Shortlisted for the 2003 Man Booker Prize, Zoe Heller`s Notes on a Scandal is a darkly compelling novel that explores the taboo subject of pupil/teacher relationships, obsession & betrayal. From the first day that the beguiling Sheba Hart joins the staff of St George`s history teacher Barbara Covett is convinced she has found a kindred spirit. Barbara`s loyalty to her new friend is passionate & unstinting & when Sheba is discovered having an illicit affair with one of her pupils, Barbara quickly elects herself as Sheba`s chief defender. But all is not as it first seems in this dark story &, as Sheba will soon discover, a friend can be just as treacherous as any lover.` Brilliant, nasty, gripping` Zadie Smith` Compelling, dark, sexy` Observer` Superbly gripping. One of the most compelling books I`ve read in ages` Daily Telegraph` Deliciously sinister` Daily Mail Zoe Heller is the author of three novels, Everything You Know, Notes on a Scandal, which was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 2003 & The Believers. The 2006 film adaptation of Notes on a Scandal, starring Cate Blanchett & Judi Dench, received four Oscar nominations. She lives in New York. ...

In the past, culture was a kind of vital consciousness that constantly rejuvenated & revivified everyday reality. Now it is largely a mechanism of distraction & entertainment. Notes on the Death of Culture is an examination & indictment of this transformation
- penned by none other than the Nobel winner Mario Vargas Llosa, who is not only one of our finest novelists but one of the keenest social critics at work today. Taking his cues from T S Eliot
- whose treatise Notes Towards the Definition of Culture is a touchstone precisely because the culture Eliot aimed to describe has since vanished
- Vargas Llosa traces a decline whose ill effects have only just begun to be felt. He mourns, in particular, the figure of the intellectual: for most of the twentieth century, men & women of letters drove political, aesthetic, & moral conversations; today they have all but disappeared from public debate. But Vargas Llosa stubbornly refuses to fade into the background. He is not content to merely sign a petition; he will not bite his tongue. A necessary provocateur, here vividly translated by John King, provides an impassioned & essential critique of our time & culture.


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The Second World War is long over but its legacy continues to tear a town
- & a young boy's life
- apart. Knud is growing up

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In the summer of 1875, two travellers walk south across the Lincolnshire Wolds to a village riven with dark secrets. When Norman Tanner kills his workmate on a cold February morning a century later, he thinks he`s got away with murder. But Norman doesn`t know about the workmate`s girlfriend, or the child that will come back to haunt him; & how he is caught up in a story that stretches back to that Victorian summer. For some in the village of Southby & its nearby grand estate, man is master of his fate, & the world is full of meaning; for others there is nothing but grass. ...

Description: Arthur Maxley is a tense & listless young man. One day he receives a letter from his long-estranged father. Arthur`s fear & aversion to the man is powerful, yet his compulsion to see his father is irresistible. After their meeting, Arthur is propelled into a night of drinking & spontaneous intimacy with a beautiful young woman. But as the memories of childhood trauma surface & disorientate, Arthur`s night out rises towards the pitch of disaster. ...

Daddy Bear insists he`s the scariest creature in the forest
- didn`t you know that nothing can frighten a bear?
- but when there`s

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In this moving autobiographical novel, the narrator`s mother, Lucile, raises her two daughters largely alone. A former child model from a large Bohemian family, Lucile is younger & more glamorous than the other mothers: always in lipstick & stylishly dressed, wayward & wonderful. But as the years pass her occasional sadness gives way to overwhelming despair & delusion. This is a story of luminous beauty & rambunctious joy, of dark secrets & silences, revelations &, ultimately, the unknowability of even those closest to us. & in the face of the unknowable, personal history becomes fiction. Nothing Holds Back the Night is universally recognisable & singularly heartbreaking. ...

Takes you on a journey into the glittering, surreal heart of 21st century Russia: into the lives of Hells Angels convinced they are messiahs, professional killers with the souls of artists, bohemian theatre directors turned Kremlin puppet-masters, supermodel sects, post-modern dictators & oligarch revolutionaries. This is a world erupting with new money & new power, changing so fast it breaks all sense of reality, where life is seen as a whirling, glamorous masquerade where identities can be switched & all values are changeable. It is home to a new form of authoritarianism, far subtler than 20th century strains, & which is rapidly expanding to challenge the global order. An extraordinary book
- one which is as powerful & entertaining as it is troubling
- Nothing is True & Everything is Possible offers a wild ride into this political & ethical vacuum.

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A journey into the glittering, surreal heart of 21st century Russia: into the lives of Hells Angels convinced they are messiahs, professional killers with the souls of artists, bohemian theatre directors turned Kremlin puppet-masters, supermodel sects, post-modern dictators & oligarch revolutionaries. This is a world erupting with new money & new power, changing so fast it breaks all sense of reality, where life is seen as a whirling, glamorous masquerade where identities can be switched & all values are changeable. It is home to a new form of authoritarianism, far subtler than 20th century strains, & which is rapidly expanding to challenge the global order. An extraordinary book
- one which is as powerful & entertaining as it is troubling
- Nothing is True & Everything is Possible offers a wild ride into this political & ethical vacuum.

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There`s nothing like this book! Bold, charming artwork enlivens a hugely enjoyable game of compare-&-contrast for curious kids & puffin-lovers alike. A puffin is an amazing creature. It`s completely unique & one of a kind. A ladder is nothing like a puffin. A house is nothing like a puffin. A newspaper is nothing like a puffin... But wait! Who would have guessed? Could these things be more alike than you think? Young children will love following this mischievous puffin in an entertaining exercise in creative classification
- & are guaranteed to start looking at everyday things in a whole new way. This is a hilarious exercise in comparing & contrasting. It encourages kids to use their imagination to identify similarities in the world around them. It features a lively graphic illustration in a brilliant colour palette.
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