Contemporary Fiction Books

Book SynopsisMaurice Leblanc's Arsène Lupin introduces readers to the charismatic and cunning gentleman thief, Arsène Lupin. The collection of testimonies follows Lupin's adventures as a grasp of conceal, a notable thief, and an impressive force against the authorities. Leblanc's work offers an aggregate of mystery, suspense, and wry humor, portraying Lupin as a chivalrous and audacious parent who operates at the fringes of the law. Lupin's escapades take readers on an interesting journey as he outwits the police, aristocrats, and different adversaries using his wit, mind, and outstanding ability at deception. Despite his criminal nature, Lupin is portrayed as a captivating and complex determine, regularly involved in heists and capers that challenge each the authorities and the reader's perceptions of justice. Leblanc's writing style immerses readers inside the elaborate world of Lupin's escapades, showcasing the cleverness and resourcefulness of a character who operates on his phrases. Each tale encapsulates Lupin's complicated and multifaceted individual, making the series an interesting exploration of the blurred strains between criminal activity and heroism. Maurice Leblanc's creation remains a long lasting and beloved figure in detective literature, captivating audiences with Lupin's speeding exploits and captivating character.

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Book SynopsisIn May and September 1976, two earthquakes ripped through north-eastern Italy, causing severe damage to the landscape and its population. About a thousand people died under the rubble, tens of thousands were left without shelter, and many ended up leaving their homes in Friuli forever. The displacement of material as a result of the earthquakes was enormous. New terrain was formed that reflects the force of the catastrophe and captures the fundamentals of natural history. But it is far more difficult to find expression for the human trauma, the experience of an abruptly shattered existence. In Rombo, Esther Kinsky’s sublime new novel, seven inhabitants of a remote mountain village talk about their lives, which have been deeply impacted by the earthquake that has left marks they are slowly learning to name. From the shared experience of fear and loss, the threads of individual memory soon unravel and become haunting and moving narratives of a deep trauma.Trade Review‘In Kinsky’s novel, the land speaks...Kinsky expertly animates the natural world around her while removing her human hand. Kinsky lets nature uphold its own intractable logic… If trauma is the inability to redescribe, Rombo offers a powerful antidote in language and the infinite possibilities of description; like the trembling Friulian landscape, forever writing itself anew.’ —Matthew Janney, Financial Times‘Esther Kinsky has more eyes than most; in her novel Rombo she evokes the entire life of an Italian village before, during, and after the two devastating earthquakes of 1976, but each plant and animal central to the village is also a character, and the most important character of all is the landscape itself. The book becomes as much about the futures as the past, for our natural disasters are increasingly man-made, and we need more than ever this reminder of universal impermanence and the marks of memory we leave in its wake.’ — Mary Ruefle, author of Madness, Rack, and Honey‘A tragic travelogue to the underworld-turned-world that recasts a newly lost Italian past with a climate-wise chorus straight out of the most harrowing Greek drama.’ — Joshua Cohen, author of The Netanyahus‘In Esther Kinsky’s new novel, language becomes the highest form of compassion and solidarity – not only with us human beings, but with the whole world, organic, non-organic, speaking out with many mouths and living voices. A miracle of a book; should be shining when it gets dark.’ — Maria Stepanova, author of In Memory of Memory‘Esther Kinsky has created a literary oeuvre of impressive stylistic brilliance, thematic diversity and stubborn originality. ... It is always clear that for her the only landscape worth describing is the one in which she is currently situated. Far from “eco-dreaming”, without sorrow or critique, Kinsky’s novels and poems position humanity in relation to the ruins it has produced and what still remains of nature.’ — 2022 Kleist Prize jury‘[Kinsky] has a poet’s ear for rhythm and precision, elegantly rendered in Caroline Schmidt’s translation. The author has a great gift for describing landscape; she lingers meticulously over rocks and ridges and the ancient formation of mountains.’ — Charlie Lee, Times Literary Supplement‘While the narrator offers insights about collective trauma and the transformative impact of nature’s whims on one’s sense of home, the book is filled with the voices of the landscape’s inhabitants.’ — New Yorker‘In Esther Kinsky, German literature has an author whose books are full of poetic intelligence. ... A brilliant new novel.’ — Neue Zürcher Zeitung‘Rombo is staggering. There is something epic about it… It’s about how we make places habitable — homes, memories, the past — and carry on.’ — Magnus Rena, Review 31‘Moving testimonies from fictionalised inhabitants of Friuli are interspersed with detailed observations about the landscape, geology, history and folklore of the area, all set down in precise, mellifluous prose.’ — Michael Delgado, i News‘Gracefully translated by Caroline Schmidt, Rombo is ambitious in its aim of presenting the total ecosystem of an area: geology, gossip, flora and folktales rub up against each other in an accumulating series of vignettes. Each voice remains distinct, however, in Kinsky’s delicately insistent prose, which draws its reader into the confidence of the village community…The notion of tales ‘written into the landscape’ underpins a central preoccupation of Kinsky’s intimate and poised novel: what happens when a landscape loses its legibility?’ — Damian Walsh, Literary Review‘The quality of Esther Kinsky’s writing is so good that you cannot fail to be spellbound by it.’ — The Modern Novel

