Most of Thubron's novels are notably different from his travel books. Several describe settings of enforced immobility: a psychiatric hospital, a prison, an amnesiac's mind. Notable among them are
Emperor (1978), a study of the conversion of
Constantine,
A Cruel Madness (winner of the PEN/Macmillan Silver Pen Award), and
Falling (1989). Others, however, use travel or a fictional abroad:
Turning Back the Sun (1991) and an imaginary journey to
Vilcabamba, Peru, in
To the Last City (2002), long-listed for the Man Booker Prize. It has been described as a "
Heart of Darkness narrative" in a "
Marquezian setting". His 2016 novel,
Night of Fire, is his most ambitious yet: a multi-layered study of time and memory, which several reviewers named his masterpiece. Thubron says that he was influenced by ''
Palgrave's Golden Treasury'' as a schoolboy, and was initially inspired by the travel writing of
Patrick Leigh Fermor,
Jan Morris and
Freya Stark. Thubron admires the English novelist
William Golding and chose
Victor Gollancz's anthology
A Year of Grace (1950) as his book for
Desert Island Discs.
Travel writing •
Mirror to Damascus –
Heinemann, 1967 •
The Hills of Adonis: A Quest in Lebanon – Heinemann, 1968 •
Jerusalem – Heinemann, 1969 •
Journey into Cyprus – Heinemann, 1975 •
Jerusalem –
Time-Life, 1976 •
Istanbul – Time-Life, 1978 •
The Venetians – Time-Life, 1980 •
The Ancient Mariners – Time-Life, 1981 •
The Royal Opera House, Covent Garden –
Hamish Hamilton, 1982 •
Among the Russians – Heinemann, 1983 •
Where Nights Are Longest: Travels by Car Through Western Russia –
Atlantic Monthly Press, 1984 •
Behind the Wall: A Journey through China – Heinemann, 1987 •
The Silk Road: Beyond the Celestial Kingdom –
Simon & Schuster, 1989 •
The Lost Heart of Asia – Heinemann, 1994 •
In Siberia –
Chatto & Windus, 1999 •
Shadow of the Silk Road, Chatto & Windus, 2006 •
To a Mountain in Tibet, Chatto & Windus, 2011 •
The Amur River: Between Russia and China, Chatto & Windus, 2021
Forewords: •
Views from Abroad: The Spectator Book of Travel Writing, edited by
Philip Marsden-Smedley & Jeffrey Klinke – Grafton, 1988 •
The Lycian Shore by Freya Stark – John Murray, 2002 •
The Road to Oxiana by Robert Byron – Penguin, 2007 • ''Stalin's Nose'' – by
Rory MacLean – Tauris Parke, 2008 •
The Travels of Marco Polo – Everyman, 2008 •
Art, Life and Everything - by
Julie Umerle - Susak Press, 2019
Novels •
The God in the Mountain - Heinemann, 1977 •
Emperor – Heinemann, 1978 •
A Cruel Madness – Heinemann, 1984 •
Falling – Heinemann, 1989 •
Turning Back the Sun – Heinemann, 1991 •
Distance – Heinemann, 1996 •
To the Last City – Chatto & Windus, 2002 •
Night of Fire - Chatto & Windus, 2016
Radio adaptations, stage and television •
Emperor - BBC Radio 4, September 1984, with
Martin Jarvis as Constantine and
Juliet Stevenson as Fausta. •
Great Journeys: The Silk Road – BBC 2 Television, presenter, 1989 •
The Prince of the Pagodas - ballet scenario, the Royal Opera House, 1989, choreographed by
Kenneth MacMillan •
A Cruel Madness – BBC Radio 4, May 1992, with
Robert Glenister as Pashley and
Harriet Walter as Sophia •
The South Bank Show – Time seen as a Road, on Colin Thubron, ITV television, 1992 ==Prizes and awards==