With the constant risk of being recorded, many young people are afraid of showing enthusiasm – let alone doing something so potentially embarrassing as dancing in public. Is there a way to set themselves free?

In a video posted to TikTok, where Katie Whitney has 2.5 million followers, she says to camera, bluntly: “This video is for Cynthia Erivo. If you’re not Cynthia Erivo … you can keep on scrolling.” Her demeanour then shifts, her voice becomes softer; more the way a person might talk to their puppy: “Hi Cynthia. Hi baby. Hey baby. How are you?” It’s toe-curling – or, in modern parlance, cringe – to watch. “I feel traumatised,” says one commenter. Others post photos of a stunned-looking Erivo and imagine: “What if the Wicked star were to actually watch this video?” Cringe!

Now 25, but having started making this kind of content – “weird skits” – at 20, Whitney is part of what is known online as CringeTok, a subsection of the internet that deals in content designed to make your toes curl. It’s in many ways a reaction to a fear of being “cringe”, which is seeping into all parts of life – from social media to classrooms to the workplace.

Experts explain how small, regular sums can build wealth over time, from your 20s through to retirement

Thinking about investing? There are compelling reasons for moving at least some of your money away from standard savings accounts and into the stock market. There are also risks, but over the long term the rewards can be better.

Many people are put off by the idea that you need to be wealthy to start investing, or over a certain age. But even if you can only afford to set aside £50 a month, it is worth considering. And while there are important factors to consider before you start, it is rarely too early, or too late, to take the first step.

My ‘niblings’ gave me a positive reason to return to the home town where I’d experienced homophobia as a boy. Over time, they transformed my sense of family and self

When I found out I had become an uncle, I was 22 and on a year abroad as part of a languages degree, living in Madrid. I’d spent much of my time there having raucous fun on the city’s gay scene, dancing till the early hours then sloping off with Spanish men. It felt a long way from my family life back home in Bolton.

As this was 1997 – a time before mobile phones – calls from landlines had to be rationed to once a week. But my mum phoned to tell me my sister had gone into labour and then, two days later, the phone rang again with the news that I had a nephew. It felt like an abstract concept, not quite real.

The Cambrian Line hugs the shore, offering easy access to the Wales Coast Path, the Cadfan Way pilgrimage route and glorious Cardigan Bay

From the graveyard of St Michael’s in Ynys, Wales, the view was ravishing: the Italianate oddity of Portmeirion sparkled on the opposite shore; the peaks of Eryri (Snowdonia) rippled in the distance; and, within the River Dwyryd’s broad swirl, sat the tidal island of Ynys Gifftan. “No one’s lived there for years,” said a passerby pointing to the isle, “but it’s just been put up for sale – £350,000, if you fancy it.”

I rather did, but sadly my modest savings don’t stretch that far. Wales’s “armpit”, geographically speaking – which is how some people refer to that chunk of Gwynedd where estuaries perspire into Cardigan Bay before it curves round the outstretched Llŷn peninsula – looked like a spectacular place to be marooned.

In the first of a new series of dispatches, fans in US, Mexico and Canada tell us that they want visitors to have a good time but are angry about ticket prices, Fifa’s priorities and a lack of long-term thinking from politicians

The 2026 World Cup features 104 matches in 16 cities across Canada, Mexico and the USA, from Vancouver to Mexico City and San Francisco to Boston. Before, throughout and after the tournament we’ll be hearing from fans in those cities about their experiences – some shared and some different – in our “My World Cup” series. Here some of our correspondents share their first thoughts.

It should have taken years, but Ash Koosha made a drama about Iran’s anti-government protests in weeks – and now it’s the first AI-made movie to screen at a major film festival. It could transform indie film-making, claims the director

Next week a breakthrough 75-minute drama about the brutal crackdown in Iran on anti-government protesters in January will premiere at the Tribeca film festival in New York. It is called Dreams of Violets and is based on journalism, video footage and eyewitness accounts. “I would say 80% of it is a recreation of events that actually happened,” says its Iranian-British director Ash Koosha. But Dreams of Violets is a work of fiction, not a documentary: a drama following a group of strangers caught up in the protests, who meet by chance in an alleyway. How on earth has Koosha managed to pull together a drama about the killings in less than six months?

The answer, it turns out, is by using artificial intelligence. Every image and character in Dreams of Violets is AI-generated. Koosha says he created the characters by describing their physical appearances, using people he has known in the past as references. It would be too dangerous to base characters on living people in Iran, he says. “Because of the security issue, it would not be safe for the characters to even remotely resemble someone.”

Demonstration follows family’s plea for death not to be used to create division

Hundreds of people gathered outside a Southampton police station to protest against the murder of Henry Nowak and dozens clashed with police close to the home of his killer, Vickrum Digwa.

The far-right activist Tommy Robinson was among speakers who addressed the crowd outside Southampton central police station at the “Justice for Henry Nowak” protest.

Testimonies from political prisoners and journalists arrested in crackdowns since the war have started to emerge as regime’s internet blackout lifts

Iranian writer Hamid Asefi wasn’t home on the afternoon of 5 March when armed intelligence agents stormed his Tehran apartment, breaking down the door with a sledgehammer and axe. After going unit to unit looking for him, they finally encountered him as he returned to the building.

One of the agents “drew his handgun, shouted at me to stop, and before I had time to respond, struck me forcefully on the back of the neck and spine with the butt of his weapon, dragging me into the apartment,” Asefi told the Guardian in a written interview.

Bank of England says updated imagery will celebrate native wildlife while bolstering anti-counterfeit features

Puffins, dolphins and bumblebees are among the wildlife that could feature on new banknotes in the UK as the Bank of England announces its shortlist.

There has been controversy over the decision, with figures including Nigel Farage criticising the Bank for, he claimed, wanting to replace Winston Churchill with a beaver. The Conservative leader, Kemi Badenoch, said it was “a silly thing to do”, and Reform UK’s Farage called it “absolutely crackers”. In the end, no beaver appeared on the shortlist. Mammal options include bottlenose dolphins and red foxes.

US military says it struck tanker and sites on Iran’s Qeshm Island and defended Kuwait and Bahrain from missile attacks

The US and Iran have exchanged fresh missiles and drone strikes, further jeopardising efforts by Washington to secure a new ceasefire agreement with Tehran.

US forces fired a Hellfire missile to disable a tanker attempting to break through the American blockade of the strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, and later said they repelled Iranian reprisal attacks in the region and attacked sites on Iran’s Qeshm Island.

NHS bosses giving evidence to public accounts committee admit current position is unacceptable

GPs in England are so “overloaded” that they cannot help older people who are at risk of falling in what NHS bosses accept is an unacceptable failure of care, the House of Commons’ public accounts committee has said.

Pressure on GPs’ time has intensified as a result of the government’s decision to give patients online access to their services, according to a report by the influential cross-party group of MPs.

OECD forecast sets out economic risks from conflict, pointing to potential shortfalls to key energy products

• OECD predicts spate of recessions globally if Iran conflict drags into 2027

Rural areas in the UK would be particularly at risk of diesel shortages if the conflict in Iran continues to squeeze supplies, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development has warned.

The OECD predicted economic growth of 0.9% in the UK this year – a modest upgrade from the 0.7% it feared in March when it last updated its forecasts. It said government spending will help to support the economy in the short term.

Patients with knee arthritis who took medications for at least three years at reduced risk of needing surgery

Taking weight-loss drugs for at least three years could prevent thousands of knee replacements a year, research suggests.

Globally, more than 500 million people have osteoarthritis. Knee arthritis is the most common form, affecting about 14 million people in the US and more than 5 million in the UK. Many will require knee surgery. In the UK more than 120,000 knee replacements are carried out every year.

Watchdog says ‘publishers will now have effective tools to prevent content being used to power AI features in search’

• Business live – latest updates

Publishers will be able to opt out of their content being used to train Google’s AI models and power its search summaries, the UK competition watchdog has announced as it imposes new conduct requirements on search services.

“Publishers will now have effective tools to prevent their content being used to power AI features in search, such as AI Overviews,” the Competition and Markets Authority said.

Campaigners say builders’ demolition of nest site highlights weak protection of wildlife from development

A building that was a noted nesting site for swifts, among the UK’s most at-risk birds, has been demolished during the nesting season, highlighting significant weaknesses in the protection of wildlife from development, campaigners say.

Contractors for the housebuilder Hill Group carried out the demolition of Regent House near Dorking station in Surrey over the last few weeks, during the nesting season which runs from 1 March to 31 August.

Files shed light on how the Labour grandee juggled patrons and supplicants using flattery, fury and contempt for three decades

Political analysts have been frustrated by the mass redactions in the Mandelson files published on Monday: with so much obscured, many serious questions remain unanswered.

But step aside from the vetting debate, and the files do shed light on another matter: how Peter Mandelson wields power, and how effectively he uses communication as a tool for maintaining it. Over the many years of retirement that lie ahead, the former ambassador might easily reshape them into a manual for his would-be successors.

ScottishPower apologises for charging error, as millions face higher costs under revised energy price cap

The energy bill from ScottishPower sent Richard Palmer into an immediate panic. It said he had to pay more than £8,400 straight away or risk his credit history being impaired for years.

The 76-year-old felt he had no option so he paid the bill, using half of his savings to do so, even though it amounted to nine times what his annual payment would normally be.

South Korea’s Kospi stock market has hit record highs thanks to AI, but experts urge caution over boom-bust cycles and a heavy reliance on two chipmakers

South Korea has leapfrogged India to become the world’s sixth largest share market, leaving equity markets in the UK, Germany and France trailing in its dust. But despite the runaway success, some are raising concerns that the Kospi index is too dependent on two freshly minted trillion-dollar chipmaking companies.

Chip company SK Hynix last week claimed a seat in Asia’s trillion-dollar company club, alongside South Korean compatriot Samsung Electronics and Taiwan’s TSMC. Explosive demand for chips used in AI has propelled the trio past the valuation threshold.

From his multi-million pound beer brand to souvenir emporium flogging cufflinks, there’s such a cult of personality around the bumbling berk now that he’s basically morphing into Kim, Khloé et al. Stick to the farming, Jeremy!

By now, five series in, the fatal flaw at the heart of Clarkson’s Farm has become unignorable. Ultimately, this is meant to be a show about failure; about an oafish man who wades in to an industry he knows little about and mucks everything up.

Except, well, it isn’t that any more, is it? Because in real life, Clarkson’s Farm has become so successful that Clarkson has now essentially colonised the entire Cotswolds in his image. His Farmer’s Dog pub is now such an attraction that it recently had to turn a nearby field into a 360-space car park – the same as a large supermarket – to cope with demand. His Diddly Squat farm shop is a souvenir emporium, catering to anyone who wants to buy branded hats and cufflinks, or to own a jar of honey with Clarkson’s face on it. And this isn’t even mentioning his Hawkstone beer brand, which reported sales of £21.3m in the year to March 2025 and has a stated goal of putting Peroni “out of business”.

