Narrative theme: interior life / psychological fiction

Book SynopsisIntroducing Little Clothbound Classics: irresistible, mini editions of short stories, novellas and essays from the world's greatest writers, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-SmithCelebrating the range and diversity of Penguin Classics, they take us from snowy Japan to springtime Vienna, from haunted New England to a sun-drenched Mediterranean island, and from a game of chess on the ocean to a love story on the moon. Beautifully designed and printed, these collectible editions are bound in colourful, tactile cloth and stamped with foil. A group of passengers on a cruise ship challenge the world chess champion to a match. At first, they crumble, until they are helped by whispered advice from a stranger in the crowd - a man who will risk everything to win. Stefan Zweig's acclaimed novella Chess is a disturbing, intensely dramatic depiction of obsession and the price of the past.

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Book SynopsisIntroducing Little Clothbound Classics: irresistible, mini editions of short stories, novellas and essays from the world''s greatest writers, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-SmithCelebrating the range and diversity of Penguin Classics, they take us from snowy Japan to springtime Vienna, from haunted New England to a sun-drenched Mediterranean island, and from a game of chess on the ocean to a love story on the moon. Beautifully designed and printed, these collectible editions are bound in colourful, tactile cloth and stamped with foil.Thirteen ingeniously crafted stories make up Vladimir Nabokov''s baker''s dozen. In some of these stories shadowy people pass through, cooped up by life, with nowhere to escape. In others, elusive glimpses of fleeting happiness, which flutter away before they can be snatched, waylay their victims. Like the shimmer of the sea, the gleam of a glass caught by the sun, these stories sparkle brilliantly only to dissolve

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Book SynopsisVladimir Nabakov''s shocking masterpiece, now in a beautifully designed clothbound edition''Lolita is comedy, subversive yet divine'' Martin AmisPoet and pervert, Humbert Humbert becomes obsessed by twelve-year-old Lolita and seeks to possess her, first carnally and then artistically, out of love, ''to fix once for all the perilous magic of nymphets''. Is he in love or insane? A tortured soul or a monster? Humbert Humbert''s seduction is one of many dimensions in Nabokov''s dizzying masterpiece, which is suffused with a savage humour and rich, elaborate verbal textures. Filmed by Stanley Kubrick in 1962 starring James Mason and Peter Sellers, and again in 1997 by Adrian Lyne starring Jeremy Irons and Melanie Griffith, Lolita has lost none of its power to shock and awe.

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Book SynopsisMARIE CLAIRE BEST BOOKS OF 2023''Funny, clever and unexpectedly profound - I couldn''t put it down'' Helena Attlee''It is remarkable how much information she can convey about Kitty's life . . . solely using wall labels'' IndependentPrized, collected, critiqued. One Woman Show revolves around the life of Kitty Whitaker as she is defined by her potential for display and moved from collection to collection through multiple marriages. Christine Coulson, who has written hundreds of exhibition wall labels for the Metropolitan Museum of Art, precisely distils each stage of Kitty''s sprawling life into that distinct format, every brief snapshot in time a wry reflection on womanhood, ownership, value and power.Described with wit, poignancy and humour over the course of the twentieth century, Kitty emerges as an eccentric heroine who disrupts her privileged, porcelain life with both major force and minor transgressions. As human foibles propel each delicately crafted text, Coulson playfully asks: who really gets to tell our stories?''Heartbreaking and funny . . . truly masterful and patient and insane, in the best way'' Leanne Shapton''Wry, humorous, poignant'' SpectatorTrade ReviewFunny, clever and unexpectedly profound - I couldn't put it down -- Helena Attlee * author of The Land Where Lemons Grow *Arch and wholly original, this is a pocket rocket of a novel. The economy with which Coulson manages to capture a life with equal amounts of both vigour and heartbreak is a stunning achievement. An irrepressible and timeless reflection on art, self and female objectification. -- Wiz WhartonA wonderfully clever concept, and a book that lends itself to being read in a single sitting, during which you’ll feel the corners of your lips curl upwards again and again . . . Coulson’s wry, often humorous, occasionally poignant commentary are moments of transgression and longing that show there’s more to our neoclassical heroine than her fine finish -- Chloe Ashby * The Spectator *Brilliant. Christine Coulson's tragicomedy of manners is an immense delight. Condensed into its witty format is the story of a life, a life like some I have known and others about which I have read. Coulson captures her character's gentle decline with the precision of Edith Wharton and evokes the eras she traverses with such clarity, even wisdom, describing a woman's changing (or unchanging) role in the world with an acuity that left this reader astonished time and again. -- Andrew Solomon * author of Far From the Tree *Short, clever . . . it is remarkable how much information she can convey about Kitty’s life . . . solely using wall labels -- Ann Levin * Independent *Heartbreaking and funny . . . Coulson's language is perfection . . . I love the pages of voices, like voices in the galleries, and so many moments made me laugh. Truly masterful and patient and insane, in the best way -- Leanne Shapton * author of Swimming Studies *A delight! This novel's formal audacity is an impressive feat of imagination. One Woman Show is a moving story of privilege, womanhood, and the sweep of the twentieth century told through a single American life. I loved this book -- Rumaan Alam * author of Leave the World Behind *Wildly original…[A] tiny but powerful novel… It’s sometimes snarky, sometimes sad, with enough poignant moments to make me wish it could go on and on. … You can sit down and read it in less time than it takes to drive to the art museum, but you’ll be thinking about it for far longer. If you appreciate truly original structure and storytelling, put this modern masterwork on your reading list. * NPR *Strange, biting, tender, and heartbreaking in turns. AND all at once . . . I read it in one fell swoop. It is brilliant -- Maira Kalman * author of Women Holding Things *A funny and clever take on the interchangeability of women and works of arts as possessions -- Philip Hook * author of Breakfast at Sotheby's *Beautiful, beautiful book . . . the cover is absolutely gorgeous, it would make a delicious Christmas gift * Art Juice Podcast *Coulson tells us Kitty Whitaker’s story stylishly and succinctly through label-length entries * Harper's Bazaar *Compulsive and spry -- Hephzibah Anderson * the Observer *Coulson’s formally inventive, witty novel uses gallery captions to capture Kitty’s journey through the 20th century. At once terse and expansive, this is a literary experiment that intrigues -- Francesca Peacock * the Mail on Sunday *A highly original and imaginative work that captivates and intrigues . . . so brief that it can be read straight through in an hour, but that is not to say it is slight . . . Coulson’s unusual command of language rewards multiple readings * The Irish Times *the writing is clever, witty and deftly – and at times poignantly–executed, and that more than earns One Woman Show its coveted red dot (aka sales sticker) from us’ * Marie Claire Best Books of 2023 *Unconventional… non-narrative paragraphs somehow add up to create mounting tension, with wry social commentary, feminist barbs and psychological insight bursting through the lacquered surface * The Lady *

