Contemporary fiction titles are those which focus on the present or near past. Stories rooted in the current cultural, social, and political landscape which feature characters we can all recognise.
Contemporary Fiction Books
Penguin Random House India Best Served Cold
Book SynopsisA powerful man approaches Maity on a balmy September evening, worried that someone is planning to murder him. Sometime later, a young woman arrives at the door pleading with Maity to stop her husband from murdering the very same man who visited barely a few hours ago. Maity is quick to act and travels to Manikpur Tea Estate to stop a potential murder. Assisting Maity is his friend Prakash Ray. Twenty years ago, four boys were wronged by a vicious man on this idyllic tea estate. Now, they have returned to avenge the crimes committed against them.
£15.99
Random House, India Aperture
Book SynopsisWhen a struggling freelance photographer discovers a secret window in his apartment that offers a clear view of the rooms in a shady hotel across the lane, he is lured by the dangerous obsession of voyeurism and, subsequently, blackmail. But one day, when he sees a husband murder his wife in a fit of rage in one of the rooms, the photographer turns to detective Janardan Maity to confess his own crimes, so that the killer can be brought to book
£15.99
Penguin Random House India Blasphear
Book SynopsisWhen Sub-inspector Waqas Mahmood is assigned the case of a suicide of a seventeen-year-old boy, he is tempted to do the bare minimum and close it. Waqas has been disenchanted with the police force and wants to quit anyway. And the ominous presence of a religious outfit around the boy's house is another reason to stay away. It''s also just too hot in Shantinagar, a dusty town in Punjab in Pakistan. But Waqas realizes there's more to the case when the boy's friend reaches out claiming that it was not a suicide. In fact, the case might be linked to another terrifying case in Shantinagar when a Hindu art teacher was lynched on the accusation of blasphemy against Islam. Waqas is intrigued; a horror story from his childhood returns to haunt him.
£19.43
Penguin Group (NZ) Poor People With Money
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£12.59
Oxford University Press, USA Kocharethi The Araya Woman Oxford India Paperbacks
Book SynopsisThe first novel by the first tribal novelist of south India, Kocharethi maps the story of the Malayarayar tribe in Kerala. Melding history with culture, the work portrays their many struggles: from possession and dispossession of land to the challenges of preserving myths, rituals, social customs, and belief systems.Table of ContentsAUTHOR'S NOTE; TRANSLATOR'S NOTE; INTRODUCTION; KOCHARETHI; AN INTERVIEW WITH NARAYAN; GLOSSARY
£11.99
Oxford University Press Paris Street Tales
Book SynopsisParis Street Tales is the third volume of a trilogy of translated stories set in Paris. The previous two are Paris Tales, in which each story is associated with one of the twenty arrondissements, and Paris Metro Tales, in which the twenty-two stories are related to a trip round the Paris Metro. This new volume contains eighteen newly translated stories related to particular streets in Paris, and one newly written tale of the city.The stories range from the nineteenth century to the present day, and include tales by well-known writers such as Colette, Maupassant, Didier Daeninckx, and Simenon, and less familiar names such as Francis Carco, Aurélie Filipetti, and Arnaud Baignot. They present a vivid picture of Paris streets in a variety of literary styles and tones. Simenon''s Maigret is called upon to solve a mystery on the Boulevard Beaumarchais; a flâneur learns some French history through second-hand objects retrieved from the Seine; a nineteenth-century affair in the Rue de MiromesnTrade Reviewthis lovely collection will give you a real sense of the city's character, and I defy anyone to read it without a great longing to get there and explore. * Shiny New Books *Often moody and always eccentric, the collectiondedicated to the memory of Parisians killed in recent attacks at Charlie Hebdo and the Bataclanuncovers the dark and light corners hidden in a city of interesting characters and exuberant history. * Publishers Weekly *If you can't make it to the capital in person this October, sitting in a café with a glass of French wine and reading this book about Paris's streets and faces is the next best thing. * Living France *A captivating read for all those who want to get a taste of classic French literature and love to lose themselves in the streets of Paris. * French Property News *I enjoy short fiction as much as anything I read today, and this Oxford University Press publication reminds me why that is. * BookChase *Table of Contents1: Didier Daeninckx: Rue des Degrés 2: Jean Follain: Streets 3: Guy de Maupassant: The Rendezvous 4: Octave Mirbeau: Tableau Parisien 5: Arnaud Baignot: Rue de la Tacherie 6: Émile Zola: Old Iron 7: Marcel Aymé: Rue Saint Sulpice 8: Jacques Réda: The Freedom of the Streets 9: Frédéric H. Fajardie: A Rapist's Shout One Night in Montparanasse 10: Julien Green: Lost Street Cries 11: Joris-Karl Huysmans: Rue de la Chine 12: Georges Simenon: The Affair in the Boulevard Beaumarchais 13: Roland Dorgelès: Rooftop over the Champs Elysées 14: Vincent Ravalec: The pigeon who shat on people 15: Aurélie Filipetti: The Street is not enough 16: Francis Carco: Rue Pigalle 17: Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette: The hold-up in the Rue Ordener 18: Gisèle Prassinos: The Tree with three branches 19: David Constantine: Rue de la Vieille Lanterne
£11.69
Oxford University Press Amsterdam Tales
Book SynopsisIn this volume Paul Vincent presents a compelling collection of prose fiction, memoirs and anecdotes centring on Amsterdam from the seventeenth to the twenty-first century. His selection offers a rare insight into the history and culture of the city. The subjects range from Rembrandt to the persecution of the Jews in World War 2, from barricades in a working-class district during the Depression to a writer''s unhealthy obsession with a massage parlour. These eighteen newly-translated tales give the reader, and the traveller, a tantalizing glimpse of the Amsterdam that lies beyond the tourist guidebooks.Table of ContentsGerard Brandt: Vondel in Hiding Arnold Houbraken: Rembrandt Catches a Pupil Red-Handed J. Colerus: Spinoza is Banned from the Jewish Community J.C. Nomen: Peter the Great as a Ship's Carpenter W. Otto: An Opponent inveighs against the Tram Herman Heijermans: Amstel Jacob Israël de Haan: The Black Cat Anonymous: Barricades in the Jordaan Frans Pointl: Amsterdam 1945-1946 Simon Carmiggelt: Itchy Feet Remco Campert: Single to Amsterdam Abel J. Herzberg: Letter to my Grandson Anton Valens: Goldfish Pieter Olde Rikkert: Who's Afraid of Allah Akbar? Sanneke van Hassel: He Directs the Traffic Thomas Heerma van Voss: Massage Parlour Margriet de Moor: A Stroke of Luck Robert Anker: Pain in the Spleen
£12.59
Oxford University Press Why Women Read Fiction
