Sweet Sorrow

Cambridge is sweltering, during an unusually hot summer. To Jackson Brodie, former police inspector turned private investigator, the world consists of one accounting sheet--"lost" on the left, "found" on the right--and the two never seem to balance. Jackson has never felt at home in Cambridge and has a failed marriage to prove it.

Douglas Petersen’s family is on the brink of dissolution. His marriage of twenty-one years to Connie is almost over. When autumn comes around, their son Albie will leave for college. Connie has decided to leave soon after. But before everything falls apart, there's still the summer holidays to get through - a Grand Tour of Europe's major cities - and over the course of the journey, Douglas devises a plan to win back the love of his wife and repair his troubled relationship with his son.

The incredibly moving and uplifting new novel from the author of The Man I Think I Know. Kerry Hayes knows exactly who she is: a single mum, a cleaner and Mariah Carey's biggest fan. Noah Martineau thinks he knows who he is: a successful barrister, with a wife, daughter and big house in Primrose Hill. Strangers with nothing in common. Strangers living worlds apart. But it wasn't always this way...and Noah and Kerry are about to discover just who they really are.

Until Darren Booth moves in at number 1, Lowland Way, the neighbourhood is a suburban paradise. But soon after his arrival, disputes over issues like loud music and parking rights escalate all too quickly to public rows and threats of violence. Then, early one Saturday, a horrific crime shocks the street. As the police go house to house, the residents close ranks and everyone’s story is the same: Booth did it. But there’s a problem. The police don't agree with them.  

The powerful new novel from number one Sunday Times best seller Clare Mackintosh. Max and Pip are the strongest couple you know. Only now they're facing the most important decision of their lives - and they don't agree. As the consequences of an impossible choice threaten to devastate them both, nothing will ever be the same again. But anything can happen after the end....

The immensely experienced Steven Pacey narrates The Exhausting Summer of São Martino by Simon Carr. Set in a provincial town far removed from the modern world, the story follows the mayor, Prospero, as he navigates the politics of rural life - and his own affairs of the heart. 

Hannah, Cate and Lissa are young, vibrant and inseparable. Living on the edge of a common in East London, their shared world is ablaze with art and activism, romance and revelry - and the promise of everything to come. They are electric. They are the best of friends. Ten years on, they are not where they hoped to be. Amidst flailing careers and faltering marriages, each hungers for what the others have. And each wrestles with the same question: what does it take to lead a meaningful life? 

No one wants to die without having really lived. Andrew works with death for a living. Searching for people's next of kin and attending the funerals if they don't have anyone, he's desperate to avoid the same fate for himself. Which is fine, because he has the perfect wife and 2.4 children waiting at home for him after a long day. At least, that's what he's told people.

At the age of 90-something, Beryl Dusinbery is forgetting everything - including her own children. She spends her days stitching morbid samplers and tormenting her two long-suffering carers, Nastya and Euphoria, with tangled stories of her husbands and love affairs. Shimi Carmelli can do up his own buttons, walks without the aid of a frame and speaks without spitting. Among the widows of North London, he’s whispered about as the last of the eligible bachelors.

Newlyweds Celestial and Roy are the embodiment of both the American Dream and the New South. He is a young executive, and she is an artist on the brink of an exciting career. But as they settle into the routine of their life together, they are ripped apart by circumstances neither could have imagined. Roy is arrested and sentenced to 12 years for a crime Celestial knows he didn't commit. Though fiercely independent, Celestial finds herself bereft and unmoored, taking comfort in Andre, her childhood friend, and best man at their wedding.

It is the summer of 1940. Nineteen-year-old Vivian Morris arrives in New York with her suitcase and sewing machine, exiled by her despairing parents. Although her quicksilver talents with a needle and commitment to mastering the perfect hair roll have been deemed insufficient for her to pass into her sophomore year of Vassar, she soon finds gainful employment as the self-appointed seamstress at the Lily Playhouse, her unconventional Aunt Peg's charmingly disreputable Manhattan revue theatre.

Brian Bilston has decided to write a poem every day for a year while he tries to repair his ever-desperate life. His ex-wife has taken up with a new man, a marketing guru and motivational speaker who seems to be disturbingly influencing his son, Dylan. Meanwhile Dylan’s football team keeps being beaten 0–11, as he stands disconsolately on the wing waiting vainly to receive the ball. At work Brian is drowning in a sea of spreadsheets and is becoming increasingly confused by the complexities of modern communication and management jargon. So poetry will be his salvation.

A newborn baby is the sole survivor of a terrifying plane crash. She is raised in wealthy isolation by an overprotective father. She knows nothing of the rumours about a beautiful young woman, hidden from the world. When a suitor visits, he understands far more than he should. Forced to run for his life, he escapes aboard The Porpoise, an assassin on his tail.... 

He is Dexter Mayhew, tall, dark, and (she can't deny it) handsome. She is Emma Morley, bottled red hair, wilfully badly dressed, all principles and no action. Could this be the dawn of the rest of their lives? Or are Dex and Em living proof that - despite an unlikely beginning - men and women really can be just good friends?

'If only you had listened to us, none of this would have happened.' Sloane, Ardie, Grace and Rosalita have worked in the same legal office for years. The sudden death of the firm's CEO means their boss, Ames, will likely take over the entire company. Ames is a complicated man, a man they've all known for a long time, a man who's always been surrounded by...whispers. But the women are watching this latest promotion for Ames differently. This time, they've decided enough is enough....