Contemporary fiction titles are those which focus on the present or near past. Stories rooted in the current cultural, social, and political landscape which feature characters we can all recognise.
Contemporary Fiction Books
Watkins Media Limited Dr Chizhevskys Chandelier
Book Synopsis
£12.34
Selkies House Limited The Museum of Contradictions
Book Synopsis
£13.50
Pegasus Elliot Mackenzie Publishers The Setting of a Thousand Suns
Book Synopsis
£9.49
Pegasus Elliot Mackenzie Publishers The Chant of Joy
Book Synopsis
£11.69
Double 9 Books The Secret Of The Island
Book Synopsis
£11.99
Double 9 Books LLP Dream Days
Book Synopsis
£10.19
Double 9 Booksllp North And South
Book Synopsis
£21.74
Octopus Publishing Group The Crustacean
Book SynopsisI want to come back as a crab. A crab''s skin is made of bone and the flesh is inside the bone. But we''re the opposite. We have bone inside flesh.Chichirim is a plain, neglected girl. Her parents forget about her birthday and the boys at school always take more interest in her best friend. She''s desperate to climb the social ladder and be noticed, by anybody. When she meets a middle-aged assistant director at her sister''s job, he makes her feel beautiful and different, and she convinces herself that she must love him. Terrified, detached, and longing for intimacy, she submits to his violent sexual demands whilst convincing herself that he makes her life worth living.When she discovers she is pregnant, her sister takes charge, arranging for an abortion and his prosecution. But all is not what it seems. The people Chichirim trusted and loved the most have their own agenda. And only twenty years later, looking back at her childhood, does she understand their true intentions. At turns defiant, tragic, funny, and shocking, THE CRUSTACEAN is an intricately-crafted novel exploring memory, exploitation, and the lasting effects of betrayal.
£15.00
Penguin Publishing Group The Heartbreak Hotel
£15.38
The Book Guild Ltd Solo
Book SynopsisA former star musician, humiliated by a disastrous performance, abandons her career. Years later, she mentors a gifted but underprivileged teen horn player. As her protégé's big break approaches, Cate must confront her past and seek redemption through the music that once broke her.
£9.49
Bookouture Where Do We Go from Here
£9.49
Peepal Tree Press Ltd The House in Bacolet
Book SynopsisWhite British couple Hugh and Julia Pennington buy an old church to convert on a former cocoa plantation on a Caribbean island. When their estate agent fails to meet them at the airport, they accept a lift in a large American car from a charismatic local, Horatio. The couple are to become increasingly dependent on Horatio who ends up moving into their servants' quarters' but remains an enigma.Hugh and Julia want to get involved' in the life of their adopted island home. But they little suspect how much the past horrors of slavery, and their best intentions, will impact their lives.This tense psychological drama examines the delicate master-servant relationship against a Caribbean island''s colonial background and a still simmering history of slavery. An intimate portrait of a marriage, the novel also explores the difficulties of human communication and how these are compounded when race, sex and culture-bound assumptions are added to the mix.
£10.44
Delphinium Books Animals of the Alpine Front
£15.08
Clash Books Give Me Danger
£15.60
Editorial Planeta, S.A. Cuentos. Planeta ediciones
£14.47
Pegasus Elliot Mackenzie Publishers Default
£10.44
Double9 Books Germinal
Book SynopsisThe thirteenth book in Emile Zola's Les Rougon-Macquart, a twenty-volume series, is titled Germinal. The novel, an unflinchingly severe and realistic account of a coalminers' strike in northern France in the 1860s, is frequently regarded as Zola's masterpiece and one of the most important works of French literature. It has been published and translated into more than one hundred languages. Additionally, it served as inspiration for two television shows and five film adaptations. Between April 1884 and January 1885, Germinal was written. It was first published as a serial between November 1884 and February 1885 in the magazine Gil Blas, after which it was published as a book in March 1885. The name of a spring-themed month on the French Republican Calendar is referenced in the title. The word germin comes from the Latin word for seed, and in the book, it refers to the hope for a brighter future that germinates among the miners. Etienne Lantier, previously seen in L' Assommoir (1877), is the central character in Germinal. The miners' lives are played out against a backdrop of severe poverty and oppression. Some of Zola's best scenes from the novel are set in the mining community.
