Contemporary Fiction Books

Book SynopsisFROM THE WINNER OF THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE 2014Mathinna, an Aboriginal girl from Van Diemen’s Land, is adopted by nineteenth-century explorer, Sir John Franklin, and his wife, Lady Jane. Franklin is confident that shining the light of reason on Mathinna will lift her out of savagery and desire. But when Franklin dies on an Arctic expedition, Lady Jane writes to Charles Dickens, asking him to defend Franklin’s reputation amid rumours of his crew lapsing into cannibalism. Dickens responds by staging a play in which he takes the leading role as Franklin, his symbol of reason’s triumph, only to fall in love with an eighteen-year-old actress. As reason gives way to wanting, the frontier between civilisation and barbarity dissolves, and Mathinna, now a teenage prostitute, goes drinking on a fatal night.Trade ReviewExquisite * New Yorker *Fascinating * New York Times *Irresistibly good * The Times *Dazzling... A captivating tale of cruelty and disappointment * Washington Post *Richard Flanagan is a master * Guardian *A beautifully constructed fugue on desire and its denial * Times Literary Supplement *This is the best novel I have read this year or expect to read for several more... Wanting shakes us rudely from our stupors, wakes us up to history. There can be no author more passionate or unfettered than Flanagan * Sydney Morning Herald *

Read more less

Book Synopsis'One of the funniest, most riotously inventive and enjoyable novels you’ll read this year' - ObserverRoland Barthes is knocked down in a Paris street by a laundry van. It’s February 1980 and he has just come from lunch with Francois Mitterrand. Barthes dies soon afterwards. History tells us it was an accident. But what if it were an assassination? What if Barthes was carrying a document of unbelievable, global importance? A document explaining the seventh function of language – an idea so powerful it gives whoever masters it the ability to convince anyone, in any situation, to do anything. Police Captain Jacques Bayard and his reluctant accomplice Simon Herzog set off on a chase that takes them from the corridors of power to backstreet saunas and midnight meetings. What they discover is a worldwide conspiracy involving the President, murderous Bulgarians and a secret international debating society.Trade ReviewEstablishes Laurent Binet as the clear heir to the late Umberto Eco, writing novels that are both brilliant and playful, dense with ideas while never losing sight of their need to entertain... One of the funniest, most riotously inventive and enjoyable novels you’ll read this year -- Alex Preston * Observer *A hugely entertaining novel, taking delight in its own twists and turns -- Nicholas Lezard * Spectator *Lively, earthy, experimental, ambitious, clever and endlessly entertaining… Smart, witty, direct, cool -- Hal Jensen * The Times Literary Supplement *The premise is a stroke of genius. Roland Barthes did not die following an accident in 1980; he was murdered… The strands of the plot are skilfully interwoven through a dual process of fictionalisation of the real and realisation of the fictional -- Andrew Gallix * Financial Times *An almost filmic detective romp, taking in glamorous international locations, killer dogs, Bulgarian secret agents, several varieties of sex and wild car chases -- Andrew Hussey * Literary Review *A smart spoof thriller, cheekily taking as its cat the most famous Parisian intellectuals in the scene in 1980… It’s all fun and games, ever so clever, and highly self-congratulatory for those of us who wasted years studying the abstruse and ultimately worthless theories of these French thinkers -- David Sexton * i *Laurent Binet is possessed of something like Superman’s X-ray vision combined with a million lasers. When he gets something in his sights, that thing is dead. And what he kills in his new novel is literary theory, in all its fake unuseful stupidity…. Reading Binet gives you that rare pleasure of feeling that you’re losing your grip on reality… What Binet can do with a scene, a paragraph, is beyond belief… One suspects Binet will make, or perhaps already has made, a lot of enemies with his jaw-droppingly disrespectful, extremely witty and – yes – heartfelt book. But one thing’s for sure, he’ll know how to handle them -- Todd McEwan * Herald *Incredibly timely ... very entertaining, like a dirty Midnight in Paris for the po-mo set -- Lauren Elkin * Guardian *On one level it’s a nostalgic look at a period in which French thinkers spent less time brooding on national identity… And on another it’s an exercise in pure intellectual slapstick of the kind that French humourists do well… It’s possible that his novel shares a few shreds of DNA with Zoolander -- Christopher Tayler * London Review of Books *

Read more less

Book SynopsisTwo lives. One night sky. Róisín and François first meet in the snowy white expanse of Antarctica, searching for a comet overhead. While Róisín grew up in a tiny village in Ireland, ablaze with a passion for science and the skies, François was raised by his restless young mother, who dreamt of new worlds but was unable to turn her back on her past. As we loop back through their lives we see their paths cross as they come closer and closer to this moment, brought together by the infinite possibilities of the night sky.Trade ReviewA magical debut…a gorgeous novel that should resonate with fans of Audrey Niffenegger’s The Time Traveller’s Wife… A breathtaking tale full of love, hope and heartbreak. You’ll be utterly captivated from the first page * Elle *Beautiful, sad, moving, fascinating and original. I loved it. -- Marian KeyesA stellar love story * Glamour, Book of the Year *Exquisitely layered, thrilling novel, which leaps across centuries and continents to delve into the role of destiny and the elusiveness of perception and memory. * New York Times *A spellbinding tale of love and loss, aglimmer with passion and melancholy. * Sunday Express, S Magazine *

Read more less

Book Synopsis'The kind of book that changes readers for the better' GuardianWhen a family tragedy means Mick is sent to the outback to live with his Granpa, it looks as if he has a lonely life ahead of him. The cattle station is a tough place for a child, where nature is brutal and the men must work hard in the heat and dust. However, after a cyclone hits, things change for Mick. Exploring the floodwaters, he finds a lost puppy covered in mud and half-drowned. Mick and his dog immediately become inseparable as they take on the adventures offered by their unusual home, and the business of growing up, together. In this charming prequel to the much-loved Red Dog, Louis de Bernières tells the moving story of a young boy and his Granpa, and the charismatic and entertaining dog who so many readers hold close to their hearts.Trade ReviewThe kind of book that changes readers for the better… The love between Mick and Granpa, and the changing landscape they inhabit, are the highlights of this superb story. * Guardian *Wise and heartwarming. -- Max Davidson * Mail on Sunday *[Blue Dog] is the heart-warming, funny, coming-of-age story… This is an irresistible, feel-good, laugh-out-loud tale… It is not an easy place to leave behind. -- Nicolette Jones * Sunday Times *A young adult novel that will appeal to all ages. -- Lorna Cumming-Bruce * Financial Times *A beautifully told story. -- Emily Bearn * Daily Telegraph, Book of the Year *

Read more less

Book SynopsisWINNER OF THE INTERNATIONAL MAN BOOKER PRIZE 2017The setting is a comedy club in a small Israeli town. An audience that has come expecting an evening of amusement instead sees a comedian falling apart on stage; an act of disintegration, a man crumbling, as a matter of choice, before their eyes. They could get up and leave, or boo and whistle and drive him from the stage, if they were not so drawn to glimpse his personal hell. Dovaleh G, a veteran stand-up comic – charming, erratic, repellent – exposes a wound he has been living with for years: a fateful and gruesome choice he had to make between the two people who were dearest to him.A Horse Walks into a Bar is a shocking and breathtaking read. Betrayals between lovers, the treachery of friends, guilt demanding redress. Flaying alive both himself and the people watching him, Dovaleh G provokes both revulsion and empathy from an audience that doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry – and all this in the presence of a former childhood friend who is trying to understand why he’s been summoned to this performance.Trade ReviewUnrelentingly claustrophobic… The violence that A Horse Walks Into A Bar explores is more private and intimate. Its central interest is not the vicious treatment of vulnerable others but the cruelty that wells up within families, circulates like a poison in tight-knit groups, and finally turns inward against the self… Strategic weaving together of manic humour and tears… Searing and poignant. -- Stephen Greenblatt * New York Review of Books *Brilliant, blistering… With Dovaleh, Grossman has created a character who’s captivating and horrific and a stand-up routine that’s disgusting and authentically human. I can hardly say how the book achieves its bewitching effects. It all happened so fast. -- Ken Kalfus * Washington Post *Unless pop lyricists have the lock on the Nobel prize in literature from now on, then a leading future candidate must be David Grossman. * Guardian, Book of the Year *Much of it is extremely funny, but it’s also tightly controlled and carefully paced… Few writers hold a more unflinching mirror up to Israeli society than Grossman… [A Horse Walks into a Bar] is a work of sombre brilliance and disquieting rage, an unsparing exploration of the seductive spell of escapism and “the corruption that is in cynicism.” -- Rebecca Abrams * Financial Times *This is a virtuoso piece of writing, a whirlwind of laughter and tears that sucks you in and makes you hold your breath. * Daily Mail *A writerly tour de force that would be unbearably painful, were it not also so generously humane. -- Lucy Hughes-Hallett * New Statesman, Book of the Year *A short, shocking masterpiece. -- Adam Lively * Sunday Times *David Grossman tells a story that is so emotional that you feel obliged to look away from time to time or to even put away the book once in a while so you can breathe again and so you can prepare yourself for the next confrontation with yourself and the world around you. * De Morgen *David Grossman’s new novel runs on a high voltage line, operated by a frantic, mesmerising and almost unbearable energy. An ongoing feeling of astonishment accompanies you throughout the read, and it is linked to Grossman’s bravado and to his innovation as a storyteller… A Horse Walks into a Bar…is unlike anything Grossman has written, or anything I have read. It is a packed explosive, multi-resonant, daring and exciting. -- Omri Herzog * Ha’aretz *Grossman’s new novel depicts a cruel demeaning stand-up act…and yet this is not a book about the violence of man but rather on the human inside - and this is what turns Grossman to a truly great author. -- Nurit Gertz * Walla! *A fine Israeli writer… It takes an author of Mr Grossman’s stature to channel not a failed stand-up but a shockingly effective one. * The Economist *Grossman's new novel is a…bravura performance… This remarkable book, rendered into English by Grossman's veteran translator Jessica Cohen, teases the reader as nakedly as the comedian does his crowd. On every page, we encounter an implied invitation to set the book down but the performer's struggle to muffle and at the same time release the howls from his soul is too profoundly haunting. -- Stoddard Martin * Jewish Chronicle *With masterly control and brilliant timing (it’s not easy to write stand-up, let alone translate it into another language, as Jessica Cohen has done so well here) Grossman has Dovaleh tell his life story, starting with the night of his conception… It may be Grossman’s finest novel yet. -- Fiammetta Rocco * 1843Magazine *With this raw and fiercely emotional book Grossman, one of Israel’s finest writers, steps into tricky new territory. -- Lee Langley * Spectator *An unexpected delight… This is a novel, for our new Age. -- Ian Sansom * Guardian *A Horse Walks into a Bar is a delight. -- Gabriel Josipovici * Times Literary Supplement *With A Horse Walks into a Bar, Israeli writer David Grossman accomplishes the seemingly impossible and transposes an entire stand-up show into a novel. Shocking and intense, bleak but sensitive, this affecting tale is much more than novelty… A novel that probes the fullest absurdities of the human condition and our capacities to reconstitute suffering. -- Jay Richardson * Chortle *The thrust though is the comedian’s monologue, by turns tragic and hilarious as he subjects his audience to his story. -- John Owen * Country and Townhouse *This is yet another masterwork from the wonderful Israeli novelist whose work resonates with emotional intelligence, humanity and truth. -- Eileen Battersby * Irish Times *Bold, brash, angry and heartbreakingly tender, with flurries of exasperated humour, here is a novel to take one by surprise… A demanding and gloriously rewarding novel, in it Grossman confronts the business of being alive. -- Eileen Battersby * Irish Times *A sensitive and deeply emotional account of a past-prime comedian… This book is an immersive read for both the fans and haters of the stand-up comedy, but tread carefully if you’re not up for an emotional rollercoaster. -- Yoojung Chun * Oxford Student *The perfect antidote to Trump. -- Sarah Churchwell * Guardian *This book is a compelling study of the relationship between artist and spectator, and how suffering feeds into art, and he’s made of it a bravura performance… Extraordinary. -- Alastair Mabbott * Herald *A haunting, intense and Man Booker International prize-winning novel from a great writer. * Mail on Sunday *Incredibly fast paced, and the dialogue comes at you like a machine gun… It is powerful in its own right. -- Sara Garland * Nudge *Abrasive, unexpected and eventually heartbreaking, it is a masterclass in characterisation and structure, and it beat off some exceptionally strong competition to win the prize… A Horse Walks into a Bar is quite unlike any other Grossman book except in one important respect: it’s another masterpiece. -- Nick Barley * New Statesman *Excellent. -- Dara Ó Briain * Observer *Pitch-perfect black comedy -- Salman Rushdie * Guardian *

