The best recent translated fiction – review roundup
The Ferryman and His Wife by Frode Grytten; Woman in the Pillory by Brigitte Reimann; Iran+100, edited by various; Sea Now by Eva Meijer
Bog People: A Working-Class Anthology of Folk Horror review – dark tales with a sting
This collection of macabre stories set across England explores class, hierarchy and the enduring nature of inequality
The Rot by Evelyn Araluen review – headlong language and bitter truths imbued with tenderness
Award-winning poet offers seductive beauty, deadly analyses, desolations and joys in the follow-up to her acclaimed debut Dropbear
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy review – flimsy extravaganza needs deeper thought
The madcap sci-fi tale is retold on a lavish scale, complete with in-show merch, but it never really blasts off
The Little Mermaid review – underwater wonders cast a spell in mid-air
A fresh telling of Hans Christian Andersen’s story deploys circus skills and inventive design to create a memorable merworld
Luigi: The Making and the Meaning by John H Richardson review – sympathy for a devil?
This nebulous study of Luigi Mangione veers close to romanticising him as a latter-day Robin Hood
The Matchbox Girl by Alice Jolly review – horror, humanity and Dr Asperger
The reader grapples with fascism and complicity through the eyes of a mute autistic girl being treated during the second world war
Service by John Tottenham review – comic confessions of a grumpy bookseller
Working in a bookshop while failing to write a novel, the narrator admits to being a ‘living cliche’ in this bitter black comedy
Slow Poison by Mahmood Mamdani review – can you really rehabilitate Idi Amin?
The anthropologist and father of New York’s mayor-elect offers a revisionist view of modern Ugandan history
The School of Night by Karl Ove Knausgård review – can this sprawling epic deliver on its promise?
In the fourth volume of the occult Morning Star cycle, a Faustian pact haunts a misanthropic artist who finds miraculous success
Crick: A Mind in Motion by Matthew Cobb review – the charismatic philanderer who changed science
Genius and arrogance play leading roles in a new biography of the man who helped uncover the structure of DNA
The Firework-Maker’s Daughter review – Philip Pullman’s fairytale is explosive fun
This spellbinding adaptation uses a bulging dramatic toolbox of clever effects and manages to be both epic and intimate
Primitive War review – it’s Green Berets vs dinosaurs in cheerfully cheesy Vietnam war gorefest
Set to an on-the-nose soundtrack of Creedence Clearwater, an elite squad of soldiers are suitably unprepared for their large-toothed assailants in this jungle thriller
Holbein: Renaissance Master by Elizabeth Goldring review – a magnificent portrait of the artist
The first scholarly biography in more than 100 years of the man who immortalised the Tudor court does not disappoint
Children and teens roundup – the best new picture books and novels
The return of Charlie and Lola; the second lives of trees; the dangers of time travel; a YA Bluebeard retelling and more