Party time...

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These guys and gals know how to party...

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What I read in 2024

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  2024 was another remarkable year for reading. Somehow I got through 264 books. Here are my favourites .       Fiction     The Incubations , Ramsey Campbell – another fantastically inventive and labyrinthine experience from one of the finest prose stylists in the business. Unique and memorable.     You Like it Darker , Stephen King – the master’s best book in years; a stirring collection of powerful tales, including one short novel surely coming soon to a cinema near you. He still has it.     Yellowface , R F Kuang – a brilliantly caustic look at contemporary PC culture and the publishing business under the shade of sensitivity reading and cultural appropriation. Blackly comic.     None of T his is True , Lisa Jewell – one of the darkest thrillers I’v e ever read and topped off with a twist so ingenious you’l l have to go back to the start and see if its suggestion bears out. Jewell has always been a fine storyteller...
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What I read in 2025 (and my favourites)

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Favourite reads of the year Although I completely ran out of reading energy towards the end of the year and switched to serial podcast consumption, I still managed to get through over 200 books in 2026. Here (excluding rereads, of which there were a fair few) are my favourites, followed by the whole list.  Fiction An Echo of Children by Ramsey Campbell -- a hugely readable thriller with all of its author's elegant prose and subtle, suggestive, slowburn menace. Caledonian Road by Andrew O'Hagan -- although it reads at times like someone desperately trying to be Martin Amis circa  The Information , this novel depicts the contemporary scene with knowing omniscience and never ceases to be entertaining.  The Only Woman in the Room by Marie Benedict -- an absolutely fascinating  roman a clef account of the life and dual career of Hollywood icon Hedy Lamarr. She might be responsible for your mobile phone, you know ...  Americanah by Chimimanda Ngozi Adiche -- a ty...
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An Echo of Children by Ramsey Campbell -- a review

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An Echo of Children by Ramsey Campbell Review by Gary Fry Ramsey Campbell has many enviable literary qualities but I think even his most ardent fan might be reluctant to use the term "page turner" to describe his approach. That's not to say he hasn't written any number of gripping thriller-type narratives. On the whole, however, his is a style that demands close attention, a kind of active collaboration between author and reader.  That is why I was surprised – pleasantly so, as it happens – by An Echo of Children . Coming off the back of a string of quite idiosyncratic Campbell novels ( Fellstones, The Lonely Lands, The Incubations ), the stark commercial appeal of his latest novel will, I hope, expose him to new fans, perhaps some of those readers who have in the past struggled to engage with his work on the basis of its elusive aesthetics. None of this is to suggest that in An Echo of Children Campbell has sacrificed any of his trademark artistry. The book is as el...
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