Book SynopsisWritten by a leading academic and broadcaster and drawing on interviews with readers, writers, reading groups, bookshop owners, librarians, and figures from literary publishing, reviewing, and festivals, this accessible volume offers an overview of the contemporary scene of women's novel-reading.Trade ReviewSelected as a book to watch out for in 2020 by The Sunday TimesA fascinating study of why the novel became central for women... * The Sunday Times, Best books of the year 2020 so far *... an illuminating and very readable study of the many reasons why women are such passionate readers of fiction and how they provide the glue for an informed and literate society. * PD Smith, The Guardian *Fascinating ... I just hope that women continue to find the pleasure in reading that is gloriously displayed in this book... * Daisy Goodwin, The Sunday Times *... an ambitious undertaking ... [Helen Taylor] has asked more than 500 female readers and writers about their reading habits. Anecdotes from famous authors and figures including Hilary Mantel and Judy Finnigan, as co-founder of the Richard and Judy Book Club, are interwoven with observations from readers. Taylor does this without ego, letting the words stand alone and turning what could easily be a dry, worthy report into more of an impassioned conversation... if youre thinking about why you choose the books you do, this is a thought-provoking place to start. * Susannah Butler, Evening Standard, Book of the Week *If publishing wants to get closer to its readers, it will do well to listen to Helen Taylor. In her new book [...] Helen Taylor [...] offers a timely and lively exploration of why women keep the book trade ticking over. * Julie Vuong, Book Brunch *The great joy of Taylor's book is the light it shines on communities of women readers, something that helped me recognise my own ... Reading Taylor's book has also made me join a book club. I did not like the January book; I did enjoy drinking gin while saying why. I would like to be in a book club with Taylor's correspondents, having so much enjoyed the warmth, intelligence, and insight of their conversations with her throughout the book... * Sophie Duncan, Literary Review *Though long overdue this satisfying offering comes at a time when women are working harder than ever to secure their rightful place in the literary canon. Recommended enthusiasts of lit crit, feminist studies, and publishing. * Erica Swensen, Library Journal *An inherently fascinating, thoughtful and thought-provoking work of insightful and seminal scholarship ... an extraordinary and unreservedly recommended addition to community, college, and university library Contemporary Literary Studies collections... * Mary Cowper, The Midwest Book Review *... there is a wealth of fantastic contributions which Helen has pulled together into a brilliant analysis of women and reading. I'm nodding in agreement with every sentence. * DoveyGreyReader *Ms. Taylor was for many years professor of English Literature at Exeter University. This is not her first book but it is her best. * peterwatsonauthor.com, Universities Press Review *Taylor captures the complex delights of reading, while taking a clear-eyed look at the politics of how books are marketed, shared and enjoyed. Astute, engaging, inspiring, Why Women Read Fiction will speak volumes to anyone who's ever experienced, at first hand, the power of novels and short stories to enrich and transform lives. * Sarah Waters *This spirited cultural history and savvy analysis as to why, how and what women read is - well, a really good story! * Sarah Dunant *In her generous and accessible book, Helen Taylor shows how the enterprise of reading draws us into an unseen collective, where the resources of the imagination are pooled; but she is not afraid to show the creative power of division and dissent. Though authoritative and well-researched, Why Women Read Fiction is far more than a study meant for academics and publishers - it is lively and absorbing, like a conversation with other women you wish you knew. * Hilary Mantel, author of Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies *Table of ContentsPreface: 'A Friend, a Bible, a Perfume' Part One: How, Where, and Why Women Read Fiction Introduction 1: 'Cheap Sweet Vacations': Reading as a Woman Rosie Jackson: 'What Their Books Yield or, Why I am Not Buying a Kindle' Part Two: What Women Read 2: Reading as a Girl U A Fanthorpe: The Poet on her childhood reading 3: Pride and Prejudice and Jane Eyre, the Novels Women Love Best 4: Romance and Erotica: Fiction by Women for Women 5: Women, Crime, Sci-Fi, and Fantasy dovegreyreader: The Literary Blogger Part Three: Writers and Readers 6: Women Writers on their Reading and Readers 7: Book Clubs in Women's Life Stories 8: Festivals, Literary Tourism, and Pilgrimage Fiction in Lives, Lives in Fiction 9: The Stories of Our Lives Appendix: Questionnaire about women's fiction reading
£12.34
Oxford University Press Lord Jim ne A Tale Oxford Worlds Classics
Book SynopsisLord Jim is a book about courage and cowardice, self-knowledge and personal growth, in the exotic setting of post-colonial Patusan, a remote Malay settlement. This new edition uses the first English edition text and includes a new introduction and notes by leading Conrad scholar Jacques Berthoud, glossaries, and an appendix on Conrad's sources and reading.
£8.54
Oxford University Press The Secret Agent
Book Synopsis''An impenetrable mystery seems destined to hang for ever over this act of madness or despair.''Mr Verloc, the secret agent, keeps a shop in London''s Soho where he lives with his wife Winnie, her infirm mother, and her idiot brother, Stevie. When Verloc is reluctantly involved in an anarchist plot to blow up the Greenwich Observatory things go disastrously wrong, and what appears to be ''A Simple Tale'' proves to involve politicians, policemen, foreign diplomats and London''s fashionable society in the darkest and most surprising interrelations.Based on the text which Conrad''s first English readers enjoyed, this new edition includes a critical introduction which describes Conrad''s great London novel as the realization of a ''monstrous town'', a place of idiocy, madness, criminality, and butchery. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment t
£8.54
Oxford University Press My Antonia
Book Synopsis''As I looked about me I felt that the grass was the country, as the water is the sea. The red of the grass made all the great prairie the colour of wine-stains...And there was so much motion in it; the whole country seemed, somehow, to be running.''My Antonia (1918) depicts the pioneering period of European settlement on the tall-grass prairie of the American midwest, with its beautiful yet terrifying landscape, rich ethnic mix of immigrants and native-born Americans, and communities who share life''s joys and sorrows. Jim Burden recounts his memories of Antonia Shimerda, whose family settle in Nebraska from Bohemia. Together they share childhoods spent in a new world. Jim leaves the prairie for college and a career in the east, while Antonia devotes herself to her large family and productive farm. Her story is that of the land itself, a moving portrait of endurance and strength.Described on publication as ''one of the best [novels] that any American has ever done'', My Antonia paradoxically took Cather out of the rank of provincial novelists as the same time that it celebrated the provinces, and mythologized a period of American history that had to be lost before its value could be understood. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.
