royal-blue Cat-Eyes, not wiry aviators. And, crucially, she happens to be a black woman.

The Nigerian-American’s success has been applauded as a victory by a community that has long cheered her on from the margins. So when she tweeted on 11 August that she was working on her first project with the comic publisher Marvel, fans were thrilled. (“A Marvel story. Written by a Nigerian woman. Set in Lagos. Superhero’s name: NGOZI. What a time to be alive,” wrote one fan on Twitter) And with a novel, Who Fears Death, to be adapted for TV by HBO (George RR Martin is its executive producer) Okorafor is about to go from the solitary geek reference-point for young African women to everybody’s favourite new sci-fi writer.

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On eve of trial, Ahmet Altan writes how imagination sustains him in Turkish jail

Essay describes the novelist’s strict isolation as he awaits judgment on charges condemned by PEN as punishment for his criticism of Turkish government

The prominent Turkish novelist Ahmet Altan has written an essay from his prison cell on the eve of his trial, describing his detention in a high-security jail where he is forbidden to send “even a two-line letter to my loved ones”.

Altan, the author of 10 acclaimed novels that have been translated around the world, as well as essays and journalism, was arrested last September following the attempted coup in Turkey in July 2016. Charges against him include “giving subliminal messages in favour of a coup on television”, “membership of a terrorist organisation” and “attempting to overthrow the government”. Altan faces a possible life sentence if he is found guilty of the charges.

Related: One year after the failed coup in Turkey, the crackdown continues

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BBC national short story award shortlist offers a 'festival of ideas'

Work by Will Eaves, Jenni Fagan, Cynan Jones, Benjamin Markovits and Helen Oyeyemi now in line for £15,000 annual prize

Judges for the BBC national short story award have announced a shortlist for 2017 that is “enduring, bold, humane and moving”, with work from five acclaimed writers now in line for the £15,000 award.

Will Eaves’s “quiet and horrifying” Murmur, about a gay academic who is convicted for gross indecency, was inspired by the real-life tragedy of Alan Turing. Eaves, a novelist, poet and former arts editor of the Times Literary Supplement, is one of the finalists for the prize, which has been won in the past by authors including Sarah Hall, Julian Gough and David Constantine. More than 600 stories were submitted, with judges unaware of the authors’ names until they made their selection.

Related: Top 10 contemporary short stories

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National Book Awards 2017 finalists announced

The longlist for the biggest prize in American literature includes previous finalists Jesmyn Award and Jennifer Egan, as well as a host of debut authors

The longlist for the 2017 National Book Award for fiction was announced on Friday, with ten contenders vying for one of the highest honors in American literature.

The list includes two previous NBA honorees, including Jesmyn Ward, who won the fiction prize in 2011, and Jennifer Egan, who was a finalist in the category in 2001. This year’s list, which includes eight women and two men, features fiction of various ilks, including two short-story collections and a number of debut honorees. Six years ago, Jesmyn Ward won the award for her novel Salvage the Bones, about a fictitious Mississippi town affected by Hurricane Katrina.

Related: Jennifer Egan: ‘Writing is an act of faith’ against the rise of technology

Related: Terry Pratchett exhibition offers peek into writer's own world

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Terry Pratchett exhibition offers peek into writer's own world

Reconstruction of room where Discworld novels were written is centrepiece of show that proves as eclectic as writer himself

The objects on display range from the cosy and nostalgic, such as Terry Pratchett’s Blue Peter badge, to the grand: a gleaming sword infused with shards of meteorite created by the author himself to commemorate his own knighthood.

Fans will, no doubt, love the vivid, original paintings of Pratchett’s beloved Discworld characters and the chance, for the first time, to peek inside a detailed reconstruction of his study, nicknamed The Chapel.

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The Journey carries off £5,000 Klaus Fugge picture-book award

Francesca Sanna’s illustrated story, inspired by her meetings with refugees, ‘will move all readers, whatever their age’

From Julia Donaldson’s mouse who “took a stroll through the deep dark wood” to the classic Rosie’s Walk, the journey is an archetype of children’s literature. The Italian artist Francesca Sanna, however, who has won the 2017 Klaus Flugge prize for most exciting newcomer to children’s picture book illustration, chose a rather tougher trek for her debut title: that of a mother and her two children who are fleeing a war.

