Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945)

Showing 1–16 of 261 results

  • 48 clues into the disappearance of my sister

    £9.99

    48 clues into the disappearance of my sister

    When a beautiful woman mysteriously vanishes, her sister must tally up the clues to discover her fate. Marguerite has disappeared from her small town in Upstate New York. But was foul play involved? Did she merely get away for fun? Or did she finally make the decision to leave behind her claustrophobic life of limited opportunities? Her younger sister Gigi wonders if the flimsy silk Dior dress, so casually abandoned on the floor, is a clue to Marguerite’s having seemingly vanished. The police examine the footprints made by her Ferragamo boots leaving the house, ending abruptly, and puzzle over how that can help lead to her. Gigi, not so pretty as her sister, slowly reveals her hatred for the perfect, much-loved, Marguerite. Bit by bit, like ripping the petals off a flower blossom, revelations about both women are uncovered.

    £9.99
  • A clock stopped dead

    £8.99

    A clock stopped dead

    ‘Satisfyingly intriguing’ Faith Martin

    ‘J.M. Hall has mastered the warmth of a perfect modern cosy crime with all the twists and turns that go with it. I really enjoyed it!’ Hannah Hendy

    Retired schoolteachers and amateur sleuths Liz, Pat and Thelma are giving up their coffee morning for a brand-new mystery.

    £8.99
  • A Day of Fallen Night

    £18.99

    A Day of Fallen Night

    Tunuva Melim is a sister of the Priory. For fifty years, she has trained to slay wyrms – but none have appeared since the Nameless One, and the younger generation is starting to question the Priory’s purpose. To the north, in the Queendom of Inys, Sabran the Ambitious has married the new King of Hróth, narrowly saving both realms from ruin. Their daughter, Glorian, trails in their shadow – exactly where she wants to be. The dragons of the East have slept for centuries. Dumai has spent her life in a Seiikinese mountain temple, trying to wake the gods from their long slumber. Now someone from her mother’s past is coming to upend her fate. When the Dreadmount erupts, bringing with it an age of terror and violence, these women must find the strength to protect humankind from a devastating threat.

    £18.99
  • A few green leaves

    £9.99

    A few green leaves

    A classic comedy of manners from Barbara Pym, the acclaimed author of Quartet in Autumn, Jane and Prudence and Excellent Women

    £9.99
  • A golden Cornish summer

    £7.99

    A golden Cornish summer

    ‘Wow wow wow. Loved this from page one’ NetGalley review?????
    ‘Absolutely wonderful. The perfect escape to Cornwall’ NetGalley review?????
    ‘Totally loved this book? Couldn’t put it down? Brilliant’ NetGalley review?????

    Under the golden Cornish sun, buried treasure and family secrets will change Emma’s life forever?

    £7.99
  • A good house for children

    £9.99

    A good house for children

    The Reeve stands on the edge of the Dorset cliffs, awaiting its next inhabitants. Despite Orla’s misgivings, her husband insists this house will be the perfect place to raise their two children. In 1976, Lydia moves to Dorset as a nanny for a family grieving their patriarch. She soon starts to hear and feel things that cannot be real, but her bereaved employer does not listen when Lydia tells her something is wrong. Separated by 40 years, both Lydia and Orla realise that the longer they stay at the Reeve, the more deadly certain their need to keep the children safe from whatever lurks inside it. Nothing is quite what it seems at the Reeve, and with its pervasive atmosphere of claustrophobia and dread, Kate Collins’ gothic creation will chill you to the core.

    £9.99
  • A good year

    £7.99

    A good year

    Rural Cyprus, 1925. Despo is recently married, heavily pregnant and deeply afraid. The twelve days of Christmas are beginning – the time when, according to local folklore, creatures known as kalikantzari come up from Hell to wreak havoc. Meanwhile, her husband Loukas has troubles of his own. Struggling with dreams and desires he doesn’t understand, he finds himself irresistibly drawn to an Englishman, a newcomer to the island. In a village wreathed in superstition, Despo and Loukas must protect themselves and their unborn child from ominous forces at play.

    £7.99
  • A history of burning

    £9.99

    A history of burning

    India, 1898: Pirbhai is thirteen when he steps into a dhow on the vague promise of work – his family is suffering and he will do anything to help. Forced to labour for the British on the East Africa Railway, he has no money, no voice, no power. Sonal is fierce and loving, always willing to fight for what she believes in. When Pirbhai, weathered from his time on the railway but not broken, walks into her father’s shop, she knows he is part of her future, and together they set out for a new life in Uganda. So begins the story of their family as they scatter across the world, fleeing the brutality of Idi Amin.