Read more less

Book Synopsis'I could not put this book down' Reese Witherspoon' IT ISN'T A GAME WHEN SOMEBODY DIESThe text message arrives in the small hours of the morning: I need you.Isa drops everything, takes her baby daughter and heads straight to Salten. She spent the most significant days of her life at boarding school on the marshes there, days which still cast their shadow over her.Isa and her three best friends used to play the Lying Game, competing to convince people of outrageous stories. Now, after seventeen years of hiding the truth, something terrible has been found on the beach. The friends' darkest secret is about to come to light...______________________Praise for THE LYING GAME:'Atmospheric, mysterious, gripping' Marian Keyes'Surprising twists' Daily Mail'Another heart-stopping belter of a thriller from an epic talent' Heat'A gripping, unpredictable narrative that shifts like sand underfoot' Erin KellyTrade Review"Atmospheric, mysterious, gripping." Marian Keyes on THE LYING GAME "Ruth Ware is one of the best suspense writers out there and The Lying Game is her strongest book yet. A gripping, unpredictable narrative that shifts like sand underfoot, and a plot that turns like the tide." Erin Kelly, bestselling author of HE SAID, SHE SAID "Cancel your plans for the weekend when you sit down with this book, because you won't want to move until it's over." Kirkus, Starred Review "Ruth Ware has done it again! In this exceptional thriller, we are in marshland, where nothing is certain and the deadly secrets we kept with our best childhood friends may be about to resurface. Intriguing to the very last page, this is a superb exploration of friendship, family and a page-turning top-notch mystery that is guaranteed to keep you reading into the wee small hours. I loved it!" Liz Nugent, bestselling author of LYING IN WAIT "There can be no complaints about the fizzy present-day narrative, with the interplay between the women particularly well-handled." -- John Dugdale The Sunday Times

Read more less

Book Synopsis'A beautiful haunting novel… looking at a familiar London through a frosty, snowy lens. Wonderful' Caryl PhillipsThe London winter of 1947 is as cold as St Petersburg during the Revolution. Albertine, the wife of a British army officer often abroad on covert government business, finds herself increasingly lonely. Eager to distract herself with work, she takes a job as companion to the mysterious 'Monsieur Ka', a Russian émigré. As she is drawn into Ka’s dramatic past, her own life is shaken to its foundations. For in this family of former princes, there are present temptations which could profoundly affect her future.Trade ReviewGoldsworthy is an elegant writer, skilful at building atmosphere. Her fiction-within-fiction device is clever and intriguing ... the novel could hardly seem more of the moment -- Rose Wild * The Times *It often takes an emigre to describe a country most clearly, and Goldsworthy, who was born in Belgrade but has lived in London for 30 years, is proving a most accomplished poet of her adopted city ... A delight -- Claire Allfree * Daily Mail *In all three of her books, Goldsworthy has displayed a gift for creating atmosphere ... One of Goldsworthy’s strengths is the sensitivity with which she portrays the many marriages in the book ... Much of the pleasure of reading this remarkable novel comes from its passionate dedication to the power of stories. -- Lara Feigel * The Guardian *In this subtle, intelligent novel, Albertine's narration of events in 1947, as her own story begins to carry reminders of Tolstoy's, proves poignant and effective -- Nick Rennison * The Sunday Times *A beautiful haunting novel… looking at a familiar London through a frosty, snowy lens. Wonderful -- Caryl Phillips

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe first collection of short stories from one of Britain's finest novelists and criticsA nameless man who has fallen out of love with life, refuses to get out of bed, with unexpected consequences. A sociologist recalls how he learned his first and formative lesson about the oppressive power of capitalism selling newspapers and magazines up and down the platforms of Waterloo station. Some years before the era of the Pill and the Permissive Society, four university friends travel to the Mediterranean for their first holiday together, where the climate is sultry and sex is on everyone’s mind. And a strong-willed young woman defies adverse circumstances to pursue the perfect wedding at all costs. These are some of the characters that populate David Lodge’s shrewd, funny and delightfully entertaining short stories, collected here for the very first time. What prompted their publication in this form is a short story in itself, told by the author in his Foreword.LONGLISTED FOR THE EDGE HILL SHORT STORY PRIZE 2017Trade ReviewHis down-to-earth stories have a nice blend of the worldly and the ingenious. -- Phil Baker * Sunday Times *David Lodge's short stories are as witty and surprising as his novels * The Times *Fresh and timely...well-observed collection that one wishes was twice as long * Financial Times *Lodge’s preoccupations in these stories tend to be masculine, though not exclusively. The stories deal with the tumult and mysteries of relationships in a style at once serious and farcical… This collection shows Lodge at his most playfully imaginative. * Independent *

Read more less

Book SynopsisNow a major film directed by Danny Boyle reuniting the cast of TrainspottingYears on from Trainspotting Sick Boy is back in Edinburgh after a long spell in London. Having failed spectacularly as a hustler, pimp, husband, father and businessman, Sick Boy taps into an opportunity which to him represents one last throw of the dice. However, to realise his ambitions within the Adult industries, Sick Boy must team up with old pal and fellow exile Mark Renton. Still scheming, still scamming, Sick Boy and Renton soon find out that they have unresolved issues to address concerning the unhinged Begbie, the troubled, drug-addled Spud, but, most of all, with each other.T2 Trainspotting was previously published as Porno.Trade ReviewFunny, appalling, frightening * Mail on Sunday *A brilliant satirical study of the ugly dynamic which draws together predators and prey * Sunday Telegraph *Not for the fainthearted... Highly entertaining * Sunday Times *Funny and eloquently obscene * Daily Telegraph *A worthy sequel... A touching love song to the possibilities and limits of friendship. Charming, funny and sly, Porno is a good poke at all kinds of pretence and moral tidiness * Evening Standard *

Read more less

Book Synopsis**Sunday Times Number One Bestseller**A classic tale of murder and deceit from one of the world's best storytellers - 'a masterpiece' The TimesTrudy has betrayed her husband, John. She's still in the marital home - a dilapidated, priceless London townhouse - but not with John. Instead, she's with his brother, the profoundly banal Claude, and the two of them have a plan. But there is a witness to their plot: the inquisitive, nine-month-old resident of Trudy's womb.'An astonishing act of literary ventriloquism unlike any in recent literature. A bravura performance, it is the finest recent work from a true master...' Daily TelegraphTrade ReviewAn astonishing act of literary ventriloquism unlike any in recent literature. A bravura performance, it is the finest recent work from a true master… Told from a perspective unlike any other, Nutshell is a shocking tale of murder and treachery from one of the world’s master storytellers. * Daily Telegraph *A creative gamble that pays off brilliantly…Witty and gently tragic, this short, bewitching novel is an ode to humanity’s beauty, selfishness and inextinguishable longing. * Mail on Sunday *Ian McEwan’s embryonic spin on Hamlet is a virtuoso feat of wordplay … Virtuoso entertainment. * Observer *While the literary device of an unborn baby narrating a novel from the womb is hardly original… Ian McEwan employs it with aplomb... Here everything is tightly controlled and the tension ratchets up as our all-knowing unborn watches helplessly from his watery sack while the dastardly plan progresses through a series of nail-biting moments… The ending is beautifully contrived… The book is elegantly written with plenty of pungent, topical observations upon the world. * Daily Mail *At once playful and deadly serious, delightful and frustrating it is one of McEwan’s hardest to categorise works, and all the more interesting for it. * The Times *

