Declan Burke, Elizabeth Mannion and Brian Cliff round up their favourite crime novels of the year

Librettist Charles Jennens is given his due in the creation of a beloved standard of classical repertoire, which has strong links to Dublin

501 Essential Albums of the ’90s is US-centric; while Further Adventures in Record Collecting: Dust & Grooves Vol 2 is wonderful if eye-wateringly expensive

Reviews: The Island in the Sound; Grand Tour; National Theatre; and Long Distance

Between Holy Show, Dublin Review of Books, Tolka and the Dublin Review, I had a high stack on my desk

The self-confessed ‘altar boy in the church of cinema’ propels the reader comfortably from one argument to the next

People suffering from chronic fatigue-type illnesses could potentially benefit enormously from reading this book, but are likely to be frustrated by its long-windedness

Garth Greenwell’s third novel looks at how slow recovery can become a rehabilitation to life and literature

Michael O’Malley explores how scientific biology informs the arbitrariness of ‘racecraft’ found in family records

This chunk of writing spanning 30 years provides an ideal entry point to new readers of Graeber, while for those returning to his ideas, the pleasure is in the writing

Adrian Frazier’s no-holds-barred biography of the American-born Irish poet acknowledges the cost of a life turned ‘into the achievement of poetry’

Kevin Barry, Aingeala Flannery, Lucy Caldwell and more contribute to ambitious collection

At least one-third of this work is devoted to little-known causes of death — famine and famine-related diseases

Denouncing ‘Zionism’ as a uniquely malign force allows people to imagine they are ‘punching up’ rather than falling for the ‘socialism of fools’

Illness, marriage, colonialism, animals, Swiss wealth and Eritrea feature in works by Johanna Ekström, Astrid Roemer, Abdelaziz Baraka Sakin, Jean Giono, Christian Kracht and Baalu Girma

A taster of the finest books as Gaeilge for adults and children published over the past year

The Story of a Gamechanger by Robert McCrum; collaborative short-story collection Duets; and Defiance: Racial Injustice, Police Brutality, A Sister’s Fight for the Truth by Janet Alder with Dan Glazebrook

Standouts include Dhirro Dhearlha by the pseudonymous JHK, The Dark Lady by Anna Maria Hall, and The Death Spancel by Katharine Tynan

Alice Kinsella and Daniel Wade explore the dimensions of a whale’s sentience, of its secret life offshore, its utility, its value and its survival

Authors have done exceptional research work in ferreting out such comprehensive accounts of these Irish resistance activists

Author connects particular concerns, often focused on Cork Protestantism, with wider debates

Biography has insider feel and performs perpetual case for defence even in absence of prosecution

The material includes rhetorical flourishes, humour and a Joycean fictional ramble through Dublin

Stunning literary ventriloquism will see George Smiley defer his retirement for some time to come, while Scott Phillips delivers a dark-stained noir punctuated by arson and murder by claw-hammer

A wide-ranging compilation of essays by the Irish Cities 2070 think tank, which is backed by the Irish Academy of Engineering and the Royal Institute of the Architects of Ireland

An ambitious and engaging novel set in the near future that pits basic human need against infinite corporate greed

The Frontier of Writing: A Study of Seamus Heaney’s Prose edited by Ian Hickey and Eugene O’Brien; Citizen Poet: New & Selected Essays by Eavan Boland; Questioning Ireland by Thomas McCarthy

Cormac Moore’s essay on the establishment of Northern Ireland is among the strongest in this collection

The poet was always good, and the more Mahon the better, but it’s possible the best came first

As children start to count down the days until Santa’s arrival, these books will help to both distract and inspire

All tell, little show, this memoir is strong on what happened but less so on why - and it gets worse as it continues.

The Daily Telegraph reviewer certainly has fun with his catastrophes, but the book has a more serious purpose

Rich collection of essays, poems and reflections on a visionary who breathed life into Ireland’s musical tradition

Featuring Sabaa Tahir’s Heir; Silver by Olivia Levez; When It’s Your Turn For Midnight by Blessing Musariri; Rani Choudhury Must Die by Adiba Jaigirdar; and Darkly by Marisha Pessl

This comprehensive and wonderfully written book serves to remind us of how much outstanding Irish theatre has been produced in the past quarter-century

Haruki Murakami expands on a 1980 novella in a book that evokes the spirit of the late Columbian Nobel Prize winner

Masayoshi Son is at centre of Barber’s dizzying tour of tech bro billionaire boom-and-bust culture

Bailey’s irrepressible humour and boyish joy are a welcome antidote to the grim news cycle of 21st-century life

Wisdom and deftness were tools of writer whose subjects ranged from the lyrical to the sectarian

Patrick Cockburn remains detached but proud of father’s career as determined, ruthless revolutionary

Despite the best of intentions and some strong ideas, Goodhart seems to underestimate the extent to which he pushes readers’ buttons

Vona Groarke reviews new work by Jamie McKendrick; Mary O’Malley; Joseph Woods; Ella Frears

Vigorous and critically minded history proves that the shifting and sometimes contradictory ‘social construct’ of Irish America cannot be reduced to one singular identity

Stories originating from Ireland to Siberia are partnered by illuminating essays of symbolic psychoanalysis

A collection of well-written and shocking essays by the crime novelist and an activist for the wrongly convicted

Tales involving hauntings by both otherworldly presences and grief and some Cern-inspired science fiction,

Brown observes that securing Taiwan may be far too big a risk for the Chinese Communist Party, which values stability above all else

A trio of compelling reads which run from the Ukraine invasion through the personal and to the curiousity of true crime

A memoir and a concept book that value warmth in their humour

The third novel of a cycle of four with abuse as their central theme makes for a powerful read