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Love In Idleness: ‘Made me laugh out loud’ Joanne Harris
by Amanda CraigWhen Polly and Theo Noble book the Casa Luna, near Cortona, for their summer holiday they plan a civilised Anglo-American house-party with Theo's brother Daniel, Daniel's girlfriend Ellen, and Polly's old schoolfriend Hemani in an idyllic Tuscan setting. Their children Tania and Robbie will have Hemani's son Bron to play with, and Theo's mother, Betty is expected keep her grandchildren under control by force of a personality that can curdle mayonnaise at a hundred paces. Even Ivo Sponge, the notorious journalist with whom Ellen was once entangled, should do little to spoil their pleasure. But the Casa Luna is a place where strange things happen, and anyone who lives there risks unexpected joys and sorrows. As both children and adults find it increasingly difficult to tell what is fantasy and what is reality, the tiny winged creatures who have persuaded Tania to brew a love potion start to take over ... The result is that of the four couples who have begun the holiday together, all have swapped partners by the end (and one has swapped sex of partner!). This is a subtle and delectable comedy of manners about love, lies and the dangers of a strong imagination ...
The Other Side of You: Quick Reads
by Amanda CraigWill must run, or die. He's seen a murder, and the gang on his estate are after him.Hurt, hungry and afraid, he comes to an abandoned house in a different part of the city. Behind its high fences is a place of safety. Here, he can hide like a wounded beast. He can find food, and healing - and learn how to do more than survive.But when Will meets Padma, he must choose between his good side and his bad one. For the gang he left behind is still there. How can he live without becoming a killer? How can he love without being a thief?Exciting, fast-paced and different, this is a story that keeps you reading until the last line.
A Private Place
by Amanda CraigKnotshead is a school catering for the children of the rich, famous, liberal - and deluded. With its progressive curriculum, complacent staff and beautiful grounds, it looks like Paradise. But the clever, the odd and the bookish are relentlessly persecuted as pupils make their own rules in a bubble of privilege and prejudice. When Alice, the Headmaster's intellectual step-daughter, and the much-expelled American millionaire Winthrop T Sheen join forces against the school bully, Grub Viner, a gifted pianist and school "joker", has to choose between love and loyalty, and black comedy escalates to murder.
The Three Graces
by Amanda Craig'Hugely entertaining' Telegraph'She's such a skilful storyteller who vividly dramatises our lives with wit, wisdom and compassion'BERNARDINE EVARISTO'I revelled in The Three Graces - such an intriguing cast, so convincingly presented, and a narrative that continually surprises' PENELOPE LIVELY'A brilliant piece of storytelling... it should be the book everybody's reading this summer'ANDREW O'HAGAN'Gorgeous and generous... rich with characters and suffused with sunlight' LISSA EVANS When Enzo shoots an illegal migrant from his bedroom one night, it triggers a series of events that embroil old and young, rich and poor, native and foreign. His elderly neighbours Ruth, Diana and Marta are three friends who have retired to Tuscany. Ruth's favourite grandson Olly is about to get married from her idyllic hillside farmhouse; however, the bride, Tania, seems curiously unengaged by anything but vlogging as a social media influencer. Marta, preparing to give the annual music recital sponsored by a Russian oligarch in hiding from Putin, is increasingly unwell, and her grandson, Xan, is full of resentment at the inequalities he encounters. Diana is nursing her husband, Lord Evenlode, who is living with dementia, and looking back over a long and troubled marriage. Over two weeks in May, all these characters will face challenging choices as they grapple with their own past and with present dangers. For although the Tuscan spring looks as ravishing as a Renaissance painting, the realities of modern life make it harder and harder to believe that there is more that unites us than what keeps us apart. Brilliant, enthralling, funny and generous, this is an exploration of the indomitable human heart.
A Vicious Circle: ‘A rip-roaring read’ Elle
by Amanda CraigA Vicious Circle exposes the corruption of London's journalistic circuit, the horrors of our hospitals and slums, and the transformations caused by motherhood. Gripping, tender and fiercely funny, it has been instantly recognised as a modern classic about the way we live now.
Rewriting American Identity in the Fiction and Memoirs of Isabel Allende
by B. CraigMoving away from territorially-bound narratives toward a more kinetic conceptualization of identity, this book represents the first analysis of the politics of American identity within the fiction and memoirs of Isabel Allende. Craig offers a radical transformation of societal frameworks through revised notions of place, temporality, and space.