£8.54
Oxford University Press Daisy Miller and Other Stories
Book SynopsisThis volume includes Daisy Miller, Pandora, The Patagonia, and Four Meetings. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.Table of ContentsDaisy Miller; Pandora; The Patagonia; Four Meetings
£7.59
Oxford University Press The Lost World
Book SynopsisThe first in Arthur Conan Doyle's series of books featuring the popular character of Professor...
£6.99
Oxford University Press The Yellow WallPaper and Other Stories
Book SynopsisCharlotte Perkins Gilman was America''s leading feminist intellectual of the early twentieth century. The Yellow Wall-Paper and Other Stories makes available the fullest selection of her short fiction ever printed. In addition to her pioneering masterpiece, `The Yellow Wall-Paper'' (1890), which draws on her own experience of depression and insanity, this edition features her Impress `story studies'', works in the manner of writers such as James, Twain, and Kipling. These stories, together with other fiction from her neglected California period (1890-5), throw new light on Gilman as a practitioner of the art of fiction. In her Forerunner stories she repeatedly explores the situation of `the woman of fifty'' and inspires reform by imagining workable solutions to a range of personal and social problems. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.Table of ContentsThe Yellow Wall Paper That Rare Jewel The Unexpected Circumstances Alter Cases The Gisnt Wistaria An Extinct Angel The Rocking Chair Deserted An Elopement Through This This Misleading of Pendleton Oaks A Day's Berryin' Five Girls One Way Out An Unpatentated Process An Unnatural Mother Three Thanksgivings According to Solomon The Cottagette The Widow's Might The Jumping of Place In Two Houses Turned Making a Change Mrs Elder's Idea Their House Her Beauty Mrs Hines's Money Bee Wise A Council of War Fulfilment A Partnership If I Were a Man Mr Peebles's Heart Mrs Merrill's Duties Girls and Land Dr Clair's Place A Surplus Woman Joan's Defender
£8.54
Oxford University Press Flush
Book SynopsisVirginia Woolf's humorous biography of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's spaniel is charming yet also radical. A work of sensuous imagination, it opens up a range of questions about class, society, and cultural attitudes which are woven throughout the whole of Woolf's writing.
£7.99
Oxford University Press The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
Book Synopsis
£12.42
Oxford University Press Women in Love
Book Synopsis`New eyes were opened in her soul. She saw a strange creature from another world, in him. It was as if she were enchanted, and everything were metamorphosed.'' In Women in Love (1920), Ursula and Gudrun Brangwen, who first appeared in Lawrence''s earlier novel, The Rainbow, take centre stage as Lawrence explores their growth and development in their relationships with two powerful men, Rupert Birkin and his friend Gerald Crich. A novel of regeneration and dark, destructive human passion, Women in Love reflects the impact on Lawrence of the First World War in the potential both for annihilation and salvation of the self. Quintessentially modernist, Women is Love is one of Lawrence''s most extraordinary, innovative and unsettling works. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.
£9.49
Oxford University Press The Years Oxford Worlds Classics
Book Synopsis
£8.99
Oxford University Press The ShadowLine A Confession ne Oxford Worlds
Book SynopsisWritten in 1915, The Shadow-Line is based upon events and experiences from twenty-seven years earlier, to which Conrad returned obsessively in his fiction. A young sea-captain faces a succession of crises on his first command, for which he feels himself responsible. The novel is a work full of 'sudden passions', as well as a penetrating analysis of the nature of manhood.
£8.54
Oxford University Press Night and Day
Book SynopsisKatherine Hilbery, torn between past and present, is a figure reflecting Woolf''s own struggle with history. Both have illustrious literary ancestors: in Katherine''s case, her poet grandfather, and in Woolf''s, her father Leslie Stephen, writer, philosopher, and editor. Both desire to break away from the demands of the previous generation without disowning it altogether. Katherine must decide whether or not she loves the iconoclastic Ralph Denham; Woolf seeks a way of experimenting with the novel for that still allows her to express her affection for the literature of the past. This is the most traditional of Woolf''s novels, yet even here we can see her beginning to break free; in this, her second novel, with its strange mixture of comedy and high seriousness, Woolf had already found her own characteristic voice. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.Trade Review'Together these ten volumes make an attractive and reasonably priced (the volumes vary between £3.99 and £4.99) working edition of Virginia Woolf's best-known writing. One can only hope that their success will prompt World's Classics to add her other essays to the series in due course.' Elisabeth Jay, Westminster College, Oxford, Review of English Studies, Vol. XLV, No. 178, May '94
£10.44
Oxford University Press The Oxford Book of Scottish Short Stories
Book SynopsisFrom tales of the supernatural to pungent social realism, and from the humorous to the disturbing, whether rural or urban, this anthology shows the vitality of the Scottish short story.Douglas Dunn''s eclectic selection displays the marvellous range of Scottish story-telling, beginning with three early traditional tales, and including a wealth of writers from the last three centuries: amongst them Sir Walter Scott, Robert Louis Stevenson, J. M. Barrie, Violet Jacob, Neil Gunn, Eric Linklater, Alasdair Gray, James Kelman, and younger talents such as Ronald Frame, Janice Galloway, and A. L. Kennedy.Trade ReviewReview from previous edition Review from previous edition This is the most substantial anthology of short stories from Scotland to appear in some years, and as such should be welcomed ... a comprehensive overview of the development of the short story in Scotland. * The List *Every story here, without exception, contains the verb to say. These stories embody the "speak" of those places which help to comprise the small but complex, multifarious nation we call ours. In this way they embellish the term Scottish in the volume's title, and help subtly to define it. * Stewart Conn, Scotland on Sunday *It is a thorough, bread-and-butter summation of the best and the wisest, the most famous and the more cobwebbed exponents of the form. * Bella Bathurst, The Scotsman *This enthralling anthology features Dunn's favourites and a fine lot they are. * Alan Bold, The Herald *The great value of this anthology is that it shows us what we have been missing ... [Dunn's] introduction is fascinating and informative ... OUP has produced several anthologies of short stories based around culture or nationhood. This is a welcome and worthy addition to that series. * Sunderland Echo *the rollcall of names in this collection is impressive * The Irish Times *
£13.49
Oxford University Press The Oxford Book of French Short Stories
