Looking back at my reading in 2021 I see with some dismay that once again I read fewer titles than in the previous year. I offer in mitigation the excuse that some of the books – biographies of Bacon and Freud and especially the Channon letters – were very long. Reversing the trend of recent years, novels and stories dominated my reading last year (24) while non-fiction fell far behind (10).

It interests me that books about nature and biographies/memoirs made up almost all of the non-fiction pile. Some of them made a deep impression on me, but if forced to pick the best of the bunch I would have to choose the account of Ivor Gurney’s tragic and piteous life. I vowed this time last year to choose my novels more carefully and I think I succeeded. I read some wonderful fiction last year, with works by Kazuo Ishiguro, Niall Williams, and Francis Spufford standing out. It’s silly to try to pick one clear favorite, but MacLaverty’s latest collection and Ali Smith’s quartet stand out as especially memorable.

At my elbow is a small pile of ten books that will accompany me into 2022. I can’t wait to get started.