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Culture Whisper's favourite books of 2019

By Lucy Brooks on 30/12/2019

From viral essay collections to world-expanding fiction, these are the new books, in hardback and paperback, that the Culture Whisper team loved in 2019

Daisy Jones and the Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid

Daisy Jones & the Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid

This fly-on-the-wall account of a fictional 70s band sings with sex, drugs, rock 'n' roll and doomed romance. Told through first-person accounts and interviews with the band members and producers, it throws you into an irresistible world of groupies and glamour. But it’s the surprising family connection and aching forbidden love story that really get you hooked. Daisy Jones & The Six is especially glorious as an audiobook, with different actors huskily voicing each band member.

WHEN

Hardback published in March 2019

The Secret Commonwealth by Philip Pullman

Those of us who grew up wanting to be Lyra Belacqua took much delight in meeting her as a bright but beleaguered young woman. More than ever before, Philip Pullman provokes soul-searching and profound thought in the guise of a gripping adventure story. Zooming in on the frayed bond between Lyra and her daemon, The Secret Commonwealth negotiates the weight of growing up and losing the magic of imagination and optimism. But it also adds a thrilling new dimension to the fictional realm of dust and dark materials.

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Hardback published in October 2019

The Testaments by Margaret Atwood

Nobody writes a feminist quite like Margaret Atwood. Her Handmaid's Tale sequel was feverishly anticipated and shrouded in secrecy. Taking us back to Gilead, through the eyes of a powerful Aunt, a young woman desperate to avoid marriage and a teenager living in Canada, it's the kind of story that sucks you in and demands to be read immediately. We were transfixed and entertained in equal measure as the three narrative threads came together and connected back to Offred.

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Hardback published in September 2019

An American Marriage by Tayari Jones

It’s impossible not to become invested in Ray and Celestial as their glowing future is crushed to the point of collapse. Switching between both their perspectives, the story follows a couple torn apart by a wrongful conviction. Tayari Jones gives a bitter indictment of racism and the American justice system, but it’s the tender humanity that makes this book so striking. It’s rare to find a story that feels so polemic but also so poetic.

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Paperback published in March 2019

Killing Commendatore by Haruki Murakami

The best books by Haruki Murakami submerge the reader into surreal, lonely and frightening spaces; usually involving a hole in the ground. Killing Commendatore is one of his finest; immersively plunging into the disturbing mysteries of an isolated portrait artist… who talks to a painting from the attic.

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Paperback published in October 2019

Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams

As perceptive as it is vivacious, Candice Carty-Williams's debut novel has been dubbed Bridget Jones's Diary meets Americanah. Queenie is a 25-year-old straddling two cultures and navigating heartbreak, anxiety and systemic racism. Her subsequent downward spiral of casual sex, conflict and rejection starts off fiercely funny but soon twists into something altogether more disturbing. And it's the darker aspects of Queenie's mental heath and treatment by others that makes this story so illuminating and thought-provoking.

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Hardback published in April 2019

Brilliant, Briliant, Brilliant Brilliant Brilliant by Joel Golby

This audaciously named essay collection from journalist Joel Golby justifies its self-professed superlatives. Golby’s keen sense of the absurd plays out to hilarious effect in the stranger-than-fiction details of a camel beauty contest. But it’s the understated loneliness and doldrum details of becoming an orphan in his early 20s that really stick with you.

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Hardback published in February 2019

Three Women by Lisa Taddeo

Journalist Lisa Taddeo devoted eight years of her life and travelled all across America to learn everything about the inner lives and desires of three real women. This commitment pays off with a study that's meticulous, intimate and far juicier than fiction. The three different realities – bored housewife, exploited teen and open marriage – are as fascinating as they are relatable. Three Women offers a rare opportunity to immerse yourself in other lives and to wholly understand and empathise with familiar and totally foreign experiences.

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Hardback published in July 2019

Trick Mirror by Jia Tolentino

Like Joan Didion for the woke generation, Jia Tolentino distils and re-considers the zeitgeist spanning Trumpism, reality TV and female self-awareness. The prose is so erudite you want to savour each sentence and the broader ideas lodge in your brain, taking root and dissolving delusions.

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Paperback published in August 2019

The Freedom Artist by Ben Okri

In Ben Okri’s enchanting, mythical allegory for our times, everyone lives inside a massive prison but doesn’t know it. Screams echo through the night, but they’re ignored. People walk the streets, but they’re actually asleep. Okri offers an eye-opening escape to those people, and encourages the reader to not submit to the lies we’re told or those we tell ourselves.

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Hardback published in February 2019

The Dutch House by Ann Patchett

This absorbing tale by Ann Patchett explores a fractured family that is bound together by a magnificent mansion. Danny and Maeve grew up in the ornately decorated Dutch House. It's the house their mother abandons. It's the house their stepmother kicks them out of. Though exiled and rootless, Danny and Maeve are still compelled by the building itself, returning regularly to gaze through the windows. As they grow up, the house continues to hold the secrets to their lonely, confusing childhood. Patchett writes with warmth, but slips in devastating details like a rug pulled out from underfoot.

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Hardback published in September 2019

Fleishman is in Trouble by Taffy Brodesser-Akner

Taffy Brodesser-Akner puts marriage and modern relationships under the microscope in this stylish, vibrant and endlessly surprising debut. Toby Fleishman is 41 years old, below average height and newly single. But this time around, women seem to want him. Then Toby's new life of Tinder hook-ups and part-time parenting is interrupted when his ex-wife disappears.

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Hardback published in June 2019

Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo

Formally inventive yet thrillingly readable, Girl, Woman, Other smashes through race and gender stereotypes by fusing and echoing different voices and experiences. It was the joint winner of the 2019 Man Booker Prize (along with Margaret Atwood's The Testaments), making Bernardine Evaristo the first black woman to receive the accolade. Although she deserved to win in her own right, the extra publicity has at least ensured this bravura book has soared into best-seller lists.

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Hardback published in May 2019