Read more less

Book SynopsisHame, n. Scottish form of ‘home’: a valued place regarded as a refuge or place of originAfter her relationship breaks down, Mhairi McPhail dismantles her life in New York and moves with her nine-year-old daughter, Agnes, to the remote Scottish island of Fascaray to write the biography of Grigor McWatt, the late Bard of Fascaray. But who was the cantankerous Grigor McWatt? Despite his international reputation, details of his past are elusive. As Mhairi struggles to adapt to her new life she begins to unearth the astonishing secret history of the poet regarded by many as the custodian of Fascaray’s – and Scotland’s – soul.Trade ReviewTransportive and immersive. -- Jonathan McAloon * Financial Times *This searching and eloquent novel muses on identity, love and belonging. -- Hepzibah Anderson * Mail on Sunday *Bristling with life and passion and wit. * The Herald *Hame treads a line between light-hearted satire and a discussion on notions of home and belonging… A hugely entertaining, roller-coaster of a ride through poetry and language -- Liam Carson * The Irish Times *Richly textured… The emotional complexity of the writing matches the landscape of the island and its surroundings. -- Philip Womack * Literary Review *

Read more less

Book Synopsis'A modern gothic triumph' Max PorterThe Bass Rock has for centuries watched over the lives that pass under its shadow on the Scottish mainland. And across the centuries the fates of three women are linked: to this place, to each other.In the early 1700s, Sarah, accused of being a witch, flees for her life.In the aftermath of the Second World War, Ruth navigates a new house, a new husband and the strange waters of the local community. Six decades later, the house stands empty. Viv, mourning the death of her father, catalogues Ruth's belongings and discovers her place in the past - and perhaps a way forward.Each woman's choices are circumscribed by the men in their lives. But in sisterhood there is the hope of survival and new life...WINNER OF THE STELLA PRIZE_______________PRAISE FOR THE BASS ROCK:'Daring, heartfelt, explosive' Daisy Johnson'A vividly imagined portrait' Sunday Times'Dark, disturbing and very sophisticated' William Boyd 'Wonderfully subtle and magnificently savage' Claire Fuller Trade ReviewLike Ali Smith’s novels crossed with the TV series Fleabag… [The Bass Rock is] a vividly imagined portrait… There’s much to admire in its little miracles of observation… [Evie Wyld] knows how to maintain suspense, what to withhold and when to reveal it — right up to the spine-chilling last line. -- Johanna Thomas-Corr * Sunday Times *A multilayered masterpiece; vivid, chilling, leaping jubilantly through space and time, it’s a jaw dropping novel that confirms Wyld as one of our most gifted young writers. -- Alex Preston * Observer *Wondrous... Expertly chilling... Wyld consistently entertains, juggling the pleasures of several different genres. -- John Williams * New York Times *Searingly controlled…psychologically fearless and…bitterly funny. Wyld is a genius of contrasting voices and revealed connections, while her foreshadowings are so subtle that the book demands – and eminently repays – a second read. -- Justine Jordan * Guardian *A rising star of British fiction… Wyld’s slow, controlled build-up of dread is excellent… Most powerful of all is Wyld’s evocation of a hairs-on-the-neck sense of foreboding when women interact with volatile men. -- Francesca Carington * Sunday Telegraph, *Novel of the Week* *

Read more less

Book SynopsisNow a major film starring Academy Award nominees Jim Broadbent (Iris) and Charlotte Rampling (45 Years)Winner of the Man Booker Prize for Fiction in 2011 Tony Webster and his clique first met Adrian Finn at school. Sex-hungry and book-hungry, they would navigate the girl-less sixth form together, trading in affectations, in-jokes, rumour and wit. Maybe Adrian was a little more serious than the others, certainly more intelligent, but they all swore to stay friends for life.Now Tony is retired. He's had a career and a single marriage, a calm divorce. He's certainly never tried to hurt anybody. Memory, though, is imperfect. It can always throw up surprises, as a lawyer's letter is about to prove.Trade ReviewA masterpiece... I would urge you to read - and re-read - The Sense of an Ending * Daily Telegraph *Mesmerising... the concluding scenes grip like a thriller - a whodunit of memory and morality * Independent *A very fine book, skilfully plotted, boldly conceived... Barnes has achieved...something of universal importance -- Justin Cartwright * Observer *A precise, poignant portrait of the costs and benefits of time passing, of friendship, of love. A small masterpiece -- Erica Wagner * The Times *A wonderful story that is all too human and all so real * Irish Times *An extremely moving, a precise book about the imprecision of memory and how it constructs people, stories and histories. -- Alasitair Bruce * Guardian *From the moment that we hear from the woodworm which snuck aboard Noah’s ark to the final pages of the novel, Barnes interrogates moral dilemmas and motivations. These tales could easily be read is isolation, but are much better when consumed as a whole. * WeAreTheCity *A masterpiece... I would urge you to read - and re-read - The Sense of an Ending * Daily Telegraph *Mesmerising... the concluding scenes grip like a thriller - a whodunit of memory and morality * Independent *A very fine book, skilfully plotted, boldly conceived... Barnes has achieved...something of universal importance -- Justin Cartwright * Observer *

Read more less

Book SynopsisSelected as a Book of the Year in 2017 in the Irish Times and The Times SHORTLISTED FOR THE COSTA FIRST NOVEL AWARD 2017 ‘A delicate, crystalline, hugely impressive novel… He's yet another masterful younger writer coming through… Wonderful’ - Sebastian BarryHer house is on Montpelier Parade – just across town, but it might as well be a different world. Sonny is fixing a crumbling wall in the garden when he sees her for the first time, coming down the path towards him. Vera. Vera is older, wealthier, sophisticated, but chance meetings quickly become shy arrangements, and soon Sonny is in love for the first time. But there is something unsettling that Vera is keeping from him. Unfolding in the sea-bright Dublin of early spring, Montpelier Parade is an indelible novel about the things that remain unspoken between lovers. It is about how deeply we can connect with one another, and the choices we must make alone.Longlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize 2017Trade ReviewA delicate, crystalline, hugely impressive novel by Karl Geary. He's yet another masterful younger writer coming through. But these writers aren't just promising, they are arriving fully fledged, like a bunch of Hemingways and Waughs. (A pride of Hemingways?) This is language on the side of life, suggesting life, giving life. Wonderful. -- Sebastian BarryIntensely powerful. * Sunday Mirror *Luminous…brilliantly paced, full of tension and tenderness. * Irish Times *Few novelists debut with a masterpiece, but Geary has done just that. Stunning. * Mail on Sunday *Montpelier Parade is haunting – a portrayal of loneliness that is eerily beautiful and desperately moving -- Lisa McInerney, author of The Glorious HeresiesLuminous and moving. A story that asks who you can love and how, and a novel that gets to the heart of things; it certainly got to the heart of me. -- Sunjeev SahotaA genuine talent. * Daily Mail *The precision in his prose bellies his training as a scriptwriter; the plot unfolds with self-assured ease, and the dialogue lives on the page… He trusts his reader, and the novel has compulsive power because of it. An astonishing debut. -- Calen O'Hanlon * Skinny *A groundbreaking debut. Montpelier Parade is a taut, riveting, beautifully sparse coming of age tale from a fearless new talent -- Téa Obreht, National Book Award Finalist & New York Times bestselling author of The Tiger's WifeI hope that someone will give me an advance copy… I’ve heard it’s lyrical, brave and inventive – everything I look for in a novel. -- Maggie O'Farrell * Observer, Book of the Year *A bittersweet love story… An unusually vivid novel, which presents life how it is, rather than how Hollywood script writers might like it to be. * Press Association *Karl’s depiction of his home-town is so visceral you can almost feel the dreich air seeping into your bones as you read…. Karl’s acute observations perfectly capture the essence of boyhood bewilderment and bravado. This is an unusually vivid novel that presents life how it is. -- Kate Whiting * UK Press Syndication *A tender, real tale of love…a captivating debut from the Dublin-born author… A luminous, moving story that is full of heart. * Image *Hypnotic and involving. * Sunday Express S Magazine *I adored this unconventional love story. It’s tender, with luminous language, and should catapult the author to literary fame. * Irish Examiner *

Read more less

Book Synopsis‘As a writer, Carrère is straight berserk’ Junot DíazIn this non-fiction novel – road trip, confession, and erotic tour de force – Emmanuel Carrère pursues two consuming obsessions: the disappearance of his grandfather amid suspicions that he was a Nazi collaborator in the Second World War; and a violently passionate affair with a woman that he loves but which ends in destruction. Moving between Paris and Kotelnich, a grisly post-Soviet town, Carrère weaves his story into a travelogue of a journey inward, travelling fearlessly into the depths of his tortured psyche.Trade ReviewAn elegant, emotional self-examination, full of bleak but truthful insights about the lies and compromises of love * The Times *This book is very much at the crossroads of writing-as-therapy and the sort of fact-fiction blurring that fans of WG Sebald and Geoff Dyer will appreciate * Independent *Carrère brings the whole to sharp focus with a few jarring truths and a moment of great beauty. You leave its last pages with a deep appreciation for life * Washington Post *Emmanuel Carrère has written a work of infinite sorrow, infernal jealousy, and violent passion. My Life as a Russian Novel dazzles * Le Monde *Brims with ideas and incidents... Gripping and fascinating, an intimate portrait of a complicated man's inner life and his struggles to find some kind of happiness and fulfilment * Guardian *A captivating memoir that reads like a literary erotic-suspense novel * Boston Globe *As a writer, Carrère is straight berserk; as a storyteller he is so freakishly talented, so unassuming in grace and power that you only realize the hold he's got on your when you attempt to pull away -- Junot DíazHe's the best kind of writer, not just a bestseller but a man who is not afraid to leave the comfort zone of his desk, go out into the world, take risks, and get his shoes dirty * Observer *Excoriating and forcefully intelligent -- Nat Segnit * Times Literary Supplement *

