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By Horror Haunted: Stories
by Celia FremlinBy Horror Haunted (1974) was Celia Fremlin's second collection of stories, and it runs the gamut of her many talents. The nightmarish plots, wit, elegance, and domestic details with an undertow of unease have lost none of their edge. 'Her Number On It' is a compelling portrait of kleptomania; the 'Unsuspected Talent' of a dissatisfied wife has dangerous consequences; while 'Don't Tell Cissie' is a superbly original ghost story. 'The reader is lulled in to a false knowledge of events... At the last moment the events are turned inside out and the actions are re-interpreted nastily, chillingly or with penetrating realism.' Catholic Herald 'A really delightful collection of short stories...the suspense, in some of them, is almost painful... [Fremlin] is the complete mistress of an extremely difficult art form.' Huddersfield Day Examiner
The Witch's Daughter: Carrie's War; The Witch's Daughter; The Peppermint Pig
by Nina BawdenOn the Scottish island of Skua, friendship develops between the lonely and mysterious Perdita and a blind girl, Janey. Both possess a kind of second sight - Janey's is the ability to hear, feel and remember more than others, and Perdita's is the ominous legacy of her being a witch's daughter. When Janey's brother, Tom, starts investigating a cluster of mysterious events and suspicious characters, all three become entwined in an adventure of hidden jewels, desperate criminals and dangerous detection.Written in 1963, The Witch's Daughter showcases Nina Bawden's innate regard for the integrity of her young characters. As she has said: 'I like writing for children. It seems to me that most people underestimate their understanding and the strength of their feelings and in my books for them I try to put this right.' Hugely admired on publication by both reviewers and readers, it was described as 'thrilling' by the Times Literary Supplement.
Space Taxi: Archie Takes Flight (Space Taxi #1)
by Wendy Mass Michael BrawerArchie Morningstar learns a big family secret and helps save the universe. All before breakfast!It's not every day a regular kid like Archie gets to wake up at midnight. But today is Take Your Kid to Work Day, and Archie is finally allowed to ride along in his dad's taxi cab. He has been waiting eight years, eight months, and eight days for this moment to arrive.But he's about to discover his dad is no ordinary cab driver...In fact, he drives an intergalactic space taxi! All night long, he shuttles aliens from one corner of the universe to another. And being a space taxi copilot is no easy task: Archie must steer them into wormholes, keep them from crashing into planets, deal with a very unusual cat...and save the universe from an evil mastermind!Space Taxi marks the debut of a brand new chapter book series from New York Times bestselling author Wendy Mass and teacher Michael Brawer, filled with humor, adventure, and plenty of science to impress your friends and teachers!
The Legend of Podkin One-Ear (The Five Realms #1)
by Kieran LarwoodWinner of the Best Story Blue Peter Book Award. The first Five Realms adventure.A thick white blanket covers the wide slopes of the band of hills known as the Razorback Downs . . .Podkin is the son of a warrior chieftain. He knows that one day it will be up to him to lead his warren and guard it in times of danger. But for now, he's quite happy to laze around annoying his older sister Paz, and playing with his baby brother Pook. Then Podkin's home is brutally attacked, and the young rabbits are forced to flee. The terrifying Gorm are on the rampage, and no one and nowhere is safe. With danger all around them, Podkin must protect his family, uncover his destiny, and attempt to defeat the most horrifying enemy rabbitkind has ever known.'It's jolly good fun . . . expect sequels to breed like . . . well, rabbits.' SFX on The Legend of Podkin One-Ear'Kieran Larwood's talent and his passion for his wonderful characters leap off every page.' David Long, author of Survivors'One of the best books I have ever read.' Cally Evans, age 10, Lovereading4kids
The Execution of Justice (Pushkin Vertigo Ser. #24)
by Friedrich DürrenmattBrilliant neo-noir from one of the greatest post-war writers of GermanA man is murdered in plain sight.But could it be the perfect crime?A respected professor is dead – shot in a crowded Zurich restaurant, in front of dozens of witnesses. The murderer calmly turned himself in to the police. So why has he now hired a lawyer to clear his name? And why has he chosen the drink-soaked, disreputable Spät to defend him?As he investigates, Spät finds himself obsessed, drawn ever deeper into a case of baffling complexity until he reaches a deadly conclusion: justice can be restored only by a crime. This is a captivating neo-noir classic from the master of the genre.Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921-1990) was a Swiss author and dramatist, most famous for his plays The Visit and The Physicists, which earned him a reputation as one of the greatest playwrights in the German language. He also wrote four highly regarded crime novels - The Pledge, The Judge and His Hangman, Suspicion and The Execution of Justice, all of which will be published by Pushkin Vertigo.
