William Boyd – författare

Britain's most beloved storyteller returns with another twisting adventure of obsessive love and elegant espionage starring reluctant spy and accidental hero, Gabriel Dax. 'Extravagantly enjoyable' THE TIMES'The Predicament is ingenious, thrilling and wonderfully entertaining' JOHN BANVILLE'Boyd’s addictive storytelling is at its very best as he navigates a collision of chance, ambition and human frailty' HER MAJESTY QUEEN CAMILLAGABRIEL DAX, TRAVEL WRITER TURNED ACCIDENTAL SPY, IS BACK IN THE SHADOWS . . . Unable to resist the allure of his MI6 handler, Faith Green, Gabriel has returned to a life of secrets and subterfuge. His latest operation takes him to Guatemala under the guise of covering a tinderbox presidential election, where the ruthless decisions of the Mafia provoke pitch-black warfare in collusion with the CIA.As political turmoil erupts, Gabriel's reluctant involvement deepens. His escape plan leads him to West Berlin, where he uncovers a chilling realisation: there is a plot to assassinate magnetic young President John F. Kennedy. In a race against time, Gabriel must navigate deceit and danger, knowing that the stakes have never been higher . . .‘Engaging, intelligent and deeply satisfying. I rate him one of our greatest living novelists’ PETER JAMES‘I enjoyed it hugely. Boyd is one of my favourite authors – he never disappoints’ KATE ATKINSON‘Simply the best realistic storyteller of his generation’ SEBASTIAN FAULKS‘There are few reading pleasures as great as giving in to a William Boyd novel’ SUNDAY TIMES

In his most exhilarating novel yet, William Boyd transports you to the vibrant streets of sixties London, as an accidental spy is drawn into the shadows of espionage and obsession . . .‘William Boyd once again brings to the spy novel his particular storytelling genius . . . brilliant fun’ MICK HERRON‘Wonderfully ambiguous with notions of twisted reality and uncertain memory’ ANN CLEEVES‘A wonderfully intricate novel of espionage and elegant skulduggery’ JOHN BANVILLEAN ACCIDENTAL SPY. A WEB OF BETRAYALS. A MYSTERY THAT WILL TAKE YOU AROUND THE WORLD . . . Gabriel Dax is a young man haunted by the memories of a tragedy: every night, when sleep finally comes, he dreams about his childhood home in flames. His days are spent on the move as an acclaimed travel writer, capturing changing landscapes in the grip of the Cold War. When he’s offered the chance to interview a political figure, his ambition leads him unwittingly into the shadows of espionage.As Gabriel’s reluctant initiation takes hold, he is drawn deeper into duplicity. Falling under the spell of Faith Green, an enigmatic and ruthless MI6 handler, he becomes ‘her spy’, unable to resist her demands. But amid the peril, paranoia and passion consuming Gabriel’s new covert life, it will be the revelations closer to home that change the rest of his story . . .------‘Engaging, intelligent and deeply satisfying. I rate him one of our greatest living novelists’ PETER JAMES‘I enjoyed it hugely. Boyd is one of my favourite authors – he never disappoints’ KATE ATKINSON‘Beautifully crafted and pleasingly unpredictable, the work of a man who knows what he is doing and makes it look effortless’ JAMES RUNCIE‘Simply the best realistic storyteller of his generation’ SEBASTIAN FAULKS‘There are few reading pleasures as great as giving in to a William Boyd novel’ SUNDAY TIMES

At the beginning of 2020, just as global Covid-19 restrictions were coming into force, the artist David Hockney was at his house, studio and garden in Normandy. From there, he witnessed the arrival of spring, and recorded the blossoming of the surrounding landscape on his iPad, a medium he has been using for over a decade. Working outdoors was an antidote to the anxiety of the moment for Hockney – 'We need art, and I do think it can relieve stress,' he says. This uplifting publication – produced to accompany a major exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts – includes 116 of his new iPad paintings and shows to full effect Hockney's singular skill in capturing the exuberance of nature.

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLERVienna, 1913. Lysander Rief, a young English actor, sits in the waiting room of the city's preeminent psychiatrist as he anxiously ponders the particularly intimate nature of his neurosis. When the enigmatic, intensely beautiful Hettie Bull walks in, Lysander is immediately drawn to her, unaware of how destructive the consequences of their subsequent affair will be. One year later, home in London, Lysander finds himself entangled in the dangerous web of wartime intelligence - a world of sex, scandal and spies that is slowly, steadily, permeating every corner of his life...