Read more less

Book SynopsisFrom the author of The Gustav SonataAt the age of six, Mary Ward, the child of a poor farming family in Suffolk, has a revelation: 'I am not Mary. That is a mistake. I am not a girl. I'm a boy.' So begins a heroic struggle to change gender, while around her others also strive to find a place of safety and fulfilment in a savage and confusing world.Over a million Rose Tremain books sold'A writer of exceptional talent ... Tremain is a writer who understands every emotion' Independent I'There are few writers out there with the dexterity or emotional intelligence to rival that of the great Rose Tremain' Irish Times'Tremain has the painterly genius of an Old Master, and she uses it to stunning effect' The Times'Rose Tremain is one of the very finest British novelists' Salman Rushdie'Tremain is a writer of exemplary vision and particularity. The fictional world is rendered with extraordinary vividness' Marcel Theroux, GuardianTrade ReviewA remarkable novel * The Times *A major book * Daily Telegraph *Tremain is superb * Independent *Funny, absorbing and quite original. I've read nothing to touch it this year * Literary Review *Sacred Country is a book that we give to our friends and are glad to have read…it makes us look forward to Ms. Tremain’s other books with hungry pleasure * New York Times *

Read more less

Book SynopsisAn international sensation, Small Country is a beautiful but harrowing tale of coming-of-age in the face of civil war.'A luminous debut novel…Faye dramatises the terrible nostalgia of having lost not only a childhood but also a whole world to war' GuardianBurundi, 1992. For ten-year-old Gabriel, life in his comfortable expat neighbourhood of Bujumbura with his French father, Rwandan mother and little sister, Ana, is something close to paradise. These are happy, carefree days spent with his friends sneaking cigarettes and stealing mangoes, swimming in the lake and riding bikes in the streets they have turned into their kingdom. But dark clouds are gathering over this small country, and soon their peaceful idyll will shatter when Burundi and neighbouring Rwanda are brutally hit by war.‘Unforgettable… Gaël Faye’s talent is breathtaking’ Imbolo Mbue, author of Behold the DreamersTrade Reviewan excellent novel, a model of restraint and quiet literary sophistication * Sunday Times *[A] luminous debut novel… This is a book that demanded to be written... With a light touch, Faye dramatises the terrible nostalgia of having lost not only a childhood but also a whole world to war -- Nadifa Mohamed * Guardian *An evocative portrait of what it means to lose one’s freedom and innocence. Gaël Faye’s literary powers lie in his unbridled honesty and his effortless prose. He is a writer of great promise and grace -- Chigozie Obioma, author of The FishermenUnforgettable… Gaël Faye’s talent is breathtaking; no country that can give the world a writer like him should ever be called small -- Imbolo Mbue, author of Behold the Dreamersas beautiful as it is painful... It's easy to see why it set the French literary scene alight. This is one you won't be abandoning in the hotel library when you leave. -- Sam Baker * The Pool *

Read more less

Book Synopsis'A cracking historical novel – with a twinge of the surreal – about passion and obsession' The TimesSHORLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2018One September evening in 1785, the merchant Jonah Hancock finds one of his captains waiting eagerly on his doorstep. He has sold Jonah’s ship for what appears to be a mermaid.As gossip spreads through the docks, coffee shops, parlours and brothels, everyone wants to see Mr Hancock’s marvel. Its arrival spins him out of his ordinary existence and through the doors of high society, where he meets Angelica Neal, the most desirable woman he has ever laid eyes on... and a courtesan of great accomplishment. This meeting will steer both their lives onto a dangerous new course.What will be the cost of their ambitions? And will they be able to escape the legendary destructive power a mermaid is said to possess?Trade ReviewA cracking historical novel – with a twinge of the surreal – about passion and obsession, dreams and reality... The story is by turns intriguing, touching, funny, sad and heartwarming. It will make you laugh and it may make you cry. Mostly, though, the cast of endlessly engaging characters will keep you turning the pages until you get to the wholly satisfying ending... The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock is superb. * The Times *From the first page of this dazzling debut novel, you are pitched into a sumptuously detailed adventure set in the bustle and swagger of 18th century London… The result is a wonderfully written and richly descriptive novel, its brilliantly drawn characters driven by heady and dangerous desires.***** * Sunday Express *Roll up, roll up, a true wonder is on display: a mermaid magicked out of words. The author of this debut set in Georgian London gulled me, by the zest of her writing and sustained authorial slight of hand, into forgetting for a second that they do not exist... Imogen Hermes Gowar delights in the feminine fakery of mermaids, but as a writer she is the real deal. -- Hermione Eyre, author of Viper Wine * Guardian *A sumptuous historical novel... It was an absolute pleasure to lose myself in this beautifully written Georgian adventureHotly anticipated... a bold, sumptuous doorstopper... Gowar has created a dazzlingly original novel, full of heady pleasures and shot through with the kind of irreverent humour you might expect to find in Georgian London. She’s succeeded in creating a fully-realised world that you want to get lost in. But what’s most refreshing is that she gives all the best lines to women. * Evening Standard *

Read more less

Book Synopsis‘One of the masters of modern Chinese literature’ Jung ChangThis gripping dystopia contrasts the reality of life in China today with the sunny optimism of the ‘Chinese dream’.One dusk in early June, in a town deep in the Balou mountains, fourteen-year-old Li Niannian notices that something strange is going on. As the residents would usually be settling down for the night, instead they start appearing in the streets and fields. There are people everywhere. Li Niannian watches, mystified. Until he realises the people are dreamwalking, carrying on with their daily business as if the sun hadn’t already gone down. And before too long, as more and more people succumb, in the black of night all hell breaks loose. Set over the course of one night, The Day the Sun Died pits chaos and darkness against the bright ‘Chinese dream’ promoted by President Xi Jinping. We are thrown into the middle of an increasingly strange and troubling waking nightmare as Li Niannian and his father struggle to save the town, and persuade the beneficent sun to rise again. Praise for Yan Lianke's books: ‘Nothing short of a masterpiece’ Guardian‘A hyper-real tour de force, a blistering condemnation of political corruption and excess’ Financial Times‘Mordant satire from a brave fabulist’ Daily Mail ‘Exuberant and imaginative’ Sunday Times ‘I can think of few better novelists than Yan, with his superlative gifts for storytelling and penetrating eye for truth’ New York Times Book ReviewTrade ReviewA winner of the Kafka Prize and a frequently cited contender for the Nobel, Yan is one of those rare geniuses who finds in the peculiar absurdities of his own culture the absurdities that infect all cultures * Washington Post *Yan Lianke, one of the most important literary interpreters of contemporary China, combines shocking satire and sharp imagery to address the moral vacuum at the heart of the country's extraordinary transformation -- Catherine Taylor * 1843 *Yan Lianke's powerful dystopian novel, narrated by a teenage boy, is set during a single night in a remote Chinese village... The underlying political message, that China is sleepwalking to disaster under President Xi Ping, could hardly be plainer... But there is so much colour in the book, as the sleepwalkers act more and more oddly, that politics seems secondary. Poignant and unsettling -- Max Davidson * Mail on Sunday *Masterful...a brave and unforgettable novel, full of tragic poise and political resonance, masterfully shifting between genres and ways of storytelling, exploring the ways in which history and memory are resurrected, how dark, private desires seep or flood out -- Sean Hewitt * Irish Times *A remarkable novel – open, like most good novels, to a variety of interpretations. The events described are incredible; the atmosphere all too believable -- Allan Massie * Scotsman *

Read more less

Book Synopsis'Helen Fielding is one of the funniest writers in Britain' Nick Hornby Discover the most recent escapades of Britian's favourite singleton. 8.45 P.M. Realise there have been so many times in my life when have fantasised about going to a scan with Mark or Daniel: just not both at the same time.Before motherhood, before marriage, Bridget, with biological clock ticking very, very loudly, finds herself unexpectedly pregnant at the eleventh hour: a joyful pregnancy which is dominated, however, by a crucial but terribly awkward question - who is the father? Mark Darcy: honourable, decent, notable human rights lawyer? Or Daniel Cleaver: charming, witty, notable fuckwit?9.45 P.M. It's like they're two halves of the perfect man, who'll spend the rest of their lives each wanting to outdo the other one. And now it's all enacting itself in my stomach.In this gloriously funny, touching story of baby-deadline panic, maternal bliss, and social, professional, technological, culinary and childbirth chaos, Bridget Jones - global phenomenon and the world's favourite Singleton - is back with a bump.'Bridget Jones is as relevant and funny today as she has always been...' Evening StandardTrade ReviewA gloriously funny and touching story * Daily Express *Bridget Jones is as relevant and funny today as she has always been... Daniel [Cleaver] is not only alive and shagging, he also has the best lines… Again and again he comes up with smutty one-liners that steal the show * Evening Standard *Fielding’s narrative diverts from the screen version: notably that feckless Daniel Cleaver, the original “fuckwit” in Bridget’s life is, gratifyingly, very much alive and central to the plot of the novel. "VG" * Financial Times *It’s a real fun read. The jokes are great and you find yourself rooting for Bridget and praying she gets the outcome she deserves * The Sun *Before I read this book, I wondered whether there could possibly be anything left to tell. This book is absolutely necessary. At a time when the world seems especially dark and difficult, and sometimes stacked against women, Bridget Jones’s Baby is both a longed for slice of escapism and a real inspiration * The Pool *It’s very, very good… Fielding reminds us once again she’s queen of encapsulating the female experience… Short, pacy and perfect * Press Association *Helen Fielding is one of the funniest writers in Britain and Bridget Jones is a creation of comic genius -- Nick HornbyA brilliant comic creation -- Salman RushdieHow can a reader not love this woman? * New York Times Book Review *Bridget Jones is no mere fictional character, she's the Spirit of the Age * Evening Standard *

