Hope by Pope Francis
This cradle-to-pontifical-throne autobiography covers everything from the Pope’s Italian roots, Argentinian childhood and his rise to modern crises in Ukraine and the Middle East. It also asks big questions around sexuality, the environment and the role of the church in today’s fractured world. His reflections reveal something of the man at the heart of the Vatican.
Viking, 14 January
We Do Not Part by Han Kang
Han Kang’s fiction is always richly evocative and this book, with events taking place in a snowstorm and spurred by a race against time, showcases the skills that won her the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature. In it, the obligations of friendship combine with a quest and a dark episode from South Korea’s past.
Hamish Hamilton, 6 February
World Builders: Technology and the New Geopolitics by Bruno Maçães
As readers of the New Statesman will know, Bruno Maçães has an insightful take on the modern world. In this book he argues that the “geo” in geopolitics is changing shape. Where once international relations were predicated on physical spheres of influence, they are now contested through technological innovation and control.
Cambridge University Press, 13 February
The City Changes Its Face by Eimear McBride
The city of the title is London and the environs of Camden are where the relationship between 19-year-old Eily and 39-year-old Stephen plays out. McBride is a subtle student of desire and in this sequel to The Lesser Bohemians she examines how love fares with the passing of time and the intrusion of the everyday.
Faber & Faber, 13 February
Get In by Patrick Maguire and Gabriel Pogrund
The Times political journalists here offer a well-briefed account of the transformation of the Labour Party and a narrative of its tumultuous first 100 days in power. Keir Starmer may by the figurehead but for the authors the lead character is his strategist Morgan McSweeney.
Bodley Head, 13 February
Minority Rule by Ash Sarkar
In her timely book, the political commentator Ash Sarkar addresses the fear that minorities are trying to overturn and oppress majority populations. She argues that much of the noise around the culture wars obscures who is really profiting from our distracted societies.
Bloomsbury, 27 February
Dream Count by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
It has been more than ten years since Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s last novel (Americanah, 2013), and this overdue return is a story of four women in America and Nigeria struggling with the choices they have made and those that have been forced on them.
Fourth Estate, 4 March
Cry When the Baby Cries by Becky Barnicoat
This magazine’s regular cartoonist Becky Barnicoat is a droll observer of the modern condition and in this graphic memoir she turns her gaze to the mysteries of parenting. Yes, it is an important business but more often it is just messy and bewildering.
Jonathan Cape, 13 March
The Last Bell by Donald McRae
Donald McRae, a long-term adherent of and writer about boxing, looked to the sport for solace in the face of personal tragedy. Here, following the world’s best pugilists, he describes not just bouts but how the ring encompasses a multitude of emotions and lessons.
Simon & Schuster, 13 March
The Age of Diagnosis by Suzanne O’Sullivan
We are, says the Wellcome Book Prize-winning writer and doctor, Suzanne O’Sullivan, over-medicalised. The screening advances of modern medicine can reveal pathologies that may never in fact materialise and risk turning healthy people into patients.
Hodder & Stoughton, 18 March
How to Think About AI by Richard Susskind
We know that artificial intelligence is already changing the world but how, and whether for good or ill, remains confusing to most. This primer outlines both ways to think about AI now and how its development might impact the future.
Oxford University Press, 20 March
When the Going Was Good by Graydon Carter
For 25 years, the Canadian Graydon Carter was the editor of Vanity Fair. Its combination of high-quality writing and photography and sassy stories made it top of the magazine pile. In this memoir he describes how he got there, what he did and who he met.
Grove, 27 March
John and Paul: A Love Story in Songs by Ian Leslie
The much picked-over relationship between Lennon and McCartney – an amalgam of love, need and resentment – is here dissected by Ian Leslie. Whether in the Beatles or apart, the constant between them, he says, is that they spoke to each other through songs.
Faber & Faber, 27 March
Hayek’s Bastards by Quinn Slobodian
The historian and author of Crack-Up Capitalism unpicks the rise of the alt-right. It was, he argues, neoliberals who developed a creed of “hardwired human nature, hard borders, and hard money” that brought the hard right to prominence.
Allen Lane, 15 April
Don’t Forget We’re Here Forever by Lamorna Ash
Lamorna Ash was vaguely aware of Christianity until the conversion of two friends made her look more closely at a resurgence in belief among a younger generation. In this book she interviews others who have found faith and probes her own religious stirrings.
Bloomsbury, 8 May
Ocean by David Attenborough and Colin Butfield
We should be looking to the sea, say the latter-day saint and his long-time collaborator, because conserving it is the key to continued life on Earth. The authors survey each of the world’s oceans, their inhabitants and the scientific advances that can safeguard them.
John Murray, 8 May
The Boys by Leo Robson
Leo Robson, a literary critic for publications including the New Statesman, puts himself on the line with his debut novel. Comedy and tenderness entwine as Johnny Voghel seeks to re-establish a relationship with his estranged half-brother Lawrence at the height of the 2012 London Olympics.
Quercus, 8 May
Mark Twain by Ron Chernow
A belt-and-braces life of America’s first literary celebrity. Ron Chernow, whose biography of Alexander Hamilton was adapted into the hit musical, has much to work with – Twain was a journalist, political pundit and performer as well as an author.
Allen Lane, 13 May
Helm by Sarah Hall
Sarah Hall has long put nature at the heart of her fiction and in this book the central character is wind. Known as Helm, this gust has blown down the Eden Valley for millennia and fascinated or frightened its inhabitants from Neolithic tribesmen to a modern meteorologist.
Faber & Faber, 5 June
It Used to Be Witches by Ryan Gilbey
Well known to NS readers as a film critic, Ryan Gilbey offers a personal examination of queer cinema in which he interviews directors and scrutinises films such as Brokeback Mountain – both in the spirit of celebration and to ask if film has the power to change attitudes.
Faber & Faber, 5 June
The Genius Myth by Helen Lewis
Genius, says the always thought-provoking Helen Lewis, is both an overused term and a little understood one. In this book she looks at everything from Leonardo da Vinci and Elon Musk to IQ tests to probe what it really means – and why we are in its thrall.
Jonathan Cape, 19 June
Memoir by Nicola Sturgeon
In this “deeply personal” book, the former Scottish first minister reveals the workings of the big events of her political life – the formation of an SNP government, the independence referendum, Brexit, Covid and the fractious events that saw her leave Holyrood.
Title to be announced, Pan Macmillan, 14 August
Sequel to Wild Swans by Jung Chang
It is now 34 years since the publication of Wild Swans, Jung Chang’s account of her family’s repression during the Cultural Revolution. The promised sequel will cover her life from 1978, when she arrived in England to study linguistics, as well as observations on Xi Jinping’s China.
Title to be announced, William Collins, autumn
1929: Inside the Crash by Andrew Ross Sorkin
Andrew Ross Sorkin, author of Too Big to Fail, has turned his attention to the greatest economic failure of all – the Wall Street Crash of 1929. This promises to be a forensic account of the key economics, events and personalities as well as the global ramifications that followed.
Allen Lane, October
Dead and Alive by Zadie Smith
In this thoughtful collection of essays, Zadie Smith ranges across the cultural landscape, thinking deeply about such disparate subjects as Stormzy’s Glastonbury set and Hilary Mantel’s death, the quiet paintings of Celia Paul and the meaning of the young Michael Jackson.
Hamish Hamilton, October
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