English books
BERNHARD SCHLINK – THE GORDIAN KNOT
A prize-winning Cold War spy novel from the author of international megaseller THE READER
Young lawyer Georg Polger gives up a comfortable existence in Germany to work as a freelance translator in the South of France. But business in the picturesque village is far from booming, and Georg struggles to make ends meet. One day he is approached by a certain Mr Bulnakov, who wants Georg to take over a local translation agency. The previous owner has just died in mysterious circumstances.
Everything seems to be going perfectly: Georg falls in love with Bulnakov's attractive secretary, Francoise, and takes on a lucrative project left unfinished by his predecessor, translating plans for military helicopters. But everything changes when Georg notices Francoise copying his plans. She tells Georg that Bulnakov has threatened to harm her brother, who lives in Poland, if she refuses to do his bidding. When Georg confronts Bulnakov Francoise disappears, and mysterious elements within the village try to hound him out. All he has left of Francoise is a picture she gave him of a church, which she told him was in Warsaw.
But when a friend tells him the church is actually in New York, Georg flies to America in a desperate bid to track down Francoise, and unravel the web of deceit. Tailed from his arrival, Georg quickly realises that he is stuck between the CIA and the KGB, and further out of his depth than he can begin to comprehend. But which side was he working for? Who is the mysterious Mr Bulkanoff? And did he ever know the real Francoise?
BERYL BRAINBRIDGE – THE BOTTLE FACTORY OUTING
Freda and Brenda spend their days working in an italian-run wine-bottling factory. A work outing offers promise for Freda and terror for Brenda; passions run high on that chilly day of freedom, and life after outing never returns to normal. Beryl Bainbridge dazzles readers in this offbeat, haunting yet hilarious novel.
BETH KERY – DARING
An intense and erotic tale of love across time from the New York Times ebook bestselling author of BECAUSE YOU ARE MINE.
Chicago Detective Ryan Daire has many secrets: a love for Shakespeare, an appreciation for the all the finer things in life, and an absolute lack of restraint in the bedroom. Now he has an even bigger secret. In every shifting shadow of the sprawling mansion he's recently inherited he can see her - tempting, ethereal, and untouchable. Hope Stillwater inhabited that mansion in 1906. Raw desire has formed a conduit between these two passionate souls who are separated by the barrier of time. Intoxicated by each other's presence, Ryan and Hope are closer than ever to crossing that inviting boundary between two worlds. But there is one grave danger: Ryan's job has put him on the trail of a depraved criminal in an investigation that's risking Hope's eternal fate and happiness. Now he must do whatever it takes to change history, protect Hope from harm, and set his own desires free.
BETH KERY – WHEN I’M WITH YOU
New York Times bestselling author Beth Kery’s blistering new novel of a man and a woman bound by the scandalous secrets of the past—and by the sexual hunger that still fuels their uncontrollable desires…
Out-of-control party girl and wealthy socialite Elise Martin has come to Chicago to prove to herself and the rest of the world that her life is truly worthwhile. But she never dreamed she’d find herself at the erotic mercy of the dynamic and wealthy Lucien Lenault, her girlhood crush, an irresistible enigma who renders women powerless and vulnerable...not to mention wholly insatiable.
But Elise isn’t just any woman. She’s used to playing with fire, and for her, discovering Lucien’s secrets is all part of the game. What brought Lucien to Chicago with a new name and a new identity? Who is Ian Noble, the provocative new stranger in Lucien’s shadow? And why has Lucien taken to following him in the night?
As the two of them get deeper into a dangerous sexual dance, Lucien can’t help but wonder if the exquisite firestorm that Elise has ignited could not only expose his secrets, but draw him dangerously close to the edge and leave both their futures in ashes.
BILL CHENG – SOUTHERN CROSS THE DOG
When the Great Flood of 1927 devastates Mississippi, eight-year-old Robert Chatham loses everything. Robert's adventures in the brooding swamplands - from hard labour to imprisonment to thwarted love - are full of courage, danger and heartbreak. This is story of how a small, hurt boy becomes a tough, young man: forced to choose between the lure of the future and the claims of his past. Set against one of the great American landscapes, Southern Cross the Dog is a mesmerizing and savagely beautiful novel. It marks the arrival of Bill Cheng as a writer of astonishing gifts.
BOB BURKE – THIRD PIG DETECTIVE AGENCY: HO HO HO MISTERY
The festive follow-up to The Third Pig Detective Agency.
When Father Christmas goes missing on Christmas Eve eve, Mrs Christmas calls on our intrepid hero Harry Pigg to track him down.