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Book Synopsis**Longlisted for The International Booker Prize 2023**'To mother is to murder, or close enough', thinks Johanna, as she looks at the spelling of the two words in Norwegian. She's recently widowed and back in Oslo after a long absence as she prepares for a retrospective of her art. The subject of her work is motherhood and some of her more controversial paintings have brought about a dramatic rift between parent and child. This new proximity, after decades of acrimonious absence, set both women on edge, and before too long Johanna finds her mother stalking her thoughts, and Johanna starts stalking her mother's house.Trade ReviewHjorth delivers a gripping tale of obsession about an artist and her frayed relationship with her family. [She] keenly walks the line between Johanna's concern and mania; as Johanna's hang-ups occasionally spin out of control, they remain true to the character. This accomplished novel is hard to shake. * Publishers Weekly, starred review *In Is Mother Dead, Hjorth returns to themes of family and estrangement. Johanna, a middle-aged artist, returns to Oslo for a retrospective of her work. She attempts to reconnect with her mother, but she doesn't pick up the phone. Johanna continues to call and text her, fixating on reaching her despite surfacing memories of an unhappy childhood. She continues to stalk her mother - hiding out in her mother's building, following her, and going through her trash - resulting in a memorable story of surveillance and psychological torment. -- Emily Firetog * Lit Hub, Most Anticipated Books of 2022 *A darkly insightful examination of mother-daughter relationships that captivates with the suspense of a thriller. The novel's strength lies in its deft use of psychological analysis as it looks at this relationship through one lens after another. * Kirkus Reviews *Is Mother Dead is a Norwegian domestic thriller about the lengths to which people will go to dig up truths that others want to stay buried. * Foreword Reviews, Starred Review *Hjorth has written a fascinating tale about the Norwegian postal system and composed a best-selling work of autofiction...In her latest work to appear in English, an ex-pat artist returns to Norway to oversee a retrospective of her work and attempts to contact, and then stalks, her estranged mother * The Millions, Most Anticipated Books of 2022 *Vigdis Hjorth is a major hero of mine. When my friend Sheila Heti told me to read A House in Norway, my life was changed. I've since recommended her work to so many people, who love it just as passionately. Hjorth has tapped into the novel in a way I have not seen or experienced since Woolf, Kafka, and Bernhard. -- Makenna Goodman, author of The ShameA master of familial estrangement and obsession, Hjorth tells the story of Johanna, an artist living abroad who returns to Oslo for a retrospective of her work. After initial attempts to get in touch with her estranged mother fail, she begins stalking her, hiding out in her building and rummaging through her trash. Hjorth's piercing writing captures the torment and mania that roils under the surface of most all of us. -- Lynn Steger Strong * Los Angeles Times *Beautiful in its ability to match effect with intention and in its descriptive powers. -- Declan O'Driscoll * Irish Times *Is Mother Dead overflows with contrasts in both its structure and its language. Some sections are stark and only a line or two long; other sentences are long and winding, helping to demonstrate the narrator's conflicted perspectives on art, family, and her own fraught relationship with her relatives. [An] immersive trip into the protagonist's mind - and the difficult decisions she has to reckon with. * Words Without Borders *Hjorth captures the minds inner dialogue...with almost nauseating precision. -- Emily Bootle * New Statesman *The realities of growing up with a mother who consumed you, who poured her insecurities into her young daughter, is an experience I have never before seen so ruthlessly examined. -- Billie Walker * Polyester Zine *Writing with a rush of anxious interiority beautifully reproduced by Barslund's translation, Hjorth spins out Joanna's hopes, fears, and half-suppressed memories in obsessive and propulsive run-on sentences, full of self-reflexive questions and crushing doubt...Is Mother Dead both pulls readers into Joanna's adventure and calls on them to become more alive to their own task, their arms stretching upward for the next rung. * Asymptote Journal *[A] harrowing and propulsive novel about the strained tether between daughters and mothers...lucidly translated by Charlotte Barslund. Hjorth deftly conveys the psychological warfare of familial conflict in circuitous, searching sentences. Fragments replicate the stab of betrayal, run-ons rummage for truth amid lies. -- Naomi Huffman * The New York Times Book Review *A thorough and anxious exploration of motherhood and childhood. -- Patrick Graney * Literary Review *Hjorth has masterfully written a family drama where no reunion takes place and a thriller where no blood is shed. -- Grace Kennedy * Ploughshares *[Is Mother Dead] feels liberating. In the struggle to break free...from our abusers and our own pain, there can be, in a hand as deft as Hjorth's, an energy both creative and destructive. -- Jessa Crispin * The Telegraph *A troubling and stunningly accomplished excavation into the past. -- Catherine Taylor * Financial Times *Hjorth traverses Johanna's emotional exile, the ruthless censorship within her family's stories, and the language of art, in which the narrator takes solace. * Astra Magazine *Bizarre yet totally mesmerising. -- Ellen Peirson-Hagger * i Newspaper *Both mother and daughter are paralysed - despite their attempts to slip the bonds of their relationship, neither can escape...This kind of 'merciless intimacy' is Hjorth's natural terrain. -- Eloise Hendy * Frieze *Is Mother Dead confirms Hjorth's place as an unparalleled chronicler of the fault lines in intimate relationships. -- Leslie Camhi * 4 Columns *Covering raw and prescient themes, Is Mother Dead is a rich but unsettling read. -- Kathryn Cutler-MacKenzie * Lucy Writers Platform *Brilliantly claustrophobic, this novel is a testament to the fact that, when the present becomes the past, we are only left with our own version of what happened. -- Holly Connolly * AnOther *The Norwegian novelist Hjorth is something of a specialist in mordant, exacting depictions of familial estrangement; her latest novel, translated by Charlotte Barslund, recounts the increasingly obsessive efforts by a middle-aged painter to reunite with her mother, whom she has not spoken to for decades. * The New York Times *Boldly refusing to settle for a narrative of forgiveness, Is Mother Dead is an increasingly shocking, unsettling novel. -- Lucy Scholes * Prospect *Rich and insular. -- Samir Chadha * White Review, Best Books 2022 *An absorbing study of inner turmoil ... gripping. -- Susie Mesure * Guardian *Hjorth is an intoxicating writer who manages to somehow infuse her fictional wanderings with a strong underpinning of personal truths. We feel her presence always lurking beneath Johanna. And we understand how much still remains unsaid. -- Elaine Margolin * World Literature Today *A profound, uncomfortable and ultimately beautiful exploration of the first human relationship. -- Emily Barton * Times Literary Supplement *

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Book Synopsis***Buy the latest instalment of the adventures of Lady Detective Violet Hamilton, How to Solve Murders Like a Lady, NOW!******Violet Hamilton is a woman who knows her own mind. Which, in Victorian Hastings, can make things a little complicated...At 28, Violet''s father is beginning to worry she will never find a husband. But every suitor he presents, Violet finds a new and inventive means of rebuffing.Because Violet does not want to marry. She wants to work, and make her own way in the world. But more than anything, she wants to find her mother Lily, who disappeared from Hastings Pier 10 years earlier.Finding the missing is no job for a lady, but when Violet hires a seaside detective to help, she sets off a chain of events that will put more than just her reputation at risk.Can Violet solve the mystery of Lily Hamilton''s vanishing before it''s too late?A delightfully joyful, funny and gripping hi

