What I read in 2024

 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 This is True, Lisa Jewell – one of the darkest thrillers I’ve ever read and topped off with a twist so ingenious you’ll have to go back to the start and see if its suggestion bears out. Jewell has always been a fine storyteller but now she’s a premium fictional terrorist, too.  

 

New Grub Street, George GissingI'd been meaning to read this for over thirty years and am so glad I finally got around to it. I love fiction about novelists and this one, set in the late 19th Century, barely seemed to have aged in its jaundiced themes. The prose is disarmingly modern, too.   

 

On Beauty, Zadie Smith – the author continues to impress with her ambition and range. This one riffs off Forsters’s Howards End and is right on the money in terms of its depiction of PC culture’s globe-sprawling vicissitudes. 

 

Wet Paint, Chloe Ashby – a nourishing depiction of youthfulness in a city centre setting, its engaging central character struggling to juggle work and relationships in the context of remaining true to her identity. A real pleasure.  

 

Martin Eden, Jack London – another sterling piece of fiction about writing. I suspect everyone who puts pen to paper will recognise the author’s merciless depiction of the insuperable demands of creativity. A very powerful ending, too. 

 

Author! Author! David Lodge – a roman a clef drawing on the middle period of Henry James’ life, as he struggled to launch himself as a playwright in London’s catty literary life. The author’s prose purrs as ever. 

 

House of Mirrors, Erin Kelly – the author’s brilliant sequel to her first and best book The Poison Tree. Her characters have lost none of their complex appeal, and the story twists and turns just as beguilingly as its predecessor.  

 

Stanley and the Women, Kingsley AmisI'm going to hell for celebrating this one, aren’t I? It’s the author’s infamous misogynistic novel. Yeah, meanspirited but frequently hilarious. I make no apologies for enjoying it. Well, just a few, perhaps.  

 

The Woodlanders, Thomas Hardy – one of the author’s novels that escaped me as a younger reader. It’s a typically powerful combination of arresting prose, traditional storytelling, and doomed characters – the full Hardyan works.  

 

Swanna in Love, Jennifer Belle – a very impressive book told from the point of view of a Lolita-like character being courted by an older man. Ambitious, risqué, and thoroughly convincing.  

 

A Spot of Folly, Ruth RendellI'd been led to believe that these short stories were just negligible odds n ends never collected in the author’s lifetime. Imagine my delight when I discovered that it’s an absolutely rock-solid collection from one of my favourite writers. Should have read it years ago.  

 

Various novels by Amanda BrookfieldI’m working my way through this writer’s back catalogue and find her work moving, convincingly romantic, and beautifully written. You can't go wrong with any of her novels (The Family Man, The Other Woman, The Lover, etc) 

 

 

 

Nonfiction 

 

Capitalist Realism, Mark Fisher – a brilliantly punchy expose of how the modern social system renders so many of us ineffectual and alienated. Quite depressing and yet illuminating. Essential reading.  

 

Existentialism and Excess, Gary Cox – I have my problems with Sartre as both a philosopher and a man, but after reading this relatively short biography, you can’t help being astonished by his undoubted genius. Some of the material about his work-enhancing drug-taking makes you gasp in disbelief.  

 

Apropos of Nothing, Woody Allenalmost a perfect autobiography. The author writes beautifully and hilariously about his youth. Constantly self-disparaging to the point of borderline disingenuousness. It loses a little shape and joy when it focuses on you-know-what, and did he really need to do it at such length? But the book remains a masterpiece of wit.  

 

 

Books read 2024 

 

