Fka USA: A Novel by Reed King

$32.99 NZD

Category: General Fiction

Reed King's amazingly audacious novel is something of a cross between L. Frank Baum's The Wizard of Oz, Douglas Adams's A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Cormac McCarthy's The Road, and Ernest Cline's Ready Player One. Indie Next Pick for JulyBest of June: io9, AV Club, Amazing Stories, The Verge In Reed King's wildly imaginative and possibly prescient debut, the United States has dissolved in the wake of environmental disasters and the catastrophic policies of its final president. It is 2085, and Truckee Wallace, a factory worker in Crunchtown 407 (formerly Little Rock, Arkansas, before the secessions), has no grand ambitions besides maybe, possibly, losing his virginity someday. But when Truckee is thrust unexpectedly into the spotlight he is tapped by the President for a sensitive political mission: to deliver a talking goat across the continent. The fate of the world depends upon it. The problem is--Truckee's not sure it's worth it. Joined on the road by an android who wants to be human and a former convict lobotomized in Texas, Truckee will navigate an environmentally depleted and lawless continent with devastating--and hilarious--parallels to our own, dodging body pickers, Elvis-worshippers, logo girls, body subbers, and VR addicts. Elvis-willing, he may even lose his virginity. FKA USA is the epic novel we've all been waiting for about the American end of times, with its unavoidable sense of being on the wrong end of the roller coaster ride. It is a masterwork of ambition, humor, and satire with the power to make us cry, despair, and laugh out loud all at once. It is a tour de force unlike anything else you will read this year.   "Mr. King looks at all our upcoming problems, and imagines a local reaction to each one. The result is often funny, usually sardonic, and always imaginative, what with all the mole rats, flesh drones, dimeheads, and especially 'The Grifter's Guide to the Territories FKA USA, ' a notable addition to the line of imaginary authorities."--The Wall Street Journal ...Show more

Luster by Leilani Raven

$37.99 NZD

Category: General Fiction

Meet Edie. Edie is not okay. She’s messing up in her dead-end admin job in her all white office, is sleeping with all the wrong men, and has failed at the only thing that meant anything to her, painting. No one seems to care that she doesn’t really know what she’s doing with her life beyond looking for her next hook-up. And then she meets Eric, a white, middle-aged archivist with a suburban family, including a wife who has sort-of-agreed to an open marriage and an adopted black daughter who doesn’t have a single person in her life who can show her how to do her hair. As if navigating the constantly shifting landscape of sexual and racial politics as a young, black woman wasn’t already hard enough, with nowhere else left to go, Edie finds herself falling headfirst into Eric’s home and family. Razor sharp. provocatively page-turning and surprisingly tender, Luster is a painfully funny coming-of-age story told by a fresh new voice. ...Show more

The Lost and the Damned by Olivier Norek

$34.99 NZD

Category: General Fiction | Series: The\Banlieues Trilogy Ser.

A suspenseful new police procedural from a serving French police officer and writer on the hit series Spiral A corpse that wakes up on the mortuary slab. A case of spontaneous human combustion. There is little by the way of violent crime and petty theft that Capitaine Victor Coste has not encountere d in his fifteen years on the St Denis patch - but nothing like this. Something unusual is afoot, and Coste is about to be dragged out of his comfort zone. Stranger still, anonymous letters addressed to him personally have begun to arrive, highlighting the fates of two women, invisible victims whose deaths were never explained. Just two more blurred faces among the ranks of the lost and the damned. Olivier Norek's first novel draws on all his experience as a police officer in one of France's toughest suburbs - the same experience he drew on as a writer for the hit TV series Spiral. Translated from the French by Nick Caistor ...Show more

