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Orion Books
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Jenna is known as The Ice Cream Girl. She doesn't mind the name one bit. After all, it's a happy name, and there are far worse jobs than selling ice creams on Everdene beach. Craig spends as much time as he can at the beach hut in Everdene he rents with a few of his mates. As a policeman, it is a restful change from his daily life, and he's surfing mad. One weekend he's down there on his own when he notices a girl on the beach. He's young, free and single and she catches his eye. But on this particular summer weekend, both Jenna and Craig's lives are about to change... |
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Doctor Who Screenwriter Ben Aaronovitch's superbly entertaining supernatural crime series has, with its witty one-liners and wonderfully erudite take on London, won a legion of fans in double quick time. Peter Grant is learning magic fast. And its just as well — he's already had run ins with the deadly supernatural children of the Thames and a terrifying killer in Soho. Progression in the Police Force is less easy. Especially when you work in a department of two. A department that doesn't even officially exist. A department that if you did describe it to most people would get you laughed at. And then there's his love life. The last person he fell for ended up seriously dead. It wasn't his fault, but still. Now something horrible is happening in the labyrinth of tunnels that make up the tube system that honeycombs the ancient foundations of London. And delays on the Northern line is the very least of it. Time to call in the Met's Economic and Specialist Crime Unit 9, aka 'The Folly'. Time to call in PC Peter Grant, Britains Last Wizard. |
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Sookie has a murder investigation on her hands. A young girl has died at a vampire party — and it looks as though her lover, Eric, might be responsible. Eric swears he didn't do it, the police don't believe him, and even Sookie isn't so sure. Nor is she inclined to take his word for it, not having caught him enjoying the victim's blood minutes before she was killed. But something strange is going on. Why had Sookie been asked to come to the fateful party a few minutes early — just to catch Eric in the act? And why had the victim spiked her blood before approaching Eric? Was it simply because she wanted to be irresistible, or was it something more sinister? Sookie will have to find out... but it's the worst moment to investigate, as her Fae family are having troubles of their own and Sookie is, inevitably, drawn in. And there is one last complication. The cluviel dor her grandmother left her. It will grant her one wish, which could fulfil Sookie's heart's desire. The only problem is, she still doesn't know what — or who — her heart truly desires... |
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Amidst the fun and festivities of Wild Card Day there is an evil mind lurking, who hopes that the celebrations will go off with more than a band. The streets of New York have erupted in celebration of Wild Card Day — the annual event held every September 15th to remember the dead and cherish the living. It is a day for fire works, street fairs and parades, for political rallies and memorial banquets, for drinking and fighting in the alleys. With each passing year, the festivities become larger and more fevered. And this year — 1986, the fortieth anniversary — promises to be the biggest and best Wild Card Day ever. The media and tourists have discovered the celebration, and taverns and restaurants expect record-setting. But lurking in the background is a twisted genius who cares nothing for the fun and festivity. The Astronomer has only one concern: destruction... Featuring plotlines and writing from George RR Martin, John J. Miller, Lewis Shiner, Melinda Snodgrass and more, this novel wraps up the opening WILD CARDS series, while also setting the stage for future adventures. |
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Eleanor is the new girl in town, and she's never felt more alone. All mismatched clothes, mad red hair and chaotic home life, she couldn't stick out more if she tried. Then she takes the seat on the bus next to Park. Quiet, careful and — in Eleanor's eyes — impossibly cool, Park's worked out that flying under the radar is the best way to get by. Slowly, steadily, through late-night conversations and an ever-growing stack of mix tapes, Eleanor and Park fall in love. They fall in love the way you do the first time, when you're 16, and you have nothing and everything to lose. Set over the course of one school year in 1986, Eleanor and Park is funny, sad, shocking and true — an exquisite nostalgia trip for anyone who has never forgotten their first love. |
