It’s easy to dismiss holiday novels as pulpy, but relaxing with a book you enjoy has huge health benefits. Here’s how to read yourself happy this summer

Leo Tolstoy’s novel Anna Karenina is a masterpiece. It has never been out of print. Luminaries from William Faulkner to Jilly Cooper have remarked on its brilliance. It is usually within the top 10 of any list of the “100 books you simply must read before you die”. However, I would argue that it’s a singularly poor choice of a book to bring with you for 10 days on the beach in Tenerife. Especially in hardback.

I really tried. Every day, I’d read two or three pages before realising I’d read the same pages the day before, and it simply hadn’t stuck. I kept drifting off during the more complex descriptions of 19th-century property law. I simply couldn’t see what Anna saw in Vronsky; he seemed dreadful, just a slightly different kind of dreadful from her husband, Karenin. My arms ached, the sand seemed unusually gritty, and on day four, as children shrieked and splashed around me, their parents read Jack Reacher books while I failed to understand the significance of Levin scything his fields, I thought, ‘No more!’ My luggage allowance was about 20kg. Tolstoy had taken up more than a tenth of it, and 100% of my headspace. I couldn’t relax. I wasn’t enjoying myself. When I found a Sophie Kinsella novel in the hotel gift shop, I almost wept with relief. It didn’t matter that I’d already read The Undomestic Goddess – my aching brain craved comfort and joy, and it simply wasn’t finding it on Russian railway lines.

The craven failure to broadcast Gaza: Doctors Under Attack is just the latest example of skewed journalistic values over Israel’s war

Tonight, audiences can finally watch Gaza: Doctors Under Attack on Channel 4 and Zeteo. This timely film was originally produced for the BBC by award-winning production company Basement Films. The BBC has been delaying it since February, arguing it couldn’t go out before a review into an entirely different film, Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone, had culminated. That was a poor editorial decision with no precedent. But poorer still: after months of leaving the film in limbo, last week the BBC announced it wouldn’t air it – leaving it for Channel 4 to pick up.

Why? The BBC said it might create “the perception of partiality”. You’d be forgiven for thinking this was lifted from a dystopian novel. Perception, after all, has nothing to do with impartiality – at least in an ideal world. The BBC seems to have said the quiet part out loud. Impartiality, as far as it’s concerned, is about PR, optics and managing the anger of certain groups, rather than following the evidence and championing robust journalism – no matter who’s angered, no matter how it looks.

From missing weddings and giving clothes away to mocking each other’s music and getting the kids involved, Noel and Liam have been through a lot in the last 16 years

An adaptable and satisfying bean and tomato feast, a moreish frittata packed with herbs and veg, and a Palestinian take on egg and chips

What better way to welcome the weekend than with the smell and sound of herb-loaded ijeh frying? This is a thick, delicious frittata-like mixture of courgettes, leeks, peas, herbs and eggs, and in Palestine it’s often made with finely chopped onions, too. I always keep a couple of tins of ful (fava beans) in my pantry for those times when I crave a quick and satisfying late breakfast or weekend lunch. When simple toast and butter won’t do the trick and I’m in need of something more substantial and savoury, that’s when fava beans come to the rescue.

The welfare bill passed, but it was chaos. A party this dysfunctional and divided cannot escape the wrath of voters at the next election

The welfare bill has gone through, but what is on the minds of most Labour MPs and supporters is how did we get into this appalling mess over disability benefits? A key factor has been the immense lack of judgment of the party’s real decision-makers, the team in the leader’s office, fuelled by their overweening arrogance. The egos of the young men cloistering Keir Starmer have clearly been inflated by the multitude of articles written by sycophantic commentators desperate to secure access to the new regime.

However, the seeds of this debacle were sown by the Treasury’s capture of the incoming government, enabling officials to bring back the same old austerity agenda of benefit cuts that they developed for George Osborne.

John McDonnell is the independent MP for Hayes and Harlington. He was shadow chancellor for Labour from 2015 to 2020

London Palladium
Zegler excels as Eva Perón and the crowds outside are used to capture the hypnotic appeal of populism but the narrative takes a backseat in his staging of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice’s musical

Director Jamie Lloyd has outraged some theatregoers, who evidently feel short-changed after paying good money to see Rachel Zegler as Eva Perón. In one scene, she wanders off stage and on to an outward-facing balcony to sing a magnetic reprise of Don’t Cry for Me Argentina to the gathered crowd outside the theatre.

What are these grumps complaining about? Not long ago, Lloyd staged Romeo and Juliet in the West End, but here is a balcony scene like no other. It makes for a sensational moment, when Perón triumphantly addresses the crowd on her husband Juan’s election victory. It is 360-degree theatre, for the rich inside (who see it on a video feed) and for the “hoi polloi” outside – very fitting for Perón given her disdain for the wealthy.

Reeves has PM’s ‘full backing’ after appearing upset in parliament as her spokesperson says it is a personal matter

• UK politics live – latest updates

Downing Street has said Rachel Reeves will stay in post and has not offered her resignation, after the chancellor was seen in tears at prime minister’s questions.

Reeves wiped away a tear on Wednesday after a series of questions from the Conservative leader, Kemi Badenoch, who suggested Labour MPs had said she was “toast”. Badenoch suggested Keir Starmer had failed to confirm Reeves would stay in post until the election.

Combs faces a maximum of 20 years in prison for transportation to engage in prostitution related to Casandra Ventura and ‘Jane’

• Sean Combs found guilty on two of five counts in sex-trafficking case

The foreperson will now read the verdict.

The jury is in the courtroom and the foreperson has given the verdict form to the court deputy.

Call between French and Russian presidents comes as Tehran says it is ending cooperation with UN nuclear inspectors

The French president, Emmanuel Macron, spoke to his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, for the first time in three years on Tuesday in an attempt to de-escalate the Iran crisis, as Tehran confirmed it was ending all cooperation with the UN nuclear inspectorate, including banning its inspectors from visiting any of its nuclear sites.

Macron had refused to speak to Putin since the Russian leader ordered the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, but Paris has become frustrated that the lack of communication with Moscow is not solving multiple crises, and leaving the diplomatic events exposed to the relationship between Putin and Donald Trump.

CPS says it is considering more charges against former nurse after evidence from Cheshire police detectives

Detectives investigating the former nurse Lucy Letby have passed evidence to prosecutors alleging she murdered and harmed more babies.

The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) confirmed on Wednesday that it was considering further charges against Letby over alleged crimes at the Countess of Chester hospital and Liverpool Women’s hospital.