Eliza Acton, despite having never before boiled an egg, became one of the world’s most successful cookery writers, revolutionizing cooking and cookbooks around the world. Her story is fascinating, uplifting and truly inspiring.

Told in alternate voices by the award-winning author of The Joyce Girl, and with recipes that leap to life from the page, The Language of Food by Annabel Abbs is the most thought-provoking and page-turning historical novel you’ll read this year, exploring the enduring struggle for female freedom, the power of female friendship, the creativity and quiet joy of cooking and the poetry of food, all while bringing Eliza Action out of the archives and back into the public eye.

A revelatory exploration of insomnia which shows how women throughout history have found healing, creativity and courage at night - and how you can too. In the winter of 2020, Annabel Abbs experienced a series of bereavements. In the wake of this grief, Annabel kept herself frenetically busy by day - organising funeral arrangements, caring for her children - but by night, she couldn't sleep. A more profound wakefulness than Annabel had ever experienced before, this period of sleeplessness led to an unexpected revelation: her Night Self. Once Annabel stopped fighting her insomnia, the night became a place of creativity, reflection and liberation - as it has been for women throughout history. From the radical fifteenth-century astronomer Laura Cereta, to subversive artist Louise Bourgeois, to Virginia Woolf, to the activist Peace Pilgrim who walked day and night across America for twenty-eight years, women have found sanctuary, inspiration and even power in darkness. Journeying from the darkest corner of the Arctic Circle to Singapore, the brightest city on Earth, Annabel sets out to discover her Night Self through travelling, drawing, writing, stargazing, night-swimming and more. Free from the anxiety of getting 'eight hours', Sleepless shows that embracing the night can open up a whole world of possibilities - even, perhaps, sleep.