A Sleepwalk on the Severn
by Alice Oswald'This is not a play. This is a poem in several registers, set at night on the Severn Estuary. Its subject is moonrise, which happens five times in five different forms: new moon, half moon, full moon, no moon and moon reborn. Various characters, some living, some dead, all based on real people from the Severn catchment, talk towards the moment of moonrise and are changed by it. The poem, which was written for the 2009 festival of the Severn, aims to record what happens when the moon moves over us - its effect on water and its effect on voices.'Alice OswaldA Sleepwalk on the Severn is a poem for several voices, set at night on the Severn Estuary. Its subject is moonrise, which happens five times in five different forms: new moon, half moon, full moon, no moon and moon reborn. Various characters, some living, some dead - all based on real people from the Severn catchment - talk towards the moment of moonrise and are changed by it. Commissioned for the 2009 festival of the Severn, Alice Oswald's breathtakingly original new work aims to record what happens when the moon moves over the sublunary world: its effect on water and its effect on language.
Circe -- Free Preview -- The First 3 Chapters
by Madeline Miller"A bold and subversive retelling of the goddess's story," this #1 New York Times bestseller is "both epic and intimate in its scope, recasting the most infamous female figure from the Odyssey as a hero in her own right" (Alexandra Alter, The New York Times). In the house of Helios, god of the sun and mightiest of the Titans, a daughter is born. But Circe is a strange child -- not powerful, like her father, nor viciously alluring like her mother. Turning to the world of mortals for companionship, she discovers that she does possess power -- the power of witchcraft, which can transform rivals into monsters and menace the gods themselves. Threatened, Zeus banishes her to a deserted island, where she hones her occult craft, tames wild beasts and crosses paths with many of the most famous figures in all of mythology, including the Minotaur, Daedalus and his doomed son Icarus, the murderous Medea, and, of course, wily Odysseus. But there is danger, too, for a woman who stands alone, and Circe unwittingly draws the wrath of both men and gods, ultimately finding herself pitted against one of the most terrifying and vengeful of the Olympians. To protect what she loves most, Circe must summon all her strength and choose, once and for all, whether she belongs with the gods she is born from, or the mortals she has come to love. With unforgettably vivid characters, mesmerizing language, and page-turning suspense, Circe is a triumph of storytelling, an intoxicating epic of family rivalry, palace intrigue, love and loss, as well as a celebration of indomitable female strength in a man's world. #1 New York Times Bestseller -- named one of the Best Books of the Year by NPR, the Washington Post, People, Time, Amazon, Entertainment Weekly, Bustle, Newsweek, the A.V. Club, Christian Science Monitor, Refinery 29, Buzzfeed, Paste, Audible, Kirkus, Publishers Weekly, Thrillist, NYPL, Self, Real Simple, Goodreads, Boston Globe, Electric Literature, BookPage, the Guardian, Book Riot, Seattle Times, and Business Insider.
Elegy for Eddie: An absorbing inter-war mystery (Maisie Dobbs #9)
by Jacqueline WinspearApril, 1933. To the costermongers of London, Eddie Pettit is simply a gentle soul with a near-magical gift for working with horses. When he is killed in a violent accident, the costers are sceptical about the cause of his death, and recruit Maisie Dobbs to investigate. Maisie, who has known these men since childhood and remembers Eddie fondly, is eager to help.But it soon becomes clear that powerful political and financial forces are equally determined to prevent her from learning too much about Eddie's death. As Maisie uncovers lies and manipulation on a national scale, she must decide whether to risk all to see justice done.
