Night Music

IT'S NEVER TOO LATE TO BLOOM'If, like me, you never stopped to think what a child born of The Rosie Project's Don Tillman and Bridget Jones might be like, there's one way to find out. Read Sarah Haywood's The Cactus. Meet Susan Green. She doesn't understand how funny she is, which is delicious.' Julia Claiborne Johnson, author of Be Frank with MePeople aren't sure what to make of Susan Green - family and colleagues find her prickly and hard to understand, but Susan makes perfect sense to herself, and that's all she needs. At forty-five, she thinks her life is perfect, as long as she avoids her feckless brother, Edward - a safe distance away in Birmingham. She has a London flat which is ideal for one; a job that suits her passion for logic; and a personal arrangement providing cultural and other, more intimate, benefits. Yet suddenly faced with the loss of her mother and, implausibly, with the possibility of becoming a mother herself, Susan's greatest fear is being realised: she is losing control.When she discovers that her mother's will inexplicably favours her brother, Susan sets out to prove that Edward and his equally feckless friend Rob somehow coerced this dubious outcome. But when problems closer to home become increasingly hard to ignore, she finds help in the most unlikely of places.This sparkling debut is a breath of fresh air with real heart and a powerful emotional punch. In Susan we find a character as exasperating and delightful as The Rosie Project's Don Tillman. An uncompromising feminist and a fierce fighter, it's a joy to watch her bloom.

'Funny, bittersweet and touching. Will resonate with anyone who is "trying"' - MARIAN KEYES*********A hugely funny, searingly honest comedy about to expect when you're not expecting.Olivia and Felix are trying for a baby. They've been trying for bloody ages, actually. And despite approaching their sex life with military precision, there's no sign of what felt like the next step, while their friends' Instagram-perfect broods grow by the week. Plus, as Olivia's black humour about the predicament grows with every discarded ovulation stick, she's vying for a promotion at work under the (very attentive) watch of a new boss. Happy marriage, promotion and a baby? Inconceivable. This is standout, intelligently written commercial fiction for fans of Sharon Horgan's Catastrophe, Dawn O'Porter's The Cows and Mhairi McFarlane's It's Not Me, It's You.

'WHAT A BOOK. IT'S SO STRANGE AND MAGICAL AND THE WRITING IS JUST BEAUTIFUL. I LOVED IT.' Louise O'Neill 'ENCHANTING AND ILLUMINATING' Carys Bray, author of A Song For Issy Bradley 'LIKE WALKING THROUGH A MIRROR.' Rachel Joyce, author of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry'THIS BOOK IS FULL OF CHARACTER AND MAGIC, AND I FOUND MYSELF MESMERISED' Claire Fuller, author of Our Endless Numbered Days'THESE STORIES ARE WEAVED TOGETHER LIKE SILVERY FISHING NETS. LIKE SHIMMERING, JEWEL-BRIGHT WORLDS' Helen McClory'These days, you can find anything you need at the click of a button. That's why I bought her heart online.'Spirits in jam jars, mini-apocalypses, animal hearts and side shows. A girl runs a coffin hotel on a remote island. A boy is worried his sister has two souls. A couple are rewriting the history of the world. And mermaids are on display at the local aquarium.The Beginning of the World in the Middle of the Night is a collection of twelve haunting stories; modern fairy tales brimming with magic, outsiders and lost souls. 'I'm fascinated by storytelling, and particularly fairy tales. How humans have always tried to explain things that they can't possibly understand with, sometimes outrageous, stories' Jen CampbellFrom the author of Weird Things Customers Say in Bookshops series and The Bookshop Book.

Evelyn is a Creole woman who comes of age in New Orleans at the height of World War II. Her family inhabits the upper echelon of Black society, and when she falls for no-account Renard, she is forced to choose between her life of privilege and the man she loves.In 1982, Evelyn's daughter, Jackie, is a frazzled single mother grappling with her absent husband's drug addiction. Just as she comes to terms with his abandoning the family, he returns, ready to resume their old life.Jackie's son, T.C., loves the creative process of growing marijuana more than the weed itself. He was a square before Hurricane Katrina, but the New Orleans he knew didn't survive the storm. Fresh out of a four-month stint for drug charges, T.C. decides to start over-until an old friend convinces him to stake his new beginning on one last deal.For Evelyn, Jim Crow is an ongoing reality, and in its wake new threats spring up to haunt her descendants. A Kind of Freedomis an urgent novel that explores the legacy of racial disparity in the South through a poignant and redemptive family history.

