Kirjahaku

Carmel McKisco, a 20-year-old girl working nights in a Manchester dive bar, cut off from her family, and from her ex, forms strange alliances with her customers and daydreams about escaping to Cornwall. She soon finds herself compelled to confront her romantic preoccupations, for better or worse.

Joshua and Natalie share a vexed history of sporadic encounters, explosive drunkenness and failed intercourse, all spliced with the occasional sad intimation of true love. Natalie attempts to start a new life without him in Manchester, but when Joshua calls unexpectedly and asks her to meet him in America she knows she has no choice but to go.

Finally her thoughts turn to her last encounter with Jim Schmidt, a man she's loved for ten years, hasn't seen for five, yet still has to consider her opposite number in life. Opposed Positions is a startlingly frank novel about the human predicament, about love and its substitutes, disgraceful or otherwise.

Hard Rain ranges over thirty years of Bob Dylan's recordings, films, and concerts to deliver astute insights into,and sometimes heretical judgements of,his prodigious corpus of work. This updated edition includes a new epilogue that examines Dylan's thirtieth anniversary celebration in 1992 his albums Good As I Been to You, World Gone Wrong, and Time Out of Mind his 1997 performance before the Pope and his 1998 Grammy Award comeback. The result is unparalleled rock criticism.

From the Women's Prize-shortlisted author of First Love Laura Miller and Edmund Putnam have been friends for a long time. Theirs is a happy meeting of minds, with long evenings spent huddled in an ancient pub by the Thames, where they share office gossip, reflect on their teenage passions, and lament the state of the world. Recently, though, Putnam has been harder to reach: he has lost his father, and the magazine to which he has dedicated his life has been hijacked by an insufferable new editor, Simon 'call me Shove' Halfpenny. Laura has her own problems: with a prickly mother and a tricky past, and in a beautiful and indifferent city, her day-to-day life is precarious. But as Putnam starts to sink into despondency, she must try to bring him back. A novel of enduring friendships and small mercies, The Palm House offers us Gwendoline Riley's trademark keen observation and wit, and leaves us - somehow - with a curious sense of possibility. PRAISE FOR GWENDOLINE RILEY 'Riley's prose is so electric, so alive with humour and insight and passion, that by the end you will want to stand up and cheer' - Paul Murray, author of The Bee Sting 'Gwendoline Riley is a genius' - Evening Standard 'So painful, so funny and acutely observed' - David Nicholls, author of You Are Here 'A writer of singular vision' - The Guardian

A hostile mother-daughter relationship stands at the center of this astonishing, blackly humorous novel by the acclaimed author of First Love. Helen Grant is a mystery to her daughter. An extrovert with few friends who has sought intimacy in the wrong places, a twice-divorced mother of two now living alone surrounded by her memories, Helen (known to her acquaintances as "Hen") has always haunted Bridget. Now, Bridget is an academic in her forties. She sees Helen once a year, and considers the problem to be contained. As she looks back on their tumultuous relationship--the performances and small deceptions--she tries to reckon with the cruelties inflicted on both sides. But when Helen makes it clear that she wants more, it seems an old struggle will have to be replayed. From the prize-winning author of First Love, My Phantoms is a bold, heart-stopping portrayal of a failed familial bond, which brings humor, subtlety, and new life to the difficult terrain of mothers and daughters.

'A singular, devastating journey into the ungovernable reaches of the heart' Observer SHORTLISTED FOR THE BAILEYS WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2017 Neve is a writer in her mid-30s married to an older man, Edwyn. For now they are in a place of relative peace, but their past battles have left scars. As Neve recalls the decisions that led her to this marriage, she tells of other loves and other debts, from her bullying father and her self-involved mother to a musician who played her and a series of lonely flights from place to place. Drawing the reader into the battleground of her relationship, Neve spins a story of helplessness and hostility, an ongoing conflict in which both husband and wife have played a part. But is this, nonetheless, also a story of love?

SHORTLISTED FOR THE RATHBONES FOLIO PRIZE 'What a phenomenal ear she has, and how remorselessly funny she is - My Phantoms is unmissably good' Kevin Barry, author of Night Boat to Tangier Helen Grant has always been a mystery to her daughter. A twice-divorced mother-of-two she has sought intimacy in all the wrong places. Her daughter Bridget sees her once a year and considers the problem contained. But as she looks back over their fractious relationship, she is forced to confront cruelties inflicted on both sides. My Phantoms is an insightful and painfully funny account of a family strained to breaking point, and a reckoning with the damage we do over the course of a life. My Phantoms was a Book of the Year in the Observer, the Daily Telegraph, the Irish Times, the Guardian, the White Review, the Evening Standard, the Big Issue, the TLS, the Week and the New Statesman.

Returning to Manchester, her broken home, Esther moves back to the flat she used to share with her best friend Donna. Surrounded by empty gin bottles, with her past life safely taped up in stacked cardboard boxes, she proceeds to turn her back on a 'real world' that seems meaningless and absurd. Instead she lives in her own head. Then she meets Newton, a care-worn American wanderer with a drinker's face and an angel's smile. Newton changes everything. But for how long?

'A singular, devastating journey into the ungovernable reaches of the heart' Observer SHORTLISTED FOR THE BAILEYS WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2017 Neve is a writer in her mid-30s married to an older man, Edwyn. For now they are in a place of relative peace, but their past battles have left scars. As Neve recalls the decisions that led her to this marriage, she tells of other loves and other debts, from her bullying father and her self-involved mother to a musician who played her and a series of lonely flights from place to place. Drawing the reader into the battleground of her relationship, Neve spins a story of helplessness and hostility, an ongoing conflict in which both husband and wife have played a part. But is this, nonetheless, also a story of love?