Book SynopsisThis collection of French short stories in translation expands our idea of French writing by including new stories by women writers and by authors of Francophone origin. Spanning the centuries from the late eighteenth to the late twentieth, the collection opens with a rumbustious tale from the Marquis de Sade, takes in the masters of the nineteenth century, from Stendhal and Balzac to Maupassant, and reaches to Quebec, Africa, and the French Caribbean in the twentieth century. Women writers include relatively well known figures such as Renee Vivien, Colette, and Beauvoir, and newer writers such as Assia Djebar, Christiane Baroche, and Annie Saumont. The French short story is a rich and diverse medium, but all the stories selected share a common characteristic: they make exciting reading.Trade ReviewReview from previous edition This is a delightful collection, ideal either for Tube reading or for savouring at greater length * Daily Telegraph 18/5/02 *wide-ranging collection . . . All the greats are here . . . * Sunday Telegraph 19/05/2002 *The anthology takes a tour through the high spots of French nineteenth-century literature * Katy Emck, Times Literary Supplement *Table of ContentsIntroduction ; The husband who said mass ; Vanina Vanini ; The coffee pot ; The message ; The Venus of Ille ; Story of a Madman ; The last lesson ; A Simple Heart ; The Necklace ; At Sea ; Gloomy Tale, Gloomier Teller ; Knapsack at the ready ; The Lady with the She-Wolf ; The Walking Stick ; Gribiche ; The Wall ; The man in the street ; An Errand ; The Guest ; Monologue ; The Lily of the Valley Lay-by ; Do you remember the rue d'Orchampt? ; The checkup ; There is No Exile ; The Negro with the White Shadow ; The Underwear of the Woman Up Above ; The Finest Stroy in the World ; Public Transit
£11.39
Oxford University Press Copenhagen Tales
Book SynopsisExploring the many moods of the Danish capital.From the narrow twisting streets of the old town centre to the shady docklands, this rich anthology captures the essence of Copenhagen and its many faces. Through seventeen tales by some of the very best of Denmark''s writers past and present, we travel the length and breadth of the Danish capital examining famous sights from unique perspectives. A guide book usefully informs a new visitor to Copenhagen but these stories allow the reader to experience the city and its history from the inside.Trade ReviewThis collection is a splendid celebration of Copenhagen. It is beautifully produced with an abundance of illustrations, many of them archival photographs, and it contains helpful introductions, notes and an indispensible map. * Times Literary Supplement, Paul Binding *This collection is a splendid celebration of Copenhagen. It is beautifully produced with an abundance of illustrations, many of them archival photographs, and it contains helpful introductions, notes and an indispensable map. * Paul Binding, The Times Literary Supplement *Sensitively edited by Helen Constantine and beautifully translated by Lotte Shankland, this eclectic anthology touches on mad kings, deliverance from enemy occupation, and the lot of Jewish-Danish immigrants in the city. * Good Book Guide *Table of ContentsThe Water Drop ; Twice Met ; A Tricky Moment ; To Catch A Dane ; Willasden ; Eggnog ; The Maids ; The Bra ; The Naughty Boy ; Is There Life After Love? ; A Bench in Tivoli ; As the Angels Fly ; The Trousers ; Nightingale ; Amelie's Eyes ; Conversation One Night in Copenhagen ; The Night of Great Shared Happiness
£11.69
Vintage Publishing Gemma Bovery
Book SynopsisGemma is the bored, pretty second wife of Charlie Bovery, the reluctant stepmother of his children and the bete-noire of his ex-wife. Gemma's sudden windfall and distaste for London take them across the Channel to Normandy, where the charms of French country living soon wear off.Trade ReviewTruly original, witty and well-observed... A work of genius * Sunday Telegraph *A tour de force of comic storytelling -- Roger Sabin * Observer *Wickedly funny... This book is so good that one can hardly bear to reach the end * Daily Mail *Hilarious... Gemma Bovery deliciously exploits Posy Simmonds' talent for observing, in words and in pictures, the absurdities of daily life among the aspiring metropolitan middle class at home and abroad * The Times *
£15.29
Vintage Publishing Bowlaway
Book SynopsisFrom the day she is discovered unconscious in a New England cemetery at the beginning of the twentieth century nothing but a bowling ball, a candlepin and fifteen pounds of gold on her person Bertha Truitt is an enigma to everyone in Salford, Massachusetts. She has no past to speak of, or at least none she is willing to reveal, and her mysterious origin scandalises and intrigues the townspeople, as does her choice to marry and start a family with Leviticus Sprague, the doctor who revived her. But Bertha is plucky, tenacious and entrepreneurial, and the bowling alley she opens quickly becomes Salford's most defining landmark with Bertha its most notable resident. She changes the town forever: her singular spirit resonating powerfully through every board and brick and bone.In a voice laced with insight and her signature sharp humour, Elizabeth McCracken has written an epic family saga set against the backdrop of twentieth-century America. Bowlaway is both a stunning
£15.29
Vintage Publishing Void Star
Book SynopsisNot far in the future the seas have risen and the central latitudes are emptying but it's still a good time to be rich in San Francisco where weapons drones patrol the skies to keep out the multitudinous poor. Irina isn't rich, not quite, but she does have an artificial memory that gives her perfect recall, and lets her act as a medium between her various employers and their AIs, which are complex to the point of opacity. It's a good gig, paying enough for the annual visits to the Mayo Clinic that keep her from ageing.Kern has no such access; he''s one of the many refugees in the sprawling drone-built favelas on the city's periphery, where he lives like a monk, training relentlessly in martial arts, scraping by as a thief and an enforcer. Thales is from a different world entirely the mathematically-inclined scion of a Brazilian political clan, he''s fled to L.A. after the attack that left him crippled and his father dead. A ragged stranger accosts Thales and demandsTrade ReviewSentence by sparkling sentence, Zachary Mason’s Void Star is [a fine] novel… Void Star is an aesthetic joy, with a chilling style often reminiscent of Don DeLillo. -- Michael LaPointe * Times Literary Supplement *A computer scientist by day, Mason deploys serious literary chops in a cyberpunk escapade that should have the producers of Total Recall or Inception drooling… Mind-bendingly engaging and most definitely not for nerds only. -- Jeffrey Burke * Mail on Sunday *An enjoyably driving techno-thriller with literary ambition, and as such it may be read as being in close dialogue with the work of SF demigod William Gibson, admirers of whom may see in this novel a lot of influence, even outright homage. -- Steven Poole * Guardian *Void Star is an extraordinary novel. The hallucinatory beauty of the prose is matched only by the book’s velocity and mystery, and the story – of mortality, memory- and what it means to be human – holds all the force and power of mythology. -- Emily St John MandelZachary Mason's magisterial new novel is a passionate immersion in science fiction, sure to delight even the most hardcore devotees of Delany, Mieville, and Dick. The greatest speculative writing intoxicates and terrifies us in equal measure with the visions it offers, and in this Void Star is no exception. A dazzling book. -- John Wray
£999.99
The University of Chicago Press It Does Not Die
Book SynopsisAn account of the experiences of Maitreyi Devi, the highly educated Indian daughter of an intellectual father who fell in love with a female student staying at her home in the 1930s. the book was written as a response to Bengal Nights, by Mircea Eliade, the young student who had stayed with the family in Calcutta.
