International law states only military sites can be targeted during conflicts, but this is routinely being ignored

Twice every day, Liubov Martynenko leaves the underground maternity ward where she works in Kherson and travels by ambulance to collect meals from another hospital in the Ukrainian city’s “red zone”, close to the Dnipro River and the Russian forces on the other side.

On 4 June , just before midday, the vehicle entered the grounds of Luchansky city clinical hospital as usual, but Martynenko, who also works as a midwife, heard a strange sound in the air. “It’s flying!” the driver screamed, as she realised there was a drone nearby.

The young leaders are eloquent and organised – and now they know what victory looks like. That could be a huge headache for Narendra Modi

The rebellion in India of the young, led by the Cockroach Janta party (CJP), unfolded against a backdrop of large, abstract, geometrical structures – arcs, planes, hemispheres – that together make up an observatory called Jantar Mantar, built in the early 18th century to refine almanacs and tell time. Jantar Mantar has been a byword for political protest for decades: it marks the space that the Delhi police assigns to the politically disgruntled so they can vent in a contained way. But it had never before hosted a political insurgency that started from scratch and forced the Indian state to back down in less than eight weeks.

When its founder, Abhijeet Dipke, brought the CJP to Jantar Mantar, it was a social media hashtag with 20 million followers. While he was studying in Boston, Dipke took the remarks of chief justice Surya Kant, who is accused of referring to the swathes of unemployed young people and activists as “parasites” and “cockroaches”, and turned them into a here-we-come meme. When he brought the CJP home to Delhi on 6 June to make it real, people were intrigued. Given the mostly dismal fate of civil society movements during prime minister Narendra Modi’s time in office, no one anticipated the David and Goliath contest that came to a head last Saturday.

Four decades after he and George Michael became the first western pop act to tour the country, Ridgeley recalls silent gigs, awkward embassy receptions – and the ‘bloody ludicrous’ hiring of Lindsay Anderson as director

• Wham! special – read about George Michael’s great lost superstar duets album

There has always been something surreal about Wham!’s 1985 trip to China. George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley looked like alien visitors on the streets of Beijing, their bouffant hair and flamboyant outfits setting them apart from the Mao jackets and drab uniforms of the Chinese people they encountered.

Now the full strangeness of the duo’s brief trip, which made them the first western pop act to play in the country, is explored in a fascinating documentary film, Wham! 10 Days in China. Using previously unseen archive footage and featuring new interviews with many of the people involved in the tour, it shows the extraordinary impact Wham!’s two concerts had on their Chinese audience, as well as providing a snapshot of a country on the brink of great change.

His mother was an Oscar-winning actor who had been exploited from a young age; Astin appeared in The Goonies at just 13. Now, he has followed in his mother’s footsteps again as a union leader. He talks Stranger Things, AI and why playing Samwise Gamgee cost him his house

Sean Astin is showing me around his new office. There’s framed movie prints on the walls, piles of paperwork and a stack of boxes of Stranger Things Funko Pops. “If you were here, you could look out this window and see a 10-storey building with our iconic Sag-Aftra logo on it,” he says proudly on video call, gesturing out of the window to the Los Angeles skyline. “But you just have to trust me that it’s there.” He shows me a framed photo of his mother, Patty Duke, aged 16, with the best supporting actress Oscar she won in 1963 (for playing Helen Keller in The Miracle Worker), and even more proudly, a framed copy of Duke’s business card from when she was president of the Screen Actors Guild in the mid-80s – the role he now occupies (Sag merged with the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists in 2012). The 10 months of his presidency “has been a whirlwind”, he says.

It’s still slightly jarring to see Astin in a suit and tie, lanyard around his neck. We’re more accustomed to seeing him in the handwoven cloak and hairy feet of Samwise Gamgee, loyally accompanying mister Frodo into Mordor in The Lord of the Rings. Or as Winona Ryder’s short-lived partner in Stranger Things (before a Demodog got to him). Or as never-say-die college football underdog “Rudy” Ruettiger in the 1993 biopic. Or, for viewers of his own vintage, as plucky leader Mikey in The Goonies. Astin has been a member of the union he now represents for 45 of his 55 years, but he seems to have survived the perils of child stardom and a Hollywood upbringing remarkably unscathed. In fact, you could see it all as preparation for the role.

There were 470 women killed in such circumstances across the country last year, with rights groups saying the true toll will be even higher, reflecting a system that still protects the accused

Mohammad Ramzan was on the night shift at the cement factory outside Karachi when he answered a phone call from home. His 20-year-old daughter, Khalida Chandio, had been shot dead in their village in Pakistan’s southern Sindh province.

Now back home, with Khalida’s mother, Nabul, at his side, the devastated couple are trying to comprehend what happened. Nabul struggles to hold back tears. She says her daughter had been taken out from their home under the cover of darkness and killed just a few hundred metres away.

Severe wildfires can generate their own unique weather systems. One of the most striking examples of this are dangerous pyrocumulonimbus, or pyroCB, clouds

• Pedro Sánchez says Spain is suffering effects of climate crisis as firefighters battle wildfires in France

As France and Spain battle some of the worst wildfires in recent history, experts have warned of an unprecedented phenomenon that could exacerbate the effects of the blazes: pyrocumulonimbus, or “fire clouds”.

Wildfires often spread when hot, windy and dry conditions coalesce but severe wildfires can generate their own unique weather systems. One of the most striking examples of this are pyrocumulonimbus clouds, or fire-generated thunderstorms, which are the most severe form of fire clouds.

Firefighters in France and Spain face another day battling wildfires that have seen hundreds of thousands of people evacuated, as another heatwave set to hit France this week

• Pedro Sánchez says Spain is suffering effects of climate crisis as firefighters battle wildfires in France

Provisional data on wildfires in Spain shows that more than 170,000 hectares of forest land have been affected since the beginning of the year – a nearly sixfold increase on the almost 29,000 recorded in the same period in 2025.

35 major fires have been recorded so far, up from just 11 last year.

Top military officials say campaign has reached its limit of effectiveness and warn of dwindling stocks of munitions

The US has paused strikes on Iran for a third night as top military officials advised Donald Trump to halt his bombing campaign, and diplomatic negotiations have continued to avoid a return to all-out war.

Oil prices fell on Monday as markets responded to the pause in combat.

Abdul Ballout, 21, reportedly shot in operation at allotment in Spandau district after fatal attack in Tiergarten park

A man suspected of driving a van into a crowd near Berlin’s Pride festival then going on a knife rampage in an Islamist terror attack has been shot dead by police, German officials have said.

Police confirmed on Sunday evening that the chief suspect had been shot dead, reportedly during an operation at an allotment garden complex ⁠in the capital’s Spandau district.

Emergency services pulled the bodies from the ocean at Port Macdonnell amid ‘grave concerns’ for second child

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

A baby is missing off the coast of South Australia after the bodies of a mother and her toddler were pulled from the ocean.

Emergency services were called to the state’s southernmost coastal town, Port Macdonnell, at about 11.15am on Monday after a car was found with its engine running.

Two others on Mount Elbrus survive after group of foreign climbers ‘strayed from route’ amid deteriorating weather, say authorities

Russia says it has found the bodies of five foreign climbers – believed to be Bosnian – on Mount Elbrus, authorities and state media say.

Authorities said earlier that out of a group of seven climbing Russia’s highest mountain, they had recovered two bodies and were searching for three more.

Labour’s 2024 manifesto did not include any specific commitments on council tax but two models are being floated

James Cleverly, the shadow housing secretary, has accused Andy Burnham of planning “more ways to tax Middle England”. Responding to reports that Burnham wants to change council tax (see 10.03am), Cleverly said:

Andy Burnham and Labour are just looking for more ways to tax Middle England, and raise taxes on people’s homes.

Replacing council tax and stamp duty with a new house price tax would not be a tax cut for hardworking families – quite the reverse: people across England would end up paying more.

The US president’s pick to be the country’s director of national intelligence is expected to be approved within days – but only after a tense confirmation hearing

• Sign up for the Breaking News US email

President Donald Trump plans to tout his handling of the economy during a visit to suburban Detroit today, defending sweeping tariffs in a swing state where their effects have hurt many businesses as midterm election season heats up.

Trump is visiting a General Motors facility in Milford, home to tracks and proving grounds for new models and vehicles. Early voting is underway for Michigan’s 4 August primary, which features fierce nomination fights in both major political parties, AP reported.

Romania summons Russian ambassador after shooting down three drones; Zelenskyy to meet Andy Burnham in UK. What we know on day 1,615

Ukrainian and US officials have discussed a proposal to offer Russia an air ceasefire, the Reuters news agency has reported, citing a Ukrainian source. Volodymyr Zelenskyy is due to meet Donald Trump, the US president, in Washington on Tuesday. The Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said on ⁠Sunday that Russia considered it premature to comment on any such ceasefire proposal. “We do not know how credible these reports are or where they come from. These are newspaper reports and nothing more. Therefore, it is premature to comment on them at this stage,” the Interfax news agency quoted Peskov as saying. “We have heard statements that some new formulas may be possible. We still need to learn ​more about them … What happens next will depend on how closely they correspond to our interests.”

Romania said it was summoning Russia’s ambassador after the Nato member’s military shot down a third drone in as many days. A Romanian F-16 fighter jet shot down the drone over the Black Sea, five minutes after it entered the country’s airspace, said Romania’s defence minister, Radu Miruță. The foreign minister, Oana Țoiu, condemned “repeated violations”. The Romanian president, Nicușor Dan, said that according to an investigation, a drone shot down on Friday was a “Shahed model used by the Russian Federation in its war of aggression against Ukraine”. Investigations into drones shot down on Saturday and Sunday continued, he said.