Sanna’s The Journey opens with an ordinary family playing on a beach by the city, using images that are redolent of classic fairytales, and simple text told from a child’s perspective. But “one day the war took my father”, and eventually the mother takes her children away to what she tells them will be a “safe place”. They face hurdles – an angry border guard, magnified to the size of a monster, turns them back; they hide in the forest; they cross the sea. “There is not much space and it rains every day, but we tell each other stories. Tales of terrible and dangerous monsters that hide beneath our boat ready to gobble us up if the boat capsizes!”

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The endless adaptability of Philip K Dick

From the new Blade Runner to Channel 4’s Electric Dreams, the insatiable hunger for ‘PKD’ stories on screen shows no sign of abating

With the Channel 4 series of dramas based on his short stories starting, Philip K Dick has cemented his reputation as one of the most adapted science fiction authors of the modern age.

The most famous big-screen outing of recent years was Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner, released in 1982, the year the author died. But there has also been Total Recall, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger (and its 2012 remake); Minority Report (2002), with Tom Cruise; the Richard Linklater “rotoscoped” version of A Scanner Darkly, which overlayed animation on live-action footage of Keanu Reeves; and 2011’s The Adjustment Bureau.

Related: Black Mirror review – Charlie Brooker's splashy new series is still a sinister marvel

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Amazon redacts one-star reviews of Hillary Clinton's What Happened

Hundreds of damning verdicts on memoir of 2016 presidential race, posted within hours of publication, have been removed by the online bookseller

Hundreds of one-star reviews of Hillary Clinton’s memoir What Happened, which appeared online within hours of the 512-page book’s publication, have been removed from Amazon.

What Happened, in which Clinton gives her account of the 2016 presidential campaign, was published on Tuesday. By Wednesday morning, there were more than 1,500 reviews of the novel on Amazon.com, the majority either glowing or scathing.

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Jane Austen £10 note campaigner will donate first one to shelter

Caroline Criado-Perez, who forced Bank of England to put a woman on new banknote, says it will feel amazing to hold one

A campaigner who forced the Bank of England to have female representation on banknotes has pledged to donate her first Jane Austen tenner to a women’s shelter as the new plastic currency enters circulation.

Caroline Criado-Perez threatened to take the Bank to court for discrimination when the former governor Mervyn King announced that it was phasing out paper fivers featuring the prison reformer Elizabeth Fry, the only woman other than the Queen to feature on legal tender.

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Charlie and the Chocolate Factory hero 'was originally black'

Roald Dahl’s widow and biographer say first Charlie was black but writer was persuaded to make him white

Roald Dahl originally wanted the eponymous hero of his much-loved children’s book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory to be black, his widow has said.

In an interview with BBC Radio 4’s Today programme for Roald Dahl day on Wednesday, Liccy Dahl said: “His first Charlie that he wrote about was a little black boy.”

Roald Dahl originally wanted Charlie from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory to be black #r4today http://pic.twitter.com/h2P4NkI78f

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Man Booker prize 2017: shortlist makes room for debuts alongside big names

George Saunders, Fiona Mozley and Emily Fridlund are nominated for their first novels, alongside new books from Ali Smith and Paul Auster

American heavyweights Paul Auster and George Saunders are to go head to head on the Man Booker prize shortlist, as major names from British fiction fall by the wayside.

This year’s judges, chaired by Baroness Lola Young, announced their shortlist of six titles this morning. Alongside Auster and Saunders, the 29-year-old British debut novelist Fiona Mozley has secured a place in the final line-up, as has Ali Smith, who is shortlisted for the Booker for the fourth time with her post-Brexit novel Autumn. But a host of award-winning writers failed to make the cut, with former winner Arundhati Roy missing out on a place, as did Sebastian Barry and Zadie Smith.

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First person in line for Clinton's new book said he regrets not voting

An estimated 1,000 Clinton supporters flocked to New York’s Union Square, where their beloved candidate was due to unveil her explosive new memoir

• Opinion: Clinton’s book has a clear message: don’t blame me
  

The first person in line for Hillary Clinton’s book signing in New York said he had not voted at all in the presidential election – and that he regretted it.

Brian Maisonet, a 29-year-old from Brooklyn, said he had arrived at 3.30pm on Monday and waited outside the bookstore overnight to meet Clinton at a Tuesday afternoon event for her book What Happened, a punchy and personal account of her stunning defeat by Donald Trump.

