Meik Wiking founded the world's first Happiness Research Institute in 2013, in Copenhagen, Denmark and is a New York Times and Sunday Times Bestselling author. Meik has been called The Indiana Jones of Smiles and probably the World's Happiest Man by The Times. He is the author of four globally bestselling books which have sold over 2 million copies worldwide: The Little Book of Hygge, The Little Book of Lykke, The Art of Making Memories and My Hygge Home.

Meik Wiking

Sue Meikle has always been obsessed with picture books, and after working as an Early Years Specialist for over 25 years, she has read stories to children from Stockport to South Africa. In schools, in early years centres, while on forest school adventures... Sue has even read stories on a travelling play bus! So, perhaps it was always in the stars for Sue to not just read books, but write them, too! When she's not reading or writing stories, Sue can be found walking her dog or chauffeuring her teenagers around the Greater Manchester area (because that’s where they live… in a home that they made from a derelict barn!)

Sue Meikle

David Meikle is a TV scriptwriter and Sunday Times bestselling author. He has written and co-written seven books, including the autobiographies of Charlie Richardson and Bobby Cummines.

David Meikle

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Paula Lichtarowicz

Brilliantly inventive and original. This debut novel tells the story of Calamity Leek: a girl who has never been allowed beyond the garden wall, until now. 
 
Lying in her hospital bed, broken, burned and scared, Calamity still believes that Aunty loved her. For as long as she can remember, Calamity, along with her sixteen sisters, lived in a Garden behind the Wall of Safekeeping. Like it said in Aunty's Appendix on the first page of the Ps: 'Everything has a purpose', and they were being trained for a very special one. In the Ns the Appendix said, 'Nosiness leads to nonsense'. As Calamity sees it, this is what led to their Garden's downfall, because when the sisters started questioning what was outside the Wall, they started questioning what was happening inside it too. 
 
But doubt is contagious. 
Watching your world crumble is frightening. 
And people who are frightened can be dangerous.

The First Book of Calamity Leek

Kevin Kwan

THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER 
 
'Flashy, funny ... Delicious ... A memorable, laugh-out-loud Asian glitz fest that's a pure pleasure to read' USA Today 
 
Nicholas Young's grandmother Su Yi is on her deathbed. While he rushes to be by her bedside, he's not the only one. The entire Shang-Young clan has convened from all corners of the globe to stake claim on their matriarch's massive fortune. With all parties vying to inherit a trophy estate in the heart of Singapore, Nicholas's childhood home turns into a hotbed of sabotage and scandal. 
 
Taking us from the elegantly appointed mansions of Manila to the secluded private islands in the Sulu Sea, Kevin Kwan's final installment in this irresistible trilogy reveals the long-buried secrets of Asia's most privileged families and their rich people problems.

Rich People Problems

Nick Harkaway

From the acclaimed author of The Gone-Away World - an adventure story, a war story, and a love story, all wound into one brilliant narrative that runs like clockwork. 
 
Shortlisted for the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Science Fiction Literature. 
 
Joe Spork, son of the infamous criminal Mathew ‘Tommy Gun’ Spork just wants a quiet life, repairing clockwork in a wet, unknown bit of London. 
 
Edie Banister, former superspy, lives quietly and wishes she didn’t. She’s nearly ninety and the things she fought to save don’t seem to exist anymore. She's beginning to wonder if they ever did. 
 
When Joe is asked to fix one particularly unusual device, his life is suddenly upended. The client? Unknown. The device? A 1950s doomsday machine. Having triggered it, Joe now faces the wrath of both the government and a diabolical South Asian dictator, Edie’s old arch-nemesis. Joe’s once-quiet world is now populated with mad monks, psychopathic serial killers, scientific geniuses and threats to the future of conscious life in the universe. The only way he can survive, is to muster the courage to fight, help Edie complete a mission she gave up years ago, and pick up his father’s old gun...

Angelmaker

Jo Marchant

In 1900 a group of sponge divers blown off course in the Mediterranean discovered an Ancient Greek shipwreck near the island of Antikythera dating from around 70 BC. 
 
Lying unnoticed for months amongst their hard-won haul was what appeared to be a formless lump of corroded rock, which turned out to be the most stunning scientific artefact we have from antiquity. For more than a century this 'Antikythera mechanism' - an ancient computer - puzzled academics, but now, more than 2000 years after the device was lost at sea, scientists have pieced together its intricate workings. 
 
In Decoding the Heavens, Jo Marchant tells for the first time the story of the 100-year quest to understand the Antikythera mechanism. Along the way she unearths a diverse cast of remarkable characters - ranging from Archimedes to Jacques Cousteau - and explores the deep roots of modern technology not only in Ancient Greece, the Islamic world and medieval Europe.

