From a very modern romantic entanglement to an epic tale of power and class in Pakistan, here are some of the most exciting debut novels of the year so far.
Prestige Drama by Séamas O’Reilly
In his 2021 memoir, “Did Ye Hear Mammy Died?”, Derry-born journalist Séamas O’Reilly applied “gallows humour” to the death of his mother, said Michael Delgado in Literary Review. In his “slim but impressive” first novel, he adopts a similar approach, finding comedy in “the Troubles and the shadow they continue to cast”. The action – set in present-day Derry – centres on the disappearance of “glamorous American actress” Monica Logue, who came to the city to film a 1980s-set crime series, said Miriam Balanescu in The Spectator. Featuring a “cacophony of voices” (each chapter is narrated by a different townsperson), this is a “thoughtful novel” from a “startlingly perceptive writer”. O’Reilly doesn’t fully pursue the “missing-actor thread”, said Joanna Quinn in The Guardian. Some may wish he had given it “more prominence”. But his main goal is to create a “patchwork portrait of the city”. Full of “gloriously vivid” writing, and insights about how Northern Ireland’s past misfortunes are recreated and commodified in the present day, “Prestige Drama” is a “brilliant” debut.
I Want You to Be Happy by Jem Calder
Jem Calder – who grew up in Essex before moving to London 10 years ago – is a writer much concerned with the “specific indignities of living in the capital”, said Laura Hackett in The Times. Both his 2022 story collection, “Reward System”, and now this debut novel are full of observations about “extortionate rent, overpriced coffees and fickle trends”. Chuck, 35, is a copywriter who has just broken up with his long-term girlfriend. At a party, he meets 23-year-old barista Joey, and they begin a “halting relationship” – one driven by their shared ambition to be writers. “Calder is brilliant at parsing the nuanced power dynamics of this situationship”; he’s a writer of “genuine talent”. “Frustrated romantic entanglements” are hardly rare in novels, but “I Want You to Be Happy” also presents a “hyper-specific chronicle of the current moment”, said Natalie Perman in Literary Review. “A significant plotline involves the opening of a branch of Gail’s”; characters spend “a lot of time” on WhatsApp. Impressively, Calder makes us care about what happens; and his “humour lands”.
Upward Bound by Woody Brown
Woody Brown is a 28-year-old with a severe form of autism, which means he’s unable to speak or type, said Xan Brooks in The Guardian. And yet, he has produced a “triumphant first novel”, about a “non-speaking” person like himself and his experiences at Upward Bound, a “dismal adult daycare centre” in Los Angeles. Told from multiple perspectives, the novel is essentially a “series of vivid character sketches”, although it builds to a climax when a “client” of Upward Bound escapes. Both a “garrulous, charming story of a young man who can’t speak, and an inclusive, friendly guide to the overlooked and the isolated”, it is “moving and ringing with life”. It is controversial, though, said Laura Hackett in The Times. Brown communicates using a system known as “rapid prompting”, which involves him pointing at a letter board. Some say helpers can influence the process – others even suggest that his mother wrote the book. Yet even if you ignore its background, the novel “stands proudly on its own”. It offers a “fascinating insight” into the mind of a non-speaking autistic person, and is “genuinely entertaining”.
Discipline by Larissa Pham
This “spare” debut tells of a “lapsed art student”, Christine, who’s touring America to promote her own first novel, said Alexandra Jacobs in The New York Times. That book is a revenge fantasy about the former art school professor who seduced her, discarded her and destroyed her confidence as a painter. On her travels she shares her story with a variety of interesting characters. But all roads lead to a confrontation with the professor on an island off Maine, at which point the book “acquires Stephen King vibes”. Will Christine, like her protagonist, resort to murder? “Thickly pigmented” with suspense, Discipline shows that Larissa Pham “is a writer to keep a close eye on”. Pham’s “spiky” novel provides rich insights into the art world, said Ceci Browning in The Sunday Times. It’s “splattered with colourful descriptions of artists’ materials and references to specific paintings that will have you gleefully googling them”. On the surface, it’s about the aftermath of an illicit affair: but, as with a painting, “far more can be revealed with a longer, more thorough look”.
This is Where the Serpent Lives by Daniyal Mueenuddin
Writers who leave a long gap between books run the risk of being forgotten, said John Self in The Times. But I think Daniyal Mueenuddin “will get away with it”. The Pakistani-American author published his first book – the short-story collection “In Other Rooms, Other Wonders” – in 2009. It was widely acclaimed, and he was hailed as “Pakistan’s answer to Chekhov”. Now, 17 years later, comes his first novel, a “sweeping parable of power and fortune” set in Pakistan in the decades following Partition. Filled with “lovingly created characters”, it more than “lives up to expectations” – and is sure to be “all over the prize lists later this year”. Divided into four self-contained sections, the novel immerses us in a semi-feudal world where “property and influence are everything”, said Lucy Popescu in The Observer. We meet those at the top, and those at the bottom – and observe their fraught, often complex interactions. The prose is “exquisite, lush” and “evocative”. It really is an “exceptional novel”, said Stevie Davies in Literary Review. “From the opening pages, I knew I held a masterpiece in my hands.”
Workhorse by Caroline Palmer
Clo, the protagonist of this “diverting” debut, is a lowly assistant at a New York fashion magazine, said Siobhan Murphy in The Times. She starts out as a “classic outsider”, who’s often mocked by her snobbish colleagues. But while she poses as a “self-deprecating storyteller”, she’s actually ruthlessly ambitious – and has an “ample amoral streak”. Caroline Palmer, a former Vogue staffer, “brings impeccable insider knowledge to her takedown of the absurdities and indignities” of the glossy magazine world. The novel is too long – and sometimes loses “propulsion” – but it’s “often punchily funny”. Any novel set at a Vogue-like magazine will inevitably draw comparisons with “The Devil Wears Prada”, said Alex Beggs in The New York Times. Yet “Workhorse” feels closer to a more “sinister story, with a paranoid and untrustworthy antihero”: “The Talented Mr. Ripley”. Palmer is a witty writer, and her observations are “razor-sharp”, said Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett in The Guardian. Still, it’s quite an ask to spend 560 pages in the head of such a “seething, grasping” central character.
This, My Second Life by Patrick Charnley
In 2021, a “near-fatal cardiac arrest” left Patrick Charnley with a brain injury, said Tilda Coleman in The Telegraph. The former lawyer draws on this experience in his “impressive” debut – about a 20-year-old who has just suffered a similar injury. Needing to lead a simple life, Jago has returned to the Cornish village where he grew up, to help his uncle on his farm. It’s not a novel in which a great deal happens (though there is “some plot”, involving a local drug dealer). Charnley’s aim, rather, is to convey the “limitations of life after such an event” – and this he does “expertly”. Like his mother, the late poet and novelist Helen Dunmore, he has a “mellow, pared-back style”. Although this novel is inspired by Charnley’s experiences (as he acknowledges in a brief preface), to see it mainly “through the lens of personal trauma would be to do it a grave injustice”, said Christobel Kent in The Guardian. It succeeds as a work of art: written in “spare and beautiful” prose, it’s as “finely wrought as poetry, luminous with Jago’s sheer delight in the world”. This is a work of “piercing intensity”.