Fiction: literary and general non-genre

Book SynopsisGathered from throughout Stead's career, these stories are a reminder of his deft storytelling and literary power. They are clever, sensual, wry and beautifully written, with Stead's subtle sense of humour evident at every turn.The collection can be read as a meditation on the writerly life, and includes a number of new, previously unpublished stories, including Last Season's Man, which won the Sunday Times EFG Short Story Award, as well as older stories that have been revised and rewritten. Set in locations as diverse as the South of France, Sydney, Zagreb, Auckland, San Francisco and Oxford, each story is vividly drawn.This extraordinary collection, along with Stead's history as New Zealand Poet Laureate (2015-17), confirms his position as an exceptionally talented writer.

Read more less

Book SynopsisWelcome to Dillon's world; a world where murderous poultry and evolutionary elephants make their mark. He takes you from the darkness of the illustrated Man and Jif Lemons to the laugh out loud Bunch of c***s. These stories are instantly accessible and always personal. Relationships, places and language are set precisely with few words and no flinching. If you're an alchoholic, recovering alcoholic, insane, a policeman, prisoner, gold digger, farmer, animal lover, Scots or Irish Scots you may well recognise yourself somewhere in this book.

Read more less

Book SynopsisManny Riley is a recovering alcoholic and struggling scriptwriter with a serious anger management problem. Lately, though, things have started to change for the better. A happy marriage, a move away from Glasgow to an idyllic seaside village and the adoption of Bailey, a lurcher with epilepsy. He'll soon find that these things only open up a whole new world of problems he'll have to face up to. And he has to do it all without losing his temper.Trade Review'Written in a vernacular style that is raw, immediate and affecting, My Epileptic Lurcher vividly evokes the vibrant, Scots-Irish storytelling tradition from which Dillon emerged.' THE BIG ISSUE'A tale about the wonder of all those things that only at first glance appear to be small, this novel is a valuable and welcome reminder of the importance of that second look.' THE STIRLING OBSERVER‘Dillon has enjoyed a great deal of success in his writing career so far, but something tells me that this book will reach more people, and touch them more deeply, than any of his works to date.' THE HERALD

Read more less

Book SynopsisAn experimental novel on a grand scale, beautifully carried through. A Perth minister takes in a traumatised stranger who calls himself 'the son and heir to being lost'. When the stranger disappears, the events leading up to and following on from this are revealed. Shifting perspectives from a contemporary mystery to a history of Shetland and emigration, it extends the idea of Scottish empire and diaspora imaginatively, while addressing notions of being and belonging in 21st century Scotland.Trade ReviewA work of complexity, a novel to be savoured and one that will only get better with age. NEW SHETLANDER Jamieson achieves something quite extraordinary [he] combines a compelling modern mystery with 500 years of history in a typically experimental style that leaves many of his contemporaries lagging THE LIST Robert Alan Jamieson's strange masterpiece Da Happie Laand haunts dreams and waking hours, as it takes my adopted home of Shetland, twisting it and the archipelago's history into the most disturbing, amazing slyly funny shapes. THE SUNDAY HERALD

Read more less

Book SynopsisFor the first time in years Gussie can run, climb and jump. Every breath she takes is easier now, and every step more confident, but Gussie can't help wondering about her doner. Was she young? Had she been very sick or was there an accident? And with her new life comes a whole new set of problems. She is going back to school at last - but she doesn't know anyone her own age, with the exception of Siobhan, the girl she hates most in the world. With school not meeting up to her expectations, Gussie turns to her old pastimes of bird watching and photography, but troubling news awaits her there too. And the lightning strikes and Gussie must act at once.Trade Review'The world of life and death, beauty and truth seen through the eyes of a 12 year old girl. A rare and beautiful book of lasting quality - we felt this book is a voice that needs to be heard and read.' COSTA AWARD JUDGES on The Bower Bird 'lyrical, funny, full of wisdom - ' THE GUARDIAN on The Bower Bird 'Gussie will win the hearts of readers - ' SCHOOL LIBRARY JOURNAL