Clarkson’s Farm is on Prime Video

Taken shortly after a spate of femicides in Peru, this image by the photographer Ana Elisa Sotelo captures a moment of sisterhood and solidarity

This image is from Women of the Water, a project I started in 2022 in Puerto Natales, in southern Patagonia, Chile, when three female swimmers I met asked me to photograph them naked in the place they felt most powerful: the water.

It was winter and the water was probably about zero degrees, but we experienced an incredible sensation of ease and freedom. When I got back to my home city of Lima in Peru, I decided to continue, developing the series through open calls. I have since expanded to Argentina, the US and Barbados.

It will take more than blokeish affability to reach across the Brexit faultline that scars British politics

Andy Burnham’s stint as health secretary in the final year of Gordon Brown’s government was not especially memorable, although one observation from a senior civil servant in the department at the time has stuck in my mind. Working for Burnham, I was told, felt like “revising for exams with a mate who might turn to you and say: ‘shall we sack this off for a bit and play football instead?’”

It was meant as a compliment, mostly. The secretary of state didn’t defer government business for kickabouts on Whitehall, he just had the vibe of someone who was tempted. That image confirms everything Burnham’s Labour supporters and critics already think about him.

Rafael Behr is a Guardian columnist

There are ways to address the lack of faith. And unless Starmer, Burnham or Streeting do that, the issue of who is PM is moot

What happens next? Will Andy Burnham win the Makerfield byelection? Will Keir Starmer fight on? Will Wes Streeting run? After that, can Reform win the next general election? Is the Green bounce real? The politics-as-sports predictions rumble on. One newspaper editor texted me the other day asking who would be prime minister come Christmas, apparently because I was on his “clever list”. “Dunno” I said. “You’re off the list,” he replied.

My fear is that whoever is prime minister by the end of the year, a lot of attention will have been distracted from the underlying problem. Voters are not just giving up on this government, but on democracy itself. This weary, cold scepticism comes through in the polls, the focus groups, and it’s in the look in the electorate’s eyes. Politicians know it and it’s making the country ungovernable.

Polly Curtis is chief executive of Demos. Her latest paper, The New Deal: How to repair the broken relationship between state and citizen, is published today

Many EU governments oppose it, but the strategic advantages of swift admission could be immense

Russia’s war on Ukraine is now in its fifth year and a ceasefire remains elusive. The US’s attention is divided, limiting external pressure for compromise, while Moscow and Kyiv both still believe they can strengthen their respective negotiating positions through battlefield gains.

At some point, however, a deal will have to be done. The parameters of that deal are already understood by negotiators on all sides. Russia will give up on its original war aims and Ukraine will make de-facto territorial concessions. The US will provide Kyiv with security guarantees to deter future Russian aggression and the EU will provide Ukraine with a membership path as well as help with the country’s postwar reconstruction.

Mujtaba Rahman is the managing director for Europe at Eurasia Group, a political risk research and consulting firm

The EU must enact laws to stop gender apartheid and end impunity – not invite the perpetrators to Brussels. For Afghan women and girls it is a matter of survival

The Taliban in Afghanistan recently arrested three of my family members, kept them in captivity, tortured one, and confiscated my house. It was to silence me. I was about to write to European diplomats to seek support for the release of my innocent family when I heard the shocking news that the EU is inviting Taliban officials to Brussels.

After nearly five years, what has changed in Afghanistan to make life better for its women and its people? Five years with no official schools for female students beyond sixth grade, while thousands of religious schools have been established across Afghanistan, where girls may attend without restrictions. Five years of bans on women becoming doctors, while maternal and infant mortality have skyrocketed. Five years of exclusion from the job market, leaving women to beg on the streets.

I’m not sure any other first world nation would have this problem. Keir Starmer’s promise of growth, growth, growth appears to have shrivelled

We are in the TL;DR days of Keir Starmer’s government. The latest Mandelson files stimulate nothing so much as an old and now immortally memed response to an online screed: “I ain’t reading all that. I’m happy for u tho. Or sorry that happened.” In any case, to save you the bother, I can report that there are only two hideously iconic moments in the latest files. The first, obviously, is Pat McFadden’s already viral verdict on Labour’s endlessly self-preserving and vision-free backbenchers – and perhaps those much closer to the heart of government: “Every meeting I have is: ‘Who can we tax in order to pay benefits to others?’” Yowch. New Liam Byrne note just dropped.

But the second is a much, much bigger problem than even that. The second might be the deadliest, most emblematic thing in the entire files dump. It is no more than 10 words but when I read it yesterday afternoon, I slumped back in my chair struck by the absolute state-of-the-nation of it. I thought: that’s it. That is literally the whole of where we are as a country, and the whole scale of the task of how on earth we get out of it. It is both staggeringly shocking and wholly predictable. I’m not doing a trigger warning or anything, but I will say it comes in the section of emails about Trump wanting to be gifted one replica ministerial red box during the state visit last year. Anyway, here goes: “the manufacturer gave a lead time of 8-10 weeks”.

Marina Hyde is a Guardian columnist

After the conviction of Henry Nowak’s killer, the right is embracing racialised language. This tragedy is now just part of a political tussle

• Joe Mulhall is director of research at the anti-fascism organisation Hope Not Hate

The video of the murder of 18-year-old Henry Nowak at the hands of Vickrum Digwa in Southampton is horrifying. But Nigel Farage’s decision to respond to these events by calling for “pure cold rage” and insisting we recognise that “white lives matter” is a worrying sign of an increasingly racialised turn in the politics of the British right.

This shift has not taken place in a vacuum. For a year now, while progressives have worried about how to beat Reform, Farage’s party has faced a new threat that has come not from the left, but a party even further to the right. Restore Britain, a party founded by former Reform MP Rupert Lowe, has been deeply critical of Farage’s outfit for not being radical enough. These criticisms have put pressure on Reform – and they may push British politics even further right.

Joe Mulhall is director of research at the anti-fascism organisation Hope Not Hate

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Mark Nowak had asked for his son’s murder not to be used to spread division. But Nige is just not the kind of guy to miss out

The email invitation arrived shortly after 7am. Nigel Farage would be making an “address to the nation” an hour later. The grandiosity. The self-importance. An address to the nation is something usually delivered by the monarch or the prime minister during an emergency. Not from a leader of a political party with just eight MPs.

There again, pomposity is now Nige’s last resort. A few months ago, we would all have been invited to a press conference in central London. Now he is a virtual prisoner in his own home. Afraid to subject himself to awkward questions about the £5m he says he was “gifted” from a Thai crypto billionaire. So Reform is effectively leaderless. All we get to see of Nige is the occasional video from an indeterminate location. He is a man determined not to be found by anyone.

From India and Africa to Europe, countries not yet in the AI supply chain risk mass job losses, losing the tax revenue needed to deal with the tech’s fallout

• Business live – AI to drive up UK youth unemployment

The San Francisco Bay Area is in the midst of an AI frenzy that makes the California gold rush of the mid-19th century look like a scavenger hunt. Top programmers and developers are being offered compensation packages worth hundreds of millions of dollars to switch firms, while young engineers lucky enough to have joined leading AI startups early are contemplating retirement before age 35.

Driving up the Bayshore Freeway from San Francisco International airport into the city, you pass hyper-specific billboards advertising obscure AI applications seemingly aimed at absurdly niche audiences. How can that possibly be profitable? The answer is that in a city crawling with startups, getting the right software product in front of a founder whose company could soon be worth billions of dollars is far more lucrative than using billboard space to sell burgers or laundry detergent.

The US president seeks to curb Israel’s intensified offensive as he looks for an exit from war with Iran, but turmoil in the Middle East will not easily be ended

“Let’s see how long that lasts,” Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social on Monday night, addressing his attempts to de-escalate in Lebanon following Israel’s intensified military campaign. Within hours, Israeli drone strikes had killed eight people in the south, including a father and his two children, and damaged a hospital. Hezbollah continued launching rockets and drones.

Anxious to escape the illegal war that he launched on Iran, and with Tehran threatening to suspend peace talks over the Israeli offensive, the US president reined in Benjamin Netanyahu – for now – in what was described as an expletive-laden phone call. Mr Trump’s post, despite its unusual admission of doubt, still oversold the agreement. He claimed that Hezbollah and Israel had agreed to “stop all shooting”. Lebanon’s presidency suggested a more limited deal: Israel would not strike Beirut’s southern suburbs if Hezbollah did not launch attacks against Israel.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

An era of excellent coming-of-age dramas moved away from the glossy lives of wealthy American teens, but unflinching portrayals easily veer into tropes

Television’s portrayal of adolescence has challenged adult complacency about young people’s lives. The best coming-of-age dramas have not just shown young people behaving badly, or dangerously, or foolishly. They have asked questions about a society that leaves them to learn about sex, addiction and violence with little help.

That idea has driven shows such as Skins, Chewing Gum, Sex Education and, at its best, Euphoria. Their value did not lie in provocation alone. Drugs, humiliation and self-destruction were ways of dramatising how power affects young lives: through families, friendships, money, class and the internet. The characters mattered to audiences – and therefore so did the scandals.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Readers respond to Jonathan Freedland’s article about Tony Blair’s vision for the future

Jonathan Freedland says Tony Blair “would say you can only address [poverty and inequality] once the economy is firing. Maybe” (Tony Blair says he is all about the future – but his vision is woefully stuck in the past, 29 May). In fact poverty and inequality are the reasons the economy is misfiring. In the big economic crashes of history, gross inequality has been present.

After 47 years, you would think that the obsession with supply-side economics might have been rumbled, but no: acres of newsprint are expended on the idea that incentivised businessmen alone can reboot the economy. There can be no animal spirits if there is no market to buy the goods. And things like people having to spend as much as 40% of their weekly salary on rent explains why there is no market, at least not without people having to get into dangerous and silly amounts of debt.

Readers strike an encouraging note for those sceptical of the joys of Proust, saying it has plenty to make it worth perservering

I read all seven volumes of Marcel Proust’s In Search of Lost Time over a nine-month period. In answer to Mike Bromberg (Letters, 26 May), a great deal happens besides the famous madeleine incident: the advent of electric lighting, motorcars and aeroplanes, not to mention endless romances and social intrigues. My memory is that every hundred pages or so of tedium would yield five to 10 pages of the most revelatory reading that I have ever experienced. Was it worth it? Totally. Would I do it again? Probably not. But I won the bet.
Bill Gaver
London

• Proust is not inaccessible. I read most of it in French on the Métro during my year abroad in Paris. It was the 1960s, and being buried in a book was a good way of deterring unwanted male attention. For anyone who fears that nothing happens, read on – there is a great variety of sex, for example, and plenty of it.

Prof John H Arnold and Douglas Russell respond to a letter that said defined-benefit pensions place enormous pressure on public finances

Prof Stephen Caddick’s letter (26 May) on public sector defined-benefit (DB) pension schemes requires a response. There are five large “unfunded” schemes: NHS, teachers, civil servants, police and army. It is true that employers, and thus ultimately taxpayers, put in a fairly high employer contribution. But without a decent pension scheme, such sectors are likely to require higher levels of pay to recruit and retain staff, the cost of which would also fall on taxpayers.