Black Plumes, Margery Allingham 

Sometimes I Lie, Alice Feeney 

Lost Notebook, Louise Douglas 

Taste, Stanley Tucci 

Curtain, Agatha Christie 

Snow, John Banville 

In a Lonely Place, Karl Edward Wagner 

Good Material, Dolly Alderton 

Mayflies, Andrew O’Hagan 

And Put Away Childish Things, Adrian Tchaikovsky 

Ipcress File, Len Deighton  

High Mountains of Portugal, Yann Martel 

Ocean at the End of the Lane, Neil Gaiman 

Girl Next Door, Ruth Rendell 

Dead to Her, Sarah Pinborough 

Last Train Home, Elle Cook 

Man I Never Met, Elle Cook 

The Island, Adrian McKinty 

Gentlemen and Players, Joanne Harris 

House of Eve, Sadeqa Johnson 

Yellowface, R F Kuang  

First Lie Wins, Ashley Elston 

Before We Were Innocent, Ella Berman 

Instructions for a Heatwave, Maggie O’Farrell 

IT, Stephen King 

Tommyknockers, Stephen King 

Moonflower Murders, Anthony Horowitz 

Sorrow and Bliss, Meg Mason 

Weaveworld, Clive Barker 

Firefly Lane, Kristin Hannah 

Nickel Boys, Colson Whitehead  

Creatures of the Pool, Ramsey Campbell 

The Comeback, Ella Berman 

Library Policeman, Stephen King 

Good Bad Girl, Alice Feeney 

Liar’s Girl, Catherine Ryan Howard 

Just Another Missing Person, Gillian McAllister 

Shawshank Redemption, Stephen King 

The Whispers, Ashley Audrain 

Beautiful World, Where are You, Sally Rooney 

Come With Me, Ronald Malfi  

The Body, Stephen King  

The Push, Ashley Audrain 

Take it Back, Kia Abdullah 

The Glass House, Eve Chase 

List of Suspicious Things, Jennie Godfrey 

Silent Patient, Alex Michaelides 

Judgment, Joseph Finder 

Nightwalker, Thomas Tessier 

Best Man to Die, Ruth Rendell 

The Blackhouse, Peter May  

The Innocent One, Lisa Ballantyne 

Homo Faber, Max Frisch 

Then She Was Gone, Lisa Jewell 

I Found You, Lisa Jewell 

Couple at Number , Claire Douglas 

None of this is True, Lisa Jewell 

The Night She Disappeared, Lisa Jewell 

Everyone Here is Lying, Shari Lapena 

Invisible Girl, Lisa Jewell 

Finding Sophie, Imran Mahmood  

The Third Wife, Lisa Jewell 

The Hike, Lucy Clarke 

Watching You, Lisa Jewell 

Tough Crowd, Graham Linehan 

New Grub Street, George Gissing 

Capitalist Realism, Mark Fisher 

The Pit, Frank Norris 

Money, Emile Zola 

On Beauty, Zadie Smith 

Ordinary People, Diana Evans  

Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, Gabrielle Zevin 

All the Fiends of Hell, Adam Nevill 

The Auctioneer, Joan Samson 

I Know Who You Are, Alice Feeney 

Love Marriage, Monica Ali 

The Trees, Percival Everett 

The Little House, Philippa Gregory 

Deaf Sentence, David Lodge 

Come Closer, Sara Gran 

Way of all Flesh, Samuel Butler  

Mary Barton, Elizabeth Gaskell 

The Wrong Man, Amanda Brookfield 

Orlando, Virginia Woolf 

Typhoon, Joseph Conrad 

The Woodlanders, Thomas Hardy 

Close to Death, Anthony Horowitz 

Tom Brown’s Schooldays, Thomas Hughes 

A Theory of Haunting, Sarah Monette 

Return of the Native, Thomas Hardy 

Kim, Rudyard Kipling  

Woman in the Purple Skirt, Natsuko Imamura 

Thursday Murder Club, Richard Osman 

Mouth to Mouth, Antoine Wilson 

Constant Nymph, Margaret Kennedy 

He Said She Said, Erin Kelly 

Case Histories, Kate Atkinson 

Wet Paint, Chloe Ashby 

Transcription, Kate Atkinson 

Treacle Walker, Alan Garner 

Martin Eden, Jack London  

Babbitt, Sinclair Lewis 

Mystic Masseur, V S Naipaul 

We Know You Know, Erin Kelly 

My Antonia, Willa Cather 

Inspector Imanishi Investigates, Seicho Matsumoto 

Tokyo Express, Seicho Matsumoto 

Such a Fun Age, Kiley Reid 

Guilty Thing Surprised, Ruth Rendell 

No More Dying Then, Ruth Rendell 

My Last Innocent Year, Daisy Alpert Florin  

Human Zoo, Sabina Murray 

Some Lie and Some Die, Ruth Rendell 

March Violets, Philip Kerr 

Shake Hands Forever, Ruth Rendell 

A Sleeping Life, Ruth Rendell 

Put on by Cunning, Ruth Rendell 

Unkindness of Ravens, Ruth Rendell 

Martian Chronicles, Ray Bradbury 

You Like it Darker, Stephen King 

Whatever You Love, Louise Doughty  

History of the World in and a Half Chapters, Julian Barnes 

Redhead by the Side of the Road, Anne Tyler 

Mania, Lionel Shriver 

A Bird in Winter, Louise Doughty 

Paul, Daisy Lafarge 

Author Author, David Lodge 

Pietr the Latvian, George Simenon 

Quite a Good Time to be Born, David Lodge 

Blackbirds, Chuck Wendig 

Writer’s Luck, David Lodge  

The Young H G Wells, Claire Tomalin 

Existentialism and Excess, Gary Cox 

Rendezvous with Rama, Arthur C Clarke 

Edmund Burke, Jesse Norman 

Hannah Arendt, Dana Villa 