The Golden Leo, an international cargo vessel, sank off the coast of ⁠Ukraine’s Black Sea port of Odesa on Sunday, a week after Ukrainian ⁠officials said ⁠it ​had been struck by Russian forces. Nine ⁠crew members were killed in the ​attack while eight ‌were evacuated to safety. The ‌ship had left the ‌port of Chornomorsk with a cargo of corn when it was shelled by Russian forces on 19 July. Russia’s defence ministry ⁠said on Sunday that its forces had ⁠struck Ukrainian ⁠ports ​and shipping. Russia claimed the container terminal ‌at Chornomorsk, near ‌Odesa, handled “military cargoes”.

Russia launched seven ballistic missiles and 136 drones at Ukraine overnight into Sunday, the Ukrainian air force said. In the northern Ukrainian city of Chernihiv, a Russian drone hit ⁠a supermarket, killing two people – including a nine-year-old child – and wounding 25, emergency services said. In the eastern city of Kharkiv, one person was killed and 16 others required medical attention ‌after a daytime drone attack, said the mayor, Ihor Terekhov. A glide bomb attack killed one person and wounded six in the southern city of Zaporizhzhia, said the regional governor, Ivan Fedorov.

In Kyiv, a fire broke out on the seventh and eighth floors of a multi-storey apartment block in a central district after ‌a missile attack, said the mayor, Vitali Klitschko. Three people were wounded. In Sloviansk, Donetsk region, the national oil and gas company Naftogaz said two of its employees died in a Russian attack while trying to help residents affected by an earlier strike.

Russia said ⁠areas of Ukraine ​under Moscow’s control had also come under attack, with four people killed in a Ukrainian drone strike in the Russian-occupied Ukrainian city of Horlivka. Twelve ⁠people, including two children, were ⁠injured ⁠in drone ​attack on ⁠the Russian city of Belgorod, close ⁠to ​Ukraine’s ‌border, regional authorities ‌said early on Monday. Ukraine denies targeting civilians.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy will become Andy Burnham’s first overseas visitor as prime minister, in a visit that Burnham said underlined Britain’s “unwavering” backing for Ukraine, Peter Walker writes. Less than two weeks after Keir Starmer travelled to Kyiv for the final foreign visit of his prime ministership, Zelenskyy will on Monday join Burnham at a naval base where Ukrainian forces have been receiving training. According to statistics released by No 10, since Russia’s full invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, total UK support for the country has totalled £25bn, including £16bn in military assistance.

Burnham and Zelenskyy are due to discuss joint projects including Stone Cloak, an electronic jammer for which the UK has shared the intellectual property, allowing Ukraine to use the system immediately to prevent Russia shooting down Ukrainian drones. Since being proven on the Ukrainian frontline, the jammers are due to be fitted to new UK weaponry, including cruise missiles.

A high-quality pirated version of the summer’s hit movie was leaked on Elon Musk’s X platform and viewed more than 3m times before being removed

A leaked copy of The Odyssey has been taken down from Elon Musk’s X platform but only after a post flagging it gained millions of views.

A high-quality pirated version of the film went viral at the weekend after an account linked to it saying “Someone uploaded ‘The Odyssey’ full movie on X. Can you believe it?”. The post flagging the film was viewed more than 3m times before the account hosting the apparently leaked film was suspended by X.

Astronauts for America liken effort to instill trust and faith back in constitution’s principles and democratic institutions to ‘making a course correction’

Orbiting 250 miles above the US in the international space station, astronaut Cady Coleman did not look down and see red or blue states, sanctuary cities or communities occupied by thousands of federal immigration enforcement agents in camouflage uniforms and automatic weapons.

What she saw was a single land, from Pacific to Atlantic, no borders or partitions, just a united America, and a population valuing its equality while convinced that what brought them together was far greater than anything that divided them.

Mass hearings, removal orders ‘in absentia’ – judges are wrapping up immigration cases in unprecedented numbers

The second Trump administration recorded its highest number of immigration arrests so far last month. One significant and alarming reason that is far less noticeable than armored, masked agents swaggering in the streets with weapons may be a sudden change in America’s immigration courts.

Here, in recent months, accelerated mass hearings are giving people facing existential questions about their future little time to prepare for their cases, and judges are often ordering vulnerable immigrants deported without them even being in the courtroom.

After masked agents fired on his truck, Francisco Longoria was ambushed, charged and jailed – only for the case against him to fall apart. Now he and his family are seeking justice, and says the harrowing experience is part of a troubling pattern

It was just after 8am on 16 August and Francisco Longoria, who runs a party supply business, was driving his truck down a suburban southern California street to deliver a jumper for a water slide. But this ordinary Saturday morning turned into a nightmare when, suddenly, three unmarked vehicles stopped his truck and four masked men jumped out.

Longoria, who had brought his son Jonathan Longoria and son-in-law Daniel Rascon with him, wondered if they were being abducted.

Stephen Walsh was such a workaholic that none of his colleagues would believe he’d ever leave. But then he learned to dance and he’s now part of a dazzling tap troupe

When he was 57, Stephen Walsh found himself in hospital with a stomach bleed from an ulcer. As he lay in bed recovering, he thought about his future. “‘You always had this vague idea that you’d retire early,’” he told himself at the time. “‘Well, I’m going to do it.’”

Discharged from hospital, he gave his business partners three years’ notice. They had worked together at the General Electric Company, and after it was broken up in 1999, they launched their own training and consultancy business specialising in how to improve companies’ efficiency and outcomes.

Half a century on, this tale of a woman who abandons her children in search of her self remains thrillingly original

There is a growing literature of maternal flight: novels about women who leave not just their husbands but also the children they have made. In the real world, men are the more frequent deserters; the connection of the father to family life is seen as contingent, while motherhood is revered as an intrinsic state. This means that women who “un-mother” themselves are doing something impossible: the connection between a woman and her child is not just emotional, but also creational. Joan Barfoot understands the inside-out nature of the logic involved in maternal obligation: “she created these other people and their need for her,” says Abra, the abandoning mother of Gaining Ground, “and now she must fulfil them.”

Abra neglects to fulfil her children or their needs. The novel is rigorously and meditatively about the business of separation, which is also the business of becoming a single and undivided self.

Super-premium Android has top performance, long battery life and good cameras, but is let down by software

Honor’s svelte Android phone-tablet has been given a glow-up for its sixth version, offering a great alternative to Samsung for a fancy foldable with a red suede-like back framed in gold.

The Magic V6 continues the Chinese challenger brand’s strategy of taking a razor-thin device and slapping a giant circular lump on the back to fit in top-class cameras, something others often forgo. It costs a not inconsiderable £1,500 (€1,700/A$2,999) but only until August when the price jumps to a cool £2,000 (€2,300) – a solid £300 more than last year’s model as the cost of RAMageddon continues to bite, even at the very top end of the market.

Main screen: 7.95in (403ppi) 120Hz OLED flexible display

Cover screen: 6.52in (406ppi) 120Hz OLED

Processor: Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5

RAM: 16GB

Storage: 512GB

Operating system: MagicOS 10 (Android 16)

Camera: 50MP + 50MP ultrawide + 64MP 3x tele; 2x 20MP selfie

Connectivity: 5G, dual sim + esim, USB-C, wifi 7, NFC, Bluetooth 6, GNSS

Water resistance: IP68/69 (1.5 metres for 30 minutes)

Dimensions folded: 156.7 x 74.5 x 8.75-9mm

Dimensions unfolded: 156.7 x 145.6 x 4.0-4.1mm

Weight: 219-224g

The classic gym routine doesn’t isolate your stomach muscles as much as you might think, but here are five that will

If someone in a film or TV show wants a six-pack, chances are they’ll drop to the floor and start doing sit-ups. According to Dr Lee Brown, senior lecturer in strength and conditioning at the University of East London, that’s more Hollywood than science.

“It’s embedded in the archaic practices of boxing coaches and therefore everyone seems to follow it,” he says. “But they’re far from the best exercise for training your core.”

Horchata, the revered creamy drink made from tiger nuts, is still served in grand Valencian parlours – always accompanied by sugar-glazed pastries

It was a glimpse of an old couple sharing a tender moment in the bustling horchatería that drew me into one of Valencia’s most storied culinary traditions. As he sipped his milky horchata de chufa and a white crescent moon appeared on his coiffed moustache, they shared a soft laugh and she dabbed it away from his upper lip.

“There’s no fixed time to drink horchata,” the lady said. “As long we have at least one every day.”

The Paramount-Warner Bros merger is being fought in the US and UK. Britain’s culture secretary knows the risks and can intervene. She should

Though it has yet to become front-page news in the UK, you should know about the proposed Paramount-Warner Bros merger. It threatens to inflict immense harm on the British public. As actors and public figures who have spent our careers in the arts in Britain – working with British crews, on British stages and sets – we have a responsibility to the public who support, enjoy and consume the art we make.

The UK is being threatened by a media merger that would harm our workers, our culture and the public – but we can stop it. We are encouraged by Lisa Nandy, the secretary of state for digital, culture, media and sport, who recently sent letters to Paramount Skydance and Warner Bros Discovery, as well as a statement to parliament, indicating that she is “minded to intervene” in Paramount’s $110bn takeover of Warner Bros.