Decoding the Heavens

How the Antikythera Mechanism Changed The World

Dan Cruickshank

SHORTLISTED FOR THE HESSELL-TILTMAN HISTORY PRIZE 2017 
 
AN OBSERVER BOOK OF THE YEAR 2016 
 
Religious strife, civil conflict, waves of immigration, the rise and fall of industry, great prosperity and grinding poverty – the handful of streets that constitute modern Spitalfields have witnessed all this and much more. 
 
In Spitalfields, one of Britain's best-loved historians tells the stories of the streets he has lived in for four decades. Starting in Roman times and continuing right up to the present day, Cruickshank explains how Spitalfields' streets evolved, what people have lived there, and what lives they have led. En route, he discovers the tales of the Huguenot weavers who made Spitalfields their own after the Great Fire of London. He recounts the experiences of the first Jewish immigrants. He evokes the slum-ridden courts and alleys of Jack the Ripper's Spitalfields. And he describes the transformation of the Spitalfields he first encountered in the 1970s from a war-damaged collection of semi-derelict houses to the vibrant community it is today. 
 
This is a fascinating evocation of one of London's most distinctive districts. At the same time, it is a history of England in miniature.

Spitalfields

The History of a Nation in a Handful of Streets

It doesn’t take much to tip the world into chaos. You don’t even have to mean to do it. You might be an honest family man; a police chief in a small town in Central Vietnam, say, with no desire whatsoever to unleash catastrophe. A man such as Chief Duong, with simple dreams of domestic happiness and future immortality by means of a small statue on a roundabout. 
 
But the problem with dreams is it’s often hard to look ahead. To see that borrowing money for your daughter’s marriage to a local bigwig will lead to the kidnap of a footballer from Scunthorpe, the downfall of a global soft drinks empire, incidents of attempted matricide, public murder, re-arranged marriage, hypnotic malpractice, and one unfortunate act of geriatric perversion. And that’s not to mention what happens to the town’s monkeys. 
 
Because every action has a consequence. 
 
And were she asked Mrs Duong could consult her astrological charts and tell her husband exactly that. 
 
But it’s not just the chief who needs telling. There’s roving British blogger, J C Bone, with an illegal marriage contract on his hands, and Global Human Resource Manager, Sherry-Sioux with a celebrity surveillance programme to keep under wraps. There’s a chief superintendent with lucrative investment plans and a physician with trail-blazing psychological ambitions. And then there’s Chief Duong’s freedom-fighting children. 
 
You see the biggest problem with chaos is that once it’s unleashed, everyone’s involved. 
 
And once everyone’s involved, how on earth is one little police chief ever going to put things right?

Creative Truths in Provincial Policing

Kirk Wallace Johnson

SHORTLISTED FOR THE GOLD DAGGER AWARD 
 
'A tale of obsession ... vivid and arresting' The Times 
 
One summer evening in 2009, twenty-year-old musical prodigy Edwin Rist broke into the Natural History Museum at Tring, home to one of the largest ornithological collections in the world. Once inside, Rist grabbed as many rare bird specimens as he was able to carry before escaping into the darkness. 
 
Kirk Wallace Johnson was waist-deep in a river in New Mexico when his fly-fishing guide first told him about the heist. But what would possess a person to steal dead birds? And had Rist paid for his crime? In search of answers, Johnson embarked upon a worldwide investigation, leading him into the fiercely secretive underground community obsessed with the Victorian art of salmon fly-tying. 
 
Was Edwin Rist a genius or narcissist? Mastermind or pawn?

The Feather Thief

The Natural History Heist of the Century

Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century

Anika Scott

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'The kind of novel we need now more than ever, [and] achieves what the best historical fiction can . . . pushing us to see ourselves in that past, demanding: Who would you have been then? What would you have done? Unflinching and absorbing, [it] does not let you look away.' Sarah Blake, New York Times bestselling author of THE POSTMISTRESS 
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Essen, 1946. Clara Falkenberg, once an iconic heiress, is on the run. With the city in ruins and her dear friend Elisa missing, Clara enlists the help of Jakob, a charming young racketeer with his own reasons for wanting to find Elisa. As the two join forces, it's not long before Clara's family secrets catch up with her. But she soon comes to realise the only way to survive is to face the truth of what she's done. 
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'What a great debut! It still haunts me, days after finishing it.' Liz Trenow, author of The Poppy Factory and The Silk Weaver 
 
'Anika Scott's finely drawn characters ... bring to life not only the struggle to rise from the ashes of war, but also the depth of resolve often required to gain redemption. Illuminating and beautifully rendered.' Susan Meissner, author of The Last Year of the War 
 
'Meticulously researched and plotted like a noir thriller, The German Heiress tells a different story of WWII - of characters grappling with their own guilt and driven by the question of what they could have done to change the past.' Jessica Shattuck, author of The Women in the Castle 
 
