Narrative theme: coming of age
Random House USA Inc The Only Story
Book SynopsisFrom the bestselling, Booker Prize-winning author of The Sense of an Ending comes “a brilliant, rueful look at love—what we do for it, how we experience it and what makes it die” (People). One summer in the sixties, in a staid suburb south of London, nineteen-year-old Paul comes home from university and is urged by his mother to join the tennis club. There he’s partnered with Susan Macleod, a fine player who’s forty-eight, confident, witty, and married, with two nearly adult daughters. She is a warm companion, her bond with Paul immediate. And soon, inevitably, they are lovers. Basking in the glow of one another, they set up house together in London. Decades later, Paul looks back at how they fell in love and how—gradually, relentlessly—everything fell apart. As he turns over his only story in his mind, examining it from different vantage points, he finds himself confronted with the contradictions and slips
£999.99
Random House USA Inc Dual Citizens Vintage Contemporaries
Book SynopsisA Scotiabank Giller Prize FinalistRaised in Montreal by their disinterested single mother, half-sisters Lark and Robin form a fierce team in spite of their differences. When Lark flees to America to attend college, her sister soon joins her. But even as Lark discovers a calling working in documentary film, she struggles with self-doubt, and Robin chafes against the demands of studying piano at Juilliard. Their bond strains under increasing pressure until it breaks.Years later, Lark’s life is in tatters and Robin’s is wilder than ever. As Lark tries to take charge of her destiny, she discovers that despite the difficulties of their relationship, there is only one person she can truly rely on: her sister.A gripping, unforgettable novel about art, ambition, sisterhood, motherhood, and self-knowledge, Dual Citizens captures the unique language of sisters and makes visible the imperceptible strings that bind us to the ones we love for
£14.40
Random House USA Inc The Den
Book Synopsis“A lush and luminous gem of a novel: The Den is a book with depth and mystery and soul.” —Chris Bohjalian, author of The Red LotusSisters Henrietta and Jane are fifteen and twelve, growing up in a farmhouse on the outskirts of a small New England town. When Henrietta becomes obsessed with a local boy, Jane takes to trailing the young couple, spying on their trysts. Until one night, Henrietta vanishes into the woods.A century and a half earlier, sisters Elspeth and Claire are separated by an ocean: Elspeth’s pregnancy at seventeen meant she was quickly married and sent to America to avoid certain shame. But when she begins ingratiating herself with a wealthy mill owner, a series of wrenching and violent events unfold, culminating in her disappearance.Each in their own times, Jane and Claire must search for their missing sisters beneath the watchful eyes of their shared small town. With echoes of The Scarlet Letter
£14.41
Alfred A. Knopf Beloved Special Edition
Book Synopsis
£21.84
Penguin Putnam Inc Where the Crawdads Sing
Book Synopsis#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING PHENOMENON—NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE!More than 18 million copies sold worldwideA Reese’s Book Club PickA Business Insider Defining Book of the Decade “I can''t even express how much I love this book! I didn''t want this story to end!”—Reese Witherspoon“Painfully beautiful.”—The New York Times Book ReviewFor years, rumors of the “Marsh Girl” have haunted Barkley Cove, a quiet town on the North Carolina coast. So in late 1969, when handsome Chase Andrews is found dead, the locals immediately suspect Kya Clark, the so-called Marsh Girl. But Kya is not what they say. Sensitive and intelligent, she has survived for years alone in the marsh that she calls home, finding friends in the gulls and lessons in the sand. Then the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. When two young men from town become intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new life—until the unthinkable happens.Where the Crawdads Sing is at once an exquisite ode to the natural world, a heartbreaking coming-of-age story, and a surprising tale of possible murder. Owens reminds us that we are forever shaped by the children we once were, and that we are all subject to the beautiful and violent secrets that nature keeps.
£19.99
Random House USA Inc A Deadly Education
Book SynopsisNEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ? From theauthor of Uprooted and Spinning Silver comes the first book of the Scholomance trilogy, the story of an unwilling dark sorceress who is destined to rewrite the rules of magic.FINALIST FOR THE LODESTAR AWARD ? ?The dark school of magic I?ve been waiting for.??Katherine Arden, author of the Winternight TrilogyI decided that Orion Lake needed to die after the second time he saved my life.Everyone loves Orion Lake. Everyone else, that is. Far as I?m concerned, he can keep his flashy combat magic to himself. I?m not joining his pack of adoring fans. I don?t need help surviving the Scholomance, even if they do.Forget the hordes of monsters and cursed artifacts, I?m probably the most dangerous thing in the place. Just give me a chance and I?ll level mountains and kill untold millions, make myself the dark queen of the world. At least, that?s what the world expects.Most of the other students in here would be delighted if Orion killed me like one more evil thing that?s crawled out of the drains. Sometimes I think they want me to turn into the evil witch they assume I am. The school certainly does. But the Scholomance isn?t getting what it wants from me. And neither is Orion Lake. I may not be anyone?s idea of the shining hero, but I?m going to make it out of this place alive, and I?m not going to slaughter thousands to do it, either. Although I?m giving serious consideration to just one.With flawless mastery, Naomi Novik createsa school bursting with magic like you?ve never seen before,anda heroine for theages?acharacter so sharply realizedand so richly nuanced that she will live on in heartsand minds for generations to come.The magic of the Scholomance trilogy continues in The Last Graduate and The Golden Enclaves?The can?t-miss fantasy of fall 2020, a brutal coming-of-power story steeped in the aesthetics of dark academia. . . . A Deadly Education will cement Naomi Novik?s place as one of the greatest and most versatile fantasy writers of our time.??BookPage (starred review) ?A must-read . . . Novik puts a refreshingly dark, adult spin on the magical boarding school. . . . Readers will delight in the push-and-pull of El and Orion?s relationship, the fantastically detailed world, the clever magic system, and the matter-of-fact diversity of the student body.??Publishers Weekly (starred review)
