When We Were Orphans - Kazuo Ishiguro

England, 1930s. Christopher Banks has become the country's most celebrated detective, his cases the talk of London society. Yet one unsolved crime has always haunted him: the mysterious disappearance of his parents, in old Shanghai, when he was a small boy. Moving between London and Shanghai of the inter-war years, When We Were Orphans is a remarkable story of memory, intrigue and the need to return.

Turtles all the way down - John Green

Sixteen-year-old Aza never intended to pursue the mystery of fugitive billionaire Russell Pickett, but there’s a hundred-thousand-dollar reward at stake and her Best and Most Fearless Friend, Daisy, is eager to investigate. So together, they navigate the short distance and broad divides that separate them from Russell Pickett’s son, Davis.

Aza is trying. She is trying to be a good daughter, a good friend, a good student, and maybe even a good detective, while also living within the ever-tightening spiral of her own thoughts.

In his long-awaited return, John Green, the acclaimed, award-winning author of Looking for Alaska and The Fault in Our Stars, shares Aza’s story with shattering, unflinching clarity in this brilliant novel of love, resilience, and the power of lifelong friendship.

Die Vrou in die Blou Mantel - Deon Meyer

Bennie needs to buy a ring – and not just any old ring for his Alexa. But eish, the money . . . Then a woman’s body is found and she becomes Bennie and Vaughn’s problem when she turns out to be a foreigner: Alicia Lewis, an art expert on the trail of an old painting. When Lithpel Davids finds the name Billy de Palma in Alicia’s laptop, Vaughn knows they’re in for it. 'Cause he knows Billy, and Billy is bad, bad news . . .

http://www.humanrousseau.com/Books/20171

Born a Crime - Trevor Noah

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Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood is the compelling, inspiring, and comically sublime story of a young man’s coming-of-age, set during the twilight of apartheid and the tumultuous days of freedom that followed—from one of the comedy world’s brightest new voices and The Daily Show host Trevor Noah. Now available at the following retailers.

Bad Me, Good Me - Ali Land

Annie's mother is a serial killer.

The only way she can make it stop is to hand her in to the police.

But out of sight is not out of mind.

As her mother's trial looms, the secrets of her past won't let Annie sleep, even with a new foster family and name - Milly.

A fresh start. Now, surely, she can be whoever she wants to be.

But Milly's mother is a serial killer. And blood is thicker than water.

Good me, bad me.

She is, after all, her mother's daughter...

The Faithful Couple - A D Miller

It is 1993 when the faithful couple of this story meet in a youth hostel in San Diego. Both English, both graduates, both in their early 20s, they are homogenous only to the casual American bystander. To those versed in the nuances of the English class system, they come from different worlds. Also, they are both men.

While Neil tries to chat up a pretty girl in a sarong, it is Adam, sitting in a corner with a magazine, whom he finds distracting. Adam has the "shaggy dirty-blond hair in the low-rent Romantic poet style that, Neil knew, was fashionable among a certain breed of public schoolboy". Neil, meanwhile, is his polar opposite: "His features suited the half-light: wideset, almost-black eyes, long, feminine eyelashes, lipstick pink lips that sometimes appeared theatrical against his luminous skin."

They have both left London to bum around California for the summer. Adam, freshly graduated in history from Durham, was due to travel with his girlfriend until she dumped him. Neil (economics, Sheffield), recently sacked from his job as a soap salesman, hopes the trip will inspire his next move. There is none of the usual gladiatorial menace in how these men appraise each other. Instead, Adam simply smiles, and Neil smiles back.

There follows your basic modern courtship ritual: drinks, confidences, the "tipsy communion" of karaoke. When Adam talks to other men, Neil feels jealous. After a midnight swim, Adam propositions Neil - why not continue north along the coast together?


By Elena Seymenliyska

www.telegraph.co.uk

Killing Karoline - Sara Jayne King

Born Karoline King in 1980 in Johannesburg South Africa, Sara-Jayne (as she will later be called by her adoptive parents) is the result of an affair, illegal under apartheid’s Immorality Act, between a white British woman and her black South African employee.
Her story reveals the shocking lie created to cover up the forbidden relationship, and the hurried overseas adoption of the illegitimate baby, born during one of history’s most inhumane and destructive regimes.
Killing Karoline follows the journey of the baby girl (categorised as ‘white’ under South Africa’s race classification system) who is raised in a leafy, middle-class corner of the South of England by a white couple. It takes the reader through the formative years, a difficult adolescence and into adulthood, as Sara-Jayne (Karoline) seeks to discover who she is and where she came from.

Zuptas Must Fall and Other Rants - Fred Khumalo

This is another literary blend of pathos-ethos and socio-political analyses from one of the most frank writers and seasoned journalists of our time, Fred Khumalo.

