Whether you’re in bed at night with the lights turned low, on the sofa at the weekend, in a hotel, on a quiet and secluded beach, leaning against a tree, quickly when nobody is watching at work, even on a plane – it doesn’t matter where you do your reading, it is just one of the greatest pleasures we have.

As much as we all enjoy a snappy tweet or a well-constructed WhatsApp story, there is nothing like losing yourself in a big book. Here’s a look ahead at the best books that will be landing on our bookshelves and eReaders next year.

Crime, thrillers and mystery

1 Run, Rose, Run, by Dolly Parton and James Patterson

To say he knocks out books at an alarming rate is an understatement. With more than 200 to his name and over a hundred on the New York Times bestseller list, not to mention a fortune fast approaching a billion dollars from sales and all manner of records, Patterson is impossibly popular. He’s happy to share the wealth, often co-authoring books with other notable names and even trading bylines with former president, Bill Clinton. He’s back again next year for a teaming up with country music legend and cultural icon Dolly Parton. No surprises that it is a thriller about a young singer-songwriter fleeing darkness and looking for fame in Nashville. If there isn’t a whiff of heartbreak along the way, we’ll be surprised. Best of all, Dolly Parton has an album of 12 original songs to go with the book.
March, 2022

2 The Match, by Harlen Coben

The mind of a crime writer, even one as prodigiously beloved and critically acclaimed as this is a constant fascination. They’re always on the lookout for a thrilling new way to tell tales of serial killers and murderers in new and interesting ways and invariably in a much more engrossing and immersive way than is managed on screen. This time it is
a community of doxxers, a group committed to exposing anonymous online trolls, and the users of a DNA-tracking genealogy website that are being bumped off one-by-one. Who is the ultimate target? Just the adult that grew up after being found as a child living a feral existence in the mountains outside New Jersey. Fans of Coben (Cobenites? Cobenistas? Cobenis?) will be drooling at the prospect already?
March, 2022.

3 The Paris Apartment, by Lucy Foley

Lucy Foley’s previous thrillers have seen her dubbed the “Agatha Christie for the Instagram age” and it’s a moniker we can’t help but love. This next will be based in Paris and has a cast of colourful characters to investigate and suspect in true whodunit fashion. An observant concierge, a scorned lover, a snooping journalist, a naive student and an unwanted guest are all in and out of No. 12 Rue des Amants, in Montmartre.
March, 2022.

4 The Sanctuary, by Andrew Hunter Murray

It would have been a fair guess to assume that comedian, podcaster and trivia-lover Andrew Hunter Murray’s debut novel, The Last Day, might have been something less intense than the dystopian thriller it was. Readers and critics loved it, though and a movie spin-off is said to be in the offing. He follows it up here with an intelligent thriller about a jilted lover trying to rescue his fiancée from an idyllic island. The high concept thriller seems a classic for anybody booked in for a staycation in a swish hotel for a few days.
May, 2022.

5 Act of Oblivion, by Robert Harris

Famed historical novelist, Harris first found acclaim for gripping thrillers set around the Second World War and has since developed a series of books based in ancient Rome. Now he returns with a dramatic manhunt for the murderers of King Charles 1, of England. Publishers are promising a continent-hopping thriller with intrigue on either side of the Atlantic.
September, 2022.

Fantasy and science fiction

6 Leviathan Falls, by James S. A. Corey

Arguably the biggest science fiction series of the past ten years will come to a conclusion when Leviathon Falls lands. It is the ninth book in the saga Game of Thrones’s George R. R. Martin described as “Interplanetary adventure the way it ought to be written”. If you’re not up to speed on The Expanse series of novels you have a lot of catching up to do before leaping in for the finale, with eight novels, five novellas, three short stories and a handful of TV series (Amazon Prime if you’re interested) to get through. The no spoiler summary so far is that humans have colonised the solar system and are looking to go even further.
December, 2021.

7 House of Sky and Breath, by Sarah J. Maas

You don’t get to sell more than 12 million copies of your book without spinning a decent yarn, and author Sarah J. Maas has a legion of fans. Best known for her Throne of Glass series of young adult books about a female assassin in a fantasy kingdom, this is a follow-up to her adult House of Earth and Blood and the second in the Crescent City series. Described as a “cross between Game of Thrones and Buffy the Vampire Slayer with a drizzle of E.L. James” it ticks a lot of page-turner boxes. Part fantasy romance and part world-building epic it could be a new series to really get lost in.
February, 2022.

9 Skandar and the Unicorn Thief, by AF Steadman

How this book even lands on our shelves is a fantasy in itself. Debut author Steadman had faced rejections for her first effort before penning this hotly-anticipated fantasy adventure and was doing a round of Zoom meetings with publishers before dreams started to come true and the story was not only snapped up in a seven-figure deal (the largest ever for a children’s debut) but also had the movie rights sold for a three-book deal. As premises go and launch pads for stories of magic, legendary heroes and adventure “Unicorns don’t belong in fairy tales; they belong in nightmares” is a great way to grab attention.
April, 2022.

