Historical Trees

When Nicole Rayburn travels to Lockwood Hall and begins to research Alys’s story for a new book, she discovers startling irregularities in Alys’s case. Nicole’s suspicions mount as every answer leads to more questions. What really happened to Alys? And what became of her son, who disappeared the day she was hanged? Could it be that Alys’s death was the result of a well-planned conspiracy, or is there another, less obvious answer? And who is trying to sabotage Nicole's efforts by stealing her work?

A blend of history, science, philosophy, and environmentalism, The Tree is an engaging and elegant look at the life of the tree and what modern research tells us about their future. There are redwoods in California that were ancient by the time Columbus first landed, and pines still alive that...

Sixteen-year-old Lorena Leland’s dreams of a rich and fulfilling life as a writer are dashed when the stock market crashes in 1929. Seven years into the Great Depression, Rena’s banker father has retreated into the bottle, her sister is married to a lazy charlatan and gambler, and Rena is an unemployed newspaper reporter. Eager for any writing job, Rena accepts a position interviewing former slaves for the Federal Writers’ Project. There, she meets Frankie Washington, a 101-year-old woman whose honest yet tragic past captivates Rena.

How do trees live? Do they feel pain or have awareness of their surroundings? Research is now suggesting trees are capable of much more than we have ever known. In The Hidden Life of Trees, forester Peter Wohlleben puts groundbreaking scientific discoveries into a language everyone can relate to.

Percival Everett's The Trees is a must-listen that opens with a series of brutal murders in the rural town of Money, Mississippi. When a pair of detectives from the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation arrive, they meet expected resistance from the local sheriff, his deputy, the coroner, and a string of racist White townsfolk. The murders present a puzzle, for at each crime scene there is a second dead body: that of a man who resembles Emmett Till.

Lady Maximilian is the daughter of the powerful Duke Croyso, but she is rarely allowed outside her family’s sprawling castle for fear that her stutter will tarnish their noble name. When she is forced to marry Sir Riftan, a lowborn knight caught in one of her father’s schemes, Maxi doesn’t dare hope for happiness, let alone love. Her stumbling communication and his gruff manner sour their relationship before it can begin, and Riftan leaves without a word the morning after their vows are exchanged.

Present day. As a love affair comes to an end, and with it her dreams for her future, artist Selena needs a retreat. The picture-postcard Sloe Cottage in the Somerset village of Ashcombe promises to be the perfect place to forget her problems, and Selena settles into her new home as spring arrives. 1682: Grace Cotter longs for nothing more than a husband and family of her own. Separated by three hundred years, two women are drawn together by a home bathed in blood and magic.

Abe is haunted by the sudden loss of both of his parents. Left to manage a New-Hampshire land grant and its troublesome Royal Navy mast trees with only his eccentric aunt to guide him, he finds comfort in a new friendship with Betty, a decidedly odd neighbor. Defying the Royal Governor’s crackdowns and his aunt’s commands, Abe makes choices that put him on a collision course with both. With rebellion in the air, Abe must escape detection by the Governor’s agents and solve the puzzle of Betty’s past in order to secure his future.

Following on from the bestselling The Seven Sisters and The Storm Sister, The Shadow Sister is the third book in Lucinda Riley's spellbinding series of love and loss, inspired by the mythology of the Seven Sisters constellation. Read by Fiona Button (This Is Not a Pity Memoir, Your Word Or Mine)...

Finn doesn't remember much about her previous life, and in a world that has been changed by the wars of the Tuatha De, where trust is hard to come by, answers are even more difficult to find. Little does she know, an unknown evil tugs on the strings of fate, and the answers she so desperately seeks may be more important than she could have ever imagined.

Most fairytales end with a wedding and a happily-ever-after—but this is no fairytale. The updated and official translation of Under the Oak Tree, the #1 webnovel on MANTA, continues in this second volume. As her first winter in Anatol turns to spring, Lady Maximilian finds herself confronting...

The story of a single tree, from the moment the seed is released from its cone until, more than 500 years later, it lies on the forest floor as a nurse log, giving life to ferns, mosses, and hemlocks, even as its own life is ending.

A mesmerizing odyssey through an unforgiving landscape, and the rich history it reveals. What does it mean to explore and confront the unknown? Beyond the Trees recounts Adam Shoalts's epic, never-before-attempted solo crossing of Canada's mainland Arctic in a single season. It's also a...

Genevieve Charbonneau talks to ghosts and has a special relationship with rattlesnakes. In her travels, she’s wandered throughout the South, working in a Louisiana circus and as a hootchy kootch dancer in Texas. Now for the first time in a decade, she’s allowed her winding path to bring her to the site of her grandmother’s Arkansas farmhouse, a place hallowed in her memory. Disguised by years in exile and a name she found on a gravestone, Genevieve intends only to visit briefly and leave.

The Persimmon Tree opens in Indonesia in 1942 on the cusp of Japanese invasion and the evacuation of Batavia (Jakarta) by the Dutch. Seventeen-year-old Nicholas Duncan is on holiday there, in pursuit of an exotic butterfly known as the Magpie Crow. It's an uncertain, dangerous time to be in Indonesia, and Nick's options of getting out are fast dwindling. Amidst the fear and chaos he falls in love with Anna, the beautiful daughter of a Dutch acquaintance, and she nicknames him 'Mr Butterfly'.

In The Heartbeat of Trees, renowned forester Peter Wohlleben draws on new scientific discoveries to show how humans are deeply connected to the natural world. In an era of climate change, many of us fear we’ve lost our connection to nature - but Peter Wohlleben is convinced that age-old ties linking humans to the forest remain alive and intact. We just have to know where to look.

From the Booker Prize finalist, author of The Island of Missing Trees, an enchanting new tale about three characters living along two great rivers, all connected by a single drop of water. "Make place for Elif Shafak on your bookshelf. Make place for her in your heart too. You won't regret it...

For twenty years Elizabeth Bennet had lived, quite contentedly, as the second daughter of a country squire. During her Easter visit to her newly married friend, Lizzy has the dubious pleasure of being introduced to Lady Catherine de Bourgh and her cosseted daughter. To Elizabeth’s surprise, the pair take a keen interest in a mere adopted daughter of the Bennet family, and when Mr. Darcy dutifully pays his annual visit to Rosings Park, her life takes a wholly unexpected turn.

Readers of exciting, challenging and visionary literary fiction—including admirers of Norman Rush's Mating, Ann Patchett's State of Wonder, Barbara Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible, and Peter Matthiessen's At Play in the Fields of the Lord—will be drawn to this astonishingly gripping and...

New York Times Bestseller * New York Public Library Best Book of 2016 * Chicago Public Library Best Book of 2016 * Kirkus Best Book of the Year Fans of acclaimed author Kendare Blake’s Anna Dressed in Blood will devour Three Dark Crowns, the first book in a dark and inventive fantasy series...