Fiction based on or inspired by true events
HarperCollins Publishers Year of Wonders
Book SynopsisIntroducing the Collins Modern Classics, a series featuring some of the most significant books of recent times, books that shed light on the human experience classics which will endure for generations to come.In the spring of 1666, a bolt of infected cloth carries the plague from London to the quiet village of Eyam. The villagers elect to isolate themselves in a fateful quarantine, seen through the eyes of eighteen-year-old Anna Frith. As death and superstition creep from household to household, she must confront loss and the lure of illicit love in an extraordinary Year of Wonders.This timeless and powerful novel, based on a true story, was the astonishing debut novel from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of March.Trade Review‘Beautifully written…it has a vivid imaginative truth’ Hilary Mantel 'Year of Wonders is a staggering fictional debut that matches journalistic accumulation of detail to natural narrative flair' Guardian ‘A lyrically written and emotionally engaging novel' Independent 'Gripping…packed with historical detail' Daily Mail
£8.54
HarperCollins Publishers A Woman of Substance
Book SynopsisThe unputdownable multi-million copy bestseller charting the rags to riches story of Emma HarteWith new Foreword from Fern Britton.A WOMAN''S AMBITIONIn the brooding moors above a humble Yorkshire village stood Fairley Hall. There, Emma Harte, its oppressed but resourceful servant girl, acquired a shrewd determination. There, she honed her skills, discovered the meaning of treachery, learned to survive, to become a woman, and vowed to make her mark on the world.A JOURNEY OF A LIFETIMEIn the wake of tragedy she rose from poverty to magnificent wealth as the iron-willed force behind a thriving international enterprise. As one of the richest women in the world Emma Harte has almost everything she fought so hard to achieve-save for the dream of love, and for the passion of the one man she could never have.A DREAM FULFILLED-AND AVENGED.Through two marriages, two devastating wars, and generations of secrets, Emma''s unparalleled success has come with a price. As greed, envy, and revenge consume those closest to her, the brilliant matriarch now finds herself poised to outwit her enemies, and to face the betrayals of the past with the same ingenious resolve that forged her empire.Trade Review‘An extravagant, absorbing novel of love, courage, ambition, war, death and passion.’New York Times ‘A mighty saga. Little has been so riveting since Gone With the Wind’ Evening News ‘A long, satisfying novel of money, power, passion and revenge, set against the sweep of 20th-century history.’Los Angeles Times ‘Few novelists are as consummate as Barbara Taylor Bradford at keeping the reader turning the page. She is one of the world’s best at spinning yarns’ Guardian
£9.49
HarperCollins Publishers The Accursed Kings 01. The Iron King
Book SynopsisThis is the original game of thrones' George R.R. MartinFrom the publishers that brought you A Game of Thrones comes the series that inspired George R.R. Martin's epic work.Accursed! Accursed! You shall be accursed to the thirteenth generation!The Iron King Philip the Fair is as cold and silent, as handsome and unblinking as a statue. He governs his realm with an iron hand, but he cannot rule his own family: his sons are weak and their wives adulterous; while his red-blooded daughter Isabella is unhappily married to an English king who prefers the company of men.A web of scandal, murder and intrigue is weaving itself around the Iron King; but his downfall will come from an unexpected quarter. Bent on the persecution of the rich and powerful Knights Templar, Philip sentences Grand Master Jacques Molay to be burned at the stake, thus drawing down upon himself a curse that will destroy his entire dynastyTrade Review‘Iron kings and strangled queens, battles and betrayals, lies and lust, the curse of the Templars, the doom of a great dynasty – and all of it (well, most of it) straight from the pages of history, and believe me, the Starks and the Lannisters have nothing on the Capets and Plantagenets. Whether you are a history buff or a fantasy fan, Druon's epic will keep you turning pages. This was the original game of thrones’GEORGE R.R. MARTIN ‘Blood-curdling tale of intrigue, murder, corruption and sexual passion’SUNDAY TIMES ‘Barbaric, sensual, teeming with life, based in wide reading and sound scholarship…among the best historical novels’ TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT
£9.49
Vintage Publishing Babi Yar: The Story of Ukraine's Holocaust
Book SynopsisThis gripping story of Kyiv during the Second World War told by a young boy who saw it all.'Rightly hailed a masterpiece' Daily Mail'So here is my invitation: enter into my fate, imagine that you are twelve, that the world is at war and that nobody knows what is going to happen next...'When the German army rolled into Kyiv in 1941 the young Anatoli was just twelve years old. He began writing down what he saw in his journals.Within ten days of the invasion, the Nazis had begun their campaign of fear and murder in Ukraine. Babi Yar (Babyn Yar in Ukrainian) was the place where the executions of Jews and many others took place. It was one of the largest massacres in the history of the Holocaust. Anatoli could hear the machine guns from his house.Anatoli’s clear, compelling voice, honesty and determination guide us through the horrors of that time. Babi Yar has the compulsion and narration of fiction but everything recounted here is true.'Extraordinary' Orlando Figes, Guardian'A vivid first-hand account of life under one of the most savage of occupation regimes... A book which must be read and never forgotten' The TimesThis is the complete, uncensored version of Babi Yar - its history written into the text. Parts shown in bold are those cut by the Russian censors, parts in brackets show later additions.Trade ReviewRead it and weep... Nothing I have read about that barbaric time has been as affecting as this gripping, disturbing book - rightly hailed a masterpiece -- Tony Rennell * Daily Mail *Babi Yar is one of the classic accounts of life under Nazi rule in occupied Europe and a depiction of man's inhumanity to man... [a] masterpiece -- Henry Marsh * New Statesman *A masterpiece . . . Every bit the peer of the canonical works of witness [such as] Anne Frank's diary . . . Wiesel's Night . . . Solzhenityn's Gulag Archipelago -- George Packer * The Atlantic *Absolutely stunning. A raw, devastating account of one of the greatest tragedies of WW2. Babi Yar provides a painfully intimate look at life during the Nazi occupation in Ukraine through the eyes of one resilient young boy. Told in poetic yet unflinching prose, this compelling book should be necessary reading for anyone looking to not only understand Ukrainian history, but humanity -- Erin LittekenMoving and shaking in a way that links it with the works of Solzhenitsyn * Times Literary Supplement *
£11.69
Penguin Books Ltd Chronicle of a Death Foretold
Book SynopsisChronicle of a Death Foretold is a compelling, moving story exploring injustice and mob hysteria by the Nobel Laureate Gabriel García Márquez, author of One Hundred Years of Solitude and Love in the Time of Cholera. ''On the day they were going to kill him, Santiago Nasar got up at five-thirty in the morning to wait for the boat the bishop was coming on''Santiago Nasar is brutally murdered in a small town by two brothers. All the townspeople knew it was going to happen - including the victim. But nobody did anything to prevent the killing. Twenty seven years later, a man arrives in town to try and piece together the truth from the contradictory testimonies of the townsfolk. To at last understand what happened to Santiago, and why. . . ''A masterpiece'' Evening Standard''A work of high explosiveness - the proper stuff of Nobel prizes. An exceptional novel'' The Times''Brilliant writer, brilliant book'' GuardianTrade ReviewA work of high explosiveness – the proper stuff of Nobel prizes. An exceptional novel. * The Times *A masterpiece * Evening Standard *
