Long after his conviction for sexual abuse, people in royalty, academia, business, journalism and politics sought his ear

He got by with a little help from his friends. From British royalty to White House alumni, from a Silicon Valley investor to a leftwing academic, connections and influence were the ultimate currency for Jeffrey Epstein.

Yet none appeared to challenge Epstein over his horrific crimes. If silence is complicity, the casual disdain of the elite circles he moved in spoke volumes.

More and more people are turning to egg freezing to increase their chances of becoming a parent. Here’s what you need to know if you’re considering it – from the hidden costs to the chances of success

When I first told my mother I was freezing my eggs, she asked: “So my grandchildren are going to be stored next to some Häagen-Dazs?” (Very funny, Mum.) I’m one of an increasing number of women in the UK who have chosen to put their eggs on ice in order to preserve their fertility, although this does – as discussed later – have clear limitations.

According to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA), the UK’s regulator for the fertility industry, there was a 170% increase in the number of egg freezing cycles between 2019 and 2023. The technology has been around since the 80s, but became more accessible in the 00s with vitrification, a flash-freezing technique. Now, celebrities such as Florence Pugh and Michaela Coel openly discuss their experiences of it, and companies such as Meta, Spotify and Goldman Sachs subsidise the procedure for employees.

London and Moscow’s rivalry stretches back to the imperial era, but the Ukraine war has brought relations to a new low

In recent years, Britain has become the villain of choice in Moscow’s eyes. It has been accused of plotting drone strikes on Russian airfields, blowing up the Nord Stream pipeline, directing “terrorist” raids inside Russia, and even abetting last year’s gruesome Islamic State concert attack in Moscow.

This week, a new charge was added to the pile: Russian authorities claimed that British intelligence had tried and failed to lure Russian pilots into defecting to the west.

As fewer people tie the knot, four well-known married couples share their secrets, from film director Bruce Robinson and artist Sophie Windham to writers Roxane Gay and Debbie Millman

Bruce Robinson – best known as the writer and director of Withnail and I – met artist Sophie Windham at an Italian restaurant in London in 1982. He proposed three days later. They have been married for 42 years and still live and work side by side in the Welsh borders. They have two grownup children, Lily and Willoughby.

In a culture of therapy-approved ‘forgiveness’, the author’s new memoir shows how hilarious long-delayed vengeance can be

“A lot of people have died, so I can actually say these things without destroying somebody’s life. Except for the people whose lives I wish to destroy.” Thus spake Margaret Atwood in a recent interview about Book of Lives: A Memoir of Sorts, in a clip that has gone viral. “They deserve it,” she says, of the people she hasn’t said such nice things about. Asked if she likes holding a grudge, she replied: “I don’t have a choice. I’m a Scorpio.”

Part of the clip’s appeal is Atwood’s icily sardonic delivery: you can understand why a recent review of her autobiography describes her as “a literary mafia don”, reminding those who have crossed her that she knows who they are, even if they remain unnamed, or pointing out that they may well be dead by now anyway. It reminds me a bit of the writer who once said to me: “If you wait by the bend in the river long enough, the bodies of your enemies will eventually float past”. Not a Buddhist proverb, for obvious reasons.

Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett is a Guardian columnist

As rainy season fails to bring relief, authorities try cloud seeding – while others across the country pray for a miracle

Water, and its absence, has become Iran’s national obsession. In the mosques of northern Tehran the imams have been praying for rain, while the meteorologists count down the hours until the weather is forecast to break and rain is finally due to fall from the sky.

Forecasts of “rain-producing clouds” are front-page news. More than 50 days have passed since the start of Iran’s rainy season and more than 20 provinces have not yet had a drop. The number of dams that have less than 5% of their reservoir capacity had increased from eight to 32, and the crisis has spread from the central plains right across the country.

Iran’s foreign minister says it has had requests to reopen negotiations, which collapsed after nuclear site bombings

Tehran is willing to restart nuclear talks with Washington as long as it is treated with “dignity and respect”, Iran’s foreign minister has told the Guardian.

Abbas Araghchi said only diplomacy worked, and disclosed fresh requests had come from intermediaries to reopen negotiations with the Trump administration. He said Iran did not have any undeclared nuclear sites, and Tehran could not yet allow the UN nuclear inspectorate to visit bombed nuclear sites for security reasons.

Clashes erupt between protesters and riot police in the capital as rallies take place in cities across the country

At least 120 people were injured as thousands of gen Z protesters took to the streets of Mexico City and across the country to voice their anger at corruption and the drug violence that claims tens of thousands of Mexican lives each year.

​Saturday’s rallies, which took place in dozens of cities from Tijuana in the north to Oaxaca in the south drew large crowds, with some demonstrators carrying the One Piece pirate flag that has become a global symbol of the youth movement.

Not ‘appropriate’ to use licence fee payer’s money to pay US president after threat to sue for up to $5bn, says peer

The BBC should not pay any money to Donald Trump, the former BBC director general Tony Hall has said.

The US president has said he plans to sue the BBC for up to $5bn (£3.8bn) despite receiving the apology he demanded over a misleading Panorama edit of his 6 January speech.

Congresswoman, a longtime Trump ally, pushes back on president’s remarks labeling her a traitor and a lunatic

Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene on Sunday called Donald Trump’s remarks labeling her a traitor and a lunatic “hurtful” but said she hopes she and the US president can “make up”, despite stark differences over policy and the release of documents about Jeffrey Epstein.

Greene, a longtime ally and fierce defender of Trump and the “Make America great again” (Maga) base, pushed back against his name-calling in her first interview since Trump withdrew his support for her on Friday.

President to overhaul state energy firms after $100m kickback scheme alleged by anti-corruption investigators

Volodymyr Zelenskyy has announced a plan to clean up Ukraine’s energy sector after an $100m (£76bn) kickback scheme was alleged by anti-corruption investigators, in the worst scandal of his presidency.

Over the weekend, the Ukrainian president announced an overhaul of key state energy companies including a complete change of management at Energoatom, the nuclear power operator at the centre of the alleged criminal scheme.

Survivors group had called on firm Felzmann to ‘show some basic decency’ and halt ‘cynical and shameless’ event

Poland’s foreign minister said on Sunday that an “offensive” auction of Holocaust artefacts in Germany has been cancelled, relaying information from his German counterpart, after complaints from Holocaust survivors.

Radosław Sikorski made the comments on X, saying he and German foreign minister Johann Wadephul “agreed that such a scandal must be prevented”.

Voters face seemingly extreme choice between communist and rightwing frontrunners, who both promise to fight foreign gangs

Chileans began voting for a new president and parliament on Sunday, in a contest expected to favour the hard right as candidates play on popular fears over organised crime and immigration.

It is the first of an expected two rounds of presidential elections, as polls show none of the candidates clearing the 50% threshold needed to avoid a runoff scheduled for 14 December.

Minister from islands facing extinction is one of few delegates directly calling out Trump’s climate policies

Of all the representatives from 193 countries present at the crucial UN climate talks in Belém, Brazil, only one has summoned the courage to take the stage and publicly denounce the absent and hostile Trump administration: the climate minister of tiny Tuvalu.

On Monday, Maina Vakafua Talia told leaders and diplomats at the Cop30 summit that Donald Trump had shown a “shameful disregard for the rest of the world” by withdrawing the US from the Paris climate agreement.

Gardaí appeal for witnesses and Simon Harris pays tribute to first responders after two-vehicle collision on Saturday

Ireland is in mourning after a road crash killed five people in their early 20s and left three other people injured.

The two-vehicle collision happened at about 9pm on Saturday on a road near Dundalk in County Louth.

Resignations, suspensions and infighting lead to party losing crown of highest number of seats in the county

“I know whenever I come back here next,” Nigel Farage told a jubilant crowd of hundreds in a leisure centre in Redruth, “Reform UK will become a dominant force, not just in Cornwall politics, but in British politics.”

That was in February and when the local elections arrived three months later it appeared Farage’s prophecy was in part coming true – Reform took 28 seats on Cornwall council, the highest number of any party.

They both liked the Greens’ Zack Polanski and disliked the tech oligarchs. But could they find common cause over the power of the unions?

