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A play by one of Britain's best-selling writers Bazaar and Rummage brings together a neurotic do-gooder, a trainee social worker and three agoraphobics who have been persuaded to venture out of their homes to run a jumble sale. "As a study of agoraphobia, Bazaar and Rummage...is written with great verve, style and wit." (Benedict Nightingale); Set in an adult literacy class where the student's fear of ignorance is as much of a handicap as their inability to read, Groping for Words is a "close up of the social scrap-heap, written in a fine vein of comic indignation and giving a voice to people whose lives are mainly spent in queues and waiting rooms." (Irving Wardle, The Times); Womberang shows free spirit Rita Onions bringing joy and anarchy to the grim waiting-room of a gynaecology clinic. "A daydream of mastered fear" (New Society)

Adrian Mole's first love, Pandora, has left him; a neighbor, Mr. Lucas, appears to be seducing his mother (and what does that mean for his father?); the BBC refuses to publish his poetry; and his dog swallowed the tree off the Christmas cake. "Why" indeed.

"The trouble with trying to read passages from the Adrian Mole Diaries aloud is that you find yourself laughing so hard you can't go on. It's that kind of book." --Kansas City Star "As sad and devastating as it is laugh-out-loud funny. A delight " --New York Times The agonizingly funny, captivatingly poignant journals of England's bespotted everyboy are now available again. An international phenomenon and perennial favorite since their initial publication made a splash in Thatcher's Britain more than twenty years ago, The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, Age 13 3/4 is now side-by-side with its hilarious sequel The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole in this collected single volume.

'A satire of our times. Very funny indeed' Sunday Times 'My comfort read. The best diaries ever written - with apologies to Samuel Pepys, Bridget Jones and me' ADAM KAYFEATURED IN 'THE 100 BOOKS THAT SHAPED OUR WORLD' BBC ARTS The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 3/4 is the first book in Sue Townsend's brilliantly funny Adrian Mole series. Friday January 2ndI felt rotten today. It's my mother's fault for singing 'My Way' at two o'clock in the morning at the top of the stairs. Just my luck to have a mother like her. There is a chance my parents could be alcoholics. Next year I could be in a children's home.Meet Adrian Mole, a hapless teenager providing an unabashed, pimples-and-all glimpse into adolescent life. Writing candidly about his parents' marital troubles, the dog, his life as a tortured poet and 'misunderstood intellectual', Adrian's painfully honest diary is still hilarious and compelling reading thirty years after it first appeared._________NOW A MAJOR MUSICAL 'I not only wept, I howled and hooted and had to get up and walk around the room and wipe my eyes so that I could go on reading' Tom Sharpe'We laugh both at Mole and with him. A wonderful comic read, that, like all the best comedy, says something rather meaningful' Heat

The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole is the second book in Sue Townsend's brilliantly funny Adrian Mole series.Sunday July 18thMy father announced at breakfast that he is going to have a vasectomy. I pushed my sausages away untouched. In this second instalment of teenager Adrian Mole's diaries, the Mole family is in crisis and the country is beating the drum of war. While his parents have reconciled after both embarked on disastrous affairs, Adrian is shocked to learn of his mother's pregnancy. And even though at the mercy of his rampant hormones and the fickle whims of the divine Pandora, a victim of a broken home and his own tortured (though unrecognised) genius, Adrian continues valiantly to chronicle the pains and pleasures of a misspent adolescence. ________'Funny, moving and a poke in the eye for adult morality' Sunday Express 'Written with great verve, and showing an uncanny understanding of the young, Sue Townsend holds the balance between innocence and precocity and the result is both hilarious and salutary' Daily Telegraph 'Life's no fun for an adolescent intellectual. For the reader it's a hoot' New Statesman

'A classic. The Adrian Mole diaries are thoroughly subversive. A true hero for our time' Richard Ingrams'My comfort read. The best diaries ever written - with apologies to Samuel Pepys, Bridget Jones and me' ADAM KAYThe FOURTH book in Adrian Mole's diaries, where we catch up with a hapless Adrian and his desperate attempts to win back the love of his life.__________ Thursday January 3rd I have the most terrible problems with my sex life. It all boils down to the fact that I have no sex life. At least not with another person. Finally given the heave-ho by Pandora, Adrian Mole finds himself in the unenviable situation of living with the love-of-his-life as she goes about shacking up with other men. Worse, as he slides down the employment ladder, from deskbound civil servant in Oxford to part-time washer-upper in Soho, he finds that critical reception for his epic novel, Lo! The Flat Hills of My Homeland, is not quite as he might have hoped. But Adrian is about to discover that extraordinary and wonderful things may blossom even in the wilderness . . .__________ 'A very, very funny book' Sunday Times 'The funniest person in the world' Caitlin Moran