£22.40
Random House USA Inc When We Were Sisters
Book SynopsisLONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD ? ?This exquisite debut wrestles with gender, siblinghood, family, and what it means to be Muslim in America?all through the lens of love.??Time ?Haunting . . . a knife-sharp story of self-discovery.??PeopleWINNER OF THE CAROL SHIELDS PRIZE FOR FICTION ? ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New Yorker, NPR, Time, Vox, PopSugar, Autostraddle In this heartrending, lyrical debut work of fiction,the acclaimed author of If They Come for Us traces the intense bond of three orphaned siblings who, after their parents die, are left to raise one another. The youngest, Kausar, grapples with the incomprehensible loss of their parents as she also charts out her own understanding of gender; Aisha, the middle sister, spars with her ?crybaby? younger sibling as she desperately tries to hold on to her sense of family in an impossible situation; and Noreen, the eldest, does her best in the role of sister-mother while also trying to create a life for herself, on her own terms.As Kausar grows up, she must contend with the collision of her private and public worlds, and choose whether to remain in the life of love, sorrow, and codependency that she?s known or carve out a new path for herself. When We Were Sisters tenderly examines the bonds and fractures of sisterhood, names the perils of being three Muslim American girls alone against the world, and ultimately illustrates how those who?ve lost everything might still make homes in one another.LONGLISTED FOR THE ASPEN WORDS LITERARY PRIZE AND THE CENTER FOR FICTION FIRST NOVEL PRIZE
£15.30
Random House USA Inc What the Fireflies Knew
Book SynopsisAn NAACP Image Award NomineeLonglisted for the Center for Fiction's First Novel PrizeA Marie Claire Book Club pickNamed a Most Anticipated Book of 2022 by *Marie Claire* *Teen Vogue* *Buzzfeed* *Essence* *Ms. Magazine* *NBCNews.com* *Bookriot* *Bookbub* and more! “Harris rewrites the coming-of-age story with Black girlhood at the center.”—New York Times Book ReviewIn the vein of Jesmyn Ward's Salvage the Bones and Sue Monk Kidd's The Secret Life of Bees, a coming-of-age novel told by almost-eleven-year-old Kenyatta Bernice (KB), as she and her sister try to make sense of their new life with their estranged grandfather in the wake of their father's death and their mother's disappearance An ode to Black girlhood and adolescence as seen through KB's eyes, What the Fireflies Knew follows KB after her father dies of an overdose a
£14.45
Penguin Putnam Inc Where the Crawdads Sing Deluxe Edition
Book SynopsisA beautiful, deluxe edition of the #1 New York Times bestseller—with over 15 million copies sold—that will make the perfect holiday gift or treat for yourself. A Reese Witherspoon x Hello Sunshine Book Club PickA Business Insider Defining Book of the Decade“I can't even express how much I love this book! I didn't want this story to end!”—Reese WitherspoonAt once an exquisite ode to the natural world, a heartbreaking coming-of-age story, and a surprising tale of possible murder, Where the Crawdads Sing has touched the hearts of millions of readers around the world, and this beautiful deluxe edition features: • new, personal note from the author • updated linen jacket with foil • foil-stamped case with cloth spine • four-color endpapers • premium interior
£28.00
Random House USA Inc Brown Girls
Book SynopsisNEW YORK TIMES EDITORS? CHOICE ? A ?boisterous and infectious debut novel? (The Guardian) about a group of friends and their immigrant families from Queens, New York?a tenderly observed, fiercely poetic love letter to a modern generation of brown girls.?An acute study of those tender moments of becoming, this is an ode to girlhood, inheritance, and the good trouble the body yields.??Raven Leilani, author of LusterFINALIST: The New American Voices Award, The Carol Shields Prize for Fiction, The VCU Cabell First Novelist Award, The New American Voices Award, The Center for Fiction First Novel PrizeONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: PopSugar, Kirkus ReviewsIf you really want to know, we are the color of 7-Eleven root beer. The color of sand at Rockaway Beach when it blisters the bottoms of our feet. Color of soil . . .Welcome to Queens, New York,where streets echo with languages from all over the globe, subways rumble above dollar stores, trees bloom and topple over sidewalks, and the funky scent of the Atlantic Ocean wafts in from Rockaway Beach. Within one of New York City?s most vibrant and eclectic boroughs, young women of color like Nadira, Gabby, Naz, Trish, Angelique, and countless others, attempt to reconcile their immigrant backgrounds with the American culture in which they come of age. Here, they become friends for life?or so they vow.Exuberant and wild, together they roam The City That Never Sleeps, sing Mariah Carey at the tops of their lungs, yearn for crushes who pay them no mind?and break the hearts of those who do?all while trying to heed their mothers? commands to be obedient daughters. But as they age, their paths diverge and rifts form between them, as some choose to remain on familiar streets, while others find themselves ascending in the world, beckoned by existences foreign and seemingly at odds with their humble roots.A blazingly original debut novel told by a chorus of unforgettable voices, Brown Girls illustrates a collective portrait of childhood, adulthood, and beyond, and is a striking exploration of female friendship, a powerful depiction of women of color attempting to forge their place in the world today. For even as the conflicting desires of ambition and loyalty, freedom and commitment, adventure and stability risk dividing them, it is to one another?and to Queens?that the girls ultimately return.
