Products
Amazing Animals with Astonishing Jobs , Simon Philips ( Paperback Sept 2024)
£7.99
A funny and fascinating guide to the world of working animals – packed with astonishing facts! Is your doctor a donkey? Is your postman a platypus? Probably not, that would be . . .
amazing! But bee-lieve it or not, many animals do have jobs. Get ready for a whirlwind tour around the globe where you'll meet some of those amazing animals and learn all about the incredible jobs they do – from bomb-sniffing bees and detector dolphins to caddy llamas and the bodega cats of New York City. Readers will discover: The role of therapy animals in helping people feel more calm in airports (including LiLou – San Fransisco’s superstar therapy pig!) How llamas can help golfers get around the course (without ever leaving a mess behind!) How bees can be trained to detect illnesses (Un-bee-lievably!) And much, much more! Simon Philip’s witty, fact-filled text pairs perfectly with Adam Ming’s captivating contemporary art, making this book the perfect gift for any child who loves animals.
Amazing Dad, Alison Brown ( picture book April 2023)
£7.99
A pitch-perfect rhyming celebration of dads everywhere! Amazing dads are all around! Dads can be busy, whizzy, caring, sharing . . .and so much more. But there's just ONE dad who gives the best hugs of all. Can you guess who it is? This super-cute new book from brilliantly talented picture book creator Alison Brown is the ULTIMATE inclusive, joyful celebration of dads and care-givers - and the love they give us every day.
Explore the adorable rhyming text, illustrated with a whole host of irresistible, relatable and hilarious animal characters. Perfect to share with YOUR amazing dad on Father's Day, or at any time of year!
American Dirt, by Jeanine Cummins ( paperback 2021)
£9.99
Vivid and utterly compelling, AMERICAN DIRT is the first novel to explore the humanity in the experience of attempting to illegally cross the US-Mexico border. Described as 'impossible to put down' (Saturday Review) and 'essential reading' (Tracy Chevalier), it is one of my books of 2020.
Yesterday, Lydia had a bookshop.
Yesterday, Lydia was married to a journalist. Yesterday, she was with everyone she loved most in the world. Today, her eight-year-old son Luca is all she has left.
For him, she will carry a machete strapped to her leg. For him, she will leap onto the roof of a high speed train. For him, she will find the strength to keep running.
Americanah, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie ( new edition 2023)
£9.99
A gorgeous new edition of the coming of age classic from 2013.
Vogue Ifemelu and Obinze are young and in love when they depart military-ruled Nigeria. In America, Ifemelu suffers defeats and triumphs, finds and loses relationships, all the while feeling the weight of something she never thought of back home: race. Meanwhile, Obinze plunges into a dangerous, undocumented life in London.
Fifteen years later, when they reunite in a newly democratic Nigeria, and reignite their passion for each other and for their homeland, they face the hardest decision of their lives. Fearless, gripping, spanning three continents and numerous lives, the National Book Critics Circle Award-winning Americanah is a literary masterpiece, and one of the defining books of the decade. A brilliant novel: epic in scope, personal in resonance and with lots to say.
Amy & Lan, Sadie Jones ( paperback June 2023)
£9.99
HOW DID THE GOOD LIFE GO SO WRONG? Amy Connell and Lan Honey are having the best childhood. When their families make the leap from city living to a farm in the West Country they have untold freedom. The adults are far too busy to keep an eye on them, and in the idyllic summer Amy and Lan would never tell them about climbing on the high barn roof, or what happened with the axe that time, any more than their parents would tell them the things they get up to.Then adult things happen, like betrayal, that threaten to bring the whole fragile idyll tumbling down... 'A fabulous thing: vivid and funny, sometimes heart-rendingly sad' Guardian'
An Adventure for Lia and Lion, Al Rodin ( June 2023)
£7.99
Lia is off on an adventure, and she'd like a pet to take with her. In another corner of the meadow is Lion - who is also looking for an adventure, and for a pet of his own . .. What will happen when they meet?A story from a stunning new author-illustrator about a special friendship, the nature of play, conflict and compromise, and about how much richer life is when you work out how to share it.