Read more less

Book SynopsisAn experimental novel on a grand scale, beautifully carried through. A Perth minister takes in a traumatised stranger who calls himself 'the son and heir to being lost'. When the stranger disappears, the events leading up to and following on from this are revealed. Shifting perspectives from a contemporary mystery to a history of Shetland and emigration, it extends the idea of Scottish empire and diaspora imaginatively, while addressing notions of being and belonging in 21st century Scotland.Trade ReviewA work of complexity, a novel to be savoured and one that will only get better with age. NEW SHETLANDER Jamieson achieves something quite extraordinary [he] combines a compelling modern mystery with 500 years of history in a typically experimental style that leaves many of his contemporaries lagging THE LIST Robert Alan Jamieson's strange masterpiece Da Happie Laand haunts dreams and waking hours, as it takes my adopted home of Shetland, twisting it and the archipelago's history into the most disturbing, amazing slyly funny shapes. THE SUNDAY HERALD

Read more less

Book SynopsisTime is running out for four-year-old Sebastian Zair. A rare blood disorder means that a stem-cell transplant is his only hope of surviving past childhood. His mother places her trust in the Pemberton Fertility Centre and a controversial IVF procedure which will allow her to select an embryo that is the same tissue type as Sebastian - to create a saviour sibling. But what she doesn't know is that the sword of Damocles is hanging over the Pemberton. A Nigerian couple, the Opakanjos, have just given birth to twins through IVF, but only one is their biological child. Someone has made a monumental mistake. With a major enquiry under way and pro-life campaigners on the warpath, both families are faced with agonising personal choices as well as the intrusions of an unscrupulous journalist. Will they break under the strain? Will Sebastian survive?Trade ReviewThere are very few novels which deal with the issues of contemporary medical ethics in the lively and intensely readable way which Hazel McHaffie's books do. - ALEXANDER McCALL SMITH McHaffie's books are skillfully written to bring out the complex ethical issues we as doctors, nurses, patients, or relatives, may face in dealing with difficult issues... These books are a welcome development of what has been called the narrative turn in medical ethics. - THE BRITISH MEDICAL JOURNAL

Read more less

Book SynopsisFelix walks the same way to work through Southampton every morning, and the same way home again in the evenings. His life up to this point feels like one day repeated over and over; a speck of silt caught in the city's muddied waters. Sometimes it is all he can do to sit and watch while the urban sprawl races indifferently around him. But when the city stares back at him, one evening after work, everything changes.He doesn't see the statue's head move, but he feels its eyes on him, studying him from its lofty perch in East Park. From then on he continues to glimpse it, or something like it, encroaching with every visitation. With it come memories, spilling through the streets, crawling through the dark, haunting his night-time flat, until he isn't quite sure what is real anymore and what is imagined, in this hard, grey place where the gulls watch him sleep...Trade Review“...a unique story and I appreciated that, along with the beautiful writing. Very thought provoking novel.” - Ana Carter, Reviewer, Canada“Featherbones ... is beautifully written, with almost lyrical prose. It’s the kind of book that sets the mood early and it can be a bit overwhelming in its greyness. Stay with it and you will be rewarded by a well plotted story that twists and wanders so many places. If you like Magical Realism with a touch of Psychological Suspense, this book will delight you. I think it would make an interesting book discussion selection.” - Janet Kinsella, Tacoma Public Library, USA"Featherbones is an ethereal love song to a city by the sea. Thomas Brown's beautiful novel depicts a liminal world of statues, drownings and winged creatures. It's also a real page turner. I love this book."- Rebecca Smith, author of The Bluebird Cafe"This is an exquisitely written novel; deft, poised, and with a writer's ear for the rhythms of the world around us.Featherbones does the always-difficult job of making the strange familiar, while asking us to attend again to the things we think we know." - William May, author and lecturer"I loved the use of language, I loved the story and above all I loved the constant sensation that I was walking on the top of the dividing wall between reality and dream and imagination and past and present and future. I want to live on that wall for the rest of my life." Bookrazy blog"What to call this experience? Magical realism doesn't quite fit right. Magical-psychological-philosophical-realism. Maybe. This is a book that will be unlike any other that you have read. "There are some very well crafted passages in this book, and some amazing uses of language. It is really the beautiful language, in my opinion, that makes this a book worth the time to read and share with others. I liked the characters ... the way the story developed and the way the reader is never quite sure if what is happening is actual reality or just the imaginings of a confused mind. "If you enjoy reading books that make you think, and make you wonder at the author's ability to turn every day ordinary into something else, something a bit more extraordinary, then I recommend this book to you." - Ionia Martin, Readful things blog“In Southampton, England, a grey, rain-filled place, the story of Felix, and Michael’s set. Repeating patterns, like grey days, the same walk through the city every morning and evening, and the sight of birds, characterize the book. What if birds were human, or humans became birds? Remember the classic on Icarus and his father Daedalus, the creator of the labyrinth?“It’s exactly this fate and circumstance that Thomas Brown as author throws his readers in while reading Featherbones. There seems no way out of this storyline. Dream and reality converge. It’s difficult to stay concentrated. Is the reference to the Titanic a clue? Will one of the main characters commit suicide, or turn into a bird at full moon? “...I’m impressed by the psychologically laden plot and the way a small world becomes even smaller throughout Featherbones.” - Henk-Jan van der Klis, Reviewer, Netherlands"'Featherbones' is the second of Thomas Brown's novels that I have read and I think that I enjoyed this more than "Lynnwood", which I loved. Having made this statement, however, the book is going to be hard to review without telling readers too much about the plot. "Felix, the main character, is a young graduate, living his rather mundane life in Southampton. The highlight of his week is his Friday night drinking binge with his workmate and long-time friend, Michael. All seems fairly commonplace, until an event acts as a trigger for Felix to fall, swoop, descend into unreality. "The novel looks back to Felix's traumatic childhood - so many events that could lead to an uncertain future for Felix's mental health. Looking into the past, we meet Felix's father, his teacher, his very best friend, Harriet and a man who was supposed to be helping Felix overcome his disturbed childhood. "What I love about this novel is that it works on several levels and is open to different interpretations. For me, it is about guilt, repression, sexuality and the need for each of us to know ourselves. It is about acceptance, love and trust. "Thomas Brown writes such beautiful prose; 'Featherbones' is worth reading for this alone. However there is much more to appreciate - a fine, thought-provoking novel." - Angela Thomas, Reviewer, UK