£14.45
Penguin Putnam Inc Come and Get It A GMA Book Club Pick
Book Synopsis
£23.20
Random House USA Inc The Final Strife
Book Synopsis
£18.00
Random House USA Inc Black Cake A Read with Jenna Pick
Book Synopsis
£22.40
Penguin Putnam Inc Checkout 19
Book Synopsis
£14.45
Random House USA Inc Body Grammar
Book SynopsisA coming-of-age queer love story set in the glamorous but grueling world of international modeling—a terrific debut ... roiling with deep questions of identity and art, love, and the irrepressible need for meaning in life (Jess Walter, bestselling author of The Cold Millions)By the time Lou turns eighteen, modeling agents across Portland have scouted her for her striking androgynous look. Lou has no interest in fashion or being in the spotlight. She prefers to take photographs, especially of Ivy, her close friend and secret crush. But when a hike ends in a tragic accident, Lou finds herself lost and ridden with guilt. Determined to find a purpose, Lou moves to New York and steps into the dizzying world of international fashion shows, haute couture, and editorial shoots. It’s a whirlwind of learning how to walk and how to command a body she’s never felt at ease in. But in the limelight, Lou begins to fear that she’s losin
£11.78
Random House USA Inc The Magic Kingdom
Book SynopsisFrom one of America’s most beloved storytellers: a dazzling tapestry of love and faith, memory and imagination that questions what it means to look back and accept one’s place in history. In 1971, Harley Mann revisits his childhood, recounting his family's move to Florida’s swamplands—mere miles away from what would become Disney World—to join a community of Shakers.“Eerily timely. Can what’s gone wrong in the past offer keys to the future? The Magic Kingdom confronts our longings for Paradise; also the inner serpents that are to be found in all such enchanted gardens.” —Margaret Atwood, author of The Testaments, via TwitterProperty speculator Harley Mann begins recording his life story onto a reel-to-reel machine, reflecting on his youth in the early twentieth century. He recounts that after his father’s sudden death, his family migrated down to Florida to join a Shaker colony. Led
£15.30
Random House USA Inc Sea Change
Book SynopsisA NEW YORK TIMES MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK • An enchanting novel about Ro, a woman tossed overboard by heartbreak and loss, who has to find her way back to stable shores with the help of a giant Pacific octopus at the mall aquarium where she works.“Immersively beautiful.... A kaleidoscope of originality. —Weike Wang, acclaimed author of Joan is OkayRo is stuck. She''s just entered her thirties, she''s estranged from her mother, and her boyfriend has just left her to join a mission to Mars. Her days are spent dragging herself to her menial job at the aquarium, and her nights are spent drinking sharktinis (Mountain Dew and copious amounts of gin, plus a hint of jalapeño). With her best friend pulling away to focus on her upcoming wedding, Ro''s only companion is Dolores, a giant Pacific octopus who also happens to be Ro''s last remaining link to her father, a marine biologist who disappeared while on an expedition when Ro was a teenager.When Dolores is sold to a wealthy investor intent on moving her to a private aquarium, Ro finds herself on the precipice of self-destruction. Wading through memories of her youth, Ro realizes she can either lose herself in the undertow of reminiscence, or finally come to terms with her childhood trauma, recommit to those around her, and find her place in an ever-changing world.
£14.45
Alfred A. Knopf The Magic Kingdom
Book SynopsisFrom one of America’s most beloved storytellers: a dazzling tapestry of love and faith, memory and imagination that questions what it means to look back and accept one’s place in history. In 1971, Harley Mann revisits his childhood, recounting his family's move to Florida’s swamplands—mere miles away from what would become Disney World—to join a community of Shakers.“Eerily timely. Can what’s gone wrong in the past offer keys to the future? The Magic Kingdom confronts our longings for Paradise; also the inner serpents that are to be found in all such enchanted gardens.” —Margaret Atwood, author of The Testaments, via TwitterProperty speculator Harley Mann begins recording his life story onto a reel-to-reel machine, reflecting on his youth in the early twentieth century. He recounts that after his father’s sudden death, his family migrated down to Florida to join a Shaker colony. Led
£24.00
Alfred A. Knopf The Romantic
Book SynopsisFrom the award-winning, internationally best-selling author, a beguiling romp of a novel, at once intimate and panoramic, about the adventures and misadventures of a nineteenth-century everymanPicaresque, big-hearted and moving, this is Boyd at the top of his game. —The Guardian One man, many lives . . . Cashel Greville Ross experiences more of everything than most, from the rapturous to the devastating, from surprising good luck to unexpected loss. Born in 1799, Cashel seeks his fortune across the turbulence of multiple continents, from County Cork to rural Massachusetts, from Waterloo to Zanzibar, embedded with the East Indian Army in Sri Lanka, sunning himself alongside the Romantic poets in Pisa. He travels the world as a soldier, a farmer, a felon, a writer, even a father. And he experiences all the vicissitudes of existence, including a once-in-a-lifetime love that will haunt the rest of his days. In the end, his great acco
£24.00
Penguin Putnam Inc The Circus Train
Book SynopsisInternational Bestseller and #1 LibraryReads PickWater for Elephants meets The Night Circus in this World War II debut about a magnificent travelling circus, a star-crossed romance, and one girl’s coming-of-age during the darkest of times.“A powerful reminder that to live is not just to survive, but to be seen and known for ourselves.” —Pam Jenoff, author of The Orphan’s TaleWhen all is lost, how do you find the courage to keep moving forward? 1938. Lena Papadopoulos has never quite found her place within the circus, even as the daughter of the extraordinary headlining illusionist, Theo. Brilliant and curious, Lena—who uses a wheelchair after a childhood bout with polio—yearns for the real-world magic of science and medicine, her mind stronger than the limitations placed on her by society. Then her unconventional life takes an exciting turn when she rescues Alexand