An American Marriage, Tayari Jones ( paperback 2019)
£9.99
'A moving portrayal of the effects of a wrongful conviction on a young African-American couple.' - Barack Obama
Newlyweds Celestial and Roy are the embodiment of the American Dream. He is a young executive, and she is an artist on the brink of an exciting career. Until one day they are ripped apart by circumstances neither could have imagined.
Roy is arrested and sentenced to twelve years for a crime Celestial knows he didn't commit. Devastated and unmoored, Celestial finds herself struggling to hold on to the love that has been her centre, taking comfort in Andre, their closest friend. When Roy's conviction is suddenly overturned, he returns home ready to resume their life together.
A masterpiece of storytelling, An American Marriage offers a profoundly insightful look into the hearts and minds of three unforgettable characters who are at once bound together and separated by forces beyond their control.
An Elephant in the Garden, Morpurgo ( paperback Jan 2024)
£7.99
An epic story of determination and love, about one family's escape from the Allied bombing of Dresden in the Second World War. It's 1945, and the bombing of Dresden is imminent. Before the bombs start to fall, Lizzie's zookeeper mother brings home the one animal she can't bear to lose: Marlene, the elephant. When Lizzie and her family join the thousands of other refugees fleeing the city, they end up with more than one unusual companion .
Anna O, Matthew Blake ( paperback May 2025)
£9.99
ANNA O HASN'T OPENED HER EYES FOR FOUR YEARS Not since the night she was found in a deep sleep by the bodies of her best friends, suspected of a chilling double murder. For Doctor Benedict Prince, a forensic psychologist on London's Harley Street, waking Anna O could be career-defining.
As an expert in sleep, he knows all about the darkest chambers of the mind; the secrets that lie buried in the subconscious. As he begins Anna O's treatment, studying his patient's dreams, combing her memories, visiting the site where the horrors played out, he pulls on the thread of a much deeper, darker mystery. Awakening Anna O isn't the end of the story, it's just the beginning.
Paperback from May 2025
Annie Lumsden, The Girl From the Sea ( paperback April 2023)
£7.99
A magical story about finding your identity from one of the most acclaimed storytellers of his generation, richly illustrated in full colour by an internationally renowned artist. My mother says that all things can be turned to tales. I thought she meant tales like fish tails, but I was wrong.
She meant tales like this, tales that are stories. But this tale of mine is very like a fish tail too... Annie has never been like the other girls.
Her mam tried sending her to school when she was small, but Annie couldn't seem to make words or numbers stick. She prefers instead to be swimming in the sea, or sunbathing on the shore at Stupor Beach, her head full of tales. She should have been a fish, her mam always tells her, and Annie knows the truth of it.
Then a stranger who comes to town is struck by the beauty and the wonder of her, and Annie Lumsden realizes that perhaps she really is half a creature from the sea.
Image is of hardback. Paperback cover is the same.
Annihilation, Michael Houellebecq ( hardback Sept 2024)
£22.00
sIt is 2027. France is in a state of economic decline and moral decay. As the country plunges into a closely-fought presidential campaign, the French state falls victim to a series of mysterious and unsettling cyberattacks.
The sophisticated nature of the attacks leaves the best computer scientists at the DGSI – the French counter-terrorism agency – scrambling for answers. An advisor to the country’s Finance Minister, Paul Raison is close to the heart of government. His wife Prudence is a Treasury official, while his father Édouard, now retired, has spent his career working for the DGSI.
When Édouard has a stroke, his children have an opportunity to repair their strained relationships, as they determine to free their father from the medical centre where he is wasting away. Michel Houellebecq’s Annihilation reveals new sides to his writing, adding compassion and tenderness to the emotions of rage and irony that have powered both him and his earlier works to international fame
Another Marvelous Thing, Laurie Colwin ( paperback Nov 24)
£9.99
At a perfectly ordinary cocktail party, Francis is introduced to Billy and - although it slips right by him at the time - he falls in love with her at once. Billy is a serious, often glum person. An economic historian, she is indifferent to a great many things (clothes, food, home décor), frowns easily and is frequently irritated.