Read more less

Book SynopsisDanny is in trouble. A wannabe animal rights activist and modern day hero, none of this was supposed to happen. After his first attempt at animal liberation ends badly, things go rapidly downhill. In the supermarket where he works his behaviour is becoming more erratic and a number of people, including his boss (a big Jim Davidson fan), a Goth grocery girl (and also teenage poet) and a security guard (enough said) are all out to get him. The woman he loves, Shona, is becoming more extreme by the minute and when they hook up with some hunt saboteurs she’s more interested in digging up human graves and stealing the remains than saving foxes. Danny doesn’t waste his time at the hunt either – thanks to him the fox gets torn to pieces. It’s treble or nothing time, and next week the Circus is coming to town.Trade ReviewAn entertaining romp that challenges your preconceptions of a world often steeped in mystery. JONATHON WHITELAW, The Sun -- Jonathon Whitelaw * The Sun *

Read more less

Book SynopsisA Book of Secrets is the story of a woman named Susan Charlewood living in Elizabethan England. Born in what is now Ghana, Susan is enslaved by the Portuguese but later rescued by British sailors, who bring her to England. Once in England, she is raised and educated in an English Catholic household.When Susan comes of age, the family marry her off to an older Catholic man, John Charlewood. Charlewood runs a printing press and uses it to supply the Papist nobility with illegal Catholic texts and foment rebellion amongst the Catholic underclass. When Charlewood dies, Susan takes over the business and uses her new position to find out more about her origins.A look at racial relationships on the eve of the beginning of the transatlantic slave trade, A Book of Secrets is a revealing and compelling glimpse into a fraught time.

Read more less

Book SynopsisMasked in the tradition of the literary confession as practiced by such writers as St. Augustine and Rousseau, this "autobiography" purports to be the candid account of its narrator's private views and feelings as well as an acknowledgement of the central secret of his life: that though he lives as a white man, he is, by heritage and experience, an African American. Tracing his journey from the South to the North and from America to Europe and back again, the narrator's first hand experiences on both sides of the colourline intimately demonstrates the qualities of race that are both established yet mutable. An important exploration into identity and how to establish it, Autobiography of an Ex-Coloured Man is a timeless and vital novel.

