|
|
|
Random House, Inc.
|
Two helicopters disrupt the peace of Dr Gabe Singleton's remote Wyoming ranch. From one of them strides the President of the United States with startling news — and a stunning request which will turn Gabe's quiet life upside down. President Stoddard's personal physician has suddenly and mysteriously disappeared, and he needs Gabe to take the man's place. Reluctantly, Gabe agrees — but soon he discovers that critical details concerning the President's health have been kept from him. Suspecting that the President's worsening condition may not be due to natural causes, Gabe sets out to uncover who is behind his mysterious illness. But the more questions he asks, the more Gabe seems to be putting himself in danger. |
|
In 1903, Leon M — a devout terrorist — is given the responsibility of 'liquidating' Valerian Alexandrovitch Courilof, the notoriously brutal and cold-blooded Russian Minister of Education, by the Revolutionary Committee. The assassination, he is told, must take place in public and be in most grandiose manner possible in order to strike the imagination of the people. Posing as his newly appointed personal physician, Leon M takes up residence with Courliof in his summer house in the Iles and awaits instructions.But over the course of his stay he is made privy to the inner world of Courliof — his failing health, his troubled domestic situation and, most importantly, the tyrannical grip that the Czar himself holds over all his Ministers, forcing them to obey him or suffer the most deadly punishments.Set during a period of radical upheaval in European history, The Courliof Affair is an unsparing observation of human motives and the abuses of power, an elegy to lost world and an unflinchingly topical cautionary tale. |
|
It is the summer of 1975. Marco Timoleon, an Onassis-like tycoon, is nearing the end of his life. When he finds out his troubled daughter is pregnant by a man he doesn't approve of, he throws a birthday party for her on his private island, secretly intending to persuade her to terminate the pregnancy. A doctor stands by to perform the operation on the spot. The story of this fateful party and the lives it affects is a brilliant modern fable, a rags-to-riches tale with no certainty of a happily-ever-after ending. |
|
Meet Burt Hecker, aka Eckbert Attquiet, a 63 year old medieval re-enactor with a momentous nose, who dresses in tunics and drinks too much home-made mead. His treasured wife Kitty has died and their strange and beautiful relationship is now the stuff of history; he has sold all of his possessions and bought a one-way ticket to Europe, bent on rescuing his beloved son Tristan from the 'evil' city of Prague. If only he knew that his son doesn't want to be rescued, or found. |
|
This perfect gem of a novel by the author of the posthumously acclaimed and bestselling Suite Francaise has never previously been published and was discovered only recently in separate archive files. A couple of pages were in the famous suitcase which her daughters saved, and the balance had been deposited with a family friend and editor during the war. A morality tale with doubtful morals, a story of murder, love and betrayal in rural France, Fire in the Blood, planned in 1937, written in 1941, is set in a small village, based on Issy-l'Eveque where Suite Francaise was written, and brilliantly prefigures the village community in her later masterpiece. An old man looks back on a chequered life with secret regrets, concealing a truth he will not reveal until the end. Fire in the Blood is a small and beautiful chamber piece which starts quietly, lyrically, but then races away with revelations and narrative twists in a story about young women forced into marriages with old men, about mothers and daughters, stepmothers and stepdaughters, youthful passions and the regrets of old age, about peasant communities and the way they hide their secrets. Nemirovsky looks at her characters, both young and old, with the same clear-eyed distance and humanity as she displayed in Suite Francaise, unpeeling layer after layer. Atmospheric and haunting as Embers and with the crystalline perfection of Chekhov, Fire in the Blood is a gripping literary find. |
|
In school playgrounds across the country parents huddle in worried packs, desperately putting together their final plans to survive the summer weeks of mayhem — school is officially out! For once, Amanda has a simple, cheap and fail-safe plan to make it through the summer holidays with her three, overexcited offspring. But a last minute addition of fellow-mum Suzanne and her perfect son Orlando quickly shatters Amanda's vision of the quintessential bucket-and-spade summer adventure. In fact, before she even makes it to the picture-perfect Cornish idyll that is home to her one-time playground comrade Skyler, Amanda has to endure tantrums, floods, and an eerie B&B, all with three ratty kids and a carsick dog in tow.When they finally arrive, dishevelled and exhausted, she discovers that not only must she endure Suzanne at close quarters in a cramped cottage, but also that Skyler's business in dire need of a helping hand. In the weeks that ensue, Amanda discovers there is only one way to survive the summer holidays, and that's with a stiff drink, a pair of wellies and a bucket-full of bonhomie! Praise for Sarah Tucker — 'Scandal, backstabbing, illicit affairs... a fab, girlie read!' — New Woman. 'Mums will be able to see the truth behind this fun novel' — In The Know. 'A real laugh-out-loud tale' OK! |
|