Andrew, 70, near Nottingham

Occupation Retired acupuncturist and herbalist

A jeans ad made her notorious. Then she got cosy with Taylor Swift’s arch-nemesis. Time to get up to speed before the actor/model next hits the headlines …

Spare a thought for Sydney Sweeney! Yes, she is young, beautiful, rich and talented, but she has also been getting it from all sides this week. Her passion project has bombed at the box office; she is still paying for a jeans advertisement she did four months ago, and being called on to address charges of having joked about eugenics; and fellow members of the Hollywood elite are breaking ranks to express their disdain (in one case, with a vomiting emoji). And, as she found out this week, she can’t even enjoy a kiss with her controversial new boyfriend without being snapped by the callous paparazzi!

Here’s what you need to know when Sweeney’s name next crops up – which, if current trends continue, will be soon.

I was sleep deprived and completely overwhelmed when she stepped in and took charge

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As a twin mum the work is constant. It is double the love and double the laughs, but also double the illness. Of course, my twins would never get sick at the same time. As one recovered, the other would start showing symptoms.

One day, when my girls were three, one had a vomiting bug. She hadn’t thrown up for 24 hours so I took my chance to do a quick run to the chemist to stock up on supplies. My husband worked away during the week, so I had to manage on my own. I was exhausted, carrying the sick kid in my arms, while walking the healthy one along next to me as quickly as I could.

The Vienna-based ‘father of neurodiversity’ was ahead of his time in his work but was also implicated in the Third Reich’s crimes. My novel set out to explore these contradictions

In 2015, I decided to write a novel about Dr Hans Asperger, who worked at the University Children’s Hospital in Vienna during the second world war. My interest was sparked by two nonfiction books: NeuroTribes: The Legacy of Autism and How to Think Smarter About People Who Think Differently by Steve Silberman and In a Different Key: The Story of Autism by John Donvan and Caren Zucker.

Reading these stories told about Asperger, you would have thought they were talking about two different people. To Silberman, Asperger was a compassionate and original thinker, whereas Donvan and Zucker depict him as an enthusiastic supporter of Hitler. For a historical novelist, widely differing accounts of the same person are gold dust, and I began to dig deeper.

The comedians on their Bafta-winning sketch show, the reason they split up – and why she reminds him of Diane Keaton

Born in Louth, Lincolnshire in 1969, and raised in Troon, Ayrshire, Ronni Ancona is an actor, writer and impressionist. She studied at Edinburgh College of Art and trained as a teacher before turning to comedy. Born in Evesham, Worcestershire, in 1964, Alistair McGowan studied at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama before becoming an impressionist. The pair met on the London comedy circuit in the 1990s. They co-created the Bafta-winning Big Impression, which aired between 1999 and 2003 and became one of the BBC’s most popular sketch shows. Ancona’s new podcast with Hal Cruttenden – Hal & Ronni in Pieces – is available now.

Feeling thankful is increasingly touted as a cure-all, but sometimes there are reasons not to be grateful

The word “gratitude” is everywhere these days. On mental health leaflets and in magazine columns, emblazoned on mugs and motivational posters. All this is the result of more than two decades’ research in positive psychology which has found that having a “gratitude practice” (usually jotting down three to five things you are thankful for most days) brings a host of psychological and physical benefits.

I don’t want to seem, well, ungrateful. I’m a sceptical historian, but even I was persuaded to take up the gratitude habit, and when I remember to do it, I feel better: more cheerful and connected, inclined to see the good already in my life. Counting your blessings, whether that’s noticing a beautiful sunset or remembering how your neighbour went out of their way to help you earlier, is free and attractively simple. But there’s the problem. In our eagerness to embrace gratitude as a cure-all, have we lost sight of its complexity and its edge?

ATP Finals up date from 5pm GMT in Turin
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Time for the Italian anthem. Tuuuuuune!

An exciting variable tonight: Sinner is playing at home. The Turin crowd will be partial in the extreme, the atmosphere steaming, and much as I’m sure Alcaraz can handle it, he’s not used to it.

Updates from across the games at 6pm GMT start
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TOUCHDOWN! Steelers 7-6 Bengals 5:19, 1st quarter

Joe Flacco hits his favourite receiver Tee Higgins with a deep strike for the 28-yard touchdown. Another shootout brewing? Cinci took the one earlier in the season 33-31 in Flacco’s debut as a Bengal.

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Declan Rice sends it back to Dean Henderson to pump upfield and we’re under way.

A duet of well-dressed blokes with microphones lead us (well, not me) in renditions of both anthems. Classy.

Troy Parrott’s brilliant hat-trick, his third coming in the depths of injury time, delivered the Republic of Ireland into the World Cup playoffs, denying a sickened Hungary at the death. To cap a remarkable week in Irish football history, Parrott, the two-goal hero of Portugal’s defeat in Dublin on Thursday, stunned Budapest’s Puskás Aréna into silence, barring the ecstatic scenes among the Irish contingent.

Parrott had described Thursday’s defenestration of Cristiano Ronaldo’s team as the best night of his life, only for Sunday to be yet more gloriously dramatic. The former Tottenham trainee, who plays in the Dutch Eredivisie for AZ Alkmaar, would almost certainly not have started Ireland’s double-header had Roma’s Evan Ferguson not injured an ankle.

• Team claimed 10th straight win against All Blacks

• ‘There’s a huge amount of growth,’ says Borthwick

George Ford has called on England to make sure their statement victory against the All Blacks is not a false dawn after Steve Borthwick’s side extended their winning run to 10 matches.

England have moved up to third in the world rankings after their impressive 33-19 win against New Zealand on Saturday and could go second next weekend should they defeat Argentina and Wales spring a surprise against the All Blacks.

• Scotland 24-33 Argentina

• Gregor Townsend’s side defeated after being 21-0 up

Nothing short of a disaster for Scotland, but a magnificent comeback by Argentina. The hosts were 21-0 up and cruising in the second half, when a loose Finn Russell pass was seized on by opponents that had been woeful until that point.

Five Argentina tries in the final 23 minutes, and a comeback orchestrated in stunning fashion by Bath’s Santi Carreras, sealed Scotland’s fate. Disappointment generated by inaccuracy and uncertainty is a familiar refrain for home fans but this, a record comeback for Argentina in Test rugby, was considerably more painful than most.

• Fitzpatrick wins DP World Tour Championship in playoff

• McIlroy now one behind record for season-long crowns

An emotional Rory McIlroy hailed surpassing Seve Ballesteros by winning a seventh Race to Dubai title as more than he ever dreamed of. McIlroy lost in a playoff against Matt Fitzpatrick in the season-ending DP World Tour Championship in Dubai, having staged a dramatic late fightback with an eagle at the 72nd hole.

While his Ryder Cup teammate celebrated a third win in the event, the Northern Irishman clinched the season-long crown to eclipse the late Ballesteros’s tally of six and move one behind record-holder, Colin Montgomerie. McIlroy told Sky Sports: “It’s amazing, I had a conversation with Carmen [Ballesteros’s ex-wife] before I went out to play today and she told me how proud he would have been.

• Littler, 18, seals top spot with semi-final victory

• He faces unseated No 1 Luke Humphries in Sunday’s final

Luke Littler made more history as he became the youngest ever PDC world No 1. The 18-year-old’s position at the top of the rankings has seemingly been a foregone conclusion ever since he burst on to the scene with his record-breaking run to the final of the 2024 PDC world championship.

He became the youngest ever world champion a year later and has gone on to become a global star, transcending the sport.

• Batter scored 100 and 90 against Lions in warmup

• Was dropped after averaging 11.17 in 2021-22 tour

Ollie Pope believes the pressure of defending his spot in the England team amid constant speculation about his future and the rising challenge presented by Jacob Bethell has given him greater clarity and quality, leaving him well-placed to improve a poor record against Australia when the Ashes start on Friday.

In 10 Test innings against ­Australia, Pope has never scored more than 42, averaging 11.17 in the three games he played last time England toured here in 2021-22, and 22.50 in two matches when the Ashes were last contested in 2023. The 27-year-old looked in fine form when scoring 100 and 90 in the warm-up fixture against the Lions at Lilac Hill and will head to the Optus Stadium with confidence high.