'One of the greatest comic creations. I can't remember a more relentlessly funny book' Daily Mirror'My comfort read. The best diaries ever written - with apologies to Samuel Pepys, Bridget Jones and me' ADAM KAYThe fifth book in his hilarious diaries, where Adrian faces divorce, fatherhood and (short-lived) television stardom . . . __________Adrian Mole is thirty, single and a father. His cooking at a top London restaurant has been equally mocked ('the sausage on my plate could have been a turd') and celebrated (will he be the nation's first celebrity offal chef?). And the love of his life, Pandora Braithwaite, is too busy as the newly elected MP for Ashby-de-la-Zouch to notice him. Frustrated, disappointed and undersexed, Adrian despairs until a letter from his past changes everything . . .__________ 'With the Mole books, Townsend has an unrivalled claim to be this country's foremost practising comic novelist' Mail on Sunday 'Adrian Mole really is a brilliant comic creation. Every sentence is witty and well thought out, and the whole has reverberations beyond itself' The Times'The funniest person in the world' Caitlin Moran 'Three cheers for Mole's chaotic, non-achieving, dysfunctional family. We need him' Evening Standard

The ORIGINAL teenage diarist is back in the second book in Sue Townsend's brilliantly funny, touching and bestselling Adrian Mole series. 'If I turn out to be mentally deranged in adult life, it will be all my mother's fault.'Adrian Mole continues to struggle valiantly against the slings and arrows of growing up and his own family's attempts to scar him for life in this second volume of his secret diary.'I not only wept, I howled and hooted and had to get up and walk around the room and wipe my eyes so that I could go on reading' Tom Sharpe'A satire of our times. Very funny indeed' Sunday Times 'We laugh both at Mole and with him. A wonderful comic read, that, like all the best comedy, says something rather meaningful' Heat

At 13 years old, Adrian Mole has more than his fair share of problems - spots, ill-health, parents threatening to divorce, rejection of his poetry and much more - all recorded in his diary.

'Hilarious and totally Townsend. There were parts where I laughed until I cried' Daily Mail What happens when a duvet day turns into a duvet year?Sue Townsend, the bestselling author of the Adrian Mole series, returns with The Woman Who Went to Bed for a Year, a funny and touching novel about what happens when someone stops being the person everyone wants them to be. The day her twins leave home, Eva climbs into bed and stays there. For seventeen years she's wanted to yell at the world, 'Stop! I want to get off'. Finally, this is her chance.Her husband Brian, an astronomer having an unsatisfactory affair, is upset. Who will cook his dinner? Eva, he complains, is attention seeking. But word of Eva's defiance spreads.Legions of fans, believing she is protesting, gather in the street. While Alexander the white van man brings tea, toast and sympathy. And from this odd but comforting place Eva begins to see both herself and the world very, very differently. . .Bestselling author Sue Townsend has been Britain's favourite comic writer for over three decades.'Laugh-out-loud . . . a teeming world of characters whose foibles and misunderstandings provide glorious amusement. Something deeper and darker than comedy' Sunday Times'She fills the pages with turmoil, anger, passion, love and big helpings of wit. It's full of colour and glows with life' Independent'Touching and hilarious. Bursting with witty social commentary as well as humour' Women's Weekly'A funny, poignant look at modern family life' Daily Express

Long before Bridget Jones came the maddest, daftest diarist of them all - Adrian Mole. Life is far from easy when you are 13 3/4. If you're not worried about spots and school bullies, it's trying to decide which of your parents to live with or whether to be a vet or a comedy writer when you grow up. Not to mention romance, in the shape of beautiful Pandora who seems not to notice poor Adrian at all. Then there are the rejections from the BBC... how much longer can he go on!

The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 ¾ is the first book in Sue Townsend's brilliantly funny Adrian Mole series, reissued in Penguin's ORIGINALS collection of iconic teen fiction.Friday January 2nd I felt rotten today. It's my mother's fault for singing 'My Way' at two o'clock in the morning at the top of the stairs. Just my luck to have a mother like her. There is a chance my parents could be alcoholics. Next year I could be in a children's home. Meet Adrian Mole, a hapless teenager providing an unabashed, pimples-and-all glimpse into adolescent life. Writing candidly about his parents' marital troubles, the dog, his life as a tortured poet and 'misunderstood intellectual', Adrian's painfully honest diary is still hilarious and compelling reading thirty years after it first appeared. Praise for Adrian Mole (and by extension, Sue Townsend): 'I not only wept, I howled and hooted and had to get up and walk around the room and wipe my eyes so that I could go on reading' Tom Sharpe'A satire of our times. Very funny indeed' Sunday Times'We laugh both at Mole and with him. A wonderful comic read, that, like all the best comedy, says something rather meaningful' Heat-----Sue Townsend is Britain's favourite comic author. Her hugely successful novels include eight Adrian Mole books, as well as The Public Confessions of a Middle-Aged Woman (Aged 55¾), Number Ten, Ghost Children, The Queen and I, Queen Camilla and The Woman Who Went to Bed For a Year, all of which are highly acclaimed bestsellers. She also wrote numerous well-received plays.