'Anika Scott's epic novel offers a captivating tour through the reckoning years that followed WWII when clarifying identities, unearthing truths, and facing judgements was the only way to rebuild a life. The novel's heroine, Clara, marches along the razor's edge between the leviathan of the past and a future full of mine shafts. I will never forget her unending struggle to rise above the dark lineage thrust upon her and her battle to stay connected to the deep binds of love, responsibility, and compassion.' Devin Murphy, author of The Boat Runner 
 
'The German Heiress is a special novel that opens one's mind to aspects of history we on the "winning" side have given little thought to, and a moving story of courage and everyday heroism rising to meet unbearable challenges.' Alex Marwood, author of The Wicked Girls 
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Previously published as Finding Clara 
_________________________ 
Readers are falling in love with The German Heiress: 
 
'A story that kept me engrossed from start to finish. I loved it.' 
'A stunning debut that will stay with me long after finishing the last page.' 
'A brilliant story which will keep you reading late into the night!' 
'An intense, dark and twisted historical read that skilfully portrays the often common experiences, horrors and dilemmas of being on the losing side in a war for ordinary people.' 
'A fascinating read about fighting for survival in post-World War 2 Germany' 
'The story is a page turner which had me gripped the whole way through' 
'A gripping read with a well-drawn characters.' 
'For those that love historical fiction, this was an unique and gripping plot'

The German Heiress

Barry Cryer

Graeme Garden

Tim Brooke-Taylor

Jack Dee

Know your Mornington Crescent from your Cheddar Gorge? 
 
Are you partial to a bad-tempered clavier? 
 
Would you like some unhelpful travel advice? 
 
Featuring the very best moments from a forty-year history of broadcasting, Stephen Fry introduces this indispensable companion to I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue, the Radio 4 comedy series which attracts millions of listeners each week. 
 
Featuring hilarious excerpts from the show's favourite games including: The Uxbridge English Dictionary, Famous First Words, the Trail of the Lonesome Pun and Late Arrivals as well as much much more, this book is essential for Clue fans young and old. 
 
For those new to Clue, there's a Beginner's Guide on how to play Mornington Crescent and numerous games which are fun and easy to play at home and guaranteed to entertain.

I’m Sorry I Haven't a Clue: The Best of Forty Years

Foreword by Stephen Fry

Marc Morris

This is the first major biography for a generation of a truly formidable king. Edward I is familiar to millions as 'Longshanks', conqueror of Scotland and nemesis of Sir William Wallace ('Braveheart'). Edward was born to rule England, but believed that it was his right to rule all of Britain. His reign was one of the most dramatic of the entire Middle Ages, leading to war and conquest on an unprecedented scale, and leaving a legacy of division that has lasted from his day to our own. 
 
In his astonishingly action-packed life, Edward defeated and killed the famous Simon de Montfort in battle; travelled across Europe to the Holy Land on crusade; conquered Wales, extinguishing forever its native rulers, and constructed - at Conwy, Harlech, Beaumaris and Caernarfon - the most magnificent chain of castles ever created. After the death of his first wife he erected the Eleanor Crosses - the grandest funeral monuments ever fashioned for an English monarch.

A Great and Terrible King

Edward I and the Forging of Britain

John Niven

GARY is a sweet and decent man. Only two things would improve his life - having children with his gorgeous wife Pauline, and a lower golf handicap. Both are unlikely. 
 
PAULINE is wondering how she ended up living in an ugly little house, driving a second-hand car and making a living dressing up as Tinkerbell. She's planning to leave Gary for a self-made carpet millionaire. 
 
FINDLAY, the Carpet King of Scotland, wants to trade in his obese wife for a younger model. But if he goes for a divorce she'll take him to the cleaners. If only there was some way she could be made to disappear... 
 
LEE, Gary's luckless brother, has botched one too many drug deals. Local crime overlord Ranta Campbell gives him one more job - one last chance to get it right. Lee's done some bad things - but murder? 
 
When Gary gets smashed on the head by a golf ball and miraculously develops an absolutely perfect swing, everyone finds their fates rest on the final day of the Open Championship...

The Amateurs

Michael Scott

'This vivid and engaging book brings to life some of the most important moments in ancient history, moments that have shaped not only the politics and culture of bygone eras, but the institutions, thoughts and fantasies of our time.' Yuval Noah Harari (Sapiens) 
 
'A bold and imaginative page-turner that challenges ideas about the world of antiquity.' Peter Frankopan (The Silk Roads) 
 
'As panoramic as it is learned, this is ancient history for our globalised world.' Tom Holland (Dynasty, Rubicon) 
________________________________________ 
Acclaimed historian and TV presenter Michael Scott guides us through an epic story spanning ten centuries to create a bold new reading of the classical era for our globalised world. 
 
