Picador The Language of Flowers Диффенбах Ванесса

The language of flowers is as old as language itself. In the earliest poetry familiar plants were used to represent simple emotions, ideas, or states of mind: love, hope, despair, fidelity, solitude, beauty, mortality. Over time these associations entwined with myth and legend, with religious symbolism, folk and herbal lore. By the early 19th century the 'Language of Flora' had become increasingly refined, especially in England and America, where sentimental flower books listing flower meanings and illustrating them with verse were perennial bestsellers • The Everyman Language of Flowers without sacrificing the charm of its Victorian predecessors aims to provide extended, updated and rather more robust floral anthology for the 21st century, presenting poetry from ancient Greece to contemporary Britain and America, and spanning the world from Cuba to Korea, Russia to Zimbabwe

The Year of the Runaways tells of the bold dreams and daily struggles of an unlikely family thrown together by circumstance. Thirteen young men live in a house in Sheffield, each in flight from India and in desperate search of a new life. Tarlochan, a former rickshaw driver, will say nothing about his past in Bihar; and Avtar has a secret that binds him to protect the choatic Randeep. Randeep, in turn, has a visa-wife in a flat on the other side of town: a clever, devout woman whose cupboards are full of her husband's clothes, in case the immigration men surprise her with a call. Sweeping between India and England, and between childhood and the present day, Sunjeev Sahota's generous, unforgettable novel is - as with Rohinton Mistry's A Fine Balance - a story of dignity in the face of adversity and the ultimate triumph of the human spirit

The Cook of the Halcyon is the penultimate novel in the Inspector Montalbano mystery series from the master of Sicilian crime, Andrea Camilleri • Moments later the all-white schooner, which looked like a hospital ship, began to pass ever so slowly before him, as if wanting to show itself off in all its beauty. The name on the prow said: Halcyon • Two deaths - the suicide of a recently fired worker and the murder of an unscrupulous businessman - lead Inspector Montalbano to the Halcyon, a mysterious ship that visits Vigata's port each day. With very few crewmen, no passengers, and a stern large enough to land a helicopter, it piques the Inspector's interest straight away • In the midst of this, a rare trip to Genoa to visit Livia ends with the Vigata police department in disarray, and Inspector Montalbano's position as the head of the commissariat in jeopardy

The sequel to Jessie Burton's million-copy bestseller The Miniaturist, The House of Fortune returns to the mysterious Brandt family in 18th-century Amsterdam for a story of fate and fortune • 'Elegant, atmospheric, compelling. I absolutely loved it' - Marian Keyes • 'A book of beauty and insight... awe-inspiring. Burton is a master storyteller' - Elizabeth Day • In the golden city of Amsterdam, in 1705, Thea Brandt is turning eighteen, and she is ready to welcome adulthood with open arms. At the city's theatre, Walter, the love of her life, awaits her, but at home in the house on the Herengracht, all is not well - her father Otto and Aunt Nella argue endlessly, and the Brandt family are selling their furniture in order to eat. On Thea's birthday, also the day that her mother Marin died, the secrets from the past begin to overwhelm the present

The Voice of the Violin by Andrea Camilleri is the fourth novel in the wryly humorous Inspector Montalbano series • The commissioner kept looking at him with an expression that combined contempt and commiseration, apparently discerning unmistakable signs of senile dementia in the inspector • "I'm going to speak very frankly, Montalbano. I don't have a very high opinion of you." • "Nor I of you," the inspector replied bluntly • Montalbano's gruesome discovery of a naked young woman suffocated in her bed immediately sets him on a search for her killer. Among the suspects are her aging husband, a famous doctor; a shy admirer, now disappeared; an antiques-dealing lover from Bologna; and the victim's friend Anna, whose charms Montalbano cannot help but appreciate

The Pyramid of Mud is the twenty-second Montalbano mystery from Italy's finest crime writer, Andrea Camilleri • It's been raining for days in Vigata, and the persistent downpours have led to violent floods overwhelming the Inspector's beloved hometown, sweeping across the land and leaving only a sea of mud behind. It is on one of these endless grey days that a man - a Mr Giuglu Nicotra - is found dead, his body discovered in a large sewage tunnel, half naked and with a bullet in his back • The investigation is slow and slippery to start with, but when Montalbano realizes that every clue he uncovers and every person he interviews is leading to the same place - the world of public spending and, with it, the Mafia - the case begins to pick up pace