£9.49
HarperCollins Publishers Rare Objects
Book SynopsisThe stunning new novel from the New York Times bestselling author of The Perfume Collector.Trade Review‘Full of rich historical detail and intriguing characters… A delight from start to end’ Hazel Gaynor, author of The Girl Who Came Home ‘A delicious novel… Kathleen Tessaro creates unforgettable worlds and, within them, compelling characters who stay with the reader long after she reaches the end’ Adriana Trigiani ‘Excellent… Tessaro has the skill to transport the reader to another time and place. She put me on the streets of Boston's North End. But her description of places and sensations throughout the book are wonderful.’ Charles Belfoure, New York Times bestselling author of House of Thieves and The Paris Architect
£12.34
HarperCollins Publishers Agatha Christie A biography
Book SynopsisJanet Morgan's definitive and authorised biography of Agatha Christie, with a new retrospective foreword by the author.Agatha Christie (18901976), the world's bestselling author, is a public institution. Her creations, Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple, have become fiction's most legendary sleuths and her ingenuity has captured the imagination of generations of readers. But although she lived to a great age and was prolific, she remained elusively shy and determinedly private.Given sole access to family papers and other protected material, Janet Morgan's definitive biography unravels Agatha Christie's life, work and relationships, creating a revealing and faithfully honest portrait. The book has delighted readers of Christie's detective stories for more than 30 years with its clear view of her career and personality, and this edition includes a new foreword by the author reflecting on the longevity of Agatha Christie's extraordinary success and popularity.Trade Review‘A masterly an gripping biography … Janet Morgan’s study has merits far beyond merely keeping the faithful in touch with their vanished priestess.’ANTONIA FRASER, STANDARD ‘From it cool, beautifully paced and consistently entertaining narrative one gets a clear view of Christie’s career and personality.’ROBERT BARNARD, TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT ‘It lays, once and for all, the malicious rumours and vulgar gossip put about by other writers on the subject of Agatha Christie’s ten days’ disappearance in 1926, providing an authoritative, as well as authorised, explanation for the event.’T.J. BINYON, LONDON REVIEW OF BOOKS ‘Leaves not a stone unturned in the day to day doings of Mrs Christie; eighty-six years of bric-a-brac, people incidents houses, places, bills and interminable contract and copyright deals.’POLLY TOYNBEE, GUARDIAN
£11.69
Orenda Books Yule Island: The No. 1 bestseller! This year's
Book SynopsisAn art expert joins a detective to investigate a horrific murder on a Swedish island, leading them to a mystery rooted in Viking rites and Scandinavia's deepest, darkest winter. The Queen of French Noir returns with a chilling, utterly captivating gothic thriller, based on a true story. FIRST in a new series. ‘A dark, dark slice of Scandi Noir’ Heat magazine *Book of the Month* ‘Gustawsson’s writing is so vivid, it’s electrifying’ Peter James ‘Remember her name. Johana Gustawsson has become a leading figure in French crime fiction [and] Yule Island is impossible to put down’ Le Monde ***Winner of the Cultura Ligue de l'Imaginaire Award 2023*** ________ Art expert Emma Lindahl is anxious when she's asked to appraise the antiques and artefacts in the infamous manor house of one of Sweden's wealthiest families, on the island of Storholmen, where a young woman was murdered nine years earlier, her killer never found. Emma must work alone, and the Gussman family apparently avoiding her, she sees virtually no one in the house. Do they have something to hide? As she goes about her painstaking work and one shocking discovery yields clues that lead to another, Emma becomes determined to uncover the secrets of the house and its occupants. When the lifeless body of another young woman is found in the icy waters surrounding the island, Detective Karl Rosén arrives to investigate, and memories his failure to solve the first case come rushing back. Could this young woman's tragic death somehow hold the key? Battling her own demons, Emma joins forces with Karl to embark upon a chilling investigation, plunging them into horrifying secrets from the past – Viking rites and tainted love – and Scandinavia's deepest, darkest winter… ________ PRAISE FOR JOHANA GUSTAWSSON ‘Wonderfully dark and intricately woven … will have you hooked from the very first page’ B A Paris ‘Johana Gustawsson has become the queen of the French thriller genre’ Le Point ‘Intriguingly dark and vivid, and so cleverly told’ Essie Fox `A gripping story of murder and black magic …Gustawsson slowly weaves together three seemingly disparate strands of her narrative with a skill that shows why she is such an admired crime writer in her native France´ The Times ‘A wonderfully creepy, unsettling read, with a superb twist in its tail‘ James Oswald ‘Bewitching and wonderfully gothic’ Sunday Express ‘Johana Gustawsson brilliantly illuminates the depths of the human heart’ Le Figaro `A whirlpool that draws you irresistibly into levels of darkness so much deeper than you can possibly be ready for´ Ambrose Parry ‘Ethereal, romantic and as cold as death, this nerve-shattering and powerful novel immerses us in a cruel and thrilling Nordic tale where love smashes against the rocks of madness’ La Fringale culturelle ‘A stunning and beautifully written gothic thriller’ Alexandra Benedict ‘Johana Gustawsson has no equal when it comes to hooking us with stunning twists and unexpected leaps in time’ Les Echos 'A bold and intelligent read' Guardian 'Utterly compelling' Woman's Own `Brilliant … the last chapters knocked me sideways, and it’s a long time since that’s happened´ Lisa Hall `A dark world of elegance and grotesque … mesmeric´ Matt Wesolowski 'Cleverly plotted, simply excellent' Ragnar Jónasson 'A must-read' Daily Express
£15.29
HarperCollins Publishers The Wilderness Way
Book SynopsisInspired by the true events of the most notorious evictions in Irish history1861, Donegal, IrelandTen years ago Declan Conaghan's father died in the Great Famine, and since then, Declan has kept his promise to keep his family out of the workhouse. But all that is threatened with the arrival of new landlord, John Adair. Adair is quick to cause trouble and fear among his tenants. When he turns them off his land, Declan has no option but to break his promiseDeclan is in despair until he receives a letter from America offering him the chance of a new life and salvation for his family. But it would mean signing up to the US Army and fighting for Lincoln. Despite knowing nothing of war, or US politics, Declan leaves behind all he knows.Set against the wild landscapes of Ireland and the turbulent times of the American Civil War, this sweeping narrative takes us on an epic journey to understand the strength and endurance of the human spirit.Praise for Anne Madden:''The author seems to have put
£9.49
HarperCollins Publishers Every Single Minute