Penguin Readers is an ELT graded reader series for learners of English as a foreign language. With carefully adapted text, new illustrations and language learning exercises, the print edition also includes instructions to access supporting material online.Titles include popular classics, exciting contemporary fiction, and thought-provoking non-fiction, introducing language learners to bestselling authors and compelling content.The eight levels of Penguin Readers follow the Common European Framework of Reference for language learning (CEFR). Exercises at the back of each Reader help language learners to practise grammar, vocabulary, and key exam skills. Before, during and after-reading questions test readers' story comprehension and develop vocabulary.The Secret Life of Adrian Mole, Aged 13 ¾, a Level 3 Reader, is A2 in the CEFR framework. The text is made up of sentences with up to three clauses, introducing first conditional, past continuous and present perfect simple for general experience. It is well supported by illustrations, which appear on most pages.Adrian Mole is a 13-year-old boy. Adrian writes a diary about his school, his family and, of course, love. "There's a new girl in our class . . . I think I might love her. I am 13 ¾ years old, so I'm old enough for love!"Visit the Penguin Readers websiteExclusively with the print edition, readers can unlock online resources including a digital book, audio edition, lesson plans and answer keys.

THE 40TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION FEATURING A BRAND-NEW INTRODUCTION FROM CAITLIN MORAN'My comfort read. The best diaries ever written' ADAM KAY, GUARDIAN'Every child in the country should receive a copy on their thirteenth birthday' CAITLIN MORAN'One of literature's most endearing figures. Mole is an excellent guide for all of us' OBSERVER**In 2022 Sue Townsend was awarded the Legacy Achievement Award by the Comedy Women in Print prize**AS SEEN IN THE TIMES________Friday January 2nd I felt rotten today. It's my mother's fault for singing 'My Way' at two o'clock in the morning at the top of the stairs. Just my luck to have a mother like her. There is a chance my parents could be alcoholics. Next year I could be in a children's home. Meet Adrian Mole, a hapless teenager providing an unabashed, pimples-and-all glimpse into adolescent life as he writes candidly about the dog, his parents' marital troubles and life as a tortured poet and 'misunderstood intellectual.' Forty years after it first appeared, Sue Townsend's comic masterpiece continues to be rediscovered by new generations of readers.________'The UK's bestselling fiction book of the eighties and one of the great comic creations of the past half-century. Impeccable comic timing, evergreen comic writing. I had more pure reading pleasure than from any other book I read this year' John Self, The Times'Reading The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole when I was 14 felt quite like an awakening' GREG DAVIES, Sunday Times'Townsend has held a mirror up to the nation and made us happy to laugh at what we see' SUNDAY TELEGRAPH 'One of Britain's most celebrated comic writers' GUARDIAN

NOW A MAJOR TV ADAPTATION STARRING DAVID WALLIAMS & SAMANTHA BONDThe Queen and I is a hilarious satire on modern Britain and an exploration of what it really means to be human, by the bestselling author of the Adrian Mole series.____________The Royals, they're just like us . . . THE MONARCHY HAS BEEN DISMANTLEDWhen a Republican party wins the General Election, their first act in power is to strip the royal family of their assets and titles and send them to live on a housing estate in the Midlands. Exchanging Buckingham Palace for a two-bedroomed semi in Hell Close (as the locals dub it), caviar for boiled eggs, servants for a social worker named Trish, the Queen and her family learn what it means to be poor among the great unwashed. But is their breeding sufficient to allow them to rise above their changed circumstance or deep down are they really just like everyone else?____________'No other author could imagine this so graphically, demolish the institution so wittily and yet leave the family with its human dignity intact' The Times'Absorbing, entertaining . . . the funniest thing in print since Adrian Mole' Daily Telegraph'Kept me rolling about until the last page' Daily Mail

Number Ten is the brilliantly funny political satire by Sue Townsend, bestselling author of the Adrian Mole series'Wickedly entertaining. There is a gem on nearly every page. Nothing escapes Townsend's withering pen. Satirical, witty, observant' Observer____________Behind the doors of the most famous address in the country, all is not well.Edward Clare was voted into Number Ten after a landslide election victory. But a few years later and it is all going wrong.The love of the people is gone. The nation is turning against him.Panicking, Prime Minister Clare enlists the help of Jack Sprat, the policeman on the door of No 10, and sets out to discover what the country really thinks of him. In disguise, they venture into the great unknown: the mean streets of Great Britain.And for the first time in years, the Prime Minister experiences everything life in this country has to offer - an English cream tea, the kindness of strangers, waiting for trains that never come and treatment in a hospital. And at last he remembers some of things he once really cared about . . ._____________'Poignant, hilarious, heart-rending, devastating' New Statesman'Hilarious. Sue Townsend's laughter is infectious' Sunday Telegraph Books of the Year

