In The Brothers York (Allen Lane), Thomas Penn has tracked backwards in time from The Winter King, his glowing biography of the first Tudor king, to Henry VII’s 15th-century predecessors, tackling the grim triangular conflict between Edward IV, his brother the Duke of Clarence and the younger brother who would become Richard III. I admire Penn’s ability to cut through complication while preserving complexity, and deliver to the reader a narrative that is pacey and full of insight. My favourite novel this year is Olive, Again (Viking), by Elizabeth Strout, which follows her spiky heroine into old age. There is nothing cosy about Strout’s books, though they focus on home and family. She is domestic in the way Jane Austen is domestic, and shares much of her wit and grace.
