{"title":"Fiction","description":"","products":[{"product_id":"my-phantoms-by-gwendoline-riley-signed","title":"My Phantoms by Gwendoline Riley (Signed)","description":"\u003cp\u003ePaperback - bookplated\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eHelen Grant is a mystery to her daughter. An extrovert with few friends who has sought intimacy in the wrong places; a twice-divorced mother-of-two now living alone surrounded by her memories, Helen (known to her acquaintances as 'Hen') has always haunted Bridget. Now, Bridget is an academic in her forties.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eShe sees Helen once a year, and considers the problem to be contained. As she looks back on their tumultuous relationship - the performances and small deceptions - she tries to reckon with the cruelties inflicted on both sides. But when Helen makes it clear that she wants more, it seems an old struggle will have to be replayed.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eFrom the prize-winning author of First Love, My Phantoms is a bold, heart-stopping portrayal of a failed familial bond, which brings humour, subtlety and new life to the difficult terrain of mothers and daughters.  \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"City Books Hove","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":40096722419920,"sku":"","price":8.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0595\/8113\/7104\/products\/SignedcopyofMyPhantomsbyGwendolineRiley.jpg?v=1647967164"},{"product_id":"real-life-by-brandon-taylor-signed","title":"Real Life by Brandon Taylor (Signed)","description":"\u003cp data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003ePaperback - bookplated \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eWallace has spent his summer in the lab breeding a strain of microscopic worms. He is four years into a biochemistry degree at a lakeside Midwestern university, a life that’s a world away from his childhood in Alabama. His father died a few weeks ago, but Wallace didn’t go back for the funeral, and he hasn’t told his friends – Miller, Yngve, Cole and Emma. For reasons of self-preservation, he has become used to keeping a wary distance even from those closest to him. But, over the course of one blustery end-of-summer weekend, the destruction of his work and a series of intense confrontations force Wallace to grapple with both the trauma of the past, and the question of the future.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eDeftly zooming in and out of focus,\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eReal Life\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/em\u003eis a deeply affecting story about the emotional cost of reckoning with desire, and overcoming pain.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"City Books Hove","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":40096727400656,"sku":"","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0595\/8113\/7104\/products\/SignedcopyofRealLifebyBrandonTaylor.jpg?v=1630927756"},{"product_id":"the-liars-dictionary-by-eley-williams-signed","title":"The Liar's Dictionary by Eley Williams (Signed)","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003ePaperback - bookplated\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eSwansby's New Encyclopaedic Dictionary is riddled with fictitious entries known as mountweazels penned by Peter Winceworth, a man wishing to make his lasting mark back in 1899. It's up to young intern Mallory to uncover these mountweazels before the dictionary can be digitised for modern readers.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eLost in Winceworth's imagination - a world full of meaningless words - will Mallory finally discover the secret to living a meaningful life? \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"City Books Hove","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":40096900317392,"sku":"","price":8.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0595\/8113\/7104\/products\/SignedcopyofTheLiarsDictionarybyEleyWilliams.jpg?v=1630927387"},{"product_id":"summerwater-by-sarah-moss-signed","title":"Summerwater by Sarah Moss (Signed)","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003ePaperback - bookplated\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eIt is the summer solstice, but in a faded Scottish cabin park the rain is unrelenting. Twelve people on holiday with their families look on as the skies remain resolutely grey. A woman goes running up the Ben as if fleeing; a teenage boy chances the dark waters of the loch in his kayak; a retired couple head out despite the downpour, driving too fast on the familiar bends.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eBut there are newcomers too, and one particular family, a mother and daughter with the wrong clothes and the wrong manners, start to draw the attention of the others. Who are they? Where are they from? Should they be here at all? As darkness finally falls, something is unravelling . . .\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"City Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":40478914183376,"sku":"","price":8.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0595\/8113\/7104\/products\/SignedcopyofSummerwaterbySarahMoss.jpg?v=1636811855"},{"product_id":"black-butterflies-by-priscilla-morris-signed","title":"Black Butterflies by Priscilla Morris (Signed)","description":"\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003ePaperback - bookplated\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eSarajevo, spring 1992. Each night, nationalist gangs erect barricades, splitting the diverse city into ethnic enclaves; each morning, the bemused residents - whether Muslim, Croat or Serb - push the makeshift barriers aside. Zora, an artist and teacher, is focused on her family, her students, her attic studio in the old town.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eBut when violence finally spills over, she sees that she must send her elderly mother and ageing husband to safety with her daughter in England. Reluctant to leave her work, or to believe that hostilities will last more than a handful of weeks, she stays behind as the city falls under siege. As the siege deepens and everything they loved is laid to waste, black ashes floating over the streets, Zora and her friends are forced to rebuild themselves, over and over.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eInspired by real-life accounts of the longest siege in modern warfare, only thirty years ago, Black Butterflies is a heartrending and utterly captivating portrait of disintegration, resilience and hope.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"City Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42225607639248,"sku":"","price":8.