When Edgar plans to acquire his family's ancient estate from the corrupt lord keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland, he is met with the complexities of the legal and political situations following the 1707 Act of Union. To complicate matters further, Edgar is falling in love with his enemy's beautiful daughter Lucy.First published in 1819, this endu...

On a road trip through Africa, two English people-Bobby, a civil servant with a guilty appetite for African boys; and Linda, a supercilious "compound wife"-are driving back to their enclave after a stay in the capital. But in between lies the landscape of an unnamed country whose squalor and ethnic bloodletting suggest Idi Amin's Uganda. And the fa...

Set in England during Richard I's reign, Sir Walter Scott's fanciful, vivid reinterpretation of medieval life is a successful blend of fact, myth, and romance. Wilfred of Ivanhoe earns his father's disapproval by falling in love with Rowena, his father's ward. Then he serves with Richard I during the Crusades, while the King's brother attempts to t...

As the BBC's North America Editor, Jon Sopel has had a pretty busy time of it lately. In the 18 months it's taken for a reality star to go from laughingstock to leader of the free world, Jon has travelled the length and breadth of the United States, experiencing it from a perspective that most of us could only dream of: he has flown aboard Air Forc...

An ordinary lad from Sheffield, Jamie Vardy has become known as an against-the-odds footballing hero the world over. Yet a few years ago, things couldn't have been any more different. Rejected as a teenager by his boyhood club, Jamie thought his chance was gone. But from playing pub football and earning œ30 a week at Stocksbridge Park Steels,...

Eimear McBride's award-winning debut is an unforgettable novel from a major new literary talent. A Girl is a Half-formed Thing tells the story of a young woman's relationship with her brother, and the long shadow cast by his childhood brain tumour. It is a shocking and intimate insight into the thoughts, feelings and chaotic sexuality of a vulnerab...

A short life of Dickens which celebrates the impact of the theatre on his life and work. Acclaimed actor and writer Simon Callow captures the essence of Charles Dickens in a sparkling biography that explores the central importance of the theatre to the life of the greatest storyteller in the English language. From his early years as a child enterta...

From the best-selling author of Americanah and We Should All Be Feminists comes a powerful new statement about feminism today - written as a letter to a friend. I have some suggestions for how to raise Chizalum. But remember that you might do all the things I suggest, and she will still turn out to be different from what you hoped, because sometime...

Sunday Times Bestseller 'A paradigm-smashing chronicle of joyous entanglement' Charles Foster Waterstones Non-Fiction Book of the Month (September) Are trees social beings? How do trees live? Do they feel pain or have awareness of their surroundings? In The Hidden Life of Trees Peter Wohlleben makes the case that the forest is a social network. He...

The oldest long poem in Old English, written about 1000 A.D., Beowulf tells the story of a great warrior in Southern Scandinavia in both youth and maturity. The monster Grendel terrorises the Scyldings of Hrothgar's Danish Kingdom until Beowulf defeats him. As a result he has to face her enraged mother. Beowulf dies after a battle against a fierce...

When the naive David Balfour sets out on his quest for a long-lost relative, a terrifying chain of events is set in motion. He is plunged into a world of infamy and violence from which there seems no escape, until, that is, he meets the enigmatic and valiant Highlander, Alan Breck...Kidnapped is a captivating novel set around Scottish events of the...

Those who only know Charles Dickens from his novels will be fascinated to discover the private and personal Dickens in this selection of his letters. His sister-in-law Georgina Hogarth thought they expressed his individuality; his friend Forster thought them literature. They give us a portrait of a complex man with so many different facets to his p...

Quentin and Lottie Bredin can't afford to divorce, so must downsize and move their three children from London to Devon. Arrogant, adulterous Quentin can't understand Lottie's anger; while Lottie feels intolerably wounded. Why is their rent so low? What is the mystery surrounding their unappealing new home? The beautiful landscape conceals a dark si...

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of The Four Pillar Plan, written and read by Dr Rangan Chatterjee. In The Four Pillar Plan, Dr Rangan Chatterjee presents us with an incredibly simple framework for taking control of our health. He divides health into four pillars: diet, rest, sleep and movement. By making small, easily achievable changes in e...

Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of Anything is Possible by Elizabeth Strout, read by Kimberly Farr. An unforgettable cast of small-town characters copes with love and loss from the No. 1 New York Times bestselling and Man Booker long-listed author of My Name is Lucy Barton Recalling Olive Kitteridge in its richness,...

Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of Believe by Nicola Adams, read by Emma Swan. At London 2012, Nicola Adams made history. The flyweight boxer - nicknamed the smiling assassin - became the first ever woman to win an Olympic Gold medal for boxing. In Rio 2016, with the nation cheering her on, she did it all over again....

Can you define your life by a single song? Adam Sharp - former pianist in a hip Melbourne bar, now a respectable IT consultant in Norwich - can. And it's 'You're Going to Lose that Girl' . . . On the cusp of fifty and a happy introvert, Adam is content. He's the music expert at his local pub-quiz and he and his partner Claire rumble along. Life may...

Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable, audiobook edition of The Bible According to Spike Milligan, written and read by Spike Milligan. The Old Testament: but more mad, more merry, more... Milligan! "And God said, Let there be light; and there was light, but Eastern Electricity Board said He would have to wait until Thursday to be connected....

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Chasing the Dead by Tim Weaver, read by Joe Coen and Lee Ingleby. One year ago, Alex Towne's body was found. One month ago, his mother saw him on the street. One week ago, David Raker agreed to look for him. Now he wishes he hadn't. Mary Towne's son, Alex, went missing six years ago. Five years later he fin...

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Close to Home by Cara Hunter, read by Emma Cunniffe and Lee Ingleby. HOW CAN A CHILD VANISH WITHOUT A TRACE? Last night, 8-year-old Daisy Mason disappeared from a summer party at her home. No one at the party noticed her leave. Even her parents aren't sure of the last time they saw her. DI Adam Fawley is tr...

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of The Darkest Hour by Anthony McCarten, read by Sean Barrett. From the prize-winning screenwriter of The Theory of Everything, this is a cinematic, behind-the-scenes account of a crucial moment which takes us inside the mind of one of the world's greatest leaders - and provides a revisionist, more rounded por...