What does it mean to lose yourself – and is that something you should be aiming for? A young woman with little interest in games takes up a job in Frankfurt at a famous gaming company, naively set on reinvention. On her morning commute, in the familiar clutches of tedium and self-loathing, she encounters a nice-eyed stranger who returns her forgotten umbrella and finds herself catapulted into a dizzying, year-long whirlwind of obsession – not just with this endlessly attractive spectre, but also with the feverish karaoke trips from which she draws the ultimate solace. With astonishing existential acuity, Polly Barton's formidable debut novel renders the paradoxes of modern life in all its complexity, in deliriously self-conscious prose that is at once propulsive, titillating and bitingly funny. Echoing with the sounds of Whitney Houston and The Cure, reaching for the sublime in dark, sweaty boxes, What Am I, A Deer? is an exhilarating exploration of authenticity, fantasy, romance and intoxication. 

The Hacienda by Isabel Cañas meets “Sister Wives” in a deliciously chilling, darkly romantic, historical gothic horror with a feminist slant, as a young Mormon woman is haunted by a malevolent presence in the decrepit Salt Lake City mansion she shares with her new husband and his other wives… Hazel Russon’s life in 1879 Utah territory is defined by three the Mormon church, polygamy, and the men who control both. She knows she’s supposed to suppress her sinful dreams of a monogamous life with her sweetheart, and her desire for the freedom to play her beloved piano. Every Mormon woman’s duty is to live obediently and meekly, devoted to her husband and her calling as a sister wife. Her eternal salvation depends upon it. Commanded to become the fourth wife of a man she’s never met, Hazel is relieved that Jacob Manwaring is attentive and handsome. However, she is shocked to discover that instead of living separately as is custom, all of Jacob’s wives and children live in the same house—a large, dilapidated manor that inexplicably fills Hazel with dread.  Despite Jacob’s tenderness, Hazel senses dark secrets and resentments among her sister wives. She hears strange music, sees blood oozing from the very walls, and glimpses apparitions that grow more terrifying every day. And as her nightmares worsen, Hazel can’t be sure if she has more to fear from the living—including her mysterious husband—or from a sinister presence that seems to animate the house itself . . . Drawing on little-known Mormon folklore and the author’s own polygamous ancestors, this fascinating, suspense-filled historical novel debut is by turns darkly romantic, spine-tingling, and wholly unforgettable.

The Hacienda by Isabel Cañas meets “Sister Wives” in a deliciously chilling, darkly romantic, historical gothic horror with a feminist slant, as a young Mormon woman is haunted by a malevolent presence in the decrepit Salt Lake City mansion she shares with her new husband and his other wives… Hazel Russon’s life in 1879 Utah territory is defined by three the Mormon church, polygamy, and the men who control both. She knows she’s supposed to suppress her sinful dreams of a monogamous life with her sweetheart, and her desire for the freedom to play her beloved piano. Every Mormon woman’s duty is to live obediently and meekly, devoted to her husband and her calling as a sister wife. Her eternal salvation depends upon it. Commanded to become the fourth wife of a man she’s never met, Hazel is relieved that Jacob Manwaring is attentive and handsome. However, she is shocked to discover that instead of living separately as is custom, all of Jacob’s wives and children live in the same house—a large, dilapidated manor that inexplicably fills Hazel with dread.  Despite Jacob’s tenderness, Hazel senses dark secrets and resentments among her sister wives. She hears strange music, sees blood oozing from the very walls, and glimpses apparitions that grow more terrifying every day. And as her nightmares worsen, Hazel can’t be sure if she has more to fear from the living—including her mysterious husband—or from a sinister presence that seems to animate the house itself . . . Drawing on little-known Mormon folklore and the author’s own polygamous ancestors, this fascinating, suspense-filled historical novel debut is by turns darkly romantic, spine-tingling, and wholly unforgettable.

