The star has hit the big time as a total grump in her new Apple TV drama – no mean feat, given how delightful she is. She talks Lego therapy, freaking out her Better Call Saul co-star and her frustration with the Guardian crossword

Rhea Seehorn has had a hell of a year. For years she had garnered a reputation as a great underappreciated talent, but that has all changed now thanks to Pluribus. A series about one of the only people on Earth not to have their minds taken over by an alien virus, Pluribus is not only critically adored, but recently became Apple TV’s most-watched show. And Seehorn is front and centre through it all. However, today she has bigger things on her mind.

“You gotta tell me how to crack the code,” she pleads before we’ve even said hello. “I’m an avid crossword puzzler, but I cannot beat the Guardian crossword. I cannot crack it, and I need to figure out what the problem is.”

Since the Enlightenment, we’ve been making our own decisions. But now AI may be about to change that

This summer, I found myself battling through traffic in the sweltering streets of Marseille. At a crossing, my friend in the passenger seat told me to turn right toward a spot known for its fish soup. But the navigation app Waze instructed us to go straight. Tired, and with the Renault feeling like a sauna on wheels, I followed Waze’s advice. Moments later, we were stuck at a construction site.

A trivial moment, maybe. But one that captures perhaps the defining question of our era, in which technology touches nearly every aspect of our lives: who do we trust more – other human beings and our own instincts, or the machine?

Joseph de Weck is a fellow with the Foreign Policy Research Institute

Readers revel in winter light, wildlife spectacles and cosy pubs from Norfolk to Northumberland
• Tell us about your favourite European beach – the best tip wins a £200 holiday voucher

Who needs the Swiss Alps when you have Macclesfield Forest on your doorstep? Walking from Trentabank car park, the 506-metre peak of Shutlingsloe is the gift that keeps on giving. The panoramic views from its summit, dubbed Cheshire’s mini Matterhorn, are breathtaking at any time of year. But it’s on the crispest of winter days you get the best views: the Staffordshire Roaches, Manchester’s skyline, the Cheshire Plain, the wonder that is Jodrell Bank, and even as far as the Great Orme in Llandudno. Head back to Trentabank where there is a food truck selling local specialities, including Staffordshire oatcakes.
Jeremy Barnett

Wealth of datasets compiled as private passions are now a goldmine for those hunting for their ancestors

The autumn sunlight is filtering through quietly falling leaves as Louise Cocker stands in front of the gravestone of James Henry Payne and takes a quick photograph. Payne died at the age of 73 in October 1917 and was buried in the Norfolk town of North Walsham, along with his wife Eleanor and son James Edward, who was killed in the Battle of Vimy Ridge in April 1917. “Not lost”, reads the simple slab, “but gone before”.

This is far from the first Norfolk gravestone Cocker, 53, has photographed – in fact, over 24 years, she has captured almost half a million of them, driving around the county on her weekends and days off from her job in the local Lidl supermarket. As a result, she has produced a remarkable dataset of 615,000 names – many graves contain more than one person – which experts consider one of the most comprehensive photographic records of gravestones and memorials in England.

With no plans, I set off from John O’Groats to travel down south to Dover. Friends and family didn’t think I’d last a mile

Since coming to England from Ethiopia eight years ago, I’ve lost parts of my cultural identity. I was stuck in a monotonous, isolated routine studying for a biochemistry degree at Imperial College London, without the family-centred lifestyle I was used to. Back in Ethiopia, I’d be surrounded by my aunt, grandparents, friends.

So this year, I took 12 months out and moved to my uncle’s house in Leeds. The change helped me try new things, like cycling: as a child, I had never ridden a bike. I bought one in a charity shop. My friends told me that it was made for a 10-year-old and donated an adult-sized bike to me.

Whether it was pop stars, athletes and Hollywood A-listers baring all or real-life heroes and fearless campaigners … Guardian photographers captured the people behind this year’s biggest stories and most revealing profiles

President claims strikes targeted militants in country’s north-west, accusing group of attacking Christian communities

Donald Trump has said the US carried out airstrikes against Islamic State militants in north-west Nigeria on Thursday, after spending weeks decrying the group for targeting Christians.

The president said in a post on his Truth Social platform: “Tonight, at my direction as Commander in Chief, the United States launched a powerful and deadly strike against ISIS Terrorist Scum in Northwest Nigeria, who have been targeting and viciously killing, primarily, innocent Christians, at levels not seen for many years, and even Centuries!

Letter from 19 organisations says a cap would help to protect democracy, weeks after £9m donation to Reform UK

Ministers should legislate to cap political donations to “rebuild voter confidence” in democracy, campaigners have said before the introduction of a landmark elections bill.

The government is being urged to show more ambition as it prepares to publish legislation early next year that will extend the franchise to 16- and 17-year-olds.

Russian state has tolerated parallel probiv market for its convenience but now Ukrainian spies are exploiting it

Russia is scrambling to rein in the country’s sprawling illicit market for leaked personal data, a shadowy ecosystem long exploited by investigative journalists, police and criminal groups.

For more than a decade, Russia’s so-called probiv market – a term derived from the verb “to pierce” or “to punch into a search bar” – has operated as a parallel information economy built on a network of corrupt officials, traffic police, bank employees and low-level security staff willing to sell access to restricted government or corporate databases.

Southern Water says incident led to ‘very low levels’ at reservoir and set up bottled water station for residents

Some households in East Sussex have had no water on Christmas Day after supplier Southern Water experienced a problem while trying to restore service following a burst water main.

Southern Water blamed “very low levels” at Fairlight reservoir, adding that the facility had “now reached its final reserves”.

Sector reinvests in high-end experiences, from front-row beds to premier pods and business class-style seats with built-in wine coolers

From champagne coolers to front row VIP beds, cinema owners are investing heavily in premium experiences as the industry gets its box office mojo back.

As the third instalment in James Cameron’s blockbuster Avatar series pulls in the Christmas holiday crowds, the UK box office is expected to surpass £1bn in 2025 for the first time since before the global Covid pandemic.

Exclusive: Analysis of NHS data shows rates of most serious tears are nearly double those for white and black women

Asian women in England are almost twice as likely to suffer the most severe birth injuries during labour, with many healthcare professionals unaware of this greater risk, analysis has found.

Third- and fourth-degree tears, also known as obstetric anal sphincter injury (OASI), are the most severe forms of vaginal tearing during childbirth.

Interest in Wet Ink by Abigail Avis is part of a trend for works by female authors among streamers and production companies

A much-hyped novel about a housewife who uses Tupperware parties to secretly smuggle erotic stories to her friends and neighbours is causing a stir in the television world, igniting a fierce bidding contest over the right to adapt it for the small screen.

Wet Ink, a novel by the 33-year-old London-based author Abigail Avis, is not scheduled to be published until the spring 2027, but industry insiders said a fierce auction between six major production companies had already taken place for the TV rights.

Mersey Valley Way takes in Manchester and Stockport on its 13-mile route with other walks to be identified in 2026

A new river walk has been announced by the government as ministers try to improve access to nature in England.

The 13-mile (21km) walk will go through Greater Manchester and the north-west of England. There will be a river walk in each region of the country by the end of parliament, the government has pledged.

• Fourth Test, day one: Australia 152 & 4-0; England 110

• Bowlers feast on green-tinged pitch on day one at MCG

A record 94,199 spectators turned up to the MCG on Boxing Day and none will forget what they witnessed. An extraordinary 20 wickets fell on a pitch offering lavish movement and it left Cricket Australia fearing a second multi-million dollar loss in this Ashes series.

The first of these came in Perth, when a two-day bunfight triggered mass refunds and had visiting fans scrambling to book sightseeing trips. This fourth Test always had the ingredients for a repeat, not just a surface with 10mm of grass but also a touring side in England who, having lost the Ashes and with criticism flying, looked broken before the coin even went up.

As part of the Guardian’s Against the tide series, readers aged 18 to 30 share what they love about living in their coastal town, the challenges and why they often choose to leave

Megan, a 24-year-old from the Isle of Wight, is very familiar with saying goodbye. She decided university wasn’t for her and remembers how, one by one, she waved off her friends who left the island to study. Many never came back.

From the ‘warrior’ midwife saving lives in Senegal to the outed Kenyan pop star speaking up against prejudice, these are some of the people that gave us hope

• We can be heroes: the inspiring people we met around the world in 2025 – part one

In the thick of the monsoon this June, I found myself squinting at the smallest of orchids and rarest of impatiens (a flowering plant) inside an enclave of lush rainforest in Kerala, southern India. With Laly Joseph, 56, at the helm, dozens of women from the local neighbourhood were in charge of preserving and cultivating more than 2,000 species of native plants either ignored or forgotten by the rest of the world. Together, they are more popularly known as “rainforest gardeners”.

Feted birth of bambina Lara in Pagliara dei Marsi highlights sticky national debate over country’s ‘demographic winter’

In Pagliara dei Marsi, an ancient rural village on the slopes of Mount Girifalco in Italy’s Abruzzo region, cats vastly outnumber people.

They weave through the narrow streets, wander in and out of homes, and stretch out on walls overlooking the mountains. Their purrs are a consistent hum in the quiet that has come with decades of population decline.

A Pulitzer finalist is among the first-time novelists, in tales of love, a surreal prison, teen murder and a tradwife

Belgrave Road
Manish Chauhan (Faber, January)
An affecting tale of loneliness and love in Chauhan’s home town of Leicester, Belgrave Road tells the story of Mira, newly arrived in the UK from India following an arranged marriage, and Tahliil, a Somali cleaner who becomes her lunch partner, and her escape. By day, Chauhan is a finance lawyer; his debut novel follows his shortlisting in last year’s BBC short story competition.

This Is Where the Serpent Lives
Daniyal Mueenuddin (Bloomsbury, January)
The Pakistani-American writer’s 2009 story collection, In Other Rooms, Other Wonders, was a Pulitzer finalist. Like his debut, hHis first novel is set in Pakistan, moving between bustling cities and agricultural estates, interrogating the country’s class dynamics through an epic portrait spanning six decades.

Is This Thing On? is Cooper’s third film as writer/director – and his third to wonder whether performing saves or destroys your love life. He and stars Will Arnett, Laura Dern and Andra Day talk gags, growth and relationship goals

Last Christmas, the audience at an open-mic night in New York welcomed to the stage a new standup. Alex Novak, he said his name was. Mildly funny, bit depressed. Mostly told jokes about getting divorced. Weirdest thing though: he looked exactly like that guy from Arrested Development.

“I was so naively unaware of what to expect,” says Will Arnett, almost a year later. “I’ve been comedy-adjacent for a lot of my life, but not a comedian. I had no idea what I was in for.”

Yes, the kids are now 90% Adam’s apple. Yes, Winona Ryder has been unforgivably sidelined. And yes, some characters are trapped in a room filling with yoghurt. But despite our misgivings, this show still absolutely slaps

Listen, this isn’t the place for newcomers. Stranger Things has been around for almost a decade, and it has spent almost all this time building a mythology that has grown so unwieldy that trying to explain it would cost me my wordcount and my will to live.

