A deadly epidemic has led to martial law. Behind boarded-up windows — in a house haunted by abduction, hunger and fragmented memories — a shred of desperate hope remains.  

Prizes all round: the Bard hands plaudits to the Miners Gala, OT&JC, Joe Solo, Black Sabbath’s frontman and the Lionesses

WILL STONE fact-checks the colourful life of Ozzy Osbourne

JAMES CROSSLEY applauds a lucid biography of the German radical preacher who reemerged as a hero in the GDR

GUILLERMO THOMAS is intrigued by a history of the Middle East that demonstrates how promising post colonial beginnings were snuffed out by Western imperialist interests

Star cartoonist JAMIE BRITTON is in awe of a graphic novel of epic proportions that explores class, religion and globalisation via the strange cultivation of Ginseng in the US Midwest

MICHAL BONCZA and MARIA DUARTE review Zero, Bring Her Back, Gazer, and The Fantastic Four: First Steps

MARIA DUARTE recommends the intricate study of a high-performance and highly dysfuntional German family

CHRIS SEARLE speaks to vocalist Jacqui Dankworth

by Matt Duggan

LAUDAN NOOSHIN praises the Design and Disability exhibition at the V&A

LEO BOIX reviews a caustic novel of resistance and womanhood by Buenos Aires-born Lucia Lijtmaer, and an electrifying poetry collection by Chilean Vicente Huidobro