Riverrun – serie

WINNER OF THE 2025 PULITZER PRIZE FOR BIOGRAPHYAn Economist book of the year 2024.The dramatic, globe-spanning and meticulously-researched story of two scientific rivals and their race to survey all life.In the 18th century, two men dedicated their lives to the same daunting task: identifying and describing all life on Earth. Their approaches could not have been more different. Carl Linnaeus, a pious Swedish doctor with a huckster's flair, believed that life belonged in tidy, static categories. Georges-Louis de Buffon, an aristocratic polymath and keeper of France's royal garden, viewed life as a dynamic, ever-changing swirl of complexities. Both began believing their work to be difficult, but not impossible--how could the planet possibly hold more than a few thousand species? Stunned by life's diversity, both fell far short of their goal. But in the process they articulated starkly divergent views on nature, on humanity's role in shaping the fate of our planet, and on humanity itself. The rivalry between these two unique, driven individuals created reverberations that still echo today. Linnaeus, with the help of acolyte explorers he called "apostles" (only half of whom returned alive), gave the world such concepts as mammal, primate and homo sapiens--but he also denied species change and promulgated racist pseudo-science. Buffon coined the term reproduction, formulated early prototypes of evolution and genetics, and argued passionately against prejudice. It was a clash that, during their lifetimes, Buffon seemed to be winning. But their posthumous fates would take a very different turn.With elegant, propulsive prose grounded in more than a decade of research, bestselling author Jason Roberts tells an unforgettable true-life tale of intertwined lives and enduring legacies, tracing an arc of insight and discovery that extends across three centuries into the present day.

Measuring the World recreates the parallel but contrasting lives of two geniuses of the German Enlightenment - the naturalist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt and the mathematician and physicist Carl Friedrich Gauss. Towards the end of the 18th century, these two brilliant young Germans set out to measure the world. Humboldt, a Prussian aristocrat schooled for greatness, negotiates savannah and jungle, climbs the highest mountain then known to man, counts head lice on the heads of the natives, and explores every hole in the ground. Gauss, a man born in poverty who will be recognised as the greatest mathematician since Newton, does not even need to leave his home in Göttingen to know that space is curved. He can run prime numbers in his head, cannot imagine a life without women and yet jumps out of bed on his wedding night to jot down a mathematical formula. Measuring the World is a novel of rare charm and readability, distinguished by its sly humour and unforgettable characterization. It brings the two eccentric geniuses to life, their longings and their weaknesses, their balancing act between loneliness and love, absurdity and greatness, failure and success.

'IT'LL EASILY BE ONE OF MY BOOKS OF THE YEAR' Hannah Beckerman'Just read it. You'll see' The Times'Funny, tender and sad' Sunday Express'If you liked Meg Mason's Sorrow and Bliss, you'll love this novel' Good Housekeeping'One of the richest explorations of family dysfunction I've read' the i newspaper'Razor-sharp ' Observer'One of the funniest novels you'll read this year' Guardian THE BOOK THAT YOU WON'T BE ABLE TO PUT DOWNFor Alice and Hanna, saint and sinner, growing up is a trial. There is their mother, who takes a divide-and-conquer approach to child-rearing, and their father, who takes an absent one. There is also their older brother Michael, whose disapproval is a force to be reckoned with. There is the catastrophe that is never spoken of, but which has shaped everything . . .As adults, Alice and Hanna must deal with disappointments in work and in love as well as increasingly complicated family tensions, and lives that look dismayingly dissimilar to what they'd intended. They must look for a way to repair their own fractured relationship, and they must finally choose their own approach to their dominant mother: submit or burn the house down. And they must decide at last whether life is really anything more than (as Hanna would have it) a tragedy with a few hilarious moments.From the author of the Waterstones Book of the Month Our Fathers comes a compelling domestic comedy about complex family dynamics, mental health and the intricacies of sibling relationships.LOVED I'M SORRY YOU FEEL THAT WAY? ORDER HAVOC NOW - A BLISTERING TRAGICOMEDY SET IN A GIRLS BOARDING SCHOOL.