However, in fairness, this new penultimate batch of episodes gives it a good try. The content of these new episodes can neatly be split into three categories. There’s action, which is high-octane and fun, and probably why you’re watching. Then there’s dialogue, which is less successful because it causes characters to stop moving and emote at each other, even though they should probably be concentrating on the imminent end of the world.

At first I thought my spinning head and nausea were symptoms of a hangover. But could they be connected to a documentary I had made on Havana syndrome?

Waking foggy-headed and with the room spinning on 26 December is surely not an uncommon condition. Who among us hasn’t felt the effects of overindulgence on Christmas Day?

These were my immediate thoughts when I rose in such a state in my parents’ house in Dublin two years ago. An hour later, the room continued its relentless swirl, nausea was building and it was becoming hard to stand. So far, so Christmas hangover. I remained in bed and waited for things to blow over. They didn’t. Gradually, family members stuck their heads into my childhood bedroom and wondered if everything was OK. I could only say that I felt quite strange.

The actor plays a ‘truthstorian’ trying to uncover how a powerful man’s death came about. Brace yourself for a hugely funny, all-American wild goose chase!

Lee Raybon (Ethan Hawke) is a “truthstorian”. How to explain that proudly self-applied title? A historian, but also an investigative journalist with an inherent distrust of mainstream narratives? A maker of trouble for trouble’s sake? Or one of those fantasists whose home contains a huge mood board (current mood? Paranoid!) covered with photos of suspects and newspaper clippings and various strands of a conspiracy connected by pieces of string? Raybon actually has one of those. “I’m a very visual thinker,” he says. His scathing former business partner Wendell (Peter Dinklage) sees it differently: “It’s like you read one Oklahoma history book and then made a junior high collage out of it.”

This exchange is typical of the alacrity with which The Lowdown cheerfully undercuts itself. Sterlin Harjo’s Tulsa noir is brilliantly elusive in tone. It allows Raybon, its nominal hero, precious little dignity. Raybon is, in many ways, a ridiculous man. His marriage is in ruins. He puts his sweet, resourceful daughter Francis in danger by mixing business and parenting. He’s one of the least physically imposing renegades you’ll ever meet (“How does an adult with a gun get put in the trunk of a car?” wonders his associate Cyrus at one point). He isn’t Woodward or Bernstein, he’s Jeffrey “The Dude” Lebowski with a sympathetic editor and a political agenda.

These unhygienic, offensive lumps of plastic do everything the sink does, and less. It’s time to get rid

When I was a kid, our TV was in a television cabinet. For those unfamiliar with this preposterous abomination, it was a box on legs into which the TV was placed to hide it. It was some sort of furniture hangover from the era of covering a piano’s ankles lest they cause lustful sweats to break out under the starched collars of young gentlemen.

The trouble is, a two-doored, TV-shaped-and-sized box in the corner of the room where the TV would usually be, cables trailing from its rear and armchairs angled towards it, was about as good a disguise as when a child lacking object permanence puts its hand up to its eyes and assumes the rest of the world can’t see it.

Jason Hazeley is a comedy writer who is partly responsible for TV untellectual Philomena Cunk

After a debilitating illness, they’ve given me a reason to get out of bed – and I now have TikTokers who love me back

After spending a large proportion of this year in hospital and coming out with a feeding tube, life felt completely upside down. I’d gone from running a busy home, juggling work, family and the everyday chaos that comes with it, to suddenly being ripped out of normality and forced to slow down in ways I never expected. When I finally returned home, I felt fragile – physically and emotionally. Getting dressed felt like climbing a mountain some days, never mind feeling remotely like myself.

So I decided to try something small but surprisingly powerful: I started sharing my “fits of the day” on TikTok, which basically means I started sharing my outfits. My most-liked video is a simple one of me in an unremarkable cord skirt, oversized collar blouse and knee-high boots.

Jen Walshaw is founder of muminthemadhouse.com

When the president targeted me and my TV show, millions said no. So don’t give up on us – and always remember, we’re not all like him

I have no idea if you know who I am, but I was asked to deliver this year’s alternative Christmas message (which I’ve heard is a big deal) so I hope you do, but if not I host what you call a chatshow (we call it a talkshow) in what you call the colonies, I think? I honestly have no idea what’s going on over there.

I do know what’s going on over here though, and I can tell you that, from a fascism perspective, this has been a really great year. Tyranny is booming over here.

This year was a pivotal one, in which the issue of restorative justice began to frame the UK’s post-imperial relationship with the global south

A little while ago, I was interviewed for a forthcoming book about reparations by a black British comedian and his co-writer. I approached it with modest expectations. It is a serious subject for me as a Caribbean man, and I wondered whether the complexity might be flattened or trivialised in the process.

I got to read the book this week. In The Big Payback, Lenny Henry and Marcus Ryder take a complex, controversial and deeply contested subject and do something both rare and necessary: they break it down into its constituent parts and explain – debunking and demystifying along the way – why so many of the stock objections to reparations are intellectually incoherent, historically illiterate or politically evasive.

The conventions and rituals that define the way we do politics rapidly eroded this year – setting the UK on a course into the unknown

Was this the year that British democracy as we have known it began to turn into something else? Politicians, voters and journalists have made this claim before – when their side has been out of power for a long while, or when an elected government has been unusually dictatorial – and their warnings have usually been overstated. But this time the evidence of a fundamental shift away from a century-old status quo seems stronger.

Familiar landmarks have disappeared: Labour and Tory dominance, two-party electoral contests, the decisive power of a big Westminster majority, the patience voters usually show towards a new government, the predictable pendulum swing between right and left, the red lines between mainstream and extreme politics and even the central role of parliament.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

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.

In order to be less scared, I imagine the huge Australian huntsman as a girlie, just chilling and listening to us yap. It sounds dumb, but it worked (a little bit)

• Read more summer essentials

I am someone who believes it is never too late to change. I think you can in fact teach an old dog new tricks, as long as the old dog is open-minded and willing to learn. As long as the old dog is willing to admit when it was wrong, and work to become a better dog.

OK yes, I am the old dog. And the trick I am trying to learn, even though I am decrepit? It is an important one, something I have struggled with, frequently, for my entire life. I have been trying … to become less scared of huntsman spiders. Apologies to all the other spiders that exist; I have to be realistic about my possible growth as a human. It also has to be the huntsman because it is large, in charge, and the one I encounter most often. Including three times in the last week. Inside my home. You can’t see me but I’m shaking my head and grimacing as I type.

Over the holiday period, the Guardian leader column is looking ahead at the themes of 2026. Today we look at the impact of devolution on growing volatility of party political allegiance

Next year will be pivotal in British politics, and 7 May will be the point around which things pivot. Elections to local councils, the Scottish parliament and the Welsh Senedd will give millions of voters across the UK a chance to express party preferences. Their verdicts could imperil Labour and Conservative leaders. In Wales, Labour might be sent into opposition for the first time since devolution. Plaid Cymru and Reform UK are set to make substantial gains. At Holyrood, the Scottish National party (SNP) is on course for a majority. That would be an extraordinary defiance of political gravity for a party weighed down by nearly two decades of incumbency.

In England, both Labour and the Tories risk losing scores of councillors as their vote shares are gobbled up by the Liberal Democrats, Reform UK and the Greens. Those results will be taken as evidence that Sir Keir Starmer and Kemi Badenoch are failing as leaders. But it would be a mistake to filter the results only through that lens. The fragmentation of national allegiances began much longer ago.

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.

The fracturing multilateral order has led to a new age of insecurity. But acts of courage and solidarity can point the way to a better future

In one of his last sermons, the great Christian theologian and philosopher Paul Tillich asked: “Do we have a right to hope?” As an army chaplain to German forces during the first world war and a refugee from Nazi Germany, Tillich had witnessed first-hand some of the horrors of the 20th century. But his answer to the question he posed in 1965 was yes. Nobody could live without hope, Tillich told his Harvard audience, even if it led “through the narrows of a painful and courageous ‘in-spite-of’”.

Sixty years on, a similar spirit of defiant optimism is needed to navigate our own era of conflict and anxiety. The fourth anniversary of Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is approaching, and dark political forces menace the social fabric of western liberal democracies. More widely, a fracturing multilateral order is delivering a more unstable and threatening world.

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.

John Goldthorpe questions the rationale of the Social Mobility Commission’s latest report, while Chrispher Tanner says that Labour’s focus should be on equality rather than upwards mobility

Alun Francis, chair of the Social Mobility Commission, says that Keir Starmer has no coherent plan for social mobility (Starmer has no coherent social mobility plan, says top government adviser, 21 December). That would indeed appear to be the case. But one can question how far a Labour government should be looking to the commission for guidance. What seems to not be widely recognised is that when in 2021 the commission was reconstituted by Liz Truss, as the then minister for women and inequalities, it took on a highly politicised form. Of its six current members, four have, or have had, Conservative party affiliations.

The commission’s recently published annual report for 2025 provides some useful information on various matters, including regional differences in opportunity structures, youth unemployment and the Neet (not in education, employment or training) problem that the chair now emphasises. However, what also has to be noted from his foreword to the report is the distinct rightwing slant on social mobility that was initiated by his predecessor as chair, Katharine Birbalsingh, and that he maintains.

With the right funding, housing associations should be able to provide a refuge for those who have experienced violence, writes Helena Doyle

The government’s new violence against women and girls strategy sets out welcome ambitions to strengthen protection and tackle misogyny, but the real test will be in delivery (UK government strategy to protect women and girls from violence ‘seriously underfunded’, 18 December). Housing remains one of the most critical yet underfunded parts of the national response to abuse. Without a secure home, survivors cannot rebuild their lives, access work or engage with support services.

Every week, too many women and families seeking help are turned away because there simply isn’t enough safe, suitable housing available. A survivor can’t start again if they have nowhere to go. Housing associations are uniquely placed to bridge that gap – combining safe accommodation with specialist, trauma-informed support that helps people rebuild confidence and independence.

An anonymous reader says the pain of her estrangement from her son during the festive season is just part of the story

In response to Jason Okundaye (Bad blood between the Beckhams at Christmas might seem trite. But here’s why it’s important, 23 December), I would like to say that heartbreak is not just for Christmas. As the mother of a son who has cut himself off from his parents (blocking us on social media and not responding to letters), I can categorically state that the pain is year-round.

Like the Beckhams, our situation appears to have started at the time of a marriage, followed by a gradual realisation that for unknown reasons we were no longer acceptable as parents or in-laws, then an abrupt (and inexplicable to us) termination of all contact.

Frankie Meehan on the decline of letter writing and Amnesty International’s annual Write for Rights campaign

Your editorial (22 December) declares that the “writing’s on the wall” for letter writing. In the month of Amnesty International’s annual Write For Rights campaign, I would like to suggest that the pen can still be powerful. Last year’s event generated 4.7m handwritten letters to human rights defenders and their oppressors. Every letter takes time, attention and physical effort. Leaders will always be more impressed by real letters than by easy clicks, and activists under pressure will always feel uplifted when they read personalised messages of solidarity.
Frankie Meehan
Singapore

• Have an opinion on anything you’ve read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section.