The £1tn in liabilities for public DB schemes that Prof Caddick mentions is misleading, as is usually the case with any assessment of pension liabilities outside the private sector. This figure (in fact probably £1.3tn) estimates the money that the government would have to pay out to cover pensions were there no income coming from workers and employers to support them – that is, in the unlikely scenario that we suddenly ceased to have any NHS workers, teachers, soldiers and so forth, but only those in receipt of a pension in those areas.

James Stoddart and Richard Eltringham respond to an investigation which found that deaths within two weeks of leaving prison have hit a record high

Your investigation showing that deaths within two weeks of release from prison have hit a record high (Report, 31 May) rightly identifies release into homelessness as a primary driver of deaths of ex-prisoners. I would add that the danger is concentrated in the first 72 hours after the gate closes behind you, and that the failures which kill people in that window are often astonishingly basic.

People are routinely released without housing, medication, identification or a bank account, and sometimes without a clear idea of when or where their first probation appointment is. Miss that appointment and the usual consequence is immediate recall back to prison. The figures you cite are not surprising to anyone who has been through it.

• Bellingham takes coveted shirt with Anderson given No 8

• England train for first time in Florida ahead of World Cup

Jude Bellingham has received a boost from Thomas Tuchel after being handed the coveted No 10 shirt for England’s World Cup campaign.

Preparations began at a training camp in Florida on Tuesday and the midfielder Kobbie Mainoo said the squad believe “100%” that they can win the tournament. With two weeks to go until England’s opening World Cup fixture, 21 of Tuchel’s 26-man squad are in West Palm Beach for a week-long camp and the squad numbers were confirmed on Tuesday.

• Negotiations with Spaniard have progressed quickly

• Assistants Tommy Elphick and Shaun Cooper to join too

Andoni Iraola is close to being confirmed as Liverpool’s new head coach after agreeing a deal in principle to succeed Arne Slot.

Iraola has been in talks with Liverpool’s sporting director, Richard Hughes, over replacing Slot after the Dutchman was sacked on Saturday. As expected, negotiations have progressed quickly and the Spaniard is set to sign a two-year contract at Anfield.

• Personal terms agreed on contract until 2030

• Tchouaméni and Wharton among other targets

Manchester United have reached an agreement with Atalanta to sign Éderson for an initial €40.5m (£35m), with the midfielder set to be the first signing of Michael Carrick’s tenure as the permanent manager.

As reported in April, the 26-year-old was identified by Carrick and Jason Wilcox, the director of football, as a replacement for Casemiro, who has now left the club after the expiry of his contract.

• All England Club to confirm prize fund details on 11 June

• Year-long dispute over increased pay at grand slams

The world’s leading players told Wimbledon officials that they expect a substantial increase in prize money at this year’s championships at a meeting at Roland Garros on Monday.

The All England Club is due to confirm details of this year’s prize fund at a press conference on 11 June, with the players calling for a bigger rise than the 7% increase last year as part of their push for the grand slam events to match the 22% of tournament revenue paid by the men’s Association of Tennis Professionals and the Women’s Tennis Association.

• England 184-4, bt India 180-5, by six wickets

• Victory perfectly timed before World Cup opener

England pulled off a statement run chase against India on Tuesday evening at Taunton, reaching their target of 181 with nine balls to spare thanks to a brilliant 137-run partnership from 76 balls between Alice Capsey and Heather Knight.

This was England’s highest successful T20 international run-chase in eight years and it could not have been more perfectly timed, providing the perfect confidence boost 10 days out from their World Cup opener against Sri Lanka on 12 June.

The Oranje had high hopes but a spate of injuries has tempered expectations

This article is part of the Guardian’s 2026 World Cup Experts’ Network, a cooperation between some of the best media organisations from the 48 countries who qualified. theguardian.com is running previews from three countries each day in the run-up to the tournament kicking off on 11 June.

Impressive results have fuelled belief that Hajime Moriyasu’s side can not just survive against the best but beat them too

This article is part of the Guardian’s 2026 World Cup Experts’ Network, a cooperation between some of the best media organisations from the 48 countries who qualified. theguardian.com is running previews from three countries each day in the run-up to the tournament kicking off on 11 June.

Julian Nagelsmann will rely on a Bayern-based core, but individual class is in worryingly short supply

This article is part of the Guardian’s 2026 World Cup Experts’ Network, a cooperation between some of the best media organisations from the 48 countries who qualified. theguardian.com is running previews from three countries each day in the run-up to the tournament kicking off on 11 June.

All you need to know about the 16 host stadiums in the US, Mexico and Canada

The 2026 World Cup is the largest tournament ever. A total of 16 venues will play host to this summer’s big games, and each has a story to tell about the past, present and future of sports in its city. Stadium names may look unfamiliar, as we are using the Fifa-approved names instead of the sponsored names that run afoul of the governing body’s clean venue rules.

Australia v Turkey, 13 June

Canada v Qatar, 18 June

New Zealand v Egypt, 21 June

Switzerland v Canada, 24 June

New Zealand v Belgium, 26 June

Round of 32, 2 July (1B v 3EFGIJ)

Round of 16, 7 July (W85 v W87)

• ‘Treatment is going well,’ says 75-year-old Scotland great

• John Barnes also reveals he had his prostate removed

Sir Kenny Dalglish has revealed he is receiving treatment for cancer. The Liverpool legend, 75, confirmed the diagnosis on Tuesday having mistakenly posted about his treatment earlier in the day.

Liverpool have said: “The support, best wishes and love of everyone at Liverpool FC are, and will be, with Sir Kenny and his family.”

For Antoine Semenyo, it was not so much a case of wrapped up in cotton wool but rather enveloped in a grey Ghana tracksuit. A couple of weeks out from their World Cup opener against Panama in Toronto, Ghana are in no position to take risks and so the Manchester City forward was rested in this friendly against Wales. He was one of the last players to join up with the squad at their base in Newport, his old stomping ground and where he spent six months on loan as a teenager.

Ghana thought they would fly to Washington on Wednesday for a training camp with a victory finally under their belts and England, their second Group L opponents this summer, soon in their sights. After five straight friendly defeats since qualifying for the World Cup last October, they had to settle for a draw in Carlos Queiroz’s first game in charge after Lewis Koumas headed in a stoppage-time equaliser.

• ‘Right now, I’m a Manchester United player’ says striker

• Toone back in England camp after injury absences

Ella Toone has said she will have to decide “what’s best for me” as she weighs up her long-term future with one year remaining on her Manchester United contract.

The England midfielder, speaking before Friday’s crucial Women’s World Cup qualifier in Spain, was asked about her club future and implied she would hold discussions with United this summer.

• Some scepticism had surrounded Australian’s record

• Time of 19.67 officially recognised to end to doubts

World Athletics has eliminated any doubt over the speed of Gout Gout, ignoring criticisms over the validity of his 19.67sec set during the 200m final at the nationals in April to formally ratify the time as the World Under 20 record.

On the windy afternoon in Sydney, Gout improved his personal best by a third of a second in a breathtaking performance.

Members of Jalisco New Generation cartel used fake retail store in San Diego as front for trafficking drugs, officials say

Federal prosecutors have charged four suspects with trafficking more than one ton of cocaine for the Jalisco New Generation cartel using a fake retail store in San Diego as a front for a sophisticated tunnel that ran across the border to Tijuana, Mexico.

The defendants include two Mexican nationals and two Americans charged with conspiring to traffic drugs across the US-Mexico border. The suspects, who range in age from 18 to 32, all face sentences that could put them in prison for life. One of them, Gregorio Epifanio Hernandez Lopez, also faces the charge of “constructing, financing or using unauthorized tunnels”.

Former first lady speaks about Biden’s decision to withdraw from the 2024 presidential race at event for her new memoir

Jill Biden recalled the immense pressure that Joe Biden faced in the aftermath of his disastrous 2024 debate performance, saying he told her “Jilly, I had no choice,” following his decision to drop out of the presidential race.

The former first lady made the comments during a Tuesday book event coinciding with the release of her new memoir, View from the East Wing. The event was held at the 92nd Street Y in New York City, and moderated by comedian and co-host of The View, Whoopi Goldberg. Former president Biden was in attendance at the event and received two standing ovations from the crowd.

Teachers associated with the CNTE union are calling for salary raises and the reversal of pension laws

Striking teachers wreaked havoc on Tuesday in downtown Mexico City, a few days before the city hosts the first match of the World Cup, with protesters pulling down giant mannequins of football players, ripping off their clothes and setting them on fire on the city’s main Paseo de la Reforma.

They also set soccer balls alight and blocked main roads across the capital.

Early results show Steve Hilton, Xavier Becerra and Tom Steyer emerging in front, with many ballots to be counted

The high-stakes gubernatorial race in California remained too close to call on Tuesday night, with early results showing a tight contest in the crowded race.

With many ballots still left to be counted, three candidates emerged at the top: the Republican Steve Hilton and the Democrats Xavier Becerra and Tom Steyer. And results were clear enough that two Democratic candidates – the San Jose mayor, Matt Mahan, and the former Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigosa – conceded the race shortly after polls closed.

Move comes after meeting in which Pelley said network chief Bari Weiss was ‘murdering’ news show

Scott Pelley, one of the most well-known and respected journalists in broadcast journalism, has been fired by CBS News after clashing with network brass over last week’s severe round of cuts at 60 Minutes, the show he has worked on since 2004, the Guardian confirmed.

While changes were long expected at 60 Minutes, CBS News management shocked staffers last week by firing the network’s executive producer, executive editor and two correspondents, Cecilia Vega and Sharyn Alfonsi, without giving a specific reason for their terminations.

Ocean Observatories Initiative, $368m network that has provided crucial climate data, latest victim of Trump cuts

The Trump administration plans to dismantle a $368m deep-sea observation system that has for more than a decade provided crucial data on ocean systems and climate change.

In a notice, the National Science Foundation (NSF) announced that it had “initiated descoping of the Ocean Observatories Initiative” (OOI), a vast ocean observation network comprising more than 900 instruments that collect data on ocean health, including current patterns, climate variability and marine biodiversity.

Kielder in Northumberland is balancing commercial production with conserving peatland and rare plants and animals

Driving through part of Northumberland, you might look around at the tall Sitka spruce and imagine yourself in Canada’s evergreen forests, or perhaps, on a sunny day, in northern California. Instead, you are in England’s largest forest, Kielder, often heralded as a success story that balances commercial production with ambitious conservation.

The first trees of this 60,000-hectare forest were planted 100 years ago with one aim: increasing Britain’s timber reserves. Much has changed since then. From a single-use plantation, Kielder Forest has been transformed into a haven for nature and an invaluable environmental asset.

BoM and other agencies expect transition to the first El Niño since spring 2023 sometime during winter

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Australia should prepare for an imminent El Niño, with the Bureau of Meteorology and other agencies forecasting that the weather phenomenon is likely to develop in the coming months.