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Andy Barber's job is to put killers behind bars. And when a boy from his son Jacob's school is found stabbed to death, Andy is doubly determined to find and prosecute the perpetrator. Until a crucial piece of evidence turns up linking Jacob to the murder. And suddenly Andy and his wife find their son accused of being a cold-blooded killer. In the face of every parent's worst nightmare, they will do anything to defend their child. Because, deep down, they know him better than anyone. Don't they? |
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The Prisoner of Heaven returns to the world of the Cemetery of Forgotten Books and the Sempere & Sons bookshop. It begins just before Christmas in Barcelona in 1957, one year after Daniel and Bea from The Shadow of the Wind have married. They now have a son, Julian, and are living with Daniel's father at Sempere & Sons. Fermin still works with them and is busy preparing for his wedding to Bernarda in the New Year. However something appears to be bothering him. Daniel is alone in the shop one morning when a mysterious figure with a pronounced limp enters. He spots one of their most precious volumes that is kept locked in a glass cabinet, a beautiful and unique illustrated edition of The Count of Monte Cristo. Despite the fact that the stranger seems to care little for books, he wants to buy this expensive edition. Then, to Daniel's surprise, the man inscribes the book with the words To Fermin Romero de Torres, who came back from the dead and who holds the key to the future. This visit leads back to a story of imprisonment, betrayal and the return of a deadly rival... |
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A grandfather brutally murdered in a post office raid. A corrupt politician fighting for his future. A police force up for sale. Three crimes leading to one question — who really runs Glasgow? Recently returned to work after the birth of her twins, DS Alex Morrow is called in to head the murder enquiry. The grandfather had helped the gunmen before being shot — was as it a moment of madness, a noble act of self-sacrifice, or did the old man and his killer share a dark past? One city, three crimes and a powerful connection that runs from Glasgow's dark criminal underworld to the international spheres of the super rich. |
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London, May 1537. As those closest to the throne are locked in a fierce fight against those desperate to save England's monasteries from destruction, young Joanna Stafford faces a far more personal battle. When Joanna learns her cousin is about to be burned at the stake for rebelling against Henry VIII, she makes a decision that will change not only her life, but quite possibly the fate of a nation. It will mean turning her back on everything she knows, for Joanna is a novice at Dartford Priory — and to save her family, she must break the sacred rule of enclosure. But running away is only the first transgression. From the Tower of London, to secret assignations and from Stonehenge to the royal court — Joanna becomes entangled with a secret whose deadly past stretches farther back than anyone had imagined. As her mission draws a trail in blood from the last whispered words of a queen to a pattern of unnatural deaths in the royal lineage, Joanna must determine who to trust, and how far she's willing to go to protect her life, her family and everything she holds dear. |
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King Arthur is the ultimate English hero. According to mediaeval histories and romances, he led the defence of Britain against the Saxon invaders in the early 6th century. Even so, the historical basis of his existence is much disputed by modern historians, although it is impossible not to imagine him at the heart of much of our literature from stories to poems to films and plays. Richard Brassey's unique gift for extracting truth from myth in a concise and insightful way makes this book the perfect introduction to King Arthur for young readers — and confused tourists! |
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We can hardly imagine a Britain without Elizabeth II on the throne. It seems to be the job she was born for. And yet for much of her early life the young princess did not know the role that her future would hold. She was our accidental Queen. As a young girl, Elizabeth was among the guests in Westminster Abbey watching her father being crowned, making her the only monarch to have attended a parent's coronation. Kate Williams explores the sheltered upbringing of the young princess with a gentle father and domineering mother, her complicated relationship with her sister, Princess Margaret, and her dependence on her nanny, Marion 'Crawfie' Crawford. She details the profound and devastating impact of the abdication crisis when, at the impressionable age of 11, Elizabeth found her position changed overnight: no longer a minor princess she was now heiress to the throne. Elizabeth's determination to share in the struggles of her people marked her out from a young age. Her father initially refused to let her volunteer as a nurse during the Blitz, but relented when she was 18 and allowed her to work as a mechanic and truck driver for the Women's Auxiliary Territorial Service. It was her forward-thinking approach that ensured that her coronation was televised, against the advice of politicians at the time. Kate Williams reveals how the 25-year-old young queen carved out a lasting role for herself amid the changes of the 20th century. Her monarchy would be a very different one to that of her parents and grandparents, and its continuing popularity in the 21st century owes much to the intelligence and elusive personality of this remarkable woman. |