£15.30
Penguin Putnam Inc Where the Crawdads Sing Reeses Book Club
Book SynopsisNOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTUREThe #1 New York Times bestselling worldwide sensation with more than 15 million copies sold, “a painfully beautiful first novel that is at once a murder mystery, a coming-of-age narrative and a celebration of nature” (The New York Times Book Review).For years, rumors of the “Marsh Girl” have haunted Barkley Cove, a quiet town on the North Carolina coast. So in late 1969, when handsome Chase Andrews is found dead, the locals immediately suspect Kya Clark, the so-called Marsh Girl. But Kya is not what they say. Sensitive and intelligent, she has survived for years alone in the marsh that she calls home, finding friends in the gulls and lessons in the sand. Then the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. When two young men from town become intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new life—until the unthinkable happens.Where the Crawdads Sing is at once
£12.00
Penguin Putnam Inc Valley Verified
Book Synopsis
£12.82
Diversified Publishing Recitatif
Book SynopsisA beautiful, arresting story about race and the relationships that shape us through life by the legendary Toni Morrison.In this 1983 short story--the only short story Morrison ever wrote--we meet Twyla and Roberta, who have known each other since they were eight years old and spent four months together as roommates in St. Bonaventure shelter. Inseparable then, they lose touch as they grow older, only later to find each other again at a diner, a grocery store, and again at a protest. Seemingly at opposite ends of every problem, and at each other''s throats each time they meet, the two women still cannot deny the deep bond their shared experience has forged between them. Another work of genius by this masterful writer, Recitatif keeps Twyla''s and Roberta''s races ambiguous throughout the story. Morrison herself described Recitatif, a story which will keep readers thinking and discussing for years to come, as an experiment in the removal of all r
£16.20
Diversified Publishing Black Cake A Read with Jenna Pick
Book SynopsisNOW A HULU STREAMING SERIES • NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • READ WITH JENNA BOOK CLUB PICK AS FEATURED ON TODAY • Two estranged siblings delve into their mother’s hidden past—and how it all connects to her traditional Caribbean black cake—in this immersive family saga, “a character-driven, multigenerational story that’s meant to be savored” (Time). “Wilkerson transports you across the decades and around the globe accompanied by complex, wonderfully drawn characters.”—Taylor Jenkins Reid, New York Times bestselling author of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Daisy Jones & The Six, and Malibu RisingONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: Oprah Daily, NPR, BuzzFeed, Glamour, PopSugar, Book Riot, She ReadsWe can’t choose what we inherit. But can we choose who we become? In present-day California, Eleanor Bennett’s death leaves behind a puzzling inheritance for her two children, Byron and Benny: a black cake, made from a family recipe with a long history, and a voice recording. In her message, Eleanor shares a tumultuous story about a headstrong young swimmer who escapes her island home under suspicion of murder. The heartbreaking tale Eleanor unfolds, the secrets she still holds back, and the mystery of a long-lost child challenge everything the siblings thought they knew about their lineage and themselves.Can Byron and Benny reclaim their once-close relationship, piece together Eleanor’s true history, and fulfill her final request to “share the black cake when the time is right”? Will their mother’s revelations bring them back together or leave them feeling more lost than ever?Charmaine Wilkerson’s debut novel is a story of how the inheritance of betrayals, secrets, memories, and even names can shape relationships and history. Deeply evocative and beautifully written, Black Cake is an extraordinary journey through the life of a family changed forever by the choices of its matriarch.
£24.00
Diversified Publishing The Violin Conspiracy
Book SynopsisGOOD MORNING AMERICA BOOK CLUB PICK! • Ray McMillian is a Black classical musician on the rise—undeterred by the pressure and prejudice of the classical music world—when a shocking theft sends him on a desperate quest to recover his great-great-grandfather’s heirloom violin on the eve of the most prestigious musical competition in the world.“I loved The Violin Conspiracy for exactly the same reasons I loved The Queen’s Gambit: a surprising, beautifully rendered underdog hero I cared about deeply and a fascinating, cutthroat world I knew nothing about—in this case, classical music.” —Chris Bohjalian, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Flight Attendant and Hour of the WitchGrowing up Black in rural North Carolina, Ray McMillian’s life is already mapped out. But Ray has a gift and a dream—he’s determined to become a w
£24.00
Penguin Putnam Inc Paper Princess
Book SynopsisThe TikTok sensation Paper Princess, the first in the #1 New York Times bestselling The Royals series, now in a new special edition with bonus material!From strip clubs and truck stops to southern coast mansions and prep schools, one girl tries to stay true to herself.These Royals will ruin you…Ella Harper is a survivor—a pragmatic optimist. She’s spent her whole life moving from town to town with her flighty mother, struggling to make ends meet and believing that someday she’ll climb out of the gutter. After her mother’s death, Ella is truly alone. That is until Callum Royal appears, plucking Ella out of poverty and tossing her into his posh mansion among his five sons who all hate her. Each Royal is more magnetic than the last, but none is as captivating as Reed Royal, the boy who is determined to send her back to the slums she came from. Reed doesn’t want her. He says
£14.45
Penguin Putnam Inc Broken Prince
