Category: 5. Entertainment

Lauren Sánchez packed 27 designer dresses for her wedding to the billionaire Amazon founder, Jeff Bezos, in Venice last week, but left with only 26 after one went missing.

The couple, who are now honeymooning in Taormina, Sicily, were wed during a star-studded three-day celebration in the lagoon city.

They left Venice on Sunday, but mystery over the missing dress has generated chatter in Venice, with Corriere della Sera claiming that it was stolen, possibly by someone who evaded security and gatecrashed a party on the tiny island of San Giorgio, where the couple exchanged rings, on Friday. The newspaper said the number of gatecrashers to the event was such that officers from the local unit of Italy’s anti-terrorism squad, Digos, were called to the island.

The newspaper also alleged a vintage Dolce & Gabbana-designed dress, either worn by the bride or wedding guest Ivanka Trump, was torn and caught fire during another party.

Sources familiar with the situation confirmed that a dress had gone missing but denied it was stolen. It is unclear where the dress disappeared and when. The couple lodged at the seven-star Aman hotel, where the bride’s wedding outfits were reportedly kept under close watch.

The sources stressed that no legal complaint about the missing dress had been made to police, with the expectation being that the garment would eventually “turn up”. They also denied the report that a dress caught fire and that the celebrations had been infiltrated by gatecrashers.

The nuptials, which are said to have cost between €40m and €48m (£34m-£41m), reportedly included everything from pyjama and foam parties to elegant dinners and a Great Gatsby-themed event.

But on almost every canal, alleyway and square, there were protests against the wedding, with anti-Bezos campaigners arguing that the celebrations risked turning Venice into a playground for the rich, bringing nothing but strife for ordinary residents. The location of the main reception party on Saturday had to be changed at the last-minute because of threats by protesters to fill the canals with inflatable crocodiles in order to prevent the 200 or so wedding guests, who included Whoopi Goldberg, Orlando Bloom and Kim Kardashian, from arriving.

The guests arrived in Venice on super-yachts and more than 90 private jets.

As Friday night’s party got into full swing, a green laser was used to spell out the slogan ‘No Kings, No Bezos’ on the bell tower in St Mark’s Square. Another stunt involved activists floating a lifesize mannequin of Bezos along the Grand Canal, clinging to an Amazon box while holding fake dollars.

The Venice mayor, Luigi Brugnaro, dismissed the protesters as “shameful” and said the Bezos-Sánchez union would fill Venetian coffers.

The couple have now moved on to Taormina. They reportedly arrived in Sicily on Bezos’s super-yacht before being transported by helicopter to the hilltop town on the island’s east coast, where they are staying in San Domenico Palace, the hotel made famous by the US TV show, The White Lotus.

For now, there have been no reports of protests or items of clothing gone astray on the southern Italian island. Instead, some political leaders have embraced the couple.

“Jeff and Lauren, we welcome you with open arms,” said Matteo Francilia, mayor of Furci Siculo, a small town near Messina. “Leave behind the beautiful lagoon with its absurd complaints! Here in Furci Siculo you’ll find sun, sea and genuine people, who would welcome you with open arms.”

It’s not the first time Bezos’s 127-metre super-yacht has sailed to Sicily. Last summer, the vessel toured the coastline near Taormina, and the Aeolian islands.

Has your northern accent helped or hindered your career? Eluned51
They do call a group of actors a “moan” of actors. We like to have a good moan. When people hear a regional accent, they immediately make assumptions about your class, financial status and education. People generally think if you’ve got a strong regional accent, you can’t do much else. Obviously there are amazing actors like Jodie Comer who smash that to pieces because people don’t realise she’s from Liverpool. But because I came out the traps with the northern accent it’s probably helped.

Do you ever suffer from impostor syndrome and think: “Why are people so fascinated by me?” RealEdPhillips
I don’t ever think people are – I think they are generally quite bored by me! Of course I have impostor syndrome. When you don’t get a job, you can’t help but think: “Why didn’t I get that job? Why don’t they think I’m good enough?” So there’s a healthy balance of inferiority complex and slightly prickly ego.

