From the author of Skippy Dies comes Paul Murray's The Bee Sting, an irresistibly funny, wise, and thought-provoking tour de force about family, fortune, and the struggle to be a good person when the world is falling apart. The Barnes family is in trouble. Dickie’s once-lucrative car business is going under―but rather than face the music, he’s spending his days in the woods, building an apocalypse-proof bunker with a renegade handyman. His wife Imelda is selling off her jewelry on eBay, while their teenage daughter Cass, formerly top of her class, seems determined to binge-drink her way through her final exams. And twelve-year-old PJ is putting the final touches to his grand plan to run away from home. Where did it all go wrong? A patch of ice on the tarmac, a casual favor to a charming stranger, a bee caught beneath a bridal veil―can a single moment of bad luck change the direction of a life? And if the story has already been written―is there still time to find a happy ending?

For fans of How to Fake it in Hollywood and Before Sunrise, a romance about how a chance encounter can rewrite a story—and change everything.This is the night Shera's been waiting She’s at a trendy Silver Lake bar to finally get a drink with the handsome, charming filmmaker she's been pining after for months. But when Max King—the alluring and mischievous frontman of an Irish punk band—enters the picture, an electric attraction ignites between them. Shera’s evening begins to unfold in ways she never imagined, and she surprises herself by getting swept up in his energy and daring to feel again after past heartbreak. But how does she know their passionate encounter won't expire in the morning? And is she ready to shed some of her hard-earned armor for this disarming stranger? The second book from 831 Stories, a modern romantic fiction company that prioritizes pleasure reading and the genre’s enthusiastic fans. **This ebook contains an exclusive bonus chapter of Comedic Timing by Upasna Barath | 831 Stories

A colony of moss does not express preferences for certain people, living or dead. But if such a colony of moss did decide to reveal its favourites, let us just say You might be surprised.In 2018, a young forensic scientist, homesick and adrift in the North of England, is heading to a coroner's office to identify a body.In 50 BCE, a female druid is travelling to a city in the South where she will appear before the new king.And underfoot, all along, a teeming colony of moss is opening its wet mouth, waiting.In this wonderfully strange, multi-layered story, the unexpected discovery of an ancient bog body becomes a pinprick of light in the depths of humanity's history.

Kendle's job is on the line every time she rescues a Wild teen. But Wilds, with their uncontrolled psychic abilities, need her help. They need the chronically underfunded Warehouse, the only school available for Wilds. But accepting a teen with potentially dangerous abilities puts her at odds with her boss; refusing means the teen faces life institutionalized, sedated, and under restraint.Stephen, the new telepathy teacher, is a Bred. His wealthy parents paid for his perfect geneticcode. He's not used to the Warehouse's long hours, to students who float beds through walls during nightmares, or send fishbowls through windows-not to mention the food sucks. The only bright spot is the fascinating Wild teacher in the next room who plays amazing cello or guitar music late at night.Kendle doesn't think Stephen belongs at the Warehouse, but when he helps save her and herstudents from a violent mob, she wonders if she was wrong...and if a Bred like Stephen mightfall for a Wild like her. But Kendle has little time for romance. As society ramps up its hatred ofWilds and the Warehouse's resources stretch desperately thin, Kendle must find a way to keepthe director from expelling the most gifted students as dangers to the school.

A journalist investigates a seductive and mysterious cult and its leader, an enigmatic Vietnam War veteran, in this not-to-be-missed novel.Faruq Zaidi, a young journalist reeling from the recent death of his father, a devout Muslim, takes the opportunity to embed in a cult called The Nameless. Based in the California redwoods and shepherded by an enigmatic Vietnam War-veteran named Odo, The Nameless adhere to the 18 Utterances, including teachings such as “THERE IS NO GOD BUT THE NAMELESS,” “ALL SUFFERING IS DISTORTION,” and “SEE ONLY BEAUTY.” Faruq, skeptical but committed to unraveling the mystery of The Nameless, extends his stay over months, as he gets deeper into the cult's inner workings, compassionate teachings, and closer to Odo. Faruq himself begins to unravel, forced to come-to-terms with the memories he has been running from while trying to resist Odo's spell. Told in three seamlessly interwoven threads between Faruq’s present-day investigation, Odo’s time before the formation of the movement as a Black infantryman during the Vietnam War, alongside three other Black soldiers, and a documentary script that recounts The Nameless’ clash with a Texan fundamentalist church, O SINNERS! examines both longing and belonging. Ultimately the novel What is it that we seek from cults and, inevitably, from each other?