Scott challenges our traditionally western-focused perception of the past, connecting Greco-Roman civilisation to the great rulers and empires that swept across Central Asia to India and China - resulting in a truly global vision of ancient history. 
 
With stunning range and richness Ancient Worlds illustrates how the great powers and characters of antiquity shared ambitions and crises, ways of thinking and forms of governing: connections that only grew stronger over the centuries as political systems evolved, mighty armies clashed, universal religions were born and our modern world was foreshadowed. 
 
Scott focuses on three epochal 'moments' across the ancient globe, and their profound wider significance: from 509-8 BCE (birth of Athenian democracy and Rome's republic, also the age of Confucius's teachings in China); to 218 BCE (when Hannibal of Carthage challenged Rome and China saw its first emperor); to 312 CE, when Constantine sought to impose Christianity on the Roman world even as Buddhism was pervading China via the vast trading routes we now know as the 'Silk Roads.' 
 
A major work of global history, Michael Scott's enthralling journey challenges the way we think about our past, re-draws the map of the classical age to reveal its hidden connections, and shows us how ancient history has lessons for our own times.

Ancient Worlds

An Epic History of East and West

Tom Dyckhoff

'A great storyteller . . . you would be hard pushed to find a more knowledgeable or entertaining [guide]' Icon 
 
'Such an interesting book . . . I cannot recommend it enough.' Lauren Laverne 
 
 
In Dubai, a luxury apartment block is built in the shape of a giant iPod. In China, President Xi Jinping denounces the trend of constructing ‘bizarre’ new buildings in wacky shapes and colours. In Cincinnati, celebrity architect Zaha Hadid is paid millions to design a single ‘iconic’ structure – with the hope of single-handedly transforming the region’s ailing fortunes. These incidents are all part of the same story: the rise of the age of spectacle. 
 
Over the last fifty years, there has been a revolution in how our cities operate. In The Age of Spectacle, Tom Dyckhoff tells the story of how architecture became obsessed with the flashy, the monumental and the ostentatious – and how we all have to live with the consequences. Exploring cityscapes from New York to Beijing, and from Bilbao to Portsmouth, Dyckhoff shows that we are not just witnessing a new kind of building: we are living through a fundamental transformation in how our urban spaces work. The corporate explosion of the last few decades has fundamentally shifted the relationship between architects, politicians and cities’ inhabitants, fostering innovative new kinds of engineering and design, but also facilitating ill-conceived vanity projects and commercial power-grabs. 
 
Timely, passionate and bursting with new ideas, The Age of Spectacle is both an examination of how twenty-first century cities work, and a manifesto for a radically new kind of urbanism. Our cities, Dyckhoff shows, can thrive in the age of spectacle – but only if they engage us not just with dazzling structures, but by responding to the needs of the people who inhabit them. 
 
'Engaging . . . The “iconic” building is the most obvious architectural phenomenon of our age yet, somehow, no one has quite done what Tom Dyckhoff does with The Age of Spectacle, which is to tell its story clearly and plainly.' Rowan Moore, Observer 
 
'First class. Finally, a book that nails the iconic movement – Tom Dyckhoff’s The Age of Spectacle is the book that I wish I had written.' Simon Jenkins 
 
'Unusually accessible [and] well argued.' Evening Standard

The Age of Spectacle

The Rise and Fall of Iconic Architecture

Adventures in Architecture and the 21st-Century City

THE ICONIC AUTHOR OF THE BESTSELLING PHENOMENON CRAZY RICH ASIANS RETURNS WITH THE GLITTERING TALE OF A YOUNG WOMAN WHO FINDS HERSELF TORN BETWEEN TWO MEN. 
 
'Your perfect summer read' Daily Mail 
 
'Delightful' Independent 
 
'Laugh-out-loud funny' Sunday Mirror 
 
When Lucie Tang Churchill meets George Zao at a lavish wedding in Capri, she can't stand him. She can't stand that he gallantly offers to trade hotel rooms with her so she can have a sea view, that he knows more about the island than she does, and worst of all, that he kisses her in the darkness of the ancient ruins. What would her Mayflower-descended, Wall Street-wealthy family think of him? But years later, when Lucie is weekending with her fiancé in East Hampton, George unexpectedly appears and Lucie must decide - does she follow her head or her heart? 
 
 A gloriously decadent homage to A Room with a View, Sex and Vanity is a glittering modern love story and a brilliantly funny comedy of manners set between two cultures.

Sex and Vanity

from the bestselling author of Crazy Rich Asians

Alice Roberts

**'A masterpiece of evocative scientific storytelling.' BRIAN COX** 
 
**'Will appeal to fans of Yuval Noah Harari's Sapiens'. Mail on Sunday ** 
 
The extraordinary story of the species that became our allies. 
 
