Literature

'You think it will never happen to you, that it cannot happen to you, that you are the only person world to whom none of these things will ever happen, and then, one by one, they all begin to happen to you, in the same way they happen to everyone else.'In Winter Journal, Paul Auster moves through the events of his life in a series of memories grasped from the point of view of his life now: playing baseball as a teenager; participating in the anti-Vietnam demonstrations at Columbia University; seeking out prostitutes in Paris, almost killing his second wife and child in a car accident; falling in and out of live with his first wife; the 'scalding, epiphanic moment of clarity' in 1978 that set him on a new course as a writer. Winter Journal is a poignant memoir of ageing and memory, written with all the characteristic subtlety, imagination and insight that readers of Paul Auster have come to cherish. 'An examination of the emotions of a man growing old . . . this book has much to recommend it, and Auster is unsparingly honest about himself.' Financial Times

"Winter Love is startlingly good: an intense, compelling story of illicit desire and heartbreak that’s also a fabulous evocation of worn-out wartime life. A blistering, unsettling, darkly romantic read." - SARAH WATERS “This short and intense shock of a book transports us to the dark streets of wartime London to experience the pleasures and pains of forbidden love” - CATHY RENTZENBRINKFrom the moment Red encounters her charismatic new college classmate, Mara, she is drawn in. Recently-married Mara is stylish and colourful and has a glamorous ease that lights up wintry Blitz-ridden London. Their friendship soon becomes an illicit but exhilarating affair exploring the enticing obsessive power, and long agonising hold, of love. First published in 1962, Winter Love is an explosive unpredictable love story told in exquisite, intimate prose.

Elfrida Phipps loves her new life in her pretty Hampshire village. She has a tiny cottage, her faithful dog Horace and the friendship of the neighbouring Blundells - particularly Oscar - to ensure that her days include companionship as well as independence. But an unforeseen tragedy upsets Elfrida's tranquillity: Oscar's wife and daughter are killed in a terrible car crash and he finds himself homeless when his stepchildren claim their dead mother's inheritance.

Oscar and Elfrida take refuge in a rambling house in Scotland which becomes a magnet for various waifs and strays who converge upon it, including an unhappy teenage girl. It could be a recipe for disaster. But somehow the Christmas season weaves its magical spell and for Elfrida and Oscar, in the evening of their lives, the winter solstice brings love and solace.

Winner of the Man Booker Prize The first book in Hilary Mantel's award-winning Wolf Hall trilogy, with a new cover design to celebrate the publication of the much anticipated The Mirror and the Light From one of our finest living writers, Wolf Hall is that very rare thing: a truly great English novel. 'Every bit as good as they said it was' Observer 'Terrific' Margaret Atwood 'As soon as I opened this book I was gripped. I read it almost non-stop' The Times In Wolf Hall, one of our very best writers brings the opulent, brutal world of the Tudors to bloody, glittering life.

We are sad creatures. I am a prostitute running to seed and my last asset is an idiot son. I am a street-sweeper collapsing under the weight of time and my own obesity. I am a foul-mouthed and repellent daughter desperately in need of a man. Sad creatures. Simple needs. Mr. Dimitriou conjures us into existence in the space of a few lines, and we live, poised between hope and its extinction, for a few brief pages in the harsh world of his pared down prose. Sad creatures, dumb creatures: our spokesman ultimately is a dead or dying dog... woof, woof, dear Lord.

Wuthering Heights is a wild, passionate story of the intense and almost demonic love between Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff, a foundling adopted by Catherine's father. After Mr Earnshaw's death, Heathcliff is bullied and humiliated by Catherine's brother Hindley and wrongly believing that his love for Catherine is not reciprocated, leaves Wuthering Heights, only to return years later as a wealthy and polished man. He proceeds to exact a terrible revenge for his former miseries.

When failed writer June Hayward witnesses her rival Athena Liu die in a freak accident, she sees her opportunity… and takes it. So what if it means stealing Athena’s final manuscript? So what if it means ‘borrowing’ her identity? And so what if the first lie is only the beginning… Finally, June has the fame she always deserved. But someone is about to expose her… What happens next is entirely everyone else's fault. ‘The book that everyone is talking about’ Glamour ‘Ingenious, astute, hugely entertaining’ David Nicholls ‘Breathtakingly clever on jealousy, talent, success, and who gets to tell which story’ Elizabeth Day ‘Hard to put down. Harder to forget’ Stephen King R.F. Kuang’s book Yellowface was a #1 Sunday Times bestseller w/c 04-06-23 R.F. Kuang’s book Yellowface was a #5 New York Times bestseller w/c 04-06-23

Now available in an all-new HarperPerennial Classics edition Thomas Wolfe's YOU CAN'T GO HOME AGAIN tells the poignant story of a successful novelist, ostracized by family and friends, who subsequently embarks on a world-wide search for his own identity and personal renewal. Perennial Classics editions include updated author biographies and a history of the book's publication.

Charles Bukowski examines cats and his childhood in You Get So Alone at Times, a book of poetry that reveals his tender side. He delves into his youth to analyze its repercussions.

Born under different stars, Protestant Mungo and Catholic James live in a hyper-masculine world. They are caught between two of Glasgow’s housing estates where young working-class men divide themselves along sectarian lines, and fight territorial battles for the sake of reputation. They should be sworn enemies if they’re to be seen as men at all, and yet they become best friends as they find a sanctuary in the doocot that James has built for his prize racing pigeons. As they begin to fall in love, they dream of escaping the grey city, and Mungo must work hard to hide his true self from all those around him, especially from his elder brother Hamish, a local gang leader with a brutal reputation to uphold.

But the threat of discovery is constant and the punishment unspeakable. When Mungo’s mother sends him on a fishing trip to a loch in Western Scotland, with two strange men behind whose drunken banter lie murky pasts, he needs to summon all his inner strength and courage to get back to a place of safety, a place where he and James might still have a future.

Imbuing the everyday world of its characters with rich lyricism, Douglas Stuart’s Young Mungo is a gripping and revealing story about the meaning of masculinity, the push and pull of family, the violence faced by so many queer people, and the dangers of loving someone too much.