Books books books! Our top picks from 2024

Life and Art from FT Weekend

Forhecz Topher

Tv & Film, Arts, Society & Culture

4.6 • 601 Ratings

🗓️ 13 December 2024

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The FT’s books of the year special is out, and today, our literary editor Fred Studemann and outgoing deputy books editor Laura Battle join us one last time to talk about their top picks of 2024. This year has seen some huge releases from authors including Sally Rooney, Miranda July, Alexei Navalny, Al Pacino and Salman Rushdie. What trends did Fred and Laura notice this year? What books did they love?

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As you know, the show is ending in early January – we’re still collecting your cultural questions. What’s rolling around in your head? How can we help? Email Lilah at [email protected] or message her on Instagram @lilahrap.

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Links (all FT links get you past the paywall):

– Books we mentioned: Orbital by Samantha Harvey; Patriot by Alexei Navalny; All Fours by Miranda July; Haunted Wood by Sam Leith; Rosarita by Anita Desai; There are Rivers in the Sky by Elif Shafak; Revolusi: Indonesia and the Birth of the Modern World by David van Reybrouck; A Voyage Around the Queen by Craig Brown; Killing Time by Alan Bennett; Meditations for Mortals by Oliver Burkeman; The Wizard of the Kremlin by Giuliano da Empoli; Hope by Pope Francis (2025); and Dream Count by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (2025)

– The FT Books of the Year are out now! Here is a roundup of the FT’s top columnists and editors’ book recommendations for 2024, including Fred’s top picks. Laura’s fiction picks are here.

– Food, drink and travel books are here. Music books here. Art and design books are here. Check out the full guide for more (paywall)

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to Life and Art from FT Weekend. I'm Lila Raptopoulos and this is our Friday chat show.
0:07.0	Today I am thrilled because in annual tradition, we are talking through some of the best books of
0:12.4	24. It's been a very exciting year for books. We got a new Sally Rooney, Elizabeth Strout and
0:18.4	Miranda July. We got memoirs from Alexei Navalny, Salman Rushdie,
0:22.9	Ina Garden, and Al Pacino. We've seen a host of great debuts and nonfiction releases. And the best
0:28.9	are collected, as always, in the FT's annual Books of the Year special, which is out now.
0:34.5	Here to talk through the year in books and share their top recommendations are two of
0:38.5	our dear friends joining me from London for our final ever books extravaganza. It's literary editor Fred
0:45.1	Studeman and until just recently our deputy books editor, Laura Battle. Friend Laura, hi, welcome.
0:51.5	Hi, Lila. Hi Lila. Good to have you both. Thank you. It's great to be here.
0:56.1	All right, so why don't we start by talking about this year in books? It feels like it's been a pretty
1:01.9	blockbuster year. I felt like for the first time in a long time, there were a number of really
1:06.8	buzzy standout books that everyone seemed to be reading. What did you both notice about
1:11.8	this year? Well, I think you've nailed it. It was quite a sort of busy year. I thought,
1:16.5	you know, we saw a lot of big names in fiction coming out. I mean, you know, Sally Rooney, Pat Barker,
1:23.2	Alan Hollinghurst, Colin Toy Bean, Percival Everett. I mean, I could go on. So it just sort of felt on that basis very strong.
1:30.7	And then if you're moving out of fiction and if you're trying to look for trends,
1:35.9	the picture becomes a bit more complicated, I think.
1:38.0	There's a lot of books about AI.
1:40.3	There was a lot about the geopolitical environment in the US,
1:43.8	then what's happening in Ukraine, Russia, the future of democracy.
1:49.1	And then in Britain we had a lot about, because we had an election this year, obviously.
	...

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