A dazzling novel, and autobiographical fiction, by Mexicans Brenda Navarro and Cristina Rivera Garza, and poetry by Brazilian Ricardo Domeneck

JONATHAN TAYLOR ponders the difference between autobiography and memoir - between life and story - in Margaret Atwood’s account of herself

DENNIS BROE examines two new horror films — Send Help and Scream 7 — for the way they demonstrate how capital routinely desensitises the consumer

Rereleases from Andrew Gold; John McFee, Stu Cook, Keith Knudsen; and The Outer Limits

KATAYOUN SHAHANDEH surveys Iran’s cultural heritage and explains what has been damaged and what could be lost

The Bard finds Bard Company, and rallies us all to the anti-fascist cause

JOHN GREEN is intrigued by an explanation of irrational behaviour from the point of view of brain science

SYLVIA HIKINS celebrates the chance that a new memoir offers to explore Frieda Brewster’s remarkable life story

MARIA DUARTE and ANDY HEDGECOCK review The Tasters, A Pale View of Hills, How To Make a Killing, and Reminders of Him

Five years ago a flash crowd of Glaswegian activists defeated the Home Office and the police; MATT KERR urges you to savour that day in a cinema

PAUL DONOVAN enjoys a somewhat rose-tinted survey of Brown’s achievements and legacy, as well as his moments of political cowardice

BRENT CUTLER admires the plotting but takes issue with the politics of a new Scottish crime thriller

SUSAN DARLINGTON applauds the sensuality and strong characterisation of an unconventional ballet about an unconventional woman

JOHN GREEN is disappointed by a history of the British working class that retreads familiar paths and offers no new insights

GUILLERMO THOMAS recommends an important, if dispiriting book about the neo-colonial culture of Uganda under Yoweri Museveni

by Patrick Cotter

KEN COCKBURN is intrigued by the publication of the Marxist theorist’s reminiscence of a bourgeois childhood

PAUL FOLEY steps gingerly through an exhibition that purports to show east and south-east Asian culture, and questions its intentions

Tyrannosaurs in Thailand, colonialism as videogame, and a feminist gem from 1936

DENNIS BROE surveys the bias of the US news networks, and recommends alternatives

New releases from Alex Wilson and Omar Rios Melendez, Hello Cosmos, and Harry Christelis

New releases from Shabaka, Squeeze, and Roswell Road

JOHN GREEN welcomes a vital contribution to the debates around genetic manipulation

GORDON PARSONS is intrigued by a biography of the Marxist intellectual and author, made from the point of view of his son

SYLVIA HIKINS is compelled by a travel writer’s personal exploration of his native Lancashire, by the Morning Star’s own Chris Moss

MARJ MAYO recommends a lyrical and disturbing account of the tragic suicide in Venice of Pateh Sabally, a refugee from the Gambia

In the face of Trump’s brutal aggression, DODIE WEPPLER and TRISH MEEHAN invite you to share some of the masterpieces of Cuban cinema

GEOFF BOTTOMS recommends an inspiring, political and bittersweet account of the munitions factory workers who are the fore-runners of the modern women’s game

MARY CONWAY is spellbound by superb performances in Arthur Miller’s study of the social and personal stress brought about by Nazi Germany’s Kristallnacht

MARIA DUARTE and ANGUS REID review The Bride!, The King’s Warden, Sound of Falling, and Mother’s Pride

ANDY HEDGECOCK recommends an unflinching analysis of the billionaire class that celebrates collective resistance to it

RON JACOBS recommends an outstanding family memoir of life in Gaza

SIMON PARSONS applauds an outstanding one woman show that weaves real poems and narratives into the story of one girl’s flight

MARY CONWAY applauds an exploration, through five short plays, that demonstrates the vital role of drama in furthering collective understanding

CHRIS SEARLE speaks to Nicaraguan guitarist OMAR RIOS MELENDEZ

by Gabriel Gbadamosi

SIMON PARSONS applauds an artist who rescues and rehumanises stories of women, the victims of violence, from a feminist perspective

Good Cop vs Bad Fascist fantasy, a guilty witness, Scottish witchcraft, and Camino de Santiago shocker

FIONA O’CONNOR relishes a cinematic exploration of the writing, and the historical context of Thomas Mann’s WWI masterpiece, The Magic Mountain

SHELLEY GALPIN points out that Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure criticised university elitism, and still rings true today

Releases from Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Maggie Nicols/Robert Mitchell/Alya Al Sultani, and Gordon Beck Trio and Quintet