Alan Cumming, Benedict Cumberbatch and Benedict Wong are actors working in the UK and Hollywood

The offensive potential is no longer theoretical. We need to develop systems to strengthen public health as quickly as AI is accelerating biological design

As artificial intelligence rapidly transforms the biological sciences, it is pushing the future of biology in two opposing directions. AI can help bad actors generate recipes for biological weapons with just a few keystrokes and computational prompts. At the same time, AI can track disease outbreaks and deliver critical public health information to millions of people in real time – potentially stopping a deadly outbreak in its tracks. What we are dealing with in this moment is profound: a race between offense and defense. Between the proliferation of dark biology, where deadly pathogens are engineered in secret, and the promise of a new era of collective global health.

Every infectious disease outbreak begins with a handful of cases. Public health wins by learning about an outbreak before it spreads wide, before hospitals fill and a crisis starts to spiral out of control. As transmission rates explode, options shrink. One of AI’s greatest values is its ability to compress the timeline between outbreak and detection. Speed can mean the difference between containing an outbreak and confronting an epidemic, or another global pandemic.

Leaving your blue ticks on used to be a sign that you were trustworthy. These days it conveys a certain ‘pick me’ energy

Genuine question: am I the last person in the world who still has my blue ticks on? In the early days of WhatsApp, if someone had gone into their privacy settings and turned them off, so you could never be sure when or even if this person had read your message, that told you all you needed to know. No blue ticks = red flag. Here was a slippery, sneaky individual, not to be trusted under any circumstances. As opposed to those of us who left them on – honest, noble, open books with nothing to hide. No blue ticks was an indicator that you were probably messaging a serial killer.

But recently the tide has turned. Now everyone seems to have gone all mysterious and switched them off, to leave you guessing. I’m starting to feel like a desperate blue-tick loser, over-keen and needy, falling over myself to volunteer the unnecessary information that I’ve read your message, when you are far too cool to care. Blue ticks on has real “pick me” energy. It’s attention-seeking, the coloured symbol equivalent of sending a selfie of you reading the message in question, while grinning and doing a thumbs up.

New research reveals deep anxieties. Medals and cash bonuses have been mooted as incentives, but the priority is for policy that addresses women’s real concerns

It seems as though every week brings another news story on declining global birthrates. A number of political leaders have been panicking for a while, of course, instructing citizens to reproduce in tones so beguiling, who could possibly resist? JD Vance: “I want more babies”; Jacob Rees-Mogg: “We need more babies”. While in France this year, a government direct-mailing campaign urged 29-year-olds to have a baby before it’s too late.

People are busily scratching their heads and trying to work out why this is happening. The trend is described as a catastrophe for civilisation, with leaders drumming up incentives and policies in response, from medals (Russia) and a €1,000 birth bonus (Italy) to expanding access to IVF (the US, with Donald Trump crowing – and if you’re eating you may want to skip the rest of this sentence – he’ll be known as the “fertilisation president”).

Lucy Jones is a journalist and the author of Matresence and Losing Eden

While the new PM’s slick social media operation can help him bypass the hostile press that devoured Starmer, he will still need friends in the fourth estate

Andy Burnham has been in politics long enough to know that the largely friendly media coverage he’s received so far would turn hostile once he was inside Downing Street. And, within hours of becoming prime minister, some familiar predators were circling as they tried to decide whether to attack him for being too leftwing, too insubstantial or simply offering more of the same.

The Mail accused him of embarking on an unfunded “spending spree”, the Sun highlighted a series of “embarrassing” and “humiliating” moments that marred his first days in office, while the Telegraph declared he stood for nothing except “gimmicks” and “rehashing failed ideas”. Much of this, of course, goes with the territory of being a Labour leader.

Even if no reactors are built, Donald Trump’s announcement of a double-standards deal with Riyadh has wrought further damage in a new era of proliferation

Even as he threatened to escalate an unlawful war sold in part as preventing Iran from gaining a nuclear weapon, Donald Trump opened the door to proliferation in the region on Wednesday. The US announced that it had signed a deal with Saudi Arabia which would potentially allow the kingdom to enrich uranium in future and to avoid the fullest inspection rights for the international watchdog.

Experts have long warned that a civilian nuclear programme could create a path towards a nuclear-armed Riyadh. Mohammed bin Salman, the Saudi crown prince and de facto leader, has said that if Tehran gets a nuclear weapon, “we will have to get one”. Concerns are magnified by the agreement’s terms. Washington previously argued that the “gold standard” was the United Arab Emirates’ agreement to permanently forgo enrichment and accept full monitoring by the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency. Weakening it sets a precedent that Russia or China could also cite in nuclear deals in future.

A decline in visitor numbers, staff strikes and budget cuts – Jessica Morgan faces many challenges as she takes on the biggest role in the British arts scene

A lack of clear vision, low morale, dwindling popularity and financial shortfalls – this may sound like a description of the previous Labour government, but these are also criticisms levelled at the UK’s most powerful arts institution, Tate. Maria Balshaw’s tenure as the first female director of Tate – comprising Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Tate Liverpool and Tate St Ives – lasted nine years and saw as many culture secretaries. One of Sir Keir Starmer’s last acts as prime minister was to approve the appointment of her successor, Jessica Morgan, a former curator at Tate and head of the Dia Art Foundation in New York.

With record-breaking Frida Kahlo and Tracey Emin shows currently at Tate Modern, suggestions that Ms Morgan is inheriting an institution in a state of “existential crisis” seem exaggerated. Tate Britain, often overshadowed by its more fashionable younger sister, pulled in crowds for its Turner & Constable and Lee Miller exhibitions. These blockbusters in the past year also rebut accusations that Ms Balshaw focused on little-known artists instead of bankable stars. Her commitment to diversifying the collection will surely be taken up by Ms Morgan, who also has a strong track record in promoting marginalised artists. Ms Balshaw is leaving on a high.

• Live updates from Monday’s action around Glasgow

• Latest medal table | Follow us on TikTok | Mail Martin

It’s time for Martin Belam to steer things for the next couple of hours.

Athletics: England’s Sam Bennett has made it to the final of the men’s 110m hurdles on his Commonwealth Games debut, having put together the best time in the heats: 13.20 (wind +2.1). Bennett claimed gold at the UK Championships in June with a time of 13.41.

• Infantino claims critics of World Cup ‘missed it all’

• He again defends Balogun affair and treatment of Iran

The Fifa president, Gianni Infantino, has hit back at critics of the World Cup, accusing them of spreading hate and false narratives while defending the tournament ⁠as a success that celebrated ⁠unity, safety and inclusion.

In ​an open letter published on Monday, Infantino said detractors had overlooked the joy and togetherness experienced by millions of fans around the world who witnessed the tournament, ⁠won by Spain and staged in the United States, Canada and Mexico.

Slovene is youngest of riders to win five Tours de France and few would bet against him claiming sixth victory next year

The 2026 Tour de France served up an epic battle that lasted for day after day between two protagonists of the highest calibre with different skillsets, a tale of epic breakaways, intriguing team tactics and reversals of fortune, building to a spectacular climax on the race’s toughest stage. The contest for the green jersey of points winner between Mads Pedersen and Jasper Philipsen was a classic.

Those hoping for something similar in the race for the yellow jersey of overall winner were disappointed, and rapidly. Any suspense was eliminated with 42km of stage six remaining, high above the ski village of La Mongie, when Tadej Pogacar dislodged Jonas Vingegaard and the other putative race favourites on the Col du Tourmalet. It was a familiar stinging attack, and a familiar outcome, with the Slovene opening a lead that looked insurmountable, as indeed it was.

• ‘He’s more in control of his emotions,’ says Andrea Stella

• World champion won his first race of season in Hungary

Lando Norris is at the peak of his powers after his win at the Hungarian Grand Prix demonstrated the world champion has a stronger psychological approach to driving, according to the McLaren team principal, Andrea Stella.

Norris took his team’s first win of the season on Sunday with a commanding drive at the Hungaroring after Mercedes dominance for much of the campaign. The Briton has always maintained his team would come back into contention and duly did so, beating the Red Bull of Max Verstappen into second and the Mercedes of Kimi Antonelli into third.

Today’s rumours are back with a vengeance

Like baggy trousers, small sunglasses and leopard print, transfer rumours are back in a big way. And there can be no doubting the transfer ambition of the Premier League champions, Arsenal, who are eyeing up either Vinícius Júnior or Bradley Barcola as a deluxe Leandro Trossard replacement.

One sticking point for the Gunners is the former’s apparent desire to stay put at Real Madrid, while Liverpool appear to be favourites for Barcola if they can muster the £145m Paris Saint-Germain are demanding for their fourth-best forward. The path may become clear for Vinícius to leave the Bernabéu, however, with the club closing in on a deal for the Ivorian World Cup sensation Yan Diomande. Perennial prospect Endrick has also been touted for a move away from Madrid this summer.

• Italian politicians had raised concern over appointment

• Roberto Mancini and Antonio Conte now in contention

Andrea Pirlo has confirmed he is no longer in line to coach Italy, with his sponsorship deal with a Russian betting firm believed to behind the development. Several Italian politicians have raised concerns about Pirlo’s role as an ambassador for Fonbet, saying the national team coach should not have conflicting views on Italy’s support for Ukraine in the war with Russia.

Writing on Instagram on Monday, Pirlo said he “heard last night that I’m no longer the candidate for the Italy national team job”. The former Azzurri midfielder had previously insisted the Fonbet deal was linked to his job in the United Arab Emirates and is “exclusively for commercial and sports purposes”, adding: “Attributing a political significance to that collaboration means attributing beliefs to me that I have never expressed and don’t belong to me.”