Book SynopsisNot only haunted by death, but also by beauty and the strangeness of being alive. A deeply memorable novel' Colm Tóibín I have friends and family, I am in this wonderful country, I have money, there is nothing much wrong with me except I am dying.'Úna has little over a week left to live and wants to see Berlin for the first and last time. Her friend Liam accompanies her. As the city streets open up to them, so too do their pasts. Úna recalls her life her lovers, her famous father, her alcoholic mother and the death of her younger brother. For Liam the weekend becomes a lesson in true living from a friend he is about to lose.Trade Review‘A profound and moving portrait … He has brought those Berlin days back to irrepressible, complicated, poignant life’ Observer ‘Told with economy and directness, it takes the reader to the heart of things … Ordinary moments take on great significance in this tale, which is as much about living in the moment as it is about revisiting the past’ Sunday Times ‘Hamilton remains one of the most unpredictable and interesting of Irish writers … ‘Every Single Minute’ is a brave and contemplative novel’ Irish Times
£8.99
HarperCollins Publishers Tales of Persuasion
Book SynopsisTen daring stories from a writer who seems capable of anything' (Guardian), the Booker Prize-shortlisted Philip HensherBackdrops vary in this collection of stories from the author of The Northern Clemency from turmoil in Sudan following the death of a politician in a plane crash, to southern India where a Soho hedonist starts to envisage the crump and soar of munitions. Each story, regardless of location, reveals a great writer at the peak of his powers.Trade Review‘As a fiction writer, Hensher has virtuosity on tap, so every page delivers something enjoyable and even eye-popping; a vibrant exchange, a spry description, a tickling bit of indirect speech’ New Statesman ‘Entertainingly varied stories … Hensher sneaks into a life like a cat burglar, pads around to survey the scene and slips out again, leaving everything quietly disturbed’ Literary Review ‘Thomas Mann-like in its homoerotic undertones and high-flown hymns to unrequited love but a good deal funnier … Hensher is deft at locating the moment of crisis when a character experiences a change of heart or a nasty surprise, and life is exposed in all its drab wonder … Entertainingly varied in tone and setting, the stories combine quaint physical observation with a caustic intelligence’ Evening Standard ‘Elegant stories that radiate with fine human feeling inspired by altogether muddled lives … Hensher’s prose can be painterly’ Financial Times 'Hensher has a pitch-perfect way with language and invented detail' Sunday Times ‘A comedy of manners with an occasional dark side’ Daily Telegraph ‘A delightful read, full of beauty and humour' The Herald ‘He is an expert writer, and an expert tone runs through this vigorous collection. Hensher observes all human life with the detachment of a scientist … He nails lust, hypocrisy, regret and hopefulness with an exquisite eye for detail. Unromantic, and dark at times, this collection is always interesting’ Daily Mail ‘A brilliantly astute book … every narrative is unified by Hensher’s incredible eye for detail and effortless talent for multi-layered storytelling’ Attitude ‘Hensher’s adaptability as a writer and love of form brings us clever, ravishing and moving storytelling’ Monocle ‘It’s Hensher writ large: poignant without sentimentalising, acutely observant of the mores of the modern world, but profoundly interested in the timeless search for the meaning of life.’ Observer
£10.78
HarperCollins Publishers Treasure
Book SynopsisIn the ninth gripping thriller in the world famous Dirk Pitt series, the adventurer finds himself in a deadly battle against the darkest forces of international terrorism.THE HIGH-EXPLOSIVE SECRET OF THE AGES391 AD:Fanatics destroy the greatest storehouse of knowledge and treasure in the ancient world the mighty library and museum of Alexandria. But a few conspirators secretly remove its most precious items and hide them deep in a specially excavated stronghold1991 AD:A UN plane, with the Secretary-General aboard, crashes in the icy waters of Greenland, brought down by a murderous conspiracy. And trouble-shooter Dirk Pitt is drawn into a deadly battle, against the darkest forces of international terrorism, that could reshape the balance of world power forever.Trade ReviewPraise for Clive Cussler: ‘Cussler is hard to beat’ Daily Mail ‘The Adventure King’ Sunday Express ‘Much fun, crisply told, with exciting special effects’ Kirkus Review ‘Just about the best storyteller in the business’ New York Post ‘Clive Cussler is the guy I read’ Tom Clancy ‘No holds barred adventure … a souped-up treat’ Daily Mirror ‘Clive Cussler and Dirk Pitt are the first names in adventure’Stephen Coonts ‘Frightening and full of suspense … unquestionably entertaining’ Daily Express ‘Clive Cussler has no equal’ Publishers Weekly
£11.69
HarperCollins Publishers The American Boy
Book SynopsisTHE NUMBER ONE BESTSELLER AND AWARD-WINNING RICHARD & JUDY BOOK CLUB PICKMurder, lies and betrayal in Regency EnglandEngland 1819. Thomas Shield, a master at a school just outside London, is tutor to a young American boy and the child's sensitive best friend, Charles Frant. Helplessly drawn to Frant's beautiful, unhappy mother, Shield becomes entwined in their family's affairs.When a brutal murder takes place in London's seedy backstreets, all clues lead to the Frant family, and Shield is tangled in a web of lies, money, sex and death that threatens to tear his new life apart.Soon, it emerges that at the heart of these macabre events lies the strange American boy. What secrets is the young Edgar Allan Poe hiding?Trade Review‘One of the Top Ten Crime Novels of the Decade’ Sunday Times ‘An enthralling read from start to finish’ The Times ‘Deeply absorbing and beautifully written’ Independent ‘Hugely entertaining, beguiling and atmospheric’ Observer ‘Delightful…it will have you desperate to search out a quiet corner to continue your acquaintance with it’ Daily Telegraph
£9.49
HarperCollins Publishers Hell in the Heartland A heartbreaking true crime
Book SynopsisThis stranger-than-fiction cold case is about to crack wide open!Perfect for fans of I'll be Gone in the Dark and ZodiacOn December 30th, 1999, in rural Oklahoma, 16-year-old Ashley Freeman and her best friend, Lauria Bible, were having a sleepover. The next morning, the Freeman family trailer was in flames and both girls were missing.While rumours of drug debts, revenge killings, and police corruption abounded in the years that followed, the case remained unsolved and the girls were never found.In 2016, crime writer Jax Miller travelled to Oklahoma to discover what really happened. What she unearthed was shocking. These forgotten towns were wild, lawless, and home to some very dark secrets.Finally, in April 2018, the first arrests were made could justice finally be in sight for the girls and their families?There is, in the best of us, a search for the truth, to serve the living and dead alikeJax Miller is one of those people and Hell in the Heartland is one of those books' Robert GrayTrade Review‘There is, in the best of us, a search for the truth, to serve the living and dead alike…Jax Miller is one of those people and Hell in the Heartland is one of those books’ Robert Graysmith,author of Zodiac ‘Every generation has its standout true-crime writer. Jax Miller does with Hell in the Heartland what Truman Capote did with In Cold Blood’ A.A. Dhand, author of Streets of Darkness ‘Mesmerizing, raw, evocative, unforgettable’ William Boyle, author of A Friend Is a Gift You Give Yourself ‘A captivating ride through the frustrating twists, turns, and dead ends of a horrifying murder case’ Publishers Weekly ‘Beautiful and devastating’ Crime Reads Praise for Jax Miller: 'A terrific read from a powerful new voice ' Karin Slaughter ‘Original, compelling and seriously recommended.’ Lee Child ‘Seldom has a literary creation bounced off the page with as much raw vitality … one of the standout debuts of the year’ Guardian ‘There’s a reckless power to Miller’s untamed prose… And sometimes she’s just plain amazing’ New York Times ‘Crackles with intensity, keeping the reader gripped’ Express ‘Chilling … A compelling read, but don’t expect to get a good night’s sleep afterwards’ Sunday Times (Ireland) ‘A propulsive, full-throttle tale of revenge and redemption’ Irish Times ‘It’s fast, it’s furious and it takes no prisoners’ Sunday Independent (Ireland) ‘A relentless and fiercely compelling debut. Freedom’s Child will hold you captive until the very last page’ Richard Montanari ‘Freedom’s Child isn’t just a great debut, it’s a great book with one of the most angry, complex and compelling heroines this side of a certain girl with a certain tattoo’ Simon Toyne ‘I loved it. Such an original new voice’ Kate Medina ‘Brilliant’ Julia Crouch
£8.99
HarperCollins Publishers A Nurses Tale
Book SynopsisInspired by a true storyDaughterMidwifePrincessA fascinating story reflecting the past moving alongside the present day' USA Today Bestseller Glynis PetersBorn Nigerian royalty, Princess Adenrele Ademola trained as a nurse at Guy's Hospital in London and stepped up to serve the people of Britain when war broke out facing both the devastation of the Blitz and the prejudice of some of the people she was trying to help.80 years later, Ade's great-niece Yemi arrives in London clutching the Princess's precious diaries and longs to uncover the mysteries they holdA richly-detailed, compelling historical novel shining a light on a hidden voice of WW2 and one woman's courageous contribution to BritainA wonderful unfurling of such an important history I was utterly absorbed in Ade''s life!' Chioma OkerekeReaders love A Nurse's Tale:I must admit I knew very little about Nigeria, its history, culture, heritage and traditions and now I doa great debut novel and perfect for readers who enjoy histo
£9.49
Columbia University Press Puppet Flower
Book SynopsisYao-Chang Chen’s historical novel Puppet Flower retells the story of the 1867 sinking of the American merchant ship the Rover and its aftermath. He brings to light the pivotal role of this incident in Taiwanese history, merging documented events and literary imagination.Trade ReviewThis well-wrought book transports us to a complicated yet majestic period in Taiwan’s history. A significant novel, steeped in this unique place while echoing around the world. -- Lu Ping, author of Love and Revolution: A Novel About Song Qingling and Sun Yat-senWas Formosa a place too treacherous to visit? The author of Puppet Flower boldly takes up this question and tries to answer it from various perspectives, most notably that of the island's indigenous peoples. Strongly recommended! -- Li Ang, author of The Lost Garden: A NovelThis engaging historical novel shows how a small event on a remote island can make history. -- Ping-hui Liao, Chuan Lyu Endowed Chair in Taiwan Studies, University of California, San DiegoIn the novel Puppet Flower, Chen explores the complex intersection of international politics and cross-cultural exchange in mid-nineteenth century Taiwan. By imagining the contributions of a mixed-race sibling pair, Chen brings to life the actions and complex societies of indigenous and plains peoples at the threshold of new forms of colonialism. -- Margaret Mih Tillman, author of Raising China's Revolutionaries: Modernizing Childhood for Cosmopolitan Nationalists and Liberated Comrades, 1920s-1950s[A] nuanced depiction of a formative Formosa. * Taipei Times *Chen’s novel successfully delivers an alternative history of Taiwan in which all the involved subjectivities, especially those that have traditionally been neglected by official narratives, are given a voice. -- Serena De Marchi * Asian Review of Books *The whole novel is fascinating in that it mixes in a fairly messy but also fairly conventional personal story with the complex manoeuvrings of the various powers seeking control of Taiwan. -- John Alvey * The Modern Novel *[A] unique reimagining of an obscure event in 'a turning point' year in Taiwanese history. Told from a multitude of perspectives, particularly of indigenous peoples, Chen’s story does not sacrifice history and complicated colonial relations for cute dramatic contrivances. This is historical fiction with an emphasis on the former. -- Peggy Kurkowski * The Historical Novels Review *Table of ContentsForeword, by Michael BerryPrefaceAcknowledgmentsList of Principal Characters1. A Pyrrhic Victory2. The Tragedy That Befell the Rover3. Orphans of Mixed Blood4. Identity Revealed5. Repulse of the Foreign Forces6. Serenity Lost and Found7. Troops Marching8. Puppet Mountains9. Praying to Guanyin10. EpilogueMaps and IllustrationsGlossaryNotes
£67.20
Columbia University Press Puppet Flower A Novel of 1867 Formosa Modern
Book SynopsisYao-Chang Chen’s historical novel Puppet Flower retells the story of the 1867 sinking of the American merchant ship the Rover and its aftermath. He brings to light the pivotal role of this incident in Taiwanese history, merging documented events and literary imagination.Trade ReviewThis well-wrought book transports us to a complicated yet majestic period in Taiwan’s history. A significant novel, steeped in this unique place while echoing around the world. -- Lu Ping, author of Love and Revolution: A Novel About Song Qingling and Sun Yat-senWas Formosa a place too treacherous to visit? The author of Puppet Flower boldly takes up this question and tries to answer it from various perspectives, most notably that of the island's indigenous peoples. Strongly recommended! -- Li Ang, author of The Lost Garden: A NovelThis engaging historical novel shows how a small event on a remote island can make history. -- Ping-hui Liao, Chuan Lyu Endowed Chair in Taiwan Studies, University of California, San DiegoIn the novel Puppet Flower, Chen explores the complex intersection of international politics and cross-cultural exchange in mid-nineteenth century Taiwan. By imagining the contributions of a mixed-race sibling pair, Chen brings to life the actions and complex societies of indigenous and plains peoples at the threshold of new forms of colonialism. -- Margaret Mih Tillman, author of Raising China's Revolutionaries: Modernizing Childhood for Cosmopolitan Nationalists and Liberated Comrades, 1920s-1950s[A] nuanced depiction of a formative Formosa. * Taipei Times *Chen’s novel successfully delivers an alternative history of Taiwan in which all the involved subjectivities, especially those that have traditionally been neglected by official narratives, are given a voice. -- Serena De Marchi * Asian Review of Books *The whole novel is fascinating in that it mixes in a fairly messy but also fairly conventional personal story with the complex manoeuvrings of the various powers seeking control of Taiwan. -- John Alvey * The Modern Novel *[A] unique reimagining of an obscure event in 'a turning point' year in Taiwanese history. Told from a multitude of perspectives, particularly of indigenous peoples, Chen’s story does not sacrifice history and complicated colonial relations for cute dramatic contrivances. This is historical fiction with an emphasis on the former. -- Peggy Kurkowski * The Historical Novels Review *Table of ContentsForeword, by Michael BerryPrefaceAcknowledgmentsList of Principal Characters1. A Pyrrhic Victory2. The Tragedy That Befell the Rover3. Orphans of Mixed Blood4. Identity Revealed5. Repulse of the Foreign Forces6. Serenity Lost and Found7. Troops Marching8. Puppet Mountains9. Praying to Guanyin10. EpilogueMaps and IllustrationsGlossaryNotes