Francis is older. He likes routine and a well-run household; he likes to pay for dinner, open car doors and call Billy at night to make sure she is safe. Both are happily married - but not to each other.
So begins a whirlwind love affair, perfectly captured in this frank, funny irresistible novel, from its fabulous inception to its inevitable end
Antartica, Claire Keegan ( paperback 2023)
£9.99
The stunning debut story collection from the author of Foster and the Booker Prize shortlisted Small Things Like These
'A beautiful, tender work of great clarity.' Sebastian Barry'Simply put, Claire Keegan is one of the greatest fiction writers in the world.' George Saunders'Among the finest contemporary stories written recently in English.' ObserverA secret one-night tryst in the city. A sister's revenge. A love-struck doctor.
A missing girl. In Antarctica, an astonishing sequence of stories, one of our most gifted writers illuminates human longing and fallibility in all its variety. 'A skilled writer who immerses us seamlessly in the lives of her characters.
'The writing is both tender, poetic and authentic ... the stories stay with you long after you have finished reading.'
APEIROGON, Colum McCann (paperback, 25 Feb 2021)
£9.99
How do we continue living once we have lost our reason to live?Rami and Bassam live in the city of Jerusalem - but exist worlds apart, divided by an age-old conflict.And yet they have one thing in common. Both are fathers; both are fathers of daughters - and both daughters are now lost. When Rami and Bassam meet, and tell one another the story of their grief, the most unexpected thing of all happens: they become best of friends.
And their stories become one story, a story with the power to heal - and the power to change the world. 'The book goes anywhere and everywhere. It is a delirious and thrilling improvisation, a jazz solo spun out of that meeting ...
Archie’s Apple, by Hannah Shuckburgh ( hardback October 22)
£14.99
Have you ever dreamed of making a discovery? Inspired by a true story, Archie's Apple tells of how one boy discovers a new variety of apple while out walking, and hits the headlines around the world. Archie lives with his father on the edge of a wood; every day and in every season Archie plays in the wood, watching and hearing nature. But one day deep in the woods he finds an apple, quite unlike any apple he's ever seen or eaten.
His discovery takes them on an adventure that neither he nor his dad could have predicted. This enchanting and intricate picture book, illustrated with original watercolours, takes the reader on a journey from the discovery to the brink of world-wide fame and back again, and has much to tell us about the wild power of nature and the value of noticing.
Rated in 2022 as a 'future classic' children's book.
Argylle, Elly Conway (paperback Nov 24)
£9.99
The globe-trotting spy thriller that inspired the upcoming action blockbuster Argylle , featuring a star-studded cast including Henry Cavill, Bryce Dallas Howard, Samuel L. Jackson, and John Cena, directed by Matthew Vaughn of Kingsman trilogy fame. 'The most incredible spy franchise since Ian Fleming’ Matthew VaughnOne Russian magnate's dream of restoring a nation to greatness has set in motion a chain of events which will take the world to the brink of chaos.Only Frances Coffey, the CIA's most legendary spymaster, can prevent it. But to do so, she needs someone special. Enter Argylle.
His life came to a crashing halt as a teenager. Since then he has been treading water, building barriers between himself and the world. Until one moment of compassion and brilliance will bring him to the attention of the most powerful woman in the secret world.
Coffey knows all about Argylle's dark past. She knows it haunts him. But she also knows it may give him the skills to join the team going up against one of the most powerful men in the world.
His crash course in espionage will take him from the jungles of Thailand to the boulevards of Monaco, from the monasteries of Mount Athos to a forgotten cavern buried deep in the mountains. It is a deathly rollercoaster ride that will either make him - or break him...
Arlo The Lion Who Couldn’t Sleep, Catherine Rayner (paperback 2021)
£7.99
What a treasure this is .... if you have a sleepy toddler who just can’t or won’t drop off to sleep, this is a lovely rhythmic story with all sorts of tips to help them relax.....
Arlo The Lion Who Couldn't Sleep is a beautifully illustrated story with a gentle mindfulness message from Kate Greenaway Medal winner Catherine Rayner - ideal for bedtime, and especially helpful for little ones who have trouble going to sleep. Arlo the lion is exhausted. He just can't drop off, no matter what he tries.