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Book Synopsis''One of Japan''s most venerated writers'' David MitchellIn this unnerving fable from one of Japan''s greatest novelists, a recluse known as ''Mole'' retreats to a vast underground bunker, only to find that strange guests, booby traps and a giant toilet may prove even greater obstacles than nuclear disaster.''As is true of Poe and Kafka, Abe creates an unexpected impulsion. One continues reading, on and on'' New Yorker''Abe''s depiction of the deadly game of survival is hilarious but at the same time leaves us with a chilling sense of apprehension about the brave new world that awaits us'' Los Angeles TimesTranslated by Juliet Winters CarpenterTrade ReviewA large, ambitious work about the lives of outcasts in modern Japan and such troubling themes as ecological destruction, old age, violence and nuclear war * The New York Times Book Review *Abe's depiction of the deadly game of survival is hilarious but at the same time leaves us with a chilling sense of apprehension about the brave new world that awaits us * Los Angeles Times *As is true of Poe and Kafka - two writers whose influence does seem apparent - Abe creates on the page an unexpected impulsion. One continues reading, on and on * New Yorker *

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Book SynopsisVladimir Nabokov''s Lolita is one of the best-known novels of the 20th century: the controversial story of Humbert Humbert who falls in love with twelve year old Lolita, beautifully repackaged as part of the Penguin Essentials range.''Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of my tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.''Humbert Humbert is a middle-aged, frustrated college professor. In love with his landlady''s twelve-year-old daughter Lolita, he''ll do anything to possess her. Unable and unwilling to stop himself, he is prepared to commit any crime to get what he wants.Is he in love or insane? A silver-tongued poet or a pervert? A tortured soul or a monster? Or is he all of these?Trade ReviewA masterpiece. One of the great works of art of our age * Independent *There's no funnier monster in modern literature than poor, doomed Humbert Humbert. Going to hell in his company would always be worth the ride * Independent *A great novel . . . It widens our own humanity * Guardian *You read Lolita sprawling limply in your chair, ravished, overcome, nodding scandalized assent -- Martin Amis * Observer *Nabokov's command of words, his joy in them, his comic and ecstatic use of them, makes reading his work such an intense joy * Daily Telegraph *Lolita is more the shocking because it is both intensely lyrical and wildly funny ... a Medusa's head with trick paper snakes * Time *

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Book SynopsisTrade ReviewUnsettling, challenging and gloriously written, Hot Milk by Deborah Levy is the multi-generational story of a hallucinatory sort of summer * Juliet Nicolson, Evening Standard *Leaves the reader enraptured and unnerved * Jackie Annesley, Evening Standard *Publisher's description. Shortlisted for the Man Booker and Goldsmiths prizes, a hypnotic tale of female sexuality and power under the scorching midday sun. Sofia and her mother arrive on the Spanish coast looking for answers - what they find there will be strange, seductive and fearsome beyond their wildest dreams. * Penguin *

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Book SynopsisThe General in his Labyrinth is the compelling tale of Simón Bolívar, a hero who has been forgotten and whose power is fading, retracing his steps down the Magdalena River by the Nobel Laureate Gabriel García Márquez, author of One Hundred Years of Solitude and Love in the Time of Cholera. ''It was the fourth time he had travelled along the Magdalena, and he could not escape the impression that he was retracing the steps of his life''At the age of forty-six General Simón Bolívar, who drove the Spanish from his lands and became the Liberator of South America, takes himself into exile. He makes a final journey down the Magdalene River, revisiting the cities along its shores, reliving the triumphs, passions and betrayals of his youth. Consumed by the memories of what he has done and what he failed to do, Bolívar hopes to see a way out of the labyrinth in which he has lived all his life. . .. ''An exquisite writer, wise, compassionate Trade ReviewA fascinating tour de force and a moving tribute to an extraordinary man * Margaret Atwood *

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Book SynopsisAny Human Heart is William''s Boyd''s classic, bestselling novel, now available as a Penguin Essential for the first time. Every life is both ordinary and extraordinary, but Logan Mountstuart''s - lived from the beginning to the end of the twentieth century - contains more than its fair share of both. As a writer who finds inspiration with Hemingway in Paris and Virginia Woolf in London, as a spy recruited by Ian Fleming and betrayed in the war and as an art-dealer in ''60s New York, Logan mixes with the movers and shakers of his times. But as a son, friend, lover and husband, he makes the same mistakes we all do in our search for happiness. Here, then, is the story of a life lived to the full - and a journey deep into a very human heart.Any Human Heart will be enjoyed by readers of Sebastian Faulks, Nick Hornby and Hilary Mantel, as well as lovers of the finest British and historical fiction around the world. It was recently adapted for a major Channel 4 four-part drama series scripted by William Boyd and starring Kim Cattrall, Gillian Anderson, Jim Broadbent and Tom Hollander. This edition features beautiful cover artwork from the television series.''Astonishing, touching, extremely funny. A brilliant evocation of a past era and an immensely readable story'' Sunday Telegraph''Superb, wonderful, enjoyable'' Guardian''A terrific journey through the twentieth century. Thoroughly entertaining and enjoyable'' Jeremy PaxmanTrade ReviewA terrific journey through the twentieth century. Thoroughly entertaining and enjoyable -- Jeremy PaxmanWise, profound and moving. Only the very best novels make you look at your own life and imagine your own future with fresh eyes -- William Sutcliffe * Independent on Sunday *Superb, wonderful, enjoyable * Guardian *This fabulous book all about life... is the journey of anyone with a heart... I think of Any Human Heart often - the sign of a truly great book -- Fi Glover * Spectator *Sheer, truly brilliant storytelling. He has probably written more classic books than any of his contemporaries * Daily Telegraph *Astonishing, touching, extremely funny. A brilliant evocation of a past era and an immensely readable story * Sunday Telegraph *Astounding. One of Boyd's greatest achievements * Mail on Sunday *