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Book SynopsisI'm going to tell you everything. I'm gonna tell you the whole story.Sometimes all it takes is a single message. Maybe it's bad, like a rival top boy's been switched off. Or maybe it's good, like an opportunity you never thought you'd get. But opportunities mean risks, and debts, and you never want to owe anyone anything.Jaq's worked hard on the road since she was fourteen, bringing in money to keep her broken family afloat. Now she's built a good life near the top of the Summerhouse crew, with a beautiful home she shares with her girlfriend Becks and her heavily pregnant older sister Lauryn.But messages are coming in - good and bad - and Jaq has to make a choice: step back from the road and start a life she's never even considered. Or seize her opportunities and risk everything for life-changing money. Either way, Jaq will make enemies. And those enemies aren't going to let her go easily . . .Trade Review[Ronan Bennett] is back with a bang * * Belfast Telegraph * *Praise for Ronan Bennett: Bennett's writing is as lush and sensual as ripe mangoes. His characters are complex and sympathetic. The tone, which is perfectly pitched, and the exotic setting collude to evoke an era of colonial decadence * * Financial Times * *A writer to watch, a genuine and gifted novelist * * Independent * *A clever and exciting thriller . . . a crime novel that's both literary and gripping, a rare treat * * Daily Mail * *

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Book SynopsisWINNER OF THE IRISH BOOK AWARDS NOVEL OF THE YEAR 2014She stood on the edge of the grass. She hovered between worlds, deciphering the ground, tracing in mid-air the hall, the dining-room, the stairs. She was despairingly close to home now, to the rooms and the voices that contained the first names for home. Memories abounded and her heart pounded and history broke in . . .Growing up in the west of Ireland in the 1940s Tess is a shy introverted child. But beneath her quiet exterior lies a heart of fire. A fire that will later drive her to make her home among the hurly burly of 1960s New York. Over four decades and a life lived with quiet intensity on Academy Street in upper Manhattan, Tess encounters ferocious love and calamitous loss. But what endures is her bravery and fortitude, and her striking insights even as she is ''floating close to hazard.''Joyous and heart-breaking, restrained but sweeping, this is a profoundly moving story tha

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Book Synopsis'The best short story writer in the world' Susan Hill 'This book is a spectacular literary revelation' Sunday Times The collected stories of an award-winning, modern classic American writer who has been compared to Alice Munro, John Updike - and even Anton Chekhov Tenderly, incisively, Edith Pearlman captured life on the page like no one else. Spanning forty years of writing, moving from tsarist Russia to the coast of Maine, from Jerusalem to Massachusetts, these astonishing stories reveal one of America's greatest modern writers. Across a stunning array of scenes-an unforeseen love affair between adolescent cousins, an elderly couple's decision to shoplift, an old woman's deathbed confession of her mother's affair-Edith Pearlman crafts a timeless and unique sensibility, shot through with wit, lucidity and compassion. Part of the Pushkin Press Classics series: timeless storytelling by icons of literature, hand-picked from around the globe Edith Pearlman (1936-2023) published her debut collection of stories in 1996, aged 60. She won The National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction for Binocular Vision. She published over 250 works of short fiction in magazines, literary journals, anthologies and online publications. Her work won three O. Henry Prizes, the Drue Heinz Prize for Literature, and a Mary McCarthy Prize, among others. In 2011, Pearlman was the recipient of the PEN/Malamud Award, which put her in the ranks of luminaries like John Updike and Joyce Carol Oates.Trade Review'[Pearlman's stories are] meticulously made, miraculously precise, and so fully populated that you marvel one mind could invent so many distinct human beings from scratch.' - Sam Leith'One of the great discoveries of the decade was the Jewish American Pearlman, who had been writing for four decades before this collection gave her the acclaim she thoroughly deserved' - Sunday Times, Books of the Decade'This book is a spectacular literary revelation... With Binocular Vision a new fictional planet, richly populated and suffused with warm lucidity, comes into view.'' - Peter Kemp'An unsung master' - Megan Walsh'Her writing is intelligent, perceptive, funny, and quite beautiful... Maybe from now on everyone will know of Edith Pearlman.' - Roxana Robinson

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Book Synopsis'A master storyteller' - Elizabeth Strout The power of money threatens young love in this charming story of romantic misadventure by one of the greatest authors of America's Gilded AgeNick Lansing and Susy Branch are young and attractive, but penniless. Gracefully moving through New York high society, they have the right connections but none of the wealth. When they inconveniently fall in love, Susy devises a plan. They will marry and spend a year flitting across Europe, staying in the homes of their rich friends and living off honeymoon gifts until either one of them meets a better, richer prospect.But jealous passions and troubled consciences soon cause their idyll to crumble. Told with Edith Wharton's trademark wit, Glimpses of the Moon is a tartly amusing story of social climbing and romantic misadventure from one of our greatest writers.Part of the Pushkin Press Classics series: timeless storytelling by icons of literature, ha

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Book SynopsisTwo brilliant, multi-layered stories from the winner of the Kenzaburo Oe Prize: the best contemporary Japanese writing

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Book SynopsisRachel North was born in Scarborough and studied English Literature at Oxford University. She has worked as a cleaner, a receptionist, a kitchen designer, a market researcher, a company director, a celebrity shopper and a victim support volunteer. She has an MA in Creative Writing. Under the name Caroline Bond, she is the author of six novels, including two Radio 2 Book Club picks, The Second Child, and, her most recently published book, The Day We Left. She lives in Leeds with her husband and one of her three children... the other two having grown up and escaped.

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Book SynopsisChristine Dwyer Hickey was born in Dublin and is a novelist and short story writer. Her recent novel The Narrow Land won two major prizes: the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction and the inaugural Dalkey Literary Award. 2020 also saw her 2004 novel Tatty chosen for UNESCO's Dublin One City One Book promotion. Her work has been widely translated into European and Arabic languages. She is an elected member of Aosdana, the Irish academy of arts.

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Book SynopsisDan Spencer is a prize-winning author whose prose poems and flash fictions regularly appear in journals including Popshot, Litro, Gutter and New Writing Scotland, among other places. He grew up in a commuter town outside London and earned a bachelor's in English Literature with Creative Writing from UEA and a master's in Creative Writing at the University of Glasgow. He's also a teacher of international students and has worked in Osaka and Riyadh. Right this moment, you'll find him by the sea near Newcastle, with a wife, two lovely daughters and two lovely cats.

