Penguin Group

When Agatha and Paddy decide to leave London and buy a house on the coast, they are full of hope for themselves and their growing family — baby Max and a new child on the way. Three months later, when the builders move out and they move in, things look very different. A personal tragedy threatens to destroy all they have carefully built up and only a small miracle, it seems, will save them. . . Ghost Story is a book both haunted and haunting, which asks how we can ever mourn something that hasn't lived. Emotionally resonant, beautifully crafted and ultimately redemptive, it will take you to the heart of suffering and desire.

‘You see, Mr Bond. You were wrong and I was right. Ten more minutes and I shall be the richest man in the world, the richest man in history!’ Returning from Mexico after cracking a squalid heroin ring, Bond is only too happy to stay at a Miami hotel and figure out how Auric Goldfinger is cheating at Canasta. It seems that the Bank of England are interested in him too, and charge 007 to discover what the richest man in England is doing with the vast quantities of gold he has acquired – and what his connection is with SMERSH, the Soviet spy-killing organization. Up against Goldfinger and his henchman Oddjob – a bowler-hatted thug with a Black Belt in Karate – Bond soon finds that this criminal genius’s schemes are greater, and more lethal, than anyone could have imagined …

Fanny Savage has always been the dutiful wife. Married to Will, a politician with big ambitions, her life is a whirlwind of public engagements and loyalty to the party, a position that requires her to look good and remain silent. But Fanny is no fool. She's well aware that the world outside her privileged home is one that seethes with despair and danger, division and lack of faith, and how fragile happiness can be. After twenty years of marriage and self-sacrifice, she begins to question her own concepts of happiness. Was being the Good Wife worth it after all?

Set against the Great Depression of 1930s America, The Grapes of Wrath is a classic example of grand-scale American storytelling. When the book arrived in 1939 it met with some harsh criticism, as it contained strong language and posed many uncomfortable questions about society, politics and humanity. There is, undeniably, a bleakness about it, but this is outweighed by an unshakeable sense of hope which permeates through the most desperate of circumstances. Eminently readable, the book manages to say big, big things, but in the simplest language possible. ‘I’ve done my damndest to rip a reader’s nerves to rags, I don’t want him satisfied’ John Steinbeck Shocking and controversial when it was first published, Steinbeck’s Pulitzer prize-winning epic, The Grapes of Wrath remains his undisputed masterpiece. Set against the background of Dust Bowl Oklahoma and Californian migrant life, it tells of the Joad family, who, like thousands of others, have travelled west in search of the promised land. Their story is one of false hopes, thwarted desires and broken dreams. Out of their suffering Steinbeck created a drama that is utterly human, but truly epic in its scale and scope; an astonishing and moving tribute to the endurance and dignity of the human spirit.

Blamed by her parents for the tragic death of a friend, Clodagh has been banished from their home in the countryside to a dingy basement flat and a meaningless existence in the city. Then she meets the inhabitants of the top floor of 15 Russia Road. Charismatic Silver, brutal Johnny, paranoid Liv and exotic Wim range across a London of roofs, eaves and ledges, unseen by the ordinary inhabitants, thrilling in the freedom and danger. Clodagh, haunted for two years by the accident on the pylon, finds that running the roofs with these fascinating misfits brings her back to life, but it seems that tragedy and misfortune may not be done with her yet …

Early in the new millennium the investment banks were on their knees. Beaten by the boom and bust of the dot.com bubble, mixed up in corporate scandals and accused of uncontrolled and rampant conflict of interest, the game seemed over for the masters of the universe. Then the bounce back came. New rules, promises to be more vigilant and rising markets took the heat off. Having learned their lesson and paid their dues, the investment banks could be relied upon to oil the wheels of capitalism in this best of all possible worlds. Philip Augar's cutting critique challenges this consensus. By being able to act simultaneously for buyers, sellers and themselves, they can generate huge returns at their customers' expense. This book explains how this systematic and legal transfer of wealth occurs and answers some important questions. Do the investment banks add value through their advice? Is there a cartel? Are there any alternatives? What will happen next?

A young prince meets with his father's ghost, who alleges that his own brother, now married to his widow, murdered him. The prince devises a scheme to test the truth of the ghost's accusation, feigning wild madness while plotting a brutal revenge. But his apparent insanity soon begins to wreak havoc on innocent and guilty alike.

‘I’m still in love with her … I’d give my life for her. But she bores me’ Proud, wilful and intensely charismatic, Pechorin is bored by the stifling world that envelops him. With a predatory energy for any activity that will relieve his ennui, he embarks on a series of adventures, encountering smugglers, brigands, soldiers, lovers and rivals – and leaving a trail of broken hearts behind him. With its cynical, immoral hero, Lermontov’s novel outraged many critics when it was published in 1840. Yet it was also a literary landmark: an acutely observed psychological novel, narrated from a number of different perspectives, through which the true and complex nature of Pechorin slowly emerges. Paul Foote’s fine translation is accompanied by an introduction discussing the figure of Pechorin within the literary tradition of ‘superfluous men’, and the novel’s influence on Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky and Chekhov. The edition also includes a chronology, explanatory notes and a historical note on the Caucasus.

