I can’t pick a single book of the year, so I’m choosing five that really left a impression on me in 2022:

* Annie Ernaux, The Years (translated by Alison L. Strayer)
* Julia May Jonas, Vladimir
* Annie Ernaux, Getting Lost (translated by Alison L. Strayer)
* Peter Matthiessen, The Snow Leopard
* Joshua Cohen, The Netanyahus

A few patterns emerge: campus novels; middle-aged women having affairs with younger Russian studs; natural history and geology; the house of Fitzcarraldo; the truth of closely observed details – of crazy obsessions, of everyday life in the suburbs, of wild birds in remote valleys I’ll never visit.

If I were to round out to ten books of the year, I’d also include:

* Lauren Groff, Matrix
* Ocean Vuong, Time Is A Mother
* Robert Macfarlane, Underland (narrated by Roy McMillan)
* Katia Oskamp, Marzahn, Mon Amour (translated by Jo Heinrich)* Barbara Kingsolver’s Demon Copperhead

Other notable reads in nonfiction: Laura Cumming’s On Chapel Sands, Tim Flannery’s Europe, Peter Frankopan’s The Silk Roads, Helen Gordon’s Notes From Deep Time, Cat Jarman’s River Kings, Robert Macfarlane’s Landmarks and The Old Ways (both narrated by Roy McMillan), Francis Rose’s Wild Flower Key, Henry Shukman’s One Blade of Grass, Stanley Tucci’s Taste, Jia Tolentino’s Trick Mirror, and Boel Westin’s Tove Jansson: Life, Art, Words (translated by Silvester Mazzarella).

And among works of fiction: Junior Burke’s Buddha Was A Cowboy, Katie Kitamura’s Intimacies, Sang Young Park’s Love in the Big City (translated by Anton Hur), Torrey Peters’s Detransition, Baby, Adrian Tchaikovsky’s Elder Race, Sarah Tolmie’s All The Horses of Iceland, and Camila Sosa Villada’s The Queens of Sarmiento Park (translated by Kit Maude).

Special mention goes to short stories by Mavis Gallant – this is an ongoing project in reading, not rushed as I’m taking her advice: ‘Stories are not chapters of novels. They should not be read one after another, as if they were meant to follow along. Read one. Shut the book. Read something else. Come back later. Stories can wait.’ I imagine a volume or two of hers might appear among books completed next year, or the year after that. Another excellent story collection I’m working through is Florida by Lauren Groff.

Maybe I’ll keep another list for specific short stories and poems next year – alongside nonfiction, short fiction and poetry certainly outclassed novels for me this year. So much product from the spoon-feeding cookie-cutter hard-sell school of creative writing is either not to my taste or just plain boring. Don’t waste my time with high-concept formulas and cheap reveals: gimme voice, gimme character, gimme setting, gimme mood.

Telly is a bit of a blur, and a lot of tv reviewers need to find new jobs. Off the top of my head, a highlight was the Star Wars prequel Andor. What a wonderful slow burn that series achieved. Again, gimme character and setting and mood – gimme depth – and while we’re at it gimme wardrobe too: so much of that mood in Andor was achieved through the costumes. And after so frequently looking up details for its UK broadcast, I’m very much looking forward to the second season of Reservation Dogs. Oh – and incoming, incoming: last night we very much enjoyed the movie of White Noise – what a good adaptation.

I also enjoyed the Masterclasses of Amy Tan and Joy Harjo. I guess learning can be a form of entertainment too. Another profoundly good book-adjacent experience was the Introduction to UK Natural History that I took with the Natural History Museum. How exciting that natural history is going to become a GCSE subject on the national curriculum – let’s hope it will be available in all schools.

Another fascinating foray: the Druidcraft Tarot. I’m not sure I’d have chosen this deck myself, as these are not cultural associations I was particularly drawn to, but it was given as a gift, and it’s turned out to be a remarkably powerful and rich resource – and now I am making sense of those cultural associations too. There is perhaps something in that idea that special tarot decks are given to us, rather than purchased. I also discovered Jessica Dore’s Tarot for Change this year – highly recommended.

I’ve enjoyed a lot of Substacks this year too – though the cheerleading in some of the writing ones gets a bit wordy and cheerless for me (are they paid by the word?!). But ones worth following include: Austin Kleon, Chuck Palahniuk’s Plot Spoiler, Lincoln Michel’s Counter Craft, and Anne Trubek’s Notes from a Small Press. In podcasts I enjoyed various interviews with Tim Ferriss, as well as anything with Kara Swisher, the sort of feisty, well-informed advocate anyone wants on their side in a culture war.

Digital subscriptions to the New York Times and the New Yorker are perhaps my greatest indulgences, but they feel well worth it – in particular the NYT’s coverage of the war in Ukraine shows the value of real reportage. I’m tired of British newspapers and the space they devote to property and panic-mongering, though maybe they are just reflecting their readers. The Cooking newsletter from the New York Times is perhaps the greatest joy in my inbox: great recipes, but also a lot of first-rate cultural writing.

Also, as a final note: praise be for libraries! They saved me a lot of money this year, and saved my bookshelves (and floors) a lot of space, and I also listened to numerous audiobooks on library apps. And in visiting the library in person I made a few discoveries too. I end the year giving thanks for libraries and librarians.