Dead and alive

An illuminating new essay collection from one of the most distinctive, exciting and acclaimed writers of her generation, Zadie SmithZadie Smith is a wonderful essayist. She is a natural. She writes as she thinks, and she thinks crisply and exactly Tessa Hadley, GuardianIn this keenly awaited new collection, Zadie Smith brings her unique skills as an essayist to bear on a range of subjects which have captured her attention in recent years. She takes an exhilaratingly close look at artists Toyin Ojih Odutola and Celia Paul. She invites us along to the movies, to see and to think about Tar, and to Glastonbury to witness the ascendance of Stormzy. She asks us to look again at the young Michael Jackson and to mourn with her the passing of writers Joan Didion, Martin Amis, Hilary Mantel, Philip Roth and Toni Morrison. And she shows us once again her unrivalled ability to think through critically and humanely some of the most urgent preoccupations and tendencies of our troubled times.