Book SynopsisThe TikTok sensation Broken Prince, the second in the #1 New York Times bestselling The Royals series, now in a new special edition with bonus material!From wharf fights and school brawls to crumbling lives inside glittery mansions, one guy tries to save himself.These Royals will ruin you…Reed Royal has it all—looks, status, money. The girls at his elite prep school line up to date him, the guys want to be him, but Reed never gave a damn about anyone but his family until Ella Harper walked into his life.What started off as burning resentment and the need to make his father’s new ward suffer turned into something else entirely—keep Ella close. Keep Ella safe. But when one foolish mistake drives her out of Reed’s arms and brings chaos to the Royal household, Reed’s entire world begins to fall apart around him.Ella doesn’t want him anymore. She says they’ll only destroy each other
£14.45
Penguin Putnam Inc Fallen Heir
Book SynopsisThe TikTok sensation Fallen Heir, the fourth in the #1 New York Times bestselling The Royals series, now in a new special edition with bonus material!With everything against them, they don''t stand a chance—not until they fight for what they really want.These Royals will ruin you…Easton Royal has it all: looks, money, intelligence. His goal in life is to have as much fun as possible. He never thinks about the consequences because he doesn’t have to. Until Hartley Wright appears, shaking up his easy life. She’s the one girl who’s said no, despite being attracted to him. Easton can’t figure her out and that makes her all the more irresistible. Hartley doesn’t want him. She says he needs to grow up. She might be right. Rivals. Rules. Regrets. For the first time in Easton’s life, wearing a Royal crown isn’t enough. He’s about to
£14.45
Penguin Putnam Inc Cracked Kingdom
Book SynopsisThe TikTok sensation Cracked Kingdom, the last in the #1 New York Times bestselling The Royals series, now in a new special edition with bonus material!From a whirlwind romance to an unforgettable tragedy, two teenagers face their cruelest test yet.These Royals will ruin you…Ever since Hartley Wright met Easton Royal, her life hasn’t been the same. There are enemies behind every corner and dangers beyond each door. When tragedy strikes and steals her memories, she can’t trust anyone, not even the blue-eyed boy who promises her that everything will be all right.Because while Hartley’s memory is full of gaps, her instincts tell her Easton is dangerous. She doesn’t know if he’s the snake in the garden or her chance at salvation. The chaos he brings wherever he goes is too much to handle, the intense feelings he evokes are too confusing to unravel.Easton wants her to remember. Hartley thi
£12.50
Diversified Publishing Earths the Right Place for Love
Book SynopsisThis beautiful new novel by the beloved author of Open House and Talk Before Sleep tells the story of two young people growing up in Mason, Missouri, and how Arthur Moses, a shy young man, becomes the wise and compassionate person readers loved in The Story of Arthur Truluv.Nola McCollum is the most desirable girl in Arthur’s class, and he is thrilled when they become friends. But Arthur wants far more than friendship. Unfortunately, Nola has a crush on the wrong Moses—Arthur’s older brother, Frank, who is busy pursuing his own love interest and avoiding the boys’ father, a war veteran with a drinking problem and a penchant for starting fights. When a sudden tragedy rocks the family’s world, Arthur struggles to come to terms with his grief. In the end, it is nature that helps him to understand how to go on, beyond loss, and create a life of forgiveness and empathy. But what can he do about Nola, who seems confused about
£21.75
Penguin Putnam Inc Five Years from Now
Book SynopsisIn the spirit of Colleen Hoover and Josie Silver’s One Day in December, a heartbreaking story of star-crossed, fated love, and two people who are brought together and torn apart every five years until they must make a choice that’s bigger than their lives alone.A love stronger than distance. A fate determined by time. Nell and Van meet as children when their parents fall in love. They become best friends and each other’s whole world. Then tragedy strikes and Van is sent to the other side of the globe.Five years later, they find each other again. But they’re no longer children and the bond between them smolders into flames. New feelings surprise them both. They are destined, soulmates. Until an untimely discovery tears them apart again.For the next two decades, fate brings Nell and Van together every five years, even as life and circumstance divide them. They will have to make a choice, but it’s bi
£14.45
Penguin Putnam Inc We Must Be Brave
Book SynopsisTHE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERA powerful story that proves how love itself requires courage. --Delia Owens, author of Where the Crawdads SingSpanning World War II and the sweep of the twentieth century, We Must Be Brave explores the fierce love that we feel for our children and the power of that love to endure. Beyond distance, beyond time, beyond life itself.A woman. A war. The child who changed everything.December 1940. As German bombs fall on Southampton, England during World War II, the city's residents flee to the surrounding villages. In Upton village, amid the chaos, newly married Ellen Parr finds a girl asleep, unclaimed at the back of an empty bus. Little Pamela, it seems, is entirely alone.Ellen has always believed she does not want children, but when she takes Pamela into her home, the child cracks open the past Ellen thought she had escaped and the future she and her husband Selwyn had dreamed for the
£15.30
Penguin Putnam Inc The Lincoln Highway
Book Synopsis#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER More than ONE MILLION copies soldA TODAY Show Read with Jenna Book Club PickA New York Times Notable Book, and Chosen by Oprah Daily, Time, NPR, The Washington Post, Bill Gates and Barack Obama as a Best Book of the Year“Wise and wildly entertaining . . . permeated with light, wit, youth.” —The New York Times Book Review “A classic that we will read for years to come.” —Jenna Bush Hager, Read with Jenna book club “Fantastic. Set in 1954, Towles uses the story of two brothers to show that our personal journeys are never as linear or predictable as we might hope.” —Bill Gates “A real joyride . . . elegantly constructed and compulsively readable.” —NPR The bestselling author of A Gentleman in Moscow a
