2024 has so far been a great year for books. Whether you’re drawn to biography and memoir, historical fiction, science fiction or thrillers, there has been something for everything.
If you’re looking for inspiration for the beach or your long-haul flight this summer, look no further than your rundown of seven of the best books released in 2024 so far.
- The Ministry of Timeby Kaliane Bradley
Recently shortlisted for the Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize 2024, Bradley’s first novel is hard to categorise. It has been described as a time-travel love story, an espionage thriller, a workplace comedy, a commentary on the state of the nation, and – by Waterstones themselves – “disarmingly funny, and surprisingly sexy”.
The British government’s near-future Ministry of Time extracts historical figures from the past to test the limits of time travel. These “expats” are assigned a “bridge” to make the transition easier.
When our narrator becomes the bridge to Commander Gore, a nineteenth-century Royal Navy commander and polar explorer, feelings blossom. It’s a relationship that could uncover secrets at the very heart of this sinister government Ministry.
- The Demon of Unrest: A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil Warby Erik Larson
Whether uncovering the horrifying crimes of serial killers, chronicling the planning and building of the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, or tracing the invention of the telegram, Larson’s books all have traits in common.
Using meticulous research, he combines fact and fiction so that conversations from the historical record appear next to and within intricately plotted and fast-paced narratives.
In The Demon of Unrest, Larson tells the story of the five months after Abraham Lincoln’s election as president. Through diaries, secret communiques, and historical letters, follow Lincoln as he finds himself racing to avert a war that will ultimately cost 175,000 American lives.
- Anita de Monte Laughs Lastby Xochitl Gonzalez
The highly anticipated follow-up to Gonzales’ best-selling debut, Olga Dies Dreaming, this latest offering revolves around a New York wedding planner.
Tending to the whims of the ultra-rich in the wake of the 2008 global financial crisis, our protagonist Raquel’s story is intermingled with that of Anita de Monte.
De Monte was an up-and-coming figure in New York’s 80s art scene until she was found dead in 1985.
- In Ascensionby Martin MacInnes
MacInnes’s In Ascension was long-listed for the 2023 Booker Prize but was released in paperback earlier this year.
Managing to be both epic and surprisingly intimate, it’s a piece of speculative fiction that is huge in scope, both narratively and thematically.
We follow Rotterdam-born microbiologist Leigh as she embarks on a scientific mission aboard the Endeavour, tasked with studying a deep chasm in the Atlantic Ocean. When the trip is followed by the discovery of a kilometre-long object from deep space, now headed for Earth, Leigh’s work takes on galactic importance.
Alongside her new mission, Leigh must juggle her relationships at home, with both her sister and her ailing mother.
- My Friendsby Hisham Matar
Matar’s novel about the lifelong friendship of three Libyans’ life in Britain recently received the 2024 Orwell Prize for Political Fiction.
The story begins in 1984, during a demonstration outside the Libyan Embassy in London’s St James’s Square. When shots were fired from within the Embassy building, many were injured and a policewoman, Yvonne Fletcher was killed.
With this real-life event as a starting point, Matar follows three friends who were there that day, as the murder and its political fallout come to define their lives and relationships.
The meaning of friendship, the pain of otherness, and the isolation of exile will occupy our narrator Khaled Abd al Hady’s thoughts for the next 30 years.
- Whale Fallby Elizabeth O’Connor
When a whale washes up on a Welsh island in the lead-up to the second world war, the creature is only the first stranger to arrive upon the islanders’ shores.
When researchers follow, hoping to understand the lives and customs of this isolated community, our protagonist Manod is quickly enlisted as a guide and interpreter.
As tensions begin to grow between the islanders and their uninvited guests, a war of wills begins, between tradition and the inevitable march of progress.
- Knifeby Salman Rushdie
On 12 August 2022, Booker Prize-winning author Salman Rushdie was the victim of a murder attempt.
While speaking in New York, a knifeman rushed the stage and the attack that followed left the author fighting for his life. He lost an eye in the attack and the emotional scars remain.
The attack and its aftermath form the basis for Knife, an extraordinary new book about the human power to endure, that also doesn’t shy away from the grisly nature of the attack.
A courageous confrontation of a horrific event, it’s also a story of survival and triumph in the face of adversity.
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