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1912. Locked in an eerily quiet dining room on the Titanic, a mysterious man tells a young girl his life story as the ship begins to sink. It all starts in Whitechapel, London in 1888... In the small hours of the night in a darkened Whitechapel alley, young Mary Kelly stumbles upon a man who has been seriously injured and is almost unconscious in the gutter. Mary — down on her luck and desperate to survive — steals his bag and runs off into the night. Two days later, an American gentleman wakes in a hospital bed with no memory of who he is or how he got there. He has suffered a serious head injury, and with no one to help him remember who he is he starts to wonder how he will ever find his way home. One terrible truth links these two lost souls in the dark world of Victorian London — a truth that could ruin the name of the most influential man in the land... Back in 1912, as the Titanic begins its final shuddering descent to the bottom of the frozen, black Atlantic, one man is about to reveal the truth behind a series of murders that have hung like a dark fog over London for more than two decades... the identity of Jack the Ripper. |
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One cold morning in December, in a small rural town on the Swedish coast, Ake Melkersson is on his way to work when his car breaks down. Luckily he spots a garage nearby, but as he approaches he realises something is wrong. The owner of the garage lies dead, sprawled on the ground, his lower body crushed where a car has repeatedly driven over him. The murder investigation is led by Inspector Christian Tell who is something of a lone wolf. But he has very few clues to go on and the deceased's wife is out of the country on holiday. Ten years earlier Maya Granith is living at a college for troubled teenagers after escaping her shattered home and her neurotic mother. But when an older student takes an overbearing interest in her things begin to go wrong. Back in the present, another murder occurs when a man is shot in the head; again his body has been driven over several times. Tell is becoming increasingly involved with a female reporter but as she witness on the first case, their relationship is complicated — especially when aspects of the case remind the reporter of someone she knew who went missing ten years earlier. |
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Tell you what, Leader, do you want to double your money? Double or quits? Of course double or quits. I'm having lunch at the Randolph Hotel in Oxford tomorrow with my uncle. If you can join us by one o'clock sharp tomorrow, I'll tear up this cheque and write you another for six thousand pounds It is a bet Richard Gaunt cannot resist — all he has to do is walk from London to Oxford in under twelve hours. As an ex-soldier he is up to the challenge. But what starts as a harmless bet turns into something altogether different when Richard is taken hostage by a mysterious stranger, Mr Khan, who makes him a highly unusual proposal. What he offers in return could transform Richard's life. Traumatised by a tour of duty in Iraq, Richard feels he has nothing to lose. The love of his life won't speak to him, he has lost every job he ever had and his friends have vanished. He therefore decides to accept Khan's strange request — never imagining the places it will take him... |
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A conversation between strangers on a long-haul flight will change lives for ever; one night in Baden-Baden will threaten to tear a couple apart; a meeting with an ex-lover will give a divorcee a second chance; holiday lovers will struggle in the harsh reality of daily routine... As Schlink's characters navigate their lives, we discover the many faces of love: the small betrayals, hidden truths and abiding affections. In Schlink's trademark spare prose, we come face to face with the desires and jealousies that define our daily lives, with the fragility of happiness and with the abiding possibility of hope. Tender yet unsentimental, achingly personal yet utterly universal, SUMMER LIES asks what it means to love, to deceive and, ultimately, to be human. |