These widely condemned strikes are just the latest sign of Trump’s imperialist revival – and the collapsing of the rules-based world order

The UK’s reported decision to restrict intelligence-sharing with the Pentagon on suspected drug-traffickers’ boats in the Caribbean is a modest yet symbolic act of resistance to Donald Trump’s imperialist revival. Britain is said to have objected to repeated, lethal US airstrikes on alleged smugglers off Venezuela’s coast – which have been widely condemned as illegal extrajudicial killings amounting to murder.

The strikes appear to foreshadow direct US attacks on Venezuela itself. Trump makes no secret of his wish to topple Nicolás Maduro’s authoritarian, ostensibly leftist regime. Most Venezuelans support this aim, but not the means. Regime change forcibly imposed by a foreign power contravenes international law, unless it is authorised by the UN or undertaken in self-defence as a last resort. Legal or not, it never ends well.

It is our solemn duty to ensure he is remembered for all he has done and may still do to destroy US democracy

The US treasury has drafted a design for a $1 coin featuring Donald Trump on both sides, for the purpose of “honoring America’s 250th Birthday and @POTUS”, according to treasury officials.

Meanwhile, Trump reportedly wants the Washington Commanders to name their planned $3.7bn stadium after him. A senior White House source told ESPN: “It’s what the president wants, and it will probably happen.”

Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is a professor of public policy emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Guardian US columnist and his newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com. His new book, Coming Up Short: A Memoir of My America, is out now

We’re taught from infancy that perseverance is a moral virtue and persistence pays. But what if quitters are happier and healthier?

Have you ever heard yourself saying “I’m going to do this if it kills me”? As the pensioners at my gym can attest, it’s what I hiss every time I’m there, attempting slowly and laboriously to get myself a millimetre closer to doing the splits.

But what if it actually is killing me? Not the groin strain, problematic as that is, but because I’ve just read in New Scientist that giving up is good for you, while grinding on isn’t. One study showed that people who “struggled to disengage from unfulfilling goals” had higher levels of cortisol and inflammatory molecules. “The result,” the article explained, “could be a heightened susceptibility to all kinds of conditions, including cardiovascular disease and Alzheimer’s.” In addition, “goal disengagement” – giving up – correlated with a lower risk of headaches, constipation and eczema; it may even protect against infection. Of 131 older adults, those who scored highly on a giving up scale (asking how easily they stopped fixating on unfulfilling goals and pivoted to others) got fewer colds.

In the context of spirituality, trauma is a hand grenade. But it can lead to deeper understandings of the world

“Why me?” “Why evil?” and “Why God?”

According to theologian and psychologist Karen McClintock, these are the three key questions that a person will ask of their faith in the aftermath of trauma.

Rescue operations in Wales, submerged railway lines in Cornwall – these events are ever more common. So why have we utterly failed to prepare?

As autumn blurs into winter, the news is once again filling up with a familiar story: overflowing rivers, inundated streets and overwhelmed infrastructure. Since Friday, England, Wales and Ireland have been hit by the storm the Spanish meteorological agency has elegantly named Claudia, with grim results. One place in particular massively bore the brunt of it all: the Welsh border town of Monmouth, where the raging River Monnow spilled into the streets, people had to be rescued from their homes and drones captured aerial views of the scene, showing fragile-looking buildings suddenly surrounded by a huge clay-brown swamp.

Claudia and her effects made it into the national headlines – but mostly, local and regional floods now seem too mundane to attract that kind of attention. Eleven days ago, Cumbria saw submerged roads, blocked drains and over 250 flood-related problems reported to the relevant councils. Railway lines in Cornwall were submerged; in Carmarthen, in west Wales, there were reports of the worst floods in living memory. But beyond the areas affected, who heard about these stories? Such comparatively small events, it seems, are now only to be expected.

John Harris is a Guardian columnist

The fragility of France’s cordon sanitaire against Le Pen is part of a worrying wider pattern, as centrist parties seek to revive their fortunes

Earlier this autumn, Giorgia Meloni laid out the strategic path to a new era of nationalist populism across Europe. Addressing a gathering of the French far-right party Identité-Libertés, which is led by Marine Le Pen’s niece, Marion Maréchal, Italy’s prime minister underlined the need to work towards “the unity of the right and the centre-right” adding “I hope that one day this can also happen in France … but that will depend on you.”

Ms Meloni knows of what she speaks. Her Brothers of Italy party, which has a lineage going back to postwar neofascist movements, became hegemonic under her leadership by mounting a reverse takeover of the Italian right. Less than a decade ago, it scored a marginal 4% in a general election. Currently, it stands at 31% in the polls. Forza Italia, the centre-right party founded by Silvio Berlusconi and a coalition partner in Ms Meloni’s government, is at 8%.

Donald Trump’s remarks on resuming nuclear testing have highlighted the risks. Proliferation must not be considered inevitable

When Eisaku Satō, a former prime minister of Japan, received the Nobel peace prize in 1974 after committing his country to not making nuclear bombs, owning them or allowing them on its territory, he assured the audience: “I have no doubt that this policy will be pursued by all future governments.”

Yet last week, Sanae Takaichi, Japan’s new prime minister, declined to say whether the country that understands the cost of nuclear war better than any other would stand by its commitment – reflecting the bleak broader outlook. Eighty years after the US dropped Little Boy on Hiroshima, incinerating tens of thousands of people, and almost 40 after Mikhail Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan seriously discussed nuclear abolition in Reykjavik, the spectre looms once more. Last month, Donald Trump ordered the US military to match other countries’ nuclear weapons testing.

Marketing or celebrity-led treatments for toddlers and upwards described as ‘ridiculous’ and lacking in skin benefit

Dermatologists have criticised an actor’s new skincare brand, calling it “dystopian” for creating face masks for four-year-olds, warning that the beauty industry is now expanding its reach from teenagers to toddlers.

It comes as a growing number of brands are moving into the children’s, teenage and young adult skincare market. In October, the first skincare brand developed for under-14s, Ever-eden, launched in the US. Superdrug has just created a range for those aged between 13 and 28.

Bangkok had earlier said it was suspending ceasefire, accusing Cambodia of laying landmines along the border

The US has put pressure on Thailand to recommit to a ceasefire with Cambodia, warning trade talks could be halted as Washington seeks to keep a Donald Trump-brokered truce agreement from falling apart.

Earlier this week, Thailand said that it was suspending the ceasefire deal, accusing Cambodia of laying fresh landmines along the border, including one it said wounded a Thai soldier on patrol, who lost a foot in the explosion.

PM makes opposition to support for Ukraine central to Fidesz campaign as it loses ground over cost of living crisis

Hungary’s prime minister has kicked off a weeks-long “anti-war roadshow”, turning criticism of European support for Ukraine into an early campaign message before next year’s elections.

Viktor Orbán’ is scheduled to stage an event in five cities before the end of the year, and started with an assembly on Saturday in the north-western city of Győr.

After Tim Davie’s resignation, the next director general will face internal strife, external noise and looming talks over the corporation’s existence and purpose

As BBC senior editors arrived at its New Broadcasting House headquarters in central London on Monday, the most pressing question was what had convinced Tim Davie, the corporation’s director general, to quit suddenly. Like any good BBC drama, it was a plot twist no one had seen coming.

As they assessed the brutal pressures that had finally proved too much for Davie, a second question soon arose. Was running the BBC now simply an impossible job?

Falcon fledglings’ inaugural flight watched by dedicated fans includes dramatic crash-landing

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A trio of young falcons born atop a 35-storey building in Melbourne’s CBD have taken flight for the first time, with the take-off captured on a livestream for the world to see.

The three peregrine falcons – two females and one male – fledged late last week, with the footage of their first flight posted on Instagram by non-profit organisation Bird Life Australia. The last falcon took flight shortly after 9am on Saturday for the second time – after returning to the ledge in a crash landing the day before.

The White House has made it a top priority to return the rare-earth industry to US shores. But is it really feasible?