Enjoy! See you all tomorrow! https://t.co/2wJN2NJGWu

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Plastic £10 note to enter circulation on Thursday

Banknote featuring Jane Austen introduced a year after launch of the first polymer note, the Winston Churchill fiver

The new plastic £10 note featuring Jane Austen is to enter circulation on Thursday, and shoppers are urged to look out for certain serial numbers that could be worth far more than a tenner.

Existing cotton-paper £10 notes, featuring Charles Darwin and with a total face value of £8bn, will stop being legal tender from spring next year, although the Bank of England has not yet issued an official date for their withdrawal.

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Amazon 'pays 11 times less corporation tax than traditional booksellers'

New report follows recent evidence that a Bedford branch of Waterstones pays business rates 17 times higher than a nearby business unit of the web giant

The UK’s bookshops pay 11 times what Amazon does in corporation tax, according to a report from the Centre for Economics and Business Research.

The Bookselling Britain report was unveiled at the Booksellers Association’s annual conference in Birmingham on Tuesday, revealing that bookshops contribute an estimated £540m to the UK economy, and pay an estimated £131m in tax, including £12m in corporation tax. This equates to 91p per £100 of turnover, the report said, which is 11 times the 8p rate that Amazon pays, according to the CEBR. Amazon’s most recent accounts show that Amazon UK Services saw turnover rise to almost £1.5bn in 2016, while corporation tax payments dropped from £15.8m to £7.4m year on year.

Related: Booksellers Association calls for end to Amazon's 'deeply unfair' tax advantages

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Hillary Clinton's new memoir compares Trump's 'war on truth' to Orwell's 1984

The former presidential candidate’s new book, What Happened, tries to come to terms with her election defeat and likens Trump to the dystopian classic

Hillary Clinton uses her new memoir to draw parallels between Donald Trump’s “war on truth” and the Soviet Union and George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four.

“Attempting to define reality is a core feature of authoritarianism,” the defeated presidential candidate writes in What Happened, published on Tuesday. “This is what the Soviets did when they erased political dissidents from historical photos. This is what happens in George Orwell’s classic novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, when a torturer holds up four fingers and delivers electric shocks until his prisoner sees five fingers as ordered.”

Related: Hillary Clinton: misogyny 'certainly' played a role in 2016 election loss

Related: White House as crime scene: how Robert Mueller is closing in on Trump

Now people seemed to think I was evil. Not just ‘not my cup of tea’ but evil. It was flabbergasting and frightening

Related: A night of shattered dreams: inside election day with Hillary Clinton

Clinton on Trump's inaugural address: 'I heard it as a howl straight from the white nationalist gut'

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AA Milne memoir shows Winnie-the-Pooh author longing to 'escape' his bear

It’s Too Late Now, being republished after 70 years, reveals a writer frustrated at the eclipse of his work for adults by runaway success of children’s books

Winnie-the-Pooh may have secured a place in the hearts of children worldwide and made his creator a millionaire, but author AA Milne resented the way the bear of little brain undermined his reputation as a serious writer.

The revelation appears in his 1939 memoir It’s Too Late Now, which is to be republished on 21 September, 70 years after it went out of print and ahead of the release of a biopic about his son, Goodbye Christopher Robin. Despite the success of Pooh, Piglet, Tigger and friends, Milne was frustrated that his reputation as a writer for adults had been irrevocably damaged.

Related: The real Winnie-the-Pooh revealed to have been 'Growler'

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Stephen King's It breaks highest-grossing horror record at the US box office

Bill Skårsgard’s demonic clown slaughtered the competition, taking more than double the previous record for a horror film’s opening weekend

It, the big-screen adaptation of Stephen King’s novel about a child-eating clown, shattered US box-office records over the weekend, earning $117.2m from 4,103 locations, according to studio estimates on Sunday.

Not only is It now the largest ever opening for a horror movie and the largest September opening of all time, the film more than doubled the earnings of the previous record holders. Before this weekend, Paranormal Activity 3 had the biggest horror opening with $52.6m from 2011, and the highest September debut was Hotel Transylvania 2’s $48.5m in 2015.

Related: Stephen King horror It: Pennywise, the Losers and Stranger Things – discuss with spoilers

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Len Wein, co-creator of Wolverine and Swamp Thing, dies aged 69

Neil Gaiman leads tributes to ‘friend and writing inspiration’ also known for his work on superhero franchises including Superman, Spider-Man and the X-Men

Comic-book writer and artist Len Wein, co-creator of Wolverine and Swamp Thing, died on Sunday at the age of 69.