“The models are really aligning now,” Felicity Gamble, a senior BoM climatologist, said. “We are expecting a transition to El Niño sometime during winter.”

A grassroots project has turned deforested beaches into thriving ecosystems by planting 100,000 native trees

Pointing to a photograph of dry brown long grass hugging the shoreline, Gerardo Bolaños stands in front of a green oasis of seedlings and trees potted in black plastic bags. “This is what Playa Guiones looked like when we started in 2011,” says the executive director of Costas Verdes, a Costa Rican nonprofit.

As howler monkeys growl in the background, Bolaños points to the picture next to it – an image of the same patch of land but with scores of flourishing, lush green trees. Today, he says, this is how the beach looks.

Spokesperson says function is in line with official guidance as scrutiny of papers relating to Peter Mandelson continues

Keir Starmer’s WhatsApp messages automatically delete from his smartphone, Downing Street has confirmed, calling into question how full a picture emerged of his role in the appointment of Peter Mandelson from a recently released tranche of government documents.

Asked at a briefing whether Starmer uses the function on his WhatsApp messages, the prime minister’s spokesperson said he “does use disappearing messages”, adding that this was in line with official guidance on the use of so-called non-corporate communications.

Utility company pleaded guilty to criminal offence of supplying water unfit for humans

• ‘My son is still suffering’: the ill effects of water contamination in ‘Brixham incident’

A utility company has been fined £1.85m for supplying water unfit for human consumption after a parasite outbreak made hundreds of people sick and forced thousands of households to boil their water.

South West Water (SWW) pleaded guilty to the criminal offence relating to a cryptosporidiosis outbreak in Brixham, Devon, in the spring and summer of 2024.

Government says it would prefer workers to be guaranteed between eight and 20 hours a week based on regular hours

Ministers are facing criticism from unions and employers after laying out details of plans for a guaranteed regular working week as part of a ban on zero-hours contracts.

Under rules poised to come into force next year, employers will have to offer staff on zero hours or “short hours” contracts, including agency workers, a minimum number of hours each week based on their regular working hours.

Founder of ‘anti-woke’ PR firm to pay £910 to woman whose hair she pulled at Bond Street tube station last October

A Maga influencer has admitted assaulting a woman at a London tube station during an altercation.

Melissa Rein Lively, 40, the founder of the “anti-woke” America First Public Relations firm in the US, allegedly pulled a woman’s hair in a “forceful manner” at Bond Street station last October.

Sydney Morning Herald removes piece by Cath Ellis, despite Western Sydney University saying her use of AI was ‘appropriate’

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A top Sydney academic used AI to write an opinion piece that urged students to “do the work” and not cut corners by using such technology, with the Sydney Morning Herald removing the “unacceptable” piece from its website.

Western Sydney University’s pro vice-chancellor for quality and integrity, Prof Cath Ellis, had an opinion piece published in the Sydney Morning Herald last month, in response to an article from the academic Kylie Moore-Gilbert.

However, Todd Blanche said the IRS will still be prohibited from auditing Donald Trump, his family and related entities

• ‘Outright theft’: legal experts decry $1.8bn Trump anti-weaponization fund

The federal government is abandoning an effort to create a $1.8bn secretive fund to compensate Donald Trump’s allies, but is maintaining an agreement that prohibits the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) from auditing Trump, his family and related entities, the acting attorney general, Todd Blanche, said on Tuesday.

“We are not moving forward with the fund, period,” Blanche said during a House appropriations committee hearing on Tuesday. “The reasons for the fund is something that President Trump talked about for a long time, which is the fact that there were a lot of people in this country who had their government weaponized against them. The reasons for the fund, I think, remain as important as they were before, but we are not moving forward with the fund.”

Mette Frederiksen, who returns for third term as PM, says minority coalition will ‘improve everyday lives’

Denmark’s new left-leaning government has pledged to keep pushing back against US pressure over Greenland and address the cost of living crisis, with measures including halving VAT on food and offering free public transport to young people.

“We present a government that will help improve the everyday lives of Danes,” Mette Frederiksen, who will return for a third consecutive term as prime minister at the head of the four-party minority coalition, said on Tuesday.

Marta Kostyuk says upcoming opponent Mirra Andreeva and others ‘know what’s going on’ but remain silent about war. What we know on day 1,561

Ukraine’s freshly minted French Open semi-finalist Marta Kostyuk ripped into Russian tennis opponents as having made clear “whose side they are on” by their silence after Kyiv and other cities endured a night of drone and missile attacks that killed at least 23 people. “I want to start with this historical match that we played today with Elina [Svitolina],” said Kostyuk after defeating her compatriot. “We had a very difficult night again in Ukraine, especially Kyiv. So many people dead. I want to give this match to Ukrainian people and to their resilience … With everything that’s happening, for me being here is a real blessing, and I don’t think about winning. I’m here to represent Ukraine and to enjoy.”

Kostyuk was asked about Russian rivals including Diana Shnaider and her upcoming semi-final opponent, Mirra Andreeva, who have previously said they focus only on the tennis ball and avoid political discussion. “They are all grownups. They know what they’re talking about. They know what’s going on. They have phones. They have Instagram. They have news,” Kostyuk said. “I wish there was some more clear stance on what’s going on, especially when your country is killing other people.”

Kostyuk praised Daria Kasatkina, who switched her allegiance from Russia to Australia, as an example of someone who had publicly spoken out despite pressure on her family. “I don’t think she lives in Russia anyways, but the majority of players don’t live in Russia,” Kostyuk said. “There is nothing that’s stopping you if this is something you don’t believe in … I know some people who have left Russia the moment the war began, who sold all their business, who left everything behind because they just don’t agree with what their country is doing to other people.” Kostyuk said representing Ukraine had become more important than results.

The deadly attacks on Ukraine on Tuesday demonstrate how Russia is able to exploit a global shortage of air defence interceptor missiles, Peter Beaumont writes. The MIM-104 Patriot has been widely relied on by US allies – not least in the Gulf, as well as by Ukraine. The US-Israeli campaign against Iran, in addition to Ukraine, has triggered a scramble for the dwindling supply of interceptor missiles. Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Ukraine’s president, has repeated his plea to the US for more stocks of interceptors.

Student groups tell inquiry about ballooning debt and ‘sneaky changes’ to loan terms while likening system to finance scandals

Graduates saddled with ballooning student loan debts feel they are being unfairly used as “cash cows” to finance measures benefiting older people such as the state pension triple lock, MPs have been told.

Student representatives told an official inquiry about the “harrowing” plight of many young people, while the man who led the 2019 government review into post-18 education criticised the “almost sneaky” changes to loan terms, and appeared to compare the situation facing graduates with the car finance and payment protection insurance (PPI) mis-selling scandals.

Markets take note as world’s biggest equity fundraiser bids to garner more money than three biggest-ever IPOs combined

• Kenneth Rogoff: will AI create a permanent underclass?

Google’s parent company, Alphabet, has said it plans to raise up to $80bn (£59bn) in equity to fund its vast artificial intelligence infrastructure investments, raising further questions over the economics of the AI boom.

The move, the largest equity fundraising ever according to analysts, includes a $10bn share sale to the US investment group Berkshire Hathaway, which was led until last year by Warren Buffett.

Senior independent director to handle process again after Albert Manifold’s shock departure last week

BP has backed Amanda Blanc to lead its search for a new chair for a second time, shrugging off investor concerns over her role at the company after the shock departure of its chair last week.

Some shareholders have voiced concerns over Blanc, the senior independent director at the British oil company, running the process again after Albert Manifold’s short stint as chair.

Financial stakes of AI race rise as Elon Musk’s SpaceX, OpenAI and Anthropic are slated to go public this year

Anthropic has filed confidentially for an initial public offering on the US stock market, the company announced on Monday. The AI firm makes the Claude chatbot, popular with software engineers and other business clients, and has seen a meteoric rise this year.

The company did not disclose the valuation it will target on the stock market, nor did it make public other terms of the offering. The startup announced on Thursday that it had raised $65bn in funding to value the company at $965bn post-money. Anthropic was valued at $380bn in February.

In less than a decade, surrounded by screens, I lost my ability to read some of the best books ever written. But, inspired by the Guardian’s 100 best novels list, I was determined to get it back

It is a privilege to be surrounded by books. My parents hail from the literary working class, a subsection of society that believes great works lead to a richer life. Reading for them was an inverted form of class snobbery. My dad could read as well as anyone. He’d prove it on package holidays, sitting on the balcony the entire time, head bowed, cigarette in hand, flicking through the pages of Jane Austen or Herman Melville. The only difference between my old man and an old Etonian was the drudgery of employment. To paraphrase Oscar Wilde: work is the bane of the reading class.

As for my own reading life, my mum wore me down, shouting “Read a book!” any time I dared say I was bored. I soon capitulated. I was nudged towards the classics, defined by Italo Calvino as books people say they should “reread” because they’ve either read them or do not want to admit they have not. In my late teens and 20s, I worked my way through the greats. I fell in love with a woman called George and thought Middlemarch was magic. I was a smart lad, prone to bad decisions, unsure of my place in the world. It is perhaps no surprise that I identified with Dorothea.

A selection of winning images from this year’s World Food Photography awards. The photographs offer insights into the lives of people around the world through the lens of food, from growing, farming and harvesting to cooking, eating, celebrating and surviving

• A free exhibition of all 203 finalist images is at the Mall Galleries, London, from Wednesday 3 June to Sunday 7 June

Terrific acting, especially an intriguingly ambiguous turn by child actor Julianna Layne, ground this twisty little horror debut

When Ellie (Jessica Rothe) wakes up in bed in a house she doesn’t recognise, next to a man she doesn’t know, she naturally assumes the worst, in debut feature director BT Meza’s creepy thriller. Understandably, she freaks out, and is even more disconcerted when a little girl calling her mommy appears, distressed that Ellie doesn’t know who she is either. Has she been kidnapped? Why would this girl play along with the kidnapper’s ruse? At this point, Bruce (an excellent performance from Joseph Cross) intervenes, reassuring his daughter and explaining to Ellie that she has memory loss. He is her husband, he says, and Alice (Julianna Layne) is their little girl.

If you’ve ever watched a film before, you’ll know there are twists and turns coming. This nifty little movie keeps you guessing and when it eventually shows its hand, there’s still plenty of mileage left in the characters. Layne gives a beautifully calibrated performance as Alice; it’s initially genuinely difficult to work out if she’s an innocent caught up in a terrifying situation or somehow in on whatever is happening – and that’s exactly what this character needs. With a film that wants to tease the viewer as to exactly what genre we’re watching, it’s ideal to see a kid played with a degree of ambiguity.