Scott Bessent, the US treasury secretary, returned from South Carolina last week brandishing a small piece of metal, proclaiming that it was the first rare-earth magnet made in the US in a quarter of a century.

It was, he indicated to Fox Business, proof that the US is ending “China’s chokehold on our supply chain”. Thanks to the South Carolina company eVAC’s new rare-earth mineral processing center, Bessent added: “We’re finally becoming independent again.”

‘Less expensive and time consuming’ model helps with fast and accurate predictions, possibly saving lives and property

When then Tropical Storm Melissa was churning south of Haiti, Philippe Papin, a National Hurricane Center (NHC) meteorologist, had confidence it was about to grow into a monster hurricane.

As the lead forecaster on duty, he predicted that in just 24 hours the storm would become a category 4 hurricane and begin a turn towards the coast of Jamaica. No NHC forecaster had ever issued such a bold forecast for rapid strengthening.

With temperatures breaching the Paris limit, experts say tackling the powerful gas could buy crucial time as the clean-energy shift stalls

• Cop30: click here for full Guardian coverage of the climate talks in Brazil

For two years, global temperatures have exceeded the 1.5C heating limit laid out in the Paris climate agreement. This overshooting will have “devastating consequences”, the UN secretary general, António Guterres, has warned.

The biggest worry for scientists is that further heating could trigger irreversible tipping points, such as the widespread drying out and dying off of the Amazon, or the melting of the Greenland ice sheet, beyond which climate breakdown could spiral out of control.

Desert kingdom depends on oil dollars but its people already face a climate ‘at the verge of livability’. What’s going on?

Force said to have agreed to £20,000 payout to parents who complained about daughter’s school in Borehamwood

A police force has reportedly admitted it unlawfully arrested two parents in front of their nine-year-old daughter after they complained about her school on WhatsApp.

Rosalind Levine and her partner, Maxie Allen, said they were held at a police station for 11 hours over the complaints about their daughter’s primary school.

CRC mission will seek to deepen public understanding of Britain’s colonial legacy and its lasting impact

A delegation from the body leading the Caribbean’s slavery reparations movement will be in the UK next week for a “historic” first official visit to advocate for former British colonies.

The Caricom Reparations Commission (CRC) will be meeting with UK parliamentarians, Caribbean diplomats, academics and civil society groups from 17 to 20 November.

Shabana Mahmood to unveil new proposals modelled on Denmark’s controversial system

• What changes to the UK asylum system are being proposed?

Refugees who have established lives with homes and families in the UK – including Ukrainians – will face having to return if their home countries become safe, the home secretary has said.

Shabana Mahmood said the asylum system was “out of control and putting huge pressure on communities” as she announced plans to end the permanent status of refugees, who would need to reapply to remain in Britain every two and a half years.

Andrew Snowden MP says government ‘must immediate take action’ on failures of anti-fraud benefits crackdown

Calls are being made for an urgent independent inquiry after thousands of families were stripped of child benefit due to flawed Home Office travel data that claimed to show parents going on holidays and not returning.

Andrew Snowden, the Conservative MP for Fylde and the party’s assistant whip, said the government “must take immediate and transparent action” to address the failures of the anti-fraud benefits crackdown.

Natalie Boucly says supplies are ready but only about half of what is needed is getting into territory

Israel is breaching international law by continuing to impose restrictions on aid flows into Gaza, where the population remains critically short of food and life-saving goods as winter sets in, a senior official at the UN agency for Palestinian refugees has said.

In an interview during a recent visit to Brussels, Natalie Boucly, an Unrwa deputy commissioner general, said the whole world – including the EU and US – needed to increase the pressure on Israel’s government to ensure the unrestricted flow of aid into Gaza.

Activity around Japanese-held islands, also claimed by China, comes after PM Sanae Takaichi said Japan might respond militarily to an invasion of Taiwan

China has sent its coast guard through the waters of the Senkaku islands and military drones past outlying Japanese territory as Beijing ramps up tensions over the Japanese prime minister’s remarks on Taiwan.

On Sunday the Chinese coastguard said its ships made a “rights enforcement patrol” through the waters of the Senkaku, which are administered by Japan but also claimed by China as the Diaoyu islands.

Gail Etienne has built a center at the former school she and her two six-year-old friends braved angry crowds to attend – the same day as Ruby Bridges’ better-known experience

Gail Etienne still remembers her first day at McDonogh 19 elementary school in New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward. As her family pulled up to the school in the car with the federal marshals, they saw crowds of angry people screaming. Some carried garbage cans and sticks. Others were holding picket signs against school integration.

“I’ll never forget it,” Etienne said. “I saw this one lady was pregnant and had a garbage can top in her hand. I’m wondering, at six years old, what could I have done at six years old to these people to make them act the way they were acting? I really thought that if they could get to me, they’d want to kill me. I didn’t know why. What had I done? I was just going to school.”

Africa CDC says at least nine cases have been detected of Ebola-like illness, which kills up to 80% of those infected

Ethiopia has confirmed an outbreak of the deadly Marburg virus in the south of the country, the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) has said.

The Marburg virus is one of the deadliest known pathogens. Like Ebola, it causes severe bleeding, fever, vomiting and diarrhoea and has a 21-day incubation period.

The actor moved to LA 22 years ago. Now she’s back in the UK to star alongside Bryan Cranston in All My Sons. She talks about the frightening rehearsal schedule, how she’d work again with Mike Leigh in a heartbeat, and why she’s taking up boot-making

Marianne Jean-Baptiste arrives at the rehearsal space in  Southwark, south London, and immediately announces that she’s exhausted. It wouldn’t be surprising if nerves were getting the better of her; she’s seven days into a three-week rehearsal period for a new production of Arthur Miller’s All My Sons, which is brutally short by anyone’s standards. Peeling off unnecessary layers of clothes – it’s not a cold morning – she says jet lag has been messing with her circadian rhythms since she flew in from Los Angeles 10 days ago. “I woke up at 3.17am and was like: fucking hell, it’s early. I lay there for a while, running lines from the play in my head. Then I thought: ‘Just get up and marinate the chicken.’ I made some ginger and lemon tea and finally went back to bed at 5.30am – better to rest and meditate even if I couldn’t sleep.” She was just dropping off when the alarm went off at 7am.

These days it takes a lot to lure Jean-Baptiste away from her home in Los Angeles, where she has lived with her husband and two daughters full-time since 2003. She loves coming back to her native London to see family and friends, but LA has a slower pace, optimism, a vast ocean – and, for a long time, it offered better opportunities to work. Her breakthrough role as the optometrist in search of her birth mother in the 1996 Mike Leigh film Secrets & Lies brought a Golden Globe nomination and she became the first Black British woman to be nominated for an Academy Award. She memorably played Doreen Lawrence in the 1999 TV movie The Murder of Stephen Lawrence, but then – nothing much. Most offers of work came from the US.

Jackson’s songs are back on charts and biopic trailer racked up 116m views in 24 hours, yet there is a certain hesitation

Michael Jackson’s voodoo classic Thriller was high on Billboard’s Hot 100 in the week of 15 November, handing the 16-years-gone King of Pop a record for having a Top 10 hit across six different decades. Simultaneously, Jackson also broke records for receiving 116m views in 24 hours for the trailer of a new biopic, Michael, set for release in April.

Millions of fans may be excited and primed for a Jackson biopic. For comparison, the trailer beat out Taylor Swift’s Eras tour preview and it will join a procession of recent music biopics about Bruce Springsteen, Amy Winehouse, Bob Dylan, Elvis Presley and Elton John. The most successful of all – the Freddie Mercury and Queen biopic Bohemian Rhapsody – took in nearly a billion dollars at the box office.