A master of many aspects of the form, Wein worked as an artist and editor, but was primarily known for his writing, having written for a veritable who’s who of classic characters, including Daredevil, Flash, Superman, Spider-Man, Batman and the Hulk.

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'Angry boredom': early responses to Waiting for Godot showcased online

The British Library’s digital archive reveals early objections to Samuel Beckett’s play alongside other records of classic works’ early lives

Today, Waiting for Godot is the most celebrated of Samuel Beckett’s plays, but newly digitised material from the depths of the British Library shows how its first audiences responded in horror to its “lavatory references”, while some anticipated that “this ugly little jet of marsh-gas” from “the late James Joyce’s secretary” would soon be forgotten.

The correspondence about Beckett’s play is among more than 100 items from the archives of 20th-century playwrights that have been digitised by the library as part of its free online resource, Discovering Literature. It sits alongside drafts, letters, notes and manuscripts from 13 other major dramatists, including John Osborne, JB Priestley, George Bernard Shaw and Harold Pinter. Aimed at students, teachers and the general public, the new additions to the online archive range from the manuscript of Shelagh Delaney’s A Taste of Honey – which a 19-year-old Delaney sent to Joan Littlewood, asking her to read it “because no matter what sort of theatrical atrocity it might be it isn’t valueless as far as I’m concerned” – to Priestley’s letters from the trenches and Beckett’s production notebooks.

Related: Theatre of war: how the monarchy suppressed anti-Nazi drama in the 1930s

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Judi Dench and Maggie Smith to reflect on lives in new BBC arts output

Two actors will spend a weekend retreat together with fellow dames Eileen Atkins and Joan Plowright for new programme

Dames Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, Eileen Atkins and Joan Plowright will reflect on their lives and careers in a new programme for BBC2.

The old friends will spend a weekend together reminiscing at a retreat once shared by Plowright and Laurence Olivier for a one-off programme directed by the Notting Hill filmmaker Roger Mitchell.

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A Sinner in Mecca review – Islam, homosexuality and the hope of tolerance

In a book subtitled ‘A Gay Muslim’s Hajj of Defiance’, Parvez Sharma’s pilgramage leads him to consider Isis, Wahabbism and the true nature of his faith

Parvez Sharma is a proud gay Muslim whose first film, A Jihad For Love, was the first ever made about Islam and homosexuality. It made him the subject of death threats throughout the Arab world.

Related: Gay Muslim film-maker receives online abuse for hajj documentary

In my nightmares, my ihram would fall off in Mecca, subjecting unsuspecting pilgrims to my un-Muslim penis

Related: Gay pride only goes so far in India | Parvez Sharma

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American War by Omar El Akkad – review

A debut novel set in a future civil war over global warming favours solemnity over drama

Set in the US some 60 years hence, Omar El Akkad’s dystopian debut imagines civil war breaking out after a group of southern states revolt against a fossil-fuel ban imposed when extreme flooding leaves Florida under water. The conflict (stoked by a rising pan-Arab empire) is described from the vantage point of the early 22nd century, by a dying historian anxious to record the pivotal role of his Louisiana-born aunt, groomed in childhood to join the insurgency against the north. While there’s no shortage of action in her grisly journey from victim to aggressor, American War is solemn, slow and somewhat schoolmasterly in its grim determination to bring the miseries of present-day trouble spots to the US. The premise is provocative – not least in how global warming trumps all else to trigger discord – but too often the drama feels like an afterthought.

• American War by Omar El Akkad is published by Picador (£14.99). To order a copy for £12.74 go to guardianbookshop.com or call 0330 333 6846. Free UK p&p over £10, online orders only. Phone orders min p&p of £1.99

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How guest Hans Christian Anderson destroyed his friendship with Dickens

The Danish writer’s behaviour on an extended visit killed the authors’ friendship, letters show

It was not, to say the least, a successful visit. The burgeoning friendship between a pair of literary stars, Charles Dickens and Hans Christian Andersen, had looked set to last. But it could not survive an overlong stay by the Danish author at the British novelist’s family home in Kent. Just how bad things became, on one side at least, has been revealed by a surprisingly frank letter sold at auction on Saturday.

