A brilliant reinvention of the detective novel, set in Renaissance Florence and packed with art, scandal, murder and scheming.

Florence, New Year’s Day 1557. As dawn breaks, a painter is discovered lying on the floor of a church, stabbed through the heart.

Above him, the paintings he laboured over for more than a decade. At his home, a hidden painting scandalously depicting Maria de Medici, daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Florence, as a naked Venus. Who is the murderer? Who is behind the painting? As the city erupts in chaos, Giorgio Vasari, the great art historian, is picked to lead the investigation.

Letters fly back and forth carrying news of political plots and speculation about the killer’s identity – between Maria and her aunt Catherine de’ Medici, the queen of France; between Catherine and her scheming agents in Florence; and between Vasari and his friend Michelangelo. Meanwhile, the Pope is banning books and branding works of art immoral. And the truth, when it comes to light, is as shocking as the bold new artworks that have made Florence the red-hot centre of Europe.

Bursting with characters and colour, Perspectives is a mystery like no other that shows us Renaissance Florence as we’ve never seen it before – a dazzling, hugely entertaining novel of court machinations, murder and art.

THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER Two men have been enlisted to kill the head of the Gestapo. This is Operation Anthropoid, Prague, 1942: two Czechoslovakian parachutists sent on a daring mission by London to assassinate Reinhard Heydrich - chief of the Nazi secret services, 'the hangman of Prague', 'the blond beast', 'the most dangerous man in the Third Reich'. His boss is Heinrich Himmler but everyone in the SS says 'Himmler's brain is called Heydrich', which in German spells HHhH. HHhH is a panorama of the Third Reich told through the life of one outstandingly brutal man, a story of unbearable heroism and loyalty, revenge and betrayal. It is a moving and shattering work of fiction. Laurent Binet's highly anticipated new novel, The Seventh Function of Language, is available for pre-order now...

It's world history. But not as we know it. c.1000AD: Erik the Red's daughter heads south from Greenland 1492: Columbus does not discover America 1531: the Incas invade Europe Freydis is the leader of a band of Viking warriors who get as far as Panama. Nobody knows what became of them. Five hundred years later, Christopher Columbus is sailing for the Americas, dreaming of gold and conquest. Even when captured, his faith in his mission is unshaken. Thirty years after that, Atahualpa, the last Inca emperor, arrives in a Europe ready for revolution. Fortunately, he has a recent guidebook to acquiring power - Machiavelli's The Prince. So, the stage is set for a Europe ruled by Incas and, when the Aztecs arrive on the scene, for a great war that will change history forever. 'Binet's best book yet: the work of a major writer just hitting his stride. A delightful counterfactual novel' ***** - Daily Telegraph

""HHhH" blew me away... It's one of the best historical novels I've ever come across."--Bret Easton Ellis, author of "American Psycho" and "Less Than Zero
"A Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction
A "Financial Times" Best Book of the Year
A "New York Times Book Review "Editors' Choice
HHhH: "Himmlers Hirn heisst Heydrich," or "Himmler's brain is called Heydrich." The most lethal man in Hitler's cabinet, Reinhard Heydrich seemed indestructible--until two exiled operatives, a Slovak and a Czech, killed him and changed the course of history.
In Laurent Binet's mesmerizing debut, we follow Jozef Gabčik and Jan Kubis from their dramatic escape from Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia to their fatal attack on Heydrich and their own brutal deaths in the basement of a Prague church. A seamless blend of memory, actuality, and Binet's own remarkable imagination, HHhH is at once thrilling and intellectually engrossing--a fast-paced novel of the Second World War that is also a profound meditation on the debt we owe to history.

'One of the funniest, most riotously inventive and enjoyable novels you'll read this year' - Observer Roland Barthes is knocked down in a Paris street by a laundry van. It's February 1980 and he has just come from lunch with Francois Mitterrand. Barthes dies soon afterwards. History tells us it was an accident. But what if it were an assassination? What if Barthes was carrying a document of unbelievable, global importance? A document explaining the seventh function of language - an idea so powerful it gives whoever masters it the ability to convince anyone, in any situation, to do anything. Police Captain Jacques Bayard and his reluctant accomplice Simon Herzog set off on a chase that takes them from the corridors of power to backstreet saunas and midnight meetings. What they discover is a worldwide conspiracy involving the President, murderous Bulgarians and a secret international debating society.

c.1000 AD: Erik the Red's daughter heads south from Greenland 1492: Christopher Columbus does not discover America 1531: the Incas invade Europe Civilisations is the world as we don't know it: set at different points in history it links stories about characters in different places and times, all hungry to explore and to acquire power. Freydis is a woman warrior and leader of a band of Viking explorers setting out southwards. They meet local tribes, exchange skills, are taken prisoner, and get as far as Panama. But nobody ultimately knows what became of them.... Fast forward five hundred years to 1492 and we're reading the journals of Christopher Columbus, mid-Atlantic on his own famous voyage of exploration to The Americas, dreaming of gold and conquest. But he and his men are taken captive by Incas. Even as their sufferings increase his faith in his superiority, and in his mission, is unshaken. Thirty years later, Atahualpa, the last Inca emperor, arrives in Europe in the ships stolen from Columbus. He finds a continent divided by religious and dynastic quarrels, the Spanish Inquisition, Luther's Reformation, capitalism, the miracle of the printing press, endless warmongering between the ruling monarchies, and constant threat from the Turks. But most of all he finds downtrodden populations ready for revolution. Fortunately, he has a recent bestseller as a guidebook to acquiring power - Machiavelli's The Prince. The stage is set for a Europe ruled by Incas and Aztecs, and for a great war that will change history forever. Civilisations is nothing less than a strangely believable counter-factual history of the modern world, fizzing with ideas about colonisation, empire-building and the eternal human quest for domination. It is an electrifying novel by one of Europe's most exciting writers.