SHORTLISTED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL BOOKER PRIZE 2026New Statesman Fiction Book of the Year 2025A Times Literary Supplement Book of the Year 2025A New York Times Notable Book of 2025A Telegraph Book of the Year 2025A Guardian Translated Book of the Year 2025An Observer Book of the Year 2025'Supple, horrifying and mordantly droll' New York Times'Nothing short of brilliant' Wall Street Journal'A subtle, often darkly funny novel about the relationship between art and power' Sunday Times'A dazzling performance and a real page turner' Salman RushdieFrom 'one of the brightest, most pleasure-giving writers at work today' (Jeffrey Eugenides), a visionary tale inspired by the life of the 20th century film director G.W. Pabst, who left Europe for Hollywood to resist the Nazis and then returned to his homeland with his wife and young son and began making films for the German Reich.An artist's life, a pact with the devil, a novel about the dangerous illusions of the silver screen.G.W. Pabst, one of cinema's greatest, perhaps the greatest director of his era: when the Nazis seized power he was filming in France, to escape the horrors of the new Germany he flees to Hollywood. But under the blinding California sun, the world-famous director suddenly looks like a nobody. Not even Greta Garbo, who he made famous, can help him. And thus, almost through no fault of his own, he finds himself back in his homeland of Austria, which is now called Ostmark. The returning family is confronted with the barbaric nature of the regime. But Goebbels, the minister of propaganda in Berlin, wants the film genius, he won't take no for an answer and makes big promises. While Pabst still believes that he will be able to resist these advances, that he will not submit to any dictatorship other than art, he has already taken the first steps into a hopeless entanglement.Daniel Kehlmann's novel about art and power, beauty and barbarism is a triumph. The Director shows what literature is capable of.

'A dirty little jewel of a novel' Julia Armfield'Malory Towers meets The Conjuring' Alice Slater'Gory, tender, sexy' Krystelle Bamford'Compulsively readable' Guardian In 1928, Emily Locke's final year at the isolated Briarley School for Girls is derailed when Violet, the school's brightest star (and a cunning beauty for whom Emily would do anything), falls to her death on her eighteenth birthday. Emily and her buttoned-up rival Evelyn are, for once, in agreement: Violet's death was no accident. There's an obvious culprit, the French schoolmistress with whom Violet was getting a little too close - they just need to prove it.Desperate for answers, Emily and her classmates turn to spiritualism, hoping for a glimpse of wisdom from the great beyond. To their shock, Violet's spirit appears, choosing pious Evelyn as her unlikely medium. And Violet has a warning for them: the danger has just begun. Something deadly is infecting Briarley. It starts with rotten food and curdled milk, but quickly grows more threatening. As the body count rises and students race to save themselves, Emily must confront the fatal forces poisoning the school. Emily's fight for survival forces her to reevaluate everything she knows: about Violet, Evelyn, Briarley, and, ultimately, herself. Avery Curran channels the indelible ambience and intrigue of the classic boarding school novel while turning the beloved genre on its head in this visceral, exuberant debut.

The instant New York Times bestseller'An unbelievable debut' New York TimesRacism, but "managed" through virtual reality Black Friday, except you die in a bargain-crazed throng Happiness, but pharmacological Love, despite everythingA Publisher's Weekly Most Anticipated Book for Fall 2018 Friday Black tackles urgent instances of racism and cultural unrest, and explores the many ways we fight for humanity in an unforgiving world. In the first, unforgettable story of this collection, The Finkelstein Five, Adjei-Brenyah gives us an unstinting reckoning of the brutal prejudice of the US justice system. In Zimmer Land we see a far-too-easy-to-believe imagining of racism as sport. And Friday Black and How to Sell a Jacket as Told by Ice King show the horrors of consumerism and the toll it takes on us all.Fresh, exciting, vital and contemporary, Friday Black will appeal to people who love Colson Whitehead's Underground Railroad, the TV show Black Mirror, the work of Kurt Vonnegut and George Saunders, and anyone looking for stories that speak to the world we live in now.'An excitement and a wonder' George Saunders'The writing in this outstanding collection will make you hurt and demand your hope' Roxane Gay'The fiction debut of the year. Bravo young man. We await your encore' Mary Karr

SHORTLISTED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL BOOKER PRIZE 2026A Times Literary Supplement Book of the Year 2025A New York Times Notable Book of 2025A Telegraph Book of the Year 2025A Guardian Book of the Year 2025An Observer Book of the year 2025'Supple, horrifying and mordantly droll' New York Times'Nothing short of brilliant' Wall Street Journal'A subtle, often darkly funny novel about the relationship between art and power' Sunday Times'A dazzling performance and a real page turner' Salman RushdieFrom 'one of the brightest, most pleasure-giving writers at work today' (Jeffrey Eugenides), a visionary tale inspired by the life of the 20th century film director G.W. Pabst, who left Europe for Hollywood to resist the Nazis and then returned to his homeland with his wife and young son and began making films for the German Reich.An artist's life, a pact with the devil, a novel about the dangerous illusions of the silver screen.G.W. Pabst, one of cinema's greatest, perhaps the greatest director of his era: when the Nazis seized power he was filming in France, to escape the horrors of the new Germany he flees to Hollywood. But under the blinding California sun, the world-famous director suddenly looks like a nobody. Not even Greta Garbo, who he made famous, can help him. And thus, almost through no fault of his own, he finds himself back in his homeland of Austria, which is now called Ostmark. The returning family is confronted with the barbaric nature of the regime. But Goebbels, the minister of propaganda in Berlin, wants the film genius, he won't take no for an answer and makes big promises. While Pabst still believes that he will be able to resist these advances, that he will not submit to any dictatorship other than art, he has already taken the first steps into a hopeless entanglement.Daniel Kehlmann's novel about art and power, beauty and barbarism is a triumph. The Director shows what literature is capable of.

