Weidenfeld & Nicolson Alys, Always Lane Harriet

What if you had said yes . . . ? • Eva and Jim are nineteen, and students at Cambridge, when their paths first cross in 1958. Jim is walking along a lane when a woman approaching him on a bicycle swerves to avoid a dog. What happens next will determine the rest of their lives. We follow three different versions of their future - together, and apart - as their love story takes on different incarnations and twists and turns to the conclusion in the present day • The Versions of Us is an outstanding debut novel about the choices we make and the different paths that our lives might follow. What if one small decision could change the rest of your life?

Andrew Landford, MP is driving home one night along a dark country lane when a barn owl flies into his windscreen. It is an accident, nothing more. But Andrew sits on a parliamentary committee concerned with the protection of endangered species, and the death of the owl threatens to destroy his hopes of reaching No. 10 • Also in the car is Andrew's old Oxford friend and political adviser, Charles Fryerne. Will they be able to keep the crime under wraps, or will circumstances conspire against them?

'My mum always said, a fistful of rings is as good as a knuckleduster' • The Great Smog descends on London overnight; a leadership feud breaks out amongst a gang of female thieves who have terrorized the city for years; and Florrie, the girl who is set to inherit the bloody crown, falls in love with a good boy • Can she find her own path and the courage to stumble along it - in a fog so thick that she can see her own feet?

1996: in a Ugandan dive bar, the 'freight dogs' gather. An anarchic group of mercenary pilots from Texas, Russia, Kenya and Belgium who transport weapons between warring African nations, without allegiance • And tonight they have a new recruit - Manu, a nineteen-year-old cowherd fleeing Congo's bloody war • Taken in by this band of unlikely brothers, Manu hopes to reinvent himself. But no matter how fast he flies, trouble always seems to follow closely behind

A groundbreaking new story of women's journey through medicine, exposing the historic origins of the gender pain gap • Medicine carries the burden of its own troubling history. Over centuries, women's bodies have been demonised and demeaned until we feared them, felt ashamed of them, were humiliated by them. But as doctors, researchers, campaigners and most of all as patients, women have continuously challenged medical orthodoxy. Medicine's history has always been, and is still being, rewritten by women's resistance, strength and incredible courage • In this ground-breaking history Elinor Cleghorn unpacks the roots of the perpetual misunderstanding, mystification and misdiagnosis of women's bodies, illness and pain. From the 'wandering womb' of ancient Greece to today's shifting understanding of hormones, menstruation and menopause, Unwell Women is the revolutionary story of women who have suffered, challenged and rewritten medical misogyny

The story of how Augustus rose from an obscure teenager to become Rome's first and greatest emperor • Caesar Augustus schemed and fought his way to absolute power. He became Rome's first emperor and ruled for forty-four years before dying peacefully in his bed. The system he created would endure for centuries • Yet, despite his exceptional success, he is a difficult man to pin down, and far less well-known than his great-uncle, Julius Caesar. His story is not always edifying: he murdered his opponents, exiled his daughter when she failed to conform and freely made and broke alliances as he climbed ever higher. However, the peace and stability he fostered were real, and under his rule the empire prospered. Adrian Goldsworthy examines the ancient sources to understand the man and his times

Alba used to live a hectic life, working as a book publicist in Italy, and yet she always felt like a woman on the run. And so one day she decided to stop running and go back to Lucignana, the small village on the Tuscan hills where she was born, to open a tiny bookshop • Alba's enterprise seems doomed from day one but it surprisingly sparks the enthusiasm of many across Italy. And after surviving a fire and multiple Covid lockdowns, the 'Bookshop on the Hill' becomes a refuge for an ever-growing community of people: from local friends and family to the many, many readers who come to visit from afar or place orders online, safe in the knowledge that Alba will be able to find the perfect book for them

This final book in Jennifer Worth's memories of her time as a midwife in London's East end brings her story full circle. As always there are heartbreaking stories such as the family devastated by tuberculosis and a ship's woman who 'serviced' the entire crew, as well as plenty of humour and warmth, such as the tale of two women who shared the same husband! Other stories cover backstreet abortions, the changing life of the docklands, infanticide, as well as the lives of the inhabitants of Nonnatus House • We discover what happens with the gauche debutant Chummy and her equally gauche policeman; will Sister Monica Joan continue her life of crime? Will Sister Evangelina ever crack a smile? And what of Jennifer herself? The book not only details the final years of the tenements but also of Jennifer's journey as she moves on from the close community of nuns, and her life takes a new path

Budapest has always been an important place. Almost at the centre of Europe, it is at the crossroads of geographical regions and of civilizations, at the intersection of ancient trade routes. Mountains that gradually slope into gentle hills converge on a great river, the Danube, and the regions of Buda and Pest sprang up on either side • Throughout history the centre of gravity in Budapest and among Hungarians has shifted between this division of East and West - culturally, politically, emotionally. Invaders have come and gone, empires have conquered, occupied for centuries or decades, and left a few footprints behind: the remains of a Roman bath house complete with wonderfully preserved mosaics stand next to a Soviet-style 'five-year-plan' apartment block

Kate has always been a wanderer. A well-published author, married several times, she has lived a life full of exploration. Now, as she begins to feel the first ravages of age, she wants to find a new sense of meaning. She leaves her lover Yolo on a journey down the Colorado River - a journey that will force her to re-explore her past and her future, and her connection to the real world. On her travels she meets shamans and the mysterious spiritual world of the native Indian. Yolo too begins his own journey as he travels to Hawaii and meets a former lover whose life is being destroyed by the excesses of American society. As Kate and Yolo gain shifting insights into the world around them, will their paths diverge or lead back to each other? This is a novel very much in tune with the zeitgeist - Alice Walker argues that we need to look inwards and develop a more open attitude in order to combat the pervasive climate of fear and distrust

You don't remember her . . . but she remembers you • Two women; two different worlds • Emma is a struggling mother who has put everything on hold • Nina is sophisticated and independent - entirely in control • When the pair meet, Nina generously draws Emma into her life. But this isn't the first time the women's paths have crossed. Nina remembers Emma and she remembers what Emma did • But what exactly does Nina want from her? • And how far will she go in pursuit of it?

Magda is a former scientist with a bad temper and a sharp tongue, living alone in a huge house by the sea and getting through carers at a rate of knots • Until Susheela arrives, carrying life with her: grief for her mother's recent death; worry for her father; longing for a beautiful and troubled young man • The two women strike up an unlikely friendship: Magda's no-nonsense attitude turns out to be an unexpected source of strength for Susheela; and Susheela's Bengali heritage brings back memories of Magda's childhood in colonial India and resurrects the tragic figure of her mother, Evelyn • But as Magda digs deeper into her past, she unlocks a shocking legacy of blood that threatens to destroy the careful order she has imposed on her life - a legacy that might just be the key to give the three women, Evelyn, Magda and Susheela, a place they can finally call home