Murder at the Brightwell: The First Amory Ames Mystery (Amory Ames #1)
by Ashley WeaverAmory Ames is a wealthy young woman who regrets her marriage to her notoriously charming playboy husband, Milo. Looking for a change, she accepts a request for help from her former fiancé, Gil Trent, not knowing that she’ll soon become embroiled in a murder investigation that will test not only her friendship with Gil, but will upset the status quo with her husband.
Rugby Heroes: Ghostly Ground, Deadly Danger (Rugby Spirit Ser. #6)
by Gerard SigginsIt looks like Eoin Madden's busiest term ever! He's Castlerock College’s star player and he's been called up for Ireland in the Under 16 Four Nations - how will he juggle sport and school work? But his biggest challenge of all goes way beyond his own concerns and right to the heart of Irish rugby. When his oldest and best ghostly friend calls for help, can Eoin and his band of heroes their deadliest mystery yet? Take a dive into history –with some help from rugby legends of the past!
Jubilee Lines
by Carol Ann DuffyTo mark the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II's accession to the throne, Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy brings together a dazzling array of contemporary poets (sixty in fact) to write about each of the of the sixty years of Her Majesty's reign. Celebrated writers as Simon Armitage, Gillian Clarke, Wendy Cope, Geoffrey Hill, Jackie Kay, Michael Longley, Andrew Motion, Don Paterson and Jo Shapcott, alongside some of the newest young talent around - address a moment or event from their chosen year, be it of personal or political significance or both. Through a series of specially commissioned poems, Jubilee Lines offers a unique portrayal of the country and times in which we have lived since 1952, culminating in an essential portrait of today: the way we speak, the way we chronicle, the way we love and fight, the way we honour and remember. Brilliantly introduced and edited by Carol Ann Duffy, Jubilee Lines is an unforgettable commemoration: not only a monarch's reign but of a way of living for generations of her peoples.
The Ancestor Game (A\penguin Original Ser.)
by Alex MillerSteven Muir, August Spiess and his daughter Gertrude, and Lang Tzu all acknowledge a restless sense of cultural displacement, an ambivalence in their relations with the culture of European Australia. Steven left England for Australia as a young man and his one attempt at returning is unsuccessful. August Spiess, although he speaks frequently of returning to his native Hamburg, fails to make the journey, as does his daughter Gertrude. Lang Tzu's very name defines his fate: two characters which in Mandarin signify the son who goes away.The 'game', however, does have winners. For despite their yearnings for the home of their ancestral dreams, a desire to belong somewhere that is truly their own, none of Miller's characters leaves Australia, and each in their own way comes to see that to be at home in exile may be a defining paradox of the European Australian condition: the paradox of belonging and estrangement that perhaps lies uneasily at the heart of all European cultures.
IN THEIR SHOES: FAIRY TALES AND FOLKTALES
by Lucie ArnouxTo coincide with a major exhibition: the best shoe stories from around the world. Red shoes, golden slippers, seven-league boots... Just step into the shoes of princes and princesses, ogres and orphans, cats and rabbits, and discover a fascinating fairy-tale world of footwear. Did you know that long ago Cinderella lived in China? That dogs in America wear boots? And that a small pair of shoes in France can fall in love? With original illustrations by Lucie Arnoux, this is a timeless and captivating collection of fairy tales and folktales, whose footprints have lasted through the generations, over the centuries, and all around the world.
Grief Is the Thing with Feathers: A Novel
by Max PorterA SUNDAY TIMES TOP 100 NOVEL OF THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURYWinner of the 2016 International Dylan Thomas Prize and shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award and the Goldsmiths Prize.In a London flat, two young boys face the unbearable sadness of their mother's sudden death. Their father, a Ted Hughes scholar and scruffy romantic, imagines a future of well-meaning visitors and emptiness. In this moment of despair they are visited by Crow - antagonist, trickster, healer, babysitter. This sentimental bird is drawn to the grieving family and threatens to stay until they no longer need him. This extraordinary debut, full of unexpected humour and emotional truth, marks the arrival of a thrilling and significant new talent.