£23.00
The University of Chicago Press Bengal Nights
Book Synopsis
£17.24
The University of Chicago Press The Last Hurrah A Novel
Book Synopsis
£17.00
The University of Chicago Press A River Runs Through It
Book Synopsis
£25.20
The University of Chicago Press The Young Lions
Book SynopsisThis novel portrays the experiences of ordinary soldiers fighting World War II. Using the points of view of a perceptive young Nazi, a jaded American film producer, and a shy Jewish boy just married to the love of his life, Irwin Shaw conveys the scope, confusion and complexity of war.
£22.80
The University of Chicago Press Billy Budd Sailor an Inside Narrative
£20.90
Columbia University Press Portraits in White
Book Synopsis
£19.00
Penguin Books Ltd Our Endless Numbered Days
Book SynopsisWINNER OF THE DESMOND ELLIOTT PRIZEFROM THE COSTA AWARD-WINNING, WOMEN'S PRIZE-SHORTLISTED AUTHOR OF UNSETTLED GROUNDEvery parent lies. But some lies are bigger than othersIn the summer of 1976 eight-year-old Peggy Hillcoat is taken from London by her survivalist father to live in a cabin in a remote European forest. When they arrive he tells Peggy that her mother and the rest of the world are gone.Now the two of them must scratch a living from the earth: trapping squirrels, foraging for berries, surviving winter as best they can. But it is easy to lose you way in the forest, to lose yourself. How long will Peggy trust her father''s story? How long can you stay sane when the world is lost? And what happens when you stop believing in everything?Extraordinary' The Sunday TimesRemarkable' Penelope LivelyHaunting, suspenseful As warped and sinister as any Brothers Grimm fairytale' MetroTrade ReviewExtraordinary...From the opening sentence it is gripping...Fuller writes with a singing simplicity that finds beauty amid the terror...might well have you crying out for more. * The Sunday Times *Fuller handles the tension masterfully in this grown-up thriller of a fairytale, full of clues, questions and intrigue. * The Times *Bewitching...a rivetingly dark tale...spellbinding. * Sunday Express *Fuller's twisted tale is compulsive, treading the fine line between charming and sinister. With its disturbing twist, Our Endless Numbered Days could well become a classic. * Stylist, 'Book Wars' *Rewardingly unsettling...as warped and sinister as any Brothers Grimm fairytale, this tautly written, tense novel is brilliant at evoking both the bewitching beauty of its setting - and its inherent dangers...haunting, suspenseful and deftly written...memorably chilling. * Metro *A debut novel that brings to mind such unlikely bedfellows as Thoreau's Walden and Emma Donoghue's Room...gripping. * Guardian *A remarkable first novel, I was much impressed by the conviction of the child's eye view, the vivid climate and the power of the narrative. * Penelope Lively *Our Endless Numbered Days is suspenseful, utterly riveting, and as dark as midnight in the forest. * Rebecca Hunt (author of Everland and Mr Chartwell) *Excellent...I loved the combination of Peggy/Punzel's absolutely authentic child's precision for detail and her day-to-day matter-of-factness (often very funny) with the strangeness of the world she inhabited...very powerfully imagined... absolutely compelling. * Morag Joss (author of The Night Following) *
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd A Hologram for the King
Book SynopsisNew from Dave Eggers, National Book Award finalist A Hologram for the King.In a rising Saudi Arabian city, far from weary, recession-scarred America, a struggling businessman pursues a last-ditch attempt to stave off foreclosure, pay his daughter''s college tuition, and finally do something great. In A Hologram for the King, Dave Eggers takes us around the world to show how one man fights to hold himself and his splintering family together in the face of the global economy''s gale-force winds. This taut, richly layered, and elegiac novel is a powerful evocation of our contemporary moment - and a moving story of how we got here.Praise for A Hologram for the King: ''Absorbing . . . modest and equally satisfying: the writing of a comic but deeply affecting tale about one man''s travails that also provides a bright, digital snapshot of our times'' Michiko Kakutani, New York Times''A fascinating novel'' New Yorker''A spare but moving elegy for the American century'' Publishers Weekly''Eggers understands the pressures of American downward-mobility, and in the protagonist of his novel, Alan Clay, has created an Everyman, a post-modern Willy Loman . . . The novel operates on a grand and global scale, but it also is intimate'' Chicago Tribune''Completely engrossing'' Fortune''Eggers can do fiction as well as he likes'' Los Angeles TimesDave Eggers is the author of six previous books: A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, How We Are Hungry, You Shall Know Our Velocity, What is the What, The Wild Things and Zeitoun. Zeitoun was the winner of the American Book Award and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and What is the What was a finalist for the 2006 National Book Critics Circle Award and won France''s Prix Médicis. Eggers is the founder and editor of McSweeney''s, an independent publishing house based in San Francisco. A native of Chicago, he lives in Northern California with his wife and two children.Trade ReviewA fascinating novel * New Yorker *A spare but moving elegy for the American century * Publishers Weekly *Completely engrossing * Fortune *Dave Eggers is a prince among men when it comes to writing deeply felt, socially conscious books that meld reportage with fiction. [Hologram] is a strike against the current state of global economic in justice -- Elissa Schappell * Vanityfair.com *
£999.99
Penguin Books Ltd The Circle