The Wealth of the Nation: Scotland, Culture and Independence
by Cairns CraigReveals Britain’s secret counter-subversive policies and security measures implemented in the post-war Middle East
The Wealth of the Nation: Scotland, Culture and Independence (Edinburgh University Press)
by Cairns CraigNew essays and creative explorations of the friendship, milieu, and writings of Katherine Mansfield and Virginia Woolf
Yeats, Eliot, Pound and the Politics of Poetry: Richest to the Richest (Routledge Library Editions: T. S. Eliot)
by Cairns Prof. CraigIt has long been recognised that there is an apparently paradoxical relationship between the revolutionary poetic style developed by Yeats, Eliot and Pound in the period during and after the First World War, and the reactionary politics with which they were associated in the 1920s and 1930s. Concentrating on their writings in the period up to the 1930s, this study, first published in 1982, helps to resolve the paradox and also provides a much needed reappraisal of the factors influencing their poetic and political development. The work of these poets has usually been seen as deriving from the tradition of continental symbolist poetics. Yeats, Eliot, Pound and the Politics of Poetry will be of interest to students of literature.
Yeats, Eliot, Pound and the Politics of Poetry: Richest to the Richest (Routledge Library Editions: T. S. Eliot #2)
by Cairns Prof. CraigIt has long been recognised that there is an apparently paradoxical relationship between the revolutionary poetic style developed by Yeats, Eliot and Pound in the period during and after the First World War, and the reactionary politics with which they were associated in the 1920s and 1930s. Concentrating on their writings in the period up to the 1930s, this study, first published in 1982, helps to resolve the paradox and also provides a much needed reappraisal of the factors influencing their poetic and political development. The work of these poets has usually been seen as deriving from the tradition of continental symbolist poetics. Yeats, Eliot, Pound and the Politics of Poetry will be of interest to students of literature.
Twentieth Century Scottish Drama (Canongate Classics #98)
by Cairns Craig Randall StevensEdited and introduced by Cairns Craig and Randall Stevenson. Ever since the major revival of dramatic writing and production in the 1970s, the style and the subject matter of Scottish writing for stage and screen has been a continuing influence on our contemporary culture, exciting, offending and challenging audiences in equal measure. Yet modern Scottish drama has a history of controversy, conflict and entertainment going back to the 1920s, notable at every turn for the vigour of its language and its direct confrontation with telling issues. The plays in this anthology offer a unique chance to grasp the different topics and also the recurrent themes of Scottish drama in the twentieth century. Gathered together in a single omnibus volume, there is the poetic eeriness of Barrie and the political commitment of Joe Corrie and Sue Glover; there is the Brechtian debate of Bridie and the verbal brilliance of John Byrne and Liz Lochhead; there is working-class experience and feminist insight; broad Scots and existential anxiety; street realism and a meeting with the devil; social injustice and raucous humour; historical comedy and tragic loss. Here is both the breadth and the continuity of the modern Scottish tradition in a single volume.
Miss Burma: LONGLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2018
by Charmaine CraigLonglisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2018Longlisted for the National Book Award for FictionAfter attending school in Calcutta, Benny settles in Rangoon, then part of the British Empire, and falls in love with Khin, a woman who is part of a long-persecuted ethnic minority group, the Karen. World War II comes to Southeast Asia, and Benny and Khin must go into hiding in the eastern part of the country during the Japanese Occupation, beginning a journey that will lead them to change the country's history. After the war, the British authorities make a deal with the Burman nationalists, led by Aung San, whose party gains control of the country. When Aung San is assassinated, his successor ignores the pleas for self-government of the Karen people and other ethnic groups, and in doing so sets off what will become the longest-running civil war in recorded history. Benny and Khin's eldest child, Louisa, has a danger-filled, tempestuous childhood and reaches prominence as Burma's first beauty queen soon before the country falls to dictatorship. As Louisa navigates her newfound fame, she is forced to reckon with her family's past, the West's ongoing covert dealings in her country and her own loyalty to the cause of the Karen people. Based on the story of the author's mother and grandparents, Miss Burma is a captivating portrait of how modern Burma came to be and of the ordinary people swept up in the struggle for self-determination and freedom.