It's either too hot, or too cold; too loud or too quiet. But then he meets Owl. She can sleep through the day, which isn't easy when most other animals are awake! Will Arlo ever get any rest? Perhaps his new friend has some special tricks she can teach him ...
Note image is of hardback, default purchase is paperback but please email if you prefer hardback. The cover image is the same.
As Good As Dead, Holly Jackson ( paperback August 2021)
£8.99
THE THIRD AND FINAL THRILLING BOOK IN THE BESTSELLING AND AWARD-WINNING A GOOD GIRL'S GUIDE TO MURDER TRILOGY
Pip Fitz-Amobi is haunted by the way her last investigation ended. Soon she'll be leaving for Cambridge University but then another case finds her . .
. and this time it's all about Pip. Pip is used to online death threats, but there's one that catches her eye, someone who keeps asking: who will look for you when you're the one who disappears? And it's not just online.
Pip has a stalker who knows where she lives. The police refuse to act and then Pip finds connections between her stalker and a local serial killer. The killer has been in prison for six years, but Pip suspects that the wrong man is behind bars.
As the deadly game plays out, Pip realises that everything in Little Kilton is finally coming full circle. If Pip doesn't find the answers, this time she will be the one who disappears . .
. A Good Girl's Guide to Murder is The New York Times No.1 bestselling YA crime thriller and WINNER of The British Book Awards' Children's Book of the Year 2020.
Perfect for fans of One of Us Is Lying,Eva Dolan, C L Taylor, We Were Liars and Riverdale
Ascension, Oliver Harris ( paperback, April 2022)
£9.99
Elliot Kane, former spy, trying to leave the world of espionage behind. Kathryn Taylor: a stalled career in MI6, running the South Atlantic desk. Rory Bannatyne: covert technical specialist.
Dead, apparently of suicide. Three friends from a mission many years ago reconnect when one of them dies on Ascension Island. Rory Bannatyne had been tasked with tapping a new transatlantic data cable, but a day before he was due to return home he is found hanged.
When Kathryn Taylor begs Kane to go over and investigate, he can't say no, but it's an uneasy reintroduction to the intelligence game. Ascension is a curious legacy of England's imperial past. Only employees and their families are allowed to live there.
It's home to several highly-classified government projects, a British and American military base, and forty dead volcanic cones. Entirely isolated from the world, the disappearance of a young girl at the same time as Rory's death means local tensions are high. Elliot needs to discover what happened to her as well as to Rory.
But the island contains more secrets than even the government knows, and it's not going to give them up without a fight.
Ash Keys, Michael Longley ( hardback July 2024)
£16.00
Published to coincide with his 85th birthday, Ash Keys looks back on the extraordinary career of the last surviving member of the triumvirate of poets that rose out of 1960s Belfast'
'A keeper of the artistic estate, a custodian of griefs and wonders' SEAMUS HEANEY
The title of Michael Longley’s New Selected Poems is taken from his poem ‘Ash Keys’. The wing-shaped, wind-borne seeds of the ash-tree might be an image for poems in search of their readers. This selection, based on thirteen individual collections, represents Longley’s unusual range as a lyric poet.
It shows how his themes, genres and forms have evolved and interlaced since the 1960s. Love, violence, the natural world, art, psychodrama, family, the Great War, the Homeric past and Northern Ireland’s troubled present cohabit in these pages – as do depth, wit and beauty. Longley’s poems of the west of Ireland, which pivot on Carrigskeewaun, his ‘soul landscape’, have also made him a pioneer of ‘eco-poetry’.
Ask Me Again, by Clare Sestanovich (paperback Jan 2025)
£10.99
One of The New Yorker's Best Books of the Year'
A finely drawn portrait of the kind of friendship we rarely see in contemporary fiction' - Jonathan Lee, The Guardian
How much knowledge do you need in order to know someone?As her grandmother is dying, sixteen-year-old Eva wanders the halls of a hospital. There, she spots Jamie. Despite having little in common, from this chance-encounter stems a life-changing platonic love.