What are your memories of filming Funny Cow? Michel3Amsterdam
We had such a good time because it was made with a bunch of friends. We managed to twist Paddy Considine’s arm to be part of it. We had Stephen Graham, Christine Bottomley, John Bishop. All these amazing people, so it was quite colourful. I have always been fascinated by female comics’ journeys through working men’s clubs in the 70s, and the sacrifices and compromises they had to make. The material they were using was horrific, really. It was all about: “How do you get noticed?” The answer was: “If you can’t beat them, join them.” The politics of the 70s seemed to come crashing down as we were filming it, with Brexit. So we wanted to do a bit of an exposé on British politics as well.

Which political figure in the Labour party would you most like to play? NorthwichTom
I’ve always wanted to play Ellen Wilkinson, but I’m far too tall because she was a little bullet: smallish stature, but mighty of heart and soul. I went to drama school with Sally Hawkins, and thought she could play her and I could be Nancy Astor, even though I have no interest in her [Conservative] politics. But they were great friends, which I always thought would make a fascinating drama.

Did writing about and playing Beryl Burton in the BBC radio drama Beryl: A Love Story on Two Wheels inspire you to get on the saddle? HenleyRegatta
I’ve always used a bike to get around. Once I started writing about Beryl, I joined a club and went on my first 50km ride and nearly died. But then I became addicted, and would go out three times a week and do 70 or 80km. So, yes, I was inspired by Beryl. I love the camaraderie and the freedom. It’s like being a kid, getting on your bike with your pals. It’s great.

Would you like to do more nihilistic action hero stuff, like you did in Black Mirror? ColdCountyHome

I remember an email came through saying: “You’ve been offered Black Mirror, can you read the script quickly and let us know?” I said: “I don’t need to read it. It’s Black Mirror. Count me in.” I loved doing it because it was the first time I had done anything remotely action based. I’d love to do something on horseback. Don’t let the accent fool you: I used to ride a lot when I was younger. So I’d love to do a female western.

What was your most memorable moment on the rugby field? scarletnoir
Getting absolutely thrashed by Keighley ladies amateur rugby league team, and trying to not get too severely injured. Our trainer used to say: “Women hold grudges.” If you made a high tackle, even accidentally, you knew revenge was coming your way.

Could you persuade Craig Cash to reopen the doors of the Grapes for another series of Early Doors? TheSableHoundReturns
I have tried. We have all tried. We had such a great time. We just laughed from the beginning to the end of the day. It didn’t feel like work. It really didn’t. I shouldn’t say this, but as you know, it was set in a pub, so we went out to an actual pub for a few drinks, then came back and filmed it on the set that looked like a pub. We are all still really close. We’ve had a few meet-ups and have said: “Come on Craig, please.” We’d love to do it. But who knows?

Line dancing with Diane Morgan in Mandy. Did you have prior experience or did you have to learn? mattyjj
Luckily they just taught me on the day, so it was a new skill. That’s my favourite screen death: being crushed to death by a disco ball. Only Diane Morgan could come up with that. We’ve been friends since drama school, so when she said: “Would you come and be in this?” I was like: “Absolutely. Why have you not asked me before?”

What was it like working with Mike Leigh in Peterloo? bumble

I wrote to Mike when I was at drama school, where I did my showcase with Sally Hawkins, a two-hander of the April De Angelis play, Playhouse Creatures. I said: “We should write to Mike Leigh.” She said: “Are you sure?” I said: “We’ll do a joint letter.” So we wrote to him and we got a call in, and the rest is history. He’s brilliant. He loves actors. He has such a specific way of rehearsing and character development, but he’s so thorough and – I don’t know whether he’d like me saying – humble. There are no airs and graces about him. He’s so passionate about what he does, and I just love the fact that he loves actors.

Happy Birthday! How do you feel at 50? TopTramp
Well, on my next birthday in two weeks, I’ll be 51. I’m at peace with the fact that I’m middle-aged now. I’m embracing it. Turning 40 was more difficult. Now I think: “I’m still here”, and that can’t be looked upon lightly.

You narrated the Transmissions: The Definitive Story of Joy Division and New Order podcast. Top three New Order songs? CraigThePaig
Bizarre Love Triangle. True Faith. Temptation. I still remember getting Substance when I was a teenager at school. That album – even though it was a compilation – changed my life. I had it on double cassette. My mum would say: “Go and set the table”, and I couldn’t hear her because I’d have it blasting in my ears on my Walkman.