Triumphant and uplifting - a queer Muslim memoir about forgiveness and freedom.'Revolutionary' Mona Eltahawy * 'Exquisite, powerful and urgent' Stacey May Fowles * 'I fell in love with this book' Shani MootooA memoir of hope, faith and love, Samra Habib's story starts with growing up as part of a threatened minority sect in Pakistan, and follows their arrival in Canada as a refugee, before escaping an arranged marriage at sixteen. When they realized they were queer, it was yet another way they felt like an outsider. So begins a journey that takes them to the far reaches of the globe to uncover a truth that was within them all along. It shows how Muslims can embrace queer sexuality, and families can embrace change. A triumphant story of forgiveness and freedom, We Have Always Been Here is a rallying cry for anyone who has ever felt alone and a testament to the power of fearlessly inhabiting one's truest self.

'A masterly achievement, a work of imaginative grandeur and complete artistic control' Ian McEwan'Brilliant and unputdownable' Salman RushdieHe's a trickster, a player, a jester. His handshake's like a pact with the devil, his smile like a crack in the clouds; he's watching you now and he's gone when you turn. Tyll Ulenspiegel is here!In a village like every other village in Germany, a scrawny boy balances on a rope between two trees. He's practising. He practises by the mill, by the blacksmiths; he practises in the forest at night, where the Cold Woman whispers and goblins roam. When he comes out, he will never be the same.Tyll will escape the ordinary villages. In the mines he will defy death. On the battlefield he will run faster than cannonballs. In the courts he will trick the heads of state. As a travelling entertainer, his journey will take him across the land and into the heart of a never-ending war.A prince's doomed acceptance of the Bohemian throne has European armies lurching brutally for dominion and now the Winter King casts a sunless pall. Between the quests of fat counts, witch-hunters and scheming queens, Tyll dances his mocking fugue; exposing the folly of kings and the wisdom of fools.With macabre humour and moving humanity, Daniel Kehlmann lifts this legend from medieval German folklore and enters him on the stage of the Thirty Years' War. When citizens become the playthings of politics and puppetry, Tyll, in his demonic grace and his thirst for freedom, is the very spirit of rebellion - a cork in water, a laugh in the dark, a hero for all time.***LOVED TYLL? ORDER DANIEL KEHLMANN'S LATEST, THE DIRECTOR, NOW***

Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor were a Sixties supercharged couple in an era of supercharged couples. As a pairing they were fantasy figures, impossibly desirable. Liz supple and soft, in perfumes and furs - yet with something demonic and lethal about her. Dick, in turn, with his ravaged, handsome face, looked as though lit by silver moonlight - poised to turn into a wolf. Roger Lewis uses this glamorous and damaged pair as the starting point to tell the story of an age of excess: the freaks and groupies, the private jets and jewels and the yachts sailing in an azure sea; the magnificent bad taste and greed. It is about the clash of worlds: the filth and decay of South Wales and the grandeur and elegance of Old Hollywood; the fantasies we have about film stars and the fantasies the Burtons had about each other.

