P Literary
Miranda July All Fours Canongate, £20, 9781838853440
The “loopy humour” of Miranda July’s All Fours beguiled the New York Times, while TIME called it a “steamy, disarming and radically honest story about a 45-year- old woman who dares to imagine more for her intimate life than marriage affords her”.
ercival Everett reigns supreme in this year’s books of the year round-ups in the national and cultural
magazines with James (Mantle). Everett is joined by established literary names Sally Rooney ( 1) and Alan Hollinghurst, one debut author in Yael van der Wouden and Craig Brown’s lauded biography of the late Queen Elizabeth II, which is flying the banner for non-fiction in joint third place overall. In fiction, the seven books here
travel between Mississippi 1861, contemporary Britain, 1970s America and post-Second World War Netherlands. The novels
offer explorations of interiority, desire and yearning in repressive environments. Van der Wouden’s debut was the second most-picked title in end-of-year round-ups from this year’s Booker Prize short- list, following Everett. The Dutch author’s exploration of sexual and moral awakening is trailed by fellow shortlistees Rachel Kushner and Charlotte Wood, alongside the Booker winner Samantha Harvey, with three mentions apiece. Over in non-fiction, the British
establishment takes centre stage with a lauded biography of Elizabeth II topping the non-fiction books of the year lists after garnering five mentions.
mentions. Johnson was narrowly beaten by Rachel Clarke’s Baillie Gifford-longlisted The Story of a Heart (Abacus), an account of the heart transplant between two nine-year-old children. Collated through 10 publications
1
Former prime minister Boris Johnson’s memoir Unleashed (William Collins), recounting his time in office, missed out on the non-fiction top spot with three
(the Times, the Sunday Times, the Financial Times, the Irish Times, the Guardian, the Telegraph, the New Statesman, the New York Times, the New Yorker and TIME), more than 900 titles were mentioned in the round-ups this year. A testament to not only the volume, but the quality of books published.
REPORTING Katie Fraser
Literary
Colm Tóibín Long Island Picador, £20, 9781035029440
Winner of Waterstones Irish Book of the Year, Colm Tóibín’s sequel to Brooklyn reunited readers with Eilis Lacey, who returns to Ireland following the discovery of her husband’s affair. Polling joint third place in the book of the year mentions, Long Island was praised as “enthralling” in the Sunday Times. “Tóibín uses masterly restraint to dramatise how lives can be destabilised by desire”, stated the New Yorker, while the New Statesman declared: “You just have to read everything he writes.”
Literary
Taffy Brodesser-Akner Long Island Compromise Wildfire, £20, 9781472273031 Taffy Brodesser-Akner’s nuanced examination of intergenerational wealth and trauma through a fictionalised retelling of a kidnapping in 1970s Long Island was a hit. A “compelling drama” wrote TIME and “a family saga that grips from the first page”, said the New Statesman. Brodesser-Akner told The Bookseller that she hoped Long Island Compromise would “affirm… the question I always had, which was: ‘Is it better to come from money and never feel afraid? Or to be someone who had to become scrappy and survive?’”
Literary
Yael van der Wouden The Safe Keep Viking, £16.99, 9780241652305 Yael van der Wouden’s debut, an examination of queer love and the legacy of the Holocaust, earned her a place on this year’s Booker shortlist and a host of critical accolades. “By turns erotic, heartbreaking and incandescent in its outrage,” said TIME.
Best of the rest Fiction
4 3
Four mentions Caledonian Road, Small Rain, Headshot, The Peacock and the Sparrow
Three mentions Orbital, Creation Lake, Stone Yard Devotional, Karla‘s Choice, My Friends, The Ministry of Time, Butter, The Voyage Home, Glorious Exploits, A Sunny Place for Shady People
Non-fiction Reviews 5
Guardian Irish Times New York Times New Yorker TIME
Reviews 5
Guardian New Statesman Sunday Times Telegraph TIME
Reviews 5
Financial Times Guardian New Statesman New Yorker TIME
Reviews 5
Guardian Irish Times New Yorker Sunday Times TIME
4 3
Four mentions The Story of a Heart, Knife, The Impossible Man
Three mentions Question 7, Sonny Boy, Unleashed, Kingmaker, The Genetic Book of the Dead, Didion & Babitz, The Peepshow, The Anxious Generation, Patriot, Adam
Children’s 2
Two mentions Songlight, Lord of the Flies: The Graphic Novel, Fox Goes North, A Drop of Golden Sun
09
ELIZABETH WEINBERG
ROOSMARIJN BROERSEN
Books
Review of the Year
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