Shefali Jariwala’s sudden passing has left her loved ones in deep sorrow. Her husband, Parag Tyagi, has been shattered since losing the love of his life. For the first time since her passing, Parag has opened up about the heartbreaking loss. He shared an emotional note in memory of Shefali, who died on June 27 in Mumbai.Parag broke his silence a week after Shefali’s passing by posting on his social media. He shared a never-seen-before picture of Shefali and vowed to love her forever. In his heartfelt message, he also expressed his wish for everyone to remember Shefali as someone who always brought happiness to those around her.Parag wrote an emotional post, remembering his wife, “Shefali — the ever-eternal Kaanta Laga — was so much more than what met the eye. She was fire wrapped in grace — sharp, focused, and fiercely driven. A woman who lived with intention, nurturing her career, her mind, her body, and her soul with quiet strength and unwavering determination. But beyond all her titles and achievements, Shefali was love in its most selfless form.“He further wrote, “She was sab ki maa — always putting others first, offering comfort and warmth simply through her presence. A generous daughter. A devoted and affectionate wife and a wonderful mom to Simba. A protective and guiding sister n maasi. A fiercely loyal friend who stood by those she loved with courage and compassion.”Amid the ongoing discussions about the circumstances of Shefali’s death, Parag stated that it’s natural to feel affected by all the rumours and assumptions. He added, “”In the chaos of grief, it’s easy to be swept away by noise and speculation. But Shefali deserves to be remembered by her light — By the way she made people feel. By the joy she sparked. By the lives she lifted. I’m starting this thread with a simple prayer: May this space be filled only with love. With memories that bring healing. With stories that keep her spirit alive. Let that be her legacy — a soul so radiant, she will never, ever be forgotten. Love you till eternity.”As soon as Parag posted the heartfelt tribute, Shefali’s friends and colleagues from the entertainment industry responded with emotional messages, expressing their grief and offering support.Arti Singh, who became thick friends with Shefali during Bigg Boss wrote, “Bhaiya ❤️ she was beautiful inside out and that baby in her u kept tht alive always. Bhagwan apko Shakti de . Aur apki sehat achi rakhe . ❤️” Prarthana Behere replied, “Parag Bhai” with a heart emoji. Anita Hassanandani also responded to the post. Several other TV stars like Ridheema Tiwari, Pratik Sehajpal, Jaswir Kaur also dropped heart emojis on the post.Shefali passed away on June 27, and the Mumbai Police have initiated an investigation to determine the exact cause of her death.

Gareth Edwards, director of Jurassic World Rebirth, has finally opened about the chances of another a sequel.

The 2025 film starring Scarlett Johansson and Jonathan Bailey is currently running successfully in theatres globally.

Even though, the latest film did present new possibilities for the franchise to go forward, but Edwards discussed that he always thought of this project as a standalone film with no other entry.

While speaking in an interview with ScreenRant’s Liam Crowley, he said, “Maybe there’s something in there. But no, we tried to make this movie like a single standalone.”

According to him sequels and trilogies leave makers to the point where they end up with one question in their heads and that is, “how do we now make the others?”

Gareth explained, “I’ve genuinely never talked about it with anybody. Not a single conversation with David Koepp or Frank Marshall or Universal about a sequel.”

“I think everyone’s like (knocks on wood), all they want is for people to really like this movie and make the best film we can, and that’s it. And then it’s in the lap of the gods, everything else, really”, he continued.

Jurassic World Rebirth grossed $250 million globally ever since its release. 

LONDON – When Kneecap performed at Glastonbury music festival this year — a performance that the British Prime Minister opposed before the band even took the stage — bandmember Mo Chara told the crowd, “us three have no right to be on this stage in front of this many people, rapping predominantly in a language that even people at home don’t even speak.”

Kneecap, three young men from Northern Ireland who rap in Irish, has risen to prominence in recent years, with controversy surrounding its shows and political statements.

The hip-hop trio was formed in 2017, composed of bandmembers Mo Chara, Móglaí Bap and DJ Próvaí, who come from Belfast. The band is part of the generation known as the “ceasefire babies,” who grew up in the aftermath of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement that formally ended the decades of violence in Northern Ireland known as the Troubles. The group’s lyrics span everything from working class youth culture in Belfast, to Irish language rights, to a desire for Northern Ireland to join the Republic of Ireland.