Any Human Heart is William's Boyd's classic, bestselling novel, now available as a Penguin Essential for the first time. Every life is both ordinary and extraordinary, but Logan Mountstuart's - lived from the beginning to the end of the twentieth century - contains more than its fair share of both. As a writer who finds inspiration with Hemingway in Paris and Virginia Woolf in London, as a spy recruited by Ian Fleming and betrayed in the war and as an art-dealer in '60s New York, Logan mixes with the movers and shakers of his times. But as a son, friend, lover and husband, he makes the same mistakes we all do in our search for happiness. Here, then, is the story of a life lived to the full - and a journey deep into a very human heart.Any Human Heart will be enjoyed by readers of Sebastian Faulks, Nick Hornby and Hilary Mantel, as well as lovers of the finest British and historical fiction around the world. It was recently adapted for a major Channel 4 four-part drama series scripted by William Boyd and starring Kim Cattrall, Gillian Anderson, Jim Broadbent and Tom Hollander. This edition features beautiful cover artwork from the television series.'Astonishing, touching, extremely funny. A brilliant evocation of a past era and an immensely readable story' Sunday Telegraph'Superb, wonderful, enjoyable' Guardian'A terrific journey through the twentieth century. Thoroughly entertaining and enjoyable' Jeremy Paxman

With contributions by: William Boyd, Candice Carty-Williams, Imtiaz Dharker, Roddy Doyle, Pico Iyer, Robert Macfarlane, Andy Miller, Jackie Morris, Jan Morris, Sisonke Msimang, Dina Nayeri, Chigozie Obioma, Michael Ondaatje, David Pilling, Max Porter, Philip Pullman, Alice Pung, Jancis Robinson, S.F.Said, Madeleine Thien, Salley Vickers, John Wood and Markus Zusak'This story, like so many stories, begins with a gift. The gift, like so many gifts, was a book...' So begins the essay by Robert Macfarlane that inspired this collection.In this cornucopia of an anthology, you will find essays by some of the world's most beloved novelists, nonfiction writers, essayists and poets.'You will see books taking flight in flocks, migrating around the world, landing in people's hearts and changing them for a day or a year or a lifetime.'You will see books sparking wonder or anger; throwing open windows into other languages, other cultures, other minds; causing people to fall in love or to fight for what is right.'And more than anything, over and over again, you will see books and words being given, received and read - and in turn prompting further generosity.'Published to coincide with the 20th anniversary of global literacy non-profit, Room to Read, The Gifts of Reading forms inspiring, unforgettable, irresistible proof of the power and necessity of books and reading.Inspired by Robert MacfarlaneCurated by Jennie Orchard

WINNER OF THE JAMES TAIT BLACK MEMORIAL PRIZE 'A brilliant storyteller . . . a book which stretches, tantalizes and delights' Financial Times_____________________________________On Brazzaville Beach, on the edge of Africa, Hope Clearwater ponders the strange circumstances that led her to leave her husband John, and his mathematical obsessions, in England and venture to Africa to help world-renowned scientist Eugene Mallabar with his studies of wild chimps. But the more Hope studies Mallabar, the more she comes to believe that something isn't right. That behind Mallabar, and his obsessive work, there lies another, more sinister truth: one that might also help explain Hope's reasons for leaving England . . ._____________________________________'A most extraordinary parable about mankind. Quite unlike anything else I have read' Sunday Express'Brilliant, daring. A gripping and compulsive story' Herald'Hilarious and edgy' Sunday Times

'One of the comic masterpieces' Daily Telegraph ______________________________________Henderson Dores is an Englishman in New York - and completely out of his depth.He should be concentrating on his job as an art assessor, but his complicated personal life keeps intruding. And that's before we even get to his sense of alienation, of being a fish out of water. For Henderson is a shy man lost in a country of extraverts and weirdos. Subway poets, loony millionaires, Bible-bashers and sharp-suited hoods stalk him wherever he goes. But it is only when he's sent to America's deep South to examine a rare collection of paintings that matters take a life-threatening turn. Still, if it doesn't kill you, they say it can only make you stronger . . .______________________________________'Boyd's humour, timed to a tee, always raps out the truth' Mail on Sunday'Extremely funny. Boyd does not pass up a single comic turn' Sunday Telegraph'Splittlingly shrewd and engaging' Guardian'The wry laughter never stops . . . the shrewdest pages yet from a master of witty manipulation' Observer

