All Books

The story of a mother, her son, a locked room and the outside world. jack is five and, like any little boy, excited at the prospect of presents and cake. he’s looking forward to telling his friends it’s his birthday, too. but although jack is a normal child in many ways – loving, funny, bright, full of energy and questions – his upbringing is far from ordinary: jack’s entire life has been spent in a single room that measures just 12 feet by 12 feet; as far as he’s concerned, room is the entire world. he shares this world with his mother, with plant, and tiny mouse (though ma isn’t a fan and throws a book at mouse when she sees him). there’s tv too, of course – and the cartoon characters he thinks of as his friends – but jack knows that nothing else he sees on the screen is real. old nick, on the other hand, is all too real, but only visits at night – like a bat – when jack is meant to be asleep and hidden safely in wardrobe. and only old nick has the code to door, which is otherwise locked… told in jack’s voice, room is the story of a mother’s love for her son, and of a young boy’s innocence. celebrating 40 years of outstanding international writing, this is one of the essential picador novels reissued in a beautiful new series style.

Back in 1941 the greek island of crete is captured by the germans and the lives of two very different women are changed forever… sixty years after the invasion of crete, lois west and her young son, alex, invite feisty great aunt pen to a special eighty-fifth birthday celebration on the island, knowing she has not been back there since the war. penelope george—formerly giorgidiou—is reluctant to go but it is time for her to return and make the journey she never thought she’d make. on the outward voyage from athens, she relives her experiences in the city from her early years as a trainee nurse tending the wounded and dying, one of the few foreign nurses left on the battlefield. when word spreads of her visit, and old cretan friends and family come to greet her, lois and alex are caught up in penelope’s epic pilgrimage and the journey that leads her to a reunion with the friend she thought she had lost forever—and the truth behind a secret buried deep in the past.

Each summer, jenn and her husband greg return to deia, on mallorca’s dramatic west coast. this year the arrival of emma, jenn’s stepdaughter, and her new boyfriend nathan threatens to upset their equilibrium. beautiful and reckless, nathan stirs something unexpected in jenn. as she is increasingly seduced by nathan’s youth and the promise of passion, the line between desire and obsession begins to blur. what follows is a highly-charged liaison that puts lives and relationships in jeopardy. for jenn, after this summer, nothing can ever be the same.

The funniest wtf am i doing?! novel of the year, now in paperback “the new bridget jones for our covid-ridden times” – telegraph nell stevens’ life is a mess. when her business goes bust and her fiancé with it, nell’s happy ever after in california falls apart and she moves back to london to start over. but a lot has changed since she’s been gone. all her single friends are now married with children, sky-high rents force her to rent a room in a stranger’s house, and in a world of perfect instagram lives, she feels like a f*ck up. even worse, a forty-something f*ck-up. but when she lands a job writing obituaries, nell meets the fabulous cricket, an eighty-something widow with challenges of her own, and they strike up an unlikely friendship. together they begin to help each other heal their aching hearts, cope with the loss of the lives they had planned, and push each other into new adventures and unexpected joys. because nell is determined. next year things are going to be very different. it’s time to turn her life around. a book for anyone who’s ever worried life isn’t going to plan, confessions of a forty-something f**k up by alexandra potter will make you laugh and it might even make you cry. but most importantly, it will remind you that you’re not alone, because we’re all in this together. time to fall in love with your life.

The magical and mesmerising story of how tomorrow can change what happens today. sometimes tomorrow has to start today tamara goodwin always had everything she wanted. why would she ever give a thought to tomorrow? but suddenly life takes a difficult turn, and tamara faces the hard decision to swap her glamorous town living for life in the country. however, tamara is soon lonely and longing for her old life. then a travelling library arrives in the village, bringing with it a mysterious leather-bound book locked with a gold clasp and padlock. what tamara discovers within its pages takes her breath away and shakes her world forever.