£24.00
Penguin Putnam Inc The Spirit of Science Fiction
Book SynopsisFrom a master of contemporary fiction, a tale of bohemian youth on the make in Mexico CityTwo young poets, Jan and Remo, find themselves adrift in Mexico City. Obsessed with poetry, and, above all, with science fiction, they are eager to forge a life in the literary world--or sacrifice themselves to it. Roberto Bolaño's The Spirit of Science Fiction is a story of youth hungry for revolution, notoriety, and sexual adventure, as they work to construct a reality out of the fragments of their dreams.But as close as these friends are, the city tugs them in opposite directions. Jan withdraws from the world, shutting himself in their shared rooftop apartment where he feverishly composes fan letters to the stars of science fiction and dreams of cosmonauts and Nazis. Meanwhile, Remo runs headfirst into the future, spending his days and nights with a circle of wild young writers, seeking pleasure in the city's labyrinthine streets, rundown cafés, and m
£19.20
Vintage Canada A Town Called Solace
Book SynopsisNATIONAL BESTSELLERLONGLISTED FOR THE 2021 BOOKER PRIZENAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE GLOBE AND MAIL, CBC BOOKS AND THE DAILY TELEGRAPH I've been telling everyone I know about Mary Lawson . . . Each of her novels is just a marvel —Anne TylerNew York Times bestselling author Mary Lawson, acclaimed for digging into the wilderness of the human heart, is back after almost a decade with a fresh and timely novel that is different in subject but just as emotional and atmospheric as her beloved earlier work.A Town Called Solace, the brilliant and emotionally radiant new novel from Mary Lawson, her first in nearly a decade, opens on a family in crisis. Sixteen-year-old Rose is missing. Angry and rebellious, she had a row with her mother, stormed out of the house and simply disappeared. Left behind is seven-year-old Clara, Rose’s adoring little sister. Isolated by her parents&rsq
£14.40
Astra Publishing House The Ice Orphan
Book SynopsisThis third book in a cli-fi series from a nationally-recognized anthropologist explores a frozen future where archaic species struggle to survive an apocalyptic ice age.It’s been 925 summers since the Jemen introduced zyme, a bioluminescent algae, into the world’s ocean and unwittingly triggered an ice age that has consumed most of the planet. All but a handful of Jemen flew to the stars, but before they left, they recreated several extinct species that had thrived in the last ice age. After almost a thousand summers, the archaic hominins that struggle along the edges of massive glaciers are dwindling. All they have to save them is a dying quantum computer called Quancee and her student, a Denisovan man named Lynx.When the last Jemen, Vice Admiral Jorgenson, tells Lynx he’s going to dismantle Quancee and use her parts to create a new computer, Lynx is stunned. But while Lynx battles to save Quancee, the quantum computer has other priorities. BefTrade ReviewPraise for The Ice Lion"With this engrossing series launch, Gear conjures a vivid postapocalyptic world.... This mesmerizing adventure through a world destroyed by climate change is sure to have readers hooked." —Publishers Weekly"Gear brings her vast knowledge of prehistoric cultures to this climate-fiction tale with beautiful and engaging worldbuilding.... A loose, beautiful tapestry of a tale." —Kirkus Reviews"Written by both a master storyteller and scientist, it’s a chilling tale of a different climate change." —Amazing Stories"The icy setting, with its mountains and ocean, provide a cold backdrop to the warmth of the peoples, whose lives are going to be inescapably altered when paths cross and the past is excavated." —Whiskey with my Book
£22.95
Astra Publishing House The Ice Ghost
Book SynopsisNow in paperback, this second book in a cli-fi series from a nationally-recognized anthropologist explores a frozen future where archaic species struggle to survive an apocalyptic Ice AgeIn the brutal Ice Age caused by the ancient Jemen war, many archaic human species, including Denisovans and Homo erectus, hover on the verge of extinction. There seems no way out, until the greatest Neanderthal holy man, Trogon, has a vision. Legends say the truce that ended the old war left one hostage in the hands of the victorious rebels: the godlike Jemen leader known as the Old Woman of the Mountain. According to Trogon’s vision, only one person knows the location of that burial cave. Trogon must capture young Quiller and force her to lead him there…for the Old Woman may not be dead. She may only have been in stasis for a thousand summers, and when reawakened she will save them from oblivion. But according to the Denisovans—Quiller’s people&mdasTrade ReviewPraise for The Ice Lion"With this engrossing series launch, Gear conjures a vivid postapocalyptic world.... This mesmerizing adventure through a world destroyed by climate change is sure to have readers hooked." —Publishers Weekly"Gear brings her vast knowledge of prehistoric cultures to this climate-fiction tale with beautiful and engaging worldbuilding.... A loose, beautiful tapestry of a tale." —Kirkus Reviews"Written by both a master storyteller and scientist, it’s a chilling tale of a different climate change." —Amazing Stories"The icy setting, with its mountains and ocean, provide a cold backdrop to the warmth of the peoples, whose lives are going to be inescapably altered when paths cross and the past is excavated." —Whiskey with my Book
£15.30
McClelland & Stewart Inc. Who Has Seen the Wind
Book SynopsisHailed as a great Canadian classic on boyhood, Who Has Seen the Wind evokes the sheer immensity of the prairie landscape, from the relentless wind to the far reaches of the bright blue sky. Like children everywhere, Brian O’Connal is a curious sort, and with enchanting naïveté he bestows his unforgettable perspective on everything from gophers to God, from his feisty Scottish grandmother to his friends Ben and Saint Sammy, the town of Arcola’s local madman. This is no simple, forgettable novel: Mitchell gives readers a memorable glimpse into the ins and outs of small-town life during the Depression years, always through Brian’s eyes, and in doing so creates a poignant and powerful portrait of childhood innocence and its loss.
