There are too many new-to-me authors that I’ve discovered this year. They’ve all brought me surprise and joy: it would be unfair to rank them. However, the books on the list below did make me want to seek out everything else their authors have ever written.
Lauren Beukes: Broken Monsters (review to follow shortly)
Sebastian Fitzek: Therapy
William McIlvanney: Laidlaw
Jung-Myung Lee: The Investigation
Koren Zailckas: Mother, Mother
Claire Messud: The Woman Upstairs
Andrew Solomon: Far From the Tree
Minae Mizumura: A True Novel
Miriam Toews: All My Puny Sorrows
Ann Patchett: This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage
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Definitely with you on the Ann Patchett front, although have to confess I lost interest in ‘All My Puny Sorrows’ and gave up halfway through. Maybe I should give it another go…
I think it depends on whether you’ve known anyone with depression… otherwise I can see that it might be a bit of a hard read. Although there is some humour there.
Marina Sofia – Lovely choices there! Definitely with you on the McIlvanney, and the Beukes is on my TBR. I love that feeling of having discovered a really talented author.
The funny thing is that I’ve had The Shining Girls on my TBR pile for even longer, but somehow I got started with this and couldn’t stop…
Thank you for the gift of this list. There are several picks for my TBR on it. Warmest wishes for the festive season and the New Year to you and yours !
Thank you – hope you enjoy them if you read any of these. Look forward to hearing what you think. And wishing you too a very peaceful and happy festive season!
McIlvanney was one of my recent finds too – the whole Laidlaw trilogy is first-class. Next year I intend to read some of his other stuff. Fitzek was another one I came across this year, in the shape of a wonderful audiobook dramatisation of The Child – I loved the way he built up a really creepy atmosphere, but sadly felt the book feel away towards the end. Don’t know how much of that was due to the format though…
Therapy is his first book and was borderline crime fiction – it was about much more than that. Curious to read his later ones and see if any awkwardness has been ironed out – along with his originality?
There are some very interesting titles on your list. Did you read the Fitzek in English? I couldn’t really read it in German but remember Lizzy loving it two or three years ago.
I read it in English as I was reviewing it for Crime Fiction Lover website, so it had to be something that was available in translation. They had a special offer on some of his books on Amazon for a while. I would like to read him in German, though. I also really want to read more German (by which I mean Austrian and Swiss too) crime fiction and see what’s happening in their world – Wolf Haas, Stefan Slupetzky, Marcus Rafelsberger, Friedrich Glauser etc.
How wonderful to have discovered these new authors! I love adding to my lists of writers whose books I follow. I love Ann Patchett and Miriam Toews and enjoyed Claire Messud’s novel. I’ll have to check out some of the others on your list too.
I have a signed copy of Zoo City by Beukes on the shelf. She was at Quai du Polar this year, have you met/seen her?
I have read and hated Therapy (no billet on the blog, it would have been too negative) but I’m quite alone with my opinion of this one.
I don’t know the other ones, except Ann Pratchett. I’ll explore them further.
I met and chatted with Lauren Beukes in Lyon (have a photo with her etc.). I could really get into her way of thinking but was afraid that maybe I wouldn’t like her books as much as I liked her in person. I needn’t have feared that.
She seemed very nice indeed.
I LOVED Andrew Solomon and enjoyed Claire Messud, but haven’t read any of the others yet. Lauren Beukes and Miriam Toews are in my TBR pile, but many of the others are new to me. *heads off to look them up*