Allen & Unwin Secrets of Happiness Silber Joan

In 1945, with no homes to return to, Jewish refugees set out for Palestine in their tens of thousands • City of Secrets follows one survivor, Brand, as he tries to regain himself after losing everyone he’s ever loved. Now driving a taxi provided – like his new identity – by the underground, he navigates the twisting streets of Jerusalem as well as the overlapping, sometimes deadly loyalties of the resistance. Alone, haunted by memories, he tries to become again the man he was before the war – honest, strong, capable of moral choice • He falls in love with Eva, a fellow survivor and member of his cell, reclaims his faith, and commits himself to the revolution, accepting secret missions that grow more and more dangerous even as he begins to suspect he’s being used by their cell’s dashing leader, Asher

When is it wise to be a fool for something? From New York to India to Paris, from the Catholic Worker movement to Occupy Wall Street, the characters in Joan Silber’s dazzling connected stories tackle this question head-on • Vera, the shy, anarchist daughter of missionary parents, leaves her family for love and activism in New York. A generation later, her doubting daughter insists on the truth of being of two minds, even in marriage. The adulterous son of a Florida hotel owner steals money from his family and departs for Paris, where he finds himself outsmarted in turn. Fools ponders the circle of winners and losers, dupers and duped, and the price we pay for our beliefs, offering readers an unforgettable look at work, faith, love and the eternal quest for personal integrity

For more than 25 years Noriko Morishita has studied and practised the intricate rules of the famous Japanese Tea Ceremony, trying to master its complexities in order to find inner peace. In this vivid account of her experience of the universal trials and triumphs of adulthood, Morishita connects the core tenets of this ancient art with leading a fulfilling life, showing how we too may use mindfulness to achieve happiness

The extraordinarily rich, dark, panoramic tale of an orphaned boy’s quest for truth and then for vengeance as war rages across 17th-century Europe • Amidst the chaos of the Thirty Years’ War, Jack Fiskardo embarks upon a quest that will carry him inexorably from France to Amsterdam and then onto the battlefields of Germany. As he grows to manhood will he be able to unravel the mystery of his father’s death? Or will his father’s killers find him first? • The Silver Wolf is a tale of secrets and treachery and the relentlessness of fate – but it is also a story of courage and compassion, of love and loyalty and ultimately of salvation too • Book One of Fiskardo’s War marks the start of a series of unforgettable, epic historical fiction for readers of Ken Follett and Kate Mosse

What would David Bowie do? • When life gets tough, who can we turn to for help? Who will help us find happiness, meaning and purpose? The Tao of Bowie suggests that we turn to David Bowie for guidance – and use his amazing journey through life as a map to help us navigate our own • Buddhism was central to David Bowie’s life, but he was a wide-ranging thinker who also drew meaning from other sources including Jungian psychology, Nietzschean philosophy and Gnosticism. The Tao of Bowie condenses these concepts – the ideas that inspired and supported Bowie throughout his life and career – into ten powerful lessons, each with a series of exercises, meditations and techniques to encourage readers to apply these learnings to their own lives • The Tao of Bowie will help readers understand who they really are, clarify their purpose in life, manage their emotions and cope with setbacks and change

A regular weekday morning veers drastically off-course for a group of strangers whose paths cross in a London cafe – their lives never to be the same again when an apparently crazed gunman holds them hostage. But there is more to the situation than first meets the eye and as the captives grapple with their own inner demons, the line between right and wrong starts to blur. Will the secrets they keep stop them from escaping with their lives?

One beautiful September day, three sixty-six-year-old men convene on Martha’s Vineyard, friends ever since meeting in college in the 1960s. They couldn’t have been more different then, or even today – Lincoln’s a commercial real estate broker, Teddy a tiny-press publisher and Mickey an ageing musician. But each man holds his own secrets, in addition to the monumental mystery that none of them has ever stopped puzzling over since 1971: the disappearance of their friend Jacy. Now, decades later, the distant past interrupts the present as the truth about what happened to Jacy finally emerges, forcing the men to reconsider everything they thought they knew about each other • Shot through with Russo’s trademark comedy and humanity, Chances Are also introduces a new level of suspense and menace that will quicken the reader’s heartbeat throughout this absorbing saga of how friendship’s bonds are every bit as constricting and rewarding as those of family

What is autism: a devastating developmental condition, a lifelong disability, or a naturally occurring form of cognitive difference akin to certain forms of genius? In truth, it is all of these things and more – and the future of our society depends on our understanding it • Following on from his groundbreaking article ‘The Geek Syndrome’, Wired reporter Steve Silberman unearths the secret history of autism, long suppressed by the same clinicians who became famous for discovering it, and finds surprising answers to the crucial question of why the number of diagnoses has soared in recent years • Going back to the earliest autism research and chronicling the brave and lonely journey of autistic people and their families through the decades, Silberman provides long-sought solutions to the autism puzzle while casting light on the growing movement of ‘neurodiversity’ and mapping out a path towards a more humane world for people with learning differences

An intensely beautiful, profound and poetic biography of the formative years of the dark prince of rock ‘n’ roll, Boy on Fire is Nick Cave’s creation story, a portrait of the artist first as a boy, then as a young man. A deeply insightful work which charts his family, friends, influences, milieu and, most of all, his music, it reveals how Nick Cave shaped himself into the extraordinary artist he would become • A powerful account of a singular, uncompromising artist, Boy on Fire is also a vivid and evocative rendering of a time and place, from the fast-running dark rivers and ghost gums of country-town Australia to the torn wallpaper, sticky carpet and manic energy of the nascent punk scene which hit staid 1970s Melbourne like an atom bomb • Boy on Fire is a stunning biographical achievement

In 2007, Bolton Crown Court sentenced Shaun Greenhalgh to four years and eight months in prison for the crime of producing artistic forgeries. Working out of a shed in his parents’ garden, Greenhalgh had successfully fooled some of the world’s greatest museums. During the court case, the breadth of his forgeries shocked the art world and tantalised the media. What no one realised was how much more of the story there was to tell • Written in prison, A Forger’s Tale details Shaun’s notorious career and the extraordinary circumstances that led to it. From Leonardo drawings to L.S. Lowry paintings, from busts of American presidents to Anglo-Saxon brooches, from cutting-edge Modernism to the ancient art of the Stone Age, Greenhalgh could – and did – copy it all

There’s a lot of angst around these days. This heightened sense of fear, concern, insecurity and uncertainty can be overwhelming • Bestselling author of The Book of Overthinking and The Book of Knowing Gwendoline Smith explains what angst is and the ways in which deep anxiety can manifest • Gwendoline then drills down into social anxiety, which is often underdiagnosed but is one of the most common of the anxiety family • Using simple, clear language and humorous illustrations, Gwendoline gives detailed step-by-step advice on how to cope

A virtuoso performance by the bestselling author of Still Alice, Lisa Genova delivers a stunning novel of finding harmony amidst the most tragic of situations • An accomplished concert pianist, Richard has already suffered many losses in his life: the acrimonious divorce from his ex-wife, Karina; the estrangement of his daughter, Grace; and now, a devastating diagnosis. ALS. The relentlessly progressive paralysis of ALS begins in the cruellest way possible – in his hands. As Richard becomes more and more locked inside his body and can no longer play piano or live on his own, Karina steps in as his reluctant caregiver • Paralysed in a different way, Karina is trapped within a prison of excuses and blame, stuck in an unfulfilling life as an after-school piano teacher, afraid to pursue the path she abandoned as a young woman