Apparently buckling under the strain of caring for wounded soldiers, Amanda retreats from her nursing job at the close of the First World War to her family's farm on a lake in rural Wisconsin, hoping that life with her beloved sister Mattie and her niece, three-year-old Ruth, will restore her. But very soon Amanda comes to see that her old home is no refuge; she has carried her troubles with her. Months later, Mattie's husband Carl returns from the war to find his wife mysteriously drowned and his daughter being raised by prickly and possessive Amanda. What happened the night Mattie died? For years the consequences of that event reverberate, and the truth, when it is finally revealed, is both dramatic and extraordinarily moving.

The second novel featuring Spero Lucas, a young Iraq vet working as a PI in Washington DC but with a sideline in finding lost items - the kind of items the owners can't go to the police about. This time Spero is trying to find a painting belonging to a sexy young woman who was scammed out of it by a super-smooth con artist, part of a team of ruthless thugs. Spero tracks the painting down but the woman is brutally attacked to warn him off. Spero goes on the attack and takes the gang out one by one in their isolated house in the woods - prompting the question: have his experiences in Iraq turned him into an amoral killer no better than the crooks he's up against? It's this question that gives the book its dark edge, and moral ambiguity, with a hero we're not quite sure we should like.

"On an autumn day in 1952, an elderly Irish actress makes her way through the windblown streets of London to a job at the BBC. Last night's hurricane has wreaked havoc, raising memories of blackout and blitz. Recollections of Broadway seem to walk with her through bomb-blasted squares. Scenes from a doomed courtship are rehearsed in her mind once again: it's one of those October days when the past comes back. Moving between a sepia-tinted Edwardian Dublin and a teeming Lower East Side of Manhattan in the 1920s, from hunger in London's West End to the elegant theatres of San Francisco, this is a love story, a tale ofjourneys, and a powerful meditation on the hope to be found in the everyday. Loosely based on real events in the lives of the greatest Irish playwright of the twentieth century and the younger woman who was his fiancee at the time of his tragically early death, Ghost Light is an exhilarating, passionate and uplifting adventure in storytelling from the award-winning author of tar of the Sea and Redemption Falls."

Contemporary fiction. Meet Jo. She's an incurable romantic, ever hopeful that life will bring her the things she wants most: a husband, children a family. She wants what her parents have had the happiest marriage ever. Meet Dean. He's a self-made, self sufficient man, who doesn't believe in happy-ever-afters. Why would he when his father walked out on his mother and sister and left them to fend for themselves? A chance phone call, a reckless decision and a twist of fate bring these two utterly different people together neither of them will ever be the same again.

New York Times bestselling authorParis, 1490. A shrewd French nobleman commissions six lavish tapestries celebrating his rising status at Court. He hires the charismatic, arrogant, sublimely talented Nicolas des Innocents to design them. Nicolas creates havoc among the women in the house-mother and daughter, servant and lady-in-waiting-before taking his designs north to the Brussels workshop where the tapestries are to be woven. The results change all their lives-lives that have been captured in the tapestries, for those who know where to look.

Barcelona Plates is a collection of sleek, dark, and witty short stories from the renowned comedian, presenter and actor, Alexei Sayle.

The creator of Wreck This Journal presents a creative, illustrated guide with a unique perspective on the purpose and function of “a book,” including using it to send a secret message, as a recording device, and as an instrument. Original.

Seventeenth-century Amsterdam, a city in the grip of tulip mania and basking the wealth it has generated. Cornelis, an ageing merchant, commissions a talented young painter to preserve his status and marriage on canvas. At the sittings, as a collector of beautiful things, Cornelis surrounds himself with symbols of his success, including his young wife, Sophia. But as the portrait grows, so does the passion between Sophia and the artist; and as ambitions, desires and dreams breed an intricate deception, their reckless gamble propels their lives towards a thrilling and tragic conclusion.

A tale reminiscent of "Hamlet" that also celebrates the alliance between humans and dogs follows speech-disabled Wisconsin youth Edgar, who bonds with three yearling canines and struggles to prove that his sinister uncle is responsible for his father's death.