This moving and profoundly truthful story is told in the form of diary, kept by Angelika, the sister-in-law and friend of Klara, who, after her release from Auschwitz, wandered through war-ravaged Europe for two months before returning to Paris in August 1945. Gradually, over a period of six weeks, Klara reveals, with cold anger and pitiless lucidity, the full horror of what she experienced in Auschwitz as she struggles to readapt to normal life. Not since Sophie's Choice has a novelist succeeded in conveying — with truth, dignity, power and intelligence — the inhumanity of the death camps and the scars suffered by those who survived them. |
|
Roxanne's world collapses when she comes home one day to discover her husband lying dead on the bathroom floor. Consumed by grief, she runs away from her life, quitting her job and heading for Peaks Island, a tiny speck off the coast of Maine. A former psycologist, she finds herself taking a job as an animal warden and reinventing her past so it doesn't include the tragedy of her husband's death. But despite Roxanne's best efforts to cut herself off from her emotions and people in general, she finds herself drawn to her quirky new neighbours. And then Roxanne meets Lloyd. Lloyd is a large black Labrador retriever who Roxanne finds with a handmade arrow sticking out of his shoulder. It's clear that Lloyd has been woefully mistreated. And so begins a remarkable friendship between a wounded woman and a wounded dog. And as slowly both begin to heal, Roxanne begins to deal with her grief and even discover that happiness can be found in unexpected places. |
|
When the spoilt and haughty Dona Constanza tries to divert a river to fill her swimming pool, she starts a running battle with the locals. The skirmishes are so severe that the Government dispatches a squadron of soldiers led by the fat, brutal and stupid Figueras to deal with them. Despite visiting plagues of laughing fits and giant cats upon the troops, the villagers know that to escape the cruel and unusual tortures planned for them, they must run. Thus they plan to head for the mountains and start a new and convivial civilisation. |
|
Dionisio Vivo, a South American lecturer in philosphy, is puzzled by the hideously mutilated corpses that keep turning up outside his front door. To his friend, Ramon, one of the few honest policement in town, the message is all too clear: Dionisio's letters to the press, exposing the drug barons, must stop; and although Dionisio manages to escape the hit-men sent to get him, he soon realises that others are more vulnerable, and his love for them leads him to take a colossal revenge. |
|
A gritty and captivating story of courage and strength against terrible odds, this is the story of Midge, abandoned with her eccentric uncle during the holidays, and her adventures with the Various, a band of earthily realistic fairies. The existence of the Various, who are strange, wild and sometimes even deadly, has been kept secret since the beginning of time, but when their world begins to clash with that of human beings, their livelihood is threatened with extinction. This is a wonderfully imaginative story of love and loyalty, and is the first in a powerful trilogy. |
|
Obabakoak means 'events that happened in Obaba', the village at the centre of a novel composed of 26 inked tales and parodies written with a delicate sense of childlike innocence. But underlying these stories is a darker theme of loss, as the narrator of the book becomes a victim of his own tales. |
|
In August 1944, Hans Georg Klamroth was executed for his part in the 20 July plot to assassinate Hitler. Wibke Bruhns, his youngest daughter, was six years old at the time. Decades later, watching a documentary about the events of 20 July, images of her father in the Third Reich People's Court appeared on the screen — and she realises she never knew him. In My Father's Country, Bruhns tells of her search for her father. Returning to her ancestral home in Halberstadt, Northern Germany, she retraces her family's story from Kaiser Wilhelm to the end of World War Two, discovering old photographs, letters and diaries, which she uses to piece together a unique and unforgettable family epic. |
|
In her second novel, Nicola Monaghan moves her focus from a Nottingham council estate to the City of London. It's the late '90s and party-girl Frankie Cavanagh has just started working as a trader, experiencing life on the trading floor in all its sweaty, adrenalin-fueled madness, for the first time. She is determined to fit in with the boys — she works hard, plays hard and gives as good as she gets. Frankie fancies her American boss, Tom, from the start — he's sexy, charismatic and a lot of fun; exactly what she's looking for in Mr Right Now. They embark on an adventure together, a risky (he's married), exciting but dangerous affair based on doing anything for a thrill. As Frankie begins to lose her grip, she speeds head on towards the ultimate question: just how far is she prepared to go for a dare? In this macho world of sex, drugs and big-money deals, a girl could get pushed too far... Starfishing gives an insight into both the vibrant London club scene and the world of trading in the '90s, crackling with energy and intensity. It's also about an Essex girl who has come to the City to make her fortune (not find a man and spend his), but gets caught up in a game that she doesn't know how to end. This is a powerful and thrilling novel which confirms an impressive talent. |
|
The Cologne police know a woman is going to die. They know the day it will happen. And they're powerless to stop it. They call on an outside expert: Jan Fabel, head of Hamburg's Murder Squad and Germany's leading authority on serial killers. Fabel is on the point of leaving the police for good, but Carnival in Cologne is a time when the world goes crazy, and he is drawn into the hunt for the Carnival Cannibal. What he doesn't know is that he is on a collision course with a crack special forces unit from Ukraine and a disturbed colleague with a score to settle. Fabel finds himself on a trail of betrayal and vengeance, violence and death. And once more he faces his greatest enemy. The true Master of the Carnival. |
