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For Wilbur it was his time with Maggie, the love of his life. Their honeymoon in Venice.
Before he threw it all away.
Years later, on the brink of his own death, a train arrives. It can take Wilbur back in time.
To relive his most important moments. Soon he realises just how much he would have changed.
An adventure through time, The Midnight Train is a story of love and second chances, from the world of The Midnight Library.
Chuck and Joey meet in a bar. He’s in his mid-thirties; she’s twelve years younger. He’s long abandoned his ambition of becoming a novelist and now works as a copywriter at a big ad agency.
‘Lead copywriter,’ he corrects himself. Joey lives paycheck to paycheck on her barista wages and privately dreams of making it as a poet. They go back to Chuck’s luxury flat-a world away from Joey’s cramped house-share, the crumbs in her bed.
Soon, Joey’s imagining a future between them, and Chuck’s moving on from a mistake in his recent past. Amazing, how meeting a new person can make you feel so new. Funny, excruciating, and true, I Want You to Be Happy is a sharp-eyed tale of two people searching for meaning and connection in modern times, missing the mark maybe, but still trying.
You give a girl a taste of fresh air and then you take it away she ll grow fierce and wild to get it back.
Oxford, Mississippi, 1933.
Eleven-year-old Meg Lefleur has learned the hard way to rely on no one.
Ever since her beloved mother failed to come home last Christmas Eve, she s been one of the ‘unadoptable’ girls at the town s orphanage, where she fights each day to keep her wits sharp and her spirit unbowed.
When she meets Birdie, a young woman who has come to Oxford determined to remind her socialite sister of the impoverished family she left behind, for the first time in a long while it seems someone else might care about Meg s future.
But as the Depression tightens its grip, Birdie begins to suspect her sister s charmed life may be founded on a tapestry of lies. Then, Birdie encounters Charlie, a woman haunted by loss who has been pushed to the brink with nothing left to lose.
Drawn together by circumstance, they find unexpected kinship among a disreputable, determined band of women.
But in a town steeped in hypocrisy, even the smallest act of defiance can have dangerous consequences
Bold, heartwarming, and riotously funny, The Calamity Club is an unforgettable story of resilience and friendship, and a sisterhood of underestimated women who risk everything to take back control of their fates.
Two best friends. One murder. The truth could unravel everything…
The gripping new thriller from the No.1 Sunday Times bestselling author of All Her Fault and No One Saw a Thing. ‘Andrea Mara is fantastic!’ Freida McFadden’Impossible to put down.’ Patricia Cornwell’Andrea’s best book yet.’ Liz Nugent Have you seen the girls?The morning after a glamorous, luxury wedding, best friends Siobhan and Grace go to wake their twenty-four-year-old daughters. Opening the door to their shared room, they find a smashed lamp, an abandoned phone and blood on the carpet.
Over the next few days, the truth unravels, testing Siobhan and Grace’s friendship to its limits. As secrets and lies begin to come to light, they realise that the girls were not best friends. In fact, they weren’t really friends at all.
And now, it looks like one of them is dead. And one of them is a killer. But whose daughter is guilty of murder?‘The thing is, we always believe the best of our own kids.
‘Louise Hegarty can do anything. She’s fearless. And I loved these playful, clever, perfect stories’ – MARIANA ENRIQUEZ’Phenomenally talented’ – THE SUNDAY TIMES’Borges for the CMAT generation’ – THE IRISH TIMESAre you ready to play?Have you ever found yourself doom-scrolling, worrying about that weird pain in your leg, only to have your plans for the day completely trashed by the appearance of a literal axe-wielding troll?What about that time you came across a perfect double of yourself in the street?Or the gorilla suit you put on one day only for it to fuse with your skin?When those children went missing from your village, did you know for sure it was the electricity that took them?And down in the basement of your ancestral family home, what is it that’s making that THUMP .
. . THUMP .
. . THUMP .
. . Bold, funny, and wild, Louise Hegarty’s debut collection will turn you upside down and inside out, if it doesn’t take you apart completely.