'The book of the year' SUNDAY TIMES'One of the very best biographies I have ever read' STEPHEN FRY'A hot thunderstorm of a book' DAVID HARE'I've never read anything like it!' RICHARD E GRANT 'Erotic Vagrancy gave me a week of pure joy' CRAIG BROWN'Unputdownable' TONY PALMER'A genius writer' LYNN BARBER'ABSOLUTE MASTERPIECE . . . ONE OF THE GREAT READING EXPERIENCES OF MY LIFE' MARINA HYDEA TOP 25 BEST BOOK OF 2023 (INDEPENDENT)AN OBSERVER BOOK OF THE YEARA SUNDAY TIMES BOOK OF THE YEARThirteen years in the writing, Erotic Vagrancy doesn't only surpass every other biography of Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton yet to appear, this rich, vital and passionately articulated book, which is as extravagant and wayward as its two subjects, is also about celebrity, creativity, being flawed, being brilliant, sexuality, the intermingling of a low and a highbrow existence, pride, insecurity, attraction and repulsion, and devilry.We see Taylor the child actress exchanging dogs and horses for husbands. We see Burton emerging from the mists and brimstone of Wales to be the greatest theatrical animal of his generation. The pair come together in Rome during the making of Cleopatra, which gives Lewis the opportunity for a major farcical set-piece. We then enter a world of jewels and private jets, vodka, yachts and furs - the splendid vulgarity of the Sixties, where the narrative of Taylor and Burton becomes a Pop Art story.Then, inevitably, it all goes wrong, with alcoholism, violence, recrimination and divorce ( twice ) - with Burton, whom Lewis depicts as a Faustus figure, damned by fame, dead at fifty-eight.Stephen Fry has said, 'It is one of the very best biographies I have ever read. One of the best books about fame, desire, Hollywood and mid-to-late twentieth century culture ever written. Inside which, brilliant, hilarious and sensitive insights on all manner of subjects fizz and froth. Magnificent, terrible, tragic, triumphant.'

This remarkable work about women writers in the English Renaissance explodes our notion of the Shakespearean period by drawing us into the lives of four women who were committed to their craft long before there was any possibility of 'a room of one's own.'In an innovative and engaging narrative of everyday life in Shakespeare's England, Ramie Targoff carries us from the sumptuous coronation of Queen Elizabeth in the mid-16th century into the private lives of four women writers working at a time when women were legally the property of men. Some readers may have heard of Mary Sidney, accomplished poet and sister of the famous Sir Philip Sidney, but few will have heard of Aemilia Lanyer, the first woman in the 17th century to publish a book of original poetry, which offered a feminist take on the crucifixion, or Elizabeth Cary, who published the first original play by a woman, about the plight of the Jewish princess Mariam. Then there was Anne Clifford, a lifelong diarist, who fought for decades against a patriarchy that tried to rob her of her land in one of England's most infamous inheritance battles. These women had husbands and children to care for and little support for their art, yet against all odds they defined themselves as writers, finding rooms of their own where doors had been shut for centuries. Targoff flings them open to uncover the treasures left by these extraordinary women; in the process, she helps us see the Renaissance in a fresh light, creating a richer understanding of history and offering a much-needed female perspective on life in Shakespeare's day.

** The phenomenal Indian bestseller ** **Winner of the Tata Lit Live Best First Book of the Year Award **'Intense, lyrical, and powerful. This is a remarkable debut' Jeet Thayil, author of Narcopolis and The Book of Chocolate Saints'Latitudes of Longing is a book to be savoured' The Hindu 'Bold and imaginative' India TodayA prizewinning literary epic of the subcontinent, for readers of Yaa Gyasi's HOMEGOING and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's HALF OF A YELLOW SUN In the feverish tropics of the Andaman Islands, a young botanist tends to a fragile rose he has imported to welcome his bride. Hoping their marriage will bloom in this strange life, hundreds of miles from the east coast of India, he is entranced by Chanda Devi's fierce nature and unusual gifts; speaking to trees and the ghosts of former colonialists. These islands, she tells her adoring husband, rest on a faultline, cracked so deep into the earth that spirits cross the boundary freely. But it is not this fracture that takes a tragic bite out of their happiness.With the family riven by heartbreak, their maid takes the chance to resolve her own past mistakes. Having abandoned her son many years before, she now traces him to Myanmar, only to find him in prison - the enemy of a brutal regime. The faultline she followed over the Indian Ocean now cuts north into Nepal, where the prisoner's ally, an itinerant drug dealer, tries to rescue a young woman from the dancing bars of Kathmandu. It shadows his footsteps into the Karakoram mountains, where a scientist looks deep into the abyss between India and Pakistan. It rises all the way to the snow deserts, beyond the reach of nation or war, where an elder of the village waits for the return of his true love, bringing all their journeys full circle.A breathtaking epic, Latitudes of Longing possesses the reader with a blazing sense of wonder. Shubhangi Swarup's vision goes deeper than the human stories of the subcontinent to reveal the conscious history of the earth itself. Tender in every detail, touched with humour and profound humanity, this is a novel brimming with life, an original masterpiece.

