Literature & Fiction

In the fading days of summer 2011, self-taught astrophysicist Petra has calculated that the atmosphere will collapse in a few weeks’ time—on September 21, at approximately 9:20 p.m.—ending the world as we know it. But the distraught Petra will not have to carry the burden of this terrible news alone for long. Fate intervenes, bringing her into the orbit of a pair of unlikely companions: Johan, a man whose intellectual prowess is remarkably overshadowed by his culinary skills, and Agnes, a seventy-five-year-old widow who has made a fortune posing as a young influencer on social media.

Twenty years after Ocean Views went off the air, the beloved TV show about teenage romance and angst is back. No one is more surprised than its former star, Agnes “Ness” Larkin, that she’s agreed to step back into the role of Aubrey Grant. After her father/manager took off with her earnings, Ness ran away from the spotlight in shame. But maybe it’s time to stare her past, and her castmates, in their discreetly Botoxed faces.

David Crader is a has-been. A former child actor from the hit teen drama Rev Beach, he now rotates between his new roles as deadbeat dad, part-time alcoholic, and occasional videogame voice actor. But when David is summoned to Los Angeles by Grace, his ex-wife and former co-star, he suddenly sees an opportunity for a reboot—not just of the show that made him famous, but also of his listless existence.

Everything is a Little Broken invites listeners to both laugh and cry at some of the painful, heart-wrenching, and absurd moments Mira Cayne and her father, Matt Frank, experience as age and infirmity begin to take their toll. Their story will be instantly recognizable to the 41 million Americans caring for older adults in their lives.

For the staff of the library at the center of The Widening Stain, it's easy enough to dismiss the death of a woman who fell from a rolling ladder as nothing more than an unfortunate accident. It's more difficult, however, to explain away the strangled corpse of a man found inside a locked room, surrounded by rare and obscure erotica.

Eighteen years have elapsed since Jason Apsley grabbed his second chance after time traveling forty-two years into the past. It's now 1994, and those time-travelling calamitous years of the late 70s and 80s are now a distant memory. Life is perfect or is it? Jason's worst nightmare becomes a reality when a mysterious letter appears, suggesting his immediate future may not be as rosy as expected. As the chaos ensues, an inquisitive journalist and DCI French close in on the truth about his past. Will time repeat itself, or can Jason, once again, alter the future?

Meet Carter Kovac disgraced art dealer turned reluctant, bumbling private detective. After inheriting his famous father's detective agency, he immediately becomes entangled in a mysterious web of intrigue and murder--and the police think he's the culprit. Or they'd at least like to pin it on him, as that'd save a lot of time.

After being laid off from his executive job with a California high-tech company, a man and his wife decide to leave the “rat race” and move to a tropical island on the coast of North Carolina. The culture of the island and its people are completely different from this cosmopolitan couple, who struggle to adapt to the island’s Southern, down-home, Redneck residents.

After David’s bizarre fall from grace, he has absolutely no idea what to do. No one in known history had ever been sent back to mortality as punishment before, and it’s no surprise when David falls into a deep depression. How could a mortal fulfill the duties of a guardian angel? And how could he ever live down the shame? With no other choice, David is forced to push onward with faith, just like any other mortal, and find new purpose in life.

Dive into the hilariously cunning world of "How to Get a Promotion Without Deserving One," a must-listen satire by Tom Baker & Paul Evans. This witty exploration of office politics through the eyes of the unforgettable "Chad" will have you laughing, cringing, and nodding in recognition.

Written in a hospital tent to the sound of gunfire and shells falling, Cicely Hamilton drew on her experiences working in France during WW1 to tell the story of William Tully and his new bride Griselda, who are wrenched away from their all-consuming interests – socialism and votes for women – and plunged into the almost dream-like horror of war. As brutal tragedy strikes, their attitude to both pacifism and patriotism is altered and their lives are changed forever.