In March 1857, Andersen had announced he was coming over for a short summer stay of a fortnight at the most. Andersen wrote: “[M]y visit is intended for you alone,” and added, “Above all, always leave me a small corner in your heart.”

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Cambridge University Press headed for showdown with China over censorship

Following protests last month, Cambridge University’s publishing house reversed its decision to censor articles in academic journal China Quarterly

Cambridge University Press is heading for a showdown with Chinese authorities after it refused a renewed request to block academic articles, following an outcry last month when it was revealed the publisher has restricted certain content in China.

A Chinese state-owned importer asked CUP, the world’s oldest publisher, to block articles from the American Political Science Review.

Related: Cambridge University Press censorship 'exposes Xi Jinping's authoritarian shift'

Related: Cambridge University Press faces boycott over China censorship

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Simon Schama leads longlist for Baillie Gifford prize

Twelve finalists for £30,000 nonfiction award cover subjects ranging from Jewish history to modern jihad, Edward Lear and even gardening

Accounts of discord in the Middle East from the middle ages to the 21st century, a polemical analysis of race in Britain and a moving memoir about the curative effect of gardening are among the books longlisted for the 2017 Baillie Gifford prize for nonfiction.

The historian Simon Schama strides into contention for the £30,000 award with the second volume of The Story of the Jews, alongside Pulitzer prizewinner Anne Applebaum and her history of the disaster Stalin inflicted on Ukraine, Red Famine.

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John le Carré on Trump: ‘Something seriously bad is happening’

Author draws parallels between Donald Trump and rise of 1930s fascism, in rare public appearance at Royal Festival Hall

John le Carré, one of Britain’s greatest living writers, has spoken of the “toxic” parallels between the rise of Donald Trump and the rise of 1930s fascism.

In a rare public appearance, the 85-year-old novelist and former spy spoke of his disdain for Trump and his despair for the US and the wider world.

Related: A Legacy of Spies by John le Carré review – Smiley returns in a breathtaking thriller

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Bram Stoker's nephew Dacre writes first authorised prequel to Dracula

Dracul, due out in 2018 and co-authored by JD Barker, draws on family stories to portray the young vampire author battling blood-chilling horrors

The great-grandnephew of Bram Stoker is writing the first authorised prequel to Dracula, based on scholarly research into the original, unedited version of Stoker’s 1897 tale of the undead count, as well as Stoker family legends.

Dacre Stoker and co-writer JD Barker’s prequel Dracul is set in 1868, and sees a 21-year-old Bram encountering some of the creatures he would later write about. Due out next year, it has provoked great excitement in both the literary and film worlds. North American rights sold for a six-figure sum to Putnam, UK rights are with Transworld, where editor Simon Taylor called it “terrific fun – and suitably terrifying”, and film rights have gone to Paramount, where the director of the new adaptation of Stephen King’s It, Andy Muschietti, is attached to direct.

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Kate Millett, pioneering second-wave feminist, dies aged 82

Author, activist and artist whose 1970 book Sexual Politics was a bestselling and hugely influential critique of patriarchal ideology

Kate Millett, the wayward artist, thinker and activist whose 1970 book Sexual Politics became a keystone of second-wave feminism, has died at the age of 82.

Perhaps aptly for someone who wrote widely and fervently of her pursuit of love, she succumbed to a heart attack during an annual holiday in Paris to celebrate her birthday with her wife and longtime collaborator, the photojournalist Sophie Keir. “Let’s always be having an affair. Wherever we meet, however many times a year – let it always be an affair,” Millett wrote in Sita, her 1976 account of an earlier, failed relationship which, like subsequent autobiographical works, became an exploration of forms of love.

So sad to hear about Kate Millett's passing. She pioneered feminist thought, de-stigmatized mental illness, wore massive fashion glasses.

Related: Kate Millett's return to the personal political

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Extinctions by Josephine Wilson wins the 2017 Miles Franklin award

Wilson, the 60th winner of Australia’s most high-profile literary prize for fiction, says ‘it’s not the sort of thing I ever imagined would happen to me’

“I can’t tell you how extraordinary it is for this to happen,” said author and 2017 Miles Franklin award-winner Josephine Wilson. “It’s not the sort of thing I ever imagined would happen to me.”

On Thursday night, Wilson was revealed as the 60th winner of Australia’s most high-profile literary prize for fiction for her novel, Extinctions, which was hailed by the judges as “compassionate and unapologetically intelligent”.