The meet had lower stakes with no Olympics or worlds this year, but Nikki Hiltz, Sha’Carri Richardson and Cooper Lutkenhaus all took advantage of the moment

In two years’ time, tens of thousands of fans will pack into the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum – with tens of millions watching around the world – as the world’s fastest and strongest athletes compete at the 2028 Olympics.

But this vast audience ebbs and flows in the long years between Olympics. On the other side of the country, around 5,000 fans filed into New York’s Icahn Stadium this weekend for the USA Track & Field national outdoor championships.

Coming to fame in The Goodies, Oddie was later known for his wildlife expertise and presented BBC Springwatch

• Bill Oddie – a life in pictures

The writer, comedian and conservationist Bill Oddie has died aged 85. Having come to prominence with the comedy group The Goodies, Oddie later established himself as an authority on wildlife, presenting television series including the BBC’s Springwatch and Autumnwatch.

Oddie’s agent paid tribute to his “intelligence and wit”. In a statement, David Foster said: “It is with deep sadness that I announce the passing of Bill Oddie, the country’s best-loved birder. Bill was a multitalented celebrity – wildlife presenter, broadcaster, comedian, writer, songwriter, musician and conservationist. Yet it was never fame that he valued.

Doctors and MPs urge more scrutiny of £300m deal for company behind system used by most GPs in England

• UK politics live – latest updates

• Business live – latest updates

A US private equity firm will take control of NHS patient records in a deal experts say should “ring alarm bells” amid concerns sensitive health data is increasingly being handed to private companies.

The investment firm TPG has bought Optum UK, the healthcare technology business behind the electronic patient record system used by most GP practices in England, in a deal worth about $400m (£300m).

Exclusive: Foreign secretary to take up World Bank seat and play active role in shaping changes to global lender

Britain’s foreign secretary, Ed Miliband, is to indicate he will put the climate crisis and overseas development at the heart of UK international relations by taking up the country’s seat on the board at the World Bank.

The position, which is usually delegated to a junior minister, means Miliband will play an active role in shaping the changes to the World Bank that developing countries have called for, and ensuring the climate remains a core focus for overseas aid.

Performer on trial on six charges of sexually penetrating a 20-year-old woman without consent

A British YouTuber and musician accused of violently raping a fan after a gig never asked his alleged victim if she wanted sex, a court has been told.

Rapper Yung Filly, whose real name is Andrés Felipe Valencia Barrientos, is fighting six charges of sexually penetrating a 20-year-old woman without consent in a Perth hotel room in September 2024.

At least four people taken to hospital after gunfire at Seattle Center near Space Needle, with one reported to be in a critical condition

Two people were killed and five others wounded in a shooting on Sunday evening during a food festival at an events complex near the Space Needle in Seattle, a city fire department spokesperson said.

The Seattle Center was hosting the Bite of Seattle food festival over the weekend. After the shooting, police urged people to avoid the area.

Fish being moved to oxygenated flowing water further downstream as water levels drop across country

Along the Odet River in Brittany, fisher Mathieu Le Bouter and a dozen volunteers are catching hundreds of trout and young salmon – not for sport but to save them.

They are only a few miles from the source of the river, which springs from the Black Mountains in Finistère and runs for about 40 miles (65km) into the Atlantic Ocean, but the water is barely up to their knees.

Environmental groups are sounding the alarm over plans that threaten a desert spring that’s home to rare fish and turtles and sacred to the O’odham people

Quitobaquito Springs in south-west Arizona has been called a biological wonderland with few equals.

The springs are an oasis in the vast Sonoran desert along the US-Mexico border, held sacred by the O’odham people, who call it A’al Vaipia. Here, water flows out of an aquifer at the bottom of a hill, runs along a short concrete channel and collects in a pond.

Fires remain out of control in Northwest Territories and Ontario, while Argentina endures record night-time heat

Recent hot, dry weather in Canada has triggered hundreds of wildfires across the country. As of Wednesday, more than 900 were burning, scorching about 3m hectares of land. While fires have broken out in several provinces, the greatest concern is in the Northwest Territories and Ontario, where several remain out of control.

Poor air quality has been reported across affected regions, with wildfire smoke carried by winds into the US and even across the Atlantic to northern Europe. The risk of further blazes remains high as North America enters the peak of fire season.

Approach focuses on rebuilding soil health, increasing biodiversity and restoring natural ecosystems

For the last few decades, the nutrient content of our crops has been declining. In the late 90s, the US Department of Agriculture found the vitamin C content of lemons had decreased by almost a third over the previous 22 years. Calcium in carrots, an important source especially for non-meat eaters, had reduced, on average, by more than a quarter. Vitamin A in bananas was down by 57%. The mineral content of wheat has declined by between 20-30% since the 1960s.

A number of reasons have been suggested for this worrying decline, ranging from new varieties of crop that are bred to grow quicker and bigger to the higher carbon dioxide levels in the air causing plants to produce more sugars and starches (they grow faster but they produce fewer nutrients). A wide range of fixes have been suggested, from GM crops to synthetic soil amendments, or underground farms.

Exclusive: Experts say policy could also cause shortages of school teachers and drive some universities to bankruptcy

Reform UK’s plan to make employers pay an annual levy for overseas staff would harm the NHS and social care, cause a shortage of schoolteachers, and could push some universities into bankruptcy, experts have warned.

Nigel Farage’s party has pledged a “migrant worker surcharge”, which would involve a higher rate of employer national insurance as well as a separate annual charge. It would apply to any employees without a UK passport, including EU nationals with settled status, with the exception of Irish passport holders.

PM urged to end ‘cover-up culture’ and order independent review taking in evidence that has emerged on 1994 crash

The families of those killed in an RAF Chinook crash in 1994 have urged Andy Burnham to end Britain’s “cover-up culture” and order an independent review into the disaster.

Twenty-nine serving military personnel died when the Chinook HC2 helicopter crashed on the Mull of Kintyre in south-west Scotland during a flight from Northern Ireland.

Exclusive: Party says housing stock ‘woefully unprepared’ for extreme heat and new rules for builders must be set

All new UK homes should be built with air conditioning to cope with the effects of the climate crisis, according to the Liberal Democrats.

The party says British homes are dangerously unsuited to rising temperatures, meaning passive cooling measures such as planting more trees in residential areas are necessary.

King’s Fund report finds men and women live, on average, for 80 years and nearly 84 years, but gains are in south

The north-south divide in life expectancy in England has grown over the past decade, with people in northern regions facing more illnesses such as heart disease and cancer, but also suicides and deaths related to alcohol and drug misuse.

Provisional figures show life expectancy reached an all-time high in 2025, with men and women in England living, on average, for 80 years and nearly 84 years respectively, but the gains were overwhelmingly in the south, the King’s Fund said.

Tom Homan comments on officer’s eligibility to serve after reports that agent’s two ex-wives had accused him of abuse

Tom Homan, the Trump administration “border czar”, on Sunday said he did not believe the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer at the center of a recent fatal shooting in Maine “should have ever cleared vetting”.

Speaking to CNN’s State of the Union, Homan was asked by host Dana Bash about the officer’s eligibility to serve following reports that two of his ex-wives had accused him of abuse.

The Associated Press contributed reporting

BirdLife Australia says discoveries of sick and dead local seabirds in South Australia show outbreak is ‘taking hold’

• Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updates

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

South Australia has reported seven new suspected cases of deadly H5 bird flu, with experts warning it could be a sign the disease has begun spreading through local bird populations.

All seven birds are greater crested terns – a common local seabird – and were found on the Limestone Coast in south-eastern SA, with one found at Cape Jaffa, five around Southend Jetty near Beachport and one at Port MacDonald, just over 20km from the Victorian border.

Mythical home of the ancient Greek gods designated alongside the D-day landing beaches in Normandy

After a 12-year wait, Mount Olympus, the mythical home of the ancient Greek gods, has been inducted into a hall of more modern fame as Unesco announced it would be added to its world heritage list.

Greece’s highest mountain made the list alongside the second world war D-day landing beaches in northern France and the ancient Japanese capitals of Asuka and Fujiwara. South Sudan’s Boma-Badingilo landscape, host to one of the world’s largest land mammal migrations, also won a designation – a first for the east African country.

Thousands have fled amid months of anti-immigration protests as campaigners demand undocumented people leave the country

In Thembelihle, an informal settlement south of Johannesburg where thousands of breeze-block houses and metal shacks line dirt streets flooded with filthy water, Malawians had lived for years alongside South Africans without any problems.

But in the last few weeks, a series of armed robberies has shaken the community. On 29 June, several men broke into the compound of Eibraheem Hussein, a 60-year-old Malawian who has lived in South Africa since 2000. They beat him and stole valuable items.

The latest in our series of writers’ most pleasurable comfort films is a journey through US airports with George Clooney

Airports have always been my happy place. From shiny citadels jutting out of the desert to shoddier European hubs located 120 miles outside the city they’re designated to serve; I love them all. With so many stories to be told, all those connections and people colliding, it’s a first-class seat to life itself. Which should go some way to explaining why I hold such a deep admiration for 2009’s comedy-drama Up in the Air.

Directed by Jason Reitman and based on the book of the same name by Walter Kirn, it stars an Oscar-nominated George Clooney as Ryan Bingham, a US corporate downsizer who spends 322 days a year flying state to state doing the job cowardly employers prefer to outsource, leaving him with “43 miserable days at home”. That is until graduate Natalie Keener (Anna Kendrick) enters the firm with a cost-saving idea of firing people by video call, and hits the road with her older colleague, who is suddenly forced to grapple with the future of his own industry while re-evaluating his nomadic lifestyle.

