Literature

In his lifetime the great American playwright Arthur Miller published two highly regarded collections of stories, "I Don't Need You Any More" (1967) and "Homely Girl, a Life" (1995). Shortly after his death in 2005 a final collection, "Presence" (2007), appeared. Now, all eighteen of these stories are gathered together in one volume for the first time, including the six from "Presence", previously only published in the USA. In his plays Miller took on the big themes of the day, putting stories of the Depression, wartime deceit and the McCarthy era on stage with an energy and passion not seen before and rarely since. In these stories he turns his attention to smaller, more intimate themes, yet still brings to bear the profound insight, humanism, empathy and wit of his work for the theatre. Including the early, O. Henry Award-winning "I Don't Need You Anymore", the original story of "The Misfits" on which the film was based, and the beautiful late story "Presence", this collection offers a fresh perspective on the great writer and his work, here informed by an unusual sensuality and delicacy. When "Homely Girl, a Life" was published in America the critic for the "New York Times" wrote of those three stories: 'The ability to sum up in clear, unequivocal prose the essence of emotion, a situation, a theme - characteristic of Mr Miller's best writing - makes the reader wish that these stories were longer, and that there were more of them.' At last there are.

Ambrose Bierce was an American writer who is best known for his realism. Often compared to Poe for the dark, realistic nature of his short stories, Bierce drew upon his Civil War experience as a soldier to write on a wide variety of subjects, and stories like "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" are still widely read.

Ahren Warner's second collection of poems opens with the sequence Lutece, te amo: a raw paean to the Paris it inhabits that flits between past and present and offers both adoration and horror in equal measure. Elsewhere, London 'licks and laps'; an anonymous man 'works his bones with a micro-plane' and translations of Baudelaire and Kojeve rub shoulders with Kurt Cobain and 'Little Lord Tory-Tit'. More capricious, fleshly and darker than Warner's previous work, Pretty culminates in Nervometer: thirteen poems hovering between a collage, translation and performance of Antonin Artaud's Le Pese-nerfs, which bring Pretty to a beautifully ugly end.

Saint John wrote the Book of Revelation over 1,900 years ago on the island of Patmos. When a revered monk from that holy island's monastery is murdered during Easter Week, Chief Inspector Andreas Kaldis is called upon to find the killer before all hell breaks loose.

'A riotous adventure, populated by a cast of vivid, glittering characters. An absolute joy!' JENNIFER SAINT'A fabulously entertaining retelling, full of magic, humour and heart' ELODIE HARPERA stunning, exciting and hotly-anticipated feminist retelling of one of the greatest love stories in Greek mythology!The greatest love story ever told... Born into an era of heroes, a prophecy claims that Psyche - Princess of Mycenae - will defeat a monster feared even by the gods themselves. Rebelling against society's traditions, she spends her youth mastering blade and bow, preparing to fulfil her destiny. But she is soon caught up in powers beyond her control, when the jealous Aphrodite sends the God of Desire, Eros, to deliver a fatal love-curse. The last thing Eros wants is to become involved in the chaos of the mortal world, but when he is pricked by the very arrow intended for Psyche, he is doomed to love a woman who will be torn from him the moment their eyes meet. Thrown together by fate, headstrong Psyche and world-weary Eros will face challenges greater than they could have ever imagined. And as the Trojan War begins and the whole of the heavens try to keep them apart, will they find their way back to each other... before it's too late?Luna McNamara's exquisitely written debut will appeal to fans of Madeline Miller, Jennifer Saint and Susan Stokes-Chapman. Praise for Psyche and Eros:'Every page is a breathless, swoonworthy adventure' Roshani Chokshi, bestselling author of The Last Tale of the Flower Bride'An enthralling tale of adventure, romance, and star-crossed lovers' Sue Lynn Tan, bestselling author of Daughter of the Moon Goddess'Psyche and Eros refigures for our times a classic tale of disguise and revelation, of improbable passion tested by fate' Gregory Maguire, bestselling author of WICKED'Evocative and lyrically spun, Luna McNamara's Psyche and Eros is a pure delight. Romantic, poignant, and spellbinding' Rebecca Ross, #1 internationally bestselling author of A River Enchanted'Delightful . . . A tender, meditative, bittersweet tale of one of literature's most ancient themes: love unfolding through self-discovery in the face of death' Maya Deane, author of Wrath Goddess Sing'Fiercely feminist and deeply romantic, Psyche and Eros has the allure of an old fable and the epic quality of ancient myth, tinged with a provocative, modern wit' Ava Reid'One simply falls into the pages and is taken along on a fun, imaginative ride that is as full of twists and turns as it is brimming with love and heart' Katherine J. Chen, author of Joan

Alasdair Gray's remarkable illustrated interpretation of Dante's La Divina Commedia continues

In Purgatorio Dante, having described his journey into Hell, narrates his ascent of Mount Purgatory with Virgil, as he encounters penitents who toil through physical agonies, starvation and flames to assuage their earthly vices. Only by learning from them can he achieve his final enlightened transition to the lost Earthly Paradise at the mountain’s summit, where he meets his dead love, Beatrice, and prepares to ascend to Heaven. Depicting a realm of intense sensation and physical experience, Dante’s poem transformed the traditional Christian idea of Purgatory by showing how the free will of the aspiring soul could change wordly perversions into perfection. It is a brilliantly nuanced and moving allegory of human possibility, hope and redemption.

"So funny, so sage and above all so incandescently intelligent" (The Chicago Tribune), the New York Times bestseller Purity is a grand story of youthful idealism, extreme fidelity, and murder, a daring and penetrating book from "the most intelligent novelist of [his] generation" (The New Republic), Jonathan Franzen, the author of Crossroads

Young Pip Tyler doesn't know who she is. She knows that her real name is Purity, that she's saddled with $130,000 in student debt, that she's squatting with anarchists in Oakland, and that her relationship with her mother--her only family--is hazardous. But she doesn't have a clue who her father is, why her mother chose to live as a recluse with an invented name, or how she'll ever have a normal life.

A glancing encounter with a German peace activist leads Pip to an internship in South America with the Sunlight Project, an organization that traffics in all the secrets of the world--including, Pip hopes, the secret of her origins. TSP is the brainchild of Andreas Wolf, a charismatic provocateur. Now on the lam in Bolivia, Andreas is drawn to Pip for reasons she doesn't understand, and she is equally conflicted about her attraction to him.

The author of The Corrections and Freedom has imagined a world of vividly original characters, and he follows their intertwining paths through landscapes as contemporary as the omnipresent Internet and as ancient as the war between the sexes.