Dogs became our companions 
Wheat fed a booming population 
Cattle gave us meat and milk 
Maize fuelled the growth of empires 
Potatoes brought us feast and famine 
Chickens led us to wonder about tomorrow 
Rice promised us a golden future 
Horses gave us strength and speed 
Apples travelled with us 
HUMANS TAMED THEM ALL 
 
For hundreds of thousands of years, our ancestors depended on wild plants and animals to stay alive – until they began to tame them. 
 
Combining archaeology and cutting-edge genetics, Tamed tells the story of the greatest revolution in human history and reveals the fascinating origins of ten crucial domesticated species; and how they, in turn, transformed us. In a world creaking under the strain of human activity, Alice Roberts urges us to look again at our relationship with the natural world – and our huge influence upon it. 
 
AN ECONOMIST AND MAIL ON SUNDAY 'BOOK OF THE YEAR' 2017

Tamed

Ten Species that Changed our World

Paul Harding

Hailed as a masterpiece, Tinkers, Paul Harding’s Pulitzer Prize-winning debut, is a modern classic. Here, in Enon, Harding follows a year in the life of Charlie Crosby as he tries to come to terms with a shattering personal tragedy. Grandson of George Crosby (the protagonist of Tinkers), Charlie inhabits the same dynamic landscape of New England, its seasons mirroring his turbulent emotional odyssey. Along the way, Charlie’s encounters are brought to life by his wit, his insights into history, and his yearning to understand the big questions. A stunning mosaic of human experience, Enon affirms Paul Harding as one of the most gifted and profound writers of his generation.

Enon

Brooke Davis

‘If you liked Rachel Joyce's The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, you'll like this’ Metro 
 
‘Will generate the same feel-good word of mouth as last year’s bestseller, The Rosie Project’ Sydney Morning Herald 
 
Millie Bird is seven-years-old. On a shopping trip with her mum, Millie is left alone beneath the Ginormous Women’s underwear rack in a department store. Her mum never returns. 
 
Agatha Pantha is eighty-two and hasn’t left home since her husband died. Instead, she fills the silence by yelling at passers-by, watching loud static on TV, and maintaining a strict daily schedule. Until the day Agatha spies a little girl across the street. 
 
Karl the Touch Typist is eighty-seven and in a nursing home. He remembers how he once typed love letters with his fingers on to his wife’s skin. Now widowed, he knows that somehow he must find a way for life to begin again. In a moment of clarity, he escapes. 
 
Together, Millie, Agatha and Karl set out to find Millie’s mum. And along the way, they will discover that the young can be wise, that old age is not the same as death, and that breaking the rules once in a while might just be the key to a happy life.

Lost & Found

Susan Frobisher and Julie Wickham are turning sixty. Susan has just discovered that her recently deceased husband was not only a swinger but had run up a fortune in debts in pursuing his extravagant double life. Julie's not faring better: living in a council house and working in an old people's home, she's desperate for excitement. 
 
When the bank threatens to take Susan's beloved home to clear the debt, the women seek the help of an octogenarian gangster named Nails. Rather than let the bank take everything Susan has, they're going to take the bank. With the help of Nails and a thrill-crazy, wheelchair-bound friend they pull off the daring robbery, and discover that getting away with it is not so easy and that the adventure is only just beginning.

The Sunshine Cruise Company

Jackie Copleton

LONGLISTED FOR THE BAILEYS WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2016 
A BBC RADIO 2 BOOK CLUB PICK 
 
'Memoirs of a Geisha meets The Piano Teacher, in the best way.' InStyle 
 
Amaterasu Takahashi has spent her life grieving for her daughter Yuko and grandson Hideo, who were victims of the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki in 1945. 
 
 Now a widow living in America, she believes that one man was responsible for her loss; a local doctor who caused an irreparable rift between mother and daughter. 
 
 When a man claiming to be Hideo arrives on her doorstep, she is forced to revisit the past; the hurt and humiliation of her early life, the intoxication of a first romance and the realisation that if she had loved her daughter in a different way, she might still be alive today.

A Dictionary of Mutual Understanding

The compelling Richard and Judy Summer Book Club winner

Michael Griesbach

___________________________ 
THE BESTSELLING BOOK ON THE CASE IN THE HIT NETFLIX SERIES MAKING A MURDERER 
 
This is the story of one of America's most notorious wrongful convictions. 
 
Steven Avery is a Wisconsin man who spent eighteen years in prison for the violent assault of Penny Beernsten. But two years after he was exonerated, just when he was poised to reap millions in his wrongful conviction lawsuit, Steven Avery was arrested for the brutal murder of Teresa Halbach. The 'Innocent Man' had turned into a cold-blooded killer. 
 
Or had he? 
 
Michael Griesbach is a veteran prosecutor who worked with the Wisconsin Innocence Project on the case which led to Avery's exoneration in 2003. Examining both trials in depth and presenting an alternative view of the Teresa Halbach case, The Innocent Killer exposes the failings of the justice system and its devastating consequences for both the accused and the victims.

