A masterfully told psychological thriller from NUMBER ONE, MILLION-COPY BESTSELLER Valerie Keogh Perfect for fans of K. L. Slater and Daniel Hurst His prized possession....his greatest mistake? From the moment I saw Ann, I knew she was perfect for me.Her beauty and her social connections would make my miserable life so much better. It didn’t matter that I didn’t love her. I would give her the lifestyle she craved, and she would give me the ...

Talbot Mundy was born William Lancaster Gribbon on April 23rd 1879 in London.After a particularly undistinguished record at Rugby School, he ran off to Germany and joined a circus. After his return, from Germany, he left Britain to work as a relief worker in Baroda in India.This was followed by further adventures in Africa, the Near East and the Far East. His initial inclination was to be a con artist, a confidence trickster and exploit other areas of petty criminality....

François-Anatole Thibault was born on the 16th April 1844 in Paris, France, the son of a bookseller and bibliophile.He studied at the Collège Stanislas, a private Catholic school, and after graduating joined his father in the bookstore, which specialised in works on the French Revolution. Several years later he secured a position as cataloguer at Bacheline-Deflorenne and at Lemerre before being appointed librarian for the French Senate in 1876.His literary career had begun ...

Vladimir Galaktionovich Korolenko was born in Zhytomyr, Ukraine, then part of the Russian Empire on 27th July 1853.His father died when he was 13 and life was then often struck with bouts of poverty, which resulted in his education being somewhat erratic. A spell in exile at 23 was followed by another as the politics of the times opposed his volatile but heart-felt passions.Writing was also coming to the fore and in 1879 his debut short story telling of a young Narodnik sea...

Wilkie Collins was born on 8th January 1824 in Marylebone, London.The family moved several times in his early years before, at 12, they travelled to France and Italy for 2 years where the sights and atmosphere made a deep and lasting impression on him.He resumed his education at Mr Cole’s private boarding school in Highbury, Islington. Here, he began his literary career under unusual circumstances: the school bully would give him no peace until he had been told a bedtime st...

The bookshelves of European literature are incredible collections that have gathered together centuries of very talented authors. From this continent their fame spread and whilst among their number many are now forgotten or neglected their talents endure. Among them is the Spanish writer Fernan Caballeron.

Mary Frances Butts was born on 13th December 1890 in Poole, Dorset.Her early years were spent at Salterns, an 18th-century house overlooking Poole Harbour. Sadly in 1905 her father died, and she was sent for boarding at St Leonard's school for girls in St Andrews.Her mother remarried and, from 1909, Mary studied at Westfield College in London, and here, first became aware of her bisexual feelings. She was sent down for organising a trip to Epsom races and only completed her...

Edward Alexander Crowley was born on 12th October 1875 to wealthy parents in Royal Leamington Spa in Warwickshire.He was educated at Malvern College, Tonbridge School, Eastbourne College and finally Trinity College, Cambridge where he focused on his passions of mountaineering and poetry and published several volumes.Life for Crowley was to abandon his parents’ Christian faith and instead to inject himself into Western esotericism. In 1898, he joined the esoteric Hermetic Or...

Mary Frances Butts was born on 13th December 1890 in Poole, Dorset.Her early years were spent at Salterns, an 18th-century house overlooking Poole Harbour. Sadly in 1905 her father died, and she was sent for boarding at St Leonard's school for girls in St Andrews.Her mother remarried and, from 1909, Mary studied at Westfield College in London, and here, first became aware of her bisexual feelings. She was sent down for organising a trip to Epsom races and only completed her...

Knud Pedersen was born in Lom in the Gudbrandsdal valley of Norway on the 4th of August, 1859 in what was then the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway. He was the fourth son of seven children born to poor parents who, when he was three, were invited to an uncle’s farm to work his land.When he was nine he moved away from his family to help another uncle who ran a post office. Whilst with him he was beaten and starved which manifested in a series of chronic nervous difficulties. The...

The bookshelves of European literature are incredible collections that have gathered together centuries of very talented authors. From this continent their fame spread and whilst among their number many are now forgotten or neglected their talents endure. Among them is Auguste Villiers de l'Isle-Adam.

Leonid Nikolaievich Andreyev was born on 21st August in Oryol, Russia to a middle-class family of Polish, Ukranian and Finnish ancestry.He studied law in Moscow before working as a police-court reporter for a daily newspaper. His literary efforts at this time were confined to poetry and those he did try to get published were all rejected.In 1898 his first short story ‘Bargamot and Garaska’, published in the ‘Kurier’ newspaper caught the attention and friendship of Maxim Gor...