Showing titles in Contemporary Fiction

Toby Jones and Holliday Grainger star in a new BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation of Dodie Smith's enduringly popular coming-of-age novel In the 1930s, seventeen-year-old Cassandra Mortmain lives in a crumbling ruin of a castle in the Suffolk countryside. Her father, an author wrestling with...

On a beautifully restored barge on the Seine, Jean Perdu runs a bookshop - or, rather, a 'literary apothecary', for this bookseller possesses a rare gift for sensing which books will soothe the troubled souls of his customers. The only person he is unable to cure, it seems, is himself. He has nursed a broken heart ever since the night, twenty-one years ago, when the love of his life fled Paris, leaving behind a handwritten letter that he has never dared read.

There is no knowing what lies in a man's heart. On a trip to buy ponies, Frank Ross is killed by one of his own workers. Torn Chancy shoots him down in the street for a horse, $150 cash, and two Californian gold pieces. Ross's unusually mature and single-minded fourteen-year-old daughter Mattie...

Zwanzig Jahre sind vergangen: Als sich Stefan und Theresa zufällig in Hamburg über den Weg laufen, endet ihr erstes Wiedersehen in einem Desaster. Zu Studienzeiten waren sie wie eine Familie füreinander, heute sind kaum noch Gemeinsamkeiten übrig. Stefan hat Karriere bei Deutschlands größter Wochenzeitung BOTE gemacht, Theresa den Bauernhof ihres Vaters in Brandenburg übernommen. Aus den unterschiedlichen Lebensentwürfen sind gegensätzliche Haltungen geworden. Stefan versucht bei seiner Zeitung, durch engagierte journalistische Projekte den Klimawandel zu bekämpfen.

A mesmerising psychological drama about desire and betrayal from the bestselling author of Our House. Be careful who you let into your heart - and your home… When Davis Calder moves in next door to Kate Easton and her two children, no one has any idea of the devastation about to be unleashed...

In POP GOES THE WEASEL, James Patterson has created a formidable villain every reader will see in the shadows when the lights are out, a tender love story, a plot powered by relentless suspense and psychological thrills kicked up to an all-time high. 'It's all just a game, darling. I play with...

Shortlisted for the 2021 International Booker Prize. A Guardian Fiction Book of the year. Sometimes discovery brings destruction. "When We Cease to Understand the World" shows us great minds striking out into dangerous, uncharted terrain. Fritz Haber, Alexander Grothendieck, Werner Heisenberg, Erwin Schrödinger: these are among the luminaries into whose troubled minds we are thrust as they grapple with the most profound questions of existence. They have strokes of unparalleled genius, they alienate friends and lovers, they descend into isolated states of madness.

The Edgar-winning short story from the author of Gone Girl. A young woman is making a living, faking it as a cut-price psychic working at Spiritual Palms (with some illegal soft-core sex work on the side). She makes a decent wage - mostly by telling people what they want to hear. But then she meets Susan Burke. Susan moved to the city one year ago with her husband and 15-year-old stepson, Miles. They live in a Victorian house called Carterhook Manor, built in 1893.

Two stunning dramatisations from one of the twentieth century’s most beloved authors Sink into the lyrical landscapes and beautifully observed lives of J. L. Carr’s finest stories, brought to life in these glorious, full-cast dramatisations starring Shaun Dingwall (Noughts and Crosses, Top...

Barrytown, Dublin, has something to sing about. The Commitments are spreading the gospel of the soul. Ably managed by Jimmy Rabitte, brilliantly coached by Joel 'The Lips' Fagan, their twin assault on Motown and Barrytown takes them by leaps and bounds from Paris Hall to immortality on vinyl...

NATIONAL BESTSELLER A PARADE BEST BOOK OF ALL TIME From the acclaimed Nobel Prize winner—a powerful examination of our obsession with beauty and conformity that asks questions about race, class, and gender with characteristic subtlety and grace. With a new introduction by...

Hi, I'm Radhika Mehta, and I'm getting married this week. I work at Goldman Sachs, an investment bank. Thank you for hearing my story. However, let me warn you. You may not like me too much. One, I make a lot of money. Two, I have an opinion on everything. Three, I have had a boyfriend before. Ok, maybe two. Best-selling author Chetan Bhagat, writing for the first time in a female voice, brings to you One Indian Girl, the heart-warming story of a modern Indian girl.

A marriage on the rocks. A family in disarray. A weekend in the sun at a luxury, all-inclusive hotel. What could possibly go wrong? Jo and Dave haven't had a holiday in years. They've had other things on their plate: failed IVF, the death of Dave's mother, doing up the bathroom. So when Dave’s...

Catherine Cookson's well-loved novels Hamilton and Goodbye Hamilton tell the story of Maisie, who invented an imaginary horse to keep her company through the long years of an unhappy marriage, and before she became a bestselling author. In this engaging sequel, Hamilton has vanished from...

Clio is staying with her aunt, Hester, at Bridge House on the edge of Exmoor. A beautiful house, it is the scene of many happy childhood memories. But Clio has no idea that it was the setting for a terrible incident after the Second World War.

LONGLISTED FOR THE COMEDY WOMEN IN PRINT PRIZE 2022/23 'Poignant as well as savagely witty' Observer 'Stylish and funny' Sunday Times 'Hits every note perfectly' Kamila Shamsie A life-changing app. The woman who created it. And the man who took the credit. When Asha starts work on a...

Abie follows the arc of a letter from London back to Africa to a coffee plantation that now could be hers if she wants it. Standing among the ruined groves she strains to hear the sound of the past, but the layers of years are too many. Thus begins the gathering of her family's history through the tales of her aunts - four women born to four different wives of a wealthy plantation owner, her grandfather.

Alfa and Mademba are two of the many Senegalese soldiers fighting in the Great War. Together they climb dutifully out of their trenches to attack France. German enemies whenever the whistle blows, until Mademba is wounded, and dies in a shell hole with his belly torn open. Without his more-than-brother, Alfa is alone and lost amidst the savagery of the conflict. He devotes himself to the war, to violence and death, but soon begins to frighten even his own comrades in arms. How far will Alfa go to make amends to his dead friend?

*NOW A MAJOR FILM by Sony Pictures, starring Chloe Grace Moretz* 'Wildly entertaining . . . I couldn't turn the pages fast enough' The New York Times *The 5th Wave is the first book in the bestselling series from award-winning Rick Yancey. Perfect for fans of The Hunger Games, Divergent and Maze...

'I ought to tell you at the beginning that I am not quite normal having had a violent experience at the age of nine'. Jessica Vye's 'violent experience' colours her schooldays and her reaction to the world around her - a confining world of wartime restrictions, Viyella dresses, nicely-restrained essays and dusty tea shops. For Jessica has been told that she is 'beyond all possible doubt', a born writer.