His writing is a cocktail of controversial and often thought-provoking topics. He chops and changes topics, from politics, history, current affairs and celebrity gossip.

In #ZuptasMustFall and other rants, Khumalo’s approach is fascinating in that it affords every reader a chance of escapism. His analyses and delves into different topics exploring various ways to tell the South African story, and he deals in all the uncomfortable issues so many shy away from like poor white people, black racism, squatter camps and many issues we all know about but aren’t often discussed publicly.

The informal language he employs can’t be an excuse to ignore the reality of the pressing issues he addresses. Often labelled as a “reluctant Zulu”, “clever black” and an “equal opportunity offender”, Khumalo has the knack to introduce humour into his analyses and pose pressing questions about the political and social state of our country as well as our economic status quo.


This compilation of his recent and already published work is rich with a blend of humour and shrewd analyses. His remarkable treatment of everyday trivial and serious issues offers a unique South African perspective and taste. He entertains readers while at the same time informing them about the pressing issues that continue to confound, infuriate and exasperate the nation – or to sink it into further controversy.

Khumalo asks questions about the state of our country and offers tongue-in-cheek palliative answers. The issues of national identity, self-identity as well as patriotism are addressed in a rather informal sense, but the truth of the matter is that the author’s questions need urgent attention.

We are told Americans view us as a people who still hunt for a living and co-habit with lions for pets. Comedian Trevor Noah was recently accused of plundering a mere joke while in the African culture. No one owns copyrights to a tale. These are also topics the author unpacks cleverly with his well crafted tongue-in-cheek approach.

He wants to show his readers how it feels to be an African living in America. His collection focuses on who we are as a nation viewed by the outside world, proposes antidotes to help Americans deal with their delusional views about Africa and their biased perception when it comes to black Africans.

Turn to page 113 on the article, “No ‘darkie’ sarcasm in the class struggle”, where Khumalo asserts that “one silly friend of mine, who happens to be black, said the conversation now should be about class, not race. I’ll have you know this, brother: race, in this country, is still by and large a class determinant. It is no accident that the majority of the people who are poor are black. A racial oligarchy designed it that way. To change the class situation you will need to educate and empower the majority – a project that will take maybe another century, or even more, to realise fully”.

Here, Khumalo touches on a race and class talk and poses questions about the often white privilege and oligarch status. The author also reflects on better strategies to pursue if we are to move forward, understand where we are going and know how to compare our value and importance as Africans to the rest of the world.

If you are pressed for knowledge, then drink from Fred Khumalo’s cup of wisdom. This book offers a wide range of topics.

* #ZuptasMustFall and Other Rants by Fred Khumalo is published by Penguin




www.iol.co.za

The Last Son's Secret - Rafel Nadal Farrerras

A huge international bestseller, this heartbreaking tale of a tiny Italian village during two World Wars will stay with you forever.

Among the olive groves and vineyards of southern Italy, a boy and a girl are born, moments apart. Far away in the trenches of World War I, their fathers have just died. Now all the men in Vitantonio’s family have been wiped out – all twenty-one. All except him.

Growing up together, war seems far away for the two children. But Vitantonio’s mother will do anything to protect her son from the curse of death that seems to hang over the family – and so she tells a lie. It is a lie that will bind Vitantonio and Giovanna, the girl who shares his birthday, together over the years. But as the clouds of another war begin to gather on the horizon, it may ultimately drive them apart...

Eleanor Oliphant is completely fine - Gail Honeyman

"This wacky, charming novel...draws you in with humor, then turns out to contain both a suspenseful subplot and a sweet romance….Hilarious and moving."—People

No one’s ever told Eleanor that life should be better than fine.

Meet Eleanor Oliphant: She struggles with appropriate social skills and tends to say exactly what she’s thinking. Nothing is missing in her carefully timetabled life of avoiding social interactions, where weekends are punctuated by frozen pizza, vodka, and phone chats with Mummy.

But everything changes when Eleanor meets Raymond, the bumbling and deeply unhygienic IT guy from her office. When she and Raymond together save Sammy, an elderly gentleman who has fallen on the sidewalk, the three become the kinds of friends who rescue one another from the lives of isolation they have each been living. And it is Raymond’s big heart that will ultimately help Eleanor find the way to repair her own profoundly damaged one.

Smart, warm, uplifting, Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine is the story of an out-of-the-ordinary heroine whose deadpan weirdness and unconscious wit make for an irresistible journey as she realizes. . .

The Susan Effect - Peter Hoeg

Susan Svendsen has a special talent: she has a unique ability to make people confide in her and tell her their innermost secrets. She has exploited that talent, and now has a prison sentence hanging over her head for punching a Bollywood actor in an Indian casino. To make matters worse, her husband is on the run from the mafia, one of her children has been accused of antiquity smuggling and the other has run off with a monk.

