New book releases, perfect for summer
William Rayfet Hunter (Author)
SHORTLISTED FOR THE WATERSTONES DEBUT FICTION PRIZE 2025
AN OBSERVER BEST NEW NOVELIST 2025
'This summer's hottest read'
SUNDAY TIMES
'You won't want to put it down'
BRITISH VOGUE
'Sticky, twisting and dangerous'
REBECCA K REILLY
It’s summer. An unnamed young man walks through the gates of a luxurious mansion in the South of France, ready to join the Blake family on their annual holiday. Here, during dreamlike days lounging by the pool and nights blurring into opulent parties, he quickly falls for Felix, the Blake’s eldest son. He is everything the man wants to be – handsome, charismatic, wealthy – and his desire is surprisingly reciprocated. Suddenly, a new world of money and power feels within reach.
But when summer ends and the two men return to London, the cracks in the Blakes’ careful façade begin to show. With the two tormented by demons of their own, their bond risks being pulled apart at the seams. Their secrets and the choices they make will change not only their lives, but the future of those around them.
William Boyd (Author)
Gabriel Dax, travel writer and accidental spy, is back in the shadows. Unable to resist the allure of his MI6 handler, Faith Green, he has returned to a life of secrets and subterfuge. Dax is sent to Guatemala under the guise of covering a tinderbox presidential election, where the ruthless decisions of the Mafia provoke pitch-black warfare in collusion with the CIA.
As political turmoil erupts, Gabriel's reluctant involvement deepens. His escape plan leads him to West Berlin, where he uncovers a chilling realisation: there is a plot to assassinate magnetic young President John F. Kennedy. In a race against time, Gabriel must navigate deceit and danger, knowing that the stakes have never been higher.
The Predicament, the second novel in the bestselling espionage trilogy starring Gabriel Dax, William Boyd weaves a masterful tale of suspense, loyalty, love and the dark temptations of spy craft.
Taylor Jenkins Reid (Author)
***THE NUMBER ONE SUNDAY TIMES AND NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER***
'The read of the summer' SUNDAY TIMES
'A richly drawn page-turner' OBSERVER
'Beautifully written, immersive' THE TIMES
'Our favourite TJR novel yet' COSMOPOLITAN
'I absolutely adored this' BRYONY GORDON
READERS ARE SAYING...
'So emotional by the end that I could hardly speak' - Reader Review, 5*****
'Melted my heart by the end' - Reader Review, 5*****
'Taylor Jenkins Reid is the master of a really great love story' - Reader Review, 5*****
'Taylor Jenkins Reid's best book yet' - Reader Review, 5*****
An epic novel set against the backdrop of the 1980s space shuttle program about the extraordinary lengths we go to live and love beyond our limits.
In the summer of 1980, Joan Goodwin begins training to be an astronaut at Houston's Johnson Space Centre, alongside an exceptional group of fellow candidates. As the new astronauts prepare for their first flights, Joan finds a passion and a love she never imagined and begins to question everything she believes about her place in the observable universe. Then, in December of 1984, on mission STS-LR9, everything changes in an instant.
Atmosphere is a soaring story about the transformative power of love - this time among the stars.
'Is there a popular fiction writer alive who conveys falling in love better than Taylor Jenkins Reid?'
DAILY MAIL
'Thrilling ... heartbreaking ... uplifting. ... I loved it'
KRISTIN HANNAH, author of The Women
'NASA? Space missions? The 80s? This is a collection of all the things I love. ... Thrilling'
ANDY WEIR, author of Project Hail Mary and The Martian
'Packs a hefty emotional punch'
MAIL ON SUNDAY
'Breathtaking'
HEAT
'Unputdownable'
GRAZIA
Richard Osman (Author)
"A wedding. A code. A murder. Time is ticking . . . Your move."
It’s been a quiet year for the Thursday Murder Club. Joyce is busy with table plans and first dances. Elizabeth is grieving. Ron is dealing with family troubles, and Ibrahim is still providing therapy to his favourite criminal.
