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Father Figure by Emma Forrest review – a slippery tale of teenage obsession

Bristling with sexual, political and emotional angst, this finely tuned coming-of-age tale thrives on the grey areas of adolescence

Father Figure opens with a memory of murders, bought and paid for; then skips briskly to scholarship girl Gail, who is on the verge of being expelled from her expensive London academy for writing a scandalous essay. The connection between death and day school is new girl Agata, the daughter of notoriously corrupt East End businessman Ezra Levy.

Ezra, a man who takes phone calls from Putin, buys football clubs and has had people killed, wants more for Agata than he had when young. Her anorexia is killing her, and he, “fleshy and stupid”, can’t stop it. Gail sets her sights on Ezra: part compulsion, part seduction, an adolescent power game taken to dangerous conclusions.

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The Parallel Path by Jenn Ashworth review – a soul-searching walk across England

Forget the Salt Path – this writer’s introspective journey provides genuine food for thought

When Jenn Ashworth set out on Alfred Wainwright’s 192-mile coast-to-coast walk, from St Bees in the west to Robin Hood’s Bay in the east, she was stepping out of character. Her daily circular walks round Lancaster during lockdown were no real preparation, and a brief orienteering course was no guarantee that she wouldn’t get lost. She wasn’t walking for charity or running away from a marriage or, like the fell runner who’d done the route in 39 hours, trying to break any record. A homebody “inclined to slowness”, she was a 40-year-old novelist, professor and mother of two going off on her own for two-and-a-half weeks for reasons she couldn’t quite articulate.

Not that there weren’t contributory factors. Lockdown had left her with post-Covid cabin fever, itchy to be elsewhere after the long months of caring for her family and students (“a one-woman battle against entropy”). She also knew that at every pub and guest house she’d booked en route supportive letters would be waiting from her terminally ill but brilliantly animated friend Clive. Most importantly, although her walking wouldn’t be solitary, since she couldn’t avoid bumping into other (potentially annoying) hikers, she’d be “the sole owner of my own skin again”.

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YouTube’s Trending Page Will Be Shut Down Today; What’s Next?

YouTube will shut down its Trending Page and Now Trending list today. The move comes 10 years after the Google-owned video streaming service first launched the page for its users and content creators. Although the page is still visible, they could be removed by the end of the day. The company attributed the shut down to the falling visits to the page.

HMD Crest 2 and HMD Bold Chipset, RAM Details Leaked; HMD Arc 2 May Launch Soon

HMD may soon launch the Crest 2, Arc 2, and Bold smartphones, as details for the phones have surfaced online. They are tipped to be codenamed Accord, Sudoku, and Mahuze, respectively. The HMD Crest 2 is expected to feature a Unisoc T8300 5G chip with up to 8GB of RAM and run Android 15. The HMD Arc 2 may use a Unisoc SC9863A chipset, while the HMD Bold could feature a Unisoc T7200 or T7250 SoC paired with up to 6GB of RAM.