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The Best Novels Of 2018 (So Far)
Including the true story of an army medic turned bank robber and a raw exploration of motherhood
By 
If, like the rest of the self-loathing world, you started the new year with the resolution to read more and not stare blankly into the black mirror of your phone screen at every given opportunity - come on in! The start of the year may be long gone but with summer here you'll be needing something to carry to and from the park and barely crack the spine of.
2018 has been a bumper year for fiction with excellent debuts from Hermione Hoby and Tommy Orange and awaited follow-ups from Sally Rooney and Patrick deWitt.
Nothing bad ever came from opening a book.
(Don't fact-check that.)
Neon In Daylight by Hermione Hoby
The debut novel from Guardian and New Yorker writer Hermione Hoby finds native Brit Kate in heatwave-struck New York where she meets two strangers, Bill and Inez, who she falls for in different ways and who pull her into the frantic rhythm of the city. A gorgeously vibrant story about the thrill and adventure of finding yourself in a new city.
The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock - Imogen Hermes Gower
Gossip spreads through the docks of Georgian London when a merchant's ship is traded for a mermaid. But their new-found popularity leads to an encounter that will doom his dazzling prize. With fascinating historical details, this debut from a gallery assistant has been compared to the likes of The Miniaturist and The Essex Serpent.
Asymmetry by Lisa Halliday
Asymmetry draws together two improbably linked stories: a young woman who starts an affair with a famous writer in New York and an Iraqi-American who is detained at Heathrow airport. In dazzling prose these worlds from opposite corners of the world collide and remind us what an accident of birth our fortunes in the world really are.
Hotel Silence by Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir
The Icelandic novelist’s fifth novel finds Jónas at a crossroads when his wife leaves him and he discovers his daughter isn’t his. But on arriving at the hotel where he plans to end his life he finds his attention absorbed with the needs and people of the hotel.
A dark comedy that deals with our darkest thoughts with deft humour, and boasts some surprisingly insightful truths about human nature. It also won the Icelandic Literary Prize in 2016.
Melody by Jim Crace
Described by The Guardian as, "a fable about grief, myth, music and persecution," Crace's follow-up to Booker shortlisted Harvest follows musician Alfred Busi whose grief for his late wife has left him confused and paranoid. After he is attacked by a strange creature he starts a campaign against the wastrels and paupers at the edge of the city, telling uncomfortable truths about persecution.
Red Clocks by Leni Zumas
Set in an imagined future America were abortion is illegal, IVF is banned and new legislation grants rights to every new embryo, five women suffer the consequences of the new world order with one put on trial in a crazed witch-hunt.
Like all great dystopian fiction it is most powerful when it reminds us how this world is not too far from our own. A fascinating drama which asks all too timely questions about women's rights to have control over their bodies and the pain they are subjected to when they cannot. A must-read for fans of The Handmaid’s Tale.
Upstate by James Wood
The nature vs nurture debate (and whether we can really blame our parents for everything) rages at the centre of this novel from literary critic James Wood. A father whose divorce has profoundly effected his two now grown-up daughters spends six frosty (in more ways than one) days in upstate New York with them. In Upstate Wood poses the question of why some people find living so much harder than others.
Census by Jesse Ball
Dedicated to Ball's late brother who suffered from Down's syndrome, Census follows a father and son who set out on a journey together when the former decides to become a census taker after discovering he doesn't have long to live. The reactions the ill son receives along the way are a profound insight into the judgement of strangers and the enduring love of family.
Dead Men's Trousers by Irvine Welsh
This August marks the 25th anniversary of Welsh's iconic novel Trainspotting. Fitting, then, that Renton, Begbie, Sick Boy and Spud will all return in a new story which takes a different route to the recent second film. Here Mark is an international jet-setter who, after encountering Begbie (now a successful artist) ends up drawn into the grim world of organ harvesting with his old comrades.
A Long Way From Home by Peter Carey
An Australian husband and wife and their friend take on the 10,000 mile Redex Trial car race in this dark adventure novel. On the way they encounter brutal racism in post-WWII Australia and the truth of the country's attitude toward its indigenous population. Twice Booker Prize winning author Peter Carey creates a rich melting pot of vivid characters and places that keep you racing down the road with them.
America Is Not The Heart by Elaine Castillo
Castillo’s debut novel has received high praise for it's colourful and moving depiction of a Filipino immigrant who arrives in America shellshocked and with two broken thumbs, hinting at the past she left behind.
Circe by Madeline Miller
Greek Titan and God of the sun Helios' daughter Circe is exiled to a foreign island for the way speaks and looks. There she finds company in mortals and exercises her witchcraft by turning enemies into monsters. Circe is an ancient journey into the characters of the Odyssey with timely wisdom about the suspicion and wrath female independence draws.
A Shout in the Ruins by Kevin Powers
Winner of the Guardian first book award for The Yellow Birds, Kevin Powers here tracks the Civil War and its aftermath from a plantation outside Richmond, Virginia where George Seldom watches the government destroying his hometown. A look at the painful legacy of the Civil War which asks how we can live in a world built on the suffering of others.
Warlight by Michael Ondaatje
The esteemed author of The English Patient conjures a hushed world of shadows in dark war-time London. We follow Nathaniel, an archivist with the Foreign Office, as he recollects his adolescent years when his parents mysteriously left him and his sister with a mysterious lodger.
There There by Tommy Orange
12 characters lives collide when they meet at the Big Oakland Powwow where they are looking for answers to the problems in their lives. Orange, himself a member of the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes of Oklahoma, exposes the untold stories of modern native American communities in this tender debut.
A Station on the Path to Somewhere Better by Benjamin Wood
After his much-celebrated 2015 novel The Ecliptic, British author Benjamin Wood turns his attention this time to the unique bond between father and son. Here is the story of a road trip through the north of England which exposes a father's mental fragility and a son to his acts of unspeakable violence.
Crudo by Olivia Laing
The debut novel from the author of the brilliant The Lonely City is firmly rooted in the summer of 2017 where newly 40 Kathy's long list of anxieties ranges from global warming to Brexit and trying to make love work, her angst made real by Laing's gift for lyricism and warm sense of humour.
My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh
A young, rich and attractive girl living in 2000 New York retreats into a cocktail of antidepressants prescribed by her nefarious therapist and loses her mind. A potent reminder for the Instagram obsessed world of what having it all on the surface can look like from the inside.
Cherry by Nico Walker
An Iraq veteran turns to robbing banks in order to fund the heroin addiction consuming him and his wife. Based on the author's own story of army medic to nefarious criminal, Walker is currently serving 11 years in jail. Darkly comic and thrilling to read, as well as a sad exploration of the drug crisis in Middle America.
Normal People by Sally Rooney
What do we hide from the people we are closest to that would have changed everything if they knew? This is the question that haunts Normal People, where we see Connell and Marianne tread the fine line between friends and lovers over many years. Sally Rooney's voice emerged fully formed on the literary scene last year with her debut novel, Conversations with Friends. Her follow-up is more impressive yet, with her ear for dialogue and eye for the devastating subtleties of relationships.
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