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William Boyd

(b.1952)

William Boyd was born in Ghana. He was brought up there and in Nigeria. He was educated at the universities of Nice, Glasgow and Oxford. He is the author of seven previous novels and the recipient of many awards including the Whitbread First Novel, the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize and the Sunday Express Book of the Year Award. An Ice-Cream War was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. He is married and lives in Chelsea, London.

Awards: Costa (2006), LA Times (1995), James Tait Black (1990), SoA (1982) see all

Genres: Literary Fiction, Thriller, Historical

New and upcoming books

September 2025

The Predicament

Novels

   A Good Man in Africa (1981)
   An Ice-Cream War (1982)
   Stars and Bars (1984)
   The New Confessions (1987)
   Brazzaville Beach (1990)
   The Blue Afternoon (1993)
   Transfigured Night (1995)
   Armadillo (1998)
   Nat Tate (1998)
   Any Human Heart (2002)
   Restless (2006)
   Ordinary Thunderstorms (2009)
   Waiting for Sunrise (2012)
   Sweet Caress (2015)
   Love is Blind (2018)
   Trio (2020)
   The Romantic (2022)
   Gabriel's Moon (2024)
   The Predicament (2025)

Collections

   On the Yankee Station (1981)
   School Ties (1985)
   My Girl in Skin Tight Jeans (1991)
   The Destiny of Natalie 'X' (1995)
   Killing Lizards (1995)
   Fascination (2004)
   The Dream Lover (2008)
   The Dreams of Bethany Mellmoth (2017)
   Hindsight's 2020 (2020) (with others)

Novellas and Short Stories

The Vanishing Game (2014)

Series contributed to

Ox-Tales
Ox-Tales:Water (2009) (with others)

James Bond
38. Solo (2013)

Plays show

Non fiction show

Books containing stories by William Boyd

Dear NHS (2020)
100 Stories to Say Thank You
edited by
Adam Kay

Arboreal (2016)
A Collection of Words from the Woods
edited by
Adrian Cooper

Literary Lunch (2015)

More books

Awards

	2006 Costa Book Award for Best Novel : Restless
	1995 Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Fiction : The Blue Afternoon
	1990 James Tait Black Memorial Prize : Brazzaville Beach
	1983 Granta Best of Young British Novelists
	1982 Somerset Maugham Award : A Good Man in Africa

Award nominations

	2016 Walter Scott Prize for Best Historical Novel (nominee) : Sweet Caress
	2007 Richard and Judy Award (nominee) : Restless
	2004 Dublin Literary Award (nominee) : Any Human Heart
	2002 Booker Prize (longlist) : Any Human Heart
	1982 Booker Prize (shortlist) : An Ice-Cream War

William Boyd recommends

Flesh (2025)
David Szalay
"A superb novel, written with great terse authority and allure: mordant, knowing and disturbingly wise."

The Proof of My Innocence (2024)
Jonathan Coe
"A brilliant, shrewd, satirical novel - gimlet-eyed, funny, very clever and a searchingly profound look at the state of this strange country of ours."

There are Rivers in the Sky (2024)
Elif Shafak
"A great, sweeping, enthralling novel - Elif Shafak's narrative vision is as remarkable and astonishing as ever. Wonderful."

Tiananmen Square (2024)
Lai Wen
"An extraordinary book. Truly important. An act of historical testimony all the more trenchant and devastating for being cast as fiction."

What Will Survive of Us (2024)
Howard Jacobson
"A wonderfully wise, moving and heartfelt novel. A profound and vital book."

The Black Eden (2023)
Richard T Kelly
"A wonderfully evocative and atmospheric novel, written with great narrative assurance and remarkable, meticulous detail. A tremendous achievement."

The Scarlet Papers (2023)
Matthew Richardson
"Hugely impressive and compelling."

To Battersea Park (2023)
Philip Hensher
"A brilliantly conceived and audacious novel from one of our most consistently intelligent and beguiling writers."

Sins of the Fathers (2022)
(Wolf , book 2)
Herbert J Stern and Alan A Winter
"A superb and exciting blend of intrigue and history that will keep you on the edge of your seat from beginning to end."

The Plant Hunter (2022)
T L Mogford
"It's a great Stevensonian adventure but with a 21st century spin. Harry and Clarissa work really well - wholly believable and sexily engaging. The detail and the textures throughout are exemplary: lightly worn but dripping with atmosphere and exotic life. Really brilliantly achieved."

