The Searcher by Tana French

One of my favourite writers is back. Cal is an ex Boston cop who’s having a midlife crisis and buys a rundown place in the Irish countryside to lick his wounds and start again – when a local kid turns up and asks for Cal’s help in finding his missing older brother. Even small towns can have big secrets.

All The Young Men by Ruth Coker Burks

This is a profoundly moving and wonderful memoir from a woman who, when she was 26, came across a young man in hospital who was dying of AIDS. None of the staff, nor his family would have anything to do with him and she became a one woman support network to that community, giving the men food, medicine and comfort – all while trying to bring up her young daughter on her own, with very little income. It’s an amazing story.