Read more less

Book SynopsisJust moved into a new apartment, alone for the first time in years, Victor Forde goes every evening to Donnelly’s pub for a pint, a slow one. One evening his drink is interrupted. A man in shorts and a pink shirt brings over his pint and sits down. He seems to know Victor’s name and to remember him from school. Says his name is Fitzpatrick.Victor dislikes him on sight, dislikes too the memories that Fitzpatrick stirs up of five years being taught by the Christian Brothers.He prompts other memories too – of Rachel, his beautiful wife who became a celebrity, and of Victor’s own small claim to fame, as the man who says the unsayable on the radio.But it’s the memories of school, and of one particular Brother, that he cannot control - and which eventually threaten to destroy his sanity.Trade ReviewRoddy Doyle excelled himself… A typically bittersweet novella about a middle-aged man’s memories of his schooldays which pulls the rug shockingly from under the reader’s feet. -- Justine Jordan * Guardian, Books of the Year *A book that made me feel I really was in the presence of a master. -- Sebastian Barry * Observer *Reading Smile, one is swept along – as in all Doyle’s novels – by the vibrancy of the language, the vivid sense of character and place, but nothing prepares you for the final few pages where, in a twist of imaginative brilliance, everything you have read is turned completely on its head… Smile is beautifully written, and beautifully observed -- Mick Brown * Daily Telegraph *Terribly moving and even, at times, distressing, while saving its greatest surprise until the end… There is a brave and complex ending to the novel… It will inspire debate but also admiration for the courage of a hugely successful writer who refuses to be predictable and uses the novel to challenge both the reader’s sense of ease and the nature of the form itself. -- John Boyne * Guardian *Smile turns out to be a novel of literary deception and self-deception, of suppression, guilt, fantasy and the deep damage that leaves a mind profoundly disordered… I suspect Smile will become a bestseller -- Linda Grant * Daily Telegraph *

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn 1929 young bride Mehar struggles with her family’s expectations whilst seventy years later her great-grandson discovers what her story can teach him about his own path.'A gorgeous, gripping read' Kamila Shamsie'A multi-generational masterpiece' Daily MailMehar, a young bride in rural Punjab, is trying to discover the identity of her new husband. It is 1929, and she and her sisters-in-law - married to three brothers in a single ceremony - spend their days hard at work on the family farm, sequestered from contact with the men. When Mehar develops a theory as to which of them is hers, a passion is ignited that will put more than one life at risk.Spiralling around Mehar's story is that of a young man who in 1999 flees from England to the deserted sun-scorched farm. Can a summer spent learning of love and of his family's past give him the strength for the journey home?Readers love China Room***** 'I didn't want it to end'***** 'What. A. Book.'***** 'Beautifully crafted...a story as old as time'***** 'A novel of thwarted loves'Shortlisted for the 2022 Rathbones Folio PrizeLonglisted for the 2021 Booker Prize'Amazing storytelling...gripping and very moving' BBC Radio 4, Open Book'I'm blown away by it' Tessa Hadley'Moving...fresh and nourishing' The TimesTrade ReviewSunjeev Sahota's writing is the stuff of miracles. Emotional and heartrending, China Room juggles questions of love, debt, and what it means to build a home alongside the history that carries us. China Room is a propulsive dream, intricately wrought, and Sahota is a maestro. -- Bryan Washington, author of LOT and MEMORIALChina Room is a rare novel that makes you pause in its beauty. -- Francesca Carington * Sunday Telegraph, *Novel of the Week* *Sahota is a truly original novelist, his prose sparingly precise in its beauty, steeped in kindness and deep humanity. -- Ruth Scurr * TLS *With poise, restraint and deep intelligence, Sahota feeds us big, difficult themes - segregation and freedom, revolution and empire - in a form that is unsweetened, fresh and nourishing. Surely this, his third novel, will propel him up the shortlists to the prizewinning status he deserves. -- Melissa Katsoulis * The Times, 'This Book Will Win Prizes' *An extraordinarily gifted writer... Sahota's ability to shine a phrase is not bought for the usual steep formalist price, at the expense of simplicity, intimate feeling, and solid representation. He's both camera and painter, in a literary world that often separates those novelistic tasks. -- James Wood * New Yorker *

Read more less

Book SynopsisWealthy dead American. Beautiful young widow. This case has PI Philip Marlowe’s name written all over it. Is it enough to bring him back for one last adventure?The year is 1988. The place, Baja California. Private Investigator Philip Marlowe is living out his retirement sipping margaritas and playing cards when in saunter two men dressed like undertakers with a case that has his name written all over it. His mission is to investigate Donald Zinn – supposedly drowned off his yacht, leaving a much younger and now very rich wife. Marlowe’s speciality. But is Zinn actually alive? And are the pair living off the spoils? 'Osborne and Chandler are a perfect match' William BoydDiscover the rest of the inimitable Philip Marlowe series – nine classic Chandler adventures, from The Big Sleep to The Long Goodbye, available now in paperback and ebook from Penguin Books.Trade ReviewA highly distinctive writer who quickly becomes addictive… I loved it -- John Gray * New Statesman, **Books of the Year** *Splendid * Mail on Sunday *A brilliant Raymond Chandler continuation novel with an ageing Philip Marlowe. Osborne and Chandler are a perfect match -- William Boyd * Guardian *It's a joy to see Philip Marlowe lured back for one last job by the gleefully unsentimental Lawrence Osborne... If you like noir, pour yourself something cool and enjoy one final dark night of the soul -- Joseph Knox, author of SirensThe decayed grandeur of the setting, the mystery of an alluring femme fatale, an old man's tussle with his conscience and his ageing body, and a healthy number of spectacular set-pieces work a subtle magic... both a convincing Marlowe and a seedily satisfying thriller -- Andrew Holgate * Sunday Times *

Read more less

Book SynopsisDiscover the blistering first novella from the from the Booker-shortlisted author of Eileen and My Year of Rest and Relaxation.They said I've done something wrong?... And they've just left me down here to starve. Haven't had a drop in days more so...Salem, Massachusetts, 1851: McGlue is in the hold, still too drunk to be sure of his name or situation or orientation – he may have killed a man. That man may have been his best friend. Now, McGlue wants one thing and one thing only: a drink. Because for McGlue, insufferable, terrifying memories accompany sobriety. Asail on the high seas of literary tradition, Ottessa Moshfegh gives us an unforgettable blackguard on a knife-sharp voyage through the fogs of recollection.Trade ReviewWonderful * Guardian *Strange and beautiful * LA Times *A gorgeously sordid story of love and murder on the high seas and in reeky corners of mid-nineteenth-century New York and points North. McGlue is a wonderwork of virtuoso prose and truths that will make you squirm and concur -- Gary LutzYou’re in safe, if sticky hands with an Ottessa Moshfegh story… Everything bulges and reeks in this novella, which feels as if it was written in a permanent state of nausea… The plot spins faster than its main character’s head. What elevates this novella are the scalpelsharp observations about McGlue’s nihilism and her prose, which is as distilled as the liquor McGlue necks. It’s a wild ride. -- Fiona Wilson * The Times *Moshfegh is… a superlative short-story writer… McGlue, which owes as much to Cormac McCarthy as it does to Poe or Melville, is an entertaining curio with some lovely baroque flourishes. -- Alasdair Lees * Independent *

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe debut novel from the brilliant and award-winning poet Helen MortAlexa is a police community support officer whose world feels unstable.Caron, Alexa’s girlfriend, is pushing her away and pushing herself even harder. A climber, she fixates on a brutal route. Leigh, who works at a local gear shop, watches Caron climb and feels complicit.Meanwhile, an ex-police officer compulsively revisits the April day in 1989 that changed his life forever. Trapped in his memories of the disaster, he tracks the Hillsborough inquests, questioning everything.As the young women negotiate Sheffield’s violent inheritance, the rock faces of Stanage and their relationships with each other, Mort stunningly grounds these journeys of trust and trauma, fear and falling, in the texture of the urban and natural terrain underfoot.'A beautifully accomplished debut...a deeply felt work of loss, time and healing' Guardian‘Helen Mort is unmistakably one of the most brilliant poets of her generation; Black Car Burning shows her to be a remarkable novelist’ Robert MacfarlaneTrade ReviewA love letter to [Mort's] home city of Sheffield... Politics and landscape are fiercely intertwined in the history of South Yorkshire, and Mort now demonstrates that she can write as assuredly on both subjects in novel form as in her poetry... Mort, in a beautifully accomplished debut, has blended a rich alloy: a deeply felt work of loss, time and healing -- Catherine Taylor * The Guardian *Black Car Burning explores the ties that bind us: literally, while strung across a cliff face in high winds, or figuratively in the tenuous bonds that hold both relationships and communities together, and which we are all responsible for maintaining. It's especially gratifying to inhabit a female-focused world within a climbing scene still party defined by machismo and male bravado. Helen Mort's writing is confident and compassionate and this is a mature and evocative debut -- Ben Myers * New Statesman *Mort has reined in the poetry to write a gritty northern novel in a lean, unflashy prose, only letting herself go in lyrical interludes spoken by the landscape itself -- Phil Baker * Sunday Times *Bold, imaginative…intensely realistic, swarming with minute physical and social detail… Mort writes brilliantly about the physical presence of the city, and she deals just as well with the tight focus of the climb... [Black Car Burning] is frequently exhilarating in its accurate sympathy, with some inch-perfect dialogue and astute observation throughout… Poet writes gripping novel: now there’s something you don’t hear every day -- Sean O'Brien * Times Literary Supplement *An impressive, Sheffield-set tale… the disparate voices are held together by short passages in which the landscape itself is given voice. These act as welcome poetic rocks in the stream of the narrative… [and] are startling reminders of Mort’s considerable poetic skill -- Jude Cook * Spectator *

Read more less

Book SynopsisA beautifully packaged hardback edition of Haruki Murakami's brilliantly surreal, detective-story classic, now with a new introduction by the author.The man was leading an aimless life, time passing, one big blank. His girlfriend has perfectly formed ears, ears with the power to bewitch, marvels of creation. The man receives a letter from a friend, enclosing a seemingly innocent photograph of sheep, and a request: place the photograph somewhere it will be seen.Then, one September afternoon, the phone rings, and the adventure begins. Welcome to the wild sheep chase.'Murakami's style and imagination are closer to that of Kurt Vonnegut, Raymond Carver and John Irving' New York TimesTrade ReviewWonderfully easy to read and just as wonderfully difficult to make sense of...like the narrator, who slowly accepts the presence in his life of mystery, we slowly recognize the possibility of a new kind of world. Like him, we lean forward and topple headlong into magic * Washington Post *It begins as a detective novel, dips into a screwball comedy, and at its close becomes a tale of possession...A highly accomplished piece of craftsmanship * New Yorker *Mr. Murakami's style and imagination are closer to that of Kurt Vonnegut, Raymond Carver and John Irving * New York Times *A Wild Sheep Chase has the conventional hull of a thriller - a quest, a mystery, an extraordinary woman, and plenty of elegant duress - but its fantastic superstructure transforms it into something quite different...a science fiction fantasy, a romance, a metaphysical tease, or a dramatisation of philosophical ideas * Independent *If you consider yourself an intelligent, sensitive common reader but wish to accommodate something a little removed from your experience, and probably your imagination, I dare you to turn your eyes towards Murakami and head off on a wild sheep chase. * Glasgow Herald *