* * * * *PRAISE FOR FAIR PLAY‘A treat . . .
Takes on the biggest questions of life and death’ – Paul Murray‘Dazzling’ – Colin Walsh‘Brilliant’ – The Times‘Ingenious’ – The Telegraph‘Terrific’ – The New York Times‘Heartbreaking’ – The Guardian‘Sally Rooney meets The Secret History’ – The Sunday Times
In a series of unexpected moments when past loves and choices re-surface with startling clarity, the imperfect beings who populate these stories find themselves finally grasping the impact of crucial early relationships, as joy, loss and betrayal echo across decades. A man searches for a possible secret half-sister to understand his father. A woman is haunted by a boy’s death fifty years ago.
A lighthouse keeper recalls his first relationship. A public figure, slipping into dementia, relives a fateful night that haunts him. A man seeks insights into his mother’s past on a remote Portuguese island.
From childhood holidays shadowed by tragedy to chance reunions that rewrite old narratives, Bolger’s complex and deeply humane characters reveal the fragile beauty of human connection.
‘Exhilarating, devastating, comforting, essential.’ CLAIRE KILROY’These are stories which sing off the page.’ JAN CARSON’Powerful, compelling and richly crafted.’ MARY COSTELLO’Profoundly intimate.’ TAHMIMA ANAMThe highly-anticipated new collection from the BBC National Short Story Award-winning author of Multitudes, Intimacies and Openings’There must be moments when we let go – let go of all that we do, all that we are.’A young Belfast theatre troupe brings its experimental production of Hamlet to New York. On a night-flight, travelling with a violin older than the United States, a professional musician slips through time. A man who loses all he thought he had, and finds himself haunted by all he never will, comes to a painful new understanding of what it might mean to love.
Transporting and profound, these are stories of love, grief, longing, of new beginnings, and the ways we find shelter in each other. ‘One of our best short story writers.’ THE TIMES'[Caldwell] holds the reader right up against the tender humanity of her characters.’ EIMEAR McBRIDE’A next-level author of short stories.’ THE HERALD
‘Back in the flat, Sylvia is no use. She doesn’t have any ideas, all she suggests is get a job, take your time, get some money together, then go somewhere. But Clodagh needs to go now, needs to go today if possible.
Even Seamus has gone. But where, and with what?’Clodagh finds herself adrift after leaving her partner Seamus. Navigating addiction, the harsh realities of a housing crisis, and relationships pushed to the brink, this is a story of her attempts to reconnect with herself, and those closest to her, in a gritty, vividly rendered contemporary Dublin.
Weaving from place to place and person to person – past friends, fellow users and her worried mother Sylvia – Clodagh struggles to fully understand herself, or the city she calls home. Urban isolation, the trials of modern life and the fleeting beauty found in Dublin marble every scene of this novel. Somewhere is a raw and intimate portrait of a woman balancing on the edge of survival, seeking meaning and love amid isolation and addiction.
When Frida Slattery and John Reddan meet in a Dublin pub in 2005, neither can imagine how they will come to shape and define each other’s lives.
Frida is struggling to launch her acting career, while John is already gaining a name for himself as a director. From the first they see in each other potential and the chance to create work that matters, though the lines between collaboration and exploitation, friendship and desire will prove dangerously slippery.
With the financial crisis looming, the next 16 years takes them from Dublin to London, via New York and LA, and through success and disappointment, joy and heartbreak.
Their connection is tested and stretched to the point of rupture, but something remains that outlasts both their work and their own shifting perceptions.
FRIDA SLATTERY AS HERSELF is an unforgettable story of love, artistic collaboration, and two people coming of age, together and apart.
Derry is already abuzz with news that famous American actor, Monica Logue, has flown to the city and will be starring in a new series set during the Troubles.
And then she goes missing . . .
All eyes are on Diarmuid, the flaky scriptwriter who was the last to see Monica alive. From budding young actors hoping for a role to grieving parent whose story forms the backbone of the narrative; newspaper editors covering the mystery to taxi drivers hearing all the news from their clients, Prestige Drama follows the city’s cast as they all try to locate themselves in Monica’s disappearance. Séamas O’Reilly’s debut novel is a comedy about dramatising tragedy, and the responsibilities of a teller to a tale.