Suing his record label and sick of being a sex symbol, the singer spent 1992 working on the Trojan Souls for stars including Aretha Franklin and Bryan Ferry. Now, newly released studio footage shows him in his creative prime

• Wham! special: read Andrew Ridgeley on their bizarre 1985 trip to China

The George Michael album that never was began in defiance and ended in grief. It was 1992. Mired in a toxic dispute with Sony Records, Michael chose to keep busy and declare his independence by making an album of songs to be sung by several of his musical heroes, including Aretha Franklin, Janet Jackson and Sade Adu, under the alias the Trojan Souls. Michael worked on the album for months until his Brazilian boyfriend Anselmo Feleppa died of Aids in March 1993 and he lost interest in music. It was never revived.

Tracks from the sessions have since leaked, along with some of the fly-on-the-wall footage filmed by Michael’s close friend and informal adviser Andros Georgiou, who has spent years trying to get unauthorised clips removed from YouTube and TikTok. Now, months before the 10th anniversary of Michael’s death, he is releasing 90 minutes of unedited video as Trojan Souls – not exactly a film but an unfiltered view of Michael in his creative prime. “I thought these fans were making money from my rights so I decided to stop fighting and get it out there,” Georgiou says. He hopes it will open a door on what he calls, with characteristic hyperbole, “the greatest album never made”.

Maryam Ebrahimi’s documentary about a home for survivors of the war in northern Syria is tender, gentle and incredibly moving

Speaking over footage filmed at the funeral of a female army commander, documentary-maker Maryam Ebrahimi notes that it’s the first time she has seen women carrying a coffin in the Middle East. As they move through crowd of mourners, she adds: “Their sisterhood amazes me.” Ebrahimi is talking about the women of Rojava, the Kurdish-led autonomous socialist region in northern Syria. At the cemetery, the women dig the soil with their bare hands; it is a tradition in Rojava, a final act of solidarity with their fallen sister.

Ebrahimi’s tender, gentle film is about a home for injured army veterans in Rojava; most are survivors of the war against Islamic State (IS). The house is mixed genders; one of the men living there is Fadakhar, who has had both his legs amputated and is haunted at night by phantom itches and pains. Mostly, though, Ebrahimi’s gaze is drawn to the female veterans, who made headlines a decade ago for their courage on the battlefield. We learn that women started leaving their villages to fight IS in 2011 – though in truth a little more background about the history of Kurdish all-female battalions might have been helpful.

A young woman strives for self-reliance as local people protest the US military communications system that has landed in their rural town

The title of Francesca Scalisi’s documentary evokes a 1950s sci-fi yarn, even if the film’s visuals are rooted in the drama of the everyday. The acronym MUOS stands for Mobile User Objective System, an advanced satellite communications system used by the US military to direct drones, missiles and other kinds of attacks from a distance. One of the key MUOS ground stations is located in Niscemi, a rural Sicilian town that is also home to Valentina, a 27-year-old woman teetering on the cusp of maturity. Politically engaged yet intimate, Scalisi’s film captures two parallel struggles for autonomy: the local people’s protests against the MUOS base, and Valentina’s determination to lead an independent life.

Much emphasis is placed on Valentina’s complicated relationship with her loving but over-protective parents. A sensitive introvert, she doesn’t work and still lives at the family home, unlike her older sister who has established a career elsewhere. Trying to become more self-reliant, Valentina picks up driving and applies for jobs, but her efforts are often met with harsh criticism from her father. Scalisi links these intense moments of familial discord to the atmosphere of surveillance that engulfs the area. Valentina is routinely stopped and questioned by troops stationed at the MUOS base, moments of disruption that turn her home into a land of strangers.

It’s set in a UK racked by an unbearable heatwave and the rise of extremism – this adaptation of the 2010 novel feels horrifyingly apt

When The Rapture by Liz Jensen was first published, in 2010, it was set in a near-future when temperatures in the UK are rising to unbearable heights, culty-Christian groups with apocalyptic bents are springing up all over the place and there is a growing sense that the world is going mad. Swap out “culty-Christian” for “political extremists bent on embracing the apocalypse rather than trying to save us from it” and it would be a deluded soul indeed who wouldn’t place it among fiction’s more prescient offerings.

The adaptation that has arrived on our screens 16 years later – a study in physical and mental discomfort – is the perfect accompaniment to our current record-breaking, fear-inducing heatwave, and gains a lot of power from our growing collective awareness that the future is finally here.

Cheetahs forced to cross roiling rivers, owls battered by storms … the tone of this look at how extreme weather affects animals is all a bit disaster movie. Subtle, it is not

You have a thick neck and poorly defined calf muscles and you live in South Dakota with your feckless partner and your five expressionless children. You are an owl. Your days consist of lengthy stretches of nothing, punctuated by sudden bursts of unimaginable terror. Coyotes, badgers and snakes are all bent on reducing your beak to marmalade.

But it’s the weather that poses the biggest threat. Specifically, shouts Force of Nature, it’s the “MONSTER STORMS” that rumble ominously across the prairies, each of which forces you and your family to scurry into your burrow, whereupon you will stand with your trembling backs to the wall, legs wide apart and fluffy britches a-flap, like anxious viscounts in the court of Charles II. Will you survive? Or will you be eviscerated by the “cluster bombs of tornadoes” that churn with increasing frequency through the midwest?

Author Alexander McCall Smith’s new series is an attempt to use short fiction to make listeners feel better about the world. Plus, what happened when two London gangsters decided to make a film?

While he is best known for his No 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency novels, Alexander McCall Smith has something of a soft spot for short stories, which can “cover a whole sweep of history in a couple of paragraphs”. His new series features a selection of short original works that he hopes will make listeners feel better about the state of the world, beginning with a pleasingly twee tale inspired by a friend’s miniature helicopter landing pad. Hannah J Davies
Widely available, episodes weekly

The country-pop superstar loves Abba and secretly listens to Lloyd Webber, but which British heartthrob’s single gets her out of bed in the morning?

The song that changed my life
There’s many critical songs on The Mission soundtrack, but Gabriel’s Oboe [by Ennio Morricone] hit me hard. I had to pull off the road, I cried like a baby. I didn’t realise how powerful music could be until that moment. I was 22.

The first single I bought
At Seventeen by Janis Ian. I reference it in my album Little Miss Twain and it says so much about the emotions of a teenage misfit. I felt like her, I related – but I was also thinking: “Wow, I have to some day write this well.” It gave me a goal; I was so in awe. I made very little money, babysitting, taking care of my neighbour’s horse, singing in bars. I would get like 20 bucks, that I would mostly give to my family, but I got that record for myself.

The singer-songwriter and Water from Your Eyes guitarist was unstoppably prolific, despite a growing dependence on substances. Now sober, he reflects on his new album and the songs that helped him turn his life round

For most of his life, Nate Amos made music just to get through the day. There was plenty of it: dozens of self-produced albums and EPs uploaded – since his This Is Lorelei project launched in 2012 – to what was then a plucky, independent platform called Bandcamp. Now 35, he is perhaps the quintessential Bandcamp artist: part bedroom-pop whiz, part alt-country troubadour, part indie rock rascal with a big, heavy heart. His peers treat him like a lost folk hero from a bygone era.

Amos is sitting in the basement of a cafe in Camden Town, north London, cradling an iced matcha; coffee makes him “feel like shit”, he says, and he no longer indulges such foibles. The title of one of those Bandcamp albums, OK N8, is tattooed on his knuckles. A friend inked it a few years ago, soon after Amos got sober. “Exactly when you’re not supposed to be making decisions like getting a tattoo on your hand,” he jokes. His active blue eyes dance around behind a golden-brown fringe and an unruly, woodchip beard. In a tough spot he will swing back in his chair and search for answers that always seem to be hiding beneath the table. But each time he stumbles upon the truth, he looks up with a hungry smile.

(RCA/Cult)
Allying the crackpot strangeness of Julian Casablancas’ side projects with his band’s gift for pop minimalism, the New Yorkers are on playful, joyous form

Here’s a sentence no old-head Strokes fan wants to hear: to understand Reality Awaits, the stalwart NYC group’s seventh album and first in six years, you first have to understand the Voidz. Julian Casablancas’s other band has been taking up more and more of his time in recent years, much to the chagrin of fans who may have dipped into the group’s painfully, awkwardly proggy 2014 debut Tyranny and decided to just let the old legend have his fun (away from their own speakers, of course). Anyone who decided to listen further will have found that the Voidz have turned into a great, crowd-pleasing, safely experimental zone for Casablancas to pull out some of the most energised, goofy work of his career. If you’re thinking I come to this guy for cool, not goof, I don’t know what to tell you: this is a man who spends interviews discussing his theories about ancient Sumerian culture.

The 2018 Voidz record Virtue is a high point of Casablancas’s entire catalogue: a gentle stylistic mixed bag that covers winsome pop-rock, yacht rock, bedroom pop and much more. That album seemed to clear the decks for the Strokes’ last record, 2020’s The New Abnormal, on which they sounded the most like their 2001 selves since Is This It. That album is now the definitive Strokes album for gen Z – go to any Strokes show and watch the younger contingent light up during The Adults Are Talking – but it didn’t presage a long-term back-to-basics route for Casablancas and co. On Reality Awaits, by sheer force of will, he fuses the crackpot strangeness and, ahem, fondness for AutoTune of the Voidz with the Strokes’ minimalism and pop melodicism.

