The Disappearers by Marlon JamesHamish Hamilton, 3 September After a detour into mythic fantasy, the author of the Booker-winning A Brief History of Seven Killings returns to Jamaica. This account of a brutal homophobic attack on a group of gay actors in 1980s Kingston has already been longlisted for this year’s prize. The Bridge by Colm TóibínPicador, 3 September Twenty years on, this short novel is a sequel to Tóibín’s exquisite story A Long Winter, set around a family tragedy in the isolated Pyrenees.
Now the building of a bridge brings modernity, possibility and threat to a father and son, in a spare chronicle of longing and grief. The Golden Hours by Louisa YoungMantle, 3 September Young continues her aunt Elizabeth Jane Howard’s much-loved Cazalet Chronicles, bringing her story of a sprawling upper-middle-class English family into the swinging 60s. Switzy by Emma ClineChatto & Windus, 10 September With dementia making him increasingly confused, David is on his way to a clinic in Zurich to end his life while he still has the capacity to make a choice.
Longlisted for the Booker prize, this is a bravura portrait of a failing mind, told from the inside. The Rouse by China MiévillePicador, 17 September A leading light of the New Weird, Miéville has been working on this stonking 1,000-page supernatural fantasy for two decades. Political intrigue, continent-hopping global conspiracy and uncanny mysteries unfold.
The Housekeeper by Rose TremainChatto & Windus, 17 September An origin story for Daphne du Maurier’s enduring bestseller Rebecca is told from the perspective of the novelist’s secret lover Danni, housekeeper in a Cornish mansion, who is outraged to find herself recast on the page as the malevolent Mrs Danvers. Stations by Louise KennedyBloomsbury, 24 September The author of bestselling 2022 debut novel Trespasses, a Troubles-set love story recently adapted into a C4 drama starring Gillian Anderson, returns with a tale of friendship and loss. Róisín and Red meet in small-town Ireland in the 1980s and reconnect in a London squat, before Red is caught up in a cycle of poverty and addiction.
Doom Painting by AK BlakemoreGranta, 24 September One of our most exciting historical novelists takes on the peasants’ revolt, in a blow-by-blow account of unlikely leader Wat Tyler and the 16 days in 1381 that turned England upside down. With cinematic action and a relish for medieval vocabulary, it’s a punky successor to Hilary Mantel. American Hagwon by Min Jin Lee 4th Estate, 29 September The hagwon or cram school is a symbol of Korea’s stress on education.
This new saga from the Pachinko author follows a middle-class family, their life in ruins after the 1997 Asian financial crisis, who move to Sydney and then California in search of a better future for their children. Partita by Barbara KingsolverFaber, 6 October After the Pulitzer-winning Demon Copperhead, a retelling of David Copperfield set in Appalachia, Kingsolver returns with a quieter tale of midlife longing and regret. A gifted pianist, Livia used music to escape the sadness of her family life in rural Tennessee, but having married and resettled in her home town, an unexpected call from a former lover drags her back into the past.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
