{"title":"Fiction Q-Z","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"9781526624246","title":"A Swim in a Pond in the Rain : From the Man Booker Prize-winning, New York Times-bestselling author of Lincoln in the Bardo","description":"\u003ch3\u003eAuthor: George Saunders\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003ch4\u003eRussian\u003c\/h4\u003e\u003ch5\u003ePublished on 19 April 2022 by Bloomsbury Publishing PLC in the United Kingdom.\u003c\/h5\u003e\u003ch4\u003ePaperback | 432 pages\u003cbr\u003e130 x 197 x 30mm | 346g\u003c\/h4\u003e\u003chr\u003e\u003cp\u003eTHE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER'A masterclass from a warm and engagingly enthusiastic companion' Guardian ‘This book is a delight, and it’s about delight too. How necessary, at our particular moment’ Tessa HadleyFrom the New York Times-bestselling, Booker Prize-winning author of Lincoln in the Bardo and Tenth of December comes a literary master class on what makes great stories work and what they can tell us about ourselves - and our world today.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFor the last twenty years, George Saunders has been teaching a class on the Russian short story to his university students. In A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, he shares a version of that class with us. Paired with iconic short stories by Chekhov, Turgenev, Tolstoy, and Gogol, these essays are for anyone interested in how fiction works and why it’s more relevant than ever in these turbulent times.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFunny, frank and rigorous, A Swim in the Pond in the Rain ultimately shows how great fiction can change a person's life and become a benchmark of their moral and ethical beliefs.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e'Part intro to Russian literature, part musings on craft, A Swim in the Pond in the Rain is all pleasure'Financial Times\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"George Saunders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58288252289349,"sku":"9781526624246","price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0994\/3721\/6069\/files\/9781526624246.jpg?v=1781599150"},{"product_id":"9781837266593","title":"A Whole Life","description":"\u003ch3\u003eAuthor: Robert Seethaler\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003ch4\u003eModern \u0026amp; contemporary fiction (post c 1945)\u003c\/h4\u003e\u003ch5\u003ePublished on 9 April 2026 by Canongate Books (Canongate Canons) in the United Kingdom as part of 'the Canons' series.\u003c\/h5\u003e\u003ch4\u003ePaperback | 160 pages\u003cbr\u003e128 x 197 x 12mm | 120g\u003c\/h4\u003e\u003chr\u003e\u003cp\u003eAndreas Egger knows every path and peak of his mountain valley, the source of his sustenance, his livelihood - his home.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Set in the mid-twentieth century and told with beauty and tenderness, Robert Seethaler's A Whole Life is a story of man's relationship with an ancient landscape, of the value of solitude, of the arrival of the modern world, and above all, of the moments, great and small, that make us who we are.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Robert Seethaler","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58288252354885,"sku":"9781837266593","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0994\/3721\/6069\/files\/9781837266593.jpg?v=1781599152"},{"product_id":"9780571340996","title":"All My Puny Sorrows","description":"\u003ch3\u003eAuthor: Miriam Toews\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003ch4\u003eModern \u0026amp; contemporary fiction (post c 1945)\u003c\/h4\u003e\u003ch5\u003ePublished on 6 September 2018 by FABER \u0026amp; FABER in the United Kingdom.\u003c\/h5\u003e\u003ch4\u003ePaperback | 336 pages\u003cbr\u003e174 x 169 x 21mm | 266g\u003c\/h4\u003e\u003chr\u003e\u003cp\u003eShortlisted for the Folio Prize 2015Shortlisted for the Wellcome Book Prize 2015Sunday Times Top Choice Summer ReadA SUNDAY TIMES TOP 100 NOVEL OF THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURYElf and Yoli are two smart, loving sisters.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eElf is a world-renowned pianist, glamorous, wealthy, happily married: she wants to die.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eYoli is divorced, broke, sleeping with the wrong men: she desperately wants to keep her older sister alive.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhen Elf's latest suicide attempt leaves her hospitalised weeks before her highly anticipated world tour, Yoli is forced to confront the impossible question of whether it is better to let a loved one go.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e'The novel she has written - so exquisitely that you'll want to savour every word - reads as if it has been wrenched from her heart.' Christina Patterson, Sunday Times'[Toews] has produced a masterly book of such precise dignity. It is, also against all the odds, at times a desperately humorous novel.' Daily Mail\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Miriam Toews","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58288252420421,"sku":"9780571340996","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0994\/3721\/6069\/files\/9780571340996.jpg?v=1781599154"},{"product_id":"9781526612656","title":"Brother of the More Famous Jack : A 40th Anniversary Edition of the Coming-of-Age Classic","description":"\u003ch3\u003eAuthor: Barbara Trapido\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003ch4\u003eModern \u0026amp; contemporary fiction (post c 1945)\u003c\/h4\u003e\u003ch5\u003ePublished on 17 March 2022 by Bloomsbury Publishing PLC in the United Kingdom.