Philip Marlowe’s on a case: his client, a dried-up husk of a woman, wants him to recover a rare gold coin called a Brasher Doubloon, missing from her late husband’s collection. That’s the simple part. It becomes more complicated when Marlowe finds that everyone who handles the coin suffers a run of very bad luck: they always end up dead. That’s also unlucky for a private investigator, because leaving a trail of corpses around LA gets cops’ noses out of joint. If Marlowe doesn’t wrap this one up fast, he’s going to end up in jail – or worse, in a box in the ground …

Husbands: you're really only allowed one at a time ... Bella secretly married Stevie, over a decade ago; they were at university, two big kids playing at being grownups. When it all unravelled and reality hit, Bella simply got up and left. Years later, Bella meets Philip and, despite her vow never to marry again, she can't resist him. He is a catch. Funny, charming, interesting and kind. Only hitch is, she's still (technically, anyway) married to Stevie. And the moment to tell Philip never quite seems to arrive. So Bella plans never to reveal her secret — after all, it's just a silly piece of paper, lodged at a registrar's office in Aberdeen, isn't it? She hasn't seen Stevie for years — probably never will again. Except when Bella's best friend Laura introduces her new man to the gang it is none other than Stevie. Could things get any more complicated? Only if Bella and Stevie fall in love with each other again...

Indie's mum loves the colour blue. Blue is the colour of her favourite things — bluebirds, bluebells, the sky. So much so that she named her children Indigo and Misty — shades of blue, special colours, magical colours. Indie loves her mum. But blue isn't always a happy colour — and there's a lot of sad stuff in her mum's life. And now suddenly she wants them to run away from their lovely house and leave Max — mum's fella — behind. Indie doesn't know why. Or where they're going. Or how to tell her friends. In a dingy old flat with a grumpy neighbour, no heating and only biscuits to eat, Indie begins to realise that her mum's got a secret — a reason she really needed to get away. Indie mustn't let her go near Max again — or something terrible will happen. A powerful, moving and tender book about love, family, domestic violence — and what it feels like to get the blues.

KILLER IN THE RAIN, THE MAN WHO LIKED DOGS, THE CURTAIN, TRY THE GIRL, MANDARIN'S JADE, BAY CITY BLUES, THE LADY IN THE LAKE AND NO CRIME IN THE MOUNTAIN It was in the pulp detective magazines of the 1930s that Raymond Chandler's definitive take on the hard-boiled detective story first appeared. Here then, from the pages of the Black Mask and Dime Detective Magazine, are eight of his finest stories. Sharper than a hoodlum's switchblade, more exciting than an unexpected red-head and stronger than a double shot of whiskey, they are packed full of the punchy poetry and laconic wit that makes Chandler the undisputed master of his genre. Also published in Penguin are the complete Phillip Marlowe novels; often imitated but never bettered, Raymond Chandler's creation became the most famous fictional detective since Sherlock Holmes. Read them now in Penguin paperback.

Eccentric Jarvis lives in a crumbling schoolhouse overlooking the tube line, compiling his obsessive history of the Underground. A group of misfits are also drawn towards his strange house: Alice, who has run away from her husband and baby; Tom, the busker who rescues her; truant Jasper who finds his terrifying thrills on the tube; and enigmatic Axel, whose deadly secret casts a shadow over all their lives. Damaged, dispossesed, outcasts, they are brought together in violent and un-foreseen ways by London's dark and dangerous underground system.

More classic twisted tales from Roald Dahl, which explore desire, deceit and the macabre with shocking results. In 'Mrs Bixby and the Colonel's Coat', a spurned woman tries on the glossy mink coat her lover has given her as a parting gift. 'Landlady' tells the story of the sinister hotel where the guests check in and never leave; in 'William and Mary' a wronged wife takes the ultimate revenge on the deceased husband she cannot escape; 'Georgy Porgy' is the strange vicar with a disturbing fear of women; and 'Pig' shows how eating meat can be fatal ...

Abbie Devereaux wakes in the dark, hooded and bound … She doesn’t know where she is nor who it is feeding her, talking to her – threatening to kill her. Yet Abbie has courage and, above all, hope. She escapes her captor and runs back into the light. But the real world, the safe one, isn’t as she remembers it. There are days missing before she disappeared – days when she quit her job and left her boyfriend, did things she can’t explain to the police, her friends or even herself. Why won’t anyone take her story seriously? Because if Abbie can’t convince anybody that it really happened, then maybe he will come for her again. And she will wake in the dark, hooded and bound …

Evil sees you Two years ago William Bantling was put on death row by Florida’s Assistant State Attorney, CJ Townsend — for the torture and murder of eleven young women. Evil hears you Now three cops crucial to Bantling’s conviction have been brutally slain. CJ knew them all — and the shocking secret they took to their graves. Evil knows you But it’s clear that somebody else also knows the truth — though their reasons for wanting it kept quiet are very different to CJ’s. Which leaves her with a terrifying choice: reveal the secret she swore to keep and stay alive — or be its last witness, and the next to die ...

