As we bid farewell to 2021, we automatically think of all the new exciting fiction and non-fiction that we’ll get to lay our hands on during the year that beckons. For a review of the most anticipated titles that will be published next year, The News on Sunday turns to booksellers and publishers to get an idea. Ranging from enthralling fiction to moving memoirs and non-fiction, below is a short list of books not to be missed next year.

Taiba Abbas

With a much-loved author revealing her novel-in-progress earlier this week, for me 2022 is already a book-year to look forward to. Few books have impacted me the way Madeline Miller’s The Song of Achilles (2011) and Circle (2018) have. Persephone is the story Miller is working on now. Its publication might still be a long way off, but knowing the novel is in the process of being written, definitely fills the coming year with thrilling suspense.

From what I’ve read so far, Monica Ali’s upcoming novel Love Marriage and its protagonist Yasmin Ghorami, seem strongly reminiscent of her debut novel Brick Lane (2003) and the memorable Nazneen. Kamila Shamsie’s Best of Friends (2022) will be at the top of my reading list. After Home Fire (2017) I think everyone has been on the edge of their seats, waiting for her next tour de force.

Another book I’m looking forward to is Jillian Cantor’s Beautiful Little Fools (2022). The novel is a retelling of F Scott Fitzgerald’s classic The Great Gatsby. Cantor expands on Fitzgerald’s story, reimagining it from the perspective of its female characters. A retelling of this kind is a bold and fascinating venture, taking on a timeless classic, reworking it, offering it anew to the world.

– The writer is the founder of Àla Books and Authors

Sara Danial

Hearing from publishers about the books coming out in the year ahead is one of the best things about my job as an editor. We hope you’re caught up on your 2021 books, because the 2022 list is rolling right in. There are some real treats in store, both from big name authors and dazzling debuts poised to become fan favourites. We have taken the liberty to round up some of the most exciting new releases coming in 2022.

Hanya Yanagihara follows her celebrated 2015 novel, A Little Life, with To Paradise, an exploration of love and loss. Tracing three fantastical, heart breaking narratives across distinct timelines, the novel follows the lives of multiple characters who, despite being separated by centuries, find connection through the shared space of a townhouse on the edge of Washington Square Park in New York City.

Son of Sin by Omar Sakr is an extraordinary tale of an estranged father, an abused and abusive mother, an army of relatives; a tapestry of violence, woven across generations and geographies, from Turkey to Lebanon to Western Sydney. This is the legacy left to Jamal Smith, a young queer Muslim trying to escape a past in which memory and rumour trace ugly shapes in the dark. When every thread in life constricts one instead of providing a connections, how does find a way to breathe? Torn between faith and fear, gossip and gospel, family and friendship, Jamal finds and tests the limits of love.

More than a decade after winning a Pulitzer Prize for A Visit from the Goon Squad, Jennifer Egan delivers a highly anticipated sibling novel. The Candy House, which follows many of Goon’s characters into their futures and pasts, transcends worlds and dimensions while observing what happens when our memories become available for others’ consumption. It’s a complex, compelling read that portrays Egan’s masterful storytelling.

– The writer is the publishing editor at Liberty Books

Safinah Danish Elahi

2021 has been a rich year, I say that because we (Reverie Publishers) began operations this year. For me personally, it has also been a year of reading widely and diversely. As we enter a new year, I would like to take up projects that start a conversation. There are many social issues that plague our society we don’t talk about. We take them up on social media but fail to comment past three days and the hype fades. Fiction teaches us empathy, fiction creates a connection with the reader, where the reader is invested enough to want things for the characters.

Someone recently sent me a graphic novel, it looked interesting, original and something we’d maybe take on. In terms of reading, I’d like to read something about love and friendship, not necessarily from the Partition. Love and friendship in this day and age and how it is an active part of our lives, written locally without it being a side story not important enough for the main plot.

