Born in London in 1985, Emerald Fennell burst onto the pop-cinema scene with her 2021 directorial debut, Promising Young Woman. Set against a candy-coated color pallet, its stylish, subversive take on toxic masculinity and feminist revenge fantasy scored widespread acclaim and an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. Fennell followed it up with 2023’s ensemble-led Saltburn, a lavish Gothic epic exploring themes of seduction, social power and mid-aughts excess.
Aside from filmmaking, Fennell is an accomplished actor who received rave reviews for her role as Camilla Parker Bowles on The Crown, and esteemed writer-director, whose work as a showrunner on Killing Eve earned two Emmy nominations. In the literary realm, she’s authored a children’s fantasy, Shiverton Hall, and its sequel, The Creeper, along with the adult mystery thriller, Monsters. Collaborating with Andrew Lloyd Webber on his 2021 musical Cinderella, she wrote a revamped version of the classic children’s story, tackling topical issues like gender roles and beauty culture.
Sharing 6 of her all-time favorite books with The Week, Fennell’s selections are rich in horror, decadence, and heart-wrenching romance. From Hilary Mantel’s harrowing memoir to the “exquisite, gleeful sadism” of Patricia Highsmith, dive into her reading list below – and check out the bookshelves of other iconic directors here.
Emerald Fennell’s Reading List
Giving Up the Ghost by Hilary Mantel (also rec’d by Tori Amos)
“Hilary Mantel is one of those impossible, once-in-a-lifetime visionaries. She seems as if she’s descended from William Blake, or from a medieval ascetic. Her horror writing is peerless, and there is nothing quite so harrowingly visceral as her memoir.” -EF
The Man Who Made Husbands Jealous by Jilly Cooper
“Jilly Cooper’s bucolic world of picturesque cottages, adorable dogs, and hard-core bonking cannot be beaten. Kindhearted serial shagger Lysander Hawkley is one of the best in the irresistible rogues’ gallery Cooper has created in her 10-book Rutshire Chronicles series.” -EF
The Complete Lyrics: 1978–2013 by Nick Cave
“I write to music, and Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds are the band I most frequently listen to while I do. Cave’s lyrics are just as much a pleasure to read as they are to listen to. Gothic, violent, and beautiful.” -EF
Nothing That Meets the Eye by Patricia Highsmith
“Patricia Highsmith’s stories are every bit as monstrous as her novels, and this collection of previously unpublished tales, written between 1938 and 1982, is seething with the exquisite, gleeful sadism that we expect from the author of The Talented Mr. Ripley.” -EF
The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro
“I love all of Ishiguro’s books, but this Booker Prize–winning novel, about a love between a butler and housekeeper that goes unspoken, is the one that most effectively rips your heart out. A perfect story of lost love and regret, it is masterful at showing the foolishness — and, often, cruelty — that is at the heart of British restraint.” -EF
Persuasion by Jane Austen (also rec’d by Brandon Taylor, Nia DaCosta & Nigella Lawson)
“‘You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late.’ There can’t be a single confession in all fiction more devastating than this one. Austen single-handedly established the rom-com as we know it: Even Tim and Dawn, everyone’s favorite couple in the U.K. version of The Office, are the love children of Anne Elliot and Captain Wentworth.” -EF
(via The Week)
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