Kirsteen is the tale of a young woman from an old but impoverished Argyllshire family who escapes her domineering father and seeks her independence. Kirsteen's options appear to be unpaid drudgery at home, or a loveless marriage. Rejecting both, she escapes to London where she makes a living through her own innate craft and skill. Though scorned by her family for choosing to work as a mantua-maker, Kirsteen becomes highly successful in the life she carves out for herself. Kirsteen is a startlingly modern novel whose powerful voice, narrative drive and ironic exposure of injustice and hypocrisy provide a fascinating perspective on women in Victorian society. First published in 1890, and written by Queen Victoria's favourite novelist Margaret Oliphant, Kirsteen is a deep, rich novel by an author at the height of her powers.

A writer's job is to notice the world. To catch in words the qualities, textures, patterns, people, events and emotions at play every day. Cadences - a memoir of personal noticings illustrated with literary awarenesses from secular and spiritual texts - charts large and small happenings in and around one woman's life and argues for an appreciation of the extra/ordinary.

Located in an old west of Scotland town, hanging on to its once proud identity with its fingertips, 'Cloisters Bookshop' functions as an oasis of culture and quirky authenticity. The glorious gallimaufry of scenes, sketches and stories assembled here arise from, and are shaped by, the bookshop's valiant setting and rich characters. Differing thus from other contributors to the genre, this will make you both smile and sigh and ultimately dissuade you of the belief that it is only book selling that goes on in a bookshop.

When a thin black and white Collie, lying quietly in her cage at the Rescue Centre, caught the eye of a family looking for a companion for their own dog, life as they had known it was irrevocably changed. Overturning all their accumulated wisdom of how to live with dogs, Sally, who had been found running scared on a city street, stretches the tolerance of her new owners to the limit. Charting the first eighteen months of life with a confused dog, Learning to Listen also celebrates and reflects on other beloved dogs, is lightly laced with literary references and the textures of daily life but above all illustrates how a seemingly insurmountable problem can reveal itself as an unexpected invitation into a deeper understanding.