£15.91
Pegasus Elliot Mackenzie Publishers On Earth As It Is In Heaven
£12.59
Everyman The Master Of Ballantrae And Weir Of Hermiston
Book SynopsisTwo of Stevenson's historical novels set against the Scottish landscape and featuring psychological studies of individuals. The unfinished "Weir of Hermiston", on which the author was working at the time of his death, is an account of the conflict between a powerful father and his rebellious son.
£10.99
Bindery Books To Bargain with Mortals
£14.24
Editorial Edinumen La Habitacion de Nona
£15.01
Austin Macauley Publishers LLC Journey to Red Dawn
£13.29
Titan Books Ltd Alien Cult
Book SynopsisAn FBI agent on the trail of a brutal serial killer gets caught in the web of a Xenomorph-worshipping religion in this thrilling murder mystery twist on the Alien universe, for fans of Scott Sigler's Aliens: Phalanx and Alex White's Cold Forge.
£9.25
Duckworth Books HoHo Homicide
Book SynopsisIt's quite a Christmas for Benbow and Wingate when an unwelcome surprise is found under the tree at their luxury retirement home: a dead body.
£9.49
Peirene Press Ltd Imagine Breaking Everything
£11.69
Penguin Random House India On the Brink of Belief
£18.99
Truran The Road to Leenane
£5.62
Twisted Spoon Press A Gothic Soul
£10.45
Profile Books Ltd Say Say Say
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£11.04
Velocity Press The Mineral Tail
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£13.49
Olympia Publishers Fallen City 2 Broken Seed
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£15.29
Pegasus Elliot Mackenzie Publishers More Brummie Stories
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£10.44
Pegasus Elliot Mackenzie Publishers Above the Ash I Rise
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£22.09
Vanguard Press HIV Negative
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£17.09
Pegasus Elliot Mackenzie Publishers Seeking From Whats Lost
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£11.69
Verso Books The Stone Woman
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£14.24
Pegasus Elliot Mackenzie Publishers Related Storeys
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£8.54
Pegasus Elliot Mackenzie Publishers Limited Objective
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£10.44
Pegasus Elliot Mackenzie Publishers Lockdown at Woodside
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£9.49
Double 9 Books The Blue Fairy Book
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£17.24
Pan Macmillan India The Machine is Learning
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£15.19
Pan Macmillan India Loyal Stalkers
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£18.69
Pan Macmillan India Prisoner's Dilemma
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£16.51
Penguin Publishing Group To Kill a Cook
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£22.94
Seven Seas Entertainment How Heavy are the Dumbbells You Lift Vol. 19
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£11.69
Austin Macauley Publishers LLC The Corrigan Factor
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£12.34
Airship My Girlfriend Cheated on Me and Now My Flirty Underclassman Wont Leave Me Alone Light Novel Vol. 1
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£13.49
Atlantic Books Scary Monsters: Winner of the 2023 Rathbones
Book Synopsis*** WINNER OF THE 2023 RATHBONES FOLIO FICTION PRIZE***ONE OF SLATE'S 10 BEST BOOKS OF 2022'Every page of her story feels charged, like an open circuit waiting for its switch; a lurking wallop. It's magnificent, peerless writing' Guardian'When my family emigrated it felt as if we'd been stood on our heads.'Michelle de Kretser's electrifying take on scary monsters turns the novel upside down - just as migration has upended her characters' lives.Lyle works for a sinister government department in near-future Australia. An Asian migrant, he fears repatriation and embraces 'Australian values'. He's also preoccupied by his ambitious wife, his wayward children and his strong-minded elderly mother. Islam has been banned in the country, the air is smoky from a Permanent Fire Zone, and one pandemic has already run its course.Lili's family migrated to Australia from Asia when she was a teenager. Now, in the 1980s, she's teaching in the south of France. She makes friends, observes the treatment handed out to North African immigrants and is creeped out by her downstairs neighbour. All the while, Lili is striving to be A Bold, Intelligent Woman like Simone de Beauvoir.Three scary monsters - racism, misogyny and ageism - roam through this mesmerising novel. Its reversible format enacts the disorientation that migrants experience when changing countries changes the story