Artie Dam is a man with a secret. He spends his days teaching history to high schoolers, expanding their young minds, correcting their casual cruelties, and lending a kind word to those who need it most.
He goes to holiday parties with his wife of three decades, makes small talk with neighbours, and, on weekends, takes his sailboat out on the beautiful Massachusetts Bay. He is, by all appearances, present and alive. But inside, Artie is plagued by feelings of isolation.
He looks out at a world gone mad—at himself and the people around him—and turns a question over and over in his mind: how is it that we know so little about one another, even those closest to us?And then, one day, Artie learns that life has been keeping a secret from him, one that threatens to upend his entire world. Once he learns it, he is forced to chart a new course, to reconsider the relationships he holds most dear—and to make peace with the mysteries at the heart of our existence. With exquisite prose and profound insight, Elizabeth Strout captures the way grief reverberates through decades, the comfort found in deep friendships and the freedom that comes when we break free of our secrets.
The Things We Never Say is a stunning new novel from one of our most acclaimed observers of the human heart. ***PRAISE FOR ELIZABETH STROUT:’A terrific writer’ ZADIE SMITH’A superbly gifted storyteller’ HILARY MANTEL’Elizabeth Strout is one of my very favourite writers’ ANN PATCHETT’Strout’s ability to reveal wonder in unrecorded lives continues to astonish’ TELEGRAPH’She gets better with each book’ MAGGIE O’FARRELL’A beautiful read’ OPRAH WINFREY’Strout is, as ever, wonderfully attentive life’s escapable cruelties and woes’ SUNDAY TIMES
‘A brilliantly observed, funny, poignant and utterly real portrait of a mid-life woman and her family. I loved it.’ Claire Fuller‘An elegant and beautifully-observed novel by one of our finest contemporary writers’ Louise Kennedy‘I found myself taking screenshots to send to friends because MacMahon nails it over and over again’ Claire Kilroy—‘Marriage was the biggest decision of their lives and yet they made it so lightly it was barely a decision at all’As schoolgirls, Justine and her best friend Iseult dreamed of a future that revolved around marriage. They saw it as a happy ending, never imagining for a moment that the reality would be more complicated.
Coming up to fifty, they’re still best friends. Justine has been married to Iseult’s brother for twenty-five years and lives in her childhood home. Iseult has spent her adult life abroad, her marriage clearly unhappy for reasons she won’t discuss.
When Justine’s daughter suddenly announces her engagement, Justine is thrown into planning a big family wedding. Afraid that her daughter is making a mistake, she finds herself questioning the choices she and Iseult made decades earlier. This crisis of confidence tests Justine in new and unexpected ways.
Hungry is the powerful new memoir from Number One bestselling author Katriona O’Sullivan – a raw, courageous exploration of survival, identity and the lifelong search for self-acceptance. Raised in a home marked by poverty, addiction and abuse, Katriona defied the odds: from teenage motherhood struggling with her own addictions to becoming a university professor and successful author. But beneath the achievements lay a more private struggle – with her body, her worth, and the unrelenting drive to be enough.
In this fiercely honest memoir, she interrogates how trauma, class and gender shape the way women see themselves – and how society teaches them to measure their value. Told with stunning courage and vulnerability, Hungry is both a personal reckoning and a powerful reclaiming of body, voice and self. It is one woman’s story – and a rallying cry for every woman who has ever felt she had to shrink to survive.
‘Soaring with compassion, intelligence and hard-won wisdom. Ireland’s most important contemporary voice.’LOUISE KENNEDY, author of Trespasses’Amazing. I couldn’t put it down.’ELAINE FEENEY, author of As You Were’Every woman needs to read this book. Every man needs to read this book.’EDEL COFFEY, author of In Her Place’
The first in a mystery series from the much-loved Irish actor, writer and comedian, for readers who enjoy the warmth of Graham Norton and the mystery of Death in Paradise, all wrapped up in one small Irish town. When beloved celebrity gardener Finn O’Leary returns to his hometown of Abbeyford in Ireland to care for his aging mother, he is naturally roped into the Tidy Towns committee. The Tidy Towns is a competition fanatically fought over by every town and village in the land. And for his best friend’s sister, Aoife, it’s a competition she’s determined to win.
