Towards the end of Love Lane, elderly protagonist Harry Cane becomes a figure of twinkly-eyed mischief. Gossiping with his granddaughter Pip, he advises her that “people without secrets … are like people... Read more »
‘May I say that I’m very glad to meet you,” Woody Brown taps on his word board. Brown is formal, funny and strikingly eloquent. He has a formidable ability to tell stories that reach into the... Read more »
Two experimental novels have jointly won the Queen Mary small press fiction prize, formerly known as the Republic of Consciousness prize. Figures Crossing the Field Towards the Group by Rebecca Gransden, published... Read more »
Sophie Mackintosh has established a reputation for speculative literary fiction about young women’s desires and suffering at the hands of men. Her new novel, Permanence, is less plainly political than earlier work,... Read more »
Anna Dempsey has been named the winner of the inaugural Hilary Mantel prize for fiction, taking home £7,500 for her unpublished novel This Is About an Alligator and Nothing Else. The newly... Read more »
Brandon Taylor’s third novel, following the Booker-shortlisted Real Life and 2023’s The Late Americans, is full of hands. It’s set in the years after a pandemic that made many people desperate “to... Read more »
Given that novels are routinely touted as the new version of some previous chartbuster, Almost Life will doubtless be heralded as One Day meets Normal People for a sexually fluid generation. Featuring... Read more »
Madeleine Thien and Robbie Arnott are among the writers shortlisted for this year’s £10,000 Climate fiction prize. Now in its second year, the prize celebrates novels that engage with the climate crisis... Read more »
7 The Professor (written 1846; published 1857) by Charlotte Brontë This was the first novel that Charlotte Brontë completed. It was rejected by publishers nine times. Written in the voice of a... Read more »