The Inklings, Humphrey Carpenter 

Veiled One, Ruth Rendell 

A Likely Story, Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais 

Horror Movie, Paul Tremblay  

Apropos of Nothing, Woody Allen  

High Fidelity, Nick Hornby 

No Hard Feelings, Genevieve Novak 

Bookshop Woman, Nanako Hanada 

Woodcutter, Reginald Hill 

Landscape of Death, M S Morris 

Aspire to Die, M S Morris  

You Are Here, David Nicholls 

The Incubations, Ramsey Campbell 

Hide and Seek, Ian Rankin 

First Wife’s Shadow, Adele Parks 

The Missing Family, Tim Weaver  

Drowning Kind, Jennifer McMahon 

My Thoughts Exactly, Lily Allen 

Silent Ones, K L Slater 

The Facts, Philip Roth 

Killing by Numbers, M S Morris 

Small Town Horror, Ronald Malfi 

House We Grew Up In, Lisa Jewell 

Truth About Melody Browne, Lisa Jewell 

Let Her Fall, Erin Kelly 

House of Mirrors, Erin Kelly  

Girls Who Disappeared, Claire Douglas 

Contemporary Fiction, Robert Eaglestone 

Ghosted, Jenn Ashworth 

Girl who Loved Tom Gordon, Stephen King 

What the Dead Know, Laura Lippman 

City and the Pillar, Gore Vidal 

The Well-Beloved, Thomas Hardy 

Human Croquet, Kate Atkinson 

Corfe Castle Murders, Rachel Maclean 

Satsuma Complex, Bob Mortimer  

Liars, Sarah Manguso 

Dead Low Tide, John D MacDonald 

Le Grand Meaulnes, Alain-Fournier 

Eyes and the Impossible, Dave Eggers 

Very Cold People, Sarah Manguso 

Cold Granite, Stuart MacBride 

Double Image, Helen MacInnes 

Breaking the Dark, Lisa Jewell 

Perfectly Nice Neighbours, Kia Abdullah 

The Family Remains, Lisa Jewell  

Vladimir, Julia May Jonas 

Nightbitch, Rachel Yoder 

Berserker, Adrian Edmondson 

Stanley and the Women, Kingsley Amis 

Difficulties with Girls, Kingsley Amis 

The Seven Doors, Agnes Ravatn 

Detective Fiction, Lee Alexander 

Kyra, Just For Today, Sara Zarr 

I Have Some Questions for You, Rebecca Makkai 

Honestly Elliott, Gillian McDunn  

Raven’s Gate, Anthony Horowitz 

A Shadow on the Wall, Jonathan Aycliffe 

Always Look on the Bright Side of Life, Eric Idle 

Fruiting Bodies, Brian Lumley 

Heroes, Stephen Fry 

Journey into Fear, Eric Ambler 

Travels with my Aunt, Graham Greene 

Incidents Around the House, Josh Malerman 

Hannah Green and Mundane Existence, Michael Marshall Smith 

The Shining, Stephen King  

Salem’s Lot, Stephen King 

Our Man in Havana, Graham Greene 

Mary Poppins, P L Travers 

Swanna in Love, Jennifer Belle 

Sirens & Muses, Antonia Angress 

Riverside Villa Murders, Kingsley Amis 

House of Last Resort, Christopher Golden 

Gabriel’s Moon, William Boyd 

Secret Keeper, Susan Lewis 

Hidden Fires, Sairish Hussain  

As Young as This, Roxy Dunn 

Good Sister, Sally Hepworth 

Girls of Riyadh, Rajaa Alsanea 

Selected Campbell 

Selected Poe 

Selected M R James 

The Other Passenger, John Keir Cross 

The Lottery and Other Stories, Shirley Jackson 

The Illustrated Man, Ray Bradbury 

Lost Stories, Daphne du Maurier  

Dark Tales, Shirley Jackson 

Stories, edited by Gaiman and Sarrantonio 

Selected MMS 

Everything That Rises Must Converge, Flannery O’Connor 

Book of Blood , Clive Barker 

Book of Blood , Clive Barker 

A Spot of Folly, Ruth Rendell 

Selected Aickman 

Selected Rendell  

Judgement in Stone, Ruth Rendell 

Selected Wodehouse 

The Gropes, Tom Sharpe 

Blott on the Landscape, Tom Sharpe 

Wilt, Tom Sharpe 

Wilt Inheritance, Tom Sharpe 

The Lover, Amanda Brookfield 

The Other Woman, Amanda Brookfield 

Make Death Love Me, Ruth Rendell 

After Leaving Mr Mackenzie, Jean Rhys  

Lake of Darkness, Ruth Rendell 

Brighton Rock, Graham Greene 

A Severed Head, Iris Murdoch 

A Family Man, Amanda Brookfield 

Clues into Disappearance of my Sister, Joyce Carol Oates 

The Keep, Jennifer Egan 

Power and the Glory, Graham Greene 

A Man Lay Dead, Ngaio Marsh 

Tigerlily’s Orchids, Ruth Rendell 

Fraud, Anita Brookner  

Sweetheart Sweetheart, Bernard Taylor 

The Godsend, Bernard Taylor 

Diver’s Clothes Lie Empty, Vendela Vida 

The Veteran, Frederick Forsyth 

The Afghan, Frederick Forsyth 

The Carter of Providence, George Simenon 

Crossing Place, Elly Griffiths 

Winds from Further West, Alexander McCall Smith 

This Sweet Sickness, Patricia Highsmith 

A Dark-Adapted Eye, Barbara Vine  

No Comebacks, Frederick Forsyth 

Reader I Buried Them, Peter Lovesey 

Eight Perfect Murders, Peter Swanson 

Cakes and Ale, Somerset Maugham 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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