THE BRILLIANTLY FUNNY SEQUEL TO THE QUEEN AND I FROM BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF THE ADRIAN MOLE SERIESWhat if being Royal was a crime?The UK has come over all republican. The Royal Family exiled to an Exclusion Zone with the other villains and spongers. And to cap it all, the Queen has threatened to abdicate.Yet Prince Charles is more interested in root vegetables than reigning ... unless his wife Camilla can be Queen in a newly restored monarchy. But when a scoundrel who claims to be the couple's secret love-child offers to take the crown off their hands, the stage is set for a right Royal show down.And the question for Camilla (and rest of the country) will be: Queen of the vegetable patch or Queen of England?_____________'Brilliantly satirical' Evening Standard'One of our finest living comic writers' The Times'Brilliantly funny' Closer'Another fantastic read from Townsend' OK!

Ghost Children is a compassionate and gritty examination of love and loss from one of Britain's most-loved writers, Sue TownsendHow can she leave the past behind when he won't let her? Seventeen years ago Angela Carr aborted an unwanted child. The child's father, Christopher Moore, was devastated by the loss and he retreated from the world. Unable to accept what had happened between them both went their separate ways. However, when Christopher makes a horrifying discovery whilst out walking his dog on the heath he finds that he is compelled to confront Angela about the past. As they start seeing each another again can they avoid the mistakes of the past? And will their future together be eclipsed by those mistakes of yesterday? 'Gripping and disturbing. Utterly absorbing' Independent 'Bleak, tender and deeply affecting. Seldom have I rooted so hard for a set of fictional individuals' Mail on Sunday 'Leaves one gasping for more' Daily Telegraph 'Engrossing, memorable and moving' Guardian 'Startling and raw' Observer

'An achingly funny anti-hero' Daily Mail'My comfort read. The best diaries ever written - with apologies to Samuel Pepys, Bridget Jones and me' ADAM KAYIn the SIXTH book in Sue Townsend's hilarious and iconic series, Adrian, Leicester's most unlikely ex-con, faces the nit-infested reality of being a single parent . . . __________ Monday January 3, 2000 So how do I greet the New Millennium? In despair. I'm a single parent, I live with my mother . . . I have a bald spot the size of a jaffa cake on the back of my head . . . I can't go on like this, drifting into early middle-age. I need a Life Plan . . . The 'same age as Jesus when he died', Adrian Mole has become a martyr: a single-father bringing up two young boys in an uncaring world. With the ever-unattainable Pandora pursuing her ambition to become Labour's first female PM; his over-achieving half-brother Brett sponging off him; and literary success elusive, Adrian tries to make ends meet and find a purpose. But little does he realise that his own modest life is about to come to the attention of those charged with policing The War Against Terror . . .__________ 'One of the great comic creations of our time. Almost every page of his diaries bring a smile to the face' Scotsman 'The funniest person in the world' Caitlin Moran

The sensational final instalment in comic legend Sue Townsend's hilarious and iconic Adrian Mole series'Effortlessly hilarious. Brilliant satire and tragedy' Times'My comfort read. The best diaries ever written - with apologies to Samuel Pepys, Bridget Jones and me' ADAM KAYRead as Adrian continues to struggle with his love life, endures a painfully awkward school play and contemplates the unsettling prospect of applying genital poultice . . .__________Sunday 1st JulyNO SMOKING DAY. A momentous day! Smoking in a public place or place of work is forbidden in England. Though if you are a prisoner, an MP or a member of the Royal Family you are exempt.Adrian Mole is thirty-nine and a quarter. He lives in the country in a semi-detached converted pigsty with his wife Daisy and their daughter. His parents George and Pauline live in the adjoining pigsty. But all is not well.The secondhand bookshop in which Adrian works is threatened with closure. The spark has fizzled out of his marriage. His mother is threatening to write her autobiography (A Girl Called Shit). And Adrian's nightly trips to the lavatory have become alarmingly frequent . . .This laugh-out-loud final chapter in Adrian's story will have you hooked from the first page as you discover what he gets up to next.__________'A tour de force by a comic genius and if it isn't the best book published this year, I'll eat my bookshelf' Daily Mail, Books of the Year'Hilarious. Comic gold' Sunday Times'The funniest person in the world' Caitlin Moran