£19.80
Faber & Faber Tremor
Book Synopsis''Extraordinary.'' SUNDAY TIMESDazzling.'' DEBORAH LEVY''Masterful.'' DAILY TELEGRAPHTunde, the man at the centre of this novel, reflects on the places and times of his life, from his West African upbringing to his current work as a teacher of photography on a renowned New England campus. He is a reader, a listener and a traveller drawn to many different kinds of stories: tales from history and the epic; accounts of friends, family and strangers; narratives found in books and films. One man's personal lens refracts entire worlds, and back again.A weekend spent shopping for antiques is shadowed by the colonial atrocities that occurred on that land. A walk at dusk is interrupted by casual racism. A loving marriage is riven by mysterious tensions. And a remarkable cascade of voices speaks out from a pulsing metropolis.Tremor is a startling work of realism and invention that examines the passage of time and how we mark it. It i
£17.09
Faber & Faber Tremor
Book SynopsisLife is hopeless but it is not serious. We have to have danced while we could and, later, to have danced again in the telling.Tunde, the man at the centre of this novel, reflects on the places and times of his life, from his West African upbringing to his current work as a teacher of photography on a renowned New England campus. He is a reader, a listener, and a traveller drawn to many different kinds of stories: from history and the epic; of friends, family, and strangers; those found in books and films. One man's personal lens refracts entire worlds, and back again.A weekend spent shopping for antiques is shadowed by the colonial atrocities that occurred on that land. A walk at dusk is interrupted by casual racism. A loving marriage is riven by mysterious tensions. And a remarkable cascade of voices speak out from a pulsing metropolis.Tremor is a startling work of realism and invention that examines the passage of time and how we mark it. It is a reckoning with human survival amidst
£12.34
Baker Publishing Group The Long March Home A World War II Novel of the
Book SynopsisInspired by true events, this gripping coming-of-age tale of friendship, sacrifice, and the power of unrelenting hope during WWII follows three friends from Mobile, Alabama, as they struggle to survive the Bataan Death March and make it home to their families--and the girl they left behind.
£13.49
Orion Publishing Co The Broken Places
Book Synopsis''Sunlit and dark, painful and joyous'' David Mitchell, author of Cloud AtlasIn 1931, Gregory Hemingway''s life begins in Kansas City, Missouri. The third and favourite child of an overbearing father, Greg is a paragon: a star athlete, a crack shot, bright and handsome and built like a pocket battleship.In 2001, Gloria Hemingway''s life ends in a Miami women''s correctional institution. Complex and contradictory, radiant and resilient, it is a life that has flourished against the odds and been lived to the full.Inspired by true events and spanning seventy years of the last century, this is the story of a miraculous existence, told with beauty and compassion. Transporting the reader back and forth in time, from Cuba to New York and Montana to Florida, The Broken Places explores what it means to grow up in the shadow of a man famous for his masculinity, to bear the weight of expectation and a tragic family legacy, and to finally step out inTrade ReviewI was completely caught up by it and found it intensely moving. The composite method of shuttling between times and places allows a depth of character to build in a way that feels almost cubist. I admire the way in which each character is seen in their variousness and inconsistency so that there is compassion for all. The central character is imagined so fully that their fractured memories now feel like my own and I left the book sad to be leaving a person I had grown to care about greatly * Elizabeth Cook *A humane and compassionate look at a fascinating life, the complexity of gender, and the destructive legacy of being the child of the world's most famous alpha male * Patrick Ness *Sunlit and dark, painful and joyous, The Broken Places follows Ernest Hemingway's child on a lifelong journey. Russell Franklin has crafted a myth-busting novel of rare skill and integrity. Its echoes persist and evolve long after the final pages' * David Mitchell, author of Cloud Atlas *'Franklin's prose is contained and concise... and provokes the question about the fixity of selfhood. What does it mean to be a man or a woman? And what about all the lives in between' * The Telegraph *The Broken Place is an enrapturing story about family and expectation * Independent *
£17.09
Rare Bird Books The List
Book SynopsisThe story of the Jewish Brigade as it evolves into a daring band of Jews hunting down Nazi war criminalsThe List is an exceptional work of historical fiction that brings to life the untold story of the Holocaust and slaughter of not just Jews, but over 150,000 Serbs and Gypsies who were executed while Croatia was under fascist rule during World War II.Martin Brosky escapes from Auschwitz and joins up with the British Jewish Brigade toward the end of the war and meets Sylvia Harvitz, a veteran of Tito's Partisans and survivor of a Croatian concentration camp, Start Gradiska. Martin's cries for revenge parallel with Sylvia's need to avenge the deaths of her parents as they travel together carrying out reprisals in Europe, and later in South America. Along with Mordecai, an Iranian Jew who also joins the Jewish Brigade, Martin and Sylvia become Mossad intelligence officers for Israel carrying out their vengeful missions together.The List brings together the names and activities of nazis and Croatian war criminals, including Josef Mengele, who avoided prosecution for their war crimes and travelled to South America under the direction and help of the Vatican. Protected by dictators in Argentina, Chile, and Brazil, these men became targets for Martin and his Mossad agents. Readers will discover that vengeance is not without pain.
£14.24
Fernwood Publishing Co Ltd This House Is Not a Home
Book SynopsisAfter a hunting trip one fall, a family in the far reaches of so-called Canada's north return to nothing but an empty space where their home once stood. Finding themselves suddenly homeless, they have no choice but to assimilate into settler-colonial society in a mining town that has encroached on their freedom.An intergenerational coming-of-age novel, This House Is Not a Home follows K????, a Dene man who grew up entirely on the land before being taken to residential school. When he finally returns home, he struggles to connect with his family: his younger brother whom he has never met, his mother because he has lost his language, and an absent father whose disappearance he is too afraid to question.The third book from acclaimed Dene, Cree and Metis writer Katłįà, This House Is Not a Home is a fictional story based on true events. Visceral and embodied, heartbreaking and spirited, this book presents a clear trajectory of how settlers dispossessed Indigenous Peoples of their land - and how Indigenous communities, with dignity and resilience, continue to live and honour their culture, values, inherent knowledge systems, and Indigenous rights towards re-establishing sovereignty. Fierce and unflinching, this story is a call for land back.