Why the trio raps in Irish 

Kneecap says that rapping in Irish, long marginalized under British rule in Northern Ireland, is a political choice. When NPR met the band at an Irish-language cultural center in west Belfast in 2023, bandmember Mo Chara explained, “It’s impossible not to be political here [in Northern Ireland] if you’re going to speak Irish. It’s very hard not to be political growing up in Belfast.”

The Irish language — which the British banned from Northern Irish government and courts under a recently repealed 18th century law — is now seeing a revival, especially among young people. Northern Ireland has seen a steady rise in Irish speakers in recent years, and Irish was made an official language of the region in 2022, where about 12% of the population now speak it.

Kneecap has been credited for leading what some have called an “Irish language revolution.” 

As well as being a political choice, the band says rapping in Irish is also a creative one. Kneecap has pushed the boundaries of the language in rap, with Mo Chara telling NPR that Irish isn’t “just about fiddles and shamrocks.”

“Our youth culture now involves a lot more paraphernalia and drugs,” says Móglaí Bap. “We had to create new words so that we could talk about these things. That was part of the band, creating this new vocabulary that didn’t really exist.”

The band’s debut song, “C.E.A.R.T.A,” means “rights” in Irish. Kneecap says it was born out of a night when Móglaí Bap and his friends were out spray-painting around Belfast during a protest in support of the Irish language. It’s about the right to speak Irish, Móglaí Bap says, but it’s also about “the right for us to get off our heads, to get high.”

The band’s influences are wide-ranging, from U.S. hip-hop to Irish rebel music. The members grew up listening to Irish rebel songs, says Mo Chara. “These were songs that were about the unification of Ireland,” he says. “They were very anti-British involvement in Ireland.”

Mo Chara cites songs like “Come Out Ye Black and Tans”, a 1920s Irish rebel song about standing up to a notoriously brutal British police force named for the color of their uniforms, who were infamous for killing Irish civilians during the Irish War of Independence in the early 1920s. Móglaí Bap says the song, “talks about this army that came from England that went out murdering people,” and says that “it would be seen today to have a hip-hop theme to it.”

Kneecap’s own music talks about a desire for Northern Ireland to be freed from British rule, too. One of the group’s biggest hits is titled “Get Your Brits Out.”

A semi-fictionalised film about the band’s origins — in which the members star as themselves — won critical acclaim and a string of awards, including a BAFTA earlier this year.

How the band has attracted controversy 

The band is also vocal in its criticism of Israel, and call Israel’s war in Gaza a genocide — statements that have drawn the ire of politicians and public figures in the UK and beyond.

At Coachella this year, Kneecap led the crowd in chants of “Free Palestine” and ended the set projecting pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel messages on the screen, including one that said “Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinian people,” and, “It is being enabled by the US government who arm and fund Israel despite their war crimes.” The set attracted criticism, with some, including Sharon Osbourne, calling for the band’s U.S. visas to be revoked.

Soon after the Coachella set, two older videos surfaced online from past concerts, which appeared to show band members shouting “up Hamas, up Hezbollah” and saying “the only good Tory is a dead Tory,” referring to lawmakers from Britain’s center-right Conservative party. British counter-terrorism police said they were investigating the band and Mo Chara was later charged with a terrorism offence, for allegedly holding up a flag in support of Hezbollah, which is a proscribed terrorist organization in the U.K.

In a statement on X, Kneecap said: “we do not, and have never, supported Hamas or Hezbollah. We condemn all attacks on civilians,” and “we reject any suggestion that we would seek to incite violence against any MP or individual.” The group said the videos had been “taken out of all context” and that there had been a “smear campaign” against the band following its Coachella performance.

The band saw some of its shows cancelled following the terror charge. Some politicians said Kneecap shouldn’t be allowed to perform at Glastonbury, including British Prime Minister Keir Starmer who said it would not be “appropriate.”

In the end, Glastonbury organizers said the Kneecap performance would go ahead. The BBC, which broadcasts the festival live every year, said it would not broadcast the Kneecap show live but later made it available to watch online. In a statement, the BBC said “whilst the BBC doesn’t ban artists, our plans ensure that our programming meets our editorial guidelines.”

The band drew a crowd of hundreds of thousands, and it used the set to reiterate its support for Palestinians in Gaza and to hit back at the band’s critics, beginning with a montage of the various condemnations Kneecap received from both sides of the Atlantic. At one point the band led the crowd in chants of “F*** Keir Starmer” and described the charge against Mo Chara as a “trumped up terrorism charge.”

