Books in the Media: Freeman's debut hits the spot with critics

Sara Freeman's debut novel Tides (Granta) topped the reviews this week, featuring in the Guardian, Irish Times, Telegraph and Financial Times, while there was also praise for The Anomaly by Hervé Le Tellier (Michael Joseph).

The Guardian’s Lamorna Ash said of Freeman's book: “At all moments, the writing in Tides has to contend with an expanse of vacant space. The experience of reading such a novel is like travelling through a series of expertly designed studio flats. You marvel at every interior you come to: a whole unto itself, not a foot wrong in the design.”

The Irish Times’ Sarah Gilmartin described Freeman’s prose as “taut and illuminating, a style that manages to be both detached and emotionally devastating”.

Alasdair Lees, writing for the Telegraph, listed Tides as one of the “four best debut novels to read in 2022”. Lees wrote “if Freeman lacks Ella’s Baxter’s leavening humour, she makes up for it with a honed lyricism”.

The debut novel featured in the Financial Times’ “showcase of emerging novelists”. Suzi Feay praised the novel for being “an intriguing exploration of the effect of sheer propinquity on romance”. The New York Times also included the novel in its "What To Read: Newly Published" article.

The Anomaly by Le Tellier also featured frequently in the newspapers this weekend as the Guardian, Times, Financial Times and New Yorker reviewed the novel.  

The Guardian’s Steven Poole commented: “The throwaway joke [in the first chapter], along with an unashamed obsession with verbally re-creating and namechecking the mise-en-scène of streaming TV drama, is typical of the book’s effervescent playfulness.” 

Christian House, from the Financial Times, described Le Tellier’s addition to science fiction as “intoxicating”. House wrote: “Le Tellier ponders what anyone of us would do if faced with our mirror self. His characters provide a variety of answers." 

The Times’ James Walton applauded the novel for being “a book that could qualify equally as a thriller, literary fiction, science fiction, philosophy, satire and several love stories”. The New Yorker also included Le Tellier’s latest novel in its round-up.

After making its way onto almost all of 2022's most eagerly awaited book lists, To Paradise by Hanya Yanagihara (Picador) has featured in the Guardian, the Times, the New York Times, the Telegraph, the Observer, iNews, the Scotsman and the Financial Times in recent weeks.

The Financial Times’ Catherine Taylor described the finale of To Paradise as accentuating “Yanagihara’s intentions for the novel as a whole, as expressed through the words of scientist Charles: ‘the truth of who we are, our essential selves, the thing that emerges when everything else has been burned away’.”