Two books I look forward to are Fiona and Jane by Jean Chen Ho, and The Candy House by Jennifer Egan.

– The writer is an author and founder of Reverie Books

Emil Hasnain

We are going into yet another year of the Covid pandemic. With high levels of smog in Lahore, it seems inevitable that we will be spending more time indoors. In such circumstances, what better company can one have than that of books? While we are always excited about all new books that come into our store, there are some highly anticipated titles coming out in 2022. The Maid by Nita Prose is a thrilling new mystery novel about a domestic helper who gets embroiled in the murder of a guest. The novel is coming out in January.

Another brilliant novel on our list is To Paradise by Hanya Yanagihara, the author of the Booker prize shortlisted bestseller A Little Life. In her new work, Yanagihara reimagines the history and past of New York and the lives of different people who live in the city.

One of the books we can’t wait to get our hands on is Sandra Newman’s Julia, a feminist retelling of George Orwell’s magnum opus Nineteen Eighty Four. For readers who enjoy a good fantastical novel, look out for Vagabonds! by Eloghosa Osunde. Osunde guides you through the streets of Lagos to uncover magic, danger and love between memorable outcasts.

– The writer is head of communications at The Last Word bookshop

Mehr F Husain

When ZUKA BOOKS started in 2020, the idea was to publish one book and go back to writing. That’s always been the dream. But then people came up with some of the most stunning work and all one could think was, “This needs to be published, but who will do that?”

Since 2020, one was privileged to publish four books, each pushing for creative space in its own right. Zahra Hameed’s book of poetry, The Burning Champa, addressed the taboo of mental health and body dysmorphia, sadly rampant in our society.

Sabdezar Irfan’s graphic novel, Grey Matter, was her final year thesis (BNU). Strong, raw and overwhelming it was a visual insight into the breakdown of a marriage. Irfan’s non-bias lens zoomed in on character flaws and how those make for disjointed couples.

Letters to My Inner Child a bi-lingual anthology published in collaboration with The Desi Collective founded by Arslan Athar, was all the proof that was needed to affirm maturity in Pakistani authors. Gone were the clichéd, internationally influenced, Hollywood-affected storylines. Powerful pieces, tenderly revealing layers of love, pain, trauma, healing and more.

The question that keeps coming up is: “what kind of books are you publishing?” Instead we need to ask: “what do you want to write?” In 2022, I am hopeful that one will come across manuscripts that further the platform.

Where are the graphic novels of the various ethnic struggles across Pakistan? Has any IDP ever been asked about What Happened? With all this travelling up north, there have been more HUM TV plays situated there than there have been books. Instagram is flooded with ‘woke’ graphic designs but where are the comic books or graphic images? For a country obsessed with marriage and motherhood, where are the stories about them?

Numerous historical archives with beautiful photos of yesteryears’ Pakistan have been created, can no one collate and compile books from those with appropriate respect for copyright? Given all the entertaining political discussions, can no one spin a yarn about historical fiction? Crime fiction should be a speciality. Political drama is something we should beat any other nation at.

Pakistan, it is high time you owned your narrative. Fiction, pictorial, graphic, non-fiction, I want it all in 2022.

– The writer is the founder of ZUKA Books

Hoori Noorani

As we end an incredibly busy and productive 2021, we look forward with excitement to an even more eventful 2022. The first half of the coming year will see the publication of Iftikhar Arif’s Kuliyat. The poet is a living legend of our times.

For the first time Maktaba-e-Danyal is working with the Urdu speaking French writer Julien Columeau to publish his collection of short stories, titled Derrida Harramda aur Doosri Kahanian. We will also be releasing in January the short stories of a hitherto unpublished but extremely talented writer, Raja Shehzad, who has a distinct style reminiscent of Qurratul Ain Hyder’s prose. His book is titled Log Sargoshiyon Mein Goya Hein.

Sameena Nazir (Kallo— Afsanay) will be coming out with her first novel Kala Heera written in the background of North Africa.

