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Lead book review

Books of the year – part one

9 November 2019

9:00 AM

9 November 2019

9:00 AM

Philip Hensher

The best novels of the year were Colson Whitehead’s The Nickel Boys (Fleet, £16.99) and James Meek’s To Calais, In Ordinary Time (Canongate, £17.99). These days, novels are often praised for the gravity of their subjects, but what elevates Whitehead’s treatment of race and American brutality is the elegance
of its style and the satisfying inventiveness of its form.

Meek’s book is an astounding linguistic fantasy about the advent of the Black Death.

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