But when Elizabeth meets a wedding guest who fears for their life, the thrill of the chase is ignited once again. A villain wants access to an uncrackable code and will stop at nothing to get it. Plunged back into their most explosive investigation yet, can the gang solve the puzzle and a murder in time?
In the highly-anticipated sequel to the No.1 Sunday Times bestselling Book of Night, the question isn’t just how to survive, it’s how to protect yourself from the one thing you can never escape – your own shadow.
Charlie Hall used to be a talented con artist and thief – until her last job nearly killed her. Instead of walking away, she bartered her freedom to the Cabal, a ruthless circle of elite gloamists who trapped Charlie’s boyfriend, the powerful shadow named Vince. As the Cabal's new Hierophant, Charlie hunts rogue shadows on their behalf – not out of loyalty, but because it keeps Vince out of their hands.
Or, at least, what’s left of him.
The tether that binds Charlie and Vince erased every memory he had of her, leaving behind only Red – a dangerous Blight with Vince’s face. Cold, ruthless, and angry, Red doesn’t trust Charlie; he doesn’t like her, so when she’s pressed into service by the Cabal’s most manipulative member, the Puppeteer, she’s on her own.
Charlie’s no investigator, just a thief in over her head, sent to track down the Blight behind a brutal church massacre. And worse, her own shadow is making plans to betray her. Vulnerable, heartbroken, and magically outmatched, Charlie has one last chance to save herself, but the price might be the one person she thought she couldn't bear to lose.
Lyse Doucet (Author)
'Ingenious' KAMILA SHAMSIE
'Incredible' PETER FRANKOPAN
'Beautiful' RORY STEWART
In 1969, the luxury Hotel Inter-Continental Kabul opened its doors: a glistening white box, high on a hill, that reflected Afghanistan’s hopes of becoming a modern country, connected to the world.
Lyse Doucet first checked into the Inter-Continental on Christmas Eve 1988. In the decades since, she has witnessed a Soviet evacuation, a devastating civil war, the US invasion, and the rise, fall and rise of the Taliban, all from within its increasingly battered walls. The Inter-Con has never closed its doors.
Now, she weaves together the experiences of the Afghans who have kept the hotel running to craft a richly immersive history of their country. It is the story of Hazrat, the septuagenarian housekeeper, of Abida, who became the first female chef after the fall of the Taliban in 2001. And of Malalai and Sadeq, the twenty-somethings who seized every opportunity offered by two decades of fragile democracy – only to see the Taliban come roaring back in 2021.
Through these intimate portraits of Afghan life, the story of a hotel becomes the story of a people.
Ocean Vuong (Author)
THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER
‘Heartbreaking, heartwarming yet unsentimental, and savagely comic’ Guardian
‘Some of the most beautiful writing I’ve experienced in my lifetime’ Oprah Winfrey
READERS ARE OBSESSED WITH THE EMPEROR OF GLADNESS:‘Read it slowly. Let it wreck you. Then read it again’‘I feel like I lost part of my soul to this book’‘I would give it 6 stars if I could’‘Sad and funny, devastating and quietly celebratory’‘A masterwork of compassion and complexity’
College dropout Hai doesn’t know how to face the future until a chance meeting with elderly widow Grazina changes his life.
One late summer evening in the town of East Gladness, nineteen-year-old Hai stands on the edge of a bridge, ready to jump, when he hears someone shout across the river. The voice belongs to Grazina, an elderly widow.
From this moment, his second chance begins. Over the course of the year, Hai’s story takes new and unexpected turns, as his life-altering bond with Grazina transforms his relationship to the community, his family and, most powerfully of all, to himself.
‘An epic about forgiveness and narrow escapes, of chosen family and the American Dream’ GQ
‘His most vivid, ambitious work yet’ Dazed
‘The first millennial Great American Novel’ ArtReview
‘This stunning book moved me so much’ Caitríona Balfe
‘A poetic, dramatic and vivid story’ Colm Tóibín
LJ Ross (Author)
From the bestselling author of Holy Island comes the gripping new novel in the Summer Suspense Mysteries, set amidst the spectacular Cornish landscape.
“LJ Ross keeps company with the best mystery writers” — The Times
“A literary phenomenon” — Evening Chronicle
There’s nothing so deadly as the sea, and the man who survives it . . .
