The 8 best Kate Atkinson books, according to our Books Editor
Kate Atkinson is something of a rule-breaker: she didn't publish her first book until her 40s and she refuses to stick to one genre, with both best-selling literary and crime novels to her name.
She started writing short stories in her 30s and won a magazine competition but it was only after she turned 40 that she began her first novel, Behind The Scenes At The Museum. As well as her inventive literary fiction, which has twice won her the Costa Novel Award (with Life After Life and A God In Ruins), she's made a name for herself as a crime writer with four books featuring private investigator Jackson Brodie. These are hugely popular and have been turned into BBC TV series, Case Histories.
Her books may be award-winning but they're also deeply readable. Her prose is beautiful and her writing is laced with dark humour. She's one of my favourite writers and even if you've read these books before, they're worth revisiting as there is layer upon layer of detail. Here, we've hand-picked eight of the best Kate Atkinson novels to read now.
Life After Life
In Life After Life, Kate Atkinson asks some interesting questions about fate and destiny. The story begins on a snowy day in 1910 with the death of baby Ursula. In a parallel story, Ursula lives and we follow her story as she relives the dramatic events of the early 20th century again and again. A beautifully written, compelling and genuinely innovative read. The book won the Costa Novel Award and sold over half a million copies, catapulting Kate Atkinson from much-loved author to household name.
A God In Ruins
This follow-up companion novel to Life After Life returns to the world of heroine Ursula Todd. This time, the spotlight is on her beloved younger brother, Teddy. This cradle-to-the-grave tale, which takes us from a bucolic childhood, through the Second World War to the present day, is mesmerising, moving and occasionally heart-breaking. Breathtakingly good.
Case Histories
Atkinson's very first crime novel introduced private investigator Jackson Brodie. Stephen King called it "the best mystery of the decade". Three seemingly unrelated stories - involving a missing child, a random attack and a domestic fit of rage - are expertly and elegantly woven together in this gripping page-turner. As the story unfolds, Brodie's complicated backstory is revealed as Atkinson skillfully builds his character.
Behind The Scenes At The Museum
This engrossing drama tells the story of the slightly dysfunctional Lennox family, as narrated by daughter Ruby; it begins in the womb before she's even born, and sweeps through the events of the 20th century. It's witty, heart-breaking and so beautifully written. For a first novel, it's remarkably assured and cleverly weaves together many strands into a beautiful tapestry. It made a big splash when it was published, winning the Whitbread (now Costa) Book of the Year Award, beating Salmon Rushdie.
Started Early, Took My Dog
This fourth Jackson Brodie book starts in the present day with an email from a woman in New Zealand asking for the investigator's help to find out who she was when she was born in England thirty years before. The story revolves around missing children from 1975 and, as ever with Kate Atkinson, nothing is simple. The connections between the various storylines slowly reveal themselves, with Brodie at the center of the whirling tornado.
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When Will There Be Good News
This third book in the Jackson Brodie series has everything that makes Kate Atkinson's crime series so good: multiple storylines that are cleverly brought together, all linked by an unsolved murder, where the only survivor is a six-year-old girl. We bounce between Yorkshire and Edinburgh as semi-retired private investigator Brodie can't help but get involved in solving the mystery. Brodie's story is fleshed out further as he loses almost everything in his life and has to rebuild.
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Big Sky by Kate Atkinson
This fifth book brings private investigator Jackson Brodie back after a nine year break. His latest case sees him looking into the murky goings-on in a small coastal town in Yorkshire. I romped through it: for Jackson who is such a wonderful character, for the brilliant dry wit that Atkinson is so good at and because it’s just a really absorbing mystery.
Transcription by Kate Atkinson
The heroine is Juliet, a naive young woman who is reluctantly recruited into the world of espionage, working with the secret services to expose Fascist sympathisers. The story jumps between 1940 and 1950, when Juliet, now working in a dusty BBC department, finds that there are consequences for her actions long after the war is over. As ever, Atkinson’s writing is inventive, with every sentence gorgeously constructed.
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