PREVIEWER’S PERSPECTIVE Previewer’s perspective
Osman, Hawkins and King lead the pack for a busy autumn schedule
There are some big books to look forward to in the months ahead, including Richard Osman’s follow-up to his hugely successful crime début, and new titles from Paula Hawkins and Stephen King
Alice O’Keeffe Books editor
W
elcome to the fiction preview for the second half of 2021—and will it be a “normal” autumn/ winter for bookshops aſter the chaos of the past 16 months, I wonder? Let us hope so. In any case, there are certainly some very big books heading your way. Likely to be the biggest in terms of sales is the second crime novel from the all-conquering Richard Osman, Author of the Year at the recent British Book Awards. The Man Who Died Twice (Viking) is the follow-up to the fastest-selling crime début of all time. But Osman has company in the bestselling crime category, notably Paula Hawkins with A Slow Fire Burning (Doubleday), and Stephen King with his thriller hat on: Billy Summers (Hodder). Expect lots of coverage too for the début thriller from the former US presidential nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton, State of Terror (Macmillan). Literary fiction is looking very lively with Sally Rooney’s
terrific third novel Beautiful World, Where Are You (Faber) likely to top the charts and sure to delight her many fans. I adored the latest novel from Pulitzer Prize winner Elizabeth Strout, Oh William! (Viking), and am very excited about the new novel from Hanya Yanagihara, To Paradise (Picador), her first since the unforgetable A Little Life. Short stories are strong too, with a new collection from Roddy Doyle, Life Without Children (Cape), and Courtia Newland’s first collection of speculative short stories Cosmogramma (Canongate). Vintage Classics has a couple of notable “débuts”, which were both writen ages ago but are now to be published in the UK for the first time: Simone de Beauvoir’s newly discovered novel about female friendship The Inseparables, and Sugar, from Bernice McFadden, widely acclaimed in her native US. Finally, each of these was a Book of the Month or an Editor’s Choice for me in hardback (and I interviewed most of the authors) so I hope lots of readers will discover them in paperback: Evie Wyld’s blistering
SALLY ROONEY
The Bass Rock (Vintage), Susanna Clarke’s weird and wonderful Piranesi (Bloomsbury), and two cracking débuts: Abigail Dean’s Girl A (HarperCollins), which I found to be both gripping and emotionally complex, and Raven Leilani’s wry, sharp and caustically funny Luster (Picador). Happy bookselling!
Have your say
You can find Alice on Twitter (@aliceokbooks), or make contact via email (
alice.okeeffe@thebookseller.com)
08
The Bookseller Buyer’s Guide Fiction
Photography: Jonny Davies
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76