|
This title presents a callous murder, a devastating secret, and a crime of passion. Bishopthorpe Palace, York. September 1373. John Thoresby, the Archbishop of York, lies dying. One of the most powerful men in the country, his imminent demise has the dominant families of the north vying to influence his succession. Owen Archer, Thoresby's master of the guards, is one of the few men Thoresby trusts. He is determined to ensure that his lord's last days are as peaceful as possible, but his plans are thrown into disarray when Thoresby agrees to a visit from Joan, Princess of Wales, wife of the Black Prince and mother of the young heir to the throne of England.She has come to seek the great man's advice before it is too late. Owen resolves to do his duty, but within minutes of Joan's arrival things go disastrously wrong when a member of the royal party is murdered. Then, only days later, a messenger carrying urgent letters for Thoresby is found hanging in the woods. Soon, the shadow of suspicion falls on the whole household. And as Owen races against time to find the murderer amongst them, he starts to realise that not only has one of his own men been compromised, but all their lives are now in danger. |
|
A charming yet scathing portrait of young adulthood at the opening of the twenty-first century, All the Sad Young Literary Men charts the lives of Sam, Mark, and Keith, as they overthink their college years, underthink their love lives, and struggle through the encouragement of the women who love and despise them to find a semblance of maturity, responsibility, and even literary fame. Heartbroken in his university town, Mark tries to focus his attention on his graduate work concerning Russian revolt, only to be lured again and again to the free pornography on the library computers. Sam binds himself to the task of crafting 'the first great Zionist epic' even though he speaks no Hebrew, has never visited Israel, and is not a practicing Jew. Keith, thwarted by inherited notions of greatness and memories of his broken family, finds solace in the arms of the selfless woman who most reminds him of his past. At every turn, at each character's misstep, All the Sad Young Literary Men radiates with comedic warmth and biting honesty and signals the arrival of a brave and trenchant new writer. |
|
One early September night in Florida, a young woman brings her daughter to work. April's usual babysitter, Jean, has had a panic attack that has landed her in hospital. April doesn't really know anyone else, so she decides it's best to have her three-year-old daughter close by, watching children's videos in the office, while she works. But April is a stripper at the Puma Club for Men. And tonight she has an unusual client, a foreigner both remote and too personal, and free with his money. Lots of it, all cash. His name is Bassam. Meanwhile, another man, AJ, has been thrown out of the club for holding hands with his favourite stripper, and he's drunk and angry and lonely.From these explosive elements comes a relentless, raw, searing, passionate page-turning narrative, a big-hearted and painful novel about sex and parenthood, honour and masculinity. Set in the seamy underside of American life at the moment before the world changed, it juxtaposes lust for domination with hunger for connection, sexual violence with family love. It seizes the reader by the throat with the same psychological tension, depth and realism that characterised Andre Dubus' bestselling House of Sand and Fog — and with an even greater sense of the dark and anguished places in the human heart. |
|
Six months ago, city girl Sophie Mills gave up everything to move to Cornwall. All to be with the man that she thinks she loves, and his two daughters who she knows she loves. But adjusting to life in the countryside isn't quite as easy as Sophie imagined it would be. Designer shoes aren't nearly so readily available — not that she ever has any occasion to wear them — and sometimes she doesn't even recognise herself; which most of the time makes her happy but every now and then scares her to death. The hardest thing of all for Sophie is to make that final commitment to actually move in with Louis and the girls — she's been the longest paying guest of the Avalon B&B, St Ives in the history of the establishment. And as she tries to adapt to country living, her newly adopted family and discovering more about Louis' past, she begins to wonder if she's got what it takes to make it all work... |
|
The hotel Waldhaus in the Swiss mountain village of Waltenberg is central to the action of this epic novel, which takes place in Europe from the First World War to the collapse of the Soviet Union. Waltenberg tells the story of the love between Hans Kappler, a German novelist, and Lena Hotspur, an American singer; of the friendship between Hans and Max Goffard, a French journalist. It is also a spy story. Michael Lilstein, a leader of the underground German communist party before World War II and an Auschwitz survivor, becomes responsible for the East German spy network. In 1956 in Waltenberg, Lilstein recruits as his mole a young Frenchman whose identity remains mysterious. At the height of the Cold War the CIA observe Lilstein and Max at Hans' funeral, determined to flush out the mole. Waltenberg is a riveting novel of espionage and a major work of literature. |
|