She is sixteen, living in middle-class Brooklyn; he is the same age, but from the super-rich of Upper Manhattan. She’s observant, cautious, eager to seem normal; he’s bold, mysterious, eccentric. Eva’s family is warm and welcoming, but Jamie avoids going home to his.
As Eva goes off to university and falls in and out of love, Jamie drops out and is drawn towards radical experiments in politics and religion. Their separate spheres seem to be spiralling away from each other, but it soon becomes clear that they are both circling the same question: how do you define yourself and your beliefs in a divided and unjust world?Written with precision and immense wit, Ask Me Again is a journey of intimacy across time. A love story of sorts, this coming-of-age novel explores how relationships can define us, change us and point us towards futures we might not have imagined for ourselves.
A Finalist for The Center For Fiction First Novel Prize
Assembly, by Natasha Brown ( paperback May 2022)
£9.99
Come of age in the credit crunch. Be civil in a hostile environment.Step out into a world of Go Home vans. Go to Oxbridge, get an education, start a career. Do all the right things.
Buy a flat. Buy art. Buy a sort of happiness.
But above all, keep your head down. Keep quiet. And keep going.
The narrator of Assembly is a Black British woman. She is preparing to attend a lavish garden party at her boyfriend's family estate, set deep in the English countryside. At the same time, she is considering the carefully assembled pieces of herself.
As the minutes tick down and the future beckons, she can't escape the question: is it time to take it all apart? Assembly is a story about the stories we live within - those of race and class, safety and freedom, winners and losers. And it is about one woman daring to take control of her own story, even at the cost of her life. 'One of the most talked-about debuts of the year .
'Bold and original, with a cool intelligence, and so very truthful about the colonialist structure of British society' Diana Evans
At The Table, Claire Powell ( paperback March 2023)
£9.99
To Nicole and Jamie Maguire, their parents seem the ideal couple - a suburban double act, happily married for more than thirty years. So when Linda and Gerry announce that they've decided to separate, the news sends shockwaves through the siblings' lives, forcing them to confront their own expectations and desires. Hardworking - and hard-drinking - Nicole pursues the ex she unceremoniously dumped six years ago, while people-pleasing Jamie fears he's sleepwalking into a marriage he doesn't actually want.But as the siblings grapple with the pressures of thirtysomething life, their parents struggle to protect the fragile facade of their own relationship, and the secrets they've both been keeping. Set in 2018, Claire Powell's beautifully observed debut novel follows each member of the Maguire family over a tumultuous year of lunches, dinners and drinks, as old conflicts arise and relationships are re-evaluated. A gripping yet tender depiction of family dynamics, love and disillusionment, At the Table is about what it means to grow up - both as an individual, and as a family.
Avalon,Nell Zink ( paperback August 2023)
£9.99
Bran's Southern California upbringing is anything but traditional. After her mother abandons her and joins a Buddhist colony, Bran is raised by her 'common-law stepfather' on Bourdon Farms - a plant nursery that doubles as a cover for a biker gang. She spends her days tending plants, slogging through high school and imagining what life could be if she had been born to a different family.
Then she meets Peter - a charming, troubled college student from the East Coast - who launches his teaching career by initiating her into the world of art. The two begin a seemingly doomed long-distance relationship as Bran searches for meaning in her own surroundings. She knows how to survive, but now she must learn how to live.
'Avalon observes beautifully the shifting terrain of teenage intimacy: its intensity and its fragility . . .
it's a hilarious, heartbreaking and - of course - extremely weird novel.' Sunday Times
Babel, RF Kuang ( paperback Sept 2023)
£9.99
'An ingenious fantasy about empire' GUARDIAN
Traduttore, traditore: An act of translation is always an act of betrayal. Oxford, 1836. The city of dreaming spires. It is the centre of all knowledge and progress in the world. And at its centre is Babel, the Royal Institute of Translation. The tower from which all the power of the Empire flows.