• England all out for 110 but Tongue marks career high

• Neser swats aside criticism of pitch after 20 wickets fall

England may have been bowled out for 110 in Melbourne, another revolution of the unceasing wheel of pain that is the current Ashes tour, but for Josh Tongue day one of the fourth Test was also a career high.

“Dreams come true,” Tongue said at the end of a day when 20 wickets fell, five of them to him in Australia’s first innings. “I’ve always wanted to play in the Ashes, if it’s home or away, and this obviously feels very special. Being here at the MCG with all my family in as well makes it even better.”

⚽ All the latest ahead of today’s festive fixtures
⚽ John Robertson, Forest and Scotland legend, dies aged 72
⚽ Fixtures | Tables | Follow us on Bluesky | Mail Tom

A reminder that this is what CFG’s chairman, Khaldoon al-Mubarak, said back in 2019 when they bought Mumbai City:

We believe this investment will deliver transformative benefits to Mumbai City FC, to City Football Group and to Indian football as a whole. City Football Group is committed to the future of football in India and to the potential for Mumbai City FC within that future. We are very much looking forward to playing an active role in Mumbai City FC’s fan and local communities, and working with our co-owners to further develop the club as quickly as possible.

Jannik Sinner dominated for three hours and 43 minutes, but the Spaniard somehow prevailed in an adrenaline-filled fifth set and all-time classic

It was not until what appeared to be the dying moments of the French Open final between Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz that I realised it could be worth taking a photo of such a monumental occasion. This was, after all, the first grand slam final between the two players who seemed set to lead men’s tennis for many years to come.

For three hours and 43 minutes Sinner had dominated Alcaraz and he earned three championship points while leading 5-3 in set four. Just before the Italian’s second championship point, I thrust up my phone and took a quick photo before my hand returned to my laptop, ready to file immediately an article that hailed his third consecutive major title and first triumph in Paris.

The four-time women’s world champion, ranked the No 2 all-time woman after the retired Judit Polgar, showed that she retains her skills

Hou Yifan, the all-time No 2 woman grandmaster after the retired Judit Polgar and currently ranked women’s world No 1, showed that she retained her brilliant skills when she made a rare appearance in the Global Chess League for Alpine SG Pipers, who defeated the reigning league champions, Triveni Continental Kings, 8.5-3.5 in the 2025 final at Mumbai on Tuesday. The Global Chess League, now in its third season, is planned as the chess equivalent of cricket’s Indian Premier League.

The final qualifying match, in which Alpine barely secured the six game points needed to edge their opponents, proved a triumph for Hou, who studied at Oxford and is semi-retired from chess in favour of a professorship at Peking University. She scored four wins in a row, including a 20-move miniature which took her team into the final.

Full-back is energised by club’s driving ambition under Red Bull while harbouring his own aspirations as an artist

The Newcastle full-back Elliott Obatoyinbo tells a revealing story about his time as an academy player that taught him the difference between rugby in England and New Zealand.

“I’d had a year at Saracens so I was learning the kicking game,” he says, recalling the southern hemisphere winter of 2018 that he spent training with Wellington and playing for Tawa RFC. “In one of my first games the opposition kicked it and trapped me in our 22. I’ve kicked for touch, a pretty good kick I thought, and suddenly everyone on the team was shouting at me: ‘Why are you kicking it? Why are you kicking it?’

• Leagues eager to sell all games in next rights cycle

• Auction for televised rights expected in 2027

The Premier League and EFL will hold talks early next year about combining to permit 3pm Saturday kick-offs to be broadcast live each week for the first time.

The UK is the last country in Europe to apply the so-called 3pm blackout, and with the Premier League and EFL eager to sell all their games to domestic broadcasters in the next rights cycle they want an early agreement before the next tender.

• Midfielder has not started a league match this season

• Head coach says ‘everything can change in two days’

Ruben Amorim has claimed that ­Kobbie Mainoo is “the future of ­Manchester United” and that the 20-year-old’s versatility increases his chances of breaking into the team soon.

Mainoo has a calf problem that rules him out of Newcastle’s visit to Old Trafford on Boxing Day but Amorim offered his firmest backing yet for a player he has not started in any of United’s 17 Premier League matches.

• Manager would like ‘clarity’ on future of facilities

• He wants show of ambition over academy setup

Eddie Howe has challenged Newcastle’s owners to end the club’s “limbo” by declaring whether they intend building a new training ground and stadium and to show their ambition by revamping the academy facilities.

Although Howe is “99.9%” certain he will no longer be Newcastle’s manager by the time any training ground or stadium project is completed, he believes the release of a blueprint could prove “gamechanging”.

• Prescott ties Romo with fourth 30-TD season

• Lions eliminated after error-strewn loss to Vikings

• Broncos’ defense shines in win over Chiefs

Dak Prescott threw for 307 yards and two touchdowns, and the Dallas Cowboys blew most of an 18-point lead before squeezing past the Washington Commanders 30-23 Thursday.

Dallas (7-8-1) scored touchdowns on their first three possessions to go up 21-3. Although the Commanders (4-12) cut the gap to a touchdown on three different occasions, they couldn’t complete the comeback and absorbed their 10th loss in 11 games.

Najib has been in prison since August 2022, when Malaysia’s top court upheld a corruption conviction. He denies wrongdoing

Jailed former Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak has been found guilty of abuse of power, in the biggest trial yet in the multibillion-dollar fraud scandal related to state fund 1MDB.

Najib had been charged with four counts of corruption and 21 counts of money laundering for receiving illegal transfers of about 2.2bn ringgit ($544.15m) from 1MDB. He has consistently denied wrongdoing.

Retirees with ‘fantastic hunger for education’ taking part in university organised events in record numbers

Record numbers of Swedish retirees are enrolling in a university run “by pensioners for pensioners” amid increased loneliness and a growing appetite for learning and in-person interactions.

Senioruniversitet, a national university that collaborates with Sweden’s adult education institution Folkuniversitetet, has about 30 independent branches around the country which run study circles, lecture series and university courses in subjects including languages, politics, medicine and architecture.

Provisional figures in government mandate’s first year show 20% shortfall in levels of SAF supplied for UK flights

The take-up of sustainable aviation fuels is on course to fall short of the UK government’s first annual mandate, official figures suggest.

Production data published by the Department for Transport (DfT) covering most of 2025 shows that sustainable fuels (SAF) only accounted for 1.6% of fuel supplied for UK flights – 20% less fuel in volume than the 2% needed to fulfil the requirement.

Cláudio Valente and one of victims, Nuno FG Loureiro, both studied at notoriously challenging Técnico in Lisbon

As investigators in Massachusetts work to piece together a motive for the murders of two Brown University students and an MIT physics professor, former classmates of the suspected gunman and one of the victims have been asking if the roots of the tragedy lie in their shared experience at a top university in Portugal.

The suspected gunman, Cláudio Valente, and one of those killed, Nuno FG Loureiro, studied at the prestigious and notoriously challenging University of Lisbon engineering and technology school, known locally as Técnico, both graduating in 2000.

Millions of households are exposed to materials in upholstered furniture that can release dangerous fumes when they burn

The UK is still using extremely outdated furniture fire safety rules, putting people at risk from toxic materials, an MP has warned.

Bob Blackman, the chair of the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on fire safety, said the government has failed to update rules that date back to 1988, leaving millions of households exposed to materials that exacerbate the release of dangerous fumes when they burn.

The Marches, Shropshire: Boxing Day has its own more violent customs between humans and animals. That’s not the world I choose to live in

The sparrows are a shuffling, chirruping shadow in the bushes, a static of anticipation. They are waiting for food, calling for it. They have not forgotten what the poet Emily Dickinson describes, in her poem Victory Comes Late, as “God keeps his oath to sparrows, / Who of little love / Know how to starve!” However, sparrows do seem to live in a much more vivid and emotional society than as mere victims of an indifferent nature that is economical at the expense of compassion.

To say they come to the feeding station sounds a bit grand for a small bird table, a few hanging fat balls and a scattering of seed and mealworms in a back yard in Oswestry. The first adventurers edge in, not just to explore the food source but to play in a space of subtle changes that have happened in their place. When the whole host, quarrel or ubiquity move in, there must be over 30 birds. The energy of their performance is contagious.

Secondhand tobacco smoke and routine tasks such as operating the stove shown to be biggest emitters of indoor pollution in UK homes

Christmas and New Year is a time when many people will be at home. Being indoors can give us a degree of protection from outdoor air pollution, but it can also trap pollution we produce inside our homes.

Risks from secondhand tobacco smoke are well known and the effect is perhaps best seen by comparison of health data before and after indoor smoking bans. A study of 47 indoor smoking bans in public spaces found hospital admissions for heart attacks decreased by an average of 12%, but people are less aware of other indoor pollutants and how to minimise them.

Experts and novices alike hunt for specimens that could change our understanding of evolution – and all only a short day trip from Melbourne

• More summer essentials

Between the cliffs and the sea at Jan Juc, on Victoria’s Surf Coast, researchers scour the shore platform for evidence of life from 25m years ago, as beachgoers revel in the sand and surf nearby.

“You can be there discovering a fossil that might change our understanding of the evolution of life on Earth. And you’re sharing it with a family that’s just gone down to the beach for the day,” says Dr Erich Fitzgerald, senior curator of vertebrate palaeontology at Museums Victoria Research Institute.

Low-cost tech and joined-up funding have reduced illegal logging, mining and poaching in the Darién Gap – it’s a success story that could stop deforestation worldwide

There are no roads through the Darién Gap. This vast impenetrable forest spans the width of the land bridge between South and Central America, but there is almost no way through it: hundreds have lost their lives trying to cross it on foot.

Its size and hostility have shielded it from development for millennia, protecting hundreds of species – from harpy eagles and giant anteaters to jaguars and red-crested tamarins – in one of the most biodiverse places on Earth. But it has also made it incredibly difficult to protect. Looking after 575,000 hectares (1,420,856 acres) of beach, mangrove and rainforest with just 20 rangers often felt impossible, says Segundo Sugasti, the director of Darién national park. Like tropical forests all over the world, it has been steadily shrinking, with at least 15% lost to logging, mining and cattle ranching in two decades.

Marina Lacerda urges him to answer questions as Virginia Giuffre’s lawyer says anyone who accepted former royal’s denials ‘should be ashamed’

One of the victims of the convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein has called for Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor to answer questions in the US, while a lawyer for the former royal’s accuser said those who had previously believed his denials “should be ashamed of themselves”.

Speaking to the Guardian after the release of some of the Epstein files, the tranche of documents related to the disgraced financier, Marina Lacerda, an Epstein survivor, said Mountbatten-Windsor should be “brought to justice”.

Research suggests fewer than one in 60 public sector workers share leave with partners when they have a baby

• Why shared parental leave is a monumental dud of a policy

Experts have criticised a “lost decade” of progress on parental rights after Guardian research suggested that fewer than one in 60 public sector workers are sharing leave with their partners when they have a baby.