A Financial Times Translated Fiction Book of the YearTranslated from the Japanese by Louise Heal Kawai Minoru Aose is an architect whose greatest achievement is to have designed the Yoshino house, a prizewinning and much discussed private residence built in the shadow of Mount Asama. Aose has never been able to replicate this triumph and his career seems to have hit a barrier, while his marriage has failed. He is shocked to learn that the Yoshino House is empty apart from a single chair, stood facing the north light of nearby Mount Asama.How can he live with the rejection of the work he had put his heart and soul into, the dream house he would have loved to own himself? Aose determines that he must discover the truth behind this cruel and inexplicable dismissal of the Yoshino house and in doing so will find out a truth that goes back to the core of who he is. Plotted with the subtlety of his bestselling masterpiece Six Four, The North Light is Yokoyama at his elusive, tantalising and surprising best.

A Financial Times Translated Fiction Book of the YearWinner of the Lindsley and Masao Miyoshi Translation PrizeTranslated from the Japanese by Louise Heal Kawai Minoru Aose is an architect whose greatest achievement is to have designed the Yoshino house, a prizewinning and much discussed private residence built in the shadow of Mount Asama. Aose has never been able to replicate this triumph and his career seems to have hit a barrier, while his marriage has failed. He is shocked to learn that the Yoshino House is empty apart from a single chair, stood facing the north light of nearby Mount Asama.How can he live with the rejection of the work he had put his heart and soul into, the dream house he would have loved to own himself? Aose determines that he must discover the truth behind this cruel and inexplicable dismissal of the Yoshino house and in doing so will find out a truth that goes back to the core of who he is. Plotted with the subtlety of his bestselling masterpiece Six Four, The North Light is Yokoyama at his elusive, tantalising and surprising best.

'They said that twenty-five percent of the population would catch the flu. Between seventy and eighty percent of them would die. He had been directly exposed to it, and the odds weren't good.'A CITY IN QUARANTINELondon, the epicenter of a global pandemic, is a city in lockdown. Violence and civil disorder simmer. Martial law has been imposed. No-one is safe from the deadly virus that has already claimed thousands of victims. Health and emergency services are overwhelmed.A MURDERED CHILDAt a building site for a temporary hospital, construction workers find a bag containing the rendered bones of a murdered child. A remorseless killer has been unleashed on the city; his mission is to take all measures necessary to prevent the bones from being identified.A POWERFUL CONSPIRACYD.I. Jack MacNeil, counting down the hours on his final day with the Met, is sent to investigate. His career is in ruins, his marriage over and his own family touched by the virus. Sinister forces are tracking his every move, prepared to kill again to conceal the truth. Which will stop him first - the virus or the killers?Written over fifteen years ago, this prescient, suspenseful thriller is set against a backdrop of a capital city in quarantine, and explores human experience in the grip of a killer virus.

A 2022 LA Times Book Prize FinalistA darkly funny, soul-rending novel of love in an epoch of collapse-one woman's furious revisiting of family, marriage, work, sex, and motherhood.Since my baby was born, I have been able to laugh and see the funny side of things. a) As much as I ever did. b) Not quite as much now. c) Not so much now. d) Not at all. Leaving behind her husband and their baby daughter, a writer gets on a flight for a speaking engagement in Reno, not carrying much besides a breast pump and a spiraling case of postpartum depression. Her temporary escape from domestic duties and an opportunity to reconnect with old friends mutates into an extended romp away from the confines of marriage and motherhood, and a seemingly bottomless descent into the past. Deep in the Mojave Desert where she grew up, she meets her ghosts at every turn: the first love whose self-destruction still haunts her; her father, a member of the most famous cult in American history; her mother, whose native spark gutters with every passing year. She can't go back in time to make any of it right, but what exactly is her way forward? Alone in the wilderness, at last she begins to make herself at home in the world.Bold, tender, and often hilarious, I Love You but I've Chosen Darkness reaffirms Watkins as one of the single writers of our time.

THE 12 MILLION COPY BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF THE LEWIS TRILOGY, THE ENZO FILES AND THE CHINA THRILLERSAWARD WINNING AUTHOR OF THE CWA DAGGER IN THE LIBRARY 2021'Peter May is one of the most accomplished novelists writing today.' Undiscovered Scotland'No one can create a more eloquently written suspense novel than Peter May.' New York Journal of BooksA detective is haunted by the feeling he knows his murder suspect - despite the fact they have never met.IF YOU FLEE FATE...When Detective Sime Mackenzie is sent from Montreal to investigate a murder on the remote Entry Island, 850 miles from the Canadian mainland, he leaves behind him a life of sleeplessness and regret.FATE WILL FIND YOU...But what had initially seemed an open-and-shut case takes on a disturbing dimension when he meets the prime suspect, the victim's wife, and is convinced that he knows her - even though they have never met.And when his insomnia becomes punctuated by dreams of a distant Scottish past in another century, this murder in the Gulf of St. Lawrence leads him down a path he could never have foreseen, forcing him to face a conflict between his professional duty and his personal destiny.LOVED ENTRY ISLAND? Read the first book in Peter May's acclaimed China thrillers series, THE FIREMAKERLOVE PETER MAY? Buy his new thriller, THE NIGHT GATE

