As per 2018, some things I read in 2019, with some brief opinions/recommendations (published slightly later than originally planned).

All categorisations are approximate at best and will probably cause some kind of contention.

Fiction

• China Miéville’s The City & the City
• Yoon Ha Lee’s The Machineries of Empire series (1-3 + 0.5) - incredibly enjoyable fantasy / sci-fi with great characters and world
• Jack Campbell’s The Lost Fleet series (1-6) - good fun and easy to read
• Martha Wells’s All Systems Red (The Murderbot Diaries #1) - this seemed popular and well-loved but I couldn’t really get into it - I felt like I’d semi-recently read much more engaging explorations of trust and self-awareness, so I didn’t continue with the series, but might give it another try later
• Nnedi Okorafor’s Binti series (1-3) - excellent and engaging
• Stephen King’s The Gunslinger (The Dark Tower #1) - I feel like I might enjoy this more if I read the rest of the series, but this book didn’t make me want to - I didn’t really get along with the gaps and jumps, and it felt a lot like an incomplete introduction with not enough closure for my liking
• Iain Banks’s Walking on Glass - I wanted to try some of his non-scifi work, and this didn’t do much for me
• Becky Chambers’s Wayfarers series (1-3) - enjoyable and relatable
• Alex White’s The Salvagers series (1-2) - good fun
• Sarah Caudwell’s Hilary Tamar series (1-3) - excellent bunch of mysteries featuring a cast of London barristers that was a captivating read with some clever twists
• Jan Needle’s Wild Wood - I might have enjoyed this more if I’d realised sooner that it was a satirical re-telling of The Wind in the Willows (or indeed, if I particularly knew the original story) but even without that, it was definitely enjoyable
• Steven Hopstaken and Melissa Prusi’s Stoker’s Wilde - Bram Stoker and Oscar Wilde? Yes please
• Catherynne M. Valente’s Space Opera - Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy meets Eurovision - thanks to Colin Watson for the recommendation
• Gregory David Roberts’s Shantaram - “influenced by real events” (though how much is unclear), this story of a bank robber and heroin addict who escapes from prison and flees to India is not my usual reading fare, but I found it captivating once I got into it
• Andrew Caldecott’s Rotherweird series (1-3) - weird and mysterious and I definitely got lost in parts of it and didn’t follow other bits, but thoroughly captivating and intriguing
• Charles Yu’s How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe - a bit lost on me
• Stephen Fry’s Mythos: The Greek Myths Retold - a very enjoyable journey through Greek mythology

Non-Fiction

• Sarah Langford’s In Your Defence: Stories of Life and Law - powerful reading, and important, but so incredibly saddening
• Gary Provost’s 100 Ways to Improve Your Writing - a David MacIver recommendation I found useful and enjoyable
• Jocelyn K. Glei’s Manage Your Day-to-Day - an interesting collection of wisdom and advice - not sure how valuable I found it overall, but an enjoyable read