David Safier’s new crime series grants the former German chancellor a lively post-leadership twilight as a super sleuth
Eva Menasse’s sprawling bestseller, set in the run-up to the fall of the Berlin Wall, confronts a nation with its murky past
These cynical domestic horror stories by the Guinness heiress seem to speak to a contemporary mindset
Compiled over more than a decade, the Nobel winner’s notebooks combine memoir with his own colourful paintings
AI could instantly open up a huge range of books in different languages — but fiction really does require that human touch
The Black boy whose murder still haunts America; Leningrad’s siege-defying botanist heroes; the brilliance and flaws of Gaia scientist James Lovelock; a survey of the 20th-century novel; the making of Handel’s ‘Messiah’; new novels from Jim Schutze and Christian Kracht; short stories by Eliza Clark — plus James Lovegrove’s pick of fantasy titles
A mother-and-son road trip is propelled by guilt and unease in Christian Kracht’s hilariously unsettling novel
The American journalist’s fiction debut is a difficult, beautiful tale of coming of age at a 1960s New England boarding school
From intergalactic sci-fi to 1970s California, Clark’s unnerving and surreal short stories traverse time, place and genre
Guided by enthusiasm, Edwin Frank’s study sidesteps the pitfalls of canonisation
A crop of fantasy novels features female warriors — and Vikings from a cult board game
Susan Minot’s first novel in a decade explores familiar themes with a pared-back tale of mid-life female desire
Malachy Tallack makes his most imaginative journey home to the Shetlands
A haunting novel set in the freezing, snowbound English winter of 1963
We asked you to share your favourite reads of the year — here are the results
James Lovegrove and Suzi Feay select their must-read titles
Maria Crawford selects her must-read titles
Laura Battle selects her must-read titles
James Lovegrove selects his must-read titles
Ángel Gurría-Quintana selects his must-read titles
Alex Clark selects her must-listen titles
Barry Forshaw and Adam LeBor select their must-read titles
The 2024 prize winner talks about setting her novel aboard the orbiting ISS to observe the beauty of our planet — and warn of its fragility
Now aged 90, the playwright returns with a novella set in a nursing home during Covid
Judges praise ‘beautiful and miraculous’ novel that tells the story of astronauts on the International Space Station