SHORTLISTED FOR THE EDGE HILL SHORT STORY PRIZE'Sensual, spiky, tender and utterly original' Pandora Sykes'A fierce and fascinating debut' Lily KingI was told of an older woman who was asked by her granddaughter, 'Granny, when was the happiest time of your life?''I don't know,' she replied, 'I may not have had it yet.'The stories found in this collection explore the worlds of thirteen older women, reframing their intellectual and emotional lives in intimate vignettes that will shock and comfort in equal measure. In elegant prose Jane Campbell ignites the voices of women who are fighting to live on their own terms, energised by the stuff of human living: a need for companionship, attachments to love-objects, freedoms, integrity and sense of self. Cat Brushing confronts the tragic misconceptions of ageing showing older women to be nothing less than courageous, fearless and defiant in the face of overwhelming odds.

'A magisterial rethinking of why we collect. I loved this book' Edmund de Waal'Magnificent . . . so compulsive and entertaining' Stephen Fry'Give it to the collector in your life, and watch sparks fly!' Cathy Gere'A delight to read and ponder' Jackson Lears'A tour de force of scholarship and storytelling' Daniel WeissA captivating history of obsessive collectors: from ancient looters and idolaters to fin de siècle decadents, Freudian psychos, and hoarders.Collectors are often praised for their taste in art or contributions to science, but there can be a darker side: their passion is sometimes driven by dangerous obsession. Roman emperors who lusted after statues; Chinese scholars obsessed with rocks and flowers; fin de siècle dandies surrounded by bibelots. History is full of stories about those who love things more than people, presenting a danger either to themselves or others. In this sweeping history from antiquity to today, James Delbourgo tells the extraordinary story of the mad collector as a cultural figure from the tyrant and idolater to the sexually repressed "psycho" of the Freudian imagination and the modern-day hoarder. His conclusion is surprising: Because they are driven by passion rather than profit, obsessive collectors also have been cultural heroes, seen as authentic and true to themselves. Some may be mad, but theirs is a noble madness.

'A magisterial rethinking of why we collect. I loved this book' Edmund de Waal'Magnificent . . . so compulsive and entertaining' Stephen Fry'Give it to the collector in your life, and watch sparks fly!' Cathy Gere'A delight to read and ponder' Jackson Lears'A tour de force of scholarship and storytelling' Daniel WeissA captivating history of obsessive collectors: from ancient looters and idolaters to fin de siècle decadents, Freudian psychos, and hoarders.Collectors are often praised for their taste in art or contributions to science, but there can be a darker side: their passion is sometimes driven by dangerous obsession. Roman emperors who lusted after statues; Chinese scholars obsessed with rocks and flowers; fin de siècle dandies surrounded by bibelots. History is full of stories about those who love things more than people, presenting a danger either to themselves or others. In this sweeping history from antiquity to today, James Delbourgo tells the extraordinary story of the mad collector as a cultural figure from the tyrant and idolater to the sexually repressed "psycho" of the Freudian imagination and the modern-day hoarder. His conclusion is surprising: Because they are driven by passion rather than profit, obsessive collectors also have been cultural heroes, seen as authentic and true to themselves. Some may be mad, but theirs is a noble madness.

