TONY BURKE plots the career of the legendary Senegalese band from Dakar nightclubs to Glastonbury
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Fantasy and sci-fi round-up
Reviews of The Coven by Lizzie Fry, Witherward by Hannah Mathewson, Escape Pod anthology and The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson
RITA DI SANTO contemplates two films about journalism that opened this year’s festival
GEOFF BOTTOMS applauds a world-class production King Lear that pits late feudalism against a rising bourgeoisie
MARY CONWAY keeps up with the sheer pace of a drama about the terrible gap between sanitised reporting and real-life turmoil of race and gender
New releases from Brian Fallon, Antony Szmierek and Hollow Hand
PAUL DONOVAN welcomes a revival of Reginald Rose’s classic play that reminds us of the fundamental need for trials with juries
THE COVEN by Lizzie Fry (Sphere, £14.99) is set in a world similar to our own except that there, witchcraft exists as part of normal life. Or it did, until a right-wing religious movement in the US saw a misogynist campaign against witches as its route to state power and ultimately to world domination.
As suppression and oppression of witches specifically, and women in general, grows, a small band of escapees and their allies are on the run in the British countryside.
So what we are presented with is essentially a chase thriller with magical elements and good fun it is too. Star readers will cheer as the characters discover that the division between men and women is intended primarily as a means to strengthen the division between rich and poor.
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