Ten years after the introduction of shared parental leave in the UK, the policy’s architects said it had failed to deliver on its promise of “culture change” and called for bold measures necessary to allow more men – including middle- and lower-earners – to spend time with their babies.

Imran Ahmed, an anti-disinformation advocate, claims he is being targeted for scrutinising social media companies

A British anti-disinformation campaigner close to Keir Starmer’s chief of staff has launched a legal challenge against the Trump administration after being told he could face deportation from the US in a row over freedom of speech.

Imran Ahmed, the chief executive of the Centre for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), has filed a complaint against senior Trump allies including the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, and the attorney general, Pam Bondi, in an attempt to prevent what he says would be an unconstitutional arrest and removal.

Monarch urges people to draw strength from community diversity after a year marked by division and violence

King Charles has called for reconciliation after a year of deepening division, saying in his Christmas address that people must find strength in the diversity of their communities to ensure right defeats wrong.

The monarch cited the spirit of the second world war generation, which he said came together to take on the challenge that faced them; displaying qualities he said have shaped both the UK and the Commonwealth.

Thai reports claim Cambodia carried out overnight attacks ahead of officials from both countries meeting for a third day of negotiations on Friday

Cambodia has accused Thailand of intensifying its bombardment of disputed border areas, even as officials from the two countries attend a multi-day meeting aimed at negotiating an end to deadly clashes.

The neighbours’ longstanding border conflict reignited this month, shattering an earlier truce and killing more than 40 people, according to official counts. About a million people have also been displaced.

Japanese strike-back capabilities and coastal defences to be boosted while Beijing accuses Tokyo of fuelling a ‘space arms race’

Japan’s cabinet has approved a record high defence budget as tensions with China continue to spiral, with Beijing this week accusing Tokyo of “fuelling a space arms race”.

The draft defence budget for the next fiscal year – approved on Friday – is more than ¥9tn ($58bn) and 9.4% bigger than the previous budget, which will end in April. The increase comes in the fourth year of Japan’s five-year program to double its annual arms spending to 2% of GDP.

Elections will be first since military seized power in 2021, but analysts say vote is far from a step toward democracy

Myanmar is preparing to go to the polls for the first time since its military seized power in a coup in 2021, but with its former leader behind bars, its most successful political party disbanded and roughly a third of the country either disputed or in rebel hands, few believe claims by its military rulers that its 28 December election will be “free and fair”.

“This is not for the people, this is for themselves,” says Pai, 25, who fled Myanmar after the military seized power. “They [the ruling junta] are looking for a way out of the trap they are [in].”

Sima Samar has spent a lifetime working for the ideals of a country that no longer exists, but even in exile she dreams of rebuilding for a second time

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The peace of the graveyard has descended upon Afghanistan.

“Afghanistan might seem safe now, there are not a lot of explosions, but it is a graveyard kind of security. The most peaceful place is the grave: there nobody protests,” says Dr Sima Samar.

Fears for transparency and governance after closure of public log meant to curb ‘abuses and excess’ in boardrooms

UK-listed companies will be able to bury controversies over executive pay for the first time in eight years, a thinktank has warned, after the Labour government shut down a public tracker meant to curb “abuses and excess in the boardroom”.

The public register was launched under the Tory prime minister Theresa May in 2017 to name and shame companies hit by shareholder revolts at their annual general meetings (AGMs). That included rebellions over issues such as excessive bonuses or salary increases for top earning bosses.

The British-made lamps have surged in popularity as younger audiences seek to recapture magic of the 1960s

Depending on your age, you may remember them from Doctor Who and The Prisoner in the 1960s, or from TFI Friday and the Big Breakfast in the 90s. Or if you’re young enough, you might not remember them at all. But now it seems lava lamps are back.

Rising sales would suggest a third wave of the lava lamp phenomenon is on the horizon, thanks to the ongoing trend towards mid-century interiors and gen Z’s fascination with the late 90s and early 2000s.

Concerns thefts could accelerate over Christmas shutdown, with tools and equipment increasingly targeted

Thefts of tools and equipment from building sites are increasingly being carried out by organised criminal groups, according to security bosses, amid warnings that the crimewave could accelerate during the Christmas construction shutdown.

Copper cables, tools and even telehandlers and diggers costing tens of thousands of pounds have been stolen in recent months, according to the security firm Kingdom Systems.

Stonepeak will acquire 65% of lubricants business as part of wider plans for the oil company to pay down its debt

• Business live – latest updates

BP has agreed to sell a majority stake in its $10bn (£7.4bn) lubricants business Castrol to the US investment company Stonepeak, as the new chair, Albert Manifold, rapidly reshapes the under-pressure oil and gas company.

Stonepeak will acquire a 65% stake in Castrol, in a deal that values the division at $10.1bn including its debt. The deal, in which BP will retain a 35% stake in the business through a joint venture, is expected to close at the end of next year, the company said on Wednesday.

There was no shortage of fun and video games in the Diamond household in the last 12 months. Which ones did we play so much our thumbs hurt? And which one saved my soul? Let the ceremony begin …
• The 20 best video games of 2025

So, how was 2025 for your household? Was it really all as good as you pretended it was on Facebook? Full of A-grades for the kids and riotous themed fancy dress birthday parties for the grownups? Or was it a sea of disappointment with only occasional fun flotsam? And was any of it actually real, or are we all now seven-fingered AI slop beings with Sydney Sweeney’s teeth?

I have gathered my thoughts (and the Diamond household) together, whether they wanted to or not, to reflect on the most important thing in any given year: which video games we enjoyed the most. Without further ado:

René Groebli took portraits of Charlie Chaplin and Walt Disney and pioneered new modes of photography. But it was his tender, erotic pictures taken in a Paris hotel room in the 50s that really caused a stir

In 1952, two young honeymooners checked into a small hotel in Montparnasse. An everyday story in the City of Light, perhaps. But the Swiss photographer René Groebli and his wife, Rita Dürmüller, spent their time in Paris cocooned in their room producing a series of photographs – sensual, intimate, enigmatic – that would first shock then beguile viewers, works that can now be seen in a new exhibition in Zurich.

In the honeymoon pictures, Groebli’s camera traces Dürmüller’s movements – as a shirt drops from her shoulders, the turn of her neck – which, he explains, was a deliberate “artistic approach not only to intensify the depiction of reality but to make visible the emotional involvement of my wife and of me.” Dürmüller is often nude, but not solely, and never explicitly posed. It is clear that she is playing with her husband, that this is fun. And we explore their shared space: the bed curved like a cello, the windows with their opaque lace curtains. There is one graceful snap of Dürmüller hanging up her laundry like a ballerina at a barre.

A transcendent new take on King Lear, a thrilling Evita and a show at Glasgow’s revamped Citizens that reduced one viewer to a ‘blubbering wreck’ are among your highlights
• More on the best culture of 2025

Hull New theatre

From Sinners to F1 to Highest 2 Lowest, Guardian writers pick the scenes that stuck with them the most this year

Spoilers ahead

Disclosure: I covered auto racing for years and still follow Formula One skeptically. I definitely went into F1: The Movie knowing what I was in for, an answer to the hypothetical: what if the bougiest sport on God’s green earth was turned into a western? But you can’t help going along for the ride once Brad Pitt starts filling the frame with his blue-eyed winks, wry smiles and Butch Cassidy swagger. I should’ve been more indignant about this martinet sport making a literal hero out of the biggest rogue on the grid. But I left disbelief in parc fermé as Pitt’s Sonny Hayes bumped and nicked his way to the season finale at Abu Dhabi to much consternation before his wingman (Damson Idris) takes up the ticky tactics at Yas Marina circuit and winds up sacrificing himself and producer Lewis Hamilton (not again!) to help Sonny win his first race and thwart a hostile takeover of their fragile team. And when the lights went up at my desolate midday screening, it was just me still on the edge of my seat and my disbelief still firmly off track. Andrew Lawrence

An exceptional cast, astonishing directing and the talent discovery of the decade – not to mention a plot so of-the-moment it was discussed in parliament. This may actually have been perfect TV

• The 50 best TV shows of 2025
• More on the best culture of 2025

How could it be anything else? Adolescence is the Guardian’s best television series of 2025. And you’d have to assume that we’re not the only ones who think so. In any available metric – story, theme, casting, performances, execution, impact – Adolescence has stood head and shoulders over everything else.

So ubiquitous was Adolescence upon release that it would be easy to assume that everyone in the world has watched it. But just in case, a recap. Adolescence is the story of a terrible crime, and how its shock waves ripple out across a community. In episode one, 13-year-old Jamie Miller is arrested on suspicion of murdering a female classmate. In episode two, we follow a pair of police officers through a school, and learn that Jamie was radicalised online. The third is a two-hander between Jamie and his psychologist, in which Jamie’s anger rushes to the surface. The fourth returns to Jamie’s parents, as they question what more they could have done to stop this from happening.

Lebanese singer-songwriter Yasmine Hamdan returns with mournful minimalism, Mohinder Kaur Bhamra’s 1982 album of Punjabi disco makes a comeback and Venezuelan-Guatemalan duo Titanic serve up ecstatic tracks
• The 50 best albums of 2025
• More on the best culture of 2025

A 40-minute suite of continuous, repetitive drumming might not sound like the most accessible music but south Asian percussionist and producer Sarathy Korwar’s latest album, There Is Beauty, There Already, turns this concept of insistent rhythm into strangely alluring work. Leading an ensemble of three drummers, Korwar develops a dense percussive language throughout the record’s 10 movements, channelling Steve Reich’s phasing motifs as well as Indian classical phrasing and anchoring each in the repetition of a continual, thrumming refrain. As the album continues, the refrain begins to emulate the hypnotic repetition of ceremonial rhythm, drawing us further into Korwar’s percussive world the longer we listen.

The thrilling zombie saga returns with Jodie Comer and Ralph Fiennes trying to protect the remnants of humanity. Plus: the new Wes Anderson – and Austin Butler as Elvis

Danny Boyle and Alex Garland’s zombie-like horror saga returns – 18 years later – with the first in a trilogy set in a Britain quarantined from the rest of Europe. Rather than being all running and dying (though there is a fair bit of that), this one follows humanity as it tries to protect the remnants of civilisation in the aftermath of the raging infection. Spike (Alfie Williams) lives with his mum, Isla (Jodie Comer), and dad, Jamie (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), on the fortified isle of Lindisfarne. But forays to the mainland lead all three into danger. And what is Ralph Fiennes’s mysterious doctor up to in the woods? A thrilling, visceral revisit to a dystopia where, despite everything, glimmers of hope remain.
New Year’s Day, 6.30am, 8pm, Sky Cinema Premiere

It’s so nice to have the old gang back together – yes, even Olivia Colman. They’re all clearly still friendly, which makes for seasonal TV that’s exactly as comforting as it should be

It’s 22 years since Peep Show began its nine-season run. God, weren’t we all happier then? With the possible exception, ironically, of its beleaguered leads Mark (David Mitchell) and Jez (Robert Webb) – though whether Jez, who made the average whelk look like a philosopher king, ever had the psychological capacity to be beleaguered, I’m not sure. Never mind. Mark was surely beleaguered enough for both of them.