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Book Synopsis'Powerful' Sunday Times 'Electric' Danya Kukafka 'Vital' Katie Gutierrez 'A triumph' Alice Ryan 'A powerful read' Heat 'Read this book!' Angie Cruz 'An instant classic' Morning Star 'Deserves all the hype' Glamour 'Crackles with life' Xochitl Gonzalez 'The book of the year' Rene Denfeld Carmen and Grace have been inseparable since they were little girls – more like sisters than cousins, survivors of a childhood marked by neglect and addiction. For too long, all they had was each other. That is, until Doña Durka swept into their lives and changed everything, taking Grace into her home and playing an outsize role in Carmen’s upbringing too. But Durka is more than a beneficent force in their Bronx neighbourhood. She’s also the leader of an underground drug empire, a larger-than-life matriarch who understands the importance of taking what power she can in a world too often ruled by violent men. So when Durka dies suddenly, Carmen and Grace’s lives are thrown into chaos. Grace has been primed to take over and has grand plans to expand the business, but Carmen is ready to move on – from Durka’s shadow, and from always looking over her shoulder in fear. As tough and tender as its main characters, Carmen and Grace is a devastatingly wise and intimate story about the bonds of female friendship, ambition and found family. Trade ReviewIn a world fraught with violence, Melissa Coss Aquino brilliantly delivers a heartwarming, loving novel with characters you are inspired to ride or die with. From page one, I was deeply invested in Carmen and Grace and their wild predicament of having to negotiate between their tight bonds and their ambitions. It had me up late turning the pages wanting to know if they will make it out without destroying everything. If you love reading novels about creative, ambitious, and relentless women who are committed to community and making a way out of no way, read this book! -- Angie Cruz'Electric, heartrending, and exceptionally tender – this novel examines the limits of familial loyalty, twisted cycles of poverty and violence, and how far we'll go to protect those we love most. Carmen and Grace are unforgettable characters, vital and flawed and relentlessly enthralling. Every sentence of Melissa Coss Aquino's debut feels acute and deliberate, a shard of glass held up to the light.' -- Danya Kukafka'Prepare to not breathe. This is a remarkable, heart-pounding book based on the best kind of tension – the real kind. Carmen and Grace is the story of two young women swept into the underground drug trade, each trying desperately to gain freedom, in their own ways. It is by turns touching, terrifying, and mesmerising. Melissa Coss Aquino is a brilliant writer and this is the book of the year.' -- Rene Denfeld'I was crying like I lost my best friend as I finished. Carmen and Grace crackles with life: its cruelty and kindness in equal measure. This book is an act of love, a story about found family, the magic sacred space that is created in a circle of women and, above all, the power and lessons of intuition. It will break you apart and remind you that we can all be put back together again, stronger, and wiser than before.' -- Xochitl GonzalezCarmen and Grace is everything I could want in a novel: a wise and ferocious exploration of mothers and motherlessness; an urgent, heart-pounding journey to power and safety; and an all-too-human rendering of what we choose when choice is an illusion. In Carmen and Grace, Melissa Coss Aquino offers us two of the most indelible, vital characters in modern literature. If this novel were a lifetime achievement, it would be enough – but it's only the beginning for Aquino, and for that we should all be thankful. -- Katie GutierrezCousins Carmen and Grace share a traumatic childhood that has bonded them together tightly. That is, until they meet a sisterhood of women known as the D.O.D, who are guided by a leader of an underground drug empire, Doña Durka. This plot-driven novel explores the bonds of found family and the ways in which power and ambition can sever relationships -- Lupita Aquino * Today.com *A grittily realistic book... a writer to watch' * Daily Mail *This is superbly written, the characters are complex and a presence on the page, you can feel their frustration, despair, and bond as they persevere against all the odds. A Latinx drama that deserves all the hype and praise. * Glamour *A powerful read **** * Heat Magazine *A powerful portrait of two women trying to make it in the Bronx... Melissa Coss Aquino offers a rich portrait of a dystopian matriarchy where shelter and security come at a high price. -- Erica Wagner * The Sunday Times *This passionate, uninhibited book, written with great craft as well with great feeling, has the air of an instant classic. * Morning Star *The characters are gripping, the story is fast-paced and the NYC Bronx setting is incredibly evocative – all the makings of a perfect summer read. * STYLIST *

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Book Synopsis'A warm, witty novel about love and friendship with a fun time-travel twist' HELLO Magazine Number one bestselling author Louise Pentland is back with her brand new novel that will make you laugh, make you cry and thoroughly charm you!Sometimes you have to go back, to move forwards.Tabby is stuck. She still lives in the small town she grew up in . . . the town she's barely ever left.So, when her dad drops a bombshell over their weekly Sunday dinner, Tabby takes a look at her own life. She lives firmly in her comfort zone and doesn't know how to break out. Sometimes she wishes she could go back and start all over again.When she meets Bea, a free spirit like no one else she's ever known with an 'interesting' sense of style, Tabby quickly befriends her, recognising in Bea the change she's been craving. But soon it becomes clear that more has changed than her new friend. Somehow Tabby has been transported back to the 1980s.With the chance to reinvent herself in another time, will Tabby finally manage to move forward?'Full of hope and courage and sisterhood' Emma B, Magic FM

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Book SynopsisSometimes you need to run, to find out where you really belong . . . Baby Saul has had it with just about everything. She's fed up with her job and her colleagues, her love life is permanently casual, and underpinning everything is the grief of losing her much-loved dad. Oh, and if the aunties don't stop asking her when she's going to settle down and start having babies, she might just lose it. When she finds some love letters between her grandfather and someone who is very clearly not her grandmother, Baby realises that she needs to know more. She heads to India to do some detective work on this mysterious other woman . . . and to find out a bit more about herself along the way. What she doesn't bargain for is Sid, her guide (and unwilling driver) being annoyingly handsome, with a knack for asking Baby the sort of questions that force her to look at what she really wants out of life.

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Book SynopsisFrom a comic mastermind comes this brilliant collection of stories Three teenagers believe they are witches. A woman defaces a local billboard. A bored landlord tries to influence his son''s best friend. A cul-de-sac WhatsApp group discusses eggs at length. A heavily pregnant woman finds a way to time travel and a girl discovers joy on a stolen bicycle . . . Each tale paints a life in miniature and offers an escape chute from the mayhem of modern life.

