The writer and publisher on the prize he created to champion independent imprints, and why we should be paying more for books

An awkward middle-aged composer teams up with a hotshot saxophonist in an exquisite odd-couple novel

Featuring a GP, a teacher, a former zoologist and a pair of poets, The Observer’s list of rising stars reveals the eight names to watch this year

His new novel Vigil is a tender morality tale in which a dying oil executive faces a supernatural reckoning

The novelist says Departure(s) is his last book, and claims it’s a true story – but with Barnes nothing is certain

John Tottenham’s debut novel Service is a winning mix of scabrous workplace comedy and mischievous metafiction

What the French writer learned from documenting the trial of the terrorists behind the 2015 Bataclan massacre

The Booker prize-winning author of Flesh on class, punctuation, and what he learned from Amis and Updike

The addictive, sparely written tale of masculinity, money and migration confirms Szalay as the finest stylist in British fiction

After his remarkable memoir, Knife, the writer showcases his worst habits in a rambling, uneven short-story collection

The author on keeping his liberal instincts in check, his love of breaking the literary fourth wall, and not fitting comfortably into the world

With the six chosen novels spanning radically different approaches, this year’s judges face a literary reckoning

The Secret of Secrets, his first novel in eight years, draws on digital-era fears in comically wooden prose

What We Can Know is a satirical vision of a future flooded Britain – and a gripping story of marital duty and guilt

As a new collection of her essays is published, the literary detective and taste-making critic talks plagiarism, gender politics and the art of the perfect putdown

In TonyInterruptor, the singular novelist returns with a witty, hyperactive satire on art and authenticity

How did this 730-page novel concerned with horrific abuse become the book of our times?

The author on being inspired by poets, finding his inner Begbie, and his new Trainspotting sequel, Men in Love

The American author of Flashlight on Korean identity, her love of short narratives, and improving upon The Borrowers

The Scottish author on retiring from the rock’n’roll life and how Martin Amis taught him to push the boundaries of good taste