Following a tight-knit, eccentric Jewish family, the Rosenbergs, over four decades, Unfinished Acts of Wild Creation combines the madness of motherhood with the manic absurdity of grief in a stunning tale for fans of Allegra Goodman and Rebecca Makkai. The night after fleeing her mother’s funeral, cellist Louise Rakoff meets aspiring therapist Leon Rosenberg at a Rosh Hashanah dinner in 1974. Over the next two decades, they build a marriage and a family based on honesty, argument, and a shared appreciation of the absurd. But that rock-solid foundation crumbles when Louise is diagnosed with a rare degenerative disease—the same one responsible for her mother's slow, agonizing passing. Determined to spare Leon and their daughter Lydia from her messy decline, Louise makes the simultaneously selfish and altruistic decision to leave her family and die on her own terms. Her disappearance forces the Rosenbergs to grapple with how to find meaning in the face of mortality—a manic and mystical quest that sends them careening across the globe, colliding into tattoo artists, Chasidic Jews, playworkers, and witches. And finally, back into each other. Bursting with humor and heartbreak, and inspired by Yahm's own experience as a disabled author facing the existential terror of parenting while ill, Unfinished Acts of Wild Creation leaps into the trials of motherhood, the impossibility of adolescence, the hopelessness of grief, and all the wild beauty and hilarity that makes life worth living anyway.

Following a tight-knit, eccentric Jewish family, the Rosenbergs, over four decades, Unfinished Acts of Wild Creation combines the madness of motherhood with the manic absurdity of grief in a stunning tale for fans of Allegra Goodman and Rebecca Makkai. The night after fleeing her mother’s funeral, cellist Louise Rakoff meets aspiring therapist Leon Rosenberg at a Rosh Hashanah dinner in 1974. Over the next two decades, they build a marriage and a family based on honesty, argument, and a shared appreciation of the absurd. But that rock-solid foundation crumbles when Louise is diagnosed with a rare degenerative disease—the same one responsible for her mother's slow, agonizing passing. Determined to spare Leon and their daughter Lydia from her messy decline, Louise makes the simultaneously selfish and altruistic decision to leave her family and die on her own terms. Her disappearance forces the Rosenbergs to grapple with how to find meaning in the face of mortality—a manic and mystical quest that sends them careening across the globe, colliding into tattoo artists, Chasidic Jews, playworkers, and witches. And finally, back into each other. Bursting with humor and heartbreak, and inspired by Yahm's own experience as a disabled author facing the existential terror of parenting while ill, Unfinished Acts of Wild Creation leaps into the trials of motherhood, the impossibility of adolescence, the hopelessness of grief, and all the wild beauty and hilarity that makes life worth living anyway.

The soil on Crow Island holds secrets, and they’re ready to be unearthed. J.H. Markert returns with a surreal horror novel perfect for fans of Graveyard Shift and What Moves the Dead.Eight years ago, a boy took up an axe and slaughtered a dozen people. That odd, troubled boy, Jericho Dodd, has been dead and buried in his father’s yard for years, but ever since that massacre, Crow Island has been a dark and unsettling place. When Jericho’s father begins digging up the past he buried, a compulsion to dig sweeps over the island and soon everyone else is obsessively churning up dirt, desperate to uncover buried secrets. The compulsion leads to violence and as neighbors turn against each other, the island’s famous tupelo honey, harvested from trees deep in a  swamp, changes too. As dread and paranoia seep up from the ground, it becomes clear that the island itself needs something from its residents–before it digs itself apart for good. Be careful what you unearth from the dirt before this surreal horror novel can worm its way into you, too.

The soil on Crow Island holds secrets, and they’re ready to be unearthed. J.H. Markert returns with a surreal horror novel perfect for fans of Graveyard Shift and What Moves the Dead.Eight years ago, a boy took up an axe and slaughtered a dozen people. That odd, troubled boy, Jericho Dodd, has been dead and buried in his father’s yard for years, but ever since that massacre, Crow Island has been a dark and unsettling place. When Jericho’s father begins digging up the past he buried, a compulsion to dig sweeps over the island and soon everyone else is obsessively churning up dirt, desperate to uncover buried secrets. The compulsion leads to violence and as neighbors turn against each other, the island’s famous tupelo honey, harvested from trees deep in a  swamp, changes too. As dread and paranoia seep up from the ground, it becomes clear that the island itself needs something from its residents–before it digs itself apart for good. Be careful what you unearth from the dirt before this surreal horror novel can worm its way into you, too.

