Category Archives: Travel Guides
Spoils
It is the spring of 2003 and coalition forces are advancing on Iraq. Images of a giant statue of Saddam Hussein crashing to the ground in Baghdad are being beamed to news channels around the world. Nineteen-year-old Specialist Cassandra Wigheard, on her first deployment since joining the US army two years earlier, is primed for
The Noise of Time
In May 1937 a man in his early thirties waits by the lift of a Leningrad apartment block. He waits all through the night, expecting to be taken away to the Big House. Any celebrity he has known in the previous decade is no use to him now. And few who are taken to the
Shark Drunk: The Art of Catching a Large Shark from a Tiny Rubber Dinghy in a Big Ocean
Winner of the Wanderlust Adventure Travel Book of the Year at the Edward Stanford Travel Writing Awards 2018In the great depths surrounding the remote Lofoten islands in Norway lives the Greenland shark. Twenty-six feet in length and weighing more than a tonne, it can live for 200 years. Its fluorescent green, parasite-covered eyes are said
Chasing the Ghost: My Search for all the Wild Flowers of Britain
**ONE OF THE GUARDIAN`S BEST BOOKS OF 2018**Join renowned naturalist Peter Marren on an exciting quest to see every species of wild plant native to Britain.The mysterious Ghost Orchid blooms in near darkness among rotting leaves on the forest floor. It blends into the background to the point of invisibility, yet glows, pale and ghostly.
The Shadow District
The first instalment in the thrilling new crime series from worldwide bestseller Arnaldur IndridasonTHE PASTIn wartime Reykjavรญk, a young woman is found strangled in a dangerous area known as ‘the shadow district’. An Icelandic detective and a member of the American military police are on the trail of a brutal killer.THE PRESENTAn elderly man is
Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How it Changed the World
“Both a saga of tragedies and a detective story… `Pale Rider` is not just an excavation but a reimagining of the past” GuardianWith a death toll of between 50 and 100 million people and a global reach, the Spanish flu of 1918-1920 was the greatest human disaster, not only of the twentieth century, but possibly
A Climate of Fear
THE NEW INSPECTOR ADAMSBERG NOVEL. Longlisted for the CWA International Dagger. A woman is found dead in her bath. The murder has been disguised as a suicide and a strange symbol is discovered at the scene. Then the symbol is observed near a second victim, who ten years earlier had also taken part in a
The Girl Who Escaped Isis: Farida`s Story
In August 2014, Farida Khalaf was just a normal Yazidi girl, living in a village high in the mountains of northern Iraq. Then her village was attacked and swiftly taken by ISIS fighters, and her whole world changed. The jihadists murdered the men and the boys of her village, including her father and brothers, before
A Natural
Tom has always known exactly the person he is going to be. A successful footballer. A man others look up to. Now, though, the bright future he imagined for himself is threatened.The Premier League academy of his boyhood has let him go. At nineteen, Tom finds himself playing for a tiny club in a town
Gould`s Book of Fish – A Novel in Twelve Fish
From the Winner of the 2014 Booker PrizeOnce upon a time that was called 1828, before all fishes in the sea and all living things on the land were destroyed, there was a man named William Buelow Gould, a white convict who fell in love with a black woman and discovered too late that to
Death of a River Guide
From the winner of the 2014 Booker PrizeTrapped within a waterfall on the wild Franklin River, Tasmanian river guide, Aljaz Cosini, lies drowning. As the tourists he has been guiding down the river seek to save him, Aljaz is beset by visions horrible and fabulous. As the rapids rise, Aljaz relives not just his own
The Unknown Terrorist
From the winner of the 2014 Booker PrizeAfter a one-night stand with an attractive stranger, pole-dancer Gina Davies finds herself prime suspect in an attempted terrorist attack on Sydney. Hunted by the police, her face stares back at her on the unremitting 24/7 news cycle. She is soon running away from her dreams for a
Wanting
From the winner of the 2014 Booker PrizeMathinna, an Aboriginal girl from Van Diemen`s Land, is adopted by nineteenth-century explorer, Sir John Franklin, and his wife, Lady Jane. Franklin is confident that shining the light of reason on Mathinna will lift her out of savagery and desire. But when Franklin dies on an Arctic expedition,
Dalila
`As compelling as it is tough, sidestepping piety in favour of clear-eyed infectious anger` Sunday TimesIrene Dalila Mwathi comes from Kenya with a brutally violent personal history. Once she wanted to be a journalist, now all she wants is to be safe. When she finally arrives, bewildered, in London, she is attacked by the very
Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights
In the near future, after a storm strikes New York City, the strangenesses begin. A down-to-earth gardener finds that his feet no longer touch the ground. A graphic novelist awakens in his bedroom to a mysterious entity that resembles his own sub-Stan Lee creation. Abandoned at the mayor`s office, a baby identifies corruption with her
The Redeemer: A Harry Hole Thriller
It is a freezing December night and Christmas shoppers have gathered to listen to a carol concert. Then a shot rings out and one of the singers falls to the floor, dead. Detective Harry Hole and his team are called in to investigate but have little to work with – there is no immediate suspect,
Queens of the Conquest: England`s Medieval Queens
Full of passion and betrayal, murder and war, the first volume of an epic new series from bestselling historian Alison Weir, bringing five of England`s medieval queens to life.A Daily Telegraph Book of the YearLove, murder, war, betrayalThis is the story of the five extraordinary queens who helped the Norman kings of England rule their
The 7th Function of Language
`One of the funniest, most riotously inventive and enjoyable novels you`ll read this year` – ObserverRoland Barthes is knocked down in a Paris street by a laundry van. It`s February 1980 and he has just come from lunch with Francois Mitterrand. Barthes dies soon afterwards. History tells us it was an accident. But what if
The Explosion Chronicles
LONGLISTED FOR THE MAN BOOKER INTERNATIONAL 2017 With the Yi River on one side and the Balou Mountains on the other, the village of Explosion was founded a thousand years ago by refugees fleeing a volcanic eruption. But in the post-Mao era, the name takes on a new significance as the rural community grows explosively
The Heavenly Table
Cane, Cob and Chimney Jewett are young Georgia sharecroppers held under the thumb of their God-fearing father, Pearl. When he dies unexpectedly, they set out on horseback for Canada, robbing and looting their way to wealth and infamy. But little goes to plan and soon they`re pursued by both the authorities and the stories emanating
