Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on, or the music we’re loving.

Amanda Rayner is reading Mantel Pieces by Hilary Mantel

Thank goodness for Hilary Mantel this year. In 2020 I have read/re-read over 2000 pages of her writing and the release of her final book in the Wolf Hall trilogy was so exciting that I even bought a Tudor costume to wear on the day of release (really). Now she has given us an extra special treat for Christmas (but not about Christmas) in the form of Mantel Pieces – a collection of her reviews/essays for The London Review of Books. Topics include the James Bulger case, John Osborne, the Virgin Mary and of course historical Tudor figures straight from the pages of Wolf Hall. The highlight for me was a copy of her speech ‘Royal Bodies’ given at an LRB event in 2013. Although the press reaction to it was understandable (and ironic) and specifically seen as a personal attack on the Duchess of Cambridge, it’s the type of speech that I think you need to read a few times before you truly understand what Mantel is trying to achieve. I would strongly recommend Mantel Pieces to her fans, as well as anyone interested in literary criticism, cultural studies or history.

Lian Hingee is reading Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Set in the 1950s, Silvia Morena-Garcia’s Mexican Gothic begins with Noemi Taboada, whose glittering social life is rudely interrupted when she receives a bewildering message from her newly married cousin Catalina. Sent by her father to the decaying grandeur of The High Place, Noemi discovers that Catalina’s claims of poisoning, treachery, ghosts and curses might not be the product of an overactive imagination after all, and it’s not long before Noemi finds herself in a battle against a terrible threat. Morena-Garcia has written a gorgeously rendered gothic horror that combines Mexican folklore, mycology, natural selection, and the nasty study of eugenics. Imagine Rebecca meets The Haunting of Hill House by way of Guillermo Del Toro, and that will give you some idea of what to expect.

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Ellen Cregan is reading Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

I’ve been reading Piranesi by Susanna Clarke, who many will remember as the author of the epic 2004 novel Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell. This latest novel is set in a strange world of endless and enormous rooms. In those many halls lives Piranesi. He is alone except for ‘the Other’ – a man who he meets with each week to discuss the halls – and the skeletal remains of fourteen other unidentified people. Piranesi’s entire life is limited to these halls – he cannot remember a time before them, or imagine a world beyond them. When certain events lead Piranesi to discover a collection of his forgotten journals, the truth slowly begins to unravel. This is an incredible book about belief, identity, consciousness and ‘other’ worlds.