Book SynopsisNOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE starring Tom Hanks, Emma Watson and John BoyegaTHE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - a dark, thrilling and unputdownable novel about our obsession with the internet''Prepare to be addicted'' Daily Mail''A gripping and highly unsettling read'' Sunday Times''The Circle is ''Brave New World'' for our brave new world... Fast, witty and troubling'' Washington PostWhen Mae is hired to work for the Circle, the world''s most powerful internet company, she feels she''s been given the opportunity of a lifetime. Run out of a sprawling California campus, the Circle links users'' personal emails, social media, and finances with their universal operating system, resulting in one online identity and a new age of transparency. Mae can''t believe her great fortune to work for them - even as life beyond the campus grows distant, even as a strange encounter with a colleague leaves her shaken, even as her role at the Circle becomes increasingly public ...Pre-order the electrifying follow up to The Circle now . . . The Every is coming November 2021.''An elegantly told, compulsively readable parable for the 21st Century'' Vanity Fair''Immensely readable and very timely'' Metro''Prescient, important and enjoyable . . . a deft modern synthesis of Swiftian wit with Orwellian prognostication'' GuardianTrade ReviewPublisher's description. Fast, thrilling and compulsively addictive, The Circle is Dave Eggers' bestselling novel about our obsession with the internet and where it may lead. When Mae Holland lands her dream job at the world's most powerful internet company, she has no idea what awaits behind the doors of The Circle... * Penguin *A stunning work of terrifying plausability ... a worthy and entertaining read * Publisher's Weekly *Eggers has set his style and pace to technothriller: the writing is brisk, spare and efficient ... it works * Time *Prescient, important and enjoyable ... a deft modern synthesis of Swiftian wit with Orwellian prognostication' * Guardian *The Circle is 'Brave New World' for our brave new world ... fast, witty and troubling * Washington Post *An elegantly told, compulsively readable parable for the 21st Century * Vanity Fair *A gripping and highly unsettling read * Sunday Times *Unputdownable * Times *Eggers's writing is so fluent, his ventriloquism of tech-world dialect so light, his denouement so enjoyably inevitable * Observer *Tremendous novel ... inventive, big hearted and very funny. Prepare to be addicted * Daily Mail *Compelling and deeply contemporary * L.A Times *Eggers brilliantly depicts the Internet binges, torrents of information and endless loops of feedback that increasingly characterize modern life * Booklist *
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd The Unloved
Book SynopsisA hypnotising summer novel from the twice Booker-shortlisted author of Hot Milk and Swimming Home_________________________________ A group of hedonistic West European tourists gather to celebrate Christmas in a remote French chateau. Then an Englishwoman is brutally murdered, and the sad, eerie child Tatiana declares she knows who did it. The subsequent inquiry into the death proves to be more of an investigation into the nature of love, insatiable rage and sadistic desire. The Unloved offers a bold and revealing look at some of the events that shaped European and African history, and the perils of a future founded on concealed truth. _________________________________''Brave and brilliant, measured and lyrical'' Independent''Levy''s prose throbs its way into the imagination'' Observer ''Startling, compelling, cool'' The Times ''
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd The Gaze
Book SynopsisAn obese woman and her lover, a dwarf, are sick of being stared at wherever they go and so decide to reverse roles. The man goes out wearing make-up and the woman draws a mustache on her face.
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd The Early Stories of Truman Capote
Book Synopsis''Breathtaking ... The stories are special. They stand in their own right as lovely vignettes of the lives of the lonely, broken and troubled'' Andrew Johnson, IndependentWritten when Truman Capote was in his teens and twenties, these recently-discovered short stories give a rare insight into an American icon. Tales of disappointed lovers, ageing spinsters, hoboes and murderous housewives, of yearning, poverty, despair, compassion, wit and wonder, they show us the boy from Alabama who became one of the twentieth century''s most celebrated literary voices.''An intriguing glimpse of Capote as a boy: precocious, provocative, spirited and strange, a pocket Merlin spinning tall tales'' Olivia Laing, New Statesman
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd A Calling for Charlie Barnes
Book SynopsisFrom the Booker-shortlisted author of To Rise Again at a Decent Hour comes a hilarious novel about fathers, sons, thwarted dreams and confronting the reality of who we really are'This is a fine American novel about family, love, and a decent but flawed man trying to be better. In dark times like these, I can't recommend this book too highly. It's strong' Stephen King on Twitter___________________________________Charlie Barnes is a mid-century man devoted to his newspaper and his landline. But Charlie is about to get dragged into our troubled age by his storyteller son, who has a different idea of him than he has of himself. Then there are his other children, his ex-wives, present wife, business clients, friends and acquaintances, all of whom have their competing opinions of Charlie. He certainly seems simple enough: he's a striver, a romantic, and a thoroughgoing capitalist. But suddenly blindsided by the Great Recession and a dose of bad news, he might have to rethink his life from
£15.29
Penguin Books Ltd The End of the Story
Book SynopsisThe first and only novel by Lydia Davis, winner of the Man Booker International Prize 2013.''It surprised me, over and over, to find that I was with such a young man. He was twenty-two when I met him. He turned twenty-three while I knew him, but by the time I turned thirty-five I did not know where he was anymore.''Mislabelled boxes, confusing notes, wrong turnings - such are the obstacles in the way of the unnamed narrator of The End of the Story as she organises her memories of a love affair into a novel. With compassion, wit and what seems to be candour, she seeks to determine what she actually knows about herself and her past, but we begin to suspect, along with her, that given the elusiveness of memory and understanding, any tale retrieved from the past must be fictionBack in print at last, this is Lydia Davis''s first - and so far only - novel. ''Extraordinary'' Newsday''Brilliant'' New Yorker''BreathtTrade ReviewUnputdownable . . . [The End of the Story] freed me from the preconceptions I had then about the way novels were supposed to work . . . it deals with the heat and the thirst of infatuation, the desperation to find an end to the torment when a desired object won't reciprocate -- Olivia Sudjic * Observer, 'Summer Reads 2023' *Can't and Won't is the most revolutionary collection of stories by an American in twenty-five years -- John Freeman * Boston Globe *Lydia Davis's short stories are perfected economies, witty devices, precision-made, primed to release intelligence, philosophy, hilarity. They celebrate the thinking universe while they redefine the possibilities of the form. There is no other writer quite like her * Ali Smith *Davis is a high priestess of the startling, telling detail. . . one of the best writers in America -- Colm Tóibín * Daily Telegraph *Her work is exquisite, finely wrought and devastating. . . Read her now! -- A. M. HomesExtraordinary * Newsday *Breathtakingly elegant * Details *Brilliant * New Yorker *
