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‘a great storyteller and a fabulous actor. well done, sir!’ david harewood ‘phenomenal! highly recommended.’ malorie blackman ‘an absolutely thrilling, throat-catching wonder of a historical novel. hugely recommended.’ stephen fry for fans of the miniaturist and the confessions of frannie langton comes this award-winning novel of illuminating historical fiction. meet charles ignatius sancho: his extraordinary story, hidden for three hundred years, is about to be told. i had little right to live, born on a slave ship where my parents both died. but i survived, and indeed, you might say i did more… it’s 1746 and georgian london is not a safe place for a young black man, especially one who has escaped slavery. after the twinkling lights in the fleet street coffee shops are blown out and the great houses have closed their doors for the night, sancho must dodge slave catchers and worse. the man he hoped would help – a kindly duke who taught him to write – is dying. sancho is desperate and utterly alone. so how does charles ignatius sancho meet the king, write and play highly acclaimed music, become the first black person to vote in britain and lead the fight to end slavery? it’s time for him to tell his story, one that begins on a tempestuous atlantic ocean, and ends at the very centre of london life. and through it all, he must ask: born amongst death, how much can you achieve in one short life? “utterly infectious.” – the times the times and sunday times historical book of the month

‘nobody does get-away-from-it-all romance like jenny colgan’ sunday express ___________________________________ in a little cornish town by the sea, a warm summer breeze brings stirrings of change. . . ‘a total joy’ sophie kinsella ‘gorgeous, glorious, uplifting’ marian keyes ‘irresistible’ jill mansell ‘just lovely’ katie fforde ‘naturally funny, warm-hearted’ lisa jewell ‘a gobble-it-all-up-in-one-sitting kind of book’ mike gayle voted best feel good read by women & home readers! summer has arrived in the cornish town of mount polbearne and polly waterford couldn’t be happier. because polly is in love: she’s in love with the beautiful seaside town she calls home, she’s in love with running the bakery on beach street, and she’s in love with her boyfriend, huckle. and yet there’s something unsettling about the gentle summer breeze that’s floating through town. selina, recently widowed, hopes that moving to mount polbearne will ease her grief, but polly has a secret that could destroy her friend’s fragile recovery. responsibilities that huckle thought he’d left behind are back and polly finds it hard to cope with his increasingly long periods of absence. polly sifts flour, kneads dough and bakes bread, but nothing can calm the storm she knows is coming: is polly about to lose everything she loves? ___________________________________ why readers adore jenny colgan ‘her books are so compelling that you can feel the cool breeze on your face, smell the salty air’ ‘her descriptions of scenery (and food!) are beautiful’ ‘i wish her places were real’ ‘her books are so good i want to start over as soon as i have finished’ ‘there’s something so engaging about her characters and plots’ ‘her stories are just so fabulous’ ‘she brings her settings and characters so vividly to life’ ‘the woman is just magic’

Arthur and george grow up worlds and miles apart in late nineteenth-century britain: arthur in shabby-genteel edinburgh, george in the vicarage of a small staffordshire village. arthur becomes a doctor, and then a writer; george a solicitor in birmingham. arthur is to become one of the most famous men of his age, george remains in hardworking obscurity. but as the new century begins, they are brought together by a sequence of events which made sensational headlines at the time as the great wyrley outrages. george edjali’s father is indian, his mother scottish. when the family begins to receive vicious anonymous letters, many about their son, they put it down to racial prejudice. they appeal to the police, to no less than the chief constable, but to their dismay he appears to suspect george of being the letters’ author. then someone starts slashing horses and livestock. again the police seem to suspect the shy, aloof birmingham solicitor. he is arrested and, on the flimsiest evidence, sent to trial, found guilty and sentenced to seven years’ hard labour. arthur conan doyle, famous as the creator of the world’s greatest detective, is mourning his first wife (having been chastely in love for ten years with the woman who was to become his second) when he hears about the edjali case. incensed at this obvious miscarriage of justice, he is galvanised into trying to clear george’s name. with a mixture of detailed research and vivid imagination, julian barnes brings to life not just this long-forgotten case, but the inner lives of these two very different men. the reader sees them both with stunning clarity, and almost inhabits them as they face the vicissitudes of their lives, whether in the dock hearing a verdict of guilty, or trying to live an honourable life while desperately in love with another woman. this is a novel in which the events of a hundred years ago constantly set off contemporary echoes, a novel about low crime and high spirituality, guilt and innocence, identity, nationality and race; about what we think, what we believe, and what we know. julian barnes has long been recognised as one of britain’s most remarkable writers. while those already familiar with his work will enjoy its elegance, its wit, its profound wisdom about the human condition, arthur & george will surely find him an entirely new audience.