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Book SynopsisBrought up in a suffocating, emotionless home in the north of England, Clara finds freedom when she wins a scholarship and moves to London. There, she meets Clelia and the rest of the brilliant and charming Denham family; they dazzle Clara with their gift for life, and Clara longs to be part of their bohemian world. But while she will do anything to join their circle, she gives no thought to the chaos that she may cause . . .'Drabble presents characters who are not passively witnessing their lives (and ours); she is not a writer who reflects the helplessness of the stereotyped "sick society", but one who has taken upon herself the task, largely ignored today, of attempting the active, vital, energetic, mysterious re-creation of a set of values by which human beings can live' - Joyce Carol OatesTrade ReviewI have learned so much from Margaret Drabble's work. Her prose is very beautiful, very funny, and at the same time very serious. Novels like The Millstone and Jerusalem the Golden have helped me to understand what great writing can be -- SALLY ROONEYDeserves to be . . . widely read . . . The traditional narrative mechanics of fate and free will, character and chance, are the driving forces of Drabble's fiction * * Guardian * *An unapologetically frank novel about the female experience * * Guardian * *Praise for Margaret Drabble: Margaret Drabble's early novels were intimate and sprightly chronicles of the small dissatisfactions and small triumphs of young women like herself -- HILARY MANTEL * * New York Review of Books * *One of the most versatile and accomplished authors of her generation * * New Yorker * *One of our foremost women writers * * Guardian * *Drabble presents characters who are not passively witnessing their lives (and ours); she is not a writer who reflects the helplessness of the stereotyped "sick society," but one who has taken upon herself the task, largely ignored today, of attempting the active, vital, energetic, mysterious re- creation of a set of values by which human beings can live. -- Joyce Carol Oates * * New York Times * *

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Book SynopsisWhen Nani is only seventeen, she loses her beloved sister and father. Misunderstood by the rest of her family, she is beguiled by an itinerant preacher, a handsome self-proclaimed ''man of God'' who seems to offer all the answers. But instead of building a better future with him, Nani is forced too soon into a challenging womanhood with an oppressive husband.Will she find the courage to take charge of her own life and seek true happiness, and at what cost?

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Book SynopsisA NEW STATESMAN BOOK OF THE YEARA TLS BOOK OF THE YEAR Nealon returns to his family home in Ireland after a long time away, only to be greeted by a completely empty house. With no sign of his wife or child anywhere, it seems the world has forgotten that he even existed. The one exception is a persistent caller on the telephone, someone who seems to know everything about Nealon''s life, his recent bother with the law and, more importantly, what has happened to his family. All Nealon needs to do is talk with him. But the more he talks the closer Nealon becomes tangled in the very crimes of which he claims to be innocent.

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Book SynopsisSHORTLISTED FOR THE BETTY TRASK PRIZEFollowing the death of her best friend, Erin has to get out of London. Returning home to Belfast, an au pair job provides some refuge from her grief and her relentless mother. She spends her spare daytime sitting in quiet churches and her free nights at the bar where her childhood friend Declan works. Erin is grateful for the distraction offered by, first, a good-looking American academic, and then the reappearance in her life of an old flame. They offer delightful diversions. But Erin must eventually confront herself.

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Book SynopsisKaty Cox is a classically trained cellist who has performed with some of the music industry's biggest names including Michael Bublé, Elton John, Bryan Ferry and Take That. After having her first child, her touring life was put on hold and she started blogging as an alternative creative outlet. Her illustrated comedy blog Carry on Katy was shortlisted for the BritMums Brilliance in Blogging award for two consecutive years. Katy is a mother of two incredible autistic sons and lives in Wales with her familykatycoxauthor.com Twitter: @MisforMummy Instagram: @m_is_for_mummy Facebook: www.facebook.com/misformummy

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Book SynopsisLonglisted for the 2022 Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize'Tense, lyrical, intelligent' - The Big Issue'A heart-wrenching human story' - SagaExit West meets An American Marriage in this breathtaking and evocative novel about a young Syrian couple in the throes of new love, on the cusp of their bright future...when a travel ban rips them apart on the eve of their son's birth.Boston, 2017: When Hadi returns to his heavily pregnant partner Sama after a trip to Jordan to bury his father, he is stopped at border control - a hostile new immigration law has just been enacted - while she awaits him on the other side. Worlds apart, suspended between hope and disillusion as hours become days become weeks, Sama and Hadi yearn for a way back to each other, and to the life they'd dreamed up together. But does that life exist any more, or was it only an illusion? Achingly intimate yet poignantly universal, No Land to Light On is the story of a family caught up in forces beyond their control, fighting for the freedom and home they found in one another.Trade ReviewZgheib writes so lyrically about rootlessness, separation and a fierce longing for home that it makes the tragedy of war that much easier to bear. Sama and Hadi will always hold a special place in my heart. -- ALKA JOSHI, author of The Henna Artist and The Secret Keeper of JaipurA masterful story of tragedy and redemption, an entire history told through the prism of a single Syrian couple, beginning and ending with love. -- HALA ALYAN, award-winning author of Salt Houses and The Arsonists' CityThrough a heart-wrenching human story runs a narrative about avian migration, the urge to take flight felt even by a caged bird - but all birds of passage need land to light on. -- Rose Shepherd * Saga Magazine *In elegant prose, Zgheib skillfully mingles her protagonists' memories with a nail-biting account of their 2017 ordeal to craft a narrative rich in metaphors and complex, believable characters. -- Washington Post * Washington Post *[in] glittering language that brings emotional resonance to the effects of monstrous policies [...] The separation comes in like thunder to break a happy story apart. Zgheib's poetic language serves her well in conveying that story. But much of its power lies also in the playful way Sama and Hadi experience new love, the sense of open possibility that immigration can still represent. This happiness is embedded within her story of suffering - and vice versa. -- Lorraine Berry * L.A. Times *Zgheib has created a tense, moving novel about the meaning of home, the risks of exile, the power of nations, and the power of love. * Kirkus *Her devastating second novel, No Land to Light On, is an illuminating, intimate look at the Syrian refugee crisis and the immigrant experience in America during the Trump administration [...] Zgheib offers nuanced insights into the complex psychology of and challenges faced by displaced people, and effectively makes the consequences of anti-immigrant sentiments and policies feel personal to all readers.Written in soul-searing prose, No Land to Light On is an essential, compassionate story that reinstates a sense of humanity for the countless people affected by U.S. travel bans. * BookPage *a graceful tale of imperiled lovers -- Kirkus * Kirkus *If you can handle suspense and heartache then add this one to your list. -- Elizabeth Walsh * Muse *An ongoing travel ban threatens every hope [Hadi and Sumi] ever shared, and through a chronicle of their torn-up plans, Zgheib deftly addresses pertinent issues of identity, homeland, exile and loss. This is a tense, lyrical, intelligent novel. -- Jane Graham * The Big Issue *