The Innocent Killer

Zaiba Malik

For Zaiba Malik, growing up in Bradford in the '70s and '80s certainly has its moments - staying up all night during Ramadan with her father; watching mad Mr Aziz searching for his goat during Eid; dancing along to Top of the Pops (so long as no-one's watching). And, of course, there's her mother - whether she's writing another ingratiating letter to the Queen or repeatedly referring to Tom Jones as 'Thumb Jone'. 
 
But Zaiba's story is also one of anxiety and seemingly irreconcilable opposites. Growing up she is constantly torn between two identities: 'British' and 'Muslim'. Alienated at school and confused at home, the racism she encounters as a child mirrors the horrors she experiences at the hands of Bangladeshi interrogators 
as a journalist years later. 
 
We Are A Muslim, Please is a stirring and enchanting memoir. We see, through Zaiba's childhood eyes, the poignancy of growing up in a world whose prejudices, contradictions and ambiguities are at once distressing and utterly captivating.

We Are a Muslim, Please

Patricia Wood

Perry L. Crandall knows what it's like to be an outsider. With an IQ of 76, he's an easy mark. Before his grandmother died, she armed Perry well with what he'd need to know: the importance of words and writing things down, and how to play the lottery. Most importantly, she taught him whom to trust - a crucial lesson for Perry when he wins the multimillion-dollar jackpot. As his family descends, moving in on his fortune, his fate and his few true friends, he has a lesson for them: never ever underestimate Perry L. Crandall.

Lottery

The Fortunes and Misfortunes of Perry L. Crandall

Thomas Harding

***WINNER OF THE CRIME WRITERS' ASSOCIATION ALCS GOLD DAGGER FOR NON-FICTION*** 
 
'Meticulous and gripping - a thriller that disturbs for revelations about a singular act of murder, and the national security state which we call home' Philippe Sands, author of East West Street 
 
A groundbreaking examination of a terrifying murder and its aftermath by the bestselling author of Hanns and Rudolf and The House by the Lake. 
 
On 14 June 2006, police were called to 9 Downshire Hill in Hampstead. The owner, Allan Chappelow, was a writer and notorious recluse who had not been seen for several weeks. Inside the darkened house, officers found piles of rubbish, trees growing through the floor, and the body of Chappelow, battered to death, partially burned and buried under four feet of paper. 
 
The man eventually arrested on suspicion of his murder was a Chinese dissident named Wang Yam, who claimed to be the grandson of one of Mao’s closest aides. His trial was the first in modern British history to be held ‘in camera’: closed, carefully controlled, secret. Wang Yam was found guilty, but has always protested his innocence. 
 
Did Wang Yam do it? Or was he framed for a crime he didn't commit? 
 
When everything is hidden, how do we know what's really true? 
 
www.bloodonthepage.com 
_________________ 
 
'An In Cold Blood for our time – a brilliant and unflinching anatomy of a murder that is both brutal true crime and heartbreaking human tragedy' Tony Parsons 
 
'A fine and fascinating read, bolstered by exemplary research and nuanced insights.' Observer 
 
‘A real-life procedural... which might have important implications for us all.’ Guardian 
 
'Reads like a thriller... a rigorous investigation... a revealing piece of social history.' Sunday Times 
 
'Detailed, painstaking and fascinating.' Evening Standard

Blood on the Page

WINNER of the 2018 Gold Dagger Award for Non-Fiction

Rebecca Makkai

The acclaimed author of The Borrower returns with a dazzlingly original, mordantly witty novel about the secrets of an old-money family and their turn-of-the-century estate, Laurelfield. 
 
Meet the Devohrs: Zee, a Marxist literary scholar who detests her parents’ wealth but nevertheless finds herself living in their carriage house; Gracie, her mother, who claims she can tell your lot in life by looking at your teeth; and Bruce, her step-father, stockpiling supplies for the Y2K apocalypse and perpetually late for his tee time. Then there’s Violet Devohr, Zee’s great-grandmother, who they say took her own life somewhere in the vast house, and whose massive oil portrait still hangs in the dining room. 
 
Violet’s portrait was known to terrify the artists who resided at the house from the 1920s to the 1950s, when it served as the Laurelfield Arts Colony – and this is exactly the period Zee’s husband, Doug, is interested in. An out-of-work academic whose only hope of a future position is securing a book deal, Doug is stalled on his biography of the poet Edwin Parfitt, once in residence at the colony. All he needs to get the book back on track – besides some motivation and self-esteem – is access to the colony records, rotting away in the attic for decades. But when Doug begins to poke around where he shouldn’t, he finds Gracie guards the files with a strange ferocity, raising questions about what she might be hiding. The secrets of the hundred-year house would turn everything Doug and Zee think they know about her family on its head – that is, if they were to ever uncover them. 
 
