After being evicted from their home, fifteen year-old Lydia and her younger brother find themselves abandoned in a strange town just two days before Christmas. Left in the care of a family they had never known and stranded in the harsh winter of 1963, their future hangs in the balance. After qualifying as a nurse, Lydia marries doctor, Martin Fraser, but the catastrophic events of her wedding day have far-reaching consequences both for Lydia and her daughter, Naomi. Sixteen years later, Lydia's mother returns, anxious to mend the rift with her grown-up children. Can she achieve the reconciliation she craves without her children finding out her dark secret? Will Lydia ever forgive her mother for deserting her? Ashes on Fallen Snow is the final book in the Jeffson family trilogy. Additional material, in the form of an epilogue, offers an insight into the events that triggered the writing of the trilogy, which is based on a true story.

A profound follow-up to the bestselling book and major motion picture, The Ultimate Gift. When Jason Stevens found out he had to jump through hoops to get an unnamed inheritance from his billionaire grandfather, he was not amused. By the time he'd finished learning the lessons, he'd become a different man. Ready to tackle the duties of running a multibillion-dollar trust, he is once again derailed, this time by his pugnacious family. Not content with their cattle ranches and oil fields, his aunts, uncles, and even his parents are determined to see every last dime entrusted to their own self-serving pockets. With none of the reluctance he initially showed for the gift, he eagerly accepts the challenge and pushes himself to prove, not only to his family and the court but also to the world, that with determination and the simple tenets of the gift, anyone can lead the ultimate life.

Have you seen the egg containing the last dinosaur? The last of any species contains great magical power. If this falls into the wrong hands, the results could turn the world upside down. It is ice age on Planet Earth, except on the island of Baratonea. There, the Grunts, Wermits and Fuzzards are enjoying life as usual, watched over by Lady Naomi in her blue pyramid. Things are about to change. The Old One needs their help against a deadly enemy. The Last Dinosaur is the first in a new series of beautifully illustrated children's adventure stories about the magical world of the Grunts and Wermits. Join the brave and fun-loving characters as they sail away to do battle with the evil Tartarus...

This unusual collection of stories ranges from the mysterious to the thought-provoking and the downright comic. As a retired social worker the author, whose schooling finished at the end of the Second World War, has brought to bear a lifetime of experience of the quirky side of human nature.

THEY'RE BAAAAACK.

Their first caper, "The Spellman Files," was a "New York Times" bestseller and earned comparisons to the books of Carl Hiaasen and Janet Evanovich. Now the Spellmans, a highly functioning yet supremely dysfunctional family of private investigators, return in a sidesplittingly funny story of suspicion, surveillance, and surprise.

When Izzy Spellman, PI, is arrested for the fourth time in three months, she writes it off as a job hazard. She's been (obsessively) keeping surveillance on a suspicious next door neighbor (suspect's name: John Brown), convinced he's up to no good -- even if her parents (the management at Spellman Investigations) are not.

When the (displeased) management refuses to bail Izzy out, it is Morty, Izzy's octogenarian lawyer, who comes to her rescue. But before he can build a defense, he has to know the facts. Over weak coffee and diner sandwiches, Izzy unveils the whole truth and nothing but the truth -- as only she, a thirty-year-old licensed professional, can.

When not compiling Suspicious Behavior Reports on all her family members, staking out her neighbor, or trying to keep her sister, Rae, from stalking her "best friend," Inspector Henry Stone, Izzy has been busy attempting to apprehend the copycat vandal whose attacks on Mrs. Chandler's holiday lawn tableaux perfectly and eerily match a series of crimes from 1991A--92, when Izzy and her best friend, Petra, happened to be at their most rebellious and delinquent. As "Curse of the Spellmans" unfolds, it's clear that Morty may be on retainer, but Izzy is still very much on the case...er, cases -- her own and that of every other Spellman family member.

(Re)meet the Spellmans, a family in which eavesdropping is a mandatory skill, locks are meant to be picked, past missteps are never forgotten, and blackmail is the preferred form of negotiation -- all in the name of unconditional love.

The Rangemore Hotel is a tired, Victorian hotel struggling to survive on the North Wales coastline. A coastline owned by the sea, loaned by the seas, and at any time, could be reclaimed by the sea. Equally as unpredictable as the sea are the fortunes of the owners and staff of the The Rangemore Hotel, the backdrop to: The Odd Noble Deed. Four people associated with this once-grand hotel tumble and crash into each other's lives. Passion, treachery and lies leave only two winners - or are they winners? - for to win one must truly value the prize.

For dreamer Clare, a chance encounter with old family acquaintance Marcus brings up haunting memories of a childhood holiday, as they try to come to terms with the events and magic that have shaped their lives. They meet by chance in a department store, having not seen one another since a long-ago summer in Guernsey that was marred by tragedy. He lost his son, Tom, in inexplicable circumstances; she was Tom's friend and the last person to see him alive. The novel flits backwards and forwards in time, from the present-day affair fuelled by grief and loneliness, to the summer when Tom went missing - a time filled with sunshine and enchantment, moving inexorably towards heartbreak. The Magic Places is a spellbinding tale of the power of stories and imagination.