Frank Sayi grew up in Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, in the 1970s. His childhood straddled two very significant periods in his country's history, both of which heavily influenced his memoir. The first was the war of liberation (1975-1979), closely followed by the post-independence internecine war (1981-1987).Crucially, Frank was raised in a native reserve in colonial Rhodesia, a country under white minority rule, governed by Ian Smith's racist and illegal regime. Native reserves were places of repression, and containment-replete of hope.Frank and his two older sisters, Thoko and Gift, lived with their grandmother, a stern, wise, mercurial matriarch, capable of intimidating severity, and her son Uncle Sami. Frank's mother, the main breadwinner, lived in the city. Frank and his siblings didn't see much of her; in his mind she was just another sister.The memoir is intricately woven around the lives of the members of Frank's immediate family, whom he uses to foreground the tragic lives of a people caught within the web of war.Their lives were extremely hard. During the war a dusk-to-dawn curfew was declared, schools were closed, and food supply chains and clothing contaminated with poison. Thousands of refugees fled the warring factions. There seemed to Frank to be no difference between government soldiers, various law enforcement agencies, and the guerrillas fighting for freedom: they were all men of violence, who terrorised the civilian population.However, by June 1979 there was a brief hiatus in fighting. And after protracted negotiations, Blacks gained their independence from white rule in April 1980. The country had a new name: Zimbabwe; Blacks welcomed a new national anthem-Nkosi sikelel'Africa! - God Bless Africa - but after an extra-ordinarily convenient discovery of an arms cache was made on a farm in Matabeleland, the stronghold of the opposition, Robert Mugabe declared total war on Matabeleland. He unleashed Gukurundi, his North Korean-trained partisan army on the Ndebele people who hadn't voted for him. Simply put, this was a war of retribution.By 1982 Frank had joined his father's family in N'kayi, one of the areas to experience the most intense violence and massacres by Gukurahundi soldiers. By using scorched-earth tactics, they brought famine, disease, murder, rape, and terror.Within their first week of deployment, they'd ruthlessly dispensed with more than 2000 lives.And as a silhouette of war, Frank's memoir showcases human capacity for extra-ordinary violence, but also, compassion, endurance, survival and the triumph of the human spirit. It binds together the narratives from two wars and acts as lens through which the implications of political violence in Zimbabwe can be understood. Frank goes beyond and beneath standard historical narratives of war and examines the psychological impact of war on ordinary people.But more importantly, Frank's memoir tells of a childhood conditioned in the shadow of the mayhem brought about by the structure and dehumanising effects of colonialism and it's dreadful legacy, and the impact of civil war. Yet it is full of moving, hilarious, and beautiful stories of innocence and the increasingly hard-won experience of a war-torn childhood, and the development of a man who was determined to leave this violence behind.

In his timely new book, Mikhail Shishkin, argues that Russia is not a 'riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma': we just don't know enough about it. So what is the real story behind Putin's autocratic regime and its invasion of Ukraine?In My Russia: War or Peace? Shishkin traces the roots of Russia's problems, from the 'Kievan Rus' via the Grand Duchy of Moscow, empire, revolution and Cold War, to the now thirty-year-old Russian Federation. He explores the uneasy relationship between state and citizens, explains Russian attitudes to people's rights and democracy, and proposes that there are really two Russian peoples: the disillusioned and disaffected, who suffer from 'slave mentality', and those who embrace 'European' values and try to stand up to oppression.Both deeply personal and taking a broader historical view, My Russia is a passionate, eye-opening account of a state entangled in a complex and bloody past, as well as a love letter to a conflicted country. Will Russia continue its vicious circle of upheaval and autocracy, or will its people find a way out of history - and how can we help?

*THE NO.5 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER*'Grips from the first page . . . Among the best he's written' Sunday ExpressA TOMB OF ICEA young meteorologist checking a mountain top weather station in Kinlochleven discovers the body of a missing man entombed in ice.A DYING DETECTIVECameron Brodie, a Glasgow detective, sets out on a hazardous journey to the isolated and ice-bound village. He has his own reasons for wanting to investigate a murder case so far from his beat.AN AGONIZING RECKONINGBrodie must face up to the ghosts of his past and to a killer determined to bury forever the chilling secret that his investigation threatens to expose.Set against a backdrop of a frighteningly plausible near-future, A WINTER GRAVE is Peter May at his page-turning, passionate and provocative best.

A #4 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER From the twelve-million copy bestselling author of the Lewis trilogy comes a chilling new mystery set in the isolated Scottish Highlands.A TOMB OF ICEA young meteorologist checking a mountain top weather station in Kinlochleven discovers the body of a missing man entombed in ice.A DYING DETECTIVECameron Brodie, a Glasgow detective, sets out on a hazardous journey to the isolated and ice-bound village. He has his own reasons for wanting to investigate a murder case so far from his beat.AN AGONIZING RECKONINGBrodie must face up to the ghosts of his past and to a killer determined to bury forever the chilling secret that his investigation threatens to expose.Set against a backdrop of a frighteningly plausible near-future, A WINTER GRAVE is Peter May at his page-turning, passionate and provocative best.

