Elisabeth Devine causes quite a stir on her arrival in the village. No one can understand why the head of a big inner city school would want to come to sleepy little Barton-in-the-Dale, to a primary with more problems than school dinners. And that's not even counting the challenges the mysterious Elisabeth herself will face: a bitter former head te...

Eleanor Oliphant leads a simple life. She wears the same clothes to work every day, eats the same meal deal for lunch every day and buys the same two bottles of vodka to drink every weekend. Nothing is missing from her carefully timetabled life. Except, sometimes, everything. One simple act of kindness is about to shatter the walls Eleanor has buil...

Ella and John have shared a wonderful life for more than 60 years. Now they're on the run from their doctors and middle-aged children, who just want them to go gently into that undignified night of old age. In their trusty camper van, the pair embark on a forbidden vacation of rediscovery along Route 66. Though time is catching up with them, Ella i...

There are three things you should know about Elsie.The first thing is that she's my best friend. The second is that she always knows what to say to make me feel better. And the third thing...might take a little bit more explaining. Eighty-four-year-old Florence has fallen in her flat at Cherry Tree Home for the Elderly. As she waits to be rescued,...

Martin Gilmour and Ben Fitzmaurice have been best friends for 25 years, since their days together at Burtonbury School. They are an unlikely pair: the scholarship boy with the wrong accent and clothes, and the dazzlingly popular, wealthy young aristocrat. But Martin knows no one else can understand the bond they share - and no one else could have k...

Come to the Comfort Food Cafe for sunshine, smiles and plenty of truly scrumptious lemon drizzle cake. For Willow, the ramshackle caf‚ overlooking the beach, together with its warmhearted community, offers friendship as a daily special and always has a hearty welcome on the menu. But when a handsome stranger blows in on a warm spring breeze,...

Harper wakes every night, terrified of the sounds outside his hut halfway up the mountain in Bali. He is afraid that his past as a mercenary has caught up with him and that his life may now be in danger. As he waits to discover his fate, he meets Rita, a woman with her own tragic past, and begins a passionate affair. Their exile makes Harper realis...

Penguin presents the complete unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of The Shape of Bones by Daniel Galera, read by Charlie Anson. From one of Brazil's foremost literary voices comes a gripping, visceral new novel about youth, power and the nature of manhood A man rises at 5 a.m. and leaves his home. He does not wake his wife or child to bid t...

One hot August day a family drives to a mountain clearing to collect birch wood. Jenny, the mother, is in charge of lopping any small limbs off the logs with a hatchet. Wade, the father, does the stacking. The two daughters, June and May, aged nine and six, drink lemonade, swat away horseflies, bicker, sing snatches of songs as they while away the...

Masha's life has stopped. Once a spirited, independent woman with a rebellious streak, her life has been forever changed by a tragic event twelve years ago. Unable to let go of her grief, she finds solace in the silent company of the souls of her local Victorian cemetery and at the town's lido, where she seeks refuge underwater - safe from the nois...

Daniel is heading north. He is looking for someone. The simplicity of his early life with Daddy and Cathy has turned sour and fearful. They lived apart in the house that Daddy built for them with his bare hands. They foraged and hunted. When they were younger, Daniel and Cathy had gone to school. But they were not like the other children then, and...

After getting a note demanding his presence, Federal Agent Aaron Falk arrives in his hometown for the first time in decades to attend the funeral of his best friend, Luke. Twenty years ago when Falk was accused of murder, Luke was his alibi. Falk and his father fled under a cloud of suspicion, saved from prosecution only because of Luke's steadfast...

Malaya, 1949. After studying law at Cambridge and time spent helping to prosecute Japanese war criminals, Yun Ling Teoh, herself the scarred lone survivor of a brutal Japanese wartime camp, seeks solace among the jungle fringed plantations of Northern Malaya where she grew up as a child. There she discovers Yugiri, the only Japanese garden in Malay...

Eva and Jim are nineteen and students at Cambridge when their paths first cross in 1958. And then there is David, Eva's then-lover, an ambitious actor who loves Eva deeply. The Versions of Us follows the three different courses their lives could take following this first meeting. Lives filled with love, betrayal, ambition but through it all is a de...

For thirty years, best friends Stephanie and Philippa have been practically inseparable. There's nothing they would not do for one another. Until a few simple words change everything. 'I need you to say that I was with you.' Both women have always believed that friendship is built on mutual selflessness, compromise and trust. Are those beliefs now...

England, 1932: Grace Hamblin, the beekeeper's daughter, knows her place and her future, until her father dies. She's alone, except for one man who she just can't shake from her thoughts. Massachusetts, 1973: Grace's daughter Trixie Valentine is in love. But when he has to go home to England, he promises to come back, if she will wait for him. Both...

For philosophically-minded Isabel Dalhousie, editor of the Review of Applied Ethics, getting through life with a clear conscience requires careful thought. And whilst juggling the arrival of baby Charlie, a passionate relationship with his father Jamie, a truce with her furious niece Cat, and struggles for authority over her son with her formidable...

Bestselling author Alexander McCall Smith captures the strange wonderful goings on of the residents and visitors at Corduroy Mansions, Pimlico, from nasty Liberal Democrat MP Oedipus Snark to the newest resident, Pimlico Terrier Freddie de la Hay.

One night, George Duncan is woken by a noise in his garden. Impossibly, a great white crane has tumbled to earth, shot through its wing by an arrow. Unexpectedly moved, George helps the bird, and from the moment he watches it fly off, his life is transformed. The next day, a kind but enigmatic woman walks into George's shop. Suddenly a new world op...

There are four words Ceri D'Altroy never wants to hear: 'I took your advice'. She's all for following your heart and living your dreams, but not because she's told you to do so. Unfortunately, having moved away from London to become a psychology lecturer, all she seems to do is inspire people to change their lives. There's Ed, who's decided to ask...

A novel about love and following one's heart, and the unexpected places to which this can lead us. At the age of four Clover chooses her own name. Aged six, she falls in love with her best friend, James. But in the adult world, things are not so simple: Clover's mother finds she's fallen out of love with her husband, and realises that James's fathe...