Amman, Jordan. As an ambitious digitization project gathers pace in a vast building outside Amman, some unpublished writings by Giordano Bruno flawed genius of the late Renaissance, renegade philosopher, occultist with a prodigious memory disappear together with the Jesuit priest sent by the Vatican to study them.When the priest is found dead and a series of mysterious threats ensues, it becomes clear that the stakes are high for all the parties openly or covertly involved. What dangerous ...

On 17th September 1820, accompanied by his friend Joseph Severn, John Keats left London for Italy on board the Maria Crowther in a desperate bid to restore his health. Anguished at the thought of having to part, possibly for ever, from his fiancée and his friends, troubled by money worries and broken in body and mind, the young poet launched on his last journey on earth with both a sense of hope and a deep foreboding that his efforts would be in vain. Despite Keats’s own assertion that by ...

A theatrical retelling of Gogol's famous story of the two Ivans squabbling over a trifling insult, The Two Friends transposes the action to the village of Newington Green on the outskirts of London in the year 1722, when Daniel Defoe was a resident of the parish, the South Sea Bubble had recently burst and a terrible gin epidemic was about to break out. Peppered with memorable lines, populated by an unforgettable cast of characters and written by multi-award-winning duo Peter Benson and Al...

Pipi isn't like his four brothers or the other young monkeys living in the forest of Hullabaloo: he has bright-pink fur, a mischievous character and a rebellious streak that lands him into all sorts of scrapes. In this story, an expanded version of Collodi's original tale, we see him lose his tail to an ancient crocodile, end up as a valet to a young master, fall into the hands of flying bandits and become emperor of a tribe of apes, before preparing to set off on a long journey at sea. Co...

When Francesco decides to embark on his first trip outside his native Italy, he leaves behind a difficult relationship with his father, the narrow vistas of a small provincial town and the stifling atmosphere of a country he feels has become degraded. All he brings with him are a change of clothes, a map of Europe and the desire to discover new places, new people and, perhaps, a new life. But a chance encounter in Munich takes him off course, on an incredible journey that will see him fall...

Jim Talbot, a writer with a dozen unpublished novels under his belt, has been roundly rejected by virtually every agent and publisher in the land, and is willing to go to extreme lengths to make his dream of literary stardom come true. Charles Randall, the eccentric founder and managing director of Tetragon Press, a small independent publisher that has managed to survive for thirty years in a fierce publishing environment dominated by corporate juggernauts, is about to be brutally sacked b...

When war photographer Jo returns from her latest assignment in Afghanistan and moves into the Brighton flat she’s just inherited, she hopes to restore equilibrium to her chaotic life. But images and events of her recent past and the reading of her great-grandmother Elizabeth’s diary haunt her night and day, forcing Jo to come to terms with demons she thought she could leave behind.Written as a long confession to Jo’s ex-girlfriend Susie, alternating with Elizabeth’s account of nursing Indi...

"Julian Stockwin, a master of the historic novel, writes with a zeal, re-creating ancient times, with fast-paced prose, vivid characters, and matchless authenticity." - QUARTERDECK MAGAZINERome 549 AD. Forced to flee the city, merchant Nicander and legionary Marius escape to a new lifein Constantinople. Determined to make their fortune, they plot a number of outrageous money-makingschemes, until they chance upon their greatest idea yet....

Don't mess with the creepy new girlRyan Devlin, a predator with a past, has been forced to take a job as a handyman at an exclusive private school, Crossley College. He's losing his battle to suppress his growing fascination with a new girl who seems to have a strange effect on the children around her.Tara Marais fills her empty days by volunteering at Crossley's library. Tara is desperate, but unable, to have a baby of her own, so she makes Reborns - eeril...

“Matt Rees has taken a complex world of culture clash and suspicion and placed upon it humanity.”—David BaldacciOmar Yussef has taught history in Bethlehem for decades. When a favorite former student, a member of the Palestinian Christian minority, is arrested for collaborating with the Israelis in the killing of a Palestinian guerrilla—a transgression with an inevitable death sentence—Omar is sure he has been framed. When Omar begins to suspect the head of the Bet...

Three women, beset by trauma, temptation, and regret, find each other in this "rich, haunted, gripping" novel (Ruth Padel, award-winning author of Beethoven Variations).That was the day that Mama made the rules: If they come, run. Be quiet and run. But not together. Never together. If one is found, at least the other survives…During a cold British winter, three women, each suffering her own demons, reach a crisis point. Emily, an immigrant ...

A brilliant and strikingly original debut novel, The Last King of Lydia imagines the bloody rise and fall of Croesus, 'the richest man on earth', and powerfully shows how happiness, even for those who have everything, is so often elusive.A defeated king stands on top of a pyre. His conqueror, the Persian ruler Cyrus, signals to his guards; they step forward and touch flaming torches to the dry wood. Croesus, once the wealthiest man of the ancient world, is...