Buy Caroline's book here.

The Blurb:

From the single ladies of Beyoncé and Taylor Swift songs to Phoebe Waller-Bridge's irreverent television series Fleabag (2016–2019) to as far back as Miss Havisham in Great Expectations, the stereotype of the damaged single woman has long pervaded music, books, television, and Hollywood movies. Spinster tropes, witch burnings, and nineteenth-century diagnoses of hysteria have reflected and continue to inform the stories told about society's singletons, most notoriously in the original bunny boiler, Fatal Attraction (1987), and popularized in Single White Female (1992) and Promising Young Woman (2020).

In Single & Psycho, author Caroline Young explores how broader social trends such as the antifeminist backlash of the 1980s, contemporary debates about tradwives and childless cat ladies, and the absence of single women of color on-screen shape the way women are (mis)perceived and (mis)treated. Young weaves the history of a stereotype with her own fight against stigma as a single woman as well as her struggles with infertility, infusing incisive analysis with personal experience in this approachable, savvy exposé of one of mainstream media's most enduring clichés.

Single & Psycho: How Pop Culture Created the Unstable Single Woman is a dynamic addition to the ongoing dialogue surrounding the #MeToo movement and societal expectations of women.

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Buy the book here:

Explore behind the scenes of the greatest monster movies ever made!

What makes a great movie monster? Academy Award-winning make-up effects artist Howard Berger and acclaimed journalist Marshall Julius have spoken to dozens of film industry legends to find out.

A celebration of monsters, monster movies and monster movie makers, Making Monsters delivers an illuminating, entertaining and accessible oral history of the genre, gathering an enviable array of A-list talent from make-up and digital effects legends (Tom Savini, Phil Tippett) to directors (John Carpenter, Ti West), actors (Simon Pegg, Barbara Crampton), composers (Michael Giacchino) and writers (Russell T Davies).

Packed with hundreds of images, from film stills to personal, behind-the-scenes pictures from dozens of interview subjects - many never before published - Making Monsters is a treasure trove of monstrous creations, and the stories behind them, that is sure to make fans jump, scream and howl with delight.

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For generations, Ed Wood has been known as “the worst director of all time.” This sympathetic critical study repositions the director of Plan 9 from Outer Space as a maverick independent whose work challenges the boundary between “bad” and “good.” The subject of a Tim Burton biopic, Will Sloan reappraises Wood as a more interesting and disruptive figure.

You can buy his book here.

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One of my favourite film critics Bilge Ebiri from Vulture joins me to talk about Olivier Assayas' The Wizard of the Kremlin, Kathryn Bigelow's A House of Dynamite, and Kaouther ben Hania's The Voice of Hind Rajab.

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Nicholas Bell from IONCINEMA joins me to run down the films we've watched so far at the 82nd Venice Film Festival. We talk La Grazia, Frankenstein, After the Hunt, Bugonia, No Other Choice and The Smashing Machine. We probably talk about even more in this bumper Lido fuelled edition.

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Available HERE.

Blockbuster box office. Critical acclaim and Oscars recognition. From Get Out and M3GAN to The Substance and Sinners, the horror genre is enjoying a glorious–and gory–golden age.

Screaming and Conjuring details the films and frights that led to this extraordinary renaissance, from the release of the groundbreaking Scream in 1996 to the arrival of 2013’s The Conjuring, which spawned a multi-billion dollar franchise. Written by entertainment journalist Clark Collis (author of You’ve Got Red on You: How Shaun of the Dead Was Brought to Life), this exhaustively researched book is the first in-depth examination of a remarkably fertile and influential time for big screen horror.

Wes Craven’s Scream was followed by a flood of classic terror tales such as The Blair Witch Project, The Sixth Sense, Final Destination, The Others, Pan's Labyrinth, 28 Days Later, Resident Evil, Saw, Hostel, Paranormal Activity, and Insidious. This comprehensive history covers the often difficult and tortuous making of all these films (and many more), giving readers the exclusive lowdown on productions which were often as intense as the horrifying sights that ended up on screen.

Screaming and Conjuring features recollections from a host of genre icons, including actors Jamie Lee Curtis and Neve Campbell, directors Eli Roth and Sam Raimi, and legendary makeup effects artist Greg Nicotero. The book also includes 200 production stills, film posters, and rarely seen images.

Blood. Sweat. Tears. More blood. Clark Collis takes you behind the scenes, and the scares, with this fascinating history of the modern horror movie.

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New book Darkness Visible, available from Sticking Place Books.

Jonathan Glazer has created some of the most unforgettable images in twenty-first-century cinema. From the dreamlike menace of Sexy Beast to the haunting abstractions of Under the Skin and the chilling banality of evil in The Zone of Interest, his films blend surreal intensity with razor-sharp formal control. But Glazer’s world doesn’t stop at the cinema screen-it extends into commercials, music videos and short films that have redefined visual storytelling. In Darkness Visible, critic and author John Bleasdale guides readers through the full scope of Glazer’s career, offering a vivid, provocative and deeply informed portrait of a filmmaker who resists interpretation even as his work demands it. With chapters on each feature film, along with Glazer’s groundbreaking work in advertising and video, this is the first comprehensive account of a visionary whose cinema explores the dark undercurrents of modern life-and leaves audiences changed.

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New Edition available here.

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Maureen Foster's book on Under the Skin was an inspiration for Visible Darkness: The Cinema of Jonathan Glazer and so I'm republished this episode which was originally broadcast two years ago.

Darkness Visible is available from Sticking Place books at a discount for the UK and US here.

And from all good book dealers for the rest of the world.

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Xan Brooks has been a film critic and journalist for decades, hosting the ground-breaking Film Weekly for The Guardian along with Jason Solomons. He's now a novelist with The Clocks in This House All Tell Different Times and his new book The Catchers, available here.

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