Orphaned in Canton and brought to England by a mysterious guardian, Babel seemed like paradise to Robin Swift. Until it became a prison... But can a student stand against an empire? An incendiary new novel from award-winning author R.F.Kuang about the power of language, the violence of colonialism, and the sacrifices of resistance.
'A masterpiece that resonates with power and knowledge. BABEL is a stark picture of the cruelty of empire, a distillation of dark academia, and a riveting blend of fantasy and historical fiction - a monumental achievement' Samantha Shannon
Baby’s First Stories 0-3m ( board book August 2023)
£10.99
Baby's First Stories presents a unique blend of read-aloud stories and high-contrast visuals to stimulate baby as you read. With four stories, featuring an adorable elephant, panda, whale and bunny.This first book in the series is full of rhythmic language and gentle rhymes, tailored to soothe the very youngest babies. Jane Foster's bold artwork uses a limited palette of black and white to hold baby's gaze. Neither too long, nor too short, these stories easily fit into baby's daily routine, to make reading together a regular activity all the family can enjoy.
When your little one is ready to move on, try the next book in the series: Baby's First Stories - 3-6 months. Each story collection has been created in consultation with early years experts to perfectly suit your baby's needs at every stage in their first year. Beautifully illustrated by award-winning textile designer Jane Foster, and written by picture book rising-star, Lily Murray.
Baby’s First Stories 3-6m, Lily Murray ( board book August 2023)
£10.99
It's never too early to start reading to your baby. Baby's First Stories presents a unique blend of read-aloud stories and high-contrast visuals to stimulate baby as you read. With four stories, featuring an adorable elephant, panda, whale and bunny.This second book in the series focusses on faces and naming body parts, and encourages babies and carers to join in with their own games of peek-a-boo, or tickle-time. Featuring black-and-white artwork with bold pops of blue. Neither too long, nor too short, these stories easily fit into baby's daily routine, to make reading together a regular activity all the family can enjoy.
When your little one is ready to move on, try the next book in the series: Baby's First Stories - 6-9 months. Each story collection has been created in consultation with early years experts to perfectly suit your baby's needs at every stage in their first year. Beautifully illustrated by award-winning textile designer Jane Foster, and written by picture book rising-star, Lily Murray.
Bad Bridget : Elaine Farrell and Leanne McCormick (paperback Jan 2024)
£10.99
Bad Bridget : Crime, Mayhem and the Lives of Irish Emigrant Women,
Ireland in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was not a good place to be a woman. Among the wave of emigrants from Ireland to North America were many, many young women who travelled on their own, hoping for a better life. Some lived lives of quiet industry and piety.
Others quickly found themselves in trouble - bad trouble, and on an astonishing scale. Elaine Farrell and Leanne McCormick, creators of the celebrated 'Bad Bridget' podcast, have unearthed a world in which Irish women actually outnumbered Irish men in prison, in which you could get locked up for 'stubbornness', and in which a serial killer called Lizzie Halliday was described by the New York Times as 'the worst woman on earth'. They reveal the social forces that bred this mayhem and dysfunction, through stories that are brilliantly strange, sometimes funny, and often moving.
From sex workers and thieves to kidnappers and killers, these Bridgets are young women who have gone from the frying pan of their impoverished homeland to the fire of vast North American cities. Bad Bridget is a masterpiece of social history and true crime, showing us a fascinating and previously unexplored world.
Bad Influence, by Tamsin Winter ( paperback June 2023)
£7.99
"A beautiful, relevant story of courage, strength, and not letting other people decide who you are." Kate Weston. Amelia Bright wants to be the best at everything. But when it comes to popularity, she is dead last. No matter what she tries, she can't shake her reputation as a maggoty nobody.When she meets cute new boy Evan, Amelia wonders if he can help her lose her loser status. And in a moment of hope, she agrees to something she quickly regrets - something that goes viral at school. Now she's not just called "maggot", she's a "bad influence" - and worse.
But Amelia's determined not to let one mistake define her...she's so much more than the image everyone sees online. A powerfully real and funny new story from the rising queen of teen, about first kisses, learning to be true to yourself and how one click can last for ever...
