Secondhand Literary Fiction Bargain Book Box SP2681
Secondhand Literary Fiction Bargain Box — 18 Books
Eighteen novels of genuine literary ambition spanning four centuries and six continents. A Pulitzer Prize winner on the loneliness of marriage. Kingsley Amis in late, brilliant form. Richard Ford returning to Frank Bascombe for the last time. Rose Tremain shortlisted for the Orange Prize. A chimpanzee narrating his own evolution into humanity. Bernhard Schlink before The Reader made him famous. Elizabeth Jolley — a fourth appearance across these boxes, which tells you everything about how seriously the previous owner took Australian fiction. And Michael Pye reconstructing the life of the first prostitute in 17th-century New Amsterdam. This is a box for readers who want their fiction to do serious work.
1. The Extinction Club — Jeffrey Moore A man obsessed with endangered species, a woman who changes everything, and a novel that holds the two together with dark wit and genuine feeling. Moore is a Canadian writer of considerable originality — this is the kind of book that finds its readers slowly and keeps them permanently.
2. Private Life — Jane Smiley "Marriage can sometimes be the loneliest place." From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Thousand Acres — a quiet, devastating novel about a woman who looks back on her marriage and sees it clearly, perhaps for the first time. Smiley writes about the interior life of women with forensic compassion.
3. The Russian Girl — Kingsley Amis A professor falls for a Russian poet and watches his carefully constructed life begin to disintegrate. Late Amis — still wickedly funny, still morally serious beneath the comedy, still one of the sharpest observers of masculine self-deception in English fiction.
4. Colombo — Carl Muller A novel set in Sri Lanka's capital from the author of the celebrated Jam Fruit Tree trilogy — Muller writes about Colombo with the intimacy and irreverence of a man who knows every street and every secret. Rich, comic, and completely distinctive.
5. Fusion — Kate Richards A haunting debut from the author of the award-winning memoir Madness — Richards brings the same unflinching intelligence she applied to her own experience of mental illness to this formally daring first novel. "Compelling" doesn't quite cover it.
6. This Bleeding City — Alex Preston A young banker in London as the 2008 financial crisis closes in — Preston's debut was praised by Oliver James as "the best evocation of the despair of materialism so far." A novel about greed, complicity, and the moment a generation realised the floor had gone.
7. An Accommodating Spouse — Elizabeth Jolley A fourth Jolley across these boxes — and every one of them earns its place. This novel about the accommodations women make, the spaces they occupy in other people's lives, and the price of compliance has all the dark comedy and fierce compassion that make Jolley essential reading.
8. The Slapping Man — Andrew Lindsay From the bestselling Australian author of The Dreadnaker's Carnival — a novel that arrives in town with a carnival's energy and a slapping man's unsettling purpose. Funny and dark in the distinctively Australian way that nobody else quite manages.
9. The Best Picture — Barry Hill "A novel of great distinction, powerful, original and beautifully realised" — Australian Books of the Year. Barry Hill writes with a poet's precision and a novelist's patience, and this is one of his finest achievements.
10. Let Me Be Frank With You — Richard Ford Four novellas set in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy — Frank Bascombe's final outing, and one of the most moving. The Financial Times called it "funny, touching and profound." Ford earns all three adjectives. If you've read the Bascombe trilogy, this is essential. If you haven't, it works on its own.
11. Adam's Wish — Paul Micou Paul Micou (The Cover Artist) writes comic novels of such precise intelligence that "seriously funny" — Victoria Glendinning's description — is exactly right. Micou is one of those writers whose cult following understands something the wider reading public is still catching up to.
12. The First Week — Margaret Merrilees A terrible incident and its long reverberations through a Barossa Valley community — Merrilees writes about the aftermath of violence with unusual restraint and moral seriousness. Shortlisted for the Barbara Jefferis Award and the Glenda Adams Award for New Writing.
13. The Colour — Rose Tremain (Special Edition) Shortlisted for the Orange Prize — a couple emigrate from England to 19th-century New Zealand and the gold rush tears them apart. Tremain writes historical fiction with a psychologist's understanding of what drives people to ruin themselves in the pursuit of what they want.
14. The Conductor — Sarah Quigley Leningrad, 1941 — the 900-day siege, and a conductor who must somehow perform Shostakovich's Seventh Symphony for a starving, freezing city. Lionel Shriver called it "superb — an extraordinary period of history brought to life by a daring novelist." One of the great novels about music and endurance.
15. The Evolution of Bruno Littlemore — Benjamin Hale A chimpanzee narrates his own transformation into a human being — and does so with shocking candour, literary ambition, and the kind of moral complexity that makes this genuinely disturbing novel so hard to dismiss. The Washington Post called it "a brilliant, unruly brute of a novel." Shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize 2011.
16. Self's Punishment — Bernhard Schlink & Walter Popp The first Gerhard Self mystery, written before The Reader made Schlink one of the most read authors in the world — a private detective novel that carries Schlink's characteristic moral weight and his extraordinary gift for implicating the reader in his characters' compromises.
17. The Dandelion Clock — Guy Burt The Guardian called it "ambitious and substantial... brilliantly composed." Burt (After the Hole, Sophie) writes psychological fiction that works on multiple levels simultaneously — a novel that rewards patient reading and repays rereading.
18. The Drowning Room — Michael Pye 17th-century New Amsterdam — the story of the first whore of New York, reconstructed from the margins of history with imagination and rigour. Pye writes about women excluded from official record with the care they deserved and never received. "Ambitious and substantial... brilliantly composed."
