We Used to Dance Here by Dave Tynan 28th August (£12.99)
We Used to Dance Here is a portrait of both Dublin and Dubliners in flux, exploring life on the margins, toxic masculinity and frustrated ambitions. With dog tracks, late-night radio talk shows, pubs, messy break-ups, industrial accidents and the reality of housing precarity, these stories show a darker, edgier side to Dublin and they do so in brilliant, crackling prose.
The Expansion Project by Ben Pester 14th August (£16.99)
Plans for the expansion of the Capmeadow Business Park are in full swing - its mission is to become the greatest business park in the region. Tom Crowley, a mid-level employee, loses his daughter at 'bring your daughter to work day.' After no sign of her is found, it transpires she was never there. And yet, as time goes on, Tom still cannot reconcile that she is really at home. Refusing to accept that she is safe, Tom continues to search for her in the maze of corridors and impossible multi-dimensional spaces that make up his place of work...
Other People by Celia Dale 28th August (£10.99)
It is summer in small town Havenport. Protected from the world by her devoted mother, fifteen-year-old June is content and completely self-absorbed. Her biggest concern is where she will be holidaying this year. When June’s father reappears after 12 years in Australia, she is thrust abruptly into a different life: new house, town, school. She soon suspects that she does not know the full story about her father, and when she meets Tony Townsend, he and his London life suddenly promise a glamorous and alluring alternative . . .
Open Wide by Jessica Gross 7th August (£16.99)
Despite being a radio host, Olive has always struggled to connect with people. And now she’s in her thirties, single, and so flustered by relationships that she secretly records conversations, hoping to decipher social clues and find a way to be less alone. Then Theo turns up for a shift at the food pantry where she volunteers. He’s a surgeon fascinated by human organs, a former football player, and possibly as weird as Olive. For the first time, someone seems to crave and understand her.
Where the Axe is Buried by Ray Nayler 14th August (£16.99)
In the authoritarian Federation, there is a plot to assassinate and replace the President, a man who has downloaded his mind to a succession of new bodies to maintain his grip on power. Meanwhile, on the fringes of a Western Europe that has renounced human governance in favour of ostensibly more efficient, objective, and peaceful AI Prime Ministers, an experimental artificial mind is malfunctioning, threatening to set off a chain of events that may spell the end of the Western world. As the Federation and the West both start to crumble, Lilia, the brilliant scientist whose invention may be central to bringing down the seemingly immortal President, goes on the run, trying to break out from a near-impenetrable web of Federation surveillance.
The Course of the Heart by M. John Harrison 7th August (£10.99)
On a hot May night, three Cambridge students carry out a ritualistic act that changes their lives. Decades later, none of the participants can remember what transpired; but their clouded memories bind them together. Unable to move on, Pam has epilepsy and is plagued by sensual visions. Her husband Lucas believes that a creature is stalking him, and invents histories to soothe Pam's fears. Self-styled Sorcerer Yaxley becomes obsessed with a terrifyingly transcendent reality. The narrator is seemingly the least effected participant in the ritual: he is haunted by the smell of roses, and his guilt as he attempts to help his friends escape the torment that has engulfed their lives. Strange, dreamlike and moving, The Course of the Heart is an examination of the edges of humanity where we lie, hide, hurt and heal.
TonyInterruptor by Nicola Barker 14th August (£16.99)
You couldn't really call the man soon to be christened TonyInterruptor a heckler, but he seems to feel an unquenchable urge to disrupt and interrupt live cultural events. Who is he? What does he want? Why does he indulge in behaviour that violates the social contract? After just such a public interruption goes viral, a small group of characters determine to find out the answers to these questions, and end up learning more than they might possibly like about music, culture, relationships, Art, integrity, each other and their own endlessly disrupted and disruptable selves.
The Dead Husband Club by Danielle Valentine 7th August (£16.99)
Maria Capello is a celebrity chef like no other. A household name with dozens of cookbooks and a weekly television show, not to mention her line of bestselling supermarket sauces. Once just the timid wife of famous chef Damien Capello, she stepped into the spotlight after his mysterious disappearance, an event she's never spoken about publicly...until now. Why is Maria willing to break her silence? When editor Thea Woods is invited to Maria's remote farmhouse to work on the manuscript of her tell-all memoir, Thea spots an opportunity. She could be the one to finally learn whether the rumours are true. Did Maria kill Damien for his recipes and the legendary 'secret ingredient'? Or is the truth even darker?