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Book SynopsisFrom the Pulitzer Prize-winning, Number One New York Times bestselling author of Olive Kitteridge and My Name is Lucy Barton''A terrific writer'' Zadie Smith''A superbly gifted storyteller and a craftswoman in a league of her own'' Hilary Mantel ''A novel to treasure'' Sunday TimesOlive, Again follows the blunt, contradictory yet deeply loveable Olive Kitteridge as she grows older, navigating the second half of her life as she comes to terms with the changes - sometimes welcome, sometimes not - in her own existence and in those around her.Olive adjusts to her new life with her second husband, challenges her estranged son and his family to accept him, experiences loss and loneliness, witnesses the triumphs and heartbreaks of her friends and neighbours in the small coastal town of Crosby, Maine - and, finally, opens herself to new lessons about life.''A powerful storyteller immersed in the nuances of human relationships'' Observer''She gets better with each book'' Maggie O''Farrell ''Her writing is exquisite; her vision is boundless. What a sublime book.'' Rachel Joyce''Glorious'' The Times''A perfect novel'' Financial TimesElizabeth Strout''s new novel Tell Me Everything is available out now!Trade ReviewA novel to treasure... Olive, Again, like Strout's first book, delivers roughly five hours of spine-tingling pleasure. * Sunday Times *Olive, Again is a tour de force. With extraordinary economy of prose - few writers can pack so much emotion, so much emotion, so much detail into a single paragraph - Strout immerses us in the lives of her characters, each so authentically drawn as to be deserving of an entire novel themselves. Compassionate, masterly and profound, this is a writer at the height of her powers * Observer *Emotionally honest, psychologically piercing and ultimately life-affirming * The i *Her writing is exquisite; her vision is boundless. What a sublime book.A superbly gifted storyteller and a craftswoman in a league of her own. In Olive, Again, she teaches us that there is always more to know about human beings, even the ones we are closest to.There's no simple truth about human existence, Strout reminds us, only wonderful, painful complexity. 'Well, that's life,' Olive says. 'Nothing you can do about it.' Beautifully written and alive with compassion, at times almost unbearably poignant. A thrilling book in every way. * Kirkus Reviews (starred review) *Strout again demonstrates her gift for zeroing in on ordinary moments in the lives of ordinary people to highlight their extraordinary resilience * Publishers Weekly, starred review *She gets better with each bookGlorious * The Times *A perfect novel * Financial Times *In Olive Kitteridge, Strout has created one of those rare characters...so vivid and humorous they seems to take on a life independent of the story framing them * Guardian *Elizabeth Strout is... one of the undisputed heavyweights of generous, clear-eyed domestic realism * Daily Mail *A special, precious book...full of hope and humanity * Red *Funny, sad, tender and truthful, this is pure joy * Stylist *A terrific writer -- Zadie Smith

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Book SynopsisThe brilliant debut novel from Emilie Pine, author of the international bestseller Notes to SelfDublin, 7 October 2019One day, one city, two women: Ruth and Pen. Neither knows the other, but both are asking the same questions: how to be with others and how, when the world won''t make space for you, to be with yourself?Ruth''s marriage to Aidan is in crisis. Today she needs to make a choice - to stay or not to stay, to take the risk of reaching out, or to pull up the drawbridge. For teenage Pen, today is the day the words will flow, and she will speak her truth to Alice, to ask for what she so desperately wants.Deeply involving, poignant and radiantly intelligent, it is a portrait of the limits of grief and love, of how we navigate our inner and outer landscapes, and the tender courage demanded by the simple, daily quest of living.''Emilie Pine is one of the most important new voices in Irish Literature. Everything she writes is imbued with wisdom'' David Park''Emilie Pine''s debut novel is ambitious, poignant and playful, with a feminist nod to Joyce . . . it is as surprising and playful as it is ambitious and relevant'' Irish Independent''This is an exciting, warm and engaging debut that signals, one hopes, even greater things to come'' The Business PostWINNER OF THE KATE O''BRIEN AWARDTrade ReviewMesmerising . . . I became completely immersed in this emotional, intimate read * Good Housekeeping *[An] uplifting debut novel . . . joy is a vital ingredient in Ruth & Pen * The Observer *The debut novel from the author of the personal essay collection Notes to Self is a poignant, raw exploration of the courage needed to find your space in the world * i *Impressive . . . Pine explores with great acuity and tenderness the restorative, capacious nature of love. A wise and lovely book * Daily Mail *Pine makes her chapters playful, writing with a friendly curiousness that brings to mind Ali Smith . . . Pine's measured yet tender juxtaposition of the women's days doesn't draw overly neat parallels so much as prove that one needs the other - younger needs older, optimist needs pessimist, introvert needs extrovert. And our opposites might help us find clarity * i *[Ruth & Pen] finds heartbreaking beauty in our everyday lives . . . There is a real tenderness in the way in which Pine writes about the teenage girls in the novel * The Irish Times *Pine reinforces her reputation as one of the most empathetic writers in the country * The Irish Examiner *There's no doubting the novel's basic integrity; its warmth, its undogmatic interest in ordinary lives, and the impressive range of its imaginative sympathies -- Kevin Power * The Irish Times *Moving and raw . . . Pine's ability to enter the heads of two such different characters is a sure sign of literary promise * The Sunday Times (Ireland) *This book is an intimate portrait of love and grief, and the tender, fragile courage required just to live each day * Irish Country Magazine *A confident walk through the lives of others, two women seeking their place in the world and a peace in themselves * RTE Guide *

