‘John of John’ by Douglas Stuart

Hbk, Picador, £20

The phenomenal Scottish writer, Douglas Stuart, has done it again – tackling uncomfortable subjects with a compelling flow and dexterity that belies their depth.

John-Calum Macleod was raised in the Isle of Harris in a community with strict adherence to the Presbyterian church and a well-practised ability to hold the deepest of secrets in plain sight.

His return from university and strained reabsorption back into his homeland and language, family rifts and contradictions, sees lives unravelling and the unsaid finally being said aloud. How can you be a young gay man when your dad, John, is a stalwart of the church?

A coming-out story with a difference and layers of unexpected family intrigue. This is one of those books that from the outside may look intimidating, but once you are in it grabs you and refuses to let you go. You will find yourself missing the characters when it ends.

‘A Far-Flung Life’ by M.L. Stedman

Hbk, Doubleday, £20

For generations, the MacBrides have lived on a remote Western Australian sheep station, Meredith Downs. A million arid acres, it’s an ocean of land, where farming is in the hands of harsh and unpredictable weather and natural forces and time has a mind of its own.

On an ordinary day, on a lonely road, under the unending blue sky, patriarch Phil MacBride swerves to avoid a kangaroo.

In seconds the lives of the entire MacBride family are shattered. Fate comes for them again, in a twist of consequences that will cause one of them to lose their life, and another to sacrifice theirs for the sake of an innocent child.

Matt, the youngest MacBride, is plunged into a moral and emotional journey, as he is forced to choose between love and duty, sacrifice and happiness.

A feast of a book with a vastness as wide as its landscape.