Mo Chara drew parallels between the Irish struggle and the plight of Palestinians in Gaza, telling the crowd that, “the Irish suffered 800 years of colonialism under the British state,” adding, “we understand colonialism and we understand how important it is for solidarity internationally.”

British police have now opened a criminal investigation into Kneecap’s Glastonbury set “relating to hate crimes,” alongside another set by British punk band Bob Vylan, in which the lead singer, Bobby Vylan, led the crowds in chants of “death, death to the IDF,” referring to the Israeli military. The police have not said which part of either set would be subject to criminal investigation.

LONDON – When Kneecap performed at Glastonbury music festival this year — a performance that the British Prime Minister opposed before the band even took the stage — bandmember Mo Chara told the crowd, “us three have no right to be on this stage in front of this many people, rapping predominantly in a language that even people at home don’t even speak.”

Kneecap, three young men from Northern Ireland who rap in Irish, has risen to prominence in recent years, with controversy surrounding its shows and political statements.

The hip-hop trio was formed in 2017, composed of bandmembers Mo Chara, Móglaí Bap and DJ Próvaí, who come from Belfast. The band is part of the generation known as the “ceasefire babies,” who grew up in the aftermath of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement that formally ended the decades of violence in Northern Ireland known as the Troubles. The group’s lyrics span everything from working class youth culture in Belfast, to Irish language rights, to a desire for Northern Ireland to join the Republic of Ireland.

Why the trio raps in Irish 

Kneecap says that rapping in Irish, long marginalized under British rule in Northern Ireland, is a political choice. When NPR met the band at an Irish-language cultural center in west Belfast in 2023, bandmember Mo Chara explained, “It’s impossible not to be political here [in Northern Ireland] if you’re going to speak Irish. It’s very hard not to be political growing up in Belfast.”

The Irish language — which the British banned from Northern Irish government and courts under a recently repealed 18th century law — is now seeing a revival, especially among young people. Northern Ireland has seen a steady rise in Irish speakers in recent years, and Irish was made an official language of the region in 2022, where about 12% of the population now speak it.

Kneecap has been credited for leading what some have called an “Irish language revolution.” 

As well as being a political choice, the band says rapping in Irish is also a creative one. Kneecap has pushed the boundaries of the language in rap, with Mo Chara telling NPR that Irish isn’t “just about fiddles and shamrocks.”

“Our youth culture now involves a lot more paraphernalia and drugs,” says Móglaí Bap. “We had to create new words so that we could talk about these things. That was part of the band, creating this new vocabulary that didn’t really exist.”

The band’s debut song, “C.E.A.R.T.A,” means “rights” in Irish. Kneecap says it was born out of a night when Móglaí Bap and his friends were out spray-painting around Belfast during a protest in support of the Irish language. It’s about the right to speak Irish, Móglaí Bap says, but it’s also about “the right for us to get off our heads, to get high.”

The band’s influences are wide-ranging, from U.S. hip-hop to Irish rebel music. The members grew up listening to Irish rebel songs, says Mo Chara. “These were songs that were about the unification of Ireland,” he says. “They were very anti-British involvement in Ireland.”

Mo Chara cites songs like “Come Out Ye Black and Tans”, a 1920s Irish rebel song about standing up to a notoriously brutal British police force named for the color of their uniforms, who were infamous for killing Irish civilians during the Irish War of Independence in the early 1920s. Móglaí Bap says the song, “talks about this army that came from England that went out murdering people,” and says that “it would be seen today to have a hip-hop theme to it.”

Kneecap’s own music talks about a desire for Northern Ireland to be freed from British rule, too. One of the group’s biggest hits is titled “Get Your Brits Out.”

A semi-fictionalised film about the band’s origins — in which the members star as themselves — won critical acclaim and a string of awards, including a BAFTA earlier this year.

How the band has attracted controversy 

The band is also vocal in its criticism of Israel, and call Israel’s war in Gaza a genocide — statements that have drawn the ire of politicians and public figures in the UK and beyond.

At Coachella this year, Kneecap led the crowd in chants of “Free Palestine” and ended the set projecting pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel messages on the screen, including one that said “Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinian people,” and, “It is being enabled by the US government who arm and fund Israel despite their war crimes.” The set attracted criticism, with some, including Sharon Osbourne, calling for the band’s U.S. visas to be revoked.