Read more less

Book SynopsisCan Gala resist the ties that bind, or will she be drawn once more into a world skewed by fear and suspicion? To avoid being caught in the web of her father’s self-delusion, she fled to another continent.Now she has returned, she must confront the unbearable weight of her past. A flawed father is seen clearly at last through his daughter’s eyes in a multi-layered narrative that echoes the shifts and loops of memory.Delicately drawn in fragments of memory, Pelmanism is a moving journey of self-discovery. With her father’s breakdown, Gala finds herself pulled back into the toxic family dynamics she thought she had eluded. Through ripples of the past, we begin to piece together the reality of a family that has lived a lie for as long as she can remember. But what kind of truth can memory really offer?

Read more less

Book SynopsisWhen Jessica, a grieving widow, inherits an antique mall from her mother she also inherits the stallholders, an elderly, amoral, acquisitive, and paranoid collection. When one of the vendors, a wily ex-con named Roxy, shoots her ex-husband, she calls on Jessica to help bury the body and soon Jessica is embroiled in cover-ups, lies, and misdirection. Into this mix comes Lizzie, Jessica’s late husband’s twelve-year-old daughter by his first marriage, who’s been dumped on Jessica’s doorstep by the child’s self-absorbed mother and it soon becomes apparent that Lizzie is as obsessed with material possessions as Jessica’s elderly tenants. Why Stuff Matters is a compelling ode to possession, why people like things and the curious lengths they will go to keep them. Returning to her fictional Caprock, Waldo turns her wry wit on the lives of those afraid to let go.

Read more less

Book Synopsis• Shortlisted for the 4th Virginia Prize for Fiction - a biennial fiction prize for women writing in English. • A poignant historical novel about loss and self-discovery told with compassion and unflinching honesty. • Set in 1988 and 2010, and in three countries: Poland, Britain and the US. • 1988 saw a massive wave of workers' strikes break out across Poland, which helped pave the way for the collapse of Communism across Eastern Europe over the next few years. • Incorporates family reminiscences, as both Ewa Dodd’s parents were part of the Solidarity movement in 1980s Poland.Trade Review“The Walls Came Down is the stunning debut novel from Ewa Dodd... Expertly written, the characters are well rounded... The poignancy of the story is extremely powerful, and left me with a warm feeling in my heart. Definitely a page turner.” White Shadow in the Basement “The Walls Came Down is a page-turner; an engaging and fast-paced story of a child disappearance that spans countries, systems and human frailties… Well written, The Walls Came Down is a gripping debut novel that brings another author to the excellent company of Polish-English writers such as Anya Lipska and Anna Taborska dark horror storytelling.” Katarzyna Zechenter, a poet, the author of In the Shadow of the Tree and a lecturer at UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies “The Walls Came Down is a tense and moving tale of love and loss that grips the reader from start to finish. Shifting between contemporary London and Chicago and the Solidarity strikes of 1988, this compelling story shows us how a momentary act of selfishness can ruin several lives. It is also a reminder that the collapse of communism started not in Germany or in the Soviet Union but in the shipyards and mines of Poland, where the workers faced down a dictatorship that claimed to rule in their name, just as the people of Leipzig later would in 1989.” Fiona Rintoul, journalist and author of the prize-winning The Leipzig Affair

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn the summer of 2006, a chance encounter on the London Underground finds eighteen-year-old Ali tagging along with a school friend and a mysterious girl to a club. The girl is Cece, and she seems to be everything Ali is not. For one night he is transfixed and transformed into someone who might belong. All he knows is he will remember it forever. In 2064, Ali takes his final flight out of the UK to Morocco, in a world upturned by climate collapse. He has a wife and a daughter, reasons to return. Yet Ali is willing to abandon everything to find Cece again, finally to recapture that long summer night when he was young, and to understand how the actions taken – and not taken - have changed all their lives. Luminous and full of longing, Constance is a novel of teenage fragility, male blindness and everyday complicity.

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn the summer of 2011, Gilbert Johnson, an Edinburgh antiquarian bookseller suffering from cancer who has only ever travelled via books before, decides to make one big journey while he is still fit enough – to British Columbia on the trail of an early settler he believes may have been his runaway grandfather, a man who went on to become important in the embryonic ‘Indian Rights’ movement of the 20th century. Flying over the Rocky Mountains he meets a fellow passenger, a Canadian woman, so beginning a relationship that ultimately carries the two of them deep into the interior of the province. macCLOUD FALLS is both an exploration of the Scottish colonisation of B.C., and a roadtrip romance full of humour, rich characters and incident in the shadow of impending death.Trade Review.