£14.39
Pushkin Press My Men
Book SynopsisA spellbinding, darkly poetic literary novel that plunges us into the inner life of America's first female serial killer 'This fascinating, off-kilter novel about a female serial killer is an unexpectedly thrilling read' Karl Ove Knausgaard Seventeen-year-old Brynhild is in a fever - she can't quiet the screaming world inside her. When an intense affair ends brutally, she flees Norway for America at the end of the nineteenth century in search of a new life. Changing her name first to Bella, later to Belle, she is driven from any potential refuge by an unbearable tension that won't let her keep still. As Belle seeks release in a series of men, her yearning for an all-consuming love erupts into violence. In this breathtaking novel, Victoria Kielland imagines her way into the tumultuous inner life of the Norwegian woman who became Belle Gunness - America's first known female serial killer. Written in prose of wild, visceral beauty, My Men is a radically empathetic and disquieting portrait of a woman capable of ecstatic love and gruesome cruelty.Trade Review'This fascinating, off-kilter novel about a female serial killer is an unexpectedly thrilling read' - Karl Ove Knausgard'One of the best young authors we have... Kielland makes Brynhild tragic rather than cold-blooded' - Morgenbladet'Gripping, unique, and amazingly well-written' - Vart Land'Unusual and extraordinary' - Klassekampen'What this rich and poignant novel does is try to get as deep as possible to the core of a person who struggles with what she is doing to the world and to herself. My Men is a literary achievement of the highest order' - De Standaard, 5 stars
£13.49
Pushkin Press The MANIAC
Book Synopsisthe author of When We Cease to Understand the World: a dazzling, kaleidoscopic book about the destructive chaos lurking in the history of computing and AI 'Monstrously good... Reads like a dark foundation myth about modern technology but told with the pace of a thriller' Mark Haddon John von Neumann was a titan of science. A Hungarian wunderkind who revolutionized every field he touched, his mathematical powers were so exceptional that Hans Bethe - a Nobel Prize-winning physicist - thought he might represent the next step in human evolution. After seeking the foundations of mathematics during his youth in Germany, von Neumann emigrated to the United States, where he became entangled in the power games of the Cold War; he designed the world's first programmable computer, invented game theory, pioneered AI and digital life, and helped create the atomic bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He was the darling of the military industrial complex, but when illness unmoored his mind, his work pushed further into areas beyond human comprehension and control. The MANIAC places von Neumann at the center of a literary triptych about the dark foundations of our modern world and the nascent era of AI. It begins with Paul Ehrenfest, an Austrian physicist and close friend of Einstein, who fell into despair when he saw science and technology become tyrannical forces; it ends a hundred years later, in the showdown between the South Korean Go Master, Lee Sedol, and the AI program AlphaGo. Braiding fact with fiction, Benjamín Labatut takes us on a journey to the frontiers of rational thought, where invention outpaces human understanding and offers godlike power, but takes us to the brink of Armageddon.Trade Review'Monstrously good... Reads like a dark foundation myth about modern technology but told with the pace of a thriller' - Mark Haddon'Labatut's voice comes from the future, to free us from the curse of our present' - Wolfram Eilenberger, author of 'Time of the Magicians''Darkly intelligent and feverishly propulsive' -Observer'Brooding, heady... addictively interesting... gripping, provocative' - Wall Street Journal'Virtuosic... Labatut is that vanishingly uncommon thing: a contemporary writer of thrilling originality... The MANIAC is a work of dark, eerie and singular beauty' -Washington Post'You just throw up your hands and think, Who cares what discourse label we assign this stuff? It's great...' -New York Times'If you've yet to sample Labatut, stop wasting time. Get on the Labatut train.' -BookMunch'Talent, ambition, skill, intelligence - [are] present in abundance.' -Guardian, Book of the Day'Captivating' -Irish Times'Thrilling - and chilling [...] A gripping read.' -Marie Claire, Best Books of 2023'A dark, strange novel by a rising literary star' -New Scientist'Intoxicating... this marvel of a book, which inspires awe and dread in equal measure, is stalked by the greatest terrors of the 20th century, yet its final heart-stopping sentence makes clear the greatest terrors are yet to come' -Daily Mail'As addictive as a true crime tale' -Mail on Sunday'Absorbing... perfect for anyone thirsting for more nuclear anxiety after watching Oppenheimer... reads like the physicist Carlo Rovelli crossed with the cosmic horror of HP Lovecraft' -Chris Power, Sunday Times'Both entertains and provokes... [Labatut's] infernal vision of science captures something of the unsettling vertigo of living right here in the Anthropocene after all' -TLS'Emerging as the most significant South American writer since Borges... there is no one writing like him anywhere in the world' -Interview in the Telegraph'Brilliantly cerebral'- 5*Sunday Telegraph'Praise for' - When We Cease to Understand the World:'A monstrous and brilliant book' - Philip Pullman'Mesmerising and revelatory' - William Boyd
£18.00
Troubador Publishing Delphy Rose
Book SynopsisMeet Delphy Rose: thirty-eight, a SEN teacher, and happily single. After a chance encounter with Ben, she is transported back to more carefree times when both were in a local post-punk band, The Thistles. They can’t help but fall in love, but things are complicated: Ben is married and has changed. Delphy is fragile and has a secret. A young, working class, ambitious Delphy dreamt of Uni. She immersed herself in and escaped through the explosion of eighties’ alternative music. As a mature woman, Delphy recalls first loves, friendships, bust ups, colourful characters, the gigs, the parties. Through the memories of Delphy’s younger days, full of hilarious escapades, Delphy Rose recounts the journey of a woman trying to find her way through and out of a difficult, coercive relationship with issues on both sides. She must realise that while Ben is the key, he is perhaps not the answer to healing past traumas. Can she resolve the pain of her past with her final song?
£11.39
Troubador Publishing Into the Abyss
Book SynopsisAn eight-year-old orphan is living off the streets and through the kindness of strangers. His home is a shack in the slums of Kinshasa. Harbouring deep feelings, and wants of a better life. He plans his escape which he must accomplish against all the odds. Soon he gets the opportunity, a charming stranger presents an opportunity to him. He makes his escape but does not get what was promised. For he has now found his way, not in a family home, but a coltan mine. The kind stranger was a child trafficker who would lure his victims with outrageous promises of a better life. Over the years to come, the orphan despite being so young, would work as hard as any adult. This served however, to make him stronger. He would learn about life, and about what is tearing his country apart. Into the Abyss tells the story of an orphan, born in the slums of Kinshasa, who escapes only to find himself trapped in a coltan mine. But where this life would take him, would be anyone’s guess. Set in The Congo, this is a book about conflict, poverty, dreams, hope, and generosity.