Bryher Enys is the proud owner of Cornwall's newest restaurant, Panorama.
When she isn't whipping up culinary feasts, she volunteers with the local lifeboat crew - a tight-knit team who regularly risk their lives to save others.
With no immediate plans to settle down, life is pretty much perfect.
Until one stormy night, when a distress signal shatters the calm. A luxury yacht is going down fast, and Bryher joins the rescue.
Too late to save the vessel, they search the raging seas for survivors - but find only one...
A man with no name, no memory and the power to turn her world upside down.
Arundhati Roy (Author)
‘Heart-smashed’ by the death of the mother she ran from at age eighteen and shaken by the intensity of her response, Arundhati Roy began this remarkable memoir – a soaring account, both intimate and inspiring, of how the author became the person and the writer she is: shaped by circumstance, but above all by her relationship to her extraordinary, singular mother, Mary, who she describes as ‘my shelter and my storm’.
With the scale, sweep and depth of her novels, and the passion, political clarity and warmth of her essays, Mother Mary Comes to Me is an ode to freedom, a tribute to thorny love and savage grace – a memoir like no other.
Emily Henry (Author)
When Margaret Ives, the famously reclusive heiress, invites eternal optimist Alice Scott to the balmy Little Crescent Island, Alice knows this is it: her big break. And even more rare: a chance to impress her family with a Serious Publication.
The catch? Pulitzer-prize winning human thundercloud, Hayden Anderson, is sure of the same thing.
The proposal? A one-month trial period to unearth the truth behind one of the most scandalous families of the 20th Century, after which she’ll choose who’ll tell her story.
The problem? Margaret is only giving each of them tantalising pieces. Pieces they can’t put together because of an ironclad NDA and an inconvenient yearning pulsing between them every time they’re in the same room.
And it’s becoming abundantly clear that their story – just like the tale Margaret’s spinning – could be a mystery, tragedy, or love ballad … depending on who’s telling it.
L. K. Steven (Author)
Two decades ago, the Bloodmoons ruthlessly murdered Saffron's parents, destroying her idyllic childhood. Hellbent on revenge, she lied her way into the elite Silvercloak Academy of detectives with a single goal: find a way to bring the Bloodmoons to justice.
But on the eve of her graduation, her deception is exposed, and she's given only one option: go undercover and tear the Bloodmoons down from the inside.
Descending into a world where pleasure and pain are the most powerful currencies, Saff must commit some truly heinous deeds to keep her cover - and her life. Not only are there rival gangs and sinister smuggling rings to contend with, there's also her growing feelings for the kingpin's tortured son, and curious prophecy foretelling his death at Saff's hand.
With each day testing her loyalties further, Saff's web of lies becomes harder to spin. And when one false step could destroy everything and everyone she's ever loved...the mage who dedicated her life to vengeance might just have to die for it.
Margaret Atwood (Author)
'Fat and satisfying' Observer * 'I loved it' Dua Lipa * 'Deliciously naughty' iNews * 'Beautifully told' Woman & Home * 'Spellbinding' FT * Book of the Year Guardian, Financial Times, Observer, Belfast Telegraph
Immerse yourself in the creative universe of Margaret Atwood for a riot of life, art and everything in between
Raised by scientifically minded parents, Atwood spent most of each year in the wild forest of northern Quebec: a vast playground for her entomologist father and independent, resourceful mother. It was an unfettered and nomadic childhood, sometimes isolated but also thrilling and beautiful.
From this unconventional start, Atwood unfolds the story of her life, linking key moments to the books that have shaped our literary landscape, from the cruel school year that would become Cat’s Eye to the unease of 1980s Berlin, where she began The Handmaid’s Tale. In pages alive with the natural world, reading and books, major political turning points and her lifelong love for the charismatic writer Graeme Gibson, we meet poets, bears, Hollywood stars and larger-than-life characters straight from the pages of an Atwood novel.
As she explores her past, Atwood reveals more and more about her writing, the connections between real life and art – and the workings of one of our boldest imaginations.
*Top ten Sunday Times bestseller week of 22 November 2025*
