Novel

IndependentShortlisted for the Booker Prize, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize and the Arthur C. Clarke Award, winner of Richard & Judy Best Read of the Year and a BBC Two Between the Covers Book Club pick'Miraculous'Sunday Times'A masterful feast'Evening Standard'Shamelessly exciting'Spectator'Remarkable'Guardian'Stunning'Daily MailA novel of mind-bending imagination and scope from the author of Ghostwritten and Utopia AvenueSouls cross ages like clouds cross skies . . . Six interlocking lives - one amazing adventure. In a narrative that circles the globe and reaches from the 19th century to a post-apocalyptic future, Cloud Atlas erases the boundaries of time, genre and language to offer an enthralling vision of humanity's will to power, and where it will lead us. *Please note that the end of p. 39 and p. 40 are intentionally blank*PRAISE FOR DAVID MITCHELL'A thrilling and gifted writer'Financial Times'Dizzyingly, dazzlingly good'Daily Mail'Mitchell is, clearly, a genius'New York Times Book Review'An author of extraordinary ambition and skill'Independent on Sunday'A superb storyteller'The New Yorker

This final classic collection of stories reveals Somerset Maugham's unique talent for exposing and exploring the bitter realities of human relationships. Brilliant tales of love, infidelity, passion and prejudice, the stories range from 'The Lotus Eater' in which a man has a vision of a life of bliss in the Mediterranean, to the astringent tales of 'The Outstation' and 'The Back of Beyond' in Malaya and South East Asia. Largely set in favourite Maugham country, this colourful collection brilliantly evokes the numbered days of the British Empire.

This definitive collection establishes Williams as a major American fiction writer of the twentieth century.

This unique edition presents the complete span of Thomas' short stories, from his urgent hallucinatory visions of the dark forces beneath the surface of Welsh life to the inimitable comedy of his later autobiographical writings. With PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG DOG and ADVENTURES IN THE SKIN TRADE, Thomas found a new voice for his irreverent memories of lust and bravado in south-west Wales and London, leading to a sequence of classic evocations of childhood magic and the follies of adult life. The definitive collection of Dylan Thomas' short stories, showing just why he is considered one of the 20th century's finest writers. Also featuring a bold new livery in celebration of the Dylan Thomas centenary.

In these hauntingly beautiful stories of abandonment and vengeance, extreme situations lead to disturbing conclusions. A missionary is sent to a place so distant he finds his God has no power there; a husband abandons his wife as they honeymoon in the South American jungle; a splash of water triggers an explosion of violence; and a boy's drug-induced transformation leads to cruelty enjoyed and suffered.

This outstanding collection by Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist John Cheever shows the power and range of one of the finest short story writers of the last century. Stories of love and of squalor, they include masterpieces such as 'The Swimmer' and 'Goodbye, My Brother' and date from the time of his honourable discharge from the Army at the end of the Second World War.

Born in Colombo, Judith Dunbar spends her teenage years at boarding school, while her beloved mother and younger sister live abroad with her father. When her new friend Loveday Carey-Lewis invites Judith home for the weekend to Nancherrow, the Carey-Lewises' beautiful estate on the Cornish coast, it is love at first sight. She falls in love too with the generous Carey-Lewises themselves. With their generosity and kindness, Judith grows from naive girl to confident young woman, basking in the warm affection of a surrogate family whose flame burns brightly. But it is a flame soon to be extinguished in the gathering storm of war. And Judith herself has far to travel before at last ...coming home.

George Orwell's paean to the end of an idyllic era in British history, Coming Up for Air is a poignant account of one man's attempt to recapture childhood innocence as war looms on the horizon. George Bowling, forty-five, mortgaged, married with children, is an insurance salesman with an expanding waistline, a new set of false teeth - and a desperate desire to escape his dreary life. He fears modern times - since, in 1939, the Second World War is imminent - foreseeing food queues, soldiers, secret police and tyranny. So he decides to escape to the world of his childhood, to the village he remembers as a rural haven of peace and tranquillity. But his return journey to Lower Binfield may bring only a more complete disillusionment ... 'Very funny, as well as invigoratingly realistic ... Nineteen Eighty-Four is here in embryo. So is Animal Farm ... not many novels carry the seeds of two classics as well as being richly readable themselves'John Carey, Sunday Times

Discover Thomas Mann's comic novel of deception and misplaced confidence - back in print for the first time in over twenty years. Waiter by day, man about Paris by night; the young and good looking Felix Krull has created for himself a personality to charm and deceive the world of wealth. When the Marquis de Venosta makes him a proposal that he can't refuse, the young Felix finds himself on the pathway that will elevate him into the world of riches. 'The most astonishing work that Mann ever wrote and also one of the most perfect' Edwin Muir

The Cazalet Chronicles continues with the third in the series, Confusion, set in the height of the Second World War and where chaos has become a way of life for the Cazalet family. It's 1942 and the dark days of war seem never-ending. Scattered across the still-peaceful Sussex countryside and air-raid-threatened London, the divided Cazalets begin to find the battle for survival echoing the confusion in their own lives. Headstrong, independent Louise surprises the whole family when she abandons her dreams of being an actress and instead makes a society marriage. Polly and Clary, now in their late teens, finally fulfil their ambition of living together in London. But the reality of the city is not quite what they imagined, and Polly is struggling to come to terms with the death of her mother and manage her grieving father. Clary, meanwhile, is painfully aware that what she lacks in beauty she makes up for in intelligence, and is the only member of the family who believes that her father might not be dead. With cover artwork exclusively designed by artist Luke Edward Hall, this is the heartbreaking and heartwarming third instalment of Elizabeth Jane Howard's bestselling series. It is followed by the fourth book, Casting Off. 'Charming, poignant and quite irresistible . . . to be cherished and shared' - The Times