Bloomsbury Ordinary Thunderstorms Бойд Уильям

Funny, moving & sharply observed, these stories are confirmation of Boyd's status as one of English fiction's finest writers. Here are 24 gripping tales told in bold, distinct voices from Brazil to Africa and from Nice to Hollywood

Книга Дж. Миро "Обычные монстры" рассказывает о талантах, людях с необычными способностями, которые живут в обстановке викториансского мира и одаренных, но сломленных детях. Необычные дети узнают правду о своих способностях и природе силы, которая их преследует. И понимают, что самые страшные монстры иногда приходят с самыми сладкими подарками • Книга на английском языке • The first in a captivating new historical fantasy series, ORDINARY MONSTERS introduces the Talents with a catastrophic vision of the Victorian world, and the gifted, broken children who must save it • There in the shadows was a figure in a cloak, at the bottom of the cobblestone stair, and it turned and stared up at them as still and unmoving as a pillar of darkness, but it had no face, only smoke

The first in a captivating new historical fantasy series, Ordinary Monsters introduces the Talents with a catastrophic vision of the Victorian world, and the gifted, broken children who must save it • There in the shadows was a figure in a cloak, at the bottom of the cobblestone stair, and it turned and stared up at them as still and unmoving as a pillar of darkness, but it had no face, only smoke • 1882. North of Edinburgh, on the edge of an isolated loch, lies an institution of crumbling stone, where a strange doctor collects orphans with unusual abilities. In London, two children with such powers are hunted by a figure of darkness – a man made of smoke • Charlie Ovid discovers a gift for healing himself through a brutal upbringing in Mississippi, while Marlowe, a foundling from a railway freight, glows with a strange bluish light

It is 1939. Eva Delectorskaya is a beautiful 28-year-old Russian emigree living in Paris. As war breaks out she is recruited for the British Secret Service by Lucas Romer, a mysterious Englishman, and under his tutelage she learns to become the perfect spy, to mask her emotions and trust no one, including those she loves most. Since the war, Eva has carefully rebuilt her life as a typically English wife and mother. But once a spy, always a spy. Now she must complete one final assignment, and this time Eva can't do it alone: she needs her daughter's help

Там, в тени, у подножия вымощенной булыжником лестницы стояла фигура в плаще, и она повернулась и уставилась на них, неподвижная, как столб тьмы, но у нее не было лица, только дым • 1882. К северу от Эдинбурга, на краю уединенного озера, находится учреждение из крошащегося камня, где странный доктор собирает сирот с необычными способностями. В Лондоне за двумя детьми, обладающими такими способностями, охотится фигура тьмы – человек, сотканный из дыма • Чарли Овид обнаруживает в себе дар исцелять себя благодаря жестокому воспитанию в Миссисипи, в то время как Марлоу, подкидыш с грузовой железной дороги, светится странным голубоватым светом. Когда двух седых детективов нанимают, чтобы сопроводить их на север в безопасное место, они сталкиваются со зловещей, опасной силой, которая угрожает перевернуть мир, каким они его знают

On Brazzaville Beach, on the edge of Africa, Hope Clearwater ponders the strange circumstances that led her to leave her husband John, and his mathematical obsessions, in England and venture to Africa to help world-renowned scientist Eugene Mallabar with his studies of wild chimps • But the more Hope studies Mallabar, the more she comes to believe that something isn't right. That behind Mallabar, and his obsessive work, there lies another, more sinister truth: one that might also help explain Hope's reasons for leaving England

Soldier. Farmer. Felon. Writer. Father. Lover • One man, many lives • Born in 1799, Cashel Greville Ross experiences myriad lives: joyous and devastating, years of luck and unexpected loss. Moving from County Cork to London, from Waterloo to Zanzibar, Cashel seeks his fortune across continents in war and in peace. He faces a terrible moral choice in a village in Sri Lanka as part of the East Indian Army. He enters the world of the Romantic Poets in Pisa. In Ravenna he meets a woman who will live in his heart for the rest of his days. As he travels the world as a soldier, a farmer, a felon, a writer, a father, a lover, he experiences all the vicissitudes of life and, through the accelerating turbulence of the nineteenth century, he discovers who he truly is

Soldier. Farmer. Felon. Writer. Father. Lover • One man, many lives • Born in 1799, Cashel Greville Ross experiences myriad lives: joyous and devastating, years of luck and unexpected loss. Moving from County Cork to London, from Waterloo to Zanzibar, Cashel seeks his fortune across continents in war and in peace. He faces a terrible moral choice in a village in Sri Lanka as part of the East Indian Army. He enters the world of the Romantic Poets in Pisa. In Ravenna he meets a woman who will live in his heart for the rest of his days. As he travels the world as a soldier, a farmer, a felon, a writer, a father, a lover, he experiences all the vicissitudes of life and, through the accelerating turbulence of the nineteenth century, he discovers who he truly is

Every life is both ordinary and extraordinary, and Logan Mountstuart's - stretching across the twentieth century - is a rich tapestry of both. As a writer who finds inspiration with Hemingway in Paris and Virginia Woolf in London, as a spy recruited by Ian Fleming and betrayed in the war, and as an art-dealer in '60s New York, Logan mixes with the men and women who shape his times. But as a son, friend, lover and husband, he makes the same mistakes we all do in our search for happiness. Here, then, is the story of a life lived to the full - and a journey deep into a very human heart

Руфь Гилмартин, молоденькая аспирантка Оксфордского университета, внезапно узнает, что ее мать, которую окружающие считают благообразной безобидной старушкой, совсем не та, за кого себя выдает • Один из лучших романов Уильяма Бойда, живого классика английской литературы

Overweight, oversexed and over there • Morgan Leafy is hardly the most respectable of Her Majesty's representatives in the West African state of Kinjanja. For starters, he probably shouldn't have involved himself in wholesale bribery. Nor was it a good career move to go chasing after his boss's daughter; especially when his doctor banned him from horizontal pursuits • But life is about to change for young Morgan Leafy. Every betrayal and humiliation he has suffered at the hands of petty persecutors is suddenly put into perspective. For Morgan has a dead body on his hands - and somehow, some way he's going to have to get rid of it

The infamous literary hoax that fooled the art world • On January 8 1960, artist Nat Tate set out to burn his entire life's work. Four days later he jumped off a Staten Island ferry, killing himself. His body was never found • When William Boyd published his biography of Abstract Expressionist Nat Tate, tributes poured in from a whole host of artists and critics in the New York art world. They toasted the troubled genius in a Manhattan launch party attended by David Bowie and Gore Vidal • But Nat Tate never existed. The book was a hoax • Will Boyd's biography of a fake artist is a brilliant probe into the politics of authenticity and reputation in the modern art scene. It is a playful and intelligent insight into the fascinating, often cryptic world of modern art