Related: Miles Franklin awards 2017 shortlist: reviews of the books you’ll read next

Related: Miles Franklin award shortlists five first-time nominees

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UK publishing industry remains 90% white, survey finds

Research indicates diversity has improved in recent years, but a generational change is needed to balance the book trade, according to researchers

A survey of more than 1,000 people working in UK publishing has found that more than 90% currently in the industry classify themselves as white British.

Carried out between June and July, the bookcareers.com salary survey received 1,023 valid responses. The vast majority of respondents – 84.6% - were female, and more than nine in 10 (90.4%) were white British. Four years ago, when research was last conducted, 81.8% of respondents were female, and 93.7% were white British.

Related: Publishing risks 'becoming irrelevant', warns Penguin Random House boss

Related: 'Why'd he get promoted? Because he has a dick': sexism in publishing survey reveals widespread frustration

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David Walliams book dragged into Australia's same-sex marriage debate

The Boy in the Dress, his tale of a cross-dressing child, has drawn accusations of ‘genderless bullying’ after it was featured in a supermarket promotion

David Walliams has reacted to Australians complaining about his novel The Boy in the Dress, saying he wrote it hoping to “change the way people think and feel”, after Aldi customers slammed the supermarket for “pushing social agendas” by selling his book about a cross-dressing child.

On Aldi Australia’s Facebook page, where the retailer had announced a competition to win books, customers wrote that Aldi “should not be selling” Walliams’s story of a boy who wears a friend’s dress to school, accusing it of “pushing social agendas”.

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Suppressed story of Richard Burton's rival explorer surfaces

Secret edition of John Hanning Speke’s What Led to the Discovery of the Source of the Nile contains stinging accusations against his fellow adventurer

A secret addendum to John Hanning Speke’s account of his discovery of the source of the Nile, which details his long-running feud with fellow explorer Richard Burton and which was considered too provocative for publication, has been acquired by the National Library of Scotland.

The eight-page supplement to Speke’s 1864 book, What Led to the Discovery of the Source of the Nile, was referred to by the explorer as “the Tail” – possibly because, like a scorpion’s tail, it included the “sting” of the book. It laid out his grievances against Burton, which included anger over Burton’s failure to pay his African caravaneers, as well as further details of his adventures.

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Tom Cruise still flying high at UK box office with American Made

Doug Liman’s CIA thriller took less than £1m at the weekend yet still ended up on top, while indie God’s Own Country charmed British cinemagoers

Tom Cruise is at the top of the UK box office for the second week running with American Made. The Doug Liman-directed film declined a slim 9% and held the chart summit with a gross of £968,000. There the good news ends, because the film’s success says more about the uncompetitive nature of the market than it does about American Made’s popularity.

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The future of computing as predicted by nine science-fiction machines

From Star Trek to The Matrix via The HitchHiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, science fiction has long predicted computing innovation before the designers have

Science fiction has an uncanny ability to predict the future of technology, from Star Trek’s Padd, essentially an iPad, to the Jetsons’ robot vacuum, basically a Roomba.

Now that the voice assistant is here, that’s another checklist off the sci-fi predictor, but while our Alexas, Siris, Cortanas and Google Assistants are pretty basic right now, if sci-fi continues its great prelude to the future, what will the computers of the future really be like?

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The real Winnie-the-Pooh revealed to have been 'Growler'

Previously unseen pictures show that EH Shepard’s iconic images were modelled on his own own son’s toy bear – not AA Milne’s

His tummy as portly as it always would be, Winnie-the-Pooh’s very first appearance has been revealed in a previously unpublished sketch from the 1920s by illustrator EH Shepard.

The Art of Winnie-the-Pooh brings together more than 150 images, 80 of which have never been seen or published before, from archives of Shepard’s work. Published next week, the book reveals the genesis of his iconic illustrations of theworld’s most beloved teddy bear, as well as the correspondence and collaboration with AA Milne that went into Pooh’s creation. The documents were found by James Campbell, who is married to Shepard’s great-granddaughter and has run his estate since 2010.

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A Christmas Carol play inspired by social media and M1 service stations

Dramatist David Edgar was struck by the Dickensian sound of names such as Tinder and Tibshelf in adaptation of classic story

Charles Dickens’s extraordinary invention of names is among the great delights of his tales. Long after Scrooge became a synonym for a miser, a forthcoming adaptation of A Christmas Carol by the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) will introduce a host of new Dickensian names for 21st-century audiences, including a Herr Uber, a Mrs Snapchat and a Mr Tinder.

