Recent Books

The Exchange (November 2023)

By John Grisham

November 22, 2023

The Exchange is John Grisham’s epic follow-up to his phenomenal global bestseller The Firm, the novel that launched his career as the world’s favourite storyteller.  It will take you on a rollercoaster journey across the globe, from New York to London, and Rome to Marrakech.

Mitch McDeere has cheated death and come out the other side.  Fifteen years ago, he stole $10 million from the mob and disappeared.  Now, with his enemies jailed or dead, he has fought his way to the top of the biggest law firm in the world.

When a new case takes Mitch to Libya, danger awaits; he’s soon in the biggest hostage negotiation in recent history with terrorists who have murdered and will murder again.  Their demand is staggering: a ransom of $100 million must be paid within ten days.

But this isn’t a random kidnapping – it’s personal.  And no one, not even Mitch’s wife in New York, is safe.

With the clock ticking, can Mitch stay one step ahead of his enemies?  This time, there’s nowhere to hide.

Shelter (November 2023)

By Catherine Jinks

November 22, 2023

Meg’s little house in the bush outside town is a perfect place to hide.  That’s one of the reasons she offers to shelter Nerine, who’s escaping a violent ex with her two little girls.  The other is that Meg knows what it’s like to live with an abusive partner.

Nerine is jumpy when she arrives, worried that her partner will find her.  Meg assures her she and her kids are safe now.

Then Meg start to wonder about some little things.  A disturbed flyscreen.  A tune playing on her wind-chimes.  Has Nerine’s ex tracked them down?  Has Meg’s husband turned up to torment her some more?

By the time she finds out, it’ll be too late to do anything but run for her life.

The Passenger (November 2023)

By Cormac McCarthy

November 21, 2023

It is three in the morning when Bobby Western zips the jacket of his wetsuit and plunges from the boat deck into darkness.  His divelight illuminates a sunken jet, nine bodies still buckled in their seats.  Missing from the crash site are the plane’s black box, and the tenth passenger.  But How?  A collateral witness to machinations that can only bring him harm, Western is shadowed in body and spirit – by men with badges; by the ghost of his father, inventor of the atom bomb; and by his sister, the love and ruin of his soul.

From the bar rooms of New Orleans to an abandoned oil rig off the Florida coast, The Passenger is a breathtaking novel of morality and science, the legacy of sin, and the madness that is human consciousness, and one of the final works by a true American master.

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue (November 2023)

By V. E. Schwab

November 21, 2023

France, 1714.  A desperate woman makes a desperate deal in the dark – a bargain to live forever but be remembered by none.

So begins the invisible life of Addie LaRue, shadow muse to artists throughout history, forgotten friend, confidante and lover, slipping away with the morning light.  Addie passes through lives, desperate only to leave a trace of herself.  Until the day she walks back into a small bookshop in Manhattan and meets Henry, who remembers her.

After 300 years Addie’s life is restarting, but the devil never plays fair.  As Henry and Addie’s lives start to intertwine, they must face the consequences of the decisions they’ve made and the prices to be paid.

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue is a dazzling adventure across centuries and continents, across history and art, about a young woman learning how far she will go to leave her mark on the world.

The Fraud (November 2023) – Athenaeum Book Club 2024

By Zadie Smith

November 21, 2023

It is 1873.

Mrs Eliza Touchet is the Scottish housekeeper – and cousin by marriage – of a once-famous novelist, now in decline, William Ainsworth, with whom she has lived for thirty years.

Mrs Touchet is a woman of many interests: literature, justice, abolitionism, class, her cousin, his wives, this life and the next.  But she is also sceptical.  She suspects her cousin of having no talent; his successful friend, Mr Charles Dickens, of being a bully and a moralist; and England of being a land of facades, in which nothing is quite what it seems.

Andrew Bogle, meanwhile, grew up enslaved on the Hope Plantation, Jamaica.  He knows every lump of sugar comes at a human cost.  That the rich deceive the poor.  And that people are more easily manipulated than they realize.  When Bogle finds himself in London, star witness in a celebrated case of imposture, he knows his future depends on telling the right story.

