Gliff by Ali Smith review – a warning from the near future
The author of the seasonal quartet projects her exceptional state-of-the-nation storytelling on to a dystopian tale of a brutal Britain run by totalitarian forces
Tell Me Everything by Elizabeth Strout review – characters that never grow old
Olive Kitteridge and Lucy Barton return, the former now in a retirement community, in the author’s understated but hugely rewarding study of small-town life
Time of the Child by Niall Williams review – sublime tale of small-town Irish life
An abandoned baby changes the lives of a doctor and his daughter in a beautifully written novel about second chances and familial love
In brief: Powsels and Thrums; By Any Other Name; The Politics of Time – review
An evocative collection of writings from the great Alan Garner; a frenetic tale of literary misogyny featuring Shakespeare’s ‘Dark Lady’; and a progressive new way to look at work and time
Karla’s Choice: A John le Carré Novel by Nick Harkaway review – the Circus is back in town
John le Carré’s son does him proud in an excellent spy thriller about a Soviet agent that faithfully bridges two of his father’s classic tales
American author Joy Williams: ‘The comfy story has got to change’
The novelist and short story writer on her new book about Azrael, the angel of death, her encounters with Raymond Carver and Richard Yates, and why fiction should be uncanny
‘There was eye-watering fear’: John le Carré’s son on writing a new George Smiley novel
Nick Harkaway was a successful novelist in his own right when his brothers asked him to continue their late father’s spy series. Could he pull it off? Plus an exclusive extract from his novel, Karla’s Choice
Nobody’s Empire by Stuart Murdoch review – Belle and Sebastian and me
Life inspires art in the debut novel by the Belle and Sebastian songwriter, tracing a young man’s path to music
Reader stumbles on Dracula’s ancestors in a Dublin library
The unknown Bram Stoker story Gibbet Hill, published soon before the author began working on Dracula, has eerie echoes of his vampire classic
The best recent crime and thrillers – review roundup
The Drowned by John Banville; The Blue Hour by Paula Hawkins; Midnight and Blue by Ian Rankin; A Case of Matricide by Graeme Macrae Burnet; The Burning Stones by Antti Tuomainen
Karl Ove Knausgård: ‘The book that changed me as a teenager? The History of Bestiality’
The Norwegian author on the magic of Ursula K LeGuin, returning to Virginia Woolf, and the insight of Jorge Luis Borges
As a middle-aged man, I would’ve saved loads on therapy if I’d read Baby-Sitters Club books as a kid
Boys weren’t exposed to emotionally intelligent characters in the books marketed to us. I won’t let my son be a victim of the same social taboo
The Burrow by Melanie Cheng review – a tender, compelling story of family and grief
A small family tries to rebuild after an incomprehensible tragedy, in a pandemic-set novella that’s both skilful and restrained
Where to start with: Alan Garner
As the master of myth and fantasy turns 90 today it’s a good time to look at his wide ranging canon, from Booker-nominated novels to children’s fiction, poetry and essays
Colored Television by Danzy Senna review – race as performance
A novelist from Brooklyn tries to make it in LA in this artful tale of ambition and identity