    £9.99
  • A lesson in cruelty

    £16.99

    A lesson in cruelty

    Anna wants a fresh start. She doesn’t believe she deserves it, but after three years behind bars she has finally paid her dues. Most of them, anyway. Lucy craves the attention of the only man she can’t have, her alluring Oxford professor. He’s married – not for the first time. Maybe she should be next in line? Marie the recluse has been locked up for too long. She’s not ready to be free, but some rules are meant to be broken. Everyone wants a perfect life. But not everyone is prepared to take it. Unless someone decides to teach them a lesson.

    £16.99
  • A Month in the Country

    £9.99

    A Month in the Country

    In the summer of 1920, a young man escapes London to embark on the unveiling of a medieval church wall painting in a small north country village. As he becomes absorbed by his work so too does he get drawn into the lives of those around him.

    £9.99
  • A mountain to the north, a lake to the south, paths to the west, a river to the

    £9.99

    A mountain to the north, a lake to the south, paths to the west, a river to the

    The grandson of Prince Genji lives outside of space and time and wanders the grounds of an old monastery in Kyoto. The monastery, too, is timeless, with barely a trace of any human presence. The wanderer is searching for a garden that has long captivated him. This novel describes a search for the unobtainable and the riches to be discovered along the way. Despite difficulties in finding the garden, the reader is closely introduced to the construction processes of the monastery, as well as the geological and biological processes of the surrounding area, making this an unforgettable meditation on nature, life, history and being.

    £9.99
  • A person is a prayer

    £18.99

    A person is a prayer

    Bedi and Sushma’s marriage is arranged. When they first meet, they stumble through a faltering conversation about happiness and hope and agree to go in search of these things together. But even after their children Selena, Tara and Rohan are grown up and have their own families, Bedi and Sushma are still searching. Years later, the siblings attempt to navigate life without their parents. As they travel to the Ganges to unite their father’s ashes with the opaque water, it becomes clear that each of them has inherited the same desire to understand what makes a life happy, the same confusion about this question and the same enduring hope.

    SKU: 9780857305855 Category: Tag:
    £18.99
  • A sign of her own

    £18.99

    A sign of her own

    Ellen Lark is on the verge of marriage when she and her fiancé receive an unexpected visit from Alexander Graham Bell. Ellen knows immediately what Bell really wants from her. Ellen is deaf, and for a time was Bell’s student in a technique called Visible Speech. As he instructed her in speaking, Bell also confided in her about his dream of producing a device which would transmit the human voice along a wire: the telephone. Now, on the cusp of wealth and renown, Bell wants Ellen to speak up in support of his claim to the patent to the telephone, which is being challenged by rivals. But Ellen has a different story to tell: that of how Bell betrayed her, and other deaf pupils, in pursuit of ambition and personal gain, and cut Ellen off from a community in which she had come to feel truly at home.

    £18.99
  • A Slow Fire Burning

    £20.00

    A Slow Fire Burning

    Laura has spent most of her life being judged. She’s seen as hot-tempered, troubled, a loner. Some even call her dangerous. Miriam knows that just because Laura is witnessed leaving the scene of a horrific murder with blood on her clothes, that doesn’t mean she’s a killer. Bitter experience has taught her how easy it is to get caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. Carla is reeling from the brutal murder of her nephew. She trusts no one: good people are capable of terrible deeds. But how far will she go to find peace? Innocent or guilty, everyone is damaged. Some are damaged enough to kill – look what’s been started.

    £20.00
  • A study in drowning

    £9.99

    A study in drowning

    Effy has always believed in fairy tales. She’s had no choice. Since childhood, she’s been haunted by visions of the Fairy King. She’s found solace only in the pages of Angharad – a beloved epic about a mortal girl who falls in love with the Fairy King, and then destroys him. Effy’s tattered copy is all that’s keeping her afloat through her stifling first term her prestigious architecture college. So when the late author’s family announces a contest to design his house, Effy fells certain this is her destiny. But Hiraeth Manor is an impossible task: a musty, decrepit estate on the brink of crumbling into a hungry sea. And when Effy arrives, she finds she isn’t the only one who’s made a temporary home there.

    £9.99
  • A Terrible Fall of Angels

    £20.00

    A Terrible Fall of Angels

    Meet Detective Zaniel Havelock, a man with the special ability to communicate directly with angels. A former trained Angel speaker, he devoted his life to serving both the celestial beings and his fellow humans with his gift, but a terrible betrayal compelled him to leave that life behind. Now he’s a cop who is still working on the side of angels. But where there are angels, there are also demons. There’s no question that there’s evil at work when he’s called in to examine the murder scene of a college student – but is it just the evil that one human being can do to another, or is it something more?

    £20.00