Archive | New Releases

Richard Broomhead

As the ship sails north to a remote group of islands, everything lies ahead for young Richard Broomhead. He is to become the manager of a copra plantation and begin his adventure.

As Richard adjusts to life on an exposed archipelago in the South Pacific, paradise quickly transforms into a living hell. Marooned for months on end with no supplies or contact with the outside world, Richard’s sanity is threatened. Among the many hardships, he is attacked by native workers wielding matches, as he struggles helplessly with loneliness and isolation.

A German Baron and his castle, a bureaucratic English-man, and the beautiful island women, are just some of the characters that round out this fast paced memoir.

Elaine DePrince

Orphaned by war, saved by ballet. Growing up in war-torn Sierra Leone, Michaela DePrince witnesses atrocities that no child ever should. Her father is killed by rebels and her mother dies of famine. Sent to an orphanage, Michaela is mistreated and she sees the brutal murder of her favourite teacher. But there is hope: the Harmattan wind blows a magazine through the orphanage gates. Michaela picks it up and sees a beautiful image of a young woman dancing. One day, she thinks, I want to be this happy. And then Michaela and her best friend are adopted by an American couple and Michaela can take the dance lessons she’s dreamed of since finding her picture.

Life in the States isn’t without difficulties. Unfortunately, tragedy can find its way to Michaela in America, too, and her past can feel like it’s haunting her. The world of ballet is a racist one, and Michaela has to fight for a place amongst the ballet elite, hearing the words “America’s not ready for a black girl ballerina”.

And yet…

Today, Michaela is an international ballet star, dancing for The Dutch National Ballet at the age of 19. A heart-breaking, inspiring autobiography by a teenager who shows us that, beyond everything, there is always hope for a better future.

Jackie French

The year is 1942 and the world is at war. Nancy Clancy is 16 and left school to spend a year droving, just like her grandfather Clancy of the Overflow was famed for. Now Nancy’s family has sent her to Malaya to bring home her sister-in-law Moira and baby Gavin. Moira is British and married to Nancy’s brother Ben, who is now a soldier. Malaya is under threat from the Japanese, but despite the warnings Moira has resisted leaving as she wants to stay near her husband.

When Malaya is invaded, Nancy, Moira and Gavin are fortunate to get out before Singapore falls. When their ship is bombed they end up stranded on an island where they, and some other colonial women, are captured. There begins the nightmare and horror of internment in a Japanese camp. Back home at Gibber’s Creek families are doing their bit for the war. They worry constantly about their men who are fighting – and now those who are missing after Singapore falls. Powerful, compelling and confronting, this is a book that pulls no punches.

Filled with emotional truth and heartfelt agony, this unforgettable fourth book in The Matilda Saga continues the journey that started with A Waltz for Matilda.

Katherine Webb

Puglia, 1921. Leandro Cardetta, born into poverty, emigrated to America to make his fortune and has returned home to southern Italy a rich man, accompanied by his glamorous wife, Marcie, an ex-showgirl fighting middle age. Now Leandro has money enough to hire renowned English architect, Boyd Kinsgley, to renovate a crumbling palazzo into an Art Deco statement of wealth, and host Boyd’s teenage son and his diffident young second wife, Clare, for one extraordinary summer.

Under the burning sky, beyond the luxury of Leandro’s home, tensions are high. Veterans of the Great War are desperate for work and food. Among these is Ettore, Leandro’s nephew. Gripped by grief at the loss of his fiancee, Ettore has sworn to identify Livia’s killer, and take his revenge. He is too proud to go to his uncle for charity, but when he injures himself one day, he has no choice but to knock on Leandro’s door. Meeting Clare there will change everything – and in the most violent way.

During the fierce summer of 1921, all these lives converge. Exactly how did Leandro grow rich in America, and what is the strange hold he has over Boyd? What happened to the first Mrs Kingsley, and what secret haunts the outwardly exuberant Marcie Cardetta? Hearts will be broken, blood will be spilt and the hardest of life’s lessons will be learnt as shadows fall.

Marsha Mehran

A moving tale of exile, friendship, love and the healing power of poetry from the bestselling author of Pomegranate Soup. Set in Buenos Aires during the Falklands War, The Margaret Thatcher School of Beauty is the story of a group of displaced Iranian refugees living in a decaying Beaux Arts building in the city centre. The inhabitants of the building form an eclectic community: a sick ex-prisoner and his daughter, a promising medical student; a timid hairdresser; a newlywed couple with a dark past; a young revolutionary; an eccentric pilgrim of Mecca; and at the heart of the group Zadi Heirati, a single mother struggling to make ends meet at the beauty salon she operates from her apartment.