LEO BOIX reviews a dazzling art exhibition by one of Latin America’s most important and rebellious artists, whose art exposes the way state violence operates not only through physical force, but through culture

The Bard stands with the Reformers of Peterloo, and their shared genius in teaching history with music and song

MARJORIE MAYO is disappointed by the lack of class analysis in an all-too-plausible account of progressive causes

IAN SINCLAIR welcomes a mainstream scholar to the ranks of left-wing critique of US foreign policy

PETER MASON is disappointed that the eponymous Count fails to put in an appearance

STEVE ANDREW recommends a Marxist analysis of the long chains of production that global corporations exploit

SUE TURNER is fascinated by a book that researches who the largely immigrant workforce were that built the Empire State

MARIA DUARTE and MALC McGOOKIN review Sirat, The Testament of Ann Lee, EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert, and All You Need Is Kill

SCOTT ALSWORTH recommends a film that is as informative as it is rage inducing

MARY CONWAY relishes the period detail but misses the drama in this unsatisfactory dramatisation of the subjugated life of George Eliot

DENNIS BROE points out that two popular TV series promote police violence and disguise it as ‘fun’

by Nuala Watt

GORDON PARSONS applauds a marvellous story of human ingenuity and youthful determination, well served by a large and talented company

PETER MASON relishes a quirky and highly entertaining take on Shakespeare’s tragicomedy

RITA DI SANTO points out that political films at Cannes, and overtly pro-Palestinian statements by film-makers, contradict the apolitical stance of the jury

SUSAN DARLINGTON applauds bold choices that force the audience to re-examine a familiar comedy

SUSAN DARLINGTON is moved by fleeting glimpses into the lives of people living on a single road in a nameless Lancashire town

New releases from Bill Callahan, The Delines, and Beck

JONATHAN TAYLOR is intrigued how good storytelling can make a hobby as obsessional as metal detecting seem fascinating

RON JACOBS sees similarities between the personality of the the Spanish Dictator Francisco Franco, and Donald Trump

RUTH AYLETT recommends this book if you want to learn how AI’s large language models work

ROB HARGREAVES is moved by the way that memories of the Spanish civil war still stir our passions

MIK SABIERS is transported by space rock groove

TONY BURKE speaks to producer and broadcaster LUCY DURAN about her new project — Guitari Baro

STEPHANIE DENNISON and ALFREDO LUIZ DE OLIVEIRA SUPPIA explain the political context of The Secret Agent, a gripping thriller that reminds us why academic freedom needs protecting

STEVE JOHNSON speaks to ANGUS REID about his new film — free to watch for Morning Star readers — that documents Cuba’s revolutionary new family code

JOHN GREEN, MARIA DUARTE and ANGUS REID review Fukushima: A Nuclear Nightmare, Man on the Run, If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, and Cold Storage

MICHAL BONCZA is engrossed by a complex and terrifying, yet respectfully intelligent political thriller set in 1970s Brazil

by Nada Shawa

TINASHE MUSHAKAVANHU explores a tender and urgent new film about the South African novelist Lauretta Ngcobo

MIK SABIERS raises a glass of Lambrini to commentary, diatribes, punk rock riffs, some pontification and a whole lot of fun

DENNIS BROE searches the literary canon to explore why a duplicitous, lying, cheating, conning US businessman is accepted as Scammer-in-Chief

BRENT CUTLER unpicks the complex social relations imagined in a novel about the builders of Stonehenge

SUSAN DARLINGTON laments a version of the adventures of Sherlock Holmes that is unable to solve its own problems

MARY CONWAY welcomes a warm, if microscopic study of an Indian and a Pakistani, both culturally adrift in Britain

New releases from The Thumping Tommys, Dan O’Farrell and The Difference Engine, and Sean Taylor

SYLVIA HIKINS relishes Jeanette Winterson’s brilliant hijack of 1001 Nights to push aside the boundaries set by others

KENNY MacASKILL welcomes a meticulous account of the corruption of the vast US Department of Justice under Trump’s first and second terms

For his study of anti-Muslim Muzaffarnagar Riot, HENRY BELL applauds Joe Sacco for a devastatingly effective combination of graphic novel and investigative journalism

Given the epidemic of corruption in post colonial states, ALEX HALL is disappointed by a failure to analyse the economic architecture that makes it so lucrative

PAUL DONOVAN applauds a new play that revisits in old age the well-known characters of Margaret Thatcher’s favourite TV series