Read more less

Book SynopsisA face is nothing without its history. Gavin and Emma live in Manhattan. She’s a musician. He works in Artificial Intelligence. He’s good at his job. Scarily good. He’s researching human features to make more realistic mask-bots – non-human ‘carers’ for elderly people. When his enquiry turns personal he’s forced to ask whether his own life is an artificial mask. Delving into family stories and his roots in the Highlands of Scotland, he embarks on a quest to discover his own true face, ‘uniquely sprung from all the faces that had been’. He returns to England to look after his Grampa. Travels. Reads old documents. Visits ruins. Borrows, plagiarises and invents. But when Emma tells him his proper work is to make a story out of glass and steel, not memory and straw, which path will he choose? What’s the best story he can give her? A novel about the struggle for freedom and personal identity; what it means to be human. It fuses the glass and steel of our increasingly controlled algorithmic world with the memory and straw of our forebears’ world controlled by traditions and taboos, the seasons and the elements.Trade ReviewThis novel is about living, nothing less. A glorious adventure in voices, it sifts through memory and randomness, what we retain and do not, the vividness of the fragments that inexplicably linger in technicolour, and our own, never-outgrown, absurdity. It’s about land and water and fairies; the marvellous and the unavoidable, and what we fi nally, with due modesty, grasp as essential. An irrepressible, quite remarkable, joy - JANICE GALLOWAY

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe frustrated wife of a French-Tunisian plantation owner, a mysterious older woman, a world weary tomboy, an unhappy mistress, a Parisian factory worker destined for tragedy, an acrobat turned cabaret sensation – these are the women whose lives are linked by their relationship with one man – Ștefan Valeriu. Divided into four separate stories connected by one man, Women takes us from Ștefan’s amorous entanglements at an Alpine lake resort, to his life in Bucharest and Paris, as each of the women in his life opens up new worlds for him. Women is a hymn to love in all its forms, romantic or platonic, sometimes reckless, often glorious and always, ultimately, ephemeral.Trade Review'..these concise stories... showcase Sebastian's brilliant eye for emotional detail.' 'It's an edgy account of sexuality, desire, and the strictures of contemporary relationships... a compelling portrait of desire in its many convoluted manifestations.'--Kirkus Reviews "Kirkus Reviews" "Nothing I have read is more affecting than Mihail Sebastian's magnificent, haunting 1934 novel, For Two Thousand Years."--Phillipe Sands "The Guardian" He wonderfully captures the atmosphere of prewar Romania in all its complexity, all the beauty and the horror... I love Sebastian for his lightness, for his wit..."--John Banville "BBC4" 'His prose is like something Chekov might have written - the same modesty, candour, and subtleness of observation.'--Arthur Miller

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe stories in this collection are stories of the lives and struggles of a wonderful variety of characters living in the Maramures region, in the years leading up to a war that will suddenly and irretrievably destroy the pattern of their existence. The eerily shocking ending of many of these stories is the moment their protagonists climb on the cattle trains to be transported to Auschwitz; while leaving the tale of their often tragic fate unstated. Bruckstein’s works, novels, stories and plays, deal with the sometimes cruel, sometimes comic, lives of simple people whose fate is controlled by highly unpredictable forces. These he describes with understanding, compassion and forgiveness; smiling at the petty worries and trivialities that people take so seriously, while often remaining unaware of very real and existential dangers. He belongs to a generation so well described by the writer Czeslaw Milosz, in his book, The Captive Mind: “Few inhabitants of the Baltic States, Poland or Czechoslovakia, of Hungary or Romania, could summarize in a few words the story of their existence. Their lives have been complicated by the course of historic events”.