Read more less

Book SynopsisA beautiful hardback edition of Angela Carter's feminist retelling of fairy tales - masterful, seductive and luminous. From familiar fairy tales and legends - Red Riding Hood, Bluebeard, Puss in Boots, Beauty and the Beast, vampires and werewolves - Angela Carter has created an absorbing collection of dark, sensual, fantastic stories.'Magnificent set pieces of fastidious sensuality' Ian McEwan'A quirky, original, and baroque stylist' Margaret AtwoodVINTAGE QUARTERBOUND CLASSICS: Bound to be beautifulINTRODUCED BY HELEN SIMPSON

Read more less

Book SynopsisVINTAGE CLASSICS' AMERICAN GOTHIC SERIESSpine-tingling, mind-altering and deliciously atmospheric, journey into the dark side of America with nine of its most uncanny classics.A gripping and dark fictionalised account of life inside the Manson family from one of the most exciting young voices in fiction.If you're lost, they'll find you...Evie Boyd is fourteen and desperate to be noticed.It's the summer of 1969 and restless, empty days stretch ahead of her. Until she sees them. The girls. Hair long and uncombed, jewelry catching the sun. And at their centre, Suzanne, black-haired and beautiful.If not for Suzanne, she might not have gone. But, intoxicated by her and the life she promises, Evie follows the girls back to the decaying ranch where they live.Was there a warning? A sign of what was coming? Or did Evie know already that there was no way back?'Taut, beautiful and savage, Cline's novel demands your attention' Guardian

Read more less

Book SynopsisVINTAGE CLASSICS' AMERICAN GOTHIC SERIESSpine-tingling, mind-altering and deliciously atmospheric, journey into the dark side of America with nine of its most uncanny classics.A haunting and affecting meditation on love from the Nobel-prize winning author of Beloved.May, Christine, Heed, Junior, Vida - even L - all are women obsessed with Bill Cosey. He shapes their yearnings for a father, husband, lover, guardian, and friend. This audacious vision from a master storyteller on the nature of love - its appetite, its sublime possession, and its consuming dread - is rich in characters and dramatic events, and in its profound sensitivity to just how alive the past can be. Sensual, elegiac and unforgettable, Love ultimately comes full circle to that indelible, overwhelming first love that marks us forever.Winner of the PEN/Saul Bellow award for achievement in American fiction'Love is her best work...a slender but mesmerising tale' Evening Standard

Read more less

Book SynopsisEscape to the ocean with the entrancing, unforgettable winner of the Costa Book of the Year - as read on BBC Radio 4.On a quiet day, near the Caribbean island of Black Conch, a mermaid raises her barnacled head from the flat grey sea. She is attracted by David, a fisherman waiting for a catch, singing to himself with his guitar. Aycayia the mermaid has been living in the vast ocean all alone for centuries.When Aycayia is caught and dragged ashore by American tourists, David rescues her with the aim of putting her back in the ocean. But it is soon clear that the mermaid is already transforming into a woman.This is the story of their love affair, of an island and of the great wide sea.'Mesmerising' Maggie O'Farrell author of The Marriage Portrait 'A unique talent' Bernadine Evaristo author of Girl, Women, Other 'Not your standard mermaid' Margaret Atwood author of The TestamentsVINTAGE EARTH is a series of books that reveals our ever-changing relationship with the environment. These are stories old and young, set in worlds real or imagined, that allow us to explore our connection to the natural world. Transformative, wild, surprising and essential, these novels take on the most urgent story of our times.Trade ReviewBighearted . . . Sentence by sensuous sentence, Roffey builds a verdant, complicated world that it is a pleasure to live inside . . . A fairy tale. But it is a ghost story too * New York Times *[A] beautiful book... Roffey's writing is lyrical and filled with magic, but there is plenty of bittersweet realism to ground it -- Sophie Dahl * Daily Mail *A very beautiful, haunting book * Stage *

Read more less

Book SynopsisEvery second son must be sacrificed at the age of fifteen. But will one boy defy all odds and triumph... On the island of Wayo Wayo, every second son must leave on the day he turns fifteen as a sacrifice to the Sea God. Atile'i is one such boy, but as the strongest swimmer and best sailor, he is determined to defy destiny and become the first to survive.Alice Shih, who has lost her husband and son in a climbing accident, is quietly preparing to commit suicide in her house by the sea. But her plan is interrupted when a vast trash vortex comes crashing onto the shore of Taiwan, bringing Atile'i with it.In the aftermath of the catastrophe, Atile'i and Alice retrace her late husband's footsteps into the mountains, hoping to solve the mystery of her son's disappearance. On their journey, memories will be challenged, an unusual bond formed, and a dark secret uncovered that will force Alice to question everything she thought she knew.VINTAGE EARTH is a collection of novels to transform our relationship with the natural world. Each one is a work of creative activism, a blast of fresh air, a seed from which change can grow. The books in this series reconnect us to the planet we inhabit - and must protect. Discover great writing on the most urgent story of our times.Trade ReviewA haunting and evocative tale, beautifully told. I wept at the description of the dying whales and the approaching tsunami ... I think this work will be a classic—Hugh Howey, author of WOOLFrankly, astonishing… A wonderful novel which deserves a very wide audience—David Barnett, Independent on SundayInventive narrative… The depiction of Atile’i’s magical realm and his innocent wonder at this unfamiliar and murky world is imaginative and moving—Trisha Andres, Financial TimesShuttles between ... two realms with a dizzying ease reminiscent of Haruki Murakami, twisting the dreamlike into the curiously credible—Times Literary SupplementWe haven't read anything like this novel. Ever. South America gave us magical realism – what is Taiwan giving us? A new way of telling our new reality, beautiful, entertaining, frightening, preposterous, true. Completely unsentimental but never brutal, Wu Ming-Yi treats human vulnerability and the world's vulnerability with fearless tenderness—Ursula Le Guin

Read more less

Book Synopsis'A long-time confidante of the rain and snow, I am ninety years old. The rain and snow have weathered me, and I too have weathered them'At the end of the twentieth century an old woman sits among the birch trees and reflects on the joys and tragedies that have befallen her people. A member of the Evenki tribe who wander the forests of north-eastern China, hers was a life lived in close sympathy with nature at its most beautiful and cruel.Then, in the 1930s, the intimate, secluded world of the tribe is shattered when the Japanese army invades China. The Evenki cannot avoid being pulled into the brutal conflict that marks the beginning of the end of life as they know it.'An atmospheric modern folk-tale, the saga of the Evenki clan of Inner Mongolia - nomadic reindeer herders whose traditional life alongside the Argun river endured unchanged for centuries... This is a fitting tribute to the Evenki by a writer of rare talent' Financial TimesVINTAGE EARTH is a collection of novels to transform our relationship with the natural world. Each one is a work of creative activism, a blast of fresh air, a seed from which change can grow. The books in this series reconnect us to the planet we inhabit - and must protect. Discover great writing on the most urgent story of our times.Trade ReviewZijian has an extraordinary gift for storytelling and her steely narrator is a true heroine, surviving war and encroaching modernity. Simply magnificent * Times *

Read more less

Book Synopsis**A RICHARD AND JUDY AUTUMN BOOK CLUB PICK AND THE MOST POWERFUL BOOK YOU'LL READ THIS YEAR** 'Poignant and bittersweet, this novel is a joy' Richard & JudyYoung and confident, with a swagger in her step, Sugar arrives in the southern town of Bigelow hoping to start over. Soon Bigelow is alight with gossip and suspicion, and Sugar fears her past is catching up with her. Then she meets Pearl, a woman trying to forget her own traumas. As these next-door neighbours become unlikely friends, they wonder if their lives could finally be changing for the better. But small towns have long memories...Perfect for fans of The Vanishing Half and Where the Crawdads Sing, Sugar is a classic waiting to be rediscovered.Reviewers adore Sugar: 'A page-turning novel guaranteed to be looked back on as a timeless classic' INDEPENDENT 'This book is so engaging and beautiful and intriguing and satisfying that I could not put it down' ELLE 'Riveting... Searing and expertly imagined' TONI MORRISON on Bernice L. McFadden Readers are falling for Sugar 'Such an enjoyable read... beautifully written, raw and impactful' 'Riveting, heart-breaking' 'Very powerful, poignant' 'Beautifully written... brutal and moving... a must read book' 'Well-written with rich characters and many twists and turns' 'So descriptive yet easy to read, and it made me fall in love with all the characters'Trade ReviewSugar follows expertly crafted characters as they wade through grief, sexism, and the bitter judgement of the 1950s Deep South with warmth and heart. Sugar is a page-turning novel guaranteed to be looked back on as a timeless classic * Independent *Riveting...searing -- Toni Morrison (on Bernice McFadden)This book is so engaging and beautiful and intriguing and satisfying that I could not put it down -- Tarana BurkeMcFadden works a kind of miracle - not only do her characters retain their appealing humanity; their story eclipses the bonds of history to offer continuous surprises . . . Beautiful and evocative -- Jesymn WardSugar was a masterful debut, an electrifying and profoundly realized addition to African American women's literary fiction. And importantly, Sugar introduced us to the brilliant author, Bernice L. McFadden, who would bring forth The Book of Harlan, Gathering of Waters, Glorious, and Nowhere is a Place. -- Sapphire