Drawn together by a revolution in their homeland, they begin to find solace in weekly poetry meetings. The words they share inspire each to turn inward and discover beauty long buried. As a new war unfolds in their adopted country, this group of disenchanted individuals begins to form a family. At once familiar and extraordinary, this moving story weaves disparate lives together into a tapestry of unique grace, wit and lyricism.

Maria Duenas

Declared “a writer to watch” (“Publishers Weekly,” starred review), “New York Times “bestselling author Maria Duenas pours heart and soul into this story of a woman who discovers the power of second chances.

With her debut novel “The Time in Between,” Maria Duenas garnered outstanding acclaim and inspired a TV series, dubbed the “Spanish Downton Abbey” by the media. “USA TODAY “said of the book: “From a terrific opening line to the final page, chapters zip by at a pulsing pace.” Now Duenas returns with a novel about a heartbroken woman’s attempt to pick up the pieces of her shattered world.

Blanca Perea is a college professor in Madrid who seems to have it all. But her perfect career and marriage start to unravel when her husband of twenty years suddenly leaves her for another woman. Devastated, Blanca is forced to question the life she once had and how well she truly knows herself. She leaves Madrid for San Francisco, where she becomes entrenched in the history of an enigmatic Spanish writer who died decades earlier. The more Blanca discovers about this man, the more she is enthralled by the ill-fated loves, half truths, and silent ambitions that haunted his life.  With lush, imaginative prose and unforgettable characters, “The Heart Has Its Reasons “is a journey of the soul that takes readers from Spain to California, between the thorny past and all-too-real present. It is a story about the thrill of creating one’s life anew.

Karly Lane

Gemma’s life has always been a foregone conclusion: school, uni, then into the family business. Her best friend, Jasmine, is a whole other story. She thrives on spontaneity, her room is always a mess and she rarely sits down and plans anything in her life.

When Gemma and Jasmine decide to go on a working holiday together on a property in central New South Wales, their friends and family are surprised, since neither woman has any experience of farm life (unless you count Jasmine’s obsession with McLeod’s Daughters).

Away from family commitments and expectations, it’s not long before Gemma is thinking about following a new life’s path in the country. It’s a choice between safety or going out on a limb for love …

Peter Watt

The Frontier Series 8. In the latest instalment of the Duffy and Macintosh saga, the inimitable Peter Watt delves into more of Australia’s great history through the lens of two unforgettable dynasties.
It is 1942 and the war in the Pacific is on Australia’s doorstep, changing the lives of the Duffy and Macintosh families as never before. In Sydney, siblings Donald and Sarah Macintosh battle for their father’s approval, and control of his empire, while their cousin David fights the enemy across the continents. US Marine Pilot James Duffy defies his grandfather’s wishes, and, a number of times, death, protecting Australian skies from the Japanese. Below, trapped in the jungles of Malaya, Diane Duffy is caught between saving the lives of hundreds of orphaned children, or that of her son. While Tom Duffy finds himself enlisting in yet another world war, his daughter Jessica narrowly escapes slaughter at a mission station, causing her to revoke her vows and follow in her father’s footsteps. Nearly a century after the Aboriginal curse that forever tied these two families, and amidst the most devastating conflict in history, the Duffys and Macintoshes will find a way to endure… and perhaps even thrive.

Marian Keyes

Stella Sweeney is back in Dublin. After living the dream in New York for a year – touring her self-help book, appearing on talk shows all over the USA and living it up in her 10-room duplex on the Upper West Side – she’s back to normality with a bang. And she’s got writer’s block.

Stella wants a clean break as she didn’t exactly leave New York on a high. Why is she back in Ireland so soon? Who is it who keeps calling? Stella wants to get back to being the woman she used to be. But can she? And should she?

Heather Gudenkauf

When teenager Allison Glenn is sent to prison for a heinous crime, she leaves behind her reputation as Linden Falls’ golden girl forever. Her parents deny the existence of their once-perfect child. Her former friends exult her downfall. Her sister, Brynn, faces whispered rumors every day in the hallways of their small Iowa high school. It’s Brynn–shy, quiet Brynn–who carries the burden of what really happened that night. All she wants is to forget Allison and the past that haunts her. But then Allison is released to a halfway house, and is more determined than ever to speak with her estranged sister. Now their legacy of secrets is focused on one little boy. And if the truth is revealed, the consequences will be unimaginable for the adoptive mother who loves him, the girl who tried to protect him and the two sisters who hold the key to all that is hidden.