Xstabeth by David Keenan

$37.99 NZD

Category: General Fiction

'Reading [Xstabeth] feels like being cut open to the accompanying sound of ecstatic music' Edna O'Brien 'Prepare for more of that inimitable Keenan narrative voodoo brilliance' Wendy Erskine In St Petersburg, Russia, Aneliya is torn between the love of her father and her father's best friend. Her fath er dreams of becoming a great musician but suffers with a naivete that means he will never be taken seriously. Her father's best friend has a penchant for vodka, strip clubs and moral philosophy. When an angelic presence named Xstabeth enters their lives - a presence who simultaneously fulfils and disappears those she touches - Aneliya and her father's world is transformed. Moving from Russia to St Andrews, Scotland, Xstabeth tackles the metaphysics of golf, the mindset of classic Russian novels and the power of art and music to re-wire reality. Charged with a consuming intensity and a torrential rhythm that pulses with music, it is an offering of transcendence and a love letter to the books of Chandler, Nabokov and Dostoevsky, by a writer who is rewriting the rulebook of contemporary fiction. ...Show more

The Greatest Beer Run Ever - A Crazy Adventure in a Crazy War by John Donohue

$37.99 NZD

Category: General Fiction

An incredible true story of how, in 1967 - having seen students protesting against the Vietnam war - Chickie Donohue and his New York City bar friends decided that someone should go to Vietnam and take their soldier pals a beer and show them that SOMEONE appreciates what they're doing out there. It wou ld be the Greatest Beer Run Ever! But who'd be crazy enough to do it? One man was up for the challenge: John "Chickie" Donohue. A U. S. Marine Corps veteran turned merchant mariner, Chickie decided he wasn't about to desert his buddies on the front lines when they needed him most. In THE GREATEST BEER RUN EVER, Chickie sets off on an adventure that changes his life forever. Armed with Irish luck and a backpack full of alcohol, he makes his way to Qui Nho'n, tracking down his disbelieving friends one by one. But Chickie sees more of the war than he ever bargained for, unexpectedly getting caught up for a night on the front line by the Demilitarized Zone, and in Saigon during the Tet Offensive. Donohue talks his way in and out of situations; learns a lot about himself and most importantly, changes his view on the Vietnam War, seeing first-hand the craziness of the whole endeavor and ultimately realising that the protesters were right. ...Show more

Ravens Bk 1 by Danielle Paige; Morgan

$24.99 NZD

Category: General Fiction

All That Glitters by Danielle Steel

$34.99 NZD

Category: General Fiction

Coco Martin, the adored only child of wealthy parents, has lived a charmed existence in their beautiful Manhattan home, and summers in a fabulous Hamptons house. Despite her privileged upbringing, Coco's parents instilled in their daughter their own values of hard work, honesty and kindness.But as she's just entering her twenties, Coco's world is devastated by the sudden death of her beloved parents. Now the heir to a considerable fortune, Coco must find her way in a world that no longer makes sense to her. The estate is protected by a trustee, a close friend of her mother and father. But is he the honourable man she believes him to be?Beginning a new life in London, she falls in love with a charismatic, handsome, penniless artistocrat, who introduces her to a world of fabulous parties and extravagance. Coco's oldest friend Sam fears that this whirlwind romance won't last, but Coco is sure that she has finally found happiness. In the middle of London's glamorous social scene, Coco struggles to see things as they really are . . . ...Show more

The Dressmaker of Paris by Georgia Kaufmann

$34.99 NZD

Category: General Fiction

I need to tell you a story, ma chère. My story. Rosa Kusstatscher has built a global fashion empire upon her ability to find the perfect outfit for any occasion. But tonight, as she prepares for the most important meeting of her life, her usual certainty eludes her. What brought her to this moment? As she struggles to select her dress and choose the right shade of lipstick, Rosa begins to tell her incredible story. The story of a poor country girl from a village high in the mountains of Italy. Of Nazi occupation and fleeing in the night. Of hope and heartbreak in Switzerland; ambition, glamour and love in Paris. Of ambition and devastation in Rio de Janeiro; success and self-discovery in New York. A life spent running, she sees now. But she will run no longer. Breathtaking and utterly enthralling, The Dressmaker of Paris is a stunning debut novel that is perfect for fans of Lucinda Riley, Kate Morton and Dinah Jefferies. ...Show more

