2020: the year of self-isolation. Luckily, there have been lots of brilliant books to help along the way. I have been mainly relying on my iBooks account and reading PDFs of books kindly sent by publishers, rather than ordering hardcopies / being sent hardcopies  which has been (yet another!) different experience altogether. Alongside my rolling Book of the Month book reviews, here are some other truly fantastic books I have read this year:

Magpie Lane by Lucy Atkins

When the quiet and shy 8-year-old daughter of a new Oxford College Master goes missing, her nanny Dee finds herself being interviewed by the police. An absolutely fantastic book – page turning and beautifully written, so evocative of Oxford as a town. I didn’t want to put it down! The delivery of the story was masterful and the ending left me breathless. Highly, highly recommend. It will make you fall back in love with reading again if the stress of the year has disrupted your normal book-buying pattern.

The Shadow King by Maaza Mengiste

Hirut has recently been orphaned in Ethiopia, 1935. She finds work as a maid for her new employer, an army officer who is hurrying to mobilise his men before Mussolini’s men invade. A sensational book that will stay with you long after you have finished reading. It was shortlisted for the Booker Prize this year and I can absolutely see why: it is such a powerful story, beautifully told.

Sisters by Daisy Johnson

Sisters September and July are close. Indeed, they were born merely 10 months apart in their namesake months. They are different but July feels like she lives in the shadow of September and worships her. September, on the other hand, treats her sister with contempt and sometimes well-disguised cruelty (and with sometimes not-so-well-disguised meanness). September, we are told, takes after her father, Peter, who passed away when she was young. July and September’s mother muses on her daughters and their father: ‘Peter [was] buried like a broken bottle inside her child. Her child who was capable of manipulation and cruelty and who sometimes treated her sister like she was a receptacle, carried around, picked up and then put back down, everything poured into her.’ At just under 200 pages, it is a short but punchy read, slightly experimental in style, yet effortless to take in.

The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

The year is 1617 and we are plunged into the depths of Winter on a remote island off of Norway, into a fierce storm. Maren, a young woman, observes the men of the island perish in the harsh conditions, making the island of Vardo a place of women. A fantastic, richly descriptive book, beautiful yet chilling with such a convincing sense of place I had to remind myself that it’s fiction. Absolutely breathtaking. Well done, Kiran!

Pine by Francine Toon

For a chilling read of a different kind, Pine by Francine Toon is the one to pick up. Lauren and her father Niall live alone in the Highlands surrounded by a forest of pine, in a community where strange activity seems to be the norm. Utterly compelling and very eerie.

Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams

Queenie is 25, black, living in South London and working at a national newspaper surrounded by white, middle class men. A timely book in a year when Black Lives Matter has been at the heart of our stories and books, Queenie is an immensely readable novel, and thoroughly enjoyable. For fans of Bridget Jones!

The Golden Rule by Amanda Craig

If you’d like to enjoy an escapist read, then The Golden Rule is your best bet. Like the Hitchcock film ‘Strangers on a Train’, Hannah finds herself on a train to London sat next to Jinni and the two start to talk. Both are angry and bitter about their lives and their awful husbands and they make a deal to murder the other one’s (ex) loves. But, of course, things get complicated.

The Beatles and Beyond by Don Short

Naturally, my non-fiction choice! More info here.