Good and Evil and Other Stories by Samanta Schweblin 28th August (£16.99)
The strange and explosive new collection from the incomparable imagination of Samanta Schweblin, a master of the short story. A gripping blend of the raw, the astonishing and the tragic, every story is as perfectly unexpected as a snare: tightly, exquisitely wound, ready to snap at a touch. Here, a young father is haunted by the consequences of a moment of distraction; tragedy is complicated by the inexplicable appearance of an injured horse; an attempted poisoning leads two writers to startling conclusions; a lonely woman’s charity is rewarded with home-invasion. Guilt, grief and relationships severed permeate this mesmerizing collection – but so do unspeakable bonds of family, love and longing, each sinister and beautiful. Step by step these unnerving stories lure us into the shadows to confront the monsters of everyday life – ourselves.
On Earth As It Is Beneath by Ava Paula Maia 12th August (£11.99)
On land where enslaved people were once tortured and murdered, the state built a penal colony in the wilderness, where inmates could be rehabilitated, but never escape. Now, decades later, and having only succeeded in trapping men, not changing them for the better, its operations are winding down. But in the prison’s waning days, a new horror is unleashed: every full-moon night, the inmates are released, the warden is armed with rifles, and the hunt begins. Every man plans his escape, not knowing if his end will come at the hands of a familiar face, or from the unknown dangers beyond the prison walls. Ana Paula Maia has once again delivered a bracing vision of our potential for violence, and our collective failure to account for the consequences of our social and political action, or inaction. No crime is committed out of view for this novelist, and her raw, brutal power enlists us all as witness.
Seduction Theory by Emily Adrian 14th August (£18.99)
The long summer holiday has begun on the campus of Edwards University in upstate New York. Simone is the star of the creative writing department, a renowned scholar, successful memoirist and campus sex icon. Ethan, her devoted husband, is a lecturer in the same department, though he hasn't published a novel since he was twenty-six. Their marriage is long, strong and happy. But, over the course of that aggressively hot summer break, both will stray. And, as others become involved, new sides to the story of this apparently flawless marriage will emerge. Deliciously smart and bitingly funny, Seduction Theory is a novel about love and betrayal, truth and fiction, power and attraction.
People Like Us by Jason Mott 5th August (£22.00)
Two Black writers - with stories to tell, and some they'd rather forget. One wins the big prize, gets the book tour, walks into the spotlight of global success. The other is about to walk into a place ripped apart by violence - a school that's recently suffered a shooting - with only a speech to offer them. Some stories are simple, and stay neatly in the lines. This one wanders, bends time, breaks rules. This one has sea monsters, floating handguns and ridiculously tiny French cars. Some stories are true. This one is - mostly - made up. Some people turn the page and move on. Some people survive by forgetting. But those people? They're not people like us.
We hope everyone has a joyful, sunny and safe pride this weekend! We wanted to highlight a few queer titles that are coming soon...
Shamiso by Brian Chikwava 28th August (£12.99)
Shamiso is a young girl, thoughtful but uncertain. She spends much of her childhood in rural Zimbabwe but takes a leap to leave it all behind for Brighton. Shamiso must find a new family and a new way of living. There she falls in love for the first time with George - whose female identity, Georgie, is everything Shamiso has ever wanted or needed. But can such happiness last, when neither of them knows yet who they truly are? Quirky, challenging and mischievous, this tender coming-of-age story brilliantly examines selfhood, love and the many shapes family can take.
The Two Roberts by Damian Barr 4th September (£18.99)
Scotland, 1933. Bobby MacBryde is on his way. After years grafting at Lees Boot Factory, he's off to the Glasgow School of Art, to his future. On his first day he will meet another Robert, a quiet man with loose dark curls - and never leave his side. Together they will spend every penny and every minute devouring Glasgow all the while loving each other behind closed doors. Stunningly reimagined, The Two Roberts is a profoundly moving story of devotion and obsession, art and class. It is a love letter to MacBryde and Colquhoun, the almost-forgotten artists who tried to change the way the world sees - and paid a devastating price.
No Body, No Crime by Tess Sharpe 14th August (£10.99)
Rural PI Mel Tillman has seen her fair share of bloody cases and botched cover-ups. But killing with someone? That is a different kind of mess all together, and Mel’s got real experience with it. No one’s heard from Toby Dunne since Chloe Harper’s sweet sixteen party—because the birthday girl and sixteen-year-old Mel buried him so deep in the backwoods, no one’s ever finding him. Mel loses little sleep over it—Toby had been terrorising them. What she does lose sleep over is Chloe, the girl with whom she survived that horrible night in the woods. Chloe, the girl she fell in love with. Chloe, the girl who disappeared and hasn’t been seen in more than six years. Tasked with locating Chloe by her family, Mel can’t resist the call of a good chase, or finding the one who got away with her heart (and with murder).
plus the books you've been waiting to come out in paperback!
