Penguin The Poison Bed Fremantle Elizabeth

The only gift Charlie wants for his 80th birthday is his family all together again • Ever since his wife Daphne passed away, and the children grew up into their own busy lives, it's felt like they've drifted apart • So he's invited them all on a family holiday - their first in years • And by some miracle, everyone has said yes • Ten days all together in the Cotswolds . . . how hard can it be?

Taryn Cornick barely remembers the family library. Since her sister was murdered, she's forgotten so much • Now it's all coming back. The fire. The thief. The scroll box. People are asking questions about the library. Questions that might relate to her sister's murder • And something called The Absolute Book • A book in which secrets are written - and which everyone believes only she can find. They insist Taryn be the hunter. But she knows the truth • She is the hunted • The Absolute Book is a tale of sisters, ancient blood, a forgotten library, murder, revenge and a book that might just have the answer to everything

Lost in history . . . losing her self. Uncover Tudor heroine Arbella Stuart's incredible story, reimagined by Elizabeth Fremantle in this tense, historical thriller • Hardwick Hall, sixteenth-century England • Formerly a beacon of wealth and power • Now a gilded prison • Hidden away, forgotten, one young woman seeks escape • But to do so she must trust those on the outside • Those who have their own motives • Discovery means death. But what choice has any woman trapped in a man's world? • Imprisoned by circumstance, Arbella Stuart is an unwilling contender for the throne. In a world where women are silenced, what chance does she have to take control of her destiny?

The queen's goddaughter • Her most trusted maid • Adultress • Enemy of the state • Who is the real Penelope Devereux? • Penelope Devereux is a legendary beauty in the court of Elizabeth I, with a smile that would light up the shadows of hell. But it's not just her looks which have won her favour with the Queen wing; her canny instinct for being in the right place at the right time, and her skilled political manoeuvrings under the guise of diplomacy, have rendered her a formidable adversary to anyone who stands in her path. Including Elizabeth • For Penelope must secure the future of the Devereux dynasty at whatever cost. Even treason. And the Queen, a woman she holds responsible for the death of her father, the exile of her mother and her failure to marry the one man she ever truly loved, is just one more pawn in a deadly game

Recalling Olive Kitteridge in its richness, structure, and complexity, Anything Is Possible explores the whole range of human emotion through the intimate dramas of people struggling to understand themselves and others. Anything is Possible tells the story of the inhabitants of rural, dusty Amgash, Illinois, the hometown of Lucy Barton, a successful New York writer who finally returns, after seventeen years of absence, to visit the siblings she left behind • Reverberating with the deep bonds of family, and the hope that comes with reconciliation, Anything Is Possible again underscores Elizabeth Strout's place as one of America's most respected and cherished authors • Lucy's story continues in Oh William! and Lucy by the Sea, available to read now!

It is 1940 and the bombs are falling thick and fast on London. The royal family must do all they can to assure the British public of their solidarity. But what of the two young princesses - Elizabeth and Margaret? How can they be kept safe without jeopardizing morale in the capital? • Meanwhile Celia Nashe is delighted when she finally gets her long-awaited transfer to MI5. But whatever she was expecting of her mission for the war effort, it wasn't this. A crumbling castle in remote, rural Ireland, playing nursemaid to two pampered young girls • But her posting soon turns out to be very far from tame. Questions are being asked by the locals about the identities of Celia's secret charges. And when a dead body turns up at the castle gates, it will take every effort to uncover the truth, and to stop it from coming to light

Everybody thinks they know what sheep are like: they're stupid, noisy, cowardly ('lambs to the slaughter'), and they're 'sheepwrecking' the environment • Or maybe not. Contrary to popular prejudice, sheep are among the smartest animals in the farmyard, fiercely loyal, forming long and lasting friendships. Sheep, farmed properly, are boons to biodiversity. They also happen to taste good and their fleeces warm us through the winter - indeed, John Lewis-Stempel's family supplied the wool for Queen Elizabeth's 'hose' • Observing the traditional shepherd's calendar, The Sheep's Tale is a loving biography of ewes, lambs, and rams through the seasons. Lewis-Stempel tends to his flock with deep-rooted wisdom, ethical consideration, affection, and humour

A new translation of Simenon's gripping novel about lives transformed by deceit and the destructive power of lust • It was all real: himself, the room, Andree still lying on the ravaged bed • For Tony and Andree, there are no rules when they meet in the blue room at the Hotel des Voyageurs. Their adulterous affair is intoxicating, passionate - and dangerous. Soon it turns into a nightmare from which there can be no escape. Simenon's stylish and sensual psychological thriller weaves a story of cruelty, reckless lust and relentless guilt

The original 'sensation novel', The Woman in White opens with Walter Hartright's eerie encounter with a strange, solitary woman on a moonlit London road. Engaged as a drawing master to the beautiful Laura Fairlie, Walter becomes embroiled in the sinister intrigues of Sir Percival Glyde and his 'charming' friend Count Fosco, who has a taste for white mice, vanilla bonbons and poison. Pursuing questions of identity and insanity along the corridors of English country mansions and the madhouse, this is the first and most influential of the Victorian genre that combined Gothic horror with psychological realism

'The island itself. Its throbbing heat as if in a belljar under the sun, the scorpion in his son's bed, the deafening sound of cicadas' • During his first holiday on the island of Porquerolles Dr Mahe caught a glimpse of something irresistible. As the memory continues to haunt him, he falls prey to a delusion that may offer an escape from his conventional existence - or may destroy him. This is the first English translation of The Mahe Circle, Simenon's dark, malevolent depiction of an ordinary man trapped in mundanity and consumed by obsession

Elizabeth Gaskell's biography of her close friend Charlotte Bronte was published in 1857 to immediate popular acclaim, and remains the most significant study of the enigmatic author who gave Jane Eyre the subtitle An Autobiography. It recounts Charlotte Bronte's life from her isolated childhood, through her years as a writer who had 'foreseen the single life' for herself, to her marriage at thirty-eight and death less than a year later. The resulting work - the first full-length biography of a woman novelist by a woman novelist - explored the nature of Charlotte's genius and almost single-handedly created the Bronte myth

Penguin Readers is a graded reading series for English Language Teaching (ELT) markets, designed for teenagers and young adults learning English as a foreign or second language • In Yukon, Canada during the 1890s Klondike Gold Rush, strong sled dogs are in high demand. Buck is stolen from his comfortable home in California and sold into service as a sled dog in Alaska. Will he survive life in the wild? • Penguin Readers is a series of the best new fiction, essential non-fiction and popular classics written for learners of English as a foreign language. Beautifully illustrated and carefully adapted, the series introduces language learners around the world to the bestselling authors and most compelling content from Penguin Random House. The eight levels of Penguin Readers follow the Common European Framework and include language activities that help readers to develop key skills