MAT COWARD takes a look at some of the options for keen gardeners as we enter 2026

A deeply pleasing festive crime wave

A WWI hero, renowned ornithologist, medical doctor, trade union organiser and founder member of the Communist Party of Great Britain all rolled in one. MAT COWARD tells the story of a life so improbable it was once dismissed as fiction

MAT COWARD tells how 18th-century scholar and revolutionary democrat Joseph Ritson turned a medieval outlaw into England’s people’s hero — soon to be gracing panto halls around the nation

Commiserations if you failed this year, MAT COWARD offers six points which, if followed religiously, will ensure you succeed next year

AI-induced murder, last rites for the mob-dog, a gullible common herd, and an exemplary Christmas chiller

MAT COWARD tells the story of the eccentric founder of a short-lived but striking experiment in ‘vital democracy,’ who became best known for giving away his estate to the nation

MAT COWARD advocates cultivating blackberries, a growing in popularity crop for gardens and allotments

MAT COWARD reminds us that the resilience of ordinary folk can turn the tables on the mighty and 'entitled'

AI shenanigans, tinnitus hallucinations, Jeckyll&Hyde in a locked room, and size doesn’t matter

A Nazi zeppelin whodunnit, death amidst detoxification, a twistaholic’s delight, and noir fiction for criminals

MAT COWARD looks back at a protest 105 years ago this month, whose reporting by the media bears uncomfortable similarities with demos today

MAT COWARD looks back to a 1931 protest against mass unemployment featuring a young Ewan MacColl

Cat show killer, avenging the pawns, women hunt the Ripper, and running dry in the outback

Spice up your life – and your greenhouse – with MAT COWARD’s gardening tips

Doomed adolescents, when the missing person is you, classic whodunnit, and an anti-capitalist eco-thriller

MAT COWARD sings the praises of the Giant Winter’s full-depth, earthy and ferrous flavour perfect for rich meals in the dark months

The heroism of the jury who defied prison and starvation conditions secured the absolute right of juries to deliver verdicts based on conscience — a convention which is now under attack, writes MAT COWARD

As apple trees blossom to excess it remains to be seen if an abundance of fruit will follow. MAT COWARD has a few tips to see you through a nervy time
 

While an as-yet-unnamed new left party struggles to be born, MAT COWARD looks at some of the wild and wonderful names of workers’ organisations past that have been lost to time

Timeloop murder, trad family MomBomb, Sicilian crime pages and Craven praise

MAT COWARD presents a peculiar cabbage that will only do its bodybuilding once the summer dies down

A heatwave, a crimewave, and weird bollocks in Aberdeen, Indiana horror, and the end of the American Dream

A corrupted chemist, a Hampstead homosexual and finely observed class-conflict at The Bohemia

Beet likes warmth, who doesn’t, so attention to detail is required if you’re to succeed, writes MAT COWARD

MAT COWARD tells the extraordinary story of the second world war Spitfire pilot who became Britain’s most famous Stalag escaper, was awarded an MBE, mentored a generation of radio writers and co-founded a hardline Marxist-Leninist party

Generous helpings of Hawaiian pidgin, rather good jokes, and dodging the impostors

MAT COWARD tells the story of Edward Maxted, whose preaching of socialism led to a ‘peasants’ revolt’ in the weeks running up to the first world war

Reasonable radicalism, death in Abu Dhabi, locked-room romance, and sleuthing in the Blitz

Edinburgh can take great pride in an episode of its history where a murderous captain of the city guard was brought to justice by a righteous crowd — and nobody snitched to Westminster in the aftermath, writes MAT COWARD