In this brilliantly conceived, ambitious, and deeply rewarding novel, Rebecca Makkai unfolds a generational saga in reverse, leading the reader back in time on a literary scavenger hunt as we seek to uncover the truth about these strange people and this mysterious house. With intelligence and humor, a daring narrative approach, and a lovingly satirical voice, Rebecca Makkai has crafted an unforgettable novel about family, fate and the incredible surprises life can offer.

The Hundred-Year House

Casey Cep

A BARACK OBAMA BOOK OF THE YEAR 
WINNER OF THE 2020 CRIME WRITERS' ASSOCIATION ALCS GOLD DAGGER FOR NON-FICTION 
SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2019 BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION 
A SUNDAY TIMES, ECONOMIST AND SPECTATOR BOOK OF THE YEAR 
 
'A triumph on every level. One of the losses to literature is that Harper Lee never found a way to tell a gothic true-crime story she'd spent years researching. Casey Cep has excavated this mesmerizing story and tells it with grace and insight and a fierce fidelity to the truth.' 
DAVID GRANN, author of Killers of the Flower Moon 
_____________________________ 
The stunning story of an Alabama serial killer and the true-crime book that Harper Lee worked on obsessively in the years after To Kill a Mockingbird 
 
Reverend Willie Maxwell was a rural preacher accused of murdering five of his family members for insurance money in the 1970s. With the help of a savvy lawyer, he escaped justice for years until a relative shot him dead at the funeral of his last victim. Despite hundreds of witnesses, Maxwell's murderer was acquitted - thanks to the same attorney who had previously defended the Reverend. 
 
As Alabama is consumed by these gripping events, it's not long until news of the case reaches Alabama's - and America's - most famous writer. Intrigued by the story, Harper Lee makes a journey back to her home state to witness the Reverend's killer face trial. Harper had the idea of writing her own In Cold Blood, the true-crime classic she had helped her friend Truman Capote research. Lee spent a year in town reporting on the Maxwell case and many more years trying to finish the book she called The Reverend. 
 
Now Casey Cep brings this story to life, from the shocking murders to the courtroom drama to the racial politics of the Deep South. At the same time, she offers a deeply moving portrait of one of the country's most beloved writers and her struggle with fame, success, and the mystery of artistic creativity. 
 
This is the story Harper Lee wanted to write. This is the story of why she couldn't. 
_____________________________ 
'Fascinating ... Cep has spliced together a Southern-gothic tale of multiple murder and the unhappy story of Lee's literary career, to produce a tale that is engrossing in its detail and deeply poignant... [Cep] spends the first third of Furious Hours following the jaw-dropping trail of murders ... Engrossing ... Cep writes about all this with great skill, sensitivity and attention to detail.' 
SUNDAY TIMES 
 
'It's been a long time since I picked up a book so impossible to put down. Furious Hours made me forget dinner, ignore incoming calls, and stay up reading into the small hours. It's a work of literary and legal detection as gripping as a thriller. But it's also a meditation on motive and mystery, the curious workings of history, hope, and ambition, justice, and the darkest matters of life and death. Casey Cep's investigation into an infamous Southern murder trial and Harper Lee's quest to write about it is a beautiful, sobering, and sometimes chilling triumph.' 
HELEN MACDONALD, author of H is for Hawk 
 
'This story is just too good ... Furious Hours builds and builds until it collides with the writer who saw the power of Maxwell's story, but for some reason was unable to harness it. It lays bare the inner life of a woman who had a world-class gift for hiding ... [this] book makes a magical leap, and it goes from being a superbly written true-crime story to the sort of story that even Lee would have been proud to write.' 
MICHAEL LEWIS, author of Moneyball and The Big Short

Furious Hours

Murder, Fraud and the Last Trial of Harper Lee

Nicola Barker

__________________________________________ 
'One of the funniest, most finely achieved comic novels, even by her own standard … I think it’s a masterpiece.' ALI SMITH 
 
‘I think Nicola Barker is incapable of a dull page. [Her work] is unified by its spirit of adventure.’ KEVIN BARRY 
 
How long does it take to change the world? 
Could it happen in approximately twenty minutes? 
 
Charles, a forty-year-old teddy bear maker, is trying to sell his late mother's house, helped by his estate agent Avigail (who thinks Charles is an imbecile). The prospective buyers: the fearsome Wang Shu - who has no desire to make idle chit-chat - and her downtrodden daughter, Ying Yue. 
 
