Sylvia Townsend Warner’s obscure forces
Sylvia Townsend Warner’s Lolly Willowes, published a century ago, is a powerful reverie on women’s interwar status
ByFiction reviews
Discover the best contemporary literature with the New Statesman’s expert reviews. From debut novels to short stories and literary veterans, get inspired here.
Paging Prime Minister Farage
A semi-fictional account predicting how a future Reform government would unfold is thrilling – and chilling
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Elizabeth Strout’s easy answers
In her novels, trauma is never far away – but her new book lays it on thick
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Ben Lerner has taken autofiction somewhere new
The American novelist’s new book is not truly about ego, or technology, but a more elusive and universal theme
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The fabrications of Albert Speer
The Nazi architect wrote his own self-exculpatory story – but what about his crimes?
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John Lanchester’s personal venom
John Lanchester’s new novel offers a darkly funny vision of bitter London professionals
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Colm Tóibín’s sounds of silence
In his latest collection of stories, Tóibín endows his characters with plenty of feelings but fewer words
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O Father, where art thou?
Literature still looks to the clergy for answers
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Brandon Taylor’s rebellious representations
Minor Black Figures novel depicts a black aesthete struggling to defy the fraught expectations of the art world
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The dark shadow of Palestinian exile
Hannah Lillith Assadi’s latest novel, Paradiso 17, draws on her father’s displacement
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Asako Yuzuki’s acquired taste
Butter author Asako Yuzuki’s latest novel offers clues about what is behind the vogue for Japanese fiction
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Time-travelling angels in the Blitz
Francis Spufford’s new novel Nonesuch combines WW2 and wizards
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James Meek’s broken Britain
The LRB essayist’s new novel draws from his reporting on a dysfunctional nation
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Dirty realism goes supernatural
The writer’s new novel Vigil suffers from its ambition
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Chomsky against Foucault against Dworkin – who cares?
Ideas overpower meaning in Sophie Ward’s packed novel
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The moral grammar of Daniyal Mueenuddin’s Pakistan
This Is Where the Serpent Lives depicts a world shaped by non-Western values
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Julian Barnes departs on his own terms
Departure(s) is the novelist’s moving and inventive final book
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Ali Smith’s infectious hope
For two pairs of sisters in her new novel Glyph, storytelling is a way of dealing with troubles past and…
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The best fiction to read this year
Despite the doomsters, novels continue to thrive. From Julian Barnes to Leïla Slimani, this will be a great 12 months…
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Joy Williams and humanity’s ultimate failure
The author’s new collection of short stories is haunted by animals – and by our failed stewardship of the natural…
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