THE PANOPTICON BY JENNI FAGAN (2012)

I think that this is already a modern classic, though it’s only a few years old. Set in a dystopian Britain, it is about a young woman with a difficult past who is now owned by the state, fighting a war against the authorities to assert her sovereignty and preserve her sanity. It manages to be both harrowing and uplifting, a masterful debut novel from one of the best writers around right now.

Irvine Welsh’s new novel, Dead Men’s Trousers (Jonathan Cape) is out now