There are shades of Gossip Girl, Desperate Housewives and everything Nicole Kidman has appeared in for the last five years. Put your brain aside, and enjoy

That its ultra-wealthy characters live in a place called Richford Lake tells you almost everything you need to know about the glossy new thriller Wild Cherry. Yes, it’s another entry in the increasingly popular eat-the-rich genre. Yes, it has shades of The White Lotus and everything starring Nicole Kidman for the past five years. Yes, most of the budget has gone to wardrobe, with any woman over the age of 30 apparently allergic to synthetic fibres and every actor seemingly cast primarily for her ability to carry off swagged silk and cashmere in warm beige tones. Yes, you should have bought shares in the colour camel years ago but it’s too late now. Yes, the insular community and soapy vibe suggests an ancestry that includes Desperate Housewives and Gossip Girl. Yes, in short, it’s trash with pretensions. But trash with pretensions is as fun a way to spend the long winter evenings as any, so why not set your brain aside and enjoy it?

We begin with the obligatory the-future-as-prelude scene, which here involves four women – two older, two younger – standing in a well-appointed bathroom in their underwear scrubbing blood off their hands. We then flashback to begin the six-part journey to finding out what the jolly heck is going on.

She’s Hollywood’s biggest character actor who terrified a generation of men with her ‘bunny boiling’ turn in Fatal Attraction. Now, Close alternates the glamour of the red carpet with living in a red state. She talks about the joy of her ‘undefined’ life

Most of us don’t live our lives in accordance with a governing metaphor, but Glenn Close does. The 78-year-old was born in Greenwich, Connecticut, a town in the north‑east of the US that, to the actor’s enduring irritation, telegraphs “smug affluence” to other Americans. In fact, Close’s background is more complicated than that, rooted in a childhood that was wild and free but also traumatic, and in an area of New England in which her family goes back generations. “I grew up on those great stone walls of New England,” says the actor, chin out, gimlet-eyed – Queen Christina at the prow of a ship. “Some of them were 6ft tall and 250 years old! I have a book called Sermons in Stone and it says at one point that more energy and hours ran into building the New England stone walls than the pyramids.”

If the walls are an image Close draws on for strength, they might also serve as shorthand for the journalist encountering her at interview. Close appears in a London hotel suite today in a military-style black suit, trim, compact, and with a small white dog propped up on a chair beside her. For the span of our conversation, the actor’s warmth and friendliness combine with a reserve so practised and precise that the presence of the dog in the room feels, unfairly perhaps, like a handy way for Close to burn through a few minutes of the interview with some harmless guff about dog breeds. (The dog is called Pip, which is short for “Sir Pippin of Beanfield”. He is a purebred Havanese and “they’re incredibly intelligent”. Most dog owners in the US have the emotional support paperwork necessary to get them on a plane but, says Close, laughing, “That’s really what he is!”)

Philip Barantini’s single-take special follows the star mooching around Manhattan, guitar ever ready for ad hoc turns, ahead of his evening show

Ed Sheeran floats through New York on a cloud of his own sunny high spirits in this hour-long Netflix special. He is the Candide of the music business, smiling benignly, strumming and singing, seamlessly pausing for selfies and fist-bumps and high-fives; he almost visibly absorbs energy from the saucer-eyed fan-worship shown by gobsmacked passersby and radiates it back at them.

Maybe you have to be a Sheeran fan to really appreciate it, but this is another single-take bravura special from film-maker Philip Barantini (who directed Netflix’s searing single-take drama Adolescence) and his director of photography Nyk Allen. With no cuts (though there’s an allowable fast-forward bit, and the audio might have been tweaked in post-production) they follow the unselfconscious Ed as he completes a late-afternoon soundcheck at the New York theatre where he’s playing a concert later on, and then for the next hour, and with fans pretty much always swarming around him, he wanders through the city with his guitar for various encounters, some planned, some (supposedly) not.

After a decade, the Netflix hit is bowing out. Ahead of its last episodes, the show’s creators and cast talk about big 80s hair, recruiting a Terminator killer – and the birds Kate Bush sent them

How do you finish one of the biggest and most popular TV series of the last decade? Three years after season four came out, the fifth and final season of Stranger Things is about to make its way into the world. Millions of viewers are getting ready to find out what happens to the Upside Down and whether the plucky teens of Hawkins, Indiana can fight off Vecna for good, but it is early November 2025, and its creators Matt and Ross Duffer are finding it difficult to talk about. It’s not just because they’re feeling the pressure, or because the risk of spoilers and leaks is so dangerously high. It’s because the identical twin brothers from North Carolina are just not ready. “It makes me sad,” says Ross. “Because it’s easier to not think about the show actually ending.”

A decade ago, hardly anyone knew what the Upside Down was. Few had heard of Vecna, Mind Flayers or Demogorgons. In 2015, the brothers – self-professed nerds and movie obsessives – were about to begin shooting their first ever TV series. Stranger Things was to be a supernatural adventure steeped in 80s nostalgia, paying tribute to Steven Spielberg and Stephen King. Part of their pitch to Netflix was that it would be “John Carpenter mashed up with ET”. Winona Ryder and Matthew Modine were in it, so it wasn’t exactly low-key, but it was by no means a dead-cert for success, not least because it was led by a cast of young unknowns. The first season came out in the summer of 2016, smashed Netflix viewing records, and almost immediately established itself as a bona fide TV phenomenon.

Prince Buster’s Al Capone changed the Madness singer’s life and Aretha Franklin is his go-to at karaoke, but what song makes him cry?

The first song I fell in love with
Judy Teen by Cockney Rebel. I’d seen Steve Harley on Top of the Pops and liked his look, with the mascara and bowler hat, like Alex from A Clockwork Orange. One day, me and my mates decided to cycle to Salisbury Plain. I had a transistor radio tied to the handlebars and Judy Teen came on. Unfortunately, the batteries ran out when we got to Swiss Cottage [in north London] … and my legs ran out at the same time!

The first single I bought
The Wall Street Shuffle by 10cc, from Woolworths in Camden Town. Later on, we used to pinch records, but I paid my dues for a while.

As she prepares to release No Lube So Rude, her first album in a decade, the Canadian dance-punk icon will answer your questions

Whether crowdsurfing inside a giant condom or singing alongside a vulva-headed dancer, Peaches has left us with some indelible on-stage images over the years – and there are set to be a few new ones as she goes on tour and releases her first album in a decade. As she does so, she’ll join us to answer your questions.

Peaches, AKA Merrill Nisker, emerged from Toronto’s underground scene in the late 1990s – her peers included Feist, her flatmate above a sex shop – but really came to fame in the early 00s after she moved to Berlin. Her debut EP, Lovertits, was a cherished item on the era’s electroclash scene but it was the a joyous, profane dance-punk track Fuck the Pain Away, from her debut album The Teaches of Peaches, that really took her into the mainstream.

With his murder conviction overturned, the Jamaican star is back performing. He talks about his illness, regrets, and how he felt about dancehall going global while he was behind bars

There’s a moment when I’m interviewing Vybz Kartel in the courtyard of the Four Seasons hotel in Tower Bridge, London, and the UK government emergency alert test rings on my phone. He is panicked by it and jumps up. “Me ready fi run you know!” he says, which has us both laughing.

It is a funny moment, but also a jolting one considering that it arrives in the middle of him discussing the lasting psychological effects of prison. Kartel, 49, real name Adidja Palmer, had been incarcerated across different institutions in Jamaica following his conviction for the 2011 murder of his associate Clive “Lizard” Williams. Following a lengthy appeal process, he was released in July last year after the ruling was overturned by the UK privy council (which is the final court of appeal for Jamaica due to the nation being a former British colony).

Overpowering, explosive and intense, the trio’s contemporary form of psychedelia is rebooted for the troubled, disturbing climate of 2025

From Brighton
Recommended if you like Osees, Ty Segall, the noisier bits of King Gizzard
Up next Currently working on a debut album for release next year.

A city with its own psych festival, and indeed a gig promotion company called Acid Box, Brighton has no shortage of lysergic left-field rock bands. But while most of their local contemporaries tend to the more recumbent end of the psychedelic spectrum, Oral Habit deal in what they call “the ear-rattling psychic dream of choked-up acid punks”, a sound that feels overpowering, explosive and intense: you could say it’s more closely aligned to the disoriented racket of mid-60s freakbeat than the pie-eyed beatitudes of the Summer of Love; equally you could suggest it’s a very contemporary form of psychedelia, rebooted for the troubled, disturbing climate of 2025.

