The best recent crime and thrillers – review roundup

The Book of the Most Precious Substance by Sara Gran; A World of Curiosities by Louise Penny; This Train by James Grady; Urgent Matters by Paula Rodríguez; Dalziel and Pascoe Hunt the Christmas Killer & Other Stories by Reginald Hill

Wild by Amy Jeffs audiobook review – otherworldly tales from medieval Britain

The author’s folksongs add a new dimension to these evocative short stories inspired by objects and texts from medieval times

The Peckham Experiment by Guy Ware review – a tale of idealism and decline

‘Housing is at the heart of everything’: the shadow of Grenfell looms over an engaging, deeply impressive novel about utopian aims in London’s building history

Salonika Burning by Gail Jones review – wartime novel feels miraculously fresh

Jones takes four famous figures who served in Thessaloniki during the first world war and imagines how their stories could have overlapped

Power Failure by William D Cohan review – pulling the plug

General Electric was a 20th-century industrial empire. What caused it to fall apart?

Cocoon by Zhang Yueran review – families warped by the state

China’s generational trauma and the long shadow of the Cultural Revolution are brought into the light in this precise and gripping novel

The Madness by Fergal Keane review – the BBC correspondent on conflict, fear and PTSD

A brutally honest exploration of the ethics and motivations of war reporters, and of Keane’s own demons

Confess, Fletch review – Jon Hamm wisecracks through screwball mystery

Greg Mottola’s amiable film rattles along with a host of wacky characters and Hamm’s more sophisticated portrayal of Irvin Fletcher

The Ghost Variations by Damian Lanigan review – the power of the piano

The constraining and consoling effects of music are compellingly explored in this novel about a bereaved pianist

Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing by Matthew Perry review – being Chandler Bing

The sitcom star’s fascinating, gruesome tale of addiction and how he kept the show on the road

The Singularities by John Banville review – inside a murderer’s underworld

Banville’s characters are in flight from the crimes of the past in an eerie, playful synthesis of his previous novels

Children’s and teens roundup – the best new chapter books

Blockbuster authors Cressida Cowell and Robin Stevens introduce new series, while SF Said returns with a tremendous counterfactual thriller

The Climate Book, created by Greta Thunberg review – an angry call for action

The environmental activist curates a supergroup of climate experts in a valuable set of essays, which at times risk overwhelming the reader

The Light We Carry by Michelle Obama review – lessons in life

The former first lady’s new book is a manifesto for thriving in a world that too often says you aren’t good enough

Douglas Stuart: Love, Hope and Grit review – the amazing real life story of Shuggie Bain is ruined by Alan Yentob

The Booker-winning author takes a squirming Yentob on a tour of Glasgow, and he couldn’t be more out of his comfort zone. Just wait till they go to a sweet shop!