10 Harry Potter 25th anniversary, by JK Rowling

OK, so there’s not much of a surprise with this one. But to make absolutely everybody feel old, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone turns 25 next year. This would make Harry and the gang in their late 30s now. So, more interested in mortgages than muggle studies. A commemorative edition will be released that brings back the iconic original cover design as well as a bundle of celebratory bonus content.
June, 2022

Contemporary fiction

11 Again, Rachel, by Marian Keyes

Literary dreams can come true. Rachel’s Holiday was first published 25 years ago in a time before social media and much of the world we know today. But we’re about to get a follow-up story and see exactly where the titular heroine is in her life now. Fans of the original may remember Rachel’s life as something of a mess. But nothing a spot of rehab couldn’t fix. Now, after decades, she has love, a great job, family, garden and an expensive trainer collection. What could go wrong? Wait, is that an old flame coming back on the horizon we can see?
February, 2022.

12 Love Marriage by Monica Ali

This will be the first new novel from the Brick Lane author in more than a decade and has already grabbed the attention of screen adaptation aficionados, with the BBC in early development on a deal. It is a story of arranged and love marriages, life, love, desire, culture and family dynamics. Expect heartbreak and hilarity in equal measure.
February, 2022.

13 Careering, by Daisy Buchanan

Reading should be a pleasure and journalist and media commentator Daisy Buchanan is back with a dark comedy that will resonate with anybody who has ever given just a little too much of their soul to their job. In examining the sometimes toxic relationship working women can have with their dream jobs it promises to be a caustically funny take on modern womanhood and be essential reading for any of us that have ever stayed late to finish that big project in the office.
March, 2022.

14 Pure Colour, by Sheila Heti

Critics, it seems, adore Sheila Heti. Listed as part of “the new vanguard” of game changing writers from around the world by the New York Times and with her books sprinkled on “must read” lists she has forged a reputation as a literary philosopher for our times. Since novels Motherhood and How Should a Person Be found such critical acclaim her works have been deeply analysed and dissected. Next year’s epic story of life, from beginning to end, will deal with the big questions of humanity and surely be streaked with the beauty that defines the author’s writing.
May, 2022.

15 Thursday Murder Club 3, by Richard Osman

TV producer and presenter Richard Osman is something of a literary phenomenon. His debut Thursday Murder Club mystery was the fastest selling adult crime debut in recorded history and the follow up, released a few months ago, was just as popular. The Man Who Died Twice, the second in the series, saw a return to the quartet of pensioners living in a retirement community in rural England so it seems safe to assume the formula will be repeated and further perfected when the third instalment lands late next year.
September, 2022.

Biography, memoir and non-fiction

16 Burning Questions: Essays and Occasional Pieces 2004-2020, by Margaret Atwood

If Margaret Atwood had written The Handmaid’s Tale and nothing else her legacy as a generational talent would have been secured. That she has written dozens more novels and collections in a career spanning decades is all the better for us. This collection of essays is a showcase not for her fantastic characterisation and storytelling, but instead a testament (get it?) to her fantastic prose. In a collection of essays published over the course of the century so far she casts her eye over breakfast cereals, zombies, technology, climate change, Donald Trump, the pandemic and much more besides.
March, 2022.

17 All About Me: My Remarkable Life in Show Business, by Mel Brooks

Few performers have ever won the EGOT. That’s an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony Award. It’s called the show business grand slam and the accolade pretty much sums up Mel Brooks. A life that started in depression era Brooklyn and went, via a comedy bootcamp in the Catskills and serving in the Second World War, to the highest reaches of comedy and Hollywood. Perfect for historians of comedy, lovers of laughs and those wanting an insight into one of the 20th century’s most revered funnymen.
December, 2021.

18 Finding Me, by Viola Davis

Viola Davis is one of the great actors of our times and has the Oscar, Emmy, Tony Awards and adulation to prove it. It was not always this way. Having grown up in abject poverty and dysfunction before going on to find fame and fortune, it promises to be a hero’s journey and Davis is promising brutal honesty as she shares her deeply personal story.
April, 2022.

19 His Name Is George Floyd, by Robert Samuels and Toluse Olorunnipa

The world watched his murder, but very little is known about his life. Two Washington Post journalists team up for this biography of a global icon, about who practically nothing is known. The murder of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, sparked reactions around the world and caused America to look once again at its attitudes to race and justice. The book, which was sought after by as many as ten publishers, will look at the one life, but also the country and its institutions.
May, 2022.

20 The Lives of Brian, by Brian Johnson

Non-fans of AC/DC will find a lot to be fascinated by in this tell-all autobiography of one of the music world’s greatest ever front men. Fans will love all of the rock and roll stories. From choirboy to Geordie to touring the world with one of the planet’s biggest ever bands, there are so many secrets to tell and this promises to be one of the funniest, warmest, touching and downright rocking books in many a year.
October, 2022.