Glorious. There is such personal and political outrage about the world. But what makes it feel like a Real Story, one that will be found and enjoyed and dreamed about for years to come, is Dhikilo, a fabulous heroine and a real person on the page. Her adventure and bravery as she attempts to restore a missing letter to the world is beautifully written and delightfully told. I loved it

In this rather ebullient and lovely new novel by Michel Faber ... older children and fully-grown adults will certainly find much to relish in it

Michel Faber never fails to tell his story with wit, intelligence and charm

Part affectionate homage, part exhuberant fan fiction, YA readers will love it, but Faber's brio and bubbly ingenuity will delight adult readers too

Dazzling

A firecracker of a novel

If ever a book like this was needed, it is now. Dhikilo is a splendid heroine for our time: She stands for kindness, honesty and humanity. Her triumph will have readers rejoicing

Testament to his storytelling gift and to the charm and the warmth of his writing

The deadpan style makes this more funny than scary. Faber's acknowledged debt to James Thurber's O is clear. It's very enjoyable

Boyd's writing is as fluent as ever but it's the ideas pulsing beneath the surface that distinguish Trio

Trio is an intricate set of variations on the idea of alternative selves, well beyond the title's trio, unobtrusively elegant in its formal beauty

Sending an affably satiric shimmer over the ceaseless rewrites, grotesque miscastings and behind-the-scenes chicanery, William Boyd simultaneously explores deeper issues of duplicity and divided personality

Ngugi wa Thiong'o's first venture into epic poetry is a triumph of the form, which resounds with the lyrical heartbeat of the Gikuyu people in Kenya as Ngugi chronicles their mythic history.

A tremendous writer... it's hard to doubt the power of the written word when you hear the story of Ngugi wa Thiong’o

In his crowded career and eventful life, Ngugi has enacted, for all to see, the paradigmatic trials and quandaries of a contemporary African writer, caught in sometimes implacable political, social, racial and linguistic currents

Ngugi masterfully sings us through an origin story written in verse. This book is a magisterial and poetic tale about women's place in a society of Gods. It is also about disability and how expectations shape and determine characters' spiritual anchoring.

[The Perfect Nine's] sophistication comes from the use of the narrative voice, which positions the reader as part of a common humanity

A wonderful book ... done with a gorgeous twist of humour and great emotional insight ... One of my books of the year

Exquisite ... One of the funniest writers in Ireland

Immensely readable, warm, human and very, very funny

Pixies were loud-quiet-loud. Patrick Freyne is funny-sad-funny. I really loved his new book

Readers are sure to find themselves touched by Freyne's writing ... Delightful

Freyne's thoroughly entertaining debut is a flash of warmth and wit in the darkness

Genuinely moving ... [It] will evoke warmth in anyone who isn't totally sociopathic

A delightful insight into the mind of the hilarious Patrick Freyne

So honest, so funny, and most importantly, 11/10 for self-deprecation

Brilliant ... An absolute mind hug

Freyne's radar is precision-honed to find the madness within the mundane

More moving that I ever expected and somehow funnier than I assumed

Captivating and moving.

Moving... Beneath the attention-seeking is a well-loved author who has gone through his cupboards, giving us all that he has.

A defiant and witty testimony to mortality and a tender remembrance of his friends and literary heroes… I’ve been reading and re-reading it this year

Continues in the same superior vein as Restoration… The fusion of such an engrossing character, and the minutiae of another time, remains a marvel

In this evocative and beautifully drawn novel of family and loyalty in the face of an uncertain future Tremain continues the story of a wonderfully unique character

Hugely enjoyable

Merivel’s hapless charm remains intact in this tour de force of literary technique

A sequel that looks back to the earlier novel without ever quite recapturing its spirit is the perfect form in which to evoke that feeling of having to carry on, and of trying to make yourself have fun even with it eventually begins to hurt

A marvelllously rollicking good read, and it is such a pleasure to meet Robert Merivel again. Rose Tremain brings the character to life in a way that makes you want to find out even more about the period. Enormously skilled and deft