Barcelona, Mary Costello (paperback April 2025)
£9.99
In Barcelona, we meet a cast of characters who live turbulent inner lives. In a Spanish hotel room a marriage unravels as a young wife is haunted by a past love. A father travels to Paris to meet his scientist son and is exposed to his son's true nature.
A woman attends a reading by a famous author and comes to some painful realisations about her own marriage. The stories in Barcelona reveal the underlying disquiet of modern life and the sometimes brutal nature of humanity. Whether on city streets, long car journeys or in suburban rooms, we glimpse characters as they approach those moments of desperation - or revelation - that change or reshape fate.
Bear and Bird, The Picnic and other stories
£7.99
Full of funny mix-ups and comic misunderstandings, as well as genuine warmth and affection, these four stories are the start of an irresistibly charming new chapter book series from award-winning creator Jarvis. "These wittily illustrated stories of mishaps, hurt feelings, fondness and friendship have a transporting quality, ideal for 5+." GuardianBear and Bird are best friends! And while they don’t always understand each other, they both agree: all they want is to make the other happy. So, when Bear forgets to pack for a picnic (but pretends that he didn’t), Bird doesn’t let on that she knew all along.
And when Bird discovers that Bear has more of a certain talent than she does, well, Bear finds a touching way to make her feel better...
Bear Town, by Fredrick Backman (paperback 2018)
£9.99
In a large Swedish forest Beartown hides a dark secret . . .Cut-off from everywhere else it experiences the kind of isolation that tears people apart. And each year more and more of the town is swallowed by the forest. Then the town is offered a bright new future.
But it is all put in jeopardy by a single, brutal act. It divides the town into those who think it should be hushed up and forgotten, and those who'll risk everything to see justice done. Who will speak up? Could you stand by and stay silent? Or would you risk everything for justice? Surrounded by impenetrable forests, Beartown recreates the stifling atmosphere of a dying community.
A mature, compassionate novel' Sunday Times
Beasts of England, Adam Biles ( paperback Sept 2023)
£10.99
Manor Farm has reinvented itself as the South of England’s premium petting zoo. Now, instead of a working farm, humans and beasts alike are invited (for a small fee) to come and stroke, fondle, and take rides on the farm’s inhabitants.But life is not a bed of roses for the animals, in spite of what their leaders may want them to believe. Elections are rigged, the community is beset by factions, and sacred mottos are being constantly updated. The Farm is descending into chaos. What’s more, a mysterious ‘illness’ has started ripping through the animals, killing them one by one ...
In Beasts of England, Adam Biles honours, updates and subverts George Orwell’s classic, all the while channelling the chaotic, fragmentary nature of populist politics in the Internet age into a savage farmyard satire.
Bedside Companion for Food Lovers, Edited by:Jane McMorland Hunter ( 2023 hardback)
£22.95
An anthology of literary morsels for every night of the year Volume 3
With extracts from over 200 authors, it embraces fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and even a smattering of recipes, with one piquant extract for every night of the year. This absorbing book is a literary feast for every food lover.
Within these pages, you'll discover a wealth of foodie extracts from around the world and throughout the centuries, from Christmas feasts in Tudor times to Nigella Lawson on how much cheese to buy for a dinner party. In addition to renowned food writers such as Elizabeth David, Madhur Jaffrey and Anthony Bourdain, it includes literary greats like Charles Dickens, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Maya Angelou, and some intriguing curiosities such as the surreal recipes in 1932’s Futurist Cookbook.
Bedside Companion for Gardeners ( hardback)
£25.00
A mix of fact and fiction, fantasy and experience, the Bedside Companion for Gardeners is a treasure trove of green-fingered inspiration where practical advice blends seamlessly with poetry and prose from intrepid gardeners past and present. Dip in and out of this collection with an entry for every day of the year that draws on writing through the ages and from across the globe. The Bedside Companion for Gardeners incorporates practical advice from the 17th-century gardening diarist John Evelyn; inspiring prose from Elizabeth von Arnim and John Milton; astute commentary from Horace Walpole on William Kent and Nancy Mitford on the vulgarity of a Surrey garden.Kipling offers practical advice, while Tennyson waxes lyrical on an Arabian night garden. The perfect gift for any gardener, this magical book is an invaluable source of inspiration and guidance to revisit throughout the year.
