{"product_id":"secondhand-contemporary-fiction-bargain-book-box-sp2731","title":"Secondhand Contemporary Fiction Bargain Book Box SP2731","description":"\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSecondhand Contemporary Fiction Bargain Book Box SP2731\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eTwenty-one novels and story collections in near-new condition, nearly all from the last fifteen years: Sarah Moss’s Summerwater, Tan Twan Eng’s Booker-listed Gift of Rain, Derek Owusu’s Desmond Elliott winner, Elin Cullhed’s Plath novel, Stefan Zweig’s stories, a Boris Akunin and two Morris Wests. Mostly literary with a few crime and comfort reads for pace.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003col dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\n\u003cli\u003ePaper Cup — Karen Campbell — Kelly has been on the streets of Glasgow for years when a stranger’s kindness and a lost engagement ring send her walking south to the place she grew up. A book about homelessness that gives its heroine wit, rage and a dog.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe Italians at Cleat’s Corner Store — Jo Riccioni — Leyton, 1949: a village grocery, a girl called Connie who wants out, and the Italian POW family who stayed on after the war. Australian author, English setting, and the ending earns its sting.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eSummerwater — Sarah Moss — Twelve families in a Scottish holiday park, one day of unbroken rain, each chapter a different head, and a death at the end none of them see coming. Moss’s tightest novel and her best.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eEuphoria — Elin Cullhed — Sylvia Plath’s last year in Devon, told in her own voice: the babies, the bees, Hughes leaving, the poems coming faster than she can write them. Won Sweden’s August Prize; the translation is excellent.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe Gift of Rain — Tan Twan Eng — Penang, 1939: Philip, half-Chinese and half-English, is taught aikido by a Japanese diplomat, and when the invasion comes his teacher is on the other side. Booker longlist; the moral problem is the whole book.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eEnvy and Gratitude and Other Works 1946–1963 — Melanie Klein — The late papers: envy as the earliest emotion, the depressive position, the roots of adult love. For anyone who’s read Winnicott and wants the source. Vintage.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eLosing the Plot — Derek Owusu — A Ghanaian woman comes to London in the 1980s, and her son tells her life in fragments with his own footnotes arguing back. Desmond Elliott Prize winner; strange, short and unlike anything else.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eTess of the D’Urbervilles — Thomas Hardy — Tess is sent to claim kin from the rich D’Urbervilles, and Alec takes what he wants. Hardy’s angriest novel, and Angel Clare is the real villain. BBC tie-in Penguin.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe Bellarmine Jug — Nicholas Hasluck — A Dutch jug found on the Western Australian coast, a 1629 wreck, and a law student in Holland uncovering what the archives hid. The Batavia mutiny as a thriller. Age Book of the Year.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eLa’s Orchestra Saves the World — Alexander McCall Smith — A widow in a Suffolk village during the war starts an amateur orchestra to keep the place sane. McCall Smith’s gentlest, and his best-loved standalone.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eRemember My Name — Sam Blake — Cressida finds out her husband has a mistress and a daughter, and then the mistress is murdered. Irish number-one bestseller, with a last-page turn.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eSpecial Assignments — Boris Akunin — Two Erast Fandorin novellas: a con man called the Jack of Spades swindling Moscow, and a Jack the Ripper copycat in the slums. The second one is as dark as Akunin gets.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eSelected Stories — Stefan Zweig — Letter from an Unknown Woman, The Royal Game, Amok and Twenty-Four Hours in the Life of a Woman. The Zweig revival in one volume. Pushkin Press.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eOne Bloody Thing After Another — Jacob F. Field — History’s gruesome bits, one page each: plagues, executions, battles, poisons. Loo-book format, better researched than it needs to be.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eOut of Breath — Anna Snoekstra — A teenager runs from a trauma into the arms of a commune that seems too kind, and is. Australian psychological thriller from the Only Daughter author.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eEveryone Is Still Alive — Cathy Rentzenbrink — One London street, one summer, and every marriage on it under strain at once. Kate Mosse called it an utter treat; it’s sharper than that sounds.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eIs This Love? — C.E. Riley — Two women, one baby, and a relationship coming apart in alternating voices. Debut, Kit de Waal–endorsed, honest about how love curdles.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eBlank Pages and Other Stories — Bernard MacLaverty — Twelve stories from the Northern Irish master of the small moment: a widower, a girl at a piano, a man hearing about a death. MacLaverty’s first collection in fifteen years.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eClaudius the God — Robert Graves — Claudius is emperor now, conquering Britain and married to Messalina, who is sleeping with Rome. The sequel to I, Claudius, and the darker book. Penguin.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe Second Victory — Morris West — Austria, 1945: a British major takes over a village and finds the war isn’t finished there. Early West, before The Devil’s Advocate.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eDaughter of Silence — Morris West — A young woman walks into an Italian village and shoots the man who killed her mother. Her defence lawyer has to make a jury see why. Coronet.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ol\u003e","brand":"Secondhand Stock","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50851329245403,"sku":"SP2731","price":110.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0523\/7646\/9701\/files\/sp2731.jpg?v=1792450818","url":"https:\/\/bookgrocer.com\/products\/secondhand-contemporary-fiction-bargain-book-box-sp2731","provider":"Book Grocer","version":"1.0","type":"link"}