A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth

$27.99 NZD

Category: General Fiction

A modern classic, this epic tale of families, romance and political intrigue never loses its power to delight and enchant readers. Vikram Seth's novel is, at its core, a love story: the tale of Lata - and her mother's - attempts to find her a suitable husband, through love or through exacting maternal appraisal. At the same time, it is the story of India, newly independent and struggling through a time of crisis as a sixth of the world's population faces its first great general election and the chance to map its own destiny. 'A Suitable Boy may prove to be the most fecund as well as the most prodigious work of the latter half of this century - perhaps even the book to restore the serious reading public's faith in the contemporary novel ... You should make time for it. It will keep you company for the rest of your life' Daniel Johnson, The Times ...Show more

The Snow Song by Wray Delaney

$32.99 NZD

Category: General Fiction

A spellbinding fable for adults from the award-winning and bestselling author, Sally Gardner. 'This heartbreaking, brilliantly written novel is the most original publication for years' The Times on Sally Gardner From an award-winning author, whose books have sold more than 2.5 million copies worldwide Women imprisoned by superstition, chained by guilt.   Perched on a mountain in a land of ancient forests is a village, rife with secrets. Cut off from the outside world it is run by the elders, men to whom tradition is all. Edith lives alone with her alcoholic father who is forcing her to marry the village butcher. But she is in love with a shepherd who promised to return to her. As the village becomes isolated in a sea of snow, Edith loses her power of speech. And it is this enchantment that will have far-reaching consequences, not only for Edith but for the whole village. ...Show more

The Decameron Project: 29 New Stories from the Pandemic by New York Times Magazine

$39.99 NZD

Category: General Fiction

A stunning collection of new short stories originally commissioned by The New York Times Magazine as the COVID-19 pandemic swept the world, from twenty-nine authors including Margaret Atwood, Tommy Orange, Colm Toibin, Kamilia Shamsie, David Mitchell and more, in a project inspired by Boccaccio's The De cameron. When reality is surreal, only fiction can make sense of it. In 1353, Giovanni Boccaccio wrote "The Decameron": one hundred nested tales told by a group of young men and women passing the time at a villa outside Florence while waiting out the gruesome Black Death, a plague that killed more than 25 million people. Some of the stories are silly, some are bawdy, some are like fables. In March of 2020, the editors of The New York Times Magazine created The Decameron Project, an anthology with a simple, time-spanning goal: to gather a collection of stories written as our current pandemic first swept the globe. How might new fiction from some of the finest writers working today help us memorialize and understand the unimaginable? And what could be learned about how this crisis will affect the art of fiction? These twenty-nine new stories, from authors including Margaret Atwood, Tommy Orange, Edwidge Danticat, and David Mitchell vary widely in texture and tone. Their work will be remembered as a historical tribute to a time and place unlike any other in our lifetimes, and offer perspective and solace to the reader now and in a future where coronavirus is, hopefully, just a memory.   ...Show more

When the Lights Go Out by Carys Bray

$37.00 NZD

Category: General Fiction

Global temperatures are rising. The climate of the Abrams' marriage is cooling. Emma is beginning to wonder whether relationships, like mortgages, should be conducted in five-year increments. She might laugh if Chris had bought a motorbike or started dyeing his hair. Instead he's buying off-label medici nes and stockpiling food. Chris finds Emma's relentless optimism exasperating. A tot of dread, a nip of horror, a shot of anger - he isn't asking much. If she would only join him in a measure of something. The family's precarious eco-system is further disrupted by torrential rains, power cuts and the unexpected arrival of Chris's mother. Emma longs to lower a rope and winch Chris from the pit of his worries. But he doesn't want to be rescued or reassured - he wants to pull her in after him. Darkly funny and beautifully written, When the Lights Go Out is a novel for our times- a story about cultivating hope and weathering change. ...Show more