Poetic license in hand, the Bard does love on Valentine’s Day

SUSAN DARLINGTON swoons in the presence of a magnetic frontman

The economy collapses and London is abandoned by the wealthy. Determined to survive, a working-class woman struggles with scarcity and dejection 

MARIA DUARTE and ANGUS REID review "Wuthering Heights", Little Amelie or the Character of Rain, Crime 101, and Stitch Head

ANDY HEDGECOCK recommends an unflinching examination of the chaos and suffering wrought by US foreign policy, told through the story of a child’s simple quest

MARY CONWAY becomes impatient with the intellectual self-indulgence of Tom Stoppard in a production that is, nevertheless, total class

ALISTAIR FINDLAY recommends the simple cadence, common prose, free verse, and descriptive power of a new collection by Julie McNeill

by Julie McNeill

FRANK McCAULEY gets Laid

MAYER WAKEFIELD has reservations about a two-handed theatrical homage to jazz’s most mercurial musician

SCOTT ALSWORTH suggests that video games have a lot to learn the rich tradition of Marxist theatre

ANDY HEDGECOCK is enthralled by a collection of South Korean ghost stories where human behaviour is as chilling as any spectral activity

MARY CONWAY revels in the macabre waiting game of Strindberg’s forensic dissection of a loveless ruling-class marriage

DAVID YEARSLEY examines the soundtrack and filmic predecessors of the execrable Melania

SIMON PARSONS is charmed by a hilarious tender show that will open the eyes to the delights and possibilities of puppetry

New releases from Pat Metheny, Greazy Alice, and Momoko Gill

ALEX HALL appreciates the history of a famous shoot-out that is sourced from diaries, letters, and newspapers of the time

GAVIN O’TOOLE welcomes an eloquent and monumental history of the many different groups that have opposed imperialism with tactical violence

HELEN MERCER recommends a timely history of the Civil Service worker organisation that proposes a principled and strategic approach for the future

ALAN McGUIRE welcomes the complete poems of Seamus Heaney for the unmistakeable memory of colonialism that they carry

MATTHEW HAWKINS enjoys the work of reading the essays of a rigorous and leading London/Caribbean cultural participant

GORDON PARSONS is fascinated by a musical — and questioning — survey of Shakespeare’s attitude to women

JOHN GREEN explores the controversial and popular images of the late Martin Parr, made in the heyday of Thatcherism

BILLY BRAGG on the role that music can play in resistance to state-sponsored violence

JOHN GREEN, MARIA DUARTE and LEO BOIX review The Shepherd and the Bear, Hamlet, Twinless, and 100 Nights of Hero

MARIA DUARTE recommends an extraordinary film that explores an absent father’s attempt to make up to his sons

GEOFF BOTTOMS applauds a version set amid the violent conflicts of the 19th century west African Oyo empire before the intervention of British colonialism

Chris Searle speaks to saxophonist LARRY STABBINS

by Allan Gaw

SEAMUS HIGGINS introduces some basic facts about the role of sugar in driving a worldwide crisis of diet-related diseases

MICHAL BONCZA welcomes a new version of a classic of British working class literature that should be placed on every school English syllabus

Japanese innovation, Costa Rican skullduggery, Glasgow Central suicide, and good deeds punished in London

GILL PARSONS introduces the remarkable process by which her childhood experience of a convalescent home has become a new drama

GEOFF BOTTOMS applauds a timely and necessary play that explores the experience of neurodiverse twins

New releases from The Orb, Meredith Monk, and Marconi Union

The bard distills our hellish times into fiery words

CONRAD LANDIN picks his highlights from Celtic Connections, and makes his recommendations for the last weekend

ANDY HEDGECOCK revels in a hugely enjoyable but deadly serious examination of the 1930s, that is an indictment of our own era

MARK TURNER applauds Michael Sheen’s determination to revive a Welsh National Theatre with Thornton Wilder’s study of love, loss and community

RITA DI SANTO draws attention to a new film that features Ken Loach and Jeremy Corbyn, and their personal experience of media misrepresentation

JULIA TOPPIN recommends Patti Smith’s eloquent memoir that wrestles with the beauty and sorrow of a lifetime

MARJORIE MAYO welcomes an account of family life after Oscar Wilde, a cathartic exercise, written by his grandson

KEN COCKBURN guides us through a survey of Chekov’s early short fiction, and the groundwork it laid for his later masterpieces

MARIA DUARTE and ANGUS REID review Is This Thing On?, Nouvelle Vague, Kangaroo, Shelter, and Melania

