Let Us Descend, Jesmyn Ward ( paperback August 2024)
£9.99
From Jesmyn Ward—the two-time National Book Award winner, youngest winner of the Library of Congress Prize for Fiction, and MacArthur Fellow—comes a haunting masterpiece, sure to be an instant classic, about an enslaved girl in the years before the Civil War.
On a slave plantation in the Carolinas, Annis has survived in the light of her mother’s resilience, comforted by stories of her African warrior grandmother. Everything she knows, she learned from her mother – how to fight, how to be strong, how to grow up in a world shrouded in darkness.
When she is sold south by the white enslaver who fathered her, Annis must venture onward through the rich but unforgiving landscapes of the American South alone: from the rice fields of the Carolinas to the slave markets of New Orleans, and into the fearsome heart of a Louisiana sugar plantation. Searching for relief in memories of her mother, she opens herself to a world beyond her own, teeming with spirits of earth, water, history and myth. A reimagining of American slavery as beautifully rendered as it is heart-wrenching, Let Us Descend offers a magnificent portrait of the strength of the human spirit and its ability to emerge from darkness into light.
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All Fours, Miranda July ( paperback May 2025)
£9.99
A semi-famous artist turns forty-five and gives herself a gift - a cross-country road trip from LA to New York, without her husband and child. But thirty minutes after setting off, she spontaneously exits the freeway, beds down in a nondescript motel - and embarks on the journey of a lifetime.
With July's wry voice, perfect comic timing, unabashed curiosity about human intimacy and palpable delight in pushing boundaries, All Fours tells the story of one woman's quest for a new kind of freedom. Part absurd entertainment, part tender reinvention of the sexual, romantic and domestic life of a 45-year-old female artist, All Fours transcends expectations while excavating our beliefs about life lived as a woman.
The Demon of Unrest : Abraham Lincoln & America’s Road to Civil War, by Erik Larson ( paperback May 2025)
£12.99
On November 6, 1860, Abraham Lincoln became the fluky victor in a tight race for president. The country was bitterly at odds; Southern extremists were moving ever closer to destroying the Union, with one state after another seceding and Lincoln powerless to stop them.
Slavery fuelled the conflict, but somehow the passions of North and South came to focus on a lonely federal fortress in Charleston Harbor: Fort Sumter. Master storyteller Erik Larson offers a gripping account of the chaotic months between Lincoln’s election and the Confederacy’s shelling of Sumter – a period marked by tragic errors and miscommunications, enflamed egos and craven ambitions, personal tragedies and betrayals. Lincoln himself wrote that the trials of these five months were ‘so great that, could I have anticipated them, I would not have believed it possible to survive them’.
Drawing on diaries, secret communiques, slave ledgers, and plantation records, Larson gives us a political horror story that captures the forces that led America to the brink – a dark reminder that we often don’t see a cataclysm coming until it’s too late.
Shark Heart, Emily Habeck ( paperback June 2024)
£10.99
For Lewis and Wren, their first year of marriage is also their last. A few weeks after their wedding, Lewis receives a rare diagnosis. He's turning into a great white shark, and has less than a year left to live as a human.
At first, Wren resists her husband's fate. Is there a way for them to be together after Lewis fully transforms?But as Lewis changes, day by day, Wren begins to make peace with the inevitable. After all, this isn't the first time she's lost a loved one.
An extraordinary novel of love, loss, hope and happiness, Shark Heart explores the shapes that love takes, in all its many forms, and asks us to ask ourselves: what makes us human?
'Every page bursts with heart' Anthony Doerr, author of All The Light We Cannot See'Compelling, moving, lyrical' - Claire North, author of Ithaca
Three Days in June, Anne Tyler ( hardback Feb 2025)
£14.99
It's the day before her daughter's wedding and things are not going well for Gail Baines. First thing, she loses her job - or quits, depending who you ask.
Then her ex-husband Max turns up at her door expecting to stay for the festivities. He doesn't even have a suit. Instead, he's brought memories, a shared sense of humour - and a cat looking for a new home.
Just as Gail is wondering what's next, their daughter Debbie discovers her groom has been keeping a secret... As the big day dawns, the exes just can't agree on what's best for Debbie. Gail is seriously worried, while Max seems more concerned with whether to opt for the salmon or prime rib at the reception, if they make it that far.
The day after the wedding, Gail and Max prepare to go their separate ways again. But all the questions about the future of the happy couple have stirred up the past for Gail. Because 'happy' takes many forms, and sometimes the younger generation has much to teach the older about secrets, acceptance and taking the rough with the smooth.
'Razor sharp on family, love and marriage' DAVID NICHOLLS
