Constable Darke Matter Gekoski Rick

Released from prison after serving his sentence for the assisted death of his wife, his health failing and his chronic impatience exacerbated, Dr James Darke self-isolates. But on his return he understands that he is now a displaced person, lost in a new world for which his education and inclinations have not prepared him • Irascible, misanthropic, intensely bookish, fastidious in his tastes and rich enough to indulge them, Darke is a happy shut-in, busily writing oppositional pamphlets and composing a literary hoax. But his daughter and the Bulgarian housekeeper she hired to look after him have other ideas • After Darke is a moving, witty reflection on grief, ageing and love in all its forms, and James Darke is one of the most memorable, exasperating yet loveable characters of contemporary fiction

It is 1953, a heat wave is sweeping across America and the Grossmans - Ben, Addie and their two children - are moving their lives from the political heart of Washington DC to suburban Long Island. With their future uncertain, life in Long Island starts to cause problems for Ben and Addie. Both begin to wonder if they were meant for more, whether their lives might look different than they planned, and whether their marriage - their family - is worth fighting for. A Long Island Story is a portrait of a couple in crisis, of a unique and fascinating period in US history and of a seemingly perfect family fighting their demons behind closed doors

When a three-year old girl is reported missing, DCI Andy Gilchrist is assigned the case. But Gilchrist soon suspects that the child's mother - Andrea Davis - may be responsible for her daughter's disappearance, or worse, her murder • The case becomes politically sensitive when Gilchrist learns that Andrea is the daughter of Dougal Davis, a former MSP who was forced to resign from Scottish Parliament after being accused of physically abusing his third wife. Now a powerful businessman, Davis demands Gilchrist's removal from the case when his investigation seems to be stalling. But then the case turns on its head when Gilchrist learns that a paedophile, recently released from prison, now lives in the same area as the missing child. The paedophile is interrogated but hours later his body is found on the beach with evidence of blunt force trauma to the head, and Gilchrist launches a murder investigation

The Thing Is • A novel, a confession, a poem, an autofiction, a commonplace book, a prose poem • By turns serious and playful, profound and trivial, sad and joyful, The Thing Is is a shape-shifting narrative: one that starts out as written by an alien, seeing the earth and its inhabitants from the outside. This perspective then becomes that of an everychild, who vaguely remembers having once been an alien, and evolves into the biography of everybody who has ever lived • The narrative moves deftly from an ingenious theory about the origins of the universe and the emergence of life, to a riff on the poetic power of doorways (and other thresholds); or from stories about things hidden from view or buried by time, to what it feels like to be alive at this particular moment in history

Roma is the story of the ancient city of Rome, from its mythic beginnings as a campsite along a trade route to its emergence as the centre of the most extensive, powerful empire in the ancient world • Beginning with the prehistory days when Roma was a way station among seven hills for traders and merchants and the founding of the city itself by Romulus and Remus, critically acclaimed historical novelist Steven Saylor tells the epic saga of a city and its people, its rise to prominence among the city-states of the area, and, ultimately, dominance over the entire ancient Western world • From the tragedy of Coriolanus, to the Punic Wars and the invasion by Hannibal, the triumph and murder of Julius Caesar, and the rise and decline of the Roman Republic and the beginnings of Imperial Rome, Saylor's breathtaking novel brings to vivid life the most famous city of the ancient world

'If all you know is cricket, then cricket will break you . . .' • It is the final Test match of The Ashes. A nation expects, and the rest of the cricketing world is watching • Fast-paced, humorous and candid, The Test follows the battles on and off the field as stand-in England captain, James McCall, tries to get his exhausted team across the finish line. Along the way, his story becomes one of fatherhood, friendship and trusting yourself when no one else will • Nathan Leamon's love letter to Test cricket is that rare thing: a novel that captures the feel and flavour of professional sport from the inside - the good, the bad and the simply surreal • Not since J. L. Carr's classic A Season in Sinji has there been a novel that quite captures the spirit of the game

Amsterdam-based Lotte Meerman is a cold case detective recovering from the emotional devastation of her previous investigation. She is angry and mentally scarred - but being a police officer is the only thing she wants to do • A tip-off leads Lotte to an unresolved ten-year-old murder case in which her father was the lead detective. ANd when she discovers irregularities surrounding the original investigation that make him a suspect, she decides to cover for him • Now she has to find the real murderer before she's discovered, otherwise her father will be arrested and she will lose her job, the one thing in life that is keeping her focused and sane

In the international bestseller Roma, Steven Saylor told the story of the first thousand years of Rome by following the descendants of a single bloodline. Now, in Empire, Saylor charts the destinies of five more generations of the Pinarius family, from the reign of the first emperor, Augustus, to the glorious height of Rome's empire under Hadrian • Through the eyes of the Pinarii, we witness the machinations of Tiberius, the madness of Caligula, the cruel escapades of Nero, and the chaos of the Year of Four Emperors in 69 A.D. The deadly paranoia of Domitian is followed by the Golden Age of Trajan and Hadrian-but even the most enlightened emperors wield the power to inflict death and destruction on a whim • Empire is strewn with spectacular scenes, including the Great Fire of 64 A

How well do you know the person you love? • A woman's body is washed up on the rocks by the castle ruins in St Andrews with evidence of strangulation, and no ID. Two days into the case, a call from another woman claiming to be the victim's friend could be DCI Andy Gilchrist's first solid lead. But when she fails to turn up for an interview, Gilchrist fears the worst. The next day, they find her battered body • Gilchrist's focus centres on his prime suspect, a local handyman with the reputation of being a ladies' man, who seems to have no history beyond three years - the length of time he's been living in the East Neuk. But before Gilchrist can bring him in for questioning, he vanishes • Would you trust the person you love with your life? If you do, they might just take it

Having been shot in the shoulder in the line of duty, Dutch police detective Lotte Meerman returns to work after four months of painful recovery - yet not all her colleagues are happy to see her • But department politics take a backseat when Lotte is called to investigate a worker's fall from the roof on a building site in the centre of Amsterdam. Frank Stapel's tragic accident becomes suspicious when Tessa, his widow, discovers human bones in her husband's left-luggage locker at Amsterdam Central. To Lotte, this changes the course of her investigation from fatal accident to potential murder • When forensics discover the skeleton dates back to the Second World War, the rest of the team are convinced that Lotte is wasting everybody's time by insisting this somehow ties in with the Frank's death, but then it is discovered that some of the bones are less than a decade old

1989. Salvadorian society is immersed in the horror of civil war. On a fateful November dawn, a group of armed men entered the Universidad Catolica and murder six Jesuits priests and two women in cold blood. Survivor of the massacre Father Tojeira is forced to take the reins of control in the sinister days following the attack, desperate to uncover the truth behind the terrible slaughter • Inspired by the real-life tragic events that shook El Salvador and Latin America, November is a moving and unsettling novel about fear, hate and impunity. It is the first book to cast some light on the crime that was never solved and an attempt to speak out, as the murdered Jesuits attempted to do, in the defence of the disadvantaged

The Unstable Boys is the first novel from legendary rock critic Nick Kent • London 1968 • The Unstable Boys are the name on every music insider's lips and tipped to follow in the footsteps of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. This is their chance to hit the bigtime. They don't know they're about to be obliterated by a series of tragedies and a chaotic breakup that puts paid to the band's starry-eyed dreams of stratospheric success. One day you're the dog's bollocks; the next day you're a nobody - fame is a fickle friend • London 2016 • Bestselling crime writer Michael Martindale has reached breaking point. Estranged from his wife and children following the very public fallout of his disastrous affair, he is alone, with only his self-pity to keep him warm at night