British Literature

In this deliciously strange debut collection, Leon Craig draws on folklore and gothic horror in refreshingly inventive ways to explore queer identity, love, power and the complicated nature of being human. In the 13 darkly audacious stories of Parallel Hells, we meet a golem, made of clay, learning that its powers far exceed its Creator's expectations; a ruined mansion which grants the secret wishes of a group of revellers and a notorious murderer who discovers her Viking husband is not what he seems.

Lowland Way is the suburban dream. The houses are beautiful, the neighbors get along, and the kids play together on weekends. But when Darren and Jodie move into the house on the corner, they donʼt follow the rules. They blast music at all hours, begin an unsightly renovation, and run a used-car business from their yard. It doesn’t take long for an all-out war to start brewing. Then, early one Saturday, a horrific death shocks the street. As police search for witnesses, accusations start flying - and everyone has something to hide.

Widowed Georgina Drake has no regrets about moving to beautiful, sleepy Little Wenborough in rural Norfolk. Until she opens the door to her rental property and finds the dead body of her latest guest, irritable university professor Roland Garnett. And on top of that she’s suddenly hearing a woman’s voice through her hearing aids. Completely shaken by the discovery, Georgina can hardly believe it when the police conclude that Professor Garnett was poisoned, with a dinner delivered by Georgina herself.

Alex-Li Tandem sells autographs. A small blip in a huge worldwide network of desire, his business is to hunt for names on paper, collect them, sell them, and occasionally fake them - all to give the people what they want: a little piece of Fame. But what does Alex want? Only the return of his father, the reinstatement of some kind of all-powerful, benevolent God-type figure, the end of religion, something for his headache, three different girls, infinite grace, and the rare autograph of '40s movie actress Kitty Alexander. With fries.

The CID's Andrew Dalziel prefers simple killers. Not a crackpot who fancies himself Hamlet and taunts authorities with lofty quotes from the Bard. Dubbed the Yorkshire Choker, he's already taken three lives in four weeks and promises more tragedy to come. To help nab the serial strangler, Peter Pascoe has enlisted the help of linguistics professors, psychologists, and psychics-all of it nonsense to the grounded Dalziel.

London, 1930. The five greatest women crime writers have banded together to form a secret society with a single goal: to show they are no longer willing to be treated as second class citizens by their male counterparts in the legendary Detection Club. Led by the formidable Dorothy L. Sayers, the group includes Agatha Christie, Ngaio Marsh, Margery Allingham and Baroness Emma Orczy. They call themselves the Queens of Crime. Their plan? Solve an actual murder, that of a young woman found strangled in a park in France.

May Rosevere has reached the grand old age of 110, thanks to several slices of toast with butter every morning, a glass (or two) of port, and the wonders of the Cornish sea air - or so she tells everyone. But there’s much more to May than her remarkable age. She has a secret. One that no one has ever discovered....

DC Sophie Jones was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Viciously bludgeoned one night in a dark alley, she is left fighting for her life in hospital, leaving no clues as to why she was there or what might have motivated the attack. For Detective Karen Hart, fiercely protective of her young protégée, this is already deeply personal: an attack on Sophie is an attack on the whole team. When a car workshop near the crime scene is linked to local mobster Quentin Chapman, the man Hart has spent years trying to bring down, it’s hard not to jump to the most obvious conclusion.

1850: Charles Dickens is in Manchester, performing at the Queen's Theatre with his acting group. But his career on the stage is cut short when a man is shot dead - on set. With Dickens himself caught with the gun in his hands, he is immediately arrested. Along with the help of his good friend Superintendent Sam Jones, Dickens must do all he can to find the real killer, before he is locked up for a crime he didn't commit. Can Dickens convince the authorities of his innocence? Will he unmask the true assassin?

As a family liaison offer, DC Maggie Neville has seen parents crumble under the weight of their child’s death. Imogen Tyler is no different. Her son’s fall was witnessed by the school caretaker, and another pupil is under suspicion/being questioned, but Imogen is paralysed by questions. Why was he at the school so early? Why was he with a girl who wasn’t a friend?