My Nemesis
by Charmaine CraigTessa is a successful writer who develops a friendship, first by correspondence and then in person, with Charlie, a ruggedly handsome philosopher and scholar. Sparks fly as they exchange ideas about Camus and masculine desire, and their intellectual connection promises more - but there are obstacles to this burgeoning relationship.While Tessa's husband Milton enjoys Charlie's company, Charlie's wife Wah is a different case, and she proves to be both adversary and conundrum to Tessa. Wah's traditional femininity and subservience to her husband strike Tessa as weaknesses, and she scoffs at the sacrifices Wah makes as adoptive mother to a Burmese girl, Htet. But Wah has a kind of power too, especially over Charlie, and the conflict between the two women leads to Tessa's martini-fueled declaration that Wah is 'an insult to womankind.' As Tessa is forced to deal with the consequences of her outburst, she wonders if Wah is really as weak as she has seemed, or if she might have a different kind of strength altogether.An exercise in empathy, an exploration of betrayal and a charged story of the thrill of a shared connection - and the perils of feminine rivalry - My Nemesis is a brilliantly dramatic and captivating story from a hugely talented writer.
Don't Breathe a Word: Includes a bonus novella (Texas Justice #2)
by Christie CraigNew York Times bestselling author Christie Craig returns with her next heart-stopping romantic suspense about a woman on the run and the man eager to uncover her secrets -- for readers of Kat Martin, Rebecca Zanetti, and Mary Burton! Police detective Juan Acosta doesn't only carry scars on the outside. He's filled with guilt and anger ever since his undercover job led to the murder of those he loved the most. Now he's living for one thing: revenge. That is, until Juan meets his beautiful new neighbor. Vicki Holloway prides herself on being capable and independent, but her life is turned upside down when her sister Sara is killed by an abusive ex. Fearing for the safety of her niece, Vicki and the little girl go into hiding...resurfacing in Texas with new identities. Juan finds his once-frozen heart thawing around Vicki, but he knows she's hiding something. Juan needs answers, but Vicki isn't talking. She has to keep her secrets if she wants to keep Bell safe, which means resisting her growing feelings for the sexy, scarred man next door. But when Juan's quest for justice brings danger to her door, divulging the truth might be the only thing that keeps her alive. Includes the bonus novella Hot Target by April Hunt!
Don't Close Your Eyes (Texas Justice #1)
by Christie CraigNew York Times bestselling author Christie Craig "delivers pulse-pounding suspense" (Lori Wilde) in this heart-stopping romance between a woman determined to unveil the secrets of her past and the only man she can trust -- perfect for fans of Kat Martin, Sharon Sala, and Mary Burton! Annie Lakes has had the same recurring nightmare for years. Her heart pounding in her chest. A panicked voice, begging her to run faster. Her own bloodcurdling scream. But now Annie is starting to realize it's more than just a bad dream. She's starting to remember things about the night her cousin Jenny disappeared all those years ago. Things that make her believe her family was involved--and what they're hiding is much worse than she ever imagined. But she can't unravel this alone. She needs someone she can trust, someone like sexy Detective Mark Sutton ....Mark has seen enough--too much--to assume that Annie's story is a dead end. It turns out that her family is hiding some killer secrets. A long time ago, Annie was just an innocent little girl who saw something she shouldn't. Now she's a target, and Mark's running out of time to protect the woman he's starting to fall for. But how does Mark face off against a murderer who just may be someone Annie loves?
Don't Close Your Eyes (Texas Justice #1)
by Christie CraigIn this dark and dangerous Texas small town, Annie Lakes' nightmares come alive when a cold case from her past reveals family secrets that put her life in jeopardy. Annie Lakes has had the same recurring nightmare for years. Her heart pounding in her chest. A panicked voice, begging her to run faster. Her own bloodcurdling scream. But now Annie is starting to realize it's more than just a bad dream. She's starting to remember things about the night her cousin Jenny disappeared all those years ago. Things that make her believe her family was involved--and what they're hiding is much worse than she ever imagined. But she can't unravel this alone. She needs someone she can trust, someone like sexy Detective Mark Sutton .... Mark has seen enough--too much--to assume that Annie's story is a dead end. It turns out that her family is hiding some killer secrets. A long time ago, Annie was just an innocent little girl who saw something she shouldn't. Now she's a target, and Mark's running out of time to protect the woman he's starting to fall for. But how does Mark face off against a murderer who just may be someone Annie loves?