What follows is another hardboiled caper featuring fairy tale villains, plenty of red herrings, a few close shaves, a couple of punch ups and a very clever twist.
Aided and abetted by his sidekicks Jack Horner and the genie from the lamp, Harry tries to save Christmas before time runs out.
If only he didn’t have to deal with those bloody annoying elves.
Book Lovers – Emily Henry
Nora is a cut-throat literary agent at the top of her game. Her whole life is books.
Charlie is an editor with a gift for creating bestsellers. And he's Nora's work nemesis.
Nora has been through enough break-ups to know she's the one men date before finding their happy-ever-after. To prevent another dating dud, Nora's sister has persuaded her to swap her city desk for a month's holiday in Sunshine Falls.
It's a small town straight out of a romance novel, but instead of meeting sexy lumberjacks, handsome doctors or cute bartenders, Nora keeps bumping into...Charlie.
She's no heroine. He's no hero. So can they take a page out of an entirely different book?
Brimming with witty banter, characters you can't help but fall for and off-the-charts chemistry, Book Lovers is Emily Henry's best novel yet.
BRAD THOR – FULL BLACK
Everybody knows that governments engage in activities that are top secret and not always carried out by-the-book. They are knows as 'black ops'. But perhaps less well known is that there is a level beyond this, when the very existence of the state is threatened and the situation needs fixing instantly and utterly secretly and probably violently. Sometimes, it's necessary to go 'full black'. And when the USA is in that position, the man most likely to lead the mission is former Navy SEAL Scot Harvath.
FULL BLACK finds Harvath in Sweden, executing in an audacious plan to prevent a massive attack on the Unites States by leading a team to capture a suspected terrorist and infiltrate his cell with a double agent.
At the same time, Larry Solomon, one of the most famous film producers in Hollywood, is attacked in his home by a special forces-style group of assassins and only escapes with the help of his friend and former Delta Force operative Luke Ralston.
In making a documentary film, Solomon has unknowingly exposed one of the world's wealthiest and highly connected power-brokers as a man determined to plunge the West into deadly chaos. Now, both Solomon and Ralston are living on borrowed time.
As the plots rocket to their pulse-pounding conclusions, Harvath will be left with only one means to save his country. Unable to trust anyone, he will be forced to go FULL BLACK.
BRETT BATTLES – NO RETURN
Fans of Jason Bourne, James Bond or Jack Reacher will devour this high-octane, all-action thriller packed with grit, intrigue, suspense and break-neck-speed plot twists. Bestselling author Brett Battles has conjured up a heart-stopping masterpiece you won't be able to put down...'Battles keeps layering on the suspense until you can hardly breathe' -- Linwood Barclay'The best word I can use to describe his writing is addictive' - James Rollins'I was glued to each sentence as though my life depended on it' -- ***** Reader review'I could not put this book down' -- ***** Reader review'Addictively engrossing' -- ***** Reader review'A terrific story' -- ***** Reader review'Read it and you will not want to put it down....' -- ***** Reader review**********************************************************************************************SOMETIMES GOOD INTENTIONS CAN LAND YOU IN A WHOLE HEAP OF TROUBLE...When an F-18 Navy fighter careens out of the blue sky above the Mojave desert , TV cameraman Wes Stewart can see exactly what is going to happen next. Frantically, he races to the downed jet and tries to save the pilot's life.The plane explodes - and Wes escapes without harm but plunges into a murderous conspiracy.He finds himself up against the US military , the local police and someone who is tracking his every move. For, in the moments he spent with the dying pilot, Wes discovered something that could get him killed.But while he tries to untangle a web of lies and secrets surrounding the crash, another danger is stalking him.And this one he will never see coming.
BRIAN MCGILLOWAY – LITTLE GIRL LOST
Midwinter. A child is found wandering in an ancient woodland, her hands covered in blood. But it is not her own. Unwilling - or unable - to speak, the only person she seems to trust is the young officer who rescued her, Detective Sergeant Lucy Black. Soon afterwards, DS Black is baffled to find herself suddenly moved from a high-profile case involving a kidnapping of another girl, a prominent businessman's teenage daughter. At home, Black is struggling with caring for her increasingly unstable father, and trying to avoid conflict with her frosty mother - who also happens to be the Assistant Chief Constable. As she tries to identify the unclaimed child, Black begins to realise that her case and the kidnapping may be linked by events from the grimmest days of the country's recent history - events that also defined her own trouble childhood. Little Girl Lost is a devastating crime thriller about corruption, greed and vengeance, and a father's love for his daughter.