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Book SynopsisTrade ReviewA beautiful, shattering novel about desire and shame, about passionate youth and the regrets of age. -- Olivia Laing, bestselling author of 'Crudo' and 'The Lonely City'A stunning and heart-gripping tale -- André Aciman, author of 'Call Me by Your Name'An intense, unforgettable novel, alive with the ache of longing and loss. -- Sarah Waters, bestselling, award-winning author of 'The Little Stranger'It has been years since anything moved me as much as Lie With Me. It will become a classic -- Jonathan Coe, bestselling author of 'Middle England'A deeply moving depiction of first love, both tender and elegiac. -- John Boyne, bestselling author of 'A Ladder to the Sky'A timeless love story. Molly Ringwald's translation is as clear and beautiful as the story it depicts. You'll read it in a night, but its exquisite heartbreak will linger. -- David Ebershoff, author of 'The Danish Girl'The uncanny thrill of Philippe Besson's Lie With Me rises up from Molly Ringwald's elegant translation with the intensity of meeting a stranger on a train who tells you a single unforgettable story and then leaves. And his voice haunts me still -- Alexander Chee, author of 'How to Write an Autobiographical Novel' and 'The Queen of the Night'An elegiac tale of first, hidden love between two teenage boys who have no chance of a shared future, "Lie with Me" sold more than a hundred thousand copies in France, where it won several prizes and is being made into a movie. -- Lauren Collins * New Yorker *Lie With Me is an exquisite whisper that lingers long after you've finished reading it -- Kevin Kwan, author of 'Crazy Rich Asians'Devastating and tender; this is the book I wish I'd read when I was 15, and a book I'm glad to have as a companion now -- Andrew McMillan, award-winning author of 'Physical'A lovely novel, a painful story of love and loss. . . Lie with Me succeeds as a novel because of Besson's graceful writing, beautifully translated by Ringwald. Besson is a gifted stylist, and he infuses Philippe's story with the right notes of sadness and longing. * NPR *This gorgeous, aching novel captures all of the fear and freedom of young desire. . . may well be the best gay love story in contemporary fiction. I dare you to read it without crying. -- Christopher Bollen, author of 'The Destroyers'This is a gorgeous fever dream of a book. Ringwald's translation does elegant justice to Besson's balance of beauty and despair, and to his interrogations of memory and longing. Lie With Me positively glows in the dark. -- Rebecca Makkai, author of 'The Great Believers'A bittersweet love story, told from the perspective of a gay man remembering his first romantic affair as a teenager in a small town in the south of France in 1984. * Wall Street Journal *At first erotic and joyous, ultimately elegiac and haunting, Lie With Me is a deceptively slender book as big as life itself -- Rumaan Alam, author of 'That Kind of Mother' and 'Rich and Pretty'In spare yet evocative prose, elegantly translated by Molly Ringwald, Philippe Besson relates the erotic awakening of two adolescent boys in a small French town in the 1980s. Lie With Me captures their world with the grainy poignancy of an old high school yearbook, while movingly conveying the quintessential human dramas of longing, love, and letting go. -- Caroline Weber, author of 'Proust's Duchess: How Three Celebrated Women Captured the Imagination of Fin-de-siècle Paris'The French Brokeback Mountain * Elle *A man looks back at his first love, a forbidden homosexual affair during his last year of high school in a small French town in the 1980s. Though a screenwriter and playwright, Mr. Besson does not rely on direct dialogue but reconstructs conversations from a fog of memories in this coming-of-age story. A French best seller likened to "Call Me By Your Name" and "Brokeback Mountain," the novel marks the first English translation by the actress and writer Ms. Ringwald, a longtime Francophile. * Wall Street Journal, The 10 Books You’ll Want to Read This Spring *Molly Ringwald translated this French Call Me By Your Name-esque novel about two teenagers in 1984 Bordeaux as they fall in love in the shadows, leaving one of them to reflect on the relationship many years later * OprahMag.com, 30 of the Best LGBTQ Books in 2019 *There's much book-to-filmstar appeal in this moving, well-plotted tale: Elle dubbed it "the French Brokeback Mountain"; there's something of Call Me by Your Name's Elio in Philippe, who lives in the books he reads and writes; and actress and writer Ringwald ably translates. * Booklist *Moving ... Besson's writing and Ringwald's smooth translation provide emotional impact. * Publishers Weekly *Universally touching * Le Parisien *Besson is a thoughtful writer who can strike home with vivid imagery. . . [and] deftly translated [by Ringwald]. * Booklist *This Year's Call Me by Your Name... While the starring peach of Call Me by Your Name was the perfect metanym for that lush and gauzy tale, Lie With Me unpeels like a springy orange. The boys' relationship is bare but segmented, each encounter entirely isolated from the others, with only a thin membrane to keep all that tart juice from bursting out. . . [A] moving and graceful novel * Vulture *A story of queer adolescence in rural France in the 1980s, Besson's "Lie With Me" is a primer on the tenacity of desire... Molly Ringwald, by delightful coincidence an icon of '80s John Hughes films, provides a limpid translation that preserves all the earnest mystery of teenage sex... Besson keeps his study in intimacy fresh through nimble plot twists, in which the present disturbs a certain version of the past, creating repercussions for the future. Equal parts André Aciman and Marguerite Duras, "Lie With Me" poignantly reflects on why some memories fade and others do not. * New York Times *A slender, sad, acute novel... absolutely excellent -- Sarah Perry, bestselling author of THE ESSEX SERPENT and MELMOTHFull of Proustian echoes, this story of gay adolescence deals with complex issues of class, shame and secrecy * Guardian *A poignant tale that captures the intensity of first love with all its sadness, longing and regret * Daily Mail *A clear-sighted and passionate coming-of-age narrative. Detailing in elegant and plain prose the anxious and intense first falling-in-love between two schoolboys, Lie With Me has a tenderness and insight that is reminiscent of the writings of Garth Greenwell. This novel can be read in a matter of hours, but its impact, like the love affair it details, will echo in the mind * Irish Times *Moving, intense, sad and sensuous * Attitude *

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Book Synopsis''Fascinating, brilliant, horribly addictive'' Guardian From the day that Sheba Hart joins the staff at St George''s, history teacher Barbara Covett is convinced that she has found a kindred spirit. When Sheba is discovered having an illicit affair with one of her pupils, Barbara appoints herself Sheba''s chief defender. Yet all is not as it first appears in this dark story and as Sheba will eventually discover, a friend can be as treacherous as any lover. ''Superbly gripping'' Daily Telegraph Trade ReviewFascinating, brilliant, horribly addictive * Guardian *Superbly gripping. One of the most compelling books I've read in ages * Daily Telegraph *Deliciously sinister * Daily Mail *Excellent. An undercurrent of subtle malice, cleverly controlled by Heller * Evening Standard *Brilliant, nasty, gripping -- Zadie Smith * Observer *Reads like a nose through someone else's bathroom cabinet: full of guilty insights and delicious snobbery * Independent *A subtle study in obsession and loneliness ... my take-it-to-the-beach recommendation -- Monica Ali * Guardian Summer Reading *

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Book SynopsisThe new novel from Salley Vickers, Sunday Times bestselling author of The Librarian and Grandmothers Artist, Hassie Days, and her sister, Margot, buy a run down Jacobean house in Hope Wenlock on the Welsh Marches. While Margot continues her London life in high finance, Hassie is left alone to work the large, long-neglected garden. She is befriended by eccentric, sharp-tongued, Miss Foot, who recommends, Murat, an Albanian migrant, made to feel out of place among the locals, to help Hassie in the garden.As she works the garden in Murat''s peaceful company, Hassie ruminates on her past life: the sibling rivalry that tainted her childhood and the love affair that left her with painful, unanswered questions.But as she begins to explore the history of the house and the mysterious nearby wood, old hurts begin to fade as she experiences the healing power of nature and discovers other worlds.In her haunting new novel, Salley Vickers, the Trade ReviewSalley Vickers sees with a clear eye and writes with a light hand. She's a presence worth cherishing -- Philip PullmanThe Gardener is a novel of regrowth & regeneration, of sisters overcoming a toxic parental legacy & of the healing power of seed packets -- Patrick GaleSteeped in a sense of the redemptive power of place, Sally Vickers's 11th novel is a paean to green-fingered regeneration that is both rigorous and charming * Observer *Vickers writes of relationships with undaunted clarity -- Adam PhillipsNo one can dig down into the shrouded recesses of the human heart quite as forensically as Vickers * Sunday Times *An escapist, involving novel about relationships and two siblings coming to terms with their childhood and each other * Saga *With its sensitively drawn characters, this is a quiet and intelligent hymn to the restorative power of nature. Delightful * Mail on Sunday *The bestselling author of Miss Garnet's Angel and The Librarian, Vickers has been a Jungian therapist and her novels have always featured personal growth and transformation. This is no exception, as Hassie weathers bereavement, abreak-up and midlife despair, but finds a sense of new beginnings and a feeling for the power of place. It also has some sharp social observation about the reality of moving out to the sticks in post-Brexit Britain * Sunday Times *Salley Vickers is skilled at transforming the everyday into something haunting. This tale of a woman's search for inner peace is no exception * Daily Express *Profoundly moving, healing and wise, this is the perfect antidote to our urban anxiety -- Joanne Harris, author of Chocolat