Fifty years after writing a book which would change how Australians view their history and culture, the author and journalist isn’t slowing down

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Anne Summers is scrutinising street numbers as we walk. Pausing in front of a 19th-century mansion, the author and journalist looks up to its second storey. “This is where I was arrested.”

“Oh wow,” she says, taking in its immaculate sandstone facade. “It didn’t look like this then.”

Feeling overwhelmed by divisive opinions, endless rows and unreliable facts? Here’s how to weather the data storm

We all live in history. A lot of the problems that face us, and the opportunities that present themselves, are defined not by our own choices or even the specific place or government we’re living under, but by the particular epoch of human events that our lives happen to coincide with.

The Industrial Revolution, for example, presented opportunities for certain kinds of business success – it made some people very rich while others were exploited. If you’d known that was the name of your era, it would have given you a clue about what kinds of events to prepare for. So I’m suggesting a name for the era we’re living through: the Information Crisis.

The actor’s account of his big Hollywood break – and how it almost never happened

Michael J Fox has already eked out four books of Hollywood memoir, so the justification for a fifth – written with longtime collaborator Nelle Fortenberry – ought to be good. It is: the subject of these 176 pages is a three-month period in 1985 when Fox was simultaneously shooting his breakout sitcom role in Family Ties and the career-defining American classic, Back to the Future.

That’s two more-than-full-time jobs for one little guy, necessitating that the then 23-year-old actor work 20-hour days, six days a week. This schedule was only possible because the mid-1980s was a time before showbiz labour laws caught up with basic human decency. These days, we’re told, a standard contract “demands two weeks of buffer time on either side of a job”, while Fox didn’t even get an hour.

The Murder at World’s End by Ross Montgomery; The Confessions by Paul Bradley Carr; The Good Nazi by Samir Machado de Machado; Bluff by Francine Toon; The Token by Sharon Bolton

The Murder at World’s End by Ross Montgomery (Viking, £16.99)
The first novel for adults by award-winning children’s author Montgomery is a locked-room mystery set in 1910 on a remote tidal island off the Cornish coast. At Tithe Hall, Lord Conrad Stockingham-Welt is busy instructing his servants to prepare for the apocalyptic disaster he believes will be triggered by the imminent passage of Halley’s comet. The labyrinthine house is a nest of secrets and grudges, harboured by both staff and family members, who include an irascible and splendidly foul-mouthed maiden aunt, Decima. When Lord Conrad is discovered in his sealed study, killed by a crossbow bolt to the eye, she co-opts a new footman to help her find the culprit. With plenty of twists, red herrings and a blundering police officer, this is a terrific start to a series that promises to be a lot of fun.

Activision; PlayStation 4/5, Xbox, PC
With a deafening onslaught of massive shootout set-pieces in exotic locations, an evolving campaign mode and excellent multiplayer offerings, this maximalist instalment of crazed carnage is a hoot

It seems like an anachronism now, in this age of live service “forever games”, that the annual release of a new Call of Duty title is still considered a major event. But here is Black Ops 7, a year after its direct predecessor, and another breathless bombard of military shooting action. This time it is set in a dystopian 2035 where a global arms manufacturer named the Guild claims to be the only answer to an apocalyptic new terrorist threat – but are things as clearcut as they seem?

The answer, of course, is a loudly yelled “noooo!” Black Ops is the paranoid, conspiracy-obsessed cousin to the Modern Warfare strand of Call of Duty games, a series inspired by 70s thrillers such as The Parallax View and The China Syndrome, and infused with ’Nam era concerns about rogue CIA agents and bizarre psy-ops. The campaign mode, which represents just a quarter of the offering this year, is a hallucinogenic romp through socio-political talking points such as psychopathic corporations, hybrid warfare, robotics and tech oligarchies. The result is a deafening onslaught of massive shootout set-pieces in exotic locations, as the four lead characters – members of a supercharged spec-ops outfit – are exposed to a psychotropic drug that makes them relive their worst nightmares. Luckily, they do so with advanced weaponry, cool gadgets and enough buddy banter to destabilise a medium-sized rogue nation. It is chaotic, relentless and stupidly pleasurable, especially if you play in co-operative mode with three equally irresponsible pals.

From Demon Souls to Baby Steps, challenging games keep a certain type of player coming back for more. I wonder why we are such suckers for punishment

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Most people who really love video games have the capacity to be obsessive. Losing weeks of your life to Civilization, World of Warcraft or Football Manager is something so many of us have experienced. Sometimes, it’s the numbers-go-up dopamine hit that hooks people: playing something such as Diablo or Destiny and gradually improving your character while picking up shiny loot at perfectly timed intervals can send some people into an obsessional trance. Notoriously compulsive games such as Animal Crossing and Stardew Valley, meanwhile, suck up hours with peaceful, comforting repetition of rewarding tasks.

What triggers obsession in me, though, is a challenge. If a game tells me I can’t do something, I become determined to do it, sometimes to my own detriment. Grinding repetition bores me, but challenges hijack my brain.

Announced in 2020 by the Game Awards as an inclusive programme for the industry’s next generation, the Future Class initiative has now been discontinued. Inductees describe clashes with organisers and a lack of support from the beginning

Video games have long struggled with diversification and inclusivity, so it was no surprise when the Game Awards host and producer Geoff Keighley announced the Future Class programme in 2020. Its purpose was to highlight a cohort of individuals working in video games as the “bright, bold and inclusive future” of the industry.

Considering the widespread reach of the annual Keighley-led show, which saw an estimated 154m livestreams last year, Future Class felt like a genuine effort. Inductees were invited to attend the illustrious December ceremony, billed as “gaming’s Oscars”, featured on the official Game Awards website, and promised networking opportunities and career advancement advice. However, the programme reportedly struggled from the start. Over the last couple of years, support waned. Now, it appears the Game Awards Future Class has been wholly abandoned.

Guitar Hero’s controllers let anyone become a star in their own living room – and made the bands featured in the game household names again

It is 20 years since Guitar Hero was launched in North America, and with it, the tools for the everyday gamer to become a rock star. Not literally of course, but try telling that to someone who has nailed Free Bird’s four-minute guitar solo in front of a packed living-room audience.

Developed by Harmonix, published by RedOctane and inspired by Konami’s GuitarFreaks, Guitar Hero gave players a guitar-shaped controller with which to match coloured notes scrolling down the screen in time with a song. Each riff or sequence corresponded to specific notes, creating the feel of a genuine performance.

The American British author on pet peeves, the perils of fantasy dinner parties, and revisiting The Short History of Everything two decades later

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You did a whole book on Australia, and have travelled here a bit since – what’s the number one tip or recommendation you’d give someone coming for the first time?

Get out and walk! I mean, maybe not through the outback, but if you’re in any of the cities, walk. I do that wherever I go. And I love to just go off and explore without knowing where I’m going, without a map or any preconceived ideas. I think it’s the best way to discover a place, and it has the great virtue that if you turn a corner – say in Sydney – and there’s suddenly the Harbour Bridge, you feel as if you’ve discovered it. There’s a real feeling of exhilaration, I think, in that. But also, you discover little cafes and hidden corners and odds and ends.

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A Short History of Nearly Everything 2.0 by Bill Bryson is out now through Penguin. The author is touring Australia and New Zealand in February 2026 with the live show The Best of Bill Bryson

A chance viewing of the comic’s World Tour of Scotland made me swap Australia for the Highlands, although things didn’t quite go to plan …

I was 23 and thought I had found my path in life. I’d always wanted to work with animals, and I had just landed a job as a vet nurse in Melbourne. I was still learning the ropes, but I imagined I would stay there for years, building a life around the work. Then, five months in, the vet called me into his office and told me it wasn’t working out. “It’s not you,” he said, “I just really hate training people.” His previous nurse had been with him for decades; she knew his every move. I didn’t. And just like that, I was out of a job.

I drove home crying, feeling utterly adrift. I wasn’t sure whether to try again at another vet clinic or rip up the plan entirely and do something else. After spending a few days floating around aimlessly, trying to recalibrate my life, I turned on the TV, needing something to take my mind off things. And there he was: Billy Connolly, striding across a windswept Scottish landscape in his World Tour of Scotland documentary.