An investigation into couples who have had shocking experiences in fertility clinics. Plus: more perfect comedy with Amandaland. Here’s what to watch this evening

7pm, BBC Two
Like many couples, Beth and Laura went to northern Cyprus for separate IVF treatments and chose the same sperm donor for their two children. But DNA test results later suggested the siblings weren’t blood-related. In this astonishing investigation, Anna Collinson asks: “Have loose rules and little regulation led to wrongdoing?” She speaks with the brother and sister, and learns they aren’t the only family affected. Hollie Richardson

Jamie and Rebekah Vardy’s new reality show will disappoint every single person who tunes in, from football lovers to followers of The Scousetrap. The only possible fun you can have is rolling your eyes at them

If you are tuning in to the new three-part reality show The Vardys you will be disappointed. There’s nothing missing from that sentence. Whatever the reasons or expectations you have for tuning in, you will be disappointed. This is because it is very bad and very boring. That will make every viewer down in the mouth. Those who tune in for more specific reasons – being a fan of Leicester City’s beloved former striker-god Jamie V or wanting to hear Rebekah V’s take on the “Wagatha Christie” libel case she brought against and lost to Coleen Rooney – will be even more let down.

Leicester fans won’t get much of Jamie or any footage they haven’t seen before. And much of what is shown in the first two episodes (the third was not available for review) is to do with the troughs of his early days at the Italian club Cremonese – injury, stress, failing to dazzle in his debut, failing to score many goals thereafter – rather than his glory days at home.

A laboured attempt to resurrect toy IP very few people still care about is a $200m-budgeted waste of everyone’s time

It’s not just that He-Man himself is from the 80s that gives 2026’s Masters of the Universe such an aggressive throwback vibe. It’s that trying to assemble a film around the haphazard mythology of a toy and dusting off IP that precious few still care about feels like something Hollywood has slowly been doing a bit less of, especially on a scale such as this.

This year, hits have relied on either properties that audiences do have passion for (Scream, Michael Jackson, Mario, The Devil Wears Prada) or, radically, original ideas (Obsession, Backrooms, Goat, Hoppers). We haven’t endured an Underworld sequel or a Tarzan reboot since 2016, a Terminator film since 2019, a Dolittle reboot since 2020 or a GI Joe spin-off since 2021. Mattel might then have struck gold with Greta Gerwig’s Barbie in 2023, but that was both an unconventional, auteur-led one-off and based on a product millions were still buying on the regular (the year before release, the brand made more than $1.4bn). Various directors, from John Woo to Jon M Chu, have been loosely attached to a He-Man movie over the years and various studios, from Sony to Netflix, have tried (the latter streamer having spent a reported $30m on a failed attempt) but, as with many long-gestating projects in Hollywood, those involved forgot to remember Jeff Goldblum’s evergreen Jurassic Park line: “So preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn’t stop to think if they should.”

‘We didn’t have a washing machine, so I was in the launderette when our manager rang and said: “You’ve gone in at No 2”’

We were still a three-piece: Adam Devlin, my brother Scott and myself. We hadn’t met Eds Chesters yet, so we didn’t have a drummer. We were spending a lot of time writing songs, trying to hone this west coast, mid-60s, Crosby, Stills & Nash sound – even though it was the 90s and we were from Hounslow in London.

The Leeds group arrived in a frenzy of post-punk energy, picking at the scabs of society – then started questioning their instant success. They talk about dodging ‘the megaband treadmill’ to make their surreal new album

It’s certainly a novel way to announce your comeback. On the opening song of Yard Act’s new album, over a cacophony of doomy piano chords and crashing drums, singer James Smith announces: “I’ve got absolutely nothing – absolutely nothing new to say!” And he’s not finished there. Later in the same track, Empty Pledges, Smith whips himself up into unhinged preacher mode only to declare: “Do you feel like an impostor for every new level you ascend to too? Do you have to bluff as much as I do?”

Is it refreshingly honest to begin a record by saying you haven’t got a clue what you’re doing – or an act of ludicrous self-sabotage? “Well, I don’t know if anyone has anything new to say really,” says Smith with a grin when I meet him and bassist Ryan Needham in a London bar to discuss You’re Gonna Need a Little Music, the band’s forthcoming third LP. “We’re in this age where everything has to be a manifesto and a statement, but it’s mainly just a one-way conversation. Nobody wants to explore the grey areas any more.”

The judgey pair swap views on everything from pop culture to fashion choices and workplace strife. Plus, what toxic masculinity looks like around the world

The freshly announced Strictly Come Dancing hosts have been generating huge online chatter, but this podcast will ensure that (half of) the judging panel isn’t totally overshadowed. Judgemental sees Anton Du Beke and Craig Revel Horwood prove they have strong opinions on more than just an ex-soap star’s pasodoble by trading verdicts on everything from pop culture to sartorial dilemmas to listeners’ workplace dramas. Rachel Aroesti
Widely available, episodes weekly from Tuesday 9 June

The Radiohead guitarist once serenaded a girl with the Smiths and thinks George Michael was a genius. But what is his favourite football song?

The first single I bought
Ally’s Tartan Army, the 1978 Scottish World Cup song, because England hadn’t qualified. I loved that Scottish team – Alan Rough, Martin Buchan, Gordon McQueen, Kenny Dalglish – and the 10-year-old me got completely swept up in World Cup fever.

The first song I fell in love with
When I was 17, I fell in love with a girl called Mary, who was this huge Smiths fan. I bought Hatful of Hollow so I could serenade her with William, It Was Really Nothing. I don’t think she adored me quite as much as she adored the Smiths.

Written in breathless multilingual prose, this coming-of-age meets state-of-the-nation novel is an incredible literary performance

Three twentysomethings “drive and dream of an impossible night on an endless street. moving as a massive through mad sticky traffic, destination: where else? manchester, wilmslow road, the curry mile, yo!” Thus opens Sufiyaan Salam’s high-octane debut novel, written largely in gen Z lowercase – and you’re in for a ride.

The Boyz are British Pakistani friends in their early 20s. Immy is “something of a bad-boy muslim slut who don’t never text back”; Khan is “the mogul mowgli himself … the type to recite Warren Buffett epigrams like they’re hadiths”; and Haris has “a mind that never switches off, philosophy subreddits doing bares”. Each is looking for an escape – from their past, present, someone else, or themselves – and they come together for one night “cruising and bruising in a hire car towards what might just be the natural elastic endpoint of a friendship beginning to fray”.

This affecting exploration of the troubled genius’s impact is packed with anecdote, sharp analysis and social context

In 1998, George Michael was arrested for public lewdness in an LA lavatory, an incident that finally led the singer to publicly come out. The following day, Sathnam Sanghera found himself unable to leave his room at university: the doorway had been mockingly plastered with tabloid newspaper headlines – “ZIP ME UP BEFORE YOU GO-GO!” – by fellow students aware of his longstanding fandom. As a writer, Sanghera is best known for a series of award-winning books on the British empire, which he calls his “specialist subject”. Judging by Tonight the Music Seems So Loud – not a biography so much as a miscellany, a set of themed essays that tend to digress in all kinds of intriguing directions – the life and work of one Georgios Panayiotou runs imperialism and its legacy a very close second.

It is an unashamedly partisan book, although not an uncritical one. Sanghera is as alive to Michael’s personal and professional failings (whether the naffness of some of his early work as one half of Wham! or his high-handed treatment of the duo’s other half, Andrew Ridgeley) as he is in love with his artistic triumphs. These, of course, range from Careless Whisper and Wham!’s annually inescapable Last Christmas to the 1996 solo masterpiece Older, a peculiar and peculiarly effective cocktail of raw grief at the Aids-related death of his lover Anselmo Feleppa and unrepentant horniness.

Madeleine Thien, Sufiyaan Salam and Guardian readers discuss the titles they have read over the last month. Join the conversation in the comments

Lately I have loved Dorothy Tse’s City Like Water, translated from Chinese by Natascha Bruce. It is an unclassifiable, sharp, ingenious, passionate novel in which the city that is dissolving is also one’s only home. I have been telling everyone to read Karen Hao’s Empire of AI so that we can understand the cost of the tools we’ve been told that we need. I re-read Hsiao-Hung Pai’s Scattered Sand: The Story of China’s Rural Migrants because it has stayed with me for more than a decade now. And I am reading Hannah Lillith Assadi’s moving novel, Paradiso 17, written in the weeks before and the year after her father, who was born in Palestine, passed away. Finally, Michael Ondaatje’s selected poems, The Distance of a Shout. This is a life’s work and a book to hold close.

A surprising romance is set against a backdrop of climate crisis, political instability and corporate corruption in this bleak but witty novel

Rosa Rankin-Gee follows her 2021 near-future climate-crisis dystopia, Dreamland, with a similar but more politically focused work. As I read My Only Boy, I kept having to remind myself that the nation it describes is not (yet) real, because, for a reader living abroad, the novel’s England seems unnervingly close to what might come next. Any political dystopia risks being overtaken by reality, but in this case the gap between truth and fiction feels claustrophobic.

At the beginning of the novel, Elle is at a party held to mourn that day’s election of a far-right populist government. She’s the communications director for the almost too brilliantly named Gigr, a company connecting people seeking immediate shift work with businesses offering it. Elle is freshly upset by witnessing and immediately containing the reputational damage of a worker’s jump from a balcony. She knows how to do this, because “we’d had a death every four weeks, then every three weeks, then every two”: exhausted, starving people taking underpaid shifts from Gigr after finishing public sector jobs that no longer pay enough for survival. Almost everyone, in this slightly more desperate, divided and unfair nation, ends up doing some work for Gigr sooner or later, to buy faster access to emergency healthcare or food for crisis-stricken family, and Gigr has algorithms to ensure that each person is paid the least their particular circumstances oblige them to accept.

Launching in the UK this month, this new pint-sized console revives the motion-controlled video game boom of the 00s – with better, safer tech

For a wonderful moment in the noughties, video games became a truly universal pursuit. As I witnessed my controller-phobic aunt swing a Wii remote and nail a tennis serve, while my great-grandmother furrowed her brow over sudoku puzzles on her Nintendo DS, it seemed my long-derided hobby had finally gone mainstream. The Nintendo Wii flew off the shelves, inspiring a wave of competitors such as the Xbox Kinect camera that encouraged people to play games by moving their bodies. But the tide turned: outside of still-niche VR gaming and the odd controller-waggler on the Switch, motion-controlled gaming has barely been seen for more than a decade.

Now, 20 years later, a new console is aiming to get the whole family flailing in front of the TV once again: the Nex Playground. Launching in the UK later this month, the first thing that struck me about this family-friendly device is just how tiny it is. The size of two and a half Rubik’s Cubes taped together, this impressively unintrusive device swaps cumbersome controllers for camera-controlled minigames, putting you and your family directly in the game. Using a wide-angle lens and AI-powered tracking tech, the Nex Playground offers over 50 games that track players’ bodies as they leap, flail and dance about the living room. It’s not hard to see the appeal.

When Ben Elton didn’t distract from the pain of moving my body, I found the perfect solution – the interactive smartphone game Zombies, Run!

At 56, I am running my first marathon, an old, fat, bald dad surrounded by millennials in body-hugging Lycra and smiles that look AI-generated. But I am ahead of them. For they are only competing for positions and personal bests, and I am being chased by zombies.