Read more less

Book SynopsisBanipal 69 opens by saluting in texts by two of its major authors, the city of Beirut that was devastated by the calamitous explosion at its port on 4 August: Beirutshima is a resounding and moving poem by the poet Abdo Wazen that describes vividly and painfully the sudden and awful moments of the destruction as “tongues of hellfire shot out” … “in a nightmare moment like eternity”, in a brilliant translation by Paul Starkey. Elias Khoury’s essay The City of Strangers begins by looking at the metaphor of Beirut as an apple, from Mahmoud Darwish’s poem “Beirut”, although it was “born a pine tree on the shores of the Mediterranean”, and how the explosion then sees “the monster bite through the metaphor’s back and tear the metaphor to pieces.”The main feature introduces nine new Arabic novels by authors from Tunisia, Oman, Bahrain, Algeria, Sudan, Qatar and Egypt. In a change from including a brief synopsis of a novel with the excerpts in translation, in this issue eight novels are fully reviewed alongside the translated excerpts while one includes an interview with the author.

Read more less

Book SynopsisGet ready to be thrilled by a brand new heroine, Ylva Norvahl.Fighter pilot Ylva Norvahl has returned to her hometown, Bodø, in Norway's frozen north where tension is escalating across the border with Russia. NATO has launched the "Arctic Blizzard" excercise, mobilising 60,000 soldiers, many of them American.All it takes is one false move to trigger a major political crisis, or even a war.When her plane is forced down over Russian territory, Ylva and the veteran U.S. Major John Evans must race against time across a frozen landscape to avoid capture by the Russian Spetsnaz special forces in pursuit. Complicating their journey is Evans' involvement with an American military contractor Titans Security which has its own agenda across international frontiers.As the hunt closes in, Ylva uses her local Sami knowledge to survive in the excruciating cold, and her family history reveals dark secrets of its own in this geopolitical game of chess.Trade Review'The best crime debut I have read – ever' -- Tor-Hammerø, Nettavisen'A Norwegian crime sensation. Bravo!' -- Catherine Krøger, Dagbladet'Grethe Bøe, and her main character Ylva are a refreshing and welcome addition to the Norwegian crime novel universe' -- Elin Brend Bjørhei, VG

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn 1937, F. Scott Fitzgerald was a troubled, uncertain man whose literary success was long behind him. In poor health, with his wife consigned to a mental asylum and his finances in ruin, he struggled to make a new start as a screenwriter in Hollywood. The last three years of Fitzgerald's life, often obscured by the legend of his earlier Jazz Age glamour, are the focus of Stewart O'Nan's heartfelt new novel. With flashbacks to key moments from Fitzgerald's past, the story follows him as he arrives on the MGM lot, falls in love with brassy gossip columnist Sheilah Graham, begins work on The Last Tycoon, and tries to maintain a semblance of family life with the absent Zelda and their daughter, Scottie. Fitzgerald's orbit of literary fame and the Golden Age of Hollywood is brought vividly to life through the novel's romantic cast of characters, from Dorothy Parker and Ernest Hemingway to Humphrey Bogart. Written with striking grace and subtlety, this wise and intimate portrait of a man trying his best to hold together a world that's flying apart, if not gone already, is an American masterpiece.Trade ReviewThe heart of the novel is his penetrating description of Fitzgerald's troubled self. * The Sunday Times *Some of O'Nan's most suggestive passages conjure the feeling of freefall that can accompany uncontrollable change. * Guardian *Mesmerising and haunting...The strings O'Nan pulls so deftly are really the mark of a consummate pro, along the lines of Fitzgerald himself. * Boston Globe *[A] gorgeous new novel... O'Nan is a writer alert to the courage and beauty inherent in the stories of people who simply have to keep on keeping on... "The Love of the Last Tycoon," even though unfinished, is a pretty fine Hollywood novel. "West of Sunset" is a pretty fine Hollywood novel, too, but it's an even finer novel about a great writer's determination to keep trying to do his best work, to keep reaching for "the silver pepper of the stars," even at a time when he was universally dismissed as a has-been. * Washington Post *O'Nan's adroitness with atmosphere and period detail makes Fitzgerald's dreams of creating worthy work, even with his best days behind him, absorbing and poignant. * The New Yorker *O'Nan is serious in his attempt to dig deep into Fitzgerald and his genius. And he does it rather affectingly... Scott's pain is palpable but O'Nan's prose glitters in response. * The Big Issue *O'Nan... skilfully pulls us into Fitzgerald's gilded and yet familiar world. He brings the Hollywood legends to life. By the end, they feel like friends. * Chicago Tribune *With West of Sunset, one brilliant American novelist has taken on another... big-hearted and fascinating. * Seattle Times *The beautifully realised Zelda sections strike a minor, elegiac chord...they let us imagine what it might have been like inside Fitzgerald's brilliant, tortured mind. * New York Times *A stunning account of F. Scott Fitzgerald's final years... With tremendous artistry, O'Nan shows in West of Sunset how one of the finest and most tragic American writers discovered not only a late creative lease on life but also a new love. * The Australian *A wonderfully intimate and gently absorbing book. It inhabits an era and a fine mind with great care, folding in details of Fitzgerald's life with subtle unhurried sympathy. * Wales on Sunday *O'Nan has written a wonderfully intimate and gently absorbing book. * Gloucestershire Echo *[He] brings depth and tenderness to the awkward love affair between Fitzgerald and the gossip columnist Sheilah Graham. * Mail on Sunday *Atmospheric West of Sunset re-imagines the last three troubled years of Fitzgerald's life... Stunning. * The Herald *The last three years of American writer F Scott Fitzgerald's life, often obscured by the legend of his earlier Jazz Age glamour, are the focus of Stewart O'Nan's heartfelt new novel. * Lincolnshire Echo *West of Sunset focuses on these last, darkly difficult years, folding in details of Fitzgerald's life with subtle, unhurried sympathy. The result is a fine portrait of grace under pressure and moral courage. * Burnley Express *