The Scent of the Night is the sixth comic detective novel in the Inspector Montalbano series by Andrea Camilleri • Montalbano learned how hard it was to put on a wetsuit while in a dinghy speeding over a sea that wasn't exactly calm. Mimi, at the helm, looked tense and worried • "Getting seasick?" the inspector asked him at one point • "No. Just sick of myself." • "Why?" • "Because every now and then I realize what a stupid shit I am to go along with some of your brilliant ideas." • When an angry octogenarian holds a terrified and lovelorn secretary at gunpoint, Inspector Montalbano is reluctantly drawn into the case. The secretary's boss, a financial advisor, has vanished along with several billion lire entrusted to him by the good citizens of Vigata

The Dance of the Seagull is the fifteenth darkly humorous adventure starring Inspector Montalbano from bestselling author Andrea Camilleri • Inspector Montalbano is awake at dawn, sitting on his porch, when his attention is caught by a seagull which falls from the sky, performing a strange dance, before lying down to die. Montalbano is perplexed by what he has witnessed and the scene hangs over him like an omen • About to depart for a holiday with his girlfriend Livia, Montalbano makes a quick trip to the police station to tie up loose ends. But when his dear colleague Fazio is discovered missing - and it transpires that the policeman has been involved in his own secret investigations - Montalbano instead launches a desperate search for his lost friend, as time begins to run out… • Navigating a shadowy maze of smuggling, blackmail and the darkest murder, and moving from the docks of Vigata to its deep, dry wells where the mafia hide their terrible crimes, Inspector Montalbano must have his wits about him to unravel this tangled mystery

The Patience of the Spider is the eighth novel in Andrea Camilleri's wryly humorous Inspector Montalbano series • Chief Inspector Montalbano is on enforced sick leave. But when a local girl goes mysteriously missing, the whole community takes an interest in the case. Why are the kidnappers so sure that the girl's impoverished father and dying mother will be able to find a fortune? The ever-inquisitive Montalbano steps in, to get to the heart of the matter in his own inimitable style

George Orwell's 1984 has become a defining narrative of the modern world. Its cultural influence can be observed in some of the most notable creations of the past seventy years, from Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale to the reality TV landmark Big Brother, while ideas such as 'thought police', 'doublethink', and 'Newspeak' are ingrained in our language • The Ministry of Truth charts the life of one of the most influential books of the twentieth century and a work that is ever more relevant in this tumultuous era of 'fake news' and 'alternative facts'. Dorian Lynskey investigates the influences that came together in the writing of 1984 from Orwell's experiences in the Spanish Civil War and in wartime London to his fascination with utopian and dystopian fiction

Inspired by twenty-six fruits, essayist, poet and pie lady Kate Lebo expertly blends the culinary, medical and personal • A is for Aronia, berry member of the apple family, clothes-stainer, superfruit with reputed healing power. D is for Durian, endowed with a dramatic rind and a shifty odour - peaches, old garlic. M is for Medlar, name-checked by Shakespeare for its crude shape, beloved by gardeners for its flowers. Q is for Quince, which, fresh, gives off the scent of 'roses and citrus and rich women's perfume' but if eaten raw is so astringent it wicks the juice from one's mouth • In this work of unique invention, these and other difficult fruits serve as the central ingredients of twenty-six lyrical essays (and recipes!) that range from deeply personal to botanical, from culinary to medical, from humorous to philosophical

Two weeks before his death, Oliver Sacks outlined the contents of The River of Consciousness, the last book he would oversee • The bestselling author of On the Move, Musicophilia, and The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, Sacks is known for his illuminating case histories about people living with neurological conditions at the far borderlands of human experience. But his grasp of science was not restricted to neuroscience or medicine; he was fascinated by the issues, ideas, and questions of all the sciences. That wide-ranging expertise and passion informs the perspective of this book, in which he interrogates the nature not only of human experience but of all life • In The River of Consciousness, Dr. Sacks takes on evolution, botany, chemistry, medicine, neuroscience, and the arts, and calls upon his great scientific and creative heroes - above all, Darwin, Freud, and William James