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Book SynopsisWinner of the Booker Prize, the beautiful, romantic and gorgeously philosophical Hotel du Lac by Anita Brookner is part of our Penguin Essential series which spotlights the very best of our modern classics''The Hotel du Lac was a dignified building, a house of repute, a traditional establishment, used to welcoming the prudent, the well-to-do, the retired, the self-effacing, the respected patrons of an earlier era''Into the rarefied atmosphere of the Hotel du Lac timidly walks Edith Hope, romantic novelist and holder of modest dreams. Edith has been exiled from home after embarrassing herself and her friends. She has refused to sacrifice her ideals and remains stubbornly single. But among the pampered women and minor nobility Edith finds Mr Neville, and her chance to escape from a life of humiliating loneliness is renewed . . .''A classic . . . a book which will be read with pleasure a hundred years from now'' Spectator''Humorous, witty, touching and formidably clever'' The Times''Hotel du Lac is written with a beautiful grave formality, and it catches at the heart'' Observer''So sure and so quietly commanding'' Hilary Mantel, GuardianTrade ReviewMiss Brookner's most absorbing novel . . . graceful and attractive * New York Times *Her technique as a novelist is so sure and so quietly commanding * Hilary Mantel, Guardian *Hotel du Lac is written with a beautiful grave formality, and it catches at the heart * Observer *The last great novelist of the 20th century * Daily Telegraph *A classic . . . a book which will be read with pleasure a hundred years from now * Spectator *A smashing love story. It is very romantic. It is also humorous, witty, touching and formidably clever * The Times *She is one of the great writers of contemporary fiction * Literary Review *

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Book SynopsisThe most celebrated and controversial French novelist of our time delivers a riveting masterpiece about art and money, love and friendship, and fathers and sons. Jed Martin is an artist. His first photographs feature Michelin road maps, and global success arrives with his series on professions: portraits of various personalities, including a writer named Houellebecq. Not long afterward, Jed helps a police inspector solve a heinous crime that leaves lasting marks on everyone involved. But after burying his father and growing old himself, Jed also discovers serenity, a deeply moving conclusion to a life of lovers, friends, and family, and filled with hopes, losses, and dreams.

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Book SynopsisBOOKER PRIZE WINNER • NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A novel that follows a middle-aged man as he contends with a past he never much thought about—until his closest childhood friends return with a vengeance: one of them from the grave, another maddeningly present. A novel so compelling that it begs to be read in a single setting, The Sense of an Ending has the psychological and emotional depth and sophistication of Henry James at his best, and is a stunning achievement in Julian Barnes's oeuvre. Tony Webster thought he left his past behind as he built a life for himself, and his career has provided him with a secure retirement and an amicable relationship with his ex-wife and daughter, who now has a family of her own. But when he is presented with a mysterious legacy, he is forced to revise his estimation of his own nature and place in the world.

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Book Synopsis Adults are as lost as the children they should be protecting, as the lives of four people trapped in a conspiracy of silence hurtle toward a desperate and devastating act. Twelve-year-old Théo and his friend Mathis have a secret. Their teacher, Hélène, suspects something is not right with Théo and becomes obsessed with rescuing him, casting aside her professionalism to the point of no return. Cécile, mother of Mathis, discovers something horrifying on her husband''s computer that makes her question whether she has ever truly known him. Respectable facades are peeled away as the lives of these four characters collide, moving rapidly toward a shocking conclusion. Delphine de Vigan has crafted a lean, darkly gripping, and compulsively readable novel about lies, loneliness, and loyalties.

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Book Synopsis A gripping page-turner for fans of The Woman in the Window and The Perfect Nanny, Michelle Sacks''s You Were Made For This provocatively explores the darkest sides of marriage, motherhood, and friendship. Doting wife, devoted husband, cherished child. Merry, Sam, and Conor are the perfect family in the perfect place. Merry adores the domestic life: baking, gardening, caring for her infant son. Sam, formerly an academic, is pursuing a new career as a filmmaker. Sometimes they can hardly believe how lucky they are. What perfect new lives they''ve built. When Merry''s childhood friend Frank visits their Swedish paradise, she immediately becomes part of the family. She bonds with Conor. And with Sam. She befriends the neighbors, and even finds herself embracing the domesticity she''s always seemed to scorn. All their lives, Frank and Merry have been more like sisters than best friends. And that''s why Frank soon sees the things others migh

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Book SynopsisFalling Man begins on September 11, in the smoke and ash of the burning towers. In the days and the years following, we trace the aftermath of this global tremor in the private lives of a few reticulated individuals. Theirs are lives choreographed by loss, by grief and by the enormous force of history. From these intimate portraits, Don DeLillo shifts to an extrapolated vision: he charts the way the events have reconfigured our emotional landscape, our memory and our perception of the world.Falling Man is an unforgettable novel, at once cathartic and beautiful and heartbreaking.Trade ReviewAmerica's greatest living writer. * Observer *Searing, profoundly unsettling. An unforgettable novel. * Sunday Times *These are pages of magnificent force and control, DeLillo's genius at full pelt. Reading them, you have to remind yourself to keep breathing. * New Statesman *

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Book SynopsisNEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Jane Hawk—fiction’s most relentless, resourceful, stunning new heroine—continues her battle against a murderous conspiracy in the riveting sequel to The Silent Corner. “No time to delay. Do what you were born to do. Fame will be yours when you do this.” These are the words that ring in the mind of mild-mannered, beloved schoolteacher Cora Gundersun—just before she takes her own life, and many others’, in a shocking act of carnage. When the disturbing contents of her secret journal are discovered, it seems certain that she must have been insane. But Jane Hawk knows better. In the wake of her husband’s inexplicable suicide—and the equally mysterious deaths of scores of other exemplary individuals—Jane picks up the trail of a secret cabal of powerful players who think themselves above the law and beyond punishment. But the ruthless people

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Book SynopsisA propulsive, darkly gripping novel about the power and paradoxes of human longing, faith, trauma and taboo, from the acclaimed author of The Amateurs, shortlisted for the Amazon First Novel Award.A fractured portrait of a darkly riveting sibling relationship from the inside out, Strange Loops is an electrifying, intelligent and emotionally charged second novel from an award-winning young literary star on the rise.Francine and her twin brother Philip share a powerful bond in childhood that fades as they became young adults. When Philip unexpectedly becomes intensely religious, his sister decides to join his Christian youth group and soon becomes infatuated with the youth pastor. Obsessed by this transgression and what he sees as his sister's moral impropriety, Philip eventually uncovers a dark secret that threatens to shatter his faith and estranges the two siblings for decades. Later, as an adult, even as the storm clouds of resentmen