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Family life for Mia Channing has always been a carefully orchestrated balancing act. Her husband, Jeff, sees himself as the Larger than Life Patriarch and has always assigned their grown up children very specific roles. Jensen, the eldest, is the Unlovable Awkward One; Eliza, the Distant Smart One; and Daisy, the baby of the family, is the Special One. Mia's own role is that of Devoted Wife and Mediator. When Jensen makes a rare visit home to the village of Little Pelham to celebrate his thirtieth birthday, he brings with him his latest girlfriend and her daughter in tow, his sister Daisy seizes the opportunity to drop the bombshell that she's moving to Australia. It's an evening that marks a turning point in all their lives... Meanwhile yet more change is in the air with the arrival in Little Pelham of wealthy, divorced Owen Fletcher. His return to live in The Hidden Cottage, a place that holds special memories for him, forces Mia to confront the role she's played all these years and to take the risk, finally, of being true to herself. |
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THE STRANGER'S SHADOW continues the adventures of Sir Max — the one-time loser who now heads the Minor Secret Investigative Force — as he hunts down trespassing monsters and investigates the use of illegal magic in the supernatural world of Echo. Joining Max on his adventures are Sir Melifaro, Sir Juffin Hully, Sir Kofa Yox, and a bizarre cast of otherworldly characters. When people begin to die in Echo, Max must travel to the Dark Side of Echo to destroy the Lonely Shadow — the shadows of the dead. But defeating the Lonely Shadow isn't the end of this battle. Someone has been using the shadows to attack Echo, which will lead the redoubtable Max into a realm of unparalleled danger. Will he be able to defend his adopted home, or will he be forced to return to our mundane world? |
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Max Frei has discovered that the one place he really fits in is the parallel world of Echo. In our world he's a loser, an insomniac with dubious social skills and an addiction to cigarettes. But in Echo, the reality is far stranger. There he is Sir Max, a superb magician and one of the powerful few chosen to defend the land against all possible enemies. And he's finally happy. But when one of his esteemed Knight colleagues tells Max of a strange dream — one that seems disturbingly familiar to Max — Max realises he will have to investigate. The subsequent series of events will remind our hero — and the people he protects — just how tenuous happiness can be. It could be his most dangerous mission yet, but The Stranger's Magic may win him through. |
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Thousands of years ago an orphan boy and his wolf cub companion challenge a demon bear that threatens to destroy their world forever. With the help of the World Spirit, Torak destroys the bear, but his beloved Wolf is lost in the ensuing avalanche. And Torak's quest is far from over. A strange, creeping sickness, silent and deadly, is threatening the Ravens. Word arrives that the Seal Clan have the cure and Torak must face a lonely journey to find it. On the Seal's Island he stumbles into a world utterly unlike his own. Here life moves to the rhythms of the sea, the Seals build shelters from whale bones and skim the waves in fast, beautiful kayaks. And here Torak is welcomed by the kindly Seal Mage, Teneris, and kinsman, Bale. But all is not as it seems — Torak must keep his wits about him to judge who might be friend or foe. As in 'Wolf Brother' Michelle Paver's sheer passion for her story set in a world of myth and natural magic, shines through in this skilfully woven, exciting and brilliantly satisfying second instalment of the Chronicles of Ancient Darkness. Launched at the height of the Harry Potter phenomenon, the Chronicles of Ancient Darkness is the ultimate magical adventure. This edition contains brand new interviews with Michelle Paver. Audio edition also available, read by Ian McKellen. |
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Haviland Tuf is an honest space-trader (one of the few), and he likes cats. So how is it that, despite being up against the worst villains in the universe, he has become the proud owner of the last working seedship, pride of Earth's Ecological Engineering Corps? We'll leave that aside for now — just be thankful that the most powerful weapon in space is in good hands, hands which now control cellular material for thousands of outlandish creatures. With his unique equipment and powerful spacecraft, Tuf is set to tackle the myriad problems that human settlers have created during their colonisation of far flung worlds. Hosts of hostile monsters, a population addicted to procreation, a dictator who is willing to unleash plagues to get his own way — and all that stands between the colonists and disaster is Tuf's ingenuity, and his reputation as an honest dealer in a universe of rogues... |
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