2023 felt like my best year for reading yet: I blazed my way through Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall trilogy, captivated by the scope of her world-building, I was moved and unsettled by Samanta Schweblin’s short, precise work and felt invigorated by Teju Cole’s way of seeing the world in Tremor. Hopefully 2024 will continue in the same bookish vein, since there are a number of exciting titles releasing over the next 12 months and I am keen to dive in.
The Spoiled Heart by Sunjeev Sahota
I loved Sunjeev Sahota’s Year of the Runaways when it came out in 2015 and I’m excited for his new novel, The Spoiled Heart. Where Runaways told the story of migrant workers in Britain and their longing for a sense of home, this latest work explores an entirely different world: a family mystery set in the Peak District.
Hari Kunzru’s deep descriptions of music and its power over us blew me away in his 2017 book White Tears and I’m intrigued by his new outing, Blue Ruin, which seems to be about a man living in his car during a pandemic…
I’m also a sucker for Ali Smith and although I prefer the impressionism of her earlier output to the zeitgeisty speed of the Seasonal quartet, I will definitely be buying Gliff when it comes out in July, hoping to be inspired by the boundless imagination of her prose.
Finally, for something closer to home, I was lucky to share the stage with VERVE Books author Elle Nash during a book blogger event at the end of 2023 and was immediately sold on the premise of her forthcoming novel, Deliver Me. A woman reckons with a much longed-for pregnancy while she continues work at a meatpacking facility that butchers 40,000 chickens in a single shift. Blending body horror with a meditation on motherhood and desire, Deliver Me will be unputdownable.
*Ammar Kalia will be releasing his own debut novel A PERSON IS A PRAYER on 30th May 2024. EBook also available*