English books

When Dorothy came back from the dead, it seemed to Aaron that some people simply didn’t notice. The accident that killed Dorothy – involving an oak tree, a sun porch and some elusive biscuits – leaves Aaron bereft and the house a wreck. As those around him fuss and flap and bring him casserole after casserole, Aaron ploughs on. But then Dorothy starts to materialize in the oddest places. At first, she only comes for a short while, leaving Aaron longing for more. Gradually she stays for longer, and as they talk, they also bicker and the cracks that were present in their perfectly ordinary marriage start to reappear...

In the latest exciting novel in Robert K. Tanenbaum’s bestselling series Butch Karp takes an ailing boy’s religious parents to court for refusing to get their son medical help. A parent’s worst nightmare sets the stage for the exhilarating new thriller in Robert K. Tanenbaum’s New York Times bestselling Butch Karp series. New York District Attorney Butch Karp has no qualms about putting David and Nonie Ellis on trial following the excruciating death of their young son, Micah. To him, the case is cut-and-dried—reckless manslaughter. Helpless ten-year-old Micah counted on his parents to protect him from the effects of a rare but treatable cancer. Instead, the Ellis family relied solely on prayer and the guidance of snake-oil salesman Reverend C. G. Westlund, of the End of Days Reformation Church of Jesus Christ Resurrected, to save him. Westlund and his zealous followers set up camp outside the DA’s office, angrily protesting the indictment of their “brother” and “sister,” but the charismatic leader’s true objective is to create a diversion from an alarming fraud. He coerced Nonie Ellis into signing an insurance policy that listed himself and the church as beneficiaries in the event of Micah’s death, but he needs the Ellises to be exonerated to get the payout. When David Ellis discovers the deception, no amount of faith can save him from his gruesome fate. Amid the firestorm of controversy surrounding the case, Karp’s wife, private investigator Marlene Ciampi, heads to Memphis to uncover Westlund’s past. The evidence she finds is enough to blow the top off the con man’s scheme—if she doesn’t get herself blown away in the process. Back in Manhattan, meanwhile, Karp is confronted by a deadly nemesis from the past who has explosive plans of her own. The edge-of-your-seat action comes to a head at the annual Halloween parade when a merciless struggle between good and evil metes out its own fatal form of justice.

'Gripping, easy to read, sometimes funny and extraordinarily romantic ...High praise' Independent on Sunday When Nuria Marti, the beautiful Spanish figure skater, is suddenly dropped from the Olympic team, a besotted admirer builds a secret ice rink for her in the ruins of an old mansion on the outskirts of their seaside town. What he doesn't tell her is that he paid for it using embezzled public funds. Such deceit is not without repercussions, and the skating rink soon becomes a crime scene ...Rife with political corruption, sex, jealousy and frustrated passion, The Skating Rink -- narrated in turn by a corrupt and pompous civil servant, a beleaguered romantic poet, and a duplicitous local entrepreneur -- is a darkly atmospheric tale of murder and its motives. 'This magnificent murder mystery ...is wrought with voices of great urgency and yet penned with a delectable lightness of touch' List 'Elegant, elusive and amusing, this novel is more than capable of standing alongside the rest of Bolano's work' Daily Telegraph

Crushed by a devastating scandal, university professor Óscar Amalfitano flees Barcelona for Santa Teresa – a Mexican city close to the US border. In this sprawling town, where women are being killed in staggering numbers, Amalfitano begins an affair with Castillo, a young forger of Larry Rivers paintings, while his daughter, Rosa, reeling from the weight of his secrets, seeks solace in a romance of her own. Featuring characters and stories from The Savage Detectives and 2666, Roberto Bolaño’s Woes of the True Policeman explores the power of art, memory, and desire – and marks the culmination of one of the great careers of world literature.

The Demi-Monde is the most advanced computer simulation ever devised. Created to prepare soldiers for the nightmarish reality of urban warfare, it is a virtual world locked in eternal civil war. Its thirty million digital inhabitants are ruled by duplicates of some of history's cruellest tyrants: Reinhard Heydrich, the architect of the Holocaust; Beria, Stalin's arch executioner; Torquemada, the pitiless Inquisitor General; Robespierre, the face of the Reign of Terror. But something has gone badly wrong inside the Demi-Monde, and the US President's daughter has become trapped in this terrible world. It falls to eighteen-year-old Ella Thomas to rescue her, yet once Ella has entered the Demi-Monde she finds that everything is not as it seems, that its cyber-walls are struggling to contain the evil within and that the Real World is in more danger than anyone realises.

A Groundbreaking new thriller by the former Commander of Special Branch who rose to a position co-ordinating all the secret services in London. This is a landmark debut novel for those who like insider fiction in the mould of Stella Rimington. Agent of the State is filled with the kind of authentic detail only a man in the know would be able to tell.A suspected terrorist is frisked for explosives on the Embankment. Operators do this so skilfully he remains completely unaware... In New Scotland Yard a new brand of manager fails to deal with escalating threats - 'aggressive indecision' is what Detective Chief Inspector John Kerr calls it... He discovers that cocaine-fuelled sex parties in Knightsbridge are pulling in businessmen, Russian diplomats and senior members of the British government... When Kerr's investigations are blocked by his bosses in Scotland Yard, he decides to go it alone and begins to expose a cover-up that extends to all levels of the British Establishment. Agent of the State is the first novel by Roger Pearce, a former Special Branch officer at New Scotland Yard who rose to become its Commander and a key player in Whitehall's intelligence network. It is an authentic account of the way the British intelligence services work at all levels and of the hypocrisy of the British establishment. 'Vividly written and delivering a glimpse of what counter-terrorism feels like, it's a highly promising start from a writer who could well have a big future.' Daily Mail 'It's a tribute to Roger Pearce's ability that the plot never becomes impenetrable and there's an uncomfortable authenticity as real-life operations are referenced... a breathless, hurtling page-turner.' Financial Times

Featured in The Times Top 10 Crime Books of the Decade The twenty-fourth book in the bestselling Detective Chief Inspector Wexford series, from the author of classic detective fiction and gripping psychological thrillers including End in Tears and Thirteen Steps Down. The impossible has happened. Chief Inspector Reg Wexford has retired from the crime force. He and his wife, Dora, now divide their time between Kingsmarkham and a coachhouse in Hampstead, belonging to their actress daughter, Sheila. Wexford takes great pleasure in his books, but, for all the benefits of a more relaxed lifestyle, he misses being the hand of the law. But a chance meeting in a London street, with someone he had known briefly as a very young police constable, changes everything. Tom Ede is now a Detective Superintendent, and is very keen to recruit Wexford as an adviser on a mysterious murder case. The bodies of two women and a man have been discovered in the old coal hole of an attractive house in St John's Wood. None of the corpses carry identification. But the man's jacket pockets contain a string of pearls, a diamond and a sapphire necklace as well as other jewellery valued in the region of £40,000. To Wexford, this is definitely a case worth coming out of retirement for. He is intrigued and excited by the challenge, but unaware that this new investigative role will bring him into extreme physical danger...

Most people believe Jimmy Antonelli is bad to the bone… New York detective – and an old friend of the family – Bill Smith is one of the few people who has ever been willing to give Jimmy a second chance. Given his own brushes with the law, Bill has an unsurprising sympathy for the youngest Antonelli brother. But this time Jimmy has gone too far. There’s a corpse of a local gangster in the cellar of Antonelli’s bar and Jimmy has disappeared... But finding Jimmy is going to be a whole lot easier than proving his innocence... A Bill Smith/Lydia Chin Crime Novel