Granta is a literary magazine and publisher in the United Kingdom whose mission centres on its "belief in the power and urgency of the story, both in fiction and non-fiction, and the story's supreme ability to describe, illuminate and make real." In 2007, The Observer stated: "In its blend of memoirs and photojournalism, and in its championing of contemporary realist fiction, Granta has its face pressed firmly against the window, determined to witness the world."
Kate Atkinson is an English writer of novels, plays and short stories. She has written historical novels, detective novels and family novels, incorporating postmodern and magical realist elements into the plots. Her debut, Behind the Scenes at the Museum, won the Whitbread Book Award, the precursor to the Costa Book Award, in 1995. The novels Life After Life and A God in Ruins won the Costa Book Award for novel in 2013 and 2015. She is also known for the Jackson Brodie series of detective novels, which has been adapted into the BBC One series, Case Histories.
Barbara Ellen Kingsolver is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist, essayist, and poet. Her widely known works include The Poisonwood Bible, the tale of a missionary family in the Congo, and Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, a nonfiction account of her family's attempts to eat locally. In 2023, she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for the novel Demon Copperhead. Her work often focuses on topics such as social justice, biodiversity, and the interaction between humans and their communities and environments.
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is a 2003 mystery novel by British writer Mark Haddon. Its title refers to an observation by the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes in the 1892 short story "The Adventure of Silver Blaze". Haddon and The Curious Incident won the Whitbread Book Awards for Best Novel and Book of the Year, the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best First Book, and the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize. Unusually, it was published simultaneously in separate editions for adults and children.
Cloud Atlas, published in 2004, is the third novel by British author David Mitchell. The book combines metafiction, historical fiction, contemporary fiction and science fiction, with interconnected nested stories that take the reader from the remote South Pacific in the 19th century to the island of Hawaii in a distant post-apocalyptic future. Its title references a piece of music by Toshi Ichiyanagi.
Sheila Heti is a Canadian writer.
The Kestrel (1982) is a speculative fiction novel by Lloyd Alexander and is the second volume of the Westmark series. It follows Theo as he comes to grips with his capacity for violence and Mickle as she discovers her ability to lead during an invasion of their country, Westmark. The Beggar Queen follows this installment.
Elif Shafak is a Turkish-British novelist, essayist, public speaker, political scientist and activist.
Maggie O'Farrell, RSL, is a novelist from Northern Ireland. Her acclaimed first novel, After You'd Gone, won the Betty Trask Award, and a later one, The Hand That First Held Mine, the 2010 Costa Novel Award. She has twice been shortlisted since for the Costa Novel Award for Instructions for a Heatwave in 2014 and This Must Be The Place in 2017. She appeared in the Waterstones 25 Authors for the Future. Her memoir I Am, I Am, I Am: Seventeen Brushes with Death reached the top of the Sunday Times bestseller list. Her novel Hamnet won the Women's Prize for Fiction in 2020, and the fiction prize at the 2020 National Book Critics Circle Awards. The Marriage Portrait was shortlisted for the 2023 Women's Prize for Fiction.
Lavinia Elaine Greenlaw is an English poet, novelist and non-fiction writer. She won the Prix du Premier Roman with her first novel and her poetry has been shortlisted for awards that include the T. S. Eliot Prize, Forward Prize and Whitbread Poetry Prize. She was shortlisted for the 2014 Costa Poetry Award for A Double Sorrow: A Version of Troilus and Criseyde. Greenlaw currently holds the post of Professor of Creative Writing (Poetry) at Royal Holloway, University of London.
Elspeth Barker was a Scottish novelist and journalist whose gothic novel O Caledonia became a cult classic.
Alice Pung is an Australian writer, editor and lawyer. Her books include the memoirs Unpolished Gem (2006), Her Father's Daughter (2011) and the novel Laurinda (2014).
Han Kang is a South Korean writer. From 2007 to 2018, she taught creative writing at the Seoul Institute of the Arts. Han rose to international prominence for her novel The Vegetarian, which became the first Korean language novel to win the International Booker Prize for fiction in 2016. In 2024, she became the first Korean writer and the first female Asian writer to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Alison Leslie Gold is an American author. Her books include Anne Frank Remembered, Clairvoyant: the Imagined Life of Lucia Joyce, The Devil's Mistress, and Memories of Anne Frank. She has written literary fiction as well as books for young people on a wide range of subjects including alcoholic intervention and the Holocaust as experienced by the young. Her work has been translated into more than 25 languages.
Christie Watson is a British writer and Professor of Medical Humanities at the University of East Anglia. She worked as a nurse for more than twenty years, before becoming an author. She has written six books, including her first novel Tiny Sunbirds Far Away (2011), which won the Costa First Novel Award, and first memoir The Language of Kindness (2018), which was a number-one Sunday Times Bestseller. Her work has been translated into 23 languages and adapted for theatre. Her latest book Moral Injuries is currently being developed as a television series.
Emmi Elina Itäranta is a Finnish novelist. Her debut novel Memory of Water was published by HarperCollins in 2014.
Heroes of the Frontier (ISBN 9780451493804) is a 2016 novel by American Author Dave Eggers. Alfred A. Knopf published the book on July 26, 2016. Set in the rugged wilderness of Alaska, the story follows Josie, a disillusioned single mother who goes on a road trip with her two children to escape her troubled past and societal expectations. The novel explores themes of parenthood, modern disillusionment, and the possibility of personal redemption.
Hamnet is a 2020 novel by Maggie O'Farrell. It is a fictional account of William Shakespeare's son, Hamnet, who died at age eleven in 1596, focusing on his parents' grief. In Canada, the novel was published under the title Hamnet & Judith.
The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox is a novel by Northern Irish author Maggie O'Farrell, published in 2006 by Headline Review, concerning three generations of a Scottish family.
Lisa Harding is an Irish writer, actress, and playwright whose work spans on fictional novels, play, anthologies and journals. She is considered an important voice in contemporary Irish literature, with her works contributing to discussions around social issues. Her novels engage readers with compelling stories while prompting reflection on the lives of those on the margins of society.