Genre: Fiction
Secondhand Literary Fiction Bargain Box — 18 Books
Eighteen novels of genuine literary ambition spanning four centuries and six continents. A Pulitzer Prize winner on the loneliness of marriage. Kingsley Amis in late, brilliant form. Richard Ford returning to Frank Bascombe for the last time. Rose Tremain shortlisted for the Orange Prize. A chimpanzee narrating his own evolution into humanity. Bernhard Schlink before The Reader made him famous. Elizabeth Jolley — a fourth appearance across these boxes, which tells you everything about how seriously the previous owner took Australian fiction. And Michael Pye reconstructing the life of the first prostitute in 17th-century New Amsterdam. This is a box for readers who want their fiction to do serious work.
1. The Extinction Club — Jeffrey Moore A man obsessed with endangered species, a woman who changes everything, and a novel that holds the two together with dark wit and genuine feeling. Moore is a Canadian writer of considerable originality — this is the kind of book that finds its readers slowly and keeps them permanently.
2. Private Life — Jane Smiley "Marriage can sometimes be the loneliest place." From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Thousand Acres — a quiet, devastating novel about a woman who looks back on her marriage and sees it clearly, perhaps for the first time. Smiley writes about the interior life of women with forensic compassion.
3. The Russian Girl — Kingsley Amis A professor falls for a Russian poet and watches his carefully constructed life begin to disintegrate. Late Amis — still wickedly funny, still morally serious beneath the comedy, still one of the sharpest observers of masculine self-deception in English fiction.
4. Colombo — Carl Muller A novel set in Sri Lanka's capital from the author of the celebrated Jam Fruit Tree trilogy — Muller writes about Colombo with the intimacy and irreverence of a man who knows every street and every secret. Rich, comic, and completely distinctive.
5. Fusion — Kate Richards A haunting debut from the author of the award-winning memoir Madness — Richards brings the same unflinching intelligence she applied to her own experience of mental illness to this formally daring first novel. "Compelling" doesn't quite cover it.
6. This Bleeding City — Alex Preston A young banker in London as the 2008 financial crisis closes in — Preston's debut was praised by Oliver James as "the best evocation of the despair of materialism so far." A novel about greed, complicity, and the moment a generation realised the floor had gone.
7. An Accommodating Spouse — Elizabeth Jolley A fourth Jolley across these boxes — and every one of them earns its place. This novel about the accommodations women make, the spaces they occupy in other people's lives, and the price of compliance has all the dark comedy and fierce compassion that make Jolley essential reading.
8. The Slapping Man — Andrew Lindsay From the bestselling Australian author of The Dreadnaker's Carnival — a novel that arrives in town with a carnival's energy and a slapping man's unsettling purpose. Funny and dark in the distinctively Australian way that nobody else quite manages.
9. The Best Picture — Barry Hill "A novel of great distinction, powerful, original and beautifully realised" — Australian Books of the Year. Barry Hill writes with a poet's precision and a novelist's patience, and this is one of his finest achievements.
10. Let Me Be Frank With You — Richard Ford Four novellas set in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy — Frank Bascombe's final outing, and one of the most moving. The Financial Times called it "funny, touching and profound." Ford earns all three adjectives. If you've read the Bascombe trilogy, this is essential. If you haven't, it works on its own.
11. Adam's Wish — Paul Micou Paul Micou (The Cover Artist) writes comic novels of such precise intelligence that "seriously funny" — Victoria Glendinning's description — is exactly right. Micou is one of those writers whose cult following understands something the wider reading public is still catching up to.
12. The First Week — Margaret Merrilees A terrible incident and its long reverberations through a Barossa Valley community — Merrilees writes about the aftermath of violence with unusual restraint and moral seriousness. Shortlisted for the Barbara Jefferis Award and the Glenda Adams Award for New Writing.
13. The Colour — Rose Tremain (Special Edition) Shortlisted for the Orange Prize — a couple emigrate from England to 19th-century New Zealand and the gold rush tears them apart. Tremain writes historical fiction with a psychologist's understanding of what drives people to ruin themselves in the pursuit of what they want.
14. The Conductor — Sarah Quigley Leningrad, 1941 — the 900-day siege, and a conductor who must somehow perform Shostakovich's Seventh Symphony for a starving, freezing city. Lionel Shriver called it "superb — an extraordinary period of history brought to life by a daring novelist." One of the great novels about music and endurance.
15. The Evolution of Bruno Littlemore — Benjamin Hale A chimpanzee narrates his own transformation into a human being — and does so with shocking candour, literary ambition, and the kind of moral complexity that makes this genuinely disturbing novel so hard to dismiss. The Washington Post called it "a brilliant, unruly brute of a novel." Shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize 2011.
16. Self's Punishment — Bernhard Schlink & Walter Popp The first Gerhard Self mystery, written before The Reader made Schlink one of the most read authors in the world — a private detective novel that carries Schlink's characteristic moral weight and his extraordinary gift for implicating the reader in his characters' compromises.
17. The Dandelion Clock — Guy Burt The Guardian called it "ambitious and substantial... brilliantly composed." Burt (After the Hole, Sophie) writes psychological fiction that works on multiple levels simultaneously — a novel that rewards patient reading and repays rereading.
18. The Drowning Room — Michael Pye 17th-century New Amsterdam — the story of the first whore of New York, reconstructed from the margins of history with imagination and rigour. Pye writes about women excluded from official record with the care they deserved and never received. "Ambitious and substantial... brilliantly composed."