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd Winter Dazzling luminous evergreen Daily
Book SynopsisDiscover Ali Smith''s dazzling, once-in-a-generation series, the Seasonal Quartet, a tour-de-force quartet of novels about love, time, art, politics, and how we live right nowAll four instalments of the quartet are available to buy and read in paperback and ebook now: Autumn, Winter, Spring and Summer A Book of the Year according to: the Daily Telegraph, the Observer, the Evening Standard, The Times.''Dazzling'' Daily TelegraphWinter? Bleak. Frosty wind, earth as iron, water as stone, so the old song goes. The shortest days, the longest nights. The trees are bare and shivering. The summer''s leaves? Dead litter. The world shrinks; the sap sinks. But winter makes things visible. And if there''s ice, there''ll be fire. In Ali Smith''s Winter, lifeforce matches up to the toughest of the seasons. In this second novel in her acclaimed SeasonalTrade ReviewCleverly constructed and elegantly written. It's both an engaging human story and a place for wider topical observations. Bring on Spring * Evening Standard *If Ali Smith's four quartets in, and about, time do not endure to rank among the most original, consoling and inspiring of the artistic responses to 'this mad and bitter mess' of the present, then we will have plunged into an even bleaker mid-winter than people often fear * Financial Times *Smith is a specialist by now in using a quizzical, feather-light prose style to interrogate the heaviest of material...throughout Winter, grief and pain are transfigured, sometimes lastingly, by luminous moments of humour, insight and connection... Even in the bleak midwinter, Smith is evergreen * Telegraph *A novel of great ferocity, tenderness and generosity of spirit that you feel Dickens would have recognised...Smith is engaged in an extended process of mythologizing the present states of Britain... Luminously beautiful * Observer *A sparkler...tune in to Spring and Summer to see if art can save the day * Spectator *Graceful... That trademark mischievous wit and wordplay, a joyful reminder of the most basic, elemental delights of reading ... Infused with some much-needed humour, happiness and hope * Independent *A capacious, generous shapeshifter of a novel taking in Greenham Common and Barbara Hepworth, Shakespeare and global migration, it juxtaposes art with nature and protest with apathy, finding surprising alliances in a family riven by feuds. It's a book with Christmas at its heart, in all its familiarity and estrangement: about time, and out of time, like the festival itself * The Guardian *Dazzling second instalment of Ali Smith's seasonal quartet * The Daily Telegraph *A book I can't wait to read for Christmas * The Observer *Relish this instalment * The Times *I would like to be given Winter for Christmas * The Observer *And now looking forward to [Ali Smith's] Winter * Gordon Brown *And the book I'd most like to find in my Christmas stocking is Ali Smith's Winter * The Observer *Finally, under the tree this year I'm hoping to find Ali Smith's Winter * The Observer *It's a brisk, frosty walk under skies that could open at any moment revealing anything but snow * The Observer *A book I'd like to be given for Christmas: Winter by Ali Smith * The Observer *It takes you on a journey through time - Christmases past and present in a Dickensian way, but brings you bang up to the present - how can we live our lives and keep our memories and how do we find the truth? It is uplifting and miraculous with plenty of surprises along the way. It is vintage Smith * Jackie Kay *"Winter" is an insubordinate folk tale, with echoes of the fiction of Iris Murdoch and Angela Carter... There are few writers on the world stage who are producing fiction this offbeat and alluring... [Ali Smith] intends to send a chill up your shanks and she succeeds, jubilantly... Her dialogue is a series of pine cones flung at rosy cheeks * The New York Times *Smith is routinely brilliant, knowing, masterful... The light inside this great novelist's gorgeous snow globe is utterly original, and it definitely illuminates * New York Times Book Review *The only preparation required to savor the Scottish writer Ali Smith's virtuosic "Winter" is to pay attention to the world we've recently been living in...What Smith has achieved in her cycle so far is exactly what we need artists to do in disorienting times: make sense of events, console us, show us how we got here, help us believe that we will find our way through...Smith gives us a potent, necessary source of sustenance that speaks directly to our age...Yet we, like her characters, are past the winter solstice now - the darkest part of the coldest season done. From here on out, we're headed toward the light...It doesn't feel that way, I know. But in the midst of "Winter," each page touched with human grace, you might just begin to believe * Boston Globe *Winter is a stunning meditation on a complex, emotional moment in history * TIME *Ali Smith is flat-out brilliant, and she's on fire these days...You can trust Smith to snow us once again with her uncanny ability to combine brainy playfulness with depth, topicality with timelessness, and complexity with accessibility while delivering an impassioned defence of human decency and art * NPR *The stunningly original Smith again breaks every conceivable narrative rule; reflecting her longstanding affinity for Modernism, what she gives us instead is a stylistically innovative cultural bricolage that celebrates the ecstasy of artistic influence. It demands and richly rewards close attention. [Autumn and Winter] each add to Smith's growing collection of glittering literary paving stones, along a path that's hopefully leading toward the Nobel she deserves. In the interim, we can (re)read "Winter" - and eagerly await the coming of "Spring" * Minneapolis Journal Sentinel *One of the rarest creatures in the world: a really fearless novelist...her prose is melodic, associative, wise, sometimes maddening...'she shares with Mantel and Ishiguro a sense of human caution, a need to understand, a wariness of the high-handedly authorial. All write with the humility of adulthood * Chicago Tribune *The second in Smith's