The’ Tichborne Trail’ captivates Mrs Touchet and all of England.  Is Sir Roger Tichborne really who he says he is?  Or is he a fraud?  Mrs Touchet is a woman of the world.  Mr Bogle is no fool.  But in a world of hypocrisy and self-deception, deciding what is real proves a complicated task…

Based on real historical events, The Fraud is a dazzling novel about truth and fiction, Jamaica and Britian, fraudulence and authenticity, and the mystery of ‘other people’.

The Moving Finger (October 2023)

By Agatha Christie

October 29, 2023

A Malicious Letter, A Tragic Death, A Village Filled With Suspects

Nothing ever happens in the sleepy village of Lymstock.  Until letters accusing the villagers of unspeakable acts start to appear.

They try to dismiss them as a cruel hoax, but then one of the recipients is found dead.  The letter next to her body reads simply, ‘I can’t go on’.

As fear spreads among the villagers, Jane Marple must uncover who is writing these letters – before anyone else is hurt.

Never Underestimate Miss Marple

The Raging Storm (October 2023)

By Ann Cleeves

October 29, 2023

Detective Matthew Venn of The Heron’s Cry returns in the next captivating novel in the Two Rivers series from Ann Cleeves, the number one bestselling author and creator of Vera and Shetland.

When Jem Rosco – sailor, adventurer and local legend – blows into town in the middle of an autumn gale, the residents of Graystone, Devon, are delighted to have a celebrity in their midst.

The residents think nothing of it when Rosco disappears again; that’s the sort of man he is.  Until the lifeboat is launched to a hoax call-out during a raging storm and his body is found in a dinghy, anchored off Scully Cove, a place with legends of its own.

This is an uncomfortable case for DI Matthew Venn.  He came to the remote village as a child, its community populated by the Barum Brethren that he parted ways with.  So when superstition and rumour mix and another body is found in the cove, Matthew soon finds his judgement clouded.

As the stormy winds howl and the village is cut off, Venn and his team start their investigation, little realizing their own lives might be in danger…

The Running Grave (October 2023)

By Robert Galbraith

October 29, 2023

Private detective Cormoran Strike is contacted by a worried father whose son, Will, has gone to join a religious cult in the depths of the Norfolk countryside.

The Universal Humanitarian Church is, on the surface, a peaceable organisation that campaigns for a better world.  Yet Strike discovers that beneath the surface there are deeply sinister undertones and unexplained deaths.

In order to try to rescue Will, Strike’s business partner Robin Ellacott decides to infiltrate the cult and travels to Norfolk to live incognito among them.  But in doing so, she is unprepared for the dangers that await her there or for the toll it will take on her…

The Seven (October 2023)

By Chris Hammer

October 29, 2023

Yuwonderie’s seven founding families have lorded it over their district for a century, growing ever more rich and powerful.

But now – in startling circumstances – one of their own is found dead in a ditch and homicide detectives Ivan Lucic and Nell Buchanan are sent to investigate.

Could the murder be connected to the execution of the victim’s friend thirty years ago – another member of The Seven – or even to the long-forgotten story of a servant girl on the brink of the Great War?

What are the secrets The Seven are so desperate to keep hidden?

With the killer still on the loose and events spiralling out of control, the closer Ivan and Nell get to discovering the truth, the more dangerous their investigation becomes.  Can they crack the case before more people die?

Before we say goodbye (October 2023)

By Toshikazu Kawaguchi

October 29, 2023

The fourth novel in Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s internationally bestselling ‘Before the Coffee Gets Cold’ series.

The regulars at the magical Cafe Funiculi Funicula are well acquainted with its famous legend and extraordinary time-travel offering.  Many patrons have reunited with old flames, made amends with estranged family, and visited loved ones.  But the journey is not without risks and there are rules to follow.  Travellers must have visited the cafe before and crucially, must return to the present in the time it takes their coffee to go cold.

In the tradition of Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s sensational ‘Before the Coffee Gets Cold’ series, readers will once again be introduced to a new set of visitors: the husband with something important left to say; the woman who couldn’t bid her dog farewell; the woman who couldn’t answer a proposal; and the daughter who drove her father away.

Featuring signature heart-warming characters and wistful storytelling, in the beautifully haunting Before we say goodbye, Kawaguchi asks: who would you visit if you could travel through time?