Piranesi lives in the House. Perhaps he always has.

In his notebooks, day after day, he makes a clear and careful record of its wonders: the labyrinth of halls, the thousands upon thousands of statues, the tides that thunder up staircases, the clouds that move in slow procession through the upper halls. On Tuesdays and Fridays Piranesi sees his friend, the Other. At other times he brings tributes of food to the Dead. But mostly, he is alone.

Messages begin to appear, scratched out in chalk on the pavements. There is someone new in the House. But who are they and what do they want? Are they a friend or do they bring destruction and madness as the Other claims?

Lost texts must be found; secrets must be uncovered. The world that Piranesi thought he knew is becoming strange and dangerous.

Nicholas Winlett is one of the best astronauts in England and he is about to embark on a routine mission to the Moon. But behind his achievements and his charismatic smile, there lies the heart of a slime ball. During the procedure of the mission, Nicholas suffers a mysterious accident inside the shuttle and is rushed to hospital for treatment. But when the doctors cannot revive him, it becomes a terrible tragedy. So why aren't his colleagues or the village community of Abbington showing signs of sadness over his unexplained death? Nicholas's sudden death has intrigued one particular person and that is Nathan Smith. But as he begins to investigate, the mystery deepens when Professor Edward Baker is murdered in his home by an apparent intruder. Nathan is convinced that Professor Baker's murder is connected to Nicholas's mysterious accident. But can he break through the wall of silence to find the answers?

Cats. Our oldest companions. They have befriended us, consoled us and given us many memories. No cat lover can doubt there is nothing quite as satisfying as the loyalty of a feline friend. But sometimes, it can go a little too far. Something that Dr Richard Cooper, recently widowed, is about to find out. The hard way. On a reminiscent fly fishing trip, Mr Gregory Rose is hunting the rainbow trout. But out on the loneliness of the lake, he discovers, to his dismay, that there is more than just fish that lurk in the depths. Sometimes ita s our own past that we cana t help but bring up to the surface.

From the author of the multimillion-copy bestseller Normal People, an exquisitely moving story about grief, love and family.

Aside from the fact that they are brothers, Peter and Ivan Koubek seem to have little in common.

Peter is a Dublin lawyer in his thirties - successful, competent and apparently unassailable. But in the wake of their father's death, he's medicating himself to sleep and struggling to manage his relationships with two very different women - his enduring first love Sylvia, and Naomi, a college student for whom life is one long joke.

Ivan is a twenty-two-year-old competitive chess player. He has always seen himself as socially awkward, a loner, the antithesis of his glib elder brother. Now, in the early weeks of his bereavement, Ivan meets Margaret, an older woman emerging from her own turbulent past, and their lives become rapidly and intensely intertwined.

For two grieving brothers and the people they love, this is a new interlude - a period of desire, despair and possibility - a chance to find out how much one life might hold inside itself without breaking.

A timeless American classic rediscovered--an unforgettable saga of a heartland family

On a farm in western Missouri during the first half of the twentieth century, Matthew and Callie Soames create a life for themselves and raise four headstrong daughters. Jessica will break their hearts. Leonie will fall in love with the wrong man. Mary Jo will escape to New York. And wild child Mathy's fate will be the family's greatest tragedy. Over the decades they will love, deceive, comfort, forgive--and, ultimately, they will come to cherish all the more fiercely the bonds of love that hold the family together.

This book continues and brings to a conclusion the story of Christina, a former nun, who left her convent after 30 years and started a business on the internet with a man she met on a computer dating site. All proceeds from the sale will be donated to a homeless charity.

Infinity Engine is the third and final novel in the Transformation series, by bestselling science fiction author Neal Asher, following Dark Intelligence and War Factory. A man battles for his life, two AIs vie for supremacy and a civilization hangs in the balance . . . Several forces now pursue rogue artificial intelligence Penny Royal, hungry for revenge or redemption. And the Brockle is the most dangerous of all. This criminal swarm-robot AI has escaped its confinement and is upgrading itself, becoming ever more powerful in anticipation of a deadly showdown. Events also escalate aboard the damaged war factory station where Penny Royal was constructed. Here Thorvald Spear, alien prador, and an assassin drone struggle to stay alive, battling insane AIs and technology gone wild. Then the Weaver arrives - last of the Atheter, resurrected from a race that suicided two million years ago. But what could it contribute to Penny Royal's tortuous plans? And beyond the war factory a black hole conceals a tantalizing secret which could destroy the Polity. As AIs, humans and prador clash at its boundary, will anything survive their explosive final confrontation?

Nothing says love like a book . . .

In a little town in the south of France, a young orphan, Marie-Jeanne, discovers the extraordinary power of books to change lives.

But as she looks around her, she sees so many unhappy and lonely people – and resolves to help them.

Because a love of books is a love of life itself.

Together with her foster father, Marie-Jeanne sets up a mobile library to travel to the many nearby mountain villages. Their books offer entertainment, guidance, comfort – and help bring lonely hearts together.

And what about Marie-Jeanne? Books have taught her all about life – but can they bring her closer to her own true love?