Influential musician who created Americana hits had recently been hospitalized with pneumonia

Todd Snider, the influential alt-country singer-songwriter who created Americana hits such as Alright Guy, has died at 59.

His passing was shared through announcements on his official social media accounts. Although no cause of death was provided, his family shared on Friday that he had recently been hospitalized with pneumonia.

Viral plush toy is heading to big screen after a deal was signed with details still unclear over whether it would be live-action or animated

Labubus could be headed to the big screen. Sony Pictures has acquired the screen rights to the plush toy sensation and is in early development of a feature film which, if successful, would anchor a new franchise.

The deal, first reported by the Hollywood Reporter, was signed this week between the Chinese toy makers and Sony Pictures, whose animation division is fresh off the global success of KPop Demon Hunters. No producer or film-maker is attached to the project yet, and it’s still unclear if the film would be live-action or animated.

Maya worried about entering into an open relationship with Ollie, but being honest with each other has deepened their relationship

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If I know that Ollie’s on a date, I find it difficult sitting around, not knowing what to do with myself

Just like Italy’s fashion capital, this saffron-hued dish is elegantly simple and very rich

Risotto alla milanese is, like the city it calls home, elegantly simple, but very rich. The saffron that gives the dish its striking colour is rightly expensive (it takes about 150 flowers to produce a mere gram), but you don’t need much and, though it’s often served alongside osso buco, I think it makes a fine meal on its own with a bitter-leaf salad.

Prep 5 min
Cook 30 min
Serves 4

It’s basically a mushroom omelette, but cooked Chinese-style and served on buttered rice

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Egg foo yung is a type of omelette that perhaps began life as a type of egg dish in Guangdong province, but has since the early 1900s been a staple on American and British Chinese takeaway menus. I like to order it at Yau’s in Broughton near Scunthorpe or Chi’s in Kenton in Devon, where it arrives as a small, fluffy, delicate omelette, barely able to hold itself together for the amount of vegetables woven into it. Over rice, it is a form of heaven on a Saturday night. I haven’t tried to replicate that specific joy here, but this is a homespun version, for those Saturdays when neither Chi’s nor Yau’s are within range.

Join Meera Sodha at a special event celebrating the best of Guardian culture on Wednesday 26 November, hosted by Nish Kumar and alongside writers Stuart Heritage and Tim Dowling, with Georgina Lawton hosting You be the judge live. Live in London or via livestream, book tickets here.

A zingy, mango mule-alike mocktail that brings the spicy kick of Indian street food to a highball glass

This was one of the first cocktails on the menu when we opened Fatt Pundit back in 2019. It pays homage to the many street-side carts that sell fresh mango in a spice mix of salt, pepper and red chillies – it’s sweet, spicy and savoury, as well as unique and delicious.

Huzefa Sajawal, co-founder and executive chef, Fatt Pundit, London W1

They have strong Christmas connotations, but these nuts are so versatile, whether you’re eating them hot out of the shell, or with pasta or pheasant. Plus: a burger that lives up to the hype

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If I’d ever spared a thought for how chestnuts – the sweet, edible kind, not the combative horsey sort – were harvested, I would probably have conjured rosy-cheeked peasants bent low in ancient forests and filling rough-hewn hessian sacks by hand. Back-breaking labour, sure, but so picturesque!

I was delighted, therefore, while on a writing retreat in Umbria last month, to get the opportunity to watch an elderly couple manoeuvre a giant vacuum around their haphazard orchard, followed by their furious sheepdog. The fallen crop was sucked into a giant fan that spat their bristly jackets back out on to the ground, and the nuts then went to be sorted by other family members on a conveyor belt in the barn – the good ones to be sold in the shell, the less perfect specimens swiftly dropped into a bucket for processing.

A wholesome, versatile cake that’s perfect for the colder months – for breakfast or for pudding

I adore a good loaf cake. There’s something about them that’s just inherently cosy and wholesome, and this one in particular is perfect for the colder months, not least because it’s simple and sturdy in the very best way. It’d be right at home with a coffee for breakfast, as well as gently warmed in a pan with butter and served with hot custard on a rainy evening. A real all-rounder.

A look at the editor-in-chief’s Vogue covers from her first radical combination in 1988 to her final ‘weird’ shoot

During her 37-year tenure as editor-in-chief of American Vogue, Anna Wintour has presided over more than 400 covers. December 2025’s, on newsstands this week, will prove her last before she steps away to focus on roles as Vogue’s global editorial director and chief content officer at Condé Nast.

The cover is certainly memorable: an image of the actor Timothée Chalamet photographed by Wintour’s long-term collaborator Annie Leibovitz in a Celine white polo neck, long cream coat and embroidered jeans, standing on a “planet” with a backdrop of a star-filled nebula provided by Nasa.

Motherhood changes so many things, including our bodies – and it’s reimagining not only our sense of style, but our sense of adventure, too

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A fresh newsletter from Blackbird Spyplane landed this autumn. Fashion’s most wise and witty tastemaker had written a guide to “cool mom style”, talking to newish mums. As a newish mum myself, the words reverberated through my inbox.

Among the pieces worn by the likes of designer Zoe Latta, designer Ellen Van Dusen and writer Natalie So were Pro Force martial arts pants and Marimekko-brights, Marni clogs and oversized yellow leather jackets. Gone were the cosy pumps and chunky practical boots I saw in the playground. Instead? Cool trainers that can go for miles, at pace, or be slipped on if your hands are full – Salomon “Snowclog Mid” sneakers, Nike Air Rifts, Asics Gel-Kayano 14s.

Anchoring your look around a pair of statement boots is a winning winter formula. These styling tips will make getting dressed a doddle

Since its inception 15 years ago, the Nigerian event has established itself on the international fashion calendar. Platforming sustainability and social issues, and showcasing local talent, it’s doing things a little differently

Inside a marquee in the grounds of Lagos’s five-star Federal Palace hotel and casino, models wearing sharply tailored suits and flowing woven pieces in earthy tones walk down the catwalk to the beats of Yoruba talking drums, an ancestral instrument that can mimic the sound of speech. The show, presenting the latest collection from the brand Emmy Kasbit – known for transforming handwoven Akwete fabric into modern silhouettes – marked the official start of 2025’s Lagos fashion week, which took place in the former Nigerian capital last month.

From a dedicated catwalk space featuring more than 70 designers, to the American singer Ciara closing one of the shows wearing a gele – a traditional Nigerian head wrap – the showcase, which takes place every October, has come a long way from its early days of power cuts and a lack of interest from industry gatekeepers.

A face-to-face conversation telling her how her behaviour affects you would give you peace, even if she ignores you

I have been friends with a woman for more than 20 years, who has overcome many challenges, which I admire. However, she’s constantly blindsided by people. Her husband left her, and it was a huge shock. A lot of her friends disappeared at that point as they were only interested in her husband. This surprised her. She made more effort to be my friend, and must have realised more clearly what friendship was.

Over the years since, quite a few of her friends have disappeared and she isn’t sure why. Her last employer turned on her, even though she was an excellent employee, and she left without knowing what had changed.

After spying Tom Box at a punk gig, Kate Logan made a Dalek poster to capture his attention

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Long before we’d met, I had heard a lot about a guy called Tom Box. I knew he was an Australian living in the South Island of New Zealand. I was in Wellington, and there’d been a few occasions when I’d travelled to the South Island for raves or anarchist conferences where some of the folks had gone to Tom’s place – but I splintered off somewhere else.

Then one day, in 2007, I was at a punk gig when a mutual friend said, “Oh, do you know Tom Box? He’s over there. He’s just moved up to Wellington.” There in a sea of black-clad punks, jumping up and down at the front of the mosh pit, was this guy in a pale blue Star Trek uniform. To me, as a person unfamiliar with Star Trek, he looked like he was wearing pyjamas. This was my first vision of him, but we didn’t talk at all that night.

Alex, 31, an academic, meets Rachel, 28, a university caseworker

What were you hoping for?
A good plotline, a fun evening and the chance of a connection.

