British Literary Fiction

At 18 years old, Dinah gave away her baby son to the rich couple she worked for before they left Jamaica. They never returned. She never forgot him. Eighteen years later, a young man comes from the US to Kingston. From the moment she sees him, Dinah never doubts—this is her son. What happens next will make everyone question what they know and where they belong.

Meet Abbas. Woodcarver, toy maker, dreamer. Abbas is seventeen when he is whisked away to Tipu Sultan's glorious palace in Mysore. Apprenticed to the legendary clockmaker Monsieur Du Leze, he is ordered to create an ingenious musical tiger to delight Tipu's sons. In the eccentric Du Leze, Abbas finds an unexpected friend who encourages his skill and hunger for learning, and through whom he also meets the unforgettable Jehanne, who has questions and ambitions of her own. But when British soldiers attack and loot Mysore, Abbas's world is turned upside down.

In the early 60s, Tayo Ajayi sails to England from Nigeria to take up a scholarship at Oxford University. There he discovers a whole generation high on visions of a new and better world. He meets Vanessa Richardson, the beautiful daughter of a former colonial officer. Their story, which spans four decades, is a bittersweet tale of a brave but doomed affair and the universal desire to fall truly, madly, and deeply in love.

Take Me to Your President is another brilliant political satire by the author of The Mouse That Roared. After chasing his dog (who was chasing a rabbit), a simple farmer from a small village in England finds himself inexplicably on board a top-secret intergalactic missile. Before he can sort it out, the farmer finds himself touching down in the United States of America where he is mistaken for a Martian. And now it’s up to him to bring world peace. “Once again Leonard Wibberley—author of The Mouse That Roared—has conjured a unique sort of comedy from a blend of fantasy, blandly ...

January 2001: A small ship, led by wealthy Scotsman Daniel Hamilton, arrives in the Sundarbans, a vast archipelago of islands in the mythical river Ganges, a half-drowned land where the waters of the Himalayas merge with the incoming tides of the sea.

Before George Orwell was Orwell - the pen name he took on becoming a writer - he was Eric Blair, an unlikely policeman in Burma. 19 years old, unusually tall, highly intelligent, a diffident loner fresh from Eton, Blair stood out amongst his fellow trainees in 1920s Mandalay. It was here, over five years in the narrow colonial world of the Raj - a decaying system steeped in overt racism and petty class-conflict - that Eric Blair became the George Orwell we know: an anti-imperialist, a socialist and a writer of rare commitment.

Nine-year-old Samuel lives alone in a once-great estate in Surrey with the family’s housekeeper, Ruth. His father is dead, and his mother has been abroad for months, purportedly tending to her late husband’s faltering business. She left one night while Samuel was sleeping. Beyond her sporadic postcards, Samuel hears nothing from his mother. Samuel’s life is otherwise regulated by Ruth, who runs the house with an iron fist. As rumors in town begin to swirl, Samuel wonders whether something more sinister is afoot. Perhaps his mother did not leave but was murdered - by Ruth.

Since the first ‘Best of Young British Novelists’ issue in 1983, Granta has championed the work of authors who have changed the landscape of British literature. In 1983, featured writers included Kazuo Ishiguro, Salman Rushdie, Julian Barnes, Martin Amis and Pat Barker, among many others. Subsequent editions have highlighted the work of Zadie Smith, Nicola Barker, Ben Okri, Jeanette Winterson and others. In 2023, they will introduce listeners around the world to a cohort of outstanding new British voices.

In 1830 a young novice called Catherine Labouré was granted a vision of the Virgin Mary. Nearly 200 years later, Sister Anne is also waiting for a sign. Which is why she accepts a mission to go to a tiny community on an island just off the coast of Brittany. Her only companion there is a sceptical, chain-smoking older nun who just wants to be left in peace.

In Jessie Greengrass' dazzlingly brilliant debut novel, our unnamed narrator recounts her progress to motherhood while remembering the death of her own mother 10 years before and the childhood summers she spent with her psychoanalyst grandmother. Woven among these personal recollections are significant events in medical history: Wilhelm Rontgen's discovery of the X-ray; Sigmund Freud's development of psychoanalysis and the work that he did with his daughter, Anna; and the origins of modern surgery and the anatomy of pregnant bodies.