Don't Look Back (Texas Justice #3)
by Christie CraigNew York Times bestselling author Christie Craig's thrilling romantic suspense about a by-the-book FBI agent who must trust a risk-taking detective for help tracking down her sister's killers.FBI agent Bree Ryan's latest mission is personal. She's posing as a waitress at the Black Diamond strip club, the same club where her estranged half sister worked until she turned up dead. When Bree's undercover assignment is compromised, she turns to the only man she knows who can help her: Connor Pierce, a too-sexy-for-his-own-good, rule-breaking cop with a knack for solving cold cases. When someone breaks into Bree's apartment, Connor's detective skills aren't the only things that kick into overdrive. Although his job demands he remain detached, now he finds himself tempted not only by Bree's beauty but also her intelligence and bravery. As the investigation -- and their attraction -- grows more intense, lives are in jeopardy, and Connor finds the most important rule he must break is his own. But can he put his heart on the line?
Storylistening: Narrative Evidence and Public Reasoning
by Claire Craig Sarah DillonStorylistening makes the case for the urgent need to take stories seriously in order to improve public reasoning. Dillon and Craig provide a theory and practice for gathering narrative evidence that will complement and strengthen, not distort, other forms of evidence, including that from science. Focusing on the cognitive and the collective, Dillon and Craig show how stories offer alternative points of view, create and cohere collective identities, function as narrative models, and play a crucial role in anticipation. They explore these four functions in areas of public reasoning where decisions are strongly influenced by contentious knowledge and powerful imaginings: climate change, artificial intelligence, the economy, and nuclear weapons and power. Vivid performative readings of stories from The Ballad of Tam-Lin to The Terminator demonstrate the insights that storylistening can bring and the ways it might be practised. The book provokes a reimagining of what a public humanities might look like, and shows how the structures and practices of public reasoning can evolve to better incorporate narrative evidence. Storylistening aims to create the conditions in which the important task of listening to stories is possible, expected, and becomes endemic. Taking the reader through complex ideas from different disciplines in ways that do not require any prior knowledge, this book is an essential read for policymakers, political scientists, students of literary studies, and anyone interested in the public humanities and the value, importance, and operation of narratives.
Storylistening: Narrative Evidence and Public Reasoning
by Claire Craig Sarah DillonStorylistening makes the case for the urgent need to take stories seriously in order to improve public reasoning. Dillon and Craig provide a theory and practice for gathering narrative evidence that will complement and strengthen, not distort, other forms of evidence, including that from science. Focusing on the cognitive and the collective, Dillon and Craig show how stories offer alternative points of view, create and cohere collective identities, function as narrative models, and play a crucial role in anticipation. They explore these four functions in areas of public reasoning where decisions are strongly influenced by contentious knowledge and powerful imaginings: climate change, artificial intelligence, the economy, and nuclear weapons and power. Vivid performative readings of stories from The Ballad of Tam-Lin to The Terminator demonstrate the insights that storylistening can bring and the ways it might be practised. The book provokes a reimagining of what a public humanities might look like, and shows how the structures and practices of public reasoning can evolve to better incorporate narrative evidence. Storylistening aims to create the conditions in which the important task of listening to stories is possible, expected, and becomes endemic. Taking the reader through complex ideas from different disciplines in ways that do not require any prior knowledge, this book is an essential read for policymakers, political scientists, students of literary studies, and anyone interested in the public humanities and the value, importance, and operation of narratives.