Last year, romance fraud rose 52% for over-55s in the UK. Victims often feel they’ve made a terrible mistake and are at fault – but really, they’ve been expertly groomed by criminals

In total, over two and a half years, Elizabeth gave £100,000 to “Sam”, the “man” she met online, who she thought she loved and loved her back. She emptied her savings account, pawned her late mother’s jewellery and took out bank loans. She became so overdrawn that she could barely afford food and lived mainly on soup.

She had sent this money, for all sorts of reasons, to a man she’d never met. The first was a $500 Amazon voucher because Sam, a consultant, was out on an oil rig and needed to buy a manual. Later, the rig required a new part; then the tanker transporting the oil ran into problems, too. She gave money to Sam’s daughter who was trapped in an abusive marriage. Finally, when Sam became ill, Elizabeth was contacted by his doctor and began paying Sam’s medical bills. “When this doctor messaged to tell me that Sam was in a coma, I remember thinking he had such a strange, unprofessional turn of phrase,” says Elizabeth. “He said, ‘I’m sorry to spill the beans.’” She breaks into laughter. “A doctor! How could I have been so gullible?”

While they can be seen as a luxury, massages are often part of healthcare – here’s how they affect physical and mental health

Massages can feel great. But are they actually good for you?

In one study, researchers observed that 8.5% of Americans reported using massage for “overall health” in the 2022 National Health Interview Survey. However, definitions of health tend to vary widely, explains the study’s first author, Jeff Levin, an epidemiologist and distinguished professor at Baylor University. For instance, does it refer to physical health, mental health or both? That makes it tough to study, but may explain why it has such broad appeal, Levin explains.

After a bereavement and world events left me struggling to cope, I tried meditation, yoga and therapy. But it was my local sauna that helped me find peace and purpose

Earlier this year, I was approaching burnout. I felt as though my career as a freelance journalist was on permanent life-support, I was juggling a hectic family life, and I was consumed with worry about a world seemingly hellbent on self-destruction. I was struggling, too, with the death of a close family member and an old school friend. Grieving had become a default status. Despite support from family and loved ones, I needed to find a way to cope with this nearly overwhelming sense of loss.

I tried meditation, yoga and therapy, which all helped. Then I heard of Community Sauna Baths, a not-for-profit project in London designed to make saunas accessible and affordable for everyone. From my very first visit, I felt something change. A sense of peace came over me. It immediately felt like a sanctuary, a pocket of calm in the chaotic city that also allowed me to soothe this churning sadness and release some of the bottled-up angst.

It contains a stain-remover pen, silent fidget toy and a few Band-Aids, and Matilda Boseley never leaves home without it

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I’ve spent a lot of this year trying to perfect the art of leaving the house.

This might sound like an odd mission until you’ve seen me spend 25 minutes getting distracted while looking for my wallet and sunnies, doubling back to grab my laptop, tripling back for my work pass, missing my train, arriving at my destination with 1% battery and only then realising the medication I was meant to take that morning is still sitting on the counter.

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Sweat levels can be misleading, and factors such as age, sex, humidity and even your clothes all make a difference

It seems like common sense: if you leave a fitness class looking as though you’ve just ridden a log flume, you’ve probably worked harder than if you’re barely glistening. But that’s not always the case, says Adam Collins, a researcher from the Centre for Nutrition, Exercise and Metabolism at the University of Bath.

Sweating, he says, is part of the thermoregulation process. When your body temperature rises, it signals to your brain to sweat in order to cool you down. As the sweat evaporates, it helps regulate your core temperature.

From a Tudor manor in Wales to a swinging 60s hotel in Prague, these hotels and guesthouses are steeped in history

The table is laid by 12.30pm and we’ve even ironed the napkins. At 1pm the meat is resting. At 1.30pm it’s time to make a phone call …

My wife and I are having people to lunch – another couple; old friends. It’s supposed to be an informal affair, but it’s necessarily been a long time in the planning because, unlike us, our guests are busy people, and hard to nail down.

Besides, if you have weeks to plan a lunch it can’t be that informal – you don’t want to make it seem as if you woke up that morning still having no idea what you were going to cook, even if that is the case.

The long-running series in which readers answer other readers’ questions on subjects ranging from trivial flights of fancy to profound scientific and philosophical concepts

They say “good fences make good neighbours”, presumably meaning that the stronger the boundary between you and people you need to deal with, the more robust the relationship. Is this really true? Jamila, via email

Post your answers (and new questions) below or send them to nq@theguardian.com. A selection will be published next Sunday.

The long-running series in which readers answer other readers’ questions on subjects ranging from trivial flights of fancy to profound scientific and philosophical concepts

Why do we feel nostalgia? And why do some things trigger it more than others? Jules, Fife

Send new questions to nq@theguardian.com.

I always used to dream of the past
But like they say yesterday never comes
Sometimes there’s a song in my brain
And I feel that my heart knows the refrain
I guess it’s just the music that brings on nostalgia for an age yet to come
Ah nostalgia for an age yet to come
Nostalgia for an age yet to come
About the future I only can reminisce
For what I’ve had is what I’ll never get
And although this may sound strange
My future and my past are presently disarranged
And I’m surfing on a wave of nostalgia for an age yet to come

Alan, 87, has devoted his life to trying to defy death, and has promised his wife, Sylvia, that they will be cryogenically preserved upon death to be reunited in the future. However, when Sylvia dies all too soon, Alan unexpectedly falls in love with another woman and is forced to reconsider his future plans. An extraordinary love story, told with humour and tenderness about how we deal with loss, our own mortality and the prospect of eternal life.

Nervous reporter is chased across English countryside by baying bloodhounds, in what could soon be only legal way to hunt with dogs

Would you like to be chased by a pack of hounds? It’s a question often put to highlight the cruelty of hunting, because the answer would seem to be no. Or so you would think.

Yet increasing numbers of people are volunteering to be chased across the countryside by baying bloodhounds in what could soon be the only legal way to hunt with dogs in England and Wales, rather than pursuing animals or their scents.

In January the island’s beaches were inundated with waves of plastic pollution, a phenomenon that has been getting worse by the year. Photographer and film-maker Sean Gallagher travelled to Bali to document the increasing tide of rubbish washing up on beaches and riverbanks, and the people facing the monumental challenge of cleaning up. His portraits are on show as part of the 2025 Head On photo festival at Bondi Beach promenade until 30 November

What prompted this change, and how has it affected you?

Are you bored of AI slop dominating news feeds? Fed up of “enshittification”? Tired out by “advice pollution”? Done with polarising content? Giving up social media and rediscovering the joy of boredom?

One study shows that time spent on social media peaked in 2022 and has gone into decline since then, according to an analysis conducted for the Financial Times by digital audience insights company GWI.

We want to hear from Brits living overseas on their views on UK politics today

The last decade in British politics has been marked by instability and fragmentation, with six prime ministers in ten years, and Nigel Farage’s Reform party now leading in the polls.

A study this month from King’s College London and Ipsos found that 84 percent of people now say the UK feels divided, up from 74 percent in 2020.

We’d like to hear about how the move affected your relationship

After Annalisa Barbieri’s recent advice column “I moved abroad to live with my wife, but I’ve come to hate her country”, we are looking to hear from people who relocated to another country for their partner but have found the move difficult, or would even prefer to be elsewhere.

How has the move affected your relationship? What have you struggled with?

Ahead of a special Guardian Live event on 26 November, you can share your questions for Tim Dowling, Stuart Heritage and Meera Sodha

It has been a year of small pleasures and big opinions. Is Kim Kardashian’s legal drama All’s Fair really the worst TV show of all time? What are the best (and worst) vegan cheeses? And 20 years after they first hit the shelves, five-toed shoes are apparently having a big fashion moment. But what is it like to wear them in public?

As the year draws to a close, Guardian Live invites you to a special event with columnist Tim Dowling, film and TV writer Stuart Heritage, and cook and author Meera Sodha. They will join comedian, broadcaster, and occasional Guardian contributor Nish Kumar for an evening of sharp observations, seasonal reflections and behind-the-scenes stories from the Guardian.

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