The August Bank Holiday means Summer is almost over but we have a long weekend of decent weather coming up so there is still time to head to the beach or relax in the garden. However you are spending the bank holiday weekend, make sure one of your companions is a good book.
Death and mayhem erupt on an exclusive island as it plays host to a reality television show like no other . . . From bestselling author Ruth Kelly, The Villa is an electrifying summer read, perfect for fans of Lucy Foley and Catherine Cooper.
A VILLA IN PARADISE
It’s destined to be the ultimate reality TV show. Ten contestants. A luxurious villa on a private island. Every moment streamed live to a global audience who have total control over those competing for the cash prize.
A JOURNALIST UNDERCOOVER
Reporter Laura is told to get the inside scoop on her fellow contestants. But once the games begin, she soon finds herself at the mercy of a ruthless producer willing to do anything to increase viewer numbers.
A REALITY SHOW TO DIE FOR
There is more to every contestant than meets the eye, including Laura. They all have secrets they’d like to keep buried, and the pressure in paradise quickly reaches boiling point. How far will the contestants go to secure audience votes? And would somebody really kill to win?
Oscar is dead because I watched him die and did nothing.
It is the end of August and the long summer holidays are drawing to a close. Seventeen-year-old Leonard is on a camping holiday with his family in the South of France. Awkward and ill at ease, he is an outsider who creeps away from parties unnoticed after a couple of drinks.
On the final Friday of the trip, unable to sleep, Leonard goes for a walk and sees one of the boys from the campsite, Oscar, hanging from the rope of a playground swing. Leonard watches as the rope slowly strangles Oscar. Then, unable to think straight, he buries the body in the sand, and returns to his tent.
The next day is the hottest in seventeen years. Disoriented by the oppressive heat, and distracted by his desire for a girl named Luce, Leonard spends the ensuing hours trying not to unravel.
A literary sensation in France, Heatwave is an unsettling and evocative novel that examines our darkest impulses.
Nora is a cut-throat literary agent at the top of her game.
Her whole life is books.
Charlie is an editor with a gift for creating bestsellers.
And he’s Nora’s work nemesis.
Nora has been through enough break-ups to know she’s the one men date before finding their happy-ever-after.
To prevent another dating dud, Nora’s sister has persuaded her to swap her city desk for a month’s holiday in Sunshine Falls.
It’s a small town straight out of a romance novel, but instead of meeting sexy lumberjacks, handsome doctors or cute bartenders, Nora keeps bumping into…Charlie.
Grace is about to turn ninety and she doesn’t want parties or presents or fuss. She just wants a quiet celebration: her daily swim in the sea and a cup of tea with granddaughter Elin and great-granddaughter Beca. More than anything, she wants to heal the family rift that’s been breaking her heart for decades.
And to do that she must find her daughter, Alys – the only person who can help to put things right.But thirty years is a long time.And many words have been left unsaid.So is it too late now to heal the pain of the past?
This is a story about mothers and daughters: the love inherent in that bond and the heartache that miscommunication can bring. More than anything, it’s about the importance of being true to oneself. Meet Grace, Alys, Elin and Beca – a family you’ll come to know, and to love.
The Seaplane on Final Approach by Rebecca Rukeyser
Tourists arrive all summer, by boat or seaplane, at Stu and Maureen Jenkins’s Lavender Island Wilderness Lodge in the Kodiak Archipelago, expecting adventure. But the spontaneity of their authentic Alaskan wilderness experience is meticulously scripted, except when real danger rears its head. Stu and Maureen’s lodge is failing, as is their marriage.
Mira has been hired for the season as the lodge’s baker and housekeeper. But she’s also busy gleefully nursing twin obsessions: building a working theory of what constitutes ‘sleaze’ and pursuing a young fisherman she deems the embodiment of all things deliciously sleazy. Her plans become more perverse and elaborate, even as life on Lavender Island starts to unravel.
By midseason, it becomes clear that Stu, the jovial, predatory patriarch of the lodge, has turned his sexual attentions to another young employee. As the mood of the lodge spirals into chaos, the inhabitants realize just how isolated Lavender Island really is.
Hilarious, sensual, and charged with menace, The Seaplane on Final Approach brilliantly illuminates the mirage-thin line between the artificial and the feral. In this daring and psychologically razor-sharp debut, Rukeyser’s characters tear aside the façade of good manners to reveal all of our deepest needs and naked desires.
The holidays have begun.
In a seaside caravan resort, Isabel and her sister Meg build sandcastles with the children, navigate deckchair politics, explore the pier’s delights, gorge ice cream in the sun.
But their half-sister Mildred has returned to a nearby coastal cottage where her husband – the mysterious Uncle Paul – was arrested for his first wife’s attempted murder: and family skeletons emerge.
Now, on his release from prison, is he returning for revenge, seeking who betrayed him?
Or are all three women letting their nerves get the better of them? Though who really is Meg’s new lover? And whose are those footsteps …?
For the people who swim there each day, the local pool is a haven of unexpected kinship and private solace.
For Alice, her daily laps have become the ritual that gives her life meaning, even though she may not remember the combination to her locker or where she put her towel.
But one day, a crack appears deep beneath the surface of the water, and then another, and then another.
The pool must close for repairs, and with that Alice is plunged into dislocation and chaos.
Away from the steady routines of her swimming, she is engulfed by difficult memories of her own past. And as her sense of home, and of herself, slip further out of her grasp, her daughter must navigate the newly fractured landscape of their relationship.
The Three of Us by Ore Agbaje-Williams
A nice house, a carefree life, a doting husband, a best friend who never leaves your side. What more could you ask for?
There’s just one problem: your husband and best friend love you, but they hate each other.
Set over a single day, husband, wife and best friend Temi toe the lines of compromise and betrayal.
Told in three parts, three people’s lives, and their visions of themselves and one another begin to slowly unravel, until a startling discovery throws everyone’s integrity into question.
Oscar is dead because I watched him die and did nothing.
It is the end of August and the long summer holidays are drawing to a close. Seventeen-year-old Leonard is on a camping holiday with his family in the South of France. Awkward and ill at ease, he is an outsider who creeps away from parties unnoticed after a couple of drinks.
On the final Friday of the trip, unable to sleep, Leonard goes for a walk and sees one of the boys from the campsite, Oscar, hanging from the rope of a playground swing. Leonard watches as the rope slowly strangles Oscar. Then, unable to think straight, he buries the body in the sand, and returns to his tent.
The next day is the hottest in seventeen years. Disoriented by the oppressive heat, and distracted by his desire for a girl named Luce, Leonard spends the ensuing hours trying not to unravel.
A literary sensation in France, Heatwave is an unsettling and evocative novel that examines our darkest impulses