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0595\/8113\/7104\/products\/SignedcopyofBlackButterfliesbyPriscillaMorris.jpg?v=1651922922"},{"product_id":"the-mermaid-of-black-conch-by-monique-roffey-signed","title":"Passiontide by Monique Roffey (Signed)","description":"\u003cp\u003ePaperback - bookplated\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eFour women spark a revolution on a Caribbean island – the electrifying new novel from the Costa-winning author of The Mermaid of Black Conch. ‘Vital, enraging and brilliant. I loved it’ SARAH WINMANEarly one morning, at the close of St Colibri’s carnival, a young female steel-pan player is found dead beneath a cannonball tree.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eIt is a discovery that will transform the lives of everyone on this small island. As the days pass, this shocking event draws together four women. There’s Sharleen, a journalist with an eye for the real story.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eHer childhood friend Tara, the pink-haired, straight-talking star of the activism scene. Gigi, the ‘notorious’ founder of the Port Isabella Sex Workers Collective. And Daisy, first lady of St Colibri, who is haunted by a disappearance in her own family decades ago.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eIn a community in which women’s voices are often silenced and violence against them is often overlooked, the group soon find themselves compelled to speak out – and to act. 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Eliot Prize-shortlisted poet--Frances is a graduate student spending a summer volunteering in rural France, in the hope that tending vegetables and harvesting honey will distract her from a scandal that drove her out of Paris, her research unfinished and her sense of self unmoored. At the eco-farm Noa Noa, she comes under the influence of its charismatic and domineering owner, Paul.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eAs his hold over her tightens and her plans come unstuck, she finds herself entangled in a strange, uneven relationship. On a fraught road trip across the South of France, both are forced to reckon with uncomfortable truths. A compelling and perturbing story of power, passivity and the cage of being 'good', Paul introduces a novelist of extraordinary perspicacity and lyricism.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"City Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43148357566672,"sku":"","price":8.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0595\/8113\/7104\/products\/SignedcopyofPaulbyDaisyLafarge.jpg?v=1668619357"},{"product_id":"the-shards-by-bret-easton-ellis-signed-1","title":"The Shards by Bret Easton Ellis (Signed)","description":"\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003ePaperback - bookplated\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eA sensational new novel from the bestselling author of Less Than Zero and American Psycho that tracks a group of privileged Los Angeles high school friends as a serial killer strikes across the city. His first novel in 13 years, The Shards is Bret Easton Ellis at his inimitable best. LA, 1981.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eBuckley College in heat. 17-year-old Bret is a senior at the exclusive Buckley prep school when a new student arrives with a mysterious past. Robert Mallory is bright, handsome, charismatic, and shielding a secret from Bret and his friends, even as he becomes a part of their tightly knit circle.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cspan data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eBret's obsession with Mallory is equalled only by his increasingly unsettling preoccupation with The Trawler, a serial killer on the loose who seems to be drawing ever closer to Bret and his friends, taunting them with grotesque threats and horrific, sharply local acts of violence. Can he trust his friends - or his own mind - to make sense of the danger they appear to be in? Thwarted by the world and by his own innate desires, buffeted by unhealthy fixations, Bret spirals into paranoia and isolation as the relationship between The Trawler and Robert Mallory hurtles inexorably toward a collision. Gripping, sly, suspenseful, deeply haunting and often darkly funny, The Shards is a mesmerizing fusing of fact and fiction that brilliantly explores the emotional fabric of Bret's life at 17 - sex and jealousy, obsession and murderous rage.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"City Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43245069238480,"sku":"","price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0595\/8113\/7104\/files\/9781800752320.jpg?v=1695744157"},{"product_id":"the-librarianist-by-patrick-dewitt-signed","title":"The Librarianist by Patrick deWitt (Signed)","description":"\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePaperback - bookplated\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFrom bestselling and award-winning author Patrick deWitt comes a novel about an ordinary man who thought life's surprises were behind him - until a chance encounter changed everything...\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBob Comet is a retired librarian passing his solitary days surrounded by books in a mint-colored house in Portland, Oregon. One morning on his daily walk he encounters a confused elderly woman lost in a market and returns her to the senior center that is her home. Hoping to fill the void he's known since retiring, he begins volunteering at the center.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHere, as a community of strange peers gathers around Bob, and following a happenstance brush with a painful complication from his past, the events of his life and the details of his character are revealed. Behind Bob Comet's straight man facade is the story of an unhappy child's runaway adventure during the last days of the Second World War, of true love won and stolen away, of the purpose and pride found in the librarian's vocation, and the pleasures of a life lived to the side of the masses. Comet's experiences are imbued with melancholy but also a bright, sustained comedy; he has a talent for locating bizarre and outsized players to welcome onto the stage of his life.