Children and teens roundup – the best new picture books and novels
An imposter monkey, an underworld princess, art’s female trailblazers, and YA tales of fear, family and friendship
The Body Builders by Albertine Clarke review – a compelling debut of mental meltdown
A young woman’s dissociation from reality and her road to recovery are vividly rendered in this striking novel
Mantle by Romy Ash review – an exquisitely wild and exhilarating vision of the near future
Thirteen years after her celebrated debut, the author returns with a bizarre, evocative work that merges science and the surreal
The Waves review – superb staging of Virginia Woolf’s deep dive into friendship
Deft production follows six friends as they morph from truth-blurting children into weary midlifers in effortless and capable performances
A Family Matter by Claire Lynch audiobook review – an award-winning story of homophobia and divorce
Dual timelines reveal the real reason a mother was forced to leave her daughter in the 80s, in this Nero prize-winning novel inspired by real-life events
Double Indemnity review – leaden drama turns crime classic into a very cold case
James M Cain’s hard-bitten novella gained bleak power on screen but this version, giving Mischa Barton her UK stage debut, loses its flinty edge
The Asset Class by Hettie O’Brien review – the hidden hand of private equity
From utilities to care homes, how capital’s most rapacious form yet is taking over the public realm
The Wonderful World that Almost Was by Andrew Durbin review – the queer artists who shaped New York cool
A tender but unflinching account of Peter Hujar and Paul Thek, forgotten stars of the 1960s scene
The Shadow of the Object by Chloe Aridjis review – one of the boldest writers at work in English today
This fable-like novella about technologies of illusion and a life-changing friendship in Mexico City is enchanting
Hotel Exile by Jane Rogoyska review – the remarkable story of a wartime institution
From haven for intellectuals fleeing Hitler to the HQ of the feared Abwehr, the changing fortunes of a Parisian icon
See You on the Other Side by Jay McInerney review – the clumsy finale of a classic New York series
The bright young things of 1992’s Brightness Falls are now in their 60s in this verbose, clunky novel that seems more interested in lifestyle than inner lives
Ghost Stories by Siri Hustvedt review – life after Paul Auster
What’s it like to lose your partner of more than 40 years? The novelist and essayist reflects on going from ‘we’ to ‘I’
Primavera review – Vivaldi’s Four Seasons is school-of-Salieri backdrop for period musical biopic
The composer has a musical relationship with a teenage violinist in this lifeless adaptation of a novel by Tiziano Scarpa
The Illuminated Man by Christopher Priest and Nina Allan review – an unconventional portrait of JG Ballard
The biographer’s terminal illness and death is woven into this original and moving account of Ballard and his work
Son of Nobody by Yann Martel review – Life of Pi author discovers a long-lost poem from Troy
An epic poem about the Trojan war is merged with the domestic heartbreak of the scholar who discovers it in this ambitious, structurally problematic novel