Victor Hugo's tale of injustice, heroism and love follows the fortunes of Jean Valjean, an escaped convict determined to put his criminal past behind him. But his attempts to become a respected member of the community are constantly put under threat: by his own conscience, when, owing to a case of mistaken identity, another man is arrested in his place; and by the relentless investigations of the dogged Inspector Javert. It is not simply for himself that Valjean must stay free, however, for he has sworn to protect the baby daughter of Fantine, driven to prostitution by poverty.

Hailsham seems like a pleasant English boarding school, far from the influences of the city. Its students are well tended and supported, trained in art and literature, and become just the sort of people the world wants them to be. But, curiously, they are taught nothing of the outside world and are allowed little contact with it. Within the grounds of Hailsham, Kathy grows from schoolgirl to young woman, but it’s only when she and her friends Ruth and Tommy leave the safe grounds of the school (as they always knew they would) that they realize the full truth of what Hailsham is. Never Let Me Go breaks through the boundaries of the literary novel. It is a gripping mystery, a beautiful love story, and also a scathing critique of human arrogance and a moral examination of how we treat the vulnerable and different in our society. In exploring the themes of memory and the impact of the past, Ishiguro takes on the idea of a possible future to create his most moving and powerful book to date.

Hailsham seems like a pleasant English boarding school, far from the influences of the city. Its students are well tended and supported, trained in art and literature, and become just the sort of people the world wants them to be. But, curiously, they are taught nothing of the outside world and are allowed little contact with it. Within the grounds of Hailsham, Kathy grows from schoolgirl to young woman, but it’s only when she and her friends Ruth and Tommy leave the safe grounds of the school (as they always knew they would) that they realize the full truth of what Hailsham is. Never Let Me Go breaks through the boundaries of the literary novel. It is a gripping mystery, a beautiful love story, and also a scathing critique of human arrogance and a moral examination of how we treat the vulnerable and different in our society. In exploring the themes of memory and the impact of the past, Ishiguro takes on the idea of a possible future to create his most moving and powerful book to date.

'One must be superior to mankind in force, in loftiness of soul—in contempt’ In these two devastating works, Nietzsche offers a sustained and often vitriolic attack on the morality and the beliefs of his time, in particular those of Hegel, Kant and Schopenhaur. Twilight of the Idols is a ‘grand declaration of war’ on reason, psychology and theology that combines highly charged personal attacks on his contemporaries with a lightning tour of his own philosophy. It also paves the way for The Anti-Christ , Nietzche’s final assault on institutional Christianity, in which he identifies himself with the ‘Dionysian’ artist and confronts Christ; the only opponent he feels worthy of him. In his introduction Michael Tanner discussed the themes of Nietzche’s argument and places the works in their historical and philosophical context.

'One must be superior to mankind in force, in loftiness of soul—in contempt’ In these two devastating works, Nietzsche offers a sustained and often vitriolic attack on the morality and the beliefs of his time, in particular those of Hegel, Kant and Schopenhaur. Twilight of the Idols is a ‘grand declaration of war’ on reason, psychology and theology that combines highly charged personal attacks on his contemporaries with a lightning tour of his own philosophy. It also paves the way for The Anti-Christ , Nietzche’s final assault on institutional Christianity, in which he identifies himself with the ‘Dionysian’ artist and confronts Christ; the only opponent he feels worthy of him. In his introduction Michael Tanner discussed the themes of Nietzche’s argument and places the works in their historical and philosophical context.

Returning to Russia from a sanitarium in Switzerland, the Christ-like epileptic Prince Myshkin finds himself enmeshed in a tangle of love, torn between two women—the notorious kept woman Nastasya and the pure Aglaia—both involved, in turn, with the corrupt, money-hungry Ganya. In the end, Myshkin’s honesty, goodness, and integrity are shown to be unequal to the moral emptiness of those around him. In her revision of the Garnett translation, Anna Brailovsky has corrected inaccuracies wrought by Garnett’s drastic anglicization of the novel, restoring as much as possible the syntactical structure of the original story.

Victor Hugo's tale of injustice, heroism and love follows the fortunes of Jean Valjean, an escaped convict determined to put his criminal past behind him. But his attempts to become a respected member of the community are constantly put under threat: by his own conscience, when, owing to a case of mistaken identity, another man is arrested in his place; and by the relentless investigations of the dogged Inspector Javert. It is not simply for himself that Valjean must stay free, however, for he has sworn to protect the baby daughter of Fantine, driven to prostitution by poverty.