But Susan gets an offer from a former government official – an offer to use her power one more time and have all her charges dropped so she can return to Denmark. Together with her family, she must track down the last surviving members of a secret think tank of young talents founded in the 1970s, the so-called Future Committee, and find out what was written in the committee’s final report. But the report is apparently covering up information of great value, and some powerful people are determined it is not revealed.

The Lightkeeper's Daughters - Jean E Pendziwol

In her mesmerizing adult debut set on the shores of the Great Lakes, critically acclaimed children's author Jean E. Pendziwol delivers an affecting story of family, identity, and art involving a decades-old mystery.

Though her mind is still sharp, Elizabeth's bones have aged and her eyes have failed. No longer able to linger over her beloved books or gaze at the paintings that move her spirit, she fills her days at the retirement home with music and with memories of her family, especially of her beloved twin sister, Emily. When her late father's journals are discovered after a tragic accident, she seizes the opportunity to piece together the mysteries of her childhood.

With the help of Morgan, a delinquent teenager performing community service at the home, Elizabeth delves into the diaries -- a journey through time that brings the two women closer together. Each entry draws these unlikely friends deep into a world far removed -- to Porphyry Island on Lake Superior, where Elizabeth's father served as lighthouse keeper and raised his young family in the years before and during World War II.

As a complex web of secrets unravels, Elizabeth and Morgan realize that their fates are connected to each other and to the isolated island in ways that are at once heartbreaking and healing.

Both sweeping and intimate, The Lightkeeper's Daughters takes readers on an enthralling journey to an unforgettable place.

A Boy made of Blocks - Keith Stuart

'The publishing sensation of the year: a compelling, uplifting and heart-rending debut novel'
Mail on Sunday

A Boy Made of Blocks is a funny, heartwarming story of family and love inspired by the author's own experiences with his son, the perfect latest obsession for fans of The Rosie Project, David Nicholls and Jojo Moyes.

A father who rediscovers love

Alex loves his wife Jody, but has forgotten how to show it. He loves his son Sam, but doesn't understand him. He needs a reason to grab his future with both hands.

A son who shows him how to live

Meet eight-year-old Sam: beautiful, surprising - and different. To him the world is a frightening mystery. But as his imagination comes to life, his family will be changed . . . for good.

*Keith Stuart's magical and moving second novel Days of Wonder is available to pre-order now.*

'One of those wonderful books that makes you laugh and cry at the same time'
Good Housekeeping

'Funny, expertly plotted and written with enormous heart. Readers who enjoyed The Rosie Project will love A Boy Made of Blocks - I did'
Graeme Simsion

'Very funny, incredibly poignant and full of insight. Awesome.'
Jenny Colgan

'Heartwarming'
The Unmumsy Mum

'A wonderful, warm, insightful novel about family, friendship and love'
Daily Mail

'A great plot, with a rare sense of honesty'
Guardian

'A truly beautiful story'
Heat

'A heartwarming and wise story'
Cathy Rentzenbrink, author of The Last Act of Love

A Column of Fire - Ken Follett

Young Ned Willard is coming home to Kingsbridge at Christmas as A Column of Fire opens. The year 1558 will turn Ned’s life upside-down and change Europe for ever.

The ancient stones of Kingsbridge Cathedral look down on a city torn by religious hatred. High principles clash bloodily with friendship, loyalty and love. Ned finds himself on the opposite side from the girl he longs to marry, Margery Fitzgerald.

When Elizabeth Tudor becomes queen, all Europe turns against England. The shrewd, determined young monarch sets up the country’s first secret service, to give her early warning of assassination plots, rebellions and invasion plans.

Waiting in Paris is the alluring, headstrong Mary Queen of Scots, part of a brutally ambitious French family. Proclaimed the rightful ruler of England, she has her own supporters scheming to get rid of Elizabeth.

Ned Willard hunts the slippery, enigmatic Jean Langlais, not knowing that the false name hides a childhood classmate who knows him all too well.

Over a turbulent half-century, the love between Ned and Margery seems doomed, as extremism sparks violence from Edinburgh to Geneva. Elizabeth clings precariously to her throne and her principles, protected by a small, dedicated group of resourceful spies and courageous secret agents.

The real enemies, then as now, are not the rival religions. The true battle pitches those who believe in tolerance and compromise against the tyrants who would impose their ideas on everyone else—no matter what the cost.