The second novel from the Costa winning and bestselling author of The LoneyIn the wink of an eye, as quick as a flea,The Devil he jumped from me to thee.And only when the Devil had gone,Did I know that he and I'd been one . . .Every autumn, John Pentecost returns to the farm where he grew up to help gather the sheep down from the moors for the winter. Very little changes in the Endlands, but this year, his grandfather - the Gaffer - has died and John's new wife, Katherine, is accompanying him for the first time.Each year, the Gaffer would redraw the boundary lines of the village, with pen and paper, but also through the remembrance of tales and timeless communal rituals, which keep the sheep safe from the Devil. But as the farmers of the Endlands bury the Gaffer, and prepare to gather the sheep, they begin to wonder whether they've let the Devil in after all . . . **********Praise for Andrew Michael Hurley's The Loney'An amazing piece of fiction' Stephen King'A masterful excursion into terror' Sunday Times'Modern classics in this genre are rare, and instant ones even rarer; The Loney, however, looks as though it may be both' Sunday Telegraph'Nuanced, deliberate and building insensibly from a murmur to a shriek. The Loney is an unforgettable addition to the ranks of the best British horror' Metro'Guaranteed to give you the chills, whatever the weather . . . superb' Independent

The last gorgeously festive instalment of the WINTER STREET series, from the New York Times bestselling author. Raise one last glass with the Quinn Family at the Winter Street Inn. It's been too long since the entire Quinn family has been able to celebrate the holidays under the same roof, but that's about to change. With Bart back safe and sound from Afghanistan, the Quinns are preparing for a holiday more joyous than any they've experienced in years.And Bart's safe return isn't the family's only good news: Kevin is enjoying married life with Isabelle; Patrick is getting back on his feet after paying his debt to society; Ava thinks she's finally found the love of her life; and Kelly is thrilled to see his family reunited at last. But it just wouldn't be a Quinn family gathering if things went smoothly.A celebration of everything we love - and some of the things we endure - about the holidays, WINTER SOLSTICE is Elin Hilderbrand at her festive best.

In Edwardian England, aeroplanes are a new, magical invention, while female pilots are rare indeed. When shy Della Dobbs meets her mother's aunt, her life changes forever. Great Auntie Betty has come home from Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, across whose windswept dunes the Wright Brothers tested their historic flying machines. Della develops a burning ambition to fly and Betty is determined to help her. But the Great War is coming and it threatens to destroy everything - and everyone - Della loves.Uplifting and page-turning, THE WILD AIR is a story about love, loss and following your dreams against all odds.

'A beautiful, evocative novel with an amazing sense of place and an understated, dark sensibility. A brilliant debut. I loved it!' Jenni Fagan, author of The PanopticonMesmeric in its prose and mythic in its sweep, THE BARROWFIELDS is an extraordinary debut about the darker side of devotion, the limits of forgiveness, and the reparative power of shared pasts.Just before Henry Aster's birth, his father, a frustrated novelist and lawyer, reluctantly returns to the remote North Carolina mountains in which he was improbably raised and installs his young family in a gothic mansion - nicknamed 'the vulture house' - worthy of his hero Edgar Allan Poe. There, Henry grows up under the desk of this fierce and brilliant man. But when a death in the family tips his father toward a fearsome unravelling, what was once a young son's reverence is poisoned, and Henry flees, not to return until years later when he, too, must go home again.

If a man beats you, you never let your anger show, never at the time. You wait, until he least expects it, until nobody remembers that you were angry at all . . . In 1860s Southern California, life on the Burn ranch has been peaceful for 15-year-old John Evert since the death of his father. But recently there have been violent raids on nearby properties, where it's not just cattle and horses that are taken, but women too. And when the white-painted men arrive at the Burn ranch on horses in the dead of night, John Evert is near-fatally injured, his beloved mother spirited away, and their house torched to the ground. Setting out on a journey to find his mother and reclaim his land, John Evert will fight in the Civil War and befriend an outlaw, challenge his assumptions and fall in love, before returning to fledgling Los Angeles older, sager and set on revenge . . .