Bloomsbury Reader imprint: 830 books

"This is a very extraordinary book... a first-rate thriller." -The Tablet As Mussolini's troops invade Abyssinia the international situation deteriorates, and the armaments kings look forward greedily to even fatter profits. No one, it seems, can halt the carnage. Except perhaps the...

Elizabeth wins Darcy, and Jane wins Bingley - but do they 'live happily ever after'? Emma Tennant's bestselling sequels to Pride and Prejudice ingeniously pick up several threads from Jane Austen's timeless novel, in a lighthearted and affectionate look at the possible subsequent lives of all the...

H.E. Bates's fifth collection is a sparkling body of work full of stories of childhood. Geoffrey West observed the collection overall as "bright with life, with individuals alive and interacting, and with the sweeping beauties of broad country backgrounds." Often cited as one of Bates's...

The Flying Goat (Jonathan Cape, 1939) features sixteen diverse stories from slapstick sketches to portraits of marital tension; one Uncle Silas tale; and three that hark back to Bates's boyhood roots. 'A Funny Thing' is an escalating bragging match between Uncle Silas and Uncle Cosmos. Cosmos...

Published in 1972, The Song of the Wren contains some light entertainments in the style of the Uncle Silas tales, alongside some more serious stories concerning thwarted love, love triangles, and, in two of the cases, the violence that comes out of psyches twisted by love. 'The Song of the...

First published in 1961, Now Sleeps the Crimson Petal and Other Stories is a collection full of light and shade, setting sensitive character studies against Bates's signature vibrant, delicate imagery. A fussy and obsessive golfer encounters a troubled young woman at a wind-swept beach in 'Lost Ball',...

This is a sparkling collection of short stories, dealing with love, loss and the tiny happenings that make up our everyday experience. Her most brilliant stories are about successful couples who own comfortable houses, enjoy interesting lives, raise attractive children - and commit adultery. On...

First published in 1928, Nor Many Waters is typical Alec Waugh in its charm and grace, and its shrewd perception of human emotions and profound exploration of human relationships.

Bates's famous loveable rogue, Uncle Silas, has a unique range of work to his name. For the first time, all of these stories are gathered together in one collection, allowing readers to experience Silas from multiple perspectives. Some tales offer sly, affectionate glimpses of the narrator's...

Monica Dickens's novel, first published in 1965, opens in a Juvenile court in London. One of the young offenders is a sixteen-year-old girl, Kate, who is described as being in need of care and protection. In the court is a girl only slightly older, Emma, daughter of the magistrate. From her experience...

First published in 1984, this is Dirk Bogarde's third novel. Set in the shadow of Hollywood opulence – the gaudy wastes of Los Angeles – West of Sunset is a sharp and potent satire of movie-making America. However, the excessive glitter is embedded in a deeper plot about a successful man's...

First published in 1975, this story tells of how a chance meeting in a café, a piece of grit delicately removed by a gentleman from a lady's eye give birth to an affair... a brief yet unrelenting emotional tug-of-war between two people whose spontaneous desire clashes head-on with the 'facts' of...

Volume Two of the dramatic saga of the Lorimer Family A Legacy may be of great value and still bring bad luck... Although Margaret Lorimer has made her own way as a doctor, she does not at all approve of the ambitions of her beautiful young ward Alexa. Being an opera singer is considered...

To newly separated Anna, holidaying in Devon with her seven-year-old son, the exquisite windsurfer winging across the waves on the river near their cottage represents all that is young, strong and free. In a nearby nursing home Anna's mother is dying of cancer, calmly accepting impending death...