Soon after the Coachella set, two older videos surfaced online from past concerts, which appeared to show band members shouting “up Hamas, up Hezbollah” and saying “the only good Tory is a dead Tory,” referring to lawmakers from Britain’s center-right Conservative party. British counter-terrorism police said they were investigating the band and Mo Chara was later charged with a terrorism offence, for allegedly holding up a flag in support of Hezbollah, which is a proscribed terrorist organization in the U.K.

In a statement on X, Kneecap said: “we do not, and have never, supported Hamas or Hezbollah. We condemn all attacks on civilians,” and “we reject any suggestion that we would seek to incite violence against any MP or individual.” The group said the videos had been “taken out of all context” and that there had been a “smear campaign” against the band following its Coachella performance.

The band saw some of its shows cancelled following the terror charge. Some politicians said Kneecap shouldn’t be allowed to perform at Glastonbury, including British Prime Minister Keir Starmer who said it would not be “appropriate.”

In the end, Glastonbury organizers said the Kneecap performance would go ahead. The BBC, which broadcasts the festival live every year, said it would not broadcast the Kneecap show live but later made it available to watch online. In a statement, the BBC said “whilst the BBC doesn’t ban artists, our plans ensure that our programming meets our editorial guidelines.”

The band drew a crowd of hundreds of thousands, and it used the set to reiterate its support for Palestinians in Gaza and to hit back at the band’s critics, beginning with a montage of the various condemnations Kneecap received from both sides of the Atlantic. At one point the band led the crowd in chants of “F*** Keir Starmer” and described the charge against Mo Chara as a “trumped up terrorism charge.”

Mo Chara drew parallels between the Irish struggle and the plight of Palestinians in Gaza, telling the crowd that, “the Irish suffered 800 years of colonialism under the British state,” adding, “we understand colonialism and we understand how important it is for solidarity internationally.”

British police have now opened a criminal investigation into Kneecap’s Glastonbury set “relating to hate crimes,” alongside another set by British punk band Bob Vylan, in which the lead singer, Bobby Vylan, led the crowds in chants of “death, death to the IDF,” referring to the Israeli military. The police have not said which part of either set would be subject to criminal investigation.

Copyright 2025 NPR

Susan Choi’s sixth novel takes a little-known and appalling aspect of Japanese-Korean history and fashions it into a rich generational saga that teems with intelligence, curiosity and, in terms of reading, sheer pleasure. Like the flashlight of its title it casts an evasive, variably illuminating beam, focusing on the hidden lives of characters, their careless and destructive lies, random yet weighted connections to each other, vulnerability and extraordinary ability to survive.

Choi’s previous work, Trust Exercise (2019) won the National Book Award in her native US. Of that novel, Choi has said that it “takes up the question of national identity, and the extent to which it coincides or does not coincide with ethnic and with cultural identity”.

Flashlight, which began as a New Yorker short story, has not dissimilar concerns as it takes in a sweep of places and periods from the 1950s to the early 2000s: suburban Indiana, downtown Los Angeles, the Japan of both city and shore, late 1980s Paris and London and, in its grave and beautiful conclusion, the border with North Korea.

It opens in the “dog days of August” 1977 in an unremarkable coastal town in Japan. On its beach one night, a nine-year-old girl is discovered suffering from hypothermia and half-drowned. Her father, with whom she had been taking an evening walk, has vanished.

Despite prolonged searches no trace of him is found, and the pair’s sandals remain side by side where they were placed at the end of the jetty. They become the objects of a temporary shrine of rice bowls, flowers, fruit and trinkets donated by local people, until they are washed away.

Identity, names and statelessness — their arbitrary bestowing and removal — are central themes in this questioning novel

What is left following this catastrophe is a traumatised family — American mother Anne, and daughter, Louisa. The latter is angry, hitting out, eternally furious with her mother and, as time passes, barely remembering her father, Serk, who was presumed washed out to sea.

Of what happened that evening, despite a psychiatrist’s delving, she has no memory: that will come much later, when “her body is leaden as if she has swum all that distance again, through the muscling, relentless, gelatinous cold force of the waves”.

Serk’s alleged drowning remains in the background until two-thirds of the way through the novel as the sea — helped by a large dose of the fatalism that readers of fiction rely on — gives up its secrets. Before his disappearance, Serk is a lecturer in engineering who emigrated from Japan to the US on a visa, although as an ethnic Korean his Japanese citizenship had been cancelled in 1952.