£14.25
Thomas Nelson Publishers Incredible Winston Browne
Book SynopsisBeloved writer Sean Dietrich---also known as Sean of the South---will warm your heart with this rich and nostalgic tale about community, kindness, and the meaning of the everyday incredible.Trade Review'Dietrich (Stars of Alabama) imbues plenty of Southern charm and colloquialisms in a read that will appeal to people of all genders, and especially to fans of small-town living. Readers who enjoy well-developed, realistic characters similar to those from Charles Martin and Lauren K. Denton will want to watch for more from this author.' * Library Journal *'Dietrich (Stars of Alabama) lovingly depicts 1950s small-town life in this excellent outing . . . Dietrich meshes mystery and romance beautifully in this moral tale about one man set on using what is left of his life to enrich the lives of others. Dietrich's fans will love this rip-roaring, dramatic inspirational.' * Publishers Weekly *Sean Dietrich's newest novel, The Incredible Winston Browne (Thomas Nelson 2021) reads as if it is a gift from Dietrich to his readers. It is singularly beautiful . . . The Incredible Winston Browne is a wonderful book, a tale of such gentleness and love that it cannot help but be uplifting even in the face of loss and death. The writing is consistently crisp with the occasional splash of dry wit and hints of poetry, and the plotting is a fresh return to the warmth of stories like those our grandparents might have told us on the porches on a summer night. * Southern Literary Review *
£19.76
Baker Publishing Group Missing Isaac
Book Synopsis2018 Christy Award Winner***There was another South in the 1960s, one far removed from the marches and bombings and turmoil in the streets that were broadcast on the evening news. It was a place of inner turmoil, where ordinary people struggled to right themselves on a social landscape that was dramatically shifting beneath their feet. This is the world of Valerie Fraser Luesse''s stunning debut, Missing Isaac.It is 1965 when black field hand Isaac Reynolds goes missing from the tiny, unassuming town of Glory, Alabama. The townspeople''s reactions range from concern to indifference, but one boy will stop at nothing to find out what happened to his unlikely friend. White, wealthy, and fatherless, young Pete McLean has nothing to gain and everything to lose in his relentless search for Isaac. In the process, he will discover much more than he bargained for. Before it''s all over, Pete--and the people he loves most--will have to blur the hard li
£20.34
New Directions Publishing Corporation Harbart
Book SynopsisThis beloved cult novel—about a young man who makes a business of relaying messages from the dead—is now in a sparkling English translationTrade Review"What is needed [now] is a kind of novel that attends to how society is being organized by certain vested interests; a novel that goes to the heart—rather, goes for the jugular—of the economic system itself. Harbart is prophetic of this tradition to come." -- 4Columns"Harbart is a haunted man—a victim-participant in the forward march of capitalism and of the impetus to assign significance to the pointlessness and chaos of material existence. Banerjee’s acrobatic translation is both enormously fun and true to the radical content." -- Asymptote"Harbart reads like Rainer Maria Rilke’s Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge set in Calcutta. Featuring a young man with an open channel to the dead who drinks and grieves to excess, it is a mosaic of manic and immersive episodes. It is a spinning drunken stumble through a city that feels menacingly sensual." -- Nate McNamara - Lit Hub"Often described as a ‘magic realist’ and compared with Bulgakov, Mr. Bhattacharya won the Sahitya Akademi award for Herbert, which many critics have called anarchic. He relentlessly wrote about the marginalized, the city streets, slums and dark alleys, using satire, dark humor, and fantasy to telling effect to highlight oppression and exploitation." -- The Hindu"Bhattacharya occupies an uneasy place in the pantheon of Bengali greats—celebrated, disillusioned, and most subversive." -- The Indian Express"Swift and strange, Harbart tells the story of its titular character, an orphan whose life is characterized by loss and longing: a sweeping view of the richness and the turmoil of Bengali culture, literature, and politics in the twentieth century." -- The New Yorker"A remarkable resurrection, one that erupts full-blooded, alive with laughter, stink and rage." -- John Domini - The Washington Post"An astonishing novel, zany, terrifying, and liberating in equal measure, by a writer who was a visionary." -- Siddharta Deb
£10.99
New Directions Publishing Corporation The Road to the City
Book SynopsisA magnificently stark book—within the smallness of one poor, muddled, provincial life, Natalia Ginzburg finds enormous pain and lossTrade Review"The voice of the Italian novelist and essayist Natalia Ginzburg comes to us with absolute clarity amid the veils of time and language. Ginzburg gives us a new template for the female voice and an idea of what it might sound like. This voice emerges from her preoccupations and themes, whose specificity and universality she considers with a gravitas and authority that seem both familiar and entirely original." -- Rachel Cusk"I’m utterly entranced by Ginzburg’s style—her mysterious directness, her salutary ability to lay things bare that never feels contrived or cold, only necessary, honest, clear. " -- Maggie Nelson"Her prose style is deceptively simple and very complex. Its effect on the reader is both calming and thrilling—that’s not so easy to do." -- Deborah Levy"A bleak and smarting read, a remarkable debut." -- Naomi Huffman - New York Times"Ginzburg’s view of family is so unsentimental, it’s visionary...The Road may be a small story about a small place, but Ginzburg’s clarity lends grandeur to Delia’s plight." -- Diane Josefowicz - Necessary Fiction"The youngest of five, Ginzburg writes like someone used to being interrupted, precisely observing daily life with a sibling’s affectionate revenge. Her work is marked by a kind of atmospheric pressure." -- Jessi Jezewska Stevens - 4Columns"Ginzburg has an incredible talent for depicting explosive clashes within families, integrating insight and humour into her narrative...this lemon of a book invites one to take a bite, to relish the burn." -- Catherine Xinxin Yu - Asymptote Journal"A blister of violence lurks tense beneath the words, the skin of it wearing thin, ready to be popped." -- Rhian Sasseen - LitHub
£15.19
New Directions Publishing Corporation The Halt During the Chase