Before My Actual Heart Breaks,Tish Delaney (paperback Oct 2021)
£9.99
_'If I could go back to being sixteen again, I'd do things differently.''Everyone over the age of forty feels like that, you total gom,' says my best friend Lizzie Magee. When she was young Mary Rattigan wanted to fly. She was going to take off like an angel from heaven and leave the muck and madness of troubled Northern Ireland behind.Nothing but the Land of Happy Ever After would do for her. But as a Catholic girl with a B.I.T.C.H. for a Mammy and a silent Daddy, things did not go as she and Lizzie Magee had planned.
Now, five children, twenty-five years, an end to the bombs and bullets, enough whiskey to sink a ship and endless wakes and sandwich teas later, Mary's alone. She's learned plenty of hard lessons and missed a hundred steps towards the life she'd always hoped for. Will she finally find the courage to ask for the love she deserves? Or is it too late?'
. . A touching tale of how one woman survives a tough beginning to eventually end up exactly where her heart belongs.' ANNE GRIFFIN, author of When All is Said
Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self, Danielle Evans ( paperback March 2023)
£9.99
A college student's unplanned pregnancy forces her to confront her feelings of resentment toward her more privileged classmates. A father's misguided attempt to rescue a gift for his adult daughter magnifies all he doesn't know about her. And two teenage girls' flirt with adulthood leads to disastrous consequences.Based in a world where inequality is reality, but where the shifting terrain of adolescence and family are the most complicating forces, Evans' characters are wry, wise and utterly original. Striking in their emotional immediacy, the electrifying, prize-winning stories in Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self offer a fresh perspective on race and class in contemporary America. 'Danielle Evans is funny as hell' - Victor LaValle, author of Big Machine'
BEGIN AGAIN, Oliver Jeffers
£20.00
A powerful, thoughtful and bold comment on humanity and its future from one of today's most thought-provoking artists. In his first picture book created specifically with a wider audience in mind, Oliver Jeffers shares a history of humanity and his dreams for its future. Where are we going? With his bold, exquisite artwork, Oliver Jeffers starts at the dawn of humankind following people on their journey from then until now, and then offers the reader a challenge: where do we go from here? How can we think about the future of the human race more than our individual lives? How can we save ourselves? How can we change our story? Illustrated in his instantly recognisable style, Oliver Jeffers's exploration of the state of the world today is insightful, moving and powerful.
A must-have for every forward-thinking person who wants the next generation to inherit a world to be proud of.
Beidh Tu Alright : An Irish Language Journey by Joe McHugh ( PB Jan 25)
£18.00
In July 2014, Joe McHugh TD faced one of the most significant challenges of his political career. Appointed Minister for Natural Resources, the Gaeltacht and the Islands, McHugh was tasked with promoting the Irish language, despite having a limited grasp of the language himself. The outcry from the Irish-speaking community was immediate, with protestors chanting ‘Aire gan teanga, Aire gan clue’ (A Minister without a language is a Minister without a clue) outside Government Buildings. But instead of retreating, McHugh embraced this personal and public challenge, embarking on a journey to become a fluent Irish speaker. In Beidh Tú Alright, Joe McHugh shares his candid account of overcoming the daunting task of mastering Irish as an adult.
He takes readers behind the scenes, revealing the emotional and intellectual struggles faced, and the deep connections he forged with the language, its history, and the Irish-speaking communities. McHugh’s journey was not just about learning a language but rediscovering its cultural significance.
From uncovering the meaning behind place names like Maam Cross and Gleann an Ghiolla Ghránna to finding inspiration in the landscapes of Bear Island and Gleann Cholm Cille, Beidh Tú Alright delves into how language can connect us to our heritage, our sense of place, and our own identity. Beidh Tú Alright is a powerful nod to the resilience of the human spirit, the importance of cultural heritage, and the joy of lifelong learning. McHugh’s personal story will inspire both those who have yet to start their Irish language journey and those who may have once given up.