Dickens found inspiration for many of his characters in real life. Cold-hearted businessman Ebenezer Scrooge and the ghost of his deceased partner, Jacob Marley, have been linked to people who lived or worked near his first London home.

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The BFG, Skellig, Aubrey ... children’s books boom

Booksellers and new publications are challenging pessimism about reading habits

Once upon a time, nine-year-old bookworms used to curl up with Little Women, or burrow under the bedclothes with a torch to read Swallows and Amazons after hours. Childhood reading was an idyll in a walled garden and books forever shaped the landscape of our minds.

Did that golden age ever exist? One thing is certain: in troubled times the nation’s reading habits have become a lightning rod for parental pessimism about video games and the end of civilisation as we know it. There is, however, a silver lining to these clouds.

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Final chapter for Pears' Cyclopaedia after 125 years in print

The once hugely popular almanac has seen much-diminished sales in the digital era, and editor’s retirement persuades publisher to close it

One hundred-and-twenty years after Pears’ Cyclopaedia made its first appearance, offering “A Mass of Curious and Useful Information about Things that everyone Ought to know in Commerce, History, Science, Religion, Literature and other Topics of Ordinary Conversation” for a shilling, its publisher Penguin has announced that the newest edition of the beloved compendium of facts will be the last.

Penguin attributed the decision to discontinue the almanac to the retirement of its long-term editor Dr Chris Cook, as well as “the ready availability of electronic information [that] has made the printed reference book no longer commercially competitive”. According to the Bookseller, sales have sharply declined in recent years, with the 2001/2002 edition selling just under 25,000 copies, while last year’s sold barely 3,000.

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Publisher pulps boys' guide to puberty over explanation of breasts

Alex Frith’s Growing Up for Boys prompted outcry over passage saying breasts develop ‘to make the girl look grown up and attractive’

A book aimed at explaining human biology to boys that said one of the purposes of breasts was “to make the girl look grown up and attractive” is now being pulped.

Publisher Usborne was criticised over an extract from Alex Frith’s Growing Up for Boys earlier this week. Covering topics including girls, sex and relationships, the guide is intended to offer boys “advice on what to expect from puberty”, but readers took issue with a section on breasts that says: “Girls have breasts for two reasons. One is to make milk for babies. The other is to make the girl look grown up and attractive. Virtually all breasts, no matter what size or shape they end up when a girl finishes puberty, can do both things.”

Related: Usborne apologises for puberty book that says breasts exist to make girls 'look grown-up and attractive'

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Only children's books with humans have moral impact, study finds

Undercutting the ageless tradition of sugaring ethical lessons with endearing animals, new research suggests human protagonists are needed to change behaviour

Forget the morals that millennia of children have learned from the Hare and the Tortoise and the Fox and the Crow: Aesop would have had a greater effect with his fables if he’d put the stories into the mouths of human characters, at least according to new research from the University of Toronto’s Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE).

In the Canadian study, researchers read one of three stories to almost 100 children between four and six years old: Mary Packard’s Little Raccoon Learns to Share, in which anthropomorphic animals learn that sharing makes you feel good; a version of the story in which the animal illustrations were replaced with human characters; or a control book about seeds.

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8,500 people lost in Mediterranean since death of three-year-old Alan Kurdi

Author Khaled Hosseini responds to images of Syrian boy washed ashore by writing short story animated in virtual reality

• Experience Khaled Hosseini’s story Sea Prayer in virtual reality
  

At least 8,500 people have died or disappeared while attempting to cross the Mediterranean since the death of Alan Kurdi, the three-year-old Syrian boy whose body washed ashore in Turkey in 2015, drawing global attention to the plight of refugees.

According to the latest figures released by the UN’s refugee agency, 4,337 people are believed to have drowned since September 2016 while attempting to reach European shores. Most departed from Libya bound for Italy, from Turkey bound for Greece or, more recently, from Morocco bound for Spain. A further 4,185 people died in the previous 12 months, from 1 September 2015 until the end of August 2016.

Related: Trying to block migrants won’t work. Europe needs a realistic plan | Sophie in ’t Veld

Related: African and European leaders agree action plan on migration crisis

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