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWith his inimitable verve, skewed humor, and compassion for the outcast, Patrick deWitt has written a wide-ranging and ambitious document of the introvert's condition. The Librarianist celebrates the extraordinary in the so-called ordinary life, and depicts beautifully the turbulence that sometimes exists beneath a surface of serenity. \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"City Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43455573393616,"sku":"","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0595\/8113\/7104\/files\/9781526646927.jpg?v=1709739872"},{"product_id":"the-most-dangerous-man-in-brighton-by-martin-webb-signed","title":"The Most Dangerous Man in Brighton by Martin Webb (Signed)","description":"\u003cp\u003ePaperback - signed\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"font_8 wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"color_15 wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003eThere are certain people you don’t want to cross. Men like Billy Murphy, a violent mob boss, reputed to be the most dangerous man in Brighton.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"font_8 wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"color_15 wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"wixGuard wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003e​\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"color_15 wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003eWhen college drop-out, Buster Brett, steals Billy’s cash on a whim, his odds of surviving are slim. On the run, a gang of armed thugs are soon hot on his heels.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"font_8 wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"color_15 wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"wixGuard wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003e​\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"color_15 wixui-rich-text__text\"\u003eWith only his druggie mate and a scheming con-artist to help out, Buster risks everything on an audacious plan that could not only save his skin, but also make the world a better place.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"City Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43478609395920,"sku":"","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0595\/8113\/7104\/files\/martinwebbsigned.jpg?v=1689846048"},{"product_id":"i-am-homeless-if-this-is-not-my-home-by-lorrie-moore-signed","title":"I Am Homeless If This Is Not My Home by Lorrie Moore (Signed)","description":"\u003cp\u003ePaperback - bookplated\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eFrom one of the most celebrated imaginations in American literature, Lorrie Moore's new novel is a magic box of longing and surprise. High up in a New York City hospice, Finn sits with his beloved brother Max, who is slipping from one world into the next. But when a phone call summons Finn back to a troubled old flame, a strange journey begins, opening a trapdoor in reality.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eIt will prompt a questioning of life and death, grief and the past, comedy and tragedy, and the diaphanous separations that lie between them all. 'Moore writes with such panache, such extraordinary perception and wit, that not a single sentence is wasted\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"City Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43556989829328,"sku":"","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0595\/8113\/7104\/files\/9780571273881.jpg?v=1713016896"},{"product_id":"the-lost-love-songs-of-boysie-singh-by-ingrid-persaud-signed","title":"Lost Love Songs by Ingrid Persaud (Signed)","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 0.875rem;\"\u003ePaperback - bookplated\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 0.875rem;\"\u003eIn hardback this title was called The Lost Love Songs of Boysie Singh.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eFrom the award-winning author of Love After Love, comes an epic of wonder, danger and risk. This is the tale of four women. Popo: brilliant, vulnerable and stuck.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eShe's determined to free herself from the traps of her past. Mana Lala: a devoted mother - her only connection to her man is their little boy, and she will do anything to keep them both close. For Doris, well, he's glorious and once she's licked him into shape, her husband presents an opportunity to climb the social ladder.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eShe's heard the awful stories, but she's sure they won't be hers. Rosie just wants to mind her business, her lover, Etty, and her store. Four lives, connected and controlled by one man: the notorious, charismatic gangster Boysie Singh.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003ePull up a chair and let these women tell of the man they believed could love, help or free them, and how some of them survived to tell a tale at all.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"City Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43903199183056,"sku":"","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0595\/8113\/7104\/files\/9780571386512.jpg?v=1741687234"},{"product_id":"prophet-song-by-paul-lynch-signed","title":"Prophet Song by Paul Lynch (Signed)","description":"\u003cp\u003ePaperback - bookplated\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eThe explosive literary sensation: a mother faces a terrible choice as Ireland slides into totalitarianism On a dark, wet evening in Dublin, scientist and mother-of-four Eilish Stack answers her front door to find the GNSB on her step. Two officers from Ireland’s newly formed secret police are here to interrogate her husband, a trade unionist. Ireland is falling apart.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eThe country is in the grip of a government turning towards tyranny and when her husband disappears, Eilish finds herself caught within the nightmare logic of a society that is quickly unravelling. How far will she go to save her family? And what – or who – is she willing to leave behind? Exhilarating, terrifying and propulsive, Prophet Song is a work of breathtaking originality, offering a devastating vision of a country at war and a deeply human portrait of a mother’s fight to hold her family together.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"City Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43982898725072,"sku":"","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0595\/8113\/7104\/files\/9780861549412.webp?v=1714221664"},{"product_id":"the-lincoln-highway-by-amor-towles-signed","title":"The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles (Signed)","description":"\u003cp\u003ePaperback - bookplated\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eIn June, 1954, eighteen-year-old Emmett returns home to his younger brother Billy after serving fifteen months in a juvenile facility for involuntary manslaughter. 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