Whatever. Jesse Armstrong, Sam Bain and Andrew O’Connor’s breakthrough show was a joy – however agonisingly painful at times. What’s more, it is lovely to see the old gang again: this time in the spotlessly clean environs of the Bake Off tent instead of a shabby Croydon flat painted various shades of B&Q’s Miasmic Despair range, for The Great Christmas Bake Off.

A Christmas special of the most berserk singing show on screen. Plus: Helen Mirren pops into The Repair Shop. Here’s what to watch this evening

7.30pm, ITV1
The most wonderfully bizarre singing contest is back for a festive special – and some panto icons have been called in to help the judges. Su Pollard, Christopher Biggins, Lesley Joseph and Basil Brush will give clues about which celebrities are singing behind the masks. Instead of “Take it off” there will surely be shouts of “Oh no it isn’t!” Hollie Richardson

Expect a fan-serving finale as the much-loved series wraps things up, plus a poetic odyssey through Wales that’s a melancholy treat

As this much-loved sci-fi thriller reaches its endgame, it seems to have narrowed its scope. The town of Hawkins – which was already under quarantine and military rule after the events of season four – now feels more isolated than ever as traces of Vecna spill out. Meanwhile, with Millie Bobby Brown’s Eleven on the run, the odds are stacked against our young (well, young-ish) heroes. Still, as this final episode provides an incredibly exciting start to 2026 for devotees, the Duffer brothers are bound to have something up their sleeves. While it’s clearly time for Stranger Things to wrap up, the concluding season has been constructed with maximalist flair … so we can expect a fan-serving ending.
Netflix, from New Year’s Day

Heartbreak and humour combine in the Danish duo’s appealing blend of balladry, shoegaze and miminalist pop

From Copenhagen, Denmark
Recommended if you like Alex G, Dido, Astrid Sonne
Up next Playing Primavera and Roskilde in summer 2026

In the hands of Andrea Thuesen and Vilhelm Strange, the band name Snuggle feels more than a little ironic. The Danish duo’s debut album Goodbyehouse, released on the cultishly adored label Escho, derives from a period when the pair’s lives were in a state of major upheaval, and comfort was in short supply. “We had fun – you can hear humour a bit on the album – and we went through some tough times, existential crisis, and you can hear that too,” says Theusen over a video call from her home in Copenhagen.

Jakob Bro’s Bill Frisell collaboration finally saw the light, Cécile McLorin Salvant drew on her teenage pop memories and Anthony Braxton looked back to 1985
• The 50 best albums of 2025
• More on the best culture of 2025

UK saxophonist, composer and bandleader Tom Smith was dropping clues to his distinctively contemporary take on jazz traditions as a BBC Young Jazz Musician of the Year finalist in 2014 and 2016, and later as a leader of groups including the sax trio Gecko and the LGBTQI+ ensemble Queertet. But his powerful big band’s 2025 release, A Year in the Life, unveiled how exultantly Smith’s writing mingles orchestral influences from Maria Schneider and Carla Bley with slamming groovers from the big-band swing era, and a deep grasp of bebop chordal acrobatics, with raw and metallic guitar interventions thrown in.

(Decca, six CDs)
This six-disc collection to mark the late pianist’s 80th birthday is full of treats and includes rare ventures into Chopin and Copland, along with Lupu’s legendary rendition of Bartók at Leeds in 1969

First, a personal declaration. Of the many hundreds of pianists I must have heard in more than 50 years of recital going, a multitude that has included many of the greatest names of the 20th century, none gave me more consistent pleasure or a greater sense of wonder than Radu Lupu. If ever a pianist’s appearance, especially in his later years, belied the character of his playing it was Lupu: that the intensely serious, heavily bearded figure who hunched over the keyboard in a way more appropriate to a seance than a recital could produce playing of such velvety tonal beauty was extraordinary enough; that such a beguiling sound world was allied to a mind of such penetrating musical intelligence sometimes seemed miraculous.

Lupu died in 2022, at the age of 76. He had retired from the concert platform three years before, and had ceased to make studio recordings some years before that. Decca, for whom he recorded exclusively for over two decades, released his complete recordings in 2015, and with that comprehensive box, one thought, the legacy would be complete. But now, to mark what would have been the pianist’s 80th birthday, the company has produced this wonderful surprise: six discs made up of unreleased studio sessions and BBC, Dutch and SWR radio tapes, dating between 1970 and 2002, of works that Lupu otherwise did not record.

Strange folk, lost pop, disco oddities and, um, Dido – here are the forgotten tracks that became this year’s most replayed revelations
• The 50 best albums of 2025
• More on the best culture of 2025

I grew up listening to the Mamas and the Papas’ hits but had never heard their albums before this year. I had no idea anything as creepy as Mansions lurked within their sunny oeuvre. Its sound is ominous, its mood one of stoned paranoia, its subject rich hippies sequestered in the titular luxury homes, haunted by the sensation that the flower-power dream is going wrong.

Memoirs from Liza Minnelli and Lena Dunham, essays by David Sedaris and Alan Bennett’s diaries are among the highlights of the year ahead

Over the past year we’ve been spoiled for memoirs from high-wattage stars – Cher, Patti Smith and Anthony Hopkins among them. But 2026 begins with a very different true story, from someone who never chose the spotlight, but now wants some good to come of her appalling experiences. After the trial that resulted in her husband and 50 others being convicted of rape or sexual assault, Gisèle Pelicot’s aim is to nurture “strength and courage” in other survivors. In A Hymn to Life (Bodley Head, February) she insists that “shame has to change sides”. Another trial – of the men accused of carrying out the Bataclan massacre – was the subject of Emmanuel Carrère’s most recent book, V13. For his next, Kolkhoze (Fern, September), the French master of autofiction turns his unsparing lens back on himself, focusing on his relationship with his mother Hélène, and using it to weave a complex personal history of France, Russia and Ukraine. Family also comes under the microscope in Ghost Stories (Sceptre, May) by Siri Hustvedt, a memoir of her final years with husband Paul Auster, who died of cancer in 2024.

Hollywood isn’t totally out of the picture, though: The Steps (Seven Dials, May), Sylvester Stallone’s first autobiography, follows the star from homelessness in early 70s New York to Rocky’s triumph at the Oscars later that decade. Does achieving your creative dreams come at a price, though? Lena Dunham suggests as much in Famesick (4th Estate, April), billed as a typically frank memoir of how how her dramatic early success gave way to debilitating chronic illness. Frankness of a different kind is promised in More (Bloomsbury, September), actor Gillian Anderson’s follow-up to her bestselling 2024 anthology of women’s sexual fantasies, Want.

The ‘religious atheist’ author held a reputation as CS Lewis’s opposite. But his two trilogies – which came to a close this year – were a celebration of humanity and imagination

Twenty years ago, I visited the Botanic Garden in Oxford for the first time. Among the winding pathways lined with flowers, about halfway back, stood a bench under a tree, largely identical to the others throughout the park. Was this the one? I wondered.

I didn’t have to question it for long. A closer look revealed words and images etched along its wooden slats, all along similar lines: “Lyra + Will”, they said. Or: “Pantalaimon” and “Kirjava”. Tucked between the bench’s arm and seat was a folded-up scrap of paper with a handwritten message of thanks.

The 1908 Tunguska comet changes the direction of history and gives rise to a weird new reality in this acclaimed epic from the Polish author

The opening sentence of this remarkable novel announces that the reader is in for an intriguing experience. “On the fourteenth day of July 1924, when the tchinovniks of the Ministry of Winter came for me, on the evening of that day, on the eve of my Siberian Odyssey, only then did I begin to suspect that I did not exist.” It may hint at Kafka in the ominous arrival of officials, or Borges in its metaphysical conundrum, but stranger things are afoot. In 1924 there was no tsar, let alone his bureaucrats, the tchinovniks. The date is significant, but I don’t mind admitting I had to find out why online. The time, as Hamlet says, is out of joint.

The rudely awakened sleeper is Benedykt Gierosławski, a Polish philosopher, logician, mathematician and gambler whose debts will be erased if he undertakes a special mission for the Ministry. He is to travel to Siberia, “the wild east”, and find his father, Filip, who was exiled there for anti-government activities. This is not clemency. Filip is now known as Father Frost, and as a geologist, radical and mystic, he might have a connection with what has occurred. The reader is drip-fed the details. A comet fell into Tunguska in Siberia in 1908, as it did in our universe. But here the event has caused the emergence of an inexplicable, expanding, possibly sentient coldness called the “gleiss”. Ice, which won the European Union prize for literature, came out in Poland in 2007, well before the Game of Thrones TV adaptation made “winter is coming” a meme; but in this novel, it certainly is.

A thought-provoking examination of the literary stars who became Catholic – from Evelyn Waugh to Muriel Spark

In the five decades between 1910 and 1960, more than half a million people in England and Wales became Catholics. Among them were a clutch of literary stars: Oscar Wilde, Evelyn Waugh, Muriel Spark and Graham Greene. But there was a whole host of poets, artists and public intellectuals less known to us today, whose “going over to Rome” provoked envy and dismay.

In this thoughtful though brisk book, Melanie McDonagh, a columnist for The Tablet, gives us 16 case histories of Britons who went “Poping” during the scariest decades of the 20th century. At a time when reason and decency appeared to have been chased out by political extremism and global warfare, it was only natural to long for something solid. Writing in 1925, Greene confided to his fiancee “one does want fearfully hard for something firm and hard and certain, however uncomfortable, to catch hold of in the general flux”.

Date a vending machine, watch intergalactic television and make the most out of your short existence as a fly. Here are the best games you weren’t playing this year
• The 20 best video games of 2025
• More on the best culture of 2025

PS5, Xbox, Switch, PC
Have you ever wanted to romance your record player? Date Everything! offers players the chance to develop relationships with everyday objects around your house, in a fully voiced sandbox romp featuring over 100 anthropomorphised characters. Wonderfully meta; you can put the moves on the textbox, or even “Michael Transaction” (microtransaction – get it?) himself. Meghan Ellis

Gaming was once compared to drugs, gambling and alcohol in South Korea. Now its gaming academies offer a chance to earn a six-figure salary – if you make the grade

Son Si-woo remembers the moment his mother turned off his computer. He was midway through an interview to become a professional gamer.

“She said when I played computer games, my personality got worse, that I was addicted to games,” the 27-year-old recalls.

In this week’s newsletter: Pushing Buttons readers on their favourite games of the year, from Death Stranding 2 and Arc Raiders to Ghost of Yōtei and more

Happy holidays, Pushing Buttons readers! Once again, we are approaching the cherished time of year between Christmas and New Year when we might actually have the time to play some video games. I hope Santa brought you something new to play, instead of taking one look at all the unplayed games in your Steam library and putting you straight on the naughty list.