\u003c\/h5\u003e\u003ch4\u003ePaperback | 272 pages\u003cbr\u003e131 x 197 x 20mm | 196g\u003c\/h4\u003e\u003chr\u003e\u003cp\u003e**BBC Radio 4 Book at Bedtime**A JOYFUL 40TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION OF A COMING-OF-AGE CLASSIC‘There are few modern tales of first love and its disillusions that are as thoroughly realised, as brilliantly lewd, and as hilariously satisfying to men and women of all ages as this one’ - Rachel CuskEighteen-year-old Katherine - bright, stylish, frustratedly suburban - doesn't know how her life will change when the brilliant Jacob Goldman first offers her a place at university. 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There’s no other book I love more’ - Caroline O'Donoghue, Sentimental Garbage‘Reading it again is as comforting as eating toast and Marmite between clean, fresh sheets’ - Rachel Cooke, Sunday Times‘Think Brideshead Revisited set in the 1970s, only sexier and much funnier. It kills me that I didn’t read it at university, when I really needed it’ - Meg Rosoff, New Statesman\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Barbara Trapido","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58288252518725,"sku":"9781526612656","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0994\/3721\/6069\/files\/9781526612656.jpg?v=1781599157"},{"product_id":"9781786890153","title":"Come Again","description":"\u003ch3\u003eAuthor: Robert Webb\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003ch4\u003eModern \u0026amp; contemporary fiction (post c 1945)\u003c\/h4\u003e\u003ch5\u003ePublished on 29 April 2021 by Canongate Books in the United Kingdom.\u003c\/h5\u003e\u003ch4\u003ePaperback | 304 pages\u003cbr\u003e127 x 195 x 29mm | 228g\u003c\/h4\u003e\u003chr\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe debut novel - a time-travelling story of love and adventure - from the number one bestselling author of How Not To Be a Boy and star of Peep Show'Part adventure, part love story, part comedy' Sunday Times'Fabulously Nineties and enjoyable' Daily MailFirst Love. 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From her days as a wild child in prohibition America to the blitz and glitz of wartime London, she is determined to live an independent life.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBut it is an obsession with flight that consumes her most.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHaving become one of the most fearless pilots in her time, she sets out to do what no one has done before: to circumnavigate the globe from pole to pole.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBut shortly before completing the journey, her plane disappears, lost to history.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOver half a century later, troubled film star Hadley Baxter is offered to play Marian in the comeback role of a lifetime. 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Immense story with beautifully created characters***** The story is so well researched and planned; historical fiction standing side by side with history itself***** This is a stunning achievement, my perspective feels fundamentally transformed through reading it***** A wonderful saga, covering a large chunk of the twentieth century\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Maggie Shipstead","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58288252780869,"sku":"9781529176643","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0994\/3721\/6069\/files\/9781529176643.jpg?v=1781599161"},{"product_id":"9781526621825","title":"Gunk : ‘One of the year's standout books’ SUNDAY TIMES","description":"\u003ch3\u003eAuthor: Saba Sams\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003ch4\u003eModern \u0026amp; contemporary fiction (post c 1945)\u003c\/h4\u003e\u003ch5\u003ePublished on 7 May 2026 by Bloomsbury Publishing PLC in the United Kingdom.\u003c\/h5\u003e\u003ch4\u003ePaperback | 240 pages\u003cbr\u003e128 x 197 x 19mm | 172g\u003c\/h4\u003e\u003chr\u003e\u003cp\u003e**Longlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize 2026****Finalist for the Nota Bene Prize****Selected as a Book of the Summer 2025 by the Guardian, The Times, Sunday Times, independent.co.uk, Vogue and Marie Claire****Selected as a 2025 book to look out for by the Guardian, Sunday Times, Irish Times, independent.co.uk, Cosmopolitan, Elle and Service95**‘Raw, original and provoking, Saba Sams is Britain's brightest debut novelist’ Vogue‘An immersive story about love and the softening borders around what family can be’ Sheena Patel'A joy to read' The Times ‘An intimate and tender exploration of love's possibilities’ Sophie Mackintosh'Raw, powerful and beautiful' Observer‘A nuanced exploration of friendship, queerness and love’ Jessica Andrews‘I loved this’ Nicola DinanJules has been divorced from her ex-husband Leon for ­five years, but she still works alongside him at Gunk, the grotty student nightclub he owns in central Brighton. She spends her nights serving shots and watching, from behind the bar, as Leon flirts with students on the dancefloor.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBut then Leon hires nineteen-year-old Nim to work the bar – and her arrival jolts Jules awake for the ­ first time in years. When Nim discovers she’s pregnant, Jules agrees to help. As the months pass, and the relationship between the two women grows increasingly intimate and perplexing, it emerges that Nim has her own unexpected gifts to give.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNow, alone in her small flat, Jules is holding a baby, just twenty-four hours old, who still smells of Nim. But no one knows where Nim is, or if she’s coming back. 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As war sweeps across Europe, Max Carver's father moves his family away from the city, to an old wooden house on the coast. But as soon as they arrive, strange things begin to happen:  Max discovers a garden filled with eerie statues; his sisters are plagued by unsettling dreams and voices; a box of old films opens a window to the past.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eMost unsettling of all are rumours about the previous owners and the mysterious disappearance of their son. 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