quartet of seasonal novels displays her mastery at weaving allusive magic into the tragicomedies of British people and politics...a bleak, beautiful tale greater than the sum of its references * Vulture *An engaging novel due to the ecstatic energy of Smith's writing, which is always present on the page * Publishers Weekly *A sprightly, digressive, intriguing fandango on life and time * Kirkus Reviews *These individuals converge to confront each other in the big shabby house, like characters in a Chekhov play. At first, hellish implosion looms. Slowly, erratically, connection creeps in. Lux quietly mediates. Ire softens. Sophia at last eats something. Art resees Nature..."Winter" gives the patient reader a colorful, witty - yes, warming - divertissement * San Francisco Chronicle *With Iris and Lux as catalysts, scenes from Christmas past unfold, and our narrow views of Sophia and Art widen and deepen, filled with the secrets and substance of their histories, even as the characters themselves seem to expand. As in Sophia's case, for Art this enlargement is announced by a hallucination - "not a real thing," as Lux tells Iris, whose response speaks for the book's own expansive spirit: "Where would we be without our ability to see beyond what it is we're supposed to be seeing?" * The Minneapolis Star Tribune *
£15.29
Penguin Books Ltd Flying Home And Other Stories Penguin Modern
Book SynopsisRaw, lyrical and blazing with intensity, these short stories are a potent distillation of the genius of Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man.''He saw the dark bird glide into the sun and glow like a bird of flaming gold''Ranging from the Jim Crow South to a Harlem bingo parlour, from the hobo jungles of the Great Depression to Wales during the Second World War, they all display the musically layered voices, soaring language and sheer ebullience that made Ellison a giant of twentieth-century American writing. Written early in Ellison''s career, several of these fourteen stories were unpublished in his lifetime, including ''A Storm of Blizzard Proportions'' which features in this collection for the first time. ''Approach the simple elegance of Chekhov'' Washington Post
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd The Complete Novels
Book SynopsisThe Penguin Complete Novels of Nancy Mitford.Here in one volume are all eight of Nancy Mitford''s sparklingly astute, hilarious and completely unputdownable novels: Highland Fling, Christmas Pudding, Wigs on the Green, Pigeon Pie, The Pursuit of Love, Love in a Cold Climate, The Blessing and Don''t Tell Alfred.Published over a period of 30 years, they provide a wonderful glimpse of the bright young things of the thirties, forties, fifties and sixties in the city and in the shires; firmly ensconced at home or making a go of it abroad; and what the upper classes really got up to in peace and in war.''Entirely original, inimitable and irresistible'' Spectator''Deliciously funny'' Evelyn Waugh''Utter, utter bliss'' Daily Mail
£18.00
Penguin Books Ltd Our Game
Book SynopsisLe Carré''s post-Cold War masterpiece, filled with suspense, betrayal, desire and dramaThe Cold War is over and retired secret servant Tim Cranmer has been put out to pasture, spending his days making wine on his Somerset estate. But then he discovers that his former double agent Larry - dreamer, dissolute, philanderer and disloyal friend - has vanished, along with Tim''s mistress. As their trail takes him to the lawless wilds of Russia and the North Caucasus, he is forced to question everything he stood for.Set in a fragmented, uncertain post-Soviet world, le Carré''s brutal story of falsehoods and betrayal shows men playing dangerous games beyond their control.Trade ReviewA wonderful book ... I cannot think of a more compelling read * Financial Times *An absorbing and thought-provoking piece of work * The Times Literary Supplement *Le Carré is in the first rank -- Ian McEwan
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd The Man in the High Castle
Book SynopsisAn official tie-in edition of Philip K. Dick''s dazzling speculative novel to accompany the new TV series, executive produced by Ridley Scott. Philip K. Dick''s acclaimed cult novel gives us a horrifying glimpse of an alternative world - one where the Allies have lost the Second World War. In this nightmare dystopia the Nazis have taken over New York, the Japanese control California and the African continent is virtually wiped out. In a neutral buffer zone in America that divides the world''s new rival superpowers, lives the author of an underground bestseller. His book offers a new vision of reality - an alternative theory of world history in which the Axis powers were defeated - giving hope to the disenchanted. Does ''reality'' lie with him, or is his world just one among many others?''The most brilliant science fiction mind on any planet''Rolling Stone''Dick''s finest book, and one of the very best science fiction novels ever published''<Trade ReviewThe most brilliant sci-fi mind on any planet * Rolling Stone *California's own William Blake. Visionary and prophet * Daily Telegraph *
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Penguin Books Ltd How Steeple Sinderby Wanderers Won the F.A. Cup
Book SynopsisSteeple Sinderby Wanderers, in their new all-buttercup-yellow stripe, start it by ravaging the Fenland League and end it with a phenomenal nail-biter against Glasgow Rangers.Trade ReviewIt's a comic story about sportsmanship and underdogs; it's also a slightly wistful portrait of village life and provincial decency, as well as a beautifully written hymn to doggedness and eccentricity. This gently humorous novella is the anti-Ronaldo. -- Robbie Millen * The Times *An extraordinary performance, simultaneously one of the greatest football novels ever written and a penetrating report card from a world where fiction rarely lingers, at once a comic masterpiece and a study in national temperament that the doughtiest social historian would struggle to match. -- DJ Taylor * Guardian *
£8.54
Penguin Books Ltd Billy Bathgate
Book Synopsis''I was living in even greater circles of gangsterdom than I had dreamed, latitudes and longitudes of gangsterdom''It''s 1930''s New York and fifteen-year-old streetkid Billy, who can juggle, somersault and run like the wind, has been taken under the wing of notorious gangster Dutch Schultz. As Billy learns the ways of the mob, he becomes like a son to Schultz - his ''good-luck kid'' - and is initiated into a world of glamour, death and danger that will consume him, in this vivid, soaring epic of crime and betrayal.
£9.49