Sayon Hughes longs to escape the volatile Bris­tol neighborhood known as Ends, the tight-knit but sometimes lawless world in which he was raised, and forge a better life with Shona, the girl he’s loved since grade school. With few paths out, he is drawn into dealing drugs along­side his cousin, the unpredictable but fiercely loyal Cuba.

Young Dorothy is trapped in a life of poverty and heartache. Abandoned by a mother who never loved her, she is forced to live with grandparents who care even less for her than they do for their own bratty children. Dorothy must persevere and hold on to the distant memory of her loving father with only a tin of letters and a small toy soldier to remind her of her former life of wealth and privilege. Just when Dorothy thinks life has nothing left to offer, a letter arrives, inviting her to visit her father in London. Will this be the opportunity Dorothy has been waiting for?

Every 10 years, Granta Magazine dedicates a special issue celebrating the 20 best British novelists under the age of 40. Historically, the judges have chosen with remarkable prescience, accurately predicting the authors who will craft the future of British fiction. Barker, Barnes, Hollinghurst, Ishiguro, Mitchell, Rushdie, Smith, Tremain, Winterson - long before they were household names they were Granta Best of Young British Novelists. To borrow from The Observer, this is "a list that sets the literary agenda for a generation".

The unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of Jonathan Coe's brilliant new comic novel Expo 58, read by the actor Julian Rhind-Tutt. Expo 58 - Good-looking girls and sinister spies: a naive Englishman at loose in Europe in Jonathan Coe's brilliant comic novelLondon, 1958: unassuming civil servant Thomas Foley is plucked from his desk at the Central Office of Information and sent on a six-month trip to Brussels.

When Kwasi’s family moves abruptly from one side of London to the other, Kwasi is both excited by the change—the new house is so big—and unsettled by his new school and the pressures placed upon him by his parents and many aunties. One place Kwasi finds refuge and inspiration is the Chest of Small Wonders, an eclectic and run-down charity shop on the high street.

Looking for your next satisfying book discussion with friends or your reading group? This guide is written without spoilers. Read it as a warm-up for the actual text, or use it to refresh your memory and jump-start your discussions with your book group and book-loving friends. In this guide to Roz Morris's novel Ever Rest, you can: Explore the author’s own thoughts and intentions for the book - and decide how they match up with your own. Discover the themes that emerged for other readers - and decide whether you agree. Discover the books that inspired the author’s treatment of settings ...

When a malicious chair's only desire is to prosper from negative thoughts, will Clarisse be willing to trade her mind for a premonition? They don't have the safety of distance to rely upon--only five days to decide if they are made for each other before Harry leaves back home. Or will the mysterious scarlet chair determine their fate? She was unlucky in love, recently separated, and desperately searching for the man of her dreams. For Harry, recently divorced-- it carried risk and uncertainty? In this heart-rending search for passion, he travels to the city of our affection to meet Clarisse...

"A thoroughly enchanting story with a warm, soothing feel to it . Reading this book is like putting on comfy slippers. Highly recommended!’ Wishing Shelf Award Finalist “Intense and evocative… A stunner.” The Prairies Book Review “Beautifully written, it is an enchanting story that I will read again and again.” Reader’s Favorite ~ 5 Star Award “BarefootAlice” is a heart-warming tale of one woman’s journey of loves, lost and found, of discovering ancestral ties and the magical interconnection with life. Dumped by her husband and homeless, middle-aged Alice finds herself ...

For DCI Eleanor Blackwell, history is a map to the truth. But when a renowned archaeologist is found dead in the bleak winter Fens, the clues left on his body—a single pressed poppy and a line of haunting war poetry—point to a history that kills. The ritualistic signature is an echo of a past case, pulling Blackwell and her team into the orbit of a shadowy cabal of academic purists. This secret society, hidden within the nation's most elite institutions, believes some historical narratives are worth killing for, and they see themselves as the guardians of the past. From ancient burial ...

World War Two vet Art Kenning is the alcoholic first-aid man in an isolated sawmill village in the interior of BC, where he dreads the sound of the five whistles that summon him to the mill floor whenever a worker is hurt. Traumatized by an incident in Holland, when he stood by while members of his unit committed a horrific act, he loses himself in drink, and in memories of the love affair he had with a woman in wartime Paris. Then one of the most powerful men at the mill arrives at his door late one evening to ask for his help.