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Book SynopsisWar arrives in rural Barsetshire.Trade ReviewYou read her, laughing, and want to do your best to protect her characters from any reality but their own * New York Times *The novels are a delight, with touches of E. F. Benson, E. M. Delafield and P. G. Wodehouse -- Christopher Fowler * Independent on Sunday *Charming, very funny indeed. Angela Thirkell is perhaps the most Pym-like of any twentieth-century author, after Pym herself -- Alexander McCall Smith

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Book SynopsisINTERNATIONAL BESTSELLERA Best Book of the Year: The New York Times Book Review, NPR, The New Yorker, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, Time, Financial Times, Slate, The Chicago Public Library, Kirkus, The TelegraphA Barack Obama Summer Reading Pick[A] savagely satirical thriller. -PeopleThe Booker Prize-winning author of The Luminaries brings us Birnam Wood, a gripping thriller of high drama and kaleidoscopic insight into what drives us to survive.Birnam Wood is on the move . . . A landslide has closed the Korowai Pass on New Zealand's South Island, cutting o? the town of Thorndike and leaving a sizable farm abandoned. The disaster presents an opportunity for Birnam Wood, an undeclared, unregulated, sometimes-criminal, sometimes-philanthropic guerrilla gardening collective that plants crops wherever no one will notice.

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Book SynopsisA woman spills the story of her life to a bar full of strangers, in the acerbic first novel from Laura Adamczyk.Anything can become the story of your life if you let it, and I suppose this became mine.In Island City, a wry, wistful woman, estranged from her family, sells her belongings and moves back to her hometown in the Midwest. To her, it's the perfect place to give up. She wants to get rid of everythingher stuff, her ambitions. Before making a messy exit, she holes up in a dark bar and tells her stories to an audience of indifferent strangers. There's the time the river dried up and you could walk across its bed; the day her sister got clobbered at the nursing home; when her dad got cancer, then Alzheimer's, then cancer again. Now she's forgetting things the way he did, words slipping away. That third drink isn't helping.Laura Adamczyk, whose writing is super weird and super unsettling (Eugenia Williamson, The Boston Globe), c

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Book Synopsis“Elegantly unnerving.” —New York Times Book ReviewTrade Review"Brilliantly constructed, The Shades is ghostly and alive, cerebral and sensuous, an absolutely riveting read." -- Scott Cheshire - Los Angeles Times"An absorbing book by an author who knows how to create organic suspense without ever overplaying her hand.… Intricately plotted and perfectly paced.… An excellent debut novel that deals heavily with death, but still feels alive, compassionate and full of truths." -- Michael Schaub - NPR"A dense, powerful novel." -- Chloe Schama and Bridget Read - Vogue"When an intriguing young woman turns up at the family’s country house and strikes up a relationship with the family’s matriarch, Catherine, a mystery is set in motion, lending the firmly contemporary The Shades a quiet echo of such classic psychological thrillers as The Turn of the Screw and Rebecca." -- Julia Vitale and Keziah Weir - Vanity Fair"This psychological thriller explores the mysteries surrounding a family still reeling from profound tragedy, and the terrifying uncertainty that meets their relocation in a distant country manor." -- David Canfield - Entertainment Weekly"This haunted tale follows a couple mourning the loss of their teenage daughter.… [The Shades] harkens back to such ghostly thrillers as du Maurier’s Don’t Look Back." -- CrimeReads"If you’re looking for a mystery to keep you on the edge of your seat, add this electrifying new novel by Evgenia Citkowitz to your reading list." -- Caroline Rogers - Southern Living"Spare, arresting, and emotionally precise. A thoroughly modern novel with a Gothic feel; a fully realized vision." -- Kirkus Reviews (starred review)"[Citkowitz’s] prose sparkles as she unpacks emotional wounds.… This compact family drama captures the thinly masked desperation of grief with an eerie undercurrent." -- Publishers Weekly"With a deceptively light touch and an almost ethereal atmosphere, debut novelist Citkowitz delves deeply into themes of loss and grief, reality and illusion, and growth and stagnation.… [The Shades] is richly layered with meaning and allusions to myth and art that make it an engaging and rewarding read." -- Booklist

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Book SynopsisOne of The Millions' Most Anticipated Books of 2022 A CrimeReads Most Anticipated Crime Fiction of 2022 Selection A contemporary reimagining of the Daphne and Apollo myth, The Latinist is a page-turning exploration of power, ambition, and the intertwining of love and obsession.Trade Review"Ingenious.... a superb literary suspense novel that calls to mind an earlier such debut, Donna Tartt’s The Secret History.... Like the classics that inspire it, The Latinist is an inventive wedding of the elegant and the barbaric." -- Maureen Corrigan - Washington Post"Smart and fast-paced.... [A] sparkling debut.... A contemporary classic." -- Clea Simon - Boston Globe"Prins’s confident, engrossing debut novel.... contains more than enough twists to keep you turning the page until the very end." -- Chris Murphy - Vanity Fair"Within the first few pages of this book, I knew I was in the hands of a masterful storyteller. The Latinist is imaginative, propulsive, and wildly intelligent. What a joy to encounter a thrilling and singular new voice in fiction." -- Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney, author of The Nest and Good Company"A devilishly clever and terrifically entertaining campus novel/philological whodunnit that also happens to be a brilliantly sly riff on Ovid’s Apollo & Daphne.... A remarkably polished and skillful first novel." -- Daniel Mendelsohn"An engrossing psychological thriller.... an absorbing drama about obsession, abuse of power and intimate violence." -- Sharmila Mukherjee - Minneapolis Star Tribune"Brilliant.... Delves deep to question the blurring line between love and obsession, between a yearning for truth and a desire of power." -- Jianan Qian - The Millions"Propulsive.... a campus novel turned psychological thriller.... The novel invites us to see Tessa as Daphne, manipulated by but ultimately escaping Eccles’s Apollo, yet it also asks us: what happens to her humanity along the way?" -- Ayelet Haimson Lushkov - Los Angeles Review of Books"This cerebral thriller will keep you on the edge of your seat.... Prins’ analysis of the toxic relationship between advisor and student is nuanced and thoughtful.... The Latinist succeeds as both literary fiction and thriller; it is every bit as suspenseful as it is intellectually intriguing, with many of the features of A.S. Byatt’s Possession." -- Hannah Joyner - Washington Independent Review of Books"A novel about love and scholarship, ego and obsession, coercion and consent—a brilliant, marvelously infuriating puzzle of a book that combines the globe-trotting exploits of The Da Vinci Code with the smarts and literary gifts of A. S. Byatt. A terrific debut!" -- Julie Schumacher, author of Dear Committee Members and The Shakespeare Requirement"Darkly disturbing and luminously told.… Every twist is delicious and every turn breathtaking as Mark Prins’s devilish debut revels in a scholarly world of cunning, ruthlessness, and dangerous obsession. Funny, erudite, and utterly absorbing, this is a merciless tale to be relished like a guilty pleasure." -- Christopher J. Yates, author of Black Chalk and Grist Mill Road"Brainy and deftly plotted, The Latinist enchants with its deft inversions of power, its witty poetic inventions, and its passion for languages old and new. A lovely debut." -- Andrea Barrett, author of Archangel and The Air We Breathe"Mark Prins weaves together an extremely contemporary plot—an American academic caught up in the machinations of her advisor at Oxford—with a much older plot—the discovery of a second-century Roman poet. The two thrillingly intertwine and the result is a wonderfully suspenseful novel. The Latinist is a brilliant debut." -- Margot Livesey, author of The Boy in the Field" The Latinist is a whip-smart tale of obsession that teeters on the knife-edge of suspense and literary fiction; Mark Prins is a worthy successor to Patricia Highsmith, Donna Tartt, and Ian McEwan." -- Alexandra Andrews, author of Who Is Maud Dixon?"With its ambitious young scholar, an ancient tomb, and a scheming advisor, The Latinist is a twisty and memorable new addition to the campus-novel genre. Mark Prins propels you through his tale of breakthroughs and retribution while delivering a sharp commentary on power dynamics in academia. A cunning and insightful read—I couldn’t put it down." -- Maria Hummel, author of Still Lives and Lesson in Red"Prins’s riveting tale of love, power, and possession matches deep characterization with an intriguing plot involving ancient texts, necropolises, and archaeological sites. Fans of academic thrillers will dig this." -- Publishers Weekly