Justin's Rhyme Time
by Justin FletcherJustin Fletcher collects his all-time favourite bedtime rhymes for his fans. With classic black and white illustrations, these are nursery rhymes to read aloud and enjoy together. Published in a child-friendly stocking-filler format alongside the hilarious joke book, Justin's Chuckle Time, this is a great gift for all children ages 3-5.
Football Fugitive with SNEAK PEEKS of 8 Matt Christopher Books
by Matt ChristopherCalling all sports fans! Do you love reading about football, baseball, basketball, or soccer? Look no further for the best of the best from Matt Christopher. Get your game face on with the fast-paced, full novel, Football Fugitive! Then, whether you're interested in Slam Dunks, Penalty Shots, or you think you're the next Primetime Pitcher, the SNEAK PEEKS of eight more Matt Christopher books will be sure to stimulate your thirst for these other action-packed novels for young readers!
Romanzo Criminale
by Giancarlo De CataldoIt is 1977. A new force is terrorising Rome - a mob of reckless, ultraviolent youths known as La Banda della Magliana. As the gang ruthlessly take control of Rome's heroin trade, they begin an inexorable rise to power. Banda della Magliana intend to own the streets of Rome - unless their internal struggles tear them apart. Based on Rome's modern gangland history, Romanzo Criminale fearlessly confronts Italy's Age of Lead: war on the streets and terrorism, kidnappings and corruption at the highest levels of government.
The Ginger Cat Mystery: (aka 'Murder at Marston Manor')
by Robin ForsytheThe body of John Cornell the well-known London Merchant and banker, was exhumed early this morning with great secrecy, following representations made to the Home Office.Everyone was astonished when the beautiful Josephine Rivron rejected the young, popular and handsome Frank Cornell, and married his elderly, wealthy father John instead. When John fell ill and died shortly after marrying, there were suspicions that the cause wasn’t pneumonia, but a nasty case of poisoning. Then Frank Cornell too was dead - shot through the head, the weapon vanished. This time no one had any doubt it was murder.Amateur sleuth Algernon Vereker is drawn to the case by a recurring bout of his “old detective fever”. He packs his Colt automatic and joins Inspector Heather down at Marston Manor to investigate. The Ginger Cat Mystery (1935 - originally titled Murder at Marston Manor in the USA) is a classic country house whodunit stuffed with suspects, clues, red herrings and dark deeds. Not to mention the eponymous feline, whose tell-tale fur might just help to hang a murderer. This new edition, the first in over seventy years, features an introduction by Curtis Evans. ‘Mr Forsythe has contrived an ingenious tale.’ The Times
Junk: A Play
by Ayad AkhtarFrom the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Disgraced, a fast-paced play that exposes the financial deal making behind the mergers and acquisitions boom of the 1980s. Set in 1985, Junk tells the story of Robert Merkin, resident genius of the upstart investment firm Sacker Lowell. Hailed as "America's Alchemist," his proclamation that "debt is an asset" has propelled him to a dizzying level of success. By orchestrating the takeover of a massive steel manufacturer, Merkin intends to do the "deal of the decade," the one that will rewrite all the rules. Working on his broadest canvas to date, Pulitzer Prize winner Ayad Akhtar chronicles the lives of men and women engaged in financial civil war: insatiable investors, threatened workers, killer lawyers, skeptical journalists, and ambitious federal prosecutors. Although it's set 40 years in the past, this is a play about the world we live in right now; a world in which money became the only thing of real value.
