It’s the time of year when a bookblogger turns to their list of books and tries to wrangle a top ten list together. This year I’ve read more books than ever before, so we’re back to the ‘here are some of my favourites’ list.
Kicking off with one I read in 2022 (hey, it’s my list, I can do what I like)
Children of the Sun, by Beth Lewis [Hodder, March 2023]
One of my all-time favourite authors, Beth Lewis has given us some incredible books. The Wolf Road is just stunning, and last year’s The Origins of Iris was wonderful. Dark, raw and startlingly original, it will linger long in the memory after you turn the last page. It took me a while to recover myself after reading. Children of the Sun is an incredible book about cults and family and belief and loss. Lewis’s writing is, as ever, just beautiful. Hugely recommended.
Moving onto 2023, we started the year with
End of Story, by Louise Swanson [Hodder, March 2023]
Oh, this book is amazing. Loved Louise’s earlier books (writing as Louise Beech), this is her first foray into a dystopian sci-fi. 2035 and fiction has been banned. Writing novels is a crime. Reading stories to children is punishable by law. The writing is beautiful, the setting is horrific, and it finishes with an ending that’ll leave you stunned. Hugely recommended.
Needless Alley, by Natalie Marlow [Baskerville, January 2023]
From a dystopian future to Birmingham, 1933. William Garret, private enquiry agent, specialises in helping men with divorces, but it all goes awry when he meets the beautiful Clara, the wife of one of his clients. Gloriously gritty Brummie Noir. A hugely impressive debut, and one which I highly recommend.
The Devil Takes You Home – Gabino Iglesias [Mulholland, 2022]
Utterly stunning. A father takes a job as a hitman to save his daughter and goes on a journey into darkness. Dark and bleak, but breathtakingly good. Not for the faint-hearted, but when I finished it, I knew that it would be top of my books of the year list, and I was only eight days into the year. It’s THAT good. If you read one from this list, read this one.
Games for Dead Girls – Jen Williams [HarperVoyager, March 2023]
Huuuge fan of Jen Williams’ books, so very excited to get my hands on an ebook proof of Games for Dead Girls. Played out over dual timelines, a macabre game in the past turned into tragedy, whilst present-day Charlotte returns to the caravan park to research local folklore and uncover the secrets of what went on all those years ago. Stitch-faced Sue is a fantastically spooky creation that will linger long after you’ve finished. Just hope she doesn’t come for you…
Grave Danger/Grave Suspicions – Alice James [Solaris, 2023]
Murder and mayhem with everyone’s favourite estate agent by day, necromancer by night, Lavington ‘Toni’ Windsor. These books are funny, dark, gory, a love story with a side order of whodunnit. What more could you want? Hugely recommended, if you hadn’t guessed.
All Of Us Are Broken – Fiona Cummins [Macmillan, July 2023]
The short version is simply this: Go buy a copy. Brace yourself, for you are not ready for what is about to unfold. Read it, take a deep breath, then tell all of your friends. Quite simply, it’s her best book yet. And those other books, my friends, are really bloody good.
Beautiful Shining People – Michael Grothaus [Orenda Books, April 2023]
Beautiful Shining People is a book that just wraps itself around you and refuses to let go. Part love story, albeit an unusual one, meshed in literary science fiction. Like the title, this story is beautiful, the characters shine and you watch entranced as they come together, each with their own secrets and past, each trying to figure out where and how they fit in this strange new world. It’s a world of superpowers battling with deepfakes and AIs rather than conventional weapons. Of quantum computing and how it’ll change our society. Of Big Corporations and whether they’re good or bad. And how humanity is dealing with all of this.
Blacktop Wasteland – S.A. Cosby [Headline, 2020]
It’s an exploration of character and family, but also of place, with the sweltering heat of rural Virgina oozing off the page. It’s also very gritty and graphic in places, and the story moves as fast as Bug’s superior driving skills. Combining heart in your mouth action scenes with heart-rending, moving moments with Bug’s family, Blacktop Wasteland is brilliant. Short and perfect, and a book I will pester you to read. This is me pestering you to read it.
The Associate – Victoria Goldman [Three Crowns Publishing, September 2023]
Goldman has followed up her excellent debut with another great installment of the Shanna Regan mysteries. Long may the series continue. As with book 1, The Redeemer, there’s a strong theme exploring Jewish identity and life here, and it’s fascinating to see this side of the community. Not something I’m familiar with, and not something I’ve seen much of in crime fiction. It’s interwoven throughout the novel, and I really enjoyed the twists and turns that Goldman throws into the narrative.
The Only Truly Dead – Rob Parker [Audible, 2023]
The first two books in Rob Parker’s superb Thirty Miles trilogy were (and indeed are) superb. Book three just cranks the dials hard over to eleven and beyond. Proper edge of your seat stuff, the stakes have been raised and no-one is safe.
I really can’t recommend this book highly enough. Warren Brown (DI Ripley from Luther) is back for a third turn at narration duties and elevates what is already a superb story to stratospheric heights. The first book accompanied me on dog walks, the second on the college drop off and pickup, but book three was with me in every spare minute I had. Utterly brilliant, hugely recommended.
All The Little Liars – Victoria Selman
Deliciously dark tale of secrets and lies, toxic relationships. A young girl goes missing from a party by a lake. But did her friends kill her? Told across two timelines, this is Selman on fine form. Absolute edge-of-your-seat stuff!
Nice round dozen to get you started! Stay tuned for part 2…
espresso coco
Hey, I’ve actually read a couple of these! I’ve loved every S.A. Cosby book I’ve read (although I still haven’t gotten to his latest). Razorblade Tears slightly edges out Blacktop Wasteland in my estimation, but not by much.
I thought The Only True Dead was a slight drop off in quality from the first two books–mainly because I think there are some incongruities between it and the first two books–but still quite good and the trilogy overall is excellent.