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Book SynopsisLONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARDWhen is it wise to be a fool for something? From New York to India to Paris, from the Catholic Worker movement to Occupy Wall Street, the characters in Joan Silber's dazzling connected stories tackle this question head-on.Vera, the shy, anarchist daughter of missionary parents, leaves her family for love and activism in New York. A generation later, her doubting daughter insists on the truth of being of two minds, even in marriage. The adulterous son of a Florida hotel owner steals money from his family and departs for Paris, where he finds himself outsmarted in turn. Fools ponders the circle of winners and losers, dupers and duped, and the price we pay for our beliefs, offering readers an unforgettable look at work, faith, love and the eternal quest for personal integrity.Trade ReviewStructurally, the intricacy is skillful; emotionally, it's astounding...Beautiful, intricate and wise * New York Times Book Review *Excellent . . . the pleasure of Ms. Silber's overlapping tales is that in all of them characters do something to surprise you. * Wall Street Journal *Silber deftly constructs whole, fully realized lives in just a few pages, and her use of first-person narratives gives these stories an intimate, confessional feeling, as if you've struck up a conversation with a particularly talkative stranger. * Boston Globe *Astonishing for its range, for its sweeping sense of time and place, and most especially for its deep insight into the way small choices can circle out to shape lives, and even human history. This is a beautiful book and an important literary achievement. -- Dan ChaonJoan Silber's stories charm us. And amuse us. And engage us. And move us. And even enlighten us. Fools embraces us all. -- Amy BloomJoan Silber's stories are like compressed novels. They are interlocking tales that fill in the history of revolutionary politics in the twentieth century. -- Edmund WhiteFools consists of cunningly, surprisingly interlinked short stories, which in this case wind their way through the last American century - in particular, the last one hundred years of belief, commitment, monogamy, integrity, all the things that complicate our lives and take us out of ourselves..."You don't know what you're going to be faithful to in the world, do you?" asks the narrator of "Two Opinions" plaintively, and Silber's characters illustrate this unpredictability with a whole range of dilemmas, all of them carefully and intricately imagined. Silber, I can tell, is never going to let me down, and I will keep a copy of one of her books, one I haven't yet read, on a special emergency get-out-of-book-jail-free shelf. -- Nick Hornby * The Believer *

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Book SynopsisCharity Norman is an ex-barrister who lives in Aotearoa New Zealand. She is the author of eight novels. After the Fall (2012) was a Richard and Judy Book Club choice and World Book Night title; Remember Me (2022) won the 2023 Ngaio Marsh Award for Best Novel. Previous novels include two BBC Radio 2 Book Club picks - bestseller The Secrets of Strangers (2020) and The New Woman (2015) - and have been shortlisted for both the Ngaio Marsh and Ned Kelly Awards.

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Book Synopsis'Impossible' Max breathes. 'This is impossible.' Anna bends to put her lips to his ear 'No, it's not' she whispers. 'I know where to hide you. I have the perfect place.'For fifty years Anna Schlemmer has refused to talk about her life in Germany during World War II. Her daughter, Trudy, was only three when she and her mother were liberated by an American soldier and went to live with him in Minnesota.Trudy's sole evidence of the past is an old photograph: a family portrait showing Anna, Trudy, and a Nazi officer, the Obersturmführer of Buchenwald. Driven by guilt about her supposed Trudy, now a professor of German history, begins investigating the past and finally unearths the dramatic and heartbreaking truth about her mother's life.Trade ReviewA compelling and often heart-wrenching work. * * The Observer * *Jenna Blum's seductive, subtle style kept me hooked. * * Sunday Telegraph * *Jenna Blum's seductive, subtle style kept me hooked. * * Independent on Sunday * *An emotive and incisive endeavour. * * Guardian * *

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Book SynopsisTaking up where AN INVITATION TO THE WALTZ left off, THE WEATHER IN THE STREETS shows us Olivia Curtis ten years older, a failed marriage behind her, thinner, sadder, and apprently not much wiser. A chance encounter on a train with a man who enchanted her as a teenager leads to a forbidden love affair and a new world of secret meetings, brief phone calls and snatched liaisons in anonymous hotel rooms. Years ahead of its time when first published, this subtle and powerful novel shocked even the most stalwart Lehmann fans with its searing honesty and passionate portrayal of clandestine love.Trade ReviewThe Weather in the Streets astounded women and men with its searing depiction of what it's like to fall in love . . . With brilliant dialogue and intense passages of elation and despair, The Weather in the Streets takes you on the rollercoaster of their relationship * Sunday Telegraph *Lehmann is unbeatable on social nuance, both among the London bohemian set and Rollo's more conventional upper-class milieu. No one could be more attractive or caddish than Lehmann's Rollo, the married man who entrances our heroine. The ultimate tragic love storyA truly great book. It is beautifully written, shrewdly observed and deftly crafted, but the novel's real concern is what it means for a woman to live an authentic lifeShe is immensely readable, acute, passionate, funny and originalThe first writer to filter her stories through a woman's feelings & perceptionsThe best book she has written -- and with as good a chance for popular success as her first book, Dusty Answer * Kirkus Reviews *

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Book SynopsisSet in the period before and through the Bangladeshi war of independence, this novel has at its heart the continuing friendship between three boys with a love of cinema, whose loyalty into adulthood has surprising outcomes.

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Book SynopsisGrowing up in a rural recording studio, Halo Llewellyn is rarely star-struck, but when one of the visiting singers gives birth to Fred, she knows right away that he's special. As the golden child grows into the gilded man, she remains dazzled by his ambition and his talent. Up on stage, being screamed at by hundreds of teenage girls, Fred will always turn his spotlight on Halo in the crowd. But that's the problem with falling in love with your charismatic almost-brother - it can never be a secret. In the end, the whole world has to know.