From award-winning author R. F. Kuang comes Babel, a thematic response to The Secret History and a tonal retort to Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell in this unforgettable work of dark academia that grapples with student revolutions, colonial resistance, and the use of language and translation as the dominating tool of the British empire. Traduttore, traditore: An act of translation is always an act of betrayal. 1828. Robin Swift, orphaned by cholera in Canton, is brought to London by the mysterious Professor Lovell. There, he trains for years in Latin, Ancient Greek, and Chinese, all in preparation for the day he’ll enroll in Oxford University’s prestigious Royal Institute of Translation—also known as Babel. Babel is the world's center for translation and, more importantly, magic. The unique magic system of silver working—the art of manifesting the meaning lost in translation using enchanted silver bars—has made the British unparalleled in power, as its knowledge serves the Empire’s quest for colonization. For Robin, Oxford is a utopia dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge. But knowledge obeys power, and as a Chinese boy raised in Britain, Robin realizes serving Babel means betraying his motherland. As his studies progress, Robin finds himself caught between Babel and the shadowy Hermes Society, a secret society dedicated to stopping imperial expansion. When Britain pursues an unjust war with China over silver and opium, Robin must decide… Can powerful institutions be changed from within, or does revolution always require violence?

An indomitable horde, nearly immune to the weight of time, marauds through the cosmos. From the seat of Earth’s veiled realms, they quest with calamity in their wake, destroying endemic life on every world they darken. Searching for an ancient power, to satisfy the vendetta of their infamous and self-named god; Ethoabba. Death is gorged by their work. Until they are discovered and pursued by them that are called. For fans of epic fantasy blended with science fiction, in modern or distant settings. This narrative weaves together mythos from across the globe, covering challenging ethical questions through the vehicle of war and violent conquest. Told from the perspective of key characters who find themselves thrown into it.

The fantastical novels of Haruki Murakami have earned him a dedicated international fan-base and recurring success in the bestseller charts. In Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, Murakamis brilliant imagination seizes on the worlds most ingenious and complex the human mind. Two contrasting worlds are envisaged. In Hard-boiled Wonderland a shuffler is at work in Tokyo, where the minds of the people have become servant to the requirements of the governmental system. In the surreal realm of the End of the World a dreamreader, sifts through memories, scattering them to oblivion. Gradually the alternate universes of the shuffler and the dreamreader are interwoven and Murakamis ingenious conception of the mind becomes clear. A feast for the imagination - Murakamis novel amazes, amuses and delights.

Come meet The Liar, The Secret Keeper, The Crybaby, and the rest. Nine children travel with their families to their Grandfather's vacation property, where strange things begin to happen: eyes blink from the bottom up, mushrooms ooze blood, people's faces don't hang right anymore-except they do, once you look more closely. Transformations warp the children's sense of time and place, the very land itself seeming to encroach upon them. As The Liar watches the children succumb one by one to an unknown fate, she must make sense of absent stars in the night sky, vials of amber liquid that taste of milk, a funny little rope tied in knots. She's faced with a choice: join or resist, only the choice is not so simple. Set in The Grandfather's Lake House as he continues to extend his property lines and told in the eerie we of the children, Root Rot explores predatory family dynamics, the boundaries of bodies and home, and how individuals choose to participate in or push back against structures that would harm them.

From the author of Skippy Dies comes Paul Murray's The Bee Sting, an irresistibly funny, wise, and thought-provoking tour de force about family, fortune, and the struggle to be a good person when the world is falling apart. The Barnes family is in trouble. Dickie’s once-lucrative car business is going under―but rather than face the music, he’s spending his days in the woods, building an apocalypse-proof bunker with a renegade handyman. His wife Imelda is selling off her jewelry on eBay, while their teenage daughter Cass, formerly top of her class, seems determined to binge-drink her way through her final exams. And twelve-year-old PJ is putting the final touches to his grand plan to run away from home. Where did it all go wrong? A patch of ice on the tarmac, a casual favor to a charming stranger, a bee caught beneath a bridal veil―can a single moment of bad luck change the direction of a life? And if the story has already been written―is there still time to find a happy ending?

A love that couldn't be broken, except by the truth. Lizzie Young has always felt she was too much everything. Diagnosed with bipolar disorder at a young age, she's never fit in with her family, her friends, her community. Lizzie wants to be accepted and understood, but with few family or friends in her corner, she's carries her burdens and her trauma on her own. But when she meets a kind boy on the school bus, things start to look bright for the first time in her life… Hugh Biggs has an old soul and the wisdom of someone far beyond his years. A young man with a sharp mind and a firm code of ethics, he sees something in Lizzie Young that he can't resist. He wants to be her everything and shoulder her burden. And Lizzie wants that too. Lizzie and Hugh's bond seems unbreakable — their chemistry is electric, their love is potent, and their connection is soul deep – but even the truest love can be shaken by forces beyond control.