Following a bumper year for critically acclaimed books, 2018 promises to offer a string of new releases from such literary giants as Mario Vargas Llosa, Karl Ove Knausgaard, Zadie Smith and Julian Barnes, not to mention a host of exciting new talent – and a political thriller from Bill Clinton.
Feel Free by Zadie Smith
A new Zadie Smith book is always accompanied by a fair amount of fanfare, but in Feel Free, the hype is well-warranted.
With subjects ranging from Jay-Z and Quentin Tarantino to Facebook and Trump’s America, Smith’s “brilliant”, second collection of essays, “is at once delightful, challenging, and important”, says Esquire, “and might be the closest we’ll ever get to a real-life conversation with the fiercely private writer”.
The Monk of Mokha by Dave Eggers
A must for all coffee lovers, Eggars non-fiction story tells the tale of fellow San Franciscan Mokhtar Alkhanshali, raised by Yemeni immigrant parents, who travels to Yemen to learn about the origins of coffee making and is caught up in the civil war.
The Only Story by Julian Barnes
The Booker Prize winning author of The Sense of an Ending returns with his latest novel about how the story of a young man’s love for an older woman darkens into the tragedy of a destroyed life.
The Melody by Jim Crace
Another bleak portrayal by the author of Harvest, The Melody is “a fable about grief, myth, music and persecution, in which a widowed musician inadvertently sparks a campaign of violence against the paupers scratching a living on the fringes of town” says The Guardian.
Out March
The Female Persuasion, by Meg Wolitzer
Wolitzer “has always found a way to write engrossing, smart, and breezy books that also cut to the heart of the conundrum of living as a woman in the world”, says Vulture, and her latest book is no exception, focusing on the generational tensions among modern feminists at a fictional US college.
Out 3 April
Agency by William Gibson
Famed for his science fiction novels predicting the modern internet age (and the man who coined the phrase “cyberspace”) Gibson’s latest novel imagines a world in which Hillary Clinton won the US election, and a London two centuries in the future where most of humanity has perished.
Out in April
The Neighbourhood by Mario Vargas Llosa
A bona fide literary giant, Peru’s most celebrated author and Nobel laureate tackles political corruption, the hazards of extreme wealth and erotic intrigues in his latest novel.
Out in May
The President is Missing by Bill Clinton and James Patterson
Political memoirs are ten-a-penny but it is not so often a former US president turns his hand to fiction. Teaming up with writing machine James Patterson, Bill Clinton brings an insider's knowledge to this political thriller.
Out in June
Warlight by Michael Ondaatje
Twenty-five years on from the release of The English Patient and Michael Ondaatje returns to familiar territory, with his latest novel set in the aftermath of the Second World War. A series of unexplained mysteries involving abductions, disappearances and intrigue that begin in Blitz London unravel over number of years, in a return to form for the Booker Prize winning author.
The Fruits of my Labour by Karl Ove Knausgaard
From one literary giant to another, “the final volume in the epic Norwegian autobiographical series includes a long essay on Hitler and a consideration of the personal fallout from his earlier books”, reports The Guardian.
Out in July
Paris Echo by Sebastian Faulks
The author of Birdsong uses Paris’s troubled past, both under the Nazis and with its former colonies, as a way of meditating upon the country’s complicated history and culture.
Out in September
Breaking News by Alan Rusbridger
The former Guardian editor-in-chief turned Cambridge don explores the hidden powers controlling the modern media, what impact this has on political debate and why it matters.
Out in September
Love Is Blind by William Boyd
Any Human Heart author goes full Moulin Rouge with his tale of a young Scottish artist who finds himself (and love) in fin-de-siècle Paris.
Out in September
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