Picking one author to 'complete' in 2026

Just came here to say Clare Chambers - just looking on good reads and if that’s reliable it says she’s written 7, which I think I’ve read all over over the years! Read “Learning to swim” many years ago (published in 98) and Shy Creatures within the last few months, I feel like she’s probably underrated but consistently great.
is the challenge to read them all in the same year? Just checked on Maggie O’Farrell and think I’ve read all of hers now bar Hamnet (which I saw the preview of, and am not quite over yet!!) so I could easily also tick her off this year if “completing” over a longer time frame would be allowed!

Ali Smith - 13 novels
Sarah Moss - 9

Not female and not 7-10 novels but I would go for Ian McEwan. Some of the authors mentioned essentially write a similar book with the same tropes and recognisable phrasing. There is little sense of progression over time. So reading the same author can be boring. It’s easy to read McEwan back to back as each novel is gripping but unique and his early work lays the ground for later more mature works.

Ooh, doesn't meet your criteria as not contemporary, but it has prompted me to think 2026 might just be the year I "finish" Stella Gibbons (the novels at least)!

As a teenager I loved Thomas Hardy, my favourites were the saddest ones like Tess of the d'Urbervilles and Jude the Obscure! I remember reading Under the Greenwood Tree and thinking this is so different as it’s happy!

I’ve always wished I had the time to immerse myself in one great writer. You know, someone like Tolstoy or Proust or Virginia Woolf. To take a whole year off and do nothing but read the works of that one genius. When my mother retired, she read all of Dickens’ novels. The whole lot in chronological order. I was so proud of her (and so impressed).

If I ever had that opportunity, I’d choose someone great but joyful and life-affirming (i.e not Kafka or Thomas Hardy). Maybe William Blake or D H Lawrence or Jane Austen.

Ishiguro? 8 novels, none of them too long.

You could definitely read all 26 in one year. In fact, you could probably read them in six months (and I’m a slow reader). It’s amazing how addictive she is. It’s also amazing how quickly you can tear through her novels. Even though she is a real highbrow, she seems to draw you in and hold you like no other writer I have ever known. My only criticism is that her characters are constantly falling in love with one another in ways that hardly seem convincing. Wonderful, wonderful novelist though.

Deborah Levy - there’s a great mix of novels (several with a young woman protagonist) plays, essays and autobiography.

Brilliant book!

The Siege is so sad!

Love all her books and sadly there will be no more!

How about Helen Dunmore? That’s 15, but the good thing about it is that they are very different. Some sad ones in the mix.

I can’t recommend Ottessa Moshfegh enough.

I’ve read all Kate Atkinson. Great novelist!

So it is. Thanks. I saw the picture of the book and didn't check the publication date.

I am continuing my Amanda Craig re-read and am currently on one of her very early ones, A Private Place.

Liz Moore - 5 novels I think, not a series.

If this is High and Low, it's due out in May 2026 - perhaps a bit late for Christmas.

Anne Tyler is brilliant but can be v v long too.
I agree about Natalie Haynes. Very very readable.

Based on some excellent books I’ve read I’d do-

Taylor Jenkins Reid - 10 books
or
Kristin Hannah - 24 books

She is fabulous. I think her latest is 'A God In Ruins'. What a read it is!

I forgot another one whom I’ve completed: Alan Hollinghurst (7). Not sure how much he’d appeal – they’re so overwhelmingly gay that the few female characters don’t tend to be fleshed out very much (with a few honourable exceptions).

This (and @HonoriaBulstrode’s observation above) has got me thinking about what I would want from a year-long project like this. I probably would want someone who writes with some sort of unifying theme—otherwise it wouldn’t feel like a project at all—but it would have to be so high-level as to allow maximum variety or I’d just get bored. A single complex character, or a particular society, or a very abstract idea.

Best summarised, I think, as the creation of a world in which all sorts of things could happen. The author needn’t actually go all over the map, but she should at least give you the impression that she might take it anywhere.

She writes well enough, but Sally Rooney would be simply terrible in this respect. You get the idea far too quickly. Nothing will come as a surprise.

@atiaofthejulii let us know what she chooses, it's an an interesting challenge.

I vote Wally Lamb. Not so many books but they are all rather huge. Don't let that put her off, it's pacy storylines.and great characters. Not always in the slightest bit pleasant, but well drawn and rounded.

I love Lissa Evans who was mentioned t too but I think they'd be raced through because they are such enjoyable and (deceptively) easy reads. It takes a lot of skill to make it seem so effortless. My DD is really enjoying her kids' fiction at the minute too - as am I when I get a chance to read any!

Anne Enright, Sarah Hall, Jenny Erpenbeck, Vigdis Hjorth, Laurie Colwin, Annie Ernaux, Mary Gaitskill.