Miss Mildred Percy is a spinster. She does not dance, she has long stopped dreaming, and she certainly does not have adventures. That is, until her great uncle has the audacity to leave her an inheritance, one that includes a dragon’s egg. The egg—as eggs are wont to do—decides to hatch, and Miss Mildred Percy is suddenly thrust out of the role of “spinster and general wallflower” and into the unprecedented position of “spinster and keeper of dragons.” But England has not seen a dragon since…well, ever.

From an early age, Grace Dent was hungry. As a little girl growing up in Currock, Carlisle, she yearned to be something bigger, to go somewhere better. Hungry traces Grace’s story from growing up eating beige food to becoming one of the much-loved voices on the British food scene. It’s also everyone’s story—from treats with your nan, to cheese and pineapple hedgehogs, to the exquisite joy of cheaply made apple crumble with custard.

A summer wedding.... An eccentric aunt.... What can possibly go wrong? Libby's instincts tell her there's something amiss in the picturesque villages, small towns, and rural farms of Exmoor. Then, people begin to disappear.... She's joined forces with on-off partner Max in a private investigation business, but she's getting cold feet about the idea of marriage. After all, it's taken plenty of hard work to regain her independence after her husband's death. Meanwhile, a sinister new acquaintance sends shivers down her spine....

An unassuming Dottie Ellis falls for bad boy Jimmy Carson, who sweeps her off her feet. But after discovering she is pregnant and learning that Jimmy has gone back to his ex-girlfriend Carrie Verne, her happiness falls apart. Heartbroken, Dottie runs home, only to unearth a disturbing family secret that rocks her to the core. She is now faced with an agonizing decision to protect her unborn child. What she does shocks the town. In a moment of solidarity, Carrie makes a promise to Dottie, cementing an unlikely bond between them.

Ellie is so not the pageant type. They’re Coralee’s thing, and Ellie is happy to let her talented friend shine in the spotlight. But what’s she supposed to do when Coralee asks her to enter a beauty pageant, and their other best friend, Bert, volunteers to be their manager? Then again, how else is she going to get through this summer with her dad, who barely knows her, while her mom is off on her honeymoon with Ellie’s amazing gym teacher? Ellie decides she has nothing to lose.

When Detective Mark Turpin is assigned the task of investigating the death of a local businessman, the case is first thought to be one of accidental drowning. Until a bullet hole is found where the victim fell into the River Thames. Then a number of graves are unearthed at a disused airfield site being redeveloped by the dead man, exposing a horrific secret and plunging Mark into one of the darkest investigations of his career. After two more bodies are discovered amongst the burnt-out ruins of a building on a nearby industrial estate, Mark realises that a serial killer is at large.

Former Detective Hillary Greene and her cold case team are handed an impossible case. Thirty years ago, two days before Christmas, the much-loved Reverend Keith Coltrane was hit over the head and left to die inside his own church. The killer was never caught. This shocking crime took place in the pretty Oxfordshire village of Lower Barton. Everyone knows everyone else in this peaceful little community. The young reverend was handsome and popular, especially with the ladies of the village. Who would have wanted to harm him?

London, 1849 When a boy is found drowned in the River Thames at Hungerford Stairs, novelist Charles Dickens and Superintendent Jones of Bow Street are mystified to discover that the child is not the missing youngster for whom they have been searching. As Dickens and Jones delve deeper into London's poverty-stricken backstreets, they stumble across two more bodies. A serial killer is on the loose. And Charles is terrified that someone close to him may be one of the victims.

Young, ardent Dorothea Brooke defies her sister by wedding the much older Reverend Edward Casaubon, blindly hoping to assist in his scholarly pursuits. Tertius Lydgate, a progressive doctor, new and unwelcome in provincial Middlemarch, is charmed into marriage with the selfish and shallow Rosamond Vincy, a disastrous mismatch of his own. Soon blatant stubbornness, unruly jealousy, blind idealism, and calculated blackmail threaten to upend the Midlands village and lay waste to happy endings.

DI Bliss attends the aftermath of an apparent murder-suicide—but the scene tells him and his colleagues something very different occurred. Now the Peterborough Major Crimes Unit face an adversary like no other. They have no idea why his victims had to die. They have no idea who he is. They have no idea where he might strike next—only that he will. But while the killer is cunning, leaving no evidence for them to find, his biggest mistake might be in underestimating the team now hunting him. Because when Jimmy Bliss is on the case, all bets are off.