The King's Evil: The thrilling historical whodunnit (Christopher Redmayne)
by Edward MarstonA PERILOUS INVESTIGATION IN THE HEART OF LONDON RAVAGED BY THE GREAT FIRESeptember 1666. Meeting in the ashes of a devastated London, Christopher Redmayne, an architect with Cavalier instincts, and Jonathan Bale, a Puritan constable, are hardly kindred spirits. Redmayne dedicates himself to rebuilding the city that Bale believes was destroyed by its own inner corruption.The two men are thrown together when they catch thieves who are stealing from the house that Redmayne has designed for Sir Ambrose Northcott. The foul murder of Sir Ambrose joins them again, albeit reluctantly, in a complex and dangerous investigation that takes them through the brothels and gaming houses of Restoration London, right to the heart of the King’s court.
The Confabulist
by Steven GallowayA masterful re-imagining of the lives and loves of Harry Houdini, from the author of the Richard and Judy bestseller The Cellist of Sarajevo.The whole world knows me as the man who killed Harry Houdini, the most famous person on the planet. But there is a secret that no one knows, save for myself and one other person who likely died long ago...This is the spellbinding story of Harry Houdini - his life, his loves, his feats of daring - and misfit Martin Strauss, the man who killed him with an ill-timed punch to the stomach. But in magic, nothing is quite what it seems. Is Strauss the killer of the greatest showman the world has ever seen, or is faking his own death the greatest trick Houdini ever pulled?
Casanova's Return to Venice
by Arthur SchnitzlerAn ageing Casanova longs to return to Venice after a life of exile, but the desire for women proves too strong. A brilliant psychological portrait two days in the life of the most famous seducer and free spirit, by the author Sigmund Freud called his alter ego.
The Selected Works of Abdullah the Cossack
by H. M. NaqviThrough the use of a roman-à-clef, the author is able to create compelling caricatures that take on a life of their own. - Guardian____________Anarchic, erudite and rollicking, with a septuagenarian protagonist like no other, The Selected Works of Abdullah the Cossack is a joyride of a story set against a kaleidoscopic portrait of one of the world's most vibrant cities.Abdullah, bachelor and scion of a once prominent family, awakes on the morning of his seventieth birthday and considers launching himself over the balcony. Having spent years attempting to compile a 'mythopoetic legacy' of his beloved Karachi, the cosmopolitan heart of Pakistan, Abdullah has lost his zeal. A surprise invitation for a night out from his old friend Felix Pinto snaps Abdullah out of his funk, and saddles him with a ward - Pinto's adolescent grandson Bosco. As Abdullah plays mentor to Bosco, he also attracts the romantic attentions of Jugnu, an enigmatic siren with links to the mob. All the while Abdullah's brothers' plot to evict him from the family estate. Now he must to try to save his home - or face losing his last connection to his familial past.
I'll Sell You a Dog
by Juan Pablo VillalobosLong before he was the taco seller whose ‘Gringo Dog’ recipe made him famous throughout Mexico City, our hero was an aspiring artist: an artist, that is, till his would-be girlfriend was stolen by Diego Rivera, and his dreams snuffed out by his hypochondriac mother. Now our hero is resident in a retirement home, where fending off boredom is far more gruelling than making tacos. Plagued by the literary salon that bumps about his building’s lobby and haunted by the self-pitying ghost of a neglected artist, Villalobos’s old man can’t help but misbehave. He antagonises his neighbours, tortures American missionaries with passages from Adorno, flirts with the revolutionary greengrocer, and in short does everything that can be done to fend off the boredom of retirement and old age . . . while still holding a beer. A delicious take-down of pretensions to cultural posterity, I’ll Sell You a Dog is a comic novel whose absurd inventions, scurrilous antics and oddball characters are vintage Villalobos.
Irish Ghost Stories: Previously Unpublished Well-known Ghost Stories and Some Lesser-known Tales
by Padraic O'FarrellThe ghost story holds a special place in Ireland. It provided the raw material for evenings of storytelling that were a common feature of country life up to the 1950s (and frequently beyond). Unexplained psychic phenomena fascinate people from all walks of life. Many are afraid, ashamed and embarrassed to come forward for fear of not being taken seriously. Of course, we can't prove that ghosts exist, we are in a different realm of consciousness when we talk about ghosts. But however strange or unusual the feelings that people experience, the experiences themselves are nonetheless real.