Modern Fiction

Whenever Selina asked about her late father, the grandmother who raised her changed the subject. The chance discovery of a photograph gave Selina hope that he was still alive and sent her searching for him on a small Spanish island. In this lush paradise, Selina found George Dyer, a writer who would help her solve the mystery of her past...and might hold the key to her future.

How to Win an Election is an ancient Roman guide for campaigning that is as up-to-date as tomorrow's headlines. In 64 BC when idealist Marcus Cicero, Rome's greatest orator, ran for consul (the highest office in the Republic), his practical brother Quintus decided he needed some no-nonsense advice on running a successful campaign.

Twenty-two-year-old Beth Ann is content with her small-town life. That is, until the day America’s electric grid is destroyed by terrorists. What starts out as an inconvenience quickly becomes a catastrophe - not only do the lights stay off, but cars won’t run and phones are dead. The world screeches to a halt. Without communication and basic supplies like food and water, widespread confusion spirals into deadly chaos within days.

It is the late 1920's, the era of Babe Ruth, Charles Lindbergh, and Al Capone, and Walt is a Saint Louis orphan rescued from the streets by the mysterious Hungarian Master Yehudi, who teaches Walt to walk on air. The vaudeville act that results from Walt's marvelous new abiltiy takes them across a vast and vibrant country, where they meet and fall prey to sinners, thieves, and villains, from the Kansas Ku Klux Klan to the Chicago mob.

In Another View, there are only two men in Emma's life - her father, a remote artist in Cornwall who left her in boarding school and saw her every few years, and Christo, who had been her stepbrother for a few months, and now wants to get to know her. But until Emma can understand what she means to them, there will never be room for love.

Over the past fifty years, fiction in English has never looked more various. Books bulkier than Victorian three-deckers appear alongside works of minimalist brevity, and experiments with form have produced everything from verse novels to Twitter-thread narratives. This is truly a golden age. But what unites this kaleidoscopic array of genres and styles? Celebrated writer and critic Peter Kemp shows how modern writers are obsessed with the past.

Private eye Travis McGee outwaits and outwits a deranged killer as he searches for a missing wife on a remote Caribbean island, where he also tangles with a baby-faced businessman with a taste for murder.

In this modern-retelling of "Beauty and the Beast", Savannah Carmichael, betrayed by an unreliable source, returns to her hometown of Danvers, Virginia, with her once-promising journalism career in ruins. Given the opportunity to get back in the game by writing a patriotic human interest piece, Savannah turns her attention to the town hermit, Asher Lee, a wounded veteran who returned to Danvers eight years ago, and hasn't been seen since.

Lauded for the power of her writing and having attracted an online fan base of millions for her extraordinary spoken-word performances, Olivia Gatwood now weaves together her own coming-of-age with an investigation into our culture’s romanticization of violence against women. At times blistering and riotous, at times soulful and exuberant, Life of the Party explores the boundary between what is real and what is imagined in a life saturated with fear. Gatwood asks, How does a girl grow into a woman in a world racked by violence? Where is the line between perpetrator and victim?

On the last day of her mother’s life, Rebecca learns she has a family in Cornwall and sets out to find the grandfather and cousin she has never known. But only the enigmatic Joss Gardner, the outsider who seems to be the apple of her grandfather’s eye, can help her understand the dark currents that lie behind her family’s loving reception.

Gripping tales that abound with fantastic characters and astonishing twists and turns, Greek myths confront what it means to be mortal in a world of powerful forces beyond human control. Little wonder that they continue to fascinate readers thousands of years after they were first told. Gods and Mortals is a major new telling of ancient Greek myths by one of the world's preeminent experts.

While Arran Adair might have followed the call of wanderlust in his younger years, it isn't the reason he stayed away from Ardnoch. Home now, desperate to put the sins of his past behind him, and rebuild his life in the Scottish Highlands, Arran could never have predicted Eredine Willows. The Ardnoch Estate Pilates instructor is a complicated mystery and one Arran can't help but want to solve.

Falling like a stone from six miles up, a brand new C-500 crashes in central France, killing two pilots aboard. When French officials take over this highly public investigation, they call in the best there is: they call Frank "Jammer" Davis.

A retired U.S. Air Force fighter pilot, Davis is part of the NTSB's "go-team". With a reputation for getting things done - and for steamrolling anyone who gets in his way - Davis starts to dig.

Often disguised as something that would help him, evil accompanies Christian on his journey to the Celestial City. As you walk with him, you'll begin to identify today's many religious pitfalls. These are presented by men such as Pliable, who turns back at the Slough of Despond; and Ignorance, who believes he's a true follower of Christ when he's really only trusting in himself.

Now that Linda "Pidge" Lewellen is grown up, she tells Travis McGee, once her girlhood idol, that either she's going crazy or Howie, her affable ex-jock of a husband, is trying to kill her. McGee checks things out, and gives Pidge the all clear. But when Pidge and Howie sail away to kiss and make up, McGee has second thoughts. If only he can get to Pidge before he has time for any more thinking.

Mad scientists have never had it so tough. In super-hero comics, graphic novels, films, TV series, video games, and even works of what may be fiction, they are besieged by those who stand against them, devoid of sympathy for their irrational, megalomaniacal impulses to rule, destroy, or otherwise dominate the world as we know it. It’s just not fair. So those of us who are so twisted and sick that we love mad scientists have created this guide.

23 stories, all unabridged, from a diverse group of star writers and readers. A truly memorable collection with a wide appeal. Includes "The Years Midnight" by Helen Simpson, read by Harriet Walter; "On Seeing the 100% Perfect Girl One Beautiful Morning" by Haruki Marukami, read by Walter Lewis; "Bablady" by A. S. Byatt, read by Roslaind Eyres; "Hotel des Vaoyaguerus" by William Boyd, read by Martin Jarvis; and "Who?" by Fay Weldon, read by Julie Christie.

Rhiannon Hunter may have revolutionized romance in the digital world, but in real life she only swipes right on her career - and the occasional hookup. The cynical dating app creator controls her love life with a few key rules: nude pics are by invitation only; if someone stands you up, block them with extreme prejudice; protect your heart. Only there aren't any rules to govern her attraction to her newest match, former pro-football player Samson Lima. The sexy and seemingly sweet hunk woos her one magical night...and disappears.

Travis McGee is too busy with his houseboat to pay attention to the little old man with the missing postage stamps. Except these are no ordinary stamps. They are rare stamps. Four hundred thousand dollars worth of rare. And if McGee doesn't recognize their value, perhaps Mary Alice McDermit, a six-foot knockout who knows all the ways to a boat bum's heart, will. Only it's not McGee's heart that's in danger. Because a syndicate killer has put a contract on McGee.

From the author of the New York Times best sellers All Adults Here and This Time Tomorrow, a smart, highly entertaining novel about a tight-knit group of friends from college - and what it means to finally grow up, well after adulthood has set in. Friends and former college bandmates Elizabeth and Andrew and Zoe have watched one another marry, buy real estate, and start businesses and families, all while trying to hold on to the identities of their youth. But nothing ages them like having to suddenly pass the torch to their own offspring.