The black dog of depression hit me around the time of my last birthday. I didn’t feel I had achieved anything of note for an eternity. I used to work out but, for years, work kept getting in the way. I decided to kill two circling, carcass-sniffing vultures with one stone and run my first marathon.

Infinity Ward’s new game in the storied shooter genre embraces change with a potentially controversial real-world setting

There was a time when Call of Duty (CoD) regularly courted controversy. In 2009, Modern Warfare 2’s infamous “No Russian” mission saw players (optionally) shooting screaming civilians in a Moscow airport. In 2022’s entry, a drone strike mission that drew chilling parallels to the real-world US assassination of Iranian general Qassem Suleimani two years earlier was featured. The series has not always been straightforwardly palatable.

In recent years, however, the world’s most popular shooter game has largely swapped grit for melodrama, following the misadventures of a troop of larger than life elite soldiers. For 2026’s Modern Warfare 4, however, Activision’s shooter series and its developer Infinity Ward are back in tabloid-baiting territory.

A gentle daily puzzle is quietly becoming the most joyful part of my morning routine​ and reminds me that not every win needs to be epic

There’s been some pretty big news in the last couple of weeks in video game world: the long-running space shooter Destiny 2 is winding up after almost nine years, PlayStation appears to have decided to stop releasing its flagship single-player games on PC, and Microsoft wants us to look like we’re shouting every time we type XBOX. But the biggest news for me is that I have found my new favourite word game. I am going to be so bold as to call it the new Wordle.

Ribbit is one of the varied suite of daily games on Puzzmo, an online puzzle platform. It launched at the beginning of January, but I only recently discovered it because I have been unwell, bored, and spending too much time on my phone. Puzzmo’s daily hits include a satisfying shape-arranging game, variations on chess that make me feel extremely stupid, and pleasing word games, which are my favourites. Circuits has you making connections between the beginnings and ends of phrases (eg “stone cold > cold medicine > medicine cabinet”) as fast as you can. Bongo gives you a bunch of letter tiles and asks you to arrange them for a maximum score.

Newport Street Gallery, London
White may be a talented musician but as a visual artist, he’s a nonstarter. Not even the collaborations with Ai Weiwei and Damien Hirst can save this show

Nobody can phone it in like a famous conceptual artist. Invited to customise one of rock star Jack White’s amplifiers, Ai Weiwei has inscribed the F-word in buttons of various sizes and colours across its front. It’s a cynical, contemptuous gesture, but also a marvellously louche one, reminding you of the dangerous, nihilistic yet creative spirit that this exhibition of White’s art totally lacks.

White was huge in the 00s as one half of duo the White Stripes, with Meg White, and his solo career is still going strong. Clearly the art world wants to be his friend. This show is on at Damien Hirst’s Newport Street Gallery and its luxurious hardback catalogue includes an interview with him by the uber-curator Hans Ulrich Obrist. Hirst has also customised an amp with – guess what? – a model of a rotting cow’s head. In addition, he has collaborated with White on works featuring other hackneyed Hirst tropes: an eternally floating ping-pong ball and a spin painting.

Theatre503, London
Hope still resides against horror in this collection of short plays from Palestinian playwrights, poets and artists

What are the basic requirements of theatre-making? Actors, writers, resource and rehearsal space, to name a few. What happens when these factors are narrowed to their most dangerous extremities? Companies like Belarus Free Theatre and the Freedom Theatre have shown that theatre does not stop its production even as bombs and bullets assail the building. The work finds its way to an audience.

This is certainly the case with this collection of nine short plays written by Palestinian playwrights, poets and artists. Directed by Ahmed Masoud and Micaela Miranda, the show has been rapidly put out with just one week of rehearsals. Four writers are currently in Gaza while two are former political prisoners, including Walid Daqqa, one of the longest-serving Palestinian prisoners, who died in custody in 2024. An extract from The Martyrs Return to Ramallah (translated by Julia Choucair Vizoso) is both absurdist and haunting, featuring the dead bodies of prisoners stored in Israeli prisons and denied burials, who begin to talk to each other.

At Theatre 503, London, until 6 June

Artist said Man in a Black Scarf was not his but evidence has emerged to show he painted it when a student in Suffolk

An early portrait by Lucian Freud, which the artist denied was his for years, is to be exhibited for the first time after experts proved it was painted by him.

Man in a Black Scarf was created in 1939 by the British artist when he was still a student at the East Anglian School of Painting and Drawing in Hadleigh, Suffolk. The sitter is thought to be John Jameson, a friend of Freud’s and scion of the whiskey family.

Wigmore Hall, London
The Norwegian singer’s remarkable ability to inhabit a character, her warmth on stage and the control and tenderness she brought to the more intimate songs made this a very special recital

Wigmore Hall is turning 125, its director John Gilhooly was being granted honorary membership of the Royal Philharmonic Society, and everyone in the audience was shouted a free drink, but there was another cause for celebration on Sunday night. With Lise Davidsen, the world’s most in-demand opera singer, giving an all-Schubert recital it was a case of standing room only.

The Norwegian soprano has a Rolls-Royce instrument, more than capable of filling a house the size of the Metropolitan Opera, but up close she brought other qualities to the table. Her disarming warmth in seemingly off-the-cuff spoken introductions put the audience entirely at ease. Her ability to inhabit a character, as she does on stage, ensured songs such as Gretchen am Spinnrade and Die Junge Nonne were dramatic highlights. The former opened with a throbbing intensity and built to an eruption of volcanic proportions. Her fledgling nun seethed with a scared rapture that verged on the dangerously corporeal.

Opera makers have always engaged with the latest inventions while also preserving historic crafts. I believe it’s possible to look both forwards and backwards in this fast-evolving landscape

The disquiet and distrust surrounding artificial intelligence among artists and creatives remain real and consequential, and the language used by leading arts commentators is often apocalyptic: AI will decimate the arts, it is evil, it is the devil. Like many emerging technologies, AI has been driven by the corporations at the forefront of its creation. Introduced to the public at a rapid rate and continuously evolving, machine learning has become closely entwined with fear, antipathy and foreboding. At the same time, its powers and possibilities are expanding exponentially, becoming embedded in almost every aspect of human activity.

The upcoming RBO/SHIFT festival at the Royal Opera House aims to interrogate all sides of this fast-evolving landscape to enable artists, performers, creatives and audiences to think deeply and widely about where we are now, and where we may be tomorrow. Machine learning represents a seismic shift, both in society and in the arts, and we need storytellers, artists, teachers and thinkers in this space to help determine the direction of that shift and help us navigate this unfamiliar territory.

Two-time Grammy winner was best known for songs from Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin

Peabo Bryson, the R&B singer best known as the voice behind the Oscar-winning Disney film duets Beauty and the Beast with Celine Dion, and A Whole New World with Regina Belle from Aladdin, has died. He was 75.

His family said in a statement that Bryson, who won two Grammy awards, died Tuesday, days after having a stroke.

Pop star says the man, 31, tried to force his way into her LA home last month and insisted she was expecting him

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Sabrina Carpenter has been granted a temporary restraining order against a man she says has been stalking her and tried to get into her California home.

On Monday, the Los Angeles county court issued an order to prohibit William Applegate, 31, from being within 100 yards of the Hollywood Hills home that she shares with her sister and the latter’s partner.

The Fall frontman’s play about a papal plot appalled critics when first staged in 1986, with Leigh Bowery starring as a cardinal. Now Hey! Luciani is back – but does it make any more sense 40 years on?

When Steve Hanley joined Manchester post-punk group the Fall, he expected to be playing bass guitar, not the pope on the London stage.

“I was the new pope,” remembers the musician. “I had a full pope suit on with about seven different layers of cassocks, and I’d come out to wave.” Hanley’s papal arrival signalled the final moments of a kaleidoscopic and surreal production that encompassed mafia gangsters, exiled Nazi commanders, and the performance artist Leigh Bowery playing a cardinal. “It was bizarre,” Hanley concedes.

Hundreds of thousands of supporters travelled to north London to celebrate their team winning the Premier League. Here’s what they wore …

‘The only thing I haven’t got are the underpants. Everything else is Arsenal,” says Shane, a memorabilia and kit collector perched outside north London’s Clissold park with his daughter, Erin. Known online as Highbury Gunner JVC, the 47-year-old wore an Arsenal-buckled belt, a club tie in a player pattern and a club shirt with a red and white vintage-style duffel bag. The showstopper, though, was his bespoke jacket made from curtains by the designer Joe Brim, finished with an Arsenal medallion and watch, and yellow customised Dr Martens. A collector since the 1970s, he says: “I could complete a catalogue from the 90s; my house is like a museum.”

Favourite shirt … Liv Samuels in his Arsenal badge Hawaiian top

As the far right fulminates about who ‘belongs’ in Britain, let’s remember Fritz Lustig, who arrived here in 1939, just months before war broke out. Initially jailed as an ‘enemy alien’, he played a vital role in a top-secret military intelligence unit

When the Nazis came to power in Germany in January 1933, Fritz Lustig, my father, was a 13-year-old schoolboy growing up in Berlin. He was a budding musician with dreams of becoming a professional cellist but, by the time he left school four years later, it was clear that under the Nazis, even though his family had largely cast aside their Jewish heritage, his options were going to be extremely limited.

Neither he, nor any of his anxious relatives, could possibly imagine the scale of the horrors that lay in store – but after the anti-Jewish pogrom of Kristallnacht in 1938, it was impossible to ignore the gathering storm clouds.

Always wondered what everyday stuff celebrities buy, where they shop for food and the basics they scrimp on? The former footballer talks Lego, Rich Tea biscuits and spending money on experiences with the Filter

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Karen Carney is England’s fourth most-capped football player, competing at four World Cups, four European Championships and the London Olympics before retiring in 2019. In 2022, she began leading a landmark government review into the Future of Women’s Football in the UK, the recommendations of which were successfully backed by the government in 2023.

She was part of the first all-female punditry team for ITV at the men’s World Cup 2022, led ITV’s coverage of the men’s Euros in 2024 and contributed analysis to the women’s Euros in 2025.

Need a pair of grown-up shorts? A summer sandal that works with everything? Or perhaps just a really cute bag? Our expert’s monthly edit is here to help

• 52 women’s summer wardrobe updates for under £100

Weddings! Wimbledon! It’s June, which means that summer has well and truly arrived. The May heatwave may have flagged some gaps in your warm-weather wardrobe, so here are some of this month’s juiciest style updates.

Read on for everything from the season’s most chic capri pants to bikini bottoms for under £10, plus some tips on under-the-radar brands to keep an eye on. Keep cool out there, comrades.

Whether you want a stick, a spray or a tinted cream, our expert’s favourite formulas can provide year-round sun protection

• The best face moisturisers for every budget

There’s nothing quite like the warmth of the sun on your face after a long, dreary winter. But before you bask in it, you should always apply an SPF. That’s especially true if you use retinol serums, which can increase your vulnerability to sun damage. If you’re not wearing an SPF every day, you might as well toss the rest of your skincare out of the window.