Extreme Situations: Literature and Crisis from the Great War to the Atom Bomb (pdf)
by David Craig Michael Egan
Murder at Crime Manor: Martin's Fishback's ridiculous second Detective Roger LeCarre parody 'thriller' (Roger LeCarre)
by Fergus CraigTHE MANOR HOUSE MURDER MYSTERY AS YOU'VE NEVER SEEN IT . . . DETECTIVE ROGER LECARRE IS BACK!!!'What's better than a good crime novel? I'll tell you - a spoof crime novel, by the absurdly funny and clever Fergus Craig'MIRANDA HART'We all need more laughs like this'AISLING BEADetective Roger LeCarre. Scourge of crime. Guardian of Exeter. Amateur squash player. And now, party guest at Powderham, the manor house owned by mysterious billionaire tech genius Eli Quartz.It is a small and unconventional gathering: the Bishop, a fading radio star, a desperate aristocrat, the aging butler and his absurdly beautiful daughter - and Detective Roger LeCarre. Then a snowstorm blows in and the group realise they are trapped.And when, completely against expectations for this kind of situation, someone winds up dead, it's obvious who must solve the crime. Obvious, but for the fact the murder weapon was in Detective Roger LeCarre's hand, and the body was at his feet...From the creator of BBC2's Martin Fishback comes the second Detective Roger LeCarre crime fiction parody, daring to go where so many other crime novels have gone before.
Once Upon a Crime: The hilarious, ridiculous first Detective Roger LeCarre parody 'thriller'
by Fergus Craig'What's better than a good crime novel? I'll tell you - a spoof crime novel, by the absurdly funny and clever Fergus Craig'MIRANDA HART'We all need more laughs like this'AISLING BEAInspired by the smash hit Twitter videos, Once Upon a Crime is a hilarious, ridiculous, gripping comic crime novel to make every reader's life better.Exeter: a city in decline, East Devon's capital of crime. Detective Roger LeCarre: a man on a quest to rid the world of crime (starting with Devon and Cornwall and then working outwards) so he can concentrate on his watercolours. LeCarre runs 10km a day but probably burns more calories shaking his head at what has become of his city. Now Exeter is set to become the UK Capital of Culture and the ambitious Lord Mayor wants to turn things around. But when a young man's (dead) body is found in the centre of town, things get murky.Detective Roger LeCarre is a character never seen before in modern fiction - a tough but troubled detective with a drink problem and a marriage in trouble. Can he find out who killed the young man, save the city and change his energy provider before the new more expensive tariff kicks in?Filled with drama, eroticism and very specific Wikipedia-sourced information on Devon, Once Upon A Crime is a thriller which demands to be read.
The Politics Of The Unpolitical: German Writers And The Problem Of Power, 1770-1871
by Gordon A. CraigThe Politics of the Unpolitical: German Writers and the Problem of Power, 1770-1871
by Gordon A. CraigIn a book written during the First World War, Thomas Mann wrote that political activity was alien to the German spirit and that "in fact the political element was absent from the German concept of education." The Politics of the Unpolitical demonstrates the essential unreliability of this generalization by focusing on the political activity of ten of Germany's most widely respected writers in the period from the French Revolution to the founding of the Bismarck Reich in 1871. Gordon A. Craig's book shows how Goethe, Schiller, Heinrich von Kleist, Wilhelm von Humboldt, Holderlin, and Heine were fascinated by the political issues of their day and reacted either by entering public service or threw themselves into efforts to change society for the better. In his study of ten of Germany's most important intellectuals Craig, focuses on their political views and activities and argues that they were not, in fact, representatives of the genre of the "unpolitical German."
Theodor Fontane: Literature and History in the Bismarck Reich
by Gordon A. CraigFirst published in Germany to popular and critical acclaim, this is a unique portrait of the life and work of Theodor Fontane, the greatest German novelist of his age, as well as a major poet and theater critic and much loved travel writer. Gordon A. Craig, one of the foremost scholars of German history, interpolates a cohesive historical biography of Fontane with his own reflections on the art, culture, and politics of Fontane's world. The ideas and impressions of Fontane and Craig echo one another throughout the book in compelling and fascinating ways. Fontane's travel accounts of Scotland and Prussia are enriched by Craig's discussion of Germany's increasingly national vision of itself and the world at the time of unification. Similarly, Craig's mastery of German military history dovetails remarkably well with Fontane's reportage on Germany's wars with Denmark, Austria, and France. Interesting are Fontane's ruminations over his great contemporary Otto von Bismarck, whom he revered as founder of the Reich but whose policies he feared would in the end be self-defeating. Although Fontane's Wanderings through the Mark Brandenburg and his novels are more widely read in Germany today than they were in his own time, and although his masterpiece Effi Briest was the basis for a famous Fassbinder film, Fontane remains little known in the English-speaking world. Theodor Fontane is the ideal introduction to this major European writer, a master of social analysis and one of the great letter writers of his age.