The Prison Bookclub - Ann Walmsley

When Ann Walmsley was asked to take part in a book club in a men’s prison, she was initially anxious: after a violent mugging a few years before, could she really cope being surrounded by violent criminals? Luckily, curiosity got the better of her, and she signed up for eighteen months of meetings with heavily tattooed inmates, talking about books ranging from The Grapes of Wrath to The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. But this wasn’t your typical book club – there was no wine and cheese, plush furniture or superficial chat about recent holidays. Classic works of fiction and non-fiction became springboards for frank discussions about loss, anger, redemption and loneliness, and for the men a prized oasis in which to regain a sense of humanity.

In this heart-warming example of the rehabilitative power of reading, follow Graham the biker, Frank the gunman, Ben and Dread the drug dealers, and the robber duo Gaston and Peter as they share ideas and reveal their life stories. The Prison Book Club is unlike anything you’ve read before.

The World without Us - Mireille Juchau

It has been six months since Tess Müller stopped speaking. Her silence is baffling to her parents, her teachers and her younger sister Meg, but the more urgent mystery for both girls is where their mother, Evangeline, goes each day, pushing an empty pram and returning home wet, muddy and dishevelled.

Their father, Stefan, struggling with his own losses, tends to his apiary and tries to understand why his bees are disappearing. But after he discovers a car wreck and human remains on their farm, old secrets emerge to threaten the fragile family.

One day Tess's teacher Jim encounters Evangeline by the wild Repentance River. Jim is in flight from his own troubles in Sydney, and Evangeline, raised in a mountain commune and bearing the scars of the fire that destroyed it, is a puzzle he longs to solve.

As the rainforest trees are felled and the lakes fill with run-off from the expanding mines, Tess watches the landscape of her family undergo shifts of its own. A storm is coming and the Müllers are in its path.

Sometimes we must confront what has been lost so that we can know the solace of being found.

The World Without Us is a beautifully told story of secrets and survival, family and community, loss and renewal.

Four Seasons in Rome - Anthony Doerr

On the same day that his wife gave birth to twins, Anthony Doerr received the Rome Prize, an award that gave him a year-long stipend and studio in Rome…

‘Four Seasons in Rome’ charts the repercussions of that day, describing Doerr's varied adventures in one of the most enchanting cities in the world, and the first year of parenthood. He reads Pliny, Dante, and Keats – the chroniclers of Rome who came before him – and visits the piazzas, temples, and ancient cisterns they describe. He attends the vigil of a dying Pope John Paul II and takes his twins to the Pantheon in December to wait for snow to fall through the oculus. He and his family are embraced by the butchers, grocers, and bakers of the neighbourhood, whose clamour of stories and idiosyncratic child-rearing advice is as compelling as the city itself.

This intimate and revelatory book is a celebration of Rome, a wondrous look at new parenthood and a fascinating account of the alchemy of writers.

A History of Running Away - Paula McGrath

In 1982 Jasmine wants to box, but in 1980s Ireland boxing is illegal for girls.

In 2012 a gynaecologist agonises about a job offer which would mean escape from the increasingly fraught atmosphere of her Dublin hospital. But what about her mother, stuck in a nursing home?

And in Maryland Ali, whose mother has recently died, hooks up with a biker gang to escape from grandparents she didn't know she had.

Gradually revealing the unexpected connections between the three women, A History of Running Away is a brilliantly written novel about running away, growing up and finding out who you are.

Kwezi - Redi Tlhabi

Sunday Times:

Author Redi Tlhabi said she wrote her account of the life of President Jacob Zuma’s rape accuser Fezekile Kuzwayo because the country needed to start reflecting on power relations in our society.

Tlhabi was speaking at the official launch of her book Khwezi: The Remarkable Story of Fezekile Ntsukela Kuzwayo in Johannesburg on Wednesday evening.

Speaking to radio talk show host and author Eusebius McKaizer, Tlhabi was asked how she felt as a citizen following the rape trial.

"If we cared, not about the outcome of the case, if we cared about our moral DNA as a nation. If we cared about what we represent, what we stand for, such a flawed person would not have been our president. It is a reflection of us,” Tlhabi said.

Tlhabi also said she wrote the book because “we need to start reflecting on power relations in our society, whether from gender, the economy and whatever”.

Kuzwayo, who was HIV-positive, accused Zuma of raping her at his home in Johannesburg in 2005.

Zuma denied this, saying the sex was consensual and he was found not guilty in 2006.

Kuzwayo went into exile following the trial as there were threats against her. She returned to the country last year and passed away.

Tlhabi said Zuma was given so many moments in court to acknowledge -- even as he held on to his innocence -- that it was not the right thing to do, there was an abuse of power.

“He was asked about his various positions in society and the authority that he brings to any space that he occupies. He was asked that by the prosecutor Charin de Beer.