In the eccentric world of 'Pussy Productions,' a London-based porn production company, a motley crew of individuals find themselves inexplicably thrown together. How this incendiary mix of people came to converge is a curious tale in itself. Sir Stott, a knighted Etonian, longs for the elegant normality of his pre-Pussy Productions life. Meanwhile, Hazelhot, an ex-military psychopath, is hell-bent on sowing violent, bloody chaos wherever he goes.

A comedy - although with human trafficking. Also a tempest, a shipwreck or two (described by the actors but invisible to the audience - and thus perfectly adapted to an audioplay), a wallet with special trinkets lost at sea, and a special fishing line.... And of course the almost unpronounceable names of antiquity.

Middle-aged governess Guinevere Pettigrew visits her employment agency one morning and is mistakenly sent to the glitzy home of a nightclub singer. Miss Pettigrew meets the glamorous Miss Delysia LaFosse and embarks on a whirlwind adventure. These two very different women soon become friends, and Miss Pettigrew proves to be the perfect companion. Instead of having to look after unruly children, Miss Pettigrew spends her evening at a party. But what will happen when the day finally ends?

A magical imagining of the fate of a fictional boy whose life is shaped forever when he loses out on the role of Harry Potter.

Margaret Atwood's The Robber Bride is inspired by "The Robber Bridegroom", a wonderfully grisly tale from the Brothers Grimm in which an evil groom lures three maidens into his lair and devours them, one by one. But in her version, Atwood brilliantly recasts the monster as Zenia, a villainess of demonic proportions, and sets her loose in the lives of three friends.

Frances Price - tart widow, possessive mother, and Upper East Side force of nature - is in dire straits, beset by scandal and impending bankruptcy. Her adult son Malcolm is no help, mired in a permanent state of arrested development. And then there’s the Price’s aging cat, Small Frank, who Frances believes houses the spirit of her late husband, an infamously immoral litigator and world-class cad whose gruesome tabloid death rendered Frances and Malcolm social outcasts. Putting penury and pariahdom behind them, the family decides to cut their losses and head for the exit.

American Howard W. Campbell, Jr., a spy during World War II, is now on trial in Israel as a Nazi war criminal. But is he really guilty? In this brilliant book rife with true gallows humor, Kurt Vonnegut turns black and white into a chilling shade of grey with a verdict that will haunt us all. Mother Night is a daring challenge to our moral sense.

Quand Samantha accepte l’invitation à une soirée organisée par quatre filles un peu sinistres, elle plonge sans le savoir dans un monde inquiétant, entre le conte de fées et l’histoire d’horreur.

Irina obsessively takes explicit photographs of the average-looking men she persuades to model for her, scouted from the streets of Newcastle. Placed on sabbatical from her dead-end bar job, she is offered an exhibition at a fashionable London gallery, promising to revive her career in the art world and offering an escape from her rut of drugs, alcohol and extreme cinema. The news triggers a self-destructive tailspin, centred around Irina's relationship with her obsessive best friend and a shy young man from her local supermarket who has attracted her attention....

In 1920s America, a plague is spreading fast. From New Orleans to Chicago to New York, the "Jes Grew" epidemic makes people desperate to dance, overturning social norms in the process. Anyone is vulnerable and when they catch it, they'll bump and grind into a frenzy. Working to combat the Jes Grew infection are the puritanical Atonists, a group bent on cultivating a "Talking Android", an African American who will infiltrate the unruly black communities and help crush the outbreak.

A man with dark thoughts on his mind is racing along the remote snowy roads of Hurmevaara in Finland when there is flash in the sky and something crashes into the car. That something turns about to be a highly valuable meteorite. With euro signs lighting up the eyes of the locals, the unexpected treasure is temporarily placed in a neighbourhood museum, under the watchful eye of a priest named Joel.    

"Tu fais quoi à Noël ? - Moi je me suicide, et toi ?" Bien sûr, dit comme ça, ça peut paraître sinistre, mais, à quarante-cinq ans, c'est ma meilleure option. Ce n'est pas comme si je faisais des malheureux autour de moi. Comme si j'abandonnais mari et enfants. Je n'ai ni chien ni chat. Même pas un perroquet pour me pleurer. Et puis ça me laisse deux mois pour faire connaissance avec mon vrai moi. Deux mois c'est court. Ou long, ça dépend de ce qui se passe, en fait.