DISCOVER THE BOOKER PRIZE LONGLISTED NOVEL ABOUT ONE HEART'S LOVES AND LOSSES FROM ICONIC STORYTELLER WILLIAM BOYD'Superb, wonderful, enjoyable' Guardian'Full of delights' The Times_____________________________Every life is both ordinary and extraordinary, and Logan Mountstuart's - stretching across the twentieth century - is a rich tapestry of both. As a writer who finds inspiration with Hemingway in Paris and Virginia Woolf in London, as a spy recruited by Ian Fleming and betrayed in the war, and as an art-dealer in '60s New York, Logan mixes with the men and women who shape his times. But as a son, friend, lover and husband, he makes the same mistakes we all do in our search for happiness. Here, then, is the story of a life lived to the full - and a journey deep into a very human heart.'One of the things this book does so brilliantly, is it so authentically recreates historical characters' Ben Miller, on BBC 2's Between The Covers____________________________'Astonishing, touching, extremely funny. A brilliant evocation of a past era and an immensely readable story' Sunday Telegraph'Superb, wonderful, enjoyable' Guardian'Generous, witty, sneakily profound' Evening StandardAny Human Heart was adapted for a Channel 4 drama starring Kim Cattrall, Gillian Anderson, Matthew Macfadyen and Jim Broadbent and is perfect for readers of Sebastian Faulks and Hilary Mantel.

A primatologist flees her broken marriage for a job in war-torn Africa in the renowned author’s “brilliant . . . stunningly magical” novel (Washington Post Book World).William Boyd’s classic Brazzaville Beach has been called a “bold seamless blend of philosophy and suspense . . . [that] nevertheless remains accessible to general readers on a level of pure entertainment.” (Boston Globe). When her marriage to a brilliant but unstable mathematician finally shatters, Hope Clearwater leaves England to join a team of primate researchers in a remote African country. Though she is there to study chimps, the greater challenge is her attempt to grapple with her own recent past—as well as her fellow scientists. And when she discovers evidence of supposedly peaceful chimps engaging in extreme violence, Hope finds herself drawn into a war of desperate egos and ruthless ambitions.

This “thoroughly entertaining” historical novel has “the pace of a spy thriller, with code-cracking and double-crossing aplenty” (The New Yorker).Vienna, 1913. Lysander Rief, a young English actor in town seeking psychotherapy for a troubling ailment, becomes caught up in a feverish affair with a beautiful, enigmatic woman. When she goes to the police to press charges of rape, however, he is mystified, and his few months of passion come to an abrupt end. Only a carefully plotted escape—with the help of two mysterious British diplomats—saves him from trial. But the frenzied getaway sets off a chain of events that steadily dismantles Lysander’s life as he knows it. He returns to London hoping to win back his one-time fiancée and banish from memory his traumatic ordeals abroad, but Vienna haunts him at every turn. The men who helped coordinate his escape recruit him to carry out the brutal murder of a complete stranger. His lover from Vienna shows up nonchalantly at a party, ready to resume their liaison. And before he knows where his new life has taken him, Lysander soon finds himself on the trail of a traitor—a man whose bizarre connection to his own family proves a cruel twist of fate.“An absorbing spy novel that raises provocative questions.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review“Breathlessly readable.” —The Independent“Boyd effortlessly combines historical detail with a sexy, galloping narrative that proves irresistible.” —People“Boyd is a born story teller whose clear, taut prose never gets in the way of his characters and their unpredictable fates.” —The Wall Street Journal“A thinking person’s thriller.” —Good Housekeeping

*The Sunday Times Bestseller*It is 1969 and James Bond is about to go solo, recklessly motivated by revenge.A seasoned veteran of the service, 007 is sent to single-handedly stop a civil war in the small West African nation of Zanzarim. Aided by a beautiful accomplice and hindered by the local militia, he undergoes a scarring experience which compels him to ignore M’s orders in pursuit of his own brand of justice. Bond’s renegade action leads him to Washington, D.C., where he discovers a web of intrigue and witnesses fresh horrors.Even if Bond succeeds in exacting his revenge, a man with two faces will come to stalk his every waking moment.