The Paper Palace (2021)
Miranda Cowley Heller
"A beautifully constructed, wonderfully intelligent and beguiling novel, rich with a multitude of pleasures."

The Answer to Everything (2021)
Luke Kennard
"A tremendous novel – funny, shrewd, poignantly destabilising – and charged with Luke Kennard’s laconic wit and his gimlet eye for the foibles and nuances of human behaviour. A huge success."

The Sandpit (2020)
Nicholas Shakespeare
"A remarkable contemporary thriller – with shades of Graham Greene and Le Carré about it – but also a profound and compelling investigation of a hugely complex human predicament. Brilliantly observed, captivatingly written, grippingly narrated – a triumph."

We Germans (2020)
Alexander Starritt
"We Germans is a remarkable and audacious novel that is harrowingly real and, at the same time, asks the most searching questions about men at war."

Independence Square (2020)
A D Miller
"A tremendous novel - taut, compelling, reeking of authenticity. A.D. Miller writes with exemplary precision and sophistication. Independence Square is an unsparing examination of human beings caught up in historical forces they can barely comprehend."

Lomita For Ever (2019)
Trevor Eve
"At once audacious, coolly knowing, highly observant and wryly funny."

In the Full Light of the Sun (2019)
Clare Clark
"A completely fascinating novel about the early 20th century art world and its many dubious machinations. Expertly researched, compellingly narrated and full of potent resonance today."

Too Close (2018)
Natalie Daniels
"A tremendous, powerful, audacious novel - full of scathing insight ; full of raw, compelling feeling."

Only to Sleep (2018)
(Philip Marlowe)
Lawrence Osborne
"A brilliant Raymond Chandler continuation novel with an ageing Philip Marlowe. Osborne and Chandler are a perfect match."

Nice Jumper (2018)
Tom Cox
"Does for golf what Fever Pitch did for football...Funny, cleaver and all-too-horribly true."

Last Stories (2018)
William Trevor
"He is, I think, sui generis, and in his 12 collections (and 13 novels, and two novellas: an exhibition of near-Updikean energy), he has created a version of the short story that almost ignores the form's hundred or so years of intricate evolution. These stories stay in the mind long after they're finished because they're so solid, so deliberately shaped and directed so surely toward their solemn, harsh conclusions."

Your Father's Room (2017)
Michel Déon
"Our lives would be all the richer if we read a Michel DÃ©on novel."

The Death of Rex Nhongo (2015)
C B George
"A terrific novel absolutely compelling and chilling. A wonderfully astute and forensic blend of fact and fiction, lies and truth."

Who is Tom Ditto? (2014)
Danny Wallace
"Tremendous. Funny, beguiling and stealthily profound."

The Dogs of Rome (2010)
(Commissario Alec Blume, book 1)
Conor Fitzgerald
"Powerful and hugely compelling."

Collected Stories (2010)
Hanif Kureishi
"No one else casts such a shrewd and gimlet eye on contemporary life."

Free Agent (2009)
(Paul Dark Trilogy , book 1)
Jeremy Duns
"A wholly engrossing and sophisticated spy novel set against a forgotten corner of 20th century history. Fascinating and compelling."

Typhoon (2008)
Charles Cumming
"Compelling, vivid and disturbing. I read it at a rate of knots."

Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi (2007)
Geoff Dyer
"A must-read."

Something in the Sea (2006)
Yves Bonavero
"I was gripped and enthralled."

Amagansett (2004)
Mark Mills
"A striking and assured first thriller...worldly and impeccably researched."

The Memory of All That (1999)
Bryan Forbes
"A fascinating novel, utterly compelling and wonderfully authentic."

The Last King of Scotland (1998)
Giles Foden
"Audacious, shrewd and spirited."

Falling Away (1996)
Candida Crewe
"A beautiful and impressive feat of imagination."

Sozaboy (1994)
Ken Saro-Wiwa
"...one of the great achievements of African Literature."

The Kindness of Women (1991)
(Empire of the Sun, book 2)
J G Ballard
"The book is full of mesmerising writing, classic examples of the Ballard style, paragraphs and pages that disturb and enthral... A force is operating in this astonishing book which is hard to resist."

Alma Cogan (1991)
Gordon Burn
"An extraordinary, unprecidented novel, audacious, innovative and totally compelling."

The Stranger (1942)
Albert Camus
"One of those books that marks a reader's life indelibly."

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