“His answer was -- to the question: ‘Do you acknowledge you hold more power’. His answer was: ‘I don’t work with her, we don’t work in the same space’. That is being frivolous about something that is important,” Tlhabi said.

Tlhabi said her analysis of the record of proceedings in the rape case made her physically ill.

She said there was an application by the defence in the rape trial to allow questioning of certain cases in Kuzwayo’s life where she was accused of demonstrating the habit of falsely accusing men of rape.“There was an application. It was granted. But my understanding was that it was meant to be specific to certain cases, but her entire sexual history was laid bare,” Tlhabi said.


She said Kuzwayo was even questioned about instances where she said she was involved with that person.

“What was the purpose of quizzing her about the men and women she chose to be with.”

Tlhabi said she imagined herself as Kuzwayo sitting in the courtroom being asked about every relationship that she had ever had.

“I imagined sitting there listening to [Zuma’s advocate] Kemp J Kemp [SC] pouring scorn on psychology and the relationship between trauma and our actions and reactions.”

The Flavours of Love - Dorothy Koomson

It's been 18 months since my husband was murdered and I've decided to finish writing 'The Flavours of Love', the cookbook he started before he died. Everyone thinks I'm coping so well without him - but now my 14-year-old daughter has confessed something devastating, and my husband's killer is writing to me claiming to be innocent, and I know it's only a matter of time before the truth is revealed to the world. My name is Saffron Mackleroy and this is my story. 'Pacy and compelling, the twists and turns come thick and fast with a surprise round every corner - a must-read' HEAT on The Rose Petal Beach

A House Without Windows - Nadia Hashimi

A vivid, unforgettable story of an unlikely sisterhood—an emotionally powerful and haunting tale of friendship that illuminates the plight of women in a traditional culture—from the author of the bestselling The Pearl That Broke Its Shell and When the Moon Is Low.

For two decades, Zeba was a loving wife, a patient mother, and a peaceful villager. But her quiet life is shattered when her husband, Kamal, is found brutally murdered with a hatchet in the courtyard of their home. Nearly catatonic with shock, Zeba is unable to account for her whereabouts at the time of his death. Her children swear their mother could not have committed such a heinous act. Kamal’s family is sure she did, and demands justice.

Barely escaping a vengeful mob, Zeba is arrested and jailed. As Zeba awaits trial, she meets a group of women whose own misfortunes have also led them to these bleak cells: thirty-year-old Nafisa, imprisoned to protect her from an honor killing; twenty-five-year-old Latifa, who ran away from home with her teenage sister but now stays in the prison because it is safe shelter; and nineteen-year-old Mezhgan, pregnant and unmarried, waiting for her lover’s family to ask for her hand in marriage. Is Zeba a cold-blooded killer, these young women wonder, or has she been imprisoned, as they have been, for breaking some social rule? For these women, the prison is both a haven and a punishment. Removed from the harsh and unforgiving world outside, they form a lively and indelible sisterhood.

Into this closed world comes Yusuf, Zeba’s Afghan-born, American-raised lawyer, whose commitment to human rights and desire to help his motherland have brought him back. With the fate of this seemingly ordinary housewife in his hands, Yusuf discovers that, like Afghanistan itself, his client may not be at all what he imagines.

A moving look at the lives of modern Afghan women, A House Without Windows is astonishing, frightening, and triumphant.

Hope in a Ballet Shoe - Michaela & Elaine DePrince

Hope in a Ballet Shoe is the emotively uplifting, coming of age autobiography of ballerina Michaela DePrince. The book begins with her childhood growing up in Sierra Leone, where the war left her orphaned and at the disposal of her cruel uncle. Unafraid to shy away from the horrors of war, it contains descriptions of victims of the conflict, alongside the many personal tragedies that took place in Michaela's own personal life - both in Sierra Leone and once she was adopted and had begun a new life in America.

Having been adopted at the age of four, alongside her best friend Mia, Michaela initially finds life in America difficult to adjust to. The cultural differences, as well as the impact that war and abuse had on both girls created fears that would appear unfounded to the onlooker, and that were overcome, in time, by the help of their family. The book is very much focused on family ties, and how in spite of the effects past events can have on young children, love and patience can overcome these obstacles.

This philosophy is also repeated in Michaela's struggle to become a professional ballerina, due to the racial prejudices held not only in the world of dance, but also those in modern day America. She writes of the importance of understanding differences, and overcoming ignorance, and we are shown, through Michaela's eyes, how hope can blossom in the most unlikely of circumstances, enabling even the most underprivileged person to beat all the odds. The straightforward way in which both Michaela and her mother, Elaine tackle racism and other issues is novel, and shows that when strengthened by family, even the most cutting of remarks can't stop someone great from reaching their full potential.

