Cinema Speculation by Quentin Tarantino review – bracing and heartfelt collection

The movie-maker’s first book of criticism is fuelled by a breathless energy that makes up for its scattershot approach

The Successor review: life of Lachlan Murdoch pulls punches all too often

Readers of Paddy Manning’s book should keep in mind the words of Media Matters: Fox News is ‘an unchained pro-Trump propaganda outlet that promotes white nationalism’

Paul Newman: The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man review – a screen idol full of self-loathing

A painfully revealing memoir, taken from transcripts of reminiscences Newman recorded in the 1980s, lays bare a candid, complicated star

In brief: Islands; The Fugitives; Ghost Music – review

BBC home editor Mark Easton on the nature of island life; an entertaining tale of a reformed Khartoum jazz band; and the intriguing musings of a Beijing pianist

So Distant from My Life by Monique Ilboudo review – illuminating take on migration

A young west African keen to go to Europe discovers the price of making a new life in this novella by the Burkinabe academic and activist

The Penguin Book of French Short Stories: Vol 1 review, edited by Patrick McGuinness – tales with a certain ooh la la

Flaubert and Zola rub shoulders with an author of three-line novellas in an eclectic, often steamy collection charting the history of the French short story

Cocoon by Zhang Yueran review – a story that needed to be told

Two old friends dissect the impact of a violent act on their families in a vital, baroque critique of the Cultural Revolution

Hunting Ghislaine by John Sweeney review – compelling study of the notorious socialite

From privileged childhood to trial, this is a riveting story – although Ghislaine Maxwell remains an enigma just out of reach

Shirley Hazzard: A Writing Life by Brigitta Olubas review – doyenne of love and devastation

This fascinating biography tenderly links the life and work of the woman whose timeless novels grappled with the power of passion

Losing the Plot by Derek Owusu review – tribute to an émigré mother

A son chronicles his mother’s experiences as she leaves her ancestral home in Ghana for a difficult life in London

Clouded Reveries review – ode to otherworldly Irish poet with a scalpel of a pen

Ciara Nic Chormaic’s documentary following writer Doireann Ní Ghríofa offers an often literal visual rendering of the poet’s ethereal perspective

The best recent science fiction and fantasy – reviews roundup

Psalms for the End of the World by Cole Haddon; The Violence by Delilah S Dawson; The Hollows by Daniel Church; Cold Water by Dave Hutchinson

To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf audiobook review – Ruth Wilson captures the writer’s rhythms

The actor moves seamlessly between the multiple viewpoints in this vivid and poetic reading of Woolf’s experimental novel

Cinema Speculation by Quentin Tarantino review – director’s cut

From Taxi Driver to Bullitt, the director in full flow on his favourite movies

Nothing Bad Ever Happens Here by Heather Rose review – one woman’s quest for joy

This vibrant memoir in essays reveals the Australian author’s tragic childhood and her restless hunt for clarity via drugs, meditation and painful rituals