Two friends fall under the spell of a New York beauty — with an unexpected outcome. A casual remark is taken seriously by a Chinese sculptor, and the British Ambassador becomes the owner of a priceless work of art... An insurance claims adviser has a most surprising encounter on the train home to Sevenoaks. The openings to three of this marvellous collection of stories that ends with a hauntingly written, atmospheric account of two undergraduates at Oxford in the 1930s, a tale of bitter rivalry that ends in a memorable love story.

6 days, 13 hours and 37 minutes to go... At the end of The Prodigal Daughter, Florentyna Kane is elected President — the first woman President of the United States. At 7.30 one evening the FBI learn of a plot to kill her — the 1572nd such threat of the year. At 8.30 five people know all the details. By 9.30 four of them are dead. FBI agent Mark Andrews alone knows when. He also knows that a senator is involved. He has six days to learn where — and how. Six days to prevent certain death of the President.

The English World Teacher's Guide contains step-by-step teaching notes for each lesson. The English World website, which is accessible through a code in the Teacher's Book will offer up-to-date teacher development and classroom resource materials.

The English World Teacher's Guide contains step-by-step teaching notes for each lesson. The English World website, which is accessible through a code in the Teacher's Book will offer up-to-date teacher development and classroom resource materials.

The Business 2.0 continues to offer Business English students the confidence, language and fundamentals skills they need to succeed in the competitive international business environment. The eWorkbook includes extra language practice, tests, wordlists and downloadable audio/video for on-the-go learning. It makes the most of new media.

Contains comprehensive coverage of reading, writing, listening and speaking skills. In this title, the CD-ROM reinforces the material learnt with unit-specific exercises. It also offers a wealth of extra information and exercises online and provides useful preparation for students working towards school-leaving exams.

When Robert Jordan died in 2007, all feared that these concluding scenes to the The Wheel of Time series would never be written. But working from notes and partials left by Jordan, established fantasy writer Sanderson now re-creates the vision that Robert Jordan left behind.

Dead Water is the fifth book in Ann Cleeves' Shetland series — which is now the major BBC1 drama starring Douglas Henshall, SHETLAND. When the body of journalist Jerry Markham is found in a traditional Shetland boat, outside the house of the Fiscal, down at the Marina, young Detective Inspector Willow Reeves is drafted in to head up the investigation. Since the death of his fiancee, Inspector Jimmy Perez has been out of the loop, but his interest in this new case is stirred and he decides to help the inquiry. Markham — originally a Shetlander but who had made a name for himself in London — had left the islands years before. In his wake, he left a scandal involving a young girl, Evie Watt, who is now engaged to a seaman. He had few friends in Shetland, so why was he back? Willow and Jimmy are led to Sullum Voe, the heart of Shetland's North Sea oil and gas industry. It soon emerges from their investigation that Markham was chasing a story in his final days. One that must have been significant enough to warrant his death... Also available in the Shetland series are Raven Black, White Nights, Red Bones and Blue Lightning. Ann Cleeves' Vera Stanhope series (ITV television drama VERA) contains five titles, of which The Glass Room is the most recent.

Punctuation marks come alive in this clever picture book featuring fourteen playful poems. Periods stop sentences in a baker's shop, commas help a train slow down, quotation marks tell people what to do, and colons stubbornly introduce lists. This appealing primer is a surefire way to make punctuation both accessible and fun for kids.

Eleanor is the new girl in town, and she's never felt more alone. All mismatched clothes, mad red hair and chaotic home life, she couldn't stick out more if she tried. Then she takes the seat on the bus next to Park. Quiet, careful and — in Eleanor's eyes — impossibly cool, Park's worked out that flying under the radar is the best way to get by. Slowly, steadily, through late-night conversations and an ever-growing stack of mixed tapes, Eleanor and Park fall in love. They fall in love the way you do the first time, when you're 16, and you have nothing and everything to lose. Set over the course of one school year in 1986, Eleanor and Park is funny, sad, shocking and true — an exquisite nostalgia trip for anyone who has never forgotten their first love.

When attending a Newcastle murder scene, Detective Sidney Hurst finds a dead North family clone. Yet none have been reported missing. And in 2122, twenty years ago, a North clone billionaire was horrifically murdered in the same manner on the tropical planet of St Libra. So, if the murderer is still at large, was Angela Tramelo wrongly convicted? She never wavered under interrogation, claiming she alone survived an alien attack. Investigating this potential alien threat now becomes the Human Defence Agency's top priority. St Libran bio-fuel is the lifeblood of Earth's economy and must be secured. A vast expedition is mounted via the Newcastle gateway, and experts are dispatched to the planet — with Angela Tramelo, grudgingly released from prison. But the expedition is cut off deep within St Libra's rainforests, and the murders begin. Angela insists it's the alien, but her new colleagues aren't sure. Did she see an alien, or does she have other reasons for being on St Libra? Praise for Peter F Hamilton: 'The most powerful imagination in science fiction' Ken Follett, 'Novels that combine fantastic speculation with incredible detailed imagining of the lives we will lead' Guardian, 'This is thrilling stuff; compulsively readable and abundantly full of ideas' The Times, 'Reaches another level of excellence... Brilliant' Locus.

