It was impossible to miss George Saunders novel Lincoln in the Bardo. lauded as much in Italy as elsewhere. A curious, challenging but ultimately rewarding read. Richard Ford’s memoir of his parents Between Them is a journey to what now seems a far-away world of technological simplicity, social repression and tight-lipped emotion.
I have long regarded Martin Amis as a heavy-handed purveyor of fiction and a superlative writer of criticism, both social and literary. When he’s flying high, as he does so often in this new collection The Rub of Time, he’s pretty well untouchable.
Both Philip Roth’s non-fiction Why Write? and the Paul Simon biography Homeward Bound are for the already converted, but if you’re one of us, both are illuminating and unmissable.
The Kent Haruf trilogy – Plainsong, Eventide and Benediction – was by far my most incredible discovery of the year. Wonderfully written stories of ordinary lives and extraordinary humanity. Beautiful, moving and hopeful.
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