Novel

One by one the boys begin to fall...In 1914, a room full of German schoolboys, fresh-faced and idealistic, are goaded by their schoolmaster to troop off to the 'glorious war'. With the fire and patriotism of youth, they sign up. What follows is the moving story of a young 'unknown soldier' experiencing the horror and disillusionment of life in the trenches.

'An extraordinary story of grace, forgiveness and moral courage' Patrick Radden Keefe The English language has no specific word for the parent that has lost a child. There exist words for orphan, widow and widower, but there is no word that captures and conveys this tragic type of loss. It has been eleven years since Diane Foley s son, the American journalist James Foley, was kidnapped in northern Syria, and nearly ten since that day in August 2014 when she would learn that he had been murdered by ISIS in a public beheading that would ricochet in video around the world. A whole decade. Time rushes past. And yet, for Diane, that moment is unending. In American Mother, legendary author Colum McCann tells Diane s story as she recalls the months of his captivity, the efforts made to bring him home and the days following his death, in which Diane came face to face with one of the men responsible for her son s kidnapping and torture. A testament to the power of radical empathy and moral courage, American Mother takes us inside one woman s extraordinary journey to find connection in a world torn asunder, and to fight for others as a way to keep her son s memory alive.

Fourteen tales include "The Enormous Radio" by Cheever, Faulkner's "Dry September," Katherine Anne Porter's "He," "A Worn Path" by Eudora Welty, and tales by Hawthorne, Twain, Poe, Fitzgerald, Wharton, others.

A tremendous bestseller when it was published in 1925, "An American Tragedy" is the culmination of Theodore Dreiser's elementally powerful fictional art. Revised reissue.

The parish of St Basil, on the fringes of North Kensington, is all of a flutter due to the arrival of Rupert Stonebird, a most eligible bachelor, in the neighbourhood. The local matchmakers are sure he will make a suitable husband for the vicar’s wife’s sister, Penny, or perhaps for local librarian Ianthe Broome?

But Ianthe is in danger of forming a most unsuitable attachment for her new library assistant, John, a man of questionable background with not a penny to his name…

Anil's Ghost transports us to Sri Lanka, a country steeped in centuries of tradition, now forced into the late twentieth century by the ravages of a bloody civil war. Enter Anil Tissera, a young woman and forensic anthropologist born in Sri Lanka but educted in the West, sent by an international human rights group to identify the victims of the murder campaigns sweeping the island. When Anil discovers that the bones found in an ancient burial site are in fact those of a much more recent victim, her search for the terrible truth hidden in her homeland begins. What follows is a story about love, about family, about identity - a story driven by a riventing mystery.

Annie Dunne and her cousin Sarah live and work on a small farm in a remote and beautiful part of Wicklow in late 1950s Ireland. All about them the old green roads are being tarred, cars are being purchased, a way of life is about to disappear. Like two old rooks, they hold to their hill in Kelsha, cherishing everything. When Annie's nephew and his wife are set to go to London to find work, their two small children, a little boy and his older sister, are brought down to spend the summer with their grand-aunt. It is a strange chance of happiness for Annie. Against that happiness moves the figure of Billy Kerr, with his ambiguous attentions to Sarah, threatening to drive Annie from her last niche of safety in the world. The world of childish innocence also proves sometimes darkened and puzzling to her, and she struggles to find clear ground, clear light - to preserve her sense of love and place against these subtle forces of disquiet. A summer of adventure, pain, delight and ultimately epiphany unfolds for both the children and their elderly caretakers in this poignant and exquisitely told story of innocence, loss and reconciliation.

P.B. Jones is the amoral, bisexual protagonist of this unfinished novel. He discovers that bed-hopping rather than literary ability is the way to get published. He discovers along the way that prayers that are answered cause more pain than those that remain ignored.

'Superb, wonderful, enjoyable' Guardian'Full of delights' The Times_____________________________Every life is both ordinary and extraordinary, and Logan Mountstuart's - stretching across the twentieth century - is a rich tapestry of both. As a writer who finds inspiration with Hemingway in Paris and Virginia Woolf in London, as a spy recruited by Ian Fleming and betrayed in the war, and as an art-dealer in '60s New York, Logan mixes with the men and women who shape his times. But as a son, friend, lover and husband, he makes the same mistakes we all do in our search for happiness.

Here, then, is the story of a life lived to the full - and a journey deep into a very human heart. ____________________________'A work of astonishing ventriloquistic virtuosity... brilliant' Sunday Telegraph'Wise, profound and moving' William Sutcliffe, Independent on Sunday'A terrific journey through the 20th century.

Thoroughly entertaining and enjoyable' Guardian'Astounding. One of Boyd's greatest achievements... A pleasure' Mail on Sunday'Generous, witty, sneakily profound' Evening Standard'The pleasures are endless...

Supremely entertaining' Washington Post'A fabulous book all about life. I think of Any Human Heart often - the sign of a truly great book' Fi Glover, New Statesman

The town of Winthrop has decided it needs a new name. The resident software millionaire wants to call it New Prospera; the mayor wants to return to the original choice of the founding black settlers; and the town's aristocracy sees no reason to change the name at all. What they need, they realize, is a nomenclature consultant.

And, it turns out, the consultant needs them. But in a culture overwhelmed by marketing, the name is everything and our hero's efforts may result in not just a new name for the town but a new and subtler truth about it as well.