Fiction for teenagers – reviews

First love, outcasts, a road trip and a dark, dystopian future feature in this month's psychologically engaging selection, writes Geraldine Brennan

The Opposite of Loneliness review – Marina Keegan’s life cut short

Keegan's posthumous collection of essays and stories shows a prodigious talent in full bloom, writes Lucy Scholes

Randall by Jonathan Gibbs review – ‘every bit as cute as the art it caricatures’

Jonathan Gibbs's satirical YBA-era debut marries fiction and art criticism without short-changing either, writes Anthony Cummins

The Night Guest review – an unsettling presence looms in Fiona McFarlane’s accomplished debut

The tiger, imagined or real, prowling the pages of this atmospheric novel throws into relief human fierceness and frailty, writes Anita Sethi

Summer House With Swimming Pool review – Herman Koch’s scalpel-like prose is a tonic for thriller fans

A film star on holiday with his doctor is pronounced dead, writes Anita Sethi, but was it medical error or murder?

The owl who liked sitting on Caesar by Martin Windrow – review

GrrlScientist: a gentle and moving memoir by a man who shared his seventh-floor London flat with an unlikely companion; a tawny owl

H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald – review

On training a falcon – the ruffian of the sky – and the life problems it can solve … By Mark Cocker

Here Come the Dogs by Omar Musa review — street poetry committed to the page

Rapper and slam poet Omar Musa examines race, identity and the unrealised dreams of disempowered Australian youths

American Innovations review – Rivka Galchen gets lost in her own mind

The debut collection from this promising author has some expertly controlled prose but slides into self-indulgence, writes David Wolf

The Emperor Waltz review – Philip Hensher leads us a merry dance

Hensher's foray into the portmanteau novel is full of character and colour – but it's a riddle of a book, writes Anthony Cummins

Bad Banks: Greed, Incompetence and the Next Global Crisis review – a rogues’ gallery of financial scandal

Alex Brummer's demolition job on the scandals of the last 10 years is a work of controlled menace, writes John Kampfner

Your Fathers, Where Are They? And the Prophets, Do They Live Forever? review – Dave Eggers’s accomplished hostage drama

A doubting Thomas kidnaps and interrogates significant people in his life in Eggers's ambitious novel, writes Edward Docx

Maidan, Portraits from the Black Square review – moving images of the Kiev protesters

Anastasia Taylor-Lind eschews reportage for quietly effective portraiture on the front line of the anti-government protests, writes Sean O'Hagan

Blazing Star: The Life and Times of John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester review – the wild man of the Restoration

The Earl of Rochester's highly candid poetry was mirrored by his anarchic life, says Ian Thomson

The Narrow Road to the Deep North review – Richard Flanagan’s powerful second world war novel

Flanagan's story of Australian PoWs forced by the Japanese to work on the Burma Railway is complex and masterful, writes Alex Preston