At fifty-seven, George is settling down to a comfortable retirement, building a shed in his garden, reading historical novels, listening to a bit of light jazz. Then Katie, his tempestuous daughter, announces that she is getting remarried, to Ray. Her family is not pleased - as her brother Jamie observes, Ray has 'strangler's hands'. Katie can't decide if she loves Ray, or loves the way he cares for her son Jacob, and her mother Jean is a bit put out by the way the wedding planning gets in the way of her affair with one of her husband's former colleagues. And the tidy and pleasant life Jamie has created crumbles when he fails to invite his lover, Tony, to the dreaded nuptials. Unnoticed in the uproar, George discovers a sinister lesion on his hip, and quietly begins to lose his mind.

A shy librarian's passion for cooking leads to an unexpected love affair. LA CUCINA combines the sensuous pleasures of love and food, simmering in the heat of a Sicilian kitchen. Rose Fiore is a solitary middle-aged librarian who has resigned herself to a loveless life, and expresses her passionate nature through her delicious cooking. Then, one day, she meets an enigmatic chef, known only as l'Inglese, whose research on the heritage of Sicilian cuisine leads him into Rosa's library and into her heart. They share one sublime summer of discovery, during which l'Inglese awakens the power of Rosa's sexuality, and together they reach new heights of culinary passion. When he vanishes unexpectedly, Rosa returns to her family's estate to grieve for her lost love only to find a new fulfilment as well as many surprises in the magic of her beloved Cucina. A love song to Italy, LA CUCINA is a celebration of all things sensual. It spills over with intense images, colours, fragrances, and exuberant characters, all reflecting the splendour of the Silician countryside in which it is set.

A debut installment in a new series introduces jack-of-all-trades Virgil Cain, who is wrongly implicated in the murder of an unscrupulous New York criminal attorney responsible for the acquittal of a man who killed Virgil's wife. Original.

Barry Trotter is pretty disreputable and unpleasant. Imagine what he was like as a teenager. Here's the beginning of the whole sorry tale. Did Barry and Ermine do it? (Their homwork, that is.) How exactly did Lon end up with a hole in his head that whistles when the wind blows? Was Lord Valumart always that crass? And where did that ridiculous German accent come from? As funny and twisted as the first two books, BARRY TROTTER AND THE DEAD HORSE is also as affectionate towards JK Rowling's originals. This has lead to the books gaining a devoted following amongst fans of Harry Potter as well as being a welcome antidote for the over-egging (eeuwww) of the boy wizard. A process that we're not a part of at all. Oh no. Not even a tiny bit.

The romantic relationship between Elise, a graduate student in Washington, D.C., and Donald, an investment banker-turned-teacher, is headed for a storybook wedding until the arrival of Donald's gorgeous ex-fiancee, Adrienne.

Two girls, one the daughter of an upper-caste Calcutta family, the other the daughter of the black sheep of that same family, form a sisterly bond that shatters when one of the girls discovers a dark family secret.

This acclaimed debut novel by a talented Scottish writer journeys into the crises, complexities, rivalries, and generation gaps that exist among members of an ordinary family living in a deprived area of western Edinburgh. Original.

Emily Bell believes in destiny. To her, being forced to sing a solo in the church choir--despite her average voice--is fate: because it's while she's singing that she first sees Sam. At first sight, they are connected. Sam Border wishes he could escape, but there's nowhere for him to run. He and his little brother, Riddle, have spent their entire lives constantly uprooted by their unstable father. That is, until Sam sees Emily. That's when everything changes. As Sam and Riddle are welcomed into the Bells' lives, they witness the warmth and protection of a family for the first time. But when tragedy strikes, they're left fighting for survival in the desolate wilderness, and wondering if they'll ever find a place where they can belong. Beautifully written and emotionally profound, I'll Be There is a gripping story that explores the complexities of teenage passions, friendships, and loyalties.