To celebrate the National Year of Reading and my books of the year since my early reading life, I bring this up to date. Here are the 2020s.
2020 The Last Laugh by Michael Holroyd
Shaw’s afterlife, where there’s a will… A fascinating codicil to Holroyd’s masterful multi-volume biography of Shaw.
2021 Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell
Magical evocation of Shakespeare’s world during a pandemic. Just read it.
2022 To Paradise by Hanya Yanagihara
Gender recastings of Henry James’s Washington Square in 1893, 1993 and 2093.
2023 The Fraud by Zadie Smith
Who is the fraud? Tichborne claimant? Ainsworth? Dickens? Take your pick! A great period drama from a brilliant writer.
2024 The Children’s Book by AS Byatt
Kill your darlings: author’s babies are their books, not their children.
2025 Bewilderment by Richard Powers
Grieving dad and autistic son wonder if there is a Planet B…
Alex White writes 
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