Search results

Ragnarok is the story of the end of the world. It is a tale of the destruction of life on this planet and the end of the gods themselves: what more relevant myth could any modern writer choose? As the bombs rain down in the Second World War, one young girl is evacuated to the English countryside. She is struggling to make sense of her new wartime life. Then she is given a copy of Asgard and the Gods - a book of ancient Norse myths - and her inner and outer worlds are transformed. War, natura...

Pemberley is Mr Darcy's splendid house, and it is there that, amidst their relatives one Christmas, his pride and his wife Elizabeth's prejudice find themselves once again provoked.

'There were many staff at Kensington, fulfilling many roles; a man who was employed to catch rats, another whose job it was to sweep the chimneys. That there was someone expected to hunt Demons did not shock the new Queen; that it was to be her was something of a surprise.'London, 1838. Queen Victoria is crowned; she receives the orb, the sceptre, and an arsenal of blood-stained weaponry. Because if Britain is about to become the greatest power of the age, there's the small matter of the demons...

Heaven can wait. In the meantime...why not go to Hell? Every once in a while a little book comes along that sheds light on our desire for intimacy, our determination to grow spiritually, and our collective yearning to define the boundaries of the soul. The Five People You Meet in Hell is not that little book. A sensitive everyman, Edgy works a meaning-less job at a seaside tourist trap. When a freak accident sends him to "the other side," he encounters a series of strangers compelled to...

Pierce Egan (1772-1849) was born near London and lived in the area his whole life. He was a famous sports reporter and writer on popular culture. His first book, Boxiana, was a collection of articles about boxing. It was a huge success and established Egan's reputation for wit and sporting knowledge. He is probably best remembered today as the creator of Corinthian Tom and Jerry Hawthorn ('Tom and Jerry'). Published in 1821 and beautifully illustrated by the Cruikshank brothers, this book is the...

A riotous new take on a classic fictional dystopia, with an all-you-can-eat quinoa buffet of wrongthink.   With 2+2=5, George Orwell's flawed masterpiece finally receives a much-needed rectification, as Jake Chapman takes us on a bad trip into an atrocious alt-Eurasia--a nightmare utopia of 24/7 self-expression, mandatory wellbeing, yogic breathing, and promiscuous empathy. Yippie wonks in open-toed sandals have ejected the evil capitalist overlords, compassion and charity reign supreme, buckwh...

Kathy Acker's practice of literary appropriation and pastiche made her notorious--as a rebel and a groundbreaker--when Great Expectations was first published in 1982. Here, she begins rewriting Charles Dickens's classic--splicing it with passages from Pierre Guyotat's sexually violent Eden, Eden, Eden, among other texts--alongside Acker's trademark pithy dialogue, as well as prank missives to the likes of Susan Sontag, Sylvere Lotringer, and God. At the center of this form-shifting narrative, Ac...

A magnificent saga set in the Celtic twilight of 10th century Ireland, when myth was law and magic was a power of nature, brilliantly brought to life: the legendary story of an evil stepmother opposed by a seventh child. Lord Colum of Sevenwaters is blessed with seven children: Liam, a natural leader; Diarmid with his passion for adventure; twins Cormack and Conor each with a different calling; rebellious Finbar made old before his time by the gift of Sight; and the young compassionate...

22 October 1789: I shall never forget that day. I shall never forget the decision I made. I was seventeen and so ill prepared for life that I hardly knew how to dress myself, let alone how to board a mail coach or even how to purchase a loaf of bread. When I fled my home at Melmouth Park, I left those who both loved and hated me behind. I threw myself upon the world, dear reader - and see what trouble has come of that. Do read my tale closely, for the warnings of your mamma and your governess w...

Caryl Phillips’s The Lost Child is a sweeping story of orphans and outcasts, haunted by the past and fighting to liberate themselves from it. At its centre is Monica Johnson, cut off from her parents after falling in love with a foreigner, and her bitter struggle to raise her sons in the shadow of the wild moors of the north of England. Intertwined with her modern narrative is the ragged childhood of Emily Brontë’s Heathcliff, the anti-hero of Wuthering Heights and one of literature’s most enigm...

A 21st century re-imagining of the Canterbury Tales, set on a vacation cruise in the midst of the pandemic, a wonderful story for our time   Hoping for an adventure (at a discounted price), two dozen strangers set sail to balmy St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands. As different from one another as strangers can be, they agree to pass the time by telling stories, entertaining one another. As the stories are shared, everyone learns more about their neighbors and starts to bond. Partway though the voya...