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Sir David Bell, vice-chancellor, University of Reading, is reading Denise Mina¡¯s Blood, Salt, Water (Orion, 2016). ¡°With a PhD in criminology, Denise Mina has turned her formidable intellect not to academia but to writing, among other things, West of Scotland crime novels. And a good thing too, as her stories are brilliantly constructed and fiendishly clever. No more so than Blood, Salt, Water, which features Detective Inspector Alex Morrow discovering the dark, drug-related side of genteel Helensburgh.¡±

Paul Greatrix, registrar, University of Nottingham, is reading Gruff Rhys¡¯ American Interior (Penguin, 2015). ¡°Myth and reality collide in this record of an expedition by the musician Gruff Rhys to follow in the footsteps of the remarkable 18th-century farmhand-turned-explorer John Evans. The narrative (and accompanying album) cover the history of both tours into the heart of the American interior in search of a legendary tribe of Welsh-speaking Native Americans. An extraordinary tale.¡±

Tabish Khair, associate professor of literature, Aarhus University, Denmark, is reading Elleke Boehmer¡¯s Indian Arrivals 1870-1915: Networks of British Empire (Oxford University Press, 2015). ¡°Boehmer is an authority on post-colonial literatures and an accomplished novelist. This combination makes for a lucid study of the complicated ¨C but not necessarily riven ¨C landscape of intercultural contacts between Britons and Indians on British soil at the height of the Empire. Focusing on both famous ¡®arrivants¡¯ (such as Tagore and Gandhi) and lesser-known ones, this is a luminous literary history.¡±

Sin¨¦ad Moynihan, senior lecturer in 20th-century literature, University of Exeter, is reading The Edinburgh Companion to Nineteenth-Century American Letters and Letter-Writing (Edinburgh University Press, 2016), edited by Celeste-Marie Bernier, Judie Newman and Matthew Pethers. ¡°There really is something for everyone in this hugely impressive collection of essays: discussions of the importance of letters to US migrant histories; materialist histories of postal systems and direct mail marketing (of ideas, as well as of goods); and the significance of letters to literary culture. From treatments of the (relatively) arcane to canonical texts, the range is simply staggering.¡±

Sharon Wheeler, visiting lecturer in journalism, Birmingham City University, is reading James Ward¡¯s Adventures in Stationery: A Journey through Your Pencil Case (Profile Books, 2015). ¡°My name is Sharon and I¡¯m a stationery addict. And so too is James Ward, who has an eye for the quirky fact and anecdote. I am currently beaming happily in a fuzzy warm cloud of nostalgia. Anyway, I can¡¯t hang around here chatting all day ¨C there are pens and notebooks to dribble over unbecomingly. A woman can never have too many of either¡­¡±