Mr Alan Garner has never been one for labels. A shape-shifter of a writer, he deftly flits between works for children and adults while wrestling with genres as if they are Play-Doh. His latest, Treacle Walker, is a petite novel about Joe, a lone boy, and his unlikely friendship with a wandering rag and bone man. It’s so petite, in fact, it is the shortest book to have been nominated for the Booker. Fused with English myth and folklore, Treacle Walker is a weird and wonderful read into which Garner has crafted an entire world and a lifetime of experience.

Mr Max Porter eschewed literary rules when he wrote Grief Is The Thing With Feathers. Part prose, part verse and at times free form, this innovative 128-page novella is a polyphonic meditation on loss told in three simple chapters: “Dad”, “Boys” and “Crow”. It features an imaginary, person-sized crow, a troublemaker who helps a father and his children deal with their mother’s death. It sounds terrifying, but it is a glorious tale delicately hewn with wisdom and emboldened by the author’s dark humour.

When Mr Chinua Achebe began writing his short novel about pre-colonial life in Nigeria, he was unaware it would become the most important and celebrated work of African literature. It was his debut, penned in 1958 when it was far from routine to write through the prism of the African experience. His 200-page parable of an Igbo man turned wrestling champion depicted a way of life that was disappearing to the clutches of European colonialism. It was critically acclaimed around the globe and quickly made him Africa’s most celebrated author.

If you prefer your short(er) stories to err on the transcendental side, try A Whole Life by Mr Robert Seethaler. Detailing one man’s solitary and simple existence against the backdrop of a remote Alpine village, this tenderly written novel spans a lifetime in just 160 pages. Seethaler’s ode to an ordinary life is shadowed by death, but this is not a dark read. It is an evocative novel of mountain life, imbued with a calm that is almost meditative.

Unless you’ve been living off-grid, this title might bring to mind a song by One Direction’s swaggiest member. Cast that thought aside because this novel will take you far from the dizzying heights of the pop charts to a post-apocalyptic commune called iDeath, a surreal place where everything is crafted from a strange substance called watermelon sugar, which feels like the weirdest of trips. Written by “the last of the beats”, this is a counterculture novel that is at times beautiful while also nightmarishly Mad Max-style brutal.

If you are partial to a doom scroll and need something to wrench your internet-addled brain from the gutters of Twitter, there is no better novel than Ms Patricia Lockwood’s 2021 work of autofiction. Constructed of two short halves, an unnamed protagonist grapples with online fame when her life changes irrevocably due to a family tragedy, which prompts her to leave “the portal” behind. Poignantly examining the small, fragile moments of real life while lambasting our reliance on big tech, this is a moving read with a lasting impact, perfectly designed for tiny attention spans.

At the heart of Mr Jeff VanderMeer’s savvy, metaphysical sci-fi novel lies a dead zone from which no human can return unscathed. Those who study it struggle to make sense of its meaning or the perils within. It’s a horror story, albeit without the jump scares, that lays bare the fragility of human existence and unflinchingly questions our role in the ecological breakdown of the world we live in. Coming in at 208 pages, Annihilation is just long enough to see you through a long-haul flight – and make you question that carbon footprint.

As we cross October’s threshold into Halloween, there is no better short book to pick up than Dame Daphne du Maurier’s sumptuous gothic classic Don’t Look Now. In this fever dream of a story a grief-stricken couple travel to Venice in the wake of their daughter’s death. When they encounter twin sisters who claim to be clairvoyants, they become embroiled in a series of deeply disturbing events. Du Maurier masterfully crafts a sense of foreboding into this barely 50-page read and takes our deepest fears and turns them into the juiciest, and most terrifying, of twists.

Ms Daisy Johnson’s Fen is set on East Anglia’s hinterland, which is neither land nor sea. It is a linked set of 12 short stories, bound together by the liminal space its inhabitants call home. Johnson blends her writing with myth and lore while lacing in a liberal dose of unease: a teenage girl slowly starves herself, a boy returns from the dead and women devour men like prey. Her writing is both lyrical and poised in this debut collection that catapulted the young writer to literary fame.

Ms Ottessa Moshfegh has never been scared to crawl into the dark underbelly of human existence. In Homesick For Another World, she collects the loners and the losers, the depraved and the down and outs and binds them together in a keenly observed collection of tales that charts just how mundane real life can be. And that’s where the magic lies. Moshfegh’s unfettered and darkly funny prose makes her one of the most original American writers. Through these 14 stories, she has created a place weirdos can comfortably call home.