Epic in scope, intimate in detail, heartbreaking in its human drama, this is the first book to recount the history of the nobility caught up the maelstrom of the Bolshevik Revolution and the creation of Stalin's Russia. It is a book filled with chilling tales of looted palaces, burning estates, of desperate flights from marauding thugs and Red Army soldiers, of imprisonment, exile, and execution. It is the story of how a centuries'-old elite famous for its glittering wealth, its service to the Tsar and Empire, was dispossessed and destroyed along with the rest of old Russia. Drawing on the private archives of two great families — the Sheremetovs and the Golitsyns — Former People is also a story of survival, of how many of the tsarist ruling class, so-called former people and class enemies, abandoned, displaced, and repressed, overcame the loss of their world and struggled to find a place for themselves and their families in the new, hostile world of the Soviet Union. It reveals how even at the darkest depths of the terror, daily life went on — men and women fell in love, children were born and educated, friends gathered, simple pleasures were cherished. Ultimately, Former People is a testament to the resilience of the human spirit.

When she fell pregnant as a teenager in Ireland in 1952, Philomena Lee was sent to the convent at Roscrea in Co. Tipperary to be looked after as a fallen woman. She cared for her baby for three years until the Church took him from her and sold him, like countless others, to America for adoption. Coerced into signing a document promising never to attempt to see her child again, she nonetheless spent the next fifty years secretly searching for him, unaware that he was searching for her from across the Atlantic. Philomena's son, renamed Michael Hess, grew up to be a top Washington lawyer and a leading Republican official in the Reagan and Bush administrations. But he was a gay man in a homophobic party where he had to conceal not only his sexuality but, eventually, the fact that he had AIDs. With little time left, he returned to Ireland and the convent where he was born: his desperate quest to find his mother before he died left a legacy that was to unfold with unexpected consequences for all involved. Philomena is the tale of a mother and a son whose lives were scarred by the forces of hypocrisy on both sides of the Atlantic and of the secrets they were forced to keep. A compelling narrative of human love and loss, Martin Sixsmith's moving account is both heartbreaking yet ultimately redemptive.

The Counsellor is now a major motion picture directed by Ridley Scott and starring Michael Fassbender, Penelope Cruz, Cameron Diaz, Javier Bardem and Brad Pitt. Pulitzer Prize-winning author Cormac McCarthy's original screenplay is the story of a lawyer who is so seduced by the desire to get rich, to impress his fiancee, that he becomes involved in a risky drug-smuggling venture. His contacts in this high-stakes cocaine trade are the mysterious and probably corrupt Reiner and the seductive Malkina, so exotic her pets of choice are two cheetahs. As the action crosses the Mexican border, things become darker, more violent and more sexually disturbing than he could ever have imagined. Deft, shocking and unforgettable, this gripping tale about risk, consequence and the treacherous balance between the two reveals Cormac McCarthy at his finest.

The story of the most successful espionage coup — and best-kept secret — of this century. It is 1968. Israeli intelligence has learned that Egypt, with Soviet help, will develop atomic bombs within months — an untimely end for the young nation unless a source of uranium for Israeli bombs can be had in complete secrecy. Impossible, of course, unless someone as improbable as the plan can be found to steal it. Working alone, Israeli agent Nat Dickstein concocts an ingenious scenario for the biggest, and quietest, hijacking in history. Against him are the Russian KGB, Egyptian Intelligence and the Arab extremist Fedayeen. With him is a half-English, half-Arab young woman of uncertain allegiance, who discovers Dickstein's Achilles heel ...

The fifth volume of memoirs from the author who inspired the BBC series All Creatures Great and Small During his decades spent as a country vet in Yorkshire, James Herriot has seen huge advances in medical science, technological leaps, and a world irrevocably changed by war. Yet some things have always stayed the same — gruff farmers, hypochondriac pet owners, and animals that never do quite what you expect them to. From a green young man in his first job in the 1930s, to an experienced veterinary surgeon, married with two children, James has spent his entire career among the people and animals of Darrowby. And there's nowhere else he'd rather be. Since they were first published, James Herriot's memoirs have sold millions of copies and entranced generations of animal lovers. Charming, funny and touching, Every Living Thing is a heart-warming story of determination, love and companionship from one of Britain's best-loved authors.

Launched just over a year ago on Facebook, 'Off The Leash' has developed a regular daily following of over 150,000 dog lovers from around the world. Now the best of Rupert Fawcett's brilliantly observed, touchingly true cartoons come together in book form for the first time. Featuring the secret thoughts and conversations of dogs of every size, shape and breed, this gorgeous book is a celebration of our favourite belly-scratching, tail-chasing, bed-stealing canine friends.

In a land without magic, where the king rules with an iron hand, an assassin is summoned to the castle. She comes not to kill the king, but to win her freedom. If she defeats twenty-three killers, thieves, and warriors in a competition, she is released from prison to serve as the king's champion. Her name is Celaena Sardothien. The Crown Prince will provoke her. The Captain of the Guard will protect her. But something evil dwells in the castle of glass--and it's there to kill. When her competitors start dying one by one, Celaena's fight for freedom becomes a fight for survival, and a desperate quest to root out the evil before it destroys her world.