Charlie Ashanti is on the run from an amazing floating circus with six homesick beautiful Lions and an extraordinary sabre-toothed creature. Charlie has promised to help the Lions find their way home to Morocco but he has his own problems: his Mum and Dad have been kidnapped and he is determined to find them. His new friends, King Boris of Bulgaria and his security chief, Edward, have promised to help. But can Charlie and the Lions trust them? One thing is for sure, the chase is on …

Encircling London like a noose, the M25 is a road to nowhere, but when Iain Sinclair sets out to walk this asphalt loop – keeping within the ‘acoustic footprints’ – he is determined to find out where the journey will lead him. Stumbling upon converted asylums, industrial and retail parks, ring-fenced government institutions and lost villages, Sinclair discovers a Britain of the fringes, a landscape consumed by developers. London Orbital charts this extraordinary trek and round trip of the soul, revealing the country as you’ve never seen it before.

To begin with he was another good time drunk in a Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith outside the terrace of The Dancers. A little later he turned up as a vagrant on Hollywood Boulevard. For no reason other than curiosity Philip Marlowe came to the rescue. Then he brought Terry Lennox a drink. Which may be why he finds himself driving Lennox to Tijuana on the same night his very rich wife is found with her brains all over the floor. Murderer or no murderer, Terry Lennox is shaping up to cause plenty of trouble. And trouble just happens to be Marlowe's line of work ... Throughout the 1940s and 1950s Philip Marlowe stalked the tawdry neon wilderness of Southern California. There Raymond Chandler's creation became the most famous fictional detective since Sherlock Holmes; often imitated, never bettered. Read the complete Marlowe novels in Penguin paperback.

Problem: Women full of impossible contradictions. Result: Bewilderment. Misunderstanding. Anger. Solution: Not known. Complicated by fact that you are also full of impossible contradictions. Down-but-not-quite-out advertising exec. Daniel Savage is one of the walking wounded – a casualty of the sex war. All his relationships have ended in defeat; one in divorce. Now he’s starting over. Starting with a blank sheet of paper, he catalogues all his past failures in order get to the heart of where it all went wrong. He ends up with ten infallible rules for making everything work out – the Love Secrets. All he has to do now is apply them to the love of his life – who just happens to be his best friend’s girlfriend …

Men are like puppies – they need training. Otherwise: 1. They wee on the floor 2. They stay out late and scratch at the door to be let in 3. They whine when you say No 4. They think they can get away with murder by gazing mournfully into your eyes. Katie Wallace had her heart broken once, and she’s not going to let it happen again. What’s more, she doesn’t want it to happen to anyone else if she can help it. After discovering a talent for advice, Katy becomes a unique service provider – a Love Trainer, capable of answering all of the following: 1. Should I call him even though he hasn’t called me? 2. Why hasn’t he called even though I’ve texted, left two messages on his mobile and one on his landline? 3. When he turns up drunk in the middle of the night wanting a shag, do I say yes or no? 4. Is he worth the effort if I’m not even sure I want to marry him? But can you really coach a man like you would a dog? Or is Katy about to learn that when it comes to training, the work needs to start much closer to home…

'How lovely — green velvet and silver, I call that a dream, so soft and delicious, too.' She rubbed a fold of the skirt against her cheek. 'Mine's silver lamé, it smells like a bird cage when it gets hot but I do love it. Aren't you thankful evening skirts are long again?' The dresses, but oh the boredom of the Season, even for Polly Hampton, with her outstanding looks and excellent social connections — the ultimate 'It Girl' of fashionable society. Groomed from a young age for marriage by her mother, the fearsome Landy Montdore, Polly causes a scandal when she declares her love for her uncle 'Boy Douglas', the Lecherous Lecturer, and runs off to Italy ...

A vast apparition towered over her on the doorstep. It wore a loose salmon pink coat... and tucked under its arm was an enormous imitation crocodile skin handbag... 'I'm Madame Doubtfire, dear.' Lydia, Christopher and Natalie Hilliard are used to domestic turmoil and have been torn between their warring parents ever since the divorce. But all that changes when their mother takes on a most unusual cleaning lady. Despite her extraordinary appearance, Madame Doubtfire turns out to be a talented and efficient housekeeper and, for a short time at least, the arrangement is a resounding success. But, as the Hilliard children soon discover, there's more to Madame Doubtfire than domestic talents...

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