Read more less

Book Synopsis'A magnum opus... Puts the reader at the heart of the horror that came to be called the Atlanta child murders' Toni MorrisonZala Spencer is barely surviving on the margins of Atlanta's booming economy when she awakens one summer's morning in 1980 to find her teenage son, Sonny, has disappeared. As uneasy hours turn into desperate days, Zala realizes that Sonny is among the many cases of missing children beginning to attract national attention. Growing increasingly disillusioned with the authorities, who respond to Sonny's disappearance with cold indifference, Zala and her estranged husband embark on an epic search. Through the eyes of a family seized by anguish and terror, we watch a city roiling with political, racial, and class tensions. Written over a span of twelve years, and edited by Toni Morrison, who called Those Bones Are Not My Child the author's magnum opus, Toni Cade Bambara's last novel leaves us with an enduring and revelatory chronicle of an American nightmare.Trade ReviewA magnum opus... Puts the reader at the heart of the horror that came to be called the Atlanta child murders -- Toni MorrisonA full-bloodied, important book and an eloquent final testament of a writer whose art was always dictated to by her humanity and sense of justice -- Eileen Battersby * Irish Times *These Bones Are Not My Child isn't just a gripping thriller; it's a masterwork of American literature * Harper's Bazaar *Bambara has produced both a human drama and a steely report on contemporary society. . .admirable * The Times *Bambara's achievement - in this masterly work - is to voice this sense of loss, to give full human dimension to events that for too long many of us flashed by like billboards at highway speed * New York Times Book Review *Captures for all time a nightmare of private hate and public racism * Independent on Sunday *A woolly mammoth of a novel, truly worthy of being called an epic, a book with great big feet that sometimes take ponderous steps but that always hit the ground with the sound of thunder * Chicago Tribune *Riveting... A carefully crafted mystery [that is] difficult to put down * Boston Globe *Toni Cade Bambara's writing is so great it lifts you off the ground * New Statesman *Nobody writes with her breathtaking humor, empathy, ferocity, and surrealness... As a writer, her observation and humanity are timeless. As a reader, I release myself into Ms. Toni's sure and steady hands, knowing every part of me will be illuminated by her gaze -- Adjoa Andoh

Read more less

Book Synopsis'A bold and remarkable novel...full of heart and compassion' Dinaw MengestuA bad-tempered grandfather, now living abroad, is back in Stockholm to see his adult children. The son is a failure, the daughter is having a baby with the wrong man, and their mother is a heartless deserter. Only he, the patriarch, is perfect - according to himself, at least. Over ten intense days, the strained relationships of this chaotic but entirely normal family unfold, and painful memories begin to resurface. Something has to give. But the son is duty-bound to his father by a murky, years-old agreement - can it be renegotiated, or will it bind everyone to the past for ever?'The dynamics of each relationship are superbly complex, and Khemiri's wry, comic touch gives a lightness to the inevitability as the children follow in their father's footsteps' Guardian'Excellent...the complex portrait of a family that is both identifiable and distinctive, normal and strange' TLSTrade ReviewA beautiful study of familial need and mess, in which the universal and the particular play footsie with each other. Deft, artful, but above all insightful till it hurts, this is Khemiri’s best yet. -- Nikita LalwaniA bold and remarkable novel - a marvel of form and imagination that is also miraculously full of heart and compassion. -- Dinaw MengestuAbsent fathers, wayward children, generational strife and the sheer fatigue of new parenthood... Khemiri's prose has a zing and bite stylishly served by Alice Menzies's pacy, idiomatic translation...The Family Clause [has] an epic, as well as a comic, buoyancy. -- Boyd Tonkin * Spectator *The dynamics of each relationship are superbly complex, and Khemiri's wry, comic touch gives a lightness to the inevitability as the children follow in their father's footsteps. -- Catherine Menon * Guardian *Excellent... Exquisitely translated by Alice Menzies... What Khemiri achieves is not just an engrossing narrative but the complex portrait of a family that is both identifiable and distinctive, normal and strange. -- Tabish Khair * Times Literary Supplement *

Read more less

Book Synopsis'A fascinating study of a difficult love' John Burnside, GuardianYoung Ismail's world centres around his mother. Naïve and fragile as a paper doll, she is an unlikely presence in her husband's imposing house, with its hidden rooms and infamous dungeon. Yet despite her youthful nature, she is not without her own enigmas. Most of all, she fears that her intellectual, radical son will exchange her for a superior mother when he becomes a famous writer.From the winner of the first ever Man Booker International Prize, this is a disarming story of home and creative ambition, of personal and political freedom. Rooted in the author's own childhood in Albania, it is dedicated to the memory of his mother.'Laconic, sinister and drily funny' SpectatorTrade ReviewAn essential work. The Doll is mesmerising, and like Kadare’s family home conceals both darkness and flashes of light in its interior -- Nilanjana Roy * Financial Times *The poignant observation, bitter irony and misspoken fear running through the narrator’s central relationship with his mother, a woman secretly terrified of being disowned as unworthy the moment her son achieves the fame he so desires, are what dominate this fascinating study of a difficult love. -- John Burnside * Guardian *In a properly ordered world, Ismail Kadare would by now have got the Nobel prize for literature. By any reckoning, he is one of the most important living European writers, a man whose work is as compelling as any novelist to have emerged from the vanished world that was the Communist bloc -- Melanie McDonagh * Evening Standard *Laconic, sinister and drily funny... Miss this fatalistic, deadpan wit, well served in John Hodgson’s nicely crafted translation, and you miss something essential in Kadare. -- Boyd Tonkin * Spectator *Albania's greatest living novelist has invariably explored his country’s repressive political legacy in his strange and brilliant novels... [The Doll] can only enrich our understanding and appreciation of Kadare’s writing. * Daily Mail *

Read more less

Book Synopsis'I was gripped by it' IAN McEWANThree lives collide, not one of them will emerge unchanged - the exhilarating new novel from the author of the Patrick Melrose series.When Olivia meets a new lover, Francis, just as she is welcoming her dearest friend Lucy back from New York, her life expands dramatically. Her connection to Francis, a committed naturalist living off-grid, is immediate and startling. Eager to involve Lucy in her joy, Olivia introduces the two - but Lucy has news of her own that binds the trio unusually close. Over the months that follow, Lucy's boss Hunter, Olivia's psychoanalyst parents, and a young man named Sebastian are pulled into the friends' orbit, and not one of them will emerge unchanged.'Moving and so funny' Observer, Books of the Year 'Heroic and astonishing' Sunday Times'Clever and compassionate... A novel with heart' Spectator 'Entertaining... Immensely pleasurable' Daily MailTrade ReviewIf, as Henry James said, the first duty of the novelist is to be interesting, he would be happy in St Aubyn's company. Double Blind is emotionally cogent and intellectually fascinating. There are reflections and conversations here which adroitly evoke those important intersections where science and our urgent contemporary concerns meet. I was gripped by it. -- Ian McEwanDouble Blind is a book of big ideas, in which the characters experiment with medicine, psychology, narcotics, religion and meditation to understand themselves and find peace. But as cerebral as the book is, it is also deeply felt, because St Aubyn has been thinking about these issues for decades -- Hadley Freeman * Guardian *This is a novel with heart... Double Blind is both clever and compassionate, confirming St Aubyn as among the brightest lights of contemporary British literature -- Alex Preston * Spectator *Shakespearean in scope and tone, moving from the intimate to the universal within paragraphs and providing tragedy, comedy and human frailty... A less practised author would run the risk of over-saturating all the disparate strands, but St Aubyn offers comment on the natural world, genetics, family dynamics, philosophy, psychiatry and ecology without forgetting the tapestry-like threads of the story itself-and provides a satisfying resolution to boot... Brimful of energy, this novel asks big questions-"How could one ever truly enter into another subjectivity?"-without giving us all the answers... Pacey, caustic and self-aware, it is this neatly choreographed dance of themes and ideas that makes for such absorbing and immediate reading. -- Zoe Apostolides * Prospect *Likeable and rounded characters and a celebration of the best things in life: the wilderness of Knepp and a touching but complex love story... St Aubyn's reinvention as a writer is heroic and astonishing. He has emerged from the "very difficult truth" of this childhood to write brilliantly about that and, now, about a lot more. -- Bryan Appleyard * Sunday Times *

Read more less

Book SynopsisVINTAGE CLASSICS' AMERICAN GOTHIC SERIESSpine-tingling, mind-altering and deliciously atmospheric, journey into the dark side of America with nine of its most uncanny classics.Every weekend, in basements and parking lots across the country, young men with good white-collar jobs and absent fathers take off their shoes and shirts and fight each other barehanded for as long as they have to. Then they go back to those jobs with blackened eyes and loosened teeth and the sense that they can handle anything. Fight Club is the invention of Tyler Durden, projectionist, waiter and dark, anarchic genius. And it's only the beginning of his plans for revenge on a world where cancer support groups have the corner on human warmth.'Hypnotic, pitiless and told brilliantly' Bret Easton Ellis'Like a noxious Doug Coupland, Palahiuk charts new-felt and totally contemporary categories of despair' Ali Smith, Guardian

Read more less

Book SynopsisVINTAGE CLASSICS' AMERICAN GOTHIC SERIESSpine-tingling, mind-altering and deliciously atmospheric, journey into the dark side of America with nine of its most uncanny classics.A landmark in American fiction, Light in August explores Faulkner's central theme: the nature of evil. Joe Christmas - a man doomed, deracinated and alone - wanders the Deep South in search of an identity, and a place in society. After killing his perverted God-fearing lover, it becomes inevitable that he is pursued by a lynch-hungry mob. Yet after the sacrifice, there is new life, a determined ray of light in Faulkner's complex and tragic world.