Identity, names and statelessness — their arbitrary bestowing and removal — are central themes in this questioning novel. Serk is known variously throughout as Hiroshi (his Japanese name), Seok (Korean), and lastly, the Crab, by which time he has been almost subsumed into mythological status.

His parents, originally from Korea, were forced through poverty to move to Japan; several years after the second world war, which ended when Serk was six, they begin to make plans to return — to a now divided country, communist North Korea, the DRPK. By this time, Serk (the Americanisation of Seok) is about to graduate from college; his next sibling, a sister, Soonja, hastily marries to avoid leaving Japan.

Their parents, seduced by the promised paradise that awaits them and their three youngest children, make the journey “home”. After their return, their letters are scarce, stating only their great happiness, which sits oddly alongside urgent requests for basic food and clothing, for medicine and blankets. The letters gradually cease.

Choi’s narrative winds back and forth over some 50 years. The viewpoints of its principal characters alternate — from Louisa as a child, then a college student, then a married woman with children of her own; to Anne, her mother; to Serk, and to Tobias, Anne’s son by another man. Aged 19, she had been forced to give him up for adoption directly after giving birth. Anne’s and Serk’s marriage foundered from the start, blighted by his arrogance, silences and their bitter arguments.

By the time of Serk’s disappearance Louisa’s relationship with her parents resembles that of “a Venn diagram” with the child as the only common factor.

In the US her father is overprotective, to the point of obsessiveness. But when they relocate to Japan for what is meant to be his year-long secondment, Louisa is expected to be independent, like a Japanese child.

Having felt that she wasn’t white enough for the US, she is too tall for Japan, and initially she struggles. (Later, as a student travelling in France, she will be subject to a horrible instance of racist violation that prefigures the darker revelations that Choi has in store).

In Japan, Anne is the outsider, just as Serk always seemed in the US; confined to their damp flat with a mysterious wasting illness (eventually diagnosed as MS), while Serk takes Louisa on visits to meet a stranger, a woman from his past.

At this point Anne is reunited with Tobias, whose role in this complex familial structure — a spiky, snarly one that resists affection — is to be the savant, annoyingly compassionate older brother whom Louisa ridicules until she finally sees the point of him.

Culturally the late 1970s were a showcase for the blockbuster sci-fi film — on one of their last outings together Serk and Lousia attend a screening of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. It is tempting to believe more in fantastical alien abduction than in the human shadow puppets of a totalitarian regime that, for Serk and others, will prove all too real as Choi delivers the book’s shocking last third: “Time is not a river moving ceaselessly into the future but a stagnated pool. Breathing at its surface, drowning in its depths, are the same.”

Here the personal graphically collides with the geopolitical. Yet it has been lying quietly in abeyance all along, like Louisa’s abandoned childhood backpack or Anne’s cassettes casually taped from Japanese radio. They are all clues hiding in plain sight in a restless, leisurely and capacious work of such emotional force and controlled style that it surely cannot be overlooked by this year’s Booker judges.

Flashlight by Susan Choi Jonathan Cape £20/Farrar, Straus and Giroux $30, 464 pages

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https://www.archdaily.com/1031410/aluned-hq-ha-ha-design-and-development

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• Area: 
  800 m²
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  Year: 
  
  

  2025

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  Manufacturers:  Aluned, Awood, Frenoflex, Stalku

Text description provided by the architects. After a devastating fire in 2021, aluminium manufacturer Aluned faced a critical question: how do you rebuild a workplace that is not only functional but also sustainable, inspiring, and in dialogue with its surroundings? HA-HA Design & Development, a Rotterdam-based architecture firm, saw an opportunity in the crisis. By retaining the existing foundations and steel structure, they designed a contemporary work environment that honours the site’s industrial heritage while embracing the landscape. “We saw the loss of the old building as a chance to show what circular and adaptive building can truly mean.” — Nima Morkoç, Architect at HA-HA. “It’s remarkable how a limitation, the existing steel structure, became the basis for a light and open design.” — Aluned BV, Client. In 2021, a fire destroyed the Aluned headquarters. Instead of demolishing and starting from scratch, the project team chose radical reuse: the original foundation and steel structure were preserved. The Zwijndrecht site consists of three industrial halls arranged around a central green courtyard with a pond — a rare oasis of green in an otherwise paved industrial zone.