The only slight downside to the book was that it was quite simply written, and although the author used descriptive language, parts of it seemed more suitable for a younger age group. It is a truly inspiring read that I would recommend to anyone over the age of eleven, for an insightful peep into culture, prejudice and ballet!

Revelation - CJ Sansom

C. J. Sansom's bestselling adventures of MAtthew Shardlake continue in the fourth title of the series, the haunting Revelation.

Spring, 1543. King Henry VIII is wooing Lady Catherine Parr, whom he wants for his sixth wife. But this time the object of his affections is resisting. Archbishop Cranmer and the embattled Protestant faction at court are watching keenly, for Lady Catherine is known to have reformist sympathies.

Matthew Shardlake, meanwhile, is working on the case of a teenage boy, a religious maniac locked in the Bedlam hospital for the insane. Should he be released to his parents, when his terrifying actions could lead to him being burned as a heretic?

When an old friend is horrifically murdered Shardlake promises his widow, for whom he has long had complicated feelings, to bring the killer to justice. His search leads him to both Cranmer and Catherine Parr - and with the dark prophecies of the Book of Revelation.

As London's Bishop Bonner prepares a purge of Protestants Shardlake, together with his assistant, Jack Barak, and his friend, Guy Malton, follows the trail of a series of horrific murders that shake them to the core, and which are already bringing frenzied talk of witchcraft and a demonic possession - for what else would the Tudor mind make of a serial killer . . .?

Walking the Nile - Levison Wood

In 2015, Lev walked the length of the Himalayas, a six-month journey of over 1700 miles from Afghanistan to Bhutan, which was televised on Channel 4 as a five part documentary series, airing throughout January 2016. His accompanying book 'Walking The Himalayas' has been published in the UK, US, Canada, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and India, amongst others, and was voted Adventure Travel Book of the Year at the Edward Stanford Travel Writing Awards. From 2013-2014, Lev walked the length of the river Nile - an expedition of 4,250 miles that took nine months and was Channel 4's most successful factual series of the year. His book ‘Walking the Nile’ became a Sunday Times bestseller.

Maggie Smith: A Biography - Michael Coveney

No one does glamour, severity, girlish charm or tight-lipped witticism better than Dame Maggie Smith. Michael Coveney's biography shines a light on the life and career of a truly remarkable performer, one whose stage and screen career spans six decades. From her days as a West End star of comedy and revue, Dame Maggie's path would cross with those of the greatest actors, playwrights and directors of the era. Whether stealing scenes from Richard Burton, answering back to Laurence Olivier, or playing opposite Judi Dench in Breath of Life, her career can be seen as a 'Who's Who' of British theatre. Her film and television career has been just as starry. From the title character in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and the meddling chaperone in A Room With a View to the Harry Potter films in which she played Minerva McGonagall (as she put it 'Miss Jean Brodie in a wizard's hat') and the Best Exotic Marigold Hotel films in which she played the wise Muriel Donnelly, Smith has thrilled, engaged and made audiences laugh. As Violet Crawley, the formidable Dowager Countess of Downton Abbey she conquered millions more. Paradoxically she remains an enigmatic figure, rarely appearing in public. Michael Coveney's absorbing biography, written with the actress's blessing and drawing on personal archives, as well as interviews with immediate family and close friends, is a portrait of one of the greatest actors of our time.

Three Daughters of Eve - Elfie Shafak

Peri, a married, wealthy, beautiful Turkish woman, is on her way to a dinner party at a seaside mansion in Istanbul when a beggar snatches her handbag. As she wrestles to get it back, a photograph falls to the ground -- an old polaroid of three young women and their university professor. A relic from a past -- and a love -- Peri had tried desperately to forget.

Three Daughters of Eve is set over an evening in contemporary Istanbul, as Peri arrives at the party and navigates the tensions that simmer in this crossroads country between East and West, religious and secular, rich and poor. Over the course of the dinner, and amidst an opulence that is surely ill-begotten, terrorist attacks occur across the city. Competing in Peri's mind however are the memories invoked by her almost-lost polaroid, of the time years earlier when she was sent abroad for the first time, to attend Oxford University. As a young woman there, she had become friends with the charming, adventurous Shirin, a fully assimilated Iranian girl, and Mona, a devout Egyptian-American. Their arguments about Islam and feminism find focus in the charismatic but controversial Professor Azur, who teaches divinity, but in unorthodox ways. As the terrorist attacks come ever closer, Peri is moved to recall the scandal that tore them all apart.

Elif Shafak is the number one bestselling novelist in her native Turkey, and her work is translated and celebrated around the world. In Three Daughters of Eve, she has given us a rich and moving story that humanizes and personalizes one of the most profound sea changes of the modern world.