Read more less

Book Synopsis* One of the Independent''s Best Books of 2022 *''A book so full of steel and compassion that it stands glitteringly apart'' Rachel Cusk''A piercingly evocative East-West love story'' The Times''Atmospheric and gloriously vivid'' Guardian____________________Two worlds on the brink of change in a love story doomed to disasterMilena is a Red Princess living in a Soviet Satellite state in the 1980s. She enjoys limitless luxury and limited freedom; the end of the Cold War seems unimaginable.When she meets Jason, a confident British poet, Milena is appalled by his political naivety and his poor choice of footwear. Still, they fall into bed together, and before long Milena is secretly planning to escape to Britain.1980s London defies her privileged expectations. The rented flat is grim and the food is disgusting but she is with the man she loves and there are no hidde

Read more less

Book SynopsisWe all live our lives carrying secrets we cannot disclose. 'Beguiling... Murakami is brilliant at folding the humdrum alongside the supernatural; finding the magic that's nested in life's quotidian details' GuardianWhen a thirty-something portrait painter is abandoned by his wife, he holes up in the mountain home of a famous artist. The days drift by, spent painting, listening to music and drinking whiskey in the evenings. But then he discovers a strange painting in the attic and unintentionally begins a strange journey of self-discovery that involves a mysterious ringing bell, a precocious thirteen-year-old girl, a Nazi assassination attempt and a haunted underworld.A stunning work of imagination, Killing Commendatore is a surreal tale of love and loneliness, war and art.Trade ReviewIt’s safe to say that there’s no one like Murakami * Literary Review *Murakami’s reality has many sides; some plain, some fancy. Translators Philip Gabriel and Ted Goossen capture every colour on this mind-altering palette. No other author mixes domestic, fantastic and esoteric elements into such weirdly bewitching shades. Murakami’s “Land of Metaphor” remains a country where wonders never cease -- Boyd Tonkin * Financial Times *Wild, thrilling. . . Murakami is a master storyteller and he knows how to keep us hooked * Sunday Times *Exhilarating. . . . Only in the calm madness of his magical realism can Murakami truly capture one of his obsessions, the usually ineffable yearning that drives a person to make art * Washington Post *Expansive and intricate . . . touches on many of the themes familiar in Mr. Murakami’s novels: the mystery of romantic love, the weight of history, the transcendence of art, the search for elusive things just outside our grasp * New York Times *

Read more less

Book Synopsis**New York Times bestseller** 'One of the most vivid and convincing portraits of contemporary America I've read' Observer When powerful real-estate tycoon Nero Golden immigrates to the States under mysterious circumstances, he and his three adult children assume new identities, taking 'Roman' names, and move into a grand mansion in downtown Manhattan. Arriving shortly after the inauguration of Barack Obama, he and his sons, each extraordinary in his own right, quickly establish themselves at the apex of New York society. The story of the Golden family is told from the point of view of their Manhattanite neighbour and confidant, René, an aspiring filmmaker who finds in the Goldens the perfect subject. René chronicles the undoing of the house of Golden: the high life of money, of art and fashion, a sibling quarrel, an unexpected metamorphosis, the arrival of a beautiful woman, betrayal and murder, and far away, in their abandoned homeland, some decent intelligence work. In a new world order of alternative truths, Salman Rushdie has written the ultimate novel about identity, truth, terror and lies. A brilliant, heart-breaking realist novel that is not only uncannily prescient but shows one of the world's greatest storytellers working at the height of his powers.Trade ReviewIt’s one of the most vivid and convincing portraits of contemporary America I’ve read. -- Alex Preston * Observer, Book of the Year *[A] complex and witty fable … Rushdie has always been an impish myth-manipulator, refusing to accept, as in this novel, that the lives of the emperors can’t be blended with film noir, popular culture and crime caper. On the evidence of The Golden House, he is quite right. -- Alex Clark * Observer *Unruly but exuberant… Much of the success of The Golden House, in fact, lies in its humour and in the vigour of its storytelling… There is a glowing energy to the prose that makes this Rushdie’s most enjoyable, mischievous and American of novels. -- Arifa Akbar * Financial Times *Intelligent and darkly funny...with a raw political edge. -- Robert Douglas-Fairhurst * The Times *Rushdie writes with a Dickensian exuberance, always full of humour as well as striking scornful, tragic notes. Often he plays the role of satirist. His caricatures and outsize figures are full of life, wickedness and human energy: again, as in Dickens, grounded in a precise social and political scene. -- Jereme Boyd Maunsell * Evening Standard *

Read more less

Book Synopsis**AS HEARD ON BBC RADIO 4 BOOK CLUB** 'Diana is so amazing when it comes to writing about humans and relationships... I don't know anyone who's as skilled as her' Candice Carty-Williams, Oprah Magazine Two couples find themselves at a moment of reckoning. Melissa has a new baby and doesn't want to let it change her. Damian has lost his father and intends not to let it get to him. Michael is still in love with Melissa but can't quite get close enough to her to stay faithful. Stephanie just wants to live a normal, happy life on the commuter belt with Damian and their three children, but his bereavement is getting in the way. Set in London to an exhilarating soundtrack, Ordinary People is an intimate study of identity and parenthood, sex and grief, friendship and ageing, and the fragile architecture of love. 'I am shouting from the rooftops to anyone who will listen about this book. It's so so good - realistic and funny and so truthful it almost winded me' Dolly Alderton 'I just finished Ordinary People by Diana Evans and it is utterly exquisite. What a writer she is - the depth of her insight, the grace of her sentences' Elizabeth Day, TwitterTrade ReviewDiana Evans is a lyrical and glorious writer; a precise poet of the human heart -- Naomi Alderman, author of The PowerThoughtful and intelligently observed... Evans's delicate prose weaves issues of racial identity and politics into the narrative so that they never feel heavy-handed...a deftly observed, elegiac portrayal of modern marriage, and the private – often painful – quest for identity and fulfilment in all its various guises * Observer *Ordinary People...is very insightful… a detailed, well observed description of modern marriage -- David Nicholls * Good Housekeeping *It could easily be reimagined for the screen, though the film would not capture the sheer energy and effervescence of Evans’s funny, sad, magnificent prose * Guardian *Diana Evans’s fiction is emotionally intelligent, dark, funny, moving. The sheer energy in her novels is enthralling. A brilliant craftswoman, a master of the form, she makes the reader ask important questions of themselves and makes them laugh at the same time -- Jackie KayAchieves a moody, velvety atmosphere, as though events were unfolding under amber-tinted bulbs...offers a precise sketch of the British black middle class, with a daring fifth-act twist -- Katy Waldman * New Yorker *Evans gives us romance going cold with just as pitiless a precision as Flaubert in Madame Bovary... Evans's prose is magnificent: it's as if she measured each sentence, trimmed the excess weight, then fitted it into place * Daily Telegraph *One of the very many things that makes this book exceptional is the even-handed sympathy and unflinching fidelity with which Evans charts the changing weather both of her protagonists’ emotions and family life. She excels at dialogue and she’s also a soulful lyrical chronicler of London in all its moods and guises * Daily Mail *I’m currently very much enjoying Diana Evans’s novel Ordinary People, which takes a forensic look at the pleasures and perils of marriage and parenting and modern London living -- Sarah Waters * Guardian, Best Summer Books *Ordinary People offers a unique insight into the complexities and the challenges of modern life, identity and that lovely little thing we call love. From the moment I started to read it I was absolutely gripped - that’s how good it is. It is a beautifully crafted, honest exploration of how relationships are forged and deconstructed, and how the everyday and the remarkable can exist side by side. * Benjamin Zephaniah, South Bank Sky Arts Awards 2019 *

Read more less

Book SynopsisFifteen year old Christopher is about to embark on an investigation...Lots of things are mysteries. But that doesn't mean there isn't an answer to them.It was 7 minutes after midnight. The dog was lying on the grass in the middle of the lawn in front of Mrs Shears' house. Its eyes were closed. It looked as if it was running on its side, the way dogs run when they think they are chasing a cat in a dream. But the dog was not running or asleep. The dog was dead.This is Christopher's murder mystery story. There are also no lies in this story because Christopher can't tell lies. Christopher does not like strangers or the colours yellow or brown or being touched. On the other hand, he knows all the countries in the world and their capital cities and every prime number up to 7507. When Christopher decides to find out who killed the neighbour's dog, his mystery story becomes more complicated than he could have ever predicted.'Outstanding... a stunningly good read' Observer'A superb achievement. He is a wise and bleakly funny writer with rare gifts of empathy' Ian McEwan**ONE OF THE GUARDIAN'S 100 BEST BOOKS OF THE 21st CENTURY**Trade ReviewWondrous...brilliantly inventive...dazzling. Not simply the most original novel I've read in years - it's also one of the best * The Times *Exceptional by any standards. Both funny and deeply moving * Sunday Telegraph *Outstanding. Heartening as well as richly entertaining. A stunningly good read * Independent *Superbly realised. A funny as well as a sad book. Brilliant * Guardian *A remarkable book. An impressive achievement and a rewarding read * Time Out *

Read more less

Book SynopsisUpstate is a funny, moving family drama from one of the world’s most influential literary critics.‘Thoughtful and though-provoking’ Financial TimesAlan Querry, a successful property developer from the north of England, has two daughters: Vanessa, a philosopher who lives and teaches in Saratoga Springs, NY, and Helen, a record company executive based in London. The sisters never quite recovered from their parents’ bitter divorce and the early death of their mother, with Vanessa particularly affected, and plagued by bouts of depression since her teenage years. When she suffers a new crisis, Alan and Helen travel to Saratoga Springs. Over the course of six wintry days in upstate New York, the Querry family begins to struggle with the questions that animate this profound and searching novel: Why do some people find living so much harder than others?Rich in subtle human insight, and vivid with a sense of place, Upstate is a perceptive, intensely poignant novel.Trade ReviewWood can produce sentences as fine as bone china. -- Claire Allfree * Daily Mail *Those who know Wood as the New Yorker's literary critic would do well to pick up his novels, too. Upstate is a funny, moving family drama. * GQ *Captures the anxious plight of a loving father with exquisite delicacy … Its affections are large and its wisdom deep … One can’t help but feel enriched by the treasure of Wood’s sweet-tempered wit. -- Ron Charles * Washington Post *Its energy derives from feted critic James Wood's observational chops, and you can expect muscular descriptions ... and modest, deeply humane revelations ... Polished, poignant and often very funny. -- Hephzibah Anderson * Mail on Sunday *Uncharted physical and emotional terrain collide in James Wood’s thoughtful and thought-provoking second novel Upstate, a deceptively gentle exploration of the wounds of the past, the complex mesh of family relationships and the ways in which they aid or obstruct our strategies for healing … stubbornly true to life. -- Rebecca Abrams * Financial Times *

Read more less