More than seven decades after they were first released, the dark novels of Osamu Dazai have become a publishing sensation, as a new generation of readers engage with his bleakness, humour and brilliance

There’s no question that Japanese literature has been one of the outstanding successes for British bookshops in recent years: in 2024 close to half of the bestselling translated fiction titles were from Japan. Much of the Japanese fiction translated into English fits into broad categories – cats, crime, coffee shops – but one surprise bestseller stands alone.

Sales of books by Osamu Dazai, who killed himself in 1948 aged 38, have rocketed in the last few years. His best-known novel, No Longer Human (1948), has sold more than 75,000 copies in the UK alone. An intense semi-autobiographical account of one man’s alienation, it was the last work of fiction completed before Dazai’s death.

The author and BookTok luminary on the nightmare trope, how to convert a straight man into loving fantasy romance, and words that should never be used in a sex scene

What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever done for love?

I was working in a bakery on the Gold Coast and across the way was a Go Sushi, and I had a crush on the boy that worked there. I was about 16. We’d close at about the same time in the evening, and I would have to throw away all of the bread that we didn’t sell and he would have to throw away all the sushi. He would always finish first, so sometimes he’d come across and help me – not allowed, by the way. And I thought it would be really funny, on one such occasion, if I did a bit where I hollowed out a cob loaf and put it on my head and stacked loaves of bread up my arms, and I put Vienna loaves on my shoes and started skating around the floor calling myself Bread Girl, thinking that he’s obviously going to find this hilarious. He laughed along, then about five minutes later he asked me if he could have my older sister’s phone number.

From a transporting historical saga to a tale of small-town betrayal, the authors of our favourite page-turners reveal the books they take on holiday – introduced by Jenny Colgan

It is important to follow a balanced diet on holiday. Too many “My Wife’s Sister’s Husband’s Psychopath”, and you’ll get confused and grumpy. Too much sugary romance and your teeth will fall out. Something too big and challenging you’ve been meaning to get round to for ages will make you feel guilty and more liable to give in to scrolling, and if you take too many supposedly upmarket “must reads” of the summer, you will simply prove to yourself just how much overhyped averageness there is out there, when all you want is something satisfying.

You need to be able to chop and change depending on your mood, which means fiction and nonfiction. And finally, you need to be able to throw all of these rules out of the window if you find a sandy old water-stained copy of, for example, James Herbert’s Domain in your holiday cottage and decide to devote yourself to 600 pages of post-nuclear mutant rat-strewn London, or choose to go for a full-on Maeve Binchy sesh.

Dogs v bears from Max Porter; a baby adventure; an Irish boarding school murder mystery; and an unsettling YA folk horror

Waffles and Julius: No Hugs Please! by Ed Vere, Puffin, £7.99
Affectionate pup Waffles wants to hug Julius the standoffish cat – but this is not a good idea! A riotously funny picture book about getting what you want by patience (and devious means).

Chasing Dragonflies by Blessing Musariri, illustrated by Maisie Paradise Shearring, Kumusha, £7.99
Shingai can’t wait for his baby sister Aneni-Rose to grow enough to be his sidekick. Or maybe she’s the hero of the adventure? This immersive, imaginative picture book is full of richly observed sibling love.

The horror movie sensation of 2026 has its roots in gaming’s discovery of ‘noclip’ – and the hidden virtual realms that could be opened up inside games. Developers explain how everyone got lost in these liminal spaces

It starts on 4chan, in a May 2019 thread entitled “unsettling images”. The first post was a photo showing an empty room with the now iconic yellow wallpaper, no natural lighting and a kind of inexplicable jutting half-wall. Shortly afterwards, another user (there are no usernames on 4chan, just identifying numbers) responded with 78 words of text that would essentially lay out the blueprint for a future $262m A24 movie sensation.

“If you’re not careful and you noclip out of reality in the wrong areas, you’ll end up in the Backrooms,” the post begins. For the uninitiated, “noclip” refers to a game mode in which collision with solid objects is disabled, allowing players to move freely through walls and floors. Think of Chiwetel Ejiofor’s character in the film, finding a permeable wall in the basement of his furniture store and passing through to the world on the other side.

Going by the mantra, if you want to make someone laugh, make them cry first, the game’s developers have created a lonely magpie who fills the void by wreaking havoc

Amid the gleeful anarchy of Bad Magpie’s debut trailer, there’s a striking note of melancholy. The game’s protagonist – a wounded corvid that creates havoc wherever she goes – calls out forlornly as a flock of her kind passes above, with a conspicuous gap in their formation.

Milktooth games designer and co-founder Daisy Fernandez has had this particular image in her head for years. Lying in the grass one afternoon during the 2020 lockdowns, she looked up and saw a V-shaped pattern in the sky, poignantly incomplete. “It really stuck with me,” she says. “I posted about it online and someone told me about a ‘missing man’ formation, which is an aerial salute to a fallen pilot.”

Renovate rooms, investigate the supernatural and watch people burst into song in this surreal British ghost story

A young American man arrives in a dilapidated British seaside town to take on the renovations of an equally run-down hotel, inherited from a mysteriously absent father he never knew. His power tools talk to him in a Scottish accent, the local people speak in baffling slang, and occasionally people burst into song. Oh, and there are ghosts.

There Are No Ghosts at the Grand is a novel mix of genres – no bad thing in these times of sequels and remakes – but, according to the creative director of independent developers Friday Sundae, Anil Glendinning, it grew organically from a single goal: to tell a very British ghost story.

These days, I ‘collect’ birdsong and wild flowers, but it all started when my sons and I first set out to find Pikachu and pals

• Don’t get Pushing Buttons delivered to your inbox? Sign up here

Believe it or not, Pokémon Go is 10 years old this month. The wildly successful smartphone game, which allows you to track down lovable creatures in the real world using GPS and augmented-reality technologies, has reportedly been downloaded 800m times across 150 countries and regions. A trillion Pokémon have been caught so far – and I have been responsible for a modest percentage of that figure.

When the game was first released, my sons and I spent many happy hours wandering the streets and parks of Frome searching for Jigglypuffs and Charizards, and the game’s social element, which lets you take on gym battles with other players in your vicinity, offered my autistic son a route to communicate with other children in a way he’d never been able to before.

The academic’s ambitious guide to the ethics of tech falls short of its promise to provide meaningful answers

The AI ethicist Eleanor Drage believes that to thrive alongside artificial intelligence, humans need to recognise AI’s “humanity”. She means that while we often speak of AI as though it were some mystical, formless thing, it is the product of hours of human labour, in silicon and quartz mines, microchip factories and data labelling centres. If citizens want to wrest power from the tech companies that are building AI, it helps to understand clearly what they are selling us. This also means seeing through the marketing and hype: “the cloud”, that nebulous, distant place where your photos are stored, is just someone else’s computer; an AI “hallucination” is a system error or data labelling mistake; intelligence is a very broad – and potentially misleading – term.

The story in Silicon Valley is that AI will either save us, ushering in a new era of prosperity and human longevity, or it will wipe us all out. Drage argues, convincingly, that big tech cannot possibly deliver on its utopian promises while it continues to chase profit and power above all else, and while it serves the interests of a narrow few. Meanwhile, the cultural obsession with the AI-induced apocalypse conveniently redirects attention from the practical conversations we could be having about how to make AI safer – by ensuring citizens have more power over how their information is used, and how AI models are trained and regulated, for example. Tech titans’ apocalyptic visions also create the false impression that AI safety is more important than climate change, geopolitical tensions and inequality, three problems that are already causing a huge amount of suffering and that, if addressed, would reduce many AI-linked risks too.

The hard-working character actor has over 400 screen credits, from The Thing to Platoon to Rick and Morty, and he isn’t slowing down any time soon

Keith David’s voice precedes him. Deep and resonant, with mellifluous notes that hark back to his boys’ choir days, it has spent decades inhabiting warriors, gods, rogues, fathers and a welter of cartoon oddballs. Before David appears in a Zoom window from his Los Angeles home office, his voice reverberates through my tinny laptop speakers like a foghorn. “Can you see me now?” he booms once our connection is established after fits and starts. “OK. Outside of technology, you know I’m … OK.”

He fizzes about the project he just wrapped: a dark buddy comedy called My Friend Jim, in which he stars opposite Rob Lowe. It’s the latest entry in a seemingly unstinting slew of productions that have kept him booked and busy since the late 1970s, from The Thing to Platoon to There’s Something About Mary to Nope.

Abandoned at the age of two, he pinched everything from birthday cake to raw potatoes. Beneath the comic greed was a much-loved companion who kept us laughing for 12 years

We adopted Morris after he’d been abandoned in a park at the age of two. The shelter named him Kai but it didn’t suit him. An old soul (read: curmudgeon) who tried to pull us into old-school boozers, and who demanded routine and treated walks as a favour to us, Morris was perfect.

Incorrigibly lazy and happiest on the sofa, preferably on top of us, his only real motivation was food. Perhaps he knew hunger in that park, and vowed never to meet it again. Among the countless petty thefts from unattended plates were some truly audacious schemes. There was the sandwich stolen right out of a stranger’s hand. The birthday cake polished off, tinfoil and all, before its intended recipient tasted a single bite. The multiple raw baking potatoes eaten, this last crime caught on video or we’d never have believed it.

Are you stuck in a makeup rut? Or maybe just beginning to wear cosmetics? Here, experts reveal how to to find the right products for you

Makeup trends change over time – and so does our skin. How can you enhance what you have and refresh your look? Here, makeup artists share the fundamentals of applying cosmetics, at every age.

