The best books of 2017, from Game of Thrones to the next Paula Hawkins

If 2016 taught us anything, it’s that predictions are for fools and pollsters. From Brexit to Trump, the past 12 months made a mockery of prophets everywhere. Which only makes the most uncertain question of our age feel even more uncertain. Will 2017 be the year that George R.R. Martin finally gets his finger out (preferably all 10 typing digits) to complete The Winds of Winter, the sixth instalment in the Game of Thrones series?

Martin has been talking up the new book since 2012, even posting an excerpt on his still gloriously rudimentary website last May. But to date, The Winds of Winter has been a rumour worthy of Tyrion Lannister. Still, you have to feel for George. Hardcore fans have apparently berated him at his rare public appearances for not being at home proofreading. You can’t win ’em all, it seems. Even games of thrones.

Almost as exciting as this (possible) publication is news that Arundhati Roy is releasing a new novel, The Ministry of Utmost Happiness. It has, amazingly, been nearly 20 years since her last, The God of Small Things, won the Man Booker in 1997. The publicity blurbs are lyrical, grandiose but a little vague: “A book about souls, past and present, human and animal, that have been broken by the world we live in and mended by love.” It sounds a little like Danielle Steel but that is where the similarities will end. We hope.

Top of my to-read lists are two memoirs by talented Chinese novelists. In February, Yiyun Li, whose books The Vagrants (2009) and A Thousand Years of Good Prayers (2005) earned her a prestigious MacArthur grant, publishes Dear Friend, From My Life I Write to You in Your Life. An exploration of Li’s favourite writers, from William Trevor to Søren Kierkegaard, it doubles as a meditation on the life of the immigrant (born in Beijing, Li lives in America), working as a novelist and coping with mental illness. Li began the book during a period of suicidal depression, and explores with intelligence and quiet fortitude her mother’s similar struggles.