Winner of IMPAC Dublin Literary Award in 2000, Wide Open is the first of Nicola Barker's Thames Gateway novels. Poking out of the River Thames estuary, the strange Isle of Sheppey is home to a nudist beach, a nature reserve, a wild boar farm and not much else. The landscape is bleak, but the people are interesting. There's Luke, who specialises in join-the-dots pornography and lippy, outraged Lily. They are joined by Jim, the 8-year-old Nathan and the mysterious, dark-eyed Ronnie. Each one floats adrift in turbulent currents, fighting the rip tide of a past that swims with secrets. Only if they see through the lies and prejudice will they gain redemption. Wide Open is about coming to terms with the past, and the fantasies people construct in order to protect their fragile inner selves

Scared to Try It? These Men and Women Aren’t Here you will meet men and women who are trying every possible kind of sexual combination to make marriage work in bold new ways. Threesomes. Open adultery. Swapping. Group marriage. And a hundred variants of every possible sexual experiment within the marital relationship. These true stories surpass the most erotic fiction. Here are fascinating and eye-opening insights into just where marriage is at today

Wideacre Hall, set in the heart of the English countryside, is the ancestral home that Beatrice Lacey loves. But as a woman of the 18th century, she has no right of inheritance. Corrupted by a world that mistreats women, she sets out to corrupt others. From Publishers Weekly Gregory's full-blown first novel is a marvelously assured period piece, an English gothic with narrative verve. Beatrice Lacey loves nothing more than the family estate, Wideacrenot her bluff, hearty father, her weak brother, Harry, or her mother, who can't quite believe mounting evidence that damns her passionate daughter. Foiled in her hunger to own the estate by the 18th century laws of entail, Beatrice plots her father's death, knowing she can twist Harry in any direction she chooses, for her brother harbors a dark, perverted secret. Their incestuous tangle is not broken even by Harry's marriage. And while a bounteous harvest multiplies, no one gainsays the young squire and his sister, the true master of Wideacre. Beatrice marries also, managing to hide the paternity of two children sired by Harry until her increasing greed squeezes the land and its people dry, and the seeds of destruction she has sown come to their awful fruition. Gregory effortlessly breathes color and life into a tale of obsession built around a ruthless, fascinating woman

Na wykopaliskach archeologicznych w Izraelu w pochodzącym sprzed dwóch tysięcy lat grobie znaleziono plastykowy woreczek, a w nim instrukcję obsługi japońskiej kamery wideo. Analiza metodą C14 potwierdziła, że wiek papieru broszurki rzeczywiście wynosi dwa tysiące lat. Jednak opisana w niej kamera ma pojawić się na rynku dopiero za trzy lata. Nasuwa się wyjaśnienie, że w niedalekiej przyszłości — w ciągu następnych czterech lub sześciu lat — odkryty zostanie sposób poruszania się w czasie. Naukowcy stwierdzą, że możliwy jest ruch tylko w jednym kierunku, mianowicie w przeszłość. Dlaczego człowiek, którego szczątki znaleziono w grobie, nie zważając na ryzyko wyruszył w bezpowrotną podróż? Przyczyna mogła być tylko jedna: pragnął sfilmować Jezusa Chrystusa i owo nagranie, dobrze ukryte w bezpiecznym miejscu czeka teraz od tysięcy lat, by w końcu zabrali je stamtąd jego wspólnicy

Freddy Otash was the man in the know and the man to know in ’50s L.A. He was a rogue cop, a sleazoid private eye, a shakedown artist, a pimp — and, most notably, the head strong-arm goon for Confidential magazine. Confidential presaged the idiot internet — and delivered the dirt, the dish, the insidious ink, and the scurrilous skank. It mauled misanthropic movie stars, sex-soiled socialites, and putzo politicians. Mattress Jack Kennedy, James Dean, Montgomery Clift, Burt Lancaster, Liz Taylor, Rock Hudson — Frantic Freddy outed them all. He was the Tattle Tyrant who held Hollywood hostage, and now he’s here to CONFESS. “I’m consumed with candor and wracked with recollection. I’m revitalized and resurgent. My meshugenah march down memory lane begins NOW.” In Freddy’s viciously entertaining voice, Widespread Panic torches 1950s Hollywood to the ground. It’s a blazing revelation of coruscating corruption, pervasive paranoia, and of sin and redemption with nothing in between. Here is James Ellroy in savage quintessence. Freddy Otash confesses — and you are here to read and succumb