Trust Me - Lesley Pearce

Trust Me is the gripping historical novel from bestselling author Lesley Pearse. She lost her parents and then was sent far, far away . . . When their father tragically kills their mother, Dulcie and her sister are sent to an orphanage. Told that a 'better life' awaits them in another country, they are shipped off to Australia. But the promises made to the sisters turn out to be lies. And it seems to Dulcie that everyone who ever said 'trust me' somehow betrayed that trust. So when she meets Ross, another orphanage survivor, and finds he is a kindred spirit, hope swells in her heart. But can she ever get over the past betrayals and learn to trust again? And can she fight not only for herself, but also for her sister? Based on a real life tragedy, Trust Me is a powerful and moving story of vulnerable children torn from their families and banished from their homelands. Lesley Pearse, author of the UK and international best-sellers Belle and Charlie, explores trust and betrayal, in her thrilling historical novel Trust Me. Fans of Susan Lewis should take note. Praise for Lesley Pearse: 'With characters it is impossible not to care about ... this is storytelling at its very best' Daily Mail 'Lose yourself in this epic saga' Bella 'An emotional and moving epic you won't forget in a hurry' Woman's Weekly Find Lesley on Twitter @LesleyPearse or find out more on her website, www.lesleypearse.co.uk.

Cockroaches - Jo Nesbo

When the Norwegian ambassador to Thailand is found dead in a Bangkok brothel, Inspector Harry Hole is dispatched from Oslo to help hush up the case.

But once he arrives Harry discovers that this case is about much more than one random murder. There is something else, something more pervasive, scrabbling around behind the scenes. Or, put another way, for every cockroach you see in your hotel room, there are hundreds behind the walls. Surrounded by round-the-clock traffic noise, Harry wanders the streets of Bangkok lined with go-go bars, temples, opium dens, and tourist traps, trying to piece together the story of the ambassador’s death even though no one asked him to, and no one wants him to—not even Harry himself.

The Printmaker - Bronwyn Law-Viljoen

When a reclusive printmaker dies, his friend inherits the thousands of etchings and drawings he has stored in his house over the years. Overwhelmed by the task of sorting and exhibiting this work, she seeks the advice of a curator.

What compulsion drove the printmaker to make art for four decades, and why did he so seldom show his prints?

When the curator discovers a single, sealed box addressed to a man in Zimbabwe, she feels compelled to go in search of him to present him with the package, hoping to find an answer to the enigma of the printmaker's solitary life.

Bronwyn Law-Viljoen’s subtle and sophisticated novel reflects on one man’s obsessive need to make meaning through images and to find, in art, the traces of love and friendship.

The Music Shop - Rachel Joyce

1988. Frank owns a music shop. It is jam-packed with records of every speed, size and genre. Classical, jazz, punk – as long as it’s vinyl he sells it. Day after day Frank finds his customers the music they need.

Then into his life walks Ilse Brauchmann.

Ilse asks Frank to teach her about music. His instinct is to turn and run. And yet he is drawn to this strangely still, mysterious woman with her pea-green coat and her eyes as black as vinyl. But Ilse is not what she seems. And Frank has old wounds that threaten to re-open and a past he will never leave behind ...

A Line Made by Walking - Sara Baume

The author of the award-winning Spill Simmer Falter Wither returns with a stunning new novel about a young artist's search for meaning and healing in rural Ireland.

Struggling to cope with urban life-and life in general-Frankie, a twenty-something artist, retreats to her family's rural house on "turbine hill," vacant since her grandmother's death three years earlier. It is in this space, surrounded by countryside and wild creatures, that she can finally grapple with the chain of events that led her here-her shaky mental health, her difficult time in art school-and maybe, just maybe, regain her footing in art and life.

As Frankie picks up photography once more, closely examining the natural world around her, she reconsiders seminal works of art and their relevance. With "prose that makes sure we look and listen,"* Sara Baume has written an elegant novel that is as much an exploration of wildness, the art world, mental illness, and community as it is a profoundly beautiful and powerful meditation on life.

Conclave - Robert Harris

The Pope is dead.

Behind the locked doors of the Sistine Chapel, one hundred and twenty Cardinals from all over the globe will cast their votes in the world’s most secretive election.

They are holy men. But they have ambition. And they have rivals.



Over the next seventy-two hours one of them will become the most powerful spiritual figure on earth.

The Good People - Hanna Kent

From the author of Burial Rites, "a literary novel with the pace and tension of a thriller that takes us on a frightening journey towards an unspeakable tragedy."-Paula Hawkins, bestselling author of The Girl on the Train

Based on true events in nineteenth century Ireland, Hannah Kent's startling new novel tells the story of three women, drawn together to rescue child from a superstitious community.
Nora, bereft after the death of her husband, finds herself alone and caring for her grandson Micheál, who can neither speak nor walk. A handmaid, Mary, arrives to help Nóra just as rumours begin to spread that Micheál is a changeling child who is bringing bad luck to the valley. Determined to banish evil, Nora and Mary enlist the help of Nance, an elderly wanderer who understands the magic of the old ways.