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Book SynopsisOne morning, in the dead of winter, three German soldiers head out into the frozen Polish countryside. They have been charged by their commanders to track down and bring back for execution 'one of them' - a Jew. Having flushed out a young man hiding in the woods, they decide to rest in an abandoned house before continuing their journey back to the camp. As they prepare food, they are joined by a passing Pole whose virulent anti-Semitism adds tension to an already charged atmosphere. Before long, the group's sympathies begin to splinter as each man is forced to confront his own conscience as the moral implications of their murderous mission become clear.Trade ReviewThe most moving book I have read for a long time... Mingarelli's spare language is well suited to this luminous tale... he accomplishes a great deal -- Peter Carty * Independent on Sunday *The "banality of evil" finds beautiful, spare expression in this remarkable novella -- Ian McEwanA masterpiece * Independent *In its modest duration and economical prose, [this book] communicates more than most novels twice or three times its length... Praise is due to the translator, Sam Taylor, who appears to have weighed every word with supreme care, capturing the rhythm of a measured tread through the icy landscape... Brave and original... a masterpiece -- Alastair Mabbott * Herald *A sparse, beautiful and shocking novel that finds a more intimate route into the Holocaust -- Ian McEwan * the Sunday Times *Mingarelli's lapidary tale of awakened conscience unites historical events with the mood of a forest fairy-tale.... Brief, elegant, quietly lyrical yet driven by an inward fire -- Boyd Tonkin * Independent *Superb... The prose, elegantly translated by Sam Taylor, is full of rich visual descriptions... Enormously powerful and moving -- David Evans * Independent on Sunday ***** *So memorable, so dark, so humane, it deserves to be read all over Europe. A masterpiece of empathy and horror -- Jane Housham * Guardian *One of the most quietly shattering novels I've read -- Cynan Jones, author * The Dig *Deliver[s] a powerful punch -- Lucy Popescu, Books of the Year * Tablet *Beautiful and disturbing... complex and surprising -- Mark Smith * Herald *This strong and simple story packs a mighty punch -- Kate Saunders * The Times *Superb and devastating -- Luke Brown, author * My Biggest Lie *Chilling... From the first lines one is taken somewhere one would never wish to go, thanks to the clear, direct style, and the brilliant dialogue... impossible to put down * Libération *The tragedy of the holocaust has rarely been better told than in this short tale, resonant with sadness and poetry * La Vie *This new novel by Mingarelli doesn't offer any miracles, but his story of wretched humanity revived around a piping hot dish shows once more the greatness of an incredibly unassuming author. Breathtaking * Pelerin *The prose draws you in... Starkly realistic -- Rachel Dunn * Cambridge News *This is Mingarelli at his best. A story delivered with restraint, in hushed, sensitive prose. Perfect * La Montagne *A gem of a novel, slight but so powerful * Bookseller *Mingarelli find[s] new ways - oblique, lyrical, humane - to address the Nazi past -- Boyd Tonkin * Independent *Masterly and necessary... no intervening hand is noticeable in Sam Taylor's rendering of Mingarelli -- Lesley Chamberlain * TLS *Devastating... Crisply translated by Sam Taylor -- Arifa Akbar * Independent *It's a brave novelist who sets out to tell a Holocaust tale from the point of view of the would-be executioner but this is what Mingarelli does with great skill and admirable subtlety. A breathtaking lesson in brevity * Monocle *A fascinating, compelling vignette from Nazi-occupied Poland explored by a masterful storyteller -- Paddy Kehoe * RTE *A narrative of bleak genius -- Eileen Battersby * Irish Times *138 profound pages of horror and humanity -- John Kelly ‘Book of the year’ * Irish Times *I so recommend this brilliant, devastating, compelling WW2 novel -- Simon Sebag MontefioreMingarelli's writing possesses a deceptive simplicity, and the novella proceeds so quietly that one is almost unprepared when the spectre of genocide intrudes upon it * Wall Street Journal *

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Book SynopsisAgainst the odds, former steel worker Harry Perkins has led the Labour party to a stunning victory. Now he's going to dismantle Britain's nuclear warheads, bring finance under public control and dismantle the media empires. But the establishment isn't going down without a fight. As MI5 conspires with the city and press barons to bring Perkins down, he finds himself caught up in a no-holds-barred battle for survival. Described as 'the political novel of the decade' when it was first published, A Very British Coup is as fresh and relevant now as it ever has been.Trade ReviewAs fascinating as it was entertaining when it was first published ... it's disturbing how much still resonates. If Corbyn seeks a cautionary tale, he need look no further. -- Val McDermid * New Statesman *Rattles along with speed and great credibility * The Times *A delicious fantasy... crisply written and the story belts along * Observer *A world of power struggle in Downing Street, Fleet Street, Whitehall and Washington * New Statesman *A spiffing read... calculated to grip blue-rinsed Conservative ladies and make Socialist eyes pop * People *Chris Mullin's book is the first for some time that I have stayed awake to finish -- Ken Livingstone * Labour Herald *A curious Molotov cocktail * Financial Times *Entertaining propaganda * Literary Review *A very effective political thriller, which hasyou on the edge of your seat from start to finish * Oxford Mail *Entertaining to anyone interested in contemporary politics * Glasgow Herald *...a brilliant concept that opened the way for my own novels -- Michael DobbsCompulsive reading * City Limits *