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Book SynopsisNamed a Best Crime and Thriller of the Year by The Guardian and Irish Times An English teacher is gaslit by his charismatic high school bully in this tense story of deception, manipulation, and murder.Trade Review"Habib ramps up the paranoia to Highsmithian levels." -- Laura Wilson - Guardian"A supremely tense debut, Conner Habib’s Hawk Mountain channels Patricia Highsmith by way of Hitchcock....Habib builds the sense of dread with slow, carefully meted out notes of obsession and intuition." -- CrimeReads"So, so dark. I loved it. Pure tension. A great book." -- Anthony Jeselnik - The Jeselnik & Rosenthal Vanity Project"A menacing page-turner....Habib has created a small but visceral world, terrifying in its realism and heartbreaking in its portrayal. Gaslighting, masculinity and cycles of abuse are all skillfully handled in a story that is, to put it lightly, not for the faint of heart." -- Andrea Cleary - Business Post Ireland"This masterful debut explores the darkest matter with a surprising and unnerving relatability and is a page-turner in the most classic sense." -- Lisa Connell - Gay Community News"There's a lot going on here and Habib skilfully manages to juggle it all, entangling the reader in a gripping narrative, one we can identify more with as each page turns." -- Pat Carty - Hot Press"Impossible to put down....Conner Habib has written a debut novel which has the style, elevated prose and assurance of a much more experienced novelist." -- Susan McKeever - Books Ireland"Conner Habib’s debut novel is a bleak, dark adrenaline rush." -- Clive Barker"Dripping with menace from the first page, this story of childhood enemies meeting up fifteen years later is utterly enthralling.… [C]ompelling, shocking, and beautiful." -- Liz Nugent, author of Lying in Wait"Tender, horrifying, utterly transfixing." -- Kelly Link, author of Get in Trouble"A deeply disturbing yet, somehow, soaring novel I won’t soon forget. It plumbs the depths of traumatized characters trapped within our damaging culture. I couldn’t look away, even when I was looking from between my fingers." -- Paul Tremblay, author of A Head Full of Ghosts and The Pallbearers Club"The opening lines of Hawk Mountain plummet you into an atmosphere of creeping dread and precarious restraint that won’t let up until the final, shocking moments." -- Caitlin Doughty, bestselling author of Smoke Gets In Your Eyes"Hawk Mountain is deft horror, made of precise strikes into our most vulnerable psychic terrain… Finally, a horror story that knows cisheteropatriarchy is the villain!" -- Andrea Lawlor, author of Paul Takes the Form of a Mortal Girl"Conner Habib writes with [a] hallucinatory precision, and a kind of merciless humanity, about the poisonous work of repression. His forebears—Poe, Highsmith, even classical tragedy—are clear, but his originality is clearer still. Hawk Mountain is a work of strange, glittering darkness." -- Mark O’Connell, author of Notes from an Apocalypse"A brilliantly disturbing, expertly crafted literary noir that will stick with you long after you put it down. Conner Habib has written a flawless meditation on the fruitless, but eternally human, effort to kill off the parts of ourselves we cannot love—literally and metaphorically. I love this book." -- Sara Gran, author of The Infinite Blacktop"A moving and unflinching portrayal of a man caught in a trap of his own making, but willing to do almost anything—to almost anybody—if it will keep him from having to face up to himself. Hawk Mountain is a wonderfully bleak and beautifully written debut." -- Brian Evenson, author of Song for the Unraveling of the World"Habib’s unique examination of his flawed and fascinating characters as the victims and sources of violence is both disturbing and insightful. ...With haunting prose and deeply atmospheric descriptions, Hawk Mountain is a disturbing descent into the convulsions of the human mind and heart." -- Maya Fleischmann - BookPage"Habib brings rich psychological insight to his characters, expertly observing how the conflicts of youth persist into Todd and Jack’s present. …[T]his dramatic tale soars." -- Publishers Weekly"The tension is palpable on every page, and Habib skillfully illustrates the complexity of relationships and the pain of unmet desires, both queer and otherwise. His prose is as brutal as it is profound and beautiful. …A brutal and gorgeous tale of manipulation, control, and desire." -- Kirkus Reviews (starred review)"This heart-pounding thriller will have readers furiously turning pages…this gorgeous debut affirms [Habib’s] stunning gift for dissecting humanity." -- Booklist (starred review)

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Book SynopsisA “mesmerizing” novel from the acclaimed author of The Emperor’s Children that is “as artful as it is affecting” (Michiko Kakutani, New York Times).

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Book SynopsisHugo Award winner Emma Newman returns to the captivating Planetfall universe with a dark tale of a woman stationed on Mars who starts to have doubts about everything around her.After months of travel, Anna Kubrin finally arrives on Mars for her new job as a geologist and de facto artist in residence--and already she feels she is losing the connection with her husband and baby at home on Earth. In her room on the base, Anna finds a mysterious note, painted in her own hand, warning her not to trust the colony psychiatrist. A note she can't remember painting.When she finds a footprint in a place that the colony AI claims has never been visited by humans, Anna begins to suspect that she is caught up in an elaborate corporate conspiracy. Or is she losing her grip on reality? Anna must find the truth, regardless of what horrors she might discover or what they might do to her mind.