As well as the risk of sunburn, UV rays cause longer-lasting, deeper skin damage, resulting in age spots, pigmentation and premature ageing. But if the thought of slathering sticky sunscreens on your face every day makes you want to spend your life in perpetual shade, you’ve come to the right place.

Best face SPF overall:
Beauty of Joseon relief sun rice + probiotics

Best budget face SPF:
E45 Sensitive Sun face cream

Crisp 27in 5K Mac monitor is packed with features and some of the best HDR performance you can get for work or play

Apple’s new 27in Studio Display XDR is its best monitor yet, with an exceptionally bright and gorgeous 5K screen that wants to be the pro display for Mac-wielding content creators everywhere, with a price tag to match.

Built to be paired with the latest or high-end Macs, the Studio Display XDR costs from £2,599 (€3,099/$2,899/A$4,799), although it is a cool £3,000 if you want it with a stand. It sits above the standard £1,499 Studio Display and is £2,000 cheaper than the 2019 Apple Pro Display XDR it replaces.

Crisp chocolate bars that are great to make with children’s help, plus a spicy carrot twist that transforms a traditional blondie

When it comes to having fun with the family in the kitchen, my brownie recipes deliver every time. The toffee crisp number brings crunch and nostalgia, while the carrot cake blondie offers a softer, spiced twist that even veg-avoiding kids love. Both are simple crowdpleasers and perfect for little hands in the kitchen. Best of all, they’re not just for children; grown-ups will happily claim the last square, too.

In the 1990s, there were hundreds of authentic balti restaurants in the English city. Now, there are about 20. Will a big campaign bring back the boom times?

‘Curry might have come from India, but balti was born in Birmingham,” says Zaf Hussain. The 40-year-old’s family business, Shababs, has been on this site on the bustling Ladypool Road in south-east Birmingham since his father opened it in 1987. Settled in between the Indian sweet shops and south Asian bridal boutiques, Shababs is one of the last remaining restaurants in the city that still makes an authentic balti curry – a dish that, if Hussain and other campaigners have their way, could be officially certified as an element of Britain’s living heritage inventory, a preservation scheme established in 2025 by Unesco and the British government.

The problem, says Hussain, is that “people don’t know what the real thing is any more”. True balti, he says, is all about “the bowl in which it’s cooked and served”. The dish is cooked in a steel bowl on a high heat and served straight away, sizzling on the table for the customer. “Lots of people say they do balti, but they actually cook it in a frying pan before dumping it into a bowl,” says Hussain. “The proper thing is fast and it’s very flavoursome.” Balti has become a catch-all term for anything vaguely resembling curry flavour, from curry-flavoured snacks to mass-produced bottled sauces.

Whether you’re grilling meat or veg, our panel agrees that the best accompaniments involve a balance of acid, fat, salt, aromatics and sweeteners

What are the best marinades and sauces for a barbecue?
Josie, by email
“Good, well-farmed meat needs none of that nonsense,” insists Richard Turner, co-founder of butcher Turner & George in London. “I want to taste the meat and, if necessary, it should be tenderised by your chosen cooking technique.”

For Josie, though, he’ll go with the flow. First things first, all good marinades have a few things in common: “You need a tenderiser, so citrus juice, vinegar, yoghurt, buttermilk, wine or enzymes [pineapple, papaya],” he says. “These acids work by breaking down the surface collagen and protein in the meat, which tenderises the exterior and lets other flavours penetrate more deeply, while enzymes break down connective tissue.” You’ll then want fat – olive oil, coconut milk, yoghurt – and seasoning – sea salt, fish sauce, soy sauce, miso. “Salt penetrates deep into the meat, breaking down muscle fibres and drawing in liquids, so increasing both moisture and flavour.” You’ve then got garlic, ginger, shallots, herbs, chilli and sweeteners (honey, maple syrup, treacle) to play with.

Got a culinary dilemma? Email feast@theguardian.com

Pork is an underrated barbecue meat, and this taste of Thailand pairs perfectly with a fiery mango salad

I tend to start grilling food the second I catch a glimpse of the sun. After all, even if the temperature drops or the clouds threaten, I can always resort to my griddle pan indoors. Pork is an underrated meat for the barbecue, and a slow-cooked shoulder or loin is a wonderful thing. When I’m short on time, however, I often go for mince: it’s reasonably priced and has enough fat for a deliciously juicy skewer. Here, I’ve infused it with Thai seasonings that take me back to the heady experience of eating grilled street food in Bangkok. A feisty mango salad and some rice on the side are all you need for a feast.

While many young people are struggling to get work, an average date night costs north of $200. No wonder so many are resigning themselves to being alone

Name: Solo-maxxing.

Age: Newish.

Like many first-time pet owners, I was overprotective when we adopted her during the pandemic. But this affectionate creature showed me that love can mean letting go

In July 2021, after a few beers on a summer evening, my flatmate, Lew, answered an internet ad. By 5pm the next day, we had a kitten. She was a swirl of tortie-and-white fluff, with a small pink snoot, and huge ears that made her look more bat than cat. We called her Mush, pronounced like “smush”. From the moment the result of our drunken decision arrived and hid behind the sofa in our south London flat, we were in love.

Like many first-time parents in their 20s, Lew and I were fussy and overprotective. Neither of us had ever been responsible for a living creature before. When I held her tiny body against my chest, I felt anxious. Any little thing sent us running to the vet. A crusty eye. A single flea. Was she too small? Was she eating enough? “She’s in perfect physical condition,” the vet assured us during one of her many checkups.

It started as a hook-up, but before long they were parents. Now Sofia and León are finding new ways to be intimate

• How do you do it? Share the story of your sex life, anonymously

It just felt easy, like I’d already known him for a long time. I told León I loved him after two weeks

Would you want this to become sexual? If the answer is yes, then think about what might be holding you back

I don’t know whether I am in love with my friend or not. We hang out a lot, because we work together in the same university. My feelings developed over many months and it took us a long time to fit with each other as we do now. I don’t find him perfect; I sometimes don’t like his behaviour, especially when we are with other people. However, I want to be with him a lot: I imagine going on holiday with him and doing things together.

We do have physical contact sometimes – just things like touching arms. I appreciate that and have deep affection for him. So I wonder if this could be love or if I am mistaking great friendship with love just because he is a guy. I do not know whether he is a friend, almost like a brother, or more than that.

Although I voluntarily handed in the licence, the agency’s action has made it far harder for me to get it back

I suffered a spinal cord injury in August 2024. I voluntarily surrendered my driving licence to the DVLA, only for it to revoke it instead. This makes it much, much harder to get it back later on.

I’ve since been told that I need to take a medical driving assessment to get the licence back, but I am unable to take one because I do not have a licence. I am now on my third application, with evidence from my spinal consultant and an off-road driving assessment confirming that I can drive with hand controls. This was submitted two months ago, and the DVLA still can’t update me.

We left our car at the short-stay car park after paying £66 for a one-week ‘meet and greet’ service

I have ended up hundreds of pounds out of pocket after paying £66 for a week’s parking at Stansted airport.

I booked through the website compareairportparkings.co.uk for our car to be collected at the short-stay car park, parked off-site while we were away, and then returned to us at the short stay.

Urgent renewal emails and huge discounts figures are used to pressure people to hand over their data

You have had McAfee antivirus software installed on your laptop for years after becoming fearful that your computer would be infected. So when an email arrives to say your protection is about to expire, you are not surprised. Better still, there is a “renewal discount” of 89% if you pay on the same day.

“Once the expiration date has passed, your computer becomes susceptible to many different virus threats,” the email warns.

Whether first-time buyers, in between homes or refixing, people tell of impact of higher mortgage rates on housing

Prospects of cuts in UK interest rates in 2026, which were widely expected at the start of the year, were rapidly extinguished when the Iran war started at the end of February. The renewed threat of inflation means the Bank of England is now expected to raise rates at least once this year, with mortgage costs staying higher for longer.

The boss of Britain’s largest housebuilder said on Thursday it was the most challenging time to be a first-time buyer since the 2008 financial crisis.

A few lucky runners can look forward to ‘an orchestra of neurochemical changes’ when they lace up their trainers. Why do the rest of us just get sweaty? And do other forms of exercise have the same effect?

The runner’s high, where pavement-pounding drudgery turns into something like a chemically enhanced experience, is an elusive state to pin down. Some people seem to get it during most of their runs; others rarely, or barely at all. A few lucky Couch to 5kers claim to experience it within their first few sessions, while some professional athletes doubt that it even exists. This is partly due to individual differences in brain chemistry, and partly because the way you train has a significant effect on how likely you are to experience it.

If you’re on the verge of throwing away your trainers, though, there’s good news: runner’s high is real, and there are ways to maximise your chances of experiencing it, even if you’d rather hit the pool or the river than the trail. On your marks, then …

Experimental tablet produces encouraging results in patients with world’s most common forms of disease

• ‘I was getting ready to say goodbye’: patient’s hope after smart drug success

A smart drug that stops cancer cells “hiding” from treatment can shrink tumours by at least 30% in six of the world’s most common forms of the disease, early trial results show.

While immunotherapy treatments have improved survival rates for many patients, their effectiveness can stall or fail when tumour cells hide and then spread.

There is no evidence that ovulation affects muscle-building, but you may feel stronger at certain times

It’s an idea that’s been enthusiastically embraced on social media: women should sync their training to their menstrual cycle. That means lifting heavier weights around ovulation, then switching to gentler movement such as yoga in the second half of the cycle – because as their hormones fluctuate so does their strength.

But there’s not much proof that this is useful, says Dr Marianna Apicella, a researcher at the University of Leicester specialising in female physiology. “High-quality evidence supporting that is seriously lacking,” she says. “There’s not really much concrete evidence for it.”

Experts hail daraxonrasib as ‘gamechanger’ for patients with advanced pancreatic cancer

A daily pill can double survival time in patients with the world’s deadliest cancer, according to the results of a clinical trial that experts are saying is a “gamechanger” and one of the biggest breakthroughs in decades.

Currently, there are few treatments for pancreatic cancer, and most do little or nothing to help. For decades, scientists have worked relentlessly trying to find clever solutions for a form of cancer that is often found late. More than half of patients are only diagnosed after it has spread.

Series two of Rivals has brought big, bouncy locks into vogue. From Slash to Grace Jones to Bono’s mullet, here are other looks to copy if you dare …

***

One thing that has come raging back in vogue upon the release of Rivals, season two, is Jilly Cooper’s hair. That’s no surprise – Rivals has revived a lot of things we thought we’d seen the back of: smoking; dinner parties with an aperitif segment; braces (the trouser variant); a haughty expression. Give it a couple of episodes and we’ll have made our peace with naked tennis in time for Wimbledon.

With procedures like filler and Botox becoming commonplace, audiences are lamenting the smoothed-out, uncanny faces now rampant in major pictures

A few years ago, New York dermatologist Dr David A Colbert received an unexpected call from a Hollywood director. The director was shooting a film starring a high-profile actor who had plumped his face with so much filler it wouldn’t move.