During the twenty-minute viewing a huge number of things happen, although it is also entirely possible that nothing happens at all. Which is it? Can the world really turn on its axis during a mundane discussion about cheese preservation? Has fiction the power to do that? Should it even want to? 
__________________________________________ 
'She really is a genius.’ GUARDIAN 
 
‘Life-affirming hilarity – Evelyn Waugh on ecstasy.’ NELL ZINK 
 
'A madly brilliant little book that asks who at any point is in control of what. I loved it.' DAILY MAIL 
 
‘Nicola Barker’s wildness and capacity for the absurd often delight me.’ SARAH MOSS 
 
‘What an audacious writer Nicola Barker is … In an era when plot is king, Barker has typically, joyously, dispensed with one … Barker’s pleasure in the novella feels defiant.’ EVENING STANDARD 
 
‘I Am Sovereign is bursting with energy, compassion and humour.’ LITERARY REVIEW 
 
‘Barker is a writer in a class of her own … A work of coruscating intelligence, of deep humanity.’ OBSERVER 
 
‘A riotous burst of a novel that scrutinises the nature of fiction with the lightest of touches.’ MAIL ON SUNDAY 
 
‘A bracing, brilliantly bonkers comic novel … This is freewheeling fiction that delights in the visual.’ SUNDAY TIMES 
 
‘Barker’s writing is very, very funny, both ha ha and strange ... Fans of Ali Smith’s “Seasonal Quartet” will enjoy a similarly arch, detached view on the banality of contemporary Britain ... A gloriously audacious blend of, well, the deep and the trite.’ INDEPENDENT

I Am Sovereign

'Extremely ambitious' Financial Times 
 
'An imaginative tour de force ... She really is a genius' Guardian 
 
'A delight' New Statesman 
 
FROM THE MAN BOOKER-SHORTLISTED AUTHOR NICOLA BARKER 
 
To the world he is Sri Ramakrishna - godly avatar, esteemed spiritual master, beloved guru. To temple owner, Rani Rashmoni, he is the Brahmin fated to defy tradition. But to Hriday, his nephew and long-time caretaker, he is just Uncle - maddening, bewildering Uncle, prone to entering trances at the most inconvenient of times, known to perform dangerous acts of self-effacement, who must be vigilantly safeguarded not only against jealous enemies but also against that most treasured yet insidious of sulphur-rich vegetables: the cauliflower.

The Cauliflower®

Asa Avdic

A masterly locked-room mystery set in a near-future Orwellian state — for fans of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale and Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games 
 
‘With a terrifying dystopian core and a foreboding that lurks on every page, this is terrifying stuff.’ Heat 
 
‘An Orwellian debut novel that never lets up . . . A heady mix of And Then There Were None and The Hunger Games.’ Booklist 
 
'Resembling Agatha Christie at her zaniest, this fascinating, ever- changing scenario is deftly and grippingly handled' Sunday Times 
 
‘Oh, it’s really quite simple. I want you to play dead.’ 
 
On the remote island of Isola, seven people have been selected to compete in a 48-hour test for a top-secret intelligence position. One of them is Anna Francis, a workaholic with a nine-year-old daughter she rarely sees, and a secret that haunts her. Her assignment is to stage her own death and then observe, from her hiding place inside the walls of the house, how the other candidates react to the news that a murderer is among them. Who will take control? Who will crack under pressure? 
 
But as soon as Anna steps on to the island she realises something isn’t quite right. And then a storm rolls in, the power goes out, and the real game begins…

The Dying Game

Duncan Hamilton

'Without football, we were strangers under a shared roof. With it, we were father and son.’ 
 
Inspired by his father’s devotion to Newcastle United and the heroes of yesteryear, Duncan Hamilton brings to life a bygone age telling the story of British football from the hardscrabble 1940s and the ‘never-had-it-so-good’ ’50s right through to the dowdy First Division of the ’70s and ’80s, and today’s slick Premiership. Hamilton recalls some of football’s most sublime players, managers and characters, from Bill Shankly and Jackie Milburn to George Best and Lionel Messi. 
 
But at the heart of The Footballer Who could Fly is Hamilton’s relationship with his own father. Here he tells how football became the only real connection between two people who, apart from their love of the beautiful game, were wholly different from one another.

The Footballer Who Could Fly

Andrea Barrett

Autumn, 1916. America is preparing to enter WWI, but at Tamarack State Hospital, the danger is barely felt. Here in the crisp, mountain air where wealthy tuberculosis patients recover in private cottages and charity patients, mostly European émigrés, fill the sanatorium, time stands still. Prisoners of routine and yearning for absent families, the inmates take solace in gossip, rumour and secret attachments. 
 
One enterprising patient initiates a weekly discussion group, but his well-meaning efforts lead instead to tragedy and betrayal. The war comes home, bringing with it a surge of anti-immigrant prejudice and vigilante sentiment. Andrea Barrett pits power and privilege against unrest and thwarted desire in a spellbinding tale of individual lives in a nation on the verge of extraordinary change.

The Air We Breathe

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