Over the past few weeks you have been sending in your favourite games of the year. I maintain that you readers have excellent taste: there’s crossover with our own Guardian games of the year list, but also plenty here that I haven’t played myself. Thank you to everyone who sent in a recommendation, and I hope you find yet another game to add to your pile of shame among the following suggestions. I’ll be back next week with a year-in-review issue – in the meantime, go enjoy yourselves!

From a family showdown on Guitar Hero III to the winter levels in Diddy Kong Racing, the designers of some of today’s top titles recall the gifts and moments that lit up their childhoods

There is a viral video that tends to get passed around at this time of year. It’s an old home movie showing a boy and a girl on Christmas morning eagerly unwrapping a present that turns out to be an N64 console – the boy is, to put it mildly, extremely pleased. It’s a scene a lot of us who play games will recognise: the excitement and anticipation provided by that big console-sized parcel, or the little DVD-shaped package that could be the latest Super Mario adventure. Although I never got a games machine at Christmas, I remember one year being given Trivial Pursuit on the Commodore 64 and the whole family gathered around the TV to play. It was one of the few times my mum and my sisters showed any interest in the computer, and I loved getting them involved.

Veteran designer Rhod Broadbent of Dakko Dakko recalls the Christmas of 1992, when his father, a programmer who had previously looked down on games consoles, bought him Mario Kart and The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. “Zelda was completely unknown to me at the time,” he recalls. “I think Dad was probably expecting me to be more excited. But after I had spent the morning in Mario Kart, I plugged in Zelda and everything changed. From the title music, through the intro and into that beautiful initial thunderstorm, everything was so polished and smooth and unlike the video games I’d played before. It didn’t leave the cartridge slot for weeks. I remember that Christmas morning like it was yesterday …”

Omnibus theatre, London
Sweet and funny show is based on rumoured vampire sightings in north London in the 1960s and 70s – though it could do with producing a few more goosebumps

For a time in the late 1960s and early 70s, the area around Highgate cemetery in north London was believed to be terrorised by a vampire. There were sightings, exorcisms, illicit grave excavations and even some desecrations. At the frenzied height of the speculation, the local police force got involved.

In real-life events that sound like the stuff of Hammer horror (indeed, the Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing Hammer horror film Dracula AD 1972 was apparently inspired by the incident), two men, David Farrant and Sean Manchester, got involved in hopes of solving the case. But rather than becoming a Holmes and Watson of the supernatural dimension, they embarked on a bitterly fought contest to be the first to vanquish the vampire, each undermining the other man’s authority along the way.

Wigmore Hall, London
Cutting’s programme of songs and music were all connected to the theme of night, in an evening that felt more cabaret than concert

Hugh Cutting is still sometimes described as a rising countertenor. That should surely now be unconditional. Cutting has risen, almost to the top, and 2025 has been a stellar year. This enthusiastically performed and received recital, a world away from the general run of pre-Christmas concerts or countertenor recitals, and accompanied by the eclectically matched eight-strong Refound Ensemble, showed why.

Themed recitals are common, but Cutting’s programme of songs and music, all connected to the theme of night, was built on levels of thought and performative imagination that few such programmes would even attempt, much less bring off. The pieces ranged from the baroque to the brand new, via Schubert, folk song and Don McLean. Few familiar pieces on the programme were played as written, with Cutting preferring arrangements mostly by members of the ensemble. It was compelling from first to last, more cabaret than concert.

Chadderton Town Hall, Oldham
Set over the course of local village hall fundraiser, Jim Cartwright’s play is charmingly performed and has a built-in sense of community

Yesterday it was the salsa class. Coming up is the panto. On other days, it may be anything from language lessons to arts and crafts. Today in this multipurpose venue, it is the turn of the annual Christmas fair, with its bric-a-brac stalls, grotto and tree. Sitting on four sides of the elegant ballroom in Chadderton town hall, a refuge for Oldham Coliseum during renovations, we require no leap of the imagination to picture ourselves at a genuine local fundraiser.

That gives Jim Cartwright’s 2012 play a built-in sense of community. Director Jimmy Fairhurst keeps the house lights up, save for the most poignant speeches, and expects us to clap along to the Christmas hits and cheer the young carol singers as if they were children of our own. Blurring the fact/fiction divide, the interval is less a break in the action than a chance to buy the scented candles and prints by Oldham artists that are otherwise part of the set.

Chichester Festival theatre
A musical adaptation of Matt Haig’s children’s book is visually delightful and heroically performed by Chichester Festival Youth Theatre but the songs are humdrum

This origin story, about how Saint Nicholas came to be an arctic-dwelling gift-giver with an army of elves, began as a children’s book by Matt Haig that was turned into a star-studded fantasy film with appearances by Maggie Smith and Jim Broadbent. Now we have the stage adaptation, which puts to music the tale of young Nikolas.

Aged 11, he is marooned in grief and loneliness after his mother is killed by a bear and his father takes off on an expedition to the North Pole to find the fabled villages of the elves. Nikolas (Devon Sandell, performing on press night and full of energy) follows his father northwards with his pet mouse Miika (Olivia Dickens), to meet a reindeer called Blitzen (Alexander Solly), the Truth Pixie (Daisy Chapman), the elves, and a bevy of other fantastical creatures.

The trailblazing female duo’s days of effortlessly holding the BBC dance competition together are over. They open up on the joy of working together

For the past 21 years, there has been only one ever-present on Strictly Come Dancing. It’s not dancer-turned-judge Anton du Beke, who usually got knocked out of the contest early. It’s not the panel’s panto villain, Craig Revel Horwood, who might be the longest-serving judge but took sick leave after testing positive for Covid in 2021. It’s not even trusty band leader Dave Arch, who didn’t join until series four.

No, Strictly’s sole permanent fixture is Tess Daly. She took a few weeks maternity leave in autumn 2004 after giving birth to eldest daughter Phoebe but since then, the glitterball stalwart hasn’t missed a show, clocking up in excess of 500 episodes. It’s an astonishingly resilient record. Daly has been the linchpin of the ballroom behemoth since the very start. And now that she and co-host Claudia Winkleman have stepped down, it is truly the end of a TV era.

The award-winning star of Say Nothing and Trespasses refuses to play the fame game when they can fight government inaction. They open up on making amazing TV … and why morals matter more than nice handbags

Few people are less daunted about the prospect of turning 30 than Lola Petticrew. “I used to be so afraid of getting old, and now I just think it’s the best thing ever,” they say. “I feel like I’m just coming into myself. And it feels fucking amazing. I think it’s such a fantastic thing to age – all the shit starts falling away and what you care about becomes more concentrated. I know what I want my life to be now, and I’m pretty stern on it. I don’t have to care about anything else.”

They’re telling me this over Zoom from New York, where Petticrew is shooting Furious, the new show by Elizabeth Meriwether (New Girl, Dying for Sex). Petticrew plays a character who was sex-trafficked as a child and is now out for revenge, tailed by an FBI agent played by Emmy Rossum.

When the band played their homecoming shows, the city council attempted to discourage ticketless fans from an area that became known as ‘Gallagher Hill’. But, realistically, nothing could keep them away ...

‘If you lot are listening on the hill … Bring It on Down,” Liam Gallagher said from the stage, dedicating the Oasis track to ticketless fans who had gathered in Heaton Park. When the band played their run of Manchester homecoming shows in July, an estimated 10,000 people made their way to what became known as “Gallagher Hill” over the five-night run.

The Manchester shows were the only UK gigs that took place in a public space, as opposed to stadiums. Manchester city council had warned those without tickets to stay away, going so far as to erect another fence to block the view when word began to spread that people were gathering. But all attempts to discourage them were futile, as word about the “electric” atmosphere spread on social media.

Jenny Saville’s bruising paintings, Andy Goldsworthy’s immersive stones, Lee Miller’s surrealist shots and Diane Arbus’s unforgiving nudes – our critics highlight a spectacular year
• The best design and architecture of 2025
• More on the best culture of 2025

If you’re aiming to heat the human, not the home – or just love snuggling under something cosy – these are our best buys from our test of 20

• The best heated clothes airers to save time and money when drying your laundry

Aside from hugging a fluffy hot-water bottle, sipping the Christmas whisky and ramping up the thermostat, an electric blanket or heated throw is the best way to ward off the winter chill. When you consider that more than half of a typical household’s fuel bills goes on heating and hot water, finding alternative ways to keep warm – and heating the person, rather than the whole home – seems like a good idea.

Many of the best electric blankets and heated throws cost about 2p to 4p an hour to run, so it’s hard to ignore their potential energy- and money-saving benefits.

Best electric blanket overall:
Carmen C81190 fitted electric blanket (double)

Best budget electric blanket:
Slumberdown Sleepy Nights (super king)

Looking for a new iPhone or a good deal on a refurbished one? Samuel Gibbs has tested and rated Apple’s smartphones, including the new iPhone 17

• How to make your smartphone last longer

The best iPhone may be the one you already own. There’s generally no need to buy a fresh phone just because new models have been released, as hardware updates are broadly iterative, adding small bits to an already accomplished package. But if you do want a replacement handset, whether new or refurbished, here are the best devices of the current crop of Apple smartphones.

Many other smartphones are available besides the iPhone, but if you’re an Apple user and don’t fancy switching to Android, there are still a few choices to make. Whether your priority is the longest battery life, the best camera, the biggest screen or simply the optimal balance of features and price, there’s more to choose from in the Apple ecosystem than you may expect, especially after the release of the cheaper iPhone 16e and super-thin iPhone Air.

Best iPhone for most people:
iPhone 17

From pub chic to sofa-ready, we’ve got looks for every kind of NYE celebration, including the New Year’s Day walk

• The best party dresses

Whether you’re curled up at home watching Jools Holland’s Annual Hootenanny, braving the cold to catch a fireworks display or escaping to the countryside with your nearest and dearest, New Year’s Eve offers the perfect excuse to get dressed up.

No matter your plans, there are simple ways to add sartorial sparkle to your night, even if your preferred party look is a pair of pyjamas. Here are the best New Year’s Eve outfits to welcome in 2026, however you’re celebrating.

Skip the Christmas scramble with our last-minute decor and gifting hacks; Jo Malone spills her shopping secrets; and the best tequila for festive tipples with a twist

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Ten years ago and newly married, I was invited to spend Christmas with my husband’s extended family. “We’re not doing gifts this year, there are too many of us,” my husband told me in early December when I queried who to buy for.

So, I showed up with a roll of novelty Christmas pudding bin bags and wine for the hosts. Imagine my embarrassment later that day when his aunt, uncle and cousins all handed me gifts so beautiful and thoughtful I still use them today. I resolved then to never enter the festive period without an arsenal of last-minute gift ideas in my back pocket – and also not to take everything my husband says as read.

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‘Firm, snappy texture’: the best supermarket crackers for cheese, tasted and rated

Whether you’re trying to stay warm at home or smarten up for guests, we’ve found the perfect slippers and bed socks for everyone – even if you don’t normally like them

• The best women’s pyjamas
• The best men’s pyjamas

If it’s true that you can judge a person by their shoes, then it’s perhaps even more so when it comes to their slippers. What you choose to put on your feet in your own home is a window into what you value most. As such, buying the perfect pair for yourself is an act of self-nurture.