Dirty Realism is the fiction of a new generation of American authors. They write about the belly-side of contemporary life - a deserted husband, an unwed mother, a car thief, a pickpocket, a drug addict - but they write about it with a disturbing detachment, at times verging on comedy. Understated, ironic, sometimes savage, but insistently compassionate, these stories constitute a new voice in fiction. In this special feature, Granta presents a group of younger authors - many published in Britain for the first time - who, writing in a strange, exaggerated style, have single-handedly revitalized the short story. 'These writers,' Tobias Wolff has observed, 'while not necessarily a school, nevertheless form a new voice. They are able to speak to us about the things that matter.'

Boris is a novella that works on several levels: a love-story, a tragedy, a depiction of pain and self-destruction. It is a moving and strangely understated chronicle of an obsession, but it is an obsession with political and historical implications that extend far beyond its seemingly straight-forward, spartan narrative.John Berger won the Booker Price for his novel G. He is also the author of the much acclaimed Ways of Seeing and Pig Earth. Boris is his first published fiction in over four years, and its eloquent sadness clearly reaffirms Susan Sontag's claim: 'John Berger writes about what is important, not just interesting. In contemporary English letters he seems to me peerless; not since Lawrence has there been a writer who offers such attentiveness to the sensual world.'

Travel writing is undergoing a revival: not since the 1920s and '30s has it been so popular or so important. What accounts for its sudden appeal? A need for escape? Nostalgia for an experience that means not tourism but adventure? Or does travel writing - being part reportage, part fiction, and part meditation - express concerns that we rarely see addressed in other forms of writing? This issue, the tenth edition of Granta, is devoted to the work of some of today's most important travel writers, including the already established and those just beginning to build their reputations.

What is Milan Kundera's writing about? Sexual conquest and Russian tanks, arousal and totalitarian repression, infidelity and political betrayal, desire and the quiet tragedy of Europe. Kundera is a literary acrobat, a master of paradox and parody. An exile from communism and a critic of the West, a sceptic and irrepressible story-teller, an erotic hedonist whose life is politicized in the extreme, Kundera is as surprising and as unpredictable as the contemporary world he addresses.The current issue of Granta publishes, for the first time in Britain, a collection of Kundera's newest work, representing the range and power of an author whom more and more people have come to recognize as one of the most important writers to have emerged in the last ten years.

Ten years ago, James Fenton went to Saigon, having made up his mind that, no matter what happened, he was not going to miss what he had travelled 10,000 miles to see: a Communist victory. And so he remained, long after the US troops and most members of the western press had been evacuated. He remained for, and even participated in, the looting of the US Embassy. And when the first North Vietnamese tank entered the city, lost, unable to make its way through Saigon's maze of streets, James Fenton jumped on the back, an unlikely navigator, directing the tank commander to the Presidential Palace. And still Fenton remained, until three months later, without food or money or clothes, wandering around a city transformed, he finally made his way back home.Witty, bizarre, and verging on the lunatic - who in his right mind would hop on the back of an invading army's tank? - James Fenton's account of the fall of Saigon is an extraordinary and historically important record of the collapse of a city at war.

For the last thirty or forty years, it has been a commonplace that science and literature don't mix. But recently science writing has undergone a revival and has come to constitute a literature in itself. What accounts for its sudden appeal? That attraction of facts? Or the possibility that 'facts' are themselves inventions of the most spectacular kind?Granta 16, 'Science' is devoted to representing part of this revival. In 'Excesses', Oliver Sacks describes individuals suffering from not only too much personality but too many. In 'Amazon', Eugene Richards and Dorothea Lynch document the terrible mystery of illness and the body. The sexuality of tortoises, the lunacy of invention, the bizarre mating habits of a tropical rodent, the zoo-like existence of the young scientists of Reagan's Star Wars - all invite us to understand 'science' not simply as the study of fact but also as another way, not unlike the novel, of describing the mystery of the world.

James Fenton is a rather peculiar individual.He was, after all, among the first to loot the US Embassy as the city of Saigon fell. This year, he found himself in the Presidential Palace in Manila, and his booty included one towel (with the monogram of Imelda Marcos) and a letter to President Macros - resting alongside the grand piano, on which James Fenton managed to play a version of Bach's Prelude in C (abruptly abbreviated), while the population of Manila rioted.But James Fenton's version of the Philippines is more than a record of being at the right place at the worst of possible times. It is also an account of one of the most historic uprisings in recent years - in which an entire people, cheated of its vote in a snap election, responded in turn: with a snap revolution.