Three very important translations will also see the light of day in 2022. Firstly, Omar Shahid Hamid’s brilliant novel The Prisoner has been translated as Qaidi by Inaam Nadeem. The other book is a translation of Russian short stories by Dr Najam Butt. This includes some classics like Sholokhov’s Fate of a Man and translations from some of the modern Russian writers. The third book is a translation by Aslam Khwaja of Ayesha Khan’s The Women's Movement in Pakistan: Activism, Islam and Democracy (Pakistan mein khawateen ki tehreek).

We are also very happy to be publishing the latest poetry collection of Ishrat Afreen, tentatively titled Parinde Chehchahatay Hein.

– The writer is the managing director of Maktaba-e-Danyal

Ameena Saiyid

Tapestry: Strands of Women's Struggles Woven into the History of Pakistan by Fouzia Saeed is a history of women’s struggle for rights and dignity in Pakistan and presents a tapestry of their movement and the range of strategies and approaches they adopted over the last eighty years to achieve their goals. It is based on hundreds of interviews of women leaders and highlights the women we should be celebrating, the ones who contributed to improving women’s lives and who are hardly known today. Individual stories of struggle, resistance and change are woven into a tapestry and valuable glimpses are provided of what these women were like and the important roles they played in earning the space and rights we enjoy today.

Jinnah: A Life by Yasser Latif Hamdani presents a holistic picture of Jinnah and the complex political problems he faced as he navigated the power corridors of British India. Understanding Jinnah’s story and his motivations may help India and Pakistan lay to rest the ghosts of Partition and the acrimonious communal dispute and realise that nothing is final in politics. This book shows that Jinnah did not envisage India and Pakistan to be perpetual enemies.

Under Such a Sheltering Sky, a novel by Sarmila Bose. The year is 1971. Two young men find themselves caught up in the tumultuous events of that year on opposite sides of the war. One is battling to preserve the unity of Pakistan; the other is fighting for an independent Bangladesh. Their paths cross in unpredictable ways in the chaos of war. At first one side, then the other gains the upper hand; at critical moments, each man would hold the other’s life in his hands.

– The writer is the founder and managing director of Lightstone Publishers

Bilal Zahoor

Folio Books has a rich pipeline of books lined up for the first half of 2022. Some of the ones that intrigue me as a publisher who conceives of independent publishing as a medium to communicate progressive politics include the following:

We lost many of our important thinkers, activists and writers during 2021, who have left behind a rich legacy of progressive thought. IA Rehman is one such tall figure with unforgettable contributions in the realm of journalism, human rights and politics of resistance. I was fortunate to have had a sustained interaction with him, especially during the last year of his incredible life – the period during which he finished his memoirs. Jointly edited by Zohra Yusuf, me, Asha’ar Rehman, Harris Khalique and Gulrukhsar Mujahid, these brilliant memoirs – a fascinating account of IA Rehman’s personal and political life – are set to be out in the first quarter of 2022.

Long overdue, Pervez Hoodbhoy’s Pakistan: Origins, Identity, Future will be one of the most important publications to appear in any discipline in 2022. Divided into five sections, the book engages with the pre-British history of India, the colonial period, the foundational narrative of Pakistan, the political life of three of Pakistan’s founding figures, the post-Partition ‘stubborn angularities’, the praetorian nature of the state and the future of Pakistan.

We’re equally excited about publishing Anjum Altaf’s series of books on Single National Curriculum, a critical reflection of the initiative and the intellectual miseries that it brings for a majority of youth in Pakistan; Ayra Indrias’s fascinating research on Christian women workers in the Punjab; Ahmed Rashid’s poetry volume, This Side of the River; and a reprint of AH Kardar’s 1954 book on Pakistan’s historic, maiden tour to England titled Test on Trial.

– The writer is the editorial director of Folio Books and a member of Haqooq-i-Khalq Movement.