If that all feels too hyperbolic, it feels safe to say that they’re at least a reflection of your favourite mode of relaxation and how high you like to turn up the heating.

Melani Sanders was frazzled and sleep-deprived, and wondered whether other menopausal women were going through the same thing. So she put her feelings on camera. The answer was immediate ...

If you’re a woman of a certain age with a phone, you’ve probably seen one of Melani Sanders’ We Do Not Care Club posts. In a fleecy dressing gown with reading glasses hanging off her like Christmas tree baubles, a sleep mask wonkily on her forehead, Sanders stares deadpan at the camera. “We are putting the world on notice that we simply do not care much any more,” she says. She uncaps a highlighter with her teeth, spitting the lid out of shot, then starts flatly listing stuff members of the We Do Not Care Club, her virtual community of menopausal women, don’t care about. “We do not care we have to go to therapy weekly; you are probably the reason we are there.” “We do not care if we asked you the question 13 times. We do not remember the answer; say it again.” “We do not care if you realise we are not wearing a bra: this, my friend, is freedom.”

Sanders laughs when I show her over Zoom (she’s in West Palm Beach, Florida) the highlighter tucked into my bra strap in her honour. Since she first suggested starting a “we do not care club” on 13 May 2025, it has become more than a series of brilliantly funny videos about how the midlife hormonal rollercoaster leaves women bereft of fucks to give. It is a worldwide sisterhood of 2.2 million followers on Instagram and 1.5 million on TikTok. But when Sanders, 45, sat frazzled and sleep-deprived in her car, fetching the supplements that kept her (somewhat) sane since entering surgically induced perimenopause, she was wondering if she was alone. Pre-hysterectomy, she was a perfectionist, running her home, family and life with military precision; no more. Her sports bra was skew-whiff; her hair dishevelled. “I said: ‘Melani, you really just don’t care any more … Is it just a me thing? I just hit record.’”

A selection of meringues, boozy cherries, coffee mascarpone and whisky caramel to mix and match until Big Ben strikes and beyond

Your favourite cocktail is now a DIY pavlova party! Pile crisp coffee meringues high with espresso cream, boozy cherries, a drizzle of whisky caramel and a flicker of edible gold leaf, then shake, spoon and sparkle your way into the New Year. A few tips: arrange the toppings in glass bowls or on tiered trays for a beautiful display, add labels for fun and, if it’s sitting out for a while, keep the whipped cream chilled on ice.

This make-ahead, easy green sauce is suitable for to almost any main dish and a great way to use up hang-about herbs

Whenever I want to cook something special, my first thought is always salsa verde, and Christmas is no exception. This vibrant sauce is so forgiving and endlessly versatile – a last-minute showstopper that can be whipped up with a few store-cupboard ingredients and some herbs. It’s normally made with parsley, garlic, capers, anchovy fillets, olive oil and vinegar, but as long as the end result is green and saucy, I’m generally more than happy. Finely chop whatever herbs you have to hand – I used rosemary, sage, lemon verbena and nasturtiumsfrom the garden.

During the southernmost continent’s darkest, coldest days, scientists and researchers turn to food for comfort

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Throughout his career, Al Chapman has spent several months cooking “on ice” – that is, in Antarctica. During the summer of 2021-22, the chef was one of three kitchen crew stationed at Scott Base, New Zealand’s only Antarctic research station. The dining hall was the hub of social activity, serving breakfast, morning tea, lunch and dinner for up to 85 people at its peak. It’s like working in a restaurant, Chapman says – one where you can sometimes see penguins from the kitchen.

Speaking of penguins: Chapman is adamant they aren’t eaten, unlike in the early days of Antarctic exploration. Not just because they’re protected under the Antarctic treaty, or that starvation is no longer a serious concern; Chapman says it’s important to serve food people like, especially when they’re working in such an isolated part of the world, in extreme conditions.

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There’s always one non-negotiable snack in Jimi Famurewa’s fridge at this time of year: a spicy, homemade scotch egg. How did it become a family favourite?

The culinary essence of the festive season is a kind of sanctioned chaos. Never mind that, from one angle, Christmas is mostly just rigidly observed collective food traditions and grown adults dying on the hill of whether yorkshire puddings should be served with turkey.

I don’t think I ever really feel that warming yuletide rush until I have turned a disparate assemblage of leftovers into what, to the casual observer, looks distinctly like a completely unhinged plate of food. I think most of us will know the sort of thing: there will be ragged hunks of surplus cheese, brine-slicked olives, stray bits of fruit and thick slices of the last of the cola-glazed ham; there will be a splat of cranberry sauce, a wodge of stewed red cabbage, and a dense, sticky slice of breathalyser-troubling Christmas cake. It is, I suppose, what most people think of as a Twixmas picky tea. Or maybe even a TikTok “girl dinner”, where the specific “girl” being channeled is an exhausted Mrs Claus pouring herself a massive Baileys on Boxing Day.

On that brilliant night at Ally Pally 21 years ago, Laura and I decided to go to Detroit on holiday. Since then there have been countless adventures: road trips, dive bars, rock camps …

Kicking-out time, January 2004, and Laura and I are sitting on the kerb waiting for a bus outside Alexandra Palace in north London. Not that we’re in a hurry to be anywhere else. We’re having the best time on our kerb, cheeks flushed from hard liquor and the exhilaration of the White Stripes show we’ve just seen. We’re busy communing with a fellow nocturnal creature, a woodlouse. It is one of those rare moments in my 20s when just about everything feels right.

Laura and I had quietly become office allies over a few years, a bond initially forming around our mutual shy diligence in the face of not fully fitting in. We would conspiratorially skip downstairs to the canteen together most lunchtimes and temper any work worries by chatting shit, laughing hysterically and plotting small acts of rebellion. (Like the time we childishly made a “FUCK CHESS” sign and left it on the office chess club’s shelf, which for some reason felt necessary and hilarious. If you’re reading this, chess club, we’re very sorry.)

Peter is waging war on the water company but Winnie feels his policing of usage is overbearing. You decide whose argument gets flushed away

• Find out how to get a disagreement settled or become a juror

Peter nags me not to flush the toilet after a wee, which is gross. I’m not up for being monitored

Everyone lets these water firms do what they like. It’s time to fight back. So we need to cut our usage

Ally and Jason met when she was 25 and he was 47. After more than a decade apart, they’re back together and their sexual connection is stronger than ever

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

Ally notices the occasional looks people give us, and her response is to ask me to give her a kiss in front of them

These types of relationships can be challenging – you need to have an honest conversation about what you both want

My partner and I are professionals in our early 30s. We’ve been together for five years, and long-distance for the last three, but have just moved back in together.

While we were long-distance, we both had difficulties in our work. She had important exams, and it’s taken a long time for me to get into my career. Over the last year, our relationship has become strained, and it feels as if we’ve grown apart. Now it feels as if we aren’t friends, let alone partners. This is complicated by our work shifts. Despite now living together, we still barely see each other.

Scheme has not replied to complaints and Pensions Ombudsman says it needs evidence of that

I retired from the civil service five months ago and I’ve still not received my pension. I’ve complained to the Civil Service Pension Scheme (MyCSP) repeatedly, but it doesn’t reply.

The Pensions Ombudsman says they need evidence that MyCSP has not responded to my complaint. How can I provide evidence of a failure to reply?

Airports say they were not responsible for incidents that led to passengers being out of pocket or ending trip

In September we arrived at Stansted airport to find that a fire within a departure lounge had closed the terminal.

We had to wait outside in the chilly small hours for nearly two hours. It was another hour before security opened in the terminal, by which time our flight had departed empty to maintain the airline’s schedules. We were rebooked for the following day.

While many use our phones predominantly to doomscroll, smartphones have a range of little-known functions that could make life better and easier – from heart monitoring to even developing camera film

Our smartphones are magical things – far more than dopamine drip providers and a way to keep in touch with friends and family. Using the built-in features and easily available additional apps, there are plenty of clever things you can do with your smartphone.

Steps to help combat fraud in which criminals use AI-generated replica of a person’s voice to deceive victims

The voicemail from your son is alarming. He has just been in a car accident and is highly stressed. He needs money urgently, although it is not clear why, and he gives you some bank details for a transfer.

You consider yourself wise to other scams, and have ignored texts claiming to be from him and asking for cash. But you can hear his voice and he is clearly in trouble.

Disturbed sleep is very common as you adapt to a new environment but, with good sleep hygiene and some practical adjustments, you can quickly settle in

• Read more summer essentials

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As the working year draws to a close, many of us only have one hope for the season, and that’s a decent night’s sleep. While not every family visit or post-Christmas getaway is going to be a trip to Rancho Relaxo, a few things can help us catch holiday kip. Pre-departure apps can be useful, so can pillow mists and thermoregulation, but when it comes to maximising rest on the road, some say less is more.

It’s the liver – not the skin – that rids the body of the toxins in alcohol, but exercise can help manage the symptoms

Here’s a useful fact to quote to any smug relatives who say they went for a run the morning after their Christmas party: you can’t get rid of toxins by sweating. “Toxins” is a broad term, says Adam Taylor, professor of anatomy at Lancaster Medical School, covering anything that can damage the body – from heavy metals to chemicals found in plastics, as well as the normal byproducts of our own metabolism. The liver is designed to process the toxins in alcohol and either break them down into usable units or get rid of them. The waste products are then filtered from the blood and excreted in urine or stools.

Sweat, on the other hand, has a very different job. Although it can contain extremely small amounts of some metabolic byproducts, its purpose is temperature regulation (and, in some situations, to signal stress or fear). “Sweating is not the means to remove toxins,” says Taylor. “Going for a run or sitting in a sauna after a night of drinking won’t reduce the toxins produced by metabolising alcohol, and it won’t lower your blood alcohol level.”

Emulating the bike-friendly highways enjoyed by our continental neighbours will take a lot more money and political will

Ever since Team GB’s velodrome successes at the 2008 Olympics, campaigners and government ministers have confidently predicted that Britain is about to become a nation of cyclists. There is just one problem: for the most part, it has not happened.

Apart from a very concentrated spike in bike use during Covid, the level of cycle trips in England has stayed broadly static for years, and things do not appear to be changing.

A study finds that as pressure increases, UK parents are more likely to put on a brave face – risking family wellbeing

Advent calendars, check. Tree and decorations, check. Teachers’ presents, nativity costumes and a whole new ticketing system for the PTA’s Santa’s grotto, check. But the Christmas cards remain unwritten, the to-do list keeps growing, and that Labubu doll your child desperately wants appears to have vanished from the face of the earth.

If you’re feeling frayed in the final days before Christmas, you’re not alone. But research suggests this festive overload doesn’t just leave parents tired and irritable – it may also make it harder to be emotionally honest with their children.

No Santas, no reindeer and zero tolerance of gingerbread men – go for a sweater that is cosy and special but not overtly Christmassy

Don’t know about you, but I find that Christmas is a bit like drinking martinis. It is really fun, and then it is a bit too much fun, and by the time I realise I’ve stepped over that line, whoops, it’s too late. I’ve overdone it, and all I want to do is lie down in a dark room.