of their lives. With this suspenseful, funny and profound book, Michelle de Kretser has made something thrilling and new.'Which comes first, the future or the past?'Trade ReviewSlyly intelligent...the book's overriding sense of anger and alarm also mingles with satirical glee. Even if she obviously has the apocalyptic drift of the present in sight, De Kretser passes on to the reader the inescapable feeling that she's also having fun, in this engaging amalgam of lament and warning shot. * The Observer *Every page of her story feels charged, like an open circuit waiting for its switch; a lurking wallop. It's magnificent, peerless writing. * Guardian Australia *A carefully constructed pattern of thematic echoes...filled with unexpected details, apt quick literary brushstrokes and the gleam of humour. For what it's worth, I'd call it two novellas: but either way, it's terrific. -- Sam Leith * Telegraph *Scary Monsters is a provocative and exhilarating game of snakes and ladders * Times Literary Supplement *Engrossing...a powerful portrait of feeling adrift in a hostile environment, suffused with stabs of beautiful description * The Times *truly great...brilliant -- Ali Smith * The Guardian *Ruminative and sly rather than preachy, this novel about complacency and compromise packs a stealthy bite -- Laura Miller * Slate, 10 Best Books of 2022 *De Kretser clearly relishes demonstrating how close we are to this dystopian future where "government hatespokespersons" dominate the media and a "climate no-policy" has already wreaked havoc. What lingers in the mind, however, are the connections she makes between past prejudices and a future society devoid of values or compassion * Financial Times *Written with incandescent moral energy, profound compassion, and astonishing precision and beauty, Michelle de Kretser's Scary Monsters extends the very possibilities of the novel form. On the contemporary international scene, there are very, very few writers who can match her style, her intelligence, her vision. To read her is to be changed. -- Neel MukherjeeIn Scary Monsters de Kretser addresses the weightiest of subjects with the lightest and deftest of touches, and the result is funny, playful, painful, angry and, above all, ferociously smart. It's a dazzling novel, by a hugely talented author. -- Sarah WatersA radically brilliant diptych-novel, in complex conversation with itself and with the world we live in, written by one of the living masters of the art of fiction. A beautifully troubling book. -- Max PorterI love the way Scary Monsters asks urgent questions about what kind of future we might be sleepwalking towards. And heightens the enquiry by looking back; by unsettling and disturbing our sense of where we are now and where we are headed by dissecting - with exquisite deftness - the barely-concealed misogyny and racism of then, to awaken our senses to now. It's a novel of luminous intelligence and profound depth, written with verve, humour and exceptional elegance. -- Monica AliBold, spare and completely original, one of the most exciting contemporary novels I've read for a very long time. -- Preti TanejaI read Scary Monsters months ago and can't stop thinking about it. This is a bold, unsettling and beautifully written book. -- Emily St. John MandelDe Kretser is a wonderful writer...Though her skewering satire is pointed and painful, her gallows humor keeps the reader smiling. -- Claire Messud * Harper's *Scary Monsters is a marvel. Each of the two very different parts of the novel had me totally riveted, intensely absorbed, wowed by de Kretser's scathing accuracy - whether she's chronicling youth's delights and distortions or a future where prosperity is the new "unethics." It's a wildly remarkable book that unfolds like no other. -- Joan Silber, author of SECRETS OF HAPPINESS and IMPROVEMENT[A]n inventive, satirical and confronting exploration of the migrant experience. * Books + Publishing *Is it possible we already have the year's best novel? I'll be amazed if anything surpasses this compulsive, exquisitely light-footed narrative...glorious. * Daily Mail on THE LIFE TO COME *De Kretser's satirical observations - on the literati, self-congratulation, suburban pretension - are so subtly deboning they remind me of Jane Austen's...The Life to Come deserves all the gongs we can bang for it. * Spectator on THE LIFE TO COME *Exhilaratingly good writing...each page yields sparkling sentences and keen observations. * Literary Review on THE LIFE TO COME *[de Kretser's] writing captures, with unflagging wit, grace and subtlety, the spiritual as well as physical journeys of people on the move - between cultures, mindsets and stages of growth. -- Boyd Tonkin * Financial Times on THE LIFE TO COME *
£9.49