BRODI ASHTON – EVERTRUE
Inspired by the Persephone myth, this stunning conclusion to the Everneath trilogy, whose captivating first book earned a VOYA Perfect Ten of 2011 and a Whitney award, explores the resiliency of the human spirit and the indomitable power of true love. Perfect for fans of Fallen and Beautiful Creatures!
Now that Nikki has rescued Jack, all she wants is to be with him and graduate high school. But after being tricked by Cole, she's begun the process of turning into an Everliving herself . . . which means she must feed on a Forfeit soon—or die. Nikki and Jack begin a desperate attempt to reverse the process, using everything they can think of. Even Cole, who they expected to fight them at every turn, has become an unlikely ally—but for how long? Nikki needs to feed on Cole to survive, Cole needs Nikki to gain the throne in the Everneath, Jack needs Nikki because she is everything to him—and, together, they must travel back to the underworld to undo Nikki's fate and make her mortal once more.
Will Nikki be forced to spend eternity in the underworld—or does she have what it takes to bring down the Everneath once and for all?
Brothers Grimm Fairy Tales
Delve into the magical world of Brothers Grimm Fairy Tales with this beautifully crafted Bath Treasury of Children's Classics. Immerse yourself in the captivating stories of enchanted forests, talking animals and mystical creatures that have captured the hearts and imaginations of all ages for centuries.
C. J. REDWINE Deception (Defiance Trilogy, 2)
A rich postapocalyptic YA fantasy perfect for fans of Graceling and Tamora Pierce, this sequel to C. J. Redwine's Defiance continues the story of warrior Rachel Adams and her love, Logan McEntire. With their city-state ravaged, their lives threatened by rival armies, and a band of survivors looking to them for leadership—Rachel and Logan must work to forge a new future for them all.
Abandoning the ruins of their home to take their chances in the Wasteland, the group soon realizes their problems have only begun: an unknown killer —possibly inside their ranks—has begun picking off the survivors one by one. And Rachel and Logan must question whether the price of freedom may be too great—and whether they can make it out of the Wasteland alive.
C.J. BOX – BLUE HEAVEN
Winner of the Edgar Award for Best Novel.
Blue Heaven is the break-out novel from C. J. Box, the award-winning, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Joe Pickett series.
A twelve-year-old girl and her younger brother are on the run in the Idaho woods, pursued by four men they have just watched commit murder―four men who know exactly who William and Annie are. And where their mother lives.
Retired policemen from Los Angeles, the killers easily persuade the local sheriff to let them lead the search for the missing children. Now there's nowhere left for William and Annie to hide…and no one they can trust. Until they meet Jess Rawlins.
Rawlins, an old-school rancher, knows trouble when he sees it. He is only one against four men who will stop at nothing to silence their witnesses. But in this thrilling mystery novel from C.J. Box, these ex-cops don't know just how far Rawlins will go to protect William and Annie…and see that justice is done.
C.J. CHERRYH – EXPLORER
The sixth novel in Cherryh’s Foreigner space opera series, a groundbreaking tale of first contact and its consequences…
It has been nearly ten years since the starship Phoenix returned to Alpha, the station orbiting the world of the atevi, which had been abandoned following a rift between a faction of the station's inhabitants and the spacers' Pilot's Guild. The unexpected return of the Phoenix has forever changed the lives of both atevi and Mospheirans, for over the ensuing decade, the captains of the Phoenix have brought both species into space. Their motivation seemed simple: Reunion Station, a human station in another sector of space, had been destroyed by aliens.
But on his deathbed, the senior captain of the Phoenix admits that he lied to the crew—that Reunion was merely damaged, not destroyed, and many people may have survived. At this disclosure, the crew rebels and forces the Phoenix to undertake a rescue mission to Reunion.
Onboard the rescue mission are Bren Cameron, brilliant human paidhi representing the atevi ruler Tabini-aiji, and Tabini's grandmother Ilisidi, a fearsome and ambitious atevi leader with an agenda of her own. Trapped in a distant star system with little fuel left, facing a bellicose alien ship, how can Bren help to avoid interspecies war when the notoriously secretive Pilot's Guild aboard Reunion Station refuse to cooperate, and may have kept the inhabitants of their own station ignorant of their true situation?
The long-running Foreigner series can also be enjoyed by more casual genre readers in sub-trilogy installments. Explorer is the 6th Foreigner novel, and the 3rd book in the second subtrilogy.
