Cirrus@Austlit

'People come to visit my home and I love to show them around. It's not the original house of course. That was destroyed the day my entire family died. But I don't think their ghosts know the difference.

'Pera Sinclair was nine the day the pilot intentionally crashed his plane into her family's grand home, killing everyone inside. She was the girl who survived the tragedy, a sympathetic oddity, growing stranger by the day. Over the decades she rebuilt the huge and rambling building on the original site, recreating what she had lost, each room telling a piece of the story of her life and that of the many people who died there, both before and after the disaster. Her sister, murdered a hundred miles away. The soldier, broken by war. Death follows Pera, and she welcomes it in as an old friend. And while she doesn't believe in ghosts, she's not above telling a ghost story or two to those who come to visit Sinclair House.

'As Pera shows a young family around her home on the last haunted house tour of the season, an unexpected group of men arrive. One she recognises, but the others are strangers. But she knows their type all too well. Dangerous men, who will hurt the family without a second thought, and who will keep an old woman alive only so long as she is useful. But as she begins to show them around her home and reveal its secrets, the dangerous men will learn that she is far from helpless. After all, death seems to follow her wherever she goes...

'Sinister and lyrical, The Underhistory is a haunting tale of loss, self-preservation and the darkness beneath.' (Publication summary)

'A meditation on the ever-constant allure of risk, fortune and fate from Booker Prize-winner DBC Pierre.

'Big Snake Little Snake is a cascade of true stories by DBC Pierre, recorded while on his way to make a short film with a parrot in Trinidad, which not only examines the nature of gambling, the love affair between gambler and game and the mindset of obsessive practitioners, but aims to shed light on the invisible odds and outrageous chances of everyday life on Earth.

'Snakes symbolise a road in a Trinidadian numbers game based on dreams and superstition. The inquiry was prompted by a little snake on Pierre's doorstep.

''If writers were athletes, DBC Pierre would be hanging out with the skydivers, the stunt-snowboarders and the white-water rafters' Independent' (Publication summary)
 

'A tumultuous psychological suspense from the author of Who We Were, exploring revenge, shattered reputations, and the true nature of consent.

'When paramedic Megan Lowe is called to the scene of an attempted murder, all she can do is try to save the victim. But as the man is lifted onto a stretcher, she realises she knows him. She despises him. Why should she save his life when he destroyed hers?

'Jess Foster is on her way home when she receives a text from Megan. Once best friends, the two women haven't been close for years, not since the night when they were just the teenage girls whom no-one believed; whose reputations were ruined. All Jess can think is, you had it coming.

'Now Megan and Jess are at the centre of a murder investigation. But what secrets are they hiding? Can they trust one another? And who really is the victim?

'Perfect for fans of C.L. Taylor, Lucy Foley and Lisa Hall, You Had It Coming is a thrilling tale of suspense and dark secrets.'

Source : publisher's blurb

'A gripping novel about the power of childhood cruelty, and how it makes us the adults we become.

'IT'S BEEN TWENTY YEARS

'BUT ALL IS NOT FORGIVEN

'Katy is not the shy schoolgirl she once was, and she's looking forward to showing her classmates who she's become.

'Annabel was the queen bee. But her fall from grace changed her life forever.

'Zach was cruel, but he thinks he's changed.

'Robbie was a target. And he never stood a chance.

'The reunion will bring together friends and enemies, many for the first time in decades. But someone is still holding a grudge...'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'Belfast, 1985. Gunrunners on the borders, riots in the cities, The Power of Love on the radio. And somehow, in the middle, Detective Inspector Sean Duffy is hanging on, a Catholic policeman in the hostile Royal Ulster Constabulary.

'Duffy is initially left cold by the murder of a wealthy couple, shot dead while watching TV. And when their troubled son commits suicide, leaving a note that appears to take responsibility for the deaths, it seems the case is closed. But something doesn't add up, and people keep dying. Soon Duffy is on the trail of a mystery that will pit him against shadowy US intelligence forces, and take him into the white-hot heart of the biggest political scandal of the decade. ' (Publication summary)

'This is the most complete history of fiction in English ever published. The world's greatest authority - arguably the only person who could have written it, John Sutherland - provides the lives of some 294 novelists writing in English, from the genre's seventeenth-century origins to the present day. Arranged in chronological order the novelist's lives are opinionated, informative, frequently funny and often shocking. Professor Sutherland's authors come from all over the world; their writings illustrate every kind of fiction from gothic, penny dreadfuls and pornography to fantasy, romance and high literature. The book shows the changing forms of the genre, and how the aspirations of authors to divert and sometimes to educate their readers, has in some respects, radically changed over the centuries, and in others - such as their interest in sex and relationships - remained remarkably constant.' (Publisher's blurb)

'A major publishing event, Ox-Tales is a remarkable collaboration between Profile Books, the Hay Festival, Oxfam and 30 of the leading fiction writers based in Britain and Ireland.

'The project launches with a set of four stunningly produced books, each containing eight original stories. Each book is themed on one of the elements - Earth, Fire, Air and Water - and features work from a dream cast of authors. The big idea is to raise money for Oxfam and along the way to highlight the charity's work in project areas: agriculture in Earth, water projects in Water, conflict aid in Fire, and climate change in Air.

'The four books will play a central role in the first ever Oxfam Book Fortnight, a new annual event launching in July 2009. The fortnight will be co-ordinated by Hay and bring together dozens of UK literary festivals, who are each being asked to put on one Oxfam event during the fortnight.' (From the publisher's website.)

'"I have several young busty blondes, Derek," Pip sang like a weathergirl. "One is a very sexy Danish girl, just back from a skiing trip, five-foot-five, long wavy blonde hair, blue eyes, 25 years old. A fantastic figure: 36-25-35. Or I have a more demure, very pretty, young strawberry-blonde Australian, Derek. She's 19..." And give or take an inch or two Pip described the same girl four different ways.'

'When her acting career stalls, Merridy Eastman lands a challenging real-life role: night receptionist at a Sydney brothel. A long way from the bright lights of a TV studio, she is swept into the high drama of the sex industry.

'Nothing in Play Street or Shakespeare in the Park could prepare her for this. She learns words for items and acts she never imagined. She opens the door to first-timers, old hands, couples and the occasional celebrity. And above all she becomes friends with the women who make their living out of having sex with strangers.

'There's a Bear in There (And He Wants Swedish) is a funny and fascinating account of a forbidden world, told with a lively sense of the absurd and a rare and forgiving understanding of human frailty.' (Publication summary)

'The idea of human cruelty to animals so consumes novelist Elizabeth Costello in her later years that she can no longer look another person in the eye: humans, especially meat-eating ones, seem to her to be conspirators in a crime of stupefying magnitude taking place on farms and in slaughterhouses, factories, and laboratories across the world. Here the internationally renowned writer J.M. Coetzee uses fiction to present a powerfully moving discussion of animal rights in all their complexity. He draws us into Elizabeth Costello's own sense of mortality, her compassion for animals, and her alienation from humans, even from her own family. In his fable, presented as a Tanner Lecture sponsored by the University Center for Human Values at Princeton University, Coetzee immerses us in a drama reflecting the real-life situation at hand: a writer delivering a lecture on an emotionally charged issue at a prestigious university. ' (Publication summary)