Fragrant, punchy vegan dishes that can be kept in the kept in the fridge or freezer for an easy midweek dinner

Whether you love it or loathe it, tofu is one of the most versatile ingredients in any kitchen. For me, it’s the saviour of stressful dinner times, because it cooks in minutes, absorbs flavour like no other and packs a real nutritional punch. Here, it plays two very different roles: crisped until golden in a fragrant, spice-infused Vietnamese-style pho, and mashed to give body and bite to bold, punchy Thai-ish fishless cakes.

Your rosy memories of the classic ice-cream dessert may not hold up to scrutiny today, but thanks to our resident perfectionist, you can make a delicious version of your own

When I was growing up, viennetta was something I had in other people’s houses – for some reason, my mum regarded these frilly blocks of ice-cream as a waste of money, which made them all the bigger treat on the rare occasion I did get a front-row seat at the cracking of the chocolate. Launched, like me, in 1982, when developers at Wall’s realised that pumping ice-cream on to the production line slightly faster than the speed of the conveyor belt created a concertina effect that, I think we can now, with the wisdom of age, agree, is more impressive to behold than to consume. No doubt diehard devotees will beg to differ, but even as a child I couldn’t help but notice that all that air made the viennetta distinctly light on flavour (no wonder one slice is never enough, as the old advertising campaign had it). Happily, you can recreate the magic at home with something that looks good and tastes great – and you don’t even need your own conveyor belt!

You’ll leave fed, challenged and gastronomically punch-drunk

Nico Simeone is the Scottish-Italian chef behind the Six by Nico restaurant empire, and Lennox, in Spring Gardens, Manchester, is his new baby. If you are unfamiliar with Six by Nico, it’s a fever-dream version of fine dining: Simeone conjured up themes such as “The Chippie”, “Italian Road Trip” and “Ancient Rome”, then served six courses in homage to them. Tokyo! Mad Hatters! Childhood! At one point, the Six empire was growing like knotweed, and by 2025 there were 17 restaurants. You had more chance of eating at a Six by Nico than finding an NHS dentist.

Suffice to say, many adore the concept – overlooking its middling cooking skills – because it’s pocket-friendly, and the six-course format gives a night out with friends a sense of occasion not available at Pizza Express. Lennox, Simeone says, will be very different: à la carte, focused on dry-aged meat, but with the same playfulness and invention. There would be a fish finger with katsu curry and celeriac remoulade; a tempura oyster shell filled with dry-aged beef tartare and oyster emulsion; and gnocchi with deboned chicken wings and parmesan. Lennox would be personal, bespoke and absolutely unscalable. No rollout planned, no siree. But by August 2026, there will be three of them. Hang on, what? Yes, shortly after Manchester came Glasgow, and then Edinburgh. Simeone sleeps with one eye open; I salute his indefatigability.

These unctuous rice-filled Japanese egg dishes are all over social media. But what does it cost to make them? A lot of eggs and a whole lot of pans ...

Among the endless videos of cute animals, influencer vlogs and celebrity content, something unusual has been going viral across social media recently: omelettes. A far cry from the usual solid egg slabs served in cafes, these bright yellow omelettes are a fluffy, oval-shaped treat filled with unctuous liquid curds, which are typically sliced open to unfurl across a mound of rice. Called omurice, the Japanese dish has been called “the world’s hardest omelette to make”.

London-based software engineer Jeremy Ocampo, who goes by the social media tag OmuricePapi, has spent the past six months documenting his journey to perfect the art of the omurice online. In the process he has amassed 110,000 followers on YouTube and more than 68,000 on Instagram. “I’m Filipino, so I grew up eating rice and eggs every day, but it took going to Japan for the first time in 2025 to have my mind blown by omurice,” he says. “I was hooked: the presentation of slicing it open over your rice makes it so alluring, while you can’t replicate that texture of egg in any other dish. It’s so unique that when I got home, I decided to teach myself how to do it.”

Around town, on the pitch and even in the pool, the New York mayor keeps his suit on – what do his sartorial choices tell us?

Playing football. Playing in the sand. Dancing on a stage with Alicia Keys and the entire New York Knicks roster. Swimming in a swimming pool. Swimming in the ocean.

Traditionally, a suit and tie would be considered inappropriate attire for each of these activities. Yet over the past year Zohran Mamdani has seemingly been on a one-man crusade to prove otherwise: to convince people that a formal suit is, actually, suitable for all activities.

Latest edition of one of world’s most influential fashion photography publications is also shot entirely in India

Against the ancient, weathered walls of Jaigarh fort, high on the hills above Jaipur, Bhavitha Mandava stood barefoot and draped in gold.

Just a few months earlier, the Indian model had been catapulted from a life of obscurity as a student at New York University to become one of the most recognisable and celebrated new faces of fashion. This year, she became the first Indian woman to open the Chanel catwalk at their Métiers d’Art show and her divisive Chanel outfit for the Met Gala, fashion’s most exclusive event, became an international talking point.

Jewellery made from BC Iran worn at Odyssey photocall throws spotlight on the trade of rare archeological finds

The Odyssey has stormed cinemas, but while its take on the Homeric epic has created ripples among western classicists, it is an actor’s earrings that have made waves further afield.

Zendaya, who portrays the goddess Athena in the movie, provoked outrage when she appeared at a London photocall wearing earrings that were allegedly made from Iranian artefacts dating back to the 1st millennium BC.

V&A event celebrates all shapes and sizes as wider fashion industry stalls on body diversity

Visitors to London’s Victoria and Albert Museum on Friday afternoon to watch Sinéad O’Dwyer’s Fashion in Motion show would have encountered something a little different. The cast of performers and models wore everything from underwear to skirt suits and sequins, and sometimes danced interpretively on the catwalk to a performance by the band Jeanie and The White Boys, but most notably came in all shapes and sizes.

O’Dwyer’s work has pushed against fashion’s insistence on a thin body type since she appeared at London fashion week in 2021. If most brands make the samples for clothes shown on the catwalk based on a size 4-8, she uses a size 18. She has won awards for her work, as well as celebrity fans including Cardi B and Björk.

Will’s lack of self-worth is creating a barrier between him and Fi, but talking more could help them adjust to their mismatched libidos

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

I worry that Will sees me more as a mother figure than a sexual being

I was just 10 at the time but my siblings and I will never forget the sense of safety, comfort and warmth they offered

• Read more in the kindness of strangers series

We were doing the groceries when a blood vessel burst in my mother’s brain. I was 10 years old and on a family holiday to France that very suddenly changed its tenor. In the following weeks Mum went through brain surgery, suffered a stroke and was placed in intensive care.

We had been staying in a gîte but moved to a small hotel closer to the hospital. It was a terrifying and stressful time, even as a young kid who knew things were serious – but didn’t understand quite how serious.

You are stepping into a family system with its own history and loyalties; try to consider how you might set boundaries without rejecting his mum

I’m in my 30s and have been living in Spain for a decade. My partner is Spanish and we have lived together for a year.

The bond he has with his mum sometimes makes me feel angry, jealous and helpless. I’m aware that, culturally, Spanish people often have closer bonds with their families and I try to accept that. He is an only child and his father left his family when he was a teenager and started another. I feel my partner has developed an unhealthy and codependent relationship with his mum.

Avtar spent decades wondering what happened to the mother he never got to know. Thousands of miles away, Nicci was haunted by the story of a half-brother given away before she was born. How did a chatbot bring them together?

As a small boy growing up in Amritsar, India, in the 1960s, Avtar Singh used to hear whispers. Your mum isn’t really your mum, the rumours would say. Your mum lives abroad. Avtar didn’t really pay any attention to it. “I thought, the neighbours are just making up stories.” But the stories were true: the woman raising Avtar was actually his grandmother. When he was too young to remember it, his father had emigrated to Canada to work as a teacher, leaving Avtar in the care of his paternal grandparents. His grandfather, a police officer, was a fearsome authoritarian, but his grandmother brought him up with tenderness, as if he were her own son. She called him by his nickname, Titu. He felt loved.

When Avtar was around eight years old, he was told about his family in Canada: his dad, his mum and a little brother were waiting for him there, and he would soon travel to join them. Just after his ninth birthday, Avtar found himself sitting on a plane, dressed in a three‑piece suit and tie. He was travelling alone. He had never flown before. He didn’t speak a word of English. He landed in Halifax, Nova Scotia, on Christmas Eve, 1968; his family met him at the airport and took him home. “I didn’t know what to think,” Avtar, now 66, tells me in a video call from his home in Abbotsford, British Columbia. “Before I knew it, it was the first week of January, and I was put in school.”

Feel lethargic even after a full night’s sleep? From not enough fibre to too much sitting, experts explain why your get up and go has got up and gone

The very air you breathe could be an issue. “Close the door, shut the window, add a partner and a heater, and by 3am a typical bedroom sits at 1,500 to 2,500 parts per million of carbon dioxide,” says Dr Jemma King, author of Sleep First: Sleep Smarter, Think Sharper, Feel Better. “Research shows that above 1,000 ppm sleep efficiency drops, deep sleep reduces and salivary cortisol rises on waking. You’re sleeping, but your nervous system is mildly activated all night.” Luckily, it’s an easy fix: open a window – even 2cm will do the job, according to King.

‘Bulking’, or gaining weight on purpose to get stronger, challenged everything I was once taught to do with my body

• Tell us: what impact have GLP-1s had on your relationships?