After an eventful first week on the job, Game Warden Jadyn St. James is happy the small bayou town of Mudbug, Louisiana, seems to have fallen back into its normal routine. But when FBI agent Raissa Bordeaux is kidnapped, Jadyn is certain the short-lived peace has come to an abrupt end. Statistics don’t lie, and Jadyn knows that the longer Raissa remains missing, the less likely she’ll be found alive. Sheriff Colt Bertrand knows the FBI won’t let him participate in their investigation, but is certain the federal agents aren’t as qualified as he is to locate someone missing in the swamps surrounding Mudbug.

LoveStar, the enigmatic and obsessively driven founder of the LoveStar corporation, has unlocked the key to transmitting data via birdwaves, thus freeing mankind from wires and devices, and allowing consumerism, technology, and science to run rampant over all aspects of daily life. Cordless modern men and women are paid to howl advertisements at unsuspecting passers-by, REGRET machines eliminate doubt over roads not taken, soul mates are identified and brought together (while existing, unscientifically validated relationships are driven remorselessly asunder), and rocketing the dead into the sky becomes both a status symbol and a beautiful, cathartic show.

L'été́ de mes dix-huit ans devait être le meilleur de toute ma vie. J'avais réussi à décrocher un job bien payé qui allait me permettre de remplacer ma vieille voiture et de mettre de l'argent de côté avant de rentrer à la fac. Tout était censé bien se passer. J'avais tout calculé. Et puis je l'ai rencontré́, lui. Aleks Pierson. Le fils de mes patrons. Ce qu'il y avait entre nous était beau, fort, absolument bouleversant. Notre idylle aurait pu être mon histoire de cendrillon, celle qui se finit avec un " ils se marièrent et eurent beaucoup d'enfants ".

Harriet is leaving her boyfriend Claude, "the French rat". That at least is how Harriet sees things, even if it’s Claude who has just asked Harriet to leave his Greenwich Village apartment. Well, one way or another she has no intention of leaving. To the contrary, she will stay and exact revenge - or would have if Claude had not had her unceremoniously evicted. Still, though moved out, Harriet is not about to move on. Not in any way. Girlfriends circle around to patronize and advise, but Harriet only takes offense, and it’s easy to understand why.

Looking for a way out of the rat race? Tired of your ho-hum, workaday life? Have an inexplicable love of turning human beings into inanimate objects? Then professional supervillainy might just be for you! With tips from the renowned founder and overlord of the International Society of Supervillains, The Supervillain Handbook is your one-stop-shop for everything evil. Gain invaluable insight on the art of revenge, choosing your evil name, where to find the perfect lair, and much more!

Après le succès de "Celle qui a dit fuck". Moi, c'est Alice. Maman, working girl, épouse, sœur, copine, GO (grincheuse organisatrice), taxi, infirmière, mouchoir géant... Ma vie ressemble à celle d'une super woman, les strass, les paillettes et la reconnaissance en moins. Telle une funambule sur le fil de la vie, j'essaye de trouver l'équilibre entre mon boulot (aussi éprouvant qu'un épisode de Game of Thrones), mes filles, que j'aime plus que tout au monde (surtout le lundi, le mardi, le jeudi et le vendredi, quand elles sont à l'école).

Lucien est mort. "C'est bien triste" se lamentent au bar du coin ses quatre copains. Pire encore : il a été retrouvé froid sur ses toilettes, lui qui ne s'était jamais montré négligé en public ! Martial, Gilbert, Jacques et Armand sont unanimes : pas question de clamser aussi bêtement ! La bande de septuagénaires a alors une idée folle : chacun va planifier sa propre mort. Quand ils veulent, comme ils veulent ! Enfin, ils vont tout oser.