'Joelle Taylor brings extraordinary linguistic inventiveness to a tale of tattoo artists and violence against women' Guardian (Fiction Books of the Year, 2024)'A glorious jewel of a novel' Sophie Ward'Exhilarating, profoundly beautiful and exquisitely written' Salena Godden'A mesmerising debut from one of the most talented literary stylists writing today' The Bookseller'Hugely imaginative' Marie Claire (Best New Books, 2024)'It's hard to think of many books more restlessly inventive' Guardian (Book of the Day)'Utterly dazzling' DIVA---------------------------------------------------------------------------------The tattoo was a reclamation, a flag we mounted in the centre of our own landscape.A woman walks into a tattoo parlour. But this is no ordinary woman, and this is Hackney in 2233. Jones' body is covered in tattoos but she wants to add one final inking to her gallery - a thin line of ink mixed with blood that connects her body art together, creating a unique map.As the two artists set to work, Jones tells them the story behind each tattoo. As Jones is no ordinary woman, these are no ordinary stories: each one represents a doorway to a life Jones fell into, a 'remembering'. Some of these lives were in the past, others in the future, some are sideways, but each of them connects Jones to the two tattoo artists in some way, though they are unaware of it.We visit the dystopian cities of the Quiet Men, the coal mines of 19th century Lancashire, join a gang of vigilante sex workers, enter the world of an INCEL murderer, haunt the old Maryville gay bar, and uncover plans to genetically modify female children. Each of the stories brings us closer to Jones' truth, and how her life is intricately interwoven with that of the women tattooing her body.Set across geographies and timespans, The Night Alphabet is a dazzlingly bold and original work, a deep investigation into human nature and violence against women.

A Guardian Book of the Year 2024'A glorious jewel of a novel' Sophie Ward'Exhilarating, profoundly beautiful and exquisitely written' Salena Godden'A mesmerising debut from one of the most talented literary stylists writing today' The Bookseller'Hugely imaginative' Marie Claire (Best New Books, 2024)'It's hard to think of many books more restlessly inventive' Guardian (Book of the Day)---------------------------------------------------------------------------------Hackney, 2233: a woman walks into a tattoo parlour. Jones' body is covered in tattoos but she wants to add one final inking to her gallery - a thin line of ink that connects the haunting images of her body art together, creating a unique and mysterious map.As the two tattoo artists set to work, Jones tells them the story behind each tattoo. As Jones is no ordinary woman, these are no ordinary stories: each one represents a doorway to a life Jones fell into, a 'remembering'.Set across geographies and time-spans, The Night Alphabet is a deep and bold investigation into violence, resilience and women's stories.

'A LABYRINTHINE MYSTERY OF EMOTIONAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL COMPLEXITY' Jo Brand'DELIRIOUS AND REWARDING' Guardian'UNMISSABLE' Woman's WeeklyA GUARDIAN BOOK OF THE YEAR 2025Fleeing Scotland in the wake of family disgrace, 16-year-old Ida Campbell secures a scholarship at a failing girls' boarding school on a remote part of the south English coast. Despite the eccentricities of her new Headmistress, who warns her of the dangers of the Cold War and the ever-present threat of the bomb, St Anne's seems like a refuge to Ida. But all this is about to change. For a start, her new room-mate is the infamous Louise Adler, potential arsonist and hardened outcast.Meanwhile, the geography teacher Eleanor Alston, in her late thirties, a disastrous love affair in her wake, faces the new term with weary resignation. But the fragile ecosystem of the school is disrupted by the arrival of a new teacher, Matthew Langfield. Eleanor has an uneasy feeling he is not who he says he is.And things only get worse when a mysterious sickness starts to spread throughout the school, causing strange limb jerks and seizures among the pupils. What is happening to the girls of St Anne's? Could there be a poisoner among them? Is Ida's scholarship really an escape, or is it instead a new nightmare?READERS ARE LOVING HAVOC:'Superb. Brilliantly funny, at times extremely poignant' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐'Another beautifully written book by Rebecca' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐'Utterly glorious, moving, enthralling and witty. I am so cross I have finished it' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐'I absolutely loved the humour in this book. Bonus points for the Cold War references' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐'Entertaining and humorous' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐Praise for Rebecca Wait:'IT'LL EASILY BE ONE OF MY BOOKS OF THE YEAR' Hannah Beckerman'It's a warm book and a touching one. And did I mention it's funny? Just read it. You'll see' The Times'Funny, tender and sad' Sunday Express'If you liked Meg Mason's Sorrow and Bliss, you'll love this novel' Good Housekeeping'One of the richest explorations of family dysfunction I've read' i newspaper'Shades of Fleabag in this smart, funny drama' Mail on Sunday'An enjoyably bittersweet novel about a dysfunctional modern family' Independent'Razor-sharp ' Observer'One of the funniest novels you'll read this year' Guardian