Children’s and teens roundup – the best new picture books and novels
A boy with his head in the clouds; a Kurdish refugee’s tale; helicopter heists, a dancer’s dreams, a mission to save Mars and more
A Voyage Around the Queen by Craig Brown audiobook review – juicy insights
A wide-ranging and thoroughly entertaining portrait not just of Queen Elizabeth II but of the psyche of her subjects
Fundamentally by Nussaibah Younis review – witty debut about Islamic State brides
A young academic travels to Iraq to help a British Asian who joined IS at 15, in this rollicking account of a UN deradicalisation programme
The Knowing by Madeleine Ryan review – intriguing ‘phone-free’ premise falters in execution
The author’s sophomore novel, in which a young woman is propelled on a journey of self-discovery after accidentally leaving her mobile at home, asks interesting questions but pulls its punches
The Café With No Name by Robert Seethaler review – lost souls in postwar Vienna
A slice-of-life portrait of a community suffering the after-effects of the second world war
Doctored by Charles Piller review – the scandal that derailed Alzheimer’s research
A dogged account of how the quest for a treatment may have been set back years by fraudulent evidence
Picnic at Hanging Rock review – Australian fever dream still dazzling 50 years on
Peter Weir’s 1975 parable of imperial anxiety and sexual hysteria, rereleased for its 50th anniversary, is a classic of Australian new wave cinema
Beartooth by Callan Wink review – an expansive drama of survival
Family relationships are explored in this finely executed tale of two brothers drawn into bear poaching in rural Montana
Minority Rule: Adventures in the Culture War by Ash Sarkar – identity fraud
A Marxist critique of left-liberal politics that delivers its message with punch and panache
The Monkey review – slapdash splatter comedy is a grating misfire
Writer-director Osgood Perkins follows up horror hit Longlegs with a tiresome, juvenile adaptation of a Stephen King short story about an evil toy monkey
Queen James by Gareth Russell review – all the king’s men
The complicated life and passionate love affairs of Great Britain’s first monarch
Death of the Author by Nnedi Okorafor review – an SF master moves into the mainstream
This book within a book weaves a writer’s struggles with scenes from their Africanfuturist tale of post-apocalyptic robots
Your Life Is Manufactured by Tim Minshall review – object lessons
A deep dive into the world of making things that means you’ll never look at your kettle in quite the same way again
The Violet Hour by James Cahill review – art, secrets and lies
The Tiepolo Blue author’s impressive second novel is an enthrallingly intricate portrait of the art world
September Says review – intense sisterly bond leads to things getting strange in rural Ireland
There’s a lot to grab your attention here, but strong performances struggle to save Ariane Labed’s adaptation of Daisy Johnson’s novel Sisters