Set in a lost world bound by its own laws, THE GOOD PEOPLE is Hannah Kent's startling new novel about absolute belief and devoted loveTerrifying, thrilling and moving in equal measure, this follow-up to Burial Rites shows an author at the height of her powers.

Lied vir Sarah - Jonathan Jansen

In Lied vir Sarah, Jansen se persoonlikste en mees intieme boek tot op hede, daag Suid-Afrika se geliefde professor die stereotipes en stigma uit wat so maklik op Kaapse Vlakte-ma's van toepassing gemaak word as luidrugtig, wellustig en sonder tande – en bied hy dié deernisvolle verhaal aan as 'n lofsang vir ma's oral wat op moeilike plekke gesinne moet grootmaak en gemeenskappe moet bou. As jong man het Jansen gewonder hoe ma's dit regkry om kinders onder moeilike omstandighede groot te maak – en toe besef die antwoord is reg voor hom in die vorm van Sarah Jansen, sy eie ma.Deur haar vroeë lewe in Montagu en die gevolge van apartheid se gedwonge verskuiwings na te speur, werp Jansen lig op hoe sterk vroue nie slegs daarin geslaag het om gesinne bymekaar te hou nie, maar hulle kinders ook met integriteit groot te maak. Met sy kenmerkende fynsinnigheid, humor en eerlikheid, volg Jansen sy ma se lewensverhaal as 'n jong verpleegster en ma van vyf kinders, en wys hy hoe dié ma's hulle verlede verwerk het, hulle huise ingerig het, sin gemaak het van die politiek, die liefde bestuur en kernwaardes gekommunikeer het – hoe hulle hulle lewens gelei het. Om sy eie herinneringe te balanseer, het Jansen hom op sy suster, Naomi, beroep om haar eie insigte en herinneringe te deel, en daardeur spesiale waarde tot hierdie roerende memoir toe te voeg.

Little Deaths - Emma Flint

It's 1965 in a tight-knit working-class neighborhood in Queens, New York, and Ruth Malone--a single mother who works long hours as a cocktail waitress--wakes to discover her two small children, Frankie Jr. and Cindy, have gone missing. Later that day, Cindy's body is found in a derelict lot a half mile from her home, strangled. Ten days later, Frankie Jr.'s decomposing body is found. Immediately, all fingers point to Ruth. 

As police investigate the murders, the detritus of Ruth's life is exposed. Seen through the eyes of the cops, the empty bourbon bottles and provocative clothing which litter her apartment, the piles of letters from countless men and Ruth's little black book of phone numbers, make her a drunk, a loose woman--and therefore a bad mother. The lead detective, a strict Catholic who believes women belong in the home, leaps to the obvious conclusion: facing divorce and a custody battle, Malone took her children's lives.

Pete Wonicke is a rookie tabloid reporter who finagles an assignment to cover the murders. Determined to make his name in the paper, he begins digging into the case. Pete's interest in the story develops into an obsession with Ruth, and he comes to believe there's something more to the woman whom prosecutors, the press, and the public have painted as a promiscuous femme fatale. Did Ruth Malone violently kill her own children, is she a victim of circumstance--or is there something more sinister at play?

White Highlands - John McGhie

Kenya, 1952, a colony on the edge. Settlers drink sundowners on the veranda but the servants can't be trusted. Beyond manicured lawns, in the dark of the forest, freedom is stirring. Johnny Seymour has seen too much war and seeks solace photographing East African wildlife. But when isolated white families are slaughtered by Mau Mau gangs, the British respond brutally and Johnny is reluctantly pulled into the horror. After his African driver Macharia disappears, Johnny is forced to confront shocking truths about his own country and ask how far he'll go to help a friend. Nearly sixty years later, disgraced young barrister Sam Seymour knows nothing about her grandfather. Even his name is taboo. All she understands is that Johnny did something so awful that his only son - her father - had to be rescued from Kenya. Now as veteran Mau Mau fighters demand reparations for past sins, she's been offered a chance to unpeel history and discover why. In a narrative spanning the generations, White Highlands follows Sam and Johnny as they confront the might of the British state. One man stands in both their way - Grogan Littleboy, a ruthless colonial survivor who'll do anything to defeat Mau Mau, past and present. A startlingly original novel set in both the present day and Kenya in the 1950s during the Mau Mau uprising - one of the least known and darkest episodes in British colonial history.