The director proceeded to berate Colbert, whose practice has treated famous faces such as Sienna Miller, Naomi Watts and Robin Wright, for stilting his star’s ability to emote. “He was kind of rude,” Colbert said. “He was like, ‘Hey, can you stop doing what you’re doing [to his face]?’”

Sorting, wearing and even reworking some of Mum’s wardrobe has given me a way to keep her close

Only my mum would insist on buying a designer swimsuit on her deathbed. She had always found emotional solace in clothes, but shopping for herself had become futile by that point. She was, after all, lying in a cancer hospital having been told there was no further treatment available for her relentless myeloma; she had exhausted all available options in the 11 years since her diagnosis. But my 37th birthday was coming up and there was no way terminal blood cancer was going to stop Rhona from buying me a present. She loved showering her family with gifts. I would reprimand her for spoiling us. “I can’t spend it when I’m dead, can I?” she used to respond.

Of course, there was only one thing I truly wanted that birthday, but I was being forced to come to terms with that being a deluded fantasy. Despite my protestations that I needed nothing, my mum insisted: “Something nice for your holidays, perhaps?”

Once associated with wealth and celebrity, cosmetic treatments to defy ageing have become more commonplace. What is it doing to beauty standards?

Mary Munson’s first non-surgical cosmetic treatment wasn’t the result of a plan, or a concrete decision. She describes it in terms of sating her curiosity. Munson, 41, was visiting a clinic to extend her lashes when a woman working there spoke to her about a procedure that she referred to as “baby Botox” – which was, in fact, Botox. Since deciding to try it, she hasn’t looked back.

“It was just a starter to see what it was like, and I realised that I enjoyed it. And to be honest I don’t feel like I see a huge change,” says Munson, who was 37 when she started treatments. While she thinks her Filipino and Scottish genes “give me good skin”, Munson started getting other treatments alongside regular Botox injections, including platelet-rich plasma (PRP) therapy (sometimes referred to as a vampire facial, in which platelets are drawn from a patient’s own blood), as well as platelet-rich fibrin (PRF), a similar treatment that stimulates collagen.

I love exploring Poland by rail. When I heard about a new back-to-the-80s service, I booked a retro seat …

Trainspotters jostled on platform 2 as sunshine lit up the polished olive-green carriages of the 11:07 from Warszawa Główna (Warsaw main station) to Poznań. As I was readying to board, a man, sporting bow tie and braces, zipped past me, making it to the steps first. Excitement was palpable. But then this was no ordinary train, but rather an event. A throwback in time.

The Polish parliament had declared 2026 as the Year of Polish Railways, and there is a double jubilee under way: the 25th anniversary of the long-distance operator PKP Intercity and the centenary of Polish state railways. To celebrate, a series of retro rail journeys called Nieśpieszny (“Unhurried”) has been launched.

Piòle are the Italian city’s working-class neighbourhood taverns. Of the few that survive, many have gone upmarket – but I was looking for the real deal and affordable home cooking

Turin is one of Italy’s most serious food cities, shaped by the culinary legacy of the House of Savoy and, more recently, the slow food movement – a reputation reflected in its historic cafes and restaurants, where meals can feel refined. But that’s only part of the picture. As a local, I’m drawn to something far less formal: the piòla.

Piòle were never quite restaurants. They were places for a glass of barbera (poured at the counter from a cylindrical, quarter-litre carafe, the tubo) in rooms worn smooth by decades of use. Regulars played cards, argued about football or politics, and lingered without ceremony. Food, if it appeared, was simple and to the point: anchovies in green sauce, hard-boiled eggs, cold cuts, perhaps a plate of agnolotti (stuffed pasta).

The 2,700-mile route covering the entire English coastline is almost complete. We walked less trodden sections big on scenery and history

Day one Circular walk of Lindisfarne (4 miles)
Day two Budle Bay to Bamburgh to (5 miles)

From a vinyl-focused music exhibition to beloved record stores, ‘listening bars’ and clubs, the Victorian capital’s fondness for wax reverberates in every corner of the city

When the needle drops, Elias Rahbani’s 1972 album Mosaic of the Orient (Näi, Buzuk & Guitar) cascades out from a Technics SL-1300GE-K turntable and a colossal pair of Tasmanian-made Pitt & Giblin Superwax speakers. I’m in the Listening Room – a temple for audiophiles, and to the vinyl record – in Melbourne’s Acmi, as part of Rising festival’s new exhibition The Vinyl Factory: Reverb. The gear sounds extraordinary – and it is only one story in a room filled with countless more.

Rising music curator and Triple R host Yasmine Sharaf remembers the moment she spotted that rare Rahbani record, on a 47C day at a Cairo market. “Record shopping is really hard in Egypt. Everything usually has no cover and is covered in dust. It was sitting on the very top in complete sun. Somehow in perfect condition, not warped or melted. You’d think it would just be a puddle. I feel I was supposed to find it and save it.”

A breadcrumb trail of secret messages spanning two years, dozens of puzzles and the Guardian’s leader column led solvers to a very special prize …

Last time, we shared some old milestone puzzles in anticipation of Guardian cryptic No 30,000. That crossword has since been published: and here, in the order it happened (that is, how solvers experienced it but in reverse), is its tale.

29581 WELLDONE
29587 BRAVO
29599 HERE
29611 INCONCLUSION
29629 ISOURF
29633 INALCH
29641 ALLENG
29663 EAREYOU
29669 KEEPINGUPGREAT
29671 THEREWI
29683 LLBEAWON
29717 DERF
29723 ULPRIZ
29741 EBUTFIR
29753 STYOUM
29759 USTENT
29761 ERARAC
29789 ENOTAN
29803 ACTUALATHLETIC
29819 RACEOFC
29833 OURSETH
29837 ATWOULD
29851 BEWEIRD
29863 NOTTHAT
29867 ITSACER
29873 EBRALRA
29879 CEINTHE
29881 FORMOFA
29917 CROSSWORDPUZZLE
29921 ITSAGEN
29927 IUSPUBL
29947 ISHEDAT
29959 NOONBST
29983 TOMORROW
29989 GODSPEED

LAST THIRTY-FIVE PRIMES

Leader I tailored badly
[ definition: leader ]
[ wordplay: anagram (‘badly’) of ITAILORED ]

You might think tropical plants would love a warm shower, but even in summer the UK’s weather is unpredictable

The problem
Indoor plants accumulate dust on their leaves, mineral deposits on their soil and a general staleness that comes from living in the same spot, in poorly ventilated air, for months at a time.

The hack
Spending time in warm summer rain is said to give houseplants a spa day: soft water reaches their roots, dust is washed from their leaves, and they get a rare dose of the outdoor conditions they may be best suited to.

Adult beginners are charming when the stakes are low. Learning the piano at 50 is cute – but nobody ever needed to be airlifted out of a piano recital

I was 43, unfit and burnt out at the end of 2025, when my phone pinged from an old friend:

I know this is unlikely but I’m thinking of doing this four-day hike and there are two places available. You stay in huts so there is less gear to carry. Would you like to come?

More and more people are looking for love when they’re abroad, and consider themselves better placed to do so. But there are potential pitfalls ...

Name: Wanderlove.

Age: Originally coined by the dating app Bumble in 2022 to describe a trend predicted for 2023.

Countries that rely on US-made air defence system feel increasingly exposed as interceptor supplies dwindle

Russia is exploiting a critical global shortage of air defence interceptor missiles as it ramps up its airstrikes against Ukraine, amid warnings that a shortfall for the Patriot system in particular is creating a “window of vulnerability” for the countries that rely on them.

The MIM-104 Patriot manufactured by Raytheon and Lockheed Martin is the primary surface-to-air system of the US military to shoot down ballistic missiles, and has been widely relied on by US allies – not least in the Gulf, as well as by Ukraine.

Towering over a low-income area of Chicago, and wrapped in a speech that’s hard to decipher, this controversial monolith feels like a menacing sci-fi HQ. Is it a monument – or a mausoleum?

The Egyptians had their pyramids. The Anglo-Saxons had their barrows. And the Americans have their presidential libraries – the chief difference being that the leaders the US venerates are usually still alive at the opening.

Lacking a royal family or a state religion, the US presidency has swelled to fill the void, transforming over the decades into a national personality cult, complete with its own secular temples to these powerful men. The latest pharaonic edifice is about to open on Chicago’s south side, where it looms on the skyline as a towering totem to the 44th president, Barack Obama. He might have seemed humble in office, but in his post-presidential, Netflix-producing afterlife, Obama has erected the largest, costliest and most audacious complex of them all. Behold the $850m Obamalisk – or, as it sometimes feels morbidly like, the Obamausoleum.

Government cites crime and drunken antics of foreigners as it shortens their stays – with ordinary Thais welcoming the crackdown

It’s late afternoon at Bangkok’s Khaosan road, the city’s backpacker strip. Bar staff are calling after passersby, enticing them inside with drinks promotions. The smell of cannabis, widely sold in the city, wafts into the street, where vendors sell anything from fake tattoos, flip-flops and icy fruit shakes.

This street, and its famously noisy nightlife, has attracted visitors from around the world for decades. But increasingly, some in Thailand are growing tired of the country’s party-loving visitors.

We would like to hear from graduates and current students aged 18 or over about their views on studying for a degree

According to the latest British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey, the proportion of people who believe a university degree is not worth the time and money has jumped from 14% in 2005 to 34% in 2025.

The survey found that younger graduates, with experience of the fee system, are more disillusioned than those who did not pay fees.

We would like to hear your stories of nightmare holidays that wouldn’t be out of place on screen

With the release of Two Weeks in August, along with new series of Four Seasons and White Lotus, it seems we can’t get enough TV about holidays from hell.

With this in mind, we would like to hear your own stories of holiday mishaps. Do you have a nightmare holiday story that could have inspired a TV show? Tell us all about it below.

Dua Lipa got married this weekend in an outfit that appeared to pay homage to Bianca Jagger’s wedding to Mick Jagger. We’d like to hear whether you made a similar style choice at your wedding?

Dua Lipa got married this weekend in a beautiful outfit that appeared to pay homage to Bianca Jagger’s wedding to Mick Jagger.

The singer wore a Schiaparelli couture white skirt suit paired with a Stephen Jones hat as she tied the knot with actor Callum Turner at Old Marylebone Town Hall in London on Sunday. In 1971, Jagger married the Rolling Stones frontman in a Yves Saint Laurent Le Smoking jacket and bias-cut skirt, finishing off the look with a floppy hat and veil.

Are you or you partner a secret spender? Take part in our experiment

We’re looking for couples, who don’t often open up about their finances with each other, to take part in an experiment for the Saturday magazine. Maybe you have a ridiculous Pret habit you don’t mention to your boyfriend or you’re hooked on online shopping and have never revealed the extent of your spending to your wife. Or maybe the two of you have simply never sat down and discussed what you scrimp on and where you splash out.

If this sounds like you – and you’d be willing to record and share money diaries with each other in the presence of a Guardian journalist – get in touch and we can share more information. We would run these interviews anonymously.

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