With everyone’s favourite gardener on board, she is sure that this year Abbeyford will take home the prize. But Finn’s not been back long when an alto-baritone at his mother’s choir practice drops dead during a rendition of ‘What the World Needs Now’. With more at stake than just winning Tidy Towns, Finn soon finds himself trying to solve a murder – or two.
For one of his many qualities is that people tend to confide in him…With his mother, her carer and Aoife in tow, Finn sets out to discover just who has brought murder to Abbeyford. And so it begins.
‘A writer living and thinking his way to the frontiers of human society’ Spectator
Cameo is the life story of invented Irish novelist Ren Duka, who has unexpected, runaway international success with a prolific series of autofictional novels.
What begins as a playful satire on literary ambition and the chaos of our times expands into a dazzling, polyphonic odyssey that challenges the border between fiction and reality.
As the Ren Duka novels race outwards in widening circles of influence, we encounter Dina Tatangelo, cult novelist of the New York underworld; a Japanese manga artist whose work eerily affects his family life; a grizzled Dublin taxi driver who just might ferry his passengers between worlds; a film-star facing public disgrace; and Rob Doyle, an author enduring a psychic and ontological crisis.
Cameo is at once a metaphysical architecture of the imagination, a human comedy full of unruly passions, and a self-portrait across multiple dimensions.
A once-in-a-generation debut from a major new talent, The Names is the story of three names, three versions of a life, and the infinite possibilities that a single decision can spark. ‘I’ve just been blown away by the best debut novel in years . .
. A genius idea for a book’ Sunday Times ‘Wildly original and emotionally profound’ Observer ‘An unadulterated success: moving, evocative and utterly convincing’ The Times THE PHENOMENAL SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLEROVER HALF A MILLION COPIES SOLDIt is 1987, and in the wake of a great storm, Cora sets out with her young daughter to register the birth of her son. Her husband expects her to follow tradition and call the baby after him – but is it right for her child to inherit his name from generations of domineering men? Her choice will shape the course of their lives.
Seven years later, her son is Bear, a name chosen by his sister, hoping he will grow up to be brave and big-hearted. Or he is Julian, the name his mother set her heart on, keen for him to become his own person. Or he is Gordon, named after his father and raised in his cruel image – but is there still a chance to break the mould? Powerfully moving and full of hope, this is the story of three names, three versions of a life, and the infinite possibilities that a single decision can spark.
A BOOK OF THE YEAR IN THE SUNDAY TIMES, GUARDIAN, INDEPENDENT, IRISH MAIL ON SUNDAY, COSMOPOLITAN AND MANY MORE | A READ WITH JENNA AND HAPPY PLACE BOOKCLUB PICK ‘The viral literary hit’ Grazia ‘A beautiful, heartwrenching, utterly original novel’ Miranda Cowley Heller ‘One of those rare books that makes you glad to be alive’ Stylist ‘Magnificent . . .
Read it. It’s very special’ Chris Whitaker ‘Beautifully written, and wise and tender . .
. An utter original’ Jojo Moyes ‘Exceptional . .
. will stay with me for a very long time’ Anita Rani, Woman’s Hour ‘Heart-shattering . .
. a sucker punch of a novel’ Pandora Sykes ‘A modern classic’ Jenna Bush Hager ‘Heartbreaking and yet brimful of hope . .
. Exceptional’ Mail on Sunday ‘Brilliant . .
. one of those books that will make you irritable with anyone who interrupts you, but which you’ll finish wanting to press into the hands of a friend’ The Times ‘Astonishing, unique and incredibly moving, The Names is a beautiful novel about the courage of a mother in the moment she names her child . .
. I know it will stay with me for a long time’ Jeanine Cummins