Jailed since the first intifada, Abu Srour charts a deeply personal journey through the conflict that has defined his life

Attempts to end the violence in Gaza have focused on the exchange of Israeli hostages taken by Hamas on 7 October for Palestinians held in Israeli prisons. One of the many Palestinians is Nasser Abu Srour, who has been incarcerated since 1993 for his alleged involvement in the death of an Israeli intelligence officer during the first intifada . This is the fourth time the prospect of freedom has been raised, the past three ending in disappointment, even when his release was part of a 2013 peace process pledge brokered by the Obama administration.

His experience might be difficult to imagine but for the extraordinary memoir he has written, translated into lyrical prose by Luke Leafgren. “This is the story of a wall that somehow chose me as the witness of what it said and did,” he begins. In a prison, walls are ever present, the single reliable feature of the world. The idea of the wall becomes a focal point for Abu Srour’s narrative, the stability to which he clings, the source of comfort and continuity.

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Magdalena Wosinska spent the 1990s hanging out with bands, skateboarders and whoever else crossed her path. These photos capture blissful free spirits

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And They Lived … Ever After is a south Asian book of reworked European classics written by women with disabilities

A deaf Snow White, a blind Cinderella, a neurodivergent ugly duckling and a wheelchair-using Rapunzel: classic European fairytales have been reimagined in a new anthropology of stories written by south Asian women with disabilities.

“ When disabled people don’t see themselves in the world, it tells us that we don’t deserve to exist, that these stories are not for us, that stories of love and friendship are not for us, and certainly not happy endings,” says Nidhi Ashok Goyal, the founder of Rising Flame, a feminist disability rights group that has produced the book, called And They Lived … Ever After.

“I can’t. There is no ramp from the room to the garden.”

“We will find a way. I can carry you down,” says the prince.

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Do you love reading – but all too often find yourself just scrolling through your phone or watching TV? Here is how to get lost in literature again

In the age of digital distractions, it is easy to struggle to find the time and headspace to get lost in literature. How can you get back into the habit? Librarians share the best ways to rediscover reading, make it a regular habit – and their tips for the most unputdownable books.

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New book coming this Fall! Pre-order today. Featuring over 200 pages—including 32 pages of brand new comics—Hope it All Works Out! contains all your favorite Mouse and friends comics, along with a selection of my best material from the past few years. In stores September 24!

Pre-order here: https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Hope-It-All-Works-Out!/Reza-Farazmand/9781524893897

Zoe Williams explores the greatest mystery of modern politics: Liz Truss’ self belief (1m15s), and Charlotte Edwardes delves into the extraordinary inside story of the biggest art fraud in American history (5m53s)

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Former Tory chair turned political biographer and publisher is behind books that have put former PM and Labour’s deputy in the spotlights

If this week’s tetchy exchanges between Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak at prime minister’s questions proved one thing, it was the ability of the veteran businessman, donor and publisher Michael Ashcroft to set the political agenda.

While Starmer revelled in the publication of 10 Years to Save the West, which was written by the former prime minister Liz Truss and published this week by Ashcroft’s Biteback Publishing, Sunak wanted to focus on another Biteback book – Ashcroft’s own Red Queen?, a biography of Labour’s deputy leader, Angela Rayner.

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Central European tourists have been descending on Achill ever since Heinrich Böll wrote effusively about its inhabitants’ customs and idiosyncrasies

In 1954, the German writer Heinrich Böll landed in Ireland for the first time, headed west and kept going till he reached the Atlantic ocean. He was seeking a refuge from the brash materialism of postwar Germany, and found it on Achill island, where waves crashed against cliffs, sheep foraged in fields and villagers went about their business of fishing, farming and storytelling.

The following year he returned with his family and began to observe and chronicle the customs, idiosyncrasies, sorrows and joys of its inhabitants. So began a literary love affair between Germany and a windswept corner of County Mayo that endures 70 years after the Nobel laureate’s first visit.

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Of Cattle and Men by Brazilian writer Ana Paula Maia, translated by Zoë Perry, is set in a slaughterhouse in an isolated corner of Brazil

Charco Press’s Of Cattle and Men by Brazilian writer Ana Paula Maia, translated by Zoë Perry, has won the Republic of Consciousness prize, which recognises books from small publishers.

The 99-page book, described as a “gut-punch of a novel” by the judge Sana Goyal, is set in a slaughterhouse in an isolated corner of Brazil where cows begin to disappear, seemingly by suicide.

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