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Book SynopsisHugo Award winner Emma Newman returns to the captivating Planetfall universe with a novel about vengeance and the lengths to which one will go to save the future of humanity.Six months after she left, Dee is struggling to manage her rage toward the people who ordered the nuclear strike that destroyed Earth. She’s trying to find those responsible, but she’s not getting very far alone.A dedicated gamer, Dee is endeavoring to discover a mersive good enough to enable her to escape her trauma. When she is approached by a designer who asks her to play test his new game, she hopes it will be what she needs—but it isn’t like any mersive she’s played before. When a man suddenly dies in the real world, she realizes that at the same time in the game, she killed a character who bears a striking resemblance to the dead man—a man she discovers was one of those responsible for the death of millions on Earth.Disturbed, but thinking it must be a coincidence, Dee continues the hunt for information. But when she finds out the plans for the future colony, she realizes that to save what is left of humanity, she might have to do something that risks what remains of her own.

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Book SynopsisIn 1726, in the town of Godalming, England, a woman confounded the nation’s medical community by giving birth to seventeen rabbits. This astonishing true story is the basis for Dexter Palmer’s stunning, powerfully evocative new novel.   Surgeon’s apprentice Zachary Walsh knows that his master, John Howard, prides himself on his rationality. But John cannot explain how or why Mary Toft, the wife of a local journeyman, has managed to give birth to a dead rabbit. When this singular event be­comes a regular occurrence, John and Zach­ary realize that nothing in their experience as rural physicians has prepared them to deal with a situation like this—strange, troubling, and possibly miraculous. John contacts sev­eral of London’s finest surgeons, three of whom soon arrive in Godalming to observe, argue, and perhaps use the case to cultivate their own fame.   When King George I learns of Mary’s plight, she and her doct

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Book SynopsisSet in rural Japan shortly after World War II, this gripping novel tells the story of a strange and utterly absorbing love triangle that leads to psychological self-entrapment, seduction, and murder. • “A compelling tale of love and violence.” —The Washington Post“Mishima is a giant.... One of the most acclaimed writers of the 20th century.” —The New York Times Book ReviewTranslated into English for the first time, this novel is about an affair gone wrong between a former university student, Kōji; his would-be mentor, the eminent literary critic Ippei Kusakado; and Ippei's beautiful, enigmatic wife, Yūko. When brought face-to-face with one of Ippei's many marital indiscretions, Kōji finds his growing desire for Yūko compels him to action in a way that changes all three of their lives profoundly. Originally published in 1961 and now available in English for the first time, The Frolic of the Beasts is a haunting examination of the various guises we assume throughout our lives.

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Book SynopsisKif Kehlmann, a young, penniless writer, thinks he’s finally caught a break when he’s offered $10,000 to ghostwrite the memoir of Siegfried “Ziggy” Heidl, the notorious con man and corporate criminal. Ziggy is about to go to trial for defrauding banks for $700 million; they have six weeks to write the book.   But Ziggy swiftly proves almost impossible to work with: evasive, contradictory, and easily distracted by his still-running “business concerns”—which Kif worries may involve hiring hitmen from their shared office. Worse, Kif finds himself being pulled into an odd, hypnotic, and ever-closer orbit of all things Ziggy. As the deadline draws near, Kif becomes increasingly unsure if he is ghostwriting a memoir, or if Ziggy is rewriting him—his life, his future, and the very nature of the truth.   By turns comic, compelling, and finally chilling, First Person is a haunting look at an age where fact is indistinguishable from fiction, and freedom is traded for a false idea of progress.

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Book SynopsisNEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Jane Hawk—who dazzled readers in The Silent Corner and The Whispering Room—faces the fight of her life, against the threat of a lifetime, in this electrifying thriller by #1 New York Times bestselling suspense master Dean Koontz.   “I could be dead tomorrow. Or something worse than dead.”   Jane Hawk knows she may be living on borrowed time. But as long as she’s breathing, she’ll never cease her one-woman war against the terrifying conspiracy that threatens the freedom—and free will—of millions. Battling the strange epidemic of murder-suicides that claimed Jane’s husband, and is escalating across the country, has made the rogue FBI agent a wanted fugitive, relentlessly hunted not only by the government but by the secret cabal behind the plot. Deploying every resource their malign nexus of power and technology command

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Book SynopsisNEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • When this relentless rogue FBI agent comes knocking, her adversaries will have to answer—with their lives—in this thrilling Jane Hawk novel by the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Silent Corner.“Koontz continues the incredible saga of the robust character of Jane Hawk, and it’s as terrific as the others in the series.”—Associated Press“We’re rewriting the play, and the play is this country, the world, the future. We break Jane’s heart, we’ll also break her will.”   She was one of the FBI’s top agents until she became the nation’s most-wanted fugitive. Now Jane Hawk may be all that stands between a free nation and its enslavement by a powerful secret society’s terrifying mind-control technology. She couldn’t save her husband, or the others whose lives have been destroyed, but eq

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Book SynopsisNEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Jane Hawk’s one-woman war comes to an explosive climax as the rogue FBI agent gambles everything against a terrifying conspiracy, for vengeance, for justice, and for humanity’s freedom—from the author of The Silent Corner. “Jane Hawk is arguably the best character Koontz has created. . . . Simply put, wow.”—Associated Press A visionary young filmmaker hunted for sport across a vast Colorado ranch by the celebrated billionaire at the heart of a monstrous cabal . . . A brilliant computer hacker slipping through top-secret databases a whisper ahead of security trackers, gathering the facts to fight the all-powerful perpetrators of mass murder . . . A pair of brutal operators, methodically shadowing their targets with every cutting-edge tool in the arsenal of today’s surveillance state . . . A sequence of quiet heroes—everyday citizens—stepping up, stepping forward, intent on countering the advancing darkness . . . A Vegas mob boss teamed with a homicidal sociopath, circling a beloved boy and his protectors, aiming to secure him as leverage against his fugitive mother . . . And that fugitive mother herself, ex-agent Jane Hawk, closing in on the malevolent architects of ruin she has stalked as they stalk her, prepared to sacrifice herself to finally bring them down. These are the people and circumstances of The Night Window, the thrilling new novel in Dean Koontz’s acclaimed Jane Hawk series. Replete—and then some—with the ingenious twists, the spellbinding action, the resonant themes, the sheer heart that have characterized Jane’s journey from the start, The Night Window follows its extraordinary heroine to her long-sought objective, in a stunning, unforgettable finale.  Don’t miss any of Dean Koontz’s gripping Jane Hawk thrillers:THE SILENT CORNER • THE WHISPERING ROOM • THE CROOKED STAIRCASE • THE FORBIDDEN DOOR • THE NIGHT WINDOW  “The spectacular finale to Jane’s story . . . will hit series fans with all the impact of a carefully calibrated hammer blow.”—Booklist (starred review)   “The best installment in the series since the first . . . [Koontz] revs it up with entertaining encounters and offbeat humor.”—Kirkus Reviews  

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