Inventive...Ybarra brings us through the process with the objectivity and forensic eye of a true crime writer, allowing glimpses of poignancy... the mother's grace and courage in the face of death is captured by her daughter... The writing sparkles throughout... Ybarra has done herself and her family proud in a story that is full of light and shade.

[A] lucid dissection of political violence and open secrets.

Intriguing and sharp.

This autobiographical novel is one of the most fascinating debuts of this year.

An absorbing thriller that had me digging into the history behind this tale as soon as I’d read the last page . . . Her descriptions of the land are movingly beautiful, but there is danger even here.

Like The Revenant but with an insistent supernatural whisper. The setting and the story are utterly chilling. And the telling of it is so well done.

Beautiful, lyrical, utterly grounded in the land, and the people, this is the best - and scariest - story I’ve read this year.

The story she writes of human failings and despair is so powerful and so well written . . . Her account of the pioneers’ dawning realisation that pressing on, staying still and turning back all mean death is hauntingly good.

Alma Katsu's accomplished, engrossing novel weaves a cocoon of supernatural horror around historical tragedy . . . it is a beautifully intense read.

In an audacious twist, Alma Katsu has made something new and suspenseful from the legendary story of the Donner Party. The Hunger is filled with terror, pity, and grue.

Alma Katsu has taken one of the darkest and most chilling episodes in our history, and made the story even darker, even more terrifying. I swear I'm still shuddering. A fantastic read!

The Hunger is a bold and brilliant novel, heavy with foreboding and dread, and with a rich vein of humanity at its core. I challenge you to read it without experiencing your own hunger pangs.

The Revenant by way of The Walking Dead and it works.

A terrific historical novel with a thrilling, bloody twist. Alma Katsu’s brilliant reimagining of the Donner Party’s fate is rich with character, laden with imminent doom, and propelled by chilling mystery. A novel that book clubs and dark fiction fans should devour with equal relish.

Katsu injects the supernatural into this brilliant retelling of the ill-fated Donner Party . . . fans of Dan Simmons’s The Terror will find familiar and welcome chills.

A riveting drama of power struggles and shifting alliances . . . the tensions [Katsu] creates are thrilling.

If you think the story of the Donner Party can’t get more horrific, think again. In this gripping, atmospheric reimagining of that dark tale, Katsu has created a deeply unsettling and truly terrifying masterpiece.

Amgash, Illinois, will be familiar to Elizabeth Strout fans as the hometown of the protagonist of her 2016 novel, My Name is Lucy Barton. In Anything is Possible... Lucy's legend looms large... but no prior reading is required to enjoy Strout's powerful writing and empathy

We devoured Strout's last novel, My Name Is Lucy Barton, and her latest-which is loosely linked to Lucy Barton-is no different. Told from multiple points of view, it's about residents of a small town in Illinois struggling with the most relatable and quotidian problems... you'll swear you know these characters. (In fact, it reminds us a bit of another of Strout's masterpieces, the excellent Olive Kitteridge.)

Elizabeth Strout's prose is like words doing jazz

I am deeply impressed. Writing of this quality comes from a commitment to listening, from a perfect attunement to the human condition, from an attention to reality so exact that it goes beyond a skill and becomes a virtue.

A powerful storyteller immersed in the nuances of human relationships

Tender, elegiac, this is the story of a single life that also manages to tell the story of many

The writing is wrenchingly lovely. It almost always is with Strout, whether she's knitting metaphors or summarizing, with agonizing economy, whole episodes.

There are not many novelists out there producing writing as good as this

Down to every sentence, it's wise, touching and quietly powerful

As always, Strout treats even the most difficult characters with rare understanding. "It made me feel much less alone," says on reader of Lucy's memoir. The same will surely be said of Anything Is Possible

Gorgeous... Strout is in that special company of writers like Richard Ford, Stewart O'Nan and Richard Russo, who write simply about ordinary lives and, in so doing, make us readers see the beauty of both their worn and rough surfaces and what lies beneath

Highly enjoyable

A subtle, disturbing and touching book that is a miracle of wisdom and perception

A beautifully told story of small-town Americans dealing with big life issues

Utterly beautiful in the way that these characters were flawed to their core yet brimful of keeping it together no matter what...I loved it, there wasn't a moment when I didn't believe it.

In all her novels, including this one, "the kindness of strangers is a fierce sun than can pierce the cloud"

Every chapter has depth, nuances, restrained descriptions and luminous characterisation. A wonder of a book

Elizabeth Strout is a novelist in whose hands anything really is possible, and if you've yet to discover her, make this holiday the one you do

This glimmering, profound, beautiful novel is modern American writing at its best'

Just as understated and as full of horrifyingly elisions and surprising epiphanies as its predecessor

This audacious novel is about small-town characters struggling to make sense of past family traumas

Strout turns her clear, incisive gaze on the intricacies and betrayals of small town life

Anything is Possible is predictably great because it's written by Elizabeth Strout, and brilliantly unpredictable - because it is written by Elizabeth Strout