Christmas is an intense and immersive experience. It is not just the alcohol, not just the food, although there have definitely been way too much of both of those things round my way. It is the whole sensory world. The new perfume your auntie got for Christmas going head-to-head with the cinnamon-scented tea lights. The nostalgia-soaked playlists and soppy romcoms. The kids on laps, the dogs on sofas, the fridge that barely closes. No doubt there was a point back there when I could have said: “You know what, I’ve had an elegant sufficiency of cheer, just a water and a quiet night with my journal tonight thanks,” but I was too busy singing along to Mariah Carey to notice and the moment passed. No matter. Better to err on the side of too much jolliness than too little, after all.

Sweet PJs, soft sweatpants and cosy accessories will make a sofa day feel even more indulgent

Head-to-toe can be too much, but a lace trim on a skirt, a camisole under a blazer, lace tights? Now you’re talking

Sometimes a little goes a long way. This is true for Tabasco on eggs, for fragrance in an elevator, for confidence in the karaoke booth, and it is also, I have belatedly realised, the secret of how to wear lace.

All these years, I’ve been getting lace wrong by wearing too much of it. Killing it with overenthusiasm. Lace is beautiful stuff: delicate and romantic. Look closely at it and you will see tiny motifs and patterns, flowers and symbols, crafted in miniature like secret messages. Lace has drama: it is the fabric of marriages, funerals and christenings, after all. And it can switch vibes: white is chaste, red is raunchy, black is sophisticated. Lace has it all going on.

These gentle, hydrating toners impart the glassy look popularised by Korean skincare – and I can’t do without them

I wouldn’t say it was rare that the beauty industry invents a whole new product category, but my own willingness to adopt another step certainly is. Ten years ago, I’d have told you not to bother with toner unless you particularly enjoyed using it, which is as good a reason as any in a world on fire. And yet over the past couple of years, the new “milky toners” have, to me at least, become so functional as to be indispensable.

These are cloudy fluids, thicker than a toner but thinner than a moisturiser, usually containing gentle, universally skin-pleasing ingredients like glycerine, ceramides and peptides.

As pubs nationwide buckle under soaring costs, one Argyll village spent three years buying and restoring theirs – and has ambitious plans for the future

It’s opening night at Scotland’s newest community pub, Oakbank Inn, which sits on the Holy Loch in the village of Sandbank, Argyll. It’s a clear, cold night, and the inn couldn’t look more welcoming: a cosy glow from within the historic building, the Cowal hills beyond. The Christmas lights are twinkling, the glasses are charged and there’s a palpable sense of goodwill, cheer, and plenty of pride in the air. By 6pm, it’s buzzing. Locals are already propping up the bar as a stylish woman sweeps in and bags the last table. She is Debbie Rycroft, a local haberdasher. “A pint in my own local,” she smiles happily, relishing a toast with her husband and equally dapper 19-year-old son.

First-night hiccups are limited to a wonky nozzle and a brief worry about a small radiator leak. “How many people to fix a heater?” quips someone as a line of concerned faces survey the scene. Almost immediately, a punter walks in with a radiator key. All sorted. Someone orders a Guinness; the bartender pulls it off. A two-part pour, pitchblack perfection with a balanced, creamy top. Good things come to those who wait? Well, this one’s been three years in the making.

This hidden gem has country inns, canalside walks, a stunning viaduct, the historic town of Market Harborough – and not a tour bus in sight

It was a chilly Sunday in November 2000 when the gods chose to smile on Ken Wallace. The retired teacher was sweeping his metal detector across a hillside in Leicestershire’s Welland valley when a series of beeps brought him up short. Digging down, he found a cache of buried coins almost two millennia old. He had chanced upon one of the UK’s most important iron age hoards, totalling about 5,000 silver and gold coins.

More than 25 years on, I’m staring at Ken’s find at the civic museum in the nearby town of Market Harborough. The now gleaming coins are decorated with wreaths and horses. They’re about the size of 5p pieces, but speak of a wild-eyed age of tribal lands and windswept hill forts.

There’s no shortage of stunning scenery and daytime activities in the Lakes. Now, an observatory is offering stellar nocturnal events too

A tawny owl screeches nearby in the dark and her mate replies, hooting eerily from the forest below. A white dome floats in the gloaming above a plain black doorway outlined with red light, like a portal to another dimension. I’m in Grizedale Forest, far from any light-polluting cities, to visit the Lake District’s first public observatory and planetarium, which opened in May.

Grizedale Observatory offers immersive films in the planetarium and three-hour stargazing events that go on late into the night. There are sessions on astrophotography and, on moonless nights, dark sky astronomy with the chance to see “a glittering tapestry of stars, galaxies, nebulae and star clusters”. Its director, Gary Fildes, is a veteran in the field, having founded and led three UK observatories over two decades. The goal at Grizedale, he says, is to create “an immersive, year-round astronomy and science destination that brings the beauty of the Lake District skies to visitors”.

Festive sea swims are pure joy – and also blow away the cobwebs, unite communities and raise money for charity. Here are some old (and new) favourites

Felixstowe, Suffolk
A proper community affair, with hundreds of participants resplendent in festive finery racing into the North Sea at 10am sharp while much of the town gathers along the promenade to watch. The event raises funds for St Elizabeth Hospice, and every year brings new tales of heroics and even romance (there’s been the odd mid-plunge proposal). The atmosphere is as heartwarming as the water is not. Afterwards warm up with a stroll around town, with its four-mile promenade and seafront gardens.
10am, £16, stelizabethhospice.org.uk

From a barn conversion with wildlife for neighbours to a recently renovated townhouse on a quaint high street

I was a chemistry student, my days spent boiling, titrating and stirring. But after that night, I formed a double act with a friend, writing jokes and making a radio show, before heading off to Australia …

Although I loved my time at Nottingham University, I didn’t go there with much intention of doing anything with my degree in chemistry afterwards. Not only was it full-on, I wasn’t particularly good at it. In an experiment to examine the incubation of goat’s blood, I accidentally added 10 times too much hydrogen peroxide. Blood shot out of the flask and splattered all over my face like a scene from The Sopranos. I can still hear my professor’s screams.

But that’s OK, because I hadn’t really gone to university to win the Nobel prize, I’d gone to experience the culture of the mid 90s. British dance music – through acts such as Orbital, Leftfield, Underworld, Faithless and the Chemical Brothers – was exploding. Britpop was happening around me: (What’s the Story?) Morning Glory was released the week I went to uni. My entry to this smorgasbord of cool happened when, in our second year, Ant and Dec announced a live show up in town.

The homemade velvet ribbon chain garland is one of the most popular home accessories this festive season

Christmas is always the busiest time of year for Josie Rossington, 52, the owner of the Follie gift store on the edge of Lincoln town centre. Christmas cards and ornaments are ordinarily her best sellers. But this year it’s her stock of velvet ribbon that has been flying off the shelves – metres and metres at a time.

“People have been buying 20, 30, 40 metres. It’s a lot of ribbon,” says Rossington, who estimates she has sold a total of six miles of it since October.

Worried about cost, planning – or whether anyone will show up? We asked experts how to bring back parties

Several months ago, staring down another empty weekend, a friend texted me. “Why is no one having parties?” she fumed.

Some people were, we agreed, but not nearly enough. Indeed, in January, the Atlantic’s Ellen Cushing declared that “America is in a party deficit”, quoting a 2023 Bureau of Labor Statistics report that found only 4.1% of Americans attended or hosted a social event on an average holiday weekend. That figure was down a whopping 35% since 2004.

Timing: Daytime or night-time? How long will it last?

Menu: Will there be food? If so, does that mean a sit-down dinner, only appetizers or a buffet? Will you have caterers? “Less is more when it comes to food,” Rhinehart says. “Keeping the menu simple yet delicious goes a long way.”

Bar: If serving alcohol, which kinds? Which non-alcoholic beverages will you have available? Don’t skimp on ice, says Rhinehart: “You can never have enough!”

Kids: Are they invited, or is it an adults-only affair?

Dying is a process and in a person’s final hours and days, Nickie and her Threshold Choir are there to accompany people on their way and bring comfort. Through specially composed songs, akin to lullabies, the choir cultivates an environment of love and safety around those on their deathbed.  For the volunteer choir members, it is also an opportunity to channel their own experiences of grief and together open up conversations about death.

Full interview with Nickie Aven, available here

Our 20 favourite pieces of in-depth reporting, essays and profiles from the year

Victor Pelevin made his name in 90s Russia with scathing satires of authoritarianism. But while his literary peers have faced censorship and fled the country, he still sells millions. Has he become a Kremlin apologist?

The rules-based global order, its institutions and value system face a crisis of legitimacy and credibility as the US turns away

‘The old world is dying,” Antonio Gramsci once wrote. “And the new world struggles to be born.” In such interregnums, the Italian Marxist philosopher suggested, “every act, even the smallest, may acquire decisive weight”.

In 2025, western leaders appeared convinced they – and we – were living through one such transitional period, as the world of international relations established after the second world war crashed to a halt.

High inflation and a cost of living crisis mean that the familiar favourite has become a rare Detty December treat for many in the country

In Lagos, the holiday season is well under way. For weeks, the roads have been jammed with traffic, concerts headlined by Afrobeats superstars are drawing crowds, and choice spots are filled with residents, returnees and tourists looking to indulge in the month-long enjoyment of Detty December.

But the spotlight is on the contents of kitchen pots as much as it is on those shuffling to the trendy Oblee dance steps in clubs and street parties.

Perhaps you have been living with friends for many years, or live in a commune

Do you have what could be described as unusual living arrangements?

Perhaps you live in communal housing, or a commune or with extended family.

We’d like to hear from independent retailers about how changes to online searches has affected them. We’d also like to find out from customers about how easy it is to track down independent retailers

We’d like to find out more about how your business has been affected by changes to online searches amid the rise of AI.

Independent businesses have traditionally relied on online advertising for increased visibility and sales, even if they are based on the high street. However, with the introduction of AI mode and AI Overview summaries on Google, and the proliferation of LLMs such as ChatGPT or Google Gemini, people are altering their search habits, which may affect the online visibility of small businesses.

We want to hear from UK parents with experience in temporary accommodation about the impact on their lives, family and schooling

More than 172,000 children were living in temporary accommodation in England at the end of June, according to the latest quarterly official figures from October.

That represented an 8.2% rise on the same period last year. There are now more than 130,000 households households living in temporary accommodation in England, the figures showed.

We would like to hear from centenarians, their family and friends

The number of centenarians (aged 100 years and over) in the UK has doubled from 8,300 in 2004 to 16,600 in 2024, according to the Office for National Statistics.

Between 2004 and 2024, the number of male centenarians has tripled from 910 to 3,100. During the same period, the number of female centenarians almost doubled from 7,400 to 13,600.

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We look back over the year’s wildlife photographs, and hand out some much-deserved gongs to brilliant and beautiful creatures around the world