Book SynopsisFinally back in print, a remarkable, hilarious coming-of-age novel from the cult classic writer Rosemary Tonks. Trade Review"For Tonks, love is its own thing, separate from both sex and its inverse, marriage, a dreaded vulnerability that could strike at any moment if one enjoys life a little too much." -- Audrey Wollen - The New Yorker"Writing like this—a bit of Rhys, a bit of Knut Hamsun, a bit of Wyndham Lewis, a bit of Muriel Spark, overlaying the everlasting Shakespeare/Austen/Brontë/ George Eliot marriage drama—is far too beautiful and accomplished to be kept off the shelf. It catches like nothing else the smogs, the rodentine genes, the murky post-War grays, the lurking sexual violence of London, between Hangover Square and Carnaby Street." -- Michael Hofmann - Poetry Magazine"Nobody writes about angsty women like Tonks." -- Daniella Fishman - The Millions"A clever, fishy little novel...all voice, half poetry and half snarl. " -- Mary Marge Locker - The New York Times"This is an exaggeratedly domestic novel, whose action unfolds in rooms gorged with furniture and objects, all brimming with meaning. Sophie knows how her mother is feeling based on the pitch of her iron’s hiss; clocks are always ticking or being wound when Philip is near or on the mind—he himself “had a clock buried in his flesh.” These objects, furnishings, and many, many articles of clothing are described with tender care and in vivid color." -- Ania Szremski - 4Columns""If Tonks’s literary career was on its deathbed when she wrote The Halt, her style was still brilliantly alive…The liquidity of Tonks’s sentences, the deftness of her humor, makes it hard to understand how writing became such a source of torment for her. Tonks left us with this odd child, this Frankensteined novel—a trembling, emotional, sensitive bildungsroman stitched inside a flashy comic-novel facade."" -- Leo Lasdun - Los Angeles Review of Books"Graceful prose, a devastatingly good ear for dialogue, a marvelous way with supporting characters—Sophie's mother, Philip's father, and their wise friend Pussy are carefully etched gems—and a sensibility which probes beneath her surface wit make Ms. Tonks a writer to conjure with." -- Publishers Weekly
£13.29
Random House USA Inc The Book of Love
Book SynopsisNATIONAL BESTSELLER • In the long-awaited first novel from short story virtuoso and Pulitzer Prize finalist Kelly Link, three teenagers become pawns in a supernatural power struggle. “A dreamlike, profoundly beautiful novel [that] pushes our understanding of what a fantasy novel can be.”—Amal El-Mohtar, The New York Times Book Review (Editors’ Choice) “Imagine a ring of David Mitchell and Stephen King books dancing around a fire until something new, brave, and wonderful rose up from the flames.”—Isaac Fitzgerald, Today (Spring Pick!)The Book of Love showcases Kelly Link at the height of her powers, channeling potent magic and attuned to all varieties of love—from friendship to romance to abiding family ties—with her trademark compassion, wit, and literary derring-do. Readers will find joy (and a little terror) and an affirmation that love goes
£24.80
Mercer University Press Piano Days
Book SynopsisTells the story of three boys growing up in the late 1950s and early 1960s in a small town doing the things young boys do; playing softball for the local church team, discovering girls, going to the record hop at the National Guard Armory on Saturday nights, and learning to drive while learning a little bit about life along the way.
£17.05
Persea Books Inc In the Between 21st Century Short Stories
Book Synopsis
£14.75
Random House Canada The Damages
Book SynopsisSharp and propulsive, The Damages is an engrossing novel set in motion by the disappearance of a student during an ice storm, and explores themes of memory, trauma, friendship, and identity.What I remember best about that week in January is trying to keep track of all the lies I told.1997: For Ros, starting university at Regis is an opportunity for reinvention—a chance to be seen as interesting, to be accepted by the in-crowd, and maybe even get a boyfriend. But when she meets her roommate, Megan, with her pleated jeans and horse-print bedding, she sees her as a social liability. Outside of their dorm room, Ros distances herself from Megan and quickly befriends the cool kids, seeking status at all costs. Just after winter break, an intense ice storm hits campus, triggering a reckless, days-long dorm party, during which Megan goes missing. Ros is blamed for the incident and abruptly dropped by her social circle, casting a shadow over the next two decades of her life.2020: Ros’s former partner, Lukas, the father of her eleven-year-old son, is accused of a sexual assault. The accusation brings new details of an old story to light, forcing Ros to revisit a dark moment from her past. Ros must take a hard look not only at the father of her child, but also at her own mistakes, her own trauma, and at the supposed liberal period she grew up in.The Damages is a page-turning, thought-provoking novel about the lies we tell other people and the lies we tell ourselves.
£16.11
Random House USA Inc The Gargoyle Hunters
Book SynopsisBoth his family and his city are crumbling when thirteen-year-old Griffin Watts stumbles headlong into his estranged father’s illicit architectural salvage business in 1970s Manhattan. Griffin clambers up the façades of tenements and skyscrapers to steal their nineteenth-century architectural sculptures—gargoyles and sea monsters, goddesses and kings. As his father sees it, these evocative creatures, crafted by immigrant artisans, are an endangered species in an age of sweeping urban renewal.Desperate for money to help his artist mother keep their home, and yearning to connect with his father, Griffin fails to see that his father’s deepening obsession with preserving the treasures of Gilded Age New York endangers them all.As he struggles to hold his family together and build a first love with his girlfriend on a sturdier foundation than his parents’ marriage, Griffin must learn to develop himself into the man he wants to become, and discern which parts of his life may be salvaged—and which parts must be let go.Hilarious and poignant, this critically acclaimed debut is both a vivid love letter to a vanishing city and an intimate portrait of father and son. And it solves the mystery of a stunningly brazen architectural heist—the theft of an entire landmark building—that made the front page of The New York Times in 1974. With writing both tender and powerful, The Gargoyle Hunters brings a remarkable new voice to the canon of New York fiction.
£14.41