Wrocław, rok 1919. Na jednej z wysepek w rozlewiskach Odry dwóch gimnazjalistów dokonuje makabrycznego odkrycia. Przybyły na miejsce asystent kryminalny Eberhard Mock odnajduje okrutnie okaleczone ciała czterech mężczyzn, a przy nich adresowaną do siebie tajemniczą notatkę. Ekscentryczny morderca wciąga policję w grę, której stawką jest życie kolejnych ludzi. Policjanci podążają jego tropem w podziemny świat tajnych sekt okultystycznych i sutenerów oferujących bogatym klientom zakazane rozrywki. Tymczasem nieustępliwy, porywczy Mock, prześladowany przez senne koszmary, słabość do alkoholu i pięknych, rudowłosych kobiet, toczy rozpaczliwą walkę z czasem. Wykorzystuje cały swój spryt i doświadczenie, by jak najprędzej powstrzymać krwawy spektakl, którego – nieświadomie – sam jest przyczyną. Mroczny, pełen napięcia i grozy thriller Marka Krajewskiego opisuje wydarzenia o osiem lat poprzedzające akcję uznanego za najlepszy polski kryminał 2003 roku Końca świata w Breslau. Podobnie jak tamten, wiernie, w najdrobniejszych szczegółach odtwarza wizerunek przedwojennego Wrocławia, kreśląc sugestywny obraz miasta zaludnionego zdeprawowanymi arystokratami, bezwzględnymi bandytami, rewolucjonistami i maniakami o najdzikszych upodobaniach

I used to murder people for money, but these days it’s more of a survival technique. Once an assassin, always an assassin. So much for being plain old Gin Blanco. With every lowlife in Ashland gunning for me, I don’t need another problem, but a new one has come to town. Salina might seem like a sweet Southern belle, but she’s really a dangerous enemy whose water elemental magic can go head-to-head with my own Ice and Stone power. Salina also has an intimate history with my lover, Owen Grayson, and now that she’s back in town, she thinks he’s hers for the taking. Salina’s playing a mysterious game that involves a shady local casino owner with a surprising connection to Owen. But they call me the Spider for a reason. I’m going to untangle her deadly scheme, even if it leaves my love affair hanging by a thread

THE A3 RAID, THE EUSTON BY — PASS JOB, THE M40 HIJACK... they all worked a treat. All magic. All the work of one mastermind — Harry Rawlins. But Harry blew it in the Blackwall Tunnel. Harry always said that if anything ever happened to him Dolly would be all right: Joe and Terry would take over, the team would look after everyone. But when Harry got blown to bits in the Blackwall Tunnel, Joe and Terry (God help them) went with him. Which only left Dolly, Linda and Shirley to run the business — the WIDOWS. A hard-hitting new gangland series in the sensational tradition of THE LONG GOOD FRIDAY and MINDER

Facing life alone, they had turned to crime together. Dolly Rawlins, Shirley Miller, Linda Pirelli and Bella O’Reilly set out to do the impossible, hold up an armed security wagon. Using Dolly Rawlins’ husband’s plans, they succeed and make their escape to Rio, leaving the bulk of their cash hidden in London. The women are free, rich, and ready to start a new life. When the scream has died down, they will return to share out their cash. Only the shadow of the man they had presumed dead hangs over them. Harry Rawlins is alive, and he wants the women’s money — and he will go to any lengths to retrieve what he feels is rightly his, even more so when he discovers his ‘widow’ has laid claim to all his business and banking assets. Rawlins is desperate to find his wife and through her the haul from the robbery. The hunt is on and the widows’ freedom short-lived