Read more less

Book SynopsisIt is London, 1880, and Lucas Jarmyn struggles to make sense of the death of his beloved youngest daughter; his wife, Aurora, seeks solace in rigid social routines; and his eighteen-year-old daughter Dinah looks for fulfilment in unusual places. Only the housekeeper, the estimable Mrs Logan, seems able to carry on. A train accident in a provincial town on the railway Lucas owns claims the life of a young child and, amid the public outcry, a father journeys to London demanding justice. As he arrives in the city on a frozen January morning he finds a family with a terrible secret tearing their lives apart.Trade ReviewAs the days get colder and darker, nothing warms me more than a period novel. Reminiscent of Kate Summerscale and set in the Victorian era, two men of very different social classes both lose their daughters in tragic accidents. * Red *Maggie Joel's new novel takes us upstairs, downstairs and into the darkest corners of a Victorian household... If you like robust dramas with the occasional dash of dark humour, then you will love this. * Daily Telegraph (Sydney) *A page-turner full of detail and colour. * Saturday Age *A sombre but fascinating tale. * The Australian *

Read more less

Book SynopsisSisters Hester and Harriet are reluctantly driving to visit relatives when they come across a young woman hiding with her baby in a bus shelter. Seeing the perfect excuse for returning to their own warm hearth, the pair insist on bringing Daria and Milo home with them.But with the arrival of a sinister stranger looking for a girl with a baby, followed quickly by their cousins' churlish fifteen-year-old son, Ben, who also appears to be seeking sanctuary, Hester and Harriet's carefully crafted peace and quiet quickly begins to fall apart. And, perhaps, that's exactly what they need...Trade ReviewThe gentle humour and relaxed pace make this an enjoyable read. * Daily Mail *A delightfully British story... An engaging read. * Women's Weekly *Europe's refugee crisis, the criminal underground, adolescent mental health and the challenges of ageing are all part of this package, wrapped up in warm, off-beat humour and a twisting, turning plot that make this a winning read... Harriet and Hester are unforgettable characters and what appears at first to be yet another cosy village read, complete with brambles and apple pie, turns out to be so much more. * Brisbane News *A lighthearted read...with hilarious results. * Sunday Telegraph (Australia) *Spiers succeeds in her aim of "giving a voice to ordinary women in sometimes extraordinary circumstances". * Sydney Morning Herald *Hold on to your teacups - you're about to fall head over heels for Hester and Harriet. * The Westerner *[Hester and Harriet] may well be my favourite characters of the year. -- Jamie Ashbird * Newtown Review of Books *Meet Hester and Harriet: two hilarious widowed sisters. * Canberra Times *Hester and Harriet is one of those books that is just so fun to read. The characters are absolutely amazing. * The Galaxial World *An enjoyable read. * Newcastle Herald *Spiers has created a lovely holiday or weekend read here with smart, funny and quirky main characters who go on a journey of discovering things they didn't even realise were missing from their lives. This is an easy, entertaining read perfect for long summer days or that rainy Saturday afternoon. * Queensland Times *

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less