Books unlike anything you've read before

A genre-bending, poetic meditation on identity, love, and loss, Emily St. John Mandel's newest book is a must-read. It begins as the story of Ari, a prisoner recently released into the newly formed Republic of California after years of brutal civil war. When she witnesses time ripple at a party celebrating her state’s newfound independence, and a bewildered doppelgänger stumbling through the crowd as the host vanishes into thin air, Ari’s understanding of the world as she knows it changes forever. Exit Party is part literary time-travel thriller, part dystopian examination of a society in ruin. 

China Miéville’s first solo novel in over a decade is one of the most anticipated literary events of the year, and his epic The Rouse is sure to satisfy the legions of fans of the author’s self-described ‘weird fiction’. Written in his signature surrealist prose, it blends the bloody history of the twentieth century with one woman's quest to solve a terrifying mystery that has haunted her past, taking her on a journey across continents and decades and questioning what is real and what is imagined. A family saga with a dark mystery at its heart, The Rouse is a must-read this autumn.

The Substance meets Botched in this highly original and darkly humorous debut novel. Tackling the provocative topics of body modification and the modern quest for fame, New Skin asks: how far is too far in the pursuit of the 'American Dream'? Fanny and her daughter Linli are in trouble. Tangled in a web of debt thanks to Fanny’s plastic surgery addiction, when Fanny accepts a place on a twisted reality show to compete for reconstructive surgery, Linli must finally confront why their relationship is so strained. As she begins to see the world through her mother’s eyes, Linli gains a new perspective on the sacrifices Fanny made to help the pair assimilate to life in the USA. 

As the summer holidays begin, Amanda and her daughter Nina leave Buenos Aires for the serenity of the Argentine countryside. But their tranquillity soon turns to terror as their neighbours start to reveal the area’s deadly secrets. When Nina is paralysed by a mystery illness, Amanda’s worst nightmare comes true. Told through the feverish prose of a woman lying on her deathbed as she tries to piece together where everything went wrong, Fever Dream packs a huge punch in under 200 pages. Part psychological horror, part environmental thriller, you’ll devour this gripping book in one sitting. 

Offering a searing examination of the impact that our reliance on technology has on society and our sense of self, Hernan Diaz’s first novel since the Pulitzer Prize-winning Trust is a dystopian, Dickensian Odyssey with shades of science fiction. Set several centuries in the future, Ply is told through the eyes of the 'Pincher', a young thief who steals electricity to power her society’s thriving underground art scene. Stumbling into an underground science experiment, she is drawn into a tangled maze that threatens to destroy the people she loves and the identity she has forged for herself. 

When Miri’s wife, Leah, finally returns from the depths of the ocean after a submarine mission gone wrong, Miri’s joy is short-lived. The woman who returned from the seabed is not the one she married. As the couple slowly drift further apart, and Miri tries to piece together what was once their life, she finds herself grieving for the woman she knew as Leah slowly transforms beyond recognition. A slow-burn body-horror and portrait of domestic life, Our Wives Under the Sea is a heartbreaking love story like no other.

A philosophical black comedy with hints of the supernatural that examines what it means to be free, Charles Johnson’s Middle Passage remains as unique and relevant as when it was first published in 1990. Middle Passage is a novel told through the journal entries of Rutherford Calhoun, a former slave escaping New Orleans, the prospect of a marriage to a woman he does not love and the bookmakers he owes money to. Accidentally stowing away on the Republic, a slave ship bound for West Africa, Calhoun must fall back on his street smarts to survive and stay free.

What would you be prepared to sacrifice to achieve your dream? This is the question Anisa, the protagonist of Ayesha Manazir Siddiqi's Black Mirror-esque speculative thriller, has to answer. Desperate to become a literary translator but unable to break into the publishing world, she soon learns of The Centre, a language school with a cult following that promises fluency in just ten days. After enrolling, Anisa is soon publishing’s rising star, but at what cost? The Centre is a surreal and darkly comedic story of appropriation, humanity and the politics of language from an exciting debut voice.