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Book SynopsisSet on a struggling farm in a fiercely beautiful colonial country teetering on the brink of civil war, this second novel by one of international literature's rising young stars weaves a brilliant tale of family drama and political turmoil. Since his mother's death ten years earlier, Tom and his father have fashioned a strained peace on their family farm. Everything is frozen under the old man's vicious, relentless control - even, Tom soon discovers, his own future. When a young woman named Carine enters their lives, the complex triangle of intrigue and affection escalates the tension between the two men to breaking point. After a catastrophic volcanic eruption ignites the nation's smoldering discontent into open revolution, Tom, his father and Carine find themselves questioning their loyalties to one another and their determination to salvage their way of life.Trade ReviewThe death-throes of a colonial world captured in dark, obsessive prose, punctuated by images of strange, surreal beauty. One thinks at times of both Coetzee and Gordimer, but Kitamura is very much her own writer -- Salman RushdieBeautifully observed ... the cumulative effect of this shocking, desperate book is something that approaches magnificent * FT *Kitamura is in complete control, both of the prose and of the story it carries. She is a skilled hunter and we are her helpless prey -- Teju Cole * Open City *A stark, urgent, beautiful novel. The characters and images continue to haunt me, a tribute to their lasting emotional power and their creator's extraordinary gifts -- Siri Hustvedt, author of 'The Summer Without Men'A ruthless, controlled style distinguishes this novel ... [Kitamura's] style reminds one of Marguerite Duras and Herta Müller - power is the subject, and the execution is precise * The Daily Beast *A mesmerizing novel, one whose force builds inexorably as its story unfolds in daring, unexpected strokes. Kitamura's prose brings to mind Cormac McCarthy or Jean Rhys, but the music of these lines is all her own - lyrical, sharp-edged, spare, and unafraid. Be warned: you'll find yourself reading long past midnight, out of breath and wide awake. This is a bold and powerful book. -- Julie Orringer, author of The Invisible BridgeI have been in a daze ever since I finished this book. Gone to the Forest is superb. It is so beautifully written, so balanced - there isn't a spare sentence or word in the whole thing ... Utterly distinctive. Kitamura is one of the best living writers I've read, and she gives the dead ones a run for their money. -- Evie Wyld, author of After the Fire, A Still Small VoiceHemingway's returned to life - and this time, he's a woman -- Tom McCarthy, author of C, Remainder and Men in SpaceA relentless fever dream, each perfectly pared paragraph urging you on to the next -- Ed Park, author of Personal DaysThere is nothing better on earth, fictive or not, than What Goes Wrong on the Plantation, and in Gone to the Forest it goes totally and splendidly wrong. -- Padgett PowellEvokes a Conradian Heart of Darkness portentousness . . . flashes of unexpected beauty . . . Like the intricate ingenuity of the floating farm flush with the golden fish, Gone to the Forest, in just 200 pages, floats, unfolds and astonishes. -- Marie Myung-Ok Lee * San Francisco Chronicle *In a restrained voice Ms. Kitamura offers echoes of J. M. Coetzee's Disgrace, coolly chronicling the family's undoing as it tracks against the political turmoil ripping through the nation. -- Susannah Meadows * New York Times *Gone to the Forest is Katie Kitamura's second novel, about a family and the cost of European colonization in an unknown time and place... that recalls, at first and most often, J.M. Coetzee's South Africa. Kitamura writes with fine tension and clipped grace. Her observations are subtle and sharp. The volcano's importance in the story evokes Aime Cesaire's poem Corps Perdu, which begins, "Moi, qui Krakatoa . . ." and is a soaring command, in the wake of decolonization, for "the islands to be." [She is a] rising literary star. -- Samantha Kuok Leese * Spectator *Striking . . . Beautifully written . . . Kitamura's carefully wrought characters are captivating. * Hyphen Magazine *In this wondrous tale of both a family and a country's dissolution, Kitamura brings readers into an unspecified time in an unnamed colonial country . . . Kitamura, with spare, mesmerizing prose, paints a memorable vision of emotional chaos echoed by geologic and political turmoil. [Starred review] * Publishers Weekly *Kitamura's words are tough, and her characters are tied to the tails of wounded beasts: mother countries, the land itself, and hierarchies both out of steam and out of date . . . Kitamura makes the end of history - many histories - seem both casual and immediate. -- Sasha Frere-Jones * NewYorker.com *A rising literary star ... Gone to the Forest is darkly seductive' -- Aimee Farrell * Vogue *Rendered in a stripped-back eerily simple prose... reads like Hemingway or Cormac McCarthy... It's horrible and beautiful and pretty much a class act all round -- Stuart Hammond * Dazed and Confused *Redolent of J.M. Coetzee and Joseph Conrad, this is not a novel that lets you go easily, even after you reach the end. -- Hephzibah Anderson * Daily Mail *Beautifully written, with the pace of a thriller, this is a dark, twisted gem -- Delphine Chui * Easy Living *Haunting and hypnotic... stunningly wrought... an intelligent, unforgettable novel * Psychologies *There is much to admire in this ambitious piece of fiction -- Sarah Hall * Guardian *A stunningly dark story -- Lena de Casparis * Company *Wonderfully evocative... by the end I was hooked and harrowed in equal measure. Gone to the Forest starts off very quietly but delivers a cracking great wallop at the end. -- Simon Savidge * We Love this Book *Thirty-three-year-old Katie Kitamura writes about raging, ageing men better than most raging, ageing men do themselves... Gone to the Forest is bold for many reasons: not only for the cultural, sexual, historical and national boundaries that Kitamura steps over to get into the minds of her characters. But also for the way she explores the cruelty of colonisation - whether it's of homelands, or of women's bodies - within a hauntingly beautiful, startlingly brief story of an old man dying. -- Chris Cox * Observer *Written in stripped-down prose, the whole has a mythic resonance that leaves a deep impression in the mind... in Gone to the Forest: as the rebels rise and a volcano explodes, Kitamura is dedicated to giving us a thrilling snapshot of tensions boiling over, and of "the world, falling to pieces". -- Philip Womack * Daily Telegraph *A pressure cooker of a book ... An allegorical novel of almost unnerving starkness -- Alastair Mabbott * Glasgow Herald *A novel of Steinbeckian characters living in a land of Biblical harshness described with a contemporary fast-and-looseness at a dizzying pace ... Otherworldly ... Strange, seductive, transporting. * Monocle *When a nearby volcano erupts, so do filial, sexual and political tensions, which Kitamura relates in cool, clipped reportage. The minimal context is frustratingly claustrophobic, but the effect is mesmerising. We discover a fable-like tale, restricted in relevance to no specific history or peoples, that condemns neither colonisers nor the colonised but rather those who fail to attempt understanding. This is sparse, dark, elegant prose that startles with its subtlety and sharp insight. -- Kathleen Harris * Irish Times *

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Book SynopsisTilly Dunnage left her hometown of Dungatar in rural Australia under a black cloud of accusation. Years later Tilly, now a couturier for the Paris fashion houses, returns home to make amends with her mentally unstable mother. Mid-century Dungatar is a small town, and small towns have long memories. At first she wins over the suspicious locals with her extraordinary dressmaking skills. But when the eccentric townsfolk turn on Tilly for a second time, she decides to teach them a lesson and exact long-overdue revenge... Packed with memorable characters, acid humour and luscious clothes, The Dressmaker is an irresistible gothic tale of small-town revenge.Trade ReviewWickedly funny and glamorous ... an irresistible, gripping read * Essentials *There's almost a fairytale aspect to this story from 2000 of the prodigal returning, in this case the prodigal daughter ... Tilly is a fun and dark creation. * Sunday Herald *Blessed with an astringently unsentimental tone and a talent for creating memorably eccentric characters, Ham also possesses a confidently brisk and mischievous sense of plot * Sydney Morning Herald *Ham writes delightfully rich set pieces and descriptive passages ... her eye for the absurd, the comical and the poignant are highly tuned ... one to savour and enjoy * Weekend Australian *

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