JOHN GREEN savours an elegy to black farmers in the deep south of the US: a vanishing way of life redolent with poetic and political meaning

Climate activist and writer JANE ROGERS introduces her new collection, Fire-ready, and examines the connection between life and fiction

by Victor Osemeka

WANJA KIMANI explores the many bonds of community experience expressed in in the bold and colourful imagery of a new mural

RUTH AYLETT appreciates the rich blend of poetry and music that accompanied the launch of the Morning Star’s anthology of poetry, Who We Are

ELEANOR DOBSON reflects on a stark visual record of the violent desecration of Tutankhamun’s mummified remains

New releases from Keeley, Lucinda Williams and Ye Vagabonds

MARY CONWAY applauds a brilliant two-hander that blows the lid off the abortion debate and rips your heart to shreds

RON JACOBS welcomes a timely biography of a contemporary of Marx and Engels who advocated revolutionary socialism

RICHARD CLARKE welcomes a study that extends an understanding of Marxism beyond human society to encompass the whole of nature

Despite an underwhelming finale, FIONA O CONNOR relishes a vivid exploration of the Cinecitta of Pasolini and Fellini at their height

PAUL DONOVAN enjoys a brutally honest rags to riches memoir of the actor’s life, even if it clearly lacks any political insight

With satirical portraits of leftist rebels in two acclaimed films today, GREGORY FRAME traces the roots of Hollywood’s relationship to civil protest

JAN WOOLF ponders the works and contested reputation of the West German sculptor and provocateur, who believed that everybody is potentially an artist

MARIA DUARTE and MICHAL BONCZA review The History of Sound, H Is For Hawk, Saipan, and Mercy

MARIA DUARTE recommends a surreal and brilliant take on corporate lay-offs and their consequences

by Jamie Lynch

DENNIS BROE unpicks the subterfuge by which the BBC claims to represent working-class prison life in a new series

JULIA THOMAS unpicks the mental processes that explain why book-to-film adaptations so often disappoint

CONRAD LANDIN thrills to the voice of 79-year-old Emmylou Harris, that is enriched rather than compromised by the gravel of experience

RICHARD MURGATROYD appreciates a study that urges us to think about water differently, as a living entity with its own logic and intelligence

The debut novel by Uruguayan Eugenia Ladra, and poetry by Gerardo Diego

New releases from Zulu Guitar Blues, Fela Kuti, and Amadou & Mariam

CHRIS SEARLE urges you not to miss two powerful performers playing three nights that will celebrate the great pianist/composer Thelonious Monk

IAN SINCLAIR revels in the reissue of great recordings by one of the most recognisable and radical voices in British music

BRENT CUTLER welcomes a valuable contribution to discussions around the need to de-carbonise energy production

STEVE ANDREW is intrigued by a timely and well-researched book that demonstrates the conflicted history of the central Asian country

JOHN GREEN’s palate is tickled by useful information leavened by amusing and unusual anecdotes, incidental gossip and scare stories

GAVIN O’TOOLE welcomes a book that sets the assassination of Brian Thomson in the context of radical individualism — lost in a vast pick-and-mix of ideologies

SIMON PARSONS applauds an original, visual and movement-based take on the birth and death of a relationship

The bard contemplates X — anti-human vomit soup with dog shit croutons — and the Tory recycling bin that is Reform

ALAN MORRISON recommends an outstanding and timely anthology of poems that reflect the experience and consequences of African migration

BINOY KAMPMARK examines the food racket as evidenced by the recent promotion of Italian cuisine to the status of ‘intangible national heritage’

FIONA O’CONNOR and MARIA DUARTE review State of Statelessness, Rental Family, 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, and The Rip

MARIA DUARTE recommends that this dramatic reconstruction of one instance of the Israeli killings in Gaza be seen as widely as possible

WILL SCHULER praises a stripped-back ‘anti-naturalist’ production of Arthur Miller’s drama about a corrupted family business

by Matt Gilbert

MATTHEW HAWKINS contrasts the sinister enchantments of an AI infused interactive exhibition with the intimacies disclosed by two real artists

DENNIS BROE surveys the new wild west: a technology that aims to “innovate” so fast that no government regulation or union negotiation can keep up

ANDY HEDGECOCK relishes a graphic portrayal of the corrosive impact of commodification, but can’t sympathise with the characters

ABIGAIL HARRISON MOORE welcomes a BBC prison drama that shows the importance of the classroom as a space to influence personal and social change

New releases from Van Morrison, Tyler Ballgame, and Dry Cleaning