I had been casually lifting weights for a few years when several things changed in quick succession.

First, my boyfriend proposed.

People have found language for moodiest part of their menstrual cycles, and the right has seized on it

Emily Rae Detrick, a health coach, wants women to be more in touch with their menstrual cycle in its entirety. This, she said on an October episode of Culture Apothecary with Alex Clark, a podcast popular among “Make America Healthy Again” (Maha) adherents, is “a way that you honor God and the way we were created”. It also serves her self-assigned mission to help “make America fertile again”.

In the episode and on social media, Detrick speaks at length about the luteal phase, the 14-ish days between ovulation and menstruation when women are more likely to experience irritability, bloating and food cravings. If a woman does not get pregnant after ovulating, or so Detrick’s line of thinking goes, her body becomes upset. “During the luteal phase, the reason why your stress threshold is so much lower is because this is the time your body would be incubating a potential baby,” she said. No baby, and you might turn into a frazzled, nagging shrew.

Experts say reducing ultra-processed foods can be challenging in a world built around convenience, but these strategies can help make it more manageable

I have been trying to eat fewer ultra-processed foods with my family for five years, and it has been challenging.

Many experts agree that ultra-processed foods (UPF) pose health risks, whether because of unhealthy ingredients, links to disease and environmental impacts, or replacing more nutritious foods. Thus, some consumers – including me – are interested in removing them from their daily diet.

Learn techniques: “Once you know how to saute, it doesn’t matter what you put in the pan.”

Develop knife skills: “If people want to get more comfortable in the kitchen, they should take a knife skills class. Those skills are a massive upscale for confidence in the kitchen.”

Know your taste: “Know what you like, then create that, because that’s the starting place. Don’t start by making miso brownies when the core is to make a really good brownie that you like, because then you’ll do it again.”

Roberts on refusing to take no from her dance teacher, moving to the US aged 18, and reuniting with Kimberly Wyatt and Nicole Scherzinger

Born in Phoenix, Arizona, in 1981, Ashley Roberts joined the Pussycat Dolls in 2002. Their debut single, Don’t Cha, spent three weeks at No 1 in the UK in 2005. The sextet sold more than 55m records worldwide before splitting in 2010. Roberts has since appeared on I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here! and Strictly Come Dancing, and was a judge on Dancing on Ice. She hosts a show on Heart 00s every Saturday. The Pussycat Dolls – now a trio of Nicole Scherzinger, Roberts and Kimberly Wyatt – are currently on a 21-date tour.

This tutu picture was taken at my first ever dance recital, and I’m happy as can be. It was the 80s, so everything’s pink and fluffy, and I have big hair and a serious fringe. I love the way my feet and hands are angled a little bit abnormally. I thought I was posing for the gods.

The long-running series in which readers answer other readers’ questions looks at secessionary movements on both sides of the pond

• Answer the latest question: What is the true Breakfast of Champions?

If it’s wrong, as some would say, for European countries to come together as a fully federal European Union, rather than individual states, why is it right for the US to be a federation rather than separate states? It always strikes me that the EU gets unfairly criticised for a system that was established over the Atlantic many years back. The US hasn’t looked back, but has become powerful as a result of being an umbrella for smaller entities. Just imagine if each state needed its own army, air force and currency, with its own customs and border controls not to mention trade tariffs! There’d be no White House and no Congress. Why is it so wrong for European countries to want similar strength, coming together as a union? Howard Phillips, Lisbon

Send new questions to nq@theguardian.com.

Sagre – the historic local events that pop up in villages across the country in summer – are the perfect way to get a taste of regional cuisine and culture

I cannot remember a summer when at least one evening hasn’t been spent following signs to a local sagra. Not quite a food market and not quite a village fete, a sagra is like a village moving its kitchen outdoors for a few nights.

When I think back to those nights from childhood, the first image that comes to mind is of a woman’s hand closed into a fist above a pan of hot oil. Through a tight circle formed between her thumb and forefinger, she would squeeze soft lumps of batter, one small ball at a time, into the oil. In a few seconds, each soft mass would become a pittula, a small Salento fritter: swollen, uneven, golden, too hot to eat straight away but too good to wait for.

Investigation finds evidence of distinct groups, from big-picture thinkers to those who sweat the small stuff.

Illustrations by Michael Parkin

An investigation into what people think about has put the spotlight on the modern mind, revealing thoughts dominated by work, the need for coffee and a strong desire to go back to bed.

It also found evidence for four distinct groups of thinkers who spend more time than most either worrying about the world; mulling on household chores and finances; focusing on the mind and body; or the work-hard, play-hard combination of career and pleasure.

Stress, the cost of living, long working hours and even excessive exercise have all been touted as reasons the illness is rising among women in their 30s and 40s. What can be done to help them?

The “lightning strike” pain was like nothing Francine Jones had experienced before. “That is the only way I can describe it,” she says, of the stabbing in her torso that would occur every 10 minutes or so. “It was a really sharp, intense pain, as if someone was giving me an electric shock … it took my breath away.”

It had started in May with a strange pricking sensation under her bra. Then 10 large blisters, plus a host of smaller ones, formed in a band from her stomach to her back. They burned, “like someone was putting an iron on me. I don’t think I wore underwear for five or six weeks.” Showering, or even a cold flannel, would make her skin burn. Then came “the itch”, which lasted for five weeks and was so intense that she was lucky if she slept for four hours a night. “It was like something was crawling all over me all the time.” I can hear her wincing.

Decadence in our era comes in technologically mediated forms, emptied of desire and obsessed with self-optimisation

Do you want to have a good time? You know, really enjoy yourself? Click here, and tell us your desires. Maybe it’s a new outfit, or some exotic cuisine delivered anonymously and steaming hot to your door. Maybe it’s porn or gambling. Perhaps you prefer the infinite scroll, the endlessly unfurling ribbon of glossy images and videos starring people you’ll never meet doing things you’ll never do. Or maybe you favor talking to a chatbot who will assure you that you are the most special of all its users.

For anyone with an Internet connection and a little discretionary income, the contemporary moment offers a superabundance of seductive distractions. Why then the pervasive mood of emptiness? Why are so many at once overstimulated and bored?

The president really has no power over elections – but that hasn’t stopped Trump from laying the groundwork to challenge results in November

When Donald Trump commandeered primetime US television last Friday, he delivered a familiar, but still extraordinary, message. The president argued once again that the results of the 2020 election, which he lost to Joe Biden, were illegitimate.

US elections are “vulnerable to being rigged and stolen”, Trump alleged, claiming that “the trust of the American people was lost” when he was defeated.

We want to hear from those working or living at sea, including maritime workers, sailors, port staff and family about how the situation is affecting their work

The conflict in the Middle East continues to disrupt shipping across the region, including in the strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s busiest maritime routes.

Donald Trump has once again threatened to take control of the strait of Hormuz, as he announced the reimposition of a naval blockade on Iran and demanded a 20% tariff on all cargoes shipped through the key maritime passage.

We would like to hear your thoughts on Christopher Nolan’s adaption of Homer’s epic

The Odyssey has stormed the global box office, taking US$264m (£196m, A$378m) in its opening weekend, according to studio Universal Pictures.

Starring Matt Damon, Tom Holland, Anne Hathaway and Zendaya, the blockbuster is an adaptation of Homer’s epic, which follows Odysseus as he makes his 10-year journey home after fighting in the Trojan war. It’s also the first feature movie to be filmed entirely with Imax cameras – a system of very heavy and loud cameras that capture a sharper, brighter and higher-resolution content.

We would like to hear about the endings of TV series that brought you the most joy

From Detectorists to The Marvelous Mrs Maisel, the Guardian’s writers have curated their list of TV’s happiest endings. Now, we would like to hear yours. What was the TV series ending that brought you the most joy?

If you’re having trouble using the form click here. Read terms of service here and privacy policy here.

If you’re wearing the new glasses, we want to know more about how you’re using them. We’d also like to hear from people about how they feel about others around them wearing the glasses

With over seven million pairs of glasses reported to have been sold by Meta in 2025, it is clear that their popularity is growing and we’d like to find out more about how people are using them.

There have been some concerns around nonconsensual filming and the data protection of users, however the glasses have proved life-changing for those with visual impairments and hearing loss.

Wake up to the top stories and what they mean – free to your inbox every weekday morning at 7am

Scroll less, understand more: sign up to receive our news email each weekday for clarity on the top stories in the UK and across the world.

Explore all our newsletters: whether you love film, football, fashion or food, we’ve got something for you

Kick off your afternoon with the Guardian’s take on the world of football

Every weekday, we’ll deliver a roundup the football news and gossip in our own belligerent, sometimes intelligent and – very occasionally – funny way. Still not convinced? Find out what you’re missing here.

Try our other sports emails: there’s weekly catch-ups for cricket in The Spin and rugby union in The Breakdown, and our seven-day round-up of the best of our sports journalism in The Recap.

Living in Australia? Try the Guardian Australia’s daily sports newsletter

A weekly email from our star chefs featuring the latest recipes and seasonal eating ideas

Each week we’ll send you an exclusive newsletter from our star food writers. We’ll also send you the latest recipes from our star chefs, stand-out food features and seasonal eating inspiration, plus restaurant reviews from Grace Dent.

Sign up below to start receiving the best of our culinary journalism in one mouth-watering weekly email.

Nesrine Malik delivers your weekly dose of Black life and culture from around the world

Observed annually on the fourth Saturday of July, International Cowboy Day celebrates the history, culture and legacy of the American west, and has a growing following in Kenya and other parts of Africa