Vintage books Waiting Jin Ha

Roddy Doyle's Booker Prize-winning novel describes the world of ten-year-old Paddy Clarke, growing up in Barrytown, north Dublin. From fun and adventure on the streets, boredom in the classroom to increasing isolation at home, Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha is the story of a boy who sees everything but understands less and less

Paddy Clarke is ten years old. Paddy Clarke lights fires. Paddy Clarke's name is written in wet cement all over Barrytown. Paddy Clarke's heroes are Father Damien (and the lepers), Geronimo and George Best. Paddy Clarke knows the exact moment to knock a dead scab from his knee. Paddy Clarke hates his brother Francis because that’s the rule. Paddy Clarke loves his Ma and Da, but it seems like they don't love each other, and Paddy wants to understand, but can't

From the Booker Prize winning author of Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha and The Commitments: the story of an ordinary woman whose extraordinary character will stay with you long after reading • ‘He loved me and he beat me. I loved him and I took it. It’s as simple as that’ • Paula Spencer is thirty-nine, the mother of four and learning to live without Charlo, her violent, abusive husband • Paula’s started drinking more and dreaming more, taking herself back to her contented childhood and audacious teenage years. Everything was better then, not least the music, the soundtrack to her romance with Charlo. As the past floats by and mingles with the present Paula Spencer finds herself coming alive, in all her vulnerability and her strength

The next round in the beloved Two Pints series from the ever-brilliant, always hilarious imagination of bestselling author of The Commitments and Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha • Two men meet for a pint - or three - in a Dublin pub. They chew the fat, set the world to rights and mourn friends gone: David Bowie, Prince, Princess Leia and Young Frankenstein. Around them the world of Brexit, Trump, and referendums storm, but some things - good things - never change • Inspired by the last five years of news, Roddy Doyle's Two for the Road offers a strong brew of Roddy Doyle's comic genius - to be downed in one riotous sitting, or savoured over, laugh after laugh

Friday August 15th, 1997. Two tiny Korean babies are delivered to two very different Baltimore families • Every year, on the anniversary of 'Arrival Day' the two families celebrate together, with more and more elaborately competitive parties, as little Susan and Jin-ho take roots and become American

Meili, a young peasant woman born in the remote heart of China, is married to Kongzi, a village school teacher, and a distant descendant of Confucius. They have a daughter, but desperate for a son to carry on his illustrious family line, Kongzi gets Meili pregnant again without waiting for official permission. When family planning officers storm the village to arrest violators of the population control policy, mother, father and daughter escape to the Yangtze River and begin a fugitive life • For years they drift south through the poisoned waterways and ruined landscapes of China, picking up work as they go along, scavenging for necessities and flying from police detection. As Meili’s body continues to be invaded by her husband and assaulted by the state, she fights to regain control of her fate and that of her unborn child

Momik, the only child of two survivors, is brought up in Israel by a family seeking to ignore the past. No-one will explain to him what life was like 'Over There' or what the 'Nazi Beast' is. His 9-year-old mind imagines a Nazi Beast hiding in the cellar, waiting to feed on Jews. Momik increasingly shields himself from all feeling and attachment. But through the stories his great-uncle tells him-the same stories he told the commandant of a Nazi concentration camp-Momik, too, becomes "infected with humanity." • See Under: Love is a luminously imaginative and profoundly affecting work

Young and confident, with a swagger in her step, Sugar arrives in the southern town of Bigelow hoping to start over. Soon Bigelow is alight with gossip and suspicion, and Sugar fears her past is catching up with her. Then she meets Pearl, a woman trying to forget her own traumas. As these next-door neighbours become unlikely friends, they wonder if their lives could finally be changing for the better. But small towns have long memories • Perfect for fans of The Vanishing Half and Where the Crawdads Sing, Sugar is a classic waiting to be rediscovered

Returning to Belfast after a long absense, to attend her father`s funeral. Catherine McKenna - a young composer-remembers exactly why she left: the claustrophobic intimacies of the Catholic enclave, her fastidious, nagging mother, and the pervading tensions of a city at war with itself. She remembers a more innocent time, when the Loyalists Lambeg drums sounded mysterious and exciting; she remembers her shattered relationship with the drunken, violent Dave, she remembers the child she had with him, waiting back in Glasgow. This is a novel, about coming to terms with the past and the healing power of music, Grace Notes is a master story-teller`s triumphant return to the long form: a powerful lyrical novel of great distinction

Ora, a middle-aged Israeli mother, is about to celebrate her son Ofer's release from army service when he returns to the front for a major offensive. Instead of waiting at home for the 'notifiers' who could arrive at any moment to tell her of her son's fate, she sets off for a hike in Galilee, leaving no forwarding address. If a mother is not there to receive the news, a son cannot die, can he? • Recently estranged from her husband, Ora drags along an unlikely companion: their former best friend and her former lover Avram, the man who in fact turns out to be her son's biological father. As they sleep out in the hills, ford rivers and cross valleys, Ora recounts, step by step and word by word, the story of her son's birth, life and possible death, in one mother's magical, passionate and heartbreaking attempt to keep her son safe from harm

One September evening in 1785, the merchant Jonah Hancock finds one of his captains waiting eagerly on his doorstep. He has sold Jonah's ship for what appears to be a mermaid • As gossip spreads through the docks, coffee shops, parlours and brothels, everyone wants to see Mr Hancock's marvel. Its arrival spins him out of his ordinary existence and through the doors of high society, where he meets Angelica Neal, the most desirable woman he has ever laid eyes on... and a courtesan of great accomplishment. This meeting will steer both their lives onto a dangerous new course • What will be the cost of their ambitions? And will they be able to escape the legendary destructive power a mermaid is said to possess?

A warm and immersive novel about ambition, power, women, friendship and finding your place in the world, from the bestselling author of The Wife and The Interestings • Greer Kadetsky is a shy college student when she meets the person who will change her life • Faith Frank, an influential and glamorous figure from the women’s movement, inhabits a very different world to Greer’s. But after a chance encounter Faith singles Greer out and invites her into her life, leading her down a thrilling path as it winds towards and away from her meant-to-be love story with high school sweetheart Cory and the future she had always imagined • Expansive and wise, compassionate and witty, The Female Persuasion is about the spark we all believe is flickering inside us, waiting to be seen and fanned by the right person at the right time