£8.54
The Lilliput Press Ltd Thirsty Ghosts
Book SynopsisEmer Martin’s is a radical, vital voice in Irish writing, as she challenges the history of silence, institutional lies, evasion and the mistreatment of women across mid-to-late twentieth-century Ireland. Two families inhabit this immersive polyvocal work, an intergenerational saga announced with The Cruelty Men (2018) and continued here as punk rockers and Magdalene laundries spiral into a post-colonial Ireland still haunted by its tribal undertow. Scenes surface from Ireland’s mythological past, Tudor plantations, workhouses and industrial schools, the Troubles laid bare, the transformative pre-digital decades playing out in this propulsive narrative. Thirsty Ghosts is epic in scope while intimate in focus. The Lyons, professionals in a newly independent state, are attacked by paramilitaries in their family home in Tyrone. The eccentric O’Conaills of Kerry, traumatized by displacement, find themselves in leafy Dublin 4. We encounter a servant who meets Henry VIII, a Lithuanian Jewish family who become part of the fabric of Dublin, and a wild young girl who escapes the laundry only to stumble into a psycho pimp. Related with dark humour, verve and high literary style, Thirsty Ghosts is a revelatory exploration of Ireland combining themes of power, class, fertility, violence and deep love, forces as universal as the old stories that permeate and illuminate each character’s life.Trade Review‘Kevin Curran's spiky, polyphonic, multi-ethnic tale of four Balbriggan teenagers, Youth, scratches an itch for modern urban grit … I hunger for more of this.’ Sunday Independent‘An unstoppable tour de force … Martin’s work is extremely important; it provides a portal for people who want to learn more about Ireland and its complex and convoluted history.’ Atticus Review'An untamed dreamtime held together by stories, this is a wild river-run of a novel about Ireland’s dark histories, narrated in the merry voice we associate with Emer Martin, one of our truly original writers. Her wry humour gives the grimmest stories an exuberant buoyancy. And seldom has English as spoken in Ireland – from rural Tyrone to south Dublin suburbia – been so perfectly conveyed on the page.’ Éilís Ní Dhuibhne'Emer Martin casts a cold eye on Ireland and the Irish in this layered narrative which ranges from myths to myth-busting over the comforting fictions we tell ourselves.’ Martina Devlin‘Inventive, freewheeling and utterly fearless, Thirsty Ghosts delves into the Irish psyche with no holds barred. An incisive and intriguing novel.’ Christine Dwyer Hickey‘There is ambition and then there is the Great Irish Novel kind of ambition that is in Emer Martin's Thirsty Ghosts … It is a fine balance of the savagely funny and heartbreaking.’ THE BOOKSELLER‘To say Emer Martin’s fifth novel is epic would be an understatement. With the literary flair and love of language to match its ambition, it is breathtaking in its scope … The writing and the tangled, intergenerational stories flow beautifully. Each sentence, each word is in service of the tragically comic, the wonderfully epic story of Ireland.’ SUNDAY INDEPENDENT ‘A new book from Emer Martin is always a big deal … Emer is a singular voice’ Derek O'Connor, RTÉ‘Emer Martin’s fourth novel, The Cruelty Men, was my book of the year in 2018, a searing account of one Irish family’s tribulations at the hands of church and state in the last century. Thirsty Ghosts revisits some of the same characters, albeit from a slightly different perspective. … There is a raw and savage humour here … Flann O’Brien shot through with Guillermo del Toro. Martin’s use of language is superb, from the comedic colloquialisms of rural accents with one character having “a face on her like a pig licking piss off a nettle”, to the lyrical and poetic where ghosts are likely to live “inside the grimy guts of the gloom of nights”. Thirsty Ghosts is also epic in scope. Martin skilfully juxtaposes the bloodletting of the recent and the distant past in a glorious bid to capture the power of story itself as a means to push back the darkness. A wild, magnificent book.’ SUNDAY BUSINESS POST‘Emer Martin knows how to tell a story. Martin’s writing has a well-earned reputation of literary merit. Her latest, Thirsty Ghosts, is an epic work of multigenerational lived truth. It follows two families, and the hag—Ireland. It’s angry, beautiful and important. … Martin sees the ghosts. She gives voice to people who weren’t listened to, and that’s what makes this book so incredibly powerful. She shows us what a difference it makes to be poor, to be rich, to be impotent against the evils.’ BOOKS IRELAND‘Emer Martin’s novel is a fierce indictment of the collusion in 20th-century Ireland between church and state. … Martin specializes in contemporary stories of exile, family dysfunction and the Irish diaspora. [She] offers a searingly unsentimental view of modern Ireland.’ AMERICA MAGAZINE‘There are very few books that I find myself compulsively recommending to absolutely everyone I know. Emer Martin’s formidable Thirsty Ghosts is one of these few. … Martin has managed to capture an emotional history of Ireland since the birth of time — in just one novel. … It is a story of missed chances, of childhood, of politics and power, of inherited pain, of familial love, but most of all it is a story of stories — the mythology that connects us, that supports us and that keeps us alive.’ TOTALLY DUBLIN ‘A sprawling, epic powerhouse of a read’ ANNE CUNNINGHAM, MEATH CHRONICLE
£15.20
Peepal Tree Press Ltd Ocean Stirrings: A Work of Fiction in Tribute to
Book SynopsisThe mother of the revolutionary firebrand Malcolm X was a Grenadian woman born at the turn of the 20th century in a small rural community in a deeply colonial society where access to education had only just begun for the children of working people. She emigrated to Canada and then the USA, where she became involved in the struggle for Black dignity and human rights then led by Marcus Garvey and the Universal Negro Improvement Association. Malcolm X and others of his siblings have testified to their mother's powerful influence on their lives. Within the sparse facts of Louise Langdon Norton Little's biography, Merle Collins, the distinguished Grenadian novelist, has created a moving and deeply feminist work of fiction that gives vivid inwardness to both the heroism and tragedy of a life that involved fighting the Ku Klux Klan, discovering that male comrades in the struggle could be abusers at home, recognition of her skills as an organiser, but also a period of mental collapse that saw her incarcerated in a mental hospital until her family fought for her release. What Merle Collins dramatizes is the meeting of a collective struggle for equal rights with an individual life profoundly shaped by growing up with her forceful matriarchal grandmother and by her schooling. In the classroom she meets teachers who show Oseyan, Louise's family name, how to turn the imperialist ideology of her schoolbooks on its head. These are the contexts of Oseyan's life, but what Merle Collins most profoundly gives us is its breathing texture, through a mix of fictive narrative, letters and poetry, with episodes of great warmth, exuberant humour and drama, as well as the pathos of separation from community.
£14.39
HarperCollins Publishers Accordion Crimes
Book SynopsisThe third novel from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of ‘The Shipping News’, ‘Accordion Crimes’ spans generations, continents and a century and confirms the hallucinatory power of Proulx’s writing. ‘Accordion Crimes’ is a masterpiece of story-telling that spans a century and a continent. It opens in 1890 in Sicily, when an accordion-maker and his son, carrying little more than his finest button accordion, begin their voyage to the teeming, violent port of New Orleans. Within a year, the accordion-maker is murdered by an anti-Italian lynch mob, but his instrument carries the novel into another community of immigrants: German-Americans founding a new town in South Dakota. Moving from South Dakota to Texas, from Montana to Maine, the nine instantly compelling and intricately connected sections of the novel illuminate the lives of the founders of a nation, descendants of Mexicans, Poles, Germans, Irish, Scots and Franco-Canadians. Through the music of the accordion they express their fantasies, sorrows and exuberance.Trade Review‘This novel confirms Proulx as one of the greatest American writers.’ Independent ‘The detail is breathtaking, her ear for dialogue matchless, her observation unsentimental, her pace infectious. She tackles death, sex and the gruesome with black hilarity and the skills of a born storyteller. Rich and dense, “Accordion Crimes” is a splendid novel.’ The Times ‘Annie Proulx has written an epic social history of America and the plight of the immigrant, which is astonishing in its breadth, heroic in the scale of its ambition and brilliant in its manner of realising them.’ Daily Mail ‘The glorious richness of the language continually makes you pause in wonder, the details pile up and surround you.’ Scotsman ‘Her range and scope are tremendous, shuttling through the warp of multiple cultures and spanning, by the end, a hundred years. And it is the range of detail that grips, richly concrete.’ Spectator ‘Vigorous, salty and extraordinary.’ The Times
£13.49
Leamington Books Vlad
Book SynopsisThe sewers of Bucharest, Romania, Christmas 1989. Vlad and other Securitate secret police comrades fan out across a city about to fall to counter-revolution. The show trial and execution of Nicolae and Elena Ceausescu are broadcast on television. Vlad, raised as an assassin in a Securitate orphanage in Targoviste, home of Vlad the Impaler, vows to avenge the death of his adoptive ‘parents’ in that very town. Moving from safe-house to safe-house, with help from remnants of the regime, he begins to pick off those involved in the murders. Vlad wanders around the new Romania, observing the turning of coats, the miners’ rampages, meeting other post-communist undead. As European integration and a ‘fully functioning market economy’ beckon, he carves, quite literally, a lucrative and grisly niche. Love and fatherhood remain a possibility. But Vlad, like the stray dogs and street walkers he frequents, knows that life is becoming increasingly dangerous. As one victim exclaims: ‘God does not love the workers!’.
£10.44
Book Guild Publishing Ltd Mine
Book SynopsisWhen is enough, enough? High-powered Sophie Taylor thinks baby-making can happen on the fly. Managed alongside work, marriage, an MBA and travel, she decides to launch Project Bébé. Successful at everything, Sophie expects and always scores one hundred per cent. That is until the shocking failure of one fertility treatment after the next. As the heart-breaking reality of infertility sinks in, Sophie owns up to another almost unspeakable loss and faces difficult decisions when she’s targeted as the love interest of a high-powered financier. Through a colleague, a mother of four, she learns that motherhood is not all it’s cracked up to be. Just as Sophie feels satisfied with the advantages of a childfree lifestyle, a fateful meeting changes everything… Triumphant, joyous and full of hope, Mine is a captivating story about a less understood route to motherhood: the fertility option Sophie almost forgot.
£9.49
Rhiza Press The Pounamu Prophecy
Book Synopsis
£9.49
Trivent Publishing Theosis
Book SynopsisTheosis offers a captivating trajectory of the life of Byzantine Emperor Basil II (976–1025), taking the reader into the intricate history of the Byzantine Empire at the peak of the Macedonian dynasty. Using authentic narratives and documentation as evidence to vividly depict life and politics at the Byzantine court, Harris in parallel traces a unique story of Basil's personal transformations from coming of age and emerging sexuality to his consolidation of power. Exploring Basil's homoerotic desires, Harris draws us in to consider familiar, seemingly modern, possibilities of queer identity without losing sight of the profound distance between Byzantine sexual cultures and our own. For the Byzantine view of rulership, another transformation represented the purpose of emperor's life. According to this ideology, theosis/deification was attainable only through a synergy of human activity and God's energies – but, how did this ideology frame Basil's views of rulership, other people and himself? Set against the backdrop of complex political events that affected the imperial dynasty, family intrigue and his early childhood losses, Harris explores the layers of Basil's conflicted selfhood, sexual subjectivity, and ultimately his desire for vengeance. This becomes the tragedy of Basil's story– despite his vast potential for goodness and self-awareness, his experiences leave him compromised, delighting in the extermination of those who have wronged him. It is this vengeance, and the transformation in him that allows it, that is now Basil's devastating theosis.(Dr. Justin Bengry, Lecturer in Queer History and Director of the Centre for Queer History, Goldsmiths University of London)Historical fiction is always a risky business. Jonathan Harris's debut novel, however, successfully overcomes the obstacles and meticulously builds a complex story set in a period that was perhaps the least covered subject of literature, especially fiction. Following Emperor Basil II on his path to deification, one can feel the atmosphere of ''Secretum'' or ''Imprimatur'' by the author duo Monaldi & Sorti, or even Madeline Miller's ''The Song of Achilles'', while exploring the vast palette of love, death, friendship, treason, and political turmoil from a thousand years ago. Harris grasps some controversy but never falls into sentimentality, which can often be a trap, especially for writers. Theosis is just a perfect text to be turned into a film or even a mini-series. (Ozren K. Glaser, mag. litt. comp., author, composer, filmmaker, cultural ambassador)Table of Contents Main Characters Maps CHAPTER 1. The Caretaker and the Ambassador (1024) CHAPTER 2. Kainourgion (958-63) CHAPTER 3. Boukoleon (963-9) CHAPTER 4. Philopation (969) CHAPTER 5. The Caretaker and the Spy (1020) CHAPTER 6. Paideia (970-4) CHAPTER 7. Hebdomon (975) CHAPTER 8. The Caretaker and Nobody (1024 CHAPTER 9. Lausiakos (975-6) CHAPTER 10. Apostoleion (976-83) CHAPTER 11. Petrion (983-4) CHAPTER 12. Dekanneakoubita (984-5) CHAPTER 13. The Ambassador and the Emperor (1024) CHAPTER 14. Abydos (985-9) CHAPTER 15. Chrysis Cheiros (989-1024) CHAPTER 16. The Ambassador and the Spy (1024) Historical Note
£17.05
HarperCollins India Kashmir: The Partition Trilogy
£13.49
