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The Latest Breaking News from John Niven

I had a front row seat at the Blur v Oasis frenzy – here’s what a new play gets bang on and bafflingly wrong

In 1995, the bands tussled for No 1 – and the Britpop crown. Our writer was on the inside of the mad-for-it contest. Does The Battle accurately capture this divisive moment? And what was Noel’s problem with risotto?

The Guardian - UK

The Battle review – Britpop bickering and 90s nostalgia in Blur v Oasis comedy

The bands that came to symbolise a divided nation compete to top the charts in John Niven’s jokey play but it is woefully short on drama

The Guardian - UK

The Fathers by John Niven review – class satire with grit

Two fortysomething Glaswegians from either side of the tracks form an unlikely friendship in this comic melodrama

The Guardian - UK

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Britpop battle between Blur and Oasis revisited in ‘punchy’ new comedy

John Niven’s debut play explores rivalry between the two British bands who vied for the No 1 spot in the charts in 1995

The Guardian - UK

“A comedy with teeth.”1995's Blur vs Oasis 'Battle of Britpop' to be dramatised in a new play staged in London next year

Novelist (and former British record industry A&R man) John Niven is writing The Battle, about the rivalry between Blur and Oasis

Louder

Gordon Burn prize announces ‘blazing’ shortlist

Seven-strong shortlist of boundary-pushing books ranges from an Arctic coming-of-age novel to nonfiction about the IRA’s Brighton bombing

The Guardian - UK

The best memoirs and biographies of 2023

The rise of Madonna, Barbra Streisand in her own words, plus the stormy relationship of Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor are among this year’s highlights

The Guardian - UK

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John Niven: ‘My comfort read? Alan Clark’s diaries’

The Scottish author on laughing out loud at Catch-22, being inspired by Martin Amis and the joy of Graeme Johnston’s Kerby

The Guardian - UK

Autumn reads: the unmissable new books to hunker down with

From spine-chilling short stories to philisophical memoirs and historical fiction, Alex Peake-Tomkinson picks the most exciting new books to tuck into this Autumn

Evening Standard

O Brother by John Niven review – a blistering memoir of sibling grief

Black humour mingles with vulnerability in the novelist and screenwriter’s moving account of his brother’s life and death

The